Study Questions for Philosophy 1000—Fall 2004.
I.
The Ontological Argument—readings: Anselm, Guanilo, Rowe.
A.
Anselm
1. What is Anselm’s definition of God?
2. What is “existence in the mind”?
3. Why is our idea of God “greater” if God actually exists (does his or her actual
existence make a difference to the idea of God)?
4. What does Anselm mean when he says “something can be thought to exist that
cannot be thought not to exist”? Is this really true?\
5. Can you give an argument for Anselm’s claim that everything but God is such
that it can be thought not to exist?
6. How does Anselm explain how some people can sincerely deny God’s existence?
7. What other features does Anselm attribute to God? Does his argument for these
other features work?
B.
Guanilo
1. How does Guanilo’s fool propose to interpret ‘existing in the mind’?
2. What other sort of ‘existence in the mind’ does Guanilo’s fool consider?
3. Why does Guanilo think there’s a problem with a kind of existence in the mind
that automatically includes recognition of existence ‘in the world’? (Guanilo gives
two reasons here.)
4. How does Guanilo distinguish the case of the picture’s existence, first in the mind
of the artist and then in the world, from the case of God’s existence?
5. What worries Guanilo about our understanding of what is meant by ‘God’?
6. What do these worries imply about the sense in which this thing (than which
nothing greater can be conceive) ‘exists’ in my mind?
7. What does Guanilo say must be proved first, before it will follow that this greatest
conceivable being exists?
8. Explain Guanilo’s parallel argument about the island which is “more excellent
than all other lands”. What does the parallel aim to show about Anselm’s argument?
Does it succeed?
9. How does Guanilo argue that the existence, in some sense, of a being (or a
‘nature’) than which nothing greater can be conceived must be demonstrated first,
before we can conclude that it cannot be thought not to exist?
10. What is the difference between thought and understanding that Guanilo invokes
in his closing remarks?