Philosophical Dilemma of Free Will

[michaelgazin]

I invite any Catholics knowledgable in philosophy to comment about this argument. I am unsure of the official Catholic Stance on free will (and not with respect to predestination; rather, hard determinism/compatibilism/libertarianism).

The following argument seems sound, is it?

1. God is omniscient
2. For the sake of argument we will consider it to be true that I will commit action x at time t in the future.
3. Being omniscient, God has always known this truth (thus it is impossible for God to not have known this truth).
4. Because God is omniscient, it is impossible for God to know I will commit action x at time t while I actually commit action z at time t.
5. Because God knows I will commit action x at time t I cannot therefore commit any action besides x at time t.
6. I must necessarily commit action x at time t therefore, and it is impossible that I will choose to commit any action besides x at time t.
7. Therefore, freedom of choice is an illusion.

This rules out libertarianism but compatibilism and hard determinism could still exist with this argument. Is it acceptable given Catholic dogma? Does Catholicism endorse libertarianism or compatibilism?

---

On another note, I got to thinking on this topic and came up with another dilemma that I can’t reason my way out of.

Imagine the following scenario:

I am standing in front of a table and there is a pen on the table. I am considering whether or not to pick it up. The interesting thing about this situation is that God is standing beside me. So, I ask Him, ‘what will I ultimately choose to do with the pen - pick it up or leave it?’ My intention is that if I can know what I will do in the future, then I can do differently. This is a paradox of immeasurable proportions to me. Its an impossible situation, however it seems so feasible - at least theoretically. Why is it impossible? Because perhaps God tells me, “Michael, being that I am omniscient, I know you will pick up the pen.” After hearing that, I deliberately do not pick up the pen, and then I am acting of my own free will (or at least it seems to negate the argument in the first post of this thread). But being that God is all-knowing, He would have ultimately known that I would have not picked up the pen, but then He would have told me that that is what I would have done (as opposed to telling me that I would lift it like He did). But if He told me that ultimately I would not pick it up, then I would deliberately pick it up but then He would have had to tell me that that is what I would have done. Essentially, there is no way out of this. The only thing I can reason from this is that the future does not objectively exist; that it is constantly changing. But this is incompatible with the idea that God can know all of our future actions, because if He truly knew all of our future actions, then the future would have to remain constant and unchanging by definition. How in the world can these two truths exist simultaneously?

This prompts the realization that theoretically we can never know our future. Anytime we know our future, we can change it which means we actually didn’t know our future in the first place. This doesn’t help the problem at all. How can we theoretically never know our future, yet, theoretically it seems possible that we can actually know our future (or at least something about it)? The future must not be constant - in other words, the future is subject to our knowledge of it. If the future is subjective however, then God cannot know our future actions because that would mean the future is objective rather than subjective, and it seems as far as reasoning goes, the future must be subjective.

Thanks and peace,
Michael

 

[NotWorthy]

Just because God knows what you are going to decide to do, doesn’t mean He is going to make you do it. He is still leaving the choice up to you.

In the second instance, I’d ask God what I will do, and then I’d do what He says, simply because I wouldn’t want to displease Him. “Wouldn’t be prudent….”

Notworthy

 

[michaelgazin]

I am not sure why the common understanding of the above argument is that God must be forcing our choices. That is not what I am saying or what the argument is positing. I am simply saying that what we choose is ultimately the only choice we could have made (without God’s force or interference).

On the second issue, yes it would be good to simply do what He says, but the mere fact that it is theoretically possible to do otherwise poses a problem.

 

[NotWorthy]

God exists outside of Time. He doesn’t know you **going **to do it, He knows you’ve already done it, even when you haven’t done it, yet.

Notworthy

 

[StCsDavid]

Michael, you’re a well thought and rather verbose fellow. Your line of thinking seems to imply that God works on a linear time frame. He does not. He simply is. The past, present, and future are not hot commodities for Him. You, too, are an eternal being. In few decades when you die, you won’t have much need to worry about time either. You do have free will. You can choose to read this or not. You can choose to throw your computer out the window after you read this…or not. God probably knows which you will choose, but that doesn’t mean you don’t have the choice. You are not a victim of God’s creation. You are His original thought that is willed, loved, and necessary. What you choose to do with that is entirely up to you. Does God know what you will choose? God only knows. We can guess, surmise, ponder, but we’ll never reach an definitive conclusion. God didn’t create us to ponder our belly buttons. He did create us because He loves us.

 

[Atreyu]

michaelgazin:

I am not sure why the common understanding of the above argument is that God must be forcing our choices. That is not what I am saying or what the argument is positing. I am simply saying that what we choose is ultimately the only choice we could have made (without God’s force or interference).

On the second issue, yes it would be good to simply do what He says, but the mere fact that it is theoretically possible to do otherwise poses a problem.

I disagree with your statement that I have emphasised in the above quote. All that we know is that God knows what choice we make; that’s it! What we choose isn’t the only choice we could have made; we can choose to do whatever we like… and God knows what choice that will be. As for your OP, I think that statement 5 does not flow logically from statement 4. Simply because God knows before we do whether we will choose x and not z, does not mean it is impossible for us not to choose z; it just means that if we chose z then He knew we were going to do that in advance! I can’t give you anything more definitive than this very vague answer, but I’m pretty sure this is where the fault is in the logic.

This is very similar to time travel philosophy, imo…

 

[Angainor]

michaelgazin:

I am standing in front of a table and there is a pen on the table. I am considering whether or not to pick it up…

This prompts the realization that theoretically we can never know our future. Anytime we know our future, we can change it which means we actually didn’t know our future in the first place. This doesn’t help the problem at all. How can we theoretically never know our future, yet, theoretically it seems possible that we can actually know our future (or at least something about it)? The future must not be constant - in other words, the future is subject to our knowledge of it. If the future is subjective however, then God cannot know our future actions because that would mean the future is objective rather than subjective, and it seems as far as reasoning goes, the future must be subjective.

I believe you are very close to the truth. In the pen example, God knows if you will pick it up or not. That is a hard, objective fact about the future. However, when God acts by giving you information “I forsee that you will pick up the pen” then the whole situation changes. You have more information to use to make your decision. You decide not to pick up the pen. This becomes the new hard, objective fact about the future.

I would not call the future subjective, but rather one objective future replaced by another.

 

[Magicsilence]

Your interesting situation is akin to saying:

When will i kill myself God? I.e The exact time.

And then you waiting one second after the time he has told you.

There is a way out of this interesting paradox which is thus:

God, with knowledge of all that will happen, knows the effect of Him telling you the answer to something and thus what your response will be.

Thus, perhaps, if he says you wont pick up the pen, perhaps he knows beforehand you will comply with Him out of love (or another reason) and thus He is right.

What you are proposing is God making a definite fact known to a human who has not made the decision yet. I.e, he is influencing their decision.

It is interesting to note that Christ told Peter what his action would be. Peter had the choice to go and run into the desert and kill himself. Thus, Christ would have been proved wrong. But he knew what Peter would ultimately decide to do on the basis of such knowledge.

In Christ.

Andre.

 

[john_doran]

your version of the argument basically defines away free will.

consider the following argument, instead:

1. God is omniscient
2. For the sake of argument we will consider it to be true that I will freely choose x at time t in the future.
3. Being omniscient, God has always known this truth (thus it is impossible for God to not have known this truth).
4. Because God is omniscient, it is impossible for God to know I will freely choose x at time t while I actually freely choose z at time t.
5. Because God knows I will freely choose x at time t I cannot therefore freely choose anything besides x at time t.
6. I must necessarily freely choose x at time t therefore, and it is impossible that I will freely choose anything besides x at time t.
7. Therefore, freedom of choice is a reality.

your argument is formal, and works for any X or any Y; and will hold for whatever propositions you substitute for those X’s and Y’s; if you use propositions about the commission of actions, then it will read one way - if you use propositions about free choices, then it works out another.

put another way, whether your argument rules out free will depends on what god knows - if you assume that he knows nothing about free choices, then it won’t be surprising that your conclusion will involve a rejection of free choices.

but why shouldn’t we assume that god’s knowledge includes propositions about free choices?

 

[Philthy]

michaelgazin:

I invite any Catholics knowledgable in philosophy to comment about this argument. I am unsure of the official Catholic Stance on free will (and not with respect to predestination; rather, hard determinism/compatibilism/libertarianism).

The following argument seems sound, is it?

1. God is omniscient
2. For the sake of argument we will consider it to be true that I will commit action x at time t in the future.
3. Being omniscient, God has always known this truth (thus it is impossible for God to not have known this truth).
4. Because God is omniscient, it is impossible for God to know I will commit action x at time t while I actually commit action z at time t.
5. Because God knows I will commit action x at time t I cannot therefore commit any action besides x at time t.
6. I must necessarily commit action x at time t therefore, and it is impossible that I will choose to commit any action besides x at time t.
7. Therefore, freedom of choice is an illusion.

Thanks and peace,
Michael

This detailed yet sloppy argument fails because a mutually exclusive relationship between KNOWLEDGE OF THE OUTCOME of an event by an observer and FREE WILL on the part of the individual acting in the event is assumed without proof.
Why does God’s knowledge of the outcome eliminate our free will in making the choice? It doesn’t.
Remember, God is not limited by time in his knowledge. What if you and I could travel through time? Follow me please:

You and I discover the secret to time travel. We will travel a week from today, observe an event - a bank robbery - and return to today with that knowledge. Summary: you and I have knowledge of a bank robbery to occur in the future. Now, you and I allow time to pass and share none of our information with anyone. A week of time passes and we watch the news which reports the bank robbery which occured exactly where we had seen it in our time travel. OK, what are the facts?
We had full knowledge of the event, so did God.
The bank robbers committing the act had free will to engage in the act or refrain from doing so.
Our knowledge in advance of their choice had no effect on their ability to choose (free will) whether to engage in robbery or refrain from it: neither does God’s knowledge.

In summary, God’s omniscience places absolutely no limitation on our free will.
The argument for such a limitation would need to flow from God’s OMNIPOTENCE, not his omniscience. The omnipotence argument will also fail because, although he could, God does not
choose to limit our free will. Quite the opposite - he has chosen to bless us with it and thereby allowed us to love him.

Phil

BTW, I called this argument sloppy because it should be structured more simply in the form of the syllogism for clarity.
His argument should have been stated as follows:

Premise 1 God is an omniscient observer of all events
Premise 2 An omniscient observer eliminates the free will of all participants in any event .

ConclusionTherefore all participants in events lack free will.

Once we can reduce the argument to this level, we simply need to do one of 3 things:

• Refute a premise outright
• Reduce a premise to the status of “unnecessary/not of necessity” rather than absolute/factual
• Invalidate the conclusion as not necessarily deriving from the premises.

In this light, you will see that Premise 2 is invalid as I demonstrated above. Once this is done, the conclusion no longer can be accepted as valid.

 

[Subrosa]

michaelgazin:

I invite any Catholics knowledgable in philosophy to comment about this argument. I am unsure of the official Catholic Stance on free will (and not with respect to predestination; rather, hard determinism/compatibilism/libertarianism).

The following argument seems sound, is it?

1. God is omniscient
2. For the sake of argument we will consider it to be true that I will commit action x at time t in the future.
3. Being omniscient, God has always known this truth (thus it is impossible for God to not have known this truth).
4. Because God is omniscient, it is impossible for God to know I will commit action x at time t while I actually commit action z at time t.
5. Because God knows I will commit action x at time t I cannot therefore commit any action besides x at time t.
6. I must necessarily commit action x at time t therefore, and it is impossible that I will choose to commit any action besides x at time t.
7. Therefore, freedom of choice is an illusion.

Thanks and peace,
Michael

Hi Michael -

There is one fatal flaw in your argument - God’s knowledge of an action does not predetermine that action.

According to Church theology, the statement in the book of Genesis that “God made man in His own image” includes free will as part of the creation.

Bottom line: any action that is taken by a human being is a choice made by that human being at the time of decision. God does not interfere or make any determination concerning the decision made by the individual. The truth that THAT PERSON does not know in advance which action he/she will take is the free will determining factor.

For example - Judas’ decision to betray Jesus was his own. He made up his own mind to do it, God did not decide for him. Even after the fact, when Judas commited suicide, again, this was his decision. He could have chosen to ask Jesus to forgive him. We know as Christians that Christ would have indeed forgiven him.

Judas had no preknowledge of his actions before he commited to them. There was a thought process, then a decision making process, then an actual decision. He then had the choice to NOT commit to those actions. He could have changed his mind. The whole process from the initial thought to the completed action was developed through a series of decisions made by Judas.

Jesus predicted Judas’ actions. Jesus did NOT predetermine Judas’ actions.

It was all a progression of free will undertaken by Judas. This is expounded by the fact that Judas could have changed his mind at any time.

Subrosa

 

[Philthy]

michaelgazin:

On another note, I got to thinking on this topic and came up with another dilemma that I can’t reason my way out of.

Do yourself a favor - start attempting to use the syllogistic "premise1 premise2 Conclusion format and you will avoid what follows. Note that you may need to construct muliple syllogisms, using the conclusion from one as a premise for the next until you finally reach your ultimate conclusion.

michaelgazin:
Imagine the following scenario:
I am standing in front of a table and there is a pen on the table. I am considering whether or not to pick it up. The interesting thing about this situation is that God is standing beside me. So, I ask Him, ‘what will I ultimately choose to do with the pen - pick it up or leave it?’ My intention is that if I can know what I will do in the future, then I can do differently.
Your thinking remains stuck in sequential time - don’t forget that God’s is not, and that changes everything.

michaelgazin:

This is a paradox of immeasurable proportions to me. Its an impossible situation, however it seems so feasible - at least theoretically. Why is it impossible? Because perhaps God tells me, “Michael, being that I am omniscient, I know you will pick up the pen.”

Once God, as omniscient, were to reveal such a scenario then it is fixed.

michaelgazin:

After hearing that, I deliberately do not pick up the pen

This of course negates the claim of God’s omniscience; and the scenario where he “reveals” something to you which does not occur is incompatable with His omniscience. His omniscience and this scenario are mutually exclusive.

michaelgazin:

and then I am acting of my own free will (or at least it seems to negate the argument in the first post of this thread). But being that God is all-knowing, He would have ultimately known that I would have not picked up the pen, but then He would have told me that that is what I would have done (as opposed to telling me that I would lift it like He did). But if He told me that ultimately I would not pick it up, then I would deliberately pick it up but then He would have had to tell me that that is what I would have done. Essentially, there is no way out of this.

Not so fast. several things immediately come to mind which would satisfy God’s omniscience while preserving his predictions. Firstly, you have assumed that the knowledge of the answer to “Will I pick up the pen?” PRIOR to it occuring is part of the body of truth we call knowledge. It is entirely plausable that it is not knowledge at all, simply a possibility. God could simply answer “It is unknown” and that would be truth.
Secondly, and somewhat related, is the concept of revealing time-independent knowledge into time-dependent reality. Such an action might preclude a definitive answer to the question and again relegate it to the first category of non-knowledge.
Thirdly, it may simply be that your scenario is impossible and therefore we can conclude nothing from it regarding free will.
Finally, you have assumed that your intellect in knowing God’s response will supercede the basis for his giving you an answer and that you will base your ultimate decision of whether to pick up the pen exclusively on the basis of contradicting his knowledge. Furthermore you then presume that you will act exclusively according to that part of your intellect. In fact, however, you have no way of knowing that that is what would happen after an interaction with God. Who knows, just as you decide to do the opposite of what He predicted it might occur to you that to do so would be contrary to His Will and you might chose to do exactly as he predicted, going against your original intent.

Con’d

 

[Philthy]

michaelgazin:

The only thing I can reason from this is that the future does not objectively exist; that it is constantly changing. But this is incompatible with the idea that God can know all of our future actions, because if He truly knew all of our future actions, then the future would have to remain constant and unchanging by definition.

How in the world can these two truths exist simultaneously?

It is constant and unchanging relative to Him, but constantly changing relative to us.

Is it possible that there are eternal realities which exist apart from temporal realities like picking up a pen and that the latter is not part of Truth?

michaelgazin:

This prompts the realization that theoretically we can never know our future. Anytime we know our future, we can change it which means we actually didn’t know our future in the first place.

Very good.

michaelgazin:

This doesn’t help the problem at all. How can we theoretically never know our future, yet, theoretically it seems possible that we can actually know our future (or at least something about it)?

Our knowledge is imperfect and not absolute. Tell me something you think you know and I will show you a limit to your knowledge of it.

michaelgazin:

The future must not be constant - in other words, the future is subject to our knowledge of it. If the future is subjective however, then God cannot know our future actions because that would mean the future is objective rather than subjective, and it seems as far as reasoning goes, the future must be subjective.

Thanks and peace,

Michael

The future is subjective relative to our temporal perspective, but objective relative to his eternal perspective. We aren’t God - get over it. And don’t forget - your scenario of God telling us a future which might not happen as a function of that knowledge is purely imaginary - we can make no conclusions regarding objective reality from it.

Phil

 

[michaelgazin]

Philthy:

I called this argument sloppy because it should be structured more simply in the form of the syllogism for clarity.
His argument should have been stated as follows:

Premise 1 God is an omniscient observer of all events
Premise 2 An omniscient observer eliminates the free will of all participants in any event .

ConclusionTherefore all participants in events lack free will.

Once we can reduce the argument to this level, we simply need to do one of 3 things:

• Refute a premise outright
• Reduce a premise to the status of “unnecessary/not of necessity” rather than absolute/factual
• Invalidate the conclusion as not necessarily deriving from the premises.

In this light, you will see that Premise 2 is invalid as I demonstrated above. Once this is done, the conclusion no longer can be accepted as valid.

This is not an accurate reduction of my above argument. First, if you are familiar with philosophy, you will know that compatibilists and soft determinists accept the above argument while also accepting free will, so the argument does not necessarily impede on free will.

I fail to see how your explanation solves anything. A more ‘tangible’ example can be given as follows:

There is an orange and an apple and I must choose one. God knows that I will choose the orange (because He is omniscient and timeless). Is it possible for me to choose the apple? The obvious answer is no. While my choosing the orange is just that, a choice, it is impossible for me to choose any other option. We still have free will, it is still our choice to choose what we desire, it is simply an impossibility to choose anything besides the orange.

The argument is not sloppy and it appears that every premise is necessary for the conclusion. Your reduced argument would be unacceptable to compatibilists while my argument would be acceptable, therefore according Leibniz’s law, your argument and my argument are not the same and do not have the same conclusion.

Subrosa:

There is one fatal flaw in your argument - God’s knowledge of an action does not predetermine that action.

I don’t believe it does. If you read my above comments, you will see that I still believe we have free will and choice in the sense of compatibilism.

For example - Judas’ decision to betray Jesus was his own. He made up his own mind to do it, God did not decide for him. Even after the fact, when Judas commited suicide, again, this was his decision.

Ok, so given that God is omniscient and timeless, can we conclude that prior to Judas’ betrayal, God knew he would betray him? I think we can agree on that. Now, is it possible, while God knew Judas would betray him, for Judas to choose *not *to betray him? That answer is of course not. If God knew that Judas would betray him prior to it happening, it is impossible for Judas to have not betrayed him, albeit it was still Judas’ personal choice! Follow me here: If you argue that God can know Judas would betray Him, and then sometime prior to Judas’ betrayal Judas decides to not betray Jesus, and then God’s knowledge changes to know that Judas would not betray Him, that would imply an imperfect knowledge of the future by God.

Likewise with the suicide, it is impossible that Judas would decide to not hang himself while God knew he would actually hang himself. It is also impossible for God’s knowledge to change, therefore God knew that Judas would hang himself, God had always known Judas would hang himself for an eternity before, therefore it is not possible that Judas would not have hung himself.

Jesus did NOT predetermine Judas’ actions.

I believe I answered that when I wrote:

I am not sure why the common understanding of the above argument is that God must be forcing our choices. That is not what I am saying

I have to run, its my 21st bday and a party awaits me

I will respond to the other comments when I get a chance.

Peace,
Michael

 

[Philthy]

michaelgazin:

This is not an accurate reduction of my above argument. First, if you are familiar with philosophy, you will know that compatibilists and soft determinists accept the above argument while also accepting free will, so the argument does not necessarily impede on free will.

I dont care who accepts it. You have claimed that free will for one individual is negated by a knowledge of the effect of that free will by another. I don’t see the relationship. The choices one makes are independent of another’s knowledge of what the choice will be. Period. If you disagree, prove it concretely.

michaelgazin:
I fail to see how your explanation solves anything.
Yes, you do.

michaelgazin:

A more ‘tangible’ example can be given as follows:
There is an orange and an apple and I must choose one. God knows that I will choose the orange (because He is omniscient and timeless). Is it possible for me to choose the apple?
The obvious answer is no.

Correct, you will exercise your free will by not choosing the apple, so what? You have still exercised your free will.

michaelgazin:
While my choosing the orange is just that, a choice, it is impossible for me to choose any other option.
So what.

michaelgazin:

We still have free will, it is still our choice to choose what we desire, it is simply an impossibility to choose anything besides the orange.

Correct. You will choose the orange, exercise your free will in doing so, and God knew you would exercise your free will to choose the orange. So what.

michaelgazin:

The argument is not sloppy and it appears that every premise is necessary for the conclusion.

I think it is sloppy. It contains clarifications of the effect of omniscience, for example, where none is needed. for example:

michaelgazin:
“2. For the sake of argument we will consider it to be true that I will commit action x at time t in the future. 3. Being omniscient, God has always known this truth (thus it is impossible for God to not have known this truth).”

Statement 3 is unnecessary once you have defined God as omniscient without temporal limitation. Sloppy.

michaelgazin:
Your reduced argument would be unacceptable to compatibilists while my argument would be acceptable, therefore according Leibniz’s law, your argument and my argument are not the same and do not have the same conclusion.
Whatever. Your original argument is flawed because you assume that since we know the outcome of the event that the free will has been eliminated, since we then know that the alternative outcomes are no longer possible. It sounds to me like an elaborate definition of what it means to know something, and nothing else.

 

[Philthy]

michaelgazin:
Ok, so given that God is omniscient and timeless, can we conclude that prior to Judas’ betrayal, God knew he would betray him? I think we can agree on that. Now, is it possible, while God knew Judas would betray him, for Judas to choose *not *to betray him? That answer is of course not.
Here again is your elaborate articulation of what it means for God to know something. Even though Judas will choose to betray he still exercises free will in doing so. It’s very simple. If you think Im wrong, please tell exactly how God’s knowledge of the outcome acts upon Judas to eliminate his free will. Will his voluntary muscles fail? Will his mind no longer be able to function to choose? How, exactly, does God’s knowledge impair Judas from choosing? It doesn’t.

michaelgazin:

If God knew that Judas would betray him prior to it happening, it is impossible for Judas to have not betrayed him, albeit it was still Judas’ personal choice!

Exactly what I have said from the beginning.

michaelgazin:

Follow me here: If you argue that God can know Judas would betray Him, and then sometime prior to Judas’ betrayal Judas decides to not betray Jesus, and then God’s knowledge changes to know that Judas would not betray Him, that would imply an imperfect knowledge of the future by God./QUOTE]
Of course. Notice how you are simply circling the definition of what it means to know something.

michaelgazin:

Likewise with the suicide, it is impossible that Judas would decide to not hang himself while God knew he would actually hang himself.

Very good. God can’t know something that is not knowledge.

michaelgazin:
It is also impossible for God’s knowledge to change, therefore God knew that Judas would hang himself, God had always known Judas would hang himself for an eternity before, therefore it is not possible that Judas would not have hung himself.
Correct. But that has no relationship to Judas’ knowledge and the ability of Judas to exercise his free will. Judas simply exercised his free will in accordance with what God forever knew. The fact that Judas “couldn’t” not hang himself isn’t because he lacked free will, it is simply because God couldn’t have known he would hang himself if, in fact, he was not going to do so.

michaelgazin:

I have to run, its my 21st bday and a party awaits me Peace,
Michael

Have a good time! I’d keep a written record of the night - I have no recollection of my 21st…

Phil

 

[mosher]

Mike,

The argument that you have is and invalid argument locically because you state that knowledge implies a causal relation however there is no basis for this conclusion.

A man standing upon a mountian notices a narrow dirt road with two cars driving in opposing directions toward one another. He can see the two cars are going to crash but the two cars cannot see eachother because of a bend in the road. Because the man on the mountian knows that the two cars will certainly crash does not mean that he caused the two cars to crash. Rather the free actions of the drivers and the circumstances of the road cause the crash. Thus what we see here are two lines of independent causality intersecting and not a determined (hard or soft) action.

You are actually missing the real issue which is that for any act to occure God must will that act but if God is outside of time and has thus already willed all actions then how is there freedom. The answer is of course in the nature of God’s will and its relation to secondary causality but you are not asking that question.

 

[michaelgazin]

philthy:

michael:

While my choosing the orange is just that, a choice, it is impossible for me to choose any other option.

So what.

It seems that the problem you are having is purely a semantics one. You agree with the comments I make (in a rather unwilling way i.e. ‘so what’), yet somehow continue to disagree because of the undesireable outcome agreed to.

philthy:

michael:

We still have free will, it is still our choice to choose what we desire, it is simply an impossibility to choose anything besides the orange.

Correct. You will choose the orange, exercise your free will in doing so, and God knew you would exercise your free will to choose the orange. So what.

So according to you we have freedom of will, freedom of choice, and we can’t choose anything besides the orange…so what? That is exactly what.

Here is the breakdown of your comments:

**michaelgazin: **it is impossible for me to choose any other option.
**philthy: **so what

michaelgazin: it is simply an impossibility to choose anything besides the orange.
**philthy: **Correct.

So you are agreeing to the argument’s outcome. Regardless of the definition you apply to free will, your answers to the dilemma are quite clear:

Free will? yes
Freedom of choice? yes
**Freedom to will a choice contrary to God’s knowledge of your ultimate singular choice? **no

What you stated above is the same thing I stated. No need to be argumentative for its own sake.​

mosher:

Because the man on the mountian knows that the two cars will certainly crash does not mean that he caused the two cars to crash.

michaelgazin:

I am not sure why the common understanding of the above argument is that God must be forcing our choices. That is not what I am saying or what the argument is positing. I am simply saying that what we choose is ultimately the only choice we could have made (without God’s force or interference).

 

[Ghosty]

I am simply saying that what we choose is ultimately the only choice we could have made (without God’s force or interference).

I think therein lies the hang-up. It’s not the only choice you could have, it’s the only choice you did make.

When viewing the linear (time) from the non-linear (eternity), the “future” and “past” of linear time have “already” occured, but occured through the free interactions of the things within linear time. It is just as much a contradiction to say that one doesn’t have the freedom to choose an orange because they won’t, as it is a contradiction to say that one didn’t have the freedom to choose an orange because they didn’t.

We do not trouble ourselves in philosophy by asking if what we chose yesterday was not freely willed just because we can not alter our choices now. Likewise, tomorrow will be yesterday in two days, and our decisions will have been made once, freely, and yet set in stone.

God’s omniscience is eternal, not temporal (linear), so its relationship to our actions is fundamentally different from linear foreknowledge, which would imply a “train-track” situation. Another point to remember is that eternity is the “norm”, and the temporal is the exception.

Peace and God bless!

 

[michaelgazin]

Ghosty:

I think therein lies the hang-up. It’s not the only choice you could have, it’s the only choice you did make.

When viewing the linear (time) from the non-linear (eternity), the “future” and “past” of linear time have “already” occured, but occured through the free interactions of the things within linear time. It is just as much a contradiction to say that one doesn’t have the freedom to choose an orange because they won’t, as it is a contradiction to say that one didn’t have the freedom to choose an orange because they didn’t.

We do not trouble ourselves in philosophy by asking if what we chose yesterday was not freely willed just because we can not alter our choices now. Likewise, tomorrow will be yesterday in two days, and our decisions will have been made once, freely, and yet set in stone.

God’s omniscience is eternal, not temporal (linear), so its relationship to our actions is fundamentally different from linear foreknowledge, which would imply a “train-track” situation. Another point to remember is that eternity is the “norm”, and the temporal is the exception.

Peace and God bless!

Ghosty, I enjoyed reading that and I thank you for the words. I agree with your reasoning insofar as we cannot change a choice already made. This I believe is the standard compatibilist belief, which seems to be the most logical in my surmation, however I am simply wondering if it is in line with official catholic dogma. I thought that the Catholic philosophical stance was similar to compatibilism however a philosopher at my college said he thought Catholicism surely maintained a libertarian stance.

Essentially, compatibilism states that one could have done differently if they had desired to do differently while libertarianism states one could have done differently regardless of desires and without any physical causation.

The main problem I have with libertarianism is it divides causation into two categories the physical (transeunt) causation and agent (immanent) causation. Immanent causation suggests that each individual is capable of causing an action into existence without any physical cause involved, essentially making every person an ‘unmoved mover’ which I believe is an attribute uniqe to God.

It can be understood when thinking of a line of dominos. The compatibilist will say that in order for the third domino to fall, the second one must apply the physical cause necessary to make it fall. The libertarian will say that the third domino can fall without the need of any physical cause or help from the second domino, rather through a sheer act of will.

Libertarianism believes that the future has vast and endless possibilities (and that regardless of the actions God knows we will commit, we can nevertheless choose to do contrary to that knowledge) while the compatibilist will believe, like you said above, that the future has ‘already’ occurred, and the choices we made were choices we must have made since they ‘already’ happened.

Thanks and peace,
Michael