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    Carmelics

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    LoyalLoyalJusticeJustice
    Made withinDC&Austin
    Statements
    321,452
    Perspectives
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    Home/Original/inverse
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    Inverse View

    It is not the case that Causal dependence is the best model for understanding how God can foreknow what you will do because you will do it.

    ?Set your confidence on the premises below to see your aggregate.

    Reasons For

    2 perspectives
    Reason for 1 of 2
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    • 1.God's knowledge is traditionally held to be simple and timeless, making causal temporal dependence between events and divine cognition incoherent.
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    • 2.On divine simplicity (Aquinas, Summa Theologiae I.14), God does not receive information from creatures, so foreknowledge cannot be causally downstream of creaturely acts.
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    • 3.A causal model implies God's knowledge is contingent on what creatures do, which compromises divine aseity and necessity accepted across Thomist and Augustinian traditions.
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    Reason for 2 of 2
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    • 1.Molinist middle knowledge grounds foreknowledge in counterfactuals of creaturely freedom, providing a non-causal explanatory model that the causal account cannot adequately capture.
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    • 2.Luis de Molina argued God knows what any free creature would do in any circumstance logically prior to creation, meaning the dependence relation is counterfactual, not causal.
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    • 3.If middle knowledge successfully explains foreknowledge without causal dependence, causal dependence cannot be established as the uniquely best model.
      ?

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    Reasons Against

    1 perspective
    Reason against
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    • After reviewing modal, counterfactual, metaphysical, and logical analyses of explanatory dependence, and taking in lessons from time travel cases, causal dependence emerges as the best model.
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