March 5, 2002

Metaphysical journals are due Thursday march 14. Journals must be 6 pages long, 8 pages will result in extra credit.

Grading scale for exam 2
A 27 - 30
B 24 - 26
C 21 – 23
D 15 – 20

Ontos is Greek for being or existence

Decartes ontological argument for the existence of God.
1. God is a perfect being. (a perfect being must have all perfections)
2. Existence is a perfection.
3. Therefore God exists.

Anselm uses the reductio argument. Which is a technique for reducing an argument to absurdity. The form is as follows.
Suppose atheism is true--------Contradiction-------Atheism is not true (God exists)
(See handout for St. Anselms ontological argument.)

Example of a reductio argument:
“It doesn’t matter what the president does as a private citizen as long as he’s doing a good job in office.” Suppose this is true. What does this imply? Suppose the president killed his wife. According to this view, he should not be prosecuted as long as he’s doing a good job as president. Therefore the president should get away with murder. Therefore it does matter what the president does as a private citizen.