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| My friend 'Chucky' and the rumoured computer chip installed in his brain. Is he a possible robot candidate and within his hyper-Mennonite upbringing, a classic victim of hard determinism? |
Mark Final Study: Robots?
During the Christianity Explored, Gospel of Mark course, finale, a 'seeker', now with a Bible, asked (paraphrased):
Why does God not just create people that believe in Jesus Christ?
An excellent question and actually I view it and its ramifications as a serious objection to a classic libertarian free will defence and incompatibilism.
There are both non-Christian and Reformed objections to libertarian free will views; please see bibliography, in particular Mackie, Flew, Plantinga and Feinberg.
Please also see this site archives.
A kind Roman Catholic, evangelical answered with the classic and typical evangelical church answer (paraphrased):
People could not love God without the option of free will and the option to not to love God; otherwise people were robots.
I respectfully answered that within a Reformed tradition there was a better answer, although her answer had some truth to it. I replied along the lines as I have written in my PhD and on my academic sites which I will present again in a more complex form than in the course:
God could inevitably bring about, through the use of the regeneration and the resurrection of elected human persons, the end of human corruption, and even Plantinga’s concept of transworld depravity. Plantinga (1977)(2002: 53). If God willed and created a finalized Kingdom of restored persons that had experienced the problem of evil and were saved from it, then it could be reasoned that with God’s constant persuasion through the Holy Spirit and human experience and maturity, transworld depravity would never take place again.
No human wrong decision would need to occur as God always determines otherwise, without force and coercion; restored human beings do not lack experience as did the first humans (Adam and Eve) who rebelled against God causing corruption.
I speculate that theological praxis of sovereignty theodicy is more certain and comforting than free will theodicy, as transworld depravity is overcome by taking the primary choice (secondary human choice remains as simultaneously caused by God) of human belief in God away from corrupted human beings. Augustine (421)(1998: Chapter 13: 8). Plantinga (1982: 184-189). Calvin (1539)(1998: Book II, Chapter 2, 7). Luther (1516)(1968: 31). Feinberg (1994: 126-127).
It is placed in the hands of a sovereign God.
I have also written on the issue of God being perfectly able to create significantly free creatures that do not sin:
Greg Welty And Christ As Sinless Human Being (PhD Edit) March 10, 2014
The church table leader kindly attempted to shed light on the discussion by stating I was Reformed and did not believe in free will, but I stated that I do not believe in libertarian free will, but limited free will. I had stated earlier in the conversation that I was a soft determinist.
I realize many incompatibilists will not accept the soft determinism/hard determinism distinction, intellectually preferring a blanket 'determinism' term; but academically, theologically and philosophically, a significant distinction remains:
Significant human will or human free will is removed from a hard determinism model.
Significant human will or limited free will or like (freely) remains within many Reformed models, including mine and that of John S. Feinberg in 'The Many Faces of Evil'.
Some hyper-Calvinists may rightly be considered hard determinists.
Another recent article:
Middle Knowledge Revisited April 20 2016
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On Free Choice of the Will, Translated by Anna S.Benjamin and L.H. Hackstaff, Upper Saddle River, N.J., Prentice Hall.
AUGUSTINE (398-399)(1992)
Confessions, Translated by Henry Chadwick, Oxford, Oxford University Press.
AUGUSTINE (400-416)(1987)(2004)
On the Trinity, Translated by Reverend Arthur West Haddan, in Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series One, Volume 3, Denver, The Catholic Encyclopedia. http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/130104.htm
AUGUSTINE (421)(1998)
Enchiridion, Translated by J.F. Shaw, Denver, The Catholic Encyclopedia. http://www.knight.org/advent
AUGUSTINE (426)(1958)
The City of God, Translated by Gerald G. Walsh, Garden City, New York, Image Books.
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On Christian Doctrine, Translated by D.W. Robertson Jr., Upper Saddle River, N.J., Prentice Hall.
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On Christian Teaching, Translated by R.P.H. Green, Oxford, Oxford University Press.
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Christus Victor, Translated by A.G. Hebert, London, S.P.C.K.
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CALVIN, JOHN (1539)(1998)
The Institutes of the Christian Religion, Book IV, Translated by Henry Beveridge, Grand Rapids, The Christian Classic Ethereal Library, Wheaton College. http://www.ccel.org/ccel/calvin/institutes.html
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The Bondage and Liberation of the Will, Translated by G.I. Davies, Grand Rapids, Baker Book House.
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Concerning Scandals, Translated by John W. Fraser, Grand Rapids, William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company.
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Acts, Translated by Watermark, Nottingham, Crossway Books.
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Job, Translated by Leroy Nixon, Grand Rapids, Baker Book House.
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Philosophy, The Quest for Truth, New York, Wadsworth Publishing Company.
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A New Dictionary of Christian Theology, Kent, SCM Press Ltd.
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