I agree with Mackie's response. It clearly can't be logically impossible for a free being to always do good - otherwise God himself would be logically impossible. The free will defense relies on the assumption of incompatibilism, the view the free will and determinism are logically incompatible. As a compatibilist, I don't accept this view. However, if you are not a compatibilist, even then, you would have to believe that libertarian free will is logically possible. This is a big problem because the only things that are logically incompatible with determinism are randomness and anything that entails randomness. But free will can't simply be randomness - something that happens randomly can't be the result of a free choice, by definition. Thus, if free will is incompatible with determinism, indeterminism does nothing to get us out of the incompatibility problem, since all it adds is randomness that also can't be free. We are therefore forced to accept either compatibilism or imossibilism, either one of which refutes the free will defense.
Dear MrMcMillian, l want to thank you for these amazing videos! They really helped me on my As philosophy exams but l was wondering if you could do these videos for A2 philosophy as well? Thank you
I have found all of your videos so helpful, I would really appreciate it if you could possibly do one on religion and science? Thanks. It would help so much
Hi, I am really enjoying all your videos and I hope you keep it up! I would love to see more in-depth presentations on these topics. Anyways at the end of your video, when you say that defenders of the FWA claim that Mackie presents a logical contradiction, I'm wondering could you elaborate on what that contradiction is?
There is a video, about 10 minuets long here on UA-cam titled "1b - Ex Nihilo and Free Will: Supplement". The meat of the video starts in at about 3 minutes and then has some interesting points about the free will defense. Any thoughts?
Thanks for your videos. I used some of them for my classes Philosophy of Religion. As I'm teaching in Haarlem (near Amsterdam) my curriculum is quite different from the English methods you're using. So, I'm thinking of making some similar presentations geared towards our RE-topics. What program/software are you using for your slides? Thanks and success with your examplary and inspiring work!
A being could be truly free to choose either good or evil, and only ever choose good. However, that being would need to be morally perfect, all-knowing, all-wise, have perfect self-control, and be all-powerful. Or in other words, they would have to be God. This is why, as Christians, we believe that the only way for humans to be able to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven, and live perfectly sinless for Eternity, is to behold God's glory, as we are transformed into the same Image, by His Spirit, as partakers of His Divine Nature, having our wills fully submitted to the Lordship of Christ.
Thanks for your video on RS revision on problem of Evil. It helps me a lot on revising GCSE Edexcel RS religion and life I would like to ask is there video on GCSE Edexcel RS religion and Society, including Rights and Responsibilities, Environmental and Medical Issues, Peace and Conflict, Crime and Punishment.
MrMcMillanREvis Hi, i have found your videos really useful and i would like to ask if you are planning on posting a video on the moral argument?Thanks for the videos =)
Hi Izzy, Glad you like the videos. I would like to eventually do a video on the Moral Argument, but I currently have a very long to do list of GCSE videos to get through first, so it will be a while. Thanks for the support though
Some suffer at a level that others couldn't handle, yet are better than people who suffer less. Not all people suffer, and if they do, they call it mental health disorder.
As the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy notes on the Free Will Defense: "Does Plantinga's Free Will Defense succeed in describing a possible state of affairs in which God has a morally sufficient reason for allowing evil? It certainly seems so. [...] it seems that the Free Will Defense successfully defeats the logical problem of evil." Source: www.iep.utm.edu/evil-log/#H7 For those unaware of the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy it's a peer-reviewed academic resource.
liam lawrence It certainly should give you enough to answer the first 21 mark part of the question. However, for part 2 where you have to evaluate you probably need to make sure you understand the strengths and the weaknesses and can come to a clear reasoned conclusion on this question
a theodicy in the context of the problem of evil is justifying the existence of the god of classical theism, when evidence implies the qualities of it do not exist. such as in this case an all-loving god
In defence of Mackie, however ... that he could argue that our comprehension of what is good could be sufficiently narrowed yet still retain chaos for which to exemplify. You know, like humans now. The everyday toils we go through at work, having to deal with family, the small problems of service that 99% of humanity provide to maintain an ever better human existence for all ... these cannot be seen as good. They can be seen as necessary ... but never good on their own, or exemplary of goodness (unless you're an atheistic utilitarian likle Bentham, of course). The limits of our comprehension of good (what we do now) could simply be sufficiently narrowed so that the status quo of humanity does them freely, but does not recognize the role it plays in maintaining the good of the world. Merely recognizing their necessity. Hence getting humans to have free will (choosing one's occupation to feed themselves, to promote fun for themselves and their friends, to limit suffering , to provide the means to give to the poor through taxes and welfare) while still doing good with their free will. After all, how much of humanity actually has a say how their government spends their taxes to benefit the poor? Yet how come God created people who rail against welfare (often being Christians themselves) ... rail against subsidised tertiary education, rail against healthcare, rail against the systems that elevated humanity from subsistence farmers and labourers pre 20th century societies? Surely if the Ireneans are right, then God's plan and most beautiful and morally upright people on the globe are atheists and agnostics who celebrate social welfare programs, promote that societies should be more generous to the least able, even when they expect no reward or return for their sacrifices in the form of salvation? People that justify a society be more egalitarian through humanity's free will, seperate from the morality of God's edicts, and hold's humanity as the beacon of its own salvation through collectivism and self promotion. That maybe social progressive don't need God because they are already closest to them, expecting nothing for their sacrifices and holding humanity to a higher standard solely because they recognise the already inherent godliness in human liberty and the compassion it can exemplify without religious codex?
If God is omniscient then the universe must also be deterministic, otherwise God could not know everything that will ever happen. If everything is in that way predetermined free will is only an illusion. This is my argument against the free-will defense, somewhat similar to Mackie's I think.
If we have free will, then there would have to exist a different possible world for each different combination of free will choices we could make. There would be a world where we sinned all the time, a world where we sinned half the time, and a world where we always chose to do good. God, being all knowing, knows which universe is which, and being all powerful, he is able to create any possible universe, so why didn't God look ahead at all the possible worlds, see the world where we always use our free will for good, and then simply choose to create that world?
You are probably the only reason I am going to pass philosophy this Thursday!! Your videos are brilliant, thank you so much for all your help
I agree with Mackie's response. It clearly can't be logically impossible for a free being to always do good - otherwise God himself would be logically impossible. The free will defense relies on the assumption of incompatibilism, the view the free will and determinism are logically incompatible. As a compatibilist, I don't accept this view. However, if you are not a compatibilist, even then, you would have to believe that libertarian free will is logically possible. This is a big problem because the only things that are logically incompatible with determinism are randomness and anything that entails randomness. But free will can't simply be randomness - something that happens randomly can't be the result of a free choice, by definition. Thus, if free will is incompatible with determinism, indeterminism does nothing to get us out of the incompatibility problem, since all it adds is randomness that also can't be free. We are therefore forced to accept either compatibilism or imossibilism, either one of which refutes the free will defense.
Great video... Kindly make a video on process theodicy
Dear MrMcMillian, l want to thank you for these amazing videos! They really helped me on my As philosophy exams but l was wondering if you could do these videos for A2 philosophy as well? Thank you
Thanks for your videos, they are so helpful. I am doing my GCSEs and guarantee my answers an A* due to the in depth knowledge.
What did you get?
I have found all of your videos so helpful, I would really appreciate it if you could possibly do one on religion and science? Thanks. It would help so much
Hi Mollie, glad you have found the videos useful. What exam board and specification are you studying for?
This is incredibly helpful with visual aspect of it I completely love thank you and you should produce more videos
Another tour de force! Thank you
You're Welcome!
These videos are great. Could you do one on process theory?
Hi, I am really enjoying all your videos and I hope you keep it up! I would love to see more in-depth presentations on these topics. Anyways at the end of your video, when you say that defenders of the FWA claim that Mackie presents a logical contradiction, I'm wondering could you elaborate on what that contradiction is?
4:55 Lol Cyborg, good analogy
stumbled upon this and it is soo good and very helpful, thank you so much!!!
Can the free will defense also be called the free-will theodicy?
thanks for the video i struggled with this topic in class and these videos really helped
liam lawrence You're welcome. I hope the exam goes well.
Thank you so much for these videos!! Finally think I will pass Phil&E!
You are a life saver thanks!!!
Can you do one on process thought too pls?
There is a video, about 10 minuets long here on UA-cam titled "1b - Ex Nihilo and Free Will: Supplement".
The meat of the video starts in at about 3 minutes and then has some interesting points about the free will defense. Any thoughts?
Thanks for your videos. I used some of them for my classes Philosophy of Religion. As I'm teaching in Haarlem (near Amsterdam) my curriculum is quite different from the English methods you're using. So, I'm thinking of making some similar presentations geared towards our RE-topics. What program/software are you using for your slides? Thanks and success with your examplary and inspiring work!
Could i ask a seemingly ridiculous question? Is it possible that we simultaneously have free will and no free will? Like the multi universe parallel?
what do you mean by this?
A being could be truly free to choose either good or evil, and only ever choose good. However, that being would need to be morally perfect, all-knowing, all-wise, have perfect self-control, and be all-powerful. Or in other words, they would have to be God.
This is why, as Christians, we believe that the only way for humans to be able to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven, and live perfectly sinless for Eternity, is to behold God's glory, as we are transformed into the same Image, by His Spirit, as partakers of His Divine Nature, having our wills fully submitted to the Lordship of Christ.
epic video bro! keep it up really helpful!
thankyou so much for these videos they are really helping me with my philosophy a level, keep it up
thank you so much I completely get this topic now!!
R u doing edexel unit 8?
I'm afraid not, at least not until later this year.
MrMcMillanREvis shame its my other exam
thanks a lot..these videos are really helpful.
Thanks for your video on RS revision on problem of Evil.
It helps me a lot on revising GCSE Edexcel RS religion and life
I would like to ask is there video on GCSE Edexcel RS religion and Society, including Rights and Responsibilities, Environmental and Medical Issues, Peace and Conflict, Crime and Punishment.
Hi, that sounds like you are referring to Unit 8? I plan to get on to unit 8 n the next year, but that wont be before this years exams. Sorry.
MrMcMillanREvis Hi, i have found your videos really useful and i would like to ask if you are planning on posting a video on the moral argument?Thanks for the videos =)
Hi Izzy, Glad you like the videos. I would like to eventually do a video on the Moral Argument, but I currently have a very long to do list of GCSE videos to get through first, so it will be a while. Thanks for the support though
You probably saw them as cyborgs because they're only able to do certain things like robots but they are still free like humans.
Some suffer at a level that others couldn't handle, yet are better than people who suffer less. Not all people suffer, and if they do, they call it mental health disorder.
As the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy notes on the Free Will Defense: "Does Plantinga's Free Will Defense succeed in describing a possible state of affairs in which God has a morally sufficient reason for allowing evil? It certainly seems so. [...] it seems that the Free Will Defense successfully defeats the logical problem of evil."
Source: www.iep.utm.edu/evil-log/#H7
For those unaware of the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy it's a peer-reviewed academic resource.
thank you for these video, very helpful to review for my finals
Actually, all the good angels in Heaven always do good and when we go to Heaven to live with God forever we will always do good.
would you say that all of the 4 parts has enough covered for the exam or is more research needed? (exam board is edexcel)
liam lawrence It certainly should give you enough to answer the first 21 mark part of the question. However, for part 2 where you have to evaluate you probably need to make sure you understand the strengths and the weaknesses and can come to a clear reasoned conclusion on this question
ok thank you i take it you would say the same for your design argument video as well?
Make sure only to use the Free Will Defense as a last resort in an exam. The exam boards hate the FWD.
👍
Thanks for this series it was such a great help for my school work! :D
I thought the free will defense was Not a theodicy!?
a theodicy in the context of the problem of evil is justifying the existence of the god of classical theism, when evidence implies the qualities of it do not exist. such as in this case an all-loving god
In defence of Mackie, however ... that he could argue that our comprehension of what is good could be sufficiently narrowed yet still retain chaos for which to exemplify. You know, like humans now. The everyday toils we go through at work, having to deal with family, the small problems of service that 99% of humanity provide to maintain an ever better human existence for all ... these cannot be seen as good. They can be seen as necessary ... but never good on their own, or exemplary of goodness (unless you're an atheistic utilitarian likle Bentham, of course).
The limits of our comprehension of good (what we do now) could simply be sufficiently narrowed so that the status quo of humanity does them freely, but does not recognize the role it plays in maintaining the good of the world. Merely recognizing their necessity. Hence getting humans to have free will (choosing one's occupation to feed themselves, to promote fun for themselves and their friends, to limit suffering , to provide the means to give to the poor through taxes and welfare) while still doing good with their free will.
After all, how much of humanity actually has a say how their government spends their taxes to benefit the poor?
Yet how come God created people who rail against welfare (often being Christians themselves) ... rail against subsidised tertiary education, rail against healthcare, rail against the systems that elevated humanity from subsistence farmers and labourers pre 20th century societies?
Surely if the Ireneans are right, then God's plan and most beautiful and morally upright people on the globe are atheists and agnostics who celebrate social welfare programs, promote that societies should be more generous to the least able, even when they expect no reward or return for their sacrifices in the form of salvation? People that justify a society be more egalitarian through humanity's free will, seperate from the morality of God's edicts, and hold's humanity as the beacon of its own salvation through collectivism and self promotion. That maybe social progressive don't need God because they are already closest to them, expecting nothing for their sacrifices and holding humanity to a higher standard solely because they recognise the already inherent godliness in human liberty and the compassion it can exemplify without religious codex?
If God is omniscient then the universe must also be deterministic, otherwise God could not know everything that will ever happen. If everything is in that way predetermined free will is only an illusion. This is my argument against the free-will defense, somewhat similar to Mackie's I think.
ever heard of the tenth demention
If we have free will, then there would have to exist a different possible world for each different combination of free will choices we could make. There would be a world where we sinned all the time, a world where we sinned half the time, and a world where we always chose to do good. God, being all knowing, knows which universe is which, and being all powerful, he is able to create any possible universe, so why didn't God look ahead at all the possible worlds, see the world where we always use our free will for good, and then simply choose to create that world?
Therefore God is impotent.
As god created human he already intervened.
These videos are great. Could you do one on process theory?