Is foreknowledge causative? Dealing with a prioris and poor critiques.

[Jaltus]

Introduction

One of the most common critiques made by both Calvinists and OVers about Arminianism is that foreknowledge and libertarian free will cannot in fact logically go together. THere are many various arguments given, and those are all well and good. However, this thread is going to deal with one major chain of argumentation, namely this thread is dedicated to dispelling the myth that foreknowledge can actually cause future events or, stated as it more often comes out of peoples' mouths, foreknowledge determines the future.

Essential Problem

The basic problem with this critique of Arminianism is inherent in the grammar. While that seems like a bizarre statement to make when dealing with theology, I assure you that it is the mistake made by many opponents of Arminianism.

Look at this statement, and I will break it down grammatically for you:


Foreknowledge determines the future.

Foreknowledge: the subject of the sentence (hence it being placed first, as most subjects head the sentence in English)

determines: the verb of the sentence (this is the action which the sentence is trying to convey)

the: definite article modifying "future" (the definite article either limits what it modifies such that it can only mean one thing, or it means that there really is only one of the things it modifies such that "the moon" can only refer to the moon that rotates around earth since there is only one)

future: the direct object of the sentence (it is what the action is being done to)

Think about this for a minute, now, before going on. Do these words make sense within the grammatical bounds they were put?

Do these words convey any underlying meaning foreign to this discussion?

Do these words make assumptions about the state of events within the universe?

I will deal with the last question first. Technically, the sentence does not truly carry any hidden assumptions, but it is often interpreted such that it does. The key here is the definite article's use in the sentence. By saying "the future," people often make the mistake of assuming the future is automatically limited to one possible future instead of there being many possible futures. In truth, however, the sentence is dealing with "the future that will come to be," which is a wideopen question rather than an immediately perceived and fully known entity. So there is not a hidden assumption in the sentence, there is a hidden assumption in the interpretation of said sentence.

The biggest problem with this sentence, however, is not the article or the direct object. What should truly standout to any reader is the subject of the sentence. Go ahead, read it again:


Foreknowledge determines the future.

Do you see the problem yet?

The problem is that foreknowledge is said to be doing something.

Foreknowledge is not a person, nor is foreknowledge any type of entity such that it can actually act. The sentence above personifies foreknowledge, giving it the ability to do different things when in actuality it can do nothing.

Think about it this way:

What would you say if I said past postknowledge made me sad?

You would know that it was not the knowledge that forced me or caused me to be sad, rather it would be my reaction to the knowledge which makes me sad. Just because the knowledge prompted a certain response does not make the knowledge in any way causative.

You see, the real issue is that knowledge, and therefore foreknowledge, cannot have any form of agency. In other words, knowledge cannot do anything for it is not an entity. Your dog is an agent, for it can run and walk and bark....it can do things. Beauty is not an agent, for it is unable to do anything on its own, though people act upon its existence. Wisdom cannot do anything, it can only be acted upon since it cannot act.

A common line in our culture is "to act upon that knowledge." You will notice immediately that this sentence assumes knowledge to be a thing which does not act and does not cause. You would never act upon an animal, the entire idea is foreign to what the word animal represents.

The Purpose of This Thread

Therefore, if you have read through all that stuff I have mentioned, let me tell you what I am looking for in this thread.

I am looking for Calvinists, yes, but even more so I am looking for Open Theists who critique Arminianism using this above poor attack.

I want to discuss this and show, once and for all, that knowledge in and of itself can cause nothing, and that the entire idea of knowledge being causative assumes knowledge is an agent, which is not possible.

Therefore, I would like only the more philosophically inclined to participate in this thread. While I would appreciate questions from others, I envision this as a rather technical discussion and would appreciate more interaction from those philosophically more adroit.

I would also love to hear supporters of what I have said as well, such that there are many of us dealing with this topic.

Finally, let me say that I chose this forum rather than philosophy because I think it has a direct bearing on our understanding of God.

[Dee Dee Warren]

DD hits subscribe

[Solly]

God's foreknowledge determines the future. See the difference?

If there is only one possible world - from the aspect of eternity and the world not created yet, and God knows its events and circumstances definitively, then the future is determined from God's pov, even though it contains rational choice making indidivudals who do not know what the future holds, beyond certain hints God has given about Christ returning.

Hence Molinism and OVT: there are possible worlds, of which God knows them, but because they don't actually exist yet - since all those possible worlds can't exist - and make all but one of the possible worlds extinct, therefore the future is not determined categorically, and LFW still finds a little niche for itself.

That's about as philosopphical as i can get, so I will sit back and watch and read.

[themuzicman]

Foreknowledge, in and of itself does not determine the future.

However, if there is foreknowledge, then the future has been determined. Not determined by foreknowledge, but deternined by an agent that existed before that which was foreknown was foreknown.

Thus, foreknowledge requires that things that happen in the future to already be determined.

:Muz:

[Jaltus]

Solly,

How does the modifier "God's" truly change anything in the sentence?

Unless "God's foreknowledge" is the Holy Spirit or Jesus, it still cannot do anything.

The reason I explicitly stayed away from using the word "God's" in the sample sentence is that people tend to import too many ideas from that, dealing with the issue such that God is an aspect of foreknowledge rather than foreknowledge being an aspect of God.

Can God's love do anything? Of course not! God is the one who does stuff, not His love. It is the same thing for His foreknowledge.

As for OVT, they deny possible worlds in terms of foreknowledge. They say God can only foreknow possibilities, not actual instantiation. In other words, God is a very good guesser, but He can be wrong.

[Solly]

God's foreknowledge changes everything, because it is not possible knowledge, and it is not knowledge of something outside of himself, apart from anything he is or will do.

I know things; some of them real - this computer, some potentially real - the dinner I will cook tonight, some imaginary - unicorns.
I foreknow my dinner which will be cooked; I have the plan of action in my mind. But other factors might come into play beyond my thoughts and actions, and the dinner not get made. That is the limitation of living historically and contingently etc.

God is not historical or contingent. His foreknowledge is not a pasive reception of a data stream - how can it, the things don't exist yet. It is an active knowlege on God's part re the created world and its events that he will bring into being. No, foreknowledge in itself does not determine anything. But God's foreknowing it does; for him to foreknow it, if one does not accept possible worlds, or the nuanced (thanks!) possibilities, not actual instantiation, then it is and will be. The actual instantiation follows on from the knowing.

Of course, I am not arguing for foreknowledge as prescience, but, as mentioned in my own thread, as verging on foreordination. God has a plan, and the plan will be.

[Jaltus]

Solly,

I think we are beginning to slide off from the intended subject of this thread. My point is to reconcile foreknowledge and LFW as possible, even if it is not something you think is truly instantiated in this world.

You and I are beginning to disagree over LFW, which is a given in this thread. I will continue this portion of the debate (LFW) in the other thread you have going.

[Solly]

Ok; though I thought I was addressing this thread is dedicated to dispelling the myth that foreknowledge can actually cause future events or, stated as it more often comes out of peoples' mouths, foreknowledge determines the future by challenging the notion of foreknowledge as used by yourself.

[Jaltus]

I can understand that, but I am assuming LFW.

You yourself, Solly, seem to agree that foreknowledge is not causative, but God's foreordination is. I am trying to show this distinction such that knowledge is not causative, and therefore foreknowledge is not causative either. I am trying to rule out only one argument, the one that assumes LFW and EDF and says they cannot go together because foreknowledge as dealt with above is causative.

(man, I have spelled foreknowledge "foreknwoledge" like 5 times today)

[Dee Dee Warren]

Today @ 10:47 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=166753#post166753)
themuzicman:

Foreknowledge, in and of itself does not determine the future.

However, if there is foreknowledge, then the future has been determined. Not determined by foreknowledge, but deternined by an agent that existed before that which was foreknown was foreknown.

Thus, foreknowledge requires that things that happen in the future to already be determined.

:Muz:

Known is not the same as determined. Known does not rule out LFW.

[Jaltus]

Today @ 09:47 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=166753#post166753)
themuzicman:

Foreknowledge, in and of itself does not determine the future.

However, if there is foreknowledge, then the future has been determined. Not determined by foreknowledge, but deternined by an agent that existed before that which was foreknown was foreknown.

Thus, foreknowledge requires that things that happen in the future to already be determined.

:Muz:

The problem I see with this is the misunderstanding between will happen and [/]must happen[/i].

Matt and I explained this to DDW last night, and she got it rather quickly.

Here is how the argument you are making goes, MM:

P1 Necessarily, if God has foreknowledge X will happen, then X will happen.

P2 Necessarily, God knows X will happen.

P3 Necessarily, X will happen.

The problem, of course, is in P3. P1 and P2 are fine, in and of themselves. However, just because the antecedent is necessary does not mean the conclusion is necessary. The true form that argument would take is:

P1a Necessarily, if God has foreknowledge X will happen, then X will necessarily happen.

P2a Necessarily, God knows X will happen.

P3a Necessarily, X will happen.

Now this argument makes sense, but P1a is flawed because it is already assuming the conclusion, there is no argument. That is the argument which MM is making without realizing it. Therefore, I think his argument is fundamentally flawed and really misses out on what this thread is about.

[nomad]

this is probably simpler than it appears.

is there a conflict between the following two statements:

1) God knows that at time T, agent P will choose between A and ~A, and will choose A.
2) Agent P, at time T, is LFW-free to choose either A or ~A.

there is a possible synergy, that agent P, LFW-freely chooses A.

but, there is a non-synergistic version as well, that agent P chooses ~A instead. in this case, the first statement is false, and if it's false, then God's foreknowledge is also invalidated. so, if statement 2 is true, it is possible for statement 1 to be false.

however, if you assert that statement 1 is always true, then from a strict point of view statement 2 is false - agent P is NOT LFW-free to choose either A or ~A; only choosing A will make statement 1 true.

now, usually at this point the discussion tends towards 'well, agent P is predictable' - but predictable only means determined, perfectly predictable means 'i know the initial state, and the process,' and therefore the end. and only perfect predictability allows statement 1 to always be true.

it's sort of like the equation y = 3x + 6, there are lots of values that will fulfill it - but if you say x = 3, then you've just removed all the possibilities for y except one. similarly, if you say y = 15, we know have exactly one choice for x. binding one variable, effectively binds the other as well.

theoretically, if i can truly choose to do A or ~A, but never choose ~A, i would consider it impossible to determine if you really could freely choose A - functionally they are identical, and the rationale no longer matters; determinism then would be the simpler explanation (especially considering that we are created by God, the non-determinism has to come from somewhere outside God).

it is a difficult problem to get around. i considered a couple, but they all fell down in one way or another. but, i don't claim to really understand this stuff anyways.

[Edited to add, after seeing Jaltus' last post before this one]

so the correct assertion, syntactically, would be 'unless the future is determined, it cannot be foreknown'. and i know there have been lots of debates about it :) but i don't think anyone REALLY is claiming that foreknowledge 'does' anything...

[themuzicman]

Today @ 12:12 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=166850#post166850)
Jaltus:



The problem I see with this is the misunderstanding between will happen and [/]must happen[/i].

Matt and I explained this to DDW last night, and she got it rather quickly.

The true form that argument would take is:

P1a Necessarily, if God has foreknowledge X will happen, then X will necessarily happen.

P2a Necessarily, God knows X will happen.

P3a Necessarily, X will happen.

Now this argument makes sense, but P1a is flawed because it is already assuming the conclusion, there is no argument. That is the argument which MM is making without realizing it. Therefore, I think his argument is fundamentally flawed and really misses out on what this thread is about.

First, we have not assumed that X will happen, but that God foreknows X.

You've made God's foreknowledge of X and the necessary happening of X to be the same thing.

It would be like saying my knowledge of the existance my car is the same thing as my car. It's not.

However, God's foreknowledge of X predates the necessary happening of X, such that they CANNOT be the same.

Thus, foreknowledge of X is not assuming X will necessarily happen.

:Muz:

[Pate]

This is a thought-experiment that I've once used to convince my opponent that God's foreknowledge as such does not determine the future. It seems almost too simple, but I can't find any fallacy in it right away, and I actually did manage to convince my opponent by using this as an important part of my case. (The person to whom this was presented, was an atheist but he was saying that there's a contradiction in my views as I accept both God's foreknowledge and human freedom, because God's foreknowledge makes freedom impossible.)


Suppose that there exists a God who does not know the future, but still acts in exactly the same ways in which God would act if he in fact did have foreknowledge. (It's logically possible that God would choose those exactly same courses of action even without his foreknowledge.) Now, this would mean that God's acts of creating and sustaining the universe and everything that's in it, would be identical to the acts that God would perform if he did have foreknowledge. And if this would be the case, then obviously, any states of affairs in the world would not be any different from the states of affairs in the actual world and that would also be true for any future states of affairs. Now, if the results would be exactly the same, regardless of whether or not God has foreknowledge, if only he chooses to act in exactly the same ways, that means that God's foreknowledge in itself does not cause anything.

[themuzicman]

However, your hypothetical is completely useless, as it is baseless.

:Muz:

[Pate]

Baseless in what sense?

[nomad]

your example preassumes a deterministic universe...



Now, this would mean that God's acts of creating and sustaining the universe and everything that's in it, would be identical to the acts that God would perform if he did have foreknowledge. And if this would be the case, then obviously, any states of affairs in the world would not be any different from the states of affairs in the actual world and that would also be true for any future states of affairs.


this is only true in a deterministic universe. in a true-LFW universe, then God's actions do not uniquely determine the states of affairs in the world. it is possible that this theoretical world would be identical, but not necessary, and to show that LFW and foreknowledge are consistent, you would have to show that it is necessarily the same i think.

the problem is that you want to use a universe with LFW AFTER the fact (a universe in which LFW exists, but foreknowledge doesn't have to), and compare it to a universe without foreknowledge, but with determinism (and, there is the question of YOUR foreknowledge...). both of those are logical. what is not logical is a universe where both appear together.

i think, have to think this over some more.

[mattbballman19]

Hi all!

Generally, Calvinists and OVers have to show how "God has foreknowledge" contradicts "I have free will." There has to be some hidden premise that would make this supposed contradiction real. As it stands, they do not contradict each other.


Today @ 12:26 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=166858#post166858)
nomad:

this is probably simpler than it appears.

is there a conflict between the following two statements:

1) God knows that at time T, agent P will choose between A and ~A, and will choose A.
2) Agent P, at time T, is LFW-free to choose either A or ~A.

there is a possible synergy, that agent P, LFW-freely chooses A.

but, there is a non-synergistic version as well, that agent P chooses ~A instead. in this case, the first statement is false, and if it's false, then God's foreknowledge is also invalidated. so, if statement 2 is true, it is possible for statement 1 to be false.

I agree with this. If P were to choose B, God would have known that and his foreknowledge would have been "God knows that G will choose B." Likewise, if P were to choose A then God would have known THAT and so "God knows that G will choose A" would be true. I think the modal conditional set up in (2) (the modal fallacious argument set up by Jaltus) is simply false. It is not necessary that God's foreknowledge leads to a decision -- quite the opposite! If the game is rigged so that P will only choose the opposite of God's foreknowledge, then you only have grounds for God's knowledge being: "God knows that P will withhold choosing until a contradiction results." It's like saying, "Okay, God; I will only pray if you say and mean 'It is true that it is impossible for Matt to pray.'" Or, P if and only if ~P. And these types of paradoxes are just that -- paradoxes.

Foreknowledge is to be understood as:

1. Either (P will do A and God knows A) or (P will do ~A and God knows ~A).
2. P will do A.
3. Therefore, God knows A.

or

2*. P will do ~A.
3*. Therefore, God knows ~A

and you can't find anything self-contradictory or absurd about this and it is perfectly consistent with God's foreknowledge and human freedom. In fact, given the definition of validity, this is necessarily true.

The following are excerts from my debate with John Powell on this very issue:

Now, Powell's presentation of God's foreknowledge being incompatible with free will is even more dubious. He writes:

1. If P has free will then P can choose A or B despite what G foretells.
2. If G knows the future and if G honestly foretells A or B then G will be right.
3. If G foretells B and P chooses A then G will not be right.
4. If G foretells A and P chooses B then G will not be right.
5. Therefore, G either does not know the future or G is not honest or P does not have free will.
[6. Not (G does not know the future or G is not honest)] -- hidden premise assumption
[7. Therefore, P does not have free will] -- hidden second conclusion assumption

What this presentation amounts to is that God will necessarily not be right if an only if He is right. And this amounts to P's defiance leading to a self-contradiction. It is a self-contradiction because it suggests that God foreknows what P will do and that P will do what God does not foreknow. So:

1' G knows A if and only if P does A.
2' G knows ~A if and only if P does ~A.
3' G knows A.
4' So, P does ~A.
5' Therefore, ?

The problem is now apparent for it cannot be the case that the first half of the first biconditional (P does A) be false (see premise 4) if the second part of that biconditional is true (God knows A -- see premise 3). The problem is that the foreknowing some action is not the sufficient cause that brings the action about. This is backwards for it confuses the logical priority of some action obtaining with God's foreknowing it. It is not that God's foreknowing some action that makes P choose but, rather, that some action P chooses will be foreknown by God. And if P makes his stubborn plea that he will not choose anything until he is made privy to God's foreknowledge about it, then the following counterfactual is known by God:

If P will not choose A or B without knowing what God knows then P will not choose A or B.

What your argument amounts to, basically, is (i) it is self-contradictory as implied by 1' - 5'. Or (ii), even if one gets beyond the contradiction, the best we are left with is that although P has free will, and that he has the ability to choose A or B, he simply will refrain from choosing A or B. There is nothing here that makes one conclude that free will does not exist.

He objected and said,

"I wanted to conclude that God could only be right if P did not have free will . . . if both G knows the future AND P has free will, consequently both can't be true. P MIGHT POSSIBLY do what G does not foreknow."

But one cannot make such a case by presuming a contradiction. It is just like the village atheist who wants to say that "God cannot make a rock so big that he can't lift it." He argues the same way. He says, God MIGHT POSSIBLY create something that He can't lift. And this makes no sense either for it also enacts a self-contradiction. In order to be successful in your approach, you would have to prove that some action necessarily results on the basis of God's foreknowledge. But I don't think one can do this because this inevitably commits a standard modal fallacy. It is fallacious in this circumstance because it ignores possible subjunctive counterfactuals:

If P were to choose X instead of ~X then God would have known that.

and this amounts to

God knows either X or ~X.

and nothing P does can make God's foreknowledge false.

I guess we can just build off from that.

matt

[Kenny]

I agree with the argument that foreknowledge isn’t necessarily causative. For me, that isn’t the fundamental issue. The issue, for me, is whether it is possible to know A without one’s knowledge of A being causally related, in some sense, the fact that A. For example, I know (with reasonably high probability) that the Sun is going to rise tomorrow. My knowledge of that fact does not determine that the Sun will rise. But, my knowledge that the Sun will rise tomorrow is caused by my observation of previous sunrises which in turn has been caused by the natural processes which caused those sunrises and which make it true that the Sun will rise tomorrow. I would argue that if there is no causal link between the fact that A and one’s belief that A (even though it may be very indirect), then one’s belief that A is unwarranted and thus that belief does not qualify as knowledge.

Now, according to LFW, there is no causal connection (or at least an indeterminate causal connection) between an agent’s free choice and the antecedent circumstances to that choice. Consequently, there can be no causal link between what a free agent will actually choose and God’s beliefs concerning what that agent will choose prior to that choice being made. Thus, God’s beliefs concerning what that free agent will choose in the future, if LFW were true, are not warranted and do not constitute knowledge. In other words, there could be no appropriate causal basis for God’s knowledge of future free choices if LFW were true.

And, just so everyone knows where I’m coming from, I’m a Calvinist and a compatiblist.

In Christ,
Kenny

[nomad]

Kenny:
...For example, I know (with reasonably high probability) that the Sun is going to rise tomorrow. My knowledge of that fact does not determine that the Sun will rise.


'reasonably high probability' is not (at least imho) foreknowledge, at least not what we are talking about, i think. the main difference between this (our 'foreknowledge' and God's is that, usually, it is believed that God's foreknowledge is never wrong. the sun might not rise, and we would just say 'well, you couldn't have known'. but we will not make excuses for God.

i also believe LFW does not solve the problem it was created to solve, but that's a different thread.


mattbballman19:
Foreknowledge is to be understood as:

1. Either (P will do A and God knows A) or (P will do ~A and God knows ~A).
2. P will do A.
3. Therefore, God knows A.

or

2*. P will do ~A.
3*. Therefore, God knows ~A

and you can't find anything self-contradictory or absurd about this and it is perfectly consistent with God's foreknowledge and human freedom. In fact, given the definition of validity, this is necessarily true.


one reason why it's not self-contradictory is there is no sense of free will in it... it is only stated 'P will do A', not why. so this little syllogism doesn't solve your problem. in fact, i think it works against you, and i'll explain why below.

but it does point to what imho is the source of our difference of opinion... i won't hold it against you, because the fact that foreknowledge limits future action is (imho) intuitively obvious, and hard to avoid using in an argument implicitly.

first of all, let's talk about the above syllogism. again, implied is determinism - 'P will do A' is future tense, and yet the decision is made - P will do A, and cannot change that choice by that time. this still might not be so bad, so let's look at some models of foreknowledge. For this, i will use 'TD' for when a decision has been made (the action is chosen and will not change), and 'TA' for when the agent actually commits the action, and 'TF' for the time at which God knows what will happen at A.

1. Concurrent knowledge.

You cannot make an action until after you have decided it, and you cannot know a decision until it is decided. So, the lower limit on delta-T is 0. This would be concurrent knowledge. The decision D is not made until the actual action is commited. TD = TA. If TF also equals TA, that's concurrent knowledge (God knows at the same time as the agent).

--------------------(TD/TA/TF)----------------------> time

2. Weak foreknowledge

One way to import foreknowledge is to separate the decision from the action in time. The decision D is made at some point before the action is committed (TD before TA). P, where God knows what the choice is, is at some point between TD and TA (TD < TF < TA). God knows what is going to happen before it happens, but not before the agent has chosen. This is 'weak' foreknowledge because it is time-limited.

----------TD--------TF-----------TA------------> time

Two main issues with this one, one being how far can you push back TD? For example, God knew me before I was born. But for me to be born, my parents had to meet, fall in love, decide to have a kid (ok sometimes the decision is made for you ;), etc. none of these are sure facts. Those decisions could have been nebulously in a vacuum when they were born, theoretically, but working backwards you quickly realize that God won't fit into this model. And it doesn't work well for OV, pushing back decisions is not all that different from calvinism for making decisions that feel like decision not really your decision etc. oh yeah i'm a traducianist, if you're not you might be able to make this work though.

3. Full foreknowledge.

The decision D is made at any time before the action is committed (TD <= TA), but the knowledge P of what decision will be made happens some time before the actual decision. (TF < TD <= TA).

----------TF----------TD------TA----------> time

2 works because after TD, the unbound 'free will' choice has been bound, and the model converts to determinism. Since we can guarantee the action will not change, we can confidently predict it.

3, which is the traditional christian view of foreknowledge, will not work with your syllogism above. The syllogism, when it is assumed that 2 is LFW, is no longer sound (though it is still valid) because the truth of premise 2 can not be determined... AT THE TIME of premise 1, P has not decided what he/she will do, and therefore we cannot say with confidence either of 'P will do A' or 'P will do ~A'. this, if anything, simply shows that determinism is needed.



Now, Powell's presentation of God's foreknowledge being ncompatible with free will is even more dubious. He writes:....

It is a self-contradiction because it suggests that God foreknows
what P will do and that P will do what God does not foreknow.
So:

1' G knows A if and only if P does A.
2' G knows ~A if and only if P does ~A.
3' G knows A.
4' So, P does ~A.
5' Therefore, ?



that is EXACTLY the point of the argument... assuming free will leads to unsolvable paradoxes. therefore, it must not be true.

i was going to mention that the basic flaw in john's argument (as presented) was that it assumes that P knows what G 'knows', but this isn't the case normally. however, it has been occasionally the case... God has sent prophets to say what will happen, and even though it was known, it still happened. even there, most often the subjects did not believe it, so it's still a bit dubious, but maybe it works.

then again, the proofs are not attempting to show that foreknowledge actually 'does' anything.

There is a set of foreknowledge of God = {G1, G2, G3, ...} and a set of possible worlds = {W1, W2, W3, ...} The problem is that this is a 1:1 mapping - there is exactly one set of knowledge Gx that describes the actions that will happen in world Wx. So: If you choose a world Wx, then there is exactly one set of foreknowledge Gx that will be correct; all other Gx will contain wrong information that doesn't actually happen in Wx. This is the claim: that you must choose Wx first, and that to ignore that foreknowledge is caused by world actions, that to have foreknowledge you must already have that which is to be foreknown; it is the world which determines the foreknowledge.

But in actuality, though this is honestly merely a philosophical exercise, it goes the other way too. If we take the foreknowledge first, which has no causal effect on the world itself (which i do agree with), if we choose a set of knowledge Gx, there is exactly one world Wx for which this knowledge is correct. and so, by choosing foreknowledge (and adding the 'hidden' assumption that God's foreknowledge is not wrong and actually matches reality), we have effecting logically constrained the system such that only world Wx is the only we are allowed to choose; a possible world Wy or Wz will lead to inconsistencies between what's known and what's real, violating foreknowledge.


i will add there might be some ways around this. one way is to make God's foreknowledge really 'post-knowledge'; if time is two-dimensional, there is no reason God couldn't go back and forth in time; effective just transforming time into a mobius strip where 'before' for us is both 'before' and 'after' for God. avoiding paradoxes is a serious issue in such a time traveling model, but then we are talking about God here. just a random thought....

[themuzicman]

Today @ 01:35 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=166898#post166898)
Pate:

Baseless in what sense?

Suppose that there exists a God who does not know the future, but still acts in exactly the same ways in which God would act if he in fact did have foreknowledge.

I might as well say "Suppose God is a rabid sun conjure".

The problem is that we can't say that either is definately true, or even work back to the assumption being possible, so there's no point in the rest of it.

:Muz:

[mattbballman19]

Today @ 03:48 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=166956#post166956)
Kenny:

I agree with the argument that foreknowledge isn’t necessarily causative. For me, that isn’t the fundamental issue. The issue, for me, is whether it is possible to know A without one’s knowledge of A being causally related, in some sense, the fact that A. For example, I know (with reasonably high probability) that the Sun is going to rise tomorrow. My knowledge of that fact does not determine that the Sun will rise. But, my knowledge that the Sun will rise tomorrow is caused by my observation of previous sunrises which in turn has been caused by the natural processes which caused those sunrises and which make it true that the Sun will rise tomorrow. I would argue that if there is no causal link between the fact that A and one’s belief that A (even though it may be very indirect), then one’s belief that A is unwarranted and thus that belief does not qualify as knowledge.

Now, according to LFW, there is no causal connection (or at least an indeterminate causal connection) between an agent’s free choice and the antecedent circumstances to that choice. Consequently, there can be no causal link between what a free agent will actually choose and God’s beliefs concerning what that agent will choose prior to that choice being made. Thus, God’s beliefs concerning what that free agent will choose in the future, if LFW were true, are not warranted and do not constitute knowledge. In other words, there could be no appropriate causal basis for God’s knowledge of future free choices if LFW were true.

And, just so everyone knows where I’m coming from, I’m a Calvinist and a compatiblist.

In Christ,
Kenny

Hmmm.

I think it's a mistake to conceive of knowledge as being causally related to anything. Instead, knowledge is the correspondence between one's belief and the actual world. The only way God's knowledge about the sun rising tomorrow could be wrong is if the sun in fact will not rise tomorrow. It is, indeed, no longer omniscience if God does not know future events because he would no longer know "John will not go to the meeting tomorrow" and "Sally will eat eggs for breakfast tomorrow." And those are not logically impossible events to know. Hence, God cannot be omniscient in an Open Theism view here. Your proposal, a sort of Humean conception, suggests that all objects of knowledge must be based on precedent. However, no unique events of history nor any even when occurring for the first time could be known! The correspondence theory is not a theory of causality.

matt

[GrayPilgrim]

Ach, Jaltus is an anti-foundationailst, ach maybe he is Grenz or Franke, ach they wrote one bad book.

Going back to Solly's point, the problem is that the given of LFW. All of your threads assume this and then you go from there, you don't ever discuss the validity of LFW vis-a-vis Divine Sovereignty.

GP

[mattbballman19]

Nomad,

I'll get to your post either tonight or tomorrow. You brought up some points that need my full attention and, unfortunately, I'm not in that frame of mind right now. :teeth:

matt

[Kenny]

Today @ 12:36 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=167096#post167096) mattbballman19:
Hmmm. I think it's a mistake to conceive of knowledge as being causally related to anything. Instead, knowledge is the correspondence between one's belief and the actual world.

You seem to be suggesting here that knowledge is nothing more than true belief, but it is not hard to see how such a characterization of knowledge is deeply problematic. Suppose I believe on a whim, without any evidence or reason whatsoever, that alien bacteria resides in subterraneous caverns beneath the surface of Mars. Now, suppose that alien bacteria does reside in subterraneous caverns beneath the surface of Mars. Does the mere fact that my belief is true make it knowledge?

This is why, prior to Edmund Gettier’s essay, “Is Justified True Belief Knowledge?”, it was customary in the field of epistemology to define knowledge not merely as true belief but as justified true belief. Gettier showed, however, that this definition isn’t adequate either, by pointing out that several counterexamples to this definition could be found. Suppose, for instance, (this counter example comes from Bertrand Russell and actually predates Gettier’s essay), that I briefly glance up at a clock in the middle of the day and the hands read that it is 12:00. I then form the justified belief that it is 12:00. Suppose also that, unbeknownst to me, the clock stopped exactly twelve hours ago. In that case, my belief is both justified and true, but we would all be hard pressed to call it knowledge. The reason my belief is not knowledge, even though it is justified and true, is that there is not an appropriate sort of causal relation between the fact that it is 12:00 and my belief that it is 12:00.

So, the contemporary practice is to define knowledge as “warranted true belief” where warrant is a sort of beefed up justification that gets around such counterexamples. There is also wide spread agreement (though it is not unanimous) that part of warrant includes some sort of appropriate causal grounding between what one believes and the fact to which one’s belief pertains (though characterizing the precise nature of ‘appropriate’ here proves elusive).


It is, indeed, no longer omniscience if God does not know future events because he would no longer know &quot;John will not go to the meeting tomorrow&quot; and &quot;Sally will eat eggs for breakfast tomorrow.&quot; And those are not logically impossible events to know. Hence, God cannot be omniscient in an Open Theism view here.

Far be it from me to defend open theism (I am a Calvinist), but if LFW properly characterizes human choices (I don’t believe it does), then there would be no such facts concerning these events (provided they were contingent on LFW decisions) for God to know. The future with respect to these events would be indeterminate and statements regarding them would have no truth values.


Your proposal, a sort of Humean conception, suggests that all objects of knowledge must be based on precedent. However, no unique events of history nor any even when occurring for the first time could be known!

Not at all. I haven’t said anything about precedent only causal grounding. If pink unicorns from dimension X were going to intrude into our space-time continuum one and only one time and I just so happened to witness them flying in and out of their interdimensional vortex during that time, I could, on the basis of that experience, know that such an event had occurred. But, the point still stands that my knowledge of such an event would be formed by my being appropriately causally related to the event (i.e. I witnessed it).


The correspondence theory is not a theory of causality.

Interesting that you should bring that up as it seems to me that Molinism tends to undermine a correspondence view of truth. Molinism suggests that there are true propositions which have no corresponding states of affairs in the world. If a future free choice is truly indeterminate, then nothing in the current structure of reality makes it true that the choice will resolve in a particular way.

In Christ,
Kenny

[Jaltus]

Interesting that you should bring that up as it seems to me that Molinism tends to undermine a correspondence view of truth. Molinism suggests that there are true propositions which have no corresponding states of affairs in the world. If a future free choice is truly indeterminate, then nothing in the current structure of reality makes it true that the choice will resolve in a particular way.


An interesting point, Kenny, but to quote Doc Brown of the Back to the Future movies, "you aren't thinking fourth dimensionally!"

Just because something does not correspond to reality now does not mean it will not or has not corresponded to reality at some point. Statements about what has happened in the past have truth value, so why is it that statements about the future do not? I believe it is because they are not yet realized truth values that you feel the need to make such a critique, but that just means you do not see the implications of what you are saying.

If only present moments can have truth value, then the past and future are completely closed, and every statement is useless as soon as it drops out of your mouth.

If only past and present moments can have truth, then one must explain how the past is ontologically differentiated from the future. Without detailing such a specific claim it is an unsubstantiated claim on your part. Therefore, I believe you will need to make some more precise choices about how you plan on attacking this concept of foreknowledge.

Molinism says that statements about the future can have truth values, which you seem to be against. Molinism also believes in possible worlds truth values, which is an essential part of philosophy. If something is true for all possible worlds, it is called a necessary thing. But for it to be true for all possible worlds, it must have a corresponding truth value in non-instantiated worlds, meaning that hypotheticals are one of the pillars of philosophy.

Thus, I think you have a bit more thinking to do, Kenny, though I appreciate your input.

GP,

If you want to critique LFW, make a new thread.

[Kenny]

Today @ 03:36 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=167197#post167197) Jaltus:An interesting point, Kenny, but to quote Doc Brown of the Back to the Future movies, &quot;you aren't thinking fourth dimensionally!&quot;

I think you are muddying the waters. Four dimensional thinking or lack thereof is not the problem here. Granted, if a B theory of time is correct (and, I do hold to a B theory of time) then there are currently definite truths about every event in the future even if some of those events are indeterminate. But, Molinism holds that God has counterfactual knowledge of what LFW creatures would do in various circumstances prior (in a logical and metaphysical sense) to the actualization of any particular timeline. Even if a B theory of time holds true, the relevant logical/causal moment of being we are discussing is prior to the existence of any particular timeline. Fourth dimensional thinking is irrelevant.

If, on the other hand, God knows indeterminate future events simply by observing them in a B mode of time, then God’s knowledge of those events may be temporally prior to them but it is neither logically nor metaphysically prior to them. It is only “after” (in a metaphysical and logical sense) these events come to be that God acquires knowledge of them. And, I think it would be very difficult to work out a coherent view of divine action on such a model. If God knows the future simply by observing the entire timeline “at once” (from an eternal perspective), then the past, present and future simply come to God as a given before God has any opportunity to respond. The only way for God to interact would be for Him to causally alter the given timeline. But, if that’s the case, then how do we know that the timeline we are currently experiencing isn’t just an earlier draft instead of the final version? But, this isn’t the Molinist view any way.


Just because something does not correspond to reality now does not mean it will not or has not corresponded to reality at some point.

Agreed. I believe statements about the future have truth values, regardless whether we are in an A mode or B mode of time, because I believe in a deterministic universe. The statement ‘X will happen at future time t’ is true if and only if the current state of affairs will inevitably lead to the instantiation of X at future time t. So, the truth values of such statements is grounded in the current state of affairs. But, if there are indeterminate future events, then the only way that statements concerning their outcomes could have truth values is if a B mode of time is in operation. In that case, the above discussion applies. If we are in an A mode of time, then statements uttered concerning indeterminate future events would have no metaphysical grounds for their truth whatsoever.


Statements about what has happened in the past have truth value, so why is it that statements about the future do not?

Statements concerning past events have truth values because the past events have occurred and are part of the causal makeup of the present. Thus, truth values concerning the past are grounded in the current state of affairs. But no such considerations hold for indeterminate future events.


If only present moments can have truth value, then the past and future are completely closed, and every statement is useless as soon as it drops out of your mouth.

I have not argued for any such conclusion. I believe that statements concerning both the future and the past have definite truth values.


If only past and present moments can have truth, then one must explain how the past is ontologically differentiated from the future.

Since I hold to a B theory of time, I don’t believe the past is all that ontologically different from the future (save for differences in causal priority). But, as I said, bringing a B theory of time into this discussion is just muddying the waters.


Molinism says that statements about the future can have truth values, which you seem to be against.

Not at all. I am against the idea that statements concerning indeterminate events can have truth values metaphysically prior (not necessarily temporally prior) to the instantiation of those events.


Molinism also believes in possible worlds truth values, which is an essential part of philosophy. If something is true for all possible worlds, it is called a necessary thing. But for it to be true for all possible worlds, it must have a corresponding truth value in non-instantiated worlds, meaning that hypotheticals are one of the pillars of philosophy.

I am familiar with modal logic and possible world semantics and I make use of these valuable tools often. I believe that God has counterfactual knowledge. But, Molinism asks us to believe that God’s counterfactual knowledge extends beyond just knowledge of possible worlds to counterfactual knowledge concerning indeterminate events (i.e. events which are not deterministic functions of antecedent circumstances in a given possible world). That’s what I have a philosophical problem with.

In Christ,
Kenny

[Pate]

Yesterday @ 11:20 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=167041#post167041)
themuzicman:



Suppose that there exists a God who does not know the future, but still acts in exactly the same ways in which God would act if he in fact did have foreknowledge.

I might as well say &quot;Suppose God is a rabid sun conjure&quot;.

The problem is that we can't say that either is definately true, or even work back to the assumption being possible, so there's no point in the rest of it.

:Muz:

I wouldn't be too sure that we can't think of a being who has all the other attributes of God but lacks foreknowledge. The point was not to show that such a being actually exists, but to show that the fact of whether or not God has foreknowledge, does not in itself change anything with regard to God's causal influences to the world, from which it seems to follow that God's foreknowledge does not cause the future.

[Pate]

Yesterday @ 06:43 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=166900#post166900)
nomad:

your example preassumes a deterministic universe...



this is only true in a deterministic universe. in a true-LFW universe, then God's actions do not uniquely determine the states of affairs in the world. it is possible that this theoretical world would be identical, but not necessary, and to show that LFW and foreknowledge are consistent, you would have to show that it is necessarily the same i think.

the problem is that you want to use a universe with LFW AFTER the fact (a universe in which LFW exists, but foreknowledge doesn't have to), and compare it to a universe without foreknowledge, but with determinism (and, there is the question of YOUR foreknowledge...). both of those are logical. what is not logical is a universe where both appear together.

i think, have to think this over some more.

That's interesting objection (one that I considered some time earlier, but ended up rejecting it - I can't remember my grounds for rejecting it, though). I think I'll have to think this over again, too.

[garthoverman]

First I'd like to note that modal logic is not proven to be a sound system. According to the axioms of modal logic, one can conclude that anything which is possible is therefore actual.

Proof:
Argument 1 - everything that is possible is actual
1. <>p . . . . . . . . . . (primary assumption)
2. <>p -> <>[]p . . . (M10 Lewis axiom)
3. <>[]p . . . . . . . . . (modus ponens from 1 and 2)
4. <>[]p -> p . . . . . (derived from axiom B)
5. p . . . . . . . . . . . . (modus ponens from 3 and 4)

...so all of this arguing using modal logic is not certain to return valid results.

Now, my main point:

Foreknowledge is not itself causative, yet it requires that the future is determined. Future event X cannot be certainly known if it is indeterminate. In that case, it would be that foreknowlege is limited to probability estimations -- which also opens up the possibility for error. For example, if future event X was inderminate, one might know that future event X will probably occur, yet no one could be sure.

In the case of an infallible entity as God is supposed to be, there can be no possible error, and for that reason His knowledge of future event X requires that future event X cannot fail to occur exactly as it is known. If the future cannot fail to occur as it is already known, it is determinate and free will does not exist.

Yours,
Garth

[Pate]

Yesterday @ 10:23 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=167007#post167007)
nomad:
'reasonably high probability' is not (at least imho) foreknowledge, at least not what we are talking about, i think. the main difference between this (our 'foreknowledge' and God's is that, usually, it is believed that God's foreknowledge is never wrong. the sun might not rise, and we would just say 'well, you couldn't have known'. but we will not make excuses for God.


Does that difference really matter? I mean, surely you don't think that your probabilistic knowledge causes it to be true that "the sun will probably rise tomorrow" either?

[nomad]

Pate:

Does that difference really matter? I mean, surely you don't think that your probabilistic knowledge causes it to be true that &quot;the sun will probably rise tomorrow&quot; either?

actually, no, i was going the other way, because if you take a probabilistic foreknowledge, everything i am saying is not true. it only applies to absolute correct foreknowledge (such as we ascribe to God).

if i say "the sun will rise tomorrow', and it doesn't, you would say 'oh well, who would have guessed' - no one will find any contradictions between what is effectively a guess and what actually happened - you thought it a good guess yesterday, and you still think it was a good guess today.

not so with true foreknowledge - if god says 'i know the sun will rise tomorrow', and today you say 'god does know the future', and it doesn't, then you would say 'no, god did not foreknow this event' - you would reneg on your belief that god actually knows the future. only if the sun actually did rise tomorrow would you say 'yes, god did know the future', and could still hold on to your belief. only one of them is consistent with god's absolute foreknowledge.

so, for my arguments, i wanted to make it clear which i am talking about.

[Kenny]

Today @ 06:39 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=167274#post167274)
garthoverman:

First I'd like to note that modal logic is not proven to be a sound system. According to the axioms of modal logic, one can conclude that anything which is possible is therefore actual.

Proof:

The M10 Lewis axiom in your proof (<>P -> <>[]P) is highly dubious as it seems to confuse epistemic possibility with logical possibility. There is no real warrant for accepting it. And, I’m not sure which “Lewis” this axiom comes from, but if it is David Lewis, then I imagine it is merely a postulate in his idiosyncratic modal philosophy. Lewis believes that all possible worlds have the same existential status as the actual world and that the actual world is not in any sense metaphysically privileged. However, such a postulate is not a part of the basic axioms of modal logic S5 and would not be accepted by a great many philosophers.


...so all of this arguing using modal logic is not certain to return valid results.

The axioms of Modal logic S5 are easily justified (with the help of possible worlds semantics) by our most basic pre-reflective intuitions. We all believe that statements such as “X might have happened but didn’t” or “If X had occurred then Y would have occurred” are meaningful in some sense. And these beliefs lead directly into a justification for possible worlds semantics and the axioms of Modal logic S5. Given the intuitive nature of the axioms, the burden of proof falls on the skeptic of Modal logic.

God Bless,
Kenny

[mattbballman19]

This quote if for Kenny for it is in relation to the alleged problem of Molinism and correspondance. I will do you, nomad, and garth more justice with a more detailed critique tonight after work. The purpose of this quote is to either a) provide an adequate answer to Kenny's objection or b) provide an adequate spring-board for discussion that will suffice to bring the discussion to a more fruitful status.

Here's what Kenny says:


Interesting that you should bring that up as it seems to me that Molinism tends to undermine a correspondence view of truth. Molinism suggests that there are true propositions which have no corresponding states of affairs in the world. If a future free choice is truly indeterminate, then nothing in the current structure of reality makes it true that the choice will resolve in a particular way.

Again, this quote from William Lane Craig is only applicable to this quote and that later tonight is the time in which I will give your post its due attention.

Here is a quote from Craig (this is in response to Hasker):


In any case, it seems to me that the answer is that counterfactuals of freedom are true in virtue of what makes any non-truth-functional proposition true, namely, correspondence. Tarski's T-schema for truth, Tp º p, applies to counterfactuals just as it does to any atomic proposition. The proposition, "If I were rich, I should buy a Mercedes," if true, is true in virtue of the fact that if I were rich I should buy a Mercedes. True counterfactuals correspond to reality and are therefore true; false counterfactuals fail to correspond and are therefore false.

Of course, if might be said that this answer only pushes the question back a notch: now we must ask, what makes certain counterfactual states of affairs obtain? Hasker says,

In order for a (contingent) conditional state of affairs to obtain, its obtaining must be grounded in some categorical state of affairs. More colloquially, truths about 'what would be the case . . . if' must be grounded in truths about what is in fact the case.{19}
For example, ". . . the truth of causal conditionals, and of their associated counterfactuals, are [sic] grounded in the natures, causal powers, inherent tendencies, and the like, of the natural entities described in them."{20}

Hasker's principle, as stated, is clearly false because we can entertain counterfactuals about what the world would be like were different laws of nature or boundary conditions to obtain. For example, consider

14. If a meter stick were set in motion relative to the aether, then it would undergo a FitzGerald-Lorentz contraction.
This counterfactual is true, but not virtue of what is in fact the case, since the classical aether does not exist. It might be said that the categorical state of affairs which in part grounds it is the state of affairs

15. The aether has the property of immobility.
But the problem is that (15) is in fact false, since there is no aether and merely possible objects neither exist nor have properties. What is true is rather

15'. If the aether existed, it would have the property of immobility.
But (15') is itself a counterfactual state of affairs, so that one counterfactual state of affairs is grounded by another.

Perhaps Hasker would merely recast his principle, however, such that a counterfactual state of affairs must be ultimately based on the individual essences of the things referred to in the counterfactual proposition. Because the essence "aethericity" includes the property of immobility, (15') is true and because (15') is true, (14) is true. But again, one can think of counterfactuals from the natural world for which this does not seem to be the case. Consider, for example, the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen thought experiment with twin photons traveling in opposite directions. If we measure the momentum of photon 1, then photon 2 must possess the same momentum, even though no measurement is carried out on it. But we could just as easily have measured instead the position of photon 1, and then photon 2 would have had a precise position. So photon 2 must possess simultaneously both position and momentum. Notice that counterfactual reasoning plays a key role in this argument. Since quantum physics prohibits our measuring both the momentum and position of photon 1 simultaneously, all the physics allows us to assert is

16. Since the momentum of photon 1 is measured to be a certain value, photon 2 has a similar value
or

17. Since the position of photon 1 is measured to be a certain value, photon 2 has a similar value.
But what the thought experiment requires us to say is that if, say, (16) is true, it is also true that

18. If we had chosen to measure instead the position of photon 1, then photon 2 would have possessed a certain value for its position.
To most thinkers, (18) seems intuitively obvious, but one will search in vain for anything in the natures of quantum entities to ground it. Now maybe Einstein, Podolsky, and Rosen were wrong to assume (18); maybe (18) is false. But it is certainly not obviously false, and the three scientists could hardly be called irrational or their position incoherent because they accepted it. In the same way, one who accepts the truth of counterfactuals of freedom can hardly be said to be embracing an incoherency.

And how do we know that counterfactuals of freedom do not satisfy Hasker's principle? Plantinga has defended the possibility of transworld depravity--that every creaturely essence is such that, if exemplified, its exemplification would have committed moral evil.{21} More recently, Kvanvig has argued that creaturely essences contain all the relevant counterfactuals of freedom concerning what their exemplifications would do in any circumstances.{22} On such views counterfactuals of creaturely freedom are grounded in the relevant individual essences of the agents referred to in the propositions. Against Kvanvig, Hasker objects, "But this is fatal to the theory. No individual chooses, or is responsible for, what is contained in that individual's essence."{23} But this objection does not tell against a view like Plantinga's, according to which creaturely essences have properties involving counterfactuals contingently, and Kvanvig could avoid the objection by making the counterfactual properties world-indexed. If creaturely essences possess counterfactual properties, then it could be maintained that counterfactuals of creaturely freedom are grounded in individual creaturely essences.

Of course, it might still be asked why individual creaturely essences have the counterfactual properties they do. But why think that volitional counterfactual properties or states of affairs must be grounded in their relevant categorical counterparts at all? Perhaps this at best characterizes only causal counterfactual states of affairs. The demand for a ground for volitional counterfactual states of affairs seems misguided. It implicitly presupposes that libertarianism and agent causation are false doctrines. To see the point, consider the libertarian claim "Jones freely chose x." If a compatibilist were to demand what makes this proposition to be true, the libertarian might well respond that nothing makes it to be true, that it simply is true in virtue of the fact that Jones freely chose x. But suppose the compatibilist presses him further, demanding why that state of affairs obtains. If Jones's choice was undetermined, then why did not some other state of affairs obtain, say, Jones's freely choosing y? The libertarian will respond that the compatibilist has missed the whole point. Jones himself is the cause of his choice and there is nothing further that makes it the case that Jones freely chose x; to ask for that is implicitly to deny the very liberty the libertarian presupposes. But in the same way, the proposition, "If Jones were in C, he would freely choose x" is true in virtue of the fact that the counterfactual state of affairs it describes obtains. To demand "But what makes it the case that if Jones were in C, he would choose x?" implicitly denies Jones's liberty. There is no further ground of why Jones would freely choose x if he were in C. To think that there must be such is to deny the hypothesis of Jones's free causal agency. Hence, Hasker's query is simply misconceived.


Sorry about the length, but I believe that the wealth of info contained therein gives an adequate reason for its posting.

matt

[Jaltus]

Yesterday @ 11:48 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=167255#post167255)
Kenny:
I think you are muddying the waters. Four dimensional thinking or lack thereof is not the problem here. Granted, if a B theory of time is correct (and, I do hold to a B theory of time) then there are currently definite truths about every event in the future even if some of those events are indeterminate. But, Molinism holds that God has counterfactual knowledge of what LFW creatures would do in various circumstances prior (in a logical and metaphysical sense) to the actualization of any particular timeline. Even if a B theory of time holds true, the relevant logical/causal moment of being we are discussing is prior to the existence of any particular timeline. Fourth dimensional thinking is irrelevant.

Not really, since it depends on when you believe God's foreknowledge "kicked-in" (for lack of a better word). Some Molinists hold to God's foreknowledge occuring at creation, some say just before it. I think it does make a difference on a few things, but those are outside the scope of this thread.



If, on the other hand, God knows indeterminate future events simply by observing them in a B mode of time, then God’s knowledge of those events may be temporally prior to them but it is neither logically nor metaphysically prior to them. It is only “after” (in a metaphysical and logical sense) these events come to be that God acquires knowledge of them. And, I think it would be very difficult to work out a coherent view of divine action on such a model. If God knows the future simply by observing the entire timeline “at once” (from an eternal perspective), then the past, present and future simply come to God as a given before God has any opportunity to respond. The only way for God to interact would be for Him to causally alter the given timeline. But, if that’s the case, then how do we know that the timeline we are currently experiencing isn’t just an earlier draft instead of the final version? But, this isn’t the Molinist view any way.

What you are describing above sounds much more like simple foreknowledge than it does Molinism. That is why the critique of Sanders and Hasker is so devastating to SFK proponents. To be honest, it is what helped push me toward a Molinistic understanding. If one takes into account Molinism in the model above, then your critique is clearly averted, for God sees not just what will be, but what would be given any circumstances, which allows Him to plan and react such that the instantiation He wants can be gotten (always balancing out both LFW and man's greater good, obviously).




Agreed. I believe statements about the future have truth values, regardless whether we are in an A mode or B mode of time, because I believe in a deterministic universe. The statement ‘X will happen at future time t’ is true if and only if the current state of affairs will inevitably lead to the instantiation of X at future time t. So, the truth values of such statements is grounded in the current state of affairs. But, if there are indeterminate future events, then the only way that statements concerning their outcomes could have truth values is if a B mode of time is in operation. In that case, the above discussion applies. If we are in an A mode of time, then statements uttered concerning indeterminate future events would have no metaphysical grounds for their truth whatsoever.

I don't think that is necessarily the case. I hold to B-theory as well, but I will make my case from the A-theory so that OVers have something to chew on.

In the A-theory of time, time only has true existence in the NOW. Only the present has any true reality, as the past is over and the future does not yet exist (this explanation is aimed at people reading this, not you Kenny).

Given an A-theory of time, can one hold to statements about the future having any truth value?

I argue yes, due to 2 things.

1) Common sense: People assume that statements made now about the future can be binding contracts. If I say I will do X, and X does not happen, you believe I lied. Therefore, it obviously holds some sort of truth value.

2) Just because I do not know the truth value of something does not mean it does not have one. This is an important point, so please bear with me here. If I tell you that I believe the Yankees won last night, but I have not seen the score and neither have you, and you then find out the score, and I am wrong, then you say I was wrong. Therefore, there was a truth value attached to the statement even though we did not know what the truth value of the statement was. Ignorance of the value does not mean no value. Stars billions of light years from us have gone out. This is true even though there is no way I can know for sure it is true (statistical probability backs me up here).

Therefore, a truth value is separate from whether someone knows what that truth value is.

Of course, if I say take the givens of LFW, EDF, and A-theory, then I can claim that God is the one who knows all truth values for every possible statement, which means that there is at least some "grounding" for this.

In the end, Kenny, you are just making the grounding objection, which has been handled time and again.



Statements concerning past events have truth values because the past events have occurred and are part of the causal makeup of the present. Thus, truth values concerning the past are grounded in the current state of affairs. But no such considerations hold for indeterminate future events.

I think you are tipping your hand here way too much. This argument is assuming LFW and EDF, but you are talking about the "causal makeup of the present," which is necessarily rejected due to the givens of this discussion. If you assume causality of the past on the present, then you can assume causality of the present on the future, and therefore you have a set future. Of course, I think that is fundamentally flawed.



I have not argued for any such conclusion. I believe that statements concerning both the future and the past have definite truth values.

Ok, so do I.




Since I hold to a B theory of time, I don’t believe the past is all that ontologically different from the future (save for differences in causal priority). But, as I said, bringing a B theory of time into this discussion is just muddying the waters.

Not really, since bringing any theory of time is necessary, and there is no reason to prefer A over B as the standard.




Not at all. I am against the idea that statements concerning indeterminate events can have truth values metaphysically prior (not necessarily temporally prior) to the instantiation of those events.

In other words, you think unless something has been caused it cannot be known. Obviously I think that is a flawed understanding of how the universe works, for I cause very little of what goes on, but (through ESPN, CNN, etc) I know a lot of what is going on, much more than what I myself have caused. Your view tends toward personal causation being the only way of accumulating personal knowledge, which I find very problematic.


I am familiar with modal logic and possible world semantics and I make use of these valuable tools often. I believe that God has counterfactual knowledge. But, Molinism asks us to believe that God’s counterfactual knowledge extends beyond just knowledge of possible worlds to counterfactual knowledge concerning indeterminate events (i.e. events which are not deterministic functions of antecedent circumstances in a given possible world). That’s what I have a philosophical problem with.

In Christ,
Kenny

Yes, Molinism holds to God knowing what you would do in any possible world.

However, debating that point would extend beyond the point of this thread, which is just looking at the objection that foreknowledge is in some way causative.

[Kenny]

Matt, I’ll have to get to the Craig quote later.

Jaltus,


Today @ 03:56 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=167488#post167488) Jaltus: Not really, since it depends on when you believe God's foreknowledge &quot;kicked-in&quot; (for lack of a better word). Some Molinists hold to God's foreknowledge occuring at creation, some say just before it. I think it does make a difference on a few things, but those are outside the scope of this thread.

Regardless, the basic point still stands. If you are holding that God knows indeterminate events metaphysically prior to their instantiation, then my argument that such knowledge has no adequate causal grounding stands. If you hold that God knows such events merely by observing them in a B mode of time, then my comments regarding that view stand.


What you are describing above sounds much more like simple foreknowledge than it does Molinism. That is why the critique of Sanders and Hasker is so devastating to SFK proponents. To be honest, it is what helped push me toward a Molinistic understanding. If one takes into account Molinism in the model above, then your critique is clearly averted, for God sees not just what will be, but what would be given any circumstances, which allows Him to plan and react such that the instantiation He wants can be gotten (always balancing out both LFW and man's greater good, obviously).

Still, the point as to what adequate causal grounding there could be for God’s counterfactual knowledge concerning indeterminate events stands.


Given an A-theory of time, can one hold to statements about the future having any truth value?

I argue yes, due to 2 things.

1) Common sense: People assume that statements made now about the future can be binding contracts. If I say I will do X, and X does not happen, you believe I lied. Therefore, it obviously holds some sort of truth value.

2) Just because I do not know the truth value of something does not mean it does not have one. This is an important point, so please bear with me here. If I tell you that I believe the Yankees won last night, but I have not seen the score and neither have you, and you then find out the score, and I am wrong, then you say I was wrong. Therefore, there was a truth value attached to the statement even though we did not know what the truth value of the statement was. Ignorance of the value does not mean no value. Stars billions of light years from us have gone out. This is true even though there is no way I can know for sure it is true (statistical probability backs me up here).

I agree with both of the above assertions. As I have said, I hold that statements concerning the future have definite truth values and I think that the truth values of propositions is independent of the knowledge of any given creature. But, I believe that because I am a determinist (and because I hold to a B theory of time, but we are presupposing an A theory here for the sake of argument) and thus see statements concerning the future as grounded in the present structure of reality.

However, I do not see that statements regarding indeterminate events could have truth values as their truth would have no grounding in any actual state of affairs. It seems to me that one must ultimately abandon a correspondence view of truth to hold to Molinism or even to just both EDF and LFW.


Therefore, a truth value is separate from whether someone knows what that truth value is.

With the exception of God, of course. If it is impossible for God to know the truth of a given statement, then (via the doctrine of omniscience) it follows that said statement has no truth value to be known.


In the end, Kenny, you are just making the grounding objection, which has been handled time and again.

I have not yet seen what I consider to be an adequate response to the grounding objection.


I think you are tipping your hand here way too much. This argument is assuming LFW and EDF, but you are talking about the &quot;causal makeup of the present,&quot; which is necessarily rejected due to the givens of this discussion. If you assume causality of the past on the present, then you can assume causality of the present on the future, and therefore you have a set future. Of course, I think that is fundamentally flawed.

Suppose, for the sake of argument, that there are causally indeterminate events which constitute part of the past (though I personally do not believe there are). Even though these events were not in and of themselves caused, it is still true that causal consequences followed from them and as such these events have causally contributed to (though not necessarily determined) the current state of affairs. Thus, the fact that these past events have occurred contributes to the present state of affairs, and this allows the truth values of statements concerning them to be grounded in the current state of affairs. That’s all I meant by “causal makeup of the present.” I was not begging the question by assuming causal determinism.


In other words, you think unless something has been caused it cannot be known.

No, that is a mischaracterization of my position. All I’m arguing is that knowledge must in some sense be causally grounded. The actual states of affairs to which knowledge pertains need not be caused. Suppose, for example, that an interpretation of quantum mechanics which maintains that indeterminate quantum events are uncaused accurately describes the world. In that case, every time physicists measure such events they are obtaining knowledge of events which were uncaused. But, it is still the case that the knowledge of the physicists is causally related to those events. They measured them. Or, suppose that physicist B knows about a particular QM event on the basis of physicist A’s testimony that he measured it. In that case, physicist B’s knowledge is causally related to physicist A’s measurement of the actual event and thus there is an appropriate causal chain (albeit indirect) from physicist B’s knowledge of the event back to the event itself. But, if there were no causal connection between the QM event and physicist B’s belief concerning it (e.g. physicist B merely dreamed that physicist A told him about the measurement), then physicist B would have no real knowledge of that event.


Obviously I think that is a flawed understanding of how the universe works, for I cause very little of what goes on, but (through ESPN, CNN, etc) I know a lot of what is going on, much more than what I myself have caused.

Yes, but it is still the case that there is an appropriate causal link between your knowledge of what is reported on ESPN and CNN and the events to which your knowledge pertains. If you found out that the CNN news crew was just guessing that a particular event took place, however, and that there was no causal link between the what was being reported and the actual event, you would not regard such reports as sources of knowledge.

That knowledge of an event requires some causal link to the event seems intuitive enough, and it is a deep problem, as I see it, for the adherent of both EDF and LFW.

In Christ,
Kenny

[themuzicman]

Today @ 01:26 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=167266#post167266)
Pate:
I wouldn't be too sure that we can't think of a being who has all the other attributes of God but lacks foreknowledge. The point was not to show that such a being actually exists, but to show that the fact of whether or not God has foreknowledge, does not in itself change anything with regard to God's causal influences to the world, from which it seems to follow that God's foreknowledge does not cause the future.

Then I disagree. I believe that God would act in a completely different way, if He had exhaustive definate foreknowledge.

Here's one problem:

God told Isreal (via Joshua, I believe) that He would drive out all of the inhabitants of the land before THEM. In the end, however, God did NOT drive them all out, and in fact, towards the end of Joshua, it says that they DID NOT drive out all the inhabitants, and they live among the Isrealis as of the time Joshua was completed.



6 "All the inhabitants of the hill country from Lebanon as far as Misrephoth-maim, all the Sidonians, I will drive them out from before the sons of Israel; only allot it to Israel for an inheritance as I have commanded you.



11 "So take diligent heed to yourselves to love the LORD your God. 12 "For if you ever go back and cling to the rest of these nations, these which remain among you, and intermarry with them, so that you associate with them and they with you, 13 know with certainty that the LORD your God will not continue to drive these nations out from before you; but they will be a snare and a trap to you, and a whip on your sides and thorns in your eyes, until you perish from off this good land which the LORD your God has given you.

Now, if God had EDF, He LIED to Joshua/Isreal in the beginning, because he KNEW that they would not drive them out.

Without EDF, God expressed His will to drive them out, and the book of Joshua is about how the Isrealites failed to obey God, and thus failed to accomplish God's purpose for them.

In this case, God's nature would have dictated that He act differently than He did.

:Muz:

[nomad]

mattbballman19:
But in the same way, the proposition, "If Jones were in C, he would freely choose x" is true in virtue of the fact that the counterfactual state of affairs it describes obtains.


if you want to say that 'in some world C, Jones would freely choose x' is a true statement. But let's be clear, this is a definitive statement - there is no theoretical world C we can look at and see what is going on there. We are imposing our own requirements on it. We have made C a deterministic world, despite our semantic assertions to the contrary. In C, Jones will freely choose X. Perhaps we should really say 'Jones freely CHOSE X', because the decision is made, it is done. The world C is defined as a world where Jones does x; that is the only reason you can make a truth claim about it.

But, if you want to claim that any statements about your theoretical world C also apply to the real world, you have a pretty heavy requirement to meet, to show that C is identical to the real world.

this is not that different than EDF/LFW i discuss below with jaltus.

to be fair, i think i really need to pick up one of his books and read it. next book run i guess.


Jaltus:
What you are describing above sounds much more like simple foreknowledge than it does Molinism. That is why the critique of Sanders and Hasker is so devastating to SFK proponents. To be honest, it is what helped push me toward a Molinistic understanding. If one takes into account Molinism in the model above, then your critique is clearly averted, for God sees not just what will be, but what would be given any circumstances, which allows Him to plan and react such that the instantiation He wants can be gotten (always balancing out both LFW and man's greater good, obviously).


this is going to take a book, and i don't have time now :) so let me just get clear exactly what your assertion is: the assertion here is that God knows all possible outcomes, and appropriately constrains the space (somehow): there is an event A, which God wishes to be A and not ~A. Some possible worlds contain event A, some possible worlds contain event ~A. (and some possible worlds don't contain either of course). God eliminates (through divine intervention) all possible worlds that lead to ~A, leaving only worlds that lead to A. Therefore, now, even though He does not know the exact sequence of events which will lead to A, He can confidently guarantee me that A will happen. I could accept this, although this is not exhaustive divine foreknowledge (that's what EDF is right?) of course.



Given an A-theory of time, can one hold to statements about the future having any truth value?

I argue yes, due to 2 things.

1) Common sense: People assume that statements made now about the future can be binding contracts. If I say I will do X, and X does not happen, you believe I lied. Therefore, it obviously holds some sort of truth value.


it WILL have a truth value. it does not yet. you believe I lied because i said X would happen (claimed X true), and yet it did (X actually turns out to be false). Of course once it happens it has a truth value! And we can act as though certain truth values will appear in the future; dealing with the theoretical is certainly with human power, and we can talk about the future as if they had truth values. But you cannot confidently say "X is false" or "X is true".

think of a graph... y = 2x + 1. i can say 'if you tell me X = 1, i can tell you y = 3; if you tell me X = -2, i can say y=-1'. what is y? can you tell me what y is? no, you can't, because y just is a calculation on x, and you haven't given me an x yet. in this case, you can't even limit what y *COULD* be significantly. at some point, you will probably give me x, and then y will have a real value. i can make all kinds of predictions, but i don't KNOW which it is. it is not knowledge, it is a guess. we can predict the kinds of values that y might contain (y will not be 'blue' for instance), but not actually the value that y holds.

now, per matt's example, i could propose a possible world in which 'you will tell me x = 1' is true. and then i can confidently tell you 'in that possible world, y = 3'. but quite obviously that has no bearing on what will happen in this world



2) Just because I do not know the truth value of something does not mean it does not have one. This is an important point, so please bear with me here. If I tell you that I believe the Yankees won last night, but I have not seen the score and neither have you, and you then find out the score, and I am wrong, then you say I was wrong. Therefore, there was a truth value attached to the statement even though we did not know what the truth value of the statement was. Ignorance of the value does not mean no value. Stars billions of light years from us have gone out. This is true even though there is no way I can know for sure it is true (statistical probability backs me up here).


hmm, yes, but in both points i noticed you carefully used past or present tense assertions.

i assert that, simplistically, truth is something that can be empirically verified by some observer. many people can verify the truth of 'jaltus is a man'; jaltus can verify for me if 'jaltus is happy', no one can verify for me if 'jaltus' tail is purple', because jaltus' nonexistent tail is not available for inspection.

inspection of the past, upon reflection, presents similar problems to the future, in that in an A theory of time, it doesn't exist. but most A-theory proponents claim that the future is mutable, but not the past, so they do have an important difference.

For the game, sure, the yankee game last night has a definite winner and loser. But what if the game is tonight? Saying that 'The yankees won' has a truth value assumes a lot... suppose that the game is called off on account of rain, or that a natural disaster destroys the stadium? then there will be no game to have a winner. there will be no truth value for 'the yankees won', because there was no game for there to be a truth value about. you might as well say 'the smerga doflops the garulla' - is that true or false? neither, it's nonsense. we do not think about the nonexistent game in the same way, but really it is.

perhaps you are God, and you can guarantee the game will happen. can you guarantee the teams will play? that, at least, is an LFW-free decision. perhaps the players will decide to go on strike right as the game is supposed to start. again, no truth value about a nonexistent game.

now, if the future is absolutely predictable, then yes, i can make absolute statements about the future. but otherwise, i can't.

statistics i'll get to later if i remember.



Therefore, a truth value is separate from whether someone knows what that truth value is.


this is true though. but i don't think the above examples can be used to project this into the future.



Of course, if I say take the givens of LFW, EDF, and A-theory, then I can claim that God is the one who knows all truth values for every possible statement, which means that there is at least some "grounding" for this.


i think that LFW and EDF are NOT compatible. it is just an assertion at this point of course.

but, imho, proponents of this say that God knows all possible worlds (all possible choices and all possible results of those choices), and this is EDF. but this model of EDF is missing one critical piece of foreknowledge: WHICH world will actually be chosen? God does not know that in this model. This is not, literally, exhaustive. Certainly 'P will choose A' is just as much a piece of knowledge as 'P could choose A, or P could choose ~A'. Let's say A leads to world W, and ~A leads to world ~W. If there is an event E that is in world W but not in world ~W, is it true or false that event E will happen? If God says 'E will happen', should I believe Him under this model?

Perhaps God can limit some freedoms; certainly there are more than one world WA, WB, WC, .... in which event E happens, and more than one world WZ, WY, WX, .. in which event E doesn't happen. God could arbitrarily put controls on the world such that WA, WB, WC are possible and WZ, WY, WX are impossible. Technically, more than one world is possible, so there is LFW freedom. But what if there is another event E' that is also dependent on that condition, such that removing worlds that E happens also removes worlds in which E' happens?

I suppose, in LFW this strictly can't happen, because people can always choose anything, however remote the chance, so there will be an infinite number of worlds. but if you allow this, you also limit God's ability above to restrict undesirable outcomes... if i am presented a choice of A or ~A, and A leads to desirable outcomes but ~A leads to undesirable outcomes... God has no control, so the only thing He can do is not allow me the condition where i have to choose A or ~A at all, cutting off both branches of the tree.

but obviously if you remove a world in which 'the yankees play the mets at 9pm on thursday night', you also remove 'the yankees won their game against the mets on thursday'.


this got too long... but i'll leave it for now. statistics another time. let me just say that 'statistically true' is significantly less strong than 'true'.

[Kenny]

In any case, it seems to me that the answer is that counterfactuals of freedom are true in virtue of what makes any non-truth-functional proposition true, namely, correspondence. Tarski's T-schema for truth, Tp º p, applies to counterfactuals just as it does to any atomic proposition. The proposition, "If I were rich, I should buy a Mercedes," if true, is true in virtue of the fact that if I were rich I should buy a Mercedes. True counterfactuals correspond to reality and are therefore true; false counterfactuals fail to correspond and are therefore false.

Of course, it might be said that this answer only pushes the question back a notch: now we must ask, what makes certain counterfactual states of affairs obtain? Hasker says,

In order for a (contingent) conditional state of affairs to obtain, its obtaining must be grounded in some categorical state of affairs. More colloquially, truths about 'what would be the case . . . if' must be grounded in truths about what is in fact the case.{19} For example, ". . . the truth of causal conditionals, and of their associated counterfactuals, are [sic] grounded in the natures, causal powers, inherent tendencies, and the like, of the natural entities described in them."{20}

Hasker's principle, as stated, is clearly false because we can entertain counterfactuals about what the world would be like were different laws of nature or boundary conditions to obtain. For example, consider

14. If a meter stick were set in motion relative to the aether, then it would undergo a FitzGerald-Lorentz contraction.
This counterfactual is true, but not virtue of what is in fact the case, since the classical aether does not exist. It might be said that the categorical state of affairs which in part grounds it is the state of affairs

15. The aether has the property of immobility.
But the problem is that (15) is in fact false, since there is no aether and merely possible objects neither exist nor have properties. What is true is rather

15'. If the aether existed, it would have the property of immobility.
But (15') is itself a counterfactual state of affairs, so that one counterfactual state of affairs is grounded by another.

Perhaps Hasker would merely recast his principle, however, such that a counterfactual state of affairs must be ultimately based on the individual essences of the things referred to in the counterfactual proposition. Because the essence "aethericity" includes the property of immobility, (15') is true and because (15') is true, (14) is true.

More or less, I would have made the same responses that Craig proposes for Hasker up to this point.


But again, one can think of counterfactuals from the natural world for which this does not seem to be the case. Consider, for example, the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen thought experiment with twin photons traveling in opposite directions. If we measure the momentum of photon 1, then photon 2 must possess the same momentum, even though no measurement is carried out on it. But we could just as easily have measured instead the position of photon 1, and then photon 2 would have had a precise position. So photon 2 must possess simultaneously both position and momentum. Notice that counterfactual reasoning plays a key role in this argument. Since quantum physics prohibits our measuring both the momentum and position of photon 1 simultaneously, all the physics allows us to assert is

16. Since the momentum of photon 1 is measured to be a certain value, photon 2 has a similar value
or

17. Since the position of photon 1 is measured to be a certain value, photon 2 has a similar value.
But what the thought experiment requires us to say is that if, say, (16) is true, it is also true that

18. If we had chosen to measure instead the position of photon 1, then photon 2 would have possessed a certain value for its position.
To most thinkers, (18) seems intuitively obvious, but one will search in vain for anything in the natures of quantum entities to ground it. Now maybe Einstein, Podolsky, and Rosen were wrong to assume (18); maybe (18) is false. But it is certainly not obviously false, and the three scientists could hardly be called irrational or their position incoherent because they accepted it. In the same way, one who accepts the truth of counterfactuals of freedom can hardly be said to be embracing an incoherency.

Honestly, I’m not sure if I see the point that Craig is making here. The conclusion of Einstein’s, Podolsky’s, and Rosen’s argument has been empirically shown false. Also, as far as I can see, the conclusion does not follow merely by accepting 18. As I see it, 18 is true. The mere counterfactual proposition ‘If we had chosen to measure the position of photon 1, then photon 2 would have possessed a certain value for its position’ does not entail that photon 1 and photon 2 ever had a determinate position, nor does it entail that there is a determinate fact concerning which certain value for the position would have obtained. So accepting 18 does not run us contrary to the standard interpretation of QM, not does it commit us to believing that there are definite facts pertaining to indeterminate events. And, I see the truth of 18 as being grounded in facts pertaining to the laws of physics. It is simply a physical fact that if one measures a certain value for the position of a particle, one obtains an indeterminate value for the momentum of a particle and vice versa. But, perhaps I have missed the point here.


And how do we know that counterfactuals of freedom do not satisfy Hasker's principle? Plantinga has defended the possibility of transworld depravity--that every creaturely essence is such that, if exemplified, its exemplification would have committed moral evil.{21} More recently, Kvanvig has argued that creaturely essences contain all the relevant counterfactuals of freedom concerning what their exemplifications would do in any circumstances.{22} On such views counterfactuals of creaturely freedom are grounded in the relevant individual essences of the agents referred to in the propositions.

Kvanvig’s view here comes close to the view of compatiblistic freedom that I personally hold. I believe that what we would do in given sets of exhaustive antecedent circumstances is a deterministic function of our individual essences. But, that’s not LFW.


Against Kvanvig, Hasker objects, "But this is fatal to the theory. No individual chooses, or is responsible for, what is contained in that individual's essence."

Here I disagree with Hasker. As I see it, moral responsibility for our actions is intimately tied to the fact that we are the cause of them, that they flow out of who we are. Our actions are reflective of the deepest parts of our being. But, that’s not really what this thread is about.


{23} But this objection does not tell against a view like Plantinga's, according to which creaturely essences have properties involving counterfactuals contingently, and Kvanvig could avoid the objection by making the counterfactual properties world-indexed. If creaturely essences possess counterfactual properties, then it could be maintained that counterfactuals of creaturely freedom are grounded in individual creaturely essences.

As I see it, at this point things just start getting really weird. An essence is by definition just the set of properties an individual possesses in every possible world in which that individual is instantiated. To say that essences themselves can possess contingent properties just seems to add a lot of metaphysical baggage. If an essence, E, possesses property, P, contingently, then there is at least one world (i.e. the actual world), W0, in which E possesses P and at least one possible world, W1, where E possesses the property, ~P. This, in turn amounts to saying that if W0 were instantiated, then the individual S, to which E belongs, would possess the essential property P and if W1 were instantiated, S would possess the essential property ~P. But, since S’s essence is merely the set of properties she possesses in all possible worlds in which she is instantiated, this amounts to a contradiction. Of course, I’m certain Plantinga has a good response to this, but I would like to see what it is. On the surface, the idea of contingent essential properties seems to me to be incoherent.

But, even if a coherent account of essences with contingent properties could be worked out, there is something to this account which I find to be deeply disturbing theologically. Since Molinists hold that God’s counterfactual knowledge of creaturely essences is logically prior to God’s creative decree and if it is added that the properties of individual essences are contingent, accepting Molinism amounts to saying that there are contingent states of affairs coeternal with God but outside of God’s volitional control. As I see it, this comes dangerously close, if it does not reach it, to affirming a sort of dualism in which there are aspects of reality which exist independently alongside God for all eternity and thereby limit the scope of God’s power. If process theology is condemned as heretical for maintaining that certain aspects of contingent reality are coeternal with God, then why shouldn’t such forms of Molinism be considered heretical for the same reason.


Of course, it might still be asked why individual creaturely essences have the counterfactual properties they do. But why think that volitional counterfactual properties or states of affairs must be grounded in their relevant categorical counterparts at all? Perhaps this at best characterizes only causal counterfactual states of affairs. The demand for a ground for volitional counterfactual states of affairs seems misguided. It implicitly presupposes that libertarianism and agent causation are false doctrines. To see the point, consider the libertarian claim "Jones freely chose x." If a compatibilist were to demand what makes this proposition to be true, the libertarian might well respond that nothing makes it to be true, that it simply is true in virtue of the fact that Jones freely chose x.

Fine, but there is still a state of affairs which makes it true that Jones freely chose x, namely the fact that Jone’s freely chose x. There is no analogous state of affairs for a not yet determined future event, however, or a counterfactual statement regarding a causally indeterminate event.


But suppose the compatibilist presses him further, demanding why that state of affairs obtains. If Jones's choice was undetermined, then why did not some other state of affairs obtain, say, Jones's freely choosing y? The libertarian will respond that the compatibilist has missed the whole point. Jones himself is the cause of his choice and there is nothing further that makes it the case that Jones freely chose x; to ask for that is implicitly to deny the very liberty the libertarian presupposes.

I happen to think that this account of freedom is incompatible with moral responsibility, but that’s not the subject of this thread. It is, however, the subject of this thread (http://theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&threadid=5896).


But in the same way, the proposition, "If Jones were in C, he would freely choose x" is true in virtue of the fact that the counterfactual state of affairs it describes obtains. To demand "But what makes it the case that if Jones were in C, he would choose x?" implicitly denies Jones's liberty.

It only does so if one assumes that said counterfactual statement has a definite truth value to begin with (and of course, the word ‘liberty’ is biasing things in favor of LFW here since a compatiblist would also maintain that Jones has liberty in a sense). Again, as I see it, if a proposition concerning what Jones would have done has a definitive truth value, then there is a definitive state of affairs pertaining to Jones and/or to the structure of reality which makes that proposition true. But, if that’s the case, then Jones’ actions (at least in certain aspects) are determinate functions of a given state of affairs. But, that’s precisely what LFW aims to deny.

In Christ,
Kenny

[garthoverman]

Yesterday @ 11:01 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=167289#post167289)
Kenny:



The M10 Lewis axiom in your proof (&lt;&gt;P -&gt; &lt;&gt;[]P) is highly dubious as it seems to confuse epistemic possibility with logical possibility. There is no real warrant for accepting it. And, I’m not sure which “Lewis” this axiom comes from, but if it is David Lewis, then I imagine it is merely a postulate in his idiosyncratic modal philosophy. Lewis believes that all possible worlds have the same existential status as the actual world and that the actual world is not in any sense metaphysically privileged. However, such a postulate is not a part of the basic axioms of modal logic S5 and would not be accepted by a great many philosophers.



The axioms of Modal logic S5 are easily justified (with the help of possible worlds semantics) by our most basic pre-reflective intuitions. We all believe that statements such as “X might have happened but didn’t” or “If X had occurred then Y would have occurred” are meaningful in some sense. And these beliefs lead directly into a justification for possible worlds semantics and the axioms of Modal logic S5. Given the intuitive nature of the axioms, the burden of proof falls on the skeptic of Modal logic

I would chuckle at this if I didn't think you were serious.

The Lewis axiom is well-justified by your own criteria of its "intuitive nature." If p is indeed possible, it can be possible in all possible worlds and thus it is possibly necessary. To deny M10 is to beg the question of the necessity (or lack thereof) of p. Look at it this way: All necessary propositions are possible, and so some possible propositions will be necessary. Therefore if p is possible, it is possible that p is necessary. We cannot deny that p is possibly necessary without dismissing its necessity a priori.

But you didn't comment on the rest of my post. Did you have any other qualms with what was intended to be the primary substance of my submission?

Also, this is not specifically directed at you, but is made available for everyone, I have a copy of a rigorous proof in formal logic that proves the incompatibility of infallible foreknowledge and free will.

Free Will vs. Predestination

In fairness, however, I will provide a formal presentation of the argument I am making here. I fear this shall be rather lengthy of necessity, as such formal argumentation normally is.

(The reasons for the numbering and for the repetitions will become clear in the second half of this post.)

1 1.1 It is possible to know infallibly
beforehand that person A will
do X and free will exists.
(Hypothesis)

1.2
1.2.1 It is possible to know infallibly
beforehand that Person A will
do X and free will exists.
(Repetition of hypothesis 1.1)

1.2.2 It is possible to know infallibly
beforehand that person A will
do X.
(Extraction of first half of hypothesis.
If the hypothesis 1.2.1 is true,
then this also must be true.)

1.2.3 That which is known infallibly
is true.
(Hypothesis, already granted as
being true by you.)

1.2.4 It is possible to know infallibly
beforehand that person A will
do X and that which is known
infallibly is true.
(Conjunction of 1.2.2 and 1.2.3)

1.2.5 If it is possible to know
infallible beforehand that person
A will do X and that which
is known infallibly is true, then
person A will do X.
(Logical consequence of 1.2.4.)

1.2.6 Person A will do X.
(1.2.4 is true, therefore 1.2.5 must
be true, therefore this must be true.)

1.3 Therefore, If it is possible to
know infallibly beforehand that person
A will do X and free will exists,
then person A will do X.
(Conclusion starting with hypothesis 1.1
and proceeding with argument 1.2.)

1.4 Person A will do X.
(Given hypothesis 1.1 and conclusion 1.3,
this must follow.)

1.5 Free will exists.
(Extraction of second half of hypothesis.
If the hypothesis 1.2.1 is true, then this
also must be true.)

1.6
1.6.1 Free will exists.
(Repetition of 1.5.)

1.6.2 If free will exists then
person A will do X or it is false
that person A will do X.
(Definition of free will, law of
excluded middle.)

1.6.3 Person A will do X or it is
false that person A will do X.
(1.6.1 specifies the premiss
of 1.6.2, therefore the consequence
of 1.6.2 must be true.)

1.6.4
1.6.4.1 Person A will do X or it is
false that person A will do X.
(Repetition of 1.6.3)

1.6.4.2 It is false that person
A will do X.
(Hypothesis)

1.6.4.3 Person A will do X
(Repetition of 1.4)

1.6.4.4 Person A will do X and it is
false that person A will do X.
(Combination of 1.6.4.3 and 1.6.4.2)

This is a contradiction, and
so cannot be true.

1.6.5 Therefore, it is false that person A
will do X or it is false that person A
will do X.
(Since the statement in 1.6.4.1 leads to
a contradiction at 1.6.4.4, the statement
at 1.6.4.1 must be false.)

1.6.6 Person A will do X or it is false that
person A will do X and it is false that
person A will do X or it is false that
person A will do X.
(This is the logical combination of 1.6.3
and 1.6.5)

This is a contradiction, and
so cannot be true.

1.7 Therefore it is false that free will exists.
(The hypothesis that free will exists stated in
1.6.1 leads to a contradiction at 1.6.6, and so
the hypothesis must be false.)

1.8 Therefore free will exists and it is false
that free will exists.
(Combination of statements at 1.5 and 1.7)
This is a contradiction, and
so cannot be true.)

2. Therefore, it is false that it is possible to
know infallibly beforehand that person A will
do X and free will exists.

Under a de Morgan law, this can be shown to be equivalent to stating that,

It is false that it is possible to know
infallibly beforehand that person A will do
X or it is false that free will exists.

Which is what I have been saying all along.


Now, let's look at this in terms of System F, which is a natural deduction formulation of classical sentential calculus.

First, some definitions:

The symbols in System F are of three kinds -- sentence variables, connectives, and 'therefore' indicators.

Any 'p,' 'q,' 'r,' 's,' or 't' is a sentence variable in F. (To provide an unlimited number of distinct kinds of sentence variables and as a trivial extension of F, we can allow also that any 'p,' 'q,' 'r,' 's,' or 't' primed one or more times is a sentence variable in F.)

Any 'K,' 'A,' 'C,' or 'N' is a connective in F.

Any |- is a 'therefore' indicator in F

K represents the connective 'and'
A represents the connective 'or'
C represents the connective 'if...then'
N represents the connective 'it is false that'

The 'or' here is similar to the 'vee' specified in Principia Mathematica, and represented by the truth table (System T):

p q Apq

Case 1 1 1 1
Case 2 1 0 1
Case 3 0 1 1
Case 4 0 0 0

There are 9 kinds of Logical Argument Formulas (LAFs) in System F:

K-in (Ki) K-out (Ko)
A-in (Ai) A-out (Ao)
C-in (Ci) C-out (Co)
N-in (Ni) N-out (No)
Repetition (rep)

And a hypothesis is denoted by "hyp."

Now, let us represent the following sentences:

p = It is possible to know infallibly
beforehand that person A will
do X

q = Free will exists

r = That which is known infallibly is true

s = Person A will do X.

Given the above representations, one can then represent the above argument as follows (the hypotheses noted as "accepted" have already been granted by Matt Killock):

1 | 1.1 | Kpq hyp
| 1.2 | 1.2.1 | Kpq 1.1, rep
| | 1.2.2 | p 1.2.1, Ko
| | 1.2.3 | r hyp - Accepted
| | 1.2.4 | Kpr 1.2.2, 1.2.3, Ki
| | 1.2.5 | CKprs Hyp - Accepted
| |-
| | 1.2.6 | s 1.2.4, 1.2.5, Co
| 1.3 | CKpqs 1.2, Ci
| 1.4 | s 1.3, 1.1, Co
| 1.5 | q 1.1, Ko
| 1.6 | 1.6.1 | q 1.5, rep
| | 1.6.2 | CqAsNs hyp - definition
| | 1.6.3 | AsNs 1.6.2, 1.6.1, Co
| | 1.6.4 | 1.6.4.1 | AsNs 1.6.3, rep
| | | 1.6.4.2 | Ns hyp
| | | 1.6.4.3 | s 1.4, rep
| | | 1.6.4.4 | KsNs 1.6.4.3, 1.6.4.2, Ki
| |-
| | 1.6.5 | NAsNs 1.6.4, Ni
| | 1.6.6 | KAsNsNAsNs 1.6.3, 1.6.5, Ki
|-
| 1.7 | Nq 1.6, Ni
| 1.8 | KqNq 1.5, 1.7, Ki
|-
2 | NKpq 1, Ni
3 | ANpNq 2, de Morgan Law

Hopefully you will find the above proof rigorous enough for you.
And I do hope you will note that:

1. It makes no reference whatever to any entity.

2. It makes no reference whatever to how something might be known infallibly beforehand.

3. It makes no reference whatever to whether or not the knowing is actually done.

All those factors are immaterial to the argument. The argument follows once anyone simply asserts the mere possibility of knowing such information infallibly.

Yes, clearly one can make the case that some entity must do the knowing, but that is irrelevant to the argument (even though you might consider it relevant).

Copied from: http://forum.darwinawards.com/index.php?act=ST&f=6&t=3350&st=0

EDIT: The symbolic form above is supposed to line up all neat and nice but for some reason the forum software removes the extra spaces I put in to align it properly. Sorry.

Yours,
Garth

[mattbballman19]

garth,

1. <>p . . . . . . . . . . (primary assumption)
2. <>p -> <>[]p . . . (M10 Lewis axiom)
3. <>[]p . . . . . . . . . (modus ponens from 1 and 2)
4. <>[]p -> p . . . . . (derived from axiom B)
5. p . . . . . . . . . . . . (modus ponens from 3 and 4)

This is not a new indictment on modal logic. The problem here is that it fails to consider the modal affirmation of

3.5 <>(~<>p)

or

3.5' <>([]~p)

Premise 4 above only takes into account the possibility of p's necessity when it should take into account both p's possible necessity and its possible non-necessity (or impossibility). Now, when 3.5 or 3.5' are inserted, the conclusion does not follow for 4 is no longer true. Otherwise two parallel syllogisms would yield both the actuality of p and the impossibility of p at the same time! Moreover, It also fails to consider the distinction between something being necessary de re and necessary de dicto.

Regarding fee will, you write


"future event X cannot fail to occur exactly as it is known."

I don't disagree with this. But it is vacuously true because no matter what X is, it is that which is foreknown by God. If X ends up being something different, then that is what was foreknown by God. There is no determinism even implied here. And if you want to assert the following:

(1) Necessarily, if God foreknows X then X will occur.
(2) God foreknows X.
(3) Therefore, necessarily X will occur.

then you will be guilty of a common modal fallacy -- confusing the necessity of consequence with the necessity of consequent.

matt

[mattbballman19]

nomad,

Clearly for non-Calvinists, definitions 1 and 2 are unacceptable. But responding to your presentation is actually quite easy because it commits a common mistake by critics of foreknowledge. The argument for determinism from foreknowledge essentially comes from the following argument:

(1) Necessarily, If God foreknows X then X will occur.
(2) God foreknows X.
(3) Therefore, X will necessarily occur.

So it is argued that it is God's foreknowledge that guarantees the event's occurrence. However, this argument commits a common modal fallacy: It confuses the necessity of consequence with the necessity of the consequent. And it will not do to alter premise 1 to read:

(1') If God foreknows X then X will necessarily occur

because this statement is false -- that something becomes a necessary existent (like a triangle is a 3-sided figure) if God foreknows it.

The only two remedies that exist are to (i) remove the modal qualifiers or (ii) remove the modal qualifier from premise 3. But in either (i) or (ii), you no longer preclude subjunctive counterfactuals.

Another tacit problem you have is assuming that foreknowledge is the cause of future events, which is absurd. In fact, knowledge doesn't "cause" anything. Propositions are true or foreknown only in that they correspond to the actual world so, for instance, the knowledge of "John will eat eggs for breakfast tomorrow" is foreknown, not because him eating eggs for breakfast "causes" that knowledge, but because John in fact will eat eggs for breakfast tomorrow. What constitutes God's foreknowledge is the actuality of the state of affairs in the actual world. So, if Simon chooses to sell his prized chickens, God would have known that and that would have constituted God's foreknowledge. But if Simon turned out to choose not to sell his prized chickens, then that would have constituted God's foreknowledge and would have been foreknown by God instead. So,

(1') If X will occur, then God foreknows X

is a better representation since it is true, guarantees God's foreknowledge, and secures libertarian free will!

matt

[mattbballman19]

Kenny,

(i) I'm not proposing internalism here critiqued by Gettier. I'm saying what knowledge is not, namely, that it is the cause of the actual world (whatever that is). Knowledge is not the product of causation.

(ii) You invoke the notion of truth-makers in responding to Molinism. But it is far from evident that counterfactuals of creaturely freedom must have truth-makers or, if they must, that appropriate candidates for their truth-makers are not available. There are too many propositions with truth-value or that have no truth-makers, such as:

No physical objects exist.
Dinosaurs are extinct today.
Torturing a child is wrong.
etc...

These do not have concrete objects to vindicate their truthfulness or falsity. And I am more confident in the truthfulness of counterfactuals than I am in believing that all statements with truth-value have truth-makers or are grounded in actual objects. For those who want to maintain truth-makers for counterfactuals may find Freddoso's comments on the subject of interest for he affirms truth-makers for counterfactuals. They may follow the disquotation principle and affirm that "If I had a million dollars then I would purchase a larger house" is true because if I did have a million dollars then I would purchase a larger house. That counterfact may exist even if the subjects and objects do not yet.

matt

[mattbballman19]

Kenny,

I'll get to your critique of the Craig quote sometime tomorrow.

matt

[Jaltus]

1.2.3 That which is known infallibly
is true.
(Hypothesis, already granted as
being true by you.)

Actually, I disagree strongly with this premise since it is intentionally set in the present tense, which already rules out counterfactuals of creaturely freedom. In other words, if this had been set in a different casting, I mgiht agree to it.

1.2.3 That which is known infallibly
is or will be true.
(Hypothesis, already granted as
being true by you.)

Thus the reality of the thing is not determined already, rather it is based on something that will happen but it is not necessary for it to happen.

In other words, something can or cannot occur. If it occurs, then God foreknew it, if it does not occur, then God did not foreknow it. This is what we are trying to argue here. By not paying attention to tenses (or diliberately setting everything to the present) you already miss the entire concept and negate free will by means of a premise that is in no way true.

If something that will happen is based on it already being necessary to happen, then it will necessarily happen, but that is the only way.

[nomad]

mattbballman19:
But responding to your presentation is actually quite easy because it commits a common mistake by critics of foreknowledge. The argument for determinism from foreknowledge essentially comes from the following argument:

(1) Necessarily, If God foreknows X then X will occur.
(2) God foreknows X.
(3) Therefore, X will necessarily occur.



apparently i am not being clear, because this is NOT what i am saying at all.

what i am saying is:

1) Without determinism, you cannot have foreknowledge.
2) Therefore, foreknowlege is therefore contingent upon, and requires, determinism.

statement 2 is (afaik) the contrapositive of statement 1, and therefore true, if statement 1 is true.



(1') If God foreknows X then X will necessarily occur
because this statement is false -- that something becomes a necessary existent (like a triangle is a 3-sided figure) if God foreknows it.


i am not sure, but that is what i am trying to prove. i am not trying to use that as a premise! or perhaps i am, if i am that would be bad :) since it is the intended conclusion.



Another tacit problem you have is assuming that foreknowledge is the cause of future events, which is absurd. In fact, knowledge doesn't "cause" anything. Propositions are true or foreknown only in that they correspond to the actual world so, for instance, the knowledge of "John will eat eggs for breakfast tomorrow" is foreknown, not because him eating eggs for breakfast "causes" that knowledge, but because John in fact will eat eggs for breakfast tomorrow.


uhh, that's what i've been trying to say. anyways i totally agree with that, so i'm not sure where the contradiction lies there.



(1') If X will occur, then God foreknows X

is a better representation since it is true, guarantees God's foreknowledge, and secures libertarian free will!


i still do not see how you can read libertarian free will into it. but i will give you that, as the statement stands, there is nothing opposed to LFW. and i totally agree with that statement (and will use it below). however, i think you have a burden of proof to show that the statement 'X will occur' is consistent with LFW; i still think you are reading causality into it.

perhaps an example might help me understand where you are coming from (or help you understand where i am coming from, one or the other):

using my example (3) above:

----------TF--------TD---------TA--------> (time)

we will separate TD from TA for now, but the limit of TD is TD=TA. TF = the moment where God knows what agent P will do at A (the choices are A or ~A); TD is the point where the agent has made a choice and will not change it; TA is the point where the action occurs in reality.

let us assume at TF, I ask God what agent P will do at A, and he gives me an answer. Suppose He says 'A'.

Agent P, up until the point of TD, the decision is not yet made. Agent P makes an LFW decision to do either A or ~A at time TD.

How, under LFW, do you guarantee that the knowledge at time TF is identical to the decision at time TD?

The example might be like, for example, you come to my house and see a red picture hanging on the wall. You tell a friend 'nomad has a red picture hanging on his wall'. Later on, I decide i don't like the red picture and replace it with a blue one (my free choice). your friend comes over, looks for a red picture but sees a blue one instead. you say to them 'well, guessed he changed it.' but, the truth is your 'foreknowledge' was wrong.

now, you could lock me out of the room after the statement. this would not violate my free will (though the locked door might ;), since you have not overridden my will, merely not given me a choice to make regarding whether i will change the picture.

but, you can not determine what will happen once an LFW decision is presented to me.

so, my issue is with the statement 'agent P will choose A'.
if it is true that 'agent P will choose A', then God will know that agent P will choose A.

the question is on what basis can we confidently hold that agent P will choose A?

the contrapositive of the above is that if God does not know that agent P will choose A, then agent P will not choose A. this is the basic of foreknowledge 'causing' things; it must be a necessary consequent of foreknowledge (so far, we are not reading causality into it):

Assumptions:
A1) LFW
A2) EDF
A3) LNC
A4) LC (which does not imply causality, just makes talking about causality meaningful)

1) If agent P will choose A, then God knows now that agent P will choose A.
1') If agent P will choose ~A, then God knows now that agent P will choose ~A.
1'c) If God does not know that agent P will choose ~A, then agent P will not choose ~A.
2) Agent P can only choose A or ~A (simplification for the purposes of argument).
2') If agent P will not choose ~A, agent P will choose A.
C1) If God does not know that agent P will choose ~A, then agent P will choose A.
3) If God does not know that agent P will choose ~A, then God does know that agent P will choose A.
C2) If God does know that agent P will choose A, then agent P will choose A.

Is there any issue with any of the above? A few of those are assertions, but i didn't think you'd have a problem with any of them. If you do, let me know. What we have shown so far is that C2 is a logical proceeding out of premise 1 (which you have already agreed to), unless you object. C2 effectively says that if God knows an agent P will choose A, then the agent P will choose A. This is not a 'causal' relationship, as some have asserted, but a contingent relationship, like a triangle with 3 sides.

Now, the question is, does 'the agent P will choose A' imply determinism? I believe it does: that is the example above, but i can make it formal if necessary (i did not read all through garth's stuff yet).

So far, what i am hearing is that God knows all POSSIBLE outcomes. But i am not interested in POSSIBLE outcomes; i am interested in ACTUAL outcomes. Even I can tell you that either the Mets or the Yankees will win that game; if this is what we mean by omniscience, i am not impressed. What i am looking for is a conversion from a possible world to an actual world. And i am not finding it yet.

It seems that the assertions 'P can do either of X or ~X' (definition of LFW) and 'P can only do X' (my translation of P will do X) are in conflict. But this second statement is required for your proof to work.

The only way so far i can see to resolve this conflict is to make God 'out of time' in regards to us, such that TF is temporally after TD on God's timeline, but temporally before TD on the observer's timeline (including the agent itself).

It is still not clear to me how an agent can be both free to do X or ~X, and yet is guaranteed to do X. Causally, i have a way to predict the choice accurately; even non-divine scientists can make fairly accurate descriptions based on physical determinism. But, an LFW decision is by definition uncaused, and therefore unknown until it becomes 'real'. Or perhaps, it is the observation of an LFW decision that makes it real? (cf with QM theories and schrodinger's cat?)

[Sheepdog]

my apologies for pretty much jumping in from left field, but the way i seek to resolve the conflict, i believe, is considerably simpler than some of the stuff i have seen here (if i merely retread already burnt ground, i again apologize). there are basically two ways of looking at the causal situation, both of which are neatly formulated in logic syllogisms (i'm sure garth knows where this is going, remember the theology board at CARM?). here they are:

let:
Fn = a specific future event
Gn = God's foreknowledge of Fn

Syllogism A
If Gn, then Fn
Gn
Therefore, Fn

Syllogism B
If Fn, then Gn
Fn
Therefore, Gn

Syllogism A is determinative, as it would mean that foreknowledge does indeed cause future events (including supposed "free-will" choices). However, if we accept B, then foreknowledge is actually representative of what will occur, not determinative. The crux of the whole debate is which if/then statement we should accept. That is, either:
"If Gn, then Fn"
or:
"If Fn, then Gn".

now A seems more intuitive, as causation as we know tends to flow with time, and foreknowledge would exist prior to the future event. However, does this really square well with how we understand knowledge at all? When you witness a car accident, your knowledge of it did not cause the accident, correct? Of course not, that is ridiculous. As Jaltus has rightly argued, does knowledge do anything? In a sense yes, as your knowledge is a partial factor in your decisions. However, even the knowledge you have exists because it was impressed onto your mind, so to speak. Thus, there is no precident in existance that would warrent us to accept "If Gn, then Fn." We could still go the route arguing from which exists prior to the other, but if we do, I will have to note that if Foreknowledge exists in the first place, one would not escape question begging how exactly foreknowledge exists. How does God foreknow that I am typing this? Unless He actively predestined it down to every letter I type, it is safe to say the existence of foreknowledge itself would be a precident of nontemporal causality.

Now, some would find this offensive, as it seems to put too much into the hands of humans. If our actions causes what God foreknows of them, does that make God dependant on us, or less sovereign? I would say no, for a couple of reasons: (1) we should not confuse the knowledge God has through his ability to foreknow, with the ability itself-- we did not give God the attribute of exhaustive foreknowledge. (2) We have to remember that the set of events F includes events directly caused by God and indirectly resulting from Gods action in real time. I believe even events that are caused by free-will agents also find a partial cause in God (either directly or indirectly). In fact, I don't suscribe to free-will in the most libertarian sense because all our choices are influenced by nonself factors (including, but not restricted to, God). I could probably call myself a libertarian along the lines of Jatlus' position, but I tend more towards an often overlooked view known as soft-determinism. Regardless, most of the ball is still in God's court, but even so: (3) a sovereign choice to draw back slightly and allow human choice to take its course is itself a sovereign decision. Even if such a view puts the responsibility of choice on mankind (which is good, since we are only rightfully held responsible for our actions if we are responsible for them), God retains sovereignty, as He was the One who decided to allow the world to become the way it is.

But of course, this might not sit right with some aspects of Calvinism. however, i believe the issues are more detailed than I intended to get in this discourse, and thus is out of the scope of this post. Perhaps another thread, on another day.

[Dee Dee Warren]

Thank you Sheepdog, that made perfect sense.

[Solly]

mscnt...he told me things I never heard in the Bible...mscnt

[Dee Dee Warren]

Matt and Jaltus, I am going to need to print out this thread to digest your responses in full. Thank you so much.

[Kenny]

Today @ 01:16 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=168310#post168310)
garthoverman: I would chuckle at this if I didn't think you were serious.

The Lewis axiom is well-justified by your own criteria of its &quot;intuitive nature.&quot; If p is indeed possible, it can be possible in all possible worlds…

So far, so good. That’s just Becker’s fifth postulate (<>P ->[]<>P).


…and thus it is possibly necessary. To deny M10 is to beg the question of the necessity (or lack thereof) of p. Look at it this way: All necessary propositions are possible, and so some possible propositions will be necessary. Therefore if p is possible, it is possible that p is necessary. We cannot deny that p is possibly necessary without dismissing its necessity a priori.

Wrong. You are making the classic mistake of confusing epistemic possibility with logical possibility. For instance, mathematical truths are necessary truths. Goldbach’s (sp?) conjecture (GC), for all we know, may be true. Therefore, epistemically speaking, it is possible that GC is necessarily true. However, if GC is false then it is necessarily false and thus it is not logically possible that GC is true. So we might have the situation here that it is epistemically possible that GC is true, but logically impossible that GC is true. Since Modal logic S5 is designed to handle logical possibility and necessity, it is illegitimate to import axioms based on epistemic possibility and necessity.


But you didn't comment on the rest of my post. Did you have any other qualms with what was intended to be the primary substance of my submission?

Since we are arguing for the same conclusion (that EDF is incompatible with LFW), I did not address it. What a strange alliance we have here, Calvinists, Open theists and atheists/pantheists all on the same side for a change. :cheers:

God Bless,
Kenny

[geebob]

It should come as no surprise to you Jaltus that I agree with your arguement in the topic as we've discussed the issue before.

As for the notion that there are open theists who hold it to be the case that foreknowledge is determinative, I'm sure this is true amongst the laity, but I find it dubious to claim that any profesional scholars do. I know you think Greg Boyd holds this, but I'm not convinced

I'll tell you why I have no problem with your arguement or more specifically, why it doesn't approach the issue. I have had a subtle shift in my view of these things.

I no longer think that indeterminism is enough. I don't know if molinists can fully coherently claim indeterminism, or B theorists, or B theorists and indeterminists, or guys who just hold to a the timeless view of God and not necessarily a B theory, and so on. I don't know if they can consistently hold to indeterminism, but even if they do it is not enough.

Why? Indeterminism and determinism are typically articulated in terms of the past's relation to the future. Determinism says that because of the way the past is, (specifically the beginning, or from the infinite past (if there was no beginning)) the future is exhaustively determined.

I don't think that the future's independence from the past is enough for libertarian free will. It is essential, but it is not enough. libertarian freedom I am convinced requires that there is a way that the future is, and that is that the future is open. Not just that it is independent from the past, but that there are many possible corridors, any of which may be actualized. And of course, if the future is open, that is how God knows it.

[mattbballman19]

nomad and kenny,

I'm going to be brief here.

Although you have not formally introduced the modal representation in the (1)-(3) argument I noted, you seem to assume it in your analysis (unwittingly, I imagine). And since it suffers a modal fallacy, there isn't much hope for precluding LFW.

Secondly, I'm not arguing for proof of LFW but, rather, that it is logically consistent with God's foreknowledge, which you admitted in my premise 1' was legitimate when you say, "i will give you that, as the statement stands, there is nothing opposed to LFW. and i totally agree with that statement."

Thirdly, the examples you set up (specifically the red mural example) fail to resemble the doctrine of foreknowledge. What you propose is that foreknowledge of a red mural at t1 does not guarantee the same content of that foreknowledge at t2. And foreknowledge at t1 can only elicit a probability for future contingents. But that's not the foreknowledge model. It is not "The sun has risen X times in the past and therefore it will probably rise tomorrow" which is just plain prediction like meteorology. That's not true foreknowledge. Rather, the content of foreknowledge is what in fact will take place. On this view, there is nothing that will in fact take place that does not compose God's foreknowledge because whatever will be is what God foreknows.

Fourthly, Molinism does provide an answer as to how God can sovereignly select events to be guaranteed to happen while at the same time using free will as a means to that end. Middle knowledge is, briefly, the view that God knows what each person will do under every circumstance. If God foreknows that A will freely do X in circumstance C, then by creating A in circumstance C God can guarantee the result. If that person were to do ~X instead, then that would have constituted God's middle knowledge instead.

matt

[mattbballman19]

kenny,

I followed that link to your analysis of LFW.

A simplified response to this large argument is that it equivocates between what will happen and what must happen (where you have the masked phrase "A obtains" or "A does not obtain"). Just because something will occur by an act of free will does not entail that it must happen for it could have been otherwise. But that it will happen is just the happy free choice of that person who will simply not fail to freely bring it about.

About premise 4, it grossly assumes that an agent is a sufficient cause for some specified effect. However, given two possibilities for an agent (LFW), e.g., "Ivan will freely enroll in Phi 101" and "Ivan will freely refrain from enrolling in Phi 101", how does the creation of Ivan in his circumstances leading up to one of these two choices guarantee one choice over another? It cannot outside of determinism. But if determinism is true, then Ivan never freely chose his course of action.

matt

[geebob]

A simplified response to this large argument is that it equivocates between what will happen and what must happen (where you have the masked phrase "A obtains" or "A does not obtain").

This answer's overrated. That's because what will happen is still inconsistent with things happening otherwise. If I will not eat oatmeal tomorrow, then my eating the oatmeal tomorrow is still inconsistent with the fact that I will not eat oatmeal tomorrow. If there was never a time from which I could have refrained from eating it, if there was never a time at which my eating of it and not eating of it was consistent with the world past present and future, then I was never free in the libertarian sense.

You can insist till you're blue that will does not imply must, but it is still incoherent to say that it is true that I will eat the oatmeal and then I don't do it. It is of no significance.

What should be true instead is that I might eat the oatmeal and that I might not eat the oatmeal. There must be that libertarian moment until I make the decision, and then it can be true that I will or will not eat the oatmeal.

[nomad]

ok, i wasn't familiar with the modal fallacy, but i did a web search, and so far i am not impressed.

particularly because the modal fallacy eliminates such statements as:

if p is true, then p cannot be false.

but this is LNC!! basically, it looks like the modal 'fallacy' works by denying LNC (implicitly).

P1) if p is true, then p is not false. (rewriting to remove the modal 'fallacy')
P2) if it is not NECESSARILY true that p is not false, p could be false.
p3) it is not necessarily true that p is not false.
p4) p could be false.
c1) it is possible for p to be both true and false.

now, this is a clear violation of standard logic. if want to remove necessity from logic, or make a clear and unwarranted separation between 'contigency' and 'necessity', then i don't see how we can proceed. this is along the lines with geebob's comments above.


mattbballman19:
Secondly, I'm not arguing for proof of LFW but, rather, that it is logically consistent with God's foreknowledge, which you admitted in my premise 1' was legitimate when you say, "i will give you that, as the statement stands, there is nothing opposed to LFW. and i totally agree with that statement."


if that is what you got (and probably what i wrote), i will have to reneg, but only slightly. what i agree with is that 'if X will happen, then God knows X' is true. Since it does not talk about how we know that X will happen, it does not a priori rule out LFW. However, we must then proceed to determine whether LFW is consistent with 'X will happen'. I do not think it is.

I should also change that first statement to 'if X will necessarily happen, then God necessarily knows X'. if we do not have necessity, and therefore reality, i am not interested.



Thirdly, the examples you set up (specifically the red mural example) fail to resemble the doctrine of foreknowledge. What you propose is that foreknowledge of a red mural at t1 does not guarantee the same content of that foreknowledge at t2.


what i propose is that if this is true at ANY time, that your so-called 'foreknowledge' of event X changes every time i ask you, i will not be impressed.



But that's not the foreknowledge model. It is not "The sun has risen X times in the past and therefore it will probably rise tomorrow" which is just plain prediction like meteorology. That's not true foreknowledge. Rather, the content of foreknowledge is what in fact will take place. On this view, there is nothing that will in fact take place that does not compose God's foreknowledge because whatever will be is what God foreknows.


that is EXACTLY my point... that if it is just plain prediction, it is ordinary. uninteresting. and not worthy of a 55 post thread ;) no, my example is an example of something that is NOT foreknowledge. and that is the point - that is where i believe LFW leaves us.

you see, when God says 'tomorrow you will die', should i believe him? or is it only a possibility? because i already know it is a possibility.



Fourthly, Molinism does provide an answer as to how God can sovereignly select events to be guaranteed to happen while at the same time using free will as a means to that end. Middle knowledge is, briefly, the view that God knows what each person will do under every circumstance. If God foreknows that A will freely do X in circumstance C, then by creating A in circumstance C God can guarantee the result. If that person were to do ~X instead, then that would have constituted God's middle knowledge instead.


not familiar with the term 'middle knowledge' as opposed to whatever other kind of knowledge there is, but you have implicitly used a deterministic model here.... 'creating A in circumstance C God can guarantee the result'. that is a causal relationship, as far as i can tell, because there is a cause (agent A and circumstance C) and a definite outcome (X).

i THINK i see what people are saying though...

basically, you assert that even though 'X will happen' for whatever X is not yet bound to true or false, and is not predictable through a CAUSAL relationship, yet somehow it IS predictable through some other, non-causal type of relationship that is not yet known. Then, God can know it.

so basically:
P1) X will necessarily happen.
P2) X is an uncaused event, and the result of an LFW decision.
P3) God, through processes yet unknown and unimagined, still knows that X will happen.

If that is what you are arguing, i guess i can accept it (though obviously not convincing, since i believe that assumption unwarranted). But at least it would consistent then. And then we should discuss, not the processes themselves perhaps, but the features of those processes to see if such a process can logically exist. i do not believe they will. But even if it doesn't, you are free to believe it... who said God HAS to be logical? logic is inside God, but perhaps illogic also is.

Determinism merely equals a causal relationship - 'if X necessarily will happen, then there is necessarily a causal relationship for X based in the current world W and all in-between worlds in the time between now and the time of X' (to be overly detailed perhaps).

[onceuponapriori]

Question for everyone involved:

Is 'foreknowledge' a sub-type of knowledge; eg, knowledge regarding future events? If not, what is it?

Is 'knowledge' justified, true belief? If not, what is it?

I think that I read all of the threads, but I might have missed these definitions if they were anywhere given.

[geebob]

Is 'foreknowledge' a sub-type of knowledge; eg, knowledge regarding future events? If not, what is it?

no, it's not a subtype. It's as much of knowledge as knowledge is knowledge. Yes it's of the future.


Is 'knowledge' justified, true belief? If not, what is it?

typically yes, but as far as I am concerned, it makes little difference to the debate. It's more important to Kenny than it is to me for these issues, though Kenny and I argue a similar position (on this topic).

[nomad]

ok, apologize for the apparent tantrum earlier :)

but, since this thread seems to have gone dormant... can someone give me a good pointer to an intro to modal logic? a quick overview looks illogical to me, but maybe if i got more in depth into it, it would make sense...

[geebob]

I have a philosophy prof who mentioned that modal logic is difficult for even him. A breif overview may not do justice. I'd say start with more basic systems of logic and move into modal logic.

Actaully, it may be easier to start with possible worlds ontology. I would recomendthe chapter on it in Metaphysics by Michael Loux.

[mattbballman19]

nomad,

I apologize for not responding at a sooner date. I should get to that response sometime tomorrow.

BTW, here's a link to an over-view of some modal logic.

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/logic-modal/

matt

[Kenny]

Sorry I’ve been unable to respond to the recent posts. My wife’s grandmother passed away rather suddenly and so we had to fly back to Missouri (3 days after we just got back from there from vacation). I’m still in Missouri right now. The funeral was this morning. So, please keep us in your prayers (as many know, my grandfather passed away about a month ago, so it’s been a difficult summer).

Anyway, for a good basic introduction to Modal Logic, I recommend the following article:

http://www.stats.uwaterloo.ca/~cgsmall/ontology.html

It’s actually not about modal logic directly but about contemporary versions of the ontological argument (Godel's version in particular) for the existence of God. But, the article does a fine job of explaining the basics of modal logic along the way.

In Christ,
Kenny

[mattbballman19]

geebob,


If there was never a time from which I could have refrained from eating it

I'll deal with this one first, for this is the one in which I understand a little. I would like to focus on the word 'could'. Of course, I'm going to have to ask you what you mean by this 'could, because if you mean what I think you mean then it seems that you may have to agree with the validity of the will/must distinction. Within the modal nexus, 'could' should be interpreted as a constituent of a modal statement expressing a possible truth. But the quote above expresses a negation of the could. A negation of the 'could' in symbolic, modal logic would look like this (~, is the negation operator; *, is the possibility operator; and ^, is the necessary operator) ~*P. But ~*P is logically equivalent to ^~P (which is necessarily, not-P). So P would not instantiate in any possible world, since it is necessarily false. P being the possibility to refrain or not refrain from eating. If P cannot be instantiated, then libertarian free-will cannot either, since inherent within the its definition is such that given a choice to do A or B, nothing determines that either choice is made. In other words, nothing outside the agent makes it the case that the agent 'must' do A or B. Rather, the agent himself must simply exercise his own causal powers and will to do one alternative, say A.

When this happens, the agent either could have refrained from willing to do A or he could have willed to do B without anything else being different inside or outside of his being. He is the absolute originator of his actions. So, some person P freely does some act E, say P changed his thoughts or raised his arm.

1. P is a substance that had the power to being E.
2. P exerted its power as a first mover (an uncaused performer of action) to bring about E.
3. P had the ability to refrain from exerting its power to bring about E.
4. P had some reason R that was the end or final cause for the sake of which he did E.

It seems, though, that the contention that something 'must' happen is inconsistent with the above. Therefore, not only is 'will' needed to be emphasized over 'must', but the will/must distinction can be seen to not be as over-rated as one thought.:smile:


if there was never a time at which my eating of it and not eating of it was consistent with the world past present and future

I don't think I follow you here.


That's because what will happen is still inconsistent with things happening otherwise

But things happening otherwise would (not could) never be the case since God's foreknowledge would have been different if it ended up being the case that somethings were otherwise. That's why I said before: If P were to choose B, God would have known that and his foreknowledge would have been "God knows that G will choose B." Likewise, if P were to choose A then God would have known THAT and so "God knows that G will choose A" would be true. If the game is rigged so that P will only choose the opposite of God's foreknowledge, then you only have grounds for God's knowledge being: "God knows that P will withhold choosing until a contradiction results." It's like saying, "Okay, God; I will only pray if you say and mean 'It is true that it is impossible for Matt to pray.'" Or, P if and only if ~P. And these types of paradoxes are just that -- paradoxes.

Foreknowledge is to be understood as:

1. Either (P will do A and God knows A) or (P will do ~A and God knows ~A).
2. P will do A.
3. Therefore, God knows A.

or

2*. P will do ~A.
3*. Therefore, God knows ~A

and you can't find anything self-contradictory or absurd about this and it is perfectly consistent with God's foreknowledge and human freedom. In fact, given the definition of validity, this is necessarily true.


it is still incoherent to say that it is true that I will eat the oatmeal and then I don't do it

I don't see how if it is the case that YOU WILL eat oatmeal, then you WILL NOT eat oatmeal. Sure its possible that you won't, but if the counterfactual is true, then that possibility will not become an actuality, since its the case that you're going to eat that oatmeal. If you ended up not eating the oatmeal, then the countefactual eternally known by God's middle knowledge would have been otherwise.


What should be true instead is that I might eat the oatmeal and that I might not eat the oatmeal. There must be that libertarian moment until I make the decision, and then it can be true that I will or will not eat the oatmeal.

This is the heart of counterfactual logic. There are 'would' counterfactuals and 'might' counterfactuals. The former state what would happen if the antecedent were true. The symbol for 'would' is -->. So, P --> Q. P and Q are indicative sentences, and is read 'If it were the case that P, then it would be the case that Q.' Similarly, a 'might' counterfactual is symbolised P -->> Q, and is read 'If it were the case that P, then it might be the case that Q.' Now, 'might' is different than 'could'. 'Could' is mere possibility. The distinction is important because the fact that something could happen under certain circumstances does not imply that it might happen under those circumstances. 'Might' is more restrictive than 'could' and indicates a genuine, live option under the circumstances, not a bare logical possibility. So, my point is that if God already knows which way the 'might' will go, given his middle knowledge, then it seems that a necessary consequence would be that He would know what will happen. Since, if something will happen, then that thing surely might have happened. And if God, according to His middle knowledge, orchestrated the direction of the mights through the utilization of how they would instantiate in accordance with the circumstances the mights were in, then, I believe, it can justifiably be said that God knows what we will do. And I believe that this in no way hinders our libertarian free-will.

matt

[mattbballman19]

nomad,


if p is true, then p cannot be false.

but this is LNC!! basically, it looks like the modal 'fallacy' works by denying LNC (implicitly).



In modal logic, you must speficy how it that p is true. Is it a necessary or a possible truth? The former says that p must be true and could not have been false. The latter says that p just happens to be true but obciously could have been false.

So, you are only attacking the necessary qualifier, right?

Let's look at your argument.


P1) if p is true, then p is not false. (rewriting to remove the modal 'fallacy')
P2) if it is not NECESSARILY true that p is not false, p could be false.
p3) it is not necessarily true that p is not false.
p4) p could be false.
c1) it is possible for p to be both true and false.

now, this is a clear violation of standard logic. if want to remove necessity from logic, or make a clear and unwarranted separation between 'contigency' and 'necessity', then i don't see how we can proceed. this is along the lines with geebob's comments above.


I don't see how you reach your conclusion. I think the conclusion should be 'It is possible for p to be EITHER true (in this reality) OR false (in this reality), not both/and.


I should also change that first statement to 'if X will necessarily happen, then God necessarily knows X'. if we do not have necessity, and therefore reality, i am not interested.

But the antecedent to your conditional is the very issue at hand and, therefore, you beg the question. The question of whether it is the case that X necessarily happens is what Molinism denies. You must provide an argument for its truth. You are also confused on the issue of something having to be necessary in order to be real or actual. I don't see how this is the case. There are many things that possible, the modal sense (something being true, but could have been false), that are actual. So, I don't follow you there.


and that is the point - that is where i believe LFW leaves us

Ok . . . Then you will only need a good argument to support your point. :smile:


not familiar with the term 'middle knowledge' as opposed to whatever other kind of knowledge there is

I'll quote philosopher Thomas Rauchenstein at length here:

In the first moment, God has natural knowledge of all propositions that correspond to logically necessary states of affairs. For instances, at the first moment, God knows that NN: If Clinton were in S, he could freely negotiate with Russia or he could freely refrain from negotiating with Russia. Broadly speaking, God's natural knowledge allows Him an intuitive grasp of what every logically possible world would be like, including what every free essence could do in any circumstances. Since these propositions are logically necessary, they are neither under God's control nor dependent on God's will for their truth.

In the second logical moment of divine omniscience, God has middle knowledge [MK] of all subjunctive (henceforth called "counterfactual") propositions, including counterfactual propositions about human freedom. At this juncture, God knows what every creaturely essence would do if put in certain circumstances. For example, F: If Peter were in C, he would deny Christ three times, is a true counterfactual proposition about what Peter would do in C; and (F), like all others of its kind, corresponds to counterfactual states of affairs that obtain.

God's intuitive knowledge of (F) is appropriately called "middle" because, as illustrated in the above diagram, it is logically posterior to God's natural knowledge, but prior to His free knowledge. Characteristic of MK is the fact that (akin to natural knowledge) God possesses it independently of any divine decree to actualize anything. The content of scientia media, therefore, is not under God's control. But unlike natural knowledge, MK is contingent.

Why should one hold that the content of God's middle knowledge is neither (a) necessary nor (b) under God's divine control? If (b) were not the case, then the truth of (F) would not be contingent on what Peter would have done, but on what God decides. As Thomas Flint says, "[t]o suggest that God can decide which counterfactuals are to be true is to abandon the libertarian standpoint essential to Molinism."{24} So God does not have control over what He knows at the second logical moment of His omniscience. Second, (a) is true because if Peter must deny Christ three times, then it is broadly logically impossible that he refrain from doing so, which destroys the indeterminate causal power we ascribed to him in the first place. So the content of MK is contingent as well.

Finally, we turn to God's divine decree to actualize a world (which, in logic, occurs between the second and third moments of divine omniscience); at that point, all remaining states of affairs – e.g. future-tense states of affairs – obtain. And at the third moment, which is logically posterior to that decree, God has free knowledge (or foreknowledge) of all these remaining states of affairs in the actual world. Foreknowledge is – unlike MK – dependant on God’s sovereign will because He could have chosen not to make any temporal world whatsoever. And without a temporal world, there would be no foreknowledge. Fundamentally speaking, foreknowledge is an accidental byproduct of God’s combining his pre-volitional knowledge with his divine decree to create. It plays no role in determining what the future will be like, for it "happens" too late in the explanatory chain of knowledge to be of any use to God. As Flint points out, "…on the Molinist picture, God’s foreknowledge is neither the effect nor the cause of our [future] free actions. Foreknowledge follows immediately from God’s conjoining his creative act of will to his prevolitional knowledge" (Flint 44). It is scientia media, not foreknowledge, that furnishes God’s ability to determine the future.


but you have implicitly used a deterministic model here.... 'creating A in circumstance C God can guarantee the result'. that is a causal relationship, as far as i can tell, because there is a cause (agent A and circumstance C) and a definite outcome (X).

Since God's middle knowledge allows him to have knowledge of what we WOULD do in any set of circumstances, then the above is not a problem. Its not that the circumstances CAUSALLY DETERMINE the creature's choice, but simply because this is how the creaturely would freely choose. God thus knows that were he to actualize certain states of affairs, then certain other contingent states of affairs would obtain. This middle knowledge DOES NOT depend on the divine will; God doesn't DETERMINE which counterfactuals of freedom are true or false. So, if its true that 'If S were placed in circumstances C, then S would freely perform action A.' then even God in his omnipotence cannot bring it about that S freely refrain from A if S were placed in C. Also, the content of middle knowledge isn't ESSENTIAL to God. True countefactuals are CONTINGENTLY true; S could freely decide to refrain from A in C, so that different counterfactuals could be true and be known by God than those that are. So, IT IS ESSENTIAL for God to have middle knowledge, but it is NOT ESSENTIAL to him to have middle knowledge of those particular propositions that he does in fact know.

matt

[geebob]

mattballman, thanks for your reply.

For the record, I have a very basic understanding of modal logic and maybe a bit more of possible worlds ontology. symbolizations will go over my head.


In other words, nothing outside the agent makes it the case that the agent 'must' do A or B. Rather, the agent himself must simply exercise his own causal powers and will to do one alternative, say A.

I'm concerned with something other than the causal aspect of lfw. I think more important and primary to the free will theists is the power to do otherwise. The unconditional power to do otherwise no less without which there is no libertarian free will. What I mean by unconditional is that under the same exact circumstances (exhaustive circumstances in the world) one may act and that person may refrain from acting.

If it is mere self causation that makes this difference between "must" and "will", then I say again, the difference between the two is not significant enough to help the defender of the coherence of edf and libertarian freedom.


I don't think I follow you here.

When one is deliberating over the libertarian free choice, if it is a libertarian free choice, it must be true at that very moment that it is within that persons power (meaning that is logically, metaphysically, psycologically, and physically, and any other way conceivably in that persons power) to make that choice and within his power to make another choice instead. I emphasize that it must be true at that time. Now for this to be the case, the past must be consistent with both choices. This much is obvious since lfw is recognized to be indeterministic. I would also insist that both choices are consistent with the future. There is a way that the future is and that way must be no less inconsistent with both choices then the past is. If it is inconsistent with either choice, then it is not within ones power to do what is logically/metaphysically, impossible for him to do thus that person is not libertarian free.


Foreknowledge is to be understood as:

1. Either (P will do A and God knows A) or (P will do ~A and God knows ~A).
2. P will do A.
3. Therefore, God knows A.

I think this ignores the temporal nature of libertarian free will, as I described above. As I deliberate, God knows at that very moment what I will do. Thus at that moment, it is not logically possible for me to enter into both possible futures (not both at the same time, mind you).

Only if you remove God so radically from time is it possible that this problem may be resolved. Only if you want to deny that God knows right now what I will do in the future, nor does he know it in the past, nor will he know it in the future. He must be that far removed from time. Even then, I'm skeptical though, but I don't find timelessness very plausible anyway.


Sure its possible that you won't, but if the counterfactual is true, then that possibility will not become an actuality

that sounds like an areguement against the existence of the counterfactuals of freedom on account of libertarian freedom.

Of course I believe that freedom has counterfactuals because I believe not only in libertarian freedom but also compatibilism plus another mode of freedom that has features of both compatibilism and libertarian freedom.


So, my point is that if God already knows which way the 'might' will go, given his middle knowledge, then it seems that a necessary consequence would be that He would know what will happen. Since, if something will happen, then that thing surely might have happened. And if God, according to His middle knowledge, orchestrated the direction of the mights through the utilization of how they would instantiate in accordance with the circumstances the mights were in, then, I believe, it can justifiably be said that God knows what we will do. And I believe that this in no way hinders our libertarian free-will.

this ignores an aspect of might statements that I capitalized on and I insist that is necessary part of libertarian freedom. It is true that If something will happen, then it is also true that it might happen, however, it is not necessarily true that because something might happen, it will happen. You see, unlike will and would statements who's negations and affirmations cannot be combined, might statements, negations and affirmations can be combined. That something might and might not happen is meaningful. That something will and will not happen is not meaningful. Thus the conjoined might statements do not imply woulds nor wills thus foreknowledge is not possible.

To fully understand this, it is helpful to note that woulds and mights can be applied to aristotle's square of opposition.

I've attached an graph of the square bellow. Would's and wills are analogous to A and E statements and mights are analoguos to I and O statements. The relevent relations are as follows. A and E statements can both be false but only one can be true if either is true. I and O statements can both be true but but if either is false, only one can be false. If both I and O are true, then both A and E are false.

Only when the sum total of the truths about the world can be expressed in terms of would statements can there be edf since all facts with regard to edf is in terms of what will and what won't happen. If both mights are true of some fact about the world, omniscience excludes edf as the truth excludes what will happen and what will not happen.

[nomad]

first of all, thanks for the more detailed explanations. that (plus some more thinking on my part) got me closer to understanding your position. and the difference between 'could' and 'will' makes sense to me (though i still don't get the difference between 'will' and 'necessarily will' - more reading i guess).

so, the basics of your position is something like:

how does God know that X will happen? Because X will happen.
how do I know that X will happen? Because God knows that X will happen.



mattbballman19:
I don't see how you reach your conclusion. I think the conclusion should be 'It is possible for p to be EITHER true (in this reality) OR false (in this reality), not both/and.


ok, i think i see what you are saying. 'if p IS true, then p COULD NOT be false' is not a true statement, though 'if p IS true, then p CANNOT be false' is a true statement. one mixes definite statements with possibilities; the other is all definite statements.

i.e. if p IS TRUE, then p IS NOT FALSE.
but if p IS TRUE, then that doesn't mean p couldn't have been false, it just means that it didn't happen to be.

ok so far.



You are also confused on the issue of something having to be necessary in order to be real or actual. I don't see how this is the case. There are many things that possible, the modal sense (something being true, but could have been false), that are actual.


i agree that things only have to be possible to be real. however, i am still pondering whether things that ARE real are, by definition, necessary or not. at least, it seems that you can make necessary statements about them. but i can already see some arguments here, so i won't go farther until i have thought them over.



I'll quote philosopher Thomas Rauchenstein at length here:


thanks. mostly OK with it... so middle knowledge is just the set of all possibilities, that i am familiar with (i use similar concepts every day at work). but, a couple of issues:




As Thomas Flint says, [t]o suggest that God can decide which counterfactuals are to be true is to abandon the libertarian standpoint essential to Molinism. Second, (a) is true because if Peter must deny Christ three times, then it is broadly logically impossible that he refrain from doing so, which destroys the indeterminate causal power we ascribed to him in the first place.


unfortunately, this seems to be including some assumptions i haven't given. but this section appears to be at the very center of our discussion. i.e. libertarianism is true, peter has 'causal power', therefore we must choose this model.

however though, for this discussion, you do not have to show that this IS the truth, but merely that a model exists where foreknowledge does not require determinism.

i will have to think about these assumptions, but i am starting to admit that perhaps, even though i don't agree with this model yet (primarily because i don't agree with LFW yet, see kenny's thread on the inconsistency of LFW, i pretty much agree with him), that since a model exists, that perhaps foreknowledge and determinism are not contingently joined (i am not giving this quite yet, but almost there :)

just wanted to make clear that i am not necessarily trying to convince you of my position; in fact, i do have an emotional response to calvinism (which i don't think LFW solves, but that's the other thread :), and would like to be convinced otherwise. but so far, i haven't been... i've gotten somewhat used to holding points of view i don't personally like, but some of them have resolved, i'm hoping this one will too.



For example, F: If Peter were in C, he would deny Christ three times, is a true counterfactual proposition about what Peter would do in C;

Since God's middle knowledge allows him to have knowledge of what we WOULD do in any set of circumstances, then the above is not a problem. Its not that the circumstances CAUSALLY DETERMINE the creature's choice, but simply because this is how the creaturely would freely choose. God thus knows that were he to actualize certain states of affairs, then certain other contingent states of affairs would obtain....

So, if its true that 'If S were placed in circumstances C, then S would freely perform action A.' then even God in his omnipotence cannot bring it about that S freely refrain from A if S were placed in C. ... True countefactuals are CONTINGENTLY true; S could freely decide to refrain from A in C, so that different counterfactuals could be true and be known by God than those that are.


and here i think you have again danced dangerously close to determinism again. at least, i think i know what you are saying... but i don't see how this, as you have said it, makes any difference.

let's go back to the basic complaint many people have with calvinism: they believe God has 'made' people do things, and don't believe that people should be responsible for that which they didn't have any control over.

but here we have the same thing: in situation C, agent S performs action A. you say 'ahh, but S could have freely chosen not to do A'. but, first of all, i see this in violation to normal definitions of LFW; i think geebob mostly covered that though. but second, i do not think this is sufficient.

back to the complaint about calvinism, the complaint is that the agent A has no control over the situation, that God has 'ordained' it. but yet, i do not see how we can escape this is your example either.... 'If S was in C, then S would choose A' is NOT the same thing as 'If S was in C, then S could choose A'. Which did you really mean to assert?

Because the first is a 'necessary' modal knowledge'... 'If S was in C, then S contingent would choose A'. If we know C obtains, then A automatically obtains. Meaning that: If I foreknow C, then A automatically obtains because it is contingent on C. You say this is 'middle' knowledge - and yet it is logically BEFORE S is actually in C. If i pull out a chair from under you, you will fall. We say this because of the laws of physics. Replace 'you' with a book, and it becomes even more clear. In what way are you different from the book, for this purpose? Both of you are subject to gravity.

It would be just as pointless for you to argue that the book, or you, have a choice in which to fall. This is an example of the statement 'If S is in C, S would do A'. This does not require a free choice. In fact, the free choice does not appear to have any direct relevance on the statement; it is just as much true if S did not have a free choice to do A. So the free will part of it is not necessarily. However, so far i can't find anything that eliminates it.

But, again, if S will always do the same thing in circumstances C, then it is entirely in God's control to determine what S will do... if God chooses to actualize C, then S will do A. Whether it is a free choice or not does not really matter at this point. IOW, under the model you have given, having a free will does not appear to buy you anything, except as something to appeal to when someone lodges the above complaint.

again, i am only interested in the proposition 'God knows that X will necessarily do A', not 'God knows that X could do A', or even 'God knows that X would probably do A if B happened'. and also i only agree with the statements in your proof if it says

P) If X will necessarily do A, then God necessarily knows A.

I'm not 100% familiar with the Arminian position, so i don't know how it relates here.

And also, in addition, we want to appeal to agent A as a 'black box'. But this doesn't appear to be true either... social science is not as accurate as physical science, but some of this is probably due to lack of controls (you can't find two people exactly alike; you can drop the same pebble 1000000 times if you like), but certain makes some predictions about what people will do in certain situations. science in general has taken the black boxes and tried to determine 'what's inside', and in most cases has successfully done so. this does not guarantee, but at least elicits the possibility that the same may be true for the 'black box' we call agent maxwell smart (S = 86 :)

the problem is that in the third stage above, a lot of hand waving seems to occur to opaque the fact that some determinism is going on. let me use a chess game example (i can apply some simulational concepts; i believe that this example, though the space is many many orders of magnitude smaller than the scope of 'middle knowledge', is good enough for example):

a chess board has 64 squares. the starting position is 32 pieces, 16 white, 16 black of various types, oriented homogenously on 4 rows excluding the middle four. yadda yadda yadda you already know all this since you've probably played chess :)

ok, so afaik an average-to-long game lasts about 40 moves (guessing based on my readings of chess books, i've never actually played in a tournament or counted my moves), that's 40 for white and 40 for black. an average turn will give each side between 30 and 40 possible moves. this means that after the first turn, there are a potential of 30 boards. the second turn, there are a potential of 30 responses to each of the 30 initial moves = ~900 possible board layouts. after 80 moves the number of possible boards (including ordering to get there) is approximately 40^80, which is a really big number but not infinite (though strictly speaking, unless you include at least the '3 times' rules, the potential games are truly infinite).

this is the middle knowledge of the chessboard. the 'initial' knowledge is the chessboard layout, the initial position, the rules of the board. the middle knowledge is all the possible board layouts at every move up to game won or lost. the end knowledge is what the actual game is that gets played (though there is nothing in this subset of 'world' to additionally constrain, beyond the two agents who are the players; including the current state of the agents, and how they are influenced by their morning coffee, current tournament standings, proximity to beautiful women, the movement of jupiter in orion, and any other phenomena, outside the 'world', are rolled up into the agents W and B). the sum of the worlds is merely the moves that are made (which can be written as 'P-K4' or 'B moves P-K4', we will assume the second even when the first is written).

do you agree with the above is somewhat roughly analogous? if not, please complain where you think the analogy falls down.

now, the question is merely: who will win the game?

on move 16, white moves P-KB6, and black moves Kt x P.

the question is: can God know that B will move Kt x P, without some degree of determinism?

first of all, do you agree that if agent X is presented with event A and event B in circumstances C, and X chooses A 100% of the time, and B 0% of the time, this reduces to determinism? or not?

ok, i will use C for the state at the beginning of move 16 (before white moves), and C2 for the state after white moves, and C3 for the state after black moves.

The foreknowledge (as of the end of move 15) is 'B will move Kt x P'. is this necessarily true, or contingently true? let's assume it is true, and see what results from it. Now, for simplicity, we will assume that our 'initial condition' I is 'the state of the board at move 15'. I is actually the same as C, so i'll just use C from now on.

if "B will move Kt x P in set of conditions C2 " is true, then it is implies that conditions C2 also exist, does it not? These are contingent truths - if B's move obtains, set of conditions C2 contingently exist.

But, if C2 exists, then it is contingently true that W moves P-KBP in condition C. (because it is the only path from C to C2). And therefore, contingently true that W moves P-KBP.

Now, in this case, what we are saying is that if C3 obtains, then C2 necessarily obtains; if black's move obtains as God foreknows, then white's move is therefore constrained. White may or may not have a choice; whether he does is not important because he necessarily will choose P-KB6. The foreknowledge does not constrain it; the presence of the foreknowledge indicates that White will move it.

You can say that White will freely choose P-KB6; but he will always do this. If so, why the significance of free? The end result of the above, though, is that if I know the end world Cx, I know the preceding world C(x-1); and therefore this regresses back to the beginning. Meaning, if God has foreknowledge of any future world X, He knows all previous worlds.

ok, that doesn't even seem convincing to me :) so convince me.

some objections i already came up with:

1) But there is more than one path from C to C2! How can you say there is only one?

answer: for most examples, you just break them down. I.E.: let's say i'm at home at C and at the grocery store in C2 (the contingent knowledge being 'i am standing in the safeway checkout line' or something like that). you say, well there are multiple ways to get there... walking, driving, down california st or central expwy, etc. so, C2 doesn't constrain what agent S does at C.

but, we can split this up... if we assume knowledge in the middle, we can continue this by putting a further set of conditions C1.5 in between them. I know i am at a specific light, in my car, at C1.5. so now, because of this knowledge, we have eliminated possibilities. eventually we will eliminate all but one path.

and if, through reduction, we come to a point where we have two circumstances C and C', but there is no intermediate distinguishable states, how can we claim there are two paths? the two paths have to be distinguishable, or they are for all practical purposes the same (at least, they are morally equivalent). so that seems a safe assumption.

2) i forget the other objection i had.

ok, comments? am i still totally missing you?

[Kenny]

Since God's middle knowledge allows him to have knowledge of what we WOULD do in any set of circumstances, then the above is not a problem. Its not that the circumstances CAUSALLY DETERMINE the creature's choice, but simply because this is how the creaturely would freely choose. God thus knows that were he to actualize certain states of affairs, then certain other contingent states of affairs would obtain. This middle knowledge DOES NOT depend on the divine will; God doesn't DETERMINE which counterfactuals of freedom are true or false. So, if its true that 'If S were placed in circumstances C, then S would freely perform action A.' then even God in his omnipotence cannot bring it about that S freely refrain from A if S were placed in C. Also, the content of middle knowledge isn't ESSENTIAL to God. True countefactuals are CONTINGENTLY true; S could freely decide to refrain from A in C, so that different counterfactuals could be true and be known by God than those that are. So, IT IS ESSENTIAL for God to have middle knowledge, but it is NOT ESSENTIAL to him to have middle knowledge of those particular propositions that he does in fact know.

matt

I’ll try to get to the other replies to me soon. In the mean time, however, I want to restate an earlier point of mine which has not yet been addressed. We need to consider carefully the implications of the above. This type of middle knowledge view maintains that there are contingent states of affairs, coeternal with God, outside of God’s volitional control, which limit what is within God’s power to do. Now, I think that this borders on being a heretical assertion for a couple of reasons.

First, it undermines the entire purpose behind the orthodox Christian doctrine of creation out of nothing. The whole purpose of that doctrine was to combat the various forms of Greek dualism at the time which suggested that the creator did the best he could but that he was limited to some extent by the pre-existing materials that he had to work with. But, this version of Molinism suggests a similar situation. God sure would have liked to have actualized a better world, but His contingent middle knowledge pertaining to counterfactuals of freedom bars Him from doing so. God has simply done the best He could with the pre-existing contingent state of affairs over which He had no volitional control.

Second, it suggests that certain aspects of the created order are coeternal with God. Since Molinism holds that the truth values of counterfactual conditionals of libertarian freedom are contingent, there are possible worlds in which the truth values of such conditionals are different. So, God is already partially embedded in the set of contingent states of affairs which constitute the makeup of our reality even before God has decreed to create. If we won’t let process theology get away with saying that certain aspects of the created order are coeternal with God, then why should we let Molinism get away with it?

In these respects, OVT strikes me as more orthodox (even though I’m no fan of OVT). At least on the open view, there are no contingent realities or aspects of the created order which are coeternal with God.

Now, granted, I myself hold that there are aspects of reality which are coeternal with God but outside of God’s volitional control and that these limit to some extent how God can create. I don’t believe that God created mathematical abstractions, for example. I don’t think God had a choice about whether or not pi = 3.14159… and so I don’t think God is capable of creating a perfectly circular object with a circumference to diameter ratio equal to 2. But, the difference is that I see such constraints as purely logical in nature. There are no limitations involving contingent states of affairs. Furthermore, I see such abstractions as ultimately being grounded in the nature of God Himself. So, the ‘constraints’ such abstractions place on God are really nothing more than God’s faithfulness to His own nature. But Molinism holds that there are eternal but contingent realities whose actual content is independent of God’s nature. The constraints involved are more than strictly logical, on Molinism, because what God can or can not do is a function of which contingent states of affairs God finds Himself in. The constraints involve more than just merely God’s faithfulness to His own nature.

I see this as deeply disturbing theologically.

In Christ,
Kenny

[nomad]

i need to ask some dumb questions i came up with while thinking about this stuff:

- according to molinism, at which point (first knowledge, middle knowledge, free knowledge) does the agent S actually exist? or does God also know many counterfactuals about agents that never will exist?

i suppose the first knowledge does not require any actual agents to exist (the 'clinton' example, as one, does not specifically require clinton to exist, or russia to exist necessarily, but requires only the office of the presidency, and existence of a state, both logical concepts not requiring an actual free agent there to be true. but they have to exist before we can have middle knowledge about them (if they are not deterministic), right?

- does God have any control over the first knowledge? i.e. does God have a choice as to whether an agent actually is free to negotiate or not negotiate, or does he limit it in any way? Obviously we have some examples where our will is not involved in the physical laws. But we have seen some examples of this elsewhere... do we have a choice to become angry? Chemistry appears to have some effects on a person's responses and personality as well. Where do we draw the line? Is it just 'intuitive'? Is there anything we might think would be a choice, but isn't as a practical matter? Or is God merely expanding his 'knowing' from something that already exists?

in other words, is the chess game built on God knowing the rules, or making up the rules?


i guess that's enough for now.

[Kenny]

08-06-2003 @ 04:10 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=168449#post168449) mattbballman19:Kenny,

(i) I'm not proposing internalism here critiqued by Gettier. I'm saying what knowledge is not, namely, that it is the cause of the actual world (whatever that is). Knowledge is not the product of causation.

I agree that knowledge is not causative. I disagree that knowledge is not caused. And, of course, there’s a significant difference between the two. In all of our experience, knowledge is caused in some way (by observation, by inference, by testimony, by revelation, etc.). And it seems to me that some sort of externalist causal grounding requirement is the only viable way around the Gettier problem.


(ii) You invoke the notion of truth-makers in responding to Molinism. But it is far from evident that counterfactuals of creaturely freedom must have truth-makers or, if they must, that appropriate candidates for their truth-makers are not available. There are too many propositions with truth-value or that have no truth-makers, such as:

Let’s take your examples one by one…


No physical objects exist.

This statement is false. It’s truth value (which is ‘false’) is grounded in the state of affairs that there are some physical objects. If this statement were true, it’s truth value would be grounded in the state of affairs that there are no physical objects.


Dinosaurs are extinct today.

This statement is true. It’s truth value is grounded in the state of affairs that there were once dinosaurs but that no dinosaurs are alive today.


Torturing a child is wrong.

This statement is true. It’s truth value is grounded in the state of affairs that torturing children is abhorrent to God. God’s attitude towards torturing children is in turn grounded in God’s nature.


These do not have concrete objects to vindicate their truthfulness or falsity.

Perhaps not, but we do see that all of these statements obtain their truth values by virtue of how they refer to relevant states of affairs in the world.


And I am more confident in the truthfulness of counterfactuals than I am in believing that all statements with truth-value have truth-makers or are grounded in actual objects.

I believe in the truth values of counterfactuals also, but that’s because I believe that the sum total of reality has a deterministic causal structure in which such truth values are grounded. Throw out indeterminism and you get two for the price of one – you get to hold on to a correspondence view of truth and you get to hold that counterfactual statements have definite truth values. That being said, my intuitions point more strongly to a correspondence view of truth than they do to all counterfactual conditionals having truth values.


They may follow the disquotation principle and affirm that &quot;If I had a million dollars then I would purchase a larger house&quot; is true because if I did have a million dollars then I would purchase a larger house. That counterfact may exist even if the subjects and objects do not yet.

As I see it, facts are just states of affairs. No state of affairs means no fact. Now, I believe that the statement ‘If Matt had a million dollars, he would purchase a larger house,’ may be true. But, if it is true, it is true by virtue of the fact that it is within your character that you would act that way if you had a million dollars. So I do think there may be a fact concerning what you would do if you had a million dollars and that this fact resolves to a state of affairs involving your character. I even think that such a fact about you may have obtained even if you did not exist. In that case, the fact about what you would do would be grounded in your individual essence which I see as residing eternally, as an abstract description of a possible person, in the mind of God. However, if such a choice is a function of LFW, then I do not see that there is any state of affairs in the world such that there is a fact about what you would do.

In Christ,
Kenny

[Kenny]

08-07-2003 @ 01:23 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=171359#post171359)
mattbballman19:

kenny,

I followed that link to your analysis of LFW.

A simplified response to this large argument is that it equivocates between what will happen and what must happen (where you have the masked phrase &quot;A obtains&quot; or &quot;A does not obtain&quot;). Just because something will occur by an act of free will does not entail that it must happen for it could have been otherwise. But that it will happen is just the happy free choice of that person who will simply not fail to freely bring it about.

About premise 4, it grossly assumes that an agent is a sufficient cause for some specified effect. However, given two possibilities for an agent (LFW), e.g., &quot;Ivan will freely enroll in Phi 101&quot; and &quot;Ivan will freely refrain from enrolling in Phi 101&quot;, how does the creation of Ivan in his circumstances leading up to one of these two choices guarantee one choice over another? It cannot outside of determinism. But if determinism is true, then Ivan never freely chose his course of action.

matt

I disagree with your criticism and I would encourage you to keep reading the rest of that thread because I think I address much of your criticism in my responses there. But, I'll say no more about this issue here so as not to hijack Jaltus' thread.

[Kenny]

To sum things up a bit. The objections I have proposed to Molinism on this thread (not that I don’t have more) fall in three basic categories:

Theologically, Molinism suggests that certain contingent states of affairs are coeternal with God. This lends itself to a sort of dualism and compromises God’s metaphysical independence.

Metaphysically, Molinism undermines a correspondence view of truth or at the very least is unable to adequately explain how it is that counterfactual conditionals regarding indeterminate events obtain determinate truth values.

Epistemologically, Molinism undercuts any appropriate causal grounding requirement for knowledge. This runs afoul of both experience and viable proposals for getting around the Gettier problem.

Though these objections specifically apply to Molinism, it seems to me that they would apply to most views that attempt to hold both EDF and LFW. Other such views, it seems to me, are doomed to incoherencies of their own (e.g. the problems I pointed out on this thread with saying that God knows future free will choices by observing them in a B mode of time). EDF and LFW simply don’t go together. I opt for dropping LFW and holding on to EDF. But, of course, open theists do it the other way around.

In Christ,
Kenny

[mattbballman19]

Alright, I can see that I have alot on my plate. In this first post, I'll address Kenny.

(i) It appears that in your assessment of knowledge-as-being-caused, you haven't provided any reasons for the conclusion. As I noted, beliefs or propositions become true when they correspond, not when they are caused. And I see no reason to abandon the classical view here.

(ii) Those examples of statements without truth-makers have not been appropriately addressed. For example, the first two statements have their truth-value depend on the absence of objects, not their presence. Secondly, in the case of "torturing children is wrong", is itself not grounded in God's nature as it is. Instead, the more fundamental moral imperatives "innocent human beings are inherently worthy" and "unjustly harming people is wrong" are rooted in God's nature, but the idea that this would apply to children is an inference from the fact that children are people and that torture is such a case of unjustified harm. So, the unjustness of torturing children is not directly grounded in God but in other basic moral imperatives, which in turn are rooted in God. And in your closing remark on this matter, you admit that maybe such truth-values are not rooted in concrete objects and affirm that their truth-values are rooted in states of affairs -- precisely the Molinist's point!

(iii) If all counterfactuals are true by virtue of being determined by God then, in effect, there are no false counterfactuals. Nothing is unavailable to God because He is the source of its being determined. And this has theological difficulties because God could have actualized a better world than what presently exists. In fact, He could have created a perfect world where everyone enjoys salvation. While you may feel that determinism saves the correspondence theory (which has not been adequately shown), it most certainly jettisons any view of libertarian free will.

(iv) Since true counterfactuals depend on their truthfulness by virtue of correspondence with the relevant states of affairs, there is ample reason to affirm a libertarian free will scenario. Counterfactuals consider what people will do and not what people must do or are constrained to do. Once this estranged idea that knowledge is caused is abandoned and that statements are given truth-value on the basis of correspondence between propositions and states of affairs is re-affirmed then the idea of free will fits nicely in this context.

Now to my thoughts on your thoughts on this quote by me:


Since God's middle knowledge allows him to have knowledge of what we WOULD do in any set of circumstances, then the above is not a problem. Its not that the circumstances CAUSALLY DETERMINE the creature's choice, but simply because this is how the creaturely would freely choose. God thus knows that were he to actualize certain states of affairs, then certain other contingent states of affairs would obtain. This middle knowledge DOES NOT depend on the divine will; God doesn't DETERMINE which counterfactuals of freedom are true or false. So, if its true that 'If S were placed in circumstances C, then S would freely perform action A.' then even God in his omnipotence cannot bring it about that S freely refrain from A if S were placed in C. Also, the content of middle knowledge isn't ESSENTIAL to God. True countefactuals are CONTINGENTLY true; S could freely decide to refrain from A in C, so that different counterfactuals could be true and be known by God than those that are. So, IT IS ESSENTIAL for God to have middle knowledge, but it is NOT ESSENTIAL to him to have middle knowledge of those particular propositions that he does in fact know.


First, I think you misunderstand how middle knowledge relates to God's sovereignty. You see, though such middle knowledge does not depend on God for their truthfulness it is not the case that something is co-eternal with God. Instead, counterfactuals are merely subjunctive hypotheticals. But if you say that the actualizability of those counterfactuals co-exist apart from God, then you would be incorrect for even though they can be made true apart from God, each counterfactual still takes into account circumstances. But those circumstances do not, indeed cannot, exist unless God creates them either directly or indirectly. Moreover, the person's existence also depends on God for his/her creation. And the pool of the viable states of affairs feasible for God depend on how God will create the universe. And this is surely not to say that counterfactuals are independent of God, only that they are true apart from Him. Let me give you a comparison. The statement "The Prime Minister is not a prime number" is eternally true. However, the truthfulness of this statement does not depend on God either. But this does not mean that there is "something" that exists apart from God in the sense that there is an object called "truth" that sits outside of God's ontology. Truth is not a "thing" it is a correspondence between propositions and states of affairs.

Secondly, this is more troublesome for Calvinism/Determinism than it is for Molinism because all natural knowledge is in fact actualizable by God so His middle knowledge just is His natural knowledge! But this means that there are more truths that are not dependent on God!

Thirdly, although it is true that human volition ensues without God being its sufficient cause, that is just a point of logic that one cannot make someone freely do something. If you impugn the Molinist's God because He has the inability to force someone to do something freely against their will, then the objection does not hold for you would be indicting God's omnipotence on the basis that He cannot bring about logical contradictions.

Nomad and Geebob, I shall respond to you shortly.

matt

[Jaltus]

Yesterday @ 01:18 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=182384#post182384)
Kenny:
Theologically, Molinism suggests that certain contingent states of affairs are coeternal with God. This lends itself to a sort of dualism and compromises God’s metaphysical independence.

It does no such thing, what it does propose is that by the act of creation God sets up a state of affairs wherein free will beings are created with the ability to make choices, and God innately knows what all of those choices would be given any situation.

In no way is any of the eternal, for God preexisted but the state of affairs did not.


Metaphysically, Molinism undermines a correspondence view of truth or at the very least is unable to adequately explain how it is that counterfactual conditionals regarding indeterminate events obtain determinate truth values.

The truth values are based on actuality. Therefore, if God says something would actually happen given A, then I for one am going to believe Him. If it corresponds to reality of a possible world instead of this one, then does it fit your definition of truth? Especially taking into consideration that these are posited as "woulds" in the first place.


Epistemologically, Molinism undercuts any appropriate causal grounding requirement for knowledge. This runs afoul of both experience and viable proposals for getting around the Gettier problem.

I have no idea what the Gettier problem is, but I do know that experience in fact dictates other than what you said here.

Two guys are walking down a street. The one stops to tie his shoe, and a brick goes flying right by his head. The second guy looks at him and says, "If you had not stopped to tie your shoe, you would have gotten that full in the face." The first man agrees, praises God, and moves on.

This is a simple story of something that more or less happens everyday. People assume counterfactuals in their daily lives. Howoften do people say "if only....then..." which is clearly expressing a counterfactual.

And of course your grounding objection is baseless for I see no reason to posit that there needs to be causal conditions in order to have knowledge, something which runs counter to LFW in the first place.



Though these objections specifically apply to Molinism, it seems to me that they would apply to most views that attempt to hold both EDF and LFW. Other such views, it seems to me, are doomed to incoherencies of their own (e.g. the problems I pointed out on this thread with saying that God knows future free will choices by observing them in a B mode of time). EDF and LFW simply don’t go together. I opt for dropping LFW and holding on to EDF. But, of course, open theists do it the other way around.

I realize you hold to this strongly, but I do not think your objections are solid objections. Once again the language of sensing is forcing you down the wrong path. If God knows innately, there is no need for Him to "see" anything.

[geebob]

I have no idea what the Gettier problem is, but I do know that experience in fact dictates other than what you said here.

It demonstrates a difficulty with the classical definition of knowledge. If something is known, it has three features in that it is true, it is justified, and it is believed.

Gettier problems arise when we have true beliefs that are justified but they are justified in the wrong way. For example, my Grandma suggested that the reason that people have breathing problems during the winter due to the depleated oxygen levels since the plants have gone dormant. it's true that some people have trouble breathing in the winter, and it's true that plants don't make as much oxygen during the winter, and it's true that less oxygen makes breathing harder, so her belief is true, it is justified, and of course she believes it. But this fact is justified for the wrong reasons. the low oxygen production is not the significant factor at work here (and even if it was, this still provides a decent example of a gettier example).


Two guys are walking down a street. The one stops to tie his shoe, and a brick goes flying right by his head. The second guy looks at him and says, "If you had not stopped to tie your shoe, you would have gotten that full in the face." The first man agrees, praises God, and moves on.

there are deterministic causal laws dictating the motion of the brick. counterfactuals apply their. Your free will choices in themselves are not supposed to be dictated by causal laws. You did put a free will choice in there (supposedly free) but it's not in the appropriate place to demonstrate what you have in mind.

Kenny believes in counterfactuals, but only when they are based on deterministic causal laws. libertarian freedom cannot abide by this.

[Jaltus]

What do you guys think of this:

"If we would say that we have no sin, we would be decieving ourselves and the truth is not in us."

That looks like a truth claim about a possible but not actualized state of affairs. The author is saying something would be the case if something else were the case. That is what counterfactuals are all about.

(the quote is my translation of I John 1:8)

[Kenny]

Today @ 04:06 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=185410#post185410)
mattbballman19:

Alright, I can see that I have alot on my plate. In this first post, I'll address Kenny.

(i) It appears that in your assessment of knowledge-as-being-caused, you haven't provided any reasons for the conclusion.

I provided two reasons. First, in all of our experience we see that things we know are in some sense appropriately causally related to the facts to which our knowledge pertains (albeit very indirectly at times). I gave examples of this in terms of observation, testimony, inference from observed regularities, etc.

Second, it seems that any viable solution to the Gettier problem requires some sort of externalist causal grounding requirement for knowledge. In the example I gave concerning the stopped clock, for example, my belief that it was 12:00 was justified and it was true but it was not knowledge because there was not an appropriate sort of causal relationship between my belief that it was 12:00 and the fact that it was 12:00.

Here are two more examples taken from Gettier himself. Suppose Smith has very strong evidence that Jones is about to receive the next upcoming promotion at the office. One day Smith sees Jones at the vending machine. Jones empties out his left pocket, counts out ten quarters, and puts the quarters back in his left pocket. Smith justifiably infers, “The man who will get the promotion has ten quarters in his left pocket.” Now suppose that it is not Jones who is going to get the promotion but Smith and suppose also that, unbeknownst to Smith, Smith has exactly ten quarters in his left pocket. In that case, Smith’s belief is both justified and true but it is not knowledge. It is not knowledge because there is not an appropriate causal relationship between the fact to which Smith’s belief corresponds and Smith’s belief itself.

Or, consider another example. I have good reason to believe that my wife is at work right now in Los Angeles. But, seeing as how I like to maximize my true beliefs, on the basis of this belief I form another belief in the truth of the ‘or’ disjunction, “My wife is in Los Angeles or my wife is in New York.” Since all that is required for an ‘or’ disjunction to be true is that one of the disjuncts be true, my belief in the truth of this disjunction is justified on the basis of the evidence I have that my wife is in Los Angeles. Now suppose, unknown to me, my wife is actually spy for the CIA (hey, it could happen, ever see that movie True Lies?) and the President has flown her to New York this morning on a top secret mission. In that case, my belief in the above disjunction is both justified and true but it is not knowledge. Again, the reason is that there is not an appropriate causal link between my belief and the fact to which it pertains.

Examples like the above point to the fact that mere internalist justification (i.e. justification in terms of the mental states that the believer has subjective access to) for a true belief is not sufficient to qualify that belief as knowledge. Some sort of appropriate externalist relationship between how the belief was formed and the environment in which the belief was formed is also required. And the examples we have seen point to the need for this relationship to involve some sort of appropriate causal relationship between the fact that one’s belief pertains to and the belief itself. So my contention is that a proper characterization of knowledge is going to involve some sort of appropriate causal grounding requirement.

Given that LFW decisions are causally disjointed from any antecedent states of affairs, however, there is no way, prior to the instantiation of such decisions, for the beliefs of any agent concerning such LFW decisions to be causally related to the actual decisions themselves. This means that neither foreknowledge concerning actual LFW decisions nor beliefs regarding counterfactual conditionals pertaining to LFW decisions could possibly satisfy any sort of appropriate causal grounding requirement for knowledge. So, no being could possibly have knowledge concerning LFW decisions prior to their instantiation nor knowledge concerning the truth values of counterfactual conditionals pertaining to LFW decisions.


As I noted, beliefs or propositions become true when they correspond, not when they are caused. And I see no reason to abandon the classical view here.

I agree. You’re mixing the issues here. My argument concerning knowledge has nothing to do with a proper characterization of truth. I haven’t said anything against the classical correspondence view of truth here. Mere correspondence between a proposition and a relevant state of affairs is a sufficient condition for truth. However, mere correspondence between one’s belief and the relevant state of affairs is not a sufficient condition for knowledge (and this, as far as it goes, is an uncontroversial epistemological claim). The issue we are discussing here does not just pertain to truth but to knowledge.


(ii) Those examples of statements without truth-makers have not been appropriately addressed. For example, the first two statements have their truth-value depend on the absence of objects, not their presence.

Yes; I never asserted that truth values need be grounded in the existence of concrete objects. I only asserted that truth values need to be grounded in some relevant actual state of affairs.


Secondly, in the case of &quot;torturing children is wrong&quot;, is itself not grounded in God's nature as it is. Instead, the more fundamental moral imperatives &quot;innocent human beings are inherently worthy&quot; and &quot;unjustly harming people is wrong&quot; are rooted in God's nature, but the idea that this would apply to children is an inference from the fact that children are people and that torture is such a case of unjustified harm. So, the unjustness of torturing children is not directly grounded in God but in other basic moral imperatives, which in turn are rooted in God.

Fine, but the point is that the moral imperative ultimately obtains its truth value via proper correspondence between the proposition which asserts it and relevant actual states of affairs.


And in your closing remark on this matter, you admit that maybe such truth-values are not rooted in concrete objects and affirm that their truth-values are rooted in states of affairs -- precisely the Molinist's point!
Given that I never made the contrary assertion to begin with, I’m perfectly happy to concede that truth values are rooted in states of affairs and not concrete objects. But, I don’t see how that helps the Molinist out all that much. Given that LFW decisions are causally independent of any antecedent conditions, there, by definition, can be no conditions within reality to which statements pertaining to LFW decisions correspond prior to the instantiation of those decisions themselves. I don’t see how the disquotation principle helps here. As I already pointed out, facts are just actual states of affairs. No actual state of affairs means no fact. But LFW decisions are by definition disconnected from prior states of affairs. So there are no facts pertaining to the definitive outcomes of LFW decisions prior to their instantiation.


(iii) If all counterfactuals are true by virtue of being determined by God then, in effect, there are no false counterfactuals. Nothing is unavailable to God because He is the source of its being determined.

I don’t believe that all counterfactuals are true by virtue of being voluntarily determined by God. For example, the counterfactual conditional ‘If scientists were to discover a perfectly spherical object on the surface of Mars, the circumference to diameter ratio of that object would be exactly equal to the numerical value of pi’ is true by virtue of its corresponding to an abstract truth about the essence of a perfectly spherical object. Since I don’t believe that God voluntarily determined abstract truths, I don’t believe that God voluntarily determined the truth value of this counterfactual conditional. I even believe that the essences of concrete objects exist eternally as abstractions in the mind of God and that this puts certain logical constraints on the way that God can create things. There were only so many ways God could have created Kenny, for example, and have it still be Kenny that He created rather than someone else (i.e. God was free to alter my accidental properties but not my essential properties in the process of creating me). But, the difference between my view and the Molinist view is that the restrictions on God’s power here are strictly logical in nature. They do not involve any contingent state of affairs over which God has no voluntary control. Furthermore, I believe that truths about abstractions are ultimately grounded in God’s nature, so none of these limitations fall outside of the scope of God’s faithfulness to His own nature itself.


And this has theological difficulties because God could have actualized a better world than what presently exists.

Who says that this is a bad one? We only have a very limited amount of information available to judge the quality of this world given that God’s plans for it stretch into all of eternity (and remember that a possible world encompasses the entire history of a world and not just the world as it presently exists). There may be gross amounts of evil in the world now, but many Calvinists, including myself, believe that God has permitted these evils so that surpassingly greater goods might be obtained. God’s love which was manifested on the cross, which we would not have known were it not for the presence of evil, is the supreme example of such a good.


In fact, He could have created a perfect world where everyone enjoys salvation.

Who says that such a world would have been a perfect one? Calvinists believe that God could have saved everyone but does not because there are greater goods to be obtained in permitting the damnation of some.


While you may feel that determinism saves the correspondence theory (which has not been adequately shown), it most certainly jettisons any view of libertarian free will.

I don’t think that a correspondence theory of truth itself requires determinism. But I do think that a correspondence theory of truth entails that truth determinate counterfactual conditionals are rooted in deterministic causal processes. For example, if I’m at a baseball game and I see someone catch a pop fly, I can truthfully think to myself, “If that ball had continued on its trajectory unimpeded, it would have made contact with the ground.” That counterfactual assertion is true by virtue of is corresponding to various facts about causally determinative principles of gravitation and motion. But, counterfactual conditionals pertaining to indeterminate processes have no states of affairs in the world to which they might correspond and so have no truth values. So, if counterfactual conditionals regarding human decisions have truth values, then LFW doesn’t hold with respect to those decisions. If LFW does hold with respect to certain human decisions, counterfactual conditionals regarding those decisions have no determinate truth values. So long as we hold to a correspondence view of truth, that must be the case.


(iv) Since true counterfactuals depend on their truthfulness by virtue of correspondence with the relevant states of affairs, there is ample reason to affirm a libertarian free will scenario.

As I have argued, there can be no relevant states of affairs in the world pertaining to LFW decisions prior to the instantiation of the decisions themselves.


First, I think you misunderstand how middle knowledge relates to God's sovereignty. You see, though such middle knowledge does not depend on God for their truthfulness it is not the case that something is co-eternal with God. Instead, counterfactuals are merely subjunctive hypotheticals.

But you still have it that certain contingent states of affairs are coeternal with God, namely that these subjective hypotheticals obtain the truth values that they do.


But if you say that the actualizability of those counterfactuals co-exist apart from God, then you would be incorrect for even though they can be made true apart from God, each counterfactual still takes into account circumstances. But those circumstances do not, indeed cannot, exist unless God creates them either directly or indirectly. Moreover, the person's existence also depends on God for his/her creation. And the pool of the viable states of affairs feasible for God depend on how God will create the universe.

Granted, but the pool of viable states of affairs available for God to actualize is still limited by contingent circumstances outside of God’s volitional control.


And this is surely not to say that counterfactuals are independent of God, only that they are true apart from Him.

So; the truth values of such counterfactuals are independent of God.


Let me give you a comparison. The statement &quot;The Prime Minister is not a prime number&quot; is eternally true. However, the truthfulness of this statement does not depend on God either.

It does not depend on a volitional decision by God, but I would argue that the truth value of that statement does ultimately depend on God. The truth value of the above statement is grounded in the fact that the essence of being The Prime Minister excludes the property of being a prime number. So the truth of the above statement is grounded in nature of certain abstractions. Now I believe that abstractions themselves are ultimately grounded in God’s nature which is in turn grounded in God. So the truth value of the above statement depends on God, just not on a voluntary decision made by God.


But this does not mean that there is &quot;something&quot; that exists apart from God in the sense that there is an object called &quot;truth&quot; that sits outside of God's ontology. Truth is not a &quot;thing&quot; it is a correspondence between propositions and states of affairs.

Agreed. But, I would hold as a theological principle that there are no states of affairs which exist independently of God or, at the very least, no states of affairs that exist independently of God without God’s volitional consent, anyway. But, it seems that Molinism requires us to abandon that principle because it holds that some states of affairs (namely that counterfactual conditionals regarding LFW decisions have the truth values that they actually do) eternally exist independently of God.


Secondly, this is more troublesome for Calvinism/Determinism than it is for Molinism because all natural knowledge is in fact actualizable by God so His middle knowledge just is His natural knowledge! But this means that there are more truths that are not dependent on God!

I don’t follow you here. I do not believe in middle knowledge as a distinct category from God’s natural knowledge, that much is true. But, I believe that the contents of God’s natural knowledge pertains only to non-contingent truth. And, I hold that ultimately all non-contingent truth has its origin in God’s nature. So all of the truths contained within God’s natural knowledge depend on God, though they do not depend on a voluntary decision by God. In this way, dualism is avoided.


Thirdly, although it is true that human volition ensues without God being its sufficient cause, that is just a point of logic that one cannot make someone freely do something. If you impugn the Molinist's God because He has the inability to force someone to do something freely against their will, then the objection does not hold for you would be indicting God's omnipotence on the basis that He cannot bring about logical contradictions.

None of my objections include this one.

In Christ,
Kenny

[Kenny]

Today @ 04:35 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=185446#post185446)Jaltus: It does no such thing, what it does propose is that by the act of creation God sets up a state of affairs wherein free will beings are created with the ability to make choices, and God innately knows what all of those choices would be given any situation.

In no way is any of the eternal, for God preexisted but the state of affairs did not.

At least according to Molina’s original version and the contemporary version espoused by the likes of Alvin Plantinga and William Lane Craig, God’s knowledge of truth values of counterfactual conditionals is both contingent and logically prior to God’s creative decree. Thus, on this version, we have it that certain contingent states of affairs (namely that counterfactual conditionals pertaining to LFW decisions obtain the truth values that they actually do) coexist eternally with God. I suppose this problem could be avoided if one were to hold that God’s middle knowledge only comes into effect after God’s creative decree, but then we are just one very small step removed from open theism.


The truth values are based on actuality. Therefore, if God says something would actually happen given A, then I for one am going to believe Him. If it corresponds to reality of a possible world instead of this one, then does it fit your definition of truth? Especially taking into consideration that these are posited as &quot;woulds&quot; in the first place.

I have no problem with counterfactual conditionals having truth values. In fact, I am a firm believer that many of them do. But, I believe that the truth values of such conditionals are rooted in actual states of affairs – namely in the causal structure of reality.


I have no idea what the Gettier problem is…

See my above post to Matt. I explain it in some detail there.


…but I do know that experience in fact dictates other than what you said here.

Two guys are walking down a street. The one stops to tie his shoe, and a brick goes flying right by his head. The second guy looks at him and says, &quot;If you had not stopped to tie your shoe, you would have gotten that full in the face.&quot; The first man agrees, praises God, and moves on.

This is a simple story of something that more or less happens everyday. People assume counterfactuals in their daily lives. Howoften do people say &quot;if only....then...&quot; which is clearly expressing a counterfactual.

Like I said, I believe that counterfactual conditionals often do have truth values based in determinative causal structures. The truth value of the conditional expressed above is based in determinative principles of gravitation and motion. The knowledge of the truth value of the above counterfactual conditional was caused via an inductive inference based on adequate experience with said principles.


And of course your grounding objection is baseless for I see no reason to posit that there needs to be causal conditions in order to have knowledge, something which runs counter to LFW in the first place.

I have already given several arguments to the effect that knowledge requires adequate causal grounding. I have also shown how my assertion in this regard is not incompatible with the assertion that people have knowledge of causally indeterminate events (see the quantum physicists example in my last post to you). There is nothing about my assertion that knowledge requires causal grounding which is incompatible with LFW.


I realize you hold to this strongly, but I do not think your objections are solid objections. Once again the language of sensing is forcing you down the wrong path. If God knows innately, there is no need for Him to &quot;see&quot; anything.

I’m not saying that God has to know things by sensing them. I am saying that there has to be at least some sort of causal connection between God and the facts which God knows in order for God to know them. Otherwise, we have it that it is logically possible for an agent to know about facts pertaining to which that agent has no connection to whatsoever. Now, one can swallow anything in philosophy if one has robust enough intuitions, but I find this highly incredulous. I suppose one could simply make an appeal to mystery here. But I think that appeals to mystery are only theologically justified where there is strong revelatory warrant for such appeals. Given that this entire discussion is philosophically motivated to begin with (let’s face it, the Bible doesn’t outright define any particular philosophical view of free will and divine foreknowledge), I think such an appeal is uncalled for here.

In Christ,
Kenny

[Kenny]

Today @ 04:48 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=186042#post186042)
Jaltus:

What do you guys think of this:

&quot;If we would say that we have no sin, we would be decieving ourselves and the truth is not in us.&quot;

That looks like a truth claim about a possible but not actualized state of affairs. The author is saying something would be the case if something else were the case. That is what counterfactuals are all about.

(the quote is my translation of I John 1:8)

Seeing as how I have no problem with counterfactual conditionals being true, I have no problem with your interpretation of this verse. In fact, I agree with you on this one.

[geebob]

aye aye.

I hold to counterfactuals. Just not counterfactuals of libertarian freedom, except when those counterfactuals are expressed in conjoined might statements. But when those are true in the actual world, they are not counterfactuals. a conjoined might counterfactual is not one that is true in this world as the necessary circumstances do not obtain, hence the meaning of counterfactual.

[nomad]

yeah, i don't there is too much confusion over the nature of counterfactuals. the disagreements tend to stem from two main branches: one, what is the difference between 'will' and 'must' (and is it significant), and two, what is the nature of the truth or falsity of a counterfactual? This appears to be relevant in the LFW/OSAS discussion too, but i put it here. though i am getting a little lost in this discussion :) i need to read through it again.

i'll do the first part first, because i'm not sure i understand it totally. I think the difference between 'will' and 'must' is as follows:

when looking at all worlds in the set, if some contain 'In X, S will do A' and others contain 'In X, S will do ~A', then it is meaningful to say that S is not constrained to always do A or ~A; a choice is chosen, but it is not the only choice possible.

OTOH, if when looking at all worlds in the set, all contain either 'In X, S will do A' or 'In X, S will do ~A', such that only one choice is represented among the possible worlds, then this means S MUST do A.

Is that an acceptable definition?

It is the only way i can make sense of it. If this is true, then perhaps in world W1 it is true that 'If S is in X, S will do A', whereas in world W2 it is true that 'If S is in X, S will do ~A' is true. This means that S is not constrained by circumstances alone.

However, inside world W1, the distinction goes away. W1 is a possible world where S DOES do A. In this case, 'will' and 'must' are identical; the set is too small, and inside this set, S always does A, there are no cases where S does ~A.

for the second part, we are really asking, in other words, under what circumstances is it meaningful to say 'If X, then Y'? If we say that, what we are saying is that X is contingent on Y... we never find Y without also finding X. Every X is accompanied by a Y. 'If X is a strawberry, then X is red'. This is not necessarily a causal relationship (and since causality is only an organization in our minds from correspondence, it is only a special case of this and may not even 'really' exist), it could also be by definition, or form some sort of logical contingency. If I then choose a strawberry, this does not 'cause' me to choose a red fruit; it is inherent in my choice, and comes along with it. I cannot choose a strawberry, without choosing a red fruit; to do so, assuming this statement is true, would be impossible.

However, if for even one X, we find that Y is not true, we have violated the contingency; we can no longer assert its truth. Of course you say, 'Well, actually strawberries aren't necessarily red; they're only red after they are ripe'. Even if you show me 1 million red strawberries, only 1 unripe green one is enough to falsify the statement. 'If X is a strawberry, then X is red' is not true.

Usually, what we will do then is refine our statement... We look again and find that not all strawberries are red, but in fact all ripe ones are; all our counterexamples are unripe. We can make the statement true by further constraining the conditions: 'If X is a ripe strawberry, then X is red'.

A long time ago, someone tried to get a computer utilizing an early neural network to recognize tanks in the jungle... To 'initialize' a neural network, you give a set of inputs and the desired output, and it adjusts itself. Over time, you 'train' it. The army put in pictures of jungle with tanks, and pictures of jungle without tanks, at least 100 iirc, to train it, the goal being an 'automatic tank detector'.

To their joy, when they put the pictures back into the system, it had a 100% accurate detection rate on the original set! Greatly encouraged, they then took another set of pictures and fed them through... which the system dismally failed on. The tank pictures had been taken on bright days, while the not-tank pictures had been taken on cloudy days; it was actually responding to the weather, not the tank.

This example is just given to reinforce the point that it is worthwhile to determine what the _real_ contigencies are. They not only had to refine their statement, but change it (their description of what the computer actually did).

Now, let's return to the molinist. They assert 'In world Wx, if S were in X, then S would do A'. Under what conditions is this true?

If there is any case where in world W1, S is in X, but S does ~A, then the above statement is not meaningless, it is false. It is NOT true that 'If S were in X, S would do A'. I would argue that even if S COULD do ~A in world W1, then you cannot say that; even a possibility of failure is fatal to the truth of this statement. So:

In world W1, if S were in X, S would do A.
In world W2, if S were in X, S would do ~A.

Note that X is identical in both statements. This is what is meant by 'S will do A (in world W1), but not (S must do A)'. However, the scientist would ask: What is different about world W1 and W2?

In science, we would say this is time to refine our statement: obviously there is something different.

The molinist says 'There is no difference, the difference is in the causal agent S'. But this isn't a very good solution... the causal agent S is the same in both possible worlds. Or is he? Is the causal agent S actually the same? Or is it different? What meaning can we give to this, other than that the world is different?

Hmm... i guess this is the root of my disagreement. i suppose i can understand the assertion, but not the grounding for it. it seems to fly in the face of my 'scientific upbringing' to call S the same agent, and yet different in the two possible worlds. If we applied this to anything else besides a person, we would say obviously S cannot be the same, because they don't act the same way. What allows us to apply this to humans, but not to other things? Or do we apply this to other things as well? It makes sense to limit it to just people, but i am wondering what the actual justification is.

of course, this still doesn't seem to escape the founding objection... once you actualize the world, everything is determined; there ARE 'free will' decisions theoretically at some logical point prior to creation, but not after. i think i'm still confused.

[mattbballman19]

geebob,

Sorry for the wait! I think that I lost track a little of where we were going, so maybe this post is sufficient for steering me back into the right direction.


If it is mere self causation that makes this difference between "must" and "will", then I say again, the difference between the two is not significant enough to help the defender of the coherence of edf and libertarian freedom.

The reason why it was said that this distinction is relevant is because if the latter is not emphasized, then the already stated fatalistic ideas necessarily arise. Since fatalism was seen to be deficient (maybe not, since due to my lack of frequent participation in the thread, I may have lost where someone has attempted to support it), then the former side of the distinction must be seen to be false. If fatalism is false and, therefore, the 'must' side of the distinction false, then by default, it seems, we must side with the 'will' side of the distinction for no other reason than that the possible reasons brought forth to make the 'must' side of the distinction logically coincide with edf and libertarian freedom is logically fallacious. For reiteration purposes, when an agent acts freely, he is a first or unmoved mover; no event or efficient cause causes him to act. If the 'must' side of the distinction is true (thereby logically excluding the 'will' side), then this rules out the nature of free-will which the libertarian advocates. If it rules that out, then not only is a successful integration between edf and libertarian free-will side-steped, but also seems to presuppose libertarianism to be false, which would be begging the question and irrelevant to the issue (for we are supposed to be presupposing its truth for the sake of discussion).


There is a way that the future is and that way must be no less inconsistent with both choices than the past is.

This seems to presuppose the same line of reasoning which is under discussion; namely, because there is a future that is (whatever 'is' means), then this implies that is 'must' obtain in the specified way. But why 'must' it? Why can't it just be stated that it 'will' happen in this or that way? Since there are external logical problems with concluding that states of affairs 'must' be a certain way given the fallacious modal axioms upon which their conclusion is rought, then it seems that we should side with the view that because it is the case that the future only 'will' happen, it is therefore sensible to say that a free-will decision within the libertarian construction is consistent with it. But, as it is, I cannot see how this assertion can get off the ground, for it seems to be presupposing a B-theory of time: the view that all moments off time are equally existent and are related by the tenseless relations of 'earlier than', 'later than', and 'simultaneous with'. So, there is just a four-dimensional space-time universe existing as a block. So, when you say 'the way the future is' you seem to be implying that there is now a future which exists, which I think is questionable. In order to make your case from this base, then it seems you must do so by beginning a justifiable substantiation of a B-theory of time, which I will contest.


As I deliberate, God knows at that very moment what I will do. Thus at that moment, it is not logically possible for me to enter into both possible futures (not both at the same time, mind you).

This is where I see inconsistency. You affirm with the libertarian that God knows what we 'will' do, as opposed to the idea that because God's knowing what I'll do, that this somehow implies that I must do something. Yet on the other hand you say that even though it is only the case that God knows I 'will' do something, it is 'logically' impossible for one to do such and such. But that implication doesn't seem to follow. It would only be 'logically' impossible if it was the case that I 'must' do so and so. It might could be said that in the actual world it is 'metaphysically' impossible to enter in so and such, but this is a far cry from 'logical' impossibility, which is what is needed to show an incompatibility between God's foreknowledge and LFW. Logical impossibility is only deduced, it seems, if the 'must' part of the distinction is extrapolated. And since its extrapolation was seen to be fallacious, then we can conclude that there is no logical impossibility/incompatibility.


Of course I believe that freedom has counterfactuals because I believe not only in libertarian freedom but also compatibilism plus another mode of freedom that has features of both compatibilism and libertarian freedom.

This could probably be the topic of another thread for I would go on to argue that the integration of libertarianism and compatibilism is a hopeless task: logically and factually.


Thus the conjoined might statements do not imply woulds nor wills thus foreknowledge is not possible.

I'm not saying that the might statements, by themselves, constitute grounds for the implication of there being wills or woulds, but that a kind of knowledge that would encompass the full range of the direction in which mights would turn into 'will'. This is different than saying that a 'raw' might, with no knowledge of the future time existing informing me about how that particular might came about, implies a 'will'. When you put into conjunction a knowledge, which Molinism argues God has, with the possibility that different 'wills' are possibily instantiated, then we can sensibly hold the position that a proper orchestration of mights can lead to states of affairs in which it can be said that God was in soveregn control over them, because of His middle knowlege.


Only when the sum total of the truths about the world can be expressed in terms of would statements can there be edf since all facts with regard to edf is in terms of what will and what won't happen. If both mights are true of some fact about the world, omniscience excludes edf as the truth excludes what will happen and what will not happen.

You may have to explain this a little more.

matt

[mattbballman19]

kenny,


Second, it seems that any viable solution to the Gettier problem requires some sort of externalist causal grounding requirement for knowledge. In the example I gave concerning the stopped clock, for example, my belief that it was 12:00 was justified and it was true but it was not knowledge because there was not an appropriate sort of causal relationship between my belief that it was 12:00 and the fact that it was 12:00.

It seems that this is inaccurate because there are cases where one can know P without P 'causing' that knowledge and, thus, this 'causal view' is not necessary for knowledge. An example would be our knowledge of 2+2=4. This is arguably knowledge about certain abstract objects (numbers and the mathematical relations that obtain among them). It doesn't seem right to say that these nonphysical abstract objects 'cause' our knowledge of them.

One can know that if a plant A is taller than plant B and plant B is taller than plant C, then it must be the case that plant A is taller than plant C. But what 'causes' this knowledge? It's not the plants, because the knowledge itself doesn't depend on any specific objects in space or time but on the logic of the relation called 'taller than'.

Another example would be our knowledge of the future. I can know that my mom will shout for joy this afternoon when she comes home and sees me doing chores around the house, but this fact can't 'cause' this knowledge because it doesn't exist yet.
Secondly, this 'causal view' doesn't even seem sufficient for knowledge. There are cases where the fact that P does cause ont to have a true belief that P but, because it causes such a belief in an epistemically irrelevant way, no knowledge obtains. Think of a small person working on a car. After working for a while he grows tired and decides to watch CNN news. Think further that, unknown to him, a certian internal disorder is what caused him to grow tired and come inside. So, as he is watching CNN, he learns that most people who suffer this particular disorder are small. Since he happens to be a hypochondriac, he comes to the conclusion that he has this particular disorder. Thus, he would not know he had this disorder, despite the fact that he does have it causally contributed to his true belief that he did.


Some sort of appropriate externalist relationship between how the belief was formed and the environment in which the belief was formed is also required.

Since there are other ways in which the externalist can articulate her views, I would tend to agree with you. Just as long as this 'causal theory' is done away with, because of the difficulties above.

Just a final note: Even if one cannot solve the Gettier problems precisely, it is still reasonable to say that knowledge is at least true belief plus something that confers justification, warrant, rationality on that belief.

I originally thought you were using this theory for knowledge as a necessary condition for something to be true. That is why I was stressing the correspondance theory of true over your 'causal grounding' theory of knowledge. So, I think that was just a communication blurp by me.



Given that LFW decisions are causally disjointed from any antecedent states of affairs

What about the state of affairs of the agent herself? Read my comments to Geebob above.


This means that neither foreknowledge concerning actual LFW decisions nor beliefs regarding counterfactual conditionals pertaining to LFW decisions could possibly satisfy any sort of appropriate causal grounding requirement for knowledge.

As seen above, I don't think any satisfaction is needed anyway, since this idea of causal grounding was seen to be deficient.


Yes; I never asserted that truth values need be grounded in the existence of concrete objects. I only asserted that truth values need to be grounded in some relevant actual state of affairs.

Firstly, this is the Molinist's point.
Secondly, as William Lane Craig says,

What Plantinga understands—and grounding objectors apparently by and large do not—is that behind the grounding objection lies a theory about the relationship of truth and reality which needs to be articulated, defended, and then applied to counterfactuals of freedom if the grounding objection is to carry any probative force. Anti–Molinists have not even begun to address these issues.

So behind your assertion I agree with Craig in that you must it not as a ,

mere ostensibly undercutting defeater of Molinism, but a putatively rebutting defeater. It makes a bold and positive assertion and therefore requires warrant in excess of that which attends the Molinist assumption that there are true counterfactuals about creaturely free actions.

Craig realized the connontations made implicit in your demand for grounding a truth value in such a way when he says:

Now we immediately see the potentially misleading connotations of the term "truth–maker" for such entities. For making sounds like a causal relation between a truth–bearer and some concrete object, but truth–maker theorists are quite clear that the relation is by no means causal. An entity a makes a proposition p true if and only if that a exists entails that p. That truth–makers are usually conceived to be such abstract entities as facts or states of affairs underlines the point that a causal relation is not at issue here.

So Craig concludes thusly:

The truth–maker theorist would take it as understood that nobody actually causes counterfactuals or any other sort of proposition to be true. The demand for a cause of a proposition's being true is inept, unless the anti–Molinist is presupposing some very special causal theory of truth–makers, in which case he owes us an articulation of that theory and a defense, not merely of its adequacy, but of its superiority to customary truth–maker theories.

So it can be said from the reasons already provided by Craig that,

Anti–Molinists have not even begun the task of showing that counterfactuals of creaturely freedom are members of the set of propositions or statements which require truth–makers if they are to be true.

The full article is located here: http://www.leaderu.com/offices/billcraig/docs/grounding.html

I stress that you read this for Craig's quotes to make more sense and so that we can have an intelligible spring-board from which we can discuss the issue.



But, I don’t see how that helps the Molinist out all that much. Given that LFW decisions are causally independent of any antecedent conditions

Just make sure you answer my question regarding this reason above.


But LFW decisions are by definition disconnected from prior states of affairs.

Why? We might be operating from different understandings of what exactly LFW is.


They do not involve any contingent state of affairs over which God has no voluntary control.

Let me reiterate why this particular state of affairs must be contingent.

Because if Peter must deny Christ three times, then it is broadly logically impossible that he refrain from doing so, which destroys the indeterminate causal power we ascribed to him in the first place. So the content of MK is contingent as well.

Remember the distinction between the content of middle knowledge and middle knowledge itself. The former is contingent, because of the above. The latter is necessary and, therefore, rooted in God's nature, because, as one philospher points out:
characteristic of MK is the fact that (akin to natural knowledge) God possesses it independently of any divine decree to actualize anything. The content of scientia media, therefore, is not under God's control.

Freddosso also says:

Like natural knowledge but unlike free knowledge, middle knowledge is prevolitional, with the result that God has no more control over the states of affairs He knows through His middle knowledge than He does over the states of affairs He knows through His natural knowledge. Like free knowledge but unlike natural knowledge, middle knowledge is such that the states of affairs known through it might have failed to obtain, with the result that what God knows through His middle knowledge may vary from one possible world to another just as what He knows through His free knowlegdge may vary from one possible world to another. So God has middle knowledge only if He knows some metaphysical contingent state of affairs over which He has no control.


We only have a very limited amount of information available to judge the quality of this world given that God’s plans for it stretch into all of eternity (and remember that a possible world encompasses the entire history of a world and not just the world as it presently exists). There may be gross amounts of evil in the world now, but many Calvinists, including myself, believe that God has permitted these evils so that surpassingly greater goods might be obtained. God’s love which was manifested on the cross, which we would not have known were it not for the presence of evil, is the supreme example of such a good.

I just disagree with this. Not only in its truth, but in its inconsistency. First, the latter. You say that it should be the case that we should be suspicious of my view of God being able to actualize a better world than the present one because of the 'limited amount of information available to judge the quality of this world given that God's plans for it stretch into all eternity . . .' Then, in the same paragraph, you proceed to lay down your beliefs, as a Calvinist, stating how you 'believe' it to be the case that the present world is the one perferred, because of these seemingly greater goods that could not have been actualized had there not been the necessary evils to flesh them out. But in the advocation of your beliefs as a Calvinist should I not be equally suspicious of the reasons for why I should espouse your beliefs because of the 'limited amount of information available to judge the quality of this world given that God's plans for it stretch into all eternity . . .' Secondly, the former. I don't believe what you say is true, because I believe that the greatest good that God wants to accomplish is the maximization of salvation (MOS). The reason the apologist brings in the presence of evil into her defense against the critic you says that the existence of evil is improbable and/or logically incompatible with God is because of the only way MOS can be attained is if LWF is actualized in His creatures. A compatablistic freedom is not enough, because God could have orchestrated a different compatablisitic route through which everyone chooses to be saved. But within the LWF frame-work this is not feasible for God to do, so then we should be not surprised at the existence of evil and its compatibility with God. So, if the Calvinist view of the greatest good doesn't consist of MOS, what does it consist of?


Calvinists believe that God could have saved everyone but does not because there are greater goods to be obtained in permitting the damnation of some.

Like what? What motivation is there?


I don’t think that a correspondence theory of truth itself requires determinism. But I do think that a correspondence theory of truth entails that truth determinate counterfactual conditionals are rooted in deterministic causal processes. For example, if I’m at a baseball game and I see someone catch a pop fly, I can truthfully think to myself, “If that ball had continued on its trajectory unimpeded, it would have made contact with the ground.” That counterfactual assertion is true by virtue of is corresponding to various facts about causally determinative principles of gravitation and motion.

Don't you think there is a line to be drawn between the determinative way in which things follow laws and the 'questionably' determinative way of 'how' and 'what' things will subject themselves to laws? The latter and not the former seems to be the question we are discussing. If so, then I don't see your connection between determinism's necessity in accounting for a correspondance theory of truth.


But, counterfactual conditionals pertaining to indeterminate processes have no states of affairs in the world to which they might correspond and so have no truth values.

Why?


But you still have it that certain contingent states of affairs are coeternal with God, namely that these subjective hypotheticals obtain the truth values that they do.

The possible hypotheticals themselves are akin to God's middle knowledge and are therefore necessary, not contingent. The truth-values that obtain relative to a possible world are contingent and so are a necessary in the sense that they are coeternal with God. The coeternality exists between the knowlege of the contingent state of affairs and God, not the contingent states of affairs by themselves and God.


Granted, but the pool of viable states of affairs available for God to actualize is still limited by contingent circumstances outside of God’s volitional control.

No, its limited by God's middle knowledge, which is outside of His volitional control. The contingent state of affairs which are possibly instantiated are under His volitional control via His middle knowledge. Those states of affairs are dependent on God's decision to create the world.


Agreed. But, I would hold as a theological principle that there are no states of affairs which exist independently of God or, at the very least, no states of affairs that exist independently of God without God’s volitional consent, anyway.

But this theological principle seems to be up for graps, since certain reasons which it was dependent on have been shown to be questionable.


I do not believe in middle knowledge as a distinct category from God’s natural knowledge, that much is true.

You may not believe it, but its distinctness is necessary for LFW. This, in no way, takes away from the kind of sovergnty explicated in Scriptures.

matt.

[geebob]

this is the second time I wrote this (as I lost the first post to the internet) and I wrote it going on 36 plus hours without sleep.


The reason why it was said that this distinction is relevant is because if the latter is not emphasized, then the already stated fatalistic ideas necessarily arise.

alright, but that still doesn't address my arguements. I highlighted specific problems with edf and foreknowledge which are not helped by this distinction you're trying to make.


For reiteration purposes, when an agent acts freely, he is a first or unmoved mover; no event or efficient cause causes him to act.

your answers weren't satisfactory because I am not focusing on this aspect of free will. If I was, maybe you would have an arguement. And the aspect I focus on is more essential to the free will theist.


This seems to presuppose the same line of reasoning which is under discussion; namely, because there is a future that is (whatever 'is' means), then this implies that is 'must' obtain in the specified way.

Read that quote of mine you quoted again. I affirm that there must be a way that the future is that is consistent with free will. I am not saying that if there is a way that the future is, it must be incompatible with libertarian free will.


But why 'must' it? Why can't it just be stated that it 'will' happen in this or that way?

I wouldn't waste my time arguing against this distinction you want to make. My discussion on the square of opposition amply demonstrates this. It's not "must" as opposed to "will" that negates free will, as far as my observations are concerned. It's "will" as opposed to "might and might not".


But, as it is, I cannot see how this assertion can get off the ground, for it seems to be presupposing a B-theory of time: the view that all moments off time are equally existent and are related by the tenseless relations of 'earlier than', 'later than', and 'simultaneous with'.

Not in the least. A B mode of time cannot describe a future where it is with in my power to act one way and also in my power to act in a different way. A view I like to call "soft" presentism does the trick very nicely where the past present and future do exist but the present is ontologically privileged and the past and future are sufficiently existent that we can meaningfully speak of them and have knowledge of them. Such a view provides the necessary grounds for my power to act and my power to refrain in full consistency with the future since the future may exist in terms of both certainties and uncertainties.


This is where I see inconsistency. You affirm with the libertarian that God knows what we 'will' do, as opposed to the idea that because God's knowing what I'll do, that this somehow implies that I must do something.

you misunderstood me. As a libertarian, I reject that there is a fact about what we will do. As an open theist, I happily grant to you that it is not the case that because we will do something doesn't mean that we must do it. Why? because I think that position is right? No, it's because it really doesn't make a difference to me. I have not seen anything in the distinction you try to make that approaches a solution to the problems I raise. They are all geared towards one aspect of free will that generally does not concern me in these debates. It's not worth the trouble. My way is easier.


Yet on the other hand you say that even though it is only the case that God knows I 'will' do something, it is 'logically' impossible for one to do such and such.

well, do people actually do other than what God knows they will do? Does this ever turn out to be the case that folks do other than what God truthfully knows what they will do? Can they do other than what God knows they will do? I mean can it be the case that God knows one thing and then we do the other. Well, both options have to be wide open for lfw. So if God has edf and we have libertarian free will, then I'd say we can expect that his true and accurate knowledge is wrong all the time. There's no reason to conclude that we can't and don't in fact do other than what God knows we will do because lfw puts it very well with in our means to do both what God knows what we will and to do other than what he knows we will do.

But this just seems like an nonsensical view of foreknowledge to me.


I would go on to argue that the integration of libertarianism and compatibilism is a hopeless task: logically and factually.

yes it would be a hopeless task of integrating the full view of compatibilism (where determinism is true) and libertarian free will (where indeterminism is true). I don't believe in compatibleism but I do believe that we make compatibilistic choices, that is free choices determined by circumstances out of our explicit control.

It would also be a hopeless task to show that one and the same choice is both libertarian and compatibilistically free. However, it is perfectly coherent to say that some choices are libertarian, some are compatibilistic, and some choices share some of the non-exclusive features of the two types of freedom and none of the mutually exclusive features.


I'm not saying that the might statements, by themselves, constitute grounds for the implication of there being wills or woulds, but that a kind of knowledge that would encompass the full range of the direction in which mights would turn into 'will'.

Your understanding of a conjoined might is not my understanding. A conjoined 'might' that has a direction cannot possibly be a conjoined might. If God knows that the 'might' will turn out towards 'would', then might not has been contradicted.


This is different than saying that a 'raw' might, with no knowledge of the future time existing informing me about how that particular might came about, implies a 'will'.

the conjoined might does convey knowledge about the future. Those statements are meaningful. They can be true. So they very much consistitute knowledge.


mights can lead to states of affairs in which it can be said that God was in soveregn control over them, because of His middle knowlege.

molinism is purely about would counterfactuals. And of course mights do indicate a would when they are not truthfully conjoined, but in that case they are logically weak and misleading where a would would accurately portray the right picture.

from me:Only when the sum total of the truths about the world can be expressed in terms of would statements can there be edf since all facts with regard to edf is in terms of what will and what won't happen. If both mights are true of some fact about the world, omniscience excludes edf as the truth excludes what will happen and what will not happen.

You may have to explain this a little more.

let me know if what I previously wrote in this post doesn't make things any more clearer.

[mattbballman19]

Geebob,


this is the second time I wrote this (as I lost the first post to the internet) and I wrote it going on 36 plus hours without sleep.

Geez! Get some sleep; maybe that way you think about the issues a little better than as of late. :teeth:

You did point out some relevant points with regard to the aim and purpose through which the critiques were operating.

Those points being:


alright, but that still doesn't address my arguements. I highlighted specific problems with edf and foreknowledge which are not helped by this distinction you're trying to make.

and


your answers weren't satisfactory because I am not focusing on this aspect of free will. If I was, maybe you would have an arguement. And the aspect I focus on is more essential to the free will theist.

and


wouldn't waste my time arguing against this distinction you want to make. My discussion on the square of opposition amply demonstrates this. It's not "must" as opposed to "will" that negates free will, as far as my observations are concerned.

and


As an open theist, I happily grant to you that it is not the case that because we will do something doesn't mean that we must do it. I have not seen anything in the distinction you try to make that approaches a solution to the problems I raise. They are all geared towards one aspect of free will that generally does not concern me in these debates. It's not worth the trouble

and


yes it would be a hopeless task of integrating the full view of compatibilism (where determinism is true) and libertarian free will (where indeterminism is true).

These are points that I am in apparent agreement with. Now to the disagreements.

You say,


I affirm that there must be a way that the future is that is consistent with free will.

Any by 'consistent' you mean there is nothing in the future which obtains that makes the exercising of that choice impossible. I am aware that this is possible without there existing a future 'now'. Below you offer a view called soft presentism in which you attempt hold to some form of existence of the past/future which is ontologically inferior to the present. Below is where I shall offer my thoughts. For now, it will suffice to say that the above quote is meaningful within an A theoretical conception of time. For when you say that there must 'be a way', it can possibly be interpreted as a kind of way which has not come yet.


It's "will" as opposed to "might and might not".

This is the point where I believe I am having sufficient difficulty in grasping the full meaning I believe you are attempting to convey. Because even in the post where you originally articulate this view, I am still fuzzy. So, I believe that further elucidation may be necessary for my full comprehension to come to fruition.

First let me just attempt to explain to you my throught processes within the back-drop of my background knowledge concerning the meaning of the words being used to make sensible your view. I have already said what I've getting ready to say in the post in which I briefly explicate my views of 'might' or 'might not' in the context of counterfactual logic, so I apologize for the repitition and if the contents of my repitition is completely irrelevant to the meanings which you have been intending to communicate to me.

The basic purpose behind this explanation is to provide reason to side with the view which rejects the meaningfulness of your particular construction of the square of opposition by pointing out that counterfactual logic uses a totally different formulation of it.

I don't have a graphic that I can show, so I'll try my best to semantically explain it:

First, some definitions: P ->>Q means that If it were the case that P, then it would be the case that Q. P-->Q means that If it were the case that P, then it might be the case that Q.

Mights indicate a live option under the circumstances, not a bare logical possibility.

First let me explicate the contraries:

P->>Q is contrary to P->>~Q.

and

P-->Q is contrary to P-->~Q

Second, the contradictories:

P->>Q is contradictory to P-->~Q

P->>~Q is contradictory P-->Q

Third, the implications:

P->>Q implies P-->Q

P->>~Q implies P-->~Q.

So, in counterfactual logic, P-->Q is simply defined as the contradictory of P->>~Q, that is to say, ~(P->>~Q). So, although P->>~Q is logically incompatible with P-->Q, it remains true that if P were the case it COULD be the case that Q. Could is expressing mere possibility. So, therefore it could be the case that Q entails in some possible world which perfectly illustrates the contingent nature of counterfactuals within the contents of God's middle knowledge.

So in using the square of opposition articulated in the literature of counterfactual logic, it not only, to my knowledge, contradicts your understanding of the way in which the square should be set up but also the particular contruction which tries to make the compossible state of affairs explicating that because X both might and might not happen that this somehow implies the impossibility of knowledge required to state that X will happen. For according to the reconstructed model of 'would' and 'might' statements within the counterfactual logic in the stated square of opposition fleshed out in the literature it is perfectly possible and meaningful to say that P->>Q is consistent with P-->~Q for that is what it implies.

So what must be understood is that 'mights' are a byproduct of 'woulds'. In order for 'mights' to even have the possibility to be actualized the necessary condition for such actualization has to be the hypothetical situation of there being a 'would' for the 'might' to become relevant. So, your objection that if it is the case that X both might and might not instantiate that therefore this indicates the impossible state of affairs of P knowing how X 'will' instantiate, since it confuses the order by which 'woulds' and 'mights' become relevant. 'Woulds' are a necessary condition for 'mights', not vice versa. Woulds dictate the knowledge of the mights. Woulds state what would happen if the antecedent were true, while mights state what mights happen if the antecedent were true. It's not the case that we say because I might or might not do such and such, I can't know what I will or will not do. The fact is that because I am an agent which is in control of what I will do, it is then the case that I can have knowledge of what I might or might not do because of what I will do, since it was shown that will logically proceedes the way in which the mights actually end up going (Look at the 'implications' above).

In conclusion: Since the 'woulds' imply the 'mights', it can't be said that the knowledge of the conjunction of the contraries P-->Q and P-->~Q preclude knowledge of the conjunction of P->>Q and P->>~Q, because it must already be the case of that something will or will not happen in order for it to be said that something might or might not happen.


A view I like to call "soft" presentism does the trick very nicely where the past present and future do exist but the present is ontologically privileged and the past and future are sufficiently existent that we can meaningfully speak of them and have knowledge of them.

Define and explain the metaphysical status of 'sufficiently existent' things.


As a libertarian, I reject that there is a fact about what we will do.

What do you mean by 'fact'? Or were you against the case where if there exists a fact about what you will do before you do it, that that therefore makes what you will do not consistent with libertarianism? I think you may have to explain this a little more, because I don't see how this is the case at all.


well, do people actually do other than what God knows they will do?

No.


Does this ever turn out to be the case that folks do other than what God truthfully knows what they will do?

No.


Can they do other than what God knows they will do?

I think we have to be aware of a distinction before I answer both yes and no. Yes in a sense AND no in a sense.

Let me quote Craig and you let me know of this fundamental distinction in counterfactual semantics:

Utilizing the medieval distinction between the senses, however, consider the proposition

2. A future event can fail to occur.
In sensu diviso, (2) means

3. Possibly, an event, which is future, will fail to occur
and is true if the event is contingent. But taken in sensu composito, (2) means

4. Possibly, an event which is future will fail to occur,
which is necessarily false. Thus, what is at issue with regard to the misleading notion of "altering the future" is whether one has the power to prevent a future event in sensu diviso. One can prevent the event, but were one to do so, then the event would not be future. To say that one cannot prevent a future event in sensu composito is merely to assert that one cannot bring it about that the event both will and will not occur--hardly a restriction on human freedom! Now consider

5. A past event can have failed to occur.
In sensu composito, (5) means

6. Possibly, an event which is past has failed to occur,
which is a self-contradiction. In sensu diviso, (5) means

7. Possibly, an event, which is past, has failed to occur.

The so-called unalterability of the past in sensu composito amounts to nothing more than the logical impossibility of bringing it about that an event has both occurred and not occurred. This trivial sense is irrelevant to considerations of power and freedom. The really interesting question is whether we have it within our power to postvent a past event in sensu diviso. In such a case one can bring it about that an event, which is past, did not occur, but were one to do so, then it would not have been a past event.

But is there not a similar fatal fallacy in theological fatalism? Consider

8. An event foreknown by God can fail to occur.
In sensu composito, this means

9. Possibly, an event which is foreknown by God will fail to occur,
which is self-contradictory. But in sensu diviso, (8) means

10. Possibly, an event, which is foreknown by God, will fail to occur, which may be true.

Thus, my ability to prevent the event is not the ability the bring about the self-contradictory state of affairs that God foreknew the event and the event does not occur. It is the power to prevent the event, which is foreknown by God, and were I to do so, it would not have been foreknown by Him.


that is free choices determined by circumstances out of our explicit control.

Even though these aren't what counterfactuals are (since nothing is 'determined', since it is still possible for the agent to do other than what he will do), but, would not be the way in which God could orchestrate counterfactuals and remain not only sovereign, but also retain libertarian freedom, since you, being a libertarian, seem to accept this rather strange integration into the libertarian understanding of free-will.


However, it is perfectly coherent to say that some choices are libertarian, some are compatibilistic, and some choices share some of the non-exclusive features of the two types of freedom and none of the mutually exclusive features.

I think you may have to explain this coherency, because I don't see it all.


molinism is purely about would counterfactuals.

No, molinism is about counterfactuals. And since counterfactuals are 'would' and 'might', therefore Molinism is about 'would' and 'might'.

Thanks for your comments! This conversation is truely stimulating.

regards,

mattd

[Kenny]

Hi Matt, where necessary for context, I have included my prior comments to which you responded in bold in the quotation boxes with your words in regular type underneath.


Yesterday @ 06:23 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=189760#post189760) mattbballman19:

It seems that this is inaccurate because there are cases where one can know P without P 'causing' that knowledge and, thus, this 'causal view' is not necessary for knowledge. An example would be our knowledge of 2+2=4. This is arguably knowledge about certain abstract objects (numbers and the mathematical relations that obtain among them). It doesn't seem right to say that these nonphysical abstract objects 'cause' our knowledge of them.

One can know that if a plant A is taller than plant B and plant B is taller than plant C, then it must be the case that plant A is taller than plant C. But what 'causes' this knowledge? It's not the plants, because the knowledge itself doesn't depend on any specific objects in space or time but on the logic of the relation called 'taller than'.

I never argued that knowledge must be caused by the actual facts themselves, only that there must be some sort of causal relationship between one’s beliefs concerning a fact and the fact itself. I agree that abstractions in and of themselves have no causal abilities. However, I deny that such entails that our knowledge of abstractions bears no causal relationship whatsoever with abstract facts. Abstract truths are metaphysically grounded in God’s nature. God knows them by virtue of His own self-awareness. We know them because God has created us in His image and has designed our cognitive faculties in such a way that when they are properly functioning they will form correct beliefs concerning basic abstract truths. So there is a causal link between our knowledge of abstract facts and those facts themselves, albeit a very indirect one.


Another example would be our knowledge of the future. I can know that my mom will shout for joy this afternoon when she comes home and sees me doing chores around the house, but this fact can't 'cause' this knowledge because it doesn't exist yet.

Since I am a compatiblist and a determinist, I do believe there is a fact concerning how your mother will respond to an upcoming future set of circumstances which is grounded in her character and the current state of affairs. Your knowledge of how she will respond, in turn, is based on an inductive inference from observations of your Mother’s past behavior. Of course, as a Molinist, you are contradicting yourself when you say that a fact about how your mother will respond doesn’t exist yet. You do believe that there is a fact, right now, about what she will do in the future, because you believe that propositions describing her future behavior have definite truth values. Of course, I question what metaphysical grounds there could be for such a fact given the assumption libertarian free will.


Secondly, this 'causal view' doesn't even seem sufficient for knowledge. There are cases where the fact that P does cause ont to have a true belief that P but, because it causes such a belief in an epistemically irrelevant way, no knowledge obtains. Think of a small person working on a car. After working for a while he grows tired and decides to watch CNN news. Think further that, unknown to him, a certian internal disorder is what caused him to grow tired and come inside. So, as he is watching CNN, he learns that most people who suffer this particular disorder are small. Since he happens to be a hypochondriac, he comes to the conclusion that he has this particular disorder. Thus, he would not know he had this disorder, despite the fact that he does have it causally contributed to his true belief that he did.

Yes, I am familiar with such examples, which is why I never claimed that a mere causal link between a fact and a belief is a sufficient condition for knowledge. I’m only arguing that it is a necessary one.


Since there are other ways in which the externalist can articulate her views, I would tend to agree with you. Just as long as this 'causal theory' is done away with, because of the difficulties above.

I actually largely subscribe to Plantinga’s proper functionalist view of warrant, that a belief is warranted if and only if it is the result of the proper functioning of one’s cognitive faculties which are part of a well designed plan aimed at the production of true beliefs in the type of environment in which those faculties were designed to function. While Plantinga’s view doesn’t contain any explicit causal grounding requirements for knowledge, I strongly suspect that they are hidden in the “type of environment in which they were designed to function” clause. I think that Plantinga’s responses to some proposed counterexamples to his view bear this out to some extent, though Plantinga may not explicitly endorce a causal groudning requirement at this point.


Just a final note: Even if one cannot solve the Gettier problems precisely, it is still reasonable to say that knowledge is at least true belief plus something that confers justification, warrant, rationality on that belief.

Right, and I strongly suspect that those extra conditions involve causal grounding requirements.


Given that LFW decisions are causally disjointed from any antecedent states of affairs

What about the state of affairs of the agent herself? Read my comments to Geebob above.

But, that’s the problem. LFW denies that the free will decisions of free agents are in any way deterministic functions of said agent’s essence or character. So no contemporary fact concerning a particular free will agent determines that she will make a particular future free will decision.


Firstly, this is the Molinist's point.
Secondly, as William Lane Craig says,

What Plantinga understands—and grounding objectors apparently by and large do not—is that behind the grounding objection lies a theory about the relationship of truth and reality which needs to be articulated, defended, and then applied to counterfactuals of freedom if the grounding objection is to carry any probative force. Anti–Molinists have not even begun to address these issues.

Yes; I’ve read this paper before. I think Craig is wrong when he says that the grounding objection requires some particular defense of a truth-maker theory of knowledge. All the grounding objection requires is a plain old ordinary correspondence view of truth. That is, all it requires is that one be committed to the intuitive belief that if a proposition is true then there is some fact about the world to which it corresponds.


Craig realized the connontations made implicit in your demand for grounding a truth value in such a way when he says:

Now we immediately see the potentially misleading connotations of the term &quot;truth–maker&quot; for such entities. For making sounds like a causal relation between a truth–bearer and some concrete object, but truth–maker theorists are quite clear that the relation is by no means causal. An entity a makes a proposition p true if and only if that a exists entails that p. That truth–makers are usually conceived to be such abstract entities as facts or states of affairs underlines the point that a causal relation is not at issue here.

Yes; I agree with this.


So Craig concludes thusly:

The truth–maker theorist would take it as understood that nobody actually causes counterfactuals or any other sort of proposition to be true. The demand for a cause of a proposition's being true is inept, unless the anti–Molinist is presupposing some very special causal theory of truth–makers, in which case he owes us an articulation of that theory and a defense, not merely of its adequacy, but of its superiority to customary truth–maker theories.

Agreed. But a causal theory of truth makes is not required for the Anti-Molinist to object to counterfactual conditionals, with respect to indeterminate events, having definite truth values. The problem is simply one of a lack of correspondence to reality. Causally indeterminate events are, by definition, not the outcome of any prior state of affairs. So prior to the instantiation of a particular indeterminate event, there are no states of affairs in reality to which propositions concerning the definite outcome of that event might correspond.


But LFW decisions are by definition disconnected from prior states of affairs.

Why? We might be operating from different understandings of what exactly LFW is.

Libertarian free will entails that the free choices of free agents are not deterministic functions of antecedent circumstances. A choice, A, is not a deterministic function of antecedent circumstances if and only if, given an exhaustive set of antecedent circumstances, C, with respect to A, in which A obtains, there is a possible world where C holds but ~A obtains. But an exhaustive set of antecedent circumstances is just an exhaustive set of prior states of affairs. And, to say that there is a possible world in which A occurs given a particular exhaustive set of prior states of affairs and that there is a possible world in which ~A occurs given the same exhaustive set of prior states of affairs is just to say that the aforementioned exhaustive set of prior states of affairs is logically consistent with both the outcome A and with the outcome ~A. But to say such a thing is just to say that A is both logically and causally disconnected from that particular exhaustive set of prior states of affairs.


Let me reiterate why this particular state of affairs must be contingent.

Because if Peter must deny Christ three times, then it is broadly logically impossible that he refrain from doing so, which destroys the indeterminate causal power we ascribed to him in the first place. So the content of MK is contingent as well.

I’m not sure just exactly what point you are trying to make here. Yes, if libertarian free will is true than the state of affairs regarding what Peter will do is contingent. I don’t believe in LFW, but agree with that assertion concerning its implications. And, of course, if God knows that Peter would in fact act that way in the given set of circumstances as part of His natural knowledge, prior to any decree to create, then part of God’s involuntary knowledge is itself contingent. But, that’s precisely where my theological objection kicks in. We have a particular state of affairs, namely that God knows a certain fact about what Peter would do, which is coeternal with God. Furthermore, this contingent state of affairs bars God from actualizing certain logically possible states of affairs, namely those in which Peter freely chooses to the contrary in the same circumstances. So we have it that certain contingent states of affairs exist coeternally with God and limit the scope of God’s power over and above mere logical limitations. But, this runs contrary to the entire motive behind the Christian doctrine of creation ex nihilo, which was to combat various forms of Greek dualism which implied that the creator’s power to create the world as he desired was limited to some degree by pre-existing materials coeternal with the creator himself.


Remember the distinction between the content of middle knowledge and middle knowledge itself. The former is contingent, because of the above. The latter is necessary and, therefore, rooted in God's nature, because, as one philospher points out: characteristic of MK is the fact that (akin to natural knowledge) God possesses it independently of any divine decree to actualize anything. The content of scientia media, therefore, is not under God's control.

Yes, I understand that according to the Molinist view it is essential to God that God has middle knowledge. But, it is still the case, as you point out, that the content of that knowledge is contingent and so we have contingent states of affairs existing coeternally with God.


Like natural knowledge but unlike free knowledge, middle knowledge is prevolitional, with the result that God has no more control over the states of affairs He knows through His middle knowledge than He does over the states of affairs He knows through His natural knowledge. Like free knowledge but unlike natural knowledge, middle knowledge is such that the states of affairs known through it might have failed to obtain, with the result that what God knows through His middle knowledge may vary from one possible world to another just as what He knows through His free knowlegdge may vary from one possible world to another. So God has middle knowledge only if He knows some metaphysical contingent state of affairs over which He has no control.

Yep; in other words, God’s power is limited by pre-existing contingent state of affairs over which God has no volitional control.


I just disagree with this. Not only in its truth, but in its inconsistency. First, the latter. You say that it should be the case that we should be suspicious of my view of God being able to actualize a better world than the present one because of the 'limited amount of information available to judge the quality of this world given that God's plans for it stretch into all eternity . . .' Then, in the same paragraph, you proceed to lay down your beliefs, as a Calvinist, stating how you 'believe' it to be the case that the present world is the one perferred, because of these seemingly greater goods that could not have been actualized had there not been the necessary evils to flesh them out. But in the advocation of your beliefs as a Calvinist should I not be equally suspicious of the reasons for why I should espouse your beliefs because of the 'limited amount of information available to judge the quality of this world given that God's plans for it stretch into all eternity . . .'

Not so. The difference between my judgment and you own is that I’m not drawing my conclusions form observations of the way the world is, but on the basis of revelation. I am convinced that there are adequate Biblical and theological grounds for my assertions. Of course, that’s subject to debate, but that’s happening on other threads than this one. In any case, my point about having insufficient information to judge the quality of this world based on personal observation alone still stands. I would agree that, left to our own observations, divorced from any revelational input, neither of us has adequate grounds for judging this world to be a good one or a bad one.


Secondly, the former. I don't believe what you say is true, because I believe that the greatest good that God wants to accomplish is the maximization of salvation (MOS). The reason the apologist brings in the presence of evil into her defense against the critic you says that the existence of evil is improbable and/or logically incompatible with God is because of the only way MOS can be attained is if LWF is actualized in His creatures.

As a Calvinist, I disagree with MOS. I believe the greatest good God wants to accomplish is to demonstrate His love in all of its aspects (including its sovereign freedom) to the rightful end of God’s glory.


A compatablistic freedom is not enough, because God could have orchestrated a different compatablisitic route through which everyone chooses to be saved.

I disagree that such is a necessary implication of compatiblistic freedom since I think that the compatiblist could consistently hold that some free will decisions are deterministically grounded in the individual essences of free agents. Since it is logically impossible to create the same individual with a different essence, there could be logical constraints on the type of free will decisions God is able to bring about for particular free will agents. However, as a Calvinist, I believe that God could have accomplished universal salvation if He had chosen to do so.


Don't you think there is a line to be drawn between the determinative way in which things follow laws and the 'questionably' determinative way of 'how' and 'what' things will subject themselves to laws? The latter and not the former seems to be the question we are discussing. If so, then I don't see your connection between determinism's necessity in accounting for a correspondance theory of truth.

Again, I’m not arguing that determinism is necessary to secure a correspondence view of truth. I am only arguing that it is incompatible with a correspondence view of truth to say that counterfactual conditionals regarding indeterminate events have definite truth values, for reasons which I have already explained.


The possible hypotheticals themselves are akin to God's middle knowledge and are therefore necessary, not contingent. The truth-values that obtain relative to a possible world are contingent and so are a necessary in the sense that they are coeternal with God. The coeternality exists between the knowlege of the contingent state of affairs and God, not the contingent states of affairs by themselves and God.

But that those hypotheticals obtain the truth values that they do is itself a contingent state of affairs over which God has no voluntary control.


No, its limited by God's middle knowledge, which is outside of His volitional control. The contingent state of affairs which are possibly instantiated are under His volitional control via His middle knowledge. Those states of affairs are dependent on God's decision to create the world.

Again, that God’s middle knowledge obtains its particular content is itself a contingent state of affairs over which God has no volitional control whatsoever.

In Christ,
Kenny

[mattbballman19]

Thanks for your informed response Kenny!


I never argued that knowledge must be caused by the actual facts themselves, only that there must be some sort of causal relationship between one’s beliefs concerning a fact and the fact itself.

The only contributing causal factor about observation is that experience impinges upon the senses, but this is not sufficient to consider something knowledge (propositional). Bertrand Russell made a distinction between experience and knowledge. What you are testifying to is that sensation is experience, not that it is propositional knowledge. Testimony and inferences are known to be true by virtue that the propositions they make correspond to a state of affairs in the world. Nothing about this is causal.

Just a side note on your stress on it being necessary that an externalist view is preferred to solve our problems. Molinism is not internalism. Edmund Gettier was (rightly) objecting to the internalist view of knowledge as merely a justified, true belief. And the correspondence theory of truth does not depend on internalism for it specifically says that a proposition is true if and only if it corresponds to a state of affairs in the world. That's the key -- the states of affairs are in the world and not in the mind. We are addressing knowledge but with respect to something's being true which is accomplished externally, of course. But Molinism wholeheartedly concurs.


So there is a causal link between our knowledge of abstract facts and those facts themselves, albeit a very indirect one.

I just don't see how it must be a 'causal' link. I see it more as a logical link. For it is admitted that one is a necessary condition for the other (abtract facts are independent of our knowledge of abstract facts, but our knowledge of abstract facts depends on the fact that there are abstract facts to know), but I don't see how it can be assumed that the nature of the link must be causal without already presupposing your view of the way you think our knowledge of truth obtains. So, it seems you're arguing in a circle. I agree that causation is involved in that the agents who must exist in order to do the knowing must be caused into being, but I don't see how, after it is the case that these beings are caused, it is the same way that their epistemological undertakings must operate in the same causal way. It only seems like the next necessary logical step in the epistemological process subsequent to that being being caused into existence.


Of course, as a Molinist, you are contradicting yourself when you say that a fact about how your mother will respond doesn’t exist yet.

Maybe I didn't make myself clear in what I meant when I said fact. Or maybe the way in which I wanted the said fact to be in relation to, temporally speaking. When I said 'didn't exist yet', what I meant was that the particular state of affairs X did not happen to become a temporal fact from the standpoint of the particular people involved in the state of affairs. Of course it would be, in the case, a 'soft' fact in God's middle knowledge for it can be counterfactually effected, due to its contingency. So, from the stand-point of us time-bound creatures, the actual instantiation of that fact has not occured at the time in which it is said to occur within the knowledge which contains the counterfactuals needed for it to be said that it is a fact from the perspective of God's knowledge.


While Plantinga’s view doesn’t contain any explicit causal grounding requirements for knowledge, I strongly suspect that they are hidden in the “type of environment in which they were designed to function” clause.

I don't think this has anything to do with actual free-will decisions being determined to go this way or that, only that a particular environment is necessary for the determination of there being the a mind there at all. So, I would say that the environment is only a necessary condition for the existence of the kind of mind which is in accordance with God's will, but not a necessary condition for the particular free-will decisions which eminate from the existence of that mind.


Given that LFW decisions are causally disjointed from any antecedent states of affairs

Let me say something else about this. This is true but does not imply that propositions and the states of affairs in the world are not related in some way. They correspond. The false causal hypothesis "I ate breakfast this morning and the power went out in New York; therefore, eating breakfast this morning caused the New York blackout." The problem here is that this commits the classical fallacy of post hoc. The reason is that even though no causal relationship has been established between eating breakfast and the New York blackout does not entail that they are not related in any way. In this example, eating breakfast and New York having a blackout are related by proximity or by a temporal relation, i.e., my eating breakfast preceded the blackout on the same day. Propositions and the world's states of affairs are not causally interactive (whatever that would look like) but are, instead, related to each other. And critiquing internalism does not make the truth-maker theory true (incidently, what would be the object that grounds "the truth-maker theory is true"?). As Alvin Plantinga writes, "It seems to me much clearer that some counterfactuals of freedom are at least possibly true than that the truth of propositions must, in general, be grounded in this way"


That is, all it requires is that one be committed to the intuitive belief that if a proposition is true then there is some fact about the world to which it corresponds.

Great! But this is not the truth-maker theory anymore. In fact, it is a retreat from the grounding objection you have been offering (grounding in physical objects, God himself, experience, etc.). Grounding truth-values in "some relevant actual state of affairs" is precisely what Molinism applauds.


Causally indeterminate events are, by definition, not the outcome of any prior state of affairs. So prior to the instantiation of a particular indeterminate event, there are no states of affairs in reality to which propositions concerning the definite outcome of that event might correspond.

I don't believe its completely indeterminate at all. I believe that I am the absolute originator of my actions. Let me quote Aristotle, "A staff moves a stone, and is moved by a hand, which is moved by a man."The event of the staff moving is caused by the event of the hand moving which is caused by the substance known as the man himself. So, the agent is the unmoved mover. The fact that it is not wholly indeterminate is because my desires or beliefs may 'influense' my choice or play an important role in my deliberations, but just because my free acts are not 'determined' or 'caused' by prior events or states in me doesn't mean I'm completely driven to a determinate view of things. Just because they are 'spontaneously' done by me, doesn't make them indeterminate. I will further point, as needed, that a crucial class of human actions are those done for certain 'reasons'. So even though I act spontaneously, my reasons serve as a 'final cause' (that for the sake of which an effect is produced) or the purpose for the sake of which I act.


We have a particular state of affairs, namely that God knows a certain fact about what Peter would do, which is coeternal with God.

Relationships are not "things" that exist apart from God co-eternally. The relationship is between God's middle knowledge (which is in God's mind) and what could be or will be (which is either potentially in the world God creates or actually in the world God creates). In Calvinism, God's middle knowledge just is His natural knowledge so that whatever God actually does, everything has a counterfactual truth because there is nothing logically possible that God cannot do. Do these then "exist" apart from God co-eternally?


So we have it that certain contingent states of affairs exist coeternally with God and limit the scope of God’s power over and above mere logical limitations.

Explain how this has anything to do with something other than the logical.


was limited to some degree by pre-existing materials coeternal with the creator himself.

What the Molinst and what the Dualist advocated are worlds apart. The whole idea of the stress upon God's creating out of nothing means that the universe was brought into being without a material cause at some point in the finite past. How is this at all akin to the content of God's Middle knowledge?


The difference between my judgment and you own is that I’m not drawing my conclusions form observations of the way the world is, but on the basis of revelation.

But the point is that if my conclusions from the way the world is are accurate pieces of philosophical argumentation, then revelation will not conflict with it, since reality doesn't contradict itself.


In any case, my point about having insufficient information to judge the quality of this world based on personal observation alone still stands. I would agree that, left to our own observations, divorced from any revelational input, neither of us has adequate grounds for judging this world to be a good one or a bad one.

Agreed. I agree with the fact that a Christian philosopher should adopt an attitude of 'faith seeking understanding'. But the christian philosopher will also try to undergird, defend, and clarify the various aspects of a philosophical view compatible with Scripture. But your are also saying the above with the false view that Molinistic ideas have no Scripture backing, and I believe they do!


As a Calvinist, I disagree with MOS. I believe the greatest good God wants to accomplish is to demonstrate His love in all of its aspects (including its sovereign freedom) to the rightful end of God’s glory.

I guess I just disagree with your Calvinistic presuppostions, becuase with respect to Calvinism/determinism, there is no reason why God could not accomplish anything logically possible for our world. Since it is not logically impossible to create a world of human beings who always do the right thing, who all seek Christ for salvation, and all apprehend any life-lessons possible, then God should be able to actualize that state of affairs. Even though the sacrifice of Jesus would have been thwarted, an infinitely greater good would have resulted: no one would have been lost to begin with. To wit, determinism has not been able to respond to this.

So, when you say "the pool of viable states of affairs available for God to actualize is still limited by contingent circumstances outside of God’s volitional control" shouldn't be true for Calvinism because God determines all outcomes and nothing logically possible is beyond His bringing about.


there could be logical constraints on the type of free will decisions God is able to bring about for particular free will agents.

I guess it is your view that it 'could' be that way, but it is the case now that it is not that way, because you say I believe that God could have accomplished universal salvation if He had chosen to do so.


"the essence of being The Prime Minister excludes the property of being a prime number"

Just had some additional thoughts to this. I don't see how it is dependent on God at all. What you are suggesting here is that the property of being the Prime Minister is logically incompatible with being a prime number. But that's precisely the point -- the two are not logically exclusive. There is nothing logically impossible about this statement, yet I cannot imagine it being actualizable. What makes this false is that the circumstances of our world would not feasibly permit a prime number being a person -- but that's a counterfactual that's false apart from any ground.

Thanks for your informed discussion.

matt

[geebob]

I'd like to get back to this but my computer is acting horrendously. I'll have access to a decent computer halfway through next week.

[Dee Dee Warren]

This is a great thread, mind-bending, but great. Thanks guys...

[mattbballman19]

nomad,

The analogies probably work just fine, but much of the lingo behind chess moves is outside of my comprehension. But there are some general observations I can make:

(i) You ask, Can God know what a chess player will do without some degree of determinism? The answer is, Yes. On way that makes a proposition known for God is that through his exhaustive omniscience, some proposition corresponds to some actual or guaranteed potential state of affairs. That God knows what a chess player will do in a certain situation is just that -- God knows what that person will do. Nothing in that analysis suggests that what the person will do is the result of the sum total of sufficient, relevant initial conditions.

(ii) You ask, Is someone's choosing A instead of B 100% of the time considered determinism? Let me just note what I think is at the heart of your misgivings here. I think you might be equivocating "determinism." On the one hand, there is external determinism. On the other, there is self-determinism (internal determinism). Just because someone self-determines to choose a course of action 100% of the time does not entail that that person makes a decision on the basis of external deterministic factors. It only means that the person has a stubborn rate of 100% in that situation to always choose A instead of B.

iii) "You can say that White will freely choose P-KB6; but he will always do this. If so, why the significance of free? . . ." Similar to (ii) above, just because someone will always do something does not mean that he must always do something. The former does not reduce to the latter.

Let me know if I missed what your point really was (and forgive my chess ignorance -- I never play by citing the move)

matt

[nomad]

mattbballman19:

The analogies probably work just fine, but much of the lingo behind chess moves is outside of my comprehension.


they really aren't that important. i just used the chess analogy because the 'middle knowlege' space is relatively finite (for an 40 move game, the total space should be in the 10^100 to 10^200 order of magnitude i think, which is large, but not infinite) and well-defined; the scope (the 'space' which the moves work in) is well defined; like molinism, the scope of 'free will' is limited, but not determined, by existing state (not all pieces may be able to be moved on any given turn); and like molinism, there is 'initial knowledge' (the rules of chess), 'middle knowledge' (the set of possible moves and possible histories), and 'free knowledge', the actual game played. i tried to find something that would not end up with 'attack the analogy' that often happens (i've never seen you do this btw, just i have seen it happen elsewhere).



(i) You ask, Can God know what a chess player will do without some degree of determinism? The answer is, Yes. On way that makes a proposition known for God is that through his exhaustive omniscience, some proposition corresponds to some actual or guaranteed potential state of affairs. That God knows what a chess player will do in a certain situation is just that -- God knows what that person will do.


the problem is that i think that 'God knows what that person will do' is necessarily conjoined with 'that person must do what God knows it will do', as you said a 'guaranteed' state of affairs. yet this doesn't seem to carry through all discussions of molinism, and there is a large amount of time differentiating between 'will' and 'must'. are both 'will' and 'must' guaranteed, but in different ways? i understand that God knows it will happen, simply because it will happen. but i am still trying to understand the difference Molinism makes on the other end of that equation. you've already posted it a couple times i think, so you can try again if you want, but i plan to read over the previous again and see if maybe i can figure out exactly where my objection lies, right now i am unable to put my finger on it (not much help i know :)

so far, my impression of molinism is actually that it is sort of 'soft' determinism, with a lot of extra baggage thrown on make sure the blame (or praise) for any action is on the agent, and not anything outside of him/her.



(ii) You ask, Is someone's choosing A instead of B 100% of the time considered determinism? Let me just note what I think is at the heart of your misgivings here. I think you might be equivocating &quot;determinism.&quot; On the one hand, there is external determinism. On the other, there is self-determinism (internal determinism). Just because someone self-determines to choose a course of action 100% of the time does not entail that that person makes a decision on the basis of external deterministic factors. It only means that the person has a stubborn rate of 100% in that situation to always choose A instead of B.


i don't differentiate the two. but then i am not convinced that a 'black box' model of agency works either.

for instance, every time i press a key on the keyboard, a letter appears in the message box. this is fairly deterministic (my keyboard is pretty new and isn't quirky yet :). that is a useful abstraction, and for most people, they don't need to know any more than that.

but there's really a lot more going on. when i push a key down, a switch closes, sending electricity through the keyboard to logic which signals an interrupt to the CPU, which then resteers to a handler, where an WM_CHAR message is sent to the foreground application (mozilla in my case), which then asks windows to draw the letter, in the current font, in a certain part of the screen, which consults the video driver, and so on (this is far too detailed already). for many of these, i could explode the model further and investigate farther down, perhaps as far as logic gates, which themselves are composed of transistors, etc. all the way down.

the question is: what is the nature of an agent? i think i'll start a new thread for that, though i suspect it will be short and this has been hashed out to great detail already :)

and as far as the '100%' is concerned, you are right: correlation does not imply causation. but, when i drop a ball, 100% of the time it falls. we call that a law, though perhaps it is really just correlation of a high enough manner than we call it causation. perhaps causation does not in fact even exist. the real question is: if i can't tell the difference, if there's no way to discern from outside if it is determined or if it is free will, then what does the distinction matter?



iii) &quot;You can say that White will freely choose P-KB6; but he will always do this. If so, why the significance of free? . . .&quot; Similar to (ii) above, just because someone will always do something does not mean that he must always do something. The former does not reduce to the latter.


i think i understand the difference (i posted above, but guess you didn't see it). as i understand it, 'must' because that S will do X in the same circumstances in all possible worlds, where 'will' means that in this world S will do X, but there exists other possible worlds where S does not do X. i.e. local determinism, but not global determinism perhaps. is this a reasonable understanding of the difference, or am i still missing it?

i think you are trying to answer my point. i think i am not exactly able to express it, which may be why you aren't able to hit it directly. i'll think some more, and if i figure it out, i'll post.

[geebob]

For now, it will suffice to say that the above quote is meaningful within an A theoretical conception of time.

yes, I consider it form of an A mode of time.


For when you say that there must 'be a way', it can possibly be interpreted as a kind of way which has not come yet.

not quite. I believe that there is a truth about the future now. I believe that that truth about the future in a consistent libertarian paradigm is expressed noting that some things about the future will come to pass while other things about the future may or may not come to pass. And these two descriptions do not intermingle, though what may or may not come to pass eventually yeilds to what will come to pass or what is transpiring.


The basic purpose behind this explanation is to provide reason to side with the view which rejects the meaningfulness of your particular construction of the square of opposition by pointing out that counterfactual logic uses a totally different formulation of it.

there's only one way to put the square of opposition and that's according to the relationship of the affirmations and negations of universal and existential statements. I'm just pointing out that you can substitute 'all things' for 'would/will' and 'some are' for 'might'. are ordinary understanding of 'may' and 'would' are perfectly described by this square.

and what you wrote of the 'may' statements and 'would' statements with regard to contraries, contradictions and so on, is exactly the picture I'm painting. You just wrote everything down that you need to understanding why libertarian freedom requires an truly open future (along with the requirement of omniscience that recognizes the openness of that future).

look at the graph I posted. There's nothing essentially different.


First let me explicate the contraries:

P->>Q is contrary to P->>~Q.

and

P-->Q is contrary to P-->~Q

which means that both P->>Q and P->>~Q are can be false but they can't both be true. This is has always been the nature of my take on the open view and provided they are both false in the actual world, the open view is true.


Second, the contradictories:

P->>Q is contradictory to P-->~Q

P->>~Q is contradictory P-->Q

thus you cannot say there is a true 'would/will' statement without violating the law of non-contradiction when a conjoined 'may' statement is true.


Third, the implications:

P->>Q implies P-->Q

P->>~Q implies P-->~Q.

and these implications go one way. P->> Implies P-->Q. P-->Q does not imply P->>. If it did, your square wouldn't be coherent since it would be impossible for your contrary statements to both be false nor could you conjoin your subcontraries.

now thus far, as I've said, all you've written works it's way right into the picture that the open theist presents. You go haywire with your claim about 'could'. I think the term is coherent simply as a synonym for might and may but the way you put it simply doesn't fit with our square which you yourself have constructed perfectly. I'll try to explain why, but my time is running short on this computer so I may be cut off before finishing my explanation as well as a response to the rest of your post.


So, although P->>~Q is logically incompatible with P-->Q, it remains true that if P were the case it COULD be the case that Q.

and what if that was the case where that mere possibility was satisfied. to say if p then not q and then claim p is true and yet q was true as well, you'd derive a contradiction.

well that's all the time I've got.

[geebob]

okay, I'm back, and I have a bit of a better computer situation where I don't think I'll be rushed off the computer so soon and I could perhaps use fewer horrendous typos. Or if I am, I'll come back later tonight.

this is my second post in a row, so don't miss my first. (it's been days since I've posted so I don't consider this a problem with the rules).


So what must be understood is that 'mights' are a byproduct of 'woulds'.

they can be. Not necessarily.


In order for 'mights' to even have the possibility to be actualized the necessary condition for such actualization has to be the hypothetical situation of there being a 'would' for the 'might' to become relevant... 'Woulds' are a necessary condition for 'mights', not vice versa.

this is totally backwards and false. recall that mights to woulds are analogous to 'some are' statements to 'all are' statements. We have the exact same relation that you pointed out in that just as 'woulds' imply 'mights', 'all are' implies some are. but the necessary condition for 'some are' statements to be true is not that 'all are' statements are true. After all, it could be false that "all x's are y's" even though it may be true that "some x's are y's".

As I said it is backwards. 'might' statements just as 'some are' statements for 'all are statements' provide the necessary condition for would statements. Not the other way around.

'would's' provide sufficient conditions for the truth of mights. they are not necessary for the truth of 'mights'


It's not the case that we say because I might or might not do such and such, I can't know what I will or will not do.

you are right that this is not the case, but only when we are considering a limited body information without considering the antecedent that guarantees the outcome. I might eat banana cream pie, if I didn't find it revolting. You might eat banana cream pie as far as I know. In other words, your eating of the banana cream pie is consistent with everything that I know about you. But the sum total truth about you may not prohibit you from eating it as it would me in normal circumstances. Then again, it may be true that you find it revolting as well, thus metaphysically speaking, you would not eat the banana cream pie and it is false that you might eat it. epistemically speaking, it is in the eye of the ignorant beholder.


from me:[i]A view I like to call "soft" presentism does the trick very nicely where the past present and future do exist but the present is ontologically privileged and the past and future are sufficiently existent that we can meaningfully speak of them and have knowledge of them.

from matt:Define and explain the metaphysical status of 'sufficiently existent' things.


I'm not trying to describe in a metaphysical way how the future or past exist. I'm just saying that they do exist and that existence is enough and guarantees (sufficient for) our ability to speak of them meaningfully. I'm giving a bare bones picture of the future. I'm just saying that the future does not exist in the same way as the present, but however it does exist, in what ever way it exists, it's enough for us to meaningfully and truthfully talk about it.

If I were to give strategies for explaining this existence, I might suggest that the future is a projection from the present in terms of what will or what may or may not come to pass. Or it may be expressed using devices provided by possible world's ontology.


What do you mean by 'fact'?

when I speak of facts, I simply mean true statements that are true in virue of grounding within existence. By that recogning, I suppose even counterfactuals would even be facts conosisdering that I hold possible worlds to be real in in the way that abstractions are real. I am a bit of a platonist.


Let me quote Craig and you let me know of this fundamental distinction in counterfactual semantics:

I didn't quite follow him. I don't no all the terms (sensu compisito, diviso, etc).

craig doesn't believe 'maybe's' have truth value and I imagine that what is thinking of is synonomouse with the conjoined might counterfactual. From little I understood, I think it's clear that he is not dealing with the conjoined might.


I think we have to be aware of a distinction before I answer both yes and no. Yes in a sense AND no in a sense.

well the sense in which you'd have to say no really bars libertarian freedom. There must be a libertarian moment and you cannot hold that God knows what we will do if there is a libertarian moment where both options are logically within our grasp. It must be true in time, the time in which we exist, the time at which we are acting or considering acting that we may go one way and we may go the other way and that must be more than an epistemic conjoined might.


from me:
[i]However, it is perfectly coherent to say that some choices are libertarian, some are compatibilistic, and some choices share some of the non-exclusive features of the two types of freedom and none of the mutually exclusive features.

from matt:
I think you may have to explain this coherency, because I don't see it all.

Where is the incoherency? Is there something about libertarian freedom that requires that all of our choices are libertarian free? Not if you hold that to be libertarian free only means that one makes libertarian free choices and to make libertarian free choices, the choices must not be determined and at that jucture, one may make one choice or he may refrain from that choice(choose something else). I don't see any need to expand libertarian freedom further than this. My experience doesn't tell me that all my choices are libertarian free (I do not have libertarian freedom to choose a banana cream pie under normal circumstances). I only sense that some of them are. The bible doesn't clearly indicate that all choices are libertarian free. We free will theists insist that we find the formula of libertarian freedom primarily in the fact that all of a chance for salvation and all have a chance for damnation(or those within the spacial temporal boundaries of the gospal, if you do not hold to the greater hope, ie God works salvifically outside of the spacial temporal boundaries of the gospel, which is a topic for another thread). So why do all choices have to be libertarian free choices? And compatibilistic choices, choices determined outside of our control do have a place in our experience and possibly biblical interpretation, (though I can't think of an example currently though others will think of some examples which I will brush under a third category to be explained). I did not choose to find banana cream pie revolting. It may be in my genes, it may be in the experience of my childhood, but under normal circumstances(excluding things like a change in chemical balences in my body, grandma telling me she made it especially for me, etc.) the choice of something else I do like or tolerate (if there is no more than two choices) will be determined. And finally, self determined choices(if you can think of a better name, tell me), do play a role in our experience and can have a solid place in our biblical interpretation. These are choices that have features of libertarian free choices and compatibilistic choices (except for the features that are logically exclusive). Choices we make in the past do have an effect on choices we make in the future, sometimes the effect is a determinative one. Addiction is like this. You may not be able to resist that next drink (given that you are not driven to the point of considering AA), and yet it is your past choices, not God's determination nor genes, that put you in that place since there had to be a first time for drinking. Maturity is morally the opposite of the addiction example. After facing a temptation and defeating it time after time( with God's help), you may reach a point where that temptation, or former challenging degrees of that temptation are no longer tempting. And of course God may determine our choices in consistency with choices we made in the past, which is still very much a self determined choice in the sense that God would not have determined we act that way had we not choosen a certain way in the past. I believe that this is what is going on with pharoah and the assyrians in Isaiah 10.

so the self determined choice has features of compatibilism in that it is determined in the past, it can be known as a future certianty, it can be determined by God, though not prior to certain actions on our part.

It has features of libertarian freedom in that it fits in a framework of indeterminism (since the choice was not determined at the beginning of time), it can be morally accountable (because it is traced back to actions you performed that you did not have to perform and could have done otherwise). And of course libertarian choices in the past are essential to the self determined choice.

There is no incoherency in this picture. If there is, it is due to factors of libertarian freedom or compatibilism that do not play a role in my view of either mode of freedom.


No, molinism is about counterfactuals. And since counterfactuals are 'would' and 'might', therefore Molinism is about 'would' and 'might'.

yes, but might counterfactuals do not play a significant role in molinism because a 'might' statment where a 'would' would do is logically weak and potentially misleading.


Thanks for your comments! This conversation is truely stimulating.

bless!:elvis:

[mickiel]

So Gods foreknowledge is reality "as it should be", not as it will be "if". Whatever we see God do, it therefore should be done. Couldnot be done different, or one could label God as imperfect. In Psalms 9:8, God will judge the worldin righteousness, not quessing, not covering mistakes of his, not switching to secondary plans. He will do it right and with EQUITY. Foreknowledge is tempered with a Holy Equity. In Gensis 1, everything God created was good, in Genesis 2 he created the knowledge of evil. Predestination is a mixture of good and evil, but it is Gods own holy mixture, unstoppable, unchangable, and for the ultimate good of all. Foreknowledge is the beginning and ending of evil, this is actually mankinds second important hope for survival, Christ being the first. God predestined evil, God is just,so evil will not destroy mankind, God would not allow that.

[mattbballman19]

nomad,

(i) Soft determinism has often been defined as not being determinism at all, so it's no doubt it will sound quite consistent with views of non-determinism such as Molinism. John Feinberg, a proponent of soft determinism, writes: "According to determinists such as myself, an action is free even if causally determined so long as the causes are nonconstraining. This view is often referred to as soft determinism or compatibilism, for genuinely free human action is seen as compatible with nonconstraining sufficient conditions which incline the will decisively in one way or another" (Feinberg, "God Ordains All Things," Predestination and Free Will: Four Views of Divine Sovereignty & Human Freedom, eds. David and Randall Basinger (Illinois: InterVarsity Press, 1986), pp. 24-25). The key word here is "nonconstraining" in referring to causation. If a cause is constrained then it is guaranteed to occur via force. A "nonconstrained" cause is one that simply influences one to do some course of action. Feinberg says it "incline[s] the will." So, I'm not impressed by the label "determinism" for this sort of analysis of divine sovereignty. In this scheme, it is still possible that God attempts to "incline" 80% of the human wills to accept Him as savior and it turns out that only 1% actually do. How can God guarantee His purposes? Molinism, in positing middle knowledge, gives God the information by which He can sovereignly elect which world to bring about so that He will retain total control yet will not lay a constraining hand on human free will. To me, reducing an Augustinian Calvinism to soft determinism is a retreat because of the obvious implications of incompatibility.

(ii) There is a difference between chain causality, direct causality, and self-determinism. Chain causality is evinced in your analogy of the keyboard yielding a result on your monitor. There is a chain of interconnected events that eventually lead to the end result. Direct causality would be something like "By pressing the 'G' key on my keyboard, the button connects two conductors on a breadboard." But self-determinism does not rely on naturalistic or physical causes (like gravity affecting a ball) whether direct or chained. There just is a difference between what must occur (as in natural law) and what will occur (where someone could do otherwise but simply will not). It would be incorrect to accuse a computer of being stubborn about my pressing the 'H' key and always getting the letter 'H' on my screen. There is a distinction.

matt

[mattbballman19]

geebob,

I'm going to need a little more time to respond to your post. This week is the first week of the semester at my college, and I'm having to re-order my priorities regarding school and computer. In other words, I'm not going to be on here has much as I have been recently. But I do plan on providing a response. :smile:

matt

[geebob]

alrighty. I consider the first post more impotant than the second fyi

[nomad]

mattbballman19:

(i) Soft determinism has often been defined as not being determinism at all, so it's no doubt it will sound quite consistent with views of non-determinism such as Molinism.



well, there i go using terms without knowing what they mean :) what i REALLY mean is, according to Molinism, it appears that there is a point in time where the event is subject to a free will decision, but that free will decision is well in advance (logically, as well as temporally) of the actual event.

basically, it appears that all of the free will decision basically 'obtain' logically at the moment of creation. are they concurrent with the moment of creation? (this is possible if all of time was created 'at once', maybe). that might alleviate my objection, not sure. but after this logical moment, there are no more free decisions. after this point, the point of instantiation, it is already known what S will do in X. we can argue all about whether S is constrained to do X, or the mechanisms by which S does X, but the fact is that in this instantiated world, S does X and won't do ~X. This is just as true at the moment after creation, as at the point where S actually does X (which could be the same moment theoretically, in a B theory of time).

i know you said you don't have much time (and i still haven't gotten his book yet... my CC expired and they still haven't sent me a new one). but i think i am getting closer to figuring out where my hangup is.



(ii) There is a difference between chain causality, direct causality, and self-determinism.


'chain causality' is not distinct from 'direct causality', it is merely applying direct causality multiple times.

self-determinism i am not convinced about either. i may be able to see some ways it would work; i think i know how to word my thoughts now (new thread). mostly because even people have a First Cause.

but the other half is simply this: the argument seems to say that 'If S were in C, S would do X' is correlation, not causation, and therefore 'self-determined'. but it is not 100% self-determined: it also depends on C. you say ah, but this is different... the causality does not depend on solely on C, but also on S, and therefore S is to blame for the result. however, what is ignored is that C is also to blame for the result, is it not? and so if someone created the condition C with intent, they would also be to blame.

thanks... i am not happy with any of the positions i've seen yet, but one of them has to be right i think (as among the ways you find polar opposites)....

[mattbballman19]

I only have a little time in which I can make this response. It is going to be to nomad. I, again, both apologize to geebob for the obvious abeyance that has come to characterize my response to him and his patience in awaiting the coming of that post (probably before the end of the week).

Ok. Nomad said,


"basically, it appears that all of the free will decision basically 'obtain' logically at the moment of creation. are they concurrent with the moment of creation? (this is possible if all of time was created 'at once', maybe). that might alleviate my objection, not sure. but after this logical moment, there are no more free decisions. after this point, the point of instantiation, it is already known what S will do in X. we can argue all about whether S is constrained to do X, or the mechanisms by which S does X, but the fact is that in this instantiated world, S does X and won't do ~X. This is just as true at the moment after creation, as at the point where S actually does X (which could be the same moment theoretically, in a B theory of time). "

It is not the case that all free will decisions occur simultaneously, except maybe to God if you happen to hold a B-Theory of time interpretation. Also, to link God's foreknowledge with the evacuation of "free decisions" is also misguided. Just because God knows what S will do in no wise entails that S's actions are determined or are causally constrained. Be careful not to confuse what one must do simply with what one will do.


self-determinism i am not convinced about either. i may be able to see some ways it would work; i think i know how to word my thoughts now (new thread). mostly because even people have a First Cause. but the other half is simply this: the argument seems to say that 'If S were in C, S would do X' is correlation, not causation, and therefore 'self-determined'. but it is not 100% self-determined: it also depends on C. you say ah, but this is different... the causality does not depend on solely on C, but also on S, and therefore S is to blame for the result. however, what is ignored is that C is also to blame for the result, is it not? and so if someone created the condition C with intent, they would also be to blame

People are caused, and those people cause various actions; but it doesn't follow that the cause of people is the cause of those various actions. Agents (free people) are the intermittent variable that breaks the chain of determinism because people can refrain from those actions or opt for entirely different ones. And when I say "self-determined" I mean that the agent certainly takes into account the circumstances (C). But it is false to conclude from this basis that C was either a sufficient or necessary condition for the agent to act. The circumstances are influencing factors -- nothing more. But the interesting thing is that God knows either one of the following:

1. X will do A in C

or

2. X will not do A in C.

So while C has something to do with the agent's actions, C serves as part of the motivation, as it were, for either doing A or ~A. So God cannot guarantee simply from the circumstances and the person He places in them that some specific result will ensue. So, God simply knows in advance what people will do in every circumstance and then creates those people accordingly so that His plans are fulfilled. There is no other way to guarantee that someone will freely do something. The only other way to guarantee anything is to opt for Calvinism-Determinism which has the unacceptable consequence of eliminating free will. I suggest a glance at a debate that Christian philosopher Shandon L. Guthrie has had at www.sguthrie.net/debates.php.

matt

[mattbballman19]

08-25-2003 @ 08:53 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=194215#post194215)
geebob:
not quite. I believe that there is a truth about the future now. I believe that that truth about the future in a consistent libertarian paradigm is expressed noting that some things about the future will come to pass while other things about the future may or may not come to pass. And these two descriptions do not intermingle, though what may or may not come to pass eventually yeilds to what will come to pass or what is transpiring.

Ok. This was basically the essence of that drawn out explication I articulated in my last post to you, so let's see where this goes.





there's only one way to put the square of opposition and that's according to the relationship of the affirmations and negations of universal and existential statements. I'm just pointing out that you can substitute 'all things' for 'would/will' and 'some are' for 'might'. are ordinary understanding of 'may' and 'would' are perfectly described by this square.

Ok. I agree that broadly there is 'the' way to construct a square of opposition much the same that there is a broad way in which one may construct all houses (you have your basic procedures of building the foundation and, from there, you build upwards utilizing base-boards, etc . . .) My emphasis wasn't on the actual construction of the square of opposition itself (i.e. the actual broad construction of the house itself), but on both the nature and the relevant implications of gaping connotative terms (may/might, would/will) within a particular domain of logic (counterfactual logic), which might not hold if looked/observed/though-about from within the basic/normal way in which the square of opposition is constructed from within the contextual frame-work of sentential/propostional logic. Sentential logic and counterfactual logic are two different domains of logic which respond differently when your advocated subsitution (the replacing of the 'will' side of the distinction in for the universal and particular affirmations and the 'may' side of the distinction in for the universal and particular negations) is superfically adduced into the sentential formula. To wit, these words (will and may) are only appropriatley designated from within a square of opposition which follows the logical rules of counterfactual logic. There are some rules which counterfactual logic abides by that are free from the shackles of the rules which propositional/sentential logic are necessitated to follow. Therefore, your suggestion to arbitrarely subsitute these connotative terms within the square of opposition of sentential logic fails to appreciate the counterfactual environment that they belong in. And, thus, my construction of the counterfactual square of opposition holds. You make some comments below relating to your agreement with it. If that is so, my criticisms may be mis-placed.




look at the graph I posted. There's nothing essentially different.

The only difference resides in that when contructing the square of opposition for counterfactual logic, universal and particular affirmations and negations are superfluous. The affirmation 'All X are Y' is nowhere to be found in counterfactal logic. The propositions inherent within the SOO (for short) are statements in the form of subjunctive conditionals (If it is the case that X, then it might (or will) be the case that Y). There is nothing in this sentence which hints at the universal/particular affirmations/negations that you are stressing because we are in a totally different domain of logic (counterfactual logic, not sentential logic).



This is has always been the nature of my take on the open view and provided they are both false in the actual world, the open view is true.

Perhaps this is an epistemological question. How would one attain the knowledge that particular subjunctive conditionals about the the future (which are contrarily opposed to one another) are both false? I maybe missing your point here.



thus you cannot say there is a true 'would/will' statement without violating the law of non-contradiction when a conjoined 'may' statement is true.

How so? The reason I don't see a contradiction is because the only way a may statement can be true is if it is implied by a will statement. How does a contradiction obtain if God knows the 'will' counterfactuals (which in turn imply the 'mights')? What my stated contradictories say is that certain 'will' statements are logically incompatible with the implications with certain 'might' statements such that if there was a 'might' statement X which obtained such that no 'will' statement Y implied it, then this is an absurdity. For a necessary condition of X's existence is the implication of a Y. The only X's which are allowed existence are those which get implied by the already existing Y's. The entertaining of an X which could arise without the necessary Y is a logical contradiction. This conclusion is damaging to your case, since you are trying to derive a contradiction by merely stating a Y and hypothesizing about its being incompatible with a given X, when, as proven above, this a logically impossible state of affairs anyway.



I think the term is coherent simply as a synonym for might and may but the way you put it simply doesn't fit with our square which you yourself have constructed perfectly.

I've already stated in accordance with recorded doctrine of counterfactual logic inherent in the literature that this is not the case. 'Can' is taken to express mere possibility and so is a constituent of a modal statement expressing a possible truth. I've stated that this distinction is important because the fact that something could happen under certain circumstances does not imply that it might happen under those circumstances. 'Might' is more restrictive than 'can' and indicates a live genuine option udner the circumstances, not a bare logical possibility.

Here's why: P->>~Q is contradictory P-->Q. Thus, although P->>~Q is contradictory P-->Q, it remains true that if P were the case it still COULD be the case that Q.

You counter this by saying:


and what if that was the case where that mere possibility was satisfied. to say if p then not q and then claim p is true and yet q was true as well, you'd derive a contradiction.


First, you're being a little sloppy with terms. These aren't simply conditionals we're dealing with here. These are 'subjunctive' condtionals (counterfactual). I'm not saying If P is the case, then it follows that Q is the case. Nowhere in this conditional is there the connotative terms which have been prevalent in our discussion, which are necessary to intelligible discussion on counterfactual logic. Second, you're begging the question by saying that Q is true, when it has been proven that the necessary means by which it is actualized is through its being implied by a pre-existing (logically speaking) P. If the counterfactual, 'If it is the case that P, then it 'might' be the case that 'Q'.' is true, then just because it is 'possible' (can) that ~Q obtains (since counterfactuals are contingent) doesn't negate the 'might' (the live option which obtains as a result of its implication by a 'will') that does IN FACT obtain. Thirdly, just because the possibility Q happens to be in accordance with the way in which the 'might' obtained, doesn't mean the validity of the 'might' is destroyed. It's just that they happen to accord with eachother. I would even go to say that every 'might' that does obtain is in accordance with some way in which a possibility concievably goes, since possibility can go both ways, thereby satisfying all possible routes.

matt

P.S. I'll try to get to your other post sometime later tonight. If not, try to hold off responding to this post, until I do that.

[mattbballman19]

Not necessarily.

I would argue that it is the case that the stated implication exists necessarily. This is where that quoted distinction by Craig becomes relevant. There are 2 ways that a modal statement can have necessity.

1. Necessity De Dicto: this is the necessity attributed to a statemtn that is true in all possible worlds.

The above is obviously not the kind of necessity which I'm adhering to, since I believe that counterfactuals are contingent and therefore do not obtain in every possible world.

2. Necessity De Re: this is the necessity of a thing's possessing a certain property, or in other words, a thing's having a property essentially.

The above is the way in which I would characterize the necessity of the might/would statements (the implications therein) within a particular possible world.


We have the exact same relation that you pointed out in that just as 'woulds' imply 'mights', 'all are' implies some are. but the necessary condition for 'some are' statements to be true is not that 'all are' statements are true. After all, it could be false that "all x's are y's" even though it may be true that "some x's are y's".

Hopefully this has been suffiently answer above. If not, our conversation continues.


you are right that this is not the case, but only when we are considering a limited body information without considering the antecedent that guarantees the outcome.

Right, and Molinism doesn't state the contents of God's middle knowledge to be a 'limited body of information' anyway. Maybe that's not what you're saying though, so what I'm going to do is to pick out certain parts of your paragraph and point out difficulties in understanding that I'm experiences.


I might eat banana cream pie, if I didn't find it revolting.

In other words, 'If it were the case that P (you found it revolting), then you 'might' eat banana cream pie.' I follow you so far.

Then,

You might eat banana cream pie as far as I know.

I suppose that this 'know' has to do with, give or take, this epistemological aspect that you are trying to spell out (i.e. from your stand point, you only have a limited amount of information for your epistemological conclusions) within the context of this 'might' counterfactual, which tries to support your original contention.

But it seems that when you say this:

In other words, your eating of the banana cream pie is consistent with everything that I know about you.

You switch from a 'might' counterfactual to an actual state of affairs. Why have you made this 'switch'? Now your epistemological conclusions based upon your limited amount of information is derivative off an actual state of affairs and not as a result of the contemplation of a 'might' counterfactual.


But the sum total truth about you may not prohibit you from eating it as it would me in normal circumstances.

I agree, but this doesn't do much to my position since this conclusion is reached through the witnessing of actual state of affairs rather than on the 'might' counterfactual which might or might not constitute that state of affairs.

So when you say:


Then again, it may be true that you find it revolting as well

this is only applicable and/or relevant on the basis of the state of affairs and the epistemological knowledge gained through the witnessing of it being carried out. But the nature of 'might' counterfactual is left untouched.

Plus, even if I'm wrong somewhere in my reasoning above your conclusion:


thus metaphysically speaking, you would not eat the banana cream pie and it is false that you might eat it.

is impossible, since it is a contradiction if this conjuntion obtains. Remember that P->>Q is contradictory to P-->~Q.


I'm not trying to describe in a metaphysical way how the future or past exist. I'm just saying that they do exist and that existence is enough and guarantees (sufficient for) our ability to speak of them meaningfully.

This is hard to follow. So you are in agreement with me that the future, metaphysically speaking, does not exist? But then you go on to say that they DO exist, but only in the sense that it is meaningful for discussion. Actually, you don't even say that. You say that this particular existence (whatever 'kind' it is) is a necessary means for its meaningful discussion, thereby making a distinction between the future's existence and the helpful pragmatic effects it has on our intellibably discussing it. So, my question is do you or don't you believe that the future metaphysically exists? If so, then this is a B-theory of time. If not, then I don't understand at all, semantically, what you're trying to say above.

It clears it up for me when you say:


I might suggest that the future is a projection from the present in terms of what will or what may or may not come to pass.

The Molinist would whole-heartedly agree with this!


craig doesn't believe 'maybe's' have truth value and I imagine that what is thinking of is synonomouse with the conjoined might counterfactual.

I wasn't posting that information from Craig in response to this 'might' thesis. I was posting in reference to what you said here: Can they do other than what God knows they will do? So it was dealing with 'woulds', not 'mights'. Thus, Craig's point stands in that respect. Which parts exactly were you fuzzy on. Maybe we could go over them.

You say:


I don't no all the terms (sensu compisito, diviso, etc).

What specifically don't you get about these terms within the contents of Craig's explanation.


There must be a libertarian moment and you cannot hold that God knows what we will do if there is a libertarian moment where both options are logically within our grasp.

I see this as untenable. Why the logical inconsistency between the seemingly ambivalent notion of knowledge about a way in which a particular action 'will' go and the idea of a person deliberating (in a libertarian way) to do X or Y. I just don't see how knowledge has any power or relevance to the idea of my free-will being eliminated.

Your reasoning seems to go as follows:

(*=necessary operator/ ~=negation operator/ v=disjunction)

1. *(P v ~P)
Therefore,
2. *P v *~P

Or that it is impossible that I 'freely' choose P or ~P. This is just a modal fallacy; a mistake in logic. I can't see it as any other way.

For example, it is thought, "Necessarily, either I shall be killed in the bombing or I shall not be killed in the bombing. But then why take precautions, since nothing I do can make a difference?" This fallaciously assumes that his being necessarily killed or his necessarily not being killed follow from the composite necessity of his being killed or not. But this is the common fallacy of modal logic known as the confusing of the distinction between necessity between what Craig explicates as the necessity in sensu composito and the necessity in sensu diviso. Its a confusion of composite (or undistributed) and divided (or distributed) necessity that is involved. I'll provide an example of this distinction if need be.


and that must be more than an epistemic conjoined might.

I don't follow you here.


Where is the incoherency?

Well, I never explicitly said it was incoherent. I just wanted you to further explain its coherency. I was an agnostic about whether your reasoning was valid/sound or no. I wasn't taking a side yet.


(I do not have libertarian freedom to choose a banana cream pie under normal circumstances).

This calls for another distinction. This time I shall quote philosopher Timothy O'Connor:

Philosophers who distinguish freedom of action and freedom of will do so because our success in carrying out our ends depends in part on factors wholly beyond our control. Furthermore, there are always external constraints on the range of options we can meaningfully try to undertake. As the presence or absence of these conditions and constraints are not (usually) our responsibility, it is plausible that the central loci of our responsibility are our choices, or "willings."


The bible doesn't clearly indicate that all choices are libertarian free.

I would agree that God has done isolated instances in which the libertarian interpretation of free-will was violated, but I don't think that gives justification for generalization from certain particulars. If He does, then I would argue that it only happens every once in a while. Not enough to make this version of free-will disappear from existence. To argue that the 'does He' extends to the absolute non-existence of libertarian free-will, or the possibility of its existence, would be begging the question, since the solution under discussion, Molinism, is still up for grabs.


So why do all choices have to be libertarian free choices?

Because it could be true!


And compatibilistic choices, choices determined outside of our control do have a place in our experience and possibly biblical interpretation

This may have to do with that distinction I noted above.


I did not choose to find banana cream pie revolting. It may be in my genes, it may be in the experience of my childhood, but under normal circumstances(excluding things like a change in chemical balences in my body, grandma telling me she made it especially for me, etc.) the choice of something else I do like or tolerate (if there is no more than two choices) will be determined.

A libertarian wouldn't agree with this. She would say that all these factors played an influencing role in your decision, but that it wasn't the case that it 'determined' your decision.


Addiction is like this. You may not be able to resist that next drink (given that you are not driven to the point of considering AA), and yet it is your past choices, not God's determination nor genes, that put you in that place since there had to be a first time for drinking.

I would also put this into the distinction I noted above. For example, I could use my libertarain free-will to jump off a cliff, but after I do that, my freedom of action has been limited. But this does not impugn the libertarian theory of free-will in the slightest. So you example would be that the drunk used his libertarian free-will to become addicted to drinking and, as a result of his poor choices, his freedom of action has been limited.

That's all for now!

:rockon:

matt

[geebob]

Sentential logic and counterfactual logic are two different domains of logic which respond differently when your advocated subsitution (the replacing of the 'will' side of the distinction in for the universal and particular affirmations and the 'may' side of the distinction in for the universal and particular negations) is superfically adduced into the sentential formula.

and yet, you didn't treat it that way. You constructed it the same way I did. That simply cannot be denied. It's in your commentary where things go awry. If you stick with your commentary, you'll have to abandon the square that you drew up.

Also, there are overlaps in the various logics. That we can draw the square for universal/existential statements as well as would/might statements is one such overlap.


To wit, these words (will and may) are only appropriatley designated from within a square of opposition which follows the logical rules of counterfactual logic.

The following terms need to be removed from your construction if you wish to maintain that there is an essential difference that helps your case: contrary, contradiction, implication.


And, thus, my construction of the counterfactual square of opposition holds.

amen.


There is nothing in this sentence which hints at the universal/particular affirmations/negations that you are stressing because we are in a totally different domain of logic (counterfactual logic, not sentential logic).

my arguements haven't relied on that. It's enough that you can put universal/existential statements on the same square as would/might statements and you have conceeded this.


Perhaps this is an epistemological question. How would one attain the knowledge that particular subjunctive conditionals about the the future (which are contrarily opposed to one another) are both false? I maybe missing your point here.

If our intuitions of free will are correct, that it is truly possible (in this world given all that is true about it) for me to choose one thing and truly possible for me (in this world given all that is true about it) to do otherwise at a specific point in time, then when we find ourselves in such a position where we are deliberating about what we will do, generally speaking, we can have knowledge that it is false that we will do either in favor of knowledge of the truth of the conjoined might statement.


The reason I don't see a contradiction is because the only way a may statement can be true is if it is implied by a will statement.

First of all, that doesn't even address the contraditiction, which I'll mention below.

secondly I don't see why that has to be the case at all. I doubt that this is a rule of logic and if someone claims this is a rule of logic, he is sorely mistaken for the simple reason that conjoined mights are intelligible. I can't help but see this as a gross misinterpretation of what it means for one thing to imply another. Woulds imply mights. You cannot then conclude that mights can only be true if the corresponding woulds are true. That would be bi-conditionality. Implication is not bi-conditionality.

Third, a might is not only implied by the truth of a corresponding would, it is also implied by the falsity of it's contradiction, which for an affirmative might would be "would not". As a matter of fact, we have something stronger than implication. Here we really do have bi-conditionality. A might is true if and only if it's contradiction is false.


How so?

I honestly don't understand your confusion here. You stated the rule. "P->>Q is contradictory to P-->~Q, and P->>~Q is contradictory P-->Q". What is a conjoined might statement? it is where P-->Q is true and P-->~Q is true. Well in light of that, if the conjoined statement is true, P->>Q has to be false for the simple reason that P-->~Q is true. That's because they are contradictory. And P->>~Q has to be false for the simple reason that P-->Q is true. That's because they are contradictory.


I've already stated in accordance with recorded doctrine of counterfactual logic inherent in the literature that this is not the case.

I've spoken with a philosopher about this. You may be coming from someone's literature, but you are not coming from the literature meaning something that is recognized by all. He didn't know of any technical usage of the term "could."


'Can' is taken to express mere possibility and so is a constituent of a modal statement expressing a possible truth.

okay, lets say that's all it is and leave it at just that. This mere possibility has nothing to do with our might's and woulds because there we are not concerned with mere possibility. We are concerned with possibility in light of something else.


Thus, although P->>~Q is contradictory P-->Q, it remains true that if P were the case it still COULD be the case that Q

not if P->>~Q is true. And if you didn't have that in mind, I don't see the relevence



For now, I'll leave the rest of discussion for later perhaps depending upon how the above discussion goes. These posts are getting a bit too long and I feel that the above is more basic and important to the discussion so this is where I'll leave it at the moment.

[geebob]

I just edited my last post for clarity.

[mattbballman19]

Hello Geebob!


That we can draw the square for universal/existential statements as well as would/might statements is one such overlap.

Ok, this is where I have a dubious perception as how to grasp this. Let me attempt to describe my thought processes. What I have understood to be universal/existential statements are statements of the type All A is B, No A is B, Some A is B, Some A is not B. I'm writing these completely from memory, so if a correction is needed, please don't hesitate to provide it. Now, those particular statements seem to me to be antithetical, if not totally irrelevent, to the would/might statements explicated within the context of counterfactual logic. For example, the top-right symbolic formula representative of counterfactual logic is not a universal affirmative, for it has nothing to do with existential quantifications. It's simply asserting a 'will' subjuntive conditional. Nothing is being quanitified here. So I fail to see how this alleged 'overlap' occurs.


If you stick with your commentary, you'll have to abandon the square that you drew up.

I don't see how this is so. My commentary is consistent with the literature on the subject. The literature on the subject explicitly and sometimes in painful detail explains the intricate ins and outs of how and why the various subjunctive counterfactuals are positioned in this particular square of opposition as they are. Where it seems that you are confused is where you make a demand that we equate the stated might/would counterfactuals with universal/particular affirmations/negations when in fact it is the case that these formulas are different; for the latter are quantified statements and the former are subjunctive counterfactuals.


The following terms need to be removed from your construction if you wish to maintain that there is an essential difference that helps your case: contrary, contradiction, implication.

Not so, I think, because those particular terms are totally consistent with either subjunctive counterfactuals and universal/particular quantified statements.


It's enough that you can put universal/existential statements on the same square as would/might statements and you have conceeded this.

I apologize if this is annoying you, because I fail to honestly comprehend this. It seems to me that once you have placed universal/existential statements onto the 'square', even though the same rules apply as far as contrary, contradiction, and implication go, since it is subjunctive counterfactuals and not quantified statements, then the reality within which these connotative words operate (will/might) should function differently.

Your explanation has been contingent on this mistaken idea that because within the sentential formulation of the square of operation dealing with quanitified statements it is the case that the particular affirmative/negative statements being both true would thereby exclude the possibility of the universal statements to be true. This contingency is your weakness, since this is only the case with quantified statements. If this is only the case for quantified statements, and subjunctive counterfactuals are not quantified statements, then your explanation is mis-placed at best. When subjunctive counterfactuals are placed where I set them on the square of opposition, your explanation becomes superfluous. You can't just say that because it is the case with quantified statements that the bottom left and right symbolic formulations of the 'square' are true implying the possibility of the upper right and left symbolic forumlations of the 'square' being false, that the substitution of countefactual subjunctives in place of quantified statements will lead to the same results. Thus, your explanation fails because of its necessary contingency on quantified statements, when that is not the issue with might/will statements.


we can have knowledge that it is false that we will do either in favor of knowledge of the truth of the conjoined might statement.

(i) This seems contradicted by the above argument.

(ii) Just a question: How is it possible that one will not to either of the choices that are presented him/her in regard to the exercising of a particular action?

Either P will do X or ~X.

If P does X then it was the case that he might do X.
If P does ~X then it was the case that he might do ~X.

I trust you may perceive incongruency here, because of your presupposition regarding the impossibility of our having knowledge of our willing to do X in the face of the conjoined might/might nots.


Woulds imply mights. You cannot then conclude that mights can only be true if the corresponding woulds are true. That would be bi-conditionality. Implication is not bi-conditionality.

Hmm. Maybe I'm rusty on the logic uptake. Maybe not, though. I fail to see how I am stating a bi-conditional nature for the way in which the woulds imply the mights. It seems that it can be said that mights can only be true if the corresponding woulds are true and yet retain its conditional nature. Note, I'm not saying the conjunction that mights can only be true if the woulds are true AND woulds are true only if the mights are true. This is the way I see a bi-conditional arising. All I'm saying is that the necessary and sufficient conditions for the arising of the mights is a would statement. Since my articulation of the above conjunction was seen as the proper way to say the bi-conditional with regard to our discussion, and it has been stated that I have not said this, then I conclude that I am not rendering the logical relationship of the might/would statements as bi-conditional, but conditional.


Third, a might is not only implied by the truth of a corresponding would, it is also implied by the falsity of it's contradiction, which for an affirmative might would be "would not".

This is simply not true. The falsity of its contradiction is simply that: a contradiction. If X is contradictory to Y, it can never, in any possible world, be the case that X implies Y. Implications and contradictions are two totally distinct sectors designating two distinct ways in which the symbolic formulations of the subjunctive counterfactuals are contructed with the square of opposition. X cannot both imply and contradict Y. X cannot both contrary and imply Y. X cannot both be contrary and contradictory to Y. These are simply the rules of the game.


A might is true if and only if it's contradiction is false.

Why doesn't this conclusion totally refute what you said in your second point?


Well in light of that, if the conjoined statement is true, P->>Q has to be false for the simple reason that P-->~Q is true.

But you only mention one half of the would options, for this conjoined statements is still dependend on the existence of a would statement: P->>~Q. Since P->>~Q is true, then P-->~Q is true. Because the discovery of the consequent leads one to the knowledge that P->>Q is false, doesn't mean that therefore mights determine the falsity of the woulds because the other half of the would options still proceeds (logically) the instantiation of that particular might.


You may be coming from someone's literature, but you are not coming from the literature meaning something that is recognized by all.

My documentation comes directly from the following:
Lewis, David K. Counterfactuals. Malden, Mass.: Blackwell, 2001.

David Lewis represents the majority and authority regarding the semantics of counterfactuals logic. So, I don't know what the philosopher you consulted is talking about. :help:


not if P->>~Q is true.

Since counterfactuals are contingent upon their instantiation within possible worlds, then it COULD be true regardless of whether or not the above was in mind.

Thanks for narrowing down the discussion to these issues. It helped.

[geebob]

greeting


My documentation comes directly from the following:
Lewis, David K. Counterfactuals. Malden, Mass.: Blackwell, 2001.

I may or may not check this out (so you can't say that it is the case that I will or will not check it out! :tongue: )

But I've been given something else to look at.

However, I don't know what difference this will make, but I suspect that since Lewis is a determinist and his take on possible worlds necessarily leads to determinism, he cannot fully appreciate (and probably even account for) the conjoined might statement as a statement about the actual world or any world.


David Lewis represents the majority and authority regarding the semantics of counterfactuals logic. So, I don't know what the philosopher you consulted is talking about

well he certainly is a pioneer. But I hope not everything he says is taken in by the majority. And even if this is true, I'm told that there are plenty of unresolved issues in counterfactual logic.


I might've taken the time to answer the rest of your post but I've got alot on my plate and may not get to it till sometime next week. Plus I may be able to address some things more clearly after looking some things up.

[geebob]

Ok, this is where I have a dubious perception as how to grasp this. Let me attempt to describe my thought processes. What I have understood to be universal/existential statements are statements of the type All A is B, No A is B, Some A is B, Some A is not B. I'm writing these completely from memory, so if a correction is needed, please don't hesitate to provide it. Now, those particular statements seem to me to be antithetical, if not totally irrelevent, to the would/might statements explicated within the context of counterfactual logic. For example, the top-right symbolic formula representative of counterfactual logic is not a universal affirmative, for it has nothing to do with existential quantifications. It's simply asserting a 'will' subjuntive conditional. Nothing is being quanitified here. So I fail to see how this alleged 'overlap' occurs.

You may not know how it occurs, and I did not bother to try to give and explanation as I would've been speculating but I cannot emphasize enough, you admitted that it does indeed occur. Your just getting tripped up over the obvious. Of course would is not all. Of course might is not some. It's not those where I build my arguement. It's merely that woulds and mights have the same exact relationships between them that the square of opposition ascribes to universal and particular statements. Would is contrary to would not. would contradicts might not. Would implies might. might and might not are subcontrary. This is all that is necessary to showing that molinism cannot withstand the truth of the conjoined might with regard to all possible relevent antecedents.

But now after further study, I can give an explanation as to why we have this overlap.

E. J. Lowe in his Survey of Metaphysics gives this analyses of would counterfactuals:

'If it had been the case p, then it would have been the case that q' is true if and only if q is true in all of the closest possible worlds in which p is true. (p 141)

Lowe goes on to explain that mights are true when q is true in some of the closest possible worlds where p is true.


Not so, I think, because those particular terms are totally consistent with either subjunctive counterfactuals and universal/particular quantified statements.

and that consistency is the all that I rest my case upon.


ii) Just a question: How is it possible that one will not to either of the choices that are presented him/her in regard to the exercising of a particular action?

Either P will do X or ~X.

X V ~X cannot represent future libertarian free actions because the options are not contradictory. They are contrary. I don't know what this would look like using using propositional logic. It would have to be something more complicated. However we can represent it using counterfactuals or we can represent it with predicate logic combined with possible worlds ontology as Lowe's analysis of counterfactuals shows.

Actually, you may be able to express the false conjoined would's with normal propositional logic, but the truth conditions might not work out for what we want, (unless you admit to soft facts, which I typically don't care to get into)

I'm running low on time so I'm going to skip over some things.


I fail to see how I am stating a bi-conditional nature for the way in which the woulds imply the mights. It seems that it can be said that mights can only be true if the corresponding woulds are true and yet retain its conditional nature. Note, I'm not saying the conjunction that mights can only be true if the woulds are true AND woulds are true only if the mights are true. This is the way I see a bi-conditional arising. All I'm saying is that the necessary and sufficient conditions for the arising of the mights is a would statement.

bingo. If one end of the condition is both necessary and sufficient, then so is the other. That is precisely bi conditionality.


The falsity of its contradiction is simply that: a contradiction. If X is contradictory to Y, it can never, in any possible world, be the case that X implies Y.

I may have worded that bad. when I said contradiction, I did not mean both x and not x at the same time. I spoke of IT'S contradition.

Third, a might is not only implied by the truth of a corresponding would, it is also implied by the falsity of it's contradiction, which for an affirmative might would be "would not".

the contradiction of might is would not.


Why doesn't this conclusion totally refute what you said in your second point?


my second point was that might does not imply a would. More specifically, an affirmative might does not imply an affirmative would is you are insisting (be that knowingly or not). an affirmative might however does imply that a negative would is false. And the falsity of the negative would implies the affirmative might. And there you have the bi conditionality. (x-->y) <--> ~(x->>~y). And of course vice versa is true for the negative might and affirmative would. So when you conjoin the mights the full sentence looks like this:

sidenote here. I'm going to use the symbols both Lowe and Lewis use for mights and woulds.

<>-> represents "then it might be the case that" and []-> represents "then it would be the case that"

So

{(x<>->y)&(x<>->~y)} <--> {~(x[]->y)&~(x[]->~y)}


I'm not editing this as I'm out of time. Hope this is clear enough grammatically and conceptually. (now a few days later, I have found the time to edit it. I'm still a slob though)

I always appreciate a discussion that spurs me into investigating further into the literature. Of course I have little time for it.

[Smitten]

I'm a new member here, sorry if i'm repeating something that's been said in the last 7 pages, haven't read through it all :smile:


I am looking for Calvinists, yes, but even more so I am looking for Open Theists who critique Arminianism using this above poor attack.

I want to discuss this and show, once and for all, that knowledge in and of itself can cause nothing, and that the entire idea of knowledge being causative assumes knowledge is an agent, which is not possible.

In my view(I'm a calvinist), foreknowledge does not cause future events to occur, rather the reason that God has foreknowledge of the future is because it already exists in His mind, according to his plan and ordainment. So, while infallible foreknowledge of the future is only possible if the future is determined, it doesn't follow that the foreknowlege is what's causing the future, rather the knowledge is there because the future is determined.