Developments

Question 1

Ontological Argument: Still studied today.

Answer 1

“Clearly an argument with such a distinguished history is to be treated with respect, whether valid or not.”

• Bertrand Russell, ‘History of Western Philosophy’ (1945)

Question 2

Ontological argument: Naked form of earlier arguments shows lack of credibility.

Answer 2

“…no one before Anselm had stated the argument in its naked logical purity. In gaining purity, it loses its plausibility; but this is also to Anselm’s credit.”

• Bertrand Russell, ‘History of Western Philosophy’ (1945)

Question 3

Ontological argument: Kant’s criticism.

Answer 3

“‘being’ is obviously not a real predicate”

- Immanuel Kant, ‘Critique of Pure Reason’ (1781)

Question 4

Ontological argument: Descartes’ version.

Answer 4

“supremely perfect being”

- René Descartes, Fifth Meditation (1641)

Question 5

Religious Language: ‘Tractatus’ on problems of life.

Answer 5

“We feel that even when all possible scientific questions have been answered, the problems of life remain completely untouched. Of course there are then no questions left, and this itself is the answer.”

• Ludwig Wittgenstein, ‘Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus’ (1921)

Question 6

Religious Language: ‘Tractatus’ on putting answers into words.

Answer 6

“when the answer cannot be put into words, neither can the question be put into words. The riddle does not exist.”

• Ludwig Wittgenstein, ‘Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus’ (1921)

Question 7

Religious Language: Ayer on God.

Answer 7

“a transcendent being who might be known through certain empirical manifestations, but certainly could not be defined in terms of those manifestations”

• A. J. Ayer, ‘Language, Truth and Logic’ (1936)

Question 8

Religious Language: Ayer on religious propositions.

Answer 8

“metaphysical utterance which cannot be either true or false”.
- A. J. Ayer, ‘Language, Truth and Logic’ (1936)

Question 9

Religious Language: ‘Investigations’ on ordinary language philosophy.

Answer 9

“bring words back from their metaphysical to their everyday use”

• Ludwig Wittgenstein, ‘Philosophical Investigations’ (1953)

Question 10

Religious Language: ‘Investigations’ on meaning as use.

Answer 10

“the meaning of a word is its use in the language.”

- Ludwig Wittgenstein, ‘Philosophical Investigations’ (1953)

Question 11

Religious Language: ‘Investigations’ on the manifold uses of language.

Answer 11

“asking, thanking, cursing, greeting, praying”

- Ludwig Wittgenstein, ‘Philosophical Investigations’ (1953)

Question 12

Religious Language: ‘Investigations’ on the ancient city of language.

Answer 12

Our language can be seen as an ancient city: a maze of little streets and squares, of old and new houses, and of houses with additions from various periods; and this surrounded by a multitude of new boroughs with straight regular streets and uniform houses.”
- Ludwig Wittgenstein, ‘Philosophical Investigations’ (1953)

Question 13

Religious Language: ‘Investigations’ on private language.

Answer 13

“it is not possible to obey a rule ‘privately’: otherwise thinking one was obeying a rule would be the same thing as obeying it.”

• Ludwig Wittgenstein, ‘Philosophical Investigations’ (1953)

Question 14

Religious Language: Phillips on religious language-games.

Answer 14

“Last Judgement”
“on an entirely different plane”
“are not participating in the same language-game”
- D. Z. Phillips, ‘Faith and Philosophical Enquiry’ (1970)

Question 15

Ethical language: Intuitionism

Answer 15

“intuit”
“this apprehension is immediate,”
“mathematical apprehension”
- H. A. Prichard, ‘Does moral philosophy rest on a mistake?’ (1912)

Question 16

Ethical language: Ayer on emotivism

Answer 16

“merely expressing moral sentiments”

- A. J. Ayer, ‘Language, Truth and Logic’ (1936)

Question 17

Ethical language: Simple and complex ideas example.

Answer 17

“You can give a definition of a horse because a horse has many different properties and qualities [but] when you have reduced a horse to its simplest terms, then you can no longer define those terms”

• G. E. Moore, ‘Principia Ethica’ (1903)

Question 18

Ethical language: Good as asimple idea.

Answer 18

“good is good, and that is the end of the matter.”
“it cannot be defined, and that is all I have to say about it.”
- G. E. Moore, ‘Principia Ethica’ (1903)

Question 19

Ontological argument: New atheism criticism.

Answer 19

“The very idea that such grand conclusions should follow from such logomachist trickery offends me aesthetically.”
He feels a “deep suspicion of any line of reasoning that reached such a significant conclusion without feeding in a single piece of data from the real world.”
- Richard Dawkins, ‘The God Delusion’ (2006)

Question 20

Ontological argument (Atheism): Russell on science/religion contrast.

Answer 20

“A religious creed differs from a scientific theory in claiming to embody eternal and absolutely certain truth, whereas science is always tentative, expecting that modification in its present theories will sooner or later be found necessary, and aware that its method is one which is logically incapable of arriving at a complete and final demonstration.”

Bertrand Russell, ‘Religion and Science’ (1935)

Question 21

Ontological argument: Definition of ontological argument

Answer 21

“nothing but analytic, a priori and necessary premises”

- Graham Oppy

Question 22

Ontological argument: A priori reasoning as tautology.

Answer 22

“It is only a priori propositions that are logically certain. But we cannot deduce the existence of a god from an a priori proposition. For we know that the reason why a priori propositions are certain is that they are tautologies.”

• A. J. Ayer, ‘Language Truth and Logic’ (1936)

Question 23

Ethical language: Further development of emotivism.

Answer 23

“Thus ethical terms are instruments used in the complicated interplay and readjustment of human interests.”

• C. L. Stevenson, ‘The Emotive Meaning of Ethical Terms’ (‘Mind’, 1937)