A tentative philosophy of time

The philosophy of time is a very complex subject. I've put further study of it on hold since I started preparing for a few essay contests on Ayn Rand's philosophy, but a friend recently asked me some questions about it, and I think the following summary I provided is a good indication of where I stand.

While I'm still open to the idea that God is not timeless, the primary problem I have with it is that it seems to be incompatible with even a weak understanding of divine immutability, a doctrine I think is Scripturally supported.

If God is temporal, then an A-series theory of time - which I will explain shortly - is true, and His knowledge literally changes. For example, the proposition "x will occur" would be true until x occurs in time, after which it would be false - so God would know "x will occur" at one point in time but not another. If God's knowledge changes, God changes.

I've tried to construct an argument that God could not be omniscient unless He is timeless, but to be honest, I haven't thought of one which holds. Of course, the meaning of "omniscience" would have to be qualified if God is temporal - it would have to mean something like "knowledge of all propositions which are now true" rather than simply "knowledge of all true propositions[, each of which are unchangingly true]" - but so long as one accepts determinism, God could control under what conditions His knowledge changes.

That's one reason I didn't really like the TF article on time. Parkinson didn't discuss an A-series vs. a B-series view of time, eternal creation, the meaning of omniscience, etc. The discussion is more complicated than "if God's knowledge changes then God is not omniscient," for why couldn't it be the case that God's knowledge changes in accordance with divinely predetermined changes?

Parkinson also doesn't seem to realize omnitemporality traditionally refers to the view that God has an infinitely extended past and future, or at least that He is at all times (contrary to atemporality). He can define omnitemporality in a certain way to make it compatible with Calvinism if he likes, but to me it seems like trying to define free will similarly - it's more likely to confuse than help.

Anyways, for "now," the best argument for divine timelessness I can think of is the argument that it follows from explicit Scriptural testimony of divine immutability. There do appear to be good philosophical arguments against an A-series view of time, however (e.g. McTaggart's paradox), which could also be used as arguments for divine timelessness. I haven't studied those enough to cite them as support for divine timelessness, though.

As for a defense of divine timelessness from counter-arguments, some language used to describe God is anthropomorphic, figures of speech not literally true. This includes words such as "past," "present," "now," and "future." Temporal events are not literally related this way. The A-series view of time says they are and that there is an objective "now." A simple way of thinking about it is to say that the A-series view of time regards some language as irreducibly tensed. So, for instance, a proposition like "I am writing this post now" cannot be reduced to "I write this sentence at 10:51 pm, June 16, 2012." Both may be true, A-series theorists say, but what they each mean is different.

A B-theory view of time, on the other hand, believes events are related by means other than tensed language. Or, at least, any tensed sentence expresses a tenseless meaning (hence, tensed language is non-literal). So in place of words like "past," "present," "now," ""future," yesterday," "today," "tomorrow," "was," will," "did," "had," etc., B-series theorists substitute words like "earlier than," "simultaneous with," and "later than." These substitutes are not tensed phrases. "I write this sentence simultaneous with Jodie driving a car, you sleeping, etc." is not tensed. "I write this sentence later than my reading of your post" is not tensed. No time has a privileged status of "now" or "present" on a B-series view of time. It rather relates events in the direction of logical causation. An event is earlier than another because the earlier event causes the latter event. Events may be caused by other events without its being necessary that they could have been, at some point, modified by the word "now."

If God is timeless and omniscient, a B-series view of time must be true. Otherwise, propositions describing events would be tensed, God would have to know those propositions, and God's knowledge of tensed propositions would necessitate and A-series view of time. This would lead to divine mutability, as shown earlier, which I find problematic.

How does a B-series view of time square with creation? Paul Helm theorizes an "eternal creation." To be eternal is simply to be atemporal or timeless. What does this mean? Well, A and B-series views of time define time in terms of the tensed or tenseless relations events possess (e.g. past/present/future vs. earlier/simultaneous/later). So the point is that God does not acquire [new] relations if He is timeless. What relation[s] God has to the universe, then, must be timeless - that is, on the B-series view of time, these relations cannot be earlier than, simultaneous with, or later than any other events.

Hence, as Helm puts it, God does not will "in" time but rather "with" time; He eternally or timelessly decrees {event A at time t1, B at t2, etc.}. He does not eternally decree {to will event A at time t1, to will B at t2, etc.}. God's will is eternal - it does not occur in time. So the whole temporal order is timeless, though the events in this order are temporal because of their tenseless yet temporal relations with each other (earlier/simultaneous/later).

In my own words, I think of the whole temporal order - the entire B-series - as a set: {A, B, C...}. A is the earliest event (or events) within this order, B is the next, and so on. A causes B, B causes C, and so on. While the entire set is eternally or timelessly created - hence God stands in static relationship to it and the events of the set, none of which possesses the tensed distinction of being "the present" - the set itself is not earlier/simultaneous/later than any other event, for there is no other event to which the creation of the temporal order could stand in [temporal] relation. However, A, B, C, etc. do stand in relation to each other in such a way, which is why we can say such events occur in time. They are earlier/simultaneous/later with respect to each other.

Thus, since there is no earlier event, the creation of the temporal order (the entire B-series set of events) is eternal. The entire created order is metaphysically dependent upon God's will, however (by definition, since created), so that creation would be eternal does not empty the word of its meaning.

If anyone is finding this difficult to understand, don't feel bad. I've read Craig's Time and Eternity (which was very helpful in introducing the material and written by an A-series theorist) Helm's Eternal God, and God and Time: Four Views, and I still have a hard time keeping it straight. I would recommend reading these books. Helm's summary view presented in God and Time: Four Views is viewable on googlebooks. It seems that he updated his views in Eternal God, though (e.g. possible worlds).

Scripturalism and self-knowledge

I've recently been discussing the possibility self-knowledge with some Scripturalists. Intuitively, I think that self-knowledge is compatible with Scripturalism. I’m simply not satisfied with what appears to be the current Scripturalist defense; perhaps that means I'm just slow on the uptake. In any case, the most powerful [and perhaps the only] objection can be strictly put as follows:

P1. There is no Scripture from which propositions in which “I” is the subject – where “I” implicitly refers to some individual who is born after the close of the canon – can be deduced.

P2. Until the second coming, Scripture comprises the extent of divine revelation.

P3. Propositions not deducible from divine revelation are unknowable.

C. Until the second coming, propositions in which “I” is the subject – where “I” implicitly refers to some individual who is born after the close of the canon – are not knowable.

This is a valid argument, so the question is whether or not the premises are true. I’ve probably argued for P3 half to death in a dozen or so posts on my blog. I haven’t found a Scripturalist who has rejected this premise, so I’m going to take it for granted. I thought P2 is sola scriptura and necessary to maintain that the canon is closed, but it seems a few Scripturalists would take exception to this and qualify it as follows: “Until the second coming, Scripture comprises the extent of public divine revelation.” P1 is what I expected most Scripturalists to reject.

Before examining P1 and P2, it is worth wondering what epistemic function self-knowledge serves. What is the fuss? Why would it be so bad to relegate self-knowledge to the level of opinion?

Can one who is born after the close of the canon know Scripturalism is true even if no proposition in which “I” is the subject – where “I” implicitly refers to some individual who is born after the close of the canon – can be philosophically known? It doesn’t seem so. It may be true that “one who is regenerate can know Scripturalism is true,” but if there is no such individual to whom this principle can be said to apply, that proposition can’t be verified. Why? One cannot hypothesize what one would believe if one were regenerate, for only actual regenerates know God’s voice. Without self-knowledge, for all one “knows” it may be possible that “one who is regenerate can know Scripturalism is false.”

This is a critical problem. It shows that unless one can know he is regenerate, a third person statement that the so-called Protestant canon of Scripture comprises the extent of [public] divine revelation is arbitrary. The connection between self-knowledge [of regeneration] and the need (on Scripturalism) for recognition of the canon of Scripture as such implies first person pronouns aren’t epistemically eliminable. Hence, P1 or P2 must be false.

As for which (or both) is false, I lean towards rejecting P1. Rejecting P2 would either entail a rejection of a closed canon or some distinction between canonical as public revelation and private revelation. I’m not aware of any Scripturalists who reject a closed canon. I do hear Revelation 2:17 cited as support from the latter distinction, but this just seems like sloppy exegesis. Revelation 2:17 refers to a point logically posterior to the second coming as seen in paralleling it to 2:7 (cf. Revelation 22). But that still leaves open the question as to whether or not those living in the last days prior to the second coming can possess self-knowledge.

I think a stronger argument would say that passages such as Romans 8:14-16 or 1 John 2:18-27 show that a believer possesses the Holy Spirit by which one is able to know, not merely opine, some his beliefs. This requires two considerations 1) a distinction between a historic/ontological order and an epistemic/logical order – i.e. “one can have self-knowledge only after he is regenerated” is true but still predicated on whether or not it can be deduced from Scripture – and 2) an understanding that these and similar passages can be legitimately interpreted as enthymematical – i.e. as applying to all Christians rather than only to those for whom the letters were originally written – a reasonable assumption because [hyper-]dispensationalism is false and the authors of Scripture didn’t personally know every Christian to whom they were writing (Romans 1:9-13, for instance, makes this clear).

But if an enthymematic interpretation is possible, that begs the question as to why an appeal to extra-canonical revelation is even necessary. One could seemingly reject P1 alone because “I” is implicit in such universal propositions. Abstract knowledge of the ego or “I” as a reflexive indexical can be deduced from Scripture; what else, then, would be necessary (also given the condition of regeneration) for self-knowledge?

UPDATE: Perhaps the temporal aspect needs to be addressed. At the time Scripture was written, anyone who was born later than the close of the canon was not alive by definition. On an A-series view of time, this would be problematic because it would not have been true at the time Scripture was written that "the Holy Spirit testifies that [Christian x who was born after the close of the canon] is a child of God." At best, then, a Scripturalist who would wish to compatibilize the belief that "all knowledge is now derived from Scripture" would have to say the meaning of Scripture changes concurrently with changes in individual assent to the Gospel. This doesn't appear feasible. On the other hand, a timeless God's knowledge never changes (neither in mode nor content). So the individuals who comprise the set of Christians would be immutably known and testified by God.

Also, to expand on what I meant by "...the "I" is implicit in such universal propositions...," the “universal proposition” to which I was referring was the enthymematic proposition “all those for whom the Holy Spirit testifies that they are children of God are Christians.” This proposition takes for granted a set of individuals for whom the Holy Spirit testifies that they are children of God. The individual members are implicit in any reference to the entire set.

Now, I don’t have anything against a public and private knowledge distinction that Scripturalists like Cheung make per se just as long as it doesn’t imply a source of knowledge other than Scripture. After all, I can’t demonstrate that I am not a figment of your imagination; knowledge claims about who I am are, by comparison, less fundamental. If it’s not a problem that I can’t demonstrate the former, there’s no reason to suppose it’s a problem that I can’t demonstrate the latter.

So while I may not be able to demonstrate to you, the reader, that the Holy Spirit indeed testifies that I am a child of God – that I am an individual implicit within any reference to the entire set of those for whom the Holy Spirit testifies that they are children of God – it is both possibly deducible from Scripture and true. And if it’s true, I both can and do know from Scripture that I am a Christian.

Epistemic Justification and Axioms

Among some interesting things I have been discussing with Drake Shelton, a fellow Scripturalist, one of the main subjects is the nature [and role] of axioms in [the justification of] an epistemic system (link). Drake has said that he is skeptical with regards to the truth of his axiom, which I argue undercuts his whole system of "knowledge." Rather, I have proposed the following:

One can know a theorem is true if it is contained in the body of propositions validly deducible from an axiom which yields a self-attesting, consistent philosophical system in which the ground and means of knowledge are explicated. Hence, while axioms by definition cannot be proven, there is nevertheless a mutual dependency inherent in the relationship between an axiom and its respective theorems. “By the systems they produce, axioms must be judged.”[5] As a theorem can be discredited if it does not follow from a purported axiom, an axiom can be falsified if it bears contradictories.

Gordon Clark, Clark and His Critics, 53.

...

I’m saying an axiom must be self-attesting, not that it is. Empiricism isn’t self-attesting because nothing one discovers empirically could ex hypothesi attest to the idea that empirical procedures alone are a means to knowledge: the claim is arbitrary. For this reason Clark is concerned in the early part of God’s Hammer to show that Scripture claims to be God’s word. There must be a mutual dependency in an epistemic system: an axiom which prescribes knowledge as coming through certain means yet cannot by those means prescribe the axiom itself is self-defeating. This is illogical and, hence, cannot be a system of knowledge.

Of course the question may be asked: how do I know the criteria of knowledge? Ultimately, by my own axiom, Scripturalism. Proximately, by necessary inference which, since such is accounted for in Scripture, refutes your charge of rationalism. I don’t begin with logic, I begin with Scripture which, since logic is accounted for in it, allows me to use logic to come to these conclusions.

A Short Thought on Zeno's Paradoxes

The purpose of Zeno's Paradoxes is to deny the possibility of [a certain conception of] motion. Now, so far as I know, no Scripturalists deny that there is a physical world [though late Clark may have been a pure idealist]. But if so, Scripturalists must be careful, for Jesus is often described as walking to some place or other in Scripture, and if these propositions correspond to the physical world - or if any Scriptural proposition corresponds to an event in the physical world - then accepting Zeno's denial of motion seems unfeasible unless qualified as applying to a certain view of motion, viz. one in which infinite divisibility or a Heraclitean flux of "space" and "time" can be applied. I don't see any reason to suppose Planck units and discontinuous change in space are illogical even if not able to be discovered via sensation.

God, Good, and Consequentialism

A while ago, I responded to someone with leanings towards open theism on an incongruency in the way in which certain Christians judge creaturely choices to be good [or sinful] as compared to how they judge God's choices to be good. Here is the argument:

I think when we employ a greater good theodicy (GGT), we are getting into some dangerous territory. Like when we use the moral argument, we want to say that the realm of objective facts is just as real as the natural realm. Certain things we just know are wrong. But then when it comes to the problem of evil, we say that things are happening for the greater good, and we can’t know if something is wrong. So we want to say we epistemically know right when it comes to other creatures, but when something bad happens we say God did or allowed it for a greater good and we can’t realize what that greater good is. Do you see what I’m driving at?

The GGT also seems to suggest that evil is necessary to the plan of God, as well as it commits seems to commit God to consequentialism, where the ends justify the means in determining what is right. And plus, say when we are poor for instance, why seek to get a better education or a better job when maybe God wills for us to be poor so that some greater good can come out of it? Or why should we help the poor if God is really working this or the greater good? For these reasons I think the GGT is inadequate and can for some people even be very damaging emotionally. (link)

I've addressed this implicitly in a view posts but never have directly responded to it. Here, I note:

God's praiseworthiness is measured on the same grounds as is ours, viz. by whether or not God's actions are to the purpose of the maximal manifestation His glory.

That is, the “greater good” so often alluded to in these conversations is usually agreed to be God’s glory (Romans 11:36).There is a bit of a disanalogy, however, in comparing God's choices to our own, as the above person says, i.e. God is committed to consequentialism. This point is well-taken in one sense but a bit imprecise. For instance, while I think God plans all things – evil included – for His glory, I do not think God Himself commits evil in the process. I would bite the proverbial bullet and claim that evil is indeed necessary to the plan of God, but I don’t see a problem in admitting this unless it is argued that this implies God does evil. Ends don't justify means.

I think the matter hinges on what it means to sin or do good. I would say that to sin is, at root, to scorn God’s glory whereas to do good is, at root, to intend to manifest God’s glory, which implies knowledge of how to do so. We know how to do so because God tells it to us; that is, the way in which we can tell whether man or God does good is by judging the choices of each in relation to whether or not they intend to and do manifest God’s glory. How can we discern this?

On God’s side of matters, the answer is simple. He does good because all that He does, even His inclusion of creaturely evil into His plan, is for the purpose of the manifestation of His glory. Any answer to “why” God planned something is, ultimately, that such manifests His glory. How evil can function towards this end is a matter of debate but a distinct issue.

On our side of matters, God has revealed that we should do all to His glory. How do we do that? Obedience to God’s commandments in faith (1 Corinthians 10:23-33, cf. Romans 14:13-23). Disobedience to God’s law (sin; 1 John 3:4), then, must be the scorning of God’s glory. And this makes sense, since disobedience to God is equivalent to a rejection of God’s authority.

So to take the example, say, of not providing for the poor when it is within our ability to do so, the response would be this: our choices can simultaneously be a creaturely disregard for God’s glory which nevertheless has been planned by God such that His glory will be manifested (e.g. Genesis 50:20). Whatever will happen – good or evil – has been planned by God for His glory; God is good. We may not have comprehensive knowledge of God’s plan, but then again, we don’t need to in order to know that we are responsible for the way in which our choices relate to God’s glory. Or as I put it here:

The chief end of man is to glorify God by following His commandments (1 John 5:3). As a matter of fact, the chief end of God is to glorify Himself in all that He does (Romans 9:22-23, Ephesians 3:10)

Or here:

The question “is everything as it ought to be?” lacks specificity. “Ought” implies responsibility, and while it may be jumping the gun to talk about what responsibility presupposes, all Christians should at least agree that it presupposes one to whom one is responsible. Men are responsible to God. God is responsible to Himself (Hebrews 6:13). If the question, then, is “is sinful man as he ought to be with respect to the laws of His sovereign?” the answer is unequivocally “no.” On the other hand, if the question is “ought God to have effected this reality?” the answer is “yes,” as Mr. Bryson can contend – but not substantiate, since one can only know counter-factuals via divine revelation – that a counter-factual world would more greatly manifest God’s glory.

This last sentence refers to the primary difference between God's choices and ours, or more precisely, God's intentions and ours. What the person at the top of this post did not take into consideration is that while it is within God's capacity as omnipotent sovereign to fulfill His intentions, man's intentions can fail to be fulfilled. A precondition of God's failing to manifest His glory, then, would be that God didn't intend to manifest His glory [which isn't a problem since such a situation isn't possible]. This is why it is necessary to highlight the fact that everything God has decreed successfully manifests His glory and why determination of evil (while at the same time not committing evil) can seem like consequentialism.

However, when people talk about consequential ethics, it is usually with the understanding that one cannot determine [what is, from his perspective,] the future. This is fundamentally problematic because it means, among other things, that the moral status of a given action can fluxuate - it's indeterminate. This is not so in the case of a sovereign God who has ordained all things. Furthermore, consequentialism doesn't take into consideration one's intentions. But God doesn't accidentally manifest His glory. That's the teleological end of all things.

So is God a consequentialist? Only in the qualified sense that a condition for God's choices to be labelled good is that they must successfully be to the purpose of the manifestation of His glory. But God isn't a consequentialist in the significant sense that the success of God's intentions is absent, uncertain, or indeterminate.

Parenthetically, men ought not be consequentialists for the same reason. If God has told us how we may manifest His glory, so long as we intend to manifest God's glory by following His commands, we do manifest His glory.