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Dale

Dale Tuggy (PhD Brown 2000) was Professor of Philosophy at the State University of New York at Fredonia from 2000-2018. He now works outside of academia in Middle Tennessee but continues to learn and podcast.

perfection, the Trinity, and impossible beings (Dale)


“This clears it all up, right?”
Anselm: “Um, no. I must bestow upon it the analytic frown of uncomprehension.”
(image credit)

I used to think I had a great objection to Anselm’s famous ontological argument. (Bear with me – this has something to do with social trinitarianism.) The argument, at least many forms of it, basically goes like this. If it is logically possible that there’s a Greatest Possible Being (i.e. a being such that there’s no logical possibility of there being a greater one), then it is necessary that there’s a Greatest Possible Being. More simply: if it’s possible (non-contradictory) that God exists, then it’s also necessary that God exists (i.e. it is inconsistent to suppose God not existing). (For more, see here and here. For more than you’d ever want to know, here.)

Many critics have replied like this:

I’d be a sucker to grant your premise. Why should I think that the notion of a Greatest Possible Being is the notion of a possible thing at all? Read More »perfection, the Trinity, and impossible beings (Dale)

Trinity Schminity – the music video

He’s baaaaack. A smokier, bluesier, dirtier “Trinity Schminity”. Now in basement music video form! Apparently there’s been some big shakeup in the band. Their website says “we are now a Christian father and son band”. Mother and daughter, we hardly knew ye. 🙁 Thankfully, they’re still “100% monotheist”. And they still ROCK. Get it? Winter has made himself a phony Trinity. “Bobo” and “Hayseed” are… Read More »Trinity Schminity – the music video

on interpersonal love and stick figures (Dale)


Four vivid, moving, memorable depictions of Love.

A post on some previous post commentary – no one can navel-gaze like a philosopher! 🙂 Here’s a pictorial recap, and some additional thoughts on the comments here, in response to Scott and JT. The point of all this: we’re exploring why people who call themselves “social trinitarians” don’t like what they call “Latin” theories, and specifically the claim that those “Latin” theories can’t do justice to the loving relationships between the persons of the Trinity.Read More »on interpersonal love and stick figures (Dale)

Reflections on the Impossibility of a truly lonely Christian God (Dale)


Not possible. But why? (image credit)

Here are some rough-draft thoughts on another line of thinking associated with social trinitarian theories.

God is perfect. Arguably, an absolutely perfect being could not fail to be “well off” – in classical terminology, a perfect being must be happy, must be in a “blessed” condition. Part of perfection is independence. One kind of independence is the kind which comes up when discussing ontological or cosmological arguments for God’s existence – the idea of aseity, or existing but not because of anything else. But here’s another kind of independence or self-sufficiency: not requiring any thing (i.e. any fact not entailed by your existence) to be well off, to have a good life. Perhaps we could call it the divine property of security, or independent or self-sufficient happiness.

Is God as well off as he could possibly be? Arguably not,Read More »Reflections on the Impossibility of a truly lonely Christian God (Dale)

Are persons essentially relational?

Dallas Willard is one of my favorite authors, and I don’t normally go in for criticizing what he writes. But I found a great example in this (good) book (p. 122) of an idea that is fairly widespread, and which underlies a lot of social trinitarian speculation. This brief passage got me to thinking. He says, …God is love and sustains love for us from… Read More »Are persons essentially relational?

Linkage: Pruss on liberal theology (Dale)

You tell ’em, Joe. An interesting post & discussion: Alexander Pruss’s Blog: Liberal theology I think a lot of liberal theologians don’t have a “high view of reason” – many (not all) of them strike me as lazy drifters on miscellaneous intellectual currents. e.g. Has anyone’s reason really revealed to them, so to speak, that miracles don’t happen, or even that it’s irrational to believe… Read More »Linkage: Pruss on liberal theology (Dale)

Reader Question About Modalism


Ice, ice, baby. (image credit)

A reader emailed me this question, and I thought others would be interested in my (attempt at) an answer. Also, this is a good chance to review and summarize some of my previous postings on modalism.

I was wondering if you could read [the following] and tell me what I was believing? (I think it might have been a form of Modalism) Also, I search everywhere and find that Modalism is wrong, but no explanations specifically why. Can you help me out on some links explaining that?

…I used to believe there was one God. He sometimes is called Father, sometimes called Jesus, and sometimes called the Holy Spirit. And sometimes called all at the same time. Read More »Reader Question About Modalism

How not to do theology, Or: the theological Vogon (Dale)

newvogon.jpg

Poetry, anyone?

Karen Armstrong is a famous ex-nun who has written, among other things, a puffing biography of the prophet Muhammad. She frequently appears on TV confidently gassing about various religious matters. But I was really taken a back by this, which I ran across in a podcast:

Ms. Armstrong: Well, you see, I think theology is poetry. That’s what my Jewish friend, Chaim Maccabee, told me all those years ago when he quoted Hillel’s golden rule to me and said, “You know, it doesn’t matter what you believe. Theology is poetry.”Read More »How not to do theology, Or: the theological Vogon (Dale)

Linkage: a Muslim challenge (Dale)

The Trinity Challenge, from a Sufi Muslim blog. The comments there are wild and wooly. There’s a charge of polytheism, and some non-trinitarian Christians weigh in. The challenge, of course, cannot be met. But it seems to me he’s carelessly overlooking the options that the Trinity doctrine is: (1) implicitly taught in the Bible (i.e. it is deducible from what is there, though not explicitly… Read More »Linkage: a Muslim challenge (Dale)

H.O.G. Questions

H.O.G. – is that you up there? I’m getting my B.B. gun.

MMM indeed! Henry of Ghent doesn’t spare the medieval lingo, and as Scott points out, it seems he never met a trinitarian theory he didn’t like – emanation, psychology, relations – it’s all good! Thanks to its being Thanksgiving break – and let me say Happy Thanksgiving to all our American and Canadian readers – I’ve caught up on the recent posts, as well as some very involved comments on my original H.O.G. post. (To those just jumping in – we’re using some letters defined in this post – it actually helps!) Here are some comments and questions relating to the lengthy comments on my original H.O.G. post. Perhaps this’ll give Scott some grist for the mill as he continues his series on Henry’s trinitarian theory. Read More »H.O.G. Questions

MMM unleashed @ trinities

augustinespec1.jpg

Blame a lot of MMM on this guy – the Hip’ster.

I feel some need to explain and justify what is going on here, as I have divided loyalties.

On the one hand, the stated purpose of the blog is to make recent research on trinitarian theories available to the wider public, in relatively brief, understandable, jargon free form.

On the other hand, this blog’s most faithful readers and commenters are specialists in medieval philosophy & theology, or in recent analytic philosophy of religion, and they can really get into dialogging in the way that PhDs (and to-be-PhDs) in these fields do – which is to say – highly abstract, jargon filled, argument-heavy discourse, that only a scholar can love. Being a scholar, of course, I love it, and have no desire to stem their exploration of historic trinitarian theories. They are all, in various ways, doing cutting edge work, and I learn a lot by listening in, and by joining in. And I know that other philosophy profs appreciate these discussions as well.

My solution? Have it both ways. 🙂 I just want to try to build a bridge for non-academic readers, to help them, maybe, be able to get something out of this recent Medieval Metaphysical Mayhem (MMM). So I’m going to try to give some relevant background information.

Here goes: Read More »MMM unleashed @ trinities

The Latin Trinity Chart 3 – Henry of Ghent to the rescue

“Stand aside, puny moderns. Or postmoderns. Or whatever you are.”

I thought that Scott and Joseph made some really penetrating comments on the first two posts in this series. Here I want to recap them, so we can discuss how Henry of Ghent (c. 1217-93) a.k.a. The Solemn Doctor would interpret our chart (see the first two posts), specifically, the second, modalistic interpretation I offered.

First, Joseph comes in with some weighty objections to that model (summarized and expanded by me from his comments).Read More »The Latin Trinity Chart 3 – Henry of Ghent to the rescue

The Latin Trinity Chart 2 – a version of FSH modalism

 Let’s try this again.

Here’s a second application for my Latin Trinity chart (see the first post for what the letters designate). Let’s say that a state of affairs is a thing/substance having a property at a time or timelessly.

The “persons” here are just modes of D, that is, states of affairs involving D. So the Son just is D having Fi. And the Father just is D having P. And the Holy Spirit just is D having Sp. Regarding each of F, S, and H, each of them “just is” D – in the sense that in each of them, there is one and the same D.Read More »The Latin Trinity Chart 2 – a version of FSH modalism

Swinburne’s Social Trinitarian Theory, Part 5 – Yes, we can prove it by reason alone


If there’s at least one, there must be exactly three. Q.E.D.

The installment before the last, we saw that Richard Swinburne’s social trinitarian theory is very carefully built so as to satisfy multiple demands of orthodoxy. There is, he argues, a contradiction-free, reasonable trinitarian theory, which fits well with the classic creeds. But we can do even better than that. In Swinburne’s view, there’s a plausible argument for the Trinity based on reason alone. Don’t believe it? Oh, ye of little faith reason. Have ye not read the earlier Richard on this?Read More »Swinburne’s Social Trinitarian Theory, Part 5 – Yes, we can prove it by reason alone

Swinburne’s Social Trinitarian Theory, Part 4 – the cooperation involved in procession or spirating

Dale’s Swinburne Trininty chart, version 2.0. (or 1.1 – whatever) Thanks to reader (and Swinburne student) Joseph Jedwab for the correction. He points out: [Swinburne] wants to avoid the idea that the Spirit’s existence is causally overdetermined [i.e. that it has two complete causes, either of which would alone suffice]. But he also wants to avoid the idea that each actively only partly causes the… Read More »Swinburne’s Social Trinitarian Theory, Part 4 – the cooperation involved in procession or spirating

Swinburne’s Social Trinitarian Theory, Part 3 – functional monotheism

How the three are tightly functionally unified, in Swinburne’s view.

(See below for the interpretation.)

Last time we looked at Swinbure’s suggested reading of the creeds. They can’t he says, be charitably read as holding that in the same sense there’s only one divinity, and that there’s three. Swinburne comes down on the side of three. Like all social trinitarians, he’s attracted to a vision of the Trinity as being a loving community, three eternal and perfect, spirits, three selves, enjoying one another’s company, living in communion with one another, and working together in all they do. In short, he wants to say there are personal relationships internal to God – and this implies that there are persons – subjects of experience, thought, and action – in God.Read More »Swinburne’s Social Trinitarian Theory, Part 3 – functional monotheism

Swinburne’s Social Trinitarian Theory, Part 2 – a key move

(Picture credit.)

Swinburne isn’t what you’d call a theological liberal. He’s not a conservative evangelical either, given his rejection of things like biblical inerrancy. He was, I believe, a life-long Anglican, until 1996 when he converted to Eastern Orthodoxy. As I understand it, at least part of his motivation was his exasperation with anything-goes style Anglicanism (e.g. priests who are not theists). But my point is that he aims to be a “Catholic” Christian, in the sense of one who holds to mainstream orthodoxy – roughly, that core of doctrines held in common by Catholicism, Eastern Orthodoxy, and (at least in theory) most Protestants. (Actually, he’s probably a good bit more “Catholic” than that – in that he believes in apostolic succession, and in the authority of The Church to decree the meaning of scriptural texts – see his book Revelation.) This requires some dexterity on his part, and creates the burden of crafting a theory that one can claim fits with the “Athanasian” and Constantinopolitan Creeds.

Swinburne argues that it is uncharitable to read the ecumenical councils’ claim that “there is only one god” as asserting that there’s only one divine individual, as that would contradict their committment to there being three divine individuals.Read More »Swinburne’s Social Trinitarian Theory, Part 2 – a key move

Swinburne’s Social Trinitarian Theory, Part 1


Swinburne sez: Two thumbs up for the social analogy!

Richard Swinburne is an Emeritus professor at Oriel College, Oxford University, and is widely considered one of the greatest living Christian philosophers. He’s done original work in philosophy of science, epistemology, philosophy of mind, and general metaphysics, but is perhaps best known for his work in philosophy of religion and philosophical theology. He has a way of squarely facing tough issues, and treating them in original and principled ways. He’s particularly well known by philosophers for his arguments for mind-body dualism, for his cumulative case for the existence of God, and for his bold social trinitarian theory, which I’ll cover in this series. Read More »Swinburne’s Social Trinitarian Theory, Part 1

Quotes: Lewis Ayres on Pro-Nicene 3rd-4th century trinitarianism

 


A simple being containing multiple distinct “persons” – D’oh!

Theologian Lewis Ayres is the author of this worthy book. In it, he hammers the point that the Latin vs. Social trinitarian categories aren’t helpful in understanding post-Constantinople trinitarian theology. I think he’s right about that, though I persist in using the terminology because it is helpful for 20th and 21st century theories. Ayres’s book is a wonderful piece of patristic scholarship, but it is also an extended polemic against social trinitarians. Basically, he thinks that what he aptly calls the pro-Nicene tradition has gotten short shrift in recent theological work on the Trinity, and he very helpfully presents the core of that tradition and bats down a great many mis-readings of it. Obviously, he’s sympathetic to this sort of trinity theory, to put it mildly. This will definitely come up when I discuss social theories.

Here I just wanted to pass on a striking quote, which to me spotlights a central problem that many people have with the mainstream classic Latin or Pro-Nicene tradition.Read More »Quotes: Lewis Ayres on Pro-Nicene 3rd-4th century trinitarianism