Abstract
Andrew H. Gleeson has written an essay commenting on an exchange between Dewi Z. Phillips and me, arguing that I was mistaken to dismiss Phillips’ criticism of the standard definition of omnipotence as unsuccessful. Furthermore, he charges Swinburne, me, and analytic theists in general, with an excessive anthropomorphism that obliterates the distinction between Creator and creature. In response, I contend that all of Gleeson’s criticisms are unsound.
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Notes
My contribution is found in ‘D. Z. Phillips’ Problems with Evil and with God,’ International Journal for Philosophy of Religion 61 (2007): 151–60. This is a review essay on Phillips’ The Problem of Evil and the Problem of God (London: SCM Press, 2004); referenced by ‘Problems’ followed by page numbers. Before his death Phillips had composed a reply, which was published posthumously as “William Hasker’s Avoidance of the Problems of Evil and God (Or: On Looking Outside the Igloo),” International Journal for Philosophy of Religion 62 (2007): 33–42. I am confident that Phillips would have agreed that a great deal more remains to be said.
‘The Power of God,’ in this journal; referenced in the text by ‘Power’ followed by page numbers.
These labels should not be taken too seriously. I would never presume to speak for all theists who are analytic philosophers, and it is well known that Wittgenstein’s followers exhibited a wide variety of religious persuasions. But for present purposes, I do not think the labels will be seriously misleading.
An equivalent statement is found in Aquinas: ‘If, however, we consider the matter aright, since power is said in reference to possible things, this phrase, God can do all things, is rightly understood to mean that God can do all things that are possible; and for this reason He is said to be omnipotent . . . Therefore, everything that does not imply a contradiction in terms, is numbered amongst those possible things, in respect of which God is called omnipotent’ (Summa Theologica I, XXV, 3).
Here and throughout this essay, italics in quotations are those in the original text.
Throughout this essay, I shall ignore complications that might arise from Trinitarian doctrine. This is not because I think that doctrine unimportant; that is far from being the case. But those considerations do not arise naturally from the discussion with Gleeson, and it would complicate matters unduly for me to introduce them.
The reader should note that Gleeson has replaced ‘logically possible’ with ‘actually possible.’ He would claim that he has justified the replacement by the intervening argument, which we shall have to examine. Nevertheless, it is illegitimate to attribute this consequence either to me or to Swinburne.
I have omitted Gleeson’s discussion of ‘miracles,’ by which he means (strangely) occasional unexplained failures of the laws of nature to operate. By his own account, such miracles are not relevant to the definition of God’s powers.
This will be so if we assume that the laws of nature are deterministic. If on the other hand they are merely probabilistic (as seems to be implied by the predominant understanding of quantum mechanics), even AG’s magnificent leap will be physically possible, though no doubt overwhelmingly unlikely.
Even assuming deterministic laws, such a round of golf seems clearly possible. It is no doubt possible, consistent with all natural laws, that my ungainly attempt should result in a highly satisfactory golf shot. (Poor golfers do hit good shots on rare occasions; no doubt this is one of the attractions of the game for them.) And if this is possible once, it is also possible (though very, very, very unlikely) for it to happen a number of times in succession; enough times, that is, to get me around the famous course under par.
With regard to the statement ‘God cannot do what is logically impossible for him to do,’ Gleeson says that ‘Hasker’s suggested definition of omnipotence is surprising since the argument against it is not original, going back at least to Aquinas’ (Power, 11). This is problematic for several reasons. First, the definition is not mine but Swinburne’s; it was quoted by Phillips in his book and by me in my review article. Second, Aquinas did criticize as circular the explanation that ‘God is omnipotent because He can do all things that are possible to His Power.’ But as has been explained above, that is not what is meant in the Swinburne definition. In fact, Aquinas himself makes use of the idea contained in the definition when he argues that omnipotence does not include the power to be moved and to suffer, because these are exercises of passive power; nor does it include the ability to sin, for ‘to sin is to fall short of a perfect action’ (S.T. I, XXV, 3). In other words, to be passible or to sin are incompatible with perfection, and are therefore not possible for God. It is also of interest that Phillips (unlike Gleeson) does not reject the definition, but rather chides Swinburne for failing to make good use of it, which he could have done by recognizing that ‘the meaning of ‘God’ is found within the appropriate religious context’ (Problems 13) – the religious context, that is, as Phillips understands it. (This is a point I overlooked in my review essay.)
There is however a qualification I should add with regard to my original verdict on Phillips’ critique. I do believe that the critique as contained in the arguments I discussed is unsuccessful. But Phillips has a good deal more to say about omnipotence in the course of his book, and since there is material there that I did not discuss, I cannot claim to have refuted it.
Note that even the process theist’s notion of ‘persuasive power’ falls under this proscription. In exercising his persuasive power God is attempting to make it the case that things turn out one way rather than another. To be sure, God on this conception cannot unilaterally guarantee a certain outcome – but this concession does not by any means suffice to elude Gleeson’s critique.
I have to say here that this characterization of the conception of God held by Swinburne, me, and many other analytic theists strikes me as abusive and indeed intentionally insulting. I do not believe the use of such language is conducive to good philosophical discussion, and I shall try not to respond in kind.
See J. R. Minkel, ‘The Gedanken Experimenter,’ Scientific American, August 2007, p. 94.
Nobel Laureate Richard Feynman, in a series of popular lectures on quantum mechanics, entreats his audience not to turn away from the subject because they don’t understand it. ‘You see, my physics students don’t understand it either. That is because I don’t understand it. Nobody does.’ QED: The Strange Theory of Light and Matter (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1985), p. 9.
That is, when God says (in effect) ‘Let so-and-so be,’ the matter is accomplished and there can be no resistance. But almost all theists (not only process theists) agree that on many occasions God relies on persuasion (also known as the internal working of the Holy Spirit), and this most certainly can be resisted.
A related issue arises concerning Gleeson’s notion of a ‘conceptual space.’ One would think that a philosopher as averse as Gleeson is to philosopher’s jargon would have taken the trouble to explain this somewhat obscure concept. I myself have no idea of how to individuate or to count conceptual spaces, so to me the term comes across as mere rhetoric.
I take the mention of an argument by Wittgenstein (Power, 16) to be a reference to the private language argument, which is important for Phillips.
According to Bruce Aune, ‘Wittgenstein’s claim that, to be conceivable, ‘an inner process stands in need of external criteria,’ lost its hold on philosophers during the 1970s’ (‘problem of other minds,’ in Robert Audi, ed., The Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy, Second Edition). (I wrote my own comment before having read this from Aune.) For some comments of my own on the alleged unintelligibility of the notion of a disembodied consciousness, see William Hasker, ‘Afterlife,’ in The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, ed. Edward M. Zalta, (Spring 2006 edition), http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/afterlife/
This is born out by the comments on Phillips’ essay in Stephen T. Davis, ed., Encountering Evil: Live Options in Theodicy, A New Edition (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2001). Each of the four respondents to Phillips (John Roth, Stephen T. Davis, David Griffin, and John Hick) expresses some degree of puzzlement as to what Phillips’ view of God involves. By way of contrast, the four seem to have relatively little difficulty in comprehending one another’s views, even though those views differ significantly among themselves.
One place to start would be chapters 7 and 8 of The Problem of Evil and the Problem of God. I add here two further remarks by Phillips, which may help to point the reader in the right direction: ‘I argued that, in religious contexts, God as Spirit is a synonym for ‘grace’ and ‘love’.’ Also, ‘I argue that God’s only omnipotence is the omnipotence of love.’ (Both are found in ‘Hasker’s Avoidance,’ pages 39 and 36 respectively.)
In a publisher’s flyer for The Problem of Evil and the Problem of God Fergus Kerr states that the book ‘clears the ground for serious engagement with traditional Catholic Christian doctrine and especially the theology of Thomas Aquinas.’ I remain deeply skeptical about the prospects for positive results from such an engagement.
I do not mean to imply that these views of Aquinas are unproblematic. My point is simply that Aquinas thinks of God as one who knows and wills in quite a robust sense, one that seems unlikely to yield easily to reductive or demythologizing interpretations.
In his final footnote (Power, 17), Gleeson sets up the issue nicely. There he refers to ‘St Thomas’s doctrine of analogy, perhaps the most famous attempt to accommodate the conceptual distance between God and man while still trying to retain some significant similarity in talk of God’s personhood, power, goodness, and so on, to talk of human’s [sic].’ Gleeson holds that ‘the doctrine is ultimately inadequate’; his response is not to moderate the conceptual distance, but to deny altogether the ‘significant similarity’ between God and human beings, thereby rejecting the Biblical realism of Thomas and of orthodox theology generally.
For a discussion of this, see my God, Time, and Knowledge (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1989), ch. 8. For a more recent discussion of divine timelessness, see ‘The Absence of an Eternal God,’ in God and Time: Essays on the Nature of God, ed. Gregory E. Ganssle and David M. Woodruff (New York: Oxford University Press, 2002), pp. 182-206.
Probably I should say here that nothing in Swinburne’s view or in mine requires that all of these narratives be taken as literally accurate portrayal of the actual events. But if all of them are rejected – in particular, the miracles connected with Jesus – historic Christianity will have been drastically modified, if not abandoned entirely.
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Hasker, W. Which God? What Power? A Response to Andrew H. Gleeson. SOPHIA 49, 433–445 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11841-010-0187-3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11841-010-0187-3