I am not convinced that the issue boils down to a simple choice between "it is possible that a maximally great being exists" and "it is possible that such a being does not exist." The problem runs deeper: how do we know that the concept of "maximal greatness" is internally coherent in the first place?


The modal ontological argument seems to smuggle in its most important assumption from the outset. If "maximal greatness" refers to a necessarily existing, omnipotent, omniscient, and perfectly good being, then one must first demonstrate that such a combination of attributes is logically possible. Simply asserting that such a being "could exist" is not yet an argument.


For comparison, one could define a "maximally perfect number" or a "necessarily existing perfect island," but their actual existence does not follow from the definition alone. The modal ontological argument works only if the possibility of a necessarily existing being is accepted as a premise. A critic may reasonably ask why we should regard this possibility as better justified than its negation.


Moreover, if we cannot independently demonstrate that the concept of maximal greatness is logically coherent, then the premise "it is possible that such a being exists" appears to be merely an expression of the theist's intuition rather than the result of argumentation. In that case, the argument does not so much lead to the conclusion that God exists as it unfolds the consequences of an assumption that is, in essence, equivalent to that conclusion.




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