Much theological debate centers around the doctrine of election. No one debates whether election is biblical, but they do debate the meaning of election. I believe in what is called unconditional individual election (the Calvinistic understanding). Those who oppose my understanding normally believe in some sort of conditional election or corporate election (or a combination of the two; the Arminian understanding). Corporate election is the belief that God elects nations to take part in his plan, not individuals to salvation. So, when Romans 9 speaks of God’s election of Jacob over Esau, Paul is speaking of God’s choosing the nation of Israel to have a special place in salvation history. They will go on to interpret all of Romans 9-11 in light of this assumption.
However, I don’t believe that Romans 9-11 is talking about corporate election, but individual election. Here are eleven reason why:
1. The whole section (9-11) is about the security of individuals. Election of nations would not make any contextual sense. Paul has just told the Roman Christians that nothing could separate them from God’s love (Rom. 8:31-39). The objection that gives rise to chapters 9-11 is: “How do we know that these promises from God are secure considering the current (unbelieving) state of Israel. They had promises too and they don’t look too secure.” Referring to corporate election would not fit the context. But if Paul were to respond by saying that it is only the elect individuals within Israel that are secure (true Israel), then this would make sense. We are secure because all elect individuals have always been secure.
2. In the election of Jacob over Esau (Rom. 9:10-13), while having national implications, starts with individuals. We cannot miss this fact.
3. Jacob was elected and Esau rejected before the twins had done anything good or bad. There is no mention of the nations having done anything good or bad. If one were to say this is nations that Paul is talking about, it would seem that they are reading their theology into the text.
4. Rom. 9:15 emphasizes God’s sovereignty about choosing individuals. “I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy.” The pronoun hon (whom) is a masculine singular. If we were talking about nations, a plural pronoun would have been used.
5. Rom. 9:16 is dealing with individuals, not nations. “So, it does not depend on the one who desires or makes effort, but on the mercy of God” (my translation). theolontos (desire) and trechontos (effort) are both masculine singulars that is why it is translated “the one” rather than “those.” (BTW: I don’t like ESV’s translation of this (man’s) as it is misleading and, ironically(!) supporting of corporate election). It is hard to see national implications at all here. It is about individual desire and effort. The acquisition of God’s mercy transcends the ability of man.
6. Once again, Rom. 9:18, speaking in the context of the hardening of Pharaoh, Paul summaries what he is trying to say using masculine singular pronouns: “Therefore, the one God wishes to have mercy on, he has mercy on. The one he wishes to harden, he hardens” (my translation). It would seem that if Paul was merely speaking about national or corporate election, the summary statement would change from Pharaoh to nations (plural), but the summary here emphasizes the sovereignty of God’s will (theleo) over individuals (singular).
7. The objection in Rom. 9:14 makes little sense if Paul were speaking about corporate or national election. The charge of injustice (adikia), which much of the book of Romans is seeking to vindicate God of, is not only out of place, but could easily be answered if Paul was saying that the election of God is only with respect to nations and has no salvific intent.
8. The objection in Rom. 9:18 is even more out of place if Paul is not speaking about individual election. “Why does he still blame people since no one can resist his will.” The verb anthesteken, “to oppose or resist,” is third person singular. The problem the objector has is that it seems unfair to individuals, not corporations of people.
9. The rhetoric of a diatribe or apostrophe being used by Paul is very telling. An apostrophe is a literary devise that is used where an imaginary objector is brought in to challenge the thesis on behalf of an audience. It is introduced with “What shall we say…” (Rom. 9:14) and “You will say to me…” (Rom. 9:19). It is an effective teaching tool. However, if the imaginary objector is misunderstanding Paul, the apostrophe fails to accomplish its rhetorical purpose unless Paul corrects the misunderstanding. Paul does not correct the misunderstanding, only the conclusion. If corporate election were what Paul was speaking of, the rhetoric demands that Paul steer his readers in the right direction by way of the diatribe. Paul sticks to his guns even though the teaching of individual election does most certainly give rise to such objections.
10. Rom. 9:24 speaks about God calling the elect “out of” (ek) the Jews and the Gentiles. Therefore, it is hard to see national election since God calls people “out of” all nations, ek Ioudaion (from Jews) ek ethnon (from Gentiles).
11. In Paul’s specific return the the election theme in the first part of Romans 11, he illustrates those who were called (elect) out of the Jewish nation by referencing Elijah who believed he was the only one still following the Lord. The response from God to Elijah’s lament is referenced by Paul in Rom. 11:4 where God says, “I have kept for myself seven thousand men who have not bowed the knee to Baal.” This tells us two things: 1) these are seven thousand individuals that God has kept, not a new nation. 2) These individuals are kept by God in belief as the characteristic of their “keeping” is their not bowing to Baal (i.e. they remained loyal to God).
12. Using the Elijah illustration in Rom. 11:5, Paul argues that “in the same way,” God has preserved a remnant of believing Israel of which he (as an individual) is a part (Rom. 11:1). This “keeping” in belief of individuals is according to “God’s gracious choice” (11:5).
438 replies to "Twelve Reasons Why Romans 9 is About Individual Election, Not Corporate Election"
Hi Hodge,
Think my brain is too tired right now to grapple!
Just wanted to say that I “came out of retirement” a couple of days ago to clarify something and here I still am.
Are you sure you are leaving again??!?? 🙂 This conversation seems to be addicting!
WM,
3. “The problem is that it only works if your opponent asserts that our beliefs are the end result of purposeless forces.”
The problem here of course is that you were determined to believe that God is a purposeful being. Furthermore, you were determined to believe in the nature of that God’s purpose. So how do you know with any degree of certainty that those beliefs are true. It all comes back to everything you believe you were predetermined to believe. It is as likely given determinism that all your beliefs are false as it is that they are true.
4. “This is not what I’ve ever said. Our conclusions are utterly predictable based on a knowledge of our desires, our natural thought processes, and the experiences we’re going to have. Because of those things, God can control what our conclusions will be based on the experiences we have and how He creates our natural thought processes and desires. Yet at the same time, God promises that all men know that God the creator exists, and they all “suppress the truth in unrighteousness”.”
First off this ultimately describes the immaterial cause and effect you railed against in the first part of your response – I’m a little confused. Secondly this is ultimately non-responsive and doesn’t dispute my point. God is still controlling what you believe and well you believe God to be good, truthful, etc. you have no grounds for believing that since you were simply destined to believe that. Some people believe God is a sadist as well. Why believe they are wrong and you are right? Reason?? They seem to think they are being reasonable. Why think their reason is inferior to yours? Evidence?? The manner in which you interpret and weigh the evidence was conditioned. Revelation?? You were conditioned to understand revelation the way you do. Why think you’re right?
Michael T,
I think we are both a little confused.
To all,
Maybe we should all just admit it is one big mystery! As for myself, I don’t think I can call myself an Arminian any more then I can call myself a Calvinist.
Arminianism puts so much emphasis on choice that they seem to eliminate a good deal of God’s sovereignty and minimize or explain away election in a way that I don’t necessarily think is correct.
On the other hand, Calvinists seem to emphasize election and God’s sovereignty so much that man’s choice seems to be very minimal at best or totally redefined from any normal meaning of the word. It also seems to require significant change to such concepts as God’s love and His desire for all to be saved that just don’t seem to work in my mind with what I believe the Bible teaches.
I think there must be some other “ism” that makes better sence out of it all–I just don’t know what it is yet or if it even has a name. Maybe no one can understand the mystery well enough to even name it, I don’t know. (For the record, I certainly don’t believe that Open Theism is the solution at all.)
That doesn’t mean that I am necessarily dropping out of this conversation by the way. Just stating that I don’t know if we can even understand the truth of all of this and that I don’t see that truth as being found any better in Arminianism that I do in Calvinism.
I remember a Bible teacher saying once that, “The Bible teaches both man’s choice and God’s election. Now wrap your mind around that one!” I think he might of had the right idea.
It’s a low blow, but I have to say it… You have no choice but to debate Calvinists on these forums. Michael’s will seems to be predetermined in this matter. Hodge is completely unpredictable. I’m here of my own free will, of course.
-Wm
I’m going to go silent regarding LFW versus determinism until you’ve all had a chance to digest Hodge’s contribution. He’s given references that I didn’t know about, so perhaps he’ll make more sense than I have.
One minor point:
Not so much. You see, under an A-theory of time God can’t actually KNOW the future (because the future doesn’t actually exist); all He can know are the implications of the past and present. If the present doesn’t fully determine the future, then God actually has to know all possible outcomes. This means that in order to make prophecies come true, God has to intervene constantly.
Since we don’t see this happening, it seems somewhat reasonable to suppose that either time is B-theory, or all is deterministic. (It’s conceptually possible to have a nondeterministic B-theory — it results in a tree-structured time rather than a linear time. Every possibility results in a branch in the tree. Of course, on some of those branches prophecies would fail, so God would have to act to prune them.)
Ah, but in a B-theory future is not different from the past or present; our choices are merely events, not actual branches. What appears to be a live possibility as we’re living the choice, turns out to be a road never taken (and thus not actual).
-Wm
I understand OT’s error (and believe I can even sympathize with it); Dr. Craig’s position is much harder for me to grasp (I’ve tried to study it). I’m fairly sure it’s an error, but it’s complex and hard for me to understand. Dr. Craig is NOT a dummy :-).
-Wm
I don’t think God generally gives people gifts of rage, no. God has in the past sent a spirit onto people specifically to commit specific sins. It’s happened. I can’t deny it. But I don’t believe it’s the normal way of God doing things, and I don’t want to leave you with that impression.
Some people have a stronger sense of justice, or stubbornness, or whatever than others. When that comes out as murderous rage, those people are abusing their natural characteristics in sin and high-handed disregard for God’s image and God’s express law — but they’re not catching God by surprise. God knew what they would do, and He nonetheless created and sustained them so that they would do it, and be condemned in His sight for it, and God would use the consequences of their sin to accomplish His plan.
No. I meant that the murder was against God’s clearly expressed commandment.
Your summary is almost exact; delete the words “and intended”.
-Wm
…once that “and intended” is gone, I don’t think there’s a contradiction.
-Wm
WM,
“Dr. Craig’s position is much harder for me to grasp (I’ve tried to study it). I’m fairly sure it’s an error, but it’s complex and hard for me to understand. Dr. Craig is NOT a dummy.”
While at least we can agree on one thing. I too have tried to figure out his position or more appropriately understand the logic behind it. I get lost after the first few paragraphs (same goes for the likes of Plantinga) and the popular level works on the subject are simply inadequate to fully explain his position (ditto for the Kalam Cosmological – most of the responses by lame brained atheists on the web only respond to the dumbed down popular understanding rather than the scholarly work). Ultimately that’s why I remain agnostic about the truth of Molinism. Something doesn’t seem right because it doesn’t seem to answer the questions it claims to answer. Yet I can’t fully grasp Craig’s reasoning so it is hard to point out exactly why.
WM,
Now to what we disagree on. Hodge’s objection is of course a famous one. I’ve heard it repeated often in many different forms. The original philosophical version I encountered in Philosophy of Religion in undergrad goes something like this.
1. God cannot be wrong in anything he knows.
2. God knows that I am going to mow the lawn on Thursday
3. On Thursday I have no choice other than to mow the lawn for to not mow the lawn would make God wrong.
4. (Implicitly) Either Determism is true or a omniscient god doesn’t exist.
Another thought experiment example in the form of a general objection to an omniscient being of any kind goes something like this.
Imagine you ask God what number you are going to write a paper in 10 seconds. God tells you 10 (remember God can’t lie). So you simply add a number to 10 and write down 11.
I find neither of these to be convincing (as you can imagine. In the first the problem hinges on what is meant by “have no choice”. I think one can replace this step with “On Thursday I choose to mow the lawn of my own free will” and conclude “LFW and an omniscient God exist. I fail and many philosophers fail to see how God infallibly knowing the future precludes libertarian free will. It’s not that one has “no choice” rather it is simply that God knows what you will “freely choose”. But I am just repeating myself again and Hodge is ultimately just repeating your objections from earlier. I don’t see how it logically follows from “God infallibly knows” to “man has no choice”.
Interesting recent podcast from Craig which directly addreses this
http://www.rfmedia.org/RF_audio_video/RF_podcast/Objections_to_Belief_in_God2.mp3
Since I have no choice but debate Calvinists on these forums, here is my next question!
So you are saying He deliberately gave desires to man–in order to accomphish His plan in His way. And He did this knowing that man would use the desire He gave in a way He hadn’t commanded–and this is the way He would accomplish His will in the way He wanted it accomplished?
So, in effect, He deliberately works it so man will sin and this is the way He wants to accomplish His will? (You did say He gave the desires so things would be done in His way). Is this God being the “author” of sin? (Horrors, back to that statement again!)
If I am understanding you corrrectly, I believe that in legal terms that would be called entrapment, am I right Michael?
Maybe I am missing something here, but something just doesn’t seem right about this picture.
Cheryl, I like what you said above; it reminds me of why I originally switched from being a hard-core libertarian free will person to a compatiblist (which I remain now). But you remind me of something I’ve allowed myself to forget: philosophy is fun and perhaps useful, but it doesn’t compare to a humble presence before God.
Well, back to the philosophical arguments.
-Wm
On the time stuff,
1. Minor squabble. “Since we don’t see this happening, it seems somewhat reasonable to suppose that either time is B-theory” While I get where you are coming from I think simply stating that just because we don’t see God doing something He isn’t doing it is rather materialistic. While I admit I’m not convinced by A-theorists I don’t think it is completely impossible – just implausible (and probably outside of historic orthodoxy as CMP points out on the threat on essentials and non-essentials).
2. “Ah, but in a B-theory future is not different from the past or present; our choices are merely events, not actual branches. What appears to be a live possibility as we’re living the choice, turns out to be a road never taken (and thus not actual).”
I’m not completely sure what you mean for this to prove. Perhaps you could explicate it a bit. As far as I can tell when we make a choice we are actually making a free choice. It’s simply from the eternal perspective God knows we made that choice and in fact every choice ever made all at once and concurrently with the choice being made. Thus it is incorrect to say that God’s knowledge of our choices preceded our choices. From God’s eternal perspective the choice I made to go to undergrad, the choice I made to go to Law School, and the choice I will make someday (hopefully) to marry someone all occurred simultaneously.
Yes. Nothing is done — not a sparrow falls — without His permission.
Yes, in the modern sense. (Not in the Westminsterian sense.)
No, in the sense that God is actually restraining sin.
No. Two reasons.
First, remember Paul’s teaching that absent God’s law, there are no sins. The awful things we do to each other are mere social rudenesses, not sins. As David said, “against You, and You alone, have I sinned.” David’s sins caused death and suffering, and wound up rending the kingdom in half — but he saw the Law, and knew who sin is always against. The true sin that we die for is the sin that says in our heart “there is no God”. Our heart (that is, our core, our entire being) is already turned against God by sin of nature and sins of commission.
Second, God by doing that is not forcing men to do awful things they would never otherwise do. He’s doing two things: first, showing them how awful they really are so that they can see the need for repentance; and second, directing their crimes and horrors so that less evil, and more good, will come of them. The Bible speaks of God restraining man’s sin.
Man without God’s continuous control would be worse, not better.
-Wm
WM,
“philosophy is fun and perhaps useful”
Wow! Another thing we agree on. Though I kinda don’t care for the pounding headache reading philosophers can have a tendency to give someone. Seriously, when it come to sheer brilliance the brightest scientists have nothing on a good philosopher. As though brilliance is both a blessing and a curse.
I’m not sure how I see working deliberately so that man will sin to accomplish His will is restraining sin.
Are you saying that if God didn’t work deliberately so man would sin to accomplish His will, man would find even worse ways to sin? Somehow, working deliberately so man will sin just doesn’t seem to, in general, fit the picture of a holy God.
Sorry guys, all of this philosophy/theology has fried my brain for the night. It’s late and I am going to bed and hopefully to sleep without dreaming about all of this too.
I’m surprised by this, honestly. I’m a compatibilist, which I’m told is not compatible 🙂 with LFW; but you sound like you hold my position.
If there’s only one actual possibility that you could actually take, and it’s been fixed at that possibility since the beginning of the universe, it’s still a free choice. This is a statement I firmly believe in.
Looks like we agree after all.
Now I just need to ask… How is your version of LFW different from my compatibilism? I mean, obviously mine includes the possibility of a harder form of determinism than yours does, but I’ve never insisted on it; I just don’t know.
Cheryl has made it clear that if there’s only one possible option isn’t not an actual choice, so she and I still disagree :-).
-Wm
I just don’t understand this at all. Actually, given your recent declaration I _really_ don’t understand it.
Why do you say this is the case? Over and over?
I believe I’ve completely disproven it; I’ve given a possible-world counterexample… You’ve dismissed them all and reasserted it. I’m just completely missing something about your argument.
The whole thing makes no sense whatsoever to me, but I guess I should start from some starting point:
Why should the reality of determinism alter the probabilities of beliefs being true? Can you break that down and explain it? It sounds like you’re claiming that determinism changes your beliefs from having an unspecified probability to a 50-50 probability, which smells STRONGLY like an either-or fallacy (where people pretend that a conclusion and its negation have equal probabilities merely because there are two choices).
-Wm
WM,
1. There is a difference between the compatibilism in the context of divine omniscience with human free will and compatibilism in the context of divine determinism and free will. These are two philosophically distinct areas of inquiry. Compatibilism is a generic term for any philosophical belief in which two things coexist. I affirm the compatibilism of divine omniscience with human freedom, but not the compatibilism of divine determinism with human freedom. Furthermore, I deny that God’s simply knowing what we will choose is determinism of any kind.
2. Why should the reality of determinism alter the probabilities of beliefs being true? Can you break that down and explain it?
OK, lets see if I can break it down syllogistically.
1. Every belief we have we were inescapably determined and willed to believe by an external force.
2. The external force equally wills and determines the beliefs of both those who believe falsehood and those who believe the truth.
3. One cannot gain an external perspective outside of themselves to determine whether or not the beliefs they were determined by the external force to believe are true beliefs or false beliefs.
4. Therefore we cannot know with ANY certainty whether or not the beliefs we have been determined to believe are true or false.
To make it concrete.
1. Same as above.
2. God has willed and determined that you believe Calvinism and I believe Arminianism. One of us is right and one of us is wrong (or we are both wrong perhaps). One is true and one is false
3. We are both trapped within our determined belief systems and cannot gain an external perspective to determine which one of us is right and which is wrong. Our understandings of the evidence (logic, reason, Scripture, general revelation, etc.) and weighing of this evidence have determined as well
4. If determinism is true we cannot have ANY certainty about which one of our beliefs is true.
WM,
FYI I am going to bed now and will probably not be on much tomorrow. I will try to keep up though.
WM,
One more thing. In case you think I’m pulling this argument out of my rear end. Here is Dr. Craig commenting on determinism in the context of commenting on Calvinism.
“There is a sort of dizzying, self-defeating character to determinism. For if one comes to believe that determinism is true, one has to believe that the reason he has come to believe it is simply that he was determined to do so. One has not in fact been able to weigh the arguments pro and con and freely make up one’s mind on that basis. The difference between the person who weighs the arguments for determinism and rejects them and the person who weighs them and accepts them is wholly that one was determined by causal factors outside himself to believe and the other not to believe. When you come to realize that your decision to believe in determinism was itself determined and that even your present realization of that fact right now is likewise determined, a sort of vertigo sets in, for everything that you think, even this very thought itself, is outside your control. Determinism could be true; but it is very hard to see how it could ever be rationally affirmed, since its affirmation undermines the rationality of its affirmation.”
I still don’t see the connection between your syllogism and the conclusion. The argument actually doesn’t explicitly use any of the premises, it merely wanders through mentioning them and then mentions a conclusion, with no connection or order. Little of the wording of the conclusion is prefigured by the premises; in particular, the phrase “know with certainty” isn’t present elsewhere. I’m not trying to nitpick your argument; I’m not understanding what you’re saying, and I’m hoping that if you can present an argument that follows those rules I might be able to follow it.
Oh, your argument will also have to address whether any greater clarity is available under LFW (which was not addressed at all before, ever).
William,
Would you say that this article is a good summary of your beliefs, (if you have the time and inclination to read it)?
http://www.reformationtheology.com/2007/08/compatibilistic_determinism.php
I like Dr. Craig and listen to one of his podcasts, but he’s AWFUL on the topic of compatibilism. I’ve never heard him actually discuss it; he always changes the subject to incompatible determinism. For example:
This is false, because of the word “wholly”. This implies that no difference in mental activity exist between the two; no difference in preferences; even an exactly identical thought process took place. And this is not considered true in ANY determinism.
-Wm
That’s what I’m saying, yes. God works deliberately so that man’s sin will work together for good, instead of simply being chaos. He also restrains the extremes of man’s sin.
-Wm
That article’s not bad, although I ran across a sentence I couldn’t affirm: Those who believe man has a free will are not compatibilists, but should, rather, be called “inconsistent”. They later use the term “inconsistent Calvinists”, which might have been what they meant there; they also use the term “inconsistent with Scripture”, although they don’t spend enough time to actually justify it.
However, all in all, it’s an acceptable article, if you find that it clarifies the issue to you. I didn’t find it extremely clear, but it may have worked for you.
-Wm
Wm,
Thanks for reading the article. Just knowing that you call yourself a compatibilist has helped me to understand your postion better then I did before.
Thank you for asking; I apologize for not having made that perfectly clear. It’s important to our discussion.
-Wm
WM,
1. The reason I think you don’t understand Craig on this is because you don’t understand what he’s doing. Compatibilism preposes that determinism is true. It then proposes that a kind of free will (or whatever you want to call it) that is compatible with determinism is also true. The superior premise in this is that determinism is true and it is this that Craig is attacking.
2. “This is false, because of the word “wholly”….”
I actually think this statement by Craig is true and should not be controversial to anyone who holds to determinism of any kind. The fact that anyone believes anything is wholly because God has determined that person to believe that thing. Now perhaps using the word “ultimately” would be better, but I think “wholly” works. If God had not destined and determined you to believe what you believe you would not believe it. I also don’t see how it implies equal brain states at the beggining. It’s just to the extent the brain states are different this too has been determined by God.
3. Reworded syllogism – I’m really not sure what you are not getting.
1. Everything one believes they were determined to believe by an external force.
2. The external force equally determined those who believe truth and those who believe falsehood.
3. Since we have no independent thoughts outside of what we were determined to think (i.e. the very thought that X is true because of Y is a determined thought) we cannot tell whether or not we have been determined by the external force to believe truth or falsehood.
4. Since we cannot independently determine whether or not we were determined to have true or false beliefs we cannot claim any certainty about the truth or falsehood of our beliefs.
I would simply ask – show me how, given the truth of determinism, one could have trancendent certainty about the truth of their beliefs (one could of course experience certainty – but everyone does, even to beliefs we would agree are false)
Wm,
You said,
If there’s only one actual possibility that you could actually take, and it’s been fixed at that possibility since the beginning of the universe, it’s still a free choice. This is a statement I firmly believe in.
Cheryl has made it clear that if there’s only one possible option isn’t not an actual choice, so she and I still disagree.
How do you deal with all of these verses showing that God gave man more then one choice in many cases and expected him to actually make the choice? Was God misleading man here into thinking He had more then one choice when He only had the one that God had ordained ahead of time and that the man, (however you understand it) voluntarily chose of his own will? These verses alone seem to me to totally refute the idea that man has only one choice.
I Kings 18:21 Elijah came near to all the people and said, “How long will you hesitate between two opinions? If the LORD is God, follow Him; but if Baal, follow him.” But the people did not answer him a word”
Deuteronomy 30:19 “I call heaven and earth to witness against you today, that I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse. So choose life in order that you may live, you and your descendants”
Joshua 24:15 “If it is disagreeable in your sight to serve the LORD, choose for yourselves today whom you will serve: whether the gods which your fathers served which were beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you are living; but as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD.”
2 Samuel 24:12 “Go and speak to David, ‘Thus the LORD says, “I am offering you three things; choose for yourself one of them, which I will do to you.”
Isaiah 7:16 “For before the boy will know enough to refuse evil and choose good, the land whose two kings you dread will be forsaken.”
(All from the NASB)
Okay, let me try to explain why this seems so fundamentally dishonest. The entire purpose of your argument is to allow people to realize that determinism undermines the ability to reach conclusions with logical grounds. And yet you throw in a premise which simply assumes that conclusions have unspecified grounds “wholly because God has determined them”. Now, this assumption doesn’t prove your argument so it’s not exactly begging the question, but it’s close to begging the question; if it were exclusively the truth, the only question remaining would be whether it were possible to know that God wanted you personally to reach correct conclusions.
Now, that’s the reason why this proposition is important to this argument. Here’s the reason why it’s false.
The whole reason why I believe what I believe is the evidence, the rules of logic, my proper rule-bases reasoning process, my proper creative reasoning, and my improper intrusions on the reasoning process.
None of those things require that determinism be true or false. Therefore, the results of my reasoning process are not dependent on whether determinism is true or false; and inspection of the above parts of a decision can reveal whether one’s process is more or less flawed. A less flawed decision is worthy of more certainty.
Because greater and lesser certainty can be assigned to conclusions regardless of whether determinism is true, your argument cannot be true.
-Wm
Okay, I may be seeing your argument. This argument appears to rely on humans being determined to think inconsistent thoughts, so that they will believe things that are against all the evidence, reason, and desires available to them. The reason I say that is that you mentioned “X is true because of Y”, and that thought would be useful to discover an inconsistency in one’s thought process.
So clearly you’re imagining that a deterministic thought system would be necessarily inconsistent, while an LFW thought system would be only *possibly* inconsistent (that is, if the person thought a little harder they’d see the inconsistency).
Am I right?
If so, would you want to add another proposition: “Some people are determined to reach conclusions that are inconsistent with the evidence and reason available to them.”?
I’m guessing that you’re going to say that LFW doesn’t suffer from that, right? Nobody in an LFW system believes anything inconsistent with the data?
Could you please explain how “transcendent certainty” differs from “certainty”? And then could you please expand your syllogism to include something about how LFW gives you that transcendent certainty? After all, your argument is supposed to be comparing LFW to determinism.
I’m still missing the point of your argument, because although I’m starting to guess what it’s trying to say about determinism, I don’t see why it’s a…
WM,
1. It is completely irrelevant how YOU think you came to the belief that you have. How the external force brought about the belief in question is irrelevant. The issue is that you were still determined by an external force to believe that belief. Once you have admitted that determinism in beliefs is true everything else – your reasoning skills, your system of logic, your weighing of the evidence – becomes suspect. These faculties become tools of the external force to manipulate in such a way as to ensure you believe what you were determined to believe.
2. “None of those things require that determinism be true or false. Therefore, the results of my reasoning process are not dependent on whether determinism is true or false; and inspection of the above parts of a decision can reveal whether one’s process is more or less flawed. A less flawed decision is worthy of more certainty.”
Basically what you are saying is you followed the evidence and everyone else just ignored it. Yet they would all say the same thing. From their perspective they followed the evidence, logic, reason, etc. and you are simply ignoring it. So what gives?? Ultimately what gives is that God engineered the universe in such a way that you were determined to believe what you believe and they were determined to believe what they believe. How one thinks they came about that belief is irrelevant because ones logic, reason, and weighing (or ignoring) of the evidence is just as determined and engineered as the final belief (if it were not their would be no way to ensure that one came to the belief they were determined to believe).
3. “Because greater and lesser certainty can be assigned to conclusions regardless of whether determinism is true, your argument cannot be true.”
This is fallacious. One is assigning these certainties from within their determined belief systems. It is ultimately equivalent to the truism that “people believe to be true what they believe to be true”. If someone thought that Christianity had a higher probability of being true then Islam they’d believe Christianity (or be Agnostic on the matter since there is a probability they are wrong either way). However, there is no objective source to determine these probabilities. Only people with determined beliefs (which are as likely to be right as wrong) weighing the evidence according to determined standards (which are as likely to be right as wrong) coming up with determined probabilities (which are as likely to be right as wrong).
4. Of course people in a LFW system can choose to believe things inspite of the evidence. The difference is they do so of their own free will, not because they were destined too.
5. I use transcendent to denote something that is unconstrained. So for instance transcendent choice = a choice unrestrained by a external causal force (i.e. God or immaterial cause and effect). One can appear to choose while having all the variables that went into that choice predetermined such that they didn’t really choose – they only appeared to choose.
By trancendent certainty I mean a type of certainty that isn’t simply the subjective experience of certainty within ones determined belief system.
WM,
Just a point of clarification. The force of Dr. Craig’s argument if you read it carefully is not that determinism is false, but rather that it cannot be rationally affirmed because it’s affirmation undermines the rationality of the person affirming it. That persons logic, reason, and weighing of the evidence cannot possibly be seen as free and objective, but rather as determined and subjective.
Michael, I see you posted a reply; but I also see that I didn’t sufficiently emphasize my question: “Could you please explain how “transcendent certainty” differs from “certainty”?”
The reason I want to reemphasize that is that you admit that “certainty” is available to all under any system, regardless of truth; while you say that “transcendent certainty” is only available under LFW, and apparently only to those whose beliefs are true.
I know that certainty is an emotion. What is “transcendent certainty”? How does it work?
Perhaps my confusion is because I don’t understand the thing that you’re saying that only LFW can provide.
-Wm
WM,
As I said earlier I invented the phrase transcendent certainty. Perhaps objective certainty would be a better phrase that communicates what I mean better. I am simply trying to distinguish what I am talking about from the subjective certainty everyone (Atheists, Muslims, Christians, etc.) experiences about their beliefs.
It seems relevant, especially if the force brought about the belief in a way that is identical to the created being’s natural workings.
BUT, perhaps I’m missing the main goal. Let’s hear what “transcendent certainty” really is, and why LFW guarantees it.
Beg pardon, I didn’t intend to say that, and I can’t tell where I miscommunicated to you. I wasn’t talking about “me” and “everyone else”. I have no idea where that came from. Is there any way you could re-read my post and assume that I didn’t introduce “me” or “everyone else”? I don’t know what good those two parties would do in this argument.
What I was trying to say was that anyone can examine their own or someone else’s reasoning process, starting from the evidence, and search for flaws. The fewer flaws found, the greater the confidence in the results. This is how one recreates an experiment in science.
I know how cognition works. I just don’t see what LFW contributes!
-Wm
I’m aware of how suicide arguments work, yes. And I’ve seen that specific one effectively employed against physical determinists — because they believe that our cognition is determined by impersonal forces that “care” for nothing, least of all correspondence with reality.
I’ve also seen that argument employed ineffectively, by people who forget to ground it in the “impersonal forces” I mentioned above; the atheist simply counters that natural selection weeds out beings with inadequate cognition. Unless the argument’s wielder counters with the point about impersonal forces, there’s nothing you can do.
-Wm
Thank you, Michael, but “objective certainty” still doesn’t help me. Certainty is an emotion, a subjective state. Did you mean something like “objective truth”? That is, one’s beliefs actually correspond with the real world?
So is the “holy grail” here actually “objectively true beliefs”? If so, how does LFW help one achieve them (in a way that deterministic thought processes cannot)?
-Wm
WM,
1.
“What I was trying to say was that anyone can examine their own or someone else’s reasoning process, starting from the evidence, and search for flaws. The fewer flaws found, the greater the confidence in the results. This is how one recreates an experiment in science.
I know how cognition works. I just don’t see what LFW contributes!”
A. The question is if the belief was determined how were the steps leading to that belief not determined?? And if the steps (logic, reason, etc.) leading to that decision were themselves determined (and were equally determined for those who reach the opposite belief) why trust your reasoning faculties.
B. The concept that the fewer flaws one finds the more likely the result is of course another truism. The question is were the reasoning capacities by which you discovered those flaws determined as well – if determism is true they would have to be. And if they are determined why trust that they are accurate?
2. “And I’ve seen that specific one effectively employed against physical determinists”
The nature of the determining entity is irrelevant since the only way one knows the nature of the determining entity is through beliefs they were determined to have. Thus God could be a sadist and just determined me and you to believe that He was good. Or the force could really be impersonal and the cause and effect simply caused us to believe it is personal in nature. One can’t know.
3. “So is the “holy grail” here actually “objectively true beliefs”? If so, how does LFW help one achieve them”
I think this is a fair assessment depending on where you go with it (I’m never quite sure if we are on the same page in our meanings). If all beliefs are determined all that exists is subjectivity within ones determined belief. Objectivity of any kind cannot exist. If LFW exists then there is something transcendent about humanity which allows us to freely weigh the evidence and come to a decision (which is not to say that ones prejudices play no role – they just aren’t the determinitive factor in how one decides and we can go against them). Thus while I would agree that pure objectivity does not exist even with LFW, there is a much, much higher degree of objectivity then the pure subjectivity of a deterministic system and thus one can have a higher degree of certainty about their beliefs.
4. I would be interested in your response to my assertion that if determism is true both our beliefs and the faculties we use to come to those beliefs are determined – thus we shouldn’t consider the faculties we used to have any objective authority.
Oops posted something here that was related to something else. My bad…
William,
I’m still wondering how you respond to Scriptures like I quoted above where God is asking people to choose between several different options given your statements that there is only one possible “choice” available at any given time–the one that has been determined by God–and your belief that having only one option available to us is still a “choice”.
Exactly my point! And here’s another element: not only are the steps determined and the belief determined and the outcome determined, but God cares about them all. He’s not leaving out steps (say, because he doesn’t care about them); He cares about all the steps.
Because you can examine your reasoning process, and other people can (if you document it) examine your reasoning process. And finally, at the transcendent extreme, there is a loving God who lives and is the Truth, and calls us to know Him.
You keep assuming that your desired conclusion is ineffably true. It’s only true if the reasoning process that God’s determined us to have is inherently wrong.
What we know about “the determining entity” is irrelevant. The thing that matters is Who the determining entity actually is. God exists objectively, not subjectively.
Now, if I were to claim that God was irrational or non-rational, you would be correct to claim that my argument committed suicide: I couldn’t possibly know that, because I couldn’t possibly know anything.
-Wm
So God has determined one set of Christians to know the truth about Him and one group of Christians to know a falsehood about Him? With all of the diametrically opposing beliefs and shades of belief in the body of Christ today, that seems to be the conclusion one would likely come to. But yet you say God calls us to know Him. Or is He giving us all just a glimpse of the real Him even if our glimpses seem to be totally opposed to each other?
Seems to me that Michael’s whole point here is, how do you know if the way God has determined for you to know Him is the truth, or if the truth is the way God has determined me to know Him, or if the truth is the way God has determined Michael to know Him, or if the truth is the way God has determined that Joe down the street know Him, etc, etc, etc.???
False. Objective truth still exists. It’s an open question whether our subjective beliefs can be brought into correspondence with objective truth; that depends on the nature of the determination, not on simply whether we’re determined.
The problem here is that this ALSO depends on the nature of the transcendent. If LFW is conformed to ultimate reality, then yes, the conclusions will be more conformed to reality (and thus true). If LFW is independent of reality, then the conclusions will NOT be more true; you’re as likely to “choose” the wrong thing as you are to choose the right thing!
All conclusions are subjective because they belong to the subject. Whether they conform to the object depends on how they are reached.
My response is that this is exactly what I’ve been saying all along.
This does not follow. Absurd non sequitur. I believe I’ve answered this completely elsewhere.
-Wm
I say “Those are all true. I agree with them.”
If you want to interact, you’ll have to explain how you interpret the verse. It’s not enough to storm me with verses; I’ve read them all, and they’re all part of why I believe what I believe.
It’s probably best to start with a single verse rather than attempting an avalanche.
I’ll give an example for you in my next comment, based on one of your verses. I’ll pick one that’s hard for me.
-Wm
Wm,
If I didn’t make myself plain, I am sorry. I thought I did. Every single one of those verses is a verse where we are commanded to make a choice between several possible options.
So how do you interpret God giving us that choice in any or all of these verses when you have said that we really have no choice at all–there is only one possible thing we can choose, that which God has predetermined in the past?
I am saying that God gives us choice in those verses, choice like Michael and I both understand choice, choice between more then one option. Not choice as you seem to define it which seems to be the freedom to voluntarily choose the only option really available to us.
Forgive me if I seem dense here. But wrapping my mind around your understanding of these issues is not easy for me at all since they are so totally opposite of the way I understand things. And for that matter, the way I see the reality of “choice” working.
(And remember, the way I understand all these things has been determined for me by God, so how else could I understand them anyway??) 🙂
I Kings 18:21 Elijah came near to all the people and said, “How long will you hesitate between two opinions? If the LORD is God, follow Him; but if Baal, follow him.” But the people did not answer him a word”
Literally, “How long are you going to limp around on two crutches?” No choice implied or stated.
Deuteronomy 30:19 “I call heaven and earth to witness against you today, that I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse. So choose life in order that you may live, you and your descendants”
Deut 30 says that they will experience all the curses and blessings, they will turn away, and that they will come back. This is a prophecy, not a mere choice.
Joshua 24:15 “If it is disagreeable in your sight to serve the LORD, choose for yourselves today whom you will serve: whether the gods which your fathers served which were beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you are living; but as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD.”
Joshua grounds this not on their free choice to serve God, but on whether they find service to God “disagreeable”. The only choice is which of the foreign Gods they will serve. Joshua, like Moses before him, promises the Hebrews that they will turn from God (and they do!).
2 Samuel 24:12 “Go and speak to David, ‘Thus the LORD says, “I am offering you three things; choose for yourself one of them, which I will do to you.”
Note that first, these are all punishments, not moral goods. Second, David answers that he trusts the mercy of God, not of man; David _prefers_ one not by LFW, but because of inherent desires (good desires!). This shows the character of David; he does it because he’s a man after God’s own heart.
Isaiah 7:16 “For before the boy will know enough to refuse evil and choose good, the land whose two kings you dread will be forsaken.”
Note that refusing evil and choosing good requires not transcendent will, but rather knowledge…