Copan answers: Who created God? (Dale)

Apr 302012
 

“Well, who created God, then?” Many an atheist has lobbed this one, supposing it to be a devastating objection in question form.

In reply, Christian philosopher Paul Copan knocks this one out of the park.

Well played, sir. I would add a few points:

One of the perfections a perfect being is supposed to have is aseity – existing but not because of anything else. God by definition has this. The physical cosmos, it seems, could not. It seems that no physical object could exist independently of anything else (a se – Latin for “through itself”). Any physical object owes its existence to some cause or causes, and will go out of existence if conditions cease to be favorable.

So there is nothing arbitrary in the believer in God demanding to know what caused the physical cosmos to come into existence, while not demanding to know what caused God to exist. Given the sort of being God is supposed to be (perfect, so a se) it is a contradiction to suppose that God is caused to exist. (X caused an essentially uncausable being to exist.)  The question/demand/objection I started this post with is based on ignorance of what sophisticated monotheism is. It’s too bad that some well known recent atheist writers have propagated this mistake.

There is trouble here, by the way, for some Trinity theories (hint: eternal generation). See here if you’re interested.

Defining the concept of a Christian unitarian (Dale)

Apr 242012
 

(click for image credit)

Thanks to reader Mike Gant  for his question about my last post.

As of now I think I’ve got a solid definition of the concept unitarian: someone who believes that the one God just is (i.e. is numerically identical to) a certain self and not to any other self.

But I then tried to define the more specific concept of a Christian unitarian: someone who believes that the one God just is (i.e. is numerically identical to) a certain self, namely the Father, and not to any other self.

But this is not a good definition. Mike asked: what about ancient friends of God like Moses and Abraham?

D’oh! The above definition makes them Christian unitarians. Thus, it is too “broad” or “wide.” Continue reading »

Defining the concept of a unitarian (Dale)

Apr 242012
 

Last time I offered a definition of the concept of a trinitarian.

This time, I will try to define the concept of a unitarian.

Many definitions of this concept are unacceptably polemical.  It is unacceptable to define a unitarian as an anti-trinitarian.  This violates requirements 3 and 5 – it doesn’t tell us what a unitarian is, but only what a unitarian is against.  And this is part of a common slashing rhetorical strategy which I have recently mentioned.  For the same reasons we must reject defining the concept unitarian as one who “denies the Trinity” or “has heretical beliefs about the Trinity,” etc. Equally, it is unacceptable to define a unitarian as one who holds the correct or biblical view about Jesus and God. Whether or not that’s so, it’s trying to sneak an argument for a thesis into a pseudo-definition of that thesis.

One common definition is,

Definition 1: someone who believes in exactly one unipersonal God.

I think this is on the right track, but the term “unipersonal” is obscure, and so this definition violates requirement 6 (and possibly also 3).

I have been working with this definition of the concept:

Definition 2: someone who believes that the one God just is (is numerically identical to) the Father.

I now think that this isn’t quite right.

First the definition is arguably too narrow.  Continue reading »

Defining the concept of a trinitarian (Dale)

Apr 232012
 

I woke up this morning, and realized that there is a problem with how I’ve been defining the concept of a unitarian.  In this post, I will attempt a definition of the concept of a trinitarian, after reviewing what is required of a good definition. Next time, I’ll try to define the concept of a unitarian.

According to the textbook I have used for years in my critical thinking class, a good definition should:

  1. Include the genus and a differentia.
  2. Not be too broad or too narrow.
  3. State the essential attributes of the concept’s referents.
  4. Not be circular.
  5. Not use negative terms unnecessarily.
  6. Not use vague, obscure, or metaphorical language. (p. 44)

What is a trinitarian?

Definition 1: someone who believes in a triune god.

This fails Continue reading »

“Sabellianism Reconsidered” Considered – Part 8 (Dale)

Apr 222012
 

In this last post in this series, I want to put out a few critical reactions to Baber’s “Neo-Sabellian” Trinity theory.

My thanks to Harriet for this piece and for her interaction with us here.

No doubt, she’ll argue back; and she will probably say something about how her views have changed since she wrote this piece.

So, in no particular order:

  1. I agree with her that it’s suspicious if some philosophical theory should appeal to us only or mainly because it’ll help us in theology. I also agree with her that it’s interesting to at least try to come up with what is in some sense an acceptable Trinity theory which uses only metaphysical doctrines we have other reasons to believe.
  2. Again, I think it is a good aim to produce an intelligible (seemingly consistent) Trinity theory, assuming some such theory is called for. I think she’s correct to complain about the severe obscurity of traditional claims about “eternal generation” and “procession”.
  3. Picky point: I think “Neo-Sabellian” is a misnomer. It’s “Neo” all right, but Continue reading »

“Sabellianism Reconsidered” Considered – Part 7 (Dale)

Apr 202012
 

Time for the old Spanish Inquisition. Will she survive The (self-administered) Rack?

In the final part of her article “Sabellianism Reconsidered”, Baber turns to theological objections. To wit:

  • The account renders it impossible for the Son to pray to the Father. But the NT says this happened.
  • The account denies that each Person of the Trinity is himself eternal, and has eternally born relations to the other two Persons. (pp. 8-9, paraphrased)

Her answers? Jesus, like his contemporaries, was not a trinitarian. That is, he didn’t realize  that the God to whom he prayed had temporal parts which were gods. Or even if he did, he didn’t intend to teach any trinitarian doctrine. Thus, he addressed not the Father, but God, as “Father”. (p. 10) Thus the term “Father”, in Jesus’ context, referred to God, while nowadays (post 380 CE?) it refers to the Father, the (temporally) first Person of the Trinity.

In response to the second objection, she notes that “a notion of timeless, metaphysically necessary causation Continue reading »

“Sabellianism Reconsidered” Considered – Part 6 (Dale)

Apr 192012
 

Switchfoot “are one”. But they are really just five dudes, not one.

Baber observes,

Typically, aggregates of Fs are not themselves Fs. A collection of cats is not itself a cat… an aggregation of persons is not a person. (p. 7, emphasis added)

Still, she thinks this needn’t preclude three gods from themselves being a god. Some sorts of things, it seems, can have other things of that same sort for parts, such as a Sierpinski Triangle. (p. 10) Maybe, then, gods are more like triangles like cats, in that groups of god can be (temporal) parts of a god. At least, we can’t rule out that this is possible.

How many temporal parts does God, on this theory have? There’s no reason to think it is exactly three. Continue reading »

“Sabellianism Reconsidered” Considered – Part 5 (Dale)

Apr 172012
 
To be omnipotent, Baber says, “is to be able to do [directly, by fiat] any action… including actions at times other than” the time at which one is omnipotent. (p.6)
But consider, say, the action of miraculously inflicting some person with a headache on 1/1/2015. It seems that the Father, on this theory, couldn’t do that, as he wouldn’t exist then (having been superseded by the Son and the Spirit) – at least not directly. Thus, it seems he wouldn’t be omnipotent. But then, he wouldn’t be a god, or fully divine, as the theory requires. Likewise, the Son would not have the ability to create the world, as he existed only c. 1-33 CE.

But, if I follow her compressed reasoning here (p.7), the reasoning just given is mistaken. God is, at any time, able to bring about anything at that time. He’s able to do this because of his temporal part (e.g. the Father) which exists at any given time. (Or if we’re talking about stretches of time, it could be 2-3 parts.) But each God-temporal-part is also omnipotent, in that for all its career, it can do any action, at the earlier or later gods which count as the same god as it, have the same sort of power during their careers. So, take the Son. He’s omnipotent, because (1) during his life he can do any action, (2) at times later than his life, the Holy Spirit can do any action, and the Holy Spirit counts as the continuing existence of the Son, and for parallel reasons, (3) before the Son’s life, he ought to be thought of as pre-existing as the Father, who during all of his career, could do any action. “The Persons, therefore, are as omnipotent… as [God] is.” (p.9) Thus, she holds, her third condition is satisfied – each of the Persons is wholly divine.

Next time: But is the Trinity God?

Religious Disagreement (Dale)

Apr 162012
 

Just got back from Killeen Chair Conference on Religious Disagreement. Kudos to Tomás Bogardus (soon to be of the University of St. Thomas in Minnesota) and St. Norbert College for a great conference.

This has been a hot topic in epistemology. Put in the most simple terms: if I think P is true, and then find out that someone at least as  intelligent and informed as me thinks P is false, must I then withhold about P (neither believe that it is true, nor believe that it is false)? My answer is: not necessarily.  See here for some seminal papers; readers of this blog will probably be most interested in the last two pieces – by eminent Christian philosophers van Inwagen and Plantinga. I agree with the thrust of both, although philosophers agree now that more should be said.

To those who want to delve into the epistemology, I’ll just opinionate that I think Michael Bergman is on the right track. Also, see important recent and forthcoming work by Nathan King (religious disagreement) and Thomas Kelly (disagreement in general). Another important player, who I also think is generally on track, is my former classmate Jennifer Lackey (disagreement in general).

Young Christian philosopher Andrew Moon also gave a good paper at the conference. Happily, he recently gave a twenty-minute, popular-audience-level talk on the epistemology of religious disagreement as a part of my department’s Young Philosophers  Lecture Series. Check it out!

A Tale of Two Tattoos (Dale)

Apr 142012
 

I love philosophy majors. The best of them almost always develop a nerdy and warped sense of humor – and I mean that in the best way. :-)

These two young ladies, recent alumnas of our department, decided to get complementary tattoos. (Sober, they swear!)

In each case, the tattoo artist left off the two initial universal quantifiers: AxAy (I can’t find the symbol codes for the upside down A representing the universal quantifier – so please imagine those A’s upside down.) They would read: For any x whatsoever and for any y whatsoever…

Now to the tattoos. “F” is supposed to be, either a predicate or a property. On the right tattoo (wrist) the right, closing parentheses is just out of view.

One of the tattoos says something nearly all philosophers agree is true (a rarity!) while the other is held to be false by many. Here’s your homework, dear reader: Continue reading »

“Sabellianism Reconsidered” Considered – Part 4 (Dale)

Apr 122012
 
The theory, then, is that God is an everlasting, temporally extended thing with three temporal parts, each of which is a god. But, they’re the same god as God. Yet as we saw last time, how can the Three be gods at all, as each exists at some times but not others?

Without going into the arguments for this controversial thesis, Baber appeals to the claim made by Derek Parfit and others, that “identity is not ‘what matters’ for survival”. (p.6) Thus, a future thing can count as my surviving, though it is not (numerically) identical to me.

Suppose (I’m stealing this thought experiment from Richard Swinburne) some mad scientists, such as Pinkie and the Brain, are going to cut my brain in half, and put the left half in one body, and the right in another. The body which gets the left half will be tortured to death, while the body getting the right half will be given lifetime passes to all NFL games and a lifetime supply of good beer. If I’m to undergo this experiment, I want to know which of these resulting people will be (numerically identical to) me: the unlucky one, the lucky one, or neither.

Baber (following Parfit) wants to say that depending on how exactly the resulting people are related to me, both may count as the continuation of or survival of me. Specifically, she suggests that psychological continuity is enough – it is enough that the later people have the same or nearly the same beliefs, desires, and so on that I have.

I don’t think this is right, but back to the Trinity: In her view, the god which is a God-stage (temporal part of God) called the Father would, just before the Incarnation, be mistaken to think Continue reading »

“Sabellianism Reconsidered” Considered – Part 3 (Dale)

Apr 112012
 

To continue Baber’s attempt to retool Sabellianism:

Suppose your car, named KITT, has temporal parts. KITT, then is the sum of, the whole composed of these parts. (KITT at t1, KITT at t2, KITT at t3, KITT at t4…etc.) Further, Baber urges each of these car-stages (temporal parts of a car) is itself a car. So, e.g., KITT at t3 is just as much a car as the whole KITT. But now, suppose David Hasselhoff is driving KITT on, say, Easter. He’s actually, on this metaphysics, driving two cars, for KITT on Easter is a different car than KITT (the sum of KITT-stages).

Not to worry, argues Baber. We simply need a concept of “tensed identity”. This is not numerical identity as normally understood, but is rather the relation between KITT and KITT at Easter, such that they “count as one”. (p.5) Thus, Baber suggests that if we believe in temporal parts, the thesis of “tensed identity” is a “plausible way to avoid over-population.” (p. 5)

Back to God. She’s exploring the idea that God is a whole composed of three temporal parts Continue reading »

“Sabellianism Reconsidered” Considered – Part 2 (Dale)

Apr 052012
 
President Bush, President Reagan, President Carter, President Ford, President Nixon
What is this adequate Trinity theory called “Sabellianism”, according to Baber? It is what I’ve called serial, non-essential FSH noumenal modalism - each “person” of the Trinty is a mode of God, a way God is during a period of time. None of these overlap (serial), they supervene on God’s intrinsic features (noumenal), and they are non-essential – if God hadn’t created, there would have been no time, and so no temporal parts to his life.
So the theory is that the one God is an everlasting self with three temporal parts, the Father (up to the time of the Incarnation?), the Son (during the earthly life of Jesus, ending at Pentecost?) and the Holy Spirit (Pentecost and after?). So the three “persons” of the Trinity are in fact person-stages of the one divine person/self, but they are also persons as well.

Following an ancient tradition of mocking modalists as “patripassians”, she seems to think the biggest or the main problem with modalism is that it identifies the Father and the Son. (pp. 1, 3) On her modalist theory, they are temporal parts (person-stages) of one being, but they are not numerically identical – they are different temporal parts of God. As she observes, on this theory, “There is… no time at while f=s.” (p. 3) Thus, her theory doesn’t identify any of the persons with one another, or with God for that matter.

Many metaphysicians, she knows, reject the theory of temporal parts, and the perdurance theory of how a thing can “last” through time.

But moving on, is this theory monotheistic? She urges,

All we need to capture the spirit of monotheism is the doctrine that at any time there is exactly one God. (3)

Huh? She draws an analogy with US Presidents; at any given time, there’s one one.

But imagine this: Continue reading »

“Sabellianism Reconsidered” Considered – Part 1 (Dale)

Apr 032012
 
Three modes, one mentally ill self.
Dr. Harriet Baber (aka H.E. Baber) teaches philosophy at the University of San Diego, and has been active for many years in the Society of Christian Philosophers. She’s published a number of papers on gender, philosophy of religion, metaphysics, and other topics. I met her in the 1990s at an SCP conference in California, and I have always found her to be funny, smart, and independent-minded. And judging by her website theme, I gather she likes to do shots of… some sort of grass juice. :-) More relevantly, I believe she’s a lifelong Episcopalian.
Here I want to review her provocative “Sabellianism Reconsidered” (Sophia 41:2, Oct 2002, 1-18.)

Her starting point is this argument:

1. There is only one God.
2. The Father is God.
3. The Son is God.
4. Therefore, the Father is the Son. (p. 1) Continue reading »

Theophilus Lindsey on human stubbornness (Dale)

Apr 012012
 

…very rarely is there found candour enough in the human breast, for a man to recede from opinions, for the defence of which he has drawn his pen, and been highly applauded, however strong and demonstrative be the evidence to the contrary that is presented to him. (Theophilus Lindsey, An Historical View of the State of the Unitarian Doctrine and Worship, From the Reformation to Our Own Times, p. 175)

Sad but true.

I must add, though, that one should be very careful in wielding this charge. In the context Lindsey is unfair; he makes this remark about a person in a dispute who in my judgment was not simply being stubborn, not ignoring a mass of evidence to the contrary.

We can be too quick to mock politicians (“Flip-flopper!”) who’ve changed their minds about substantial issues. We assume, cynically, that they must be merely saying they’ve changed beliefs to gain political advantage. But how do we know they haven’t really changed their mind, after revisiting the evidence? Case in point: Romney on abortion.

Given how finite and fallible we are, if someone never changes his mind, you can be sure that he just doesn’t think much.

True story: On the day I successfully defended my PhD dissertation Continue reading »

Scott Williams’s new paper: Henry of Ghent on Real Relations and the Trinity (Dale)

Mar 262012
 

Congratulations to Scott Williams, trinities contributor and newly minted Oxford University PhD in Theology,  on his forthcoming paper:

 ‘Henry of Ghent on Real Relations and the Trinity: The Case for Numerical Sameness Without Identity’, in: Recherches de Théologie et Philosophie Médiévales 79.1 (2012), will be published.

Here is his abstract:

I argue that there is a hitherto unrecognized connection between Henry of Ghent’s general theory of real relations and his Trinitarian theology, namely the notion of numerical sameness without identity.
This last notion can be traced back to Aristotle, and pops up through the middle ages: the basic idea is that an x and y can differ, and so fail to be identical, and yet be “numerically one”. Myself, I deny that there’s any such relation, but some disagree, most notably Mike Rea and Jeff Brower. Here’s a relevant 2007 post featuring Billary.
Theories of real relations… well, Scott should get on here and explain that one! Medieval theories of relations are best left to the specialists. :-)

It’s just gotta be true… (Dale)

Mar 242012
 

<gossip>Once some years ago, I was hanging out with a group of Christian philosophers, and the subject of the Trinity came up. One person,  a well known philosopher, firmly remarked that “It’s just gotta be modalism.”

I recently shared this story with a Christian philosopher friend. In response, he told me that more recently, he was hanging with a group of Christian philosophers, and one (who is at least as respected as the aforementioned – which is to say, very) opined firmly that Christians should just admit to being tritheists and defend tritheism. </gossip>

My friend and I got a big laugh out of this.

Neither philosopher, by the way, has published yet on this topic. But maybe we’re in for a bumpy ride!

The more I think about this, though, the less funny I think it is. There’s nothing new under the sun, says my darker self. And I recall the words of the dearly departed Christian philosopher William Alston,

It is a well known fact, amply borne out by the history of the discussion of the topic, that as soon as one goes beyond the automatic recital of traditional creedal phrases one inevitably leans either in the direction of modalism – the “persons” are simply the different aspects of the divine being and/or activity – or tritheism – there are really three Gods, albeit very intimately connected in some way. (“Swinburne and Christian Theology,” International Journal for Philosophy of Religion, 41 (1997) , p. 54).

Well, if that’s so, maybe there’s a problem with those traditional creedal phrases! (For his part, Alston rested with a very unsatisfying appeal to mystery.)

I tremendously respect all three of these people – Alston and the two nameless ones – but I dare say that none of the three has fully enough explored all the options.

How not to conduct theological dialogue (Dale)

Mar 222012
 

A poor exchange. Read it first – then my comments.

Where do I start?

  • The unitarian behaves poorly. Pretending to ask questions, he instead puts forward objections. This is disrespectful. And it makes the compliments at the start seem disingenuous, which is obnoxious.
  • But Bill serves it back, by sarcastically labeling the thing “Muslim objections…” Cute.
  • Are these objections “simple-minded”? No, not really. What they are, are objections to Jesus being the same self as, and so identical to God.  They are objections from the indiscernibility of identicals. And they do apply to one-self understandings of the Trinity.
  • But the unitarian, not having done his homework, lobs them at Craig, to whom they do not apply. ‘Cause Craig thinks that God Continue reading »

Craig, White, and Cerberus (Dale)

Mar 182012
 

First, I suggest we stick with “SER-ber-us” because pronouncing it “Ker-ber-us” fills some people’s  heads with images like these. And we can all agree, that is not a good thing. :-)

Last time, I mentioned Bill Craig’s recent public assertion of his Cerberus analogy for the Trinity. Here’s a remix by an Islamic apologist, with snickering commentary by Reformed Christian apologist James White.

I take it White is not a “social” theorist like Craig, but rather a negative mysterian (refusing to assign much intelligible content to the doctrine) – like those Dallas Theological Seminary folks. In that video linked above, he just asserts that Craig doesn’t know what he’s talking about.

This (that he’s a negative mysterian) in confirmed by this follow up video.  (Or at his blog.) In the name of just sticking with what the Bible says, he just Continue reading »

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