tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3891434218564545511.post2629920529616216267..comments2024-03-28T19:56:42.305-05:00Comments on Alexander Pruss's Blog: Diversity of goods, heaven and theodicyAlexander R Prusshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05989277655934827117noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3891434218564545511.post-52358303492102036752017-03-03T11:32:00.670-06:002017-03-03T11:32:00.670-06:00More diverse in goods is one way of being better. ...More diverse in goods is one way of being better. Not all cases of diversity will, however, be worth having _on balance_. I think that inserting a painful moral victory into an infinite sequence of painless is worth it, but inserting infinitely many might not be.Alexander R Prusshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05989277655934827117noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3891434218564545511.post-79520363817507905282017-03-03T02:50:43.297-06:002017-03-03T02:50:43.297-06:00"But wouldn't a painful moral victory plu..."But wouldn't a painful moral victory plus an infinite number of painless ones be better than just an infinite number of painless ones, because of the greater diversity in types of victories?"<br /><br />Only if "better" means "more diverse", which would be a strange definition of "better" and which would entail that an infinite number of painful victories plus an infinite number of painless oness would be the best possible outcome. In that case, heaven would have to be a place/condition with an infinity of pain as well as an infinity of pleasure. That may be a possibility, but I fear it is a heresy too.<br /><br />On the foreknowledge thing, I believe that with this definition of foreknowlegde you don't need a theodicy because whatever evil in the world can be accounted for by God's ignorance of what the result of his creation is going to be. I fear you are getting dangerously close to a heresy here, not to mention the problems this view has for God's alleged immutability.<br /><br /><br /><br />Walter Van den Ackerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16101735542155226072noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3891434218564545511.post-32476306386050045312017-03-02T10:04:20.686-06:002017-03-02T10:04:20.686-06:00But wouldn't a painful moral victory plus an i...But wouldn't a painful moral victory plus an infinite number of painless ones be better than just an infinite number of painless ones, because of the greater diversity in types of victories?<br /><br />On the simple foreknowledge picture, God's knowledge of how Alice will act is explanatorily, but not temporally, posterior to God's deciding to put Alice in that situation. In other words, God's decision whether to put Alice in that situation cannot be affected by his knowledge of how Alice will act.Alexander R Prusshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05989277655934827117noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3891434218564545511.post-69318243210780643562017-03-02T04:15:13.381-06:002017-03-02T04:15:13.381-06:00Dr Pruss
The problem I have with this is that in ...Dr Pruss<br /><br />The problem I have with this is that in order for God to get off the hook for allowing pain in Alice's life we have to ask, <br />"Is it better for Alice to have the <i>painful</i> moral victory plus an infinite number of painless but valuable achievements, or the <i>painless</i> moral victory plus an infinite number of painless but valuable achievements?"<br /><br />We shouldn't presuppose that painless moral victories are impossible, and if they aren't, then the second option seems to be the best.<br /><br />I am also not sure how simple foreknowledge implies that God's decision whether to put Alice in that situation can be based on chances. That seems to imply open theism, which you reject as a heresy. Because when exactly does God get the "simple foreknowledge" about which choice Alice will make? Does God really play dice after all?Walter Van den Ackerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16101735542155226072noreply@blogger.com