Descartes Argument Analysis
2.2.5 Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz
Liebniz adds some clarification to Descartes argument in an attempt to strengthen it, he argue that’s Descartes has not asserted how coherent the idea of a “perfect being” is, Leibniz argues that unless this point is demonstrated then overall argument fails. In order to prevent this Leibniz attempts to analyze what perfection actually means, he concludes that this is an impossible task and concludes that it’s impossible to demonstrate all perfections are incompatible with one another, and so it must be said that all perfections can coexist in a single entity, thus keeping Descartes argument valid.
2.2.6 David Hume
David Hume argued that ontological arguments were not possible at all; he believed that nothing …show more content…
He starts by refuting Descartes triangle example, and objects Descartes attempt to transfer the logic to the existence of God. He argues that a triangle has three sides only if it first exists, a nonexistent triangle has no existing sides. Saying that a triangle has three sides does not mean that a triangle actually exists. He then continues on to declare that the claim “God exists” is either analytic or synthetic, if it is analytic then the predicate is contained with the subject, if its synthetic the predicate is not contained with the subject, the ontological argument assumes the predicate to be within the subject making it an analytic claim, this would mean that the statement is only true because of the meaning given to the words. If we were to make the argument synthetic then we would find that it doesn’t work either, the existence of God would not be contained within the definition of God and as a result we would need to find other evidence. He follow this argument with another, this argument is that existence is not a real predicate and cannot be a part of a concept, he argues that existence does not add to the essence of a being, rather it only indicates whether something occurs in reality. His argument is that if existence isn’t a predicate then the ontological argument is invalid because it would be possible to be a perfect being that doesn’t
Liebniz adds some clarification to Descartes argument in an attempt to strengthen it, he argue that’s Descartes has not asserted how coherent the idea of a “perfect being” is, Leibniz argues that unless this point is demonstrated then overall argument fails. In order to prevent this Leibniz attempts to analyze what perfection actually means, he concludes that this is an impossible task and concludes that it’s impossible to demonstrate all perfections are incompatible with one another, and so it must be said that all perfections can coexist in a single entity, thus keeping Descartes argument valid.
2.2.6 David Hume
David Hume argued that ontological arguments were not possible at all; he believed that nothing …show more content…
He starts by refuting Descartes triangle example, and objects Descartes attempt to transfer the logic to the existence of God. He argues that a triangle has three sides only if it first exists, a nonexistent triangle has no existing sides. Saying that a triangle has three sides does not mean that a triangle actually exists. He then continues on to declare that the claim “God exists” is either analytic or synthetic, if it is analytic then the predicate is contained with the subject, if its synthetic the predicate is not contained with the subject, the ontological argument assumes the predicate to be within the subject making it an analytic claim, this would mean that the statement is only true because of the meaning given to the words. If we were to make the argument synthetic then we would find that it doesn’t work either, the existence of God would not be contained within the definition of God and as a result we would need to find other evidence. He follow this argument with another, this argument is that existence is not a real predicate and cannot be a part of a concept, he argues that existence does not add to the essence of a being, rather it only indicates whether something occurs in reality. His argument is that if existence isn’t a predicate then the ontological argument is invalid because it would be possible to be a perfect being that doesn’t