Saturday, September 19, 2009

A Couple of Clarifications

I am using examples related to racism because I think it's something most of us would agree is morally wrong, and our conviction on this is going to be pretty tough to shake. Or I think so. I'm in no way implying that Calvinism is implicity racist.

I will divide the claims of Calvinism into two propositions.
1) There exists a supremely powerful being who has predestined some to heaven and others to hell.
2) That being is morally justified in so doing.

2 seems false to me, but if I cam to think 1 were true, I would certainly have to entertain some questions about 2. That's where the humility comes in.

However, what I won't accept as an argument for 2 boils down to argument from might to right. So the writing in the sky wouldn't persuade me of the rightness of these actions, because that would only show might and would not be a moral argument.

21 comments:

Peter Pike said...

But in order to question whether it's right or wrong, you have to establish your basis for which you determine anything to be right or wrong.

What is that basis, Reppert?

Let's call it X. Every single argument that you employ against DCT I can employ back against X. Because no matter what you choose to ground your morality in, at some point you have to get to the axiom stage where it simply *IS* true by definition. And you can't very well argue that that's a defect in Calvinism or DCT (which are not identical even though I hold to both) and escape the defect in X.

That's the problem I have with you on this position. You want some kind of universal morality out there that you can judge God's motives by and say "If God does this then God is evil" yet you never bother to ground what that universal morality is. If it exists apart from God, then why does God have to obey it? (And wouldn't it make whatever that morality is superior to God too?)

It *sounds* nice to say that you wouldn't want to charge God with something that you think is evil, but when you actually think through your position all you've got is *sound* with no foundation to back it up.

So how can there be a morality apart from God? How can it exist apart from God? How can it transcend God?

If you even probe those questions very soon you realize that morality *MUST* come from God's nature, and that puts you in the DCT camp whether you want to be there or not. Because morality flows from who God is, not from anything external to God. And that means that the God who exists determines morality by the very virtue of His existence. And if that is "might makes right" then so be it (although I would say it's more accurate to say "God exists therefore what He says goes.")

I don't see any way of escaping this. It's not like morality exists somewhere "out there" as an independent entity or anything.

Blip said...

Ok, so would you ever let any sort of testimonial evidence outweigh what you take to be the deliverances of your moral intuitions?

Suppose we encounter a race of aliens who are brilliant moral theorists. Macintyre and Singer are amateurs compared to these guys. Suppose you tell them about the perceived content of your moral intuitions and your consequent objections to Calvinsim. "Oh, no no!" they reply, "You are riding rough-shod over a great deal of fine distinctions! If you understood those, you would realise why your argument doesn't work."

Would you believe them? Looks like you should. But isn't God an even better moral theorist than these guys are? (Assuming the universe is morally deep to the required degree.) And if you come to the conclusion that God is asserting the truth of Calvinism via Romans 9 etc., shouldn't you believe him, and also take God to be indirectly asserting that our grasp of moral facts via intuition is too crude or simple to do the work you require of it here?

Importantly, none of this would require you to deny that moral intuitions provide PF justification.

Victor Reppert said...

Robert Merrihew Adams defends his "modified" divine command theory by stipulating that God is a loving God. If there were (as I think there is) a genuinely loving God, then I can be sure that all his actions and all his commands are with our best interests at heart. That would provide a more than ample basis for morality. God has the same interest I have in the fulfillment of my interests, and the knowledge and wisdom to tell me how to get it done. And, he has made me in such a way that I can achieve my true interests only through loving relationships with him and with others.

So we get to God by ostention from Scripture? I read your post on identifying God, and it looks as though you think it's a pseudoproblem. I'm a little unpersuaded here.

The other problem that theological voluntarism faces is that the expression "God is good" becomes trivial. If God had predestined everyone to hell, he would have been good, if he had saved everyone, he would have been good, if he had saved some and reprobated others, he would have been good. If he entered covenants and broke them he would have been good. What does "God is good" mean, here?

With Calvinism, you don't get a mirroring of God's character with redeemed human character.

Peter Pike said...

Reppert said:
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If there were (as I think there is) a genuinely loving God, then I can be sure that all his actions and all his commands are with our best interests at heart.
---

That's hardly a justifiable assumption. Why is it that if God is a loving God then He wants what's best for US? What if what's best for us is not what's best for, say, kangaroos or elephants? What if what's best for us is not what's best for Him? This simple assumption that if God is loving He must want what's best for me doesn't work.

And even if we stipulate that humanity has some special place in God's plan (which I would agree with, but which you haven't argued for), then who's to say what's best for Reppert is what's best for me? If Tom and Bill both love Sue and she would be the best for either of them, then if she marries Tom that's *not* the best for Bill.

If it takes me less than a minute to think up a dozen counter-examples to your claim then I'd wager your claim isn't very philosophically appealing.

Reppert said:
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That would provide a more than ample basis for morality.
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No it wouldn't, for reasons I've already shown. Your view is totally anthropocentric. God cannot be good until He creates people under your view. And further, whatever God does is only good or evil insofar as it relates to humans, under that theory. You are saying that *HUMANS* dictate the morality of God in such a circumstance.

Reppert said:
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God has the same interest I have in the fulfillment of my interests, and the knowledge and wisdom to tell me how to get it done.
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Do you even realize that this puts you in a superior position to God? Isn't this exactly what Satan claimed when he tempted Eve? Doesn't that phase you even a little bit?

Furthermore, it's saying that good doesn't exist until Reppert exists, for God cannot help you achieve your goals until you exist. Have you actually thought through this position? Because I cannot understand how someone of your intellectual caliber would not see the problems with it.

Reppert said:
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And, he has made me in such a way that I can achieve my true interests only through loving relationships with him and with others.
---

Let's grant that to you for the sake of argument, because while I disagree that this is viable you still haven't answered the problem.

How do you get from this to saying that it is *GOOD* for God to do that? You're still missing the forest for the trees. You *STILL* have some idea or concept of what is "good" out there that you are then applying to this position. This position doesn't *create* the meaning of "good." You are saying that this position *already is* good.

I merely continue to point out that your evaluation of this position still needs justification. You still need to demonstrate how this *establishes* the meaning of "good."

Peter Pike said...

Reppert said:
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So we get to God by ostention from Scripture? I read your post on identifying God, and it looks as though you think it's a pseudoproblem. I'm a little unpersuaded here.
---

First, as a Christian I believe in the God of the Bible. You have said you're a Christian too, and that would seem to insist that you believe in the God of the Bible too.

Ultimately, however, it doesn't matter if it is the God of the Bible or not. It only matters that the God who does exist is the God who determines morality. If I am mistaken in my belief that it is the Christian God, that doesn't change the fact that whatever God is real is the God who determines morality.

Identifying who God is, is a separate issue from claiming that morality stems from the existence of God. That's the essence of my claim regarding the origin of morality. That said, I do have a multitude of other reasons to believe that the God who exists is the God of the Bible--but those are reasons that I assumed, you professing to believe in the Biblical God as I do, that we did not need to discuss as Christians.

Reppert said:
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The other problem that theological voluntarism faces is that the expression "God is good" becomes trivial.
---

But again, I don't hold to theological voluntarism. I've not rooted God's commands in His will; I've rooted them in His nature. This has been my consistent claim, and it can even be seen in my first comment above. God's will doesn't act in a vacuum. It is determined by His nature.

Reppert said:
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If God had predestined everyone to hell, he would have been good, if he had saved everyone, he would have been good, if he had saved some and reprobated others, he would have been good. If he entered covenants and broke them he would have been good. What does "God is good" mean, here?
---

But this is true of your X morality too. If your trans-divine X morality says God can predestine people to hell, then X is good; if it says God cannot, then X is good; if it says that God can lie, then X is good; if it says God cannot lie, then X is good.

You cannot escape the problem, Reppert. At some point, you get to the level of definition, where something just IS what it is. You cannot appeal to something higher because it is the highest authority on whatever point you're claiming. You have to get to Identity somewhere--A is A.

This is not a defect. This is, indeed, how objects are ultimately defined.

So at some point you have to get to "X is good by definition" and there is no way to prove X is good. My X is God. Yours is something else that you've still never gotten around to identifying.

steve said...

"I am using examples related to racism because I think it's something most of us would agree is morally wrong, and our conviction on this is going to be pretty tough to shake."

The empirical problem with that statement, Victor, is that the constituency for Dangerous Idea is hardly a representative sampling of world opinion throughout history.

At just about all times and places, various ethnicities and nationalities have practiced racism. And they felt justified in so doing.

So rather than ask yourself what we'd do if we thought the Bible endorsed racism, a better question to ask yourself is how you'd condemn racism without the Bible.

Victor Reppert said...

Adams' X is a loving God. What's wrong with his DCT?

Victor Reppert said...

How would you argue against racism using the Bible?

Victor Reppert said...

Morality is written into God's character. But God is subject to it, and the commands he gives reflect the character he possesses himself. If God commands us not to be cruel, that should be good evidence that he is not cruel.

Anonymous said...

Victor,

Does it trouble you that your argument depends on holding the position that Alston, Bergmann, Ganssle, Howard-Snyder, Plantinga, Rea, Wykstra, and Yandell, to name a few, are all wrong.

Victor Reppert said...

Somebody's got to be wrong. It might as well be them.

steve said...

Victor Reppert said...

"How would you argue against racism using the Bible?"

Victor Reppert said...

How would you argue against racism w/o using the Bible (on purely intuitive grounds)?

steve said...

Victor Reppert said...

"How would you argue against racism using the Bible?"

You could start with the unity and continuity of the human race in Adam.

Victor Reppert said...

The wrongness of racism doesn't follow from that. We could all be unified in Adam, but one race might have been hit with a divine curse. I take it Cain's children and Seth's are all descendants of Adam, but Cain's were punished in a way that Seth's were not.

steve said...

Victor Reppert said...

"The wrongness of racism doesn't follow from that. We could all be unified in Adam, but one race might have been hit with a divine curse. I take it Cain's children and Seth's are all descendants of Adam, but Cain's were punished in a way that Seth's were not."

i) Even if, ad arguendo, we accept that interpretation, the distinction between an accursed brother and a brother who is not accursed is hardly a racial distinction. They have the same parents. Their posterity belong to the same tribe or clan. So how would that justify *racial* discrimination?

So you're equivocating.

ii) Likewise, assuming, for the sake of argument, that a brother and his posterity are accursed, how would that justify a policy of discrimination unless the terms of the curse prescribed some form of discrimination?

Suppose, for example, they are cursed to suffer a genetic defect, like color-blindness. How would that justify a general policy of discrimination?

At best, that would only justify discrimination in those cases where color vision is a relevant consideration.

iii) Finally, either you (Victor Reppert) think the Bible is racist or not. If you think a racist interpretation is incorrect, then why am I under some obligation to disprove an interpretation which both of us agree is incorrect?

That's just a ploy.

Anonymous said...

Victor, yes, someone has to be wrong. But the Calvinists are in pretty good company. What's more, you certainly can't think what you've said on the topic is sufficient to rebut them. You've made assertions about the confidence you have in your moral intuitions. They give reasons to suppose one should not be so optimistic. There's undefeated defeaters for you. Perhaps you could write a post critiquing their arguments. I'll be sure to point (some of) them this way. It is interesting that you side with Rowe over those guys, though ;-)

Anonymous said...

To pigg-back on the above: if they are wrong you have no answer to the evidential argument from evil. Atheists wil mirror ever argument you give the Calvinists. That your argument leaves Christianity indefenseless against the evidential problem of evil is another undefeated defeater for you.

Victor Reppert said...

Well, I should have asked, wrong about what, exactly?

Actually I do think that evil might be evidence against theism, although not decisive evidence against it.

Victor Reppert said...

I think the Bible gives us a case against racism based on God's love for every person regardless of race. There is a parallel argument for the Calvinist which says that God takes his elect out of every race.

The relative status of moral intuitions to Scripture depends upon how deeply embedded in one's system of moral thought the intuitions are, and how much certainty is provided by the exegetical arguments on the other hand. If exegetical evidence only supports a Calvinist interpretation marginally over an anti-Calvinist interpretation, then it seems to me that I am perfectly justified in saying that there's got to be something wrong with the exegetical evidence available to me. Or, that I just don't know the meaning of the passage. That was the point of my mentioning the guy who is told by the best exegete in town that the Curse of Ham supports white supremacy.

The more havoc I have to wreak on my moral philosophy to accept a particular exegesis, the stronger that exegesis is going to have to be. I've looked at Moo, and Schreiner on the one side, and Robert Hamilton on the other, and I'm not impressed. Do we read Romans 9 through Romans 11, or 11 through 9?

Am I biased? Sure. Are you biased? Is Moo biased? Is Schreiner biased? D. A. Carson, maybe he's unbiased.

We have to live within the web of our own beliefs, not try to become people we are not.

Anonymous said...

Dr. Reppert,

What part of their argument are you unclear about? I don't want to be uncharitable and assume that you are unfamiliar with the position that your argument depends on. In short, it seems fairly obvious you take a "noseeum" stance. If you don't, your argument is rendered a non-starter. If you do, how would you rebut them?

Anonymous said...

Nick Trakakis thinks that skeptical theism is "the only plausible response that a theist . . . can offer in the face of the bewildering quantity of evil and the existence of horrendous evil" (Trakakis, Does hard determinism Render the Problem of Evil Even Harder?, Ars Disputandi, V.6, (2006) ISSN: 1566-5399).