A. There is at least one metaphysically possible world at which every single person God could've created suffers from transworld depravity (TWD).[1]
B. How could that be?
A. We can support the thesis as follows: (1) Each creaturely essence is transworld depraved at some possible world or other. Therefore, (2) there's bound to be one possible world at which every creaturely essence is transworld depraved.
B. Why think that? First, the notion of transworld depravity relies on the notion of counterfactuals of creaturely (libertarian) freedom (CCFs). But there are powerful reasons to think that the notion of a CCF is incoherent.
Second, (1) would entail that no possible creature is essentially morally perfect. But if you allow that a god could be essentially morally perfect, then there is pressure on the proponent of the free will defense to give a principled basis for why a created being cannot be essentially morally perfect as well.
Finally, the inference from (1) to (2) commits a modal operator shift fallacy:
1. (x)(CEx --> <>TWDx)
Therefore,
2. <>(x)(CEx --> TWDx)
Such
is the same illicit pattern of inference involved in reasoning that if
each book in the library is such that it's possible to read it in a
single day, then it's possible to read each book in the library in a
single day. In fact, the inference from (1) to (2) relies on the unargued assumption of the truth of Interworld Plenitude. But if Intraworld Plenitude better captures the distribution of counterfactuals of creaturely freedom, then not only is the inference from (1) to (2) demonstrably false, but (2) is false as well. And as it turns out, Plantinga and others have (to date) failed to show that the former is more plausible than the latter. Therefore, not only is the inference from (1) to (2) undercut, but (2) is undercut as well.
Third, there are burden-shifting grounds against (2). For what grounds the counterfactuals of freedom here? Presumably, it's the character or nature or preference structure of a given being. This seems to be the most plausible explanation for
why it's supposed to be that the redeemed in heaven never do wrong. So,
for example, the Christian tradition speaks of the renovation of the
"heart" of the Christian into one that, like God's, finds sin
repulsive -- or at least uninteresting --, and which delights in what is
right and good. But if so, then all that's required to create a free being that
wouldn't sin is to endow them with such a "heart", and with a
sanctified and glorified nature or character. (This needn't obviously require that there is no possible world at which such creatures freely do wrong, but only that, relative to the possible world in question, there is no "close" world (in the Lewis/Stalnaker sense) at which they do wrong). So, for example, it's not implausible that at any possible world W God could've created, God can create tokens of a type of creature that has libertarian free will, but also has a nature that makes it "grossed out" by the thought of doing wrong (on a par with, say, eating a shit sandwich), and that makes them delight in what is right and good. Such creatures have the power to do wrong; it's just that their inclinations are strongly against it. As such, the possible worlds at which they freely do wrong aren't "close" (in the Lewis-Stalnaker sense) to W, in which case God can't actualize them -- i.e., they aren't "feasible" worlds. But if so, then there is no metaphysically possible world at which every
creaturely essence God could create suffers from transworld depravity.
And if that's right, then Plantinga's free will defense is unsuccessful.
A. I'm not sure you're right about that. For suppose God creates creatures
with a "heavenly" character from the get-go. Then since they didn't
form their character through their free choices, they're not free at
all. But whether or not we say such beings are free, perhaps we should
say that it's better to be able to shape one's character through free
choices than to come "ready-made" as it were with a morally perfect
character.
B. If you're right, then it would seem to follow that since God is supposed to be morally perfect essentially, he's had his morally perfect character or nature from the get-go, in which case he's
not free. Furthermore, the same assumptions seem to imply that God's
essentially morally perfect character is inferior to those whose
character was shaped by their free choices.
A. Nevertheless, I still think there's a crucial difference here between a perfect-from-the-get-go God and a perfect-from-the-get-go created
person. For unlike the created person, God is the ultimate source of his actions. That is, he acts on
his own reasons, and nothing external to God determines his actions. Because of this, God is free and morally responsible. By
contrast, if God created persons with a morally perfect nature, they
could not be the
ultimate source of their actions. Rather, God would be the ultimate
source, as he would be an external cause of their nature, which in turn
would ensure that their actions are always good. The only way for God to
create free creatures, then, is to create them with the ability to
choose between good and evil. Therefore, while the freedom of created
beings requires the ability to do evil, God's freedom does not.[2]
B. That's
an ingenious and elegant proposal, but I'm not persuaded. Here's why.
Consider two finite persons, Alpha and Beta[3]. Alpha and Beta are both
morally perfect, and thus unable to do what is morally wrong. They
differ, however, in their origins: while Alpha was made to be morally
perfect by external causes (e.g., heredity and environment, God, etc.),
Beta was not. Rather, Beta just popped into existence. Now if the
account of freedom and responsibility you propose is correct, then we
should say that while Beta
is a free and morally responsible agent, Alpha is not. For while Alpha's nature was caused by an external source, no external source caused Beta's nature. And because of this, we should evaluate the following subjunctive conditionals differently:
1. If Alpha existed, she'd be free and morally responsible. (F)
2. If Beta existed, she'd be free and morally responsible. (T)
But
this doesn't seem right: whether their natures had an external cause
doesn't seem to make a difference to the issue of whether they're free
or responsible. What matters here is that the actions of both are due
to natures they did not create and for which they are not responsible.
Thus, either being is free and morally responsible just in case the
other one is. The proposal is therefore an unsuccessful
reply to the criticism of the free will defense at issue.
A.
That's an equally ingenious and elegant rejoinder, but I'm not
persuaded. For the scenario depicted in your thought
experiment seems metaphysically impossible. For it seems
metaphysically impossible for a being to just pop into existence. And if
it's not metaphysically possible, it can't undermine my account.[4]
B. Whether the scenario is
metaphysically possible or not is irrelevant. For per impossible
arguments clearly have epistemic force, and have proper use in the evaluation of
counterpossible conditionals.[5] Therefore, even if the thought experiment
should turn out to depict a metaphysically impossible scenario, we can
construe the subjunctive conditionals above as counterpossible
conditionals, and we can use the thought experiment to evaluate them.
The rejoinder is therefore
unsuccessful.[6]
The moral
seems to be this: According to orthodox Christian theism, there are at
least three sets of free beings: (i) the fallen creatures on earth now,
(ii) the redeemed and glorified creatures in heaven, and (iii) God. But
the problem is that Plantinga's free will defense gives an account of
free beings in (i) that's prima facie incompatible with an account of free beings in (ii) and (iii). Plantinga's free will defense is therefore an unsuccessful response to the logical problem of evil.
----------------------------
[1] Plantinga's claim here is one about the counterfactuals of creaturely freedom. He is arguing that there is a metaphysically possible world W at
which every single one of the (non-denumerably?) infinitely many
libertarianly-free creaturely essences he could create at W would do
wrong at least once; the would-counterfactuals of freedom of each such
creaturely essence are "messed up" at W, so that although there may be
metaphysically possible worlds W*1-W*n where each such creature always
freely does right, none of those worlds are "close" (in the
Lewis-Stalnaker sense) to W. As such, those are metaphyically
possible-yet-infeasible worlds.
[2] Cf.Morriston, Wes. "What is so Good About Moral Freedom?", The Philosophical Quarterly 50:3 (2000), pp. 343-358.
[3] The following is a paraphrase of Ibid.
[4] Ibid.
[5] Indeed, counterpossible reasoning had better be
legitimate; otherwise it'd be impossible in principle to evaluate
competing philosophical theses, each of which is necessarily true if
true at all.
[6] Ibid.
