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Hegel and the ontological argument for the existence of God

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 April 2014

PAUL REDDING  and
PAOLO DIEGO BUBBIO
PAUL REDDING
Affiliation:
School of Philosophical and Historical Inquiry, University of Sydney, A14, NSW 2006, Australia e-mail: [email protected]
PAOLO DIEGO BUBBIO
Affiliation:
School of Humanities and Communication Arts, University of Western Sydney, Penrith, NSW 2751, Australia e-mail: [email protected]
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Abstract

We reconstruct Hegel's implicit version of the ontological argument in the light of his anti-representationalist idealist metaphysics. For Hegel, the ontological argument had been a peculiarly modern form of argument for the existence of God, presupposing a ‘representationalist’ account of the mind and its concepts. As such, it was susceptible to Kant's famous refutation, but Kant himself had provided a model for an alternative conception of concept, one developed by Fichte with his notion of the I=I. We reconstruct an Hegelian version of the ontological argument by considering the possibility of a Fichtean version, and then subjecting it to a critique based on Hegel's critical appropriation of Fichte's I=I.

Type
Articles
Information
Religious Studies , Volume 50 , Issue 4 , December 2014 , pp. 465 - 486
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2014 

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