A) I have an idea of God.
This idea must have come from somewhere.
The only thing capable of providing this idea is God.
Therefore, God exists.
Hobbes criticized this argument by saying that we have an idea of unicorns. However, they do not exist. Then how did we get the idea? Easy: we combined a horse and a rhinoceros's horn, or something to similar effect.
On the surface, we can dismiss Hobbes's criticism. After all, we have an idea of an infinite God, and since we have never observed an infinite object in nature, we cannot get this idea from simply combining several things that we have observed in our head.
However, the major Empiricists (Locke, Berkeley, Hume) all reject this response. True, they say, there is no way to observe an infinite item, so this cannot be the source of an idea of infinity; nonetheless, you don't have any idea of infinite anyway. This is because infinite is not a number; it is just the concept that there is no upper bound to the number. Then how do we get this concept of an infinite God? By, as Hume said, increasing the number without limit. But why did we do this for God? Hume says in his Natural History of Religion,
Whether this god, therefore, be considered as their peculiar patron, or as the general sovereign of heaven, his votaries will endeavour, by every art, to insinuate themselves into his favour; and supposing him to be pleased, like themselves, with praise and flattery, there is no eulogy or exaggeration, which will be spared in their addresses to him. In proportion as men's fears or distresses become more urgent, they still invent new strains of adulation; and even he who outdoes his predecessor in swelling up the titles of his divinity, is sure to be outdone by his successor in newer and more pompous epithets of praise. Thus they proceed; till at last they arrive at infinity itself, beyond which there is no farther progress.
Therefore, this version of the Ontological Argument falls flat.
B) God is the most-perfect being: omniscient, omnipotent, eternal, etc.
If God did not exist, then I could think of a more perfect being: one that did exist.
Therefore, if God did not exist, we would have a contradiction.
Therefore, God exists.
Kant succinctly responded: Existence is not a predicate. Existence is the basis for the attribution of predicates. If one denies that something exists, then one denies the description of it as well. So, if God does not exist, there is not most-perfect being.
If one persists in insisting that existence is indeed a predicate, I can simply respond that it then might contradict the other predicates in God: namely, its existence might preclude its omniscience, etc.
I also would like to point out that perfection is a relative term. Something cannot be simply perfect; it has to be perfect for something. How, then, do we know our idea of perfection is correct? Alternatively, there could be different perfections for different things. Does that mean that there are different most-perfect beings, such as a most-perfect cow, or a most perfect balloon?
Supposedly some philosophers, such as Alvin Plantinga, have responses for this, but I feel this is tough to refute.
C) God is a possible necessary being.
If it is possibly necessary, then it is necessary.
Therefore God is a necessary being.
Therefore God exists.
We can simply respond to this that if it is possibly necessary, then it is not necessary, so God might not exist. The confusion arises from using "necessary" in two different senses - necessary in that the world depends on Him, and necessary in that the world is inconceivable without Him.
I hope I correctly represented all of the positions here.
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