Now as for your argument, I think two of its premisses are false. First, it seems to me that (2) is false, both on philosophical and on theological grounds. Philosophically, I’m persuaded by arguments such as have been offered by Harry Frankfurt that free choice does not entail the ability to do otherwise. Imagine that a mad scientist has secretly wired your brain with electrodes so that he can control your choices. Suppose that in the last Presidential election, he wanted you to vote for Obama and had determined that if you were going to vote for McCain he would activate the electrodes and make you cast your vote for Obama. Now as it turns out, you also wanted to vote for Obama, and so when you went into the polling booth you marked your ballot for Obama, and therefore the scientist never activated the electrodes. I think it’s clear that you freely voted for Obama, even though it was not possible for you to do otherwise. What this thought experiment suggests is that the essence of free choice is the absence of causal constraint with respect to your choices; it is up to you alone how you choose.
Now in the case of God, if God is essentially good, then there is no possible world in which He does evil. But does that imply that God does not freely do the good? Not if Frankfurt’s analysis is right. For God acts in the complete absence of any causal constraint whatsoever upon Him. It is up to Him and Him alone how He acts. He therefore acts freely in doing the good. That God is acting freely is evident in the fact that His will is not inclined necessarily toward any particular finite good; He chooses to do whatever He wants.
https://www.reasonablefaith.org/writings/question-answer/is-god-morally-praiseworthy/
I have a hard time understanding what differentiates Craig`s Molinism from Calvinism...
ReplyDeleteI'm not an expert myself, but I think the idea of "middle knowledge"--God knowing what a specific person would do in a certain situation or under a certain set of conditions, etc.--is the biggest thing. I think the Calvinist conception of God's knowledge of human actions involves God's determining of human actions to some extent (unless I badly misunderstand Calvinism here).
ReplyDeleteBut middle knowledge simply restates the issue at hand: it`s knowledge of what libertarianly free creatures would do in given situations. But libertarian free will for Craig seems to be `the absence of causal constraint with respect to your choices; it is up to you alone how you choose.` And yet, at the same time, he would say there is another sense in which God `makes all things happen` via selecting which possible world will be actual and putting creatures in the situations according his middle knowledge in order to know what they will do beforehand.
ReplyDeleteSo I`m not sure what the difference is, really... he wants to say that in some sense that it is up us alone what we do, but in another sense God decides before the foundation of the world what we will do. I don`t get the substantial difference... (heck, even Calvinism wants to say in some sense we are the source of our actions, not God directly; Calvinism assumes a distinction between primary and secondary causation, assumes concursus, etc.)
Perhaps under the Calvinistic framework, there are no possible universes where S could freely choose X (in a libertarian sense) and others where S freely chooses Y (in a libertarian sense), but rather there are possible universes where God determines S to choose X and others where God determines S to choose Y.
ReplyDeleteIs there a difference, do you think?
Another difference might be that under a Molinistic framework, God predestines those to salvation which he knows would freely choose to believe in Christ, follow his commandments, etc., while under a Calvinistic framework, God chooses to predestine those whom he loves, not based on knowledge of their own future acts (which are determined by him anyway) but rather because of his own love for them.
ReplyDeleteI`m not an expert either, fwiw.
ReplyDeleteI`m still not sure that that makes a difference, though: even on the Molinist framework God is in some sense `selecting` which possible world will be actual, and arranging persons in situations so that they will choose exactly as he planned. It is not up to the creature alone (in the sense that God`s decision before the foundation of the world had nothing to do with it) how the creature will choose.
So then what is the functional difference between that and determining something, given that alternative possibility is not in play in either the Molinist (according to Craig) or Calvinist scheme?
Re: your second thought:
ReplyDeleteBut on the Molinist scheme God`s foreknowledge is based on his decision of which possible world he is going to actualize. So again, in some sense how the creature decides in the matter of salvation is up to God, and before they even exist...
(1) Maybe Molinists choose Molinism over Calvinism because they find libertarian conceptions of freedom more compelling and true than compatibilist conceptions of freedom while still wanting to remain true what scripture plainly teaches (that some are destined unto salvation and others damnation).
ReplyDelete(2) Maybe God instantiated the universe in which everyone who would choose to believe in Christ do, and all who wouldn't, don't.
(1) No doubt they do, but I`m wondering precisely what the difference is between compatibilist freedom and LFW without alternate possibilities and with a comprehensive divine plan. Adding those two qualifications to LFW seems to gut it of any substantial difference between it and compatibilist freedom...
ReplyDelete(2) But a Calvinist could affirm that in a sense, too... it`s tautological for a Calvinist, but still meaningful...
(1) Interesting point here. Someone with more extensive knowledge of the metaphysical issues at hand will have to continue it from here rather than myself.
ReplyDelete(2) Maybe the qualification "would choose to believe in Christ freely (in a libertarian sense) and of their own strength and ability" was necessary :)
(2) Brings up LFW again, which includes the issue in (1); also, while Molinists could go the pure Pelagian way you are suggesting, Craig certainly doesn`t (he holds to a view of grace called Congruism: “Via His middle knowledge, God knew which gifts of grace would be efficacious in eliciting the free, affirmative response of these creaturely wills. Therefore, He decreed to create a world containing these individuals and to accord to them those gifts of grace to which He knew they would freely respond. These gifts are extrinsically, not intrinsically, efficacious in that the creaturely will is free to reject such grace, but since such gifts are selected according to God's middle knowledge, they are congruent to each created will and therefore infallibly are met with an affirmative response.”) (http://www.leaderu.com/offices/billcraig/docs/lest.html).
ReplyDeleteGood point, and thank you for bringing that up, I didn't know Craig thought that.
ReplyDeleteI don't know the difference between Craig's conception of LFW and Calvinistic compatibilism, so I can't be of any more help to you. *shrug*
I should note, too, that Congruism seems to distinguish itself from Calvinism precisely by means of the PAP: the distinction between intrisically and extrinsically efficacious grace seems to be none other than “the creaturely will is free to reject such grace”.
ReplyDeleteI think Steven already identified a major distinction. In Calvinism, God can pick anybody and guarantee that they will come. In Molinism, there are people out there who would never come, regardless of what situations He puts them in.
ReplyDelete`I think Steven already identified a major distinction. In Calvinism, God can pick anybody and guarantee that they will come. In Molinism, there are people out there who would never come, regardless of what situations He puts them in.`
ReplyDeleteWell, perhaps. But even on Molinism it is only possible there are some people who are `transworld damned` (that there are does not follow *necessarily* from any conception of LFW); and even in Calvinism there are restrictions on what God can decree (as Frame has pointed out in his article on the mystery of creaturely integrity, God is limited in the sense that he can`t decree two opposite things about creatures; thus it could be possible that for some unknown historical reason to do with God`s consistency there are some people God cannot grant effectual grace to... at least I see no reason why we can be sure there are no such possible people).
Anyway, this would only be a difference pertinent to effectual calling; I`m not sure it makes the general view of providence and free will distinct. But I could be wrong.
Andrew,
ReplyDelete"(1) No doubt they do, but I`m wondering precisely what the difference is between compatibilist freedom and LFW without alternate possibilities and with a comprehensive divine plan. Adding those two qualifications to LFW seems to gut it of any substantial difference between it and compatibilist freedom..."
There are many libertarians who deny PAP and affirm a comprehensive plan; e.g., Hunt, Zagzebski, Craig, &c.
For one, they would bring up source incompatibilism, ultimate responsibility, and self-forming characters into their account. These aren't compatibilistic.
We can also see how PAP isn't necessary to libertarianism since some classical compatibilists will allow a form of "could have done otherwise." Though these views are losing favor.
Basically, there are two major motivations for libertarian free will: (1) PAP and (2) ultimate Responsibility) i.e., that the agent is the ultimate source of his action, IOW, the relevant "causal buck" stops with him).
Some indeterminists claim that (2) gets you all you need. So a libertarian could conceivably drop (1) and hold to (2), thus distancing himself from determinism.
Now, how successful is this move? How successful is Molinism (or, Molinists who deny PAP)? There's some good arguments that suggest, "not very." Timpe (and Kane) argue that PAP needs to enter into the picture somewhere. But those guys still hold that (2) is what is most important (and you'll have to read their stuff to see how they cash out UR and why it is inconsistent with determinism. Kane spells it out in his books, and Timple in his latest, Sourcehood and its Alternatives).
Hope that was of some partial help.
We can also see how PAP isn't necessary to libertarianism since some classical compatibilists will allow a form of "could have done otherwise." Though these views are losing favor.
ReplyDelete**********
The above begged some questions.
I meant: We can see that PAP doesn't always necessitate indeterminism, compatibilists think it fits with compatibilism too given a hypothetical reading of alternatives, though this view is falling out of favor.
So, it may necessitate indeterminsm, but it's not obvious, there's still an argument that it fits with both.
So, interestingly, just because Craig denies PAP doesn't make him a compatibilist since some compatibilists hold to a form of PAP!
Paul,
ReplyDeleteThanks for the comment! At this point, I probably wont have the time to chase down those sources... would you mind offering your opinion on whether Molinism is substantially different from Calvinism without the libertarian PAP?
As I mentioned above, I really don't understand how, on Craig's framework, how a creature chooses can be "up to them alone" when in fact God decided from before the foundation of the earth how they would decide, and works through providence to ensure they will choose as he decided. It seems to me that to be consistent in preserving LFW-as-ultimate-causal-source one would have to deny the comprehensive plan.
Andrew,
ReplyDeleteWell, that's just part of the debate, ins't it :-) Forget Craig. Part of the debate is whether Molinism can keep LFW. Whether it leads to determinism anyway. (In fact, Part of the wider debate is whether infallible foreknowledge can keep LFW too.) I'm just letting you know what they would say and how they think it is different. So for Craig, God has a plan and wants an agent to act a certain way, he then instatiates the possible world where the agent libertarian freely acted that way because he knows what libertarian free agents would do in any circumstance. They would also presumably invoke nearby worlds to provide more evidence for the indeterminate action that happened in the actual world. And Craig (and other Molinists) even suggest that they believe that an agent has the power to make the counterfactual that applies to them, false. This would be counterfactual power over the past. That's a rough sketch of some of the things they'd probably say.
Wouldn't invoking possible worlds simply be repeating PAP? What relevance does that have to causal sourcehood?
ReplyDeleteAs for backwards causality, I suppose that could be the difference. It could explain how, virtually speaking, creatures exist before the foundation of the world in order to help God plan the future. But backwards causality seems intuitively nonsensical to me (and seems to make any biblical notion of an eternal decree to have no significance, since we always have the ability to change the plan now). It seems that the past is by definition something that is already fixed.
And in a way, backwards causality seems to violate the law of causation: if someone from the future can affect the present (from their perspective, the present affecting the past), then someone who doesn`t exist can cause something to happen. This seems to lead to some kind of eternal pre-existence...
ReplyDeleteAndrew: regarding backward causation. The point was to explicate differences between Molinism and Compatibilism. I'm sure you have your intuitions that it is false, but they don't, and they have intuitions that determinism is false, as it undermines moral responsibility. So, we're now leaving the confines of your original question.
ReplyDeleteRe: nearby worlds: Why would it bring in PAP in the actual world? In all worlds where I own a Bently, I would let you drive it, say. But if God actalized the world where I owned no Bently, then I don't do this. If he actualized a world where I did, then I would libertarianly do it. So, different conditions yield different libertarian results.
Right; I realized that I was leaving the confines... they were just my ramblings (what do you think of backwards causation, anyway?)
ReplyDeleteI'm not sure I understand the terms in your worlds comment. But I wont pester you about it.
I don't find backward causation to be correct.
ReplyDeleteHave you elaborated on why somewhere? (I searched Triablogue and didn't find much...)
ReplyDeleteHmmm! Stumped by Craig. Wow!
ReplyDeleteRob, that seems a bit of a cheap shot, unless you're not reading charitably. It seems people are wondering how Craig can still hold to LFW given Molinism. This question is raised by many philosophers and theologians, mostly from fellow LFWers themselves. I find it hard to believe that all these thinkers are "stumped by Craig." Rather, they're "stumped" that Craig thinks he can squeeze the libertarian juice out of the Molinist lemon.
ReplyDeleteAndrew,
ReplyDeleteNo I haven't since the issue hasn't arisen lately. However, I may do a post on the foreknowledge/freewill debate where this issue is touched. I did ask the question a few days ago that if man causes or determines God's beliefs, does this make God into a puppet?