{"id":53,"date":"2008-01-20T23:37:00","date_gmt":"2008-01-21T03:37:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/alanrhoda.net\/wordpress\/?p=53"},"modified":"2008-01-20T23:37:00","modified_gmt":"2008-01-21T03:37:00","slug":"open-theism-and-divine-freedom","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/alanrhoda.net\/wordpress\/2008\/01\/open-theism-and-divine-freedom\/","title":{"rendered":"Open Theism and Divine Freedom"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In a recent book entitled Can God Be Free?, William Rowe argues that the answer to the titular question is no, and he develops this into an argument for atheism. Here&#8217;s a simplified version of his basic argument:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>[T]here is a serious argument to the effect that no such being as God could exist if for every creatable world there is a better creatable world. This argument depends on the following principle:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>If an omniscient being creates a world when it could have created a better world then it is possible that there be a being morally better than it.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>From this principle and the assumption that for any creatable world there is a better creatable world, it follows that an all-powerful, omniscient creator of a world is a being than which a better being is possible. But the theistic God is by nature an unsurpassable being, a being than which a better being is not possible. Therefore, so the argument goes, if there is no best world, the exalted God of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam does not exist. (pp. 4-5)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>The key assumptions of this argument are these:<\/p>\n<ol>\n<li>God is an essentially unsurpassable being, that is, he is a being than which a better being is not possible.<\/li>\n<li>If a being performs one action when it could have performed a better action instead, then it is possible that there be a being better than it.<\/li>\n<li>For every world that God could create, there is a better world that God could have created instead, and doing so would constitute a better action on God&#8217;s part.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p>Rowe contends that these three claims form a mutually inconsistent set. Since he accepts (2) and (3), he concludes that (1) is false: there is no essentially unsurpassable being. Hence, there is no God.<\/p>\n<p>A theist can resist this argument by rejecting either (2) or (3) instead of (1).<\/p>\n<ol>\n<li>creates a world when it could have created a better world then it is possible that there be a being better than it.<\/li>\n<li>If God is omnipotent, then there is a creatable world better than this world.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p>More formally, the argument looks like this:<\/p>\n<ol>\n<li>According to theism, God is a being than which a better being is not possible; as such, God is essentially omnipotent, omniscient, and perfectly morally good.<\/li>\n<li>If an omniscient being creates a world when it could have created a better world then it is possible that there be a being better than it.<\/li>\n<li>If God is omnipotent, then there is a creatable world better than this world.<\/li>\n<li>Therefore, God could not have created this world. (1, 2, 3)<\/li>\n<li>If theism is true, then there cannot be a world that God does not create.<\/li>\n<li>Therefore, if theism is true, then this world was created by God and this world was not created by God. (4, 5)<\/li>\n<li>Therefore, theism is false.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p><\/p>\n<ol>\n<li>For any creatable world there is a better creatable world.<\/li>\n<li>Therefore, if God exists, then he cannot create a world. (1, 2, 3)<\/li>\n<li>If theism is true, then there cannot be a world that God does not create.<\/li>\n<li>There is a world.<\/li>\n<li>Therefore, if theism is true, then God created this world. (5, 6)<\/li>\n<li>Therefore, if theism is true, then God created this world and God did not create this world. (4, 7)<\/li>\n<li>Therefore, theism is false. (8)<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p>Premises (2) and (3) are the most controversial premises here, and Rowe defends them skillfully throughout the book. In what follows, I&#8217;m going to concede (2) for the sake of argument and focus on (3).<\/p>\n<p>There are three ways in which premise (3) might be false:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>There is a unique best creatable world.<\/li>\n<li>There are several best creatable worlds.<\/li>\n<li>There is no objective evaluative ranking among creatable worlds.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>The first option is very dubious if we assume, as Rowe does, that all possible worlds are creatable worlds. It seems rather obvious that this<\/p>\n<p>Su<\/p>\n<p><\/p>\n<ol>\n<li>There necessarily exists an essentially omnipotent, essentially omniscient, essentially perfectly good being (i.e., God).<\/li>\n<li>Necessarily, as an essentially perfectly good being, God always does the best that he can.<\/li>\n<li>Necessarily, as an essentially omnipotent being, God can create any possible world.<\/li>\n<li>Necessarily, God does not create a possible world if he can create a better one. (2, 3)<\/li>\n<li>Necessarily, God is free if and only if there is more than one possible world that God can create.<\/li>\n<li>Either (a) there is a single best possible world, (b) there are several maximally good possible worlds, or (c) for every possible world there is a better one.<\/li>\n<li>If (a), then God is not free. He must create the best of all possible worlds. (4, 5, 6)<\/li>\n<li>If (c), then God is not free. He cannot create any possible world. (4, 5, 6)<\/li>\n<li>If (b), then God is free. (4, 5, 6)<\/li>\n<li><\/li>\n<li>Necessarily, as a maximally powerful being, God can always do better than<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p>Just a short post.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In a recent book entitled Can God Be Free?, William Rowe argues that the answer to the titular question is no, and he develops this into an argument for atheism. Here&#8217;s a simplified version of his basic argument: [T]here is a serious argument to the effect that no such being as God could exist if\u2026 <span class=\"read-more\"><a href=\"http:\/\/alanrhoda.net\/wordpress\/2008\/01\/open-theism-and-divine-freedom\/\">Read More &raquo;<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-53","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/alanrhoda.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/alanrhoda.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/alanrhoda.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/alanrhoda.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/alanrhoda.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=53"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/alanrhoda.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/alanrhoda.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=53"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/alanrhoda.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=53"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/alanrhoda.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=53"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}