Death of Free Will

Calvinism leads to the death of free will. I know that May seem like a serious claim but let's break it down.

Freedom - The ability to do as one wants.

Now, this is a simplistic definition of freedom because there are, most certainly, limitations to freedom. Take for example, I am not free to choose to breath oxygen, freely without mechanical assistance, under water. I'm limited by the laws of physics. I'm also bound by circumstances. For example right this moment I'm not free to go parasailing because I'm sitting in my living room and part of the laws of physics and my circumstances dictates that I cannot parasail at this very moment.

One last, and possibly the most important part of this idea, one cannot go against oneself. Now, before you get in a huff about this and say that I'm Calvinist after all... Listen, there are different levels to a person. For example, I want to eat ice cream right now, but I'm choosing not to do so because my will is overriding my natural desire. Anyone who's ever dieted can attest to this conundrum. I want to but I don't want to and that's okay. In the end I'm still doing what I want on a certain level.

Choice - an act of selecting or making a decision when faced with two or more possibilities.

This requires an actor, and two or more options. This doesn't mean that there cannot be agreement between two actors. Take my wife and I together we chose to attend a financial class. We came together and talked about the choice and decided that we agreed we should take this class. That's a different class of choices.  We're talking about two separate actors that do not consult each other.

Take Bob. Bob decides to murder his neighbor. Did God choose for Bob to murder his neighbor? There is no evil in God, therefore God could not have gone against His nature to choose murder.

Take Jim. Jim hates the very thought of God. His heroes are Nietzsche and Hitler. Jim is faced with a choice, to murder his neighbor or not. He chooses not to do so. Did God choose this? If all choices are God's choice then He did choose that. But, everything an evil person chooses is evil, so God couldn't have made this choice either because it's an evil choice too because Jim is evil.

If God makes all choices then God is evil.

Now, if you say God made the decision to let Bob and Jim make those decisions, that is a TOTALLY different position. That is a totally different decision. God didn't decide between the two options to murder or not to murder. That is not an option that God's nature allows. God chose to let Bob and Jim make those decisions.

Within Calvinism there are several ideas that rob everyone of this idea of choice. That is, within Calvinism mankind is limited by his nature to choose; the whole TULIP acronym, Total Depravity, Unconditional Election, Limited Atonement, Irresistible Grace, and Perseverance of the Saints means that mankind has absolutely no decision in salvation.  Within total depravity, is the concept that mankind has a sinful nature, and as such people cannot choose to love God.  Also, this sinful nature is part of mankind's birthright, it has nothing to do with each individual's behavior or anything like that.  To a certain extent I can see the point there, but the problem comes when one says that a sinful-natured person cannot go against that nature and choose God.

In this Calvinist view, mankind cannot be said to be punished for individual choices, only the choices of Adam/Eve.  They're the only people who have ever been able to make the choice to love God or disobey Him, ever since that one fateful decision all mankind has been doomed to hell.  Don't get me wrong, I feel the Bible more or less supports that idea (Rom. 5:12ff).  The problem is this, if no one can choose to do good ever, that means that mankind is doomed to hell not based on his own decision but based on the decisions of someone else.  That isn't freedom, that's slavery.  Now, yes, we are slaves to sin and after forgiveness we're slaves to righteousness so, we're always enslaved, but here's the kicker, how can we be punished for our nature?  That'd be like me being punished because I'm red-haired.  So, according to this view, I'm a slave because I was born a slave and I'll be punished to everlasting torment because I didn't win the lottery?

Here's the second issue, Unconditional Election especially when coupled with Irresistible Grace.  They also together remove all choice from mankind.  So, according to Calvinism, not only can I not make the decision because of my sinful nature, God specifically chooses exactly who gets saved.  Now, don't misunderstand me, I think in a certain way God chooses.  God is omniscient, which would mean that He knows who does and who doesn't want to be saved, and God is omnipotent, which means that He could work in such a way that makes whomever He wills choose salvation.  But, again, that's not freedom.  Being chosen by God as a random (that's the unconditional part, meaning it's not contingent on our actions or choices) recipient of grace and forgiveness is not freedom.  Especially with the idea of irresistible grace.  Not only can we not choose God, but if chosen we cannot resist, we cannot go against His choice in us.

So, where's this free will again?  Oh, it's dead.  It was recently engaged in so strong an argument that I would rather be an atheist than a Calvinist.  If this God that Calvinists believe in is really that terrible I don't want anything to do with it.  Maybe it's supposedly more biblical as some seem to believe, but it's certainly not rational.

I found yet another site about Calvinism and the first point it tries to make is that "man is one hundred percent responsible for his behavior."  I found this interesting site also which makes it clear that the Bible teaches that mankind can make free choices.  "Luke reports that, “by refusing to be baptized by [John], the Pharisees and the lawyers rejected God’s purpose for themselves” (Luke 7:30, emphasis added). How could Scripture be more explicit than that? So too, in Isaiah the Lord says, “Oh, rebellious children…who carry out a plan, but not mine; who make an alliance, but against my will, adding sin to sin” (Is. 30:1). Again, how could Scripture get any clearer than that?"  So, which is it?  Did the Pharisees actually reject God?  Not according to Calvinism, they were born rejecting God as part of their sin nature, not as any actual choice of their own.  So, how is man responsible for his own choices if his choices are

I realize that philosophically speaking having at least two options presented to an individual is all that's required for choice.  However, I would posit that there's more to it than that simple concept.  I believe that for a choice to be real the different options have to be viable options.  Like in the examples in Calvinism the sinful human cannot choose God/good because of a born-in predilection to sin.  That is not a real choice.

If Calvinism is right then John the Baptist was wrong in saying: "Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!"

In summary, I still believe in God.  I will always believe in God.  Also, I believe Christianity (really the Bible) has the best description of God available for mankind.  I will never and can never accept that Calvinism has the answers to the nature of Christianity/salvation.  I know I may be missing something, but as it stands, I don't think I will ever be dissuaded from holding that view.

Discovering the Philosopher in You: Part 8: Morality and Blame: Are We Free?

Continuing on the topic of morality lecture eight of the fourteen lectures on the big questions of philosophy.  Inherent in the concept of morality are the concepts of praise and blame.  When we say something is good we're assigning praise to that object or action and vice versa.  However, praise or blame only holds if the person that did the good/bad action was free to do it.  If a person were forced to murder (technically that wouldn't be murder so, bad example), say someone was forced to steal.  Would we blame that person?  Presumably no.

The problem is, what does it mean to be free to do something?  Determinism (and to some extent the laws of physics) says that everything has a cause, which makes sense, so if we could freeze a slice of the universe in time we would see the cause(s) behind every decision.  Also, behind even the simplest of decisions there's a physiological component; a genetic predisposition, and there's a sociological component; a way one is raised.  The example Prof McGinn uses is the choice between chocolate and vanilla ice cream, which I'll continue to use throughout this entry.

Here's the real kicker though...  You might say, "but everything isn't caused by something else, especially at the sub-atomic level."  There are super tiny particles that are as unpredictable as far as we understand it.  They appear to be random and have no governing principles.  There are two issues with this.  One, there might be some governing principle or law that determines how these sub-atomic particles move/act.  Or two, even if they truly are random, that's still not freedom.  Look at it this way, if you have to choose chocolate, vanilla, both, or none, and you have to roll a die to decide, you don't get a choice in the matter.  You have to randomly choose every time you make a decision, therefore you really don't have any choice in the matter.  So either way, regardless if the universe is deterministic or indeterministic there's no way to have free choice (we'll go more into that later, but that's the way it's looking so far).

Don't worry, I'm not trying to say there's no such thing as free will or freedom of choice.  The problems (at least to some extent) stem from the logical link between the universe being deterministic and that relation to free will.  The logic seems to say that if every instant of the universe is somehow determined by the previous instant, then there's no such thing as free will.  And, as I've said even if it's not determined by the previous instant, that's not truly free will either.  How can we reconcile this issue?  I'll give you a hint, I don't think there will be a resolution.  Prof McGinn doesn't seem to think there will ever be a resolution either.

Some seem to think that free will is somehow compatible with determinism.  I don't see how that can be but I can see that one has to draw a line somewhere.  Let's try to come at this from a different angle.  Let's continue to use the chocolate/vanilla decision, starting at the end and working backwards.  The very last instant is your hand picking up whatever ice cream cone you choose.  In the instant immediately preceding that a signal went from your brain to your arm/hand to reach out and take whatever you've decided.  Is that a decision in itself?  I don't think anyone would say that it is; though it stands to reason that the brain can still be indecisive and change and choose a different option even after the signal has been sent to the arm/hand to pick up the ice cream.  You could even touch one of the cones and then change your mind and pick something different.  Then, just before the signal is sent from the brain to the hand, there's processing in your mind.  Maybe you're weighing the options...  Chocolate, yum, vanilla, yum, both?  I'll get fat.  Neither?  But I really want ice cream.  When I was talking to my wife about this her answer was hilarious, "stop thinking and just take both."  So we're somewhere in the brain making the decision now.  Determinism would say that you're genetically predisposed or raised to make whatever decision you do end up choosing.  But wait, can't you go against that?  Especially now that you've (hopefully) considered all these determining factors?  You know you've got a terrible sweet tooth, but you're trying to cut back so you decide none.  Or, your parents liked to reward you with chocolate sweets for good behavior when you were young, but you know that so you decide to go against the grain and pick vanilla.  So, where did the original decision come from?  Is it from the person who set the ice cream in from of you?  Maybe that was the inciting incident, but that certainly isn't a determining factor or a decision in itself.

The next lecture is going to cover more of this intractable issue when it comes to the mind-body problem.  But here's the question, where do thoughts, in general, come from?  I'm not talking about observations of things within the world, that's mostly self-explanatory.  I'm talking about just thoughts in general.

One important point Prof McGinn says in the lecture that I disagree with on the same grounds I disagreed with him on skepticism and epistemological ignorance.  He says that we cannot just flippantly dismiss the notion that we don't have free will.  I say, why not?  Let me put it to you this way, if we all understand that there exists such notions as free will and praise and blame for actions but we cannot ever follow the rabbit hole all the way down will that change the way we behave?  Not for me.  I believe God gave us free will as incomprehensible as that can be at times I believe God set up the universe with laws and logic and that we fit into that design in an important way, but that we have the free choice to ignore that plan and attempt to go our own way.  There's another thing I'd like to point out...  This concept of determinism is determined (pun intended) by the ability to do things that only God could do anyways.  Things like freeze time and look at one instant, neurons fire so fast it's measured in milliseconds and multiple neurons fire at once, so to be able to see the deterministic characteristics in the human brain, would take a much more accurate accounting of the brain than we have (or every will have, to my estimation).  Then there's a universality to it, one would have to have the power to read genetic code and understand genetic predisposition as well as a thorough understanding of the decider's history of how he/she was raised.  Only God could have such abilities so I would say we need not trouble ourselves (too much) over not being able to completely understand these things.  I would say, we don't know, and we never will so don't get too bent out of shape about not knowing.  Keep calm and eat ice cream.