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Bibliographia. Annotated bibliographies by Raul Corazzon | e-mail: rc@ontology.co
Texts and translations
The standard critical edition of Anselm's works is the Opera omnia prepared by Fr. F. S. Schmitt: S. Anselmi Cantuariensis archiepiscopi opera omnia, ad fidem codicum recensuit, 6 vols [the first printed at Seckau, 1938, the second at Rome in 1940, all reset for the Nelson edition], (Edinburgh: Nelson, 1946-1961).
Reprinted with new editorial material as: S. Anselmi Cantuariensis archiepiscopi opera omnia, ad fidem codicum recensuit, 2 vols. (Stuttgart-Bad-Cannstatt: Frommann, 1968-1984)
Anselm, of Canterbury. 1938. Proslogion. Edinburgh: Thomas Nelson & Sons.
Written in 1077-1078.
Critical edition of Latin text in the first volume of: Sancti Anselmi Cantuariensis Archiepiscopi Opera Omnia ad fides codicum recensuit Franciscus Salesius Schmitt, OSB - 6 voll. (1938-1961); reprinted in two volumes, Stuttgart (Bad Cannstatt) Friedrich Frommann Verlag 1968 with an introducition by Schmitt drawing together his articles on Anselm.
Proslogion vol. I pp. 93-122.
———. 1938. Responsio Anselmi (Quid ad haec respondeat editor ipsius libelli). Edinburgh: Thomas Nelson & Sons.
Reply to Gaunilo written in 1078.
Critical edition of Latin text in the first volume of: Sancti Anselmi Cantuariensis Archiepiscopi Opera Omnia, vol. I pp. 130-139.
———. 1986. A new, interpretive translation of St. Anselm's Monologion and Proslogion. Minneapolis: Arthur J. Banning Press.
Translated by Jasper Hopkins
———. 2000. Complete philosophical and theological treatises of Anselm of Canterbury. Minneapolis: Arthur J. Banning Press.
Translated by Jasper Hopkins and Herbert Richardson.
Proslogion pp. 88-112.
———. 2001. Proslogion, with the Replies of Gaunilo and Anselm. Indianapolis: Hackett.
Translated, with introduction, by Thomas Williams.
Studies
Adams, Robert Merrihew. 1971. "The Logical Structure of Anselm's Argument." Philosophical Review no. 80:28-54.
Reprinted in: R. M. Adams, The Virtue of Faith and Other Essays in Philosophical Theology, New York: Oxford University Press, 1987, pp. 221-242.
"In this essay I offer a formal analysis of Anselm's arguments for the existence of God in the Proslogion and in his reply to Gaunilo. I do not attempt to show here that the arguments are compelling, or that they are not. What I try to do is discover in each argument, so far as possible, a valid logical form, to exhibit the relations of the arguments to each other, and to show how they depend on certain doctrines in logic or the philosophy of logic. Anselm's arguments are far from dead, and in this paper I hope to provide a logical map, so to speak, of some ground that is still very much fought over.
The first two sections of the paper are concerned with the most famous of Anselm's arguments, the argument of Chapter 2 of the Proslogion. In Section I, I formulate a version of the argument in modern logical symbolism, and state the assumptions about existence and predication on which the argument seems to me to depend. Gaunilo's criticism of Anselm was directed very largely against the ontological presuppositions of the Proslogion 2 argument; and in Section II I try to show how Gaunilo's famous "lost island" counterexample proves that the assumptions stated in Section I must be modified, if not rejected. In his reply to Gaunilo Anselm introduced two new arguments for the existence of God, which do not depend on assumptions about predication.
I discuss one of these arguments in Section III; it seems to me to be at least a better argument than the argument of Proslogion 2. Analysis of this argument from the reply to Gaunilo leads to the conclusion that the crucial question about logically necessary divine existence is whether it is possible. Section IV is devoted to an analysis of Anselm's argument in the third chapter of the Proslogion and its relation to the other arguments."
Anscombe, Gertrude Elizabeth. 1985. "Why Anselm's proof in the Proslogion is not an ontological argument." Thoreau Quarterly no. 17:32-40.
Armour, Leslie. 1999. "Anselm's proof and some problems of meaning and reference." In God and argument, edited by Sweet, William, 97-113. Ottawa: Ottawa University Press.
"In Proslogion IV, Anselm addresses the peculiar referring power of the expression "God". In the light of the idea of determinates and determinables (used by W.E. Johnson and others) one can read what Anselm says here, supplemented perhaps by De Grammatico, as making a case for the belief that "God" refers not to a thing in the world but to the highest member of the system of determinates and determinables, and that this hierarchy is essential to meaning. The highest order determinable can plausibly be identified with God. Denying that God exists, therefore, is denying the possibility of meaningfulness."
Bäck, Allan. 1981. "Existential Import in Anselm's Ontological Argument." Franciscan Studies no. 41:97-109.
"The ontological argument of Saint Anselm has attracted a great deal of attention. There has been considerable discussion of whether the argument begs the question, by assuming the existence of God in the premises of the argument. But, although the theological, Augustinian context of Anselm's argument has been dealt with, and although the argument has been extensively treated in modern logical terms, little attention has been paid to how the argument fares in terms of traditional logic. In this article I shall analyze the argument of Proslogion 2 in traditional terms. I shall then argue that to a great extent the debate between Anselm and Gaunilon can be viewed as depending on attitudes toward the Aristotelian syllogistic.1 In short, the standard for the validity and soundness of arguments in medieval philosophy was the syllogistic. It was apparently assumed that all terms used in the syllogistic have existential import. So Anselm's argument is suspect in that it employs a term, 'that than which nothing greater can be conceived,' which cannot be assumed to have existential import. I then shall offer a solution of this difficulty. I shall argue that the success of the argument of Proslogion 2 depends on the modal character of 'that than which nothing greater can be conceived.' That modal character suggests that the argument of Proslogion 2 is modal as well. I shall show that there are grounds in theology and in the Aristotelian modal syllogistic for rejecting the existential import assumption, and shall suggest that Anselm does not make such an assumption, at least in the ontological argument. Rather, despite its assertoric appearance, the argument in Proslogion 2 is modal." (pp. 97-98)
———. 1983. "Anselm on Perfect Islands." Franciscan Studies no. 43:188-204.
Bencivenga, Ermanno. 1993. Logic and Other Nonsense. The Case of Anselm and his God. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Boutin, Maurice. 1990. "L'argument d'Anselme et la règle de foi selon Rudolf Bultmann." Archivio di Filosofia:471-481.
Brecher, Robert. 1974. "Greatness in Anselm's ontological argument." Philosophical Quarterly no. 24:97-105.
"Examination of Anselm's Proslogion shows that he carefully distinguishes 'greater' from 'better' or 'more perfect'. He says that God 'most truly exists', that he exists 'in the highest degree'; the Neo-platonist metaphysical framework suggested by this is confirmed by examining Anselm's Augustinian background, and the Monologion. 'Greatness' is an ontological concept. This both makes good sense of Anselm's argument, and justifies his refutation of the 'Lost Island' objection: it is nonsense to say of any island, or dollar, that it is ontologically superior to another, or to anything else."
———. 1983. "Gremlins and parodies." Philosophical Studies (Ireland) no. 29:48-54.
"The paper aims to show that parody-based critiques of Anselm's ontological argument fail to do damage because there is a crucial disanalogy between 'God' and for example, Gaunilean 'Islands'. the basis of the disanalogy is God's alleged uniqueness in terms of necessary existence. It is this rather than the structure of Anselm's argument which constitutes the real problem in attempting to assert that there is a God."
———. 1985. Anselm's argument. The logic of divine existence. Aldershot: Gower.
Brunner, Fernad. 1976. "Questions sur l'interprétation du "Proslogion" par Jules Vuillemin." In Saint Anselme ses précurseurs et ses contemporains, edited by Kohlenberger, Helmut, 65-83. Frankfurt: Minerva.
Campbell, Richard James. 1976. From Belief to Understanding. A Study of Anselm's Proslogion Argument on the Existence of God. Canberra: Australian National University.
Contents: Acknowledgments VII; 1. Introduction 1; 2. The Text 6; 3. The Structure of the Argument 10; 4. The First Stage 30; 5. The Second Stage 92; 6. The Third Stage 126; 7. A Formalisation of the Argument 151; 8. The Force of the Argument 172; 9. The Relevance of the Argument 208; Index 228-229.
Cappuyns, Maieul D. 1934. "L'argument de saint Anselme." Recherches de Théologie ancienne et médiévale no. 6:313-330.
Cattin, Yves. 1986. La preuve de Dieu. Introduction à la lecture du Proslogion d'Anselme de Canterbury. Paris: Vrin.
Chambers, Timothy. 2000. "On behalf of the Devil: a parody of Anselm revisited." Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society no. 100:93-113.
"This paper treats a question which first arose in these Proceedings: Can Anselm's ontological argument be inverted so as to yield parallel proofs for the existence (or nonexistence) of a least (or worst conceivable being? Such "devil parodies" strike some commentators as innocuous curiosities, or redundant challenges which are no more troubling than other parodies found in the literature (e.g., Gaunilo's Island). I take issue with both of these allegations; devil parodies, I argue, have the potential to pose substantive, and novel, challenges to Anselm's ontological argument."
Chandler, Hugh S. 1993. "Some ontological arguments." Faith and Philosophy no. 10:18-32.
"The principal arguments considered are in some ways similar to those offered in Anselm's Proslogium, Chapters II and III. In addition, two quick' versions of the ontological argument are examined. Finally, I worry a bit about the ineffable One. The general line of attack is similar to a procedure employed by David Lewis in discussing Proslogium II. My approach to Proslogium III is based upon the idea that the appropriate modal logic for these matters is much weaker than the standard S5. The hope is that this alternative perspective reveals features worthy of notice."
Corbin, Michel. 1983. "Cela dont plus grand ne puisse être pensé." Anselm Studies.An Occasional Journal no. 1:59-83.
———. 1988. ""Nul n'a plus grand amour que de donner sa vie pour ses amis (Jn 15,13)". La signification de l'unum argumentum du Proslogion." Anselm Studies.An Occasional Journal no. 2:201-228.
D'Onofrio, Giulo. 1990. "Chi è l' "insipiens"? L'argomento di Anselmo e la dialettica dell'alto Medioevo." In L'argomento ontologico / The ontological Argument / L'argument ontologique / Der Ontologische Gottesbeweis, edited by Olivetti, Marco M., 95-109. Padova: CEDAM.
Davies, Brian. 2004. "Anselm and the ontological argument." In The Cambridge Companion to Anselm, edited by Davies, Brian and Leftow, Brian, 157-178. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
De Boni, Luis Alberto. 2011. "Saint Anselm and Duns Scotus." In Anselm of Canterbury (1033-1109). Philosophical Theology and Ethics, edited by Pich, Roberto Hofmeister, 169-195. Porto: Fédération Internationale des Institutd d'Études Mèdiévales.
Delgado, Antolin Salvador. 1988. El argumento anselmiano. Sevilla: Publicaciones de la Universidad.
Devine, Philip. 1977. "'Exists' and Saint Anselm's argument." Grazer Philosophische Studien no. 3:59-70.
"This paper examines interpretations of the doctrine that "exists" is not a predicate (existence is not a property). None, it is concluded, is both true and a refutation of st Anselm's "ontological" argument for the existence of God."
Dicker, Georges. 1988. "A refutation of Rowe's critique of Anselm's ontological argument." Faith and Philosophy no. 5:193-202.
Evans, Gillian Rosemary. 1978. Anselm and talking about God. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Evdokimov, Paul. 1959. "L'aspect apophatique de l'argument de Saint Anselme." In Spicilegium Beccense (vol. I), 233-258. Paris.
Forest, Aimé. 1972. "Remarques sur l'argument du Proslogion." In Scritti in onore di Carlo Giacon, 147-172. Padova.
Galvan, Sergio. 1989. "Una variante deontica dell'argomento modale di S. Anselmo." Epistemologia no. 12:135-144.
———. 1993. "Aspetti problematici dell'argomento modale di Anselmo." Rivista di Storia della Filosofia:587-609.
Ghisalberti, Alessandro. 1990. "Per una rilettura dell'argomento ontologico di Anselmo d'Aosta." Vita e Pensiero (7-8):543-549.
Gilbert, Paul. 1990. "Unum argumentum et Unum necessarium." In L'argomento ontologico / The ontological Argument / L'argument ontologique / Der Ontologische Gottesbeweis, edited by Olivetti, Marco M., 81-94. Padova: Cedam.
———. 1990. Le Proslogion de S. Anselme. Silence de Dieu et joie de l'homme. Roma: Editrice Pontificia Università Gregoriana.
Bibliographie Anselmienne: pp. 249-279: sur l'argument ontologique: livres pp. 253-255, articles pp. 267-273.
Gilson, Etienne. 1934. "Sens et nature de l'argument de saint Anselme." Archives d'Histoire Doctrinale et Littéraire du Moyen Age no. 9:5-51.
Gogacz, Mieczyslaw. 1970. "La "ratio Anselmi" en face du problème des relations entre métaphysique et mystique." Analecta Anselmiana no. 2:169-185.
Gombocz, Wolfgang. 1974. Uber E! Zur Semantik der Existenzprädikates und des ontologischen Arguments für Gottes Existenz von Anselm von Canterbury. Wien: Verband der Wissenschaflliche Gesellschaft.
Unpublished Dissertation (University of Graz).
———. 1976. "Zur Zwei-Argument-Hypotese bezüglich Anselms Proslogion." In Saint Anselme ses précurseurs et ses contemporains, edited by Kohlenberger, Helmut, 85-98. Frankfurt: Minerva.
Grappone, Arturo Graziano. 1999. "Anselm's Ontological Proof: Consequences in System Theory." Metalogicon no. 12:33-40.
Hartman, Robert S. 1961. "Prolegomena to a Meta-Anselmian Axiomatic." Review of Metaphysics no. 14:637-675.
Hartshorne, Charles. 1983. "Anselm and Aristotle's First Law of Modality." Anselm Studies.An Occasional Journal no. 1:51-58.
Hendley, Brian. 1981. "Anselm's "Proslogion" argument." In Sprache und Erkenntnis in Mittelalter (vol. II), 838-846. Berlin, New York.
Henry, Desmond Paul. 1969. "Proslogion Chapter III." In Analecta Anselmiana (vol. I), 101-105.
———. 1993. "Aliquid quo nihil maius cogitari possit: counterpart of homo mortuus." Rivista di Storia della Filosofia:513-525.
Herrera, Robert A. 1979. Anselm's Proslogion: an introduction. Washington: University Press of America.
———. 1984. "The "Proslogion Argument" viewed from the perspective of "De casu diaboli"." In Spicilegium Beccense (vol II), 623-629.
Hochberg, Herbert. 1959. "Anselm's ontological argument and Russell's theory of descriptions." New Scholasticism:319-330.
Holopainen, Toivo. 2007. "Anselm's argumentum and the early medieval theory of argument." Vivarium no. 47:1-29.
"The article aims at elucidating the argumentation in Anselm's Proslogion by relating some aspects of it to the early medieval theory of argument. The focus of the analysis is on the "single argument" (unum argumentum), the discovery of which Anselm announces in the Preface to the Proslogion. Part 1 of the article offers a preliminary description of the single argument by describing the reductio ad absurdum technique based on the notion "that than which a greater cannot be thought". Part 2 discusses the ideas about arguments and argumentation that Boethius presents in Book One of his In Ciceronis Topica. Part 3 draws attention to some early medieval sources (Abelard, Lanfranc, Anselm) that are witness to the importance of the Boethian ideas in Anselm's time. Finally, Part 4 argues that Anselm looked at his single argument in the Boethian framework and that the term "that than which a greater cannot be thought" should be identified as his single argument."
Hopkins, Jasper. 1972. A Companion to the Study of St. Anselm. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
Chapter III. Ontological Argument 67-89.
———. 1978. "On Understanding and Preunderstanding St. Anselm." New Scholasticism no. 52:243-284.
Review of R. Campbell, From Belief to Understanding. A Study of Anselm's Proslogion Argument on the Existence of God (1976).
Huber, Carlo. 1990. "Considerazioni semantiche e logiche sul cosiddetto argomento ontologico di Anselmo d'Aosta nel Proslogium." In l'attualità filosofica di Anselmo d'Aosta, edited by Hoegen, Maternus, 11-23. Roma.
Jacquette, Dale. 1997. "Conceivability, intensionality, and the logic of Anselm's modal argument for the existence of God." International Journal for Philosophy of Religion no. 42:163-173.
Jarmuzek, Tomasz, Nowicki, Maciej, and Pietruszczak, Andrzej. 2006. "An outline of the Anselmian theory of God." In Essays in logic and ontology, edited by Malinowski, Jacek and Pietruszczak, Andrzej, 317-330. Amsterdam: Rodopi.
"The article presents a formalization of Anselm's so-called 'ontological arguments' from Proslogion. The main idea of our research is to stay to the original text as close as is possible. We show, against some common opinions, that (i) the logic necessary for the formalization must be neither a purely sentential modal calculus, nor just non-modal first-order logic, but a modal first-order theory; (ii) such logic cannot contain logical axiom A right arrow implies that A is possible; (iii) none of Anselm's reasoning requires the assumptions that God is a consistent object or that existence of God is possible; (iv) no such thing as the so-called Anselm's principle is involved in any of the proofs; (v) Anselm's claims (that God exists in reality and that God necessarily exists in reality) can be obtained independently, hence, there is no need for presenting them in an opposite order than Anselm did."
Kelly, Charles J. 1994. "Circularity and Amphiboly in Some Anselmian Ontological Proofs: A Syllogistic Inquiry." Noûs no. 28:482-504.
Kenny, Anthony Patrick. 1990. "Anselm on the conceivability of God." In L'argomento ontologico, edited by Olivetti, Marco M., 71-79. Padova.
Kienzler, Klaus. 1993. "Das Proslogion-Argument. Anselm's und die Confessiones des Augustinus." In The European dimension of St. Anselm's thinking, 137-161.
———. 1999. International bibliography - Anselm of Canterbury. Lewiston: The Edwin Mellen Press.
In cooperation with Eduardo Brinacesco, Walter Fröhlich, Helmut Kohleberger, Frederick Van Flaten, Coloman Viola.
Contains 3.784 references up to 1996.
Contents: I. Text and editions 12 (items 1-441); II. Alpahbetical Table 33 (items 442-3784); III. Systematic Table 158-201.
Introduction: "With this International Bibliography of Anselm of Canterbury we intend to lay out a comprehensive list of works and sources of Anselm of Canterbury as well as the relevant research literature. The systematic presentation takes into consideration the time period from the first manuscripts until 1996. The bibliography includes all together three thousand, seven hundred, and eighty four individual citations.
Part I: For a manual of this kind, not only a presentation of secondary literature, but also a presentation of texts, manuscripts, omnia opera, editions, and translations, ordered according to the most important languages, should be useful. This latter collection is presented in the first part of the bibliography, entitled 'Texts and Editions'. We have undertaken no new studies of sources and manuscripts, but have taken the references of F. S. Schmitt's Omnia Opera and F. S. Schmitt's and R. Southern's Memorial, and have reprinted the most important bibliographical information.
Part Il: The 'Alphabetical Table' presents alphabetically all the relevant secondary literature in detail. This second section is the heart of the bibliography. It serves as the foundation for Part III. The systematic presentation of the literature extends to the year 1996. The final references were to the contributions in the collection of D. E. Luscombe and G. R. Evans, Aosta, Bec, and Canterbury. Papers in Commemoration of the Nine-hundreth Anniversary of Anselm's Enthronement as Archbishop, 25 September 1093 (1996). After that, particular titles appear only sporadically.
Part III: The 'Systematic Table' is conceived as an aid for research into the works of Anselm of Canterbury. In a systematic reference word table, developed especially for this purpose, relevant research contributions are presented in short form. It should be possible quickly to find citations in the 'Alphabetical Table' through the presentation of references of Author (Year) in the 'Systematic Table'."
King, Peter. 1984. "Anselm's intentional argument." History of Philosophy Quarterly no. 1:147-166.
"Anselm's Ontological Argument is an ad hominem argument against the Foole, part of which is a reductio ad absurdum, designed to prove the existence of God. The actual argument offered by St. Anselm has seventeen premisses; the heart of the argument is a careful distinction among intentional objects-and the Ontological Argument cannot be formalized by modal logic. It is not a modal argument at all, but rather relies on certain intuitive principles of intentional logic, which Anselm applies throughout the Proslogion. The Ontological Argument is valid, if one accepts these principles; insofar as an ad hominem argument may be sound, it is sound as well. It is not a demonstration, for the key premiss granted by the Foole is highly implausible. Those who agree with the Foole, however, may justifiably assert God's existence.
These claims only apply to Anselm's actual argument, not to other Ontological Arguments, no matter how distinguished the pedigree, no matter how careful the formalization. Other Ontological Arguments only interest me insofar as they shed light on, or claim to accurately represent, Anselm's Ontological Argument. Other Ontological Arguments must be judged on their own merits. Anselm's actual argument, unlike most versions, is an exercise in intentional logic, a fact that has eluded commentators from the time of Gaunilon. That Ontological Argument is the subject of this article, and henceforth I shall call it the Ontological Argument."
Klima, Gyula. 2000. "Saint Anselm's Proof: a problem of reference, intentional identity and mutual understanding." In Medieval philosophy and modern times, edited by Holmström-Hintikka, Ghita, 69-87. Dordrecht: Kluwer.
———. 2003. "Conceptual closure in Anselm's Proof: reply to Professor Roark." History and Philosophy of Logic no. 24:131-134.
"This paper provides replies to the objections Tony Roark presented (Roark, T. 2003. 'Conceptual closure in Anselm's proof', History and Philosophy of Logic 24) to my reconstruction of Anselm's famous argument in the Proslogion (Klima, G. 2000. 'Saint Anselm's Proof: A Problem of Reference, Intentional Identity and Mutual Understanding', in G. Holmström-Hintikka, Medieval Philosophy and Modern Times, Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 69-87). The replies argue that Roark's objections actually strengthen the general conclusion of my original paper concerning the different attitudes one can take toward Anselm's argument, depending on whether one refers to that than which nothing greater can be thought 'constitutively' or 'parasitically'. In agreement with Roark, however, at the end of the paper I also indicate some of the broader implications of this distinction worthy of further exploration."
Kopper, Joachim. 1962. Reflexion und Raisonnement im ontologischen Gottesbeweis. Köln: Universitätsverlag.
Koyré, Alexandre. 1923. L'idée de Dieu dans la philosophie de St. Anselme. Paris.
La Croix, Richard R. 1972. Proslogion II and III. A third interpretation of Anselm's argument. Leiden: E. J. Brill.
Losoncy, Thomas. 1982. "Anselm's Response to Gaunilo's Dilemma -- An Insight into the Notion of 'Being' Operative in the Proslogion." New Scholasticism no. 56:207-216.
———. 1994. "Chapter 1 of St. Anselm's Proslogion: its preliminaries to proving God's existence as paradigmatic for subsequent proofs of God's existence." In Greek and Medieval Studies in Honor of Leo Sweeney, S.J., edited by Carroll, William J. and Furlong, John J., 171-180. New York: Peter Lang.
———. 2008. "Language and Saint Anselm's Proslogion argument." In Acta Conventus Neo-Latini Bononiensis, edited by Schoeck, Richard J. Binghantom: State University of New York Press.
Proceedings of the Fourth International Congress of Neo-Latin Studies: Bologna, 26 August to 1 September 1979.
"In the over nine hundred years since Saint Anselm wrote the Proslogion steadfast disagreement over what he meant, and sometimes over what he said, functions as an unbroken principle of interpretation among its readers and commentators alike. How to explain this phenomenon has proven equally controversial. However, two explanations of the long embattled history of the Proslogion are feasible.
One is that access to the complete Proslogion was impossible for many of Anselm's successors, including such renowned reviewers of the work as Aquinas, Scotus, and the noted modern critic of the ontological argument, Immanuel Kant. A second, applying more to recent times, appears to be a failure to exercise due regard for the language of the work. (1) This is further evidenced by a tendency to concentrate only on part of the Proslogion, principally chapters two-four."
(1) Two recent discussions of the Proslogion deserve notice in this regard. Professor G. R. Evans, Anselm and Talking about God (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1978), devotes more time to talking about the interpretation a large tradition has placed upon the Proslogion argument than to an analysis of the argument's language as such. See, especially, chapters two and three, pp. 39-75. On the other hand, Professor Gregory Schufreider's study, "The Identity of Anselm's Argument," The Modern Schoolman, LIV (1977), pp. 345-61, breaks genuinely new ground in its search for the argument in Anselm's Proslogion instead of a new search for confirmation of an old rendition. In arguing that Saint Anselm has a single argument in the Proslogion Schufreider provides a careful analysis of Anselm's use of "vere esse" in chapter eleven's heading and chapter three's text (pp. 349-52); of "absolute" in chapters twenty-two and twenty-eight of the Monologion (pp. 353-58) and the modal quality of the Proslogion's "vere esse" (p. 360). The conclusion Schufreider reaches reinforces the argument of this paper from a different perspective.
Makin, Stephen. 1988. "The ontological argument." Philosophy no. 63:83-91.
"I offer a defence of the ontological argument. I argue for the principle that if Fis a necessarily exemplified concept and G is not, then Fs are a greater kind of thing than Gs. This principle is defended on the basis of two other principles concerning such attitudes as total reliance, which it is appropriate to take to Fs if f is a necessarily exemplified concept."
———. 1992. "The ontological argument defended." Philosophy no. 67:247-255.
Mann, William E. 1972. "The ontological presuppositions of the ontological argument." Review of Metaphysics:260-277.
"I present a semi-formal analysis of St. Anselm's version of the ontological argument from Proslogion II, with two purposes in mind. First, I show that some contemporary analyses of the argument, in terms of the apparatus of modal logic, neglect the conceptual framework within which Anselm worked. I then display three ingredients of that framework: the distinction between beings 'in intellectu' and beings 'in re', the distinction between one's conceiving of a thing and one's conceiving it to exist, and the doctrine that existence is a property of things. Second, I argue that even if Anselm is granted all three of these presuppositions, he still cannot produce a convincing argument for the existence of God."
Marenbon, John. 2006. "Anselm Rewrites his Argument Proslogion 2 and the Response to Gaunilo." In Écriture et réecriture des textes philosophiques mèdiévaux. Volume d'hommage offert à Colette Sirat, edited by Hamesse, Jacqueline and Weijers, Olga, 347-365. Turnhout: Brepols.
Martinich, Aloysius P. 1977. "Scotus and Anselm on the Existence of God." Franciscan Studies no. 37:139-152.
Matthews, Scott. 1999. "Arguments, Texts, and Contexts: Anselm's Argument and the Friars." Medieval Philosophy and Theology no. 8:83-104.
"The contrast between the reception of Anselm's Proslogion in the work of Bonaventure and in the work of Thomas Aquinas is often held up as a classic example of their competing intellectual assumptions. Some have located the intellectual prerequisites for the acceptance or rejection of Anselm's argument in the prior acceptance of univocal or analogical accounts of being. (1) P. A. Daniels argued that the prerequisites for Bonaventure's acceptance of the argument were not his "ontological" mode of thought, or a doctrine of the innate idea of God within the soul, but in his acceptance of examplar causality.(2) Half a century later, Jean Chattillon, following Étienne Gilson, affirmed the more common view of the issue, that the acceptance or rejection of Anselm's argument among the first scholastics of the thirteenth century depended upon their allegiance to Augustinian or Aristotelian traditions.(3) Anton Pegis did the same when he insisted that recovery of the Anselmian argument in its original form involved stripping away the Aristotelian framework in terms of which the Proslogion has been read since Thomas. (4)"
(1) In general terms, the interpretation of Bonaventure as leader of an Augustinian tradition, and of Thomas as representative of Aristotelianism, can be found in the work of E. Gilson, A History of Christian Philosophy in the Middle Ages (London, 1978). On Bonaventure's refinement of Anselm in the context of the Augustinian tradition, see H. R. Klocker, S.J. "Bonaventure's Refinement of the Ontological Argument," Mediaevilla 4 (1978): 209-23. On analogical and univocal accounts of being as factors determining attitudes to Anselm's argument, see H. J. Johnson, "Contra Anselm But Contra Gentiles: Aquinas's Rejection of the Ontological Argument," Schede Medievali 13 (1986): 18-27.
(2) P. A. Daniels, Quellenbeiträge und Untersuchungen zur Geschichte der Gottesbeweise im Dreizehnten Jahrhundert (Münster, 1909), pp. 131, 156.
(3) Jean Chattillon, "De Guillaume d'Auxerre à Saint Thomas d'Aquin: L'Argument de Saint Anselme Chez Les Premiers Scolastiques du XIIIe Siècle," Spicilegium Beccense 1 (1959): 209-31.
(4) Anton C. Pegis, "St. Anselm and the Argument of the "Proslogion"," Mediaeval Studies 28 (1966): 228-67.
McEvoy, James. 1994. "La preuve anselmienne de l'existence de Dieu est-elle un argument "ontologique"? A propos de trois interprétations récentes." Revue Philosophique de Louvain no. 92:167-183.
McGrath, P.J. 1988. "The ontological argument revisited." Philosophy no. 63:529-533.
———. 1990. "The refutation of the ontological argument." Philosophical Quarterly no. 40:195-212.
———. 1994. "Does the ontological argument beg the question?" Religious Studies no. 30:305-310.
"In his paper Has the Ontological Argument Been Refuted?' (Religious Studies, 29 (1993), 97-110) William F. Vallicella argues that my attempt to show that the Ontological Argument begs the question is unsuccessful. I believe he is wrong about this, but before endeavouring to vindicate my position I must first make clear what precisely is the point at issue between us. The Ontological Argument is not a single argument, but a family of arguments. Newly devised formulations of the argument are frequently put forward by philosophers in an effort to avoid difficulties that have been pointed out in previous versions. As a consequence there is no possibility of a conclusive proof that every form of the argument embodies the same fallacy. Nevertheless, one can, I believe, prove that all the standard versions of the argument embody a certain fallacy and that, given the nature of the argument, it is therefore unlikely that the argument can be formulated in such a way as to avoid this difficulty. What I tried to show in my paper is that the six best-known versions of the argument (the non-model versions of Anselm, Descartes and Leibniz and the modal versions of Malcolm, Hartshorne and Plantinga) all beg the question and that they do so at the same point in the argument, namely when it is asserted that it is possible,that an absolutely perfect being exists. It is difficult to see how an ontological argument could be formulated without, including this claim as one of its premises, since the distinguishing badge of the argument is the inference from the possibility of an absolutely perfect being to its actuality. It must be unlikely then, if my criticism of these six versions is correct, that there is any way of formulating the argument that avoids this fallacy."
Millican, Peter. 2004. "The one fatal flaw in Anselm's argument." Mind (113):437-476.
"Anselm's Ontological Argument fails, but not for any of the various reasons commonly adduced. In particular, its failure has nothing to do with violating deep Kantian principles by treating 'exists' as a predicate or making reference to 'Meinongian' entities. Its one fatal flaw, so far from being metaphysically deep, is in fact logically shallow, deriving from a subtle scope ambiguity in Anselm's key phrase. If we avoid this ambiguity, and the indeterminacy of reference to which it gives rise, then his argument is blocked even if his supposed Meinongian extravagances are permitted. Moreover it is blocked in a way which is straightforward and compelling (by contrast with the Kantian objections), and which generalizes easily to other versions of the Ontological Argument. A significant moral follows. Fear of Anselm's argument has been hugely influential in motivating ontological fastidiousness and widespread reluctance to countenance talk of potentially non-existing entities. But if this paper is correct, then the Ontological Argument cannot properly provide any such motivation. Some of the most influential contributions to ontology, from Kant to Russell and beyond, rest on a mistake."
Moreau, Joseph. 1967. Pour ou contre l'insensé? Essai sur la preuve anselmienne. Paris.
———. 1981. "Logique et dialectique dans l'argument du "Proslogion"." In Sprache und Erkenntnis im Mittelalter. Axten des VI. Internationalen Kongresses für Mittelaterliche Philosophie der Société internationale pour l'étude de la philosophie médiévale 29. August - 3, September 1977 in Bonn. II Halbband, edited by Beckmann, Jan P., Honnefelder, Ludger, Jüssen, Gabriel, Münxelhaus, Barbara, Schrimpf, Gangolf, Wieland, Georg and Kluxen, Wolfgang, 718-721. Berlin, New York: Walter de Gruyter.
———. 1983. "Inintelligible et impensable (Anselm, Liber Apologeticus, IV)." Anselm Studies.An Occasional Journal no. 1:85-93.
Morscher, Edgar. 1997. "Anselm's Argument -- Once Again." Logique et Analyse no. 158:175-188.
"The kernel of Anselm's famous argument in chapter II of his Proslogion consists of a few lines. Thousands of pages have been written about them, but nevertheless they have resisted final clarification, though the literature about them still grows.
Most of what has allegedly been written about Anselm's argument is concerned more with phantasies than with Anselm's original text. In fact most authors take Anselm's argument as an excuse for doing quite different things and developing their own ideas.
Anselm's brilliant text does not deserve such a treatment. Accordingly I will focus on Anselm's own words and will display the ingenuity of his argument as well as where it fails."
Müller, Jörn. 2011. "Ontologischer Gottesbeweis? Zur Bedeutung und Funktion des unum argumentum in Anselm von Canterburys Proslogion." In Anselm of Canterbury (1033-1109). Philosophical Theology and Ethics, edited by Pich, Roberto Hofmeister, 37-71. Porto: Fédération Internationale des Institutd d'Études Mèdiévales.
Nef, Frédéric. 2002. "Perfection divine et propriétés positives. L'argumentum unicum d'Anselme et la preuve ontologique de Leibniz à la lumière de la preuve gödelienne de l'existence de Dieu." In Analyse et théologie. Croyances religieuses et rationalité, edited by Bourgeois-Gironde, Sacha, Gnassounou, Bruno and Pouivet, Roger, 95-124. Paris: Vrin.
Park, Desirée. 1983. "Berkeley's Rejection of Anselm's Argument." Anselm Studies.An Occasional Journal no. 1:105-109.
Pearl, Leon. 1990. "A puzzle about Necessary Being." Philosophy no. 65:229-231.
"I argue contrary to Stephen Makin's "The Ontological Argument" (Philosophy 63, No. 243) that one can't show that necessary being is a meaningful concept by the use of modal notions involving the exemplification of concepts. For conceptual coherence provides, at best, a necessary condition for necessary exemplification, not a sufficient one. What then could there possibly be about a concept beyond its coherence that would necessitate its exemplification. I suspect there is none."
Pegis, Anton Charles. 1966. "St. Anselm and the Argument of the "Proslogion"." Mediaeval Studies no. 28:228-267.
"This study is a reexamination of the Proslogion, aiming, in the light of the interpretations of K. Barth, E. Gilson and especially H. Bouillard, to determine the nature of its argument for God as a rational construction. St. Anselm believes that the believing reason is both believing in itself and rationally visible to an unbeliever. The argument in chapters 2-4 is not from thought to existence, but from God as designated by and in things to God as posited in his transcendence. There is no reason for thinking that the so-called ontological argument originates in the Proslogion."
Pich, Roberto Hofmeister. 2011. "Amselm's "Idea" and Anselm's Argument." In Anselm of Canterbury (1033-1109). Philosophical Theology and Ethics, edited by Pich, Roberto Hofmeister, 73-110. Porto: Fédération Internationale des Institutd d'Études Mèdiévales.
Priest, Stephen. 2000. "Reality and existence in Anselm." Heythrop Journal.A Bimonthly Review of Philosophy and Theology no. 41:461-462.
"Although 'exists' has the superficial appearance of a predicate in the Proslogion, Anselm does not rely on the premise that 'exists' is a logical predicate (or that existing is a property) in the ontological proof. Anselm argues that God exists not only as a mental object (in intellectu) but also exists in extramental reality (in re). Whether 'exists' is a predicate is irrelevant to this inference. It follows that many putative refutations of the argument fail."
Read, Stephen. 1981. "Reflections on Anselm and Gaunilo." International Philosophical Quarterly no. 21:437-438.
"In Anselm's ontological argument, the phrase 'to exist (only) in the understanding' needs explanation; so also does the claim that something which exists only in the understanding, and so does not exist, is less great than something that does exist. What this means is that, if it were to exist, it would be less great than the other. But it could not then be less great than itself. So Anselm's argument collapses."
Roark, Tony. 2003. "Tarski and Klima: conceptual closure in Anselm's Proof." History and Philosophy of Logic no. 24:1-14.
"Gyula Klima maintains that Anselm's ontological argument is best understood in terms of a theory of reference that was made fully explicit only by later medievals. I accept the interpretative claim but offer here two objections to the argument so interpreted. The first points up a certain ambiguity in Klima's formulation of the argument, the correction of which requires a substantive revision of the argument's conclusion. The second exploits the notion of semantic closure introduced by Tarski. Klima offers the atheist an 'out' by drawing a distinction between constitutive and parasitic reference. I argue that using Klima's preferred description ('the thought object than which no thought object can be thought to be greater') to refer constitutively to God results in conceptual closure, a condition analogous to semantic closure that renders the instant conceptual scheme inconsistent and subject to paradox. Although the proof ultimately fails, Klima's development of the notions of constitutive and parasitic reference has important and far-reaching implications."
Sagal, Paul. 1973. "Anselm's Refutation of Anselm's Ontological Argument." Franciscan Studies no. 33:285-291.
Scapin, Pietro. 1983. "Argomento Ontologico e Ateismo Semantico." Anselm Studies.An Occasional Journal no. 1:95-101.
Schmitt, Franciscus Salesius. 1933. "Der ontologische Gottesbeweis Anselms." Theologische Revue no. 32:217-223.
Schnepf, Robert. 1998. "Sein als Ereignis: Zu einigen Voraussetzungen des Gottesbeweises bei Anselm von Canterbury." Patristica et Mediaevalia no. 19:3-22.
"In recent discussions on Anselm's ontological argument, the assumption is made, that Anselm holds "existence" to be a first order predicate.
However, there is no explicit statement in Anselm's texts that confirms this interpretation. In Thomas Aquinas and his predecessors, the logic of subject and predicate is applied on Anselm's argument.
Anselm himself has no logic of "existence". The exact meaning and function of the expression "existence" is, therefore, to be investigated by an interpretation of its actual use in the argument itself. I propose, that Anselm views existence to be an event, and that the term "maius" can best be interpreted as a relation between different kinds of events."
Schufreider, Gregory. 1977. "The identity of Anselm's argument." Modern Schoolman no. 54:345-361.
———. 1978. An introduction to Anselm's argument. Philadelphia: Temple University Press.
———. 1992. "A classical misunderstanding of Anselm's argument." American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly no. 66 (4):489-499.
Smith, A. D. 2014. Anselm's Other Argument. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Tichy, Pavel. 1979. "Existence and God." Journal of Philosophy no. 76:403-420.
"The article presents an analysis of Anselm's ontological argument for the existence of God, based on Transparent Intensional Logic. Section I consists of general considerations on denotation and existence. In section II, two fallacies flawing Descartes's proof are exposed. Anselm's argument is reconstructed and assessed in section III, it is found logically sound, but doubt is cast on one of its premises."
Vallicella, William. 1993. "Has the ontological argument been refuted?" Religious Studies no. 29:97-110.
"Suppose we say that a deductive argument is probative just in case it is (i) valid in point of logical form, (ii) possesses true premises, and (iii) is free of informal fallacy. We can then say that an argument is normatively persuasive for a person if and only if it is both probative and has premises that can be accepted, without any breach of epistemic propriety, by the person in question. If the premises of a probative argument would be accepted by any reasonable person, I will call such an argument demonstrative.
Now it seems that a reasonable position to take with respect to the Ontological Argument for the existence of God (hereafter, OA) is that none of its versions is demonstrative, though some of the versions are normatively persuasive. If so, the OA in at least one version is a 'good' argument although not a successful piece of natural theology'. To show that the OA is 'bad' in all versions one would have to show, for each version, either that it is not probative, by showing that it is either invalid, or possessed of one or more false premises, or guilty of informal fallacy, or such that its premises are more rationally rejected than accepted by the person who considers the argument. To show a version 'bad', then, it does not suffice to show that it fails to establish its conclusion in some incontrovertible manner. Precious few philosophical arguments get the length of that." (Notes omitted).
Varisco, Novella. 1998. "La 'Ratio Anselmi' nell'interpretazione di alcuni pensatori medievali." Rivista di Filosofia Neo-Scolastica no. 90:5-27.
Viola, Coloman E. 1992. "Origine et portée du principe dialectique du 'Proslogion' de Saint Anselme. De l' 'argument ontologique' à l' 'argument mégalogique'." Rivista di Filosofia Neo-Scolastica no. 83:339-384.
———. 1996. "Saint Anselme est-il le 'père de l'argument ontologique'? Le Proslogion confronté à Kant." In Saint Anselm - Thinker for Yesterday and Today. Anselm's Thought Viewed by our Contemporaries, edited by Viola, Coloman E. and Van Fleteren, Frederick. Evanston: Edwin Mellen Press.
Vuillemin, Jules. 1971. Le Dieu d'Anselme et les apparences de la raison. Paris: Aubier.
