God's vision of reality

Consider the simple theory of visual sensation on which for me to have a visual sensation as of y is for x to stand in a “vision relation” to y, with the relation being external to x so that x is no different intrinsically when x has a visual sensation as of a red cube and when x does not.

We know that this simple theory is false of us for the obvious reason that we suffer from visual hallucinations or illusions: there are cases where we have a visual sensation as of a red cube in the absence of a red cube. Our best explanation of visual misperception is that visual sensation is mediated by an internal state of ours that can occur in the absence of the apparently visually sensed object. Thus, we have internal modifications—accidents—of visual perception.

But now consider what I think of as the biggest objection to the doctrine of divine simplicity: God’s knowledge of contingent facts. This objection holds that God must be internally different in worlds where what he knows is different, or at least sufficiently different. This objection is based on the intuition that knowledge is written into the knower, that it is an intrinsic qualification of the knower.

Let’s, however, think what a perfect knower’s knowledge would be like. My knowledge divides into the dispositional and the occurrent: I dispositionally know my multiplication table, but at most one fact from that table is occurrent at any given time. It is clear that having merely dispositional knowledge is not the perfection of knowledge. A perfect knower would know all reality occurrently at once. Moreover, my knowledge varies in vividness. Some things, like perhaps the fundamental theorem of algebra, I know “theoretically” (in the modern sense of the word, not the etymological one) and “discursively”, and some facts—such as my visual knowledge of the screen in front of me—are vividly present to my mind. The vivid knowledge is more perfect, so we would expect a perfect knower to know all reality occurrently at once in the liveliest and most vivid way, more like in a vision of reality than in a discursive mental representation.

Let’s go back to the simple theory of visual sensation. Our reason for rejecting that theory in our own case was that it did not accord with the fact that humans are subject to visual misperception. But suppose that we never misperceived. Then we could easily believe the simple theory, at least until we learned a bit more about the contingent causal processes behind our visual processing.

Thus, the reason for rejecting the simple theory in our case was our imperfection. But this leaves open the possibility that something like the simple theory could hold for the vision-like knowledge of reality that a perfect knower would have. Such a knower might not have any internal state “mirroring” reality, but might simply have reality related to it in a relation of being-known which is external on the knower’s side. In the case of a perfect knower, we have no need to account for a possibility of misperception. Thus, the perfect knower may know me simply by having me be related to it by a relation of being-known, a relation external to the knower.

Objection 1: How do we account for God’s knowledge of absences, such as his knowledge that there are no unicorns? This cannot be accounted for by a relation between God and the absence of unicorns, since there is no such thing as the absence of unicorns.

Response: In the case of an imperfect knower, absence of knowledge is not knowledge of absence, since there is always the possibility of mere ignorance. But perhaps in the case of a perfect knower, knowledge of absence is constituted by absence of knowledge.

Objection 2: This account makes the perfect knower’s “knowledge” too different from ours for us to use the same word “knowledge” for both.

Response 1: We have good reason to think that all words applied to us and the perfect being to be applied merely analogously. A perfect being would be radically different from us.

Response 2: While the simple theory is false of us, given dualism we may have a somewhat more complex theory that is not so different from what I said about God. We have significant empirical reason to think that the brain is modified by our visual experiences, and that our visual experience is in some way determined by an internal state of the brain. However, if we are dualists, we will not think that the internal state of the brain is sufficient to produce a visual experience. There could be zombies with brains in the same state that we are in when we are seeing a red cube, but who do not see.

We can now give two different dualist theories about how I come to see a red cube. Both theories suppose an internal red-cube-mirroring state r_b of my brain. On the causal theory, the state r_b then causes an internal state r_s of the soul (=mind) which mirrors the relevant features of r_b, and I have a red-cube experience precisely in virtue of my soul hosting r_s. But the causal theory is not the only option for the dualist. There is also a relational theory, on which my red-cube experience is constituted by my soul’s standing in an external relation to the brain state r_b.

The two theories yield different predictions as to possibilities. On the causal theory, it is possible for me to have a red-cube experience in a world where God and my soul (and my soul’s states and me-constituted-by-my-soul) are all that exists—all that’s needed is for God to miraculously cause r_s in my soul in the absence of r_b. On the relational theory, on the other hand, I can only have a red-cube experience when my soul stands in a certain external relation to a brain state, and in that God-and-my-soul world, there are no brain states.

The causal theory of our visual perception is indeed very different from the external-relation theory of divine knowledge. The relational theory, however, is more analogous. The main difference is that our visual experiences come not from our mind’s direct relation to the external world, but from our mind’s (=soul’s) direct relation to a representing brain state. And that is very much a difference we would expect given our imperfection and God’s perfection: we would expect a perfect knower’s knowledge to be unmediated.

We have reason independent of divine simplicity not to opt for the causal theory in the case of God. First, on the causal theory, we seem to have great power over God: every movement of ours causes an effect in God. That seems to violate divine aseity. Second, the causal theory in the case of God seems to lead to a nasty infinite causal chain: if God’s vision-like knowledge of y is caused by y, then we would expect that God’s knowledge of his knowledge of y is caused by his knowledge of y, which leads to an infinite causal chain. Moreover, God would know every item in this infinite sequence, which leads to a second causal chain (God’s knowledge of God’s knowledge of … the first chain). This would violate causal finitism, besides seeming simply wrong.

Do we have independent reason to opt for the causal over the relational theory in our case, or perhaps the other way around? I don’t know. Until today, I assumed the causal theory to be correct. But the relational theory makes for a more intimate connection between the soul and brain, and this is somehow appealing.