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Anselm and Aquinas Argument Regarding God

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Anselm and Aquinas Argument Regarding God

The article I am writing is about Anselm and Aquinas views on God’s existence and the different arguments trying to find out the same thing, does god exist? And if so what is he? The following will be a comparison about Anselm and Aquinas views on god. I mostly agree with Anselm on the topic of that if god were to exist that he would have to be greater than anything conceived. Although I think Aquinas argument that if everything has the possibility of not being, then at sometime nothing exists and there would be nothing now, and is too weak to have it worth my support. First I will explain the assumption of Anselm and Aquinas, and then evaluate the assumption of each. I will compare and show Anselm and Aquinas unlikeness and differences between their arguments, and finally put my view on the issue.

One of Anselm’s arguments is that there is nothing greater than God that can be conceived. He is stating that god is all greatness, perfect, the best and is the most worthy. Anslem says that god is the greatest and if there was a way to describe an example of him then it wouldn’t be god anymore. Second of Anslems argument is, that god exists at least in our understanding. What he is trying to explain is how God is in our understanding, our mental existence or in thought (a vision in our mind). He is saying that if we think of something that is god then he exists in our brain because we have thought of him in the first place. An example is if I think of a place where the sky is blue. It has to exist at least in my mind because I have thought of it in the first place.

Next, the premise that, if god existed only in the understanding, we could think of something greater than god. What he means is that something that exists both in understanding and in real existence is greater than something that only

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