Is There a Shallow Logical Refutation of the Ontological Argument?
The beauty of Anselms ontological argument is, I believe, that no matter how one approaches it, one cannot refute it without making a significant metaphysical assumption, one that is likely to be contentious in its own right. Peter Millican (2004, 2007) disagrees. He introduces an objection accordi...
| Main Author: | |
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| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
| Published: |
University of Innsbruck in cooperation with the John Hick Centre for Philosophy of Religion at the University of Birmingham
[2012]
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| In: |
European journal for philosophy of religion
Year: 2012, Volume: 4, Issue: 2, Pages: 87-99 |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (doi) Volltext (teilw. kostenfrei) |
| Parallel Edition: | Non-electronic
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| Summary: | The beauty of Anselms ontological argument is, I believe, that no matter how one approaches it, one cannot refute it without making a significant metaphysical assumption, one that is likely to be contentious in its own right. Peter Millican (2004, 2007) disagrees. He introduces an objection according to which one can refute the argument merely by analysing its shallow logical details, without making any significant metaphysical assumption. He maintains, moreover, that his objection does not depend on a specific reading of the relevant Anselmian text; in fact, Millican claims that his objection is applicable to every version of the ontological argument. In this paper, I argue that millicans objection does not succeed, because, contrary to what he says, in order to justify his objection he does have to make a deep metaphysical assumption and rely on a specific reading of Anselms text. |
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| Contains: | Enthalten in: European journal for philosophy of religion
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| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.24204/ejpr.v4i2.297 |