Anselm's First Ontological Argument Holds Merit

The Ontological Argument (OA) has long held a fascination for Philosophers, but not because of its soundness. Indeed most argue that it is deeply flawed, effectively defining a god into existence by fiat. The fascination comes from pinning down exactly where and why it is flawed. Several famous attempts have been made to do so, and the orthodoxy tends to revolve around the Kantian objection (namely that existence is not a predicate). However true that is (and it seems to have some merit), how does it actually disprove the OA, where is it undermined? A number of traditions object to the OA from a variety of standpoints (they probably number over 10 different objections). However, they all seem to rather need a deep explanation and framework in order to challenge the premises. I will argue that, whilst there may be merit in some or all of the deep philosophical objections, the OA is trivially flawed, in that it cannot be argued to be sound. The centre piece for the argument is that "there-is-a-maximally-perfect-being-of-which-nothing-greater-can-be-conceived" (proposition-G). Because "it-is-still-greater-to-exist-than-not" (proposition-E), that it follows that this being must exist. But here we see some trivial problems. Because G includes the concept of maximal greatness (which itself includes the concept of existence from E), it immediately begs the question and smuggles in the very thing it attempts to prove. The theist is not able to independently conceive of maximal greatness, without existence (unless he accepts the Kantian objection, which flaws his argument anyway). Attempts to avoid this seem to render the argument further exposed to ambiguity of terms and equivocation as propositions G and E are then further 'explained'. G also establishes a nature for such an entity through its maximal greatness. Without a detailed exposition of Anselmian natures, one can state that this has at least something to do with levels of Omni-perfections. This creates 2 further problems: 1) how can a thing which does not exist in the natural world have a 'nature'? It seems to be the fallacy of the stolen concept. If anything, such an entity would have a 'supernature'. The theist may believe this to be semantics. But it is semantics of the theists own creation. The atheist can sit back at this point and quite rightly ask, what do you mean exactly? It is not up to the atheist to define what the theist means by the 'nature' of a god anymore than it is to define what for example omniscience is, and how the internal paradoxes in it are resolved. Furthermore, if the theist cannot respond coherently, he is in fact left holding an empty sack, referring to something not instantiated in reality, i.e. semantically meaningless god-talk. 2) given the theist definition of a god as being maximally great, a pinnacle of perfection etc, how is it even possible for a mere human to conceive of such a thing? Included in the definition of the god concept is that up to a point a god becomes unknowable. Meaning our minds have a limitation and can never come to be on the same level. But this renders G impossible, because to conceive of maximal greatness, one must understand it, and thus the one must know the mind of a god. At this point either the god concept must be redefined or argument fails or both. Lastly, in this round, I would like to turn to one of the classical and less specific objections, and use the generalist approach of Gaunilo. Gaunilos reductios seek to parody the OA, not in order to show its logical failures, but to show that any absurdity (including from a theist perspective), can be generated using its premises. For example using the same structure one could import maximally effective evil into the concept, to prove a deity equal to the proposed god in every way, but is maximally evil and not good. There is no independent justification as to why good is preferable to evil in an objective sense, just the theist assertion. These parodies can be made ad infinitum on so called necessary and/or contingent existence of proposed entities. This is because of the lack definition and malleable conceptualization inherent to the god concept, something computer scientists would call a bug, not a feature. So in conclusion Anselms argument, whilst intuitively absurd, is not so easy to refute. The classical arguments against it (whilst seemingly sound), require a deep philosophical understanding. It is the trivial shallow failures of the argument that seem to undermine it fatally. It is not sound and should be rejected by theists.