Libertarian Freewill and the Existence of God

[pog]

So is chad Ozel a Theist or an Atheist? That is relevant here

I don’t know. And I don’t see it as relevant, sorry. I quoted him to show that the majority interpretation of quantum physics leans towards true indetrminism in the universe - and this holds for both theistic quantum physicists and atheistic ones (as my quotes tried to demonstrate). By doing this I wanted to show that it is possible to believe that the universe does have randomness in it; that many highly intelligent and informed people accept this; that both Christians and non-Christians can hold this view (and Einstein was a determinist, but also an atheist). Note again, I have no idea whether it is true or not, but I accept that a number of key thinkers have no issue with it scientifically, philosophically or theologically.

Another quote, this time from Ian Barbour, eminent professor of physics and religion, “A minority of physicists, including Einstein and Planck, have maintained that the uncertainties of quantum mechanics are similarly attributable to our present ignorance. They believed that detailed subatomic mechnisms are rigidly causal and deterministic … Many physicist assert that uncertainty is not a product of temporary ignorance but a fundamental limitation permanently peventing exact knowledge … Heisenberg held that* indeterminacy is an objective feature of nature *and not a limitation of human knowledge … by far the majority of contemporary physicists agree in rejecting the determinism of Newtonian physics … In sum, Einstein’s classically realist, determinist, and local interpretation seems to be ruled out by the Aspect experiments” (Religion and Science) [italics mine].

The key disgreement between us seems to lie here. I believe that *if God so wished He could create a universe with randomness, originality, creative power, self-unfolding and true freedom in it. You seem to see that God and randomness are somehow incompatible. * Why? What is preventing God from self-limitation or from creating an open universe?

I don’t see how Ozel’s statement holds true if you allow for the possibility that there’s a God actually moving these particles around

Why does God *have to *move them around? Why can’t He just create a system that has limited statistical chaos in it - and then, should He wish, intervene in that system when He wants to?

And once again, I don’t see what has changed since Lewis wrote (as a Christian Philosopher) that he found it almost impossible to believe that these scientists (in the emerging field of quantum mechanics) really meant what they seemed to be saying

and:

I cannot help thinking they mean no more than that the movements of sub-atomic particles are permanently incalculable to us, not that they are in themselves random and lawless.

I guess, but I do not know, that physics has developed quite a bit since Lewis and that some new experiments and maths have helped make certain interpretations of quantum nature more popular. How long ago did Lewis write that book - and how close was he to cutting-edge quantum physics? Eitherway, he seems to suggest that the scientists couldn’t really mean what they said - but this is quite wrong. They *really did mean *what they said - and time has shown this. They might be wrong (how would I know?), but it seems odd to not accept their own word for what they believe. Let them say what they want to say and if you think they or their interpretations are wrong then argue with that point and provide the evidence or justifications to back up the point - but don’t say that they mean something else other than what they say they mean simply because you cannot accept or understand it.

Does Polkinghorne (as a Theist, not a scientist) explain where this randomness, chance, and chaos come from?

Off the top of my head I’m not sure. He may well do, but I don’t have it to hand, and I’ve read very little of his quite voluminous output! I suspect (but am prepared to be corrected) that he simply attributes this element of chaos to God’s own deisgn. On a side note, I think the Christian philosopher Keith Ward has some stuff to say about freedom and quantum physics - but again, I’m not well read enough to offer more.

If God created all things, visible and invisible out of nothing but His own will (as the traditional Christian creeds seem to maintain), where does this haphazardness, randomness, and chaos come from (and how can anything be unpredictable to Him)?

Again, I fail to see the problem If God wanted randomness He made randomness! Or is God constrained by something? I see no reason why a limited degree of creative randomness or freedom cannot be compatible with love - indeed, it strikes me as true creative empowerment of the other would better fulfill love’s essence!

As to ‘How can anything be unpredicatble to Him?’ I simply point towards kenotic self-limitation and open theism and see no issue with that possibility.

Perhaps because I see know way to avoid that conclusion if there is an All Powerful, All Knowing Creator of Einstein’s block universe (of time and space

But why do you have to conclude this?
I certainly don’t, and far more importantly neither do many Christian scientists, philosophers or theologians. What is your justification for seeing no other possible conclusion to God’s existence? And, as far as I understand, Einstein’s God was really just a shorthand for Nature - he was, I believe, an atheist.

But I also have difficultly seeing how every little thing could have meaning or purpose, or how God could make totally random or arbitrary decisions.

I don’t think God makes random decisions - but I do think it’s perfectly possible He could have created a universe where truely random events outside His meticulous control take place.
Neither do I believe that ‘every little thing’ has meaning or purpose - many things are meaningless or purposeless (at least from God’s point of view) - and evil is a great example. God does not will evil - it does not have some grand purpose in His economy. Sure, freewilled beings introduce evil for their own reasons, but as far as God is concerned it is always gratuitous. And the direction which the earth spins may be likewise gratuitous or arbritary - not even God cares about it!

But if you really love X wouldn’t you give her what she would enjoy most

My anaology is very far from perfect, since I compared the creation of the universe to giving someone cake All I meant to show was that many actions could be in concert with love without being contrary to love. And that God had more than one option available to Him (with regards creation) that would be in concert with love.

Let me try another (no doubt flawed) analogy: As an artist I aim to create a beautiful picture. And I face a choice: do I paint the tree here or there? Both equally fulfill the aesthetic conditions, neither contravene the end beauty of the picture, so there is genuine uncoerced choice. But the choice is not arbitrary as I can provide good artistic reasons for placing it here, or there. Is this any better

I don’t see how you can say know, or how you can conceive of God introducing true randomness in to a universe entirely made and maintained by Him.

I agree that your argument is strong, that it is dificult, and that I really cant give you the kind of clear answer you’re looking for. Remember, I’m just a nobody. But I still fail (my problem, I’m sure) to see why God cannot introduce randomness or self-limitation if He wants to. He creates a system where time runs only in one direction, where physical laws have bounded probable outcomes but not definite ones, where creatures have self-determining and self-actualising powers of free choice, and where the future is an undetermined realm of possibilities rather than a realm of predetermined events, and He removes the ability to change the past and limits His ability to interfere with free creatures and the consequences of their actions. Why is this impossible to God?

[Michael]

1.) I don’t believe there’s any evidence that Einstein was an atheist (I think he was more of a Panentheist, or maybe a Pantheist.)

2.) Science deals in math and experimentation, and scientists aren’t qualified to draw Philosophical inferences from their work.

Quantum Physicists shouldn’t be taken to mean what they seem to be saying (Philosophically), because they’re speaking Philosophical nonsense.

It’s Philosophically nonsensical to speak of God creating a square circle, an object too heavy for Him to move, a being greater than He is, or particles that slip in and out of existence without His involvement.
**
And it’s Philosophically nonsensical to speak of Him causing a causal series of events so complicated that He can’t follow it**.

3.) These modern scientists are standing on Einstein’s shoulders, building on his work.

So even in speaking of the science, and the math (which I don’t pretend to understand), it’s extremely arrogant of them to suggest that their work is complete, and there isn’t anything to discover that they haven’t discovered.

He creates a system where time runs only in one direction

Not according to some of the quantum physicists you’re fond of quoting.

closertotruth.com/video-profile/Is-Time-Travel-Possible-Michio-Kaku-/385

Which brings me to something you said about Padre Pio.

Yes, and I disagree with him. It seems obvious to me that God can’t/won’t alter the past. If he could then he already would have, wouldn’t he? If he truly was loving, then every time someone did something that went against his will or led to evil and suffering He would rewind, rinse and repeat…

No.

If anything valuable can be learned (or must be learned) from such things, God wouldn’t change everything.

And we wouldn’t know of anything He changed, because anything He changed would be the past, and it would already be past for anyone here in the present.

where physical laws have bounded probable outcomes but not definite ones,

I’m not sure what you mean by this.

It isn’t probable, it’s certain (barring Divine intervention) that an object dropped from a plan within earth’s gravitational field will fall to earth.

If particles of light encounter a mirror, it’s certain (not probable) that a certain number of them will pass thru the mirror, and a certain number will go around the mirror–and though it may be humanly impossible to predict which particles will go thru, and which particles will go around, I don’t see how you or your sources have shown that God doesn’t determine that, so I don’t see what you mean by "where physical laws have bounded probable outcomes but not definite ones."

where creatures have self-determining and self-actualising powers of free choice

Now I think you’re saying that God has given creatures libertarian freewill, and if that’s true He would have it Himself, and He could decide which particles go thru and around the mirror anytime quantum physicists conduct their experiments without having any particular reason (and that would answer a lot of my questions–but I still have difficulty with the concept of libertarian freewill.)

and where the future is an undetermined realm of possibilities rather than a realm of predetermined events

If you add libertarian freewill to the equation, some future events would be undetermined by God, but I don’t believe they’d be unknown to Him.

The future might be an unbounded field of possibilities and probabilities for us, but I believe it would be known to Him (and if you believe that God has predicted the rise and fall of empires, and the freewill actions of individuals, it would seem it has to be.)

and He removes the ability to change the past and limits His ability to interfere with free creatures and the consequences of their actions.

If that’s true, how could UR be more than a possibility, probability, or hope?

Why does God have to move them around? Why can’t He just create a system that has limited statistical chaos in it - and then, should He wish, intervene in that system when He wants to?

Let’s take a simple system like a table, some walnut shells, and a pea.

I could see God playing a shell game on some human scientists trying to measure the speed and location of sub-atomic particles, but I can’t see Him playing one on Himself, and I can’t see the system of table, shells, and pea doing things all on their own.

But it seems to me that one of the last two alternatives is exactly what you and the quantum physicists you quote are suggesting, and I think Lewis would (rightly) view that as Philosophical nonsense.

Where does this “chaos,” “randomness,” and “unpredictability” come from?

And how could God introduce it into the system of Nature (even if He wanted to)?

In other words, why did you never answer this question?

If you say God could flip a coin, wouldn’t He have to make the coin, create the space and air the coin would travel thru, create a surface for the coin to land on, and create and maintain the forces that would cause it to land tails up or face up?

In other words, wouldn’t He have to in effect make the choice before He flipped the coin?

Those are the questions that neither you or your sources have answered (to the best of my observation.)

[pog]

1.) I don’t believe there’s any evidence that Einstein was an atheist (I think he was more of a Panentheist, or maybe a Pantheist.)

You are correct. I was wrong to label Einstein an atheist - especially since he hated being called one! According to his wiki page Einstein described himself as an agnostic. He thought that the personal God of theism was silly and the bible childish, and it seems that the God he didn’t know existed or not was more akin to the deity of Spinoza or Plato. Perhaps he is better classed as an anti-theist agnostic Platonist!

The reason I noted (incorrectly) his religious worldview was to draw attention to what seemed an inconsistency on your part: you seem to dismiss scientists’ opinions if they are not theists (ie Chad Orzel) yet favour Einstein’s determinism even though he was anti-theistic in the face of the opinion of scientists who are also Christian theists (like Polkinghorne). Something doesn’t seem to add up here.

2.) Science deals in math and experimentation, and scientists aren’t qualified to draw Philosophical inferences from their work.

That’s too harsh. Surely they can draw whatever inferences they want to. Doesn’t mean their opinions are correct, but they have as much right to draw inferences as everyone else. Or would you limit such inferences only to professional philosophers? But in that case why would they have a right to comment on science they knew nothing about? Or is comment to be restricted to only quantum physicists who are also philosophers of science and religion and who are also theologians? Where does that leave me? Where does that leave you?

It’s Philosophically nonsensical to speak of God creating a square circle, an object too heavy for Him to move, a being greater than He is, or particles that slip in and out of existence without His involvement.

The nonsense of a square-circle seems to be a different order of nonsense - self-contradictory on a semantic level. Having particles appear without God’s help is not so *prima facie *obviously self-contradictory. Besides, I was really talking about indeterminancy about particle behaviour, not really expanding it to cover fluctutions in the quantum vacuum - whatever that is all about!

I think it unfair to compare square-circles to modern quantum science, not least because almost everyone (I think some theologians are different) believe square-circles are silly, but almost noone (philosophers or scientists) that I’ve come across thinks quantum physics is nonsense. Other than C S Lewis, who else would you quote? Even if one disagrees I think it somewhat overdone to refer to their theories as ‘nonsense’.

David Wilkinson, scientist and theologian, writes “The philosophical questions remain unanswered but the success of quantum theory does have profound implications for our view of science … It reminds us of the limits of our imagination. To view the world as a rigid clockwork mechanism does not describe the world as it is. It reminds us to be very hesitant to say that something cannot possibly happen” (God, The Big Bang, and Stephen Hawking).

And it’s Philosophically nonsensical to speak of Him causing a causal series of events so complicated that He can’t follow it.

As I said before, complexity has got nothing to do with it. It’s not that something is too complex for God to understand (who has ever said that?). Rather, it’s that God has created a truely free system, has created truely free beings, and has limited Himself (by His own volition).

3.) These modern scientists are standing on Einstein’s shoulders, building on his work.

True, in part - all science is collaborative and cumulative. But although Einstein was part of the initial quantum revolution he soon was isolated and it was left to other geniuses to develop the field. Max Born wrote of Einstein, “He has seen more clearly than anyone before him the statistical background of the laws of physics, and he was a pioneer in the struggle of conquering the wilderness of quantum phenomena. Yet later, when out of his own work a synthesis of statistical and quantum principles emerged which seemed acceptable to almost all physicists he kept himself aloof and sceptical. Many of us regard this as a tragedy.”

Einstein was a great physicist, but he was not infallible, nor was he the last word on quantum mechanics.

So even in speaking of the science, and the math (which I don’t pretend to understand), it’s extremely arrogant of them to suggest that their work is complete, and there isn’t anything to discover that they haven’t discovered.

Who says that? No one says that there isn’t more to be discovered or that all the work is complete. All acknowledge the possibility of being wrong, the need for more investigation, the ongoing nature of the scientific enterprise. I don’t know what you’re getting at here. The majority of physicists in the field accept an indeterminate strata to reality. How does this equate to arrogance?

Not according to some of the quantum physicists you’re fond of quoting.

Absolutely. Some scientists believe time travel is possible, some don’t. I’m not sure where the majority lean, or if there’s consensus. I don’t believe that it’s possible. More importantly I don’t believe God can or will or has altered the past, but I believe that on non-scientific grounds. Also, the reason I quote so much is that you asked for expert opinion on this issue - I’m giving you names and books to read

If anything valuable can be learned (or must be learned) from such things, God wouldn’t change everything. And we wouldn’t know of anything He changed, because anything He changed would be the past, and it would already be past for anyone here in the present.

You’re right, of course. If God has/had changed the past then we could never know - it is something that is untestable, unknowable, unprovable.

But I still rejest it for ethical and theological reasons.

You say that if we had something valuable to learn from an event then God, whose nature is love, wouldn’t change it or remove it from history. But think what this implies. It means that every single event ever has occurred because God wanted it to and that He thought *it was for our benefit *and that no other posible outcome would have been better (or He would have kept rewinding until He got the one He wanted). In other words, this is the best of all possible worlds! And instantly we’re hit by Dr Pangloss and Ivan Karamazov. Consider the immense amount of animal pain over millions of years - what did that dying deer or extinct dinosaur learn from this gracious lesson? Consider the huge number of terminated foetuses and dead infants - what did they learn from all this? A God who uses such teaching methods is a monster.

And it gets worse. For changing the past doesn’t *actually solve anything *- for the pain still happened! I have a headache - I’m feeling it know. Even if God rewinds time and changes the past I will still have felt it now, even though no one will know. The pain I’m feeling now is real - even if the past changes it is still happening to me now. If God keeps rewinding when something goes against His will then all He is doing is multiplying the suffering! and also consider that although we will never know the alternative histories that have existed, God will. He will still have all the memory of all that hurt - He will forever know of suffering that to our mind never occurred. Poor God!

And consider what history-alteration does to our freewill. I can never be sure that my choices have any real consequences - God can always change it without me ever being able to know. How do I know that there’s even such thing as cause and effect? And why should I pray if everything is going to work out exactly as God wants it to anyway? So, when faced with suffering, one shouldn’t pray, one should simply thank God for His great lesson. And what does sucha view do with the bible: When Jesus prayed ‘If there be any other way’ well there was another way - why did God not do it? And when God regretted making man why cause a flood when He could have just pressed the rewind button?

It isn’t probable, it’s certain (barring Divine intervention) that an object dropped from a plan within earth’s gravitational field will fall to earth.

Yes. But that’s Newtonian physics not quantum physics. I don’t think anyone’s been able to solve the micro- macro- scale problem of quantum stuff. But I’m no quantum physicist! Remember, all I’m arguing for here is the possibility that the scientists might have got it right - that’s all (I’m not wedded to quantum indeterminism - indeed it is very much an ongoing debate and Einstein might be proved right after all).

If particles of light encounter a mirror, it’s certain (not probable) that a certain number of them will pass thru the mirror, and a certain number will go around the mirror–and though it may be humanly impossible to predict which particles will go thru, and which particles will go around, I don’t see how you or your sources have shown that God doesn’t determine that, so I don’t see what you mean by “where physical laws have bounded probable outcomes but not definite ones.”

That is not what the scientists are themselves saying. It’s not that we simply cammot measure - it’s that it is always undetermined - it’s probabilistic. Do I understand this? No, I’m not a quantum physicist. And I certainly can’t be expected to either learn quantum physics or copy whole physics texts in order to give you a complete account of the phenomena! I suggest that you learn quantum mechanics if you want to argue this on a scientific level I have no idea. Maybe a science forum would be the best place to go for answers on this topic?

Now I think you’re saying that God has given creatures libertarian freewill, and if that’s true He would have it Himself, and He could decide which particles go thru and around the mirror anytime quantum physicists conduct their experiments

God could decide which particles do whatever - I guess He could decide to turn all the particles into pink hippos if He wanted to. But I reject the idea that libertarian freedom and God’s freedom mean He would make that choice without good reason, and I also reject that God *has to intervene *to choose which particles do what - His system is good enough to work on its own (this reminds me of design arguments).

If you add libertarian freewill to the equation, some future events would be undetermined by God, but I don’t believe they’d be unknown to Him.

But they could be unknwon to Him - open theism is a philosophically and biblically robust theory. and I prfer it for many reasons. Firstly, God’s foreknowledge would seem to undermine libertarian freedom. I can choose A or B. God knows which I will choose. Can I choose the other one and make God wrong? If not, then in what way am I really free to choose either?

The future might be an unbounded field of possibilities and probabilities for us, but I believe it would be known to Him (and if you believe that God has predicted the rise and fall of empires, and the freewill actions of individuals, it would seem it has to be.)

Not if open theism is correct. Prophecy can be explained in different ways that are compatible with open theism (I suggest Greg Boyd’s God of the Possible) - I take a mixed approach that draws on notions of conditional prophecy and God’s control over events rather than His foreknowledge. Example: God declares that Babylon will smash the Jews. Is that a predetermined event, does God know the future and is simply recounting it - or is it (as I prefer) that God is going to make that happen (or that he’ll permit it to happen) if the Jews don’t repent. When Jonah went with God’s message of destruction to the Ninivites was that a future set in stone or did God change His mind when they repented?

If that’s true, how could UR be more than a possibility, probability, or hope?

There are multiple possible answrs to this. One is that God over-rides freewill at a certain point (I disagree). Another is that simply given enough time all beings will chose Him. I prefer the idea that fully rational beings when faced with the full knowledge of God’s love as manifest in Christ will be unable to not love God (note, there isn’t a choice for God - I don’t like that talk of a freechoice for God, belief is not a choice it’s a state of being), not because of coercion or loss of freedom, but rather with *full persuasion *(in the same way that when one understands that 2+2=4 one can never not believe it or act sincerely and rationally contrary to that knowledge - to know is to understand is to believe) - and persuasion and belief do not remove freedom (I am subject to many influences, beliefs, and am persuaded of many things but still consider myself a freewilled being). I refer to this as epistemic collapse - the veil between God and man is removed, the epistemic distance is collapsed and man believes and accepts God by being persuaded that God is good.

But it seems to me that one of the last two alternatives is exactly what you and the quantum physicists you quote are suggesting, and I think Lewis would (rightly) view that as Philosophical nonsense.

It is not philosophical nonsense! They might be wrong, but they (the scientists, philosophers and theologians) are not being nonsensical. I’m not sure that C S Lewis really was at the forefront of cutting edge quantum physics (or philosophy - he was an English specialist).

Keith Ward, respected Christian theologian and philosopher, writes “What is needed here is a clear distinction between intelligibility and determinism. A process can be wholly intelligible without being deterministic. In fact, it may be a condition of thehighest sort of intelligibility that processes are non-deterministic … Many philosophers … say that in order to be intelligible some processes actually rule out determinism … The theory of cosmic evolution encourages us to think of the story of the expanding universe as the development of new and richer forms of beauty and wisdom, strictly unpredictable from their antecedents, but always remaining within the basic parameters of fundamental physical constants … It is a logical entailment of finite free creativity that many states exist that God does not intend” (God, Faith and the New Millennium).

Where does this “chaos,” “randomness,” and “unpredictability” come from? And how could God introduce it into the system of Nature (even if He wanted to)?

What, is anything impossible to God? If God wanted a chaotic system why could not have a chaotic system? If God wanted free creatures, if He wanted a free universe, if He wanted to limit His own interventions or capabilities or bind Himself to time - why couldn’t He?

In other words, why did you never answer this question?

I thought I had, sorry. Let’s just pretend that the mainstream scientific view is right (again, I’m not arging for it - I just think it’s a reasnoble possibility). God freely chooses to create a universe which has the capability to unfold without intervention, and where genuine randomness exists - that is to say on some quantum level the behaviour of some objects, like sub-atomic particles, is not strictly deterministic but rather probabilistic - ie there is a 50/50 chance it’ll be particle A or B but that no preceeding event affects that and it is therefore unknowable. God has created a universe that throws dice. Now, I’m not sure how that works - and my brain has evolved to only be able to cope with macro-level Newtonian stuff with simple cause and effect - but I don’t see why my imaginative and biological limits should prevent brighter people, and more especially God, understanding how this works in detail. What exactly is the problem here?

Those are the questions that neither you or your sources have answered (to the best of my observation.)

Wow - did you read all those books and listen to all those Faraday lectures already!
There’s some more lectures from the Faraday Institute with such great titles as: Brain, Mind and Free-Will: Did my neurons make me do it?; A Philosophical Perspective on Free Will; Theology and Physics; Science and Religion in the Writings of C. S. Lewis; Mind and Matter: The World as ‘Representation’ in Quantum Theory; Physics and Faith; Lemaitre, the Big Bang and the Quantum Universe; The Necessity of Chance: Randomness, Purpose and the Sovereignty of God; Does quantum mechanics have any relevance for religious belief?; Quantum Cosmology and Its Implications for Theology; Dialogue: Can God Know the Future? Reflections on the Block Universe; Quantum Theory, Critical Realism and Religious Belief … and loads more!

Regardless, I’m pretty sure we’ve wandered far from your OP! We’ve got side-tracked onto quantum randomness, but that seems somewhat tangential to the main point which seems to be freewill! I’m not sure that I care too much whether the universe has a non-deterministic level or not, so long as beings have freewill.

So, for the sake of argument, let’s say that the universe is strictly deterministic in the physical. Are we agreed that beings (like humans) have freewill? If so, I’m not quite sure what the problem is.

[Michael]

Thank you Pog.

I’ll post more later, but (for now) I’d like to ask just one question.

Are we agreed that it’s Philosophically nonsensical to speak of particles popping in and out of existence of their own accord?

I mean if anything could pop into existence without a Creator, creation itself would be no evidence of a Creator (and you’d have to be just as agnostic as you say Einstein was, wouldn’t you?)

[pog]

Are we agreed that it’s Philosophically nonsensical to speak of particles popping in and out of existence of their own accord??)

My gut reaction would be yes, nothing can come from nothing - and I don’t believe there has ever been nothing since God has always been. I don’t see that nothing has ever been a real state of affairs - for if there was nothing then we’d still and always have nothing and thus we wouldn’t be having this discussion!

Though, as far as I understand it, when physicists talk of sub-atomic particles appearing out of nothing they don’t, by their own detailed explanations, mean literally nothing in a philosophical or common-sensical manner. As William Lane Craig keeps pointing out in his debates, by nothing the physicists really mean something arising out of the immaterial (but definitely not nothing) energy filled, lawful quantum vacuum. I don’t think that anyone really speaks of something coming out of nothing (but maybe I’m wrong on this) - I think all start with at least a mathematical realm of physical forces.

[Michael]

My gut reaction would be yes, nothing can come from nothing - and I don’t believe there has ever been nothing since God has always been. I don’t see that nothing has ever been a real state of affairs - for if there was nothing then we’d still and always have nothing and thus we wouldn’t be having this discussion!

I think you’re using your logic more than your gut there (and I don’t think anything in quantum physics, or anything inferences quantum Physicists might attempt to draw from their work could alter the validity of your observation.)

Though, as far as I understand it, when physicists talk of sub-atomic particles appearing out of nothing they don’t, by their own detailed explanations, mean literally nothing in a philosophical or common-sensical manner.

I’ve seen them speak as though they mean sub-atomic particles literally pop in and out of existence, but I’ve always assumed (like Lewis) that they couldn’t really mean what they seemed to be saying.

As William Lane Craig keeps pointing out in his debates, by nothing the physicists really mean something arising out of the immaterial (but definitely not nothing) energy filled, lawful quantum vacuum.

So Craig (the Philosopher) still has to explain what the new scientists Lewis spoke of “really mean” when they seem to be saying something else.

Interesting.

It doesn’t seem like much has changed since Lewis wrote what I quoted.

"Those who like myself have had a philosophical rather than a scientific education find it almost impossible to believe that the the scientists really mean what they seem to be saying. I cannot help thinking they mean no more than that the movements of individual units are permanently incalculable to us, not that they are in themselves random and lawless."

William Lane Craig (like Lewis) has had a Philosophical education, and you yourself have quoted him to explain what these scientists really mean, so it seems to me that that quote has stood the test of time.

If you agree that it’s Philosophically nonsensical to speak of particles popping in and out of existence of their own accord, would you also agree that it’s Philosophically nonsensical to speak of mindless particles doing things of their own accord?

I mean moving, changing direction, changing velocity, doing the humanly unexpected while under human observation, without God directly causing them to do these things, or any humanly (as of yet) undiscovered law or force that God created causing them to do these things?

Can you put aside your respect for these scientists long enough to consider whether it’s as philosophically nonsensical to speak of mindless particles moving without a moving mind or force as it is to speak of them popping into existence without a Creator?

What, is anything impossible to God?

Lewis, Aquinas, Agustine, William Lane Craig, Tom Talbott, and (as far as I know) every other Christian Philosopher who has ever given the matter any thought has come to the conclusion that anything that is possible is possible for God, but it is impossible for Him to do anything self-contradictory, or anything that would constitute a logical incongruity.

If God wanted a chaotic system why could He not have a chaotic system? If God wanted free creatures, if He wanted a free universe, if He wanted to limit His own interventions or capabilities or bind Himself to time - why couldn’t He?

Back to the simple analogy of tossing a coin.

If you say God could flip a coin, wouldn’t He have to make the coin, create the space and air the coin would travel thru, create a surface for the coin to land on, and create and maintain the forces that would cause it to land tails up or face up?
**
In other words, wouldn’t He have to in effect choose whether the coin was gonna land heads up or tails up before He flipped it?**

Are you suggesting that God kidds Himself into thinking He has a chaotic system because He wants one?

That He somehow blinds Himself to having in effect made the choice of how the coin would land before He tossed it?

Are you suggesting that neither God, or any derivative second cause created by God, would have to set the coin in motion, or stop it’s motion (causing it to land one way or the other)?

Are you suggesting it would not be a logical incongruity to say that God could create a universe where mindless coins just toss themselves, and land however they (mindless though they are) want?

You’re good at quoting scientists who are trying to make philosophical statements (that I don’t believe stand up to logical analysis anymore now than they did when C.S. Lewis was alive), and perhaps one or two chaps trying to wear both hats (and letting the science skew their judgement) , but can you (or they) explain how it’s any less of a logical incongruity to suggest that God can create inanimate particles capable of moving of their own accord, in ways uncontrolled and undesigned by Him, and surprising to Him, than it would be to say that these particles just pop into existence of their own accord?

If you can accept the one, why not the other?

And what need is there for God?

If the basic building blocks of the universe can just pop in and out of existence, and do their own thing, why couldn’t the whole universe?

Do you not yet see any logical or philosophical absurdity in any of the things your scientific sources seem to say (or why a philosopher like Lewis or Craig might have reason to think they must really mean something else)?

Take another look at what Lewis said here.

“Those who like myself have had a philosophical rather than a scientific education find it almost impossible to believe that the the scientists really mean what they seem to be saying. I cannot help thinking they mean no more than that the movements of individual units are permanently incalculable to us, not that they are in themselves random and lawless.”

If these sub-atomic particles (that Lewis referred to as individual units) really are “in themselves random and lawless,” aren’t you suggesting that mindless things can move and stop without a mover, without a reason, and without a Cause?

And how is science at all relevant here?

Math and experimentation (at best) can only tell us how these particles behave under human observation (using our best instruments), it cannot tell us why they behave as they do (or dogmatically assert they behave as they do for no reason.)

How is that any less logically incongruous than saying they could pop in and out of existence without a cause?

If that’s true, how could UR be more than a possibility, probability, or hope?

There are multiple possible answers to this. One is that God over-rides freewill at a certain point (I disagree). Another is that simply given enough time all beings will chose Him. I prefer the idea that fully rational beings when faced with the full knowledge of God’s love as manifest in Christ will be unable to not love God…

If you didn’t disagree with the first possible answer, you wouldn’t believe in any kind of freewill, but if you believe either that “simply given enough time all beings will chose Him,” or (as you say you prefer) that “fully rational beings when faced with the full knowledge of God’s love as manifest in Christ will be unable to not love God,” I think you’re more of a compatibilist than a believer in libertarian freewill.

Are we agreed that beings (like humans) have freewill?

If you mean libertarian freewill, I don’t know.

This is from another thread on that topic.

Unless we possess libertarian free will, we are not responsible for our actions. For we couldn’t have done otherwise. So where would be the justice in punishing the thief, the murderer, the torturer, etc. etc. etc.?

I guess that would depend on whether you see the purpose of punishment as remedial or vindictive.

If it’s remedial, the thief could perhaps learn something by having his possessions taken from him, and the torturer could perhaps learn something from being tortured (and if there’s life after death, the murderer could perhaps learn something by having his mortal life prematurely taken from him by execution.)

If you choose chicken over steak, it’s either because you like chicken better than steak, or because you think it’s better for you.

Liking chicken better than steak is an influence on you, but not a CAUSE of your choice.
Thinking chicken is better for you is likewise an influence, but not a CAUSE of your choice.

But here’s the heart of the matter. Say you did choose chicken over steak for whatever reason. Could you have chosen steak instead?
You mean could you choose steak over chicken while hating the taste of it, believing it was bad for you, proffering chicken, and viewing chicken as the more healthful choice?

I don’t see how a “free” agent could do that unless they had some reason (like winning a bet, or letting someone else have the chicken when there wasn’t enough to go around.)

There’s a reason most universalists are compatibilists who believe in remedial punishment.

If it’s possible for a rational agent to choose steak over chicken while hating the taste of it, believing it’s bad for him, proffering chicken, and viewing chicken as the more healthful choice (in other words, for no reason), wouldn’t it be possible for men and angels to choose sin, and evil, and eternal torment over heaven?

If your answer is “yes” then you are neither a determinist nor a compatibilist. You believe in libertarian free will.You believe that you yourself are the cause of your action.

Not necessarily.

Even if you didn’t like steak, and you didn’t think it was particularly healthful, there could be other reasons for choosing it.

(like trying to please someone you love, or get them to eat.)

But if you say you could choose something for absolutely no reason, than I guess you believe in libertarian freewill.

[Is compatibilism campatible with the existence of God?)

[Paidion]

If your answer is “yes” then you are neither a determinist nor a compatibilist. You believe in libertarian free will.You believe that you yourself are the cause of your action.

Not necessarily.

Even if you didn’t like steak, and you didn’t think it was particularly healthful, there could be other reasons for choosing it.

( like trying to please someone you love, or get them to eat,)

But if you say you could choose something for absolutely no reason, than I guess you believe in libertarian freewill.

I don’t say that there would be absolutely no reason. But if I give the reason, then you will simply say that that reason is what determined my choice. However these “reasons” do not CAUSE my action. I, myself, cause my action.

So the man who steals a bicycle could have refrained from stealing it. If not, how can we hold him responsible for the theft?

It is hard to believe that some people, who themselves have the ability to choose, believe that no one has that ability. It’s a little bit like people who have good eyesight claiming that they cannot see.

[Paidion]

Here is a short article from Wikipedia which describes Robert Kane’s position concerning libertarian freedom:

Robert Kane

Kane is one of the leading contemporary philosophers on free will. Advocating what is termed within philosophical circles “libertarian freedom”, Kane argues that “(1) the existence of alternative possibilities (or the agent’s power to do otherwise) is a necessary condition for acting freely, and that (2) determinism is not compatible with alternative possibilities (it precludes the power to do otherwise)”. It is important to note that the crux of Kane’s position is grounded not in a defense of alternative possibilities (AP) but in the notion of what Kane refers to as ultimate responsibility (UR). Thus, AP is a necessary but insufficient criterion for free will. It is necessary that there be (metaphysically) real alternatives for our actions, but that is not enough; our actions could be random without being in our control. The control is found in “ultimate responsibility”.

Ultimate responsibility entails that agents must be the ultimate creators (or originators) and sustainers of their own ends and purposes. There must be more than one way for a person’s life to turn out (AP). More importantly, whichever way it turns out must be based in the person’s willing actions. As Kane defines it,

UR: An agent is ultimately responsible for some (event or state) E’s occurring only if ® the agent is personally responsible for E’s occurring in a sense which entails that something the agent voluntarily (or willingly) did or omitted either was, or causally contributed to, E’s occurrence and made a difference to whether or not E occurred; and (U) for every X and Y (where X and Y represent occurrences of events and/or states) if the agent is personally responsible for X and if Y is an arche (sufficient condition, cause or motive) for X, then the agent must also be personally responsible for Y.

In short, “an agent must be responsible for anything that is a sufficient reason (condition, cause or motive) for the action’s occurring.”

What allows for ultimacy of creation in Kane’s picture are what he refers to as “self-forming actions” or SFAs — those moments of indecision during which people experience conflicting wills. These SFAs are the undetermined, regress-stopping voluntary actions or refraining in the life histories of agents that are required for UR. UR does not require that every act done of our own free will be undetermined and thus that, for every act or choice, we could have done otherwise; it requires only that certain of our choices and actions be undetermined (and thus that we could have done otherwise), namely SFAs. These form our character or nature; they inform our future choices, reasons and motivations in action. If a person has had the opportunity to make a character-forming decision (SFA), they are responsible for the actions that are a result of their character.

[Michael]

I don’t say that there would be absolutely no reason. But if I give the reason, then you will simply say that that reason is what determined my choice. However these “reasons” do not CAUSE my action. I, myself, cause my action.

And who are you?

Are you not a product of your heredity, environment, and surrounding circumstances?

And are your choices not governed by who you are, what you know and understand, and what you can foresee of the consequences?

So the man who steals a bicycle could have refrained from stealing it. If not, how can we hold him responsible for the theft?

We could hold him responsible so that he could learn from the consequences.

Are you saying that a man who knew he wouldn’t get two feet without being caught, and that the consequences of stealing the bike would far out way driving it two feet, would still be free to steal the bike?

What would it mean to be “free” to make such a totally irrational choice?

On the other hand, if the man who steals the bike thought he needed it, or was entitled to it, never considered any hardship or inconvenience he might cause the owner, and didn’t know he’d be caught, maybe he couldn’t (at that time, with what he knew and believed) have refrained from stealing the bike (and maybe there’s much he can learn from the consequences, and every reason to hold him responsible.)

I see no contradiction in holding someone who was unable to refrain from some action responsible for the action if he’s able to learn from the “character-forming” consequences.

[pog]

Hi Michael,
this’ll be my last post for a while, what with Christmas looming and all. And I apologise if my posts have made you angry (or if I’ve misread your tone). I think we have reached an impasse and are now arguing against or past each other rather than trying to understand each other, so it’s probably best if I have a break after this anyway.

I’ve seen them speak as though they mean sub-atomic particles literally pop in and out of existence, but I’ve always assumed (like Lewis) that they couldn’t really mean what they seemed to be saying.

No - the issue here is not as you and Lewis are saying that they really mean something else, but rather they’re using the word ‘nothing’ in a different way to its usual sense, in same way specialists in all fields sometimes alter the denotation of terms to suit a more nuanced usage. A simple check up on wikipedia shows that:

“According to present-day understanding of what is called the vacuum state or the quantum vacuum, it is “by no means a simple empty space”,and again: “it is a mistake to think of any physical vacuum as some absolutely empty void.” According to quantum mechanics, the vacuum state is not truly empty but instead contains fleeting electromagnetic waves and particles that pop into and out of existence.”

So I don’t accept a large portion of your post has any relevance, sorry. We’re talking at cross purposes - I tried to communicate that they were using ‘nothing’ in a different way but obviously I failed to make myself clear to you.

If you agree that it’s Philosophically nonsensical to speak of particles popping in and out of existence of their own accord, would you also agree that it’s Philosophically nonsensical to speak of mindless particles doing things of their own accord?

No - mindless particles do things ‘of their own accord’ all the time. I drop a rock - it falls. Who’s is making it travel towards the earth? I know that you know this, so I guess you meant something else when you typed that. But I’m not sure what.

I mean moving, changing direction, changing velocity, doing the humanly unexpected while under human observation, without God directly causing them to do these things, or any humanly (as of yet) undiscovered law or force that God created causing them to do these things?

Not sure what you mean. A particle does X, it may or may not be what we expected - we explain X as best as we can using mathematics etc Some ‘laws’ remain undiscovered, others we’re working on, some we pretty much have down cold.

Can you put aside your respect for these scientists long enough to consider whether it’s as philosophically nonsensical to speak of mindless particles moving without a moving mind or force as it is to speak of them popping into existence without a Creator?

Yes, I can put aside respect (why would I want to?). It is (why say philosophically as if that lends credence to a point?) nonsense to talk of particles popping in and out of existence out of nothing. It is *not nonsense *to talk of mindless, material particles ‘obeying’ physical forces without the constant intervention of mind.

Lewis, Aquinas, Agustine, William Lane Craig, Tom Talbott, and (as far as I know) every other Christian Philosopher who has ever given the matter any thought has come to the conclusion that anything that is possible is possible for God, but it is impossible for Him to do anything self-contradictory, or anything that would constitute a logical incongruity.

Descartes believed this, and Aquinas’ view (along with Mavrodes) - I think - was that God could make a rock so heavy He couldn’t pick it up. There’s various ways of dealing with the omnipotence paradox, and different philosophers and theologians have arrived at differing answers. But I’m not sure of the relevance of this with regards creation, chaos or freewill.

If you say God could flip a coin, wouldn’t He have to make the coin, create the space and air the coin would travel thru, create a surface for the coin to land on, and create and maintain the forces that would cause it to land tails up or face up? In other words, wouldn’t He have to in effect choose whether the coin was gonna land heads up or tails up before He flipped it?

Yes and no. Let’s say He made a spinning coin *ex nihilo *- and made all the surrounding environment. And let’s say He knows everything. He knows, in Newtonian terms, which side the coin will land - so in making it with a certain spin, and in a certain environment He is choosing which side it will land.

So far so good - but when I used that analogy I was trying to relate the coin to non-Newtonian physics. So lets try that:

God makes a special coin where nothing in the environment can change the fact that the coin has a 50/50 chance of landing heads or tails (it’s a quantum coin!). God knows everything there is to know about the environment, the spin of the coin etc - but, by His own choosing, the coin is part of an irreducable probabilisitc system. The only way God can now know which side the coin will land, and therfore the only way God would be said to have specifically chosen it to land that way, is if God’s omniscience covers* knowledge of future events as facts*. As an open theist I reject that any such knowledge is possible - the future is a realm of possibilities which chance and freewilled beings actualise as self-determining agents (or systems), to talk of knowing the future is as nonsensical as talking about knowing how to make a four-sided triangle. If you believe that God’s omnipotence is limited by logic, then I can make the same philosophical move with regards omniscience.

Are you suggesting that God kidds Himself into thinking He has a chaotic system because He wants one?

No. God made a chaotic system 'cause He wanted one (if there is one - again, I’m just arguing that it’s possible - trying to keep an open mind etc).

Are you suggesting it would not be a logical incongruity to say that God could create a universe where mindless coins just toss themselves, and land however they (mindless though they are) want?

No more logically incongrous than a world where rocks fall according to the laws of gravity without God’s direct intervention or guidance.

You’re good at quoting scientists who are trying to make philosophical statements

O.K - I’ll stop. You obviously don’t like quotes (apart from Lewis) even though you asked who the experts were.

I think you’re more of a compatibilist than a believer in libertarian freewill.

I believe both can exist. Some choices I make are free in the libertarian sense; others might not be. I think I can be a libertarian and a universalist. It’s a cool viewpoint that gives me the best of both worlds. I like it.

I’ll leave it there. There’s much more you said that I could respond to, but I have limited time and it seems like it’s getting us nowhere now. I’ve learned a bit from our chat, and you’ve helped me sharpen up my views. Thank you. I hope that I too may have been of some use - I did warn you to start with that I wasn’t an expert and that I couldn’t engage you on the level you wanted. In all seriousness I suggest that you learn quantum theory and discuss these things on a science forum - becuase it’s the only way you’ll really know what the scientists are saying. Similarly, I suggest that you read a selection of the texts or listen to a selection of the lectures I’ve named so that you can beter understand, even if you disagree with, the opposing viewpoint.

Merry Christmas!

[PrototypeAnthroUnit]

I certainly don’t mean to hi-jack this thread and take it off into a completely different direction, but I had a question for pog that related to Open Theism and prophesy. I’m mostly wondering how you see God speaking with any definitive character regarding future events in light of your perspective.

Perhaps this would be a good topic for a new thread, or maybe there’s already a thread about this that I haven’t found yet? If you know about anything, I’d be most interested to hear about it!

Alright, that’s it. Interruption over. Carry on!

[pog]

I think that’s a great topic for another thread, prototypeanthrounit - there’s some passages of scripture I’m quite stuck on and maybe other open theists here can help me out .

The usual answers involve the future being partly open and partly closed, which I guess is simple enough, but I favour totally open but making what he wants to happen happen + conditional prophecy.

I’ll be happy to get involved sometime after Xmas. Have a good holiday!

[Michael]

Hi Michael,
this’ll be my last post for a while, what with Christmas looming and all. And I apologise if my posts have made you angry (or if I’ve misread your tone). I think we have reached an impasse and are now arguing against or past each other rather than trying to understand each other, so it’s probably best if I have a break after this anyway.

I’ve seen them speak as though they mean sub-atomic particles literally pop in and out of existence, but I’ve always assumed (like Lewis) that they couldn’t really mean what they seemed to be saying.

No - the issue here is not as you and Lewis are saying that they really mean something else, but rather they’re using the word ‘nothing’ in a different way to its usual sense, in same way specialists in all fields sometimes alter the denotation of terms to suit a more nuanced usage. A simple check up on wikipedia shows that:

It would take a direct quote from your sources to show that.

I haven’t been involved with wikipedia for a long time, but I’ve been an editor, and if I had the time and inclination (and could remember my old password) I could probably edit the page you’re quoting.

If you want to show that “the issue here is not as you and Lewis are saying that they really mean something else, but rather they’re using the word ‘nothing’ in a different way to its usual sense, in same way specialists in all fields sometimes alter the denotation of terms to suit a more nuanced usage” please provide firsthand quotes.

What Lewis said was that (as a Philosopher) he found it almost impossible to believe the quantum theorists he heard really meant what they seemed to be saying (in regards to movements of sub-atomic particles being totally undirected and ungoverned), and these same quantum theorists certainly (at times) seem to be saying that such particles pop in and out of existence–so even if “they’re using the word ‘nothing’ in a different way to its usual sense,” they mean something quit different from what they would seem to be saying to most of us.

Are you suggesting it would not be a logical incongruity to say that God could create a universe where mindless coins just toss themselves, and land however they (mindless though they are) want?

No more logically incongruous than a world where rocks fall according to the laws of gravity without God’s direct intervention or guidance.

Are you serious?
**
Rocks don’t just fall of their own accord.

They fall according the law of gravity, and we can both agree that there’s nothing logically incongruous about that.

But without gravity, an object at rest will remain at rest, and an object in motion will remain in motion, and rocks don’t fall at all**

But unless you don’t really mean what you seem to be saying, what you’re suggesting is a world where sub-atomic particles move in (both humanly and Divinely) unpredictable ways, without their movements being governed or caused by God or any God-made laws (such as gravity), and that is much more logically incongruous than a world where rocks fall according to the laws of gravity.

You’re suggesting a world where “rocks” (on a sub-atomic level) can fall up or down, without being acted on by any law, for no reason, and of their own accord (if you really mean what you seem to be saying.)

The reason Lewis found it almost impossible to believe that the precursors of the scientists you quote really meant what they seemed to be saying was that he understood that without God there could be no objects, no motion, and no gravity (and no particles could do anything.)

You agree they couldn’t really pop in and out of existence, but don’t seem to see the absurdity of saying that these particles just do their own thing (without being caused to by any minds of their own, or any outside mind, or law, or force.)

I apologise if my posts have made you angry (or if I’ve misread your tone).

I find some of your posts frustrating.

Talking to you is like talking to someone who agrees that an explosion at a typewriter factory couldn’t produce a typewriter, but doesn’t agree that a typewriter couldn’t unpredictably start typing and produce random works of literature without any human input.

What’s more frustrating is that all you’re doing is defending the theories of these quantum physicists you admire, without even trying to make sense (or help anyone else make sense) of what they’re saying.

How do particles that could not exist without God move without Him?

If God moves them (either directly, or thru intermediate laws of His creation and maintenance–and therefore predicable to Him), and He wants them to move without His knowing how or when they will move, how could He conceivably accomplish this?

Returning to the coin analogy, how could God create the coin, set it in motion, create and maintain the space it traveled through, create the surface it would land on, and create and maintain all the forces that would act upon it and cause it to land either heads up or tails up, without knowing (before He set the coin in motion) how it would land?

How could He cause a given 50% of given particles to go one way, and the other 50% to go the other way, without either directly choosing which particles would go each way, or creating and maintaining some (as yet undiscovered law) that determines which particles go which way?

Are you (or your sources) saying the particles act on their own, like rocks deciding when, if, and whether to fall without being caused to fall by God, man, or gravity?

Because that is what you seem to be saying, and it is (imo) philosophically absurd.

You may be up on the science, but you seem to be intentionally avoiding the real philosophical difficulty here (and I find it almost impossible to believe you don’t see it.)

Would you please try to say something (or quote someone who has said something) that’s relevant to the question?

How could even God design chaos?

How could He make (or create laws that make) sub-atomic particles do things that they aren’t caused to do (i.e. that are truly indeterminate)?
**
Isn’t that the very definition of a contradiction in terms?**

[Paidion]

My position is that free-will actions are NOT random (whatever “random” means. I think what we call “random” are actually events which we cannot yet explain.)

Like determinists, I believe that all events are caused. However, not all events are caused by other events. Many of them are caused by free-will agents (including God).

[Michael]

An interesting comment from the other forum.

When you allow the supernatural anything is possible. God could say, “Let there be a little black box out of which random particles appear.” He wouldn’t need to know the mechanism. There is no mechanism. It’s just his supernatural will. And if he wills it to be random it is random. He knows what comes out just because he sees all time.

Isn’t this basically what he does when he creates souls/libertarian-free-wills? There isn’t a mechanism or formula that determines at the moment of its creation that a particular soul/LFW will be good or bad, is there? Isn’t each LFW a little random decision generator as far as God knows?

To Pog and Paidion:

I can’t understand that, but is that what you’re saying?

P.S. The part I have a problem with is “He wouldn’t need to know the mechanism. There is no mechanism. It’s just his supernatural will. And if he wills it to be random it is random.”

I just posted this reply.

And neither He or the secondary cause (i.e. the little black box) would create the particles, or determine their behavior–they’d just come into existence and start doing things all on their own because God willed it?

Isn’t saying that these particles could come into existence on their own (i.e. just appear out of the little black box), and do things on their own (i.e. behave indeterministically), and (at the same time) saying that this could be so because God wills it a contradiction in terms?

Aren’t you saying both that the mechanism of their existence and behavior is God’s will, and that there is no mechanism?

If I forget about there being no table, and no laws of gravity, or friction, or motion without God, I can imagine Him blindfolding Himself and letting the dice roll, but once I remember that He’s supposed to be the source of all, I tend to come to the conclusion that the dice would do nothing unless He willed them to.

So I ask myself how God’s will (or secondary deterministic causes that exist only because of God’s will) could cause the dice to move, and come to rest in a certain position, without God being fully aware of how they would move and where they would come to rest?

Any thoughts?

[pog]

Hi Michael.
I notice that you’ve started at least four threads on this website that pertain to this issue and that you are also discussing the same topic on other websites. You have made many posts, often quite complex ones, and posted even on Christmas Day. Clearly, this issue is one that you find deeply troubling, that you have no clear answer to, and which, I suspect, you have a deep personal motivation for pressing on with. I wish I could help, but I really don’t think that either I, or anyone else, will be able to give you the kind of clarity and perfect answers you seek.

These threads have raised issues concerning: the nature of free will; the freedom of God; the origin of the universe and the cosmological argument; the intelligibility of quantum physics and the principle of indeterminancy; the relation between libertarian freewill and universalism; open theism; the attributes of God and their relation to causality, universalism and biblical prophecy; the relationship of God and free agents to time; and determinism and moral accountability. As far as I know, no one, no scientist, philosopher or theologian, has ever been able to present a convincing and total answer to these topics - there is no position that anyone has taken that has not been argued against or rebutted by other equally intelligent and educated professionals. I fear that the best anyone can hope for on these topics is to reach a tentative and reasoned position that accepts the fact that others might have differing, but no less reasnoble and tentative positions. Consensus is simply not going to happen - we simply don’t know enough about the true nature of reality.

I find some of your posts frustrating. Talking to you is like talking to someone who agrees that an explosion at a typewriter factory couldn’t produce a typewriter, but doesn’t agree that a typewriter couldn’t unpredictably start typing and produce random works of literature without any human input.

Yes, it is frustrating And, actually, I think you’ve represented me (or at least the science I’m saying I find possible) accurately - and I know that it goes totally against our common sense and intuitions - but that is what the majority of quantum scientists do seem to be saying - *and meaning *- and what a large number of eminent philosophers and theologians accept as being a good, or at least plausible, description of reality. Quantum weirdness is called quantum weirdness for a reason! And I am saying that I think such a view is possibly right. I guess you think that makes me mad I don’t find the view nonsense, merely confusing.

To help you sympathetically understand this point of view maybe we could reverse roles and you could answer a few of my questions to take the discussion on:

Situation: State of affairs x leads to state of affairs y. Is it possible that there exists a probabilistic casual relation between x and y? In other words, is it possible that x caused y but might not have?
A1) Yes; in which case you agree with me that probabilistic causality is not nonsense.
A2) No, because there is no causality. This is a radical move and I would like you to explain your view further.
A3) No, because all states of affairs are caused by the choices of free agents. Again, this is a radical move and I would like you to explain this viewpoint.
A4) No, because all causal relations are deterministic. See questions under P1.
A5) No, because all causal relations are either deterministic or the choices of free agents. See questions under P2.

P1: All causal relations are deterministic.
Q1) This goes against the universal subjective experience of free choice. What argument can you forward that is strong enough to overturn the universal experience of freedom?
Q2) Without the freedom to choose otherwise no agent can be considered morally culpable for any action. How do you avoid the conclusion of moral nihilism?
Q3) Without freedom how is God a maximally perfect being?
Q4) How can you explain the huge biblical emphasis upon choice?
Q5) What is the point and purpose of prayer? What is the point and purpose of evangelism?
Q6) How does God escape the blame for actualising a universe that He knew would lead to all the suffering of history? How is God not a monster?
Q7) If God is a necessary being, but is without freedom, then must we conclude that everything is also necessary for it could not have been otherwise? Are there no contingencies at all?
Q8) If all things are deterministic then with omniscience there can be no pleasant surprises and no novelty and no growth in knowledge. Do we therefore experience pleasures God cannot?
Q9) Without freedom how am I anything more than a puppet and how is history anything more than a scripted stage show that God watches whilst all the time knowing the end? And if God knows it all anyway, why bother running through the show – why not just jump straight to the end point and cut out the intervening suffering – what is the point of earth if heaven is the goal?
Q10) Is this, then, the best of all possible worlds? How then do you explain that it seems obvious to me that even a simple change could make the world better?

P2: All causal relations are either deterministic or the choice of free agents.
Q1) Is God the only free agent?
Q2) If God is the only free agent, what has prevented Him from endowing creatures with a quality He Himself possesses?
Q3) If humans are free agents then is God also free, or do we have an excellence that God does not possess?
Q4) If a free agent chooses x instead of y what is the originating cause of x – is it the creature’s will or is it something else? Could you explain how this works?
Q5) Is nature aside from free agents deterministic? What grounds this form of causality; was it chosen by God? Was God free to chose another form or system of causality? What prevented God from establishing randomness as a causal factor?
Q6) If nature is deterministic then how are humans free? Is there a part of human agents that is not subject to natural, deterministic laws? What is this part and where does it come from?
Q7) If humans have a non-physical aspect that stands in causal relation to physical systems how does this non-physical element interact with the physical world: what is the solution to the mind-body problem?
Q8) What caused the first cause? Is there a state of affairs or agent that is uncaused and undetermined by a preceding state of affairs or free choice? Is it possible for something or someone to exist that stands in neither a deterministic or free choice causal relationship to other states of affairs?

[Paidion]

[size=130]Early Christian Writers Who Affirmed Free Will[/size]

100-165 AD : Justin Martyr
“We have learned from the prophets, and we hold it to be true, that punishments, chastisements, and rewards are rendered according to the merit of each man’s actions. Otherwise, if all things happen by fate, then nothing is in our own power. For if it be predestinated that one man be good and another man evil, then the first is not deserving of praise or the other to be blamed. Unless humans have the power of avoiding evil and choosing good by free choice, they are not accountable for their actions—whatever they may be.” (First Apology ch.43 )

[About the year 180, Florinus had affirmed that God is the author of sin, which notion was immediately attacked by Ireneaus, who published a discourse entitled: “God, not the Author of Sin.” Florinus’ doctrine reappeared in another form later in Manichaeism, and was always considered to be a dangerous heresy by the early fathers of the church.]

130-200 AD : Irenaeus
“This expression, ‘How often would I have gathered thy children together, and thou wouldst not,’ set forth the ancient law of human liberty, because God made man a free (agent) from the beginning, possessing his own soul to obey the behests of God voluntarily, and not by compulsion of God…And in man as well as in angels, He has placed the power of choice…If then it were not in our power to do or not to do these things, what reason had the apostle, and much more the Lord Himself, to give us counsel to do some things and to abstain from others?” (Against Heresies XXXVII )

150-190 AD : Athenagoras
“men…have freedom of choice as to both virtue and vice (for you would not either honor the good or punish the bad; unless vice and virtue were in their own power, and some are diligent in the matters entrusted to them, and others faithless)…”(Embassy for Christians XXIV )

150-200 AD : Clement of Alexandria
“Neither praise nor condemnation, neither rewards nor punishments, are right if the soul does not have the power of choice and avoidance, if evil is involuntary.” (Miscellanies, book 1, ch.17)

154-222 AD : Bardaisan of Syria
“How is it that God did not so make us that we should not sin and incur condemnation? —if man had been made so, he would not have belonged to himself but would have been the instrument of him that moved him…And how in that case, would man differ from a harp, on which another plays; or from a ship, which another guides: where the praise and the blame reside in the hand of the performer or the steersman…they being only instruments made for the use of him in whom is the skill? But God, in His benignity, chose not so to make man; but by freedom He exalted him above many of His creatures.” (Fragments )

155-225 AD : Tertullian
“I find, then, that man was by God constituted free, master of his own will and power; indicating the presence of God’s image and likeness in him by nothing so well as by this constitution of his nature.” (Against Marcion, Book II ch.5 )

185-254 AD : Origin
“This also is clearly defined in the teaching of the church that every rational soul is possessed of free-will and volition.” (De Principiis, Preface )

185-254 AD : Origen
“There are, indeed, innumerable passages in the Scriptures which establish with exceeding clearness the existence of freedom of will.” (De Principiis, Book 3, ch.1 )

250-300 AD : Archelaus
“There can be no doubt that every individual, in using his own proper power of will, may shape his course in whatever direction he chooses.” (Disputation with Manes, secs.32,33 )

260-315 AD : Methodius
“Those [pagans] who decide that man does not have free will, but say that he is governed by the unavoidable necessities of fate, are guilty of impiety toward God Himself, making Him out to be the cause and author of human evils.” (The Banquet of the Ten Virgins, discourse 8, chapter 16 )

312-386 AD : Cyril of Jerusalem
The soul is self-governed: and though the Devil can suggest, he has not the power to compel against the will. He pictures to thee the thought of fornication: if thou wilt, thou rejectest. For if thou wert a fornicator by necessity then for what cause did God prepare hell? If thou wert a doer of righteousness by nature and not by will, wherefore did God prepare crowns of ineffable glory? The sheep is gentle, but never was it crowned for its gentleness; since its gentle quality belongs to it not from choice but by nature.” (Lecture IV 18 )

347-407 AD : John Chrysostom
“All is in God’s power, but so that our free-will is not lost…it depends therefore on us and on Him. We must first choose the good, and then He adds what belongs to Him. He does not precede our willing, that our free-will may not suffer. But when we have chosen, then He affords us much help…It is ours to choose beforehand and to will, but God’s to perfect and bring to the end.” (On Hebrews, Homily 12 )

[Michael]

Hi Don.

I’m more interested in logic here than I am in Patristic quotes that simply support your pre-stated position.

(But if you can quote Justin Martyr and Ireaneus, can I quote Augustine, Aquinas, Calvin, and A. E. Knoch?)

[Michael]

Hi Michael.
I notice that you’ve started at least four threads on this website that pertain to this issue and that you are also discussing the same topic on other websites. You have made many posts, often quite complex ones, and posted even on Christmas Day. Clearly, this issue is one that you find deeply troubling, that you have no clear answer to, and which, I suspect, you have a deep personal motivation for pressing on with.

Holidays become less important, and philosophical questions pertaining to the existence of God (and the hope of life after death) become less academic when those you love most aren’t visibly here anymore.

I find some of your posts frustrating. Talking to you is like talking to someone who agrees that an explosion at a typewriter factory couldn’t produce a typewriter, but doesn’t agree that a typewriter couldn’t unpredictably start typing and produce random works of literature without any human input.

Yes, it is frustrating And, actually, I think you’ve represented me (or at least the science I’m saying I find possible) accurately - and I know that it goes totally against our common sense and intuitions - but that is what the majority of quantum scientists do seem to be saying - *and meaning *

And the fact that the inferences these scientists draw from their math and experimentation “goes totally against our common sense and intuitions” (as you yourself say) is why C.S. Lewis found it almost impossible to believe they meant what they were saying (and found their speculation philosophically unacceptable.)

But I’m no quantum physicist! Remember, all I’m arguing for here is the possibility that the scientists might have got it right - that’s all (I’m not wedded to quantum indeterminism - indeed it is very much an ongoing debate and Einstein might be proved right after all).

So let’s try to focus on the philosophical issues this time.

To help you sympathetically understand this point of view maybe we could reverse roles and you could answer a few of my questions to take the discussion on:

O.K.
**
If I do, will you try to put the same thought and effort into answering my questions?**

Situation: State of affairs x leads to state of affairs y. Is it possible that there exists a probabilistic casual relation between x and y? In other words, is it possible that x caused y but might not have?

You’re asking me whether or not I believe that the concept of indeterminism is compatible with the concept of God, and it was to explore that very question that I started this thread.

What I will say is that this “probabilistic” view sometimes seems to conflict with what I would call the almost universal human intuition that “there must be a reason for things” (which has always led most men to believe in God), and with the most basic Philosophical arguments men have used to prove the existence of God.

I’m asking you (and those reading along), if you can see any way around what I perceive as this conflict (without getting into quantum theory, which seems impossible to reconcile with the idea of one uncaused cause, or one independent fact.)

This goes against the universal subjective experience of free choice.

I’ve known many people who denied having any free choice.

They were mostly universalists who esteemed the life and the writing of A. E. Knoch, and were fond of quoting passages to the effect that “all is of God.”

I believe some of them were (and probably still are) on this forum, so this “universal subjective experience” is perhaps not as universal as you imagine.

Without the freedom to choose otherwise no agent can be considered morally culpable for any action.

If Hitler were totally insane, and had survived WWII, do you believe an insanity defense would have (or should have) saved him from the gallows?

Hitler knew better.

He saw what happened to Mussolini, and he killed himself to avoid what would surely have happened to him.

I don’t believe he would have committed his crimes if he knew that would be their outcome, but that doesn’t mean he could have avoided committing them given who he was and what he knew at the beginning of his career.

Could he have decided to outlive the war and try for one last soapbox after he saw what happened to Mussolini?

Being who he was (and as prideful as he was), I don’t see how he could have.

But let’s say he would have imagined himself given a public soapbox (and welcomed it) if he hadn’t seen Mussolini strung up by the partisans.

That means that seeing Mussolini pay for his crimes in that way (whether or not Mussolini ever had the freedom to choose otherwise) changed who Hitler was (to some small extant.)

Without the freedom to choose otherwise no agent can be considered morally culpable for any action.

I don’t agree.

Let’s say that the death penalty definitely deters (no freedom to choose otherwise) 100% of those who would definitely (no freedom to chose otherwise) be murderers in a society with no death penalty (and that those executed would murder under the same circumstances in either society.)

Wouldn’t human courts have a compelling social reason to impose the death penalty on those who commit murder (regardless of whether or not those executed had the freedom to chose otherwise)?

Could God not have even more reasons for holding an individual accountable for his actions (whether or not he have the power to choose otherwise)?

God’s purpose could be more than deterring (molding the characters) of the living, it could be shaping and molding the executed criminals themselves (i.e. all universalists assume Mussolini and Hitler will be different after the closing scenes of their lives, and whatever post-mortum hell they experience.)

So I don’t see that it’s at all true that “without the freedom to choose otherwise no agent can be considered morally culpable for any action.”

Without training, does a dog have the freedom to choose otherwise when it comes to doing property damage to a house or apartment?

No?

But doesn’t training still involve holding the dog culpable for staining the carpet or chewing the walls?

How do you avoid the conclusion of moral nihilism?

By maintaining that some things (like being a saint) are still better than other things (like being a Hitlerian monster), and that for a finite being, the purpose of life is to learn the difference.

Without freedom how is God a maximally perfect being?

God already knows what perfection is, and He’s already perfect.

How can you explain the huge biblical emphasis upon choice?

By all the above.

What is the point and purpose of prayer? What is the point and purpose of evangelism?

Consider two passages from the book of Acts.

But after long abstinence Paul stood forth in the midst of them, and said, Sirs, ye should have hearkened unto me, and not have loosed from Crete, and to have gained this harm and loss. And now I exhort you to be of good cheer: for there shall be no loss of any man’s life among you, but of the ship. For there stood by me this night the angel of God, whose I am, and whom I serve, Saying, Fear not, Paul; thou must be brought before Caesar: and, lo, God hath given thee all them that sail with thee. (Acts 27:21-24.)

And
**
And as the shipmen were about to flee out of the ship, when they had let down the boat into the sea, under colour as though they would have cast anchors out of the foreship, Paul said to the centurion and to the soldiers, Except these abide in the ship, ye cannot be saved. Then the soldiers cut off the ropes of the boat, and let her fall off.** (Same chapter, verses 30-32.)

What was the point of cutting the lifeboat lose, and keeping these men aboard if they were all gonna make it thru the storm alive?

Apparently their staying aboard was part of the process of their all making it thru the storm alive (just as prayer and evangelism, and holding people accountable, seem to be part of what God is working out in creation.)

BTW: If you had really given any thought to what Padre Pio said regarding his prayers for the happy death of his late grandfather, you would have noticed that he didn’t really say anything about time travel or changing the past.

He said that God would have already taken his prayers into account.

How does God escape the blame for actualising a universe that He knew would lead to all the suffering of history? How is God not a monster?

By creating some good that in the end far outweighs all the suffering.

If God is a necessary being, but is without freedom, then must we conclude that everything is also necessary for it could not have been otherwise? Are there no contingencies at all?

I don’t know.

That’s what I’m trying to figure out (and it seems to me, that I’m doing a better job of answering your questions here than you are of answering mine.)

If all things are deterministic then with omniscience there can be no pleasant surprises and no novelty and no growth in knowledge. Do we therefore experience pleasures God cannot?

If God is all-knowing, wouldn’t He know what we feel–and couldn’t He experience pleasant surprises and novelty “through us”?

Maybe nothing really surprises Him, but He knows what it feels like when we’re surprised.

Maybe there’s a sense in which He lives through us (in much the way parents live through their children.)

Without freedom how am I anything more than a puppet and how is history anything more than a scripted stage show that God watches whilst all the time knowing the end? And if God knows it all anyway, why bother running through the show – why not just jump straight to the end point and cut out the intervening suffering – what is the point of earth if heaven is the goal?

Maybe God is already at the end point, but we just can’t get there by skipping the show.

Is this, then, the best of all possible worlds? How then do you explain that it seems obvious to me that even a simple change could make the world better?

I don’t know if any simple change would make the world better.

I’m still trying to figure out how a timeless God (who sees all the alternative at once) could choose between worlds that would have been just as good.

I’ve given your questions some thought, and I’ve tried to answer them.

I hope you (or someone here) will kindly take the time to give as much thought to my questions (and perhaps try to say something that might at least be helpful in trying to answer them.)

And, actually, I think you’ve represented me (or at least the science I’m saying I find possible) accurately - and I know that it goes totally against our common sense and intuitions

So if all this talk about a “self-actualizing” creation “goes totally against our common sense and intuitions,” are you saying that we should throw philosophy and reason out the window?

That in the end human reason is unreliable, and the agnostics are right?

But I’m no quantum physicist! Remember, all I’m arguing for here is the possibility that the scientists might have got it right - that’s all (I’m not wedded to quantum indeterminism - indeed it is very much an ongoing debate and Einstein might be proved right after all).

Then let’s forget the quantum theory.

I’ve given some thought to the philosophical questions you asked, and I’ve tried to answer them (using reason and logic–not the language of scientific theories nether of us understand).
**
Could you please try to address my questions in the same way?**

Thank you.

[pog]

Holidays become less important, and philosophical questions pertaining to the existence of God (and the hope of life after death) become less academic when those you love most aren’t visibly here anymore.

O.K I’m sorry. I am of no use to you. I hope you find the answers you’re looking for, though I doubt you’ll find them on an internet forum.

So let’s try to focus on the philosophical issues this time.

Why the snarkiness? You seem to have adopted an adversarial tone in this post - is this how you want our discussion to progress? I will try my best.

If I do, will you try to put the same thought and effort into answering my questions?

I thought I had. Why the snarkiness?

What I will say is that this “probabilistic” view sometimes seems to conflict with what I would call the almost universal human intuition that “there must be a reason for things” (which has always led most men to believe in God), and with the most basic Philosophical arguments men have used to prove the existence of God.

Is that a ‘yes’ you think probabilistic causal relations are possibe, or a ‘no’? I’ll take it as a ‘no’. Based on your choice of questions you’ve gone with: A4) No, because all causal relations are deterministic.

I’m asking you (and those reading along), if you can see any way around what I perceive as this conflict (without getting into quantum theory, which seems impossible to reconcile with the idea of one uncaused cause, or one independent fact.)

Quantum theory *would *be the way I view probabilistic causal relations as possible - I can see no other way. Note, this regards probabilisitc relations - I firmly hold to the choice of agents which is also non-deterministic but not proabilisitic.

I believe some of them were (and probably still are) on this forum, so this “universal subjective experience” is perhaps not as universal as you imagine.

I mostly still think they made choices as they lived, they just ascribed them to God’s will/foreknowledge. Some might have believed that God was making choices through them in time, but I suspect that view is rare. Eitherway, I still stick with ‘universal’ giving the vanishing rarity of other viewpoints.

If Hitler were totally insane, and had survived WWII, do you believe an insanity defense would have (or should have) saved him from the gallows?

The legal framework of the Allies has nothing to do with Hitler’s moral guilt. If Hitler was totally insane in the sense that he had no informed free choices at all, or if at no time he had made free choices that had contributed significantly towards his insanity, then he would not be guilty of sin. I have no idea as to what extent psycopaths are guilty of sin - I leave that kind of judgement to God. But I hold that someone with profound mental difficulties would be incapable of making an informed and free choice, things I see as prerequisites for true moral culpability.

Let’s say that the death penalty definitely deters (no freedom to choose otherwise) 100% of those who would definitely (no freedom to chose otherwise) be murderers in a society with no death penalty (and that those executed would murder under the same circumstances in either society.) Wouldn’t human courts have a compelling social reason to impose the death penalty on those who commit murder (regardless of whether or not those executed had the freedom to chose otherwise)?

So ethically suspect action X prevents clearly ethically wrong action Y. If X was suspect or wrong then no, the courts wouldn’t be obligated to impose it. But lets say, for the sake of argument, that morally neutral action X prevents Y - in that case, yes, human governments would be under an obligation to impose that. I should say that there is no ‘real’ counterpart to this thought experiment, and that even if I choose not to commit murder because of fear, I am still acting in a morally reprehensible manner by wanting to and thinking about it.

Could God not have even more reasons for holding an individual accountable for his actions (whether or not he have the power to choose otherwise)?

This doesn’t follow. You’ve moved from prevention (a pragmatic consideration) to moral accountability. I can implement X to prevent an action regardless of morality. If I had absolutely *no choice *in thinking about murder, desiring it and acting upon that thought, then God *would not *hold me morally accountable for that. Without freedom there can be no fair judgement.

God’s purpose could be more than deterring (molding the characters) of the living

So God uses X (which is what exctly - the entire life history of the universe and all its events?) to slowly, painfully create characters which will end up as Y. Couldn’t God have chosen an alternative method? If there was any other less horrific method or universe that would have achieved this end then God is a moral monster - for choosing the way of more suffering for no good reason. Thus one is committed to saying that this is the best of all possible worlds.

it could be shaping and molding the executed criminals themselves

How does that work for animals, foetuses, babies and the profoundly handicapped? How is God molding them? How is that the best of all possible worlds? How is God not a monster?

But doesn’t training still involve holding the dog culpable for staining the carpet or chewing the walls?

I’m not sure that I would hold a dog morally culpable for any act, and I certainly wouldn’t hold it morally guilty for doing something like that prior to being informed and trained otherwise. Are you comparing an informed, normal adult’s moral choices as equivalent to an untrained dog? Are you saying that humans have no moral accountability? How does this square with the universal sense of objective moral values and the strong biblical emphasis upon moral accountability and judgement (sin and righteousness)?

By maintaining that some things (like being a saint) are still better than other things (like being a Hitlerian monster), and that for a finite being, the purpose of life is to learn the difference.

I’m not convinced that this makes sense. Being X has no freedom to make any choices - all his thoughts and actions are determined. In what sense could he be considered a saint or monster? In what sense does he learn? He is robot; a puppet; a zombie. It wouldn’t be like a person learning the difference between right and wrong and then making better and more informed choices and building a more virtuous character under the guidance of a wise teacher - it’d be like an engineer trying to get his robot to do exactly what he wanted through adjusting the mechanics. This view of humanity is not only degrading, it has nothing to do with morality.

God already knows what perfection is, and He’s already perfect.

So are you saying that God is not free and yet is still perfect? Could you explain that view as it seems counter-intuitive.

By all the above.

That, to my mind, is no explanation at all.

Apparently their staying aboard was part of the process of their all making it thru the storm alive (just as prayer and evangelism, and holding people accountable, seem to be part of what God is working out in creation.)

This is the Calvinist line of predetermined means for predetermined ends. But why does God have to use those means? Couldn’t He have chosen other means? And aren’t these means misleading in that they seem to emphasise the importance of freedom? And how do you deal with those biblical passages that show God changing His mind or plans in response to human prayer, action, repentance, argument etc?

If you had really given any thought

Why the snarkiness?

He said that God would have already taken his prayers into account.

O.K - so are you saying that what I pray now would have already been taken into account in the past because God knew that I would pray X now and so would have adjusted things in the past?

So in what way would my prayers for say the prevention of the holocaust have any effect? Are you saying that God knew that I wouldn’t pray for that now? But I just did - so why isn’t God honouring that prayer?

What explanation is there for why God doesn’t answer any prayer regardig the past that is as simple and convincing as that God doesn’t alter the past? Can you give me one example of where a prayer now has made something in the past happen? If I pray now for something I already know to have happened should I take credit for being instrumental in bringing about a state of affairs that I already know to have happened? This way madness lies …

By creating some good that in the end far outweighs all the suffering.

Are you saying the ends always justify the means? Because God seems to use some pretty foul means - just consider the number of babies who have died in massive suffering. God not only knew that would happen, but He instanstiated a deterministic universe where this was guaranteed to happen (thus He willed for it to happen). That seems a remarkably bad plan! Couldn’t God have created a better world that still resulted in an end of incomparable good? If I can think of a way - freewill + universalism, how come God couldn’t?

If God is a necessary being, but is without freedom, then must we conclude that everything is also necessary for it could not have been otherwise? Are there no contingencies at all? I don’t know.

You seem to know quite well, judging by your previous answers, but don’t like the implications. If God has no freedom then 1) He is not really God as He is not maximally pefect (I can imagine a better being easily), 2) Everything follows from God’s uncaused existence as matter of course - everything, including God, is just a cosmic puppet show. This a bleak view of the universe. 3) It goes against that common-sense intuition and logic you otherwise prefer - it is clear that situation X could have been slightly different - it is clear that X might have been Y - contingency is everywhere in the universe. Are you really wanting to say that everything had to be exactly the way it was and that nothing could ever have been even slightly different and that there is no freedom for any being now or ever in eternity?

and it seems to me, that I’m doing a better job of answering your questions here than you are of answering mine

Why the snarkiness?

If God is all-knowing, wouldn’t He know what we feel–and couldn’t He experience pleasant surprises and novelty “through us”?

But that isn’t the same as experiential knowledge, as far as I can see. He doesn’t know what it is for Godself to experience novelty and pleasant suprises - in the same way that He doesn’t know what it is for Godself to commit sin. I can imagine that God is devoid of some evil, but why should He deny Himself some good?

Maybe God is already at the end point, but we just can’t get there by skipping the show.

Why? If God knew exactly the end point (universalism?) when He created the universe, why couldn’t God create the end point - exactly what has been gained by running through a puppet show jam-packed full of gratuitous suffering and misery just to arrive at a point He could have got to by a click of His fingers? Without positing freedom or without utilising the free will defense theodicy I can see no reason at all why God couldn’t just make happy puppets at the start - why make His puppets suffer first? This ‘God’ is a monster and not worthy of worship.

I don’t know if any simple change would make the world better.

I’ve stubbed my toe. It would have been better if I hadn’t.

I’m still trying to figure out how a timeless God (who sees all the alternative at once) could choose between worlds that would have been just as good.

If He had no freedom He couldn’t. If He had freedom then He would have to instantiate the best of all possible worlds to keep in accordance with His character - which makes His freedom pointless and means that neither God nor us have true libertarian freedom, an you have the massive problem of evil and suffering. Or you say that there was more than one equally good possible world - but then you get the donkey scenario and the problem of God making an impossible arbitrary choice but knowing the outcome of such a choice - making it not arbitrary.

Or you say, with me, that God creates the best universe (in keeping with His character) but doesn’t know the future and that this good/best universe is one which has a mixture of deterministic and probilisitc laws (this far will your waves go and no further) and, most importantly, truely free willed creatures who’s choices God does not know, predetermine or dictate. Seems the best way to go!

I’ve given your questions some thought, and I’ve tried to answer them.

Ok

I hope you (or someone here) will kindly take the time to give as much thought to my questions

Why the snarkiness?

So if all this talk about a “self-actualizing” creation “goes totally against our common sense and intuitions,” are you saying that we should throw philosophy and reason out the window?

No; we use the methods of reason to discover that our common-sense has its limitations and that reality doesn’t confrom perfectly to our sense of logic. We then use the methods of reason to re-build a better logic and a better understanding of the universe rather than sticking to a form of logic that might be flawed.

I’ve given some thought to the philosophical questions you asked, and I’ve tried to answer them (using reason and logic–not the language of scientific theories nether of us understand). Could you please try to address my questions in the same way?

Why the snarkiness?