Anselm of Canterbury (1033 – 1109) was a medieval theologian.

Dear tuanquang269,
I'm happy to respond. This is a question I wrote, and this is the very first time someone has posted this very difficult question here in GC.

The argument is drawn from the historical figure, Anselm of Canterbury, a figure who lived before Thomas Becket, the figure on whose cult The Canterbury Tales are based.

Let's look at these definitions given in the prompt.

"accidental beings" --- "all those things whose non-existence could be imagined without inherent contradiction" --- in other words, X is an "accidental being" if we could imagine an alternate world in which X didn't exist.

For example, we could imagine a world without the GMAT, some alternate world in which some other means was used to demonstrate admissibility to business school. The GMAT is an an accidental being.

We could imagine any city, any mountain, any person, any idea, and imagine an alternate world in which this didn't exist. All of these are accidental beings.

We could easy imagine a world with, say, an ocean of water or an atmosphere of air. We don't even have to imagine it, because the planet Mars provides a perfect example. These two are accidental beings. Or a world with a moon -- Mercury. etc. etc.

OK, we could go on and on, but pretty much anything we could name or conceive is an accidental being.

Now, the second term:
"necessary being" --- "those things whose existence is guaranteed precisely by what they are"

Now, the obvious question is: what on earth would be an example of this? What is an example of something that has a guaranteed existence, such that we couldn't even imagine a world without it? Hmm. It's not immediate obvious than anything falls in this category.

Some might argue that mathematical ideas, the ideas of pure mathematics, would be in this category. In other words, there would be fundamental mathematical statements that would be true of any imaginable world, even if the folks in that world never figured out anything about mathematics. This is conceivable, but debatable.

What it comes down to is that we cannot be sure whether there actually is anything that would qualify as a "necessary being." Hmm. That is awfully problematic for the argument as a whole, because if we are not sure whether there is any "necessary being" in the first place, then we can't use this supposition to prove anything else.

OK, now we are ready to look at the answers:
(A) It establishes an effect that must exist well before its cause.
This argument is not really about cause and effect. This is not correct.

(B) It completely depends on a definition of a term that stands in stark contrast to the everyday understanding of the term.
Hmm. The actual words are used in more or less their ordinary senses. It's just that the ideas are questionable, not the words themselves. This is not correct.

(C) The conclusion supports facts that directly contradict the evidence given to support it.
There's no logical contradiction without the argument presented. It has holes, but it doesn't contradict itself. This is incorrect.

(D) It makes a distinction that presupposes the truth of the conclusions that is to be established.
The argument does make the distinction of "accidental being" vs. "necessary being," and we are not sure that anything would actually qualify as the latter. In a way, the assumption that there is a unique "necessary" being is tantamount to the assumption of the existence of God, which the argument is trying to prove. This is a promising answer.

(E) It presents as evidence in support of a claim information that is inconsistent with other evidence presented in support of the same claim.
The argument doesn't really present evidence per se. It presents ideas and definitions. Again, everything here is self-consistent, just not consistent with our more modern way of thinking.

The best answer here is the OA, (D).

Does this make sense?
Mike