A Study on the Argument of God's Existence of Duns Scotus

Abstract

There have been two traditional streams in the arguments of God's existence in the philosophy of religion; ontological argument and cosmologicnl argument. Ontological argument infers existence of God from the concepts, orders of thought, and logical orders. This argument hypothesizes the independent ground(A Priori something absolute like god) which is prior to experience. After it examines the conception and the inner logical consistence on that ground, it infers existence from them. This argument, however, is facing some critique that a priori argument lacks actuality and coherence in the argument itself, however, because it focuses on the analysis of the conceptions and presuppositions transcending the concrete reality. The ontological argument was put forward by Anselmus Cantaberiensis(1033-1109) and has been denounced and affirmed in various ways by Anselmus' contemporary Gaunilon, R. Descartes(1596-1650), G.W. Leibnitz(1646-1716), I. Kant(1724-1804), B. Russel(1872-1970), K. Barth(1886-1968), and so on. In the twentieth century, philosopher of analysis N. Malcolm(1911- ) raised again this argument strongly, and opened the way for the Fideism of L. Wittgenstein(1889-1951).