Hmm. I might nit-pick that you make it seem like all free will proponents must be theists, which I don't believe is true, but other than that I have nothing to argue with on this one. (I'm shocked too!) Great stuff, keep it up.
Most Divine Determinists will say “yes.” This doesn’t seem to challenge God’s freedom, because i) His “freedom” could be compatibilistic and ii) even if it wasn’t His knowledge of His future choices could still be informed by His decisions.
If there are people still stick to this God fantasy and I don't think they are very logical, a child can use logic to come this conclusion with absolute sense that there is no GOD!
What about people who choose 3rd option (I'd call them "doesnt matter" people), who are convinced that world is non deterministic at least in some parts, making the whole distinction pointless?
I like Pereboom's way of defining it. It's simple and gets at the heart of what the proponent of free action is looking for: We have free will iff we are morally responsible for our actions in the basic desert sense. Also the compatibalist isn't committed to determinism being true, they need merely be committed to the fact that if it *were* true then we would have free will. I currently consider myself something of a compatibalist, but I also think that human action is indeterministic and that thereby determinism is false.
@@ApologeticsSquared hey hey one more question. Are you going to go over the coherence of libertarian free will? I’ve heard some people say it’s impossible.
If our universe is Compatibilist, how come God determines all things including their purpose? How do humans have free will if they can't choose anything and their purpose is determined?
Couldn't Molinism be considered a type of compatibilism? Because the antecedant condition of God actualizing this particular world entails that only one particular future is accessible to us. (Otherwise, we'd have the power to change God's foreknowledge in the past.)
A Molinist (however she does it) is explicitly going to deny the validity of this argument, since Molinism is *explicitly* incompatibilistic. The way I dodge this is to question the framing of the question. Whenever we think of a counterfactual, like “If I were the president, then I’d be rich,” we look at the closest possible world where the antecedent is true, and see if the consequent is true. The conditional your argument relies upon seems to be this: “If I had done otherwise, then this would change God’s past beliefs.” However, in the closest possible world where the antecedent is true, it had ALWAYS been the case that God held the different belief. So, Molinism can permit the ability to have done otherwise without us being able to control the past in a problematic way. Have a nice day! :)
When it comes to defining free will, exactly because there are so many opinions, I usually ask a person what they think they are free from at the given moment or always: - some substantial obstacles - another human's coercion / peer pressure - other spiritual beings' coercion - determinism - indeterminism (in a sense of some randomness in underlying reality; simply because something partially random emerges into choices, doesn't mean you have some significant freedom; many might say they re free from determinism and indeterminism both, so from physicalism) - God's will - God's foreknowledge ...and so on. Each person should be able to answer for each item on the list: yes, I'm free from that at the moment/sometimes/always. No, I'm not free from that at the moment/at times/ever. I don't know. Because the will itself is self-evident, but what underlies it is quite opaque, yet the evidence shows many discernible factors _can_ in fact influence it while philosophical or theological reasoning may lead to some conclusions as well. edit: Also, Molinism looks as fatalistic as determinism to me still...
What do you call the theory that states that God knows every single counterfactual for every single possible or impossible junction, but doesn't know which choice will be made in each junction? It's what I personally believe, but idk if that makes me a Heretic :(
The "doesn't know" is a bit off since Christians believe in an allknowing GOD. If HE knows every possible and impossible junction than it have to logically follow that HE would know wich choices will be made. That sounds fully deterministic, I know. Not a calvinist myself but I see how they can come to that conclusion. To be honest I'm not sure myself how it works out ultimately. I guess this is one of the things wich will be a mystery till we meet our heavenly FATHER. GOD bless you
That would be Open Theism, if I understand you correctly. I don’t think you are concerned to Hell for believing it, but I think it is very dangerous. Have a nice day! :)
These are all theistic perspectives. Which I appreciate is the focus of your channel. However, it would be quite nice if you either explicitly stated the implied premise (the existence of some form of magic sky fairy) in the video, for those of us who are not familiar with your oeuvre; or discuss non-theistic perspectives.
I would say the Bible is very clear God knows the end from the beginning. The Bible is also very clear that human beings have the power of choice. Knowing the result of a choice the decision maker makes does not mean God is determing that person's choice, It just means God has access to viewing the timeline in ways we do not, which I also feel is Biblical.
@@BeachBumZeroif you are to say that God knows the end from the beginning, exhaustively and perfectly, then you have to at least concede that agents (like humans) do not possess the ability to do otherwise (or God would not have perfect knowledge). There may be room to argue that the decision that an agent makes still originates from within that agent, but I don’t see any logical room left to argue that they could do other than what was already known by God.
@cordellcrisp I have heard this argument before, and I just don't see how there is a contradiction between free will and God knowing the choices human being WILL make. According to the Bible humans were created in the image of God, and part of that includes the ability to make free choices. Imagine I create a computer system with characters whom I give the ability through my programming to make choices as they freely decide within the system. Now also imagine that I am able outside of the computer system to see the choices each character made during a sequence before I actually run the sequence. Explain to me how that eliminates the free choice that character made. Just because I know the choice ahead of time does not make the choice any less valid. It just means I exist in a position in time ahead of the character. Knowledge of outcome in my view does not mean another choice could not have been made. It just means in that sequence another choice was not made. If I run the sequence again and once again know the choices before I run the sequence, but they are different the 2nd time then I think it shows the free will component. I think the human brain is design with an internal component that does allow free will choices. It allows us to contemplate and weigh options in a state of non choice before committing to a choice. I do think different choices and conclusions can be made.
“Incompatibilism” is not at all synonymous with “libertarianism.” Hard determinists are also incompatibilists, but no hard determinists are libertarians.
Compatibilists are like the atheists that still uphold Christian virtues through humanism. They say they don't believe in God but need to attach themselves to metaphysical superstitions to feel safe.
@@ShouVertica they may have not "invented" such a notion but they spread its seed everywhere. now with guilt some instincts that can help you grow stronger are labeled as "evil".
Ahhh, wow! This video confuses the two notions "compatibilism" and "incompatibilism". Compatibilism is about Libertarianism being compatible with determinism including "Open Theism", "Simple Foreknowledge" and "Molinism". Incompatibilism is rejecting Libertarianism and it is about "Divine Determinism". Not the other way around. @Apologetics Squared please correct this or at least acknowledge this error in some way or the other.
The definition I gave seems to be the standard one. "Compatibilism is the thesis that free will is compatible with determinism." plato.stanford.edu/entries/compatibilism/ Have a nice day! :)
@@ApologeticsSquared Yeah, I think, that you are partially correct. *Libertarianism* ( www.wikiwand.com/en/Moral_responsibility#/Metaphysical_libertarianism ) is kind of an incompatibilist position. But at the same time I don't understand, how Divine Determinism is supposed to be categorized and assigned to Compatibilism as it has been described by you. If God has full control over Creation and is involved causally in each moment of Creation, then how compatible is that determinism with our free will? Sure, God might intervene according to his free will, but are we capable of acting according to our free will, if each moment of Creation is determined by God's will? As Divine Determinism has been described by you or here ( *Theological Determinism* iep.utm.edu/theo-det/ ), it appears to me rather, that God's free will is compatible with his determinism and our free will is incompatible with that. In that case I would rather put that to the side of "Incompatibilism". Have a good evening! :)
@@whatsinaname691 Well, I guess there is only so much or in this case so little amount of time to accurately or in this case inaccurately describe theological compatibilism. I may have conflated the presented version in this video with *fatalism* ( plato.stanford.edu/entries/free-will-foreknowledge/ ). My bad. Sorry.
"Compatibalism is about libertarianism being compatible with determinism" ... whuuu? I mean obviously there is disagreement about what free will is but compatibalism and libertarianism are distinctly opposite views. They are like A and ~A, they can't be conjoined in the same way. Necessarily, if one is a compatibalist he cannot be a libertarian and vice versa by standard definitions. I take it this is uncontroversial in philosophy of action. Now maybe you're referring to a subset of views which might be referred to also as compatibalism and incompatibalism, wherein compatibalism is the idea the God's foreknowledge of our actions is compatible with libertarianism (and the incompatibalist thinks it isn't) but it seems like, rather than the thesis on God's foreknowledge and its compatibility A2 is talking about the thesis on action.
AMAZING content. Short, but really clear. Perfect for those who want to share these topics.
Cant wait for the next video!
Freewill + determinism = blatant contradiction
Nah
Hmm.
I might nit-pick that you make it seem like all free will proponents must be theists, which I don't believe is true, but other than that I have nothing to argue with on this one. (I'm shocked too!)
Great stuff, keep it up.
So in divine determinism, does God know what actions will he himself take in the future? If so, does God himself have free will in these views?
Most Divine Determinists will say “yes.” This doesn’t seem to challenge God’s freedom, because i) His “freedom” could be compatibilistic and ii) even if it wasn’t His knowledge of His future choices could still be informed by His decisions.
If there are people still stick to this God fantasy and I don't think they are very logical, a child can use logic to come this conclusion with absolute sense that there is no GOD!
What about people who choose 3rd option (I'd call them "doesnt matter" people), who are convinced that world is non deterministic at least in some parts, making the whole distinction pointless?
I like Pereboom's way of defining it. It's simple and gets at the heart of what the proponent of free action is looking for:
We have free will iff we are morally responsible for our actions in the basic desert sense.
Also the compatibalist isn't committed to determinism being true, they need merely be committed to the fact that if it *were* true then we would have free will. I currently consider myself something of a compatibalist, but I also think that human action is indeterministic and that thereby determinism is false.
Word salad
Can you hold to compatibilism and still use the free will defence?
(Btw good stuff)
Not reallllllllllly... it’s more of an incomptibilist thing.
(Also, thanks!)
@@ApologeticsSquared that’s too bad. Would necessitarians be considered compatiblists?
@@doggoslayer5679 If they affirm we have free will, then they must be compatibilists. The other option is to deny that we have free will.
@@ApologeticsSquared aw that’s even worse :( necessitarianism can solve a bunch of problems with classical theism in one fell swoop. Ah well.
@@ApologeticsSquared hey hey one more question.
Are you going to go over the coherence of libertarian free will? I’ve heard some people say it’s impossible.
If our universe is Compatibilist, how come God determines all things including their purpose? How do humans have free will if they can't choose anything and their purpose is determined?
Couldn't Molinism be considered a type of compatibilism? Because the antecedant condition of God actualizing this particular world entails that only one particular future is accessible to us. (Otherwise, we'd have the power to change God's foreknowledge in the past.)
A Molinist (however she does it) is explicitly going to deny the validity of this argument, since Molinism is *explicitly* incompatibilistic. The way I dodge this is to question the framing of the question. Whenever we think of a counterfactual, like “If I were the president, then I’d be rich,” we look at the closest possible world where the antecedent is true, and see if the consequent is true. The conditional your argument relies upon seems to be this: “If I had done otherwise, then this would change God’s past beliefs.” However, in the closest possible world where the antecedent is true, it had ALWAYS been the case that God held the different belief. So, Molinism can permit the ability to have done otherwise without us being able to control the past in a problematic way.
Have a nice day! :)
When it comes to defining free will, exactly because there are so many opinions, I usually ask a person what they think they are free from at the given moment or always:
- some substantial obstacles
- another human's coercion / peer pressure
- other spiritual beings' coercion
- determinism
- indeterminism (in a sense of some randomness in underlying reality; simply because something partially random emerges into choices, doesn't mean you have some significant freedom; many might say they re free from determinism and indeterminism both, so from physicalism)
- God's will
- God's foreknowledge
...and so on.
Each person should be able to answer for each item on the list: yes, I'm free from that at the moment/sometimes/always. No, I'm not free from that at the moment/at times/ever. I don't know.
Because the will itself is self-evident, but what underlies it is quite opaque, yet the evidence shows many discernible factors _can_ in fact influence it while philosophical or theological reasoning may lead to some conclusions as well.
edit: Also, Molinism looks as fatalistic as determinism to me still...
What do you call the theory that states that God knows every single counterfactual for every single possible or impossible junction, but doesn't know which choice will be made in each junction? It's what I personally believe, but idk if that makes me a Heretic :(
The "doesn't know" is a bit off since Christians believe in an allknowing GOD. If HE knows every possible and impossible junction than it have to logically follow that HE would know wich choices will be made. That sounds fully deterministic, I know. Not a calvinist myself but I see how they can come to that conclusion.
To be honest I'm not sure myself how it works out ultimately. I guess this is one of the things wich will be a mystery till we meet our heavenly FATHER.
GOD bless you
That would be Open Theism, if I understand you correctly.
I don’t think you are concerned to Hell for believing it, but I think it is very dangerous.
Have a nice day! :)
These are all theistic perspectives. Which I appreciate is the focus of your channel. However, it would be quite nice if you either explicitly stated the implied premise (the existence of some form of magic sky fairy) in the video, for those of us who are not familiar with your oeuvre; or discuss non-theistic perspectives.
Hard determinism is also incompatiblism.
The bible seems to think it is compatible. Have no clue how but it is apperently not a contradiction in Gods mind so I'll just stick with it.
I don’t see how the Bible would commit me to compatibilism. Have a nice day! :)
I would say the Bible is very clear God knows the end from the beginning. The Bible is also very clear that human beings have the power of choice. Knowing the result of a choice the decision maker makes does not mean God is determing that person's choice, It just means God has access to viewing the timeline in ways we do not, which I also feel is Biblical.
@@BeachBumZeroif you are to say that God knows the end from the beginning, exhaustively and perfectly, then you have to at least concede that agents (like humans) do not possess the ability to do otherwise (or God would not have perfect knowledge). There may be room to argue that the decision that an agent makes still originates from within that agent, but I don’t see any logical room left to argue that they could do other than what was already known by God.
@cordellcrisp I have heard this argument before, and I just don't see how there is a contradiction between free will and God knowing the choices human being WILL make. According to the Bible humans were created in the image of God, and part of that includes the ability to make free choices. Imagine I create a computer system with characters whom I give the ability through my programming to make choices as they freely decide within the system. Now also imagine that I am able outside of the computer system to see the choices each character made during a sequence before I actually run the sequence. Explain to me how that eliminates the free choice that character made. Just because I know the choice ahead of time does not make the choice any less valid. It just means I exist in a position in time ahead of the character. Knowledge of outcome in my view does not mean another choice could not have been made. It just means in that sequence another choice was not made. If I run the sequence again and once again know the choices before I run the sequence, but they are different the 2nd time then I think it shows the free will component. I think the human brain is design with an internal component that does allow free will choices. It allows us to contemplate and weigh options in a state of non choice before committing to a choice. I do think different choices and conclusions can be made.
“Incompatibilism” is not at all synonymous with “libertarianism.” Hard determinists are also incompatibilists, but no hard determinists are libertarians.
Compatibalism is just determinism but being nice to people who believe in free will.
Compatibilists are like the atheists that still uphold Christian virtues through humanism. They say they don't believe in God but need to attach themselves to metaphysical superstitions to feel safe.
@@tangerinesarebetterthanora7060 "Christian virtues"? lol like what.
@@ShouVertica moral responsibility
@@tangerinesarebetterthanora7060 You think Christianity is unique in that? How?
@@ShouVertica they may have not "invented" such a notion but they spread its seed everywhere. now with guilt some instincts that can help you grow stronger are labeled as "evil".
God knows the end from the beginning hence incompatiblism utterly destroyed 🙄
Ahhh, wow!
This video confuses the two notions "compatibilism" and "incompatibilism".
Compatibilism is about Libertarianism being compatible with determinism including "Open Theism", "Simple Foreknowledge" and "Molinism".
Incompatibilism is rejecting Libertarianism and it is about "Divine Determinism".
Not the other way around.
@Apologetics Squared please correct this or at least acknowledge this error in some way or the other.
The definition I gave seems to be the standard one.
"Compatibilism is the thesis that free will is compatible with determinism." plato.stanford.edu/entries/compatibilism/
Have a nice day! :)
@@ApologeticsSquared
Yeah, I think, that you are partially correct.
*Libertarianism* ( www.wikiwand.com/en/Moral_responsibility#/Metaphysical_libertarianism ) is kind of an incompatibilist position.
But at the same time I don't understand, how Divine Determinism is supposed to be categorized and assigned to Compatibilism as it has been described by you.
If God has full control over Creation and is involved causally in each moment of Creation, then how compatible is that determinism with our free will?
Sure, God might intervene according to his free will, but are we capable of acting according to our free will, if each moment of Creation is determined by God's will?
As Divine Determinism has been described by you or here ( *Theological Determinism* iep.utm.edu/theo-det/ ), it appears to me rather, that God's free will is compatible with his determinism and our free will is incompatible with that. In that case I would rather put that to the side of "Incompatibilism".
Have a good evening! :)
That’s just wrong
@@whatsinaname691
Well, I guess there is only so much or in this case so little amount of time to accurately or in this case inaccurately describe theological compatibilism.
I may have conflated the presented version in this video with *fatalism* ( plato.stanford.edu/entries/free-will-foreknowledge/ ).
My bad. Sorry.
"Compatibalism is about libertarianism being compatible with determinism" ... whuuu? I mean obviously there is disagreement about what free will is but compatibalism and libertarianism are distinctly opposite views. They are like A and ~A, they can't be conjoined in the same way. Necessarily, if one is a compatibalist he cannot be a libertarian and vice versa by standard definitions. I take it this is uncontroversial in philosophy of action.
Now maybe you're referring to a subset of views which might be referred to also as compatibalism and incompatibalism, wherein compatibalism is the idea the God's foreknowledge of our actions is compatible with libertarianism (and the incompatibalist thinks it isn't) but it seems like, rather than the thesis on God's foreknowledge and its compatibility A2 is talking about the thesis on action.