Divine Sovereignty & Human Freedom

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Civbert

Puritan Board Junior
I was doing a search for "epistemic paradox" when I came across this article on the blog http://blog.solagratia.org/ . Divine Sovereignty & Human Freedom by C. Ryan Jenkins. Since these are issues of direct reference to Calvinism, I thought this is the place to discuss it.

Just a clip to get started:

Throughout history Christians have debated the questions surrounding God´s sovereignty and human freedom and especially how these concepts relate to one another. As David Basinger has succinctly pointed out, Christians have normally wished to affirm both of the following tenets:

T1. Humans are free with respect to certain actions and, therefore, responsible for them.

T2. God is omnipotent in the sense that he has (sovereign, providential) control over all earthly affairs.David Basinger, "œDivine Control and Human Freedom: Is Middle Knowledge the Answer?," JETS 36/1 (March 1993): 54.

The problem of affirming both tenets simultaneously, however, creates a prima facie conflict. If one first assumes T1 (i.e., that humans are causally and therefore morally responsible for certain states of affairs), it is difficult to see how God can bring about the exact state of affairs he desires in every case, and therefore difficult to affirm that he is totally in control of everything in any meaningful sense (as T2 affirms). A similar dilemma occurs in relation to human freedom if one first assumes T2.
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Please read the comments at the end of the article from James McAnany.

James McAnany wrote

Sorry for the timing on this,

but I have a huge problem with T1.

First of all your formulation as it stands is [if free then responsible]. But this of course does not rule out [if not free then responsible] on pains of committing the fallacy of denying the antecedent.

So, I take it that what you really mean is
[If responsible then free].

That´s better, now denying the consequent (not free) implies not being responsible.

But now, why think that the relation between "œfreedom" and responsibility is one of implication? For instance, using Alvin Plantinga´s initial definitions of freedom and moral significance in his Free-Will Defense, I can easily show that the relation that he sets forth as holding between "œfreedom" and responsibility is one of conjunction - not implication.
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