3) But there is a higher form of being, namely not being only in the human mind, but being in the real world, outside of the human mind.
4) Since this kind of being, outside of the human mind, is higher than the mere being (thought) in the intellect, it must be attributed to the unconditional. These are the four steps in the argument. Each step in this conclusion is such that each of you can easily refute it. and the refutations were given in Anselm’s time already, and then again..later. For instance he refutation is: It would be adequate for every highest thing – for instance, a perfect island – since it is more perfect to exist in reality than only in mind. Secondly, the term “being in the mind” is an ambiguous phrase which means actually being thought, being intended, being an object of man’s intentionality. But “in” is metaphorical and should not be taken literally.
Now this criticism is so obvious that each of you can make it. (!) But to the first, Anselm answered that a perfect island is not a necessary thought, but the highest being, or the unconditioned, is a necessary thought. Now we come back to the question: “Is God a necessary thought?” To the second argument he could answer that the unconditional must overcome the cleavage between subjectivity and objectivity. It cannot be only in mind; the power of the meaning of the unconditional overcomes subject and object, embraces them. But now if he had answered this way, then the fallacious form of the argument is abandoned. Then the argument is not an argument for a highest being, but is an analysis of human thought. And as such the argument says: there must be a point in which the unconditional necessity of thinking and being must be identical, otherwise there could not be certainty at all, not even that amount of certainty which every skeptic always presupposes.
