Identity and Trinity

This is a follow-up to my previous post:

http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2013/10/dale-tuggys-ruse.html

Because Tuggy replied, I'm going to repost my responses:

Dale

"Is that an objection to Bauckham? Read all the way through, then think, and then, finally start objecting."

It does nothing to show that Bauckham's exegesis is flawed. It's only relevant to high-church Christians who think the creeds must be isometric with the NT.

"About the 'fatal concession', I'm afraid you're mistaken. The time-explicit version of the indiscernibility of identicals is all I need to make the point. Jesus and God have, at one time, differed. It follows that they are not identical (by the time-explicit version). "

You're not entitled to both invoke and modify Leibniz's law Your time-explicit version abdicates the principle of strict, abstract identity. Once you make allowance for identity that falls short of strict, abstract identity, you disqualify yourself from wielding Leibniz's Law to attack the Trinity. For, by your own admission, you now operate with a more flexible concept or standard of identity.

"Eh... no. "

Eh…yes. If according to your time-explicit version of Leibniz's law, it's possible for the same individual to undergo intrinsic change, then your definition of identity is now consistent with one or more intrinsic differences.

"This is what is impossible: Steve being dismissive and not being dismissive at one and the same time, in one and the same 'possible world'. In another possible world (at this same time), it may be that Steve is not dismissive. That is wholly compatible with him being dismissive in this, the actual world."

Dale, you're fudging strict identity. Is he the same individual in two or more possible worlds? Is he the same self in both the actual world as well as an unexemplified possible world (where things turned out slightly differently)? If you allow for him to be the same individual, despite alternate life-histories, then you ditched strict identity for a more flexible standard.

"Has God himself told us this? If so, we might try to overlook that it seems as obviously false as any claim does."

There's an elementary distinction between what a writer means, and whether you agree with him. An honest interpreter is concerned with what the writer meant. Whether the interpreter personally agrees with the writer is a separate issue.

"Of course, the point of the whole paper, which I don't think you've really digested, is that Bauckham's theory seems ill-equipped to help us understand the texts."

The duty of an interpreter is to construe the text on its own terms, not reinterpret the text the according to what he would say if he were the writer.

"When faced with such a patent incoherence, we really ought to doubt our theory, and see if we can make better sense of the text. We should be afraid that the apparent contradictions have come from our own confused theorizing, and not from the texts themselves. In every other context, we rightly hesitate to attribute an obviously confused message to a text."

This is not a question of what the text means, but whether you're prepared to believe it. The fact that a unitarian reader can't bring him to accept what a Bible writer said is irrelevant to exegesis. The object of exegesis is not to pacify the reader, but to ascertain the meaning of the text.

"Is it arrogant to refuse to believe what appears contradictory? It can be. It doesn't seem to be in the above case; it is the humble course to try to make the best sense out of a text."

You systematically confound the outlook of the reader with the outlook of the writer. At best, the outlook of the reader would only be relevant in reference to the implied audience, viz. John's 1C audience. 

But where a modern reader is concerned, his beliefs, his plausibility structure, is irrelevant to what the ancient writer meant. Writers can say things readers disagree with, Dale.

Of course, due to the authority of Scripture, Christians are supposed to align or realign (if need be) their beliefs with what the Bible teaches. That's your predicament.

"But it is plainly arrogant to foist a demonstrably incoherent theory on the Christian public, and if they point out its incoherence, accuse them of sitting in judgment over God's self-revelation. I dare say God does not appreciate this condemnation; as we listen to him, he expects and requires us to use the minds he so generously gave us."

That's a transparent rhetorical ploy. This is about you screening the Bible through your extraneous filter. Because you refuse to believe what the Bible says about Jesus, since that conflicts with your metatheory, you're the one who's foisting makeshift interpretations onto the text.

"The fact is that the argument above was not endorsed by a great many historic mainstream theologians. e.g. http://trinities.org/blog/archives/5000 They called Jesus 'God' and thought of him as in a lesser sense divine, but they demonstrably did not draw the conclusion that Jesus and the Father were the same being, or the same God. Instead, the argued that the one God of the OT is the Father, who is greater than Jesus. In your mind, Steve, the numerical identity of Jesus and God is an obvious implication of the NT. Well, then Justin, Origen, Tertullian, etc. didn't get the memo. Which is to say, no - that's not at all an obvious implication of the NT, but rather a controversial theory about it."

The early church fathers were groping with how to model the deity of Christ in relation to their preconceived notions of monotheism, using the conceptual resources of Greco-Roman philosophy at their disposal. They were experimenting with various Christological and Trinitarian paradigms. Historical theology evolves. And that's continuous, from Clement of Rome to Oliver Crisp and beyond.

But that's a separate question from what the Bible teaches.

"At different times, yes. Identity is the relation that everything bears to itself, and not to anything else, and which forces indiscernibility."

Is it the same "itself" at different times if it changes through time? If you allow for diachronic change, then you admit differences. Yes, the individual is self-identical at any given time. That's not the issue, The issue is whether the individual is the same individual across time. The same individual between T1 and T2, given the changes it undergoes. Clearly your definition of sameness falls short of strict identity. And then moment you allow for a concept of personal identity that's looser than strict identity, you're dealing with degrees of similarity. More alike and less alike. At that point, what basis to you have to attack the Trinity?

"Steve, I'll wager that you assume Ind Id, in my preferred formulation, in all other contexts. e.g. in a court case."

The question is whether your preferred formulation waters down the indiscernibility of identicals to something less than strict identity.

"No, sorry. Steve in the other possible world is not real. So, he's not identical to you, the Steve in this actual world. To talk about "possible worlds" is just to talk about how things might (logically) have been - it's a way of talking about mere possibilities. To say that Steve in the other word is not dismissive, is just saying that Steve (the real, actual one - here in this world) could have been, at this time, not dismissive."

The question at issue is the nature of counterfactual identity. Who are counterfactual statements about Dale about? Are they about the real Dale in the real world? Yet they are contrary to fact statements. Statements that aren't true of what Dale actually does in the actual world. So what's the reference point for the truth of these statements? Are counterfactual statements about you about you, or about someone like you?

"Really? How so? Note that the tools I'm wielding are very simply ones, that all people at all times possess: concern with consistency, the concept of a single being, and the belief that a thing can't at one time be and not be a certain way, simple plainly valid arguments. Pretty plain-Jane stuff, no? I stick deliberately to common sense there. Show me where any speculations intrude, if you think they do. It's easy to accuse."

i) Dale, you're prevaricating. There's no philosophical consensus on the conditions under which individuals are identical or distinct. Consider the intricate debate between endurantists and perdurantists.

Do you think "all people at all times" possess formal criteria for personal identity? Do you think "all people at all times" have a solution to Frege's Julius Caesar problem?

ii) Ironically, if you're going to appeal to pretheoretical intuitions of identity, that undercuts your definition. Let's compare two definitions back-to-back, beginning with yours:

"This principle is sometimes called 'Leibniz's Law.' It is commonly expressed in standard logical symbols like this: □(x)(y)( x = y → (F)(Fx ↔ Fy)). (Necessarily, for any x and any y, x is identical to y only if for any F, x is F if and only if y is F.) Roughly: it is impossible for numerically identical things to differ. In my view, this principle should be explicitly complicated so as to allow that a thing may intrinsically change through time."

This is Tuggy's definition of numerical identity, which he expounds in relation to Leibniz's law. Notice that his definition allows for persistence through time.

Let's compare that to another definition:

"Butler said there are two senses of the word 'identity.' There is, he says, identity in the strict sense and identity in 'a loose and popular sense.' The problem that Butler was concerned with was that of identity of persons and other objects over time. We say that a certain person we saw today is the very same person that we saw yesterday. Does that mean that the person today and the person yesterday are actually identical?…'The same river' would equally well do as examples. Here is an argument for saying that a person today and a person yesterday are not strictly identical: Strict identity is governed by a principled that is called the Indiscernibility of Identicals. This says that if a is strictly identical with b, then a and b have exactly the same properties. Sameness of thing gives sameness of properties. It is sometimes called Leibniz's Law. Now consider a person yesterday and a person today. Many of the person's properties will be different on different days. The person may have been cold yesterday and may be hot today, standing up yesterday and sitting today. So it seems that we conclude, by the Indiscernibility of Identicals, that the person yesterday is not strictly identical with 'the very same person' today. This is where Butler's distinction can be used. We can soften the blow by saying that what we have when we speak of a person yesterday and the same person to day is identity only in a 'loose and popular sense' of the word 'identity.'" 

D. M. Armstrong, Universals: An Opinionated Introduction (Westview Press, 1989), 2-4.

Notice that Armstrong definition distinguishes between strict and loose senses of identity. He defines strict identity by reference to Leibniz's law. But he sets that in direct contrast to persistence through time. For Armstrong, personal identity, involving diachronic change, falls short of strict identity (i.e. the indiscernibility of identicals).

So you and Armstrong present diametrically opposing definitions of identity. Your common man appeal only gets you the "loose and popular" definition of personal identity, in contrast to strict identity (i.e. the indiscernibility of identicals).

iii) Let's run with Armstrong's definition. Timeless (abstract) objects are paradigm cases of strict identity. Temporal objects can have incompatible properties by losing or gaining properties over time. That results in some differences–before and after. Some discontinuity.

By contrast, timeless objects have no incompatible properties. They don't change over time. They don't undergo change because they are timeless. So they are what they are without qualification. 

If that's how we define numerical identity (a la Leibniz, Armstrong), then personal identity may only been identity in the loose rather than strict sense of the term. Tuggy tries to play both ends off the middle. Where the Trinity is concerned, he seems to demand strict identity, as if he were using abstract objects (e.g. numbers) as the paradigm of personal identity.

Yet he defines identity to make allowance for change. However, that's a a looser definition of identity than strict identity. And once he forfeits strict identity, I don't see how Tuggy can attack the Trinity as a violation of Leibniz's law. 

iv) In addition, Tuggy rejects divine eternalism for divine temporalism. So he thinks the same God (same divine "self") has incompatible properties, spread over time. 

How is that consistent with personal identity, but the Trinity is not?

"Agreed. But my point is that we think it important to be charitable in what interpretation of their speech or writing we adopt. Normally, it's a deal-breaker in the interpretation we're considering is plainly self-contradictory - we resist this, the more we have reason to think the speaker non-confused. Here, I take it, we have a lot of reason to think that, because we agree that the inspirer is God himself."

i) It's not as if we're born with innate definitions of personal identity or numerical identity.

ii) Moreover, if God reveals himself to be Trinitarian, then we should allow that divine self-disclosure to inform or reform our preconceived notions of numerical identity or personal identity.

"Really? How so? Note that the tools I'm wielding are very simply ones, that all people at all times possess: concern with consistency, the concept of a single being, and the belief that a thing can't at one time be and not be a certain way, simple plainly valid arguments. Pretty plain-Jane stuff, no? I stick deliberately to common sense there. Show me where any speculations intrude, if you think they do. It's easy to accuse."

I've already presented a lengthy response, but to make some additional points:

i) Take a stock definition of numerical identity: "to be one and the same: one thing rather than two."

Problem is, that's not very informative. For it fails to explain what *makes* something to be one and the same thing. And that's the nub of the issue. So you can't get much milage out of that minimal definition. It's practically a cipher.

ii) Apropos (i), the popular concept of a "single being" involves a fuzzy notion of personal identity rather than strict identity. So your man-on-the-street appeal backfires.

iii) It's unitarians rather than Trinitarians who disregard the "identity" statements in Scripture. Trinitarians accept the "identity" statements that Scripture makes about the Son's relationship to God (as well as the Spirit's relationship to God). We take it as far as Scripture takes it. Unitarians are the ones who stop shot of accepting the predications of Scripture.

"Steve, what I called incoherent was precisely *your* claim that both Father and Son are identical to God, and yet they differ from one another. If you think the Bible says that, you're saying something pretty bold."

You're equivocating. Are you using "God" as a common noun or proper noun? Are you using "identity" in some technical sense of personal identity or numerical identity? There's no philosophical consensus on personal identity.

Do you equate numerical identity with strict identity? Apparently not.

"(that Jesus and the Father are and aren't identical)"

Don't be simpleminded. Individuals can be identical in one or more respects, but distinct in one or more respects. It's not all or nothing.

"but people who hold out hope that what the Bible says is *true*, and who don't accept your special pleading appeal to 'mystery' are going to be looking elsewhere to understand what the Bible really says."

i) I needn't appeal to "mystery." If that's what God reveals about himself, then that's sufficient justification.

ii) However, appealing to paradox is not ipso facto "special pleading." Paradox is a common and tenacious phenomenon in logic, science, metaphysics, and mathematics.

"It's relevant in that it shows that what you claim the Bible obviously says or implies, is not so."

That's a non-sequitur Dale. The fact that you imagine the Trinity to be incoherent based on your preconception of identity conditions or identity relations hardly obviates what the Bible "obviously says or implies."

And the formal criteria for determining identity conditions or identity relations is a vexed issue in philosophy and mathematics. That's not something you're entitled to treat as a given. Far from it, that's a matter of ongoing debate.

"Careful, Accuser. I said that I was deliberately sticking with *common sense* - not that the assumptions I made were one's that all or most philosophers agree to. Most philosophers, these days, are naturalists. And philosophers, naturalist and not, say some very strange things. But my argument is with Christians, and it seems to me that all Christians agree, e.g. that the one who dies = the one who is raised from the dead, and that the one who sins = the one who suffers in hell."

Since you're raising philosophical objections to the Trinity, the Incarnation, and the deity of Christ, you don't get to evade philosophical objections to your position by "sticking with common sense." That oscillation is an example of your studied duplicity.

"All people believe, in my view, that they endure through time; at least, that's the default position. Memory and anticipation presuppose endurance. Buddhist or four-dimensionalist philosophy make intrude. Note that I don't adhere to "criteria of identity" - I think identity-facts are basic, and are not to be analyzed in terms of anything else, e.g. memory, bodily continuity."

Dale, you act as if you can resolve philosophical controversies by edict. That's not how it works.

"Look around - you'll see that basically no Christian philosopher, and wider than that, no moral realist endorses this, for the reasons above. Another reason is that we experience true change. Change, properly speaking, presupposes that one and the same thing is first one way, and then that same thing is another way. If it's not the same thing both times, we have replacement, not change. The four-dimensionalist doesn't believe in change. He reduces the appearance of change to replacement, or simply to differ person-stages at different times. But I know that I'm the person who typed the last sentence. And you know you're person who made this blog post on Oct 9."

Dale, I've cited specific counterexamples like the endurantist/perdurantist debate and Frege's Caesar problem which belie your facile assertions.

"A related point: 'loose and popular identity' is not a kind of identity, not a kind of numerical sameness. There are no kinds of it. So no, there's nothing tricky going on... on my side. On your side, I note that you're endorsing, at least in this discussion, an implausible and revisionary metaphysical theory, only because you suppose that it'll help you maintain a cherished Trinity theory. This is ad hoc. But also, it doesn't work."

I quoted David Malet Armstrong. Are you suggesting that he's a fringe figure in modern philosophy? He's a leading philosopher on attribute-agreement, so he has well-considered views on the nature of identity. You're free to disagree with him, but don't pretend he's eccentric. That tactic exposes your desperation.

"the Father and Son. You say that these are "loosely" identical, meaning that they can have different properties at different times. Great!"

No, that's not what I'm saying. I'm simply using diachronic change to illustrate the claim that personal identity doesn't presuppose strict identity.

I don't think the Father or the Son qua Son undergo change. The Son qua Incarnate is subject to change.

"But, in the NT, they have incompatible properties at the same time. And even if you didn't see that, it would remain that it is possible (non-contradictory) on your own views, that Father and Son differ at a given time."

Meaning the Father is not the Son, and vice versa. Needless to say, that distinction is an essential component of the Trinity.

"It follows that they are not numerically one."

That only follows if you beg the question of makes something to be the same thing. If you assume, in the teeth of arguments to the contrary, that strict identity must underwrite numerical identity and/or personal identity.

"About God and time: my view is, like Craig's, that if there is time, everything's in it, even God. But this is good - he couldn't respond to us if he weren't temporal, due to his free creation."

Which ducks the question I raised by changing the subject.

"About your last question, my reply is: intrinsic change is actual - we know this by experience. Thus, it is possible. Thus, change is real. Thus, Leibniz's Law must be understood to allow the reality of change."

That's a non sequitur. The fact that change is real doesn't mean Leibniz's law must be redefined to allow for the reality of change. Rather, that would restrict Leibniz's law to abstract objects. Although concrete objects (or relations) could approximate Leibniz's law, concrete identity would be less stringent. Analogous to the way in which real space exemplifies geometrical universals.

"Thus, the theory above implicitly affirms and denies the same claim - a theoretical disaster."

Don't be a simpleton. Same in most respects, different in another.

"Finally, let me substantiate my claim that you, and every reader of this blog, are committed to something like my version of Leibniz's Law (aka the Indiscernibility of Identicals). You're on the jury, and they've hauled in Joe Biden. They know *someone* spray-painted 'You should move to Kolob' on the side of Romney's bus, but they don't know who. Joe is a suspect. How will he be acquitted? This will suffice, for you, and for any juror - that there has been a time, any time, no matter when or how brief, that the spray-painter was one way, and Joe was another. Why? You infer, that as they have differed, they (Joe and the spray painter) are not numerically the same."

That doesn't pick out any particular theory of personal identity.

"To the contrary, the concept of identity is built-in. So is the concept of a self. I don't think the former concept is really definable. The concept of a self is certainly understandable, or explicable - maybe even definable. 'Personal identity' is just whether or not some x and y are the same self - i.e. x is a self, y is a self, and x=y."

The man on the street has crude notions of personal identity, which is consistent with conflicting philosophical models.

"Numerical sameness is a rock-bottom, basic items in our conceptual toolbox."

Which is a cipher, as I pointed out (see above).

"But the biggest problem is just that the Bible everywhere supposes God to be a uniquely great self…"

That's tendentiously one-sided. The Biblical data is more complex. Unitarianism simplifies theology by simplifying the data.

"Just numerical identity. Again, 'personal identity' isn't really a kind of identity - see above."

Which is unfortunately for your argument.

"Numerical identity IS all-or-nothing."

Really? A few days ago, Alexander Pruss said: "distinguish two different kinds of identity, identity of person and identity of essence, and say that that some predicates only transfer across one of these two identities."

But I guess he's a philosophical bumpkin.