Divine Omniscience and Human Free Will: A Logical and Metaphysical Analysis

Divine Omniscience and Human Free Will: A Logical and Metaphysical Analysis
ISBN-10
303031300X
ISBN-13
9783030313005
Category
Philosophy
Pages
268
Language
English
Published
2019-11-14
Publisher
Springer Nature
Authors
Ciro De Florio, Aldo Frigerio

Description

This book deals with an old conundrum: if God knows what we will choose tomorrow, how can we be free to choose otherwise? If all our choices are already written, is our freedom simply an illusion? This book provides a precise analysis of this dilemma using the tools of modern metaphysics and logic of time. With a focus on three intertwined concepts - God’s nature, the formal structure of time, and the metaphysics time, including the relationship between temporal entities and a timeless God - the chapters analyse various solutions to the problem of foreknowledge and freedom, revealing the advantages and drawbacks of each. Building on this analysis, the authors advance constructive solutions, showing under what conditions an entity can be omniscient in the presence of free agents, and whether an eternal entity can know the tensed futures of the world. The metaphysics of time, its topology and the semantics of future tensed sentences are shown to be invaluable topics in dealing with this issue. Combining investigations into the metaphysics of time with the discipline of temporal logic this monograph brings about important advancements in the philosophical understanding of an ancient and fascinating problem. The answer, if any, is hidden in the folds of time, in the elusive nature of this feature of reality and in the infinite branching of our lives.

Similar books

  • Ecofeminist Philosophy: A Western Perspective on what it is and why it Matters
    By Karen Warren

    Wijkman and Timberlake , Natural Disasters , 27 . 32. Wijkman and Timberlake , Natural Disasters , 49 . 33. Seager , New State of the Earth Atlas , 121 .

  • Each Day a Renewed Beginning: Meditations for a Peaceful Journey
    By Karen Casey

    7. Sometimes the things that frighten you the most can be the biggest sources of strength. —Iris Timberlake or Most of us learn as we mature that strength.

  • Emerging Trends in Continental Philosophy
    By Todd May

    28 It is therefore not difficult to reconcile Badiou«s references to historical ... On the one hand, Badiou«s major essays on Rancière all deal with the ...

  • Pierre Bayle's Cartesian Metaphysics: Rediscovering Early Modern Philosophy
    By Todd Ryan

    Bayle offers a similar assessment in a letter to Minutoli: There has just been ... touchant la tran[s]substantiation, et leur conformité avec le calvinisme.

  • Negotiating a Settlement in Northern Ireland, 1969-2019
    By John Coakley, Jennifer Todd

    However, acceptance of the deal was driven in part by threats of worse to come should agreement ... see Northern Ireland (St Andrews Agreement) Act 2006, s.

  • The Philosopher's Way
    By Pearson Education, Pearson Education Staff, Inc.

    Several versions of Pearson's MyLab & Mastering products exist for each title, including customized versions for individual schools, and registrations are not transferable.

  • Swimmer in a Dark Sea
    By Pierce Timberlake

    Take a tour through the mind of America's undiscovered philosopher: Pierce Timberlake. Swimmer in a Dark Sea is a dizzying ride through a dazzling array of profound concepts.

  • Bringing Peace Home: Feminism, Violence, and Nature
    By Karen Warren, Duane L. Cady

    "This collection of works is ambitious, well documented, thoroughly—though not turgidly—referenced, and comprehensively indexed.

  • Ecological Feminism
    By Karen Warren, Barbara Wells-Howe

    The essays in this volume deal with a wide variety of subjects - the essential distinction between the "ecofeminist" and the "ecofeminine," the link between violence and environmental exploitation, feminism's relationship to animal rights ...

  • Catharine Macaulay's Republican Enlightenment
    By Karen Green

    6 Davies, Catharine Macaulay and Mercy Otis Warren, 228; Franklin Bowditch Dexter (ed.), The Literary Diary of Ezra Stiles (New York: C. Scribner's Sons, ...