God, Time, and Action
One of the great things about Tom Woods’ recent exposition of one of Thomas Aquinas’ proofs of God, is when Tom makes a crucial distinction: Aquinas was not making a chronological argument, saying that at some point in the past, a First Mover must have set everything in motion in order to explain today’s state of the universe. On the contrary, Tom explained, Aquinas showed that God needed to exist in order to support the universe at every moment.
This links up nicely, I think, with my view on miracles and physical law. I don’t think it makes sense to say, “Usually the universe unfolds according to the mechanical laws of physics, but every once in a while God intervenes to accomplish His will.” That is nonsensical both on scientific and theological grounds.
As an added bonus, this notion of God being outside of time itself–rather than creating everything “in the beginning” and then moving through time with us–also resolves a standard paradox that Mises brought up. According to Mises, the notion of an acting omnipotent being makes no sense, because action requires unease and an omnipotent being would have eliminated all uneasiness in one fell swoop.
Right, I agree. But I think a better framework for thinking about this is to view God deciding on the entire history of the physical universe first, then willing it all into being. From His perspective, the events in Genesis are happening at the same moment as the events in Revelation. It’s not that God first creates the world, then watches unfolding events to make sure they go the way He planned. No, He directly wills every moment of existence into reality, all in one fell swoop (from His perspective).
This also resolves the standard skeptic taunt of, “If God is so smart, why did he have to reboot his creation with the flood?” I agree that’s a deep issue, but it’s not that God was surprised by what happened. He knew all along that He would flood the Earth. To suggest otherwise is like saying, “George Lucas had to rewrite the script once Anakin turned to the dark side.”
Last thing, for those of you who don’t like me veering off into my own conjectures rather than staying tied to Scripture: Notice that my perspective above makes perfect sense for a being who introduces Himself as “I AM.” When I was younger, that phrase struck me as odd. But that’s because I was (like Mises) viewing God as a really powerful being operating inside the constraints of time. Once you fully appreciate the significance of a being identified as “I AM,” Mises’ critique wilts away.
Bob, I wanted to save this for a Sunday post, since it seemed more fitting. I don’t understand your qualms with Gruber, when he is simply trying his best to live up to the Abrahamic tradition.
Gruber, like Abraham, lied to a nation to ensure safe passage. Abraham, fearing he will not be able to pass through Egypt, lied to the Egyptians about his wife Sarah being his sister. Was Abraham wrong? Was he reprimanded? No! He does it again later on. As though a second video is released, Abraham again lies about Sarah to a people.
So, I am at a bit of a loss. Why are you not praising Gruber for his faith, that he knows when it is right to lie, as Abraham did?
Lucas claims he had the whole thing planned from the beginning. This is exceedingly doubtful, however.
Leave it to me to comment on a deep theological issue by harping on the part about Star Wars.
Also, I always understood God to be referencing the Axiom of Identity.
Also, also, it may be relevant that ehyeh ašer ehyeh more literally translates as “I will be what I will be.”
So, what appears to be physical causality is really divine causality?
Bob,
Thanks for the post. You might enjoy looking at some of the thinking of Molina (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Molinism), if you aren’t already aware of it.
“No, He directly wills every moment of existence into reality, all in one fell swoop (from His perspective).”
I should probably stay out of this stuff as I know even less about theology than I do about economics or libertarianism, that I sometimes get tempted to comment on.
But It struck me when I read this that it is not far away from the views of Dennett in Freedom Evolves (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_Evolves), where he describes a theory where people may have the sense of free-will even though the laws of physics pre-ordain every aspect of their lives.
Dennett of course is a leading atheist.
So I have a question: What fundamentally would be the difference between a universe willed into existence by a god, and one determined by the laws of physics , if in each case humans are just playing out a pre-defined script ?
Two questions, Bob:
1.) If the universe is laid out exactly as God planned, with the entirety of existence happening at once for him, what is the purpose of prayer?
2.) In the past I have heard you say that you don’t doubt the scientific age of the earth as being 4.6 billion years. Then in this post you seem to believe the story of the flood as being at least mostly true. Are you saying that the timeline of Genesis is not literal?
This was an interesting post, Bob. I, too, thought about God, time, and action after listening to that particular episode. I have thought about the distinction as God possessing a timeless intention logically prior to the creation of the universe, not chronologically prior. So, in effect, at t=0 would be the first event of time.
I am interested in your view, as well as Tom’s I presume, that God is outside of time. I understand this is a traditional view of God, but what about the view that God is timeless without creation and is temporal from creation? This view is defended most famously by William Lane Craig, and I admit that he has been persuasive to me in this aspect, so much of my post will be a less eloquent version of his view. Now, you state that “the events in Genesis are happening at the same moment as the events in Revelation.” Would that view imply that there is an moment that exists where Jesus is eternally on the cross? How is sin ultimately extinguished if there are events where it exists and does not exist? It seems the way one views that question would depend on your theory of time. Does time exist of events that are equally real (B-theory), or is there temporal becoming (A-theory)?
With respect to Mises’s view on God acting to bring about some event, I am curious to see how this objection stands if we think of God, existing prior to creation in a perfect interchange of love in a Trinitarian relationship, as having the timeless intention to share this love with His creation. So, the willing of creation comes not out of discomfort but from a desire to allow creatures to share in this ultimate satisfactory state of affairs. I am not sure what implication that has on the Austrian claim that every action takes place in time. Maybe it would be amended that “for contingent, intentional agents every action takes place in time”?
That would be the intention, so to speak, for creation but what about His relationship to His creatures? If God knows how humans would choose in every situation, then He could actualize a world which he knows the outcome of every event but allows humans to freely choose. It would never be a world where God has to react to decisions. After He has identified all possible and feasible worlds God wills the divine decree to create the actual world. This would retain providence and integrate divine foreknowledge and human freedom. In this way, God would know the decisions which would bring about the flood and what the consequences of the flood would be on human decisions.That is a Molinist point of view, which OFelixCulpa has mentioned above.
Anyways, those are just some thoughts. Thanks for the engaging post!
“But I think a better framework for thinking about this is to view God deciding on the entire history of the physical universe first, then willing it all into being.”
How can people have free will?
“This also resolves the standard skeptic taunt of, “If God is so smart, why did he have to reboot his creation with the flood?” I agree that’s a deep issue, but it’s not that God was surprised by what happened. He knew all along that He would flood the Earth”
OMG, does Bob Murphy actually think that the biblical flood was real? Is he not aware of the overwhelming geological and archaeological evidence that no such thing ever happened?
Bob has actually voiced skepticism about Noah’s flood as it’s described in the Bible:
http://consultingbyrpm.com/blog/2008/10/i-have-a-hard-time-with-the-story-of-noahs-ark.html
Good question. Heck, how can people have free will under the assumptions most secular humanists have as well? Nothing adds up here.
Yeah to me this argument works in favor of the Islamic god Allah where all things are God’s will and not the Christian view that humans have free will. And frankly I I don’t think you can logic away my experience of choosing to write this.
“How can people have free will?”
They can’t and they don’t.
But that would invalidate our secular humanistic sacred cows as well, so it cannot, nay, it mustn’t be true.
That would imply a noninterventionist God. Thus, in a strictly physical sense there’s no difference between believing in God and not believing in God. For example, no miracle would favour the believer over the unbeliever, either in battle, or in a competitive business environment, or wherever. I think in terms of empiricism, there’s no way to disprove the possibility of some entity outside time and space … the entire universe may be a video game, or it may be a replay of an old DVD, but although it can’t be disproven, there’s no great incentive to believe it either.
I might also point out that such a God outside time and space is necessarily also outside the concept of good and evil. Suppose there was no God, but only the Devil, and this Devil entity was the one and only thing outside time and space, but still noninterventionist. Would there be any experiment we could perform to resolve the difference?
Einsteinian space-time gives the same result, does it not? The space time universe exists as a 4-dimensional object. Our “passage” through it is just an illusion.
Where’s Karl Popper when you need him?
If God created the Universe and all that is, then all of creation including time and space, the past and future, is contained within the mind of God. We are but a limited aspect of Gods consciousness, experiencing reality in a linear fashion. The structure of this reality is held together with pure intention by a universal intelligence we can barely comprehend.
This brings up an interesting question regarding free will vs determinism. But from the perspective of us human actors, it is a necessary illusion (paraphrasing Hans Hoppe).
I don’t know or understand how he resolves it, but my brother’s dissertation is largely along these lines. He’s looking at a guy named Troeltsch and how he thinks he should be read regarding a teleological view of God acting in history from Kant (apparently Evan’s reading is different from most). My understanding is that Troeltsch dealt a lot with issues of what it means for God to act in history – things like miracles or some kind of eschatological culmination.
This is all very vague and probably a little misleading – I just know he’s writing about reconciling God’s absoluteness and acting in human time and what Troeltsch thought that implied for the philosophy of history.
Bob Murphy: “This links up nicely, I think, with my view on miracles and physical law. I don’t think it makes sense to say, “Usually the universe unfolds according to the mechanical laws of physics, but every once in a while God intervenes to accomplish His will.” That is nonsensical both on scientific and theological grounds.”
The only problem is that the view you describe as ‘nonsense’ on scientific and theological grounds, is exactly the view Aquinas subscribed to.
“Of these miracles there are various degrees and orders. The highest degree in miracles comprises those works wherein something is done by God, that nature can never do: for instance, that two bodies occupy the same place, that the sun recede or stand still, that the sea be divided and make way to passers by. Among these there is a certain order: for the greater the work done by God, and the further it is removed from the capability of nature, the greater the miracle: thus it is a greater miracle that the sun recede, than that the waters be divided.”
Summa Contra Gentiles, lib III, cap 101.
The same view (miracles are God’s temporary suspension of natural laws) is the mainstream Catholic view to this day.
I agree Ivan it’s awkward that I’m citing Aquinas to support my view on miracles, when it seems (according to your quotation) that he would reject my view on miracles. However, strictly speaking, the Aquinas quote doesn’t contradict my view of God achieving His will at all times. Rather, it contradicts my discussion of physics. I don’t expect Aquinas to be an expert on what “the laws of nature” really means.
So to sum up, I’m saying my view reconciles Richard Feynman’s view of physical law, with the Calvinist view of God’s sovereignty. I know many Christians think God violates natural laws with miracles, but I think they are wrong; their view doesn’t make sense when you really think about what “natural laws” means.
“So to sum up, I’m saying my view reconciles Richard Feynman’s view of physical law, with the Calvinist view of God’s sovereignty.”
It does not: it only empties both the notion of miracle and of physical law of any empirical content. Feynman’s (actually Newton’s) physics says that we cannot walk on the water because of the insufficient pressure of water to balance the force that we exert on its surface, due to gravitation. If Jesus indeed walked on the water, that could only mean that God suspended the law of gravity for a moment in order to make a point. If this were not the case, then the very concept of physical law would not make sense: it could be everything and anything, depending on God’s will. If this so, what is then the difference between a miracle and a process guided by natural law? How to recognize a miracle when we see it?
Ivan your point is well taken but Bob wants to be able to define “natural laws” in such a way that they can mean anything, to anybody, at anytime. Bob needs to square the circle so he defines the circle as a square. The rationalization two-step is simply amazing (amazing in a “Hi, my name is Kirk Cameron and this is a banana” kind of way).
Knoxharrington, so when physicists realized nature violated Newton’s understanding of the laws of physics, their reaction was to say, “Wow, sometimes Nature breaks the laws of physics. Interesting.” ?
Or did they redefine their understanding of what the laws of physics were, so that by definition Nature didn’t violate them?
And makes sure your answer respects the conservation of sarcasm.
Do you really want to equate the historical development of science based on scientific method, reliable testing methods, falsifiable hypotheses and so on with ruminations on some concept for which there is no evidence? With the increase in scientific knowledge we have gained two things – the first is a greater and greater understanding of the universe, the second is the diminishing need for a “god” to explain things.
Bob – answer my question from previous posts. Please provide us with an extra-Biblical account for any of the miracle stories. Exodus? Walking on water? Feeding the multitude? Resurrection? Zombies in Jerusalem? Any non-Biblical contemporaneous source for the validity of ANY miracle story. Just one. You choose.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z0YIJQ1jgEI