Philosophy of Religion Research
Bennet’s Criticism of Kant's Refutation of Theoretical Proofs for the Existence of God
Document Type : Original Research
Author
PhD student of philosophy, University of Isfahan, Isfahan, Iran.
Abstract
Kant categorizes the arguments for the existence of God into ontological, cosmological, and design arguments. He holds that whereas existence is not a real and determining predicate, it is not allowed to be a part of object’s definition and so the ontological argument is fruitless. Along with Kant and Bennett, I shall try to show that existence is not a perfection nor a determining predicate. Besides, contrary to Bennett, who assesses Kant's reasoning insufficient, I argue that Kant finds the fallacy hidden in the argument and argues that the flaw of cosmological argument is its dependence on the insecure ontological argument. While Bennett truly notices the ambiguity and weakness of this relation, Kant, by appealing to a strong criticism, destructs the cosmological argument later. Finally, despite his interest in the argument from design, Kant asserts that it is based on the invalid cosmological argument. In this stage, Bennett criticism neglects the inherent connection between design and cosmological argument.
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