I realize that my last column had a bit of circular logic to it. I wrote it in a rush and when my brain wasn't functioning terribly well. The problem was with my machine. The inner workings were too narrow, and the space alloted too small to describe it without employing a nauseating circle of logic. Thus, even though no one liked the concept, I have decided to revisit it. Why? I like it.
First, the ground rules. I do comprehend that it may be impossible to define a proof of what The Creator can and cannot do. This puts my conjectures at great risk. However, I think that by likening the concept to the “Rock so heavy that God cannot lift it” puzzle, we can show it to be nonsense.
We all know the childhood query of “If God is so powerful can he make a rock so heavy that he can't lift it?” This is a fun game that I would like to write about in depth some day, but not today. The crux of the puzzle is that the question is nonsense. Lewis talks about this at length in “The Problem of Pain.” He does a much better job than I ever will.
So here is the situation. Can we prove that the idea of our Calvinistic machine is nonsense.
First, semantically I am inclined to think that it is a slam dunk. If the machine is free to choose evil then we have won, for choosing implies that any of the several options available could have been taken. Thus, if I choose evil, I could have chosen good just as well.
Sadly enough, this doesn't work, because it too is a circular argument. Instead, let's build this creature ourselves. Please remember the note at the top of this article. I am not The Creator. Just because I may not be able to envision this thing doesn't mean that it cannot exist. What I am hoping for is a proof by contradiction. If we build it and run into a concrete contradiction then it is impossible in the universe we live in.
Here is the definition of the machine in the only way in which I can define one. As a computer program.
Input:
1)A series of options for a given situation. Some options are good, while some are evil. Absolute values for good and evil exist, but are hidden from the machine. These values are boolean in nature. Relative values for good and evil are given to the machine for it to use in its evaluation. These values are rational in nature, and their correctness will be discussed later.
2)Grace. This will be the mechanism for enabling or picking good options. Grace will have an absolute value of true or false, but this is hidden from the machine. The machine will see a rational value called perception, which will be its sense of the Grace that it actually has. Perception will always be <= the absolute value of actual Grace.
NOTE #1: One possible explanation of this machines behavior would be that all options that have absolute values of good would be hidden from the machine unless it were predestined to pick that value. That might solve our problem, but our world does not work in that way. I have seen many good and right actions laid out before me only to have taken the bad ones instead. In addition to the fact that this is not an accepted view of any of the major Christian faiths. For simplicity's sake, we will always have at least one good, and one bad option on the table for any situation. This is a matter of philosophy, but if there be any wholly bad situations, we can rest assured that they may have been preventable by earlier decisions.
NOTE #2: This machine is Calvinistic. Grace may be a FALSE if the machine is not elected (i.e. this Grace is not “Common Grace”). If it were an Arminian machine Grace would be a constant TRUE, and thus the task at hand would be rather different. Also of note, is the fact that the perception value may be irrelevant in this Calvinistic machine. I put it in as a precautionary variable. I know that it would be of use, and exists in an Arminian/Wesleyan philosophy, but am uncertain how it will play out in our task at hand.
Output: The chosen option.
Constraints:
1)The machine must work according to the observable world around us.
2) The machine must conform to the ideals of Calvinistic doctrine (God does not cause an evil choice being the real problem)
3)Internal logic must be consistent.
4)(And this is a point of personal preference) God (the force giving Grace) is not the equivalent of some schiester lawyer. He will not rely on technicalities that fly in the face of the spirit of his own laws.
Machina:
If (Grace){
while(inOptions){
if(inOptions .isGood()){
validChoices.add(inOption);
}
inOptions = inOptions.next();
}
} else {
while(inOptions){
if(inOptions .isEvil()){
validChoices.add(inOption);
}
inOptions = inOptions.next();
}
}
pickFromThese(validChoices);
Ok. What we have here (for the uninitiated) is a pretty simple little application, and quite likely a great insult to The Creator that something so beautiful as man could be reduced to this little loop.
That being the case, let's define the terms in the algorithm.
inOptions and validChoices are linked lists of options. They have the members described above, and the functions used. In addition to standard linked list functions (next, add, prev, etc.) they have the following:
isGood()
isEvil()
One might wonder why I broke this task into two functions. Proper programming would have called for isEvil to simply return !isGood(). This cannot be the case in our machine. Our machine must work differently depending on the presence of Grace, and thus the functions are broken up accordingly. One measures Good in the presence of Grace, while the other measures Evil in the absence of Grace.
At this point, it is silly to go on any further. There is an obvious contradiction with the ideology at hand.
The problem is that God is now directly causing bad actions.
We could re-write the algorithm such as this
if(inOptions.isGood() && Grace) {
validOptions.add(inOptions);
}else if (inOption.isBad() && !Grace && desires(inOptions)){
validOptions.add(inOptions);
}
The problem there is that it is quite possible for no action to be taken. If there is no desire for a bad option then it will not be added. Thus if no option is pleasant (a situation we find quite often) then our machine just sits there and looks pretty. We could say that Grace will always force an action, but that would mean that people would always make the right decision in such a situation. That is not the case.
The trouble seems to be, that if Grace is the factor on which our decision depends, then God has a direct hand in our bad choices. Any comparison using it will, by its negation, mean that we are but automata. Automata do not really make the choices. Their creator does.
Thus, only being able to choose one option of two means that there is no choice at all. It is a nonsense statement. It is also inconsistent with the rest of the ideology.
That is not to say that this statement could be correct, and the rest of the ideology wrong. As I have said previously, it may be possible that The Creator simply wishes to watch a deterministic (yet beautiful) universe unfold. I like watching dominoes too. However, I do not love dominoes, and could not imagine a god who committed such a sacrifice as described in Christianity for dominoes.
If there are no choices, then what could we be, but a bundle of neurons? Why would such a creature have a soul? What would be the point in giving eternity to it?
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