© Michael Lacewing
Malcolm’s ontological argument
This handout follows the one on ‘Historical Ontological Arguments’. You should read that
handout first.
Malcolm’s argument (‘Anselm’s ontological arguments’)
Norman Malcolm agrees that the claim that ‘existence is a perfection’ is false. And so
Descartes’ ontological argument fails, and so does Anselm’s version as he initially presents it.
However, in Ch. 3 of the Proslogium, when Anselm takes himself to be explaining his
argument, in fact he provides a different argument, says Malcolm. Anselm says that a being
whose non-existence is inconceivable is greater than a being whose non-existence is
conceivable. It is not existence that is a perfection, but the logical impossibility of nonexistence. Necessary existence is a perfection.
We can show that necessary existence is part of the concept of God. ‘God is the greatest
possible being’ is a logically necessary truth – it is part of our concept of God. Therefore,
God’s existence cannot depend on anything – because a being that depends on something else
for its existence is not as great as a being whose existence is completely independent of
anything else. So God cannot depend on anything for coming into existence or staying in
existence.
Suppose God exists. Then God cannot cease to exist – nothing can cause God to cease to exist.
In that case, God’s non-existence is inconceivable. So if God exists, God exists necessarily.
Suppose God doesn’t exist. Then if God came into existence, God’s existence would then be
dependent on whatever caused God to exist. This, we said, is impossible. So if God does not
exist, then God’s existence is impossible.
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
Either God exists or God does not exist.
God cannot come into existence or go out of existence.
If God exists, God cannot cease to exist.
Therefore, if God exists, God’s existence is necessary.
If God does not exist, God cannot come into existence.
Therefore, if God does not exist, God’s existence is impossible.
Therefore, God’s existence is either necessary or impossible.
Malcolm now adds two further premises to complete the form of ontological argument he finds
in Anselm’s Proslogium, Ch. 3:
8
God’s existence is only impossible if the concept of God is self-contradictory.
9 The concept of God is not self-contradictory.
10 Therefore, God’s existence is not impossible.
11 Therefore (from (7) and (10)), God exists necessarily.
Malcolm’s reply to Kant Malcolm agrees with Kant that contingent existence is not a property,
but argues that Kant does not show that necessary existence is not a property. Kant discusses
the claim ‘God exists’, but he doesn’t satisfactorily distinguish it from the claim ‘God exists
necessarily ’. The two claims are not equivalent. To say that ‘God exists necessarily’ is to
unpack the concept of God. It tells us more about what the concept ‘God’ is a concept of. So
it is an analytic judgement, not a synthetic one. Not all claims about what exists have the
same kind of meaning.
Kant accepts that it is part of our concept of the greatest possible being that such a being
would exist necessarily. But what this means is that ‘if God exists, then God exists
necessarily’. And this doesn’t entail that God exists. In other words, the claim ‘if God exists,
then God exists necessarily’ is compatible with the possibility that God doesn’t exist at all.
Malcolm responds that this is confused. If we accept that ‘God exists necessarily’ is an
analytic truth, derived from our concept of God, then this rules out ‘it is possible that God
doesn’t exist’. ‘God doesn’t exist’ is necessarily false.
Objections
One objection to Malcolm’s argument is that he has not shown that premise (9) is true; is the
concept of God coherent? Malcolm admits that he can think of no general proof that it is.
But there should be no presupposition that the concept is incoherent, so the argument is
sound unless we can show that the concept of God is incoherent.
A second objection targets the inference from (3) to (4) (a similar objection can be made for
the inference from (5) to (6)). Malcolm may have shown that if God exists, God’s existence
does not depend on anything, and God cannot cease to exist. But that is not the same as
saying that God’s existence is necessary. There are two confusions here.
First, even allowing that necessary existence is a property, Malcolm’s argument only shows
that if God exists, then God’s existence is necessary. If God doesn’t exist, then it is false that
God’s existence is, in fact, independent of anything else, because God doesn’t, in fact, exist.
Nothing has that property of necessary existence. In his response to Kant, Malcolm rejects
this, claiming that ‘God exists necessarily’ is an a priori truth derived from the concept of
God. But we cannot derive this claim from the concept of God; we can only derive the weaker
claim that ‘if God exists, God exists necessarily’.
Second, the form of words ‘God exists necessarily’ confuses two distinct claims. The first is
that there is a form of existence – necessary existence – which God has. This is why Malcolm
says necessary existence is a property. And it is what Malcolm tries to establish by the
argument that God’s existence can’t depend on anything. The second is that it is necessarily
true that God exists. This is the conclusion of the ontological argument. Malcolm claims that
we can infer that
1
‘God exists’ must be true from
2
the fact that the concept of God entails that God’s existence does not depend on anything.
But this doesn’t follow; it confuses two meanings of ‘necessarily’. Not depending on
anything characterises the nature of God’s existence, if God exists; but existence does not
characterise God.
We can argue, therefore, that Kant is not confused. He does not accept the claim that ‘God
exists necessarily’. He only accepts the claim ‘If God exists, then God exists necessarily (i.e.
without dependence on anything).’ This conditional claim is analytic. But it is compatible with
the claim ‘It is possible that God does not exist.’