Philo 106 Final Paper

1. Riza Mae B. Pascual September 29. 2015
BSCS – 4A Philo 106
St. Anselm of Canterbury was a Neoplatonic Realist and was often called “The Second Augustine”. A
doctrine of realism implies that the extent to which anything is real is dependent upon its degree ofuniversality; hence,
God is the most real. Other existent things in the world are emanations from archetypes. The general idea of the
ontological argument is based on the notion that the concept of God as the greatest being implies that God exists – if
not, there could be something greater, namely an existent greatest being – but this being would be God. The structure
of the Ontological Argument can be outlines as first, we conceive of God as a being than which no greater can be
conceived. Second, this being than which no greater can be conceived either exists in the mind alone or both in the
mind and in reality. Third is assuming that this being than which no greater can be conceived exists in the mind alone.
Therefore, this being than which no greater can be conceived exists in reality as well as exists in the mind.
Philosophical reasoning, according to Thomas, is sufficient by itself, without faith or revelation, to
demonstrate that God exists. Thomas believes God’s existence, although not self-evident, can be made evident using
reasoning drawn from the nature and structure of the world. The so-called “five ways” are taken from his Summa
Theologica.Thomas, as do many philosophers,believes that we can know by reason that God is, but we cannot know
what God is. In other words, the nature of God, often defined by the characteristics of perfection, is, according to
Thomas only a linguistic approximation. The first way says the evident to our senses is motion, the movement from
actuality to potentiality. Whatever is moved, is moved by another. Potentiality can only be moved by an actuality.
Unless there is a first Mover there can be no motions. The second way says there is an efficient cause for everything;
nothing can be efficient cause of itself. It is not possible to regress to infinity in efficient causes. To take away the
cause is to take away the effect. If there be no first cause then there will be no others.The third way says,since things
are generated, it is possible for them to be or not to be. Since things are countable,they are finite in number. If, for all
things,they do not exists at some time, then given infinite time, there would be nothing in existence, but many things
exist. The fourth way says, there are degrees of goodness in different things – the more being, the more goodness.For
there to be degrees of being at all there must be somethings which has being in the highest degree. The last way says
that all things have an order or arrangement, and work for an end. This order cannot be explained by chance,but only
by some design or purpose (these two are product of intelligence). Therefore, all of the five ways leads to the
conclusion that God exists.
William Paley in his Natural Theology; or Evidences of the Existence and Attributes of the Deity, Collected
from the Appearancesof Nature argues for the existence of God based upon the intricate design of the universe. On
Paley’s view, just as the function and complexity of the universe implies the existence of a universe-maker. Analogical
Teleological Argument states that if I stumbled on a stone and asked how it came to be there, it would be difficult to
show that the answer, it has lain there forever is absurd. Yet this is not true if the stone were to be a watch. The
interference would be inevitable from the intricate design to a maker who constructed and designed its use. The
interference will be as follows… watch : watchmaker :: universe : universe-maker.
In an another approach to God that is something personal, intuitive, spontaneous, and emotional, Cardinal
John Henry Newman presented his incredible masterpiece called “An Essay in Aid of a Grammar of Assent” from
which it also called as the Argument from Conscience. In this argument, Newman contended that the real assent to
the being of God is not of which objective or is not of which is just been understood or comprehended by the mind
but of which something that is personal, something that is vivid, something that is direct, something that is concrete
and something that is experienced that “as if I saw”. Real assent here is understood to be the voice of conscience
calling upon us,rewarding us when we do what is right and haunting us every night when we depart. Finally, Newman
added that the dictate and the voice of conscience reveals to us ofsomething an imposing and exterior personalMaster
whose voice echoes in our depths.
For certain people who cannot make judgement on whether to believe or not believe in God because any sorts
of proving ways cannot really convinced the certain, Blaise Pascal, the famous mathematician offers his wager of
practicality or that is pragmatic. This argument is not intended to attest the existence of God but to convinced people
who cannot make up their minds to have faith in God due to the reason of positive rewards that one can gain if God
exist. If it is true then that God exist, the one that risks in faith will have an eternal reward, if otherwise, the one that
risks in faith will not lose anything but will be benefited by the life he lived. In addition, if it true then that God exist ,
the one that did not risk in faith will received the eternal punishment, if otherwise, the one that did not risk in faith
will not lose and will not gain anything.
A lot of people believe in God not on the basis on what the mind can reason and not on what the conscience
dictates but of a certain particular experiences in life that arrests, these arrests are so special that the American
Philosopher John Smith termed the moments “try men’s souls”. In this argument, Smith’s approach is
phenomenological or the dealings in arriving to the truth is that of based on personalexperience rather than the use of
existing literatures. In order to understand his point, he sets first the distinction of what is “Holy” and what is
“profane”. That the “Holy” set apart from what is ordinary, that the “Holy” is awe-inspiring, powerful, precious, and
that the “Holy” can be approached with utmost seriousness.On the otherhand,“profane” is ordinary, readily available,
manifest and harbors no mysterious depth in life. But this distinctions does not separate the Holy from the profane.
Smith ended his argument stating that though there is no necessary connection between the experience of Holy and
the idea of God, there is still a point where the two can converge,but this is only possible when one have faith in God.
This last argument by Rudolf Otto is very different and from all other arguments being presented for the
existence of a living God because it takes into account God as the “Wholly Other”. When taking into consideration,
God must be seen as a non-rational being, a being that is beyond,a being of not our logic, a being, a being that is not
of the same matter of what is natural, and a being whose being is so great that his greatness will not and cannot be
fully understood by ourlimited reality. Otto contended that any rationalposition on the existence ofGod is a misguided
and corrupted understanding of such.That the Wholly Other is beyond sacred and beyond dimension that no one can
reduce God to any intellectual categorization. If we want to understand God, we should go back to the experience and
destroy all humanistic attributes we labelled about him. In order to describe the Holy one must take into account not
the rational approach but of the very essence of experience of encounter of the sacred.

2. Riza Mae B. Pascual September 29. 2015
BSCS – 4A Philo 106
All arguments presented describes a person with faith that has so many doubts.To justify this, it is important
to mention the idea and the manner of each argument. It is also essential to know the importance of relation of the
arguments from the different kinds of argument (Ontological Argument, Cosmological Argument, Teleological
Argument, Argument from Conscience,Pragmatic Argument, Argument from Life’s Crucial Junctures,and Argument
from Religious Experience). The first three arguments of the existence of God presents the different logical attempts
on why we should accept the existence of God. The Ontological Argument has its deductive characteristics. It means
that if we accept that the premises of the argument are true, then we have to accept its conclusion. This argument is
known to be grounded at a priori because there are arguments that will try to justify the truth based on understanding
the definition of things. Somehow the Cosmological Argument as well as the Teleological Argument are both
inductive. This simply means that in some ways, they try to make different cases of evidences that will persuade
everybody of their conclusion. But the problem is that they cannot provide a firm proof. Arguments mentioned above
are grounded at a posteriori which basically means that the truthiness of the arguments are established after looking
for evidences from the world around us.Based on the manner on how the three arguments are presented in a logical
manner, we can observed that they are addressed mainly on people who believed in the power of philosophy and the
greatness of science (this includes atheists, agnostics and even theists). The remaining other four arguments claims
that if you based it on a non-logical manner which is however sensible (this talks about Argument from Conscience
and Pragmatic Argument) yet intersubjective (which talks about Argument from Life’s Crucial Junctures and
Argument from Religious Experience) on why we should have faith in God. The Argument from Conscience tries to
justify that the existence of God in terms of something personal(contrast to impersonal logic) from which the phrase
“as if I saw” is considered as the heart ofthe argument. Based on the manner of justification of the argument presented,
we can nearly observed that this is being addressed mainly to the people of the masses whose lives are granted as
living witnesses.We can also withheld that it is also addressed to the people being addressed by the logical first three
arguments mentioned above. Theistic pragmatic arguments are not arguments for the proposition that God exists; they
are arguments that believing that God exists is rational. Based on this approach,it-is-speak-to but not-limited-to those
who are still judging whether to believe in God or not. The Argument from Life’s Crucial Juncture’s approach is
phenomenological, that is, considering experience as a primary datum containing a kind of primary truth which can
be arrived at through analysis. In other words, this argument uses (philosophy of experience) the experience of Holy
that it’s meaning and value is structured on “crucial junctures of life” in order to justify faith in a way that it can be
also used in establishing the idea of God. This argument generally appeals to everyone’s individuality who have
recognized and will still recognize the significance of crucial events in life. The Argument from Religious Experience
is way revolutionary than compared to all previous arguments for it rejects the rational conception of the Divine and
entails the doctrine of inter subjectivity. It opposes the rational view of God because God himself is not rational which
subsequently,the rational approaches are not applicable. It is intersubjective in the sense that the truth is behind your
personal relationship with God and it can vary from all other relationships. So in order to understand God, it is
contended that we must go back to the experience and destroy all humanistic attributes we have perceived about God.
This final non-rational approach speaks to all humanity, telling us that he is the One, Whole, Holy, Other – “WHOLLY
OTHER”. In general, if we would be so observant we can notion that all arguments yet imperfect addresses the very
heart of doubt,telling us to conquerourdoubts,reinforcing us not to fear our doubts and reminding us that the process
we have undertaken in search for the answers of the doubts are the most meaningful. Indeed, though we cannot put
everything in words to this paper and concretely establish the significance and relation of the arguments, at least we
can say that “there is a relationship” in spite that we doubt and cannot fully reason.
There are things in this world that cannot be explained that of any comprehension we made it totally eludes
us,the same as true with this statement that eludes us to recognize, that there are non-things,non-non-things in another
world, in another completely other world that we apparently feel its force, of another completely other force, that
cannot be explained by the predicate “- that cannot be explained that of any comprehension”. But it can only be
seemingly felt of another deeper feeling that is totally not a feeling or not a conviction at all when you believe in the
right God whom yourthoughts and hearts is directed to. The source of our doubts originated to move when we are not
worshipping the true God. When we say that we believed in the false god, there are points in our life that our faith is
shaky, that when the false god cannot met our expectations and comprehensions we tend to side in the disbelieving
process, and that when the false god cannot at least fill our emptiness we then sort to search “deeply” yet actually
“superficially” on why such god cannot fill our emptiness. Then after of such inquiry, because it is “deeply yet
superficial” we strongly came into conclusion yet actually a false one. The problem of disbelief is not actually the
problem, the real problem is ourfrailty and weakness to recognize the true God. Our frailty also is not ourfault because
“it is innate in ourhuman dimension the question “Does God Exist?”, and it is also innate in us by the evidence of our
human mortality to seekfor answers.My point here is that we failed to see the true God because the foundation of our
faith is not built on solid ground. When I mean a solid ground,I mean that the faith is mismatched or the other way, a
blinded faith. Blinded faith occurs when one follows to what everyone is saying,to what the books are telling, to what
other intelligent like you is expressing, to what the search “deeply” yet actually “superficially” process and to what
the personal relationship the true God inscribed in you that you fail to nurture.