Can a Timeless God Freely Create?
I don't think so. Let me explain.
To say that God freely creates is to say that he could have refrained from creating and that he could have created a different sort of world, one with different initial and boundary conditions.
To say that God is timeless is to say that he undergoes no change in any respects whatsoever. In other words, it is to say that God is absolutely immutable.
Given these two assumptions (and assuming, of course, that there is a God who has in fact freely created), we can derive a contradiction:
- God is absolutely immutable.
- God has freely created.
- A free act proceeds from a free decision from among several mutually exclusive possibilities.
- Therefore, God made a free decision to create from among several mutually exclusive possibilities. (2,3)
- A free decision from among several mutually exclusive possibilities involves a change in one's 'intentional stance' from regarding something as indeterminate (as one of several possibilities) to regarding it as determinate (as the chosen course of action).
- Therefore, in freely created God undergoes a change in his intentional stance. (4,5)
- Therefore, God has changed in some respect. (6)
- Therefore, God is not absolutely immutable. (7)
The only way to avoid the conclusion is to challenge the logic at some point or reject one of the independent premises, namely, (3) or (5). As far as I can see, the argument is valid, so the logic seems to check out. One might, however, try rejecting premise (3) by arguing that a free act need not proceed from a free decision. Perhaps God never decided to create. Perhaps he has just immutably willed to create. Okay, but what makes this "willing" free? That God has immutably willed to create could just as easily be said of a God who had no freedom, who had to create precisely the sort of world that we find ourselves in. Perhaps one could say that God's immutably willing to create is free because nothing about God's nature constrains God to will as he does. But if that's so, then why does God will as he does? Why does he immutably will to create precisely this type of world and not another or no world at all? It's not clear that any answer can be given unless it's along the lines of "because that's what he decided to do," in which case premise (3) is conceded. On the current proposal, therefore, it is just a brute fact that God wills as he does. He didn't choose to will as he does; he just does will as he does. I think it's safe to say that that's a rather lame explanation.
What's more, how is a denial of (3) to be squared with divine providence (i.e., God's manner of ruling creation)? Every theory of providence that I am aware of - Calvinism, Molinism, open theism, etc. - makes explicit reference to God's 'deciding' on or 'choosing' one possibility from among several others. The Biblical writers talk that way as well (for example, the nation of Israel is said to be "chosen" of God).
As for premise (5) it too seems to be highly plausible. Certainly when we make decisions we move from a state of indecision to a state of decision and a clear change in our intentional stance vis-a-vis our deliberative options takes place. Does this have to be the case for a timeless God? Perhaps not. Perhaps God's deliberative process can be understood in terms of distinct logical moments, rather than distinct temporal moments. An example of this distinction is the order of the steps in the proof of a mathematical theorem. It takes a human mathematician time to trace through the logical steps in performing the proof. That's a temporal sequence. But in the proof itself, considered abstractly as an ordered set of propositions connected by logical rules, there is only a logical sequence. The axioms from which the proof sets out are logically prior to the conclusion, but not temporally prior to it. Could God's decision to create be understood along similar lines? In other words could we say that God's contemplation of possibilities and his deciding to actualize one of them occur simultaneously, as it were, with the "change" in God's intentional stance reflecting a mere logical sequence and not a temporal one?
I don't think this will work because the relation between (1) God's contemplation of a set of creative possibilities and (2) his selecting one of those is not a logical sequence. In other words, no purely logical relation is going to get you from a proposition describing a set of possibilities ("Either A or B or C ...") to a proposition affirming just one of those possibilities ("A"). The latter just doesn't follow from the former. What we need is not a logical rule, but something substantive, namely, the exclusion of the other possibilities ("Neither B nor C ..."). This exclusion is due to a volitional act on God's part, an act that effects a transition from volitional indeterminacy ("Either A or B or C ...") to volitional determinacy ("A"). And it is simply incoherent to suppose that God (or anyone else) could be in both states at once. There are two distinct intentional stances here, and they are incompatible. Hence a free decision to create involves a qualitative change in God's mental life. And qualitative changes are temporal, not logical.
I conclude, then, that the above argument is sound. A timeless God could not freely create. On the assumption that God has freely created, therefore, it follows that God is not timeless.
posted by Alan Rhoda @ 1:27 AM
19 comments
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19 Comments:
(5) doesn't seem plausible to me at all. Why would one assume that free choice requires an original indeterminacy, rather than just a modal one, i.e., rather than just a set of possible alternatives, among which one of them is selected?
There seems, in fact, some independent reason. If possibilities cannot be selected except by changes, the possibilities for changes can't be selected except by changes, and the possibilities for those changes can be selected except by changes, ad infinitum, which is awkward. So either we have an infinite regress of changes, or some possibilities are selected from other possibilities without a change from indeterminacy to determinacy. But if anyone can do the latter, God can. As for the infinite regress of changes, it seems unlikely that free creation necessarily presupposes an infinite past (which it would under the sort of infinite regress involved here).
As far as I can see, the atemporalist also doesn't need the sequence of God's decision to be a logical sequence; he just needs the steps to be distinguishable independently of any temporal characteristics -- that's all that's required to divide things into logical moments -- and the steps not to require separation from each other by time in order to be in the same subject. The response, after all, is not that Step 1 and Step 2 are related to each other logically, but that Step 1 and Step 2 are distinguishable for certain logical purposes even though they are not distinguishable according to the times they occur.
Finally! I've been saying for years that a timeless God could never "get off the dime" (not philosophical lingo, but the same thought).
Appreciate it.
Tom
Brandon,
Thanks for your comments. I'm not quite sure that I understand what you mean by a "modal" indeterminacy as opposed to an "original" one. You refer to "a set of possible alternatives" from among which one is selected. But that doesn't seem to be an apt description. As I see it, your're characterizing God's decision to create too abstractly for it to really be a decision. A decision, I submit, has to involve a shift in intentional stance. In other words, apart from God's decision to create there is not just "a set of possible alternatives" but also an indeterminate divine stance toward those alternatives.
As for the regress problem you raise, I think it is easily avoided. I am arguing that decisions involve changes, but it does not follow that every decision requires a prior decision. In other words, one doesn't have to decide to decide to decide etc. God simply decides. That involves a change in God, but does not set up a regress nor does it entail an infinite past.
You're right that the atemporalist needs a way of specifying the steps in the sequence of God's decision independently of any temporal characteristics. I just don't think that can be done without describing the decision sequence so abstractly that it winds up as something other than a decision sequence.
It would be simpler to say that the eternal perfection of God both makes him immutable (for if absolute perfection changed, it would become either more or less perfect, each of which is impossible) and it makes him absolutely free (for what has freedom is more perfect than what does not)
So for these reasons, we might answer #5, and hold to both immutablity and freedom.
In other words, let's dust off an old classic: God is both immutable and free because he is that-than-which-nothing-greater-can-be-thought.
Hi Shulamite,
Your argument that absolute perfection implies immutability (which goes back at least as far as Plato) assumes that no changes can be evaluatively neutral. This is not obvious. In fact, sometimes it is a defect for something not to change. For example, a good watch ought to change so as to keep track of time.
So what you need to argue, and haven't yet done so, is that God's undergoing a change in his intentional states vis-a-vis a given creative possibility would be for him to become either more or less perfect. Do you have an argument along those lines in mind? If so, I'd like to hear it.
Finally, even if you're right that absolute perfection implies immutability (which I do not grant), that still doesn't show that absolute perfection is compatible with freedom. Anselmian perfect being theology aims at understanding God as having the greatest compossible set of great-making properties. Immutability and freedom may be perfections in abstraction from each other, but that is not enough to show that they are compossible.
Regards,
Alan
Alan,
You are right that the eternalist is going to attack (5). It may seem that it is true, but that's just because the decisions that we are familiar with, namely our own, are temporal (precisely because we are temporal). The plausibility you find is understandable but need not ultimately be indicative of truth.
Lower in the post, you say that what is needed is an exclusion principle, and seem to suggest that these must be volitional. Two comments. First, the eternalist is going to say that your characterization of this as a qualitative change is begging the question. It's simply not the case, on the eternalist's view, that God was first (in the sense of any sort of temporality) undecided and then decided (or from volitionally indeterminate to volitionally determinate).
Second, here seems to be a non-volitional exclusion principle.
Proposition describing a set of possibilities: 'Either I create a world containing some state of affairs (S) and a suffering infant (call this I, where the state of affairs including S and I is a maximal state of affairs) or (b) I create a world containing S and ~I.'
Exclusion principle: 'Option (b) is a better option than (a)'
Why think that this exclusion principle is volitional?
You might want to take a look at Stump's Aquinas book for a thorough and sophisticated defense of the compatibility of divine eternity and God's freedom with respect to creation.
Hi Kevin,
Thanks for your feedback. I'll be sure to check out the reference to Stump that you mention.
Honestly, though, I'm don't think my argument is question-begging since I'm not assuming that eternalism is false. Rather, I'm arguing that a free decision, on the face of it, seems to involve an intentional shift on the part of the decision-maker from indeterminately considering a range of possibilities to determinately selecting one of those possibilities to actualize. The eternalist may suggest either (1) that God's freely creating doesn't involve a 'decision' or (2) that it does, but not one that requires any intentionaly shift. Frankly, I don't see how either of those suggestions is to be made plausible.
Your proposal faces at least two problems that I see. First, if a non-volitional exclusion principle is employed, then it seems misleading to speak of God's 'deciding' to create or exercising 'providence', since those notions seems to be essentially volitional. Second, your suggestion that God can exclude (a) in favor of (b) on the grounds that (b) is better than (a), can offer a general solution to my challenge only if all creatable worlds can be arranged in a linear heirarchy such that there is a unique 'best' world. But then it seems that you agree with Leibniz that God has to create, and has created, the best of all possible worlds. Not only does that seem to deny divine freedom, but it also makes the problem of evil a real whopper.
All the best,
Alan
Hi Alan,
Even if there were such a neutral state, the changing thing- insofar as it is changing- stands to the end as lacking it. Even if it were true that there are neutral states, the change connotes imperfection- not per accidens, as happens with the motion of a watch, but per se, according to the definition of change.
I would take passive potency as a middle term:
All potency connotes imperfection
All mutability requires potency.
And so the absolute perfection of God would require immutability. You may apply the argument to the particular case of his intentional states.
Hi Shulamite,
Thanks for making your argument more explicit, but I still don't see why change connotes imperfection. It seems to me that you, following Aristotle and Aquinas, are equivocating on two different senses of the term "perfection". In one sense, to be perfect is simply to be complete, i.e., fully determinate. In another sense, to be perfect is to correspond to an ideal, to exhibit maximal greatness. It was by equating these two notions that Aquinas arrived at the doctrine of God's pure actuality. I think that was a mistake on his part. Being maximally great does not, so far as I can see, imply being fully determinate.
A decision, I submit, has to involve a shift in intentional stance. In other words, apart from God's decision to create there is not just "a set of possible alternatives" but also an indeterminate divine stance toward those alternatives.
I'm afraid I'm not understanding you; if I have a set of alternative possibilities (A, B, C) that are genuine possibilities (because I am able to make them actual)and known to be such, and of these possibilities A is the one I'm willing to be actual; why isn't this, on its own, enough to characterize it as a 'decision'? There is nothing abstract about this (it's just 'intentionally picking an alternative'). There is indeed an intentional stance required; namely, the intentional stance of selection or decision itself. The 'indeterminate stance' you are suggesting appears to be purely extrinsic to any actual decision-making. It is not a decision; it does not include a decision; it is not a sufficient condition for a decision. Therefore at most it is a necessary condition; and so the question is, why would one think that one intentional stance is a necessary condition for a completely different one, and in particular why would the 'indeterminate stance' be a necessary condition for actually deciding? And indeed, as far as I can see, there is nothing even in human cases that this stance could be, except simply not having decided yet. But why would originally not having decided yet be a necessary condition for deciding as such? (Things like this are not generally true in the case of God. For instance, 'not existing yet' is not a temporally prior necessary condition for existing; 'not knowing yet' is not a temporally prior necessary condition for knowing; so what's the reason for this difference?) It's obvious that it's a necessary condition for the temporal sequence, "First not deciding, then deciding"; but this can't be what you mean, because then the argument really would beg the question.
So I'm not sure what you're going for.
I also don't understand you on the infinite regress issue. If God has two genuine possibilities, not deciding to create and deciding to create, why wouldn't God's intentionally picking one of them be deciding to make the decision about whether to create? And if the selection from the genuine alternatives isn't made by a divine decision, what is doing the selecting? In other words:
(1) Either a decision is itself one of several possibilities or it is the only possibility;
(2) If it is the only possibility, it is necessary; but if it is one of several possibilities, something has to select the possibility that becomes actual;
(3) Either this selection is the only possibility or it is not.
(4) If it is the only possibility then it is necessary that God decide; if it is not the only possibility, there must be some sort of selection, etc.
So if all intentional selections from possibilities we either have an infinite regress or a sharp limit to God's freedom. If, however, not all intentional selections from possibilities are not taken as real 'decisions', we have to ask what a 'decision' in this sense is, and why it is so necessary for creation in the first place. So those seem the only choices available: either God's freedom is sharply limited; or there is an infinite past; or (5) is wrong; or you seem to be using 'decision' in a wonky way. I had assumed that we were using 'decision' in an ordinary way, in which case it's pretty hard to see why intentionally picking a possibility wouldn't be counted as a decision; and I didn't think you were wanting to limit the possibilities open to God, although perhaps I was wrong. I know you don't like an infinite past; but if every picking of possibilities requires a temporally prior state in which possibilities are not picked, and no picking of possibilities is necessary, I don't see how you can avoid that. In other words, on your account, if not every picking of possibilities requires a prior picking of possibilities; then why are we putting that limit on God's freedom; but if every picking of possibilities requires a prior picking of possibilities, how can it be that we don't get an infinite past of possibilities picked? :)
Hi Brandon,
You ask, "If I have a set of alternative possibilities (A, B, C) that are genuine possibilities (because I am able to make them actual) and known to be such, and of these possibilities A is the one I'm willing to be actual; why isn't this, on its own, enough to characterize it as a 'decision'?"
My answer is that the concept of a free decision entails not only that one does in fact will one of several possibilities, but also that one have selected one of those possibilities, which requires a shift from volitional indeterminacy to volitional determinacy. In the scenario you describe there's no selection, just a timeless willing. So there's no real decision. You want to use the language of decision while stripping it of its inherent transitional character. I think you're conflating a decision with the kind of state that results from a decision, namely, determinately willing this and not that. That conflation allows you to conceive of God's timelessly willing thus-and-so as a "decision" when in fact it is just the kind of state that would have resulted from a decision had God made one.
You then ask, "If God has two genuine possibilities, not deciding to create and deciding to create, why wouldn't God's intentionally picking one of them be deciding to make the decision about whether to create?"
You're creating a problem where there is none by misdescribing the situation. The possibilities before God, we will suppose, are not "deciding to create" versus "deciding not to create", but rather simply "creating" versus "not creating". There is no difference between God's deciding to create and his creating. For God, to unilaterally decide is to do.
On a slightly more related matter, does anyone here know the origin of the so-called 'Stone Paradox'. Can God, in his omnipotence, create a stone so heavy he cannot lift it, thus being not omnipotent? It feels medieval, but I have only been able to trace it back to the 1960's.
Welcome back, Ocham!
Unfortunately, I have no leads to offer you. If you find out, though, I'd appreciate your letting me know.
Cheers.
Ocham: On a slightly more related matter, does anyone here know the origin of the so-called 'Stone Paradox'.
HammsBear: It's old:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omnipotence_paradox
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omnipotence_paradox
Irony here. I am one of the editors of this article (see the talk page - I am dbuckner).
The original article claimed that the paradox is old, but if you se the talk page, I have only located a statement of it in the 1960's. Checks in the standard references (such as Suarez, who is v late scholastic) do not mention the paradox.
I have since been referred to
Urban and Walton's collection The Power of God: Readings on Omnipotence and Evil? It has some excellent articles on this topic, including several efforts by contemporary logicians to translate and resolve the stone-lifting problem. It also includes excerpts from Anselm, Aquinas Peter Damian, et alii, on similar issues.
My answer is that the concept of a free decision entails not only that one does in fact will one of several possibilities, but also that one have selected one of those possibilities, which requires a shift from volitional indeterminacy to volitional determinacy. In the scenario you describe there's no selection, just a timeless willing.
I'm not sure I follow this argument. Of course there is selection, because there are possibilities known but not actualized. What else would we call that except selection? What you must mean is that there was no process of possibilities becoming selected; but, again, I don't see why one would hold that this is necessary for act of selecting itself. There is no conflation here between initial and final terms; rather, you seem to be using 'selection' in a peculiar way, in which it is not literally possible to be selecting something, i.e., in which there are only initial (potentially having selected) and final (actually having selected) terms, and no act of actually selecting. The decision process seems to be a leap from discrete term to discrete term. If, however, actually selecting something is possible, then we need a serious argument for why it is impossible to be selecting something unless you were previously not selecting something.
Your response to the possibility of decisions point still doesn't make sense to me. Is it or is it not possible for God to decide not to decide whether to create? If it is not possible, as you seem to suggest, that seems a straightforward restriction of divine freedom. If it is possible, then we run into the problem of what selects the alternatives. The problem doesn't rest on any 'misdescribing' of the situation. Think of it as an honest set of questions that either need to be answered or need to be shown to be malformed: Does God have necessary decisions (or more specifically: is the decision to create a decision God necessarily must make)? If not, then how could we say that God decides without also being committed to saying that God must decide to decide? If so, then why wouldn't this be an apparently arbitrary limiting of God's freedom? If decisions are necessarily temporal, then it would appear that God can decide not to decide; when we do that we call it 'deferring a decision'. But you seem to be suggesting that it is not. Then it seems it is necessary for God to decide whether or not to create; He can't defer. But it isn't clear at all from your account of the decision process how this could be so: if every decision requires a temporally prior state of being undecided, then there seems to be no reason why God couldn't defer; it appears to be a purely arbitrary limitation of divine freedom. Of course for God to decide is to do; this isn't in question. What is in question is whether God's actually deciding is an alternative among other possibilities.
Brandon,
We seem to be going around in circles here, so this will be my last go at it for now.
Regarding 'selection', 'decision, 'choice, etc. I continue to insist that you are the one who is using those terms in an unusual way, not I. You take it to be sufficient for a 'selection' that there be "possibilities known but not actualized". I say that's not enough. Unless there is a transition from volitional indeterminacy to volitional determinacy, no 'selection' has occurred. So the issue between us is which construal of 'selection' should we prefer and why. Here I think I'm on stronger ground, for my construal corresponds more closely to ordinary usage. Since these are our terms, they have to be grounded in our experience, and whenever we make a 'selection' we undergo an intentional change.
You charge that on my construal "it is not literally possible to be selecting something" because "there are only initial (potentially having selected) and final (actually having selected) terms, and no act of actually selecting." This is not true at all. What effects the transition on my view is the selecting agent. That agent, in selecting, takes a new volitional stance toward one of the possibilities that it did not have before.
Regarding the decision-regress, you ask several questions:
Q.1: Is the decision to create a decision God necessarily must make?
A.1: Yes.
Q.2: If so, then why wouldn't this be an apparently arbitrary limiting of God's freedom?
A.2: Deciding not to decide anything is not a coherent option. It's self-contradictory. So it is no arbitrary limitation on God's freedom that he should have to make some decisions.
Q.3: But why couldn't God defer some decisions, such as the decision to create?
A.3: We sometimes defer decisions on particular matters because of our limitations. We don't know all the possibilities and probabilities, nor do we have the power to guarantee particular outcomes. And it takes us time and effort to gather the evidence and process it. So on particularly important matters (like whom to marry), it makes sense to defer deciding until we've had a chance to think things through. But God has none of these limitations. He necessarily knows all possibilities and probabilities. He has sufficient power to bring about anything that can be brought about. And he is not limited by a finite processing speed. So he can fully size up all of the options all at once. A being like God, then, could have no reason for deferring any decision. In short, I think God must necessarily decide all matters at the outset. This does not negate his freedom because on most of those matters which decision he makes is up to him. So on my view there must necessarily be at least one temporal moment for God, namely, his moment of decision. Depending on what he decides, there may be additional temporal moments for him, but it all starts with his decision.
Again, I'm so impressed and encouraged by your precision and courtesy, Alan. And I'm glad to see you laying out an argument that I've had in mind in a very inchoate form for years.
Thank you.
Shane
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