St. Anselm’s Ontological Argument for the Existence of God
St. Anselm of Canterbury (1033-1109) explained this attempted proof of the existence of God using reasoning alone. Chapter 2 of “The Existence of Nature and God” shows Anselm’s argument as the following:
1. God is perfect and ultimately great..
2. A concept of God can exist in the mind.
3. It is more perfect to actually exist in the real world and in the mind rather than just the mind.
4. Therefore, God exists in the real world.
Problems with the Argument
The reasoning is based on problematic premises, namely whether or not we can actually conceive of a perfect being. If it were true, the rest of the line of reasoning could potentially follow, but it’s not. Having a rough idea what perfection implies does not make a full conception possible, and what it essentially amounts to is just a list of words. It’s unclear what a conception of an omniscient, omnipotent being really is.
Also, it could be used to justify anything. A perfect unicorn is easier to conceive than God, since you would even know what it would like, a bit more. A perfect unicorn would be more perfect if it existed in reality than if it didn’t, therefore unicorns exist. Obviously this isn’t true.