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One Love
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| Posted 2/19/2005 8:15 AM (GMT -6) |   | Ok. A primer example.
Tom is unchangably disposed in such a way that Tom wants to consume as much chocolate as is humanly possible, without dying. He just loves chocolate. I know of a place where Tom can get as much FREE chocolate as he wants. There is NO OTHER PLACE like this one. It has every possible variety of chocolate that is available to humankind. There are no external things hindering him from going to the place anytime he wants. I keep trying to tell Tom about the place, because I want him to access the chocolate. But for whatever reason, Tom refuses to believe me. He'll go to all these other places to get chocolate. Sometimes, he'll get a little chocolate here, or a little chocolate there. But he always seems frustrated because he can't find a steady, plentiful source of chocolate! This keeps on...until one day, I can't take anymore. I effectively grab him forcibly, take him to the place. I take him right outside the building and let him SMELL the chocolate aroma coming from the building. I let him SEE the sign that says "Free chocolate here!" No dice. He's still resisting. He keeps thinking that this is some kind or trick or somthing. Finally, I literally drag him through the front door. I do this to shatter any ILLUSIONS, MISCONCEPTIONS or wrong thoughts that he has about the nature of the store or whatever. I make sure that he not only sees all the chocolate, but he also tastes some of the chocolate...and interacts with several people (both employees and visitors) that tell him that indeed, should he come to the store he can get all the free chocolate that he wants. After I feel that he's got the message quite clearly, I take him outside the store and then say...
"Ok. Now you know. Whatever you do from here is up to you."
And then I walk away.
Now, given that...
--Tom DEEPLY UNDERSTANDS the nature and reality of the store
--Tom is a rational being
--There is nothing and no one external hindering him from going to the place anytime he wants...and..
--There is nothing and no one external MAKING him to to the place...
What do you think the chances are that Tom will FREELY choose to go back into the chocolate place sometime in the future?
What is the probability that Tom will freely choose to go to the place MORE THAN ONCE over his lifetime, assuming Tom is immortal??
Do...you...get...this??? Let the person who has ears....HEAR!
Mad love  , 
"I've been converted three times. The first was to traditional Christianity; the second to honesty and the third was to the Love of God and man (humanity) The third was the real conversion. The first two were preliminary." --Nels Ferre, a theologian speaking of his spiritual journey with the Triune God Post Edited (MephEternal) : 2/19/2005 7:36:51 AM (GMT-6) | | Back to Top | | |
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One Love
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| Posted 2/19/2005 8:17 AM (GMT -6) | | Tom: (emphases mine)
Tom: Step 5 screams out to me: I’m contradictory! Don’t accept me. Step 5: “An unchangeable desire for sustained pursuit of a loving relationship with God emerges from a RATIONAL, yet UNFREE understanding of God. This is because the sentient being realizes that actualization of its own dispositional desires CANNOT be fulfilled without a love relationship with God. Unidirectionality is set, because of the empowered rationality of the sentient being.”
I sitting here thinking to myself: How can Mephi think Step 5 is anything other than pure, unconditional, unilateral, determinism? That’s all I see. An “unchangeable desire for God emerges from an unfree understanding of God”? The question mark is not meant to indicate an absence of understanding. It’s meant to express astonishment. OK. I’ll concede for the sake of argument that the “understanding” is unfree or hardwired. Fine. When we bottom out, we trip the mechanism, and then the “lights” turn on and we wake up to no epistemic distance and understand the truth about ourselves and God. But what makes you think an “unchanging desire for a loving relationship with God” would necessarily emerge from such understanding? Why believe that? Is that just what you’d like to see happen or do you have grounds (empirical or analytic) for believing that understanding the truth about ourselves and God necessarily results in wanting to relate to God? How do you know such desire would emerge from such knowledge? Yes, I see that you immediately follow with “…because the sentient being realizes that actualization of its own dispositional desires CANNOT be fulfilled without a love relationship with God,” and I’m thinking, “So what? Why should this realization eventuate necessarily in the emergence of a desire for God?” But, Mephi, moreover; even if such understanding eventuates in such a “desire” to date God, desiring a relationship doesn’t amount to being in a relationship. Actually relating requires the fulfillment of another necessary condition in addition to desiring: Choice.
Step 5 is to be rejected because it posits a metaphysically impossible state of affairs—not the hardwiring of understanding about God, nor the emergence of desire (though I’m skeptical of this for reasons I mentioned above), nor that God empowers rationality (though I’m not sure about this either, I’m granting it). It’s the total absence of a free volition, or libertarian free will, IN STEP 5 that renders the relationship established therein incoherent. You remove LFW from the one step that absolutely requires it.
Ok...
I think I'm seeing something.
I think that we are disagreeing about WHAT HAPPENS with near-zero epistemic distance. (Note: I wouldn't say absolute ZERO epistemic distance for that would NECESSARILY render exhaustive determinism, if beings are indeed rational.) Remember that "overwhelming" effect that you talked about before? It's that. People like John Hick say that a certain amount of epistemic distance is a necessary AND SUFFICIENT condition for LFW. The thought is that if too much were revealed to us about who God is...AND we are RATIONAL BEINGS...that any choices that we made at that time would not be properly "moral" because their was NO AMBIGUITY towards what the right choice was. He concurs that if there were ZERO epistemic distance then there would be NO more relative autonomy, existentially speaking. "Moral" choices, pre-self-solidification, necessitate having enough of the truth available to make the right choice, but not TOO MUCH of the truth that makes the right choice SO OBVIOUS that no rational being would choose otherwise! This is what the entire character developing (soul-making) argument says.
This is where I think you are wrong. Somehow, you've got the idea that rational, volitional activity where a being actualizes what they want REQUIRES libertarian freedom. This is just plain NOT the case! No agent theorists of libertarian freedom that I know of would even deny this. Check it out. Look at this VERY, VERY carefully.
Compatibilistic choice:
Rationality + Volition + Operating out of what one wants.
Libertarian choice:
Rationality + Volition + Operating out of what one wants + the agent itself being the FINAL SOURCE of what one wants + the genuine ability to do otherwise.
What is being denied by agent theorist is this: Any rational, volitional action where the being CANNOT 1) be designated the FINAL and ULTIMATE explanation for what is desired and 2) choose otherwise...is NOT a morally free act, thus moral responsibility cannot exist. Compatibilists say that moral responsibility CAN exist, because ALL that is necessary for moral responsibility is rational, volitional thought of a being, NOT power to the contrary or the ability to be a PRIMARY SOURCE of their willing. This is why compatibilists will say that if a person merely actualizes what they want without obstruction, then they are free and morally responsible. But at the same time, they'll say that...
1) God can place the IRRESISTABLE DESIRE within that person, and thus be the ultimate explanation for the desire.
and...
2) Using #1, God can make it such that the person CANNOT choose otherwise.
THIS is the big debate, Tom. And I agree with liberatian free willers. Though the idea of compatibilistic choice is not incoherent as an idea, it is very incoherent to say that compatibilistic choice IS A "FREE" one in any sense, morally or existentially! Again...
Compatibilistic choice:
Rationality + Volition + Operating out of what one wants.
Libertarian choice:
Rationality + Volition + Operating out of what one wants + the agent itself being the FINAL SOURCE of what one wants + the genuine ability to do otherwise.
This is why I couldn't, for the life of me, understand why you kepts saying that compatibilistic choice is unintelligible! It IS intelligible. What's NOT intelligible is compatibilistic choice that entails moral responsibility or moral autonomy.
In Step 5, the near zero epistemic distance does this: Given the being's rationality and a person's dispositional reality, there is NO MORE genuine ability to do other than choose to unchangably desire the pursuit of the love relationship with God.
I'll say it straight out...again. In Step 5, THINGS ARE DETERMINISTIC insofar a critical thing needed for libertarian free choice are not there: the ability to do otherwise! However, it's not like God just mystically "zapped" them or something. What God DID do was interact God's presence with sentient being's dispositional reality such that epistemic distance was removed...which also removed power to the contrary. There's a distinction there that I want kept. But I'm NOT DENYING that this is not a libertarianly free decision.
As far as the "actual relating", I AGREE with you that that is a product of libertarian freedom. But here's the thing, Tom. The exercise of our will is NOT DIVORCED from our thoughts and beliefs. There is a mutually influential interaction between our thoughts, beliefs, and will such that our will CANNOT just work AGAINST our deeply held thoughts and beliefs on a fundamental level. To posit this is to posit IRRATIONALITY. This is why making the tie between rationality and will is SO important. Voluntarism ends up saying that rationality is NOT NECESSARY for a morally free act. Preposterous! Of course it is.
So how does this all look?
In the "rock bottom" experience, God effectively "fixes" sentient being's thoughts and beliefs about God, via his decreased epistemic distance. This, combined with their dispositional realities, creates a COMPATIBILISTIC EFFECT such that there is a rational, YET UNFREE choice made to desire a sustained pursuit of a love relationship with God. It is proper to assume that the sentient being will exercise it's will in conjunction with it's newly acquired beliefs about God and reality. This leads the being to make LIBERTARIANLY FREE choices from what it COGNITIVELY UNDERSTANDS about God, itself, and reality
So, do you get what I'm saying?
The post-"rock bottom" emergent choice to unchangably desire a sustained pursuit of a love relationship with God is NOT FREE...but subsequent libertarianly free decisions which are based upon and interacting with that being's changed conceptions of reality are INDEED free. To me the "rock bottom" experience is like a great big cognitive/rational-emotive therapy session! God pierces our more irrational, erroneous beliefs about reality, give us a better understanding of reality and a better option (Godself), and then let's us freely operate on WHAT WE THEN KNOW TO BE TRUE.
Please tell me that you're getting me here.
"I've been converted three times. The first was to traditional Christianity; the second to honesty and the third was to the Love of God and man (humanity) The third was the real conversion. The first two were preliminary."
--Nels Ferre, a theologian speaking of his spiritual journey with the Triune God
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Tom
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| Posted 2/19/2005 11:58 AM (GMT -6) | |
Mephi: After I feel that he's got the message quite clearly, I take him outside the store and then say..."Ok. Now you know. Whatever you do from here is up to you." And then I walk away. Now…What do you think the chances are that Tom will FREELY choose to go back into the chocolate place sometime in the future? What is the probability that Tom will freely choose to go to the place MORE THAN ONCE over his lifetime, assuming Tom is immortal?
Tom: You’re the king of analogies dude. You deserve dwell forever in analogy heaven!
OK, here’s the needle in the haystack: I can process your analogy and say, “Heck, the probability that I’d irrevocably dive into divine chocolate is like 100%. I’d be in it faster than an NFL player can get his criminal charges dropped!” (Cuba Gooding Jr in “The Fighting Temptations”—I’m trying to wash Alien vs Predator out of my head).
I can say this with confidence because I don’t have to deal with LFW, and I don’t see that LFW would be working in this situation. You admit the choice for chocolate would NOT be a libertarian one. So we agree on that. And that’s cool, because the “integrity” of “eating chocolate” (what constitutes the experience of eating chocolate) isn’t compromised if I didn’t exercise LFW to get there. This is fine because the experience of “eating chocolate” is not analogous where it needs to be to the experience of “relating personally and lovingly," in which case such freedom IS a “metaphysical requirement.” That means it’s GOT to be there; i.e., there’s no conceivable circumstance that can render its fulfillment 100% guaranteed. That doesn’t make sense with eating chocolate, I agree. Everything tells us there’s no problem with our knowing that I would, with 100% probability, dive into chocolate. But this is only because we’ve taken LFW out of the equation. The choice for chocolate in the circumstances you’ve described is compatibilistic, pure and simple, and nobody who might know that they need chocolate would feel the experience of eating chocolate was compromised if they discovered their choosing to eat chocolate was not determined at least partly by their choosing to do so libertarianly. BUT THEY WOULD (and DO) have definitional and existential objections they discovered their choosing a “relationship of love” was not ultimately resolved by such will.
Real simply, check this out:
Let’s suppose I’m a person NOT in a personal relationship with God. No relationship. Then at some time later I AM in a relationship (NR for “No Relationship” to R for “Relationship”). So there’s “movement”…
From |NR| to |R|. Thus |NR|------>|R| where the arrow represents the movement from one obtaining state of affairs to another contradictory state of affairs.
You’re admitting the exercise of LFW within the established relationship, like this: |LFW-R|. That’s nice. But that’s only partly what TWT1 claims. You’re denying that LFW characterizes the movement itself from |NR| to |R|, so that |NR|----LFW---->[R]. In other words, with respect to any CHOICE finite creatures make, this theorem obtains: Either |NX|----LFW---->[X] or |NX|----D---->[X] (where X is some choice, NX = “not having made the choice,” X = “having made the choice,” and D = “deterministically”). Compatibilists might say |NR|----C---->[R] (where C = “compatibilistically”) can guarantee the integrity of X where X = the choice to relate, or |R|, but we’ve spent three years here showing they’re wrong. It’s LFW or D with respect to the MOVEMENT from |NR| to |R|, and we know D to be a metaphysically impossible track for this movement.
Sure, it doesn’t HAVE to be the case with eating chocolate that |NEC|----LFW---->|EC| obtains. In other words, where NEC means “not eating chocolate” and EC means “eating chocolate,” |NEC|---D---->|EC| doesn’t jeopardize the existential integrity of |EC|. D is a metaphysically possible track for such movement. But it’s not where |R| is concerned.
So if “Either |NR|----LFW---->[R] or |NR|----D---->[R]” is true, and the latter is a logically impossible state of affairs, then your claim that the rock-bottom experience can guarantee |NR|----D---->[R] is false. |NR|----LFW (among other things)---->[R] is the only metaphysically possible track for obtaining |R|. Notice I'm not saying LFW is the ONLY thing that characterizes the movement from |NR| to |R|. But it's ONE of the necessary conditons.
More later!
Tom Post Edited (TGB) : 2/19/2005 11:24:15 AM (GMT-6) | | Back to Top | | |
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One Love
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| Posted 2/19/2005 12:22 PM (GMT -6) | | Wait a second,
Now, I think I get what you are saying...
Sheesh...It can't be this simple...
This is SOOOO anal...
Fine...whatever.
Let it be stated that:
It is VERY, VERY, VERY, VERY, VERY, VERY, VERY, VERY, VERY, VERY, VERY, VERY, VERY, VERY, VERY, VERY, VERY, VERY, VERY, VERY, VERY, VERY, VERY, VERY, VERY, VERY, VERY, VERY HIGHLY probable that given 1)reduced epistemic distance and 2) a certain dispositional reality that post-"rock bottom" people will end up freely choosing to begin loving God as a result of their unchangeable desire for sustained pursuit or a loving relationship with God that will culminate with them being solidified with God...
but it's not 100% certain that they will make that initial free choice.
It's a statistical, but not LOGICAL, impossibility, that a post-"rock bottom" person will NEVER choose to love God.
How about this, Tom?
"I've been converted three times. The first was to traditional Christianity; the second to honesty and the third was to the Love of God and man (humanity) The third was the real conversion. The first two were preliminary."
--Nels Ferre, a theologian speaking of his spiritual journey with the Triune God
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One Love
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| Posted 2/19/2005 9:59 PM (GMT -6) | | Good enough, Tom. Thanks for all the interaction and patience. Really. Thanks for hanging in there with me.
Remember, the reason why I wanted to work this out from this standpoint first is because, in my mind, there would NO reason to argue for universalism exegetically, if it were a philosophically and theologically unviable concept. But if we can agree that, functionally speaking, universalism IS viable...that there is a logically consistent perspective that allows for it...particularly with the Arminian supposition of libertarian free will, now we can get somewhere...
Anyways as we are looking at scripture, I did want to repost some things WHILE we are looking at scripture.
A brief summary statement of my conception of Universal Reconciliation:
In the end, God's love and justice are consummated by God's divine elimination of everything in Creation that is against the nature and being of God...and the purification of everything that can be redeemed to God. God, by his wisdom, in His love, and for His glorious purposes, has made Creation such that there is SOMETHING inherent in ALL sentient beings that can be redeemed. How MUCH of sentient beings that will be redeemed or eliminated...and the duration of the process...is genuinely up to the beings themselves. In other words, God is the SOLE agent of judgment (Judge) and redemption (Savior), while we genuinely affect how this agency will SUBJECTIVELY affect us, though the power of our decisions.
I wanted to put this in full view and keep this in mind.
If accepted, this view allows for...
--relative ontological autonomy (which gives ontological distinction
--moral autonomy and moral responsibility (ie earthly decisions are commensurate with eternal states) [This uses a more process philosohical understanding]
--a coherent, consistent explanation of "rewards" and "losses" in Heaven (tied in with moral autonomy!)
--affirmation of all 6 theses of the open/warfare worldview, including #1--love MUST be chosen
--a coherent, consistent outworking of post-mortem evangelism (This is actually quite important, because post-mortem evangelism is inextricably linked to the free-will defense!)
--the painful reality and harshness of a hellish divine punishment
--divine punishment as retributive AND rehabilitative
--the final victory of God over sin, wickedness, and the Devil
--the faithful reigning with Christ following the judgement
--the total elimination (destruction!) of ALL of sin's effects. (ie we don't have to posit the love of God being frustrated in any way by divine mourning!)
--the complete VICTORY over DEATH (both spiritual and physical)
-------------------
Plus, I'd like to remind us of this...there are VERY CLOSE similarities between some of the exegetical arguments for annihiliationism...and for my type of universalism here. Particularly the idea of hell being eternal in consequence and not duration...and it's criticisms of the eternal conscious punishment view. I'd even use annihilationism's argument against Revelation 14 and 20... in conjunction with some of my own ideas on the "second death." As we talk about this more, we'll see that I completely agree that the destruction and extinguishing in hell IS eternal in consequence. And that all wickedness and sin is utterly "burned up" and destroyed in hell...as are the "lives" of the people in hell.
But...
Where I am going to part ways with annihilationism is 1) their conception of personhood implicit in their claims, 2) their allowance for DEATH to have final victory over God, and 3) the corresponding eternal frustration of the love of God via God's eternal mourning.
I will argue that there is no real reason outside of a PARTICULAR VIEW OF PERSONHOOD to think that the elimination of all sin NECESSARILY ENTAILS the destruction of the entire person. If one accepts a different view of personhood, one can completely affirm that the [i]effects[/i] of hell have eternal consequence and all sin and wickedness is utterly destoyed...WHILE affirming that it is logically possible that some aspect of sentient creaturely existence is always redeemable!
So...we'll get on this. Again, Tom and all, thanks for all the great interaction thus far. Let's keep it movin.
"I've been converted three times. The first was to traditional Christianity; the second to honesty and the third was to the Love of God and man (humanity) The third was the real conversion. The first two were preliminary."
--Nels Ferre, a theologian speaking of his spiritual journey with the Triune God
Post Edited (MephEternal) : 2/20/2005 6:15:02 PM (GMT-6) | | Back to Top | | |
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Similitude
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| Posted 2/19/2005 10:08 PM (GMT -6) | | Meph: In the end, God's love and justice are consummated by God's divine elimination of everything in Creation that is against the nature and being of God...and the purification of everything that can be redeemed to God. God, by his wisdom, in His love, and for His glorious purposes, has made Creation such that there is SOMETHING inherent in ALL sentient beings that can be redeemed.
Jeff: Sorry for not keeping up with the thread completely, but has the issue of atonement for angels been addressed herein or elsewhere? In other words, if humans HAVE to have atonement for their repentance to avail them any reconciliation with God, would not the same be true of angels? And if so, is the death of Christ the kind of atonement that would be effectual for an angel? It seems possible that it might not be, for why would the shedding of blood be needed for a blood-less, non-physical being? Any thoughts?
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One Love
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| Posted 2/19/2005 10:14 PM (GMT -6) | | Oh, one more thing, for Tom.
These are the things that we seem to agree on...
1. God IS love. Not God is "loving" God IS love.
2. God is completely omnipotent. God can accomplish whatever God wants to accomplish that doesn't a) violate the laws of logic and b) does not go against God's necessary essential existence.
3. God REALLY wants display His glorious nature to something OTHER THAN God and have it represented back to God by that something. In words, God requires relative ontological distinction.
4. God REALLY wants those "others" to participate significantly in their OWN moral existence. In other word, the relative ontological distinction facilitates moral autonomy and responsibility.
5. God REALLY wants all sentient beings in Creation to embody and reflect God's glorious nature to God and each other forever...extending the "dance of the Trinity"
6. God REALLY DOESN'T WANT any sentient being to experience eternal destruction. Not only because it's bad for the sentient beings...but because that would TAKE AWAY from God's own aesthetic experience of contingent reality.
7. If there is ANY POSSIBLE WAY that God can actualize God's own divine disposition and intentions, God will do so.
I want to highlight #7. If there is ANY WAY that was metaphysically possible and consonant with his necessary essential existence where God could get everyone saved, God WILL use it.
My presupposition is that God is infinitely intelligent, meaning that God could have definitely thought of ANYTHING that we can think of. And he'd have had that conception from eternity past. The way this works out is this for me: If we can find a logically possible way for universalism (functional or otherwise) to work while not violating the metaphysics of love, then there is at least ONE option open to God to actualize his "trinification" project. There may be MORE ways than this...and there probably are. But we would know of AT LEAST one way. Thus, we could say that because at least ONE method of universalism is possible, God actualizes universalism.
This is why I HAD to spend so much time here. If it was not METAPHYSICALLY possible for God to be assure Godself of this, then there went the whole idea. But what it seems to me that we've come to is saying that it IS metaphysically possible to be VERY, VERY optimistic that every person will be saved.
Just getting this clear too.
"I've been converted three times. The first was to traditional Christianity; the second to honesty and the third was to the Love of God and man (humanity) The third was the real conversion. The first two were preliminary."
--Nels Ferre, a theologian speaking of his spiritual journey with the Triune God
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One Love
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| Posted 2/19/2005 10:18 PM (GMT -6) | | Jefscott:
Jeff: Sorry for not keeping up with the thread completely, but has the issue of atonement for angels been addressed herein or elsewhere? In other words, if humans HAVE to have atonement for their repentance to avail them any reconciliation with God, would not the same be true of angels? And if so, is the death of Christ the kind of atonement that would be effectual for an angel? It seems possible that it might not be, for why would the shedding of blood be needed for a blood-less, non-physical being? Any thoughts?
If one takes a variation of the Christus Victor model, we understand that "salvation" is a COSMOLOGICAL thing, not just a ANTHROPOLOGICAL thing. Christ's work was to redeem CREATION and combat the corrupting work of sin in it. This, in my mind, includes ALL of creation. Let's not forget...sin DIDN'T start with human beings...and via Satan's initial rebellion EVERYTHING got marred by sin.
Thus the redemption work of Christ is much more expansive than just the particular sins of human beings...even though that's included in the work.
"I've been converted three times. The first was to traditional Christianity; the second to honesty and the third was to the Love of God and man (humanity) The third was the real conversion. The first two were preliminary."
--Nels Ferre, a theologian speaking of his spiritual journey with the Triune God
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Starkman
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| Posted 2/20/2005 10:16 AM (GMT -6) | | | Meph,
So that I can work through this also, will you answer a few questions for me here...
Meph: Tom, we are postulating an EXISTENTIAL aburdity. For the slimmest possibility to occur, a person would have to LEAP into complete irrationality, choosing against every belief they have about the truth and all of the dispositional realities within them. It would like you in the analogy just up and NEVER deciding to go back to the chocolate shop. This would be what Talbott would say is nonsensical, if beings are fundamentally rational beings who act in their own self-interest
Starkman: There is something else besides acting rationally as humans that is very much a part of our make up: individuality in context with some self autonomy, and the desire to distinguish these if in no other way than by going against the grain. It would not, therefore, be absurd that Tom not eat the chocolate if Tom is aware that he is being played a pawn. Individuality rises above the desire. Further, does this individuality make possible a solidificaiton for self and not for God, despite all the epistemistic closure? It would seem to be the case while on earth (Romans 1).
Further, don't we have an example of this Self solidification in Satan?
And finally, if one can be solidified in self and not God, would it not be true that God's desires are NOT frustrated, because, in view of this individuality, God knowing this as an option, having creating man with this gift, is therefore not frustrated if man exercises this option? God, Himself, would have eliminated the possibility of His being frustrated by allowing for a solidification towards either direction. Obviously, if solidificaiton in Self, or otherwise, is not possible, then God's desires are frustrated.
Thanks,
Starkman
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One Love
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| Posted 2/20/2005 6:48 PM (GMT -6) | | Starkman:
Meph: Tom, we are postulating an EXISTENTIAL aburdity. For the slimmest possibility to occur, a person would have to LEAP into complete irrationality, choosing against every belief they have about the truth and all of the dispositional realities within them. It would like you in the analogy just up and NEVER deciding to go back to the chocolate shop. This would be what Talbott would say is nonsensical, if beings are fundamentally rational beings who act in their own self-interest
Starkman: There is something else besides acting rationally as humans that is very much a part of our make up: individuality in context with some self autonomy, and the desire to distinguish these if in no other way than by going against the grain. It would not, therefore, be absurd that Tom not eat the chocolate if Tom is aware that he is being played a pawn. Individuality rises above the desire. Further, does this individuality make possible a solidificaiton for self and not for God, despite all the epistemistic closure? It would seem to be the case while on earth (Romans 1).
I'm glad you brought this up, Starkman. More that a couple of theologians have discussed something like this. The aspect of self-interest and autonomy. The desire to be oneself and actualize one's will. This is actually, interestingly enough, the basis for why a significant amount of evangelical theologians believes that a hell exists. Presumably, God loves human dignity and the ability to be themselves even to utter ruin SO much, that God is sorrowfully, but dutifully willing to endure the choices of God's creations. In other words, God supposedly lets people have want they want and become what they want. If they want to be completely away from God and be the ANTITHESIS of what God is, then God honors their right to do that. This is the line that is usually taken. But SOME theologians, like William Lane Craig, will say that this will to power is SO strong possibly, that even the most irrational decisions can be made, even in the face of all truth. That choices don't need rationality in order to be free. And supposedly God doesn't honor choices JUST because they are have some meaningful rationality involved...but because they are "free"
I disagree with these theologians.
First of all, let's look at a possible disposition that could be said to allow this search for self-autonomy. I believe that it can be summed up as follows:
Self-actualization:
This means that all sentient beings have the drive to acknowlege and fully "become" themselves and their realize their willings.
According to people like Jonathon Edwards, God also has this. It is the drive that inclines the being to BE and BECOME who they are...and to realize themselves through their willings. How this would work out in sentient creations is that all sentient creatures has SELF-INTEREST.
We understand ourselves as SUBJECTS, not merely OBJECTS. Moreover, we WANT to be and we want to become more. We want to exist and we want to "increase" our existence. Also, we want to have EFFICACY in the world. We want our willed actions to have bearing not just on ourselves, but on our world. I firmly believe that all of these flow from the disposition that we have for self-actualization.
Now here's the interesting point.
The truth of the matter is that, though we realize ourselves as subject, we cannot shake this feeling of incompleteness. Though we are agents in our own rights, we cannot shake this sense of needing some type of unity with something other than ourselves. This gets deep becauses, in contemplating this, it's possible that one makes oneself an OBJECT before this other thing...or PERSON. In this case, we percieve things other than ourselves as THREATS to our existences and our actualization. The bigger something is, the less we seem. And this dissonance....the longing for unity AND the need for separate existence...gets rough. The irony of ALL of this is that this "incompleteness" that we feel can only be fixed by God. In the paradox of paradoxes, the only way for a unique, contingent, sentient being to fully become itself and actualize the fullness of itself, it MUST be unified with God in relationship! This goes RIGHT along with all of the "lose your life to find it" motif. In surrendering ourselves to God in relationship, we actually gain more of ourselves than we EVER could have gotten otherwise! So, the idea is that if a sentient being were to have a disposition that inclined one to fully actualize itself...and the ONLY WAY that that could happen was to be unified with God...then it would be in that being's HIGHEST SELF-INTEREST in this regard to be unified with God.
But...
We believe lies. And we suppress the truth. When faced with the holy otherness and immensity of God, we are faced with ultimately two choices:
1) See God as the Source of all and our greatest empowerment for self-actualization
or..
2) See God as a threat to our existence, freedom, and becoming.
As we see biblically and even in our own experience, we do the latter. The anxiety becomes too great and we make bad choices and "fall." Instead of thinking of God as our raison d'etre (reason for being), we think of God as a tyrant and threat to our existence. Thus we begin believing lies about God. Being deceived and SELF-deceived. And the inner tension is great because, in a crazy twist, the very thing that our innermost being hungers for, we cojole ourselves into BELIEVING that thing something we HAVE to stay away from. This is why, I believe, the Bible make so much about people being DECEIVED and SELF-DECEIVED. How people couldn't recognize true light and LOVED the darkness. How people would go after their own vain imaginations. We believe the LIE about God. We SUPPRESS the truth of God that we, in our innermost parts, KNOW to be true. We do this to the point where we actually don't think about God much. Sometimes, some people do this to the point where they hate God.
How the Devil must laugh. It would be like brainwashing a malnourished starving child into wholeheartedly believing that eating healthy food would kill it! And then watching the child starve and exist in living death, as he refused to eat what could veritably save his life! And we just fall for it. All the time. Just like this. It would be just like the devil to take a desire that we have...an innately GOOD desire...and help us screw up it's true use and intention.
Anyways, our will has an mutually influential, interdependent relationship with our thoughts and feelings. Our thoughts and feelings guide our volitional activity...even as our volitional activity can limit or expand the types of thoughts and feelings that we have. This is why rationality is ESSENTIAL to any view of free choice. To postulate a "free decision" outside of rational deliberation is a contradiction. It wouldn't be "free" in any real sense of the word, because it didn't come from an agent considering itself and it's desires. It would be sponteneous at best, and utter irrational and spastic at worst. What all this means it that our wills can ONLY REALLY WORK on our thoughts, beliefs, and interpretations of reality. When we take this to our dispositional realities, our sense of agency will operate on the inclinations of our dispositional realities only using the content of our thoughts, beliefs, and interpretations of reality. We can use no one else's.
Now what do you think would happen if a person is disposed toward self-actualization...but truly BELIEVES that God is the ultimate ANNIHILATOR, not ultimatle FULFILLMENT, of that self-actualization? Very simple. That being is going to will for SELF-AUTONOMY!! There will be no discussion. No debating. They will want to get AWAY. Do we not see this in our OWN existences? Do we have any parents of adolescents in the house that can testify what their children will do to get their sense of AUTONOMY during those crucial stages of development?? Sometimes, in a way that is hurtful not only to the parent/child relationship...but to the child as well??
This, dear Starkman, is what is going on when we see the will to autonomy being demonstrated. Even in Satan. The desire to be like the Most High isnt necessarily about avarice or pride...more than it's a faulty expression of a glorious impulse to become oneself! It's NOT a fundamentally irrational decision, as some theologians want to make it out. It's PERFECTLY rational operation...based on faulty beliefs and thoughts.
Now, taking all of this...what would happen if God were to, at some point, confront us with our deception and self-deception...and show us the truth? That there was a REASON for that constant incompleteness that we always felt but couldn't get rid of. There was a REASON for us feeling the tension between unity and diversity. Most of all, God would show us that, contrary to popular belief, the ONE THING that would fulfill our longing for fully becoming oneself and actualizing our willing according to that self...is GOD! If God were to do this, what do we honestly think would happen? Now remember we are ASSUMING some core rationality here...because it's NECESSARY for "free choice" to have any meaning. What do you think would happen? How about this? There may be some SERIOUS mourning over the sheer futility of action up to that point. And there would DEFINITELY be at least a UNCHANGEABLE DESIRE to pursue this God. Why? Because doing anything otherwise would NOT help one truly become oneself, like that one really wanted! To rail against God at that point would be the ultimate SELF-BETRAYAL! A person would be making the choice NOT for self-autonomy, but for continued self-annihiliation and working against self-interest! Only this time, it would be worse, because it would be done KNOWINGLY. It would be the ultimate irrationality. And, if done, it DEFINITELY wouldn't be a "free decision" as we conceive of it. Nah. I don't think this would happen. Not given core rationality, corrected interpretations of reality, and the internal motivations towards self-actualization. Just don't think so.
All this is to say this, Starkman. The will to self-autonomy can be viewed as a UNHEALTHY EXPRESSION of a divinely granted disposition towards self-actualization, that is fed by INCORRECT thoughts, beliefs, and interpretations about themselves and about God. The will to self-autonomy does NOT need to be conceived of as irrationality, per se.
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Starkman:
And finally, if one can be solidified in self and not God, would it not be true that God's desires are NOT frustrated, because, in view of this individuality, God knowing this as an option, having creating man with this gift, is therefore not frustrated if man exercises this option? God, Himself, would have eliminated the possibility of His being frustrated by allowing for a solidification towards either direction. Obviously, if solidificaiton in Self, or otherwise, is not possible, then God's desires are frustrated.
The only way what you are saying would make sense to me is for us to say that God's ultimate desire for Creation was for it to go it's own way, become what it wills, and face the ramifications of those decisions. In other words, the chief telos would have to be FREEDOM. That's the only way I could see God's ultimate desires not being frustrated. Think about it. Even if someone completely solidified against God to their ultimate harm and destruction, this would be an instantiation of the DIVINE TELOS. God would have every right to be pleased as punch. The END RESULT of sentient being's choices wouldn't be as important as the FACTICITY of their freely chosen ends.
However...
If you REALLY want me to believe that God created this WHOLE UNIVERSE for the MAIN PURPOSE of LOVING OTHERS and having those others love him for eternity...NOW we have a different issue. If you want me to believe that God truly loves EVERY INDIVIDUAL BEING like it's the only one...AND wants nothing more than to have each and every sentient being reflect his loving nature and His glory back to Him for all eterity...
You CANNOT expect me to believe that God would NOT be frustrated if someone chose eternal self-destruction. Moreover, you cannot expect me to believe that an infinitely intelligent, omnipotent God wouldn't ANTICIPATE such risks and create Creation with those UNACCEPTABLE risks in mind.
Acceptable risks:
Sin, Death, Pain, Hell, Tragedy, Evil, Suffering, Loss, Destruction, Decay, Self-destruction, Deceit, Self-Deceit, etc.
NON-Acceptable risks:
God being "dethroned", God compromising Godself in any way, eternal self-destruction of any sentient being
This fits so easy to my mind, God being love and truly wanting NO ONE to be lost.
Anyways, I say this: If we are going to say that God really DID create this whole universe for the chief telos of having ETERNALLY-LASTING LOVING PERSONAL RELATIONALITY with sentient beings...then let's take that thought to it's logical conclusions! But if the telos IS "freedom", then ANY view of hell will do with no problems. No problems at all.
"I've been converted three times. The first was to traditional Christianity; the second to honesty and the third was to the Love of God and man (humanity) The third was the real conversion. The first two were preliminary."
--Nels Ferre, a theologian speaking of his spiritual journey with the Triune God
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Tom
Registered Member
Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 10353
| Posted 2/20/2005 7:55 PM (GMT -6) | | |
I didn’t get to interact with this post of Mephi’s before (his second post on page 4). Not sure it all still applies if he now concedes things he didn’t concede when he wrote, so may there’s no need to comment on it, but perhaps my replies will make my own position clearer.
Mephi: Remember that "overwhelming" effect that you talked about before? It's that. People like John Hick say that a certain amount of epistemic distance is a necessary AND SUFFICIENT condition for LFW. The thought is that if too much were revealed to us about who God is...AND we are RATIONAL BEINGS...that any choices that we made at that time would not be properly "moral" because their was NO AMBIGUITY towards what the right choice was. He concurs that if there were ZERO epistemic distance then there would be NO more relative autonomy, existentially speaking.
Tom: I like this. SOME ambiguity has to be present for LFW to exist.
Also, Mephi, in your view, does the rock-bottom encounter remove whatever level of self-solidification in evil an agent had immediately prior to that encounter?
Mephi: "Moral" choices, pre-self-solidification, necessitate having enough of the truth available to make the right choice, but not TOO MUCH of the truth that makes the right choice SO OBVIOUS that no rational being would choose otherwise! This is what the entire character developing (soul-making) argument says.
Tom: Right.
Mephi: This is where I think you are wrong. Somehow, you've got the idea that rational, volitional activity where a being actualizes what they want REQUIRES libertarian freedom. This is just plain NOT the case! No agent theorists of libertarian freedom that I know of would even deny this. Check it out. Look at this VERY, VERY carefully.
Tom: Right. It doesn’t apply to all choices. Just morally responsible ones. Compatibilistic choices aren’t incoherent. It’s “unconditionally predetermined compatibilistic morally significant choices” that’s an incoherent notion.
Mephi: THIS is the big debate, Tom. And I agree with liberatian free willers. Though the idea of compatibilistic choice is not incoherent as an idea, it is very incoherent to say that compatibilistic choice IS A "FREE" one in any sense, morally or existentially!
Tom: Exactomundo.
Mephi: This is why I couldn't, for the life of me, understand why you kepts saying that compatibilistic choice is unintelligible! It IS intelligible. What's NOT intelligible is compatibilistic choice that entails moral responsibility or moral autonomy.
Tom: Right.
Mephi: In Step 5, the near zero epistemic distance does this: Given the being's rationality and a person's dispositional reality, there is NO MORE genuine ability to do other than choose to unchangably desire the pursuit of the love relationship with God. I'll say it straight out...again. In Step 5, THINGS ARE DETERMINISTIC insofar a critical thing needed for libertarian free choice are not there: the ability to do otherwise! However, it's not like God just mystically "zapped" them or something. What God DID do was interact God's presence with sentient being's dispositional reality such that epistemic distance was removed...which also removed power to the contrary. There's a distinction there that I want kept. But I'm NOT DENYING that this is not a libertarianly free decision.
Tom: OK, have you changed on this since conceding LFW more recently? This is what I need to know. Because this is problematic for me.
Mephi: As far as the "actual relating", I AGREE with you that that is a product of libertarian freedom. But here's the thing, Tom. The exercise of our will is NOT DIVORCED from our thoughts and beliefs. There is a mutually influential interaction between our thoughts, beliefs, and will such that our will CANNOT just work AGAINST our deeply held thoughts and beliefs on a fundamental level. To posit this is to posit IRRATIONALITY.
Tom: Well, we may have some problem still then. Not sure. You want to posit a perfectly rationally informed, determined, and unchangeable “desire” for God, BUT you want to posit SOME epistemic distance which acknowledges some ambiguity WHERE IT COUNTS, that is, with respect to how God and the self in relation to one another are understood. The ED means the “rationality” can’t be entirely empowered, leaving the agent with NO rational explanation of God and self which has to be the reasonable basis for exercising LFW.
Mephi: In the "rock bottom" experience, God effectively "fixes" sentient being's thoughts and beliefs about God, via his decreased epistemic distance.
Tom: If the distance is greater than zero (and it is), then it’s not “fixed.” The agent STILL retains whatever “self-solidification in evil” she had prior to the rock-bottom experience. I’m wondering where you posit this self-solidification, where it manifests itself. See, if the rock-bottom encounter so empowers and enlightens reason that no other rational explanation of God and the self is possible, so radically alters disposition that no other desiring but for God is possible, then just where DOES the near-total self-solidification in evil reside in the person?
Mephi: The post-"rock bottom" emergent choice to unchangably desire a sustained pursuit of a love relationship with God is NOT FREE...but subsequent libertarianly free decisions which are based upon and interacting with that being's changed conceptions of reality are INDEED free.
Tom: You’ve changed on this right? You’re repudiated this, worn sackcloth and ashes and threw dirt up into the air over your head in repentance, right?
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SUBSEQUENT POST OF MEPHI’S:
Mephi: Remember, the reason why I wanted to work this out from this standpoint first is because, in my mind, there would NO reason to argue for universalism exegetically, if it were a philosophically and theologically unviable concept. But if we can agree that, functionally speaking, universalism IS viable...that there is a logically consistent perspective that allows for it...particularly with the Arminian supposition of libertarian free will, now we can get somewhere.
Tom: I apologize for being anal, but I do still have OTHER issues. When I said your view is plausible “all else being equal” I just mean that THIS ONE ASPECT (your denial of LFW in the movement from |NR| to |R|) that WAS disqualifying your view in my mind was now gone. Now we have to deal with the “all else being equal.” I’ve already asked you above about where the self-solidification in evil that SURVIVES the rock-bottom encounter resides in the “self” if the encounter leaves reason and disposition both freedom from the effects of the self’s solidification in evil.
And then there’s epistemic distance. You admit to SOME distance, SOME ambiguity, within the encounter, yet you deny that the post-rock-bottom self would have any REASONABLE explanation for choosing to reject God. Seems to me that the ambiguity (for LFW to work) has to be explanatory ambiguity (ambiguity of reason, or its exercise at least) with regard to UNDERSTANDING God and the self AND dispositional ambiguity (the real ability to invest one’s “self”—thoughts, feelings, and desires—in a reasonable way in rejecting God.
We’re still a long way off from looking at scripture.
Mephi: A brief summary statement of my conception of Universal Reconciliation:
In the end, God's love and justice are consummated by God's divine elimination of everything in Creation that is against the nature and being of God...and the purification of everything that can be redeemed to God. God, by his wisdom, in His love, and for His glorious purposes, has made Creation such that there is SOMETHING inherent in ALL sentient beings that can be redeemed. How MUCH of sentient beings that will be redeemed or eliminated...and the duration of the process...is genuinely up to the beings themselves. In other words, God is the SOLE agent of judgment (Judge) and redemption (Savior), while we genuinely affect how this agency will SUBJECTIVELY affect us, though the power of our decisions.
Tom: When you speak of some of the sentient being’s self or soul is “eliminated,” do you mean “eternally” eliminated? Permanently lost? If so, please describe for me the existence of a person who has lost 99% of their “self” or “soul” but who was redeemed through the rock-bottom encounter and now resides in heaven? In what sense is God’s purpose for that person fulfilled? What do they DO in heaven?
I still don’t get it. God is the “sole” agent of judgment and redemption but we determine whether we’re judged or saved through the exercise of our will? Well, yeah. This could fit into a paragraph expressing eternal conscious torment. If you think this contributes to your universalism, I’m missing something.
Mephi: “how MUCH of sentient beings that will be redeemed or eliminated. I wanted to put this in full view and keep this in mind. If accepted, this view allows for...
--relative ontological autonomy (which gives ontological distinction
--moral autonomy and moral responsibility (ie earthly decisions are commensurate with eternal states) [This uses a more process philosohical understanding]
Tom: Really? Earthly decisions are commensurate with eternal states? Then like I just asked, I need you to describe for me the eternal state of someone who has had 99% of their “self” eliminated.
Now, my question is, does the autonomy and responsibility apply not only to earthly decisions but to post-mortem decisions, all the way through and after the rock-bottom encounter? If so, and if an agent cannot have their freedly chosen solidification in evil erased by God, and if there’s enough epistemic distance to rationally ground a choice LFW after the rock-bottom encounter, then I don’t know why you’re so optimistic.
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ANOTHER SUBSEQUENT POST OF MEPHI’S:
Mephi: I will argue that there is no real reason outside of a PARTICULAR VIEW OF PERSONHOOD to think that the elimination of all sin NECESSARILY ENTAILS the destruction of the entire person. If one accepts a different view of personhood, one can completely affirm that the effects of hell have eternal duration and all sin and wickedness is utterly destoyed...WHILE affirming that it is logically possible that some aspect of sentient creaturely existence is always redeemable!
Tom: I’ve already asked about the nature of the existence of somebody who has only 1% of their “self” or “soul” in heaven. We’ll have to talk about this.
Dude, when we’re finished, let’s edit this and publish it!
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ANOTHER SUBSEQUENT POST OF MEPHI’S:
Mephi: Oh, one more thing, for Tom. These are the things that we seem to agree on...
1. God IS love. Not God is "loving" God IS love.
2. God is completely omnipotent. God can accomplish whatever God wants to accomplish that doesn't a) violate the laws of logic and b) does not go against God's necessary essential existence.
Tom: AND c) violate the metaphysics of love (enough epistemic distance to make the exercise of LFW rationally defensible and dispositionally possible).
Mephi: 3. God REALLY wants display His glorious nature to something OTHER THAN God and have it represented back to God by that something. In words, God requires relative ontological distinction.
4. God REALLY wants those "others" to participate significantly in their OWN moral existence. In other words, the relative ontological distinction facilitates moral autonomy and responsibility.
5. God REALLY wants all sentient beings in Creation to embody and reflect God's glorious nature to God and each other forever...extending the "dance of the Trinity"
6. God REALLY DOESN'T WANT any sentient being to experience eternal destruction. Not only because it's bad for the sentient beings...but because that would TAKE AWAY from God's own aesthetic experience of contingent reality.
7. If there is ANY POSSIBLE WAY that God can actualize God's own divine disposition and intentions, God will do so.
Tom: It all sounds good.
Mephi: I want to highlight #7. If there is ANY WAY that was metaphysically possible and consonant with his necessary essential existence where God could get everyone saved, God WILL use it.
Tom: What libertarian would deny this? The question is “what is possible and not” with respect to the metaphysics of love in post-mortem states. We gotta get clear on that, and there are several key questions.
Mephi: There may be MORE ways than this...and there probably are. But we would know of AT LEAST one way. Thus, we could say that because at least ONE method of universalism is possible, God actualizes universalism.
Tom: Eventually we’ll have to defend our optimism. You seem to want to see the possibility that agents always have a way out as grounds for rejoicing in the fact that all will be saved. I? Well, even IF I can manage to work through questions I have about…
-epistemic distance and rational grounds for rejecting God post-rock-bottom (which seem to be entailed in the existence of LFW),
-the eschatological lopsided effect this all has on what seems to me to be a fundamental temporal arrangement that obtains between final victory and the return of Christ,
-the very strange claim that only 1% of an agent’s “self” or “soul” might survive and whether in the end this is worth it (is it any different really than annihilation?),
-the huge exegetical obstacles…
…and in the end STILL affirm the possibility that agents would always have a way out, I don’t know that I’d be so optimistic as to claim dogmatically that all will be saved.
Mephi: This is why I HAD to spend so much time here. If it was not METAPHYSICALLY possible for God to be assure Godself of this, then there went the whole idea. But what it seems to me that we've come to is saying that it IS metaphysically possible to be VERY, VERY optimistic that every person will be saved.
Tom: I need to leave the question of how optimistic I have a right to be until after I’ve worked through everything.
Gotta run!
Tom Post Edited (TGB) : 2/20/2005 6:58:40 PM (GMT-6) | | Back to Top | | |
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One Love
Registered Member
Date Joined Jan 2003
Total Posts : 13888
| Posted 2/21/2005 3:21 AM (GMT -6) | | Mephi: In Step 5, the near zero epistemic distance does this: Given the being's rationality and a person's dispositional reality, there is NO MORE genuine ability to do other than choose to unchangably desire the pursuit of the love relationship with God. I'll say it straight out...again. In Step 5, THINGS ARE DETERMINISTIC insofar a critical thing needed for libertarian free choice are not there: the ability to do otherwise! However, it's not like God just mystically "zapped" them or something. What God DID do was interact God's presence with sentient being's dispositional reality such that epistemic distance was removed...which also removed power to the contrary. There's a distinction there that I want kept. But I'm NOT DENYING that this is not a libertarianly free decision.
Tom: OK, have you changed on this since conceding LFW more recently? This is what I need to know. Because this is problematic for me.
Mephi: As far as the "actual relating", I AGREE with you that that is a product of libertarian freedom. But here's the thing, Tom. The exercise of our will is NOT DIVORCED from our thoughts and beliefs. There is a mutually influential interaction between our thoughts, beliefs, and will such that our will CANNOT just work AGAINST our deeply held thoughts and beliefs on a fundamental level. To posit this is to posit IRRATIONALITY.
Tom: Well, we may have some problem still then. Not sure. You want to posit a perfectly rationally informed, determined, and unchangeable “desire” for God, BUT you want to posit SOME epistemic distance which acknowledges some ambiguity WHERE IT COUNTS, that is, with respect to how God and the self in relation to one another are understood. The ED means the “rationality” can’t be entirely empowered, leaving the agent with NO rational explanation of God and self which has to be the reasonable basis for exercising LFW.
We only want ENOUGH epistemic distance not to remove all sense of relative ontological autonomy. I'm postulating that there is a state where epistemic distance <> 0 where the "reality alignment" takes place WITHOUT completely eliminating EVERY sense of autonomy from God. In other words, there can be a state where epistemic distance is small enough were some some decisions are free, but NOT all. I have no problem saying that the "rock bottom" experience lies at a range were the truth of the God/creature relationship, with respect to the creature's dispositional yearnings is UNDENIABLE by the being. And directly after that understanding is internalized, the epistemic distance is enlarged such that that understanding is feasibly DENIABLE again.
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Mephi: The post-"rock bottom" emergent choice to unchangably desire a sustained pursuit of a love relationship with God is NOT FREE...but subsequent libertarianly free decisions which are based upon and interacting with that being's changed conceptions of reality are INDEED free.
Tom: You’ve changed on this right? You’re repudiated this, worn sackcloth and ashes and threw dirt up into the air over your head in repentance, right?
Umm..nope. I didn't think I repudiated this. What I thought I said was that the free-willed decision that formally INITIATES the love relationship with God cannot be 100% certain to occur...if we are going to philosophically maintain LFW. Even though it would be HIGHLY, HIGHLY, HIGHLY unlikely that the continued resistence would occur, given all the stipulations (as you noted with my analogy, Tom) we still must admit that logical possibility that it COULD happen...and therefore it's not 100% certain and not completely predictable.
I DO think that it would be wrong to call the unchangable desire for a sustained pursuit of a love relationship with God a "choice" though. You are right on that score. It would be more of an UNDENIABLE DEDUCTION FROM THE FACTS. Simply put, the being would have an undeniable understanding that it it completely in it's best interest as a self-actualizing, aesthetic value maximizing, relational being to pursue a love relationship with God.
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Tom: I apologize for being anal, but I do still have OTHER issues. When I said your view is plausible “all else being equal” I just mean that THIS ONE ASPECT (your denial of LFW in the movement from |NR| to |R|) that WAS disqualifying your view in my mind was now gone. Now we have to deal with the “all else being equal.” I’ve already asked you above about where the self-solidification in evil that SURVIVES the rock-bottom encounter resides in the “self” if the encounter leaves reason and disposition both freedom from the effects of the self’s solidification in evil.
And then there’s epistemic distance. You admit to SOME distance, SOME ambiguity, within the encounter, yet you deny that the post-rock-bottom self would have any REASONABLE explanation for choosing to reject God. Seems to me that the ambiguity (for LFW to work) has to be explanatory ambiguity (ambiguity of reason, or its exercise at least) with regard to UNDERSTANDING God and the self AND dispositional ambiguity (the real ability to invest one’s “self”—thoughts, feelings, and desires—in a reasonable way in rejecting God.
I'll deal with the "self solidification in evil" in the next section.
But as far as the epistemic distance question. If we are talking about the "undeniable deduction from the facts" being realized by the sentient creature, I don't see why THIS has to involve LFW with respect to being able to rationally COUNTERACT the deduction. I can understand the initial love CHOICE being free...as well as the initial movement TOWARDS the relationship being free, but not the "new perspective" accepted by the sentient being as being true. Using the chocolate shop analogy, my changing your perspective about the chocolate shop was NOT free. I pretty much MADE that happen, giving you an UNDENIABLE deduction from the facts. Then when I made sure you had the "new perspective", I let you do whatever you want. THAT was analogous to the enlarging of the epistemic distance. And your unimpeded choice from THAT point was the FREE choice to initiate the relationship.
Again, I think that ONLY THE INITIALIZING CHOICE of the relationship necessatites LFW per the metaphysics of love...NOT the corrected thoughts and interpretations of the sentient creature.
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Tom:
See, if the rock-bottom encounter so empowers and enlightens reason that no other rational explanation of God and the self is possible, so radically alters disposition that no other desiring but for God is possible, then just where DOES the near-total self-solidification in evil reside in the person?
and...
I’ve already asked you above about where the self-solidification in evil that SURVIVES the rock-bottom encounter resides in the “self” if the encounter leaves reason and disposition both freedom from the effects of the self’s solidification in evil.
and...
When you speak of some of the sentient being’s self or soul is “eliminated,” do you mean “eternally” eliminated? Permanently lost? If so, please describe for me the existence of a person who has lost 99% of their “self” or “soul” but who was redeemed through the rock-bottom encounter and now resides in heaven? In what sense is God’s purpose for that person fulfilled? What do they DO in heaven?
I still don’t get it. God is the “sole” agent of judgment and redemption but we determine whether we’re judged or saved through the exercise of our will? Well, yeah. This could fit into a paragraph expressing eternal conscious torment. If you think this contributes to your universalism, I’m missing something.
and...
Really? Earthly decisions are commensurate with eternal states? Then like I just asked, I need you to describe for me the eternal state of someone who has had 99% of their “self” eliminated.
Now, my question is, does the autonomy and responsibility apply not only to earthly decisions but to post-mortem decisions, all the way through and after the rock-bottom encounter? If so, and if an agent cannot have their freedly chosen solidification in evil erased by God, and if there’s enough epistemic distance to rationally ground a choice LFW after the rock-bottom encounter, then I don’t know why you’re so optimistic.
Ok. Here's where we get a little deep. First, if you haven't done it already, check out this thing that I did explaining how moral autonomy can be retained in universalism. It's the first post on the page.
http://www.opentheismboard.org/default.aspx?f=5&p=2&m=50111
As I understand it, this whole idea is actually a similar to a view by a process theist, Marjorie Suchoki, from her work "The End of Evil." Basically, we are talking about a more PROCESS, rather then SUBSTANTIALIST, view of the self and it's development. From the insights of process philosophy, we can conceive of the self as a SYNTHESIZING entity. Always absorbing past occasions into itself and generating non-necessary creative action and possibility expansion. With respect to loving, the more love experiences that we garner and exist in, the more love that we not only contribute to our own SELF enhancement but also that of CREATION...and God's experience of Creation. This goes right along, actually, with the trinification idea. Where we are to receive the love of God, internalize it, and reflect that love back to God and all others around us. Whenever we do this, we open up more possibilities to love and for OTHERS to love. However, to the extent that we neglect and shun love, we miss out on our chances to enhance ourselves, Creation and God's experience of Creation. Not only that, but we SHUT OFF new vistas of possibilities for ourselves and others to love. And all of these losses are IRRETRIEVABLE, and therefore ETERNAL. As I said in the other post, even if one were to get another opportunity to love, it would not be the exact same opportunity. And that loss is significant because, when it comes to our own self-actualization AND God's aesthetic appreciation of Creation, it all matters.
Now, let's postulate what you are asking. Let's postulate a person who has literally spend 99% of their lives living out of things NOT love. They could be anything: fear, hatred, indifference. Whatever. Bottom line, they aren't living out of love. You truly have a "black hole" of a person, as Doc would say. A person who has TOTALLY SCREWED views of reality such that most to ALL of his dispositional yearning are expressed in wrong directions. This person would have effectively spent the VAST majority of her life in futilty and waste. Actually, the best way I would describe this person would be a SOLIPSIST. Someone that, for all intents and purposes, has created their OWN world where only THEY matter and only THEY count...where THEY determine their "reality" (or so they think)
Ok, you may wonder, in hell, where does all this 99% solidification go right before or during the "rock bottom" event. This, I think, is the BEST description of hell I can think of. God CANNOT get all the wasted years, opportunities and possibities back. They are all lost ETERNALLY. All the potential friendships, all the potential help this person could have given to the world, all the potential divine love that the being could have shared with other persons in Creation prior to their stint in hell. God can't get ANY of that back. And the person has to be shown this. Nor can God just magically allow all of the wasted TALENTS and HABITS that the person acquired to endure. Remember, this is the time where EVERYTHING that is not consonant with the Kingdom of God gets eliminated. So, all those selfish, narcissistic, evil tendencies that that person dumped upon themselves have got to go. All that messed up self-disposition. God has to show the person JUST how futile all of those habits were. And how those habits and thoughts are NOT NECESSARY for the person to "become" the self they really want to be. This is VERY important! Psychological habituation is mainly based upon BAD COGNITION! Assuming that we are NOT dealing with bad neurophysiology (we're talking about the "soul" here), psychological habituation is based upon certain thoughts, ideas, and feelings. The way to break the habit is to demonstrate to the person that the maladaptive behaviors are no longer needed because their cognitive maps were wrong. Once this happens, veritable miracles can be seen. Neuro-linguistic programming shows us this quite clearly...as do more cognitive theoretical approaches to counseling.
So what does this look like. An description is in order. We're in hell. Let's say you have someone who has virtually mastered EVERY VICE known to man. Pimping, prostitution, drug running, murder, you name it. A pro. Let's further say that they've been doing this their ENTIRE LIVE. Ok. Now let's say that they hit the "rock bottom" point that really reveals to them the error of their ways. Really shows them their TRUE motivations for what they've done and how futile it all is. Such that they don't want to do ANY of those things anymore. What's left of that person. Pretty much just THEMSELVES. Their desire and will not to do that stuff again. This person would have to LEARN what it's like to love, to give, to share, to empathize...ALL that. Heaven would be REMEDIAL ENGLISH for this person...while people like Mother Teresa would be in the Honors literature classes! Mother Teresa's had PLENTY of experience loving others, giving of herself, and all that. But both the remedial person AND the moral expert are CONSONANT with the Kingdom...though their expressions of the Kingdom of vastly different. Yes, I believe that growth is possible in heaven!
THIS, my friend Tom, is the MOST CONSISTENT, COHERENT view I can make out of the idea of rewards and losses in heaven. The rewards and losses will be in terms of one's own self-development towards Christlikeness and the corresponding contributions towards Creation and God's experience of Creation. The dynamic that provides the moral autonomy of sentient beings AND the context for divine judgement of all people...is the EXACT SAME dynamic thta provides the context of rewards and losses in heaven!
I want everyone to see the ELEGANCE of my view here!
THIS is how a universalist can be VERY SERIOUS about coming to God...NOW. There is NO cheap grace in my view. Hell, no! EVERY MOMENT OF ONE'S LIFE counts! The longer one waits to live in love, the worse it is for EVERYONE. You. God. Your fellow human being. EVERYONE. Not only that but to continue on a God-less path is to ensure that there will be THAT MUCH LESS of your "life" to remain after the judgement. This testifies to something that Evangelicals always say: ONLY what you do for
Christ will last! And just because one is saved...doesn't mean that it's gonna be as good as it COULD be...
1 Cor 3:10-15
By the grace God has given me, I laid a foundation as an expert builder, and someone else is building on it. But each one should be careful how he builds. For no one can lay any foundation other than the one already laid, which is Jesus Christ. If any man builds on this foundation using gold, silver, costly stones, wood, hay or straw, his work will be shown for what it is, because the Day will bring it to light. It will be revealed with fire, and the fire will test the quality of each man's work. If what he has built survives, he will receive his reward. If it is burned up, he will suffer loss; he himself will be saved, but only as one escaping through the flames.
Yeah, baby...
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Tom:
Eventually we’ll have to defend our optimism. You seem to want to see the possibility that agents always have a way out as grounds for rejoicing in the fact that all will be saved. I? Well, even IF I can manage to work through questions I have about…
-epistemic distance and rational grounds for rejecting God post-rock-bottom (which seem to be entailed in the existence of LFW),
I would just say that all we need is the space for LFW to be LOGICALLY POSSIBLE. Nothing more. You know William Lane Craig does THAT all the time!  Besides, it can be very well argued that just because the power to the contrary exists does NOT ENTAIL that it will be used...and we have VERY good reasons to say that it wouldn't. But we can talk more on this.
-the eschatological lopsided effect this all has on what seems to me to be a fundamental temporal arrangement that obtains between final victory and the return of Christ,
1) If this would be a problem for universalists, it would definitely be a problem for ANNIHILATIONISTS as well. Remember, most annihilationists posit that people spend various lengths of time in a conscious punishment state before they are annihilated. They don't seem to see this as a problem.
2) Approximately HOW LONG would you say that "package of events" is Tom? Does it say??
3) The victory of God can be said to occur at the casting of people in to the "second death". That's HUGE. How is this de-eschatologizing anything?
4) If one were a preterist or something like that, then none of this would be a worry, now would it?
-the very strange claim that only 1% of an agent’s “self” or “soul” might survive and whether in the end this is worth it (is it any different really than annihilation?),
Not that strange, man. I hope you see that now. If not, we'll work on it some more.
-the huge exegetical obstacles…
I don't know if there as "huge" as we think there are. Let's remember that there are more than a few people who held to universalism. Like Origen, Gregory of Nyssa, etc. Moreover, both you and I know the flexibility of biblical interpretation, both contemporarily and historically. Come on, yo.
…and in the end STILL affirm the possibility that agents would always have a way out, I don’t know that I’d be so optimistic as to claim dogmatically that all will be saved.
Dude, I just believe in the power of God to accomplish his purposes. It's as simple as that. Not even being funny. VERY seriously. If a piddly little being like me can come up with ONE way for God to save all people, I REFUSE to believe that God can't do it. I've got to be shown WHY God can't do it. The strongest thing that ANYONE'S come up with thus far is the whole libertarian free will metaphysical limitation thing. But if I'm right, there is a way even around THAT!
"I've been converted three times. The first was to traditional Christianity; the second to honesty and the third was to the Love of God and man (humanity) The third was the real conversion. The first two were preliminary."
--Nels Ferre, a theologian speaking of his spiritual journey with the Triune God
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markporter
Fire over Oxford
Date Joined Oct 2003
Total Posts : 263
| Posted 2/21/2005 10:13 AM (GMT -6) | | | [quote]
Tom: You’re the king of analogies dude. You deserve dwell forever in analogy heaven!
OK, here’s the needle in the haystack: I can process your analogy and say, “Heck, the probability that I’d irrevocably dive into divine chocolate is like 100%. I’d be in it faster than an NFL player can get his criminal charges dropped!” (Cuba Gooding Jr in “The Fighting Temptations”—I’m trying to wash Alien vs Predator out of my head).[/quote]
I find the problem with analogies is that in general you can usually construct an equally good one for or against any particular situation, depending upon the aspects you pick up on and the associations you use - for example while an atheist can be quite capable of painting an utterly abhorent picture of substitutionary atonement the believer can equally be capable of painting an utterly beautiful one. | | Back to Top | | |
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One Love
Registered Member
Date Joined Jan 2003
Total Posts : 13888
| Posted 2/21/2005 10:36 AM (GMT -6) | | I think that there is something that we HAVE to acknowledge here.
Whether we believe this or not, it is VERY IMPORTANT that we acknowledge that our ideas of personhood and the notion of the soul will influence this discussion greatly. What IS the immaterial aspect of human beings composed of? Is eternality of the soul INNATE or is the eternality is a product of God's continual SUSTANANCE. All of these are EXTRABIBLICAL discussion that effect one's possible interpretations of the texts. This cannot be avoided. Think about it. If a person has a SUBSTANTIALIST view of personhood, then it gets confusing to think about being "99% lost" or whatever. Either the person's in heaven or their in hell, it's said. This is why, I believe, by and large, people have needed the idea of EITHER utter annihiliation or eternal conscious punishment. It's all based on a SUBSTANTIALIST view of reality and the immaterial aspect of the self.
Surely, y'all have got to see that.
If one assumes a different view of personhood that is more consonant with process or systems thought, then it makes the sense to consider eternally consequential destruction of the self without positing TOTAL annihiliation of that self. Unfortunately, many evangelicals won't touch process philosophy with a 10 foot pole...except to just criticize it as being "unbiblical". I wonder did they say that same thing when Copernicus and Galileo were spouting their nonsense!
I NEED you guys to see this. Besides the issues of looking about our hermeneutical grids themselves, which is GOING to be important, we have to see the importance of the views of the immaterial nature of the self that is INHERENT in some of the biblical views, and within our ow presuppositions!
Just think about it, okay?
"I've been converted three times. The first was to traditional Christianity; the second to honesty and the third was to the Love of God and man (humanity) The third was the real conversion. The first two were preliminary."
--Nels Ferre, a theologian speaking of his spiritual journey with the Triune God
Post Edited (MephEternal) : 2/21/2005 9:55:44 AM (GMT-6) | | Back to Top | | |
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One Love
Registered Member
Date Joined Jan 2003
Total Posts : 13888
| Posted 2/21/2005 10:50 AM (GMT -6) | | One more thing. A person wrote me and I wanted to respond this way.
Within my view of universalism, we are positing some SERIOUS divine judgement. This is no mere slap of the wrist. Forget just flailing around in some fire and brimstone. Forget some pseudo-hell where people actually LIKE where they are (ala C.S. Lewis). Those don't do justice to the sense of suffering involved. My view deals with having EVERY EVIL and IDLE THING that one has done revealed to them, every thing they've done that's hurt ANYONE including God, having to experience it ALL, and understanding one's pitiful state and the futility of all that they've done. I don't believe that there IS any consciously understood pain that a person can endure that would exceed this. Standing before the holy God will all that mess. Hell, y'all saw how Isaiah was before the Lord, at his call. Imagine how you will feel when YOU stand before God and "every idle word" is called to account...and the Holy God stands before you. and YOU are supposedly "saved"!! Can you even imagine what it will be like for beings more completely solidified in evil who don't know about God's love and all that? It will not be pretty. I honestly cannot imagine a worse torture. I cannot imagine finally coming to grips with an existence LARGELY lived in utter futility and pain. I could easily seeing people enduring this BEGGING for annihilation following such a realization. Being VERY honest, I am very concerned about my own judgement before God. I am grateful for his grace, and I know that I'm covered by that grace. But it's still not gonna feel good. I've hurt a lot of people in my life and shed a lot of tears over that. But I know there's lots of stuff I don't know about. But God does. And that's not gonna feel good. Not in the least. I feel nothing but PITY for people like Bin Laden, Castro, and yes, Satan. They are gonna get hit like a Mack truck.
But it shows the majesty and wonder of God to use such a pitiful point to bring people OUR of their self-inflicted darkness into HIS light! When Jesus says "woe be unto you", it's a SERIOUS situation! It is NOT relegated to some lesser status by postulating universal reconciliation. We have GOT to expand our minds with respect to how divine judgment can look. We are dealing with GOD, for goodness sakes!
"I've been converted three times. The first was to traditional Christianity; the second to honesty and the third was to the Love of God and man (humanity) The third was the real conversion. The first two were preliminary."
--Nels Ferre, a theologian speaking of his spiritual journey with the Triune God
Post Edited (MephEternal) : 2/21/2005 9:58:21 AM (GMT-6) | | Back to Top | | |
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One Love
Registered Member
Date Joined Jan 2003
Total Posts : 13888
| Posted 2/21/2005 11:11 AM (GMT -6) | | Nother thought.
One can take the line of thought that many universalists take. Ie "eternal" referring to God's nature that has no beginning or end. And contingent things that emerge from that possess the ETERNALITY of God's purpose and nature. In this way, any INSTANCE of divine judgement, regardless of temporal duration, is ETERNAL because it originates from God. I think this is VERY true and needs to be considered. As well as the idea that aionios can refer to dealing with the "two epochs" idea.
However...
I am much more partial to annihilationist arguments dealing with the idea of the "destruction" and "perishing" of the wicked. I believe those arguments are pretty damn solid. God truly IS the consuming fire that eliminate everything NOT of God! Moreover, I would say that the annihiliationist position deals much better with the idea of the sin that will never be forgiven (Mark 3:29). However, as I've said before, what I would assert is that the annihiliationist perspective needs a DIFFERENT VIEW of sentient creaturely personhood. Instead of the more substantialist view that pretty much NECESSITATES the total elimination of the person, a more process/systems view DOESN'T.
So, as I'm thinking about it, I suppose that, scripturally speaking, I'm an ANNIHILATIONIST with a different view of personhood...and this leads to my universalism. That's why my view essentially says that God redeems all that CAN be redeemed. Because all else will be done away with.
Just letting you know where I'm going to be coming from, biblically.
"I've been converted three times. The first was to traditional Christianity; the second to honesty and the third was to the Love of God and man (humanity) The third was the real conversion. The first two were preliminary."
--Nels Ferre, a theologian speaking of his spiritual journey with the Triune God
Post Edited (MephEternal) : 2/21/2005 10:46:30 AM (GMT-6) | | Back to Top | | |
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