Consider Further the Ontological Argument

June 25, 2006-July 4, 2006

This was a discussion via e-mail between my friend Justin and I. Some portions are incomplete or contain grammatical/structural errors

Justin's initial argument
I propose that the ontological argument is insufficient for a belief in God's existence.

Aquinas agrees with Anselm in that existence is a necessary attribute of a being that which nothing greater can be conceived. However he claims that as humans we can’t have an idea of the essence of God. Thus, the argument falls apart since Anselm is presupposing he can know the essence of God. A supporting argument for Aquinas is in the notion of infinity. Think, ponder, and try as hard as you'd like but you're never able to conceive what the term infinity entails. I agree with Aquinas in that we don't have a solid grasp of God's essence. It seems likely that if there is a God only he/she can know his/her essence in its entirety. However, here I would appeal to pragmatism to get around what Aquinas is arguing. So, I admit that I don't really know the essence of God. Likewise, I surely don't have a real concept of infinity. As a mathematician, I use infinity in every field whether it be geometry, algebra, calculus, or number theory. Even though I don't know infinity per se, I use the idea of it daily. So perhaps even though I don't know the utter essence of God, I still have an idea of his/her essence and for all practical purposes, I claim it's enough!

Having addressed Aquinas' argument, I will appeal now to Immanuel Kant. Instead of disputing whether or not we know God's essence, he uses an analogy of the notion of a dollar to counter the argument. He says something like this:

  1. I have an idea of God's essence
  2. God's essence entails God's existence
  3. Therefore God exists
  4. I have an idea of a dollar bill
  5. The dollar bill entails 100 cents
  6. But I don't have 100 cents to spend
  7. Thus, God doesn't exist either

His argument is a very slick idea; however, he takes a few assumptions perhaps too lightly. For example, God's essence necessarily includes all characteristics of God simultaneously, but how can a dollar relate? Kant's idea of a dollar is equally real as an idea of 100 cents. That is to say, just thinking about the dollar doesn't give existence to it, anymore than existence to the 100 cents. In fact, if I did indeed have a dollar, I could easily exchange it for 100 cents. Speaking of, I could even more easily exchange it for 4 quarters and that would be even better! The point here is that if God is the God defined by the ontological argument then each attribute would always exist. The dollar counterexample introduces only an interesting thought - the idea of essence without the reality of existence. The essence of the dollar is no more real than the essence of 100 cents or 4 quarters or really any material thing. A material counterexample of an argument for an immaterial being seems illogical in and of itself. Let me give my own counter:

  1. I have an idea of a Being worse than any other Being. (That is, it is equivalent to the ontological God except replace "Good" with "Bad" and "Holy" with "Evil" and so on and so forth).
  2. This being must necessarily exist for I could of a worse Being than a Being not existing and that would be a Being existing.
  3. Therefore, this Being exists.

The purpose of this counter is twofold:

  1. To dismiss the ontological argument as a substantial proof for Christians and
  2. To provide a contradiction of definition of Being in other cases (this will be more clear soon)

I will address the issues in the aforementioned order.

  1. What I have created is a logically equivalent ontological argument for the existence of, let us call it, Satan. For you see, this Being is the zenith of evil or bad. Additionally, it is equal with God (and remember I am arguing solely with Christians here) in respect to power, presence, will, and knowledge. That is, if you accept the ontological proof for God you must accept this also since they're logically equivalent statements. A contradiction arises. There is an evil being in the Christian world, namely Satan. Biblically, Satan is certainly not on par with God. Thus, the ontological argument for Satan must be thrown out, and with it, the argument for God since they're logically equivalent.
  2. The second contradiction follows in much the same way but in a more general sense. It goes like this:
    1. Assume the argument for God
    2. Accept the argument for Satan by logical equivalence
    3. A contradiction occurs

Which being is more powerful? Both must be the most powerful. In the same way, both must be omniscient, etc. Each of these are irreconcilable contradictions by definition. It should be noted that the 3 steps can be reversed and the same contradictions occur. Thus, the ontological argument for God (and for that matter Satan) cannot prove anything.

Of course, the crux of my argument is in the logical equivalence of the two arguments, but I hold that they are indeed equivalent. Given the argument was stated loosely, some fine-tuning should produce an unquestionably logically equivalent statement. Once again, I base the ontological argument as insufficient only from my counterexample.

My Response #1
Although the ontological argument can be used to argue for the existence of a most evil Being, the conclusion that the most evil Being would be as equally powerful in all respects as the most good Being, i.e. God, is a mistake.

The idea of the most good and greatest Being is one that exists and one that can triumph over any opposing force. The most good and greatest Being cannot be conquered if it is the greatest and best Being. With this established we can move in the opposite direction to the most evil Being.

At a first glance, the worst evil, or most evil Being, seems to be one that exists and one that can conquer the best Being. It seems correct to argue that the worst possible evil would be an evil that could triumph completely over good. However, evil will always be limited by good if we are truly talking about evil and good. The all good Being must, by necessity and definition, be the highest form. The reason for this is that evil is only possible in respect to the existence of good while good may remain good even in the absence of evil. Evil does not come from evil as such, but from the perversion of good. This being so, evil is immediately inferior to good. Therefore, the worst possible Being cannot be one that is equally as powerful as the best and most good possible Being. Once evil is established to be equal with good, good and evil are no longer being considered.

Therefore, by understanding that the worst evil can only be an evil that at its greatest is an evil that stills stands inferior to good, when the ontological argument is applied in the opposite direction towards the evil Being, the argument logically concludes not an existing evil equal to that of the good, but an existing evil inferior to the good. In other words, what we end up with is Almighty God on the one end and Satan, a being who embodies genuine and horrendous evil but is subject to the commands and will of God, on the other.

Justin's Counter #1
I think that in order for that counter to be valid, it can only be applied to the Judeao/Christian God. You're assuming the presupposition that good is better and that evil is a distortion of that which is good. I'm not going to disagree with you on a personal level, but philosophically there is no basis for this outside of theology. I mean, sure you could appeal to psychology, pragmatism, or perhaps even existentialism, but since those systems are not all encompassing, the conclusion based from them cannot be either.

I think you may have further misunderstood my argument. The idea of it is two mutually separate, exclusive argument. That is to say, one is not based off of the other. One cannot denounce the other in relation to the first, or vice versa because of the way the argument is set up. The two arguments have to be either both not accepted or both accepted by logical equivalence, not by anything within the arguments themselves. If you were to argue the validity of my argument, the real crux of the issue is to object to my presupposition that neither is based off of the other. If you could prove that one cannot have the idea of an ultimate evil Being without precisely the idea of an ultimate good Being, then you will have shown my argument flawed. I'm not sure if such a thing can be proven as the proof would seem to have to entail a subjective element, which is not a priori, and is thus not relevant to the sake of the argument, since it meant to be purely rationalistic.

My Response #2
Firstly, I disagree that my counter is only valid with the traditional Christian God. I think that the only Christian attribute that the ontological argument suggests is an all powerful and ever existing God. Honestly, the ontological argument is more of a strong rational indication of an existing God and not a method of concluding particular details about God. I assume that you understand this as well.

Secondly, I do not argue that good is superior to evil by mere Christian supposition. I argue that by definition of good and evil, one is inferior and the other superior. This first can be seen throughout human history. Never has any sane and/or reasonable person or culture fought to establish what they believed to be evil. Whenever good and evil are being fought, which is the main reason for any war fought by reasonable nations, the evil is always fought against. Of course there are some groups and individuals who have been so perverted and disillusioned that they actually fight for the sake of evil, but again I argue that these particular scenarios are considered to be evil and horrendous by all reasonable minds, inside or outside the Church. Besides these rare cases in which the antagonist is knowingly fighting for evil, most nations or persons who are branded as evil have fought and strived for what they thought was good. Take Adolph Hitler for example. Hitler and Nazi Germany did not consider themselves to be fighting for evil. Nazi Germany considered her actions to be the highest and best good. Hitler’s intention was to establish the superior race as the ruling class and thus make the world a better place to live. Hitler thought, or at least argued, that he was doing good. The opposition to Nazi Germany thought the exact opposite; Nazi Germany was evil. Therefore the Allied forces fought against the Axis powers in order to preserve and restore good to the world. The evil that is pursued by evil men is most usually pursued because the evil men think that they are pursuing good. A perversion of the good produces evil action.

Thirdly, good by definition is always superior to evil. Evil is always judged to be evil in comparison to good. Without this comparison evil cannot be understood to be evil. I again affirm that evil is inferior to good because the very definition of evil is dependent upon the establishment of the good. I refer again to CS Lewis’ response to the validity of theological Dualism. In this response he very clearly establishes what I mean by good being superior to evil by it’s very definition:

“In what sense can the one party be said to be right and the other wrong? If evil has the same kind of reality as good, the same autonomy and completeness, our allegiance to good becomes the arbitrarily chosen loyalty of a partisan. A sound theory of value demands something different. It demands that good should be original and evil a mere perversion; that good should be the tree and evil the ivy; that good should be able to see all round evil (as when sane men understand lunacy) while evil cannot retaliate in kind; that good should be able to exist on its own while evil requires the good on which it is parasitic in order to continue its parasitic existence…If a taste for cruelty and a taste for kindness were equally ultimate and basic, by what common standard could one reprove the other? In reality, cruelty does not come from desiring evil as such, but from perverted sexuality, inordinate resentment, or lawless ambition and avarice. That is precisely why it can be judged and condemned from the standpoint of innocent sexuality, righteous anger, and ordinate acquisitiveness….Badness is not even bad in the same way in which goodness is good. Ormuzd (good Being) and Ahriman (evil Being) cannot be equals. In the long run, Ormuzd must be the original and Ahriman derivative.” (“Evil and God”, God in the Dock, CS Lewis, 23)

From this argument I do not think that the superiority of good is a presupposition by only the Christian but is also a known fact to anyone who considers the foundational concepts of good and evil. This is why I say that if we talk of an equally superior Evil to that of Good, we are no longer talking about good and evil. For by definition, an Evil equal in power and command as Good is not possible.

So I return to your supposed contradiction of the ontological argument. You argued, “The idea of it is two mutually separate, exclusive argument. That is to say, one is not based off of the other. One cannot denounce the other in relation to the first, or vice versa because of the way the argument is set up.” However, by the sheer definition of good and evil, a mutually exclusive argument of evil cannot exist. Surely, the argument for an existing evil Being can be established by the method of the ontological argument. I agree with you on this. However, once we begin to argue a detailed idea of evil we are at once required to compare this with the idea of good. So the argument, as you stated:

  1. I have an idea of a Being worse than any other Being. (That is, it is equivalent to the ontological God except replace "Good" with "Bad" and "Holy" with "Evil" and so on and so forth).
  2. This being must necessarily exist for I could of a worse Being than a Being not existing and that would be a Being existing.
  3. Therefore, this Being exists.

is true only by establishing the existence of an evil Being. To go any further and assert that this existing evil Being is indeed equal in every way to the good Being is incorrect because such a comparison is not reasonably possible. Again, I know that you argue that this argument for evil is not based upon a comparison to good, that without first the idea of the good Being first having been established, the conclusion is that the evil is supremely powerful. However, the assertion of an all powerful evil demands the comparison to the all powerful good. This is true for this argument does not even establish an all powerful evil that is equal to the power of supreme good. All that you have argued thus far is that a chiefly evil Being exists, one that is the worst of all evils. No statement of the extent of the evil Being’s power is present. All we know is that a Being exists that is more evil than the greatest evil we can imagine. Again, there is no contradiction here. Surely this evil is reasonably established by the ontological argument.

When you then argue, however, that the evil Being “is equal with God (and remember I am arguing solely with Christians here) in respect to power, presence, will, and knowledge” you are making an assumption that is not supported by the stand alone argument. For again, all you have established by way of the ontological argument is that the evil of all evils certainly exists, but the extent of the power is not known. By comparing this existing evil to the existing good, the argument is no longer standing alone but standing in comparison to the established good by way of the ontological argument. Now we can assert the extent of the existing evil Being’s power and by strict comparison to the good Being the extent of power cannot exceed or even equal that of the good Being’s power. A genuine comparison between good and evil is no longer being made by arguing that the evil is equal to the good in all ways; good and evil have lost all meaning. The only way to truly understand evil is to compare it with good.

In conclusion, the ontological argument in favor of evil only establishes an existing and all powerful Being in respect to all other evils. There is no indication to the extent of power in relation to the good. All we know is that this evil is greater than any evil that we can think of. If we assume, however, that the ultimate evil is greater than that of the ultimate good, we have made a logical error because by definition the greatest evil cannot be greater than the greatest good. The ontological argument works quite well when used correctly. An ultimate Good and existing Being can be established reasonably and so can an existing and ultimately Evil Being be established. What cannot be established reasonably is an evil Being that is equal to the good Being.