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→Recent Ontological Arguments
The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy states the following regarding recent developments in ontological arguments for the existence of God:
The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy states the following regarding recent developments in ontological arguments for the existence of God:
{{cquote|In more recent times, [[Kurt Gödel]], Charles Hartshorne, Norman Malcolm and [[Alvin Plantinga]] have all presented much-discussed ontological arguments which bear interesting connections to the earlier arguments of St. Anselm, [[Rene Descartes|Descartes]] and [[Gottfried Leibniz|Leibniz]]. Of these, the most interesting are those of Gödel and Plantinga; in these cases, however, it is unclear whether we should really say that these authors claim that the arguments are proofs of the existence of God.<ref>http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/ontological-arguments/</ref>}}
{{cquote|In more recent times, [[Kurt Gödel]], Charles Hartshorne, Norman Malcolm and [[Alvin Plantinga]] have all presented much-discussed ontological arguments which bear interesting connections to the earlier arguments of St. Anselm, [[Rene Descartes|Descartes]] and [[Gottfried Leibniz|Leibniz]]. Of these, the most interesting are those of Gödel and Plantinga; in these cases, however, it is unclear whether we should really say that these authors claim that the arguments are proofs of the existence of God.<ref>http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/ontological-arguments/</ref>}}
=== Plantinga's ontological argument ===
The philosopher Ed Feser offers the following summary of Plantinga's ontological argument:
{{Cquote|We might summarize his version (presented in The Nature of Necessity and elsewhere) as follows:
1. There is a possible world W in which there exists a being with maximal greatness.
2. Maximal greatness entails having maximal excellence in every possible world.
3. Maximal excellence entails omniscience, omnipotence, and moral perfection in every possible world.
4. So in W there exists a being which is omniscient, omnipotent, and morally perfect in every possible world.
5. So in W the proposition “There is no omniscient, omnipotent, and morally perfect being” is impossible.
6. But what is impossible in one possible world is impossible in every possible world.
7. So the proposition “There is no omniscient, omnipotent, and morally perfect being” is impossible in the actual world.
8. So there is in the actual world an omniscient, omnipotent, and morally perfect being.<ref>[https://edwardfeser.blogspot.com/2010/12/plantingas-ontological-argument.html Plantinga's ontological argument]</ref>}}
== Criticism ==
== Criticism ==