Kant on the Ontological Argument

Kant claims the ontological argument is unsound because existence is not a predicate. Since existene is not "something' that can be part of our concept of a thing, it can not be part of our concept of God. Basically Kant thinks existence consists in the application of a concept to reality. He foreshadows the Russellian view of existence as a second order property.

My concern with Kant's critique lies in the relationship between two claims:

(1) Existence is not a real predicate

and


(2) Existence is not a first order property


I don't think (1) entails (2)

To be a "real predicate" is to be part of the concept of a thing. To be a property is to be part of a thing (or instantiated by the thing--the point is properties deal with reality, predicates with concepts)

Suppose there was a feature of reality that could not be part of the concept of a thing. Surely we cannot rule out a priori the possibility of such a property.

But how could such a property be known? if it is not part of the concept, how do we even thing about it?

My answer is to suggest that thinking by means of concepts is only one way to understand something. I can think of pain by means of a concept (i had a bad headache yesterday) OR I can think of pain by directly experiencing the pain. Only the former requires a concept.

I think that the cogito provides us with an example of a property being present phenomenologically, but which may, as Kant says, never be a part of our concept of something. When I know I exist, I know something about me intuitively, not by means of concepts. So I have reason to think that existence is a property even if Kant is right that existence is not a real predicate.

Another way of making the same point is to consider whether it is proper to think of consciousness as an object at all. Perhaps our concepts are limited to cognition of objects, but that which is aware of objects is of a radically different ontological kind.( compare Berkeley on notions and ideas.)

an ontological argument for immortality

Recall Descartes' famous dictum that "I exist" can be known with certainty prior to any other knowledge. Now if my existence is really what is first known, it cannot be an inference. If Descartes reasoned "Everything that thinks, exists"/"I think" "THerefore, I exist, my existence would not be the first thing known. it would depend on some general and controversial premises. For these reasons I think the cogito has to be understood as an immediate intuition--an insight into the necessary connection between "me" and "existence"

But the "I" or "me" may be too metaphysically robust. We may argue, contra Descartes, that what is known to exist is not the metaphysical subject, but consciousness--particular moments of awareness.

If that is so, then we should more conservatively claim: There is a necessary connection between consciousness and existence.

why a necessary connection? Well, if it was merely contingent, if there could be a consciousness that did not exist, then even this truncated cogito fails. But this more limited cogito is probably the least controversial of all philosophical theses.

Nor can one say that the intuition involved in the cogito only applies to consciousess--that the existence part is really superfluous. This is because it is not obvious that "everything" exists. Hallucinations and dreams seem to provide prima facie examples in which we are aware of nonexistent things. Of course, those of a Russellian bent will be inclined to explain away these appearances. But the theory of descriptions is hardly a premise we can use to buttress the soundness of the cogito. Again, the cogito stands on its own--its soundness relies on an immediate insight, not an argument that involves other premises.

But if existence is necesarily connected to consciousness, have we not then shown that consciousness necessarily exists? is not this parallel to the conclusion of the ontological argument with respect to God?