This is a guest post from blog friend and fellow Tyndale alumni, Greg Armstrong.
Does Calvin deny free will? That’s a question I’ve always thought could be given a quick and simple response: Yes. This was obviously the case, since don’t we all know that Calvin was a determinist? For the longest time I thought these questions were like asking whether Ockham was a nominalist or Aquinas was an Aristotelian.
In the couple years when I would have regarded myself as a strong Calvinist I didn’t have time for Calvinists who would say that Calvin or Calvinism affirms free will but just defines it differently than the libertarian. I still somewhat agree with that mindset: that we should not simply redefine terms so that we can say we also affirm them. Where I now disagree on this issue is over how we should answer the initial questions on Calvin’s view of free will and determinism. Calvin does not deny free will; nor is he a determinist.
What got me interested in exploring Calvin’s Institutes in recent months in more depth was my studying of Aquinas and Thomistic metaphysics. Arvin Vos’ book, Aquinas, Calvin, and Contemporary Protestant Thought: a Critique of Protestant Views of the Thought of Thomas Aquinas, was the real catalyst for getting into Calvin. Vos explains that, contrary to a common misperception, Calvin’s anti-Scholastic and anti-Sophistic emphases in his thought were not directed against Aquinas. Actually, it would appear that Calvin had minimal knowledge of Aquinas’ thought and possibly did not study Aquinas’ texts firsthand. Rather, his response to Scholasticism was a response to his contemporaries and the later Scholastics, who rightly deserved repudiation by Calvin, who castigated them for their hypocrisy (i.e. using their theology to rationalize abuses) and for their heresy. In the Institutes, Calvin typically characterizes their theological method as excessively speculative and concerned with controversies over the trivial minutiae of precise philosophical distinctions. Now, I think Calvin was justified in his rejecting people who would obsess over unimportant issues and would draw distinctions to justify sinful behaviour. But I also think Calvin took this too far because it resulted in him avoiding drawing what are really important distinctions. His understanding of Aristotelian psychology (i.e. human faculties and operation) is also mistaken in some important places (cf. Institutes, bk.1, ch.15.6-7; bk.2, ch.2.3). For example, he thinks that the Aristotelian distinction between vegetative, sensitive, and rational souls means that humans have multiple souls (1.15.6).
Given Calvin’s tendency to avoid many of the Scholastic discussions of philosophical distinctions, I thought I should try to read Calvin more charitably knowing better the context of abuses in which he was responding. That is, I should make a point of trying to understand his own usage of terminology and try to import as little as possible and recognize that his terms might be imprecise and ambiguous. And assuming Calvin’s minimal direct study of Aquinas’ thought, I realized I shouldn’t read his reactions to Scholasticism as a reaction that necessary related in any way to Aquinas. On reading him in this light, I came to find that Calvin really did not deny a traditional concept of free will, nor was he a determinist.
One of the most troublesome issues in the Institutes for libertarians is Calvin’s frequent use of the term “necessity.” For example, Calvin speaks of divine “determination” and that everything is subject to the “necessity” of the divine will—even to the point that Calvin appears to explicitly deny all “contingency” and only affirm that things ‘appear to be contingent to us’ (1.16.6-9). But Calvin does not, in fact, deny real contingency, nor is he affirming necessitarianism. At least in many instances, when Calvin says “contingency” he really means “chance”—that is, an occurrence that results without God’s deciding that it would result in that way and causing it do so. Calvin’s concern is to safeguard God’s ultimate primacy as First Cause of all things; and in extension of this, to safeguard God’s providence over all things, both universally and particularly. Calvin also speaks of “the necessity of [God’s] own plan” (1.16.9) by which he means to counteract the notion “that the plan of God does not stand firm and sure” (1.17.12) and to affirm that God cannot fail in bringing about whatever God wills to bring about: “whatever God has determined must necessarily so take place, even though it is neither unconditionally, nor of its own peculiar nature, necessary” (1.16.9). Another way of saying this is that Calvin wants to safeguard the infallibility of God’s will and that the divine decree extends to all things in all their particularity.
But none of this conflicts with human free agency. All that one needs to affirm is the Scholastic distinction between God as First Cause and all other created causes as secondary causes. Not only does Calvin recognize this distinction (e.g. 1.17.9), but the Westminster Confession affirms this distinction along with explicitly identifying free agency as a mode of secondary causation: “God from all eternity did…freely and unchangeably ordain whatsoever comes to pass: yet so, as thereby neither is God the author of sin, nor is violence offered to the will of creatures, nor is the liberty or contingency of second causes taken away, but rather established” (3.1). It also reads: “Although, in relation to the foreknowledge and decree of God, the first cause, all things come to pass immutably and infallibly; yet, by the same providence, he orders them to fall out according to the nature of second causes, either necessarily, freely, or contingently” (5.2).
What then of Calvin’s explicit denunciations of “free choice” (cf. bk.2, ch.2)? Calvin rejects the term “free will” (or “free choice”) because he dislikes it. He dislikes it because he thinks the term inherently implies the possession of sufficient power to do whatever one might want to do. For him the “free” in “free will” also sounds “as if man still remained upright” or that he has the ability to rightly reorient oneself to God without divine assistance (2.2.4). But Calvin recognizes that this meaning of free will is not how all orthodox thinkers have used it, so he concludes saying: “If anyone, then, can use this word without understanding it in a bad sense, I shall not trouble him on this account. But I hold that because it cannot be retained without great peril, it will, on the contrary, be a great boon for the church if it be abolished. I prefer not to use it myself, and I should like others, if they seek my advice, to avoid it” (2.2.8). One person he singles out as using free will in a good sense if Peter Lombard:
“For Lombard finally declares that we have free will, not in that we are equally capable of doing or thinking good and evil, but merely that we are freed from compulsion. According to Lombard, this freedom is not hindered, even if we be wicked and slaves of sin, and can do nothing but sin [John McNeill comments that Calvin’s last clause is hyperbolic]. [New section:] Man will then be spoken of as having this sort of free decision, not because he has free choice equally of good and evil, but because he acts wickedly by will [i.e. voluntarily], not by compulsion. Well put, indeed, but what purpose is served by labeling with a proud name [note: Calvin’s dislike of the term itself] such a slight thing [i.e. voluntariness]? A noble freedom, indeed [note: sarcasm]—for man not to be forced to serve sin, yet to be such a willing slave that his will is bound by the fetters of sin!” (2.2.6-7)
In this text, Calvin affirms Lombard’s teaching on free choice, though Calvin does not want to use the term itself. The remainder of 2.2.7 gives Calvin’s clearest account of why he dislikes the term. I don’t agree with his concerns about the word, though I think they are at least in part understandable.
The issues over the term “free will” can be summarized as follows. Calvin thinks the usual impression from “free” in “free will” or “free choice” is that people have the inherent power or ability to act rightly and desire rightly. In other words, Calvin’s problem with the term is not with Lombard’s usage of voluntariness (as opposed to compulsion) which is an aspect of choice, but with the added Pelagian notion of not needing divine assistance to be reoriented in one’s desires to God and not needing divine empowerment to act in faith and do truly good deeds. To clarify, Aquinas taught that the will necessarily follows upon the intellect. In other words, choice necessarily accompanies rationality. Once a rational being apprehends various courses of action open to him, he can elect one of them over the others. As thesis 21 of The Twenty-Four Thomistic Theses says:
“The will does not preceded the intellect but follows upon it. The will necessarily desires that which is presented to it as a good in every respect satisfying the appetite. But it freely chooses among the many goods that are presented to it as desirable according to a changeable judgment or evaluation. Consequently, the choice follows the final practical judgment. But the will is the cause of it being the final one.”
This is why the will of a rational being is “free” (i.e. voluntary and not compelled): the will is informed by the intellect about the different courses of action it can take. Said differently, that is why rational beings have choice and do not merely act as a result of appetites, instinct, and emotions, as non-rational animals do. Choice itself does not imply that the person has the power or ability to carry out the course of action apprehended or that the counsel of his intellect or his desires would be rightly oriented to God—or be able to be so reoriented by means of the person’s own ability.
My advice would be to emphasize using the terms “will” and “choice” over against “free will” and “free choice,” since “choice” itself implies voluntariness and electing between alternative courses of action.
For any interested in this subject, Paul Manata did a study on this issue in the Reformed tradition:
http://veritasdomain.wordpress.com/2011/08/01/paul-manatas-pdf-freewill-human-responsibility-and-reformed-theology/
I think part of Calvin’s context was responding to neo-Stoics here, and more specifically to a concept of determinism-by-created-causes. He was not opposing theological determinism, I don’t think.
Andrew, the issue is really that the modern debate over free agency presupposes a Modernist metaphysical framework that is not transferable to premodernists. It presupposes a mechanistic conception of causality–like a billiard ball knocking another billiard ball. My point is that compatibilism will not carryover as an accurate description of any Christian theologian’s views prior to the Modern era. Compatibilism was not what was claimed by the Scholastics who affirmed primary and secondary causation. It is true that the First Cause is the ultimate ontological ground for every other being and causes them to exist and to exist as what and how they are. But such causation is not mechanistic, which would necessitate all subordinate causes. Rather, as Aquinas explains, God as First Cause not only causes the existence of all beings but also the mode of being of every being. Thus God not only causes animals to exist, he also causes them to operate in accordance with their animal natures. The nature of a living being is to be a self-mover. But the principle of self-motion in a created being is still dependent upon the First Cause, since neither animals nor any created being possesses in itself the adequate explanation of its motion (cf. the First Way; Thomistic Thesis #22). The subordinate living being requires the First Cause to cause it to have a nature (or form, essence) in which is has the principle of self-motion (i.e. lives). Likewise, human beings are living beings–and so are also self-movers–but they are also rational beings, so they not only move themselves in the organic sense, but they move themselves voluntarily. To move oneself voluntarily means that one has the ability to choose from among the courses of action apprehended by the intellect. Such choice means that one is not compelled to act in accordance with a particular course of action apprehended–whatever the form of that compulsion might take (e.g. emotions, habits, desires).
This premodernist Scholastic metaphysical framework that affirms primary and secondary causation is what Calvin and the Westminster divines inherited. Determinism presupposes a different conception of causality. Now it is possible to still deny all contingency (as determinism does) when affirming primary and secondary causation, but then such a person would say that all secondary causes are necessary causes. Yet I’m unaware of any major figure who affirmed such a position. And the only way to affirm such a necessitarian position along with Scholastic conceptions of causality would seem to require a form of emanationism, which is incompatible with Christian doctrine. So I just don’t see how one can say that determinism is compatible with Christian teaching or the Christian tradition prior to Modern philosophy.
Greg,
(1) “Such choice means that one is not compelled to act in accordance with a particular course of action apprehended–whatever the form of that compulsion might take (e.g. emotions, habits, desires).” This doesn’t seem to follow to me. If someone were to believe that one’s strongest desire/reason determines one’s action, they would still be deciding from a field of epistemically contingent possibilities.
(2) I’m not sure why one would have to deny all types of contingency as a determinist. Surely one can be a determinist simpliciter and not believe in logical determinism, for example? It seems all a theological determinist is committed to believing is that, logically consquent to the divine decree, no events are historically contingent.
(3) There are some people even today who I think would agree: compatibilist proponents of agent causation. My reading of Aristotle, admittedly amateur, back in the day also suggested he did not hold to the necessity of PAP for moral responsibility. And then even Thomas agreed with effectual grace.
FWIW.
Andrew,
(1) There are a few issues with talking about a “strongest desire” determining “choice.” Firstly, someone can have desires for different kinds of goods. If there are different kinds of goods (e.g. knowledge, friendship), then desire could not be measured on a univocal scale. Such desires would be different kinds of desires like a sexual appetite is a different kind of desire than a nutritive appetite. So then it doesn’t always make sense to speak of a “strongest desire”—or maybe to be more accurate, it wouldn’t be a technically accurate way of describing what actually goes on psychologically. The intellect apprehends various courses of action open to the person. In apprehending them, it is not a neutral apprehension, since the intellect can recognize the respective values (e.g. moral permissibility, prudential expediency) of the different actions. And as the 21st Thomistic thesis on the will explains: “[the will] freely chooses among the many goods that are presented to is as desirable according to a changeable judgment or evaluation. Consequently, the choice follows the final practical judgment. But the will is the cause of it being the final one.”
If what you’re saying is that the intellect (and not the will) is the cause of the final practical judgment, then in effect you’re erasing “choice” itself. There would be various goods apprehended by the intellect, but then the one most desirable (again this assumes the problematic notion of univocal as opposed to pluralistic goodness) would cause the agent to act accordingly. Where is the “choice” and where is the voluntariness in the action? Unless the final practical judgment is “changeable,” as the thesis states, and is ultimately determined by the will and not the intellect, then there is only causal necessitation. There is no “field of epistemically contingent possibilities” because the person lacks the ability to elect a different course of action than the one dictated to him by his “strongest desire.”
I can accept that the intellect apprehends courses of action not open to the person. For example, I know that I could jump to my death off the CN Tower. But that isn’t open to me at this moment. So the intellect can apprehend courses of action that are open as well as closed to me. But closed courses of action are possible in a different way than open ones. Closed options are conditional and when those conditions cannot be presently met. I can’t jump off the CN Tower right now because it would take me about 2 hours to get there. But then closed options are not really possibilities for me in the way that open options are, since there is nothing blocking me from being able to perform the latter like there is with the former. So at best, it seems to me that on your determinist scheme the person could apprehend different closed courses of action that correspond with his weaker desires. But then as closed options they would not be “epistemically contingent possibilities,” since the person lacks the power to choose them and follow them through.
(2) I don’t know what you mean by the distinction between “determinism simpliciter” and “logical determinism.” When you say that: “It seems all a theological determinist is committed to believing is that, logically consequent to the divine decree, no events are historically contingent.” It sounds like you’re not drawing the distinction between the necessity of the consequent and the necessity of consequence. Calvin even recognizes this Scholastic distinction as a good one. It is true that: “Necessarily, if God decrees that X will happen, then X will happen.” But not true that: “If God decrees that X will happen, then necessarily X will happen.” As Aquinas explains, God’s will is not only infallible with respect to willing something to be, but God also wills things to be in accordance with their respective mode of being. In other words, God both wills things to happen and the ways they should happen (cf. Summa Theologiae, I, q.19, a.8). If you don’t accept this point, then you will have to assume the Modernist mechanistic conception of causality. And as I pointed out, even the Westminster Confession agrees:
“Although, in relation to the foreknowledge and decree of God, the first cause, all things come to pass immutably and infallibly; yet, by the same providence, he orders them to fall out according to the nature of second causes, either necessarily, freely, or contingently” (5.2)
So nothing can thwart God’s willing that something come to pass and nothing that God wills to come pass will fail to come to pass—his will is both immutable and infallible—but God also wills things to come to pass in accordance with the mode of each being’s nature (i.e. a rock acts as an inanimate being, living beings act with the principle of self-motion, and rational beings act as voluntary agents).
(3) A compatibilist proponent of agent causation? That sounds like a contradiction in terms, unless the compatibilist denies determinism and only says that were determinism true (though in fact it is not), then people would still be responsible for their actions.
I don’t think your readings of Aristotle and Aquinas are necessarily accurate. Aristotle and Aquinas did not necessarily affirm PAP theory, but that is because they had a better understanding of human action and psychology. Technically, there are some circumstances in which there is only one course of action open to a free agent and that in those circumstances those actions would still be voluntary and the agent responsible. For example, in a situation in which God reacts to someone’s faithfulness or unfaithfulness to his covenant, God will only have one course of action open to him, namely: faithfully executing his promises/curses as stipulated in the covenant. While he lacks other courses of action open to him, he still voluntarily chooses that course of action because it follows from a previous choice he made (viz., to enter into the covenant in the first place). A human example might be something like an overwhelmingly strong addiction (assuming the person voluntarily got into the drug and was not forced into it). But all such exceptions to having other open courses of action require that there be earlier decisions at the time of which other courses of action were really open to the agent.
My point when it comes to Aristotle and Aquinas is that their conception of free agency is more robust than most accounts like PAP or libertarian agent causation, since the modern ideas do not ground their theories in a robust understanding of human psychology. They only attempt to give a set of necessary conditions for (broadly) responsible action.
Aquinas’ view of effectual grace is wrong. I will grant you at this point that his view on the matter sounds more compatibilist. It still isn’t compatibilist, since compatibilism assumes mechanistic causality. The problem with his view of grace here is that he thinks that God could give the appropriate or sufficient grace to any individual such that that individual would freely cooperate in faith resulting in their justification. Notice that this still follows his own scheme in which the person’s free act of the will is necessary for justification; Aquinas just (mistakenly) thinks that God could bring about cooperation from any individual he so pleases. I don’t believe that this is an assumption Aquinas should make given his own metaphysics of the human person. But it is somewhat understandable and he only very rarely says something relevant to the issue.
Effectual grace is something Molina emphasized as a problem among Dominican Thomists. A fallible and peccable voluntary agent can always refuse or reject God and his grace. Hence, as Molina argued, it is possible for person A to be given lesser grace and cooperate, and for person B to be given greater grace and still rebel. Thus the difference with respect to efficacy is not ultimately in the grace but in the human response to the grace. In Molina’s debate with Bañez over the nature of efficacious grace, the question (which was not something Aquinas himself discussed) was whether grace attains its efficacy intrinsically—in virtue of the nature of grace itself—or extrinsically—as the result of human cooperation. Bañez affirmed the former and Molina the latter. I think Molina has to be correct here. And I don’t think we can know for sure what Aquinas would have said, though both of them thought they knew.
Greg,
(1) Psychologically, we very often have the experience of one desire being stronger than another. This is even the case when the desires are for different types of goods. So, not just “Shall I have one slice of pie, or two?” But also “Shall I have one slice of pie, or have sex with my wife?” The intellect apprehends not just the abstract goodness of the possible object of intention, but the goodness of it in its present context (say, if the agent has not eaten in three days, or has just had a massive banquet but hasn’t been with his wife in months). This context, in combination with the desired objects in themselves, can form desires that are more strong than the alternative possibilities the agent considers. I see nothing in this account that does not match reality.
I am not so interested in defending Thomas on every detail as much as in defending the compatibility of determinism with a non-mechanistic view of causation. By mechanistic I assume you mean an account of causation where only efficient and material causes are invoked, to the exclusion of formal and final causes. (If this is not what you mean, your language seems to suggest “mechanistic” to you means nothing other than “deterministic”, which is begging the question.)
In light of this, I would say choice and voluntariness is preserved if nothing causes the agent to act in a way that bypasses their deliberation. Or in other words that, absent their deliberation, they would not act in the way that they do. It is a necessary part of the explanation for why they act in the way that they do.
You say:
I think I perhaps was not clear in what was meant by “epistemically contingent”. What I meant was: in the process of deliberation, the agent is aware of several possible courses of action, taking into account the circumstances known by the agent to be present at the beginning of that deliberative process. In this sense, it would be incorrect to say the person lacks these possibilities, because before they have completed deliberation, they do not know which choice they are going to choose. They do not know which of the possible courses of action is open in light of God’s eternal decree, and which are closed in light of that decree. This lack of knowledge is precisely what makes them *epistemically* contingent.
But there’s also another issue here. I don’t think I need to appeal to this model of choice to defend the compatibility of determinism with a non-mechanistic account of causation. I could also say that relative to reasons and desires the agent’s choice is not determined. But I could add that it is determined relative to God’s decree. This could still preserve freedom as long as the agent was not forced to act and choose in a way that would bypass their deliberation, or their act of choosing, or make their deliberation not a necessary part of the explanation of why they acted as they did.
(2) Richard Taylor defines determinism as the thesis that: “for everything that ever happens there are conditions such that, given them, nothing else could happen.” This is what I call determinism simpliciter. But holding to this thesis does not require one to believe that whatever happens is determined by physical causes, or by logical laws. Thus something can be logically but not physically possible. Or it can be logically and physically possible, but not possible in light of God’s decree. Thus events and choices can be contingent relative to logical and physical laws, but not relative to God’s decree. To deny that something happens necessarily, then, could be to deny that it is happens necessarily relative to physical laws. Further, to say something happens contingently, could be to say that it is contingent relative to physical laws and the sensitive appetites of a creature, but not relative to its intellectual appetite (and then you would insert my account of deliberation and choice here). I’m not an expert on WCF, so I’m not aware of the precise meanings they loaded “necessarily, freely, and contingently” with, but again, I am more concerned about showing determinism is compatible with a non-mechanistic account of causation than I am about defending a particular historical-theological position.
(3) See the work of Markosian or Nelkin for compatibilist accounts of agent causation.
Briefly, the agent is a substance which exercises causal powers when put in a circumstance, according with its rational nature (by means of deliberation, etc.) and characteristics. There’s nothing about this description that requires indeterminism, as far as I can see.
I should add that, of course, I think if I am able to defend the compatibility of determinism with a non-mechanistic kind of causation, then that adds to the probability that Calvin and WCF could be determinist.
One last point. It seems to me that this issue raises one of the longstanding objections to Molinism, i.e., that it is incoherent when it comes to defending the compatibility of divine foreknowledge and libertarian free will. That is, to my mind, Calvin and the WCF framers are pretty clear that everything God decrees to come to pass cannot fail to come to pass. But this means that the decreed events are not contingent relative to the decree, for to be contingent (at least on one dictionary definition of the term) is precisely to be “liable to happen or not; uncertain; possible”. I interpret the affirmations of free will and contingency on the part of Calvin and the WCF in light of this. This leads me to expect that when they say something is contingent, they mean with reference to created causes, and perhaps a specific subset of created causes (physical laws, sensitive appetites, etc.). They do not mean contingent relative to everything else in existence (including God and his decree). That would raise the same problem of incoherence that compatibilists accuse Molinism of.
Andrew,
(1) I don’t totally disagree with what you’re saying about being able to speak about stronger desires when one is a different kind than another, but I think how you’re speaking of it is more to do with what is “right” and not with what is “good.” The given context and background information will help a person to know when acting in accordance with one desire rather than the other is more or less right or appropriate. But let’s leave this point at least for now.
You’re right that I mean something more like efficient causation when I say “mechanistic” but, as Feser points out, it isn’t true efficient causality, but only what seems like efficient causality. Efficient causality cannot be separated from the other types of causes—all four are related to one another.
I just don’t see how you can affirm that choice and voluntariness are preserved when determinism is also affirmed. I’ll go back to the 21st Thomistic thesis again. The point there is that “[the will] freely chooses among the many goods presented to it as desirable according to a changeable judgment or evaluation” and “the will is the cause of it [the final practical judgment] being the final one.” In other words, the will is involved with the intellect in the deliberative process in determining (i.e. judging or evaluating) the course of action he wishes to take. If the will is not involved at all and the judgment is not “changeable,” then there is no real choice. The intellect would simply dictate how the person is to act without that person being able to deliberate and ultimately select for himself which course he wishes to take. My point is that if you admit that the deliberative judgment is “changeable” and not determined to one particular course by the intellect, as the thesis asserts, then you can’t really be affirming determinism. And it really does sound like you’re asserting something inconsistent with determinism—which is fine by me because I think determinism is wrong.
You said that prior to the decision the various courses of action are epistemically contingent. But the reason you give is the person’s ignorance of the future: “because before they have completed deliberation, they do not know which choice they are going to choose.” Are you saying that the courses of action are ‘merely epistemically contingent’ as opposed to ‘really/metaphysically contingent’? So that if I knew what my choice would be ahead of time, then I would know that the other courses of action (corresponding to lesser desires) aren’t really open to me or aren’t really contingent—since the choice that will take place is necessitated by God’s decree? If that’s the case, then you’re reasoning in accordance with the necessity of the consequent not the necessity of consequence.
Now your alternative: “I could also say that relative to reasons and desires the agent’s choice is not determined. But I could add that it is determined relative to God’s decree.” Is it not better to say, as Aquinas does, that God not only wills things to be but also wills the ways that things be? There just is no conflict in affirming the immutability and infallibility of God’s will and affirming that rational beings really could choose from among any number of courses of action in a given situation (more on that below).
I’m going to combine (2) and (3) because I think the issue in both now is that of the nature of determinism and the issue of necessity as it relates to the divine decree. The issue seems to center around the need to draw the distinction between the necessity of the consequent and the necessity of consequence. It does not follow logically that the infallibility and immutability of God’s decree implies the necessitation of what is decreed. I think it is quite clear that the WCF is making precisely this point in the text I quoted above:
“Although, in relation to the foreknowledge and decree of God, the first cause, all things come to pass immutably and infallibly; yet, by the same providence, he orders them to fall out according to the nature of second causes, either necessarily, freely, or contingently” (5.2)
Just because God’s decree cannot be changed (given God’s omniscience) and that he cannot fail to attain to whatever he decrees to come to pass does not in any way imply that what he decrees comes about by necessitation. Precisely what Aquinas taught about God also willing the ways that things will be—that God wills that such things will be and the way such things will be—is being affirmed in the WCF. It is also what Calvin teaches, given his explicit acceptance of the Scholastic distinction between consequent and consequence.
So I just don’t see the perceived conflict between God’s decreeing all things in all their particularity (as Calvin emphasizes) and humans having alternative courses of action open to them that they could really choose, but that in fact they will not choose. Just as I really could have chosen not to wait until today to post my response to your comment, even though I had written the substance of it on Saturday night and decided not to post it then. God knew that that was open to me all along and knew what I would in fact do in accordance with how he has ordered this world. So when we think of God’s decree, Aquinas’ point is that we should not neglect the modalities that were part of the decree. God decreed not only the fact that I would post my reply today, but also that I had the ability to post it as soon as I finished writing it on Saturday night. My not posting until today does not imply that I lacked the ability to do so or couldn’t have chosen to post it. I could have but didn’t. God decreed all of that.
I think the fact that you’re drawing the distinction between necessity relative to God’s decree and necessity/contingency relative to other secondary causes means that what you’re affirming isn’t really determinism. Because God’s decree doesn’t necessitate what he decrees (given that the necessity of the consequent doesn’t follow from the necessity of consequence) things really could be otherwise. Or in contrast to Taylor’s definition, “[something] else could happen.” Even though we know that something else other than what God decrees will not in fact happen, we still know that it is possible for other things to happen. It really was possible for me to not wait until today to write this response, but in fact I did. God knew that I could have posted it immediately and that I would have waited. For you to be a determinist you would have to reject the distinction you’re drawing between what is relative to God’s decree and what is relative to secondary causes. Because if you maintain this distinction and say that relative to secondary causes things result contingently, then you’re not saying that things result by causal necessity. At that point if you try to come back by saying that, well, it is all really necessitated when we remember that God has decreed all things, then you’re either denying your own distinction by reducing the contingency among secondary causes to necessary causes finding their ultimate source in God, or else you’re equivocating on necessity, or fallaciously inferring the necessity of the consequent.
Determinism just doesn’t seem compatible with what you’re affirming, if I’ve correctly understood what you’ve said. The way you’re speaking of necessity relative to God is also the sort of language Calvin uses. I think it’s misleading because it often sounds like the necessity of the consequent is implied, but in fact he denies it. If you also follow Calvin and the WCF in denying it, then you shouldn’t say you’re a determinist anymore, since you’d be admitting, contrary to Taylor, that things can really be contingent despite the infallible and immutable character of God’s decree.
Greg,
Deliberation occurs when many possible courses of action occurs to an agent, and concludes when the intellect determines the most desirable/good choice. It is “changeable” in the sense that the intellect does not choose the first thing that pops into its head (at least, not in cases where deliberation occurs), but goes through a process of comparison. The choice just is the intellect determining that one of the possible options that occurred to it is the best one and that it will therefore act according to it. (on this model, that is.)
I’m not sure how I’m reasoning fallaciously here. If you really knew ahead of time what you were determined to do (on a deterministic scheme), deliberation would be irrational and would not occur in rational agents. It would be deliberating about whether to perform things known to be absolutely impossible. But as long as we are not aware of what we are determined to do, deliberation is not irrational and makes perfect sense. That’s what I’m trying to say.
Regarding the rest: I think my point is precisely that God’s foreknowledge/decree does necessitate the events it decrees. But there is no reason that it has to do so by means of making secondary causes necessitate other secondary causes. I do not agree, though, that it is ultimately sensible to say that God perfectly foreknows your future course of action, and that you could nevertheless do otherwise. Molinism asserts this is possible, I realize, but to me it is nothing more than that (an impossible assertion). Thus, I don’t want to attribute what I see as incoherent to other historical figures unless I have to. My distinction between contingency-relative-to-secondary-causes and contingency-absolutely-speaking was an attempt to explain the language of Calvin and WCF without imputing that incoherence to them.
The reason why I think it is irrational, ultimately, is that God’s knowledge is both past (or atemporal) and infallible (and so unable to be falsified). It cannot be changed or contradicted, and it exists prior to the choices of human agents. In other words, I think the consequence argument requires either determinism or open theism.
Andrew,
Now I am more confused about your position. How is it that you’re saying things can be contingent relative to secondary causes but only necessary relative to the First Cause? Can you explain what you’re meaning by this? I thought I understood from your earlier comment, but your latest remarks seem to contradict what you’ve said. What I’m not understanding is how you can say things could be contingent relative to secondary causes but necessary relative to the First Cause. If you’re accepting the inference to the necessity of the consequent, then you would have to apply this to all secondary causes, thereby rendering all secondary causes necessary. Thus speaking of lower secondary causes having a contingent relationship to higher secondary causes wouldn’t make sense, since all secondary causes have been necessitated by the First Cause. In other words, if God’s will imposes necessity upon things (cf. Aquinas asks, “Whether the will of God imposes necessity on all things willed?” in ST, I, q.19, a.8), then it would be incorrect to speak of any contingency in any relative sense whatsoever.
If you don’t accept the necessity of the consequent, then the only necessity you can draw as following from the divine decree is what Aquinas calls “conditional necessity” or “suppositional necessity.” He uses the example of Socrates sitting (cf. ST, I, q.19, a.3). He says that it is contingent that Socrates sit, since Socrates need not sit. Yet when we consider Socrates as presently seated and only so long as he is seated, then there is a sense in which we should say that Socrates cannot not be presently seated. But this point just illustrates the principle of non-contradiction, since it cannot be the case that ‘Socrates is seated’ and ‘Socrates is not seated’ be true at the same time in the same sense. Said differently, Socrates has the power to sit and not to sit, but Socrates does not have the power to both sit and not-sit at the same time. The same is true of God’s decree. The truth about the circumstances is immutable since God is omniscient and infallible, but none of this implies that things had to turn out that way (God’s decree being a free choice) or that created beings lack the power to act in other ways not decreed. Just as Socrates retained the power to stand before, during, and after he sat down.
The issue is that it is logically fallacious to infer that the necessity of the consequent follows from the necessity of the consequence. The burden of proof lies on your side to show that this isn’t actually a logically invalid move. As I pointed out, even Calvin explicitly accepted this. So if you don’t you’re actually taking a stance against Calvin, not with him. The same goes with the WCF, since it makes assertions that presuppose it, as I have shown.
Just because God is omniscient does not imply that what he knows is necessitated by his knowing it. (Incidentally, I’m surprised you speak of God’s knowledge literally being in the past relative to any point in time, since this assumes a view of God that is not timeless. I’m OK with that, but I didn’t think you would be.) Notice the argument that would be required:
1. Necessarily, if God knows that X will happen, then X will happen.
2. God knows that X will happen.
3. Therefore, necessarily X will happen.
This is the logical form:
4. Necessarily, if P then Q.
5. P
6. Therefore, necessarily Q.
The problem is that the inference in 3 and 6 is modally fallacious. The “necessarily” does not carryover from the premises. The “necessarily” in 1 and 4 modifies the composite statement–the conditional proposition as a whole. For the necessity to result in the conclusion as it does here it would have to exist in a premise modifying the consequent in particular (i.e. “Q” or “X will happen”). The only thing that follows from the premises is:
7. Therefore, X will happen.
AND
8. Therefore, Q.
At this point, all you will be able to argue is that things are necessitated from God’s decree because he decrees that all things are the result of necessary secondary causes, which is the claim of determinism anyway. But you’ve said that things can be contingent relative to other secondary causes, so this option isn’t open to you either.
I really don’t understand your opposition to Molinism because once you accept secondary causation there is no reason to deny middle knowledge. (I will admit the question of irresistible grace or the nature of efficacious grace as a separate issue, so you could still not be a Molinist if you accept middle knowledge.) But middle knowledge is not incompatible with Aquinas here. And based on my analysis of the texts on providence and free choice in Calvin’s “Institutes,” middle knowledge seems perfectly compatible with Calvin (and the WCF) too.
Answering your first point last, your account of deliberation isn’t deliberation. You’ve basically denied the will wholesale and replaced it with the intellect. This relates back to Aquinas’ discussion of whether the human will (the will of a rational animal) is (1) an appetitive intellect, or (2) an intellectual appetite (cf. ST, I, q.83, a.3). Your account sounds like (1), whereas Aquinas says it must be (2). In Aristotelian thought, the will of an animal is characterized by its essence or substantial form. So non-rational animals have wills. Their wills are appetites characterized by their natural needs for nutrition, reproduction, etc. And as having sensitive souls, their will is sensitive–it is characterized by their sense faculties. Their wills will differ in kind according to the differences in their substantial forms, such as the differences among animals with their sense faculties (e.g. bats having echo-location). As rational animals, humans have a will that is characterized by an intellect. The will is intellectual. It isn’t the intellect that ultimately determines how the person will act, though it does delimit the field of options from which the will chooses. The person must choose from among the different courses of action the intellect apprehends. The will works with the intellect in forming the final practical judgment. To say that the intellect does this all on its own is to obliterate the will altogether. Of course to rid people of wills is to rid them of choice as well, since choice is just the function of an intellectual appetite (or rational will)–in other words, choice just is a kind of will, so there being no will means there is no choice. On your way of conceiving the relationship between the intellect and will there is no room for responsibility of any kind because there is no room for the person to be an agent, free or otherwise. The intellect has become the agent and the will has become the patient (cf. ST, I, q.82, a.4).
Greg,
I will try to condense the discussion as much as possible, just to make sure I don’t create red-herrings.
(1) When I say something can be necessary relative to the First Cause, but not to secondary causes, I mean that any given effect may be causually underdetermined relative to all other secondary causes/created substances, but not causally underdetermined relative to the First Cause. Hopefully this clears things up. Thus there can be relative contingency without absolute contingency. [A thought experiment to give an example: imagine a universe with only inanimate substances operating according to natural laws (a universe without contingency in your sense). Then imagine God directly creates a new inanimate substance, apart from the instrumentality of any secondary cause. Relative to the universe, this new substance would not be necessary: indeed, it is not possible for inanimate substances to create anything ex nihilo, so more than just being not necessary, it's not possible. But it's existence would be necessary relative to will of the First Cause.]
(2) I did say: “The reason why I think it is irrational, ultimately, is that God’s knowledge is both past (or atemporal)” (note the parenthetical comment there).
(3) I would add to your 2. that “Necessarily, God knows that X will happen”, since we are either talking about foreknowledge in the past, which partakes of the accidental necessity of the past, or else atemporal knowledge, which is similarly unchangeable (by definition). Thus the inference is no longer fallacious. Matt and I discussed this a fair amount a little while ago:
http://www.cityofgodblog.com/2011/12/the-consequence-argument-and-molinism/
(4) My point about Calvin and WCF remains that, I don’t think they could be asserting what you mean by contingency when it comes to the will; without doing any actual historical exegesis on what they might have meant (which could indeed prove me wrong), it seems to me that this would be to impute to them an inconsistency. That’s why I’ve been trying to find a charitable way to avoid doing that. But I could be wrong, I admit. [Rereading your comments about Calvin in the post, I also don't see what he has said that would contradict what I am saying here. Is there one passage in particular that you mentioned, that you think does?]
(5) I would be obliterating the will and agent as defined libertarianly. I would be preserving the will and agent according to my definition of it in my account of deliberation. [It's also not clear to me why this would eliminate responsibility unless we're presupposing all determinism eliminates responsibility, which I would deny.] But anyway, I’m not absolutely wedded to this model, as I suggested with my alternative possibility that we’re discussing in (1).