Libertarian Free Will Debate

Revealed Apologetics

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00:00

Welcome back to another episode of Revealed Apologetics. I'm your host, Eli Ayala, and today we're doing something pretty unique.

00:08

I think it's unique. I'm not sure. I don't know if there are other people who have done this, but my two guests tonight have been participating in a debate in which the debate has been broken up on each of their respective

00:20

YouTube channels. So one portion of the debate is on one person's channel. Another portion of the debate is on another person's channel and then today

00:28

I will be hosting the kind of Q and A slash cross -examination slash audience participation portion of the debate here.

00:39

And so if you want to watch the entire debate in each portion of the debate, my guests will kind of share with you what you need to do to do that.

00:48

So I highly recommend, I did listen to both portions about a week ago and been pretty busy since then.

00:54

So hopefully as they're interacting with some of the questions that we're gonna be dealing with tonight, we'll kind of inspire some more questions.

01:02

But here's the thing, in this discussion tonight between Tyler Vela and Dan Chapa, I think it's

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Chapa. I don't know if it's Chapa. Chapa, he'll correct me once I invite him on. I am going to encourage everyone who is going to be watching tonight that you, if you send in your question and you preface your question with the word question, we will not necessarily be waiting till the end.

01:28

Usually I take the questions at the end. If you ask a question, we will take it the moment you ask it and the moment they're kind of done explaining maybe a point of contention that we've been going through, we'll ask your question right away, okay?

01:41

So I know that we just got started. And so as we move along, there'll be some more people kind of coming in watching.

01:46

I'm gonna periodically remind folks that if they have questions, please send them in.

01:52

Think in terms of you listen to the debate in person. And now we are at that portion of the debate where people can just ask any question they want more specifically on the topic of the debate, which is libertarian free will.

02:07

So the context here is this is a debate over libertarian free will.

02:13

And of course that kind of comes with all of those other interesting side discussions related to Calvinism and non -Calvinist perspectives and things like that.

02:21

So please, please, please, if you have a question, I hope you have a question. It's more interesting if you have a question, please send your question in the comments and preface your question with question, all right?

02:32

Well, without further ado, I'm going to invite my first guest, which is

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Tyler Vela. And perhaps Tyler can tell folks a little bit about himself and then we'll introduce our next guest.

02:46

So hello, Tyler, how are you? Who are you? And where can people view the other portions of this debate?

02:53

Yeah, thanks for having me on. Again, I appreciate coming back. I am the host of The Freed Thinker.

03:00

That's why I put it as the title instead of the full name. I guess I should do you where it's like the name and then the parentheses.

03:07

So I host The Freed Thinker podcast, blog and YouTube channel. YouTube channel is mostly dedicated towards apologetics and dealing with unbelievers.

03:16

Although there are some interesting side topics that just video is better for. And I put that on the channel. The podcast is usually dealing more with biblical theology, some in -house discussion, systematic theology considerations and the like.

03:29

So for my opening statement, I'm actually the negative position.

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I'm the contra position. For my opening statement and then Dan's cross -examination of me, it's on my

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YouTube channel. Reformed Presbyterian.

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Very excited. I'm very excited for this conversation. Anyone who's seen

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Dan's stuff knows that he's just, he's such a brilliant guy and such a fantastic, such a fantastic thinker and a great

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Christian brother. And so it's just, it makes these conversations so enjoyable to have. So I'm excited that you're playing

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Switzerland for us on this and being kind of the neutral grounds we kind of experimented with this.

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I'm Puerto Rican. So Puerto Rico, we're neutral too. We're neutral too. Yeah, yeah. So thank you very much.

04:20

All right. Well, thank you for that, Tyler. And I want to now invite Dan Chapa. Is it

04:25

Chapa or Chapa? Chapa, yeah. Chapa. Dan Chapa. Excellent. Okay.

04:31

Well, welcome Dan. This is your first time on Revealed Apologetics. Why don't you tell folks a little bit about yourself? Yeah, thanks for having me on.

04:38

And thanks to Tyler, of course. It's been really good discussion so far. I've enjoyed it. And I'm looking forward to continuing it.

04:43

I've been excited about this. So I'm Dan Chapa. God saved me when I was very young.

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You know, I was about six years old and I grew up in a Baptist church, you know, and a Christian home and, you know, was doing

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Awanas, which is a very Baptist thing to do, studying Bible verses as a kid. And I just kind of kept going and going and going and kept studying

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God's word. And I never really have kicked the habit. The Lord has always been drawing my heart to him and to his word.

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And so I think that's important for us as Christians to do. So I'm a

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Southern Baptist and my soteriology would be closer to Arminianism, but I also hold to, you know, basically some form of perseverance of the saints or eternal security or that sort of thing, as Southern Baptists usually do.

05:28

And then I also am a Molinist. So I certainly hold to God's foreknowledge. I'm not an open theist, but I hold to God's foreknowledge and God's middle knowledge, where he knows what we would do under different circumstances.

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So I think that makes Tylan and I, you know, kind of close in a lot of areas, but one specific area where we disagree is this idea of libertarian free will or determinism and that sort of thing.

05:50

So I think we're getting right at one of the fine -tuned differences in our theology,

05:58

I suppose. Well, the term Molinism can have kind of a wide application. You could have

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Molinists who lean more Calvinistically and you could have Molinists that lean more Arminianistically.

06:09

That's not a real word. I just made that up. So would you describe yourself, Dan, as a

06:15

Molinist that leans more towards an Arminian sort of theological framework? Yeah, that's right.

06:21

Yeah, I'm probably a classical Arminian. So if you look at the tulip, I will hold to total depravity, but I'll disagree with the

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Uli in the middle, unconditional election, limited atonement and irresistible grace. But I do agree with perseverance of the saints.

06:36

So at the end of the day, I'd probably be a two -point Calvinist, which isn't a thing. Just enough to be saved.

06:43

You're good now. I'm just kidding. I'm just kidding. You drop one more pedal, I'm gonna start praying for you. I'm totally joking.

06:50

All right, well, thank you for those brief introductions. I said I was gonna take questions right away.

06:56

And so I'm gonna stay true to my promise because if I start initiating my first question, I'm gonna forget what

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I said previously by taking audience questions as soon as they post them. So I'm actually gonna start this discussion with an audience question.

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So I hope you don't mind that. Tyler and Dan have agreed to kind of do this pretty informally. And so hopefully this will not be the last question.

07:15

Again, if you're just listening in now, we have a few more people watching. If you have a question, send it in and I will get it to these debaters right away and they can discuss their answers to those questions.

07:26

So here's the first question from Chris Harris. He says, for each, what is your view concerning the faculties involved in choice as in the intellect slash understanding and the will?

07:36

Is there indifference? Does either faculty have priority? Dan, why don't you take a stab at that first and then maybe

07:43

Tyler can chime in. Sure, so older theologians will slice this very, split it kind of evenly between the will and the understanding.

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And I think there's a bit of a mistake because it's like, do you have a understanding will or do you have a understanding without desire?

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So in essence, you've got the person, but if you do wanna parse it in the two, you have reasons and desires.

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And I would say that both of these are necessary preconditions for a choice. So if you don't wanna do something at all, it's probably outside of your nature to do it.

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So you literally can't do something that you don't desire at all in any way, shape or form. So, and then if you don't have any reason to do it at all, then you can't do that either.

08:26

So it's just outside of your nature, but your nature itself works as kind of a perimeter fence. And within that perimeter fence, you can choose this or that option, that sort of thing.

08:36

As far as indifference, again, that's a bit of an older term in what the older theologians meant by that term, talking about like around the time of the

08:45

Reformation or that sort of thing, I would agree with it, but I probably use more precise language these days and just say, it's a matter of both sourcehood.

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So sourcehood being that nothing preceding you determines what you do. And then the other condition is alternative possibilities.

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Sourcehood is primary and the main one, but alternative possibilities sometimes come into play.

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There are times when we can choose between A and B, and those are live options and that sort of thing.

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And as far as does either faculty have priority, that's a tough one. Once again, I try to view it as the whole person, but if I try to parse it between desire and reason, the way

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I would say it is this, desire pushes you to act and reason slows things down and says, hey, wait, let's think this over.

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And the more you think about something, the more you want it. And so that's how these two interplay.

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And so you can think of it as like reason as blocking action and desire is pushing it. And then desire ultimately pushes forward into action.

09:52

So I guess that's probably the way I would describe it. So I hope that makes sense. Well, thank you for that.

09:58

Dan, Tyler, do you have any comments on that? I mean, a little bit. I wouldn't disagree with much of what

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Dan said, although I tend to think it's better to look at people, look at the composition of a human and also in a little bit more of a holistic way as well, and not so piecemeal that way.

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But again, the way that I understand the will really is a faculty more so than say like desires or intellect are.

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Those are much more like propane or fuel in the tank, so to speak, where if you think about, well,

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I mean, I'm the determinist in the group and I'm gonna say, well, I'm determined to pick up this water bottle.

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Does that mean that I don't have the faculty to have like not picked it up or vice versa, if I didn't pick it up, does that mean my arm, my will literally just wouldn't, like if I wanted to pick it up, suddenly be like, oh no, like my arm isn't working.

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Like, no, I mean, we have these faculties, but this is part of why

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I'm compatible is that faculties are without the enlivening and the gas in the tank, so to speak, of desires, of reasons, responsiveness, of all those types of things.

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I mean, faculties are just kind of a husk. Faculty is just kind of the route by which the self chooses.

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It's not a thing in itself, if that makes sense.

11:31

All right, very good. We have a nice crowd kind of coming in and listening in. So just wanna remind folks, this is a

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Q &A portion of a debate that occurred. One portion of the debate occurred on Dan's channel, the other portion of the debate occurred on Tyler's channel and now we're doing the

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Q &A. So I have some questions, but I promised to get to the audience questions. And fortunately, there are a lot of people asking questions.

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So I'm just going to go straight to the audience so that they can get their little itching questions out of the way.

11:58

And perhaps somewhere down the line, I'll throw in some of my own, if that's okay. How does that sound, guys? Yeah, did you want us to briefly say what our arguments were?

12:07

That was my next point. Before I went to the next one, I was actually gonna ask both of you if you could define libertarian free will and Tyler, define briefly, and I mean very briefly, like a thumbnail sketch, your position, assuming that they can go back and listen to the longer portion, and then kind of just briefly summarize, what are you arguing for?

12:28

In just a couple of seconds, if that's possible. So Dan, what is libertarian free will and what's the main point of contention that you're trying to demonstrate in this debate?

12:38

Sure, so libertarian free will comes down to those two things we mentioned, which was sourcehood and alternative possibility.

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So sourcehood being it's free from some preceding determining factor or determining cause, and then alternative possibilities is, the ability to do otherwise, so to speak, where it's typically illustrated with the garden of forking paths or a road that splits in the two, you can go left or you can go right, or you can choose left or you can choose right, that sort of thing.

13:07

So I think that's it in a nutshell, from putting it in a positive sense,

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I guess it would be that we have this type of agent causation, that although there are certainly necessary conditions, the necessary cause we depend on God, he's given us this strength, he's keeping us in existence and that sort of thing.

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In some sense, there's no preceding sufficient cause for our choice.

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So there's no, at least at no event cause, there's an agent cause, but that's pretty unique.

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It's a special type of causation, I guess. So I don't know if I've said enough there.

13:47

Are you arguing that libertarian free will is true? Is biblical more reasonable?

13:55

What's the specific thing you're trying to demonstrate? Yeah, so definitely true and biblical. I mean, biblical first.

14:01

So I think that the simple language of choice in the scripture and especially the language of deliberation was the basis of my arguments in the pre -succession section.

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And a choice essentially just means to select between alternative possibilities.

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So you've got your twofold possibilities or your AP, right there in scripture, just in every sense that every scripture passages that has the word choice.

14:30

Now, I understand that what, so this is probably not gonna be fair, but I think what

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I see determinists doing when they read this passage is they do one of two things. They'll accept a simple definition of choice that seems libertarian, right?

14:46

But then when I point out, well, isn't it inconsistent to think, well, I can choose A and I can choose B, but I'm determined such that A is necessary and B is impossible.

14:55

So isn't that inconsistent to hold all three propositions at the same time? And at that point, what'll happen is

15:02

I hear, well, let's define this ability in this conditional sense or that sort of thing.

15:08

And there I push back and say, well, that conditional sense has problems, which I've talked about in the preceding episode, and it's not scriptural.

15:16

It's like that you can't really, you shouldn't take that type of stipulated definition for choice or ability and try to use it in exegesis.

15:24

Are you saying, and I'm just gonna say this real quick so Tyler can summarize his point. Are you saying that you have issues with the conditional ability to do otherwise?

15:32

So are you talking within the context of that conditional categorical debate? 100%, I don't agree with the way it's framed.

15:39

And I think there's significant problems with the analysis. We can get into the details, but I paused the mic, so.

15:45

No worries, no worries. All right, so Tyler, what is your position and why are you not a libertarian freewheeler?

15:50

Yeah, so I am the negative position here. So I could have remained a pure skeptic, played the largest lack of belief in libertarianism and you have to prove it, but those are terrible dodging debates.

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And so I tried in mine to say, okay, well, I'm gonna take a true negative. I'm gonna try to actually argue the case that we have good reason to think libertarian freedom is false.

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And the way that I did that, I was saying, okay, well, what's necessary to libertarian freedom is this affirmation of incompatibilism, right?

16:20

Libertarianism just is this incompatibilist position that thinks that determinism is what's called in principle, incompatible with any type of freedom that's sufficient for responsibility.

16:35

The problem with all principled positions, I shouldn't say problem, the weakness of all principled positions is that they're what

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I call fragile positions, right? Because if you take a principled position, one exception falsifies the entire position and any sub position that affirms it, right?

16:56

So in order for me to overcome incompatibilism, which says that just in principle, if something is determined, you can't be free sufficient for responsibility, right?

17:06

So my goal was to say, okay, well, it just seems like we have all kinds of biblical examples where God has determined something and either by weak actualization or sometimes by flat out, it says

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God did it, like flat out God, we're at causal determinism on that instance. And yet the agents that are doing the actions are held responsible for their actions.

17:31

And so it just seems to me that I can take kind of a soft compatibilism, kind of a weak compatibilism in that sense and say that, well, if I have good reason to think that there's examples where something is determined and the agent is free sufficient that they're such that they're responsible, then just incompatibilism just is necessarily false.

17:55

And therefore, libertarian incompatibilism is necessarily false. And so I go through the argument and I give multiple biblical examples.

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And then I give one theological argument from a shared view that Dan and I have, and most kind of conservative

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Protestants have, not all, but most in verbal plenary inspiration and how that kind of, that doesn't really jive with, that just is an example of compatibilism as well of something determined and free.

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And so if those types of examples hold, and remember, I only need one, then libertarianism is just necessarily false.

18:34

Whether or not I can give account, whether or not I can give a positive account for how things are compatible, whether or not

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I can describe the metaphysics, whether it's by these conditional analysis or if there's reasons responsiveness or guidance control, even if I can't give the actual mechanisms and the roadmap for how it works, if we're all trying to be biblically accurate and there's biblical examples of something that's determined and yet responsible, then it just seems to be the case that the biblical position is compatibilism.

19:05

All right, thank you for that. Let's move along with some audience questions. Bought with a Price asks the question, why claim libertarian free will if it's an understood partial libertarian free will?

19:17

Meaning God does some things as the Bible states against what man desires, such as Joseph's brothers.

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Shaky ground felt by the libertarian free will side. I suppose that question is for Dan.

19:31

So you feel free, libertarianly free to tackle that. Okay. Yeah, God does some things that the

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Bible states against what man desires. I don't think that's what the passage says.

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So I think that the text in mind is probably Genesis 50, 20.

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Let's look it up and read that real quick. So it says, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good to bring it about that many people should be kept alive as they are today.

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So this is the brothers of Joseph when they were selling into slavery, they meant it for evil. So they had a plan for Joseph.

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They were basically trying to get rid of him and ultimately kill him off or at least get him out of the family.

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But God meant it for good. So God did like a Jew move and he turned, they thought this would kill

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Joseph or harm Joseph, but it didn't, right? He ended up becoming the second to. So I think that's what the passage is saying, but here's

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I think more to, but with a price's point, God does have providential control over the world and he can use our choices to bring about his outcomes the way he wants them to be.

20:48

And there's nothing inconsistent with that and libertarian free will. Okay, would you like to comment on that Tyler or would you like me to go to the next question?

20:59

I mean, the only thing I would say is I agree with Dan. I'm not sure that if we're doing this as an internal critique of libertarian freedom,

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I'm not sure the objection really holds because Dan wouldn't be arguing for some type of partial libertarian freedom, right?

21:16

He would just say, well, like he just did, like God just is working providentially through these libertarian free choices, right?

21:21

That's not a partial. I would just exegetically push back and say intentionality is always forward looking, right?

21:30

God had this forward providential intention for the action, not kind of this backwards,

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I'm gonna turn it into something good type of reactionary, right? Intention is a prior state that's driving the action.

21:46

Can I stop you right there? So Dan, is that what your position is? That God has kind of this backwards kind of reaction to what man does?

21:54

I mean, that's an interesting kind of way that Tyler phrased it, that God's intentions is kind of forward, right?

22:01

Is your God, now I know we worship the same God, but just the same God. You know, is your picture of God, okay, reactionary in the way that it seemed

22:13

Tyler was suggesting given your position? You know, I think that there's a possibility that Tyler and I are not on the same page on this and we actually disagree.

22:22

There's certainly a sense where God knows what's gonna happen and He allows it and that sort of thing, and He's gonna turn it into a greater good.

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But the example that I think people like to give, and I think this is a good one. Let's say you're gonna throw a party, right?

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And if you throw the party, you know your friends are gonna make a mess in the house, but you've got this, you know, vacuum cleaner, the robot, you know, you got your new

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Roomba that's gonna clean up the mess, right? So God creates the world and He can show off His goodness,

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His power, you know, His control, His knowledge, His wisdom, all this stuff that He can show, but just by creating the world.

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But then sin enters and God allows it to enter knowing what's going to happen, but He allows it to enter and because He also has a defeater for sin, the cross, right?

23:11

Redemption, and He's gonna bring a greater good out of the sin, right? Now, if we flip the analogy, right?

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So in that vacuum cleaner story, right? You can say, well, the reason, you know, the reason for creating wasn't for the vacuum cleaner, right?

23:28

The reason why you throw the party isn't so you can use a vacuum cleaner, it just happens to be the method used to clean it up, right?

23:35

But let's take super lapsarian Calvinism, I'm not saying any of you guys are super lapsarian, but if God chose the end state, right?

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And said, there are certain people that I'm going to send to heaven and some people that I'm gonna send to hell, I don't think that story applies, right?

23:53

So if that's what is meant by intention, right? You know, is God first picks the end state and then

23:59

He brings sin into the picture to, you know, get to that end state. Yeah, that's something

24:05

I would push back on and disagree with. And I think that does not avail itself to I guess the theodicy that I just laid out in this party story.

24:15

All right, thank you for that. I just thought the way you phrased it, if I were

24:21

Dan, Tyler, and the way you kind of suggested that there was kind of this backwards

24:26

God react, if I were Dan, I probably, I asked the question because I probably would have taken issue to or maybe want to qualify the way that you said it there.

24:33

So that was the reason why I asked the question. All right, well, you guys are doing a great job. Here's another question from Augur.

24:40

I never pronounce his name. I think, I hope that's correct. And also just as a side note, there are some questions coming in.

24:47

Excellent, I'm so happy. But what is a mystery to me is, of course, God's secret councils is a mystery to me.

24:55

And another great mystery to me is how there are 43 people, almost 50 people watching and one heart.

25:00

Does anyone not like this conversation? If you like this conversation, you're enjoying this conversation, why don't you click the like button that does me a solid and lets me know that you guys are not just watching, but you're enjoying this conversation.

25:12

So I'd appreciate that. Give a little love to Revealed Apologetics. All right, Augur asked the question, and this is for you,

25:18

Tyler, okay? Now, Augur pops up on a lot of my live streams, man. And it seems to me he's not very fond of Calvinism, bro.

25:27

All right, so I think he's just cutting straight to the chase here. What is a positive argument to think compatibilism is possible?

25:35

So he thinks probably it's not possible. How would you demonstrate its possibility? Yeah, so that's a good question.

25:44

And I would give it a couple of different ways, right? The first one is to say, go listen to my opening. I gave a whole bunch of them.

25:51

But I do it a couple of different ways. One is I would say, well, in order,

25:58

I'm not sure that I need to show that it's possible, right? Because the principled position is the one that would bear the burden, right?

26:05

So the person who says that something can't be spherical and be green, right?

26:12

It just seems that that person would bear the burden to say that rather than the person who says, well, there's just not really a reason to think those two.

26:20

There's no formal contradiction between them, right? It's not something saying green and not green, right? It's not saying determined and not determined.

26:27

It's not saying free and not free. It's saying determined and free, right? There's no formal contradiction there.

26:35

It just seems like the person who's saying that there is this principled contradiction, they have this burden to prove it.

26:40

So I would push back a little bit on that. But I would say that my main argument is, well, like I said, it just seems that there are strong biblical examples of this, right?

26:50

So without going into too many of them. Just give, how about you just give one? One that you think is the best that captures what you're saying.

26:57

So the biggest one I give is, and I focus the most on, is the crucifixion, right? So we have passages like Acts 2 .23

27:05

which says, this man delivered over by the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God, you nailed to the cross by hands of godless men and put him to death.

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And then expounding on this, after Peter's let out of prison, he then, they're saying a prayer in 4 .27

27:21

and following. And to God, he says, for truly in the city were gathered together your holy servant

27:29

Jesus, whom you anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with the Gentiles and the people of Israel to do whatever your hand and your purpose predestined to occur.

27:38

Purpose, the plan, the bulleh and the predestined, the oridzo, which was in chapter two, it's now proridzo, it's actually intensified.

27:47

It's happened before the events even happened. He uses both those. And it's by God's hand this time that it was predestined to occur.

27:55

And in the biblical language, whenever God something's by his hand, God is bringing it about, right? This is not, he's allowing it.

28:01

This is not, he knows. God's hand is what's doing it. And we see it in just the, in the very next verse, where it's by, that you, while you extend your hand to heal and signs and wonders take place, right?

28:14

So God's hand in this context is very active. He's saying it's by your hand that they were predestined by your plan to crucify

28:25

Jesus, right? But we're also told that they were wicked men for doing so, right? So there's this clear example of God is causally bringing about, right?

28:33

Whether or not you think that God has determined all things. Remember, I only need one example where something is determined and yet the agents are responsible, right?

28:42

And so it just seems, it just seems patently the case without, you know, I would need some really, really, really amazing exegesis from the other side to say, well, this isn't somehow

28:53

God's hand, you know, determining that they do this and yet they're responsible. Dan, would you agree that God causes everything, but that you have a particular understanding of what it means for God to cause so that you have perhaps an explanation of God bringing about things that's consistent with like your libertarianism?

29:14

How would you hash out or respond to what Tyler has said there? What do you disagree with?

29:20

And how would you explain this idea that it seems, at least for me as a Calvinist, it seems clear that at least in the sense of the crucifixion,

29:28

God is actively bringing about this evil action and men are sufficiently held responsible for their action.

29:35

So that passage seems, at least on the surface, to support a Calvinistic understanding. Where would you disagree and how would you explain it from your perspective?

29:44

Sure. So I guess let's start with the Acts 428 passage.

29:49

And actually Tyler's advanced three different arguments. So the Acts 428, they're basically the crucifixion.

29:55

There's also the case of hardening. And then there's the case of inspiration of scriptures. And all three of them,

30:00

I've responded roughly the same way, which is two different ways. I'm not sure what the answer is. On the one hand, especially with Acts 428,

30:08

I'm not sure that pro -arizzo is just a synonym for determined or predetermined or something like that.

30:13

It could be, you know, arranged or planned, you know, that sort of thing, or God made a choice. But let's say for the sake of argument that Tyler is right and this just means predetermined.

30:24

Okay. So just because God determines one thing, the crucifixion, doesn't mean that he's determined everything, you know, what cereal you're gonna have for breakfast or that sort of thing, right?

30:35

So that's the main concern. Now, Tyler is right that, okay, if for the sake of argument, it means determined, these people are responsible.

30:44

So he's right, they're determined and responsible. So the question is not, can they be determined and responsible, but can they be determined and free?

30:52

That's, they're two different questions. And it's true that freedom and responsibility usually go to hand in hand, but not always, right?

31:01

So there's cases where people are will set in terms of Keynes philosophy or hardened or that sort of thing in terms of the scriptural language and where, you know, in some preceding case, they had alternative possibilities, but it may be that a hardened sinner, like let's say

31:17

Judas, right? Maybe he couldn't have done otherwise at the time. Okay, you know, but he previously, he did have alternative possibilities.

31:27

So that's an example like a, you know, a drunk person or something like that. They can choose not to get drunk, but once they're drunk, maybe they can't actually control their car, but they're still responsible if they hit somebody.

31:39

So it would be something like that. So I guess - Would they be responsible for hitting someone because there was a prior state in which they were free and responsible to prevent themselves from getting into that state in which they couldn't do otherwise?

31:55

Exactly, so the question is really, just because this one event is determined, for the sake of argument, let's just say that it's determined, right?

32:03

You know, it doesn't mean that everything else is determined, why? Why think that everything is determined if this one thing is?

32:10

Can I, okay, so I guess I'm asking because Tyler was saying something of the effect that all he needs is one example.

32:17

If it's possible that these people were determined, to perform a wicked act, and they're held morally responsible, doesn't that,

32:25

I mean, you can help me understand, doesn't that demonstrate that incompatibilism is false?

32:31

He found an instance in which they are compatible. What am I missing? Okay, so remember, again, we have the two main conditions, sourcehood and alternative possibilities.

32:43

Most of the time, they go hand in hand. When you're making a choice, they go hand in hand, but they don't always, right?

32:49

They can come apart. Once you have identified the two of them as distinct concepts, you can see cases where you have sourcehood, but you don't have alternative possibilities.

33:01

Now, so if you read, let's say, for example, if you read Arminius' commentary on Romans 9 .19, he specifically says in the preceding time, you know,

33:10

Pharaoh had alternative possibilities and he could have avoided this situation, but at that moment when he was being hardened, he couldn't.

33:18

God irresistibly hardened him, right? So he's specifically saying that, yes,

33:24

Pharaoh is responsible because in preceding cases, when he told people to make bricks without straw and stuff like that, you know, when

33:30

Moses comes, says, let my people go. Anyway, so the point is, the alternative possibilities were in some preceding condition, but once they've gone down this path far enough, once they develop bad enough habits and that sort of thing, they may actually be in a condition where they no longer have alternative possibilities, but remain responsible because they will set or form their character in this specific way.

33:56

Gotcha, gotcha. Is there any other follow -up that you'd like for that or would you like me to go to the next question?

34:02

I mean, just, I mean, a couple of thoughts is if libertarianism has to,

34:14

I'm trying to find a gentle way to say what I wanna say, but if it has to modify itself to the point where incompatibilism is no longer necessary, alternative possibilities are no longer necessary, right?

34:32

I mean, you can talk to a bunch of incompatibilists who are sourced at, you know,

34:38

Kevin Tempe and others, and they'll say, look, I mean, at the core of incompatibilism, there just is this leeway condition.

34:44

There's always this leeway condition somewhere at the core. And so if you say that's unnecessary, it really comes down to sourcehood.

34:50

And most compatibilists are gonna say, well, I mean, if all you have is sourcehood, like you just are a compatibilist, right?

34:57

You're just kind of an unhappy compatibilist, right? You just don't like the label, right?

35:02

So, because most compatibilists, we're sourcehood compatibilists, right? We think that the reason why you are responsible is because you are the efficient source for your actions, right?

35:14

That you're doing the thing that you want to do as the source of your action, right? God isn't, when we say

35:21

God is determined, it doesn't mean God is choosing it in your plate, like kicking you out of the driver's seat, and now he's in the driver's seat choosing it for you.

35:30

You are still the source, you're the still, you still have guidance control, you still have reasoned responsiveness, right? So everything that Dan said,

35:37

I would say, well, that just is compatibilism at that point, that just is that, but that's just become so modified away from libertarianism that at that point

35:48

I'm saying, okay, well, now we just have to discuss, what type of compatibilist are you?

35:54

Because it's no longer, like it's no longer libertarianism as defined in the literature. Now, I just wanna, if we're playing volleyball,

36:01

I'm going to, like you hit that one and it looks like Dan wants to give one more volley back.

36:06

So let's - One more, he can have the last word. Yeah, let's let Dan kind of respond to that, and then we'll go to the next question.

36:13

This is an excellent conversation, folks. Thank you so much for listening in. There's so many questions here. I had my cup of coffee, so I'm awake.

36:20

So as long as they're awake and down, we can go through these and hopefully folks can get their questions answered. So far, you guys are doing a great job, but Dan, why don't you respond to what

36:29

Tyler said there? Yeah, so again, at some points, you actually do have alternative possibilities.

36:35

Even if you don't have them all the time, you do have them sometimes. And where it comes really important is in the garden before the fall, right?

36:44

Because then when you have alternative possibilities and sourcehood, now you have apologetic value in it.

36:51

And if libertarian free will doesn't exist, libertarian free will can't be between God and sin, right?

36:56

So, you know, I guess I would put a huge difference between a

37:02

Pharaoh being hardened and Adam and Eve pre -fall. And so I would say it still plays a very, very, very important role in our overall theology and theodicy and that sort of thing.

37:16

But it is true, in some cases, we don't have alternative possibilities. Okay, all right, thank you for that.

37:23

The Sire asks, what actually is a possible world? What actually are their ontology and how does that work within your view?

37:31

Tyler first, and then Dan can share his thoughts. Yeah, I mean, alternative or other possible worlds are these sci -fi parallel universes.

37:42

No, it's not at all. So they're just a way that we can talk about different types of modalities, right?

37:47

Different types of ways the world could have been had certain conditions been different, right?

37:56

So, you know, we can talk about a possible world where I have blonde hair instead of brown hair, but we can't talk about a possible world where I'm a married bachelor, right?

38:06

Because that's not a possible world, right? That's not a logically possible world. So that's really it.

38:15

Some people think that they're these like mystical things that philosophers are talking about. They're not. It's just kind of talking about the ways the world could have been.

38:23

And as someone who's reformed, I'm gonna say, well, there are ways that God could have degreed the world to be other than the way that it is.

38:34

Okay, I'm curious then before I ask Dan, so do you think God has libertarian free will? So it's a good question.

38:41

I'm gonna answer no, but for a definitional reason, not for a he's not free reason.

38:48

Because remember, libertarianism just is an incompatible position. So if I say it's libertarian, it just means that in no way is determinism ever compatible with freedom sufficient responsibility.

39:00

I think that's false, right? So I'm gonna say, well, God is maximally free. I think

39:05

God does have alternative possibilities. I think that there's nothing outside of God that's determining his actions in the way that there are things that are outside us determining our actions in our creaturely freedom.

39:17

So I would just say that he has maximal freedom as the creator in an undetermined way, whereas we have creaturely determined freedom.

39:28

Okay, Dan, did you wanna add to that or? Yeah, definitions are important.

39:33

I mean, I think what I would characterize roughly what Tyler said as libertarian freedom for God, right, he's not determined by something outside of God and he has alternative possibilities.

39:42

Sounds pretty good as far as checking the boxes as libertarian freedom. In terms of the

39:48

Cyrus question, what actually is a possible world? That's a good question. Frankly, if you don't find the term helpful, probably just set it aside, that's my advice.

39:57

But one of the qualms I have with the term possible world is it flattens it out because you think of it as like a globe, but think of them as timelines.

40:07

Possible worlds are timelines and these are alternative timelines. And the foundation for all possibilities is

40:14

God, right? So there's what God can do. So he can create the world, not create the world, create the world this way or that way.

40:21

And those are all different possible worlds or possible timelines. And then there's also what

40:26

God can enable us to do. So if he can enable me to have Cheerios or eat strawberries, right, so those are two different possible worlds.

40:36

And that language itself, like Tyler said, isn't exclusive to non -Calvinists or Molinists or something like that.

40:42

Reformed theologians can hold to possible worlds in that sense as well. Now, one further clarification is when it talks about possible worlds, are you talking about logical possibility or are you talking about causal possibility?

40:55

Normally, this is talking about logical possibility in terms of a coherent set of propositions about everything that's going to happen.

41:03

So they're non -contradictory propositions about everything that's going to happen. And it's not specifically talking about causation and the causal possibilities and that sort of thing.

41:12

So hopefully that answers the question there, sir. All right, thank you for that,

41:18

Dan. Next question, Colin Brooks asks, this is for Dan. How do you reconcile perseverance of the saints with your view of free will?

41:26

Very good question. So I do take the warning passages and especially the ones in Hebrews six and Hebrews 10 very seriously.

41:32

They do seem to be saying, certainly if you fell away, then you would lose your salvation, that sort of thing.

41:38

So I kind of think of it as like a parent telling a child, if you touch the stove, you're gonna burn your hand. But that doesn't mean that if I saw my kid going for the stove,

41:46

I'm gonna grab him and stop him. The same thing with like running down the street. If you run out in the street, you can get squashed by the car. So it's kind of like that.

41:53

So the warnings themselves are a means that God uses. Now God has knowledge, not just of what we will do, but what we would do.

42:01

And he uses that knowledge to keep us from falling away, from going too far, from renouncing our faith and that sort of thing.

42:09

And the way I look at it is like this. So in libertarian free will,

42:14

God can't determine that somebody freely do something because that's a contradiction, right? That they're determined to freely do it.

42:24

But apostasy is something that is a positive action that God can prevent, right?

42:31

So God can prevent anything he wants to, and he simply doesn't allow a true believer to apostatize.

42:38

Now, one final argument that I'd make for Colin, and I don't know if you guys have ever heard Plato's analogy of the cave, but I think it's actually a good one.

42:46

So there's a guy who lives in a cave, he was born in a cave, and all he sees is like, he has a candle behind him, all he sees is a shadow of himself and his limbs and that sort of thing.

42:55

And then eventually he's in stocks and stuff like that. So literally all he knows of himself is the shadow world of the cave.

43:03

Then once he goes outside of the cave, then he sees the light and the beauty of it. And then they ask him, hey, do you wanna go back in?

43:09

No, I'm never going back into the cave again. Well, I think the glory of Christ is kind of that way.

43:15

So once we've seen who Christ is, and I think in the Hebrews 11 passage, they were looking for the kingdom of God, that sort of thing.

43:25

So once they have that, once they have that beautiful vision of Christ, they're never turning back. All right, thank you for that.

43:32

This is a question for both of you. Shannon Herring says, since both of you hold to the

43:38

T, total depravity, how does this totally depraved person, quote, hear the gospel in this state?

43:44

Tyler, why don't you tackle that first? Yeah, I think this is actually an interesting, this will be an interesting answer because Dan, as far as I understand it, is a classical, what some would even call a reformed

43:58

Arminian. And so I think some of the Arminians and provisionists and others in the group might hear his answer.

44:06

As far as I understand it, I could be wrong, but if I remember right, they might hear it and be like, oh, Dan's a covert Calvinist.

44:14

But as reformed, I would say, well, the person who is totally depraved, the person in their natural state, they cannot hear the gospel, right?

44:25

I mean, Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians 2 that the natural man cannot appraise or even accept the things of the spirit.

44:34

Paradigmatically, he's giving an example of what's foolishness to the Gentiles, which is the gospel, it's the death and resurrection of Jesus.

44:42

In 2 Corinthians, he talks about how the natural man, the unbelievers are blinded to the gospel.

44:50

The very thing that we're saying, well, can't they just believe it? We're told that if you're an unbeliever, you're actually blinded to it by the prince of the power of the air.

44:59

And so I would say that the way that someone hears the gospel in a sense that they come to saving faith is by, and I'll say this in a more ecumenical way than a specifically

45:12

Calvinistic way, but is by the special and gracious working of the Holy Spirit on that person in the moment that they repent and believe.

45:21

Okay, what about you, Dan? So I think almost every

45:27

Armenian is gonna agree on three points that I'm gonna lay out and the fourth point is more controversial. So the three points would be, before you're ready to hear the gospel and accept the gospel or unable to believe the gospel, three things are necessary.

45:39

One is the conviction of the Holy Spirit that we see in John chapter 16. The second is the drawing of the cross that we see in John 12, 32.

45:47

And then the third is the illumination that we see in John 1, 9. So now the fourth point, not everyone holds to, but I think

45:57

Armenians did and I think some do in what I call a peri -regenerational state or an opening of the heart state.

46:05

So in, I think it's what, in Ezekiel 36, it talks about God basically opening our heart or changing out our heart, taking out the heart of stone and turning it into a heart of flesh.

46:19

So it depends what that passage means, right? And there are passages that speak of Israel at that time having been hardened, right?

46:30

And if that's the case, if that's what it's talking about, then that hardening of heart has to be softened first and the hardening has to be reversed first before the person can hear the gospel in the sense that,

46:43

Shana, that you're asking. Now that's my personal take on it. Now, other people will take it different ways and they'll say, no, that's a new covenant blessing and there's good reasons to believe that too.

46:52

So I think that's kind of an in -house dispute amongst our minions, but the three core points, conviction, illumination, and drawing,

47:01

I think all our minions will say are necessary prerequisites before you're able to believe the gospel.

47:07

All right, thank you for that. Next question here from Neland. Neland asks, can you both please define the will?

47:15

I can take a stab at it. Without going to a specific view of freedom and what's needed for responsibility, almost universally across the board, there actually is a surprising amount of agreement that the will, and we're talking about freedom, we're talking about what's called the control condition for moral responsibility.

47:35

So there's a bunch of these different conditions that say, okay, well, what has to be met, what has to be necessary in order for some type of moral epistemic existential responsibility to obtain?

47:48

And the will, free will is seen as the control condition, the amount of control you have to have over the action in order to be responsible, right?

47:58

So there's epistemic conditions, right? So you have to be in a position to know that if you put poison in your friend's drink, you have to have been in a position to know that it was poison, not deceive to think that it was sugar.

48:14

So those types of things. So the free will just is that condition of control that's needed for someone to be responsible.

48:21

Hmm. Dan, do you agree with that or you have something to add to that? I do disagree with that, but so just to focus on Leland's question, so the will or in Greek phallos or something like that, is it an equivocal term?

48:35

So it can be taken in terms of desire or it can be taken in terms of the faculty which chooses.

48:41

In our discussion, probably the faculty which chooses is probably the more relevant sense, but you need to look at the context of the term will to determine which one is the correct one to go with.

48:52

In some sense, the term libertarian free will is triple redundant, right? The will can't be forced because that's against the nature of the will itself.

49:01

So the will is gonna be free, right? That's just it. And if it's not free, it's not a will. And then if it's not free, if it's not libertarian, it's not free.

49:10

So libertarian and free are just kind of redundant terms. And I mean the same thing by those terms.

49:17

All right, thank you for that. Keith Hoover asked the question, point one, pre -fall, two, after the fall, three, born again believer, four, believer in new heaven and new earth, five, unbelievers in hell.

49:32

Question, do they all have libertarian free will at each point? Well, I suppose

49:39

Dan can answer that question because you hold to libertarian free will. So maybe you have something to speak to that. Maybe Tyler could share his thoughts.

49:46

Sure, so in point one, pre -fall, yes, people have a libertarian free will. Adam had the ability to obey or not obey.

49:56

Point two, after the fall, we retain libertarian free will among evil options.

50:04

So the person can, I don't know, go out and get drunk or smoke pot or something like that.

50:10

Like you can choose between evil options, some less evil than others. They can be relatively, there can be relative good acts,

50:16

I guess, but there's no true acceptable before God righteousness in a fallen, unregenerated state.

50:25

So I apologize for interrupting. So you said that they have libertarian free choices between evil actions.

50:32

Would you hold to a soft libertarian perspective as opposed to say like hard libertarianism? I guess maybe if you could clarify those two terms,

50:42

I'm less familiar with them. Yeah, Tyler, are you familiar with like hard and soft libertarianism?

50:48

Yeah, a little bit. So I think what he's asking you, Dan, is when you say they have libertarian freedom, do you mean that they just, they have the ability of contriety, of choosing between a range of options, all of them are evil, but they could choose one or not choose one, but all of their options are bad because they're depraved, but they don't have the ability of contradiction, which is they can't do either a good thing or a bad thing.

51:20

Right, yeah, I agree with that. So, right, so I'm not a, so a Pelagian would say they can choose between good or evil in a fallen state, they can choose between good or evil without God's grace.

51:31

And I'm not that, right? So apart from God's enabling grace, they can only choose between evil, but they can choose evil options because there's an evil alternatives before them.

51:45

Okay, so their evils are not determined. They're determined by their, they're limited by their nature, but they have libertarian free will ability between the evil options that they choose from.

51:56

Right, right, again, so think of it as like going down a road and there's guardrails on the other side, but it's a three lane road. So they can go, you know, left, right or center, but they can't go, you know, off the rails on a free train.

52:08

And then, so the born again believer, yes. So the born again believer has a libertarian free will and the ability to choose between good and evil options because we have the

52:19

Holy Spirit's enabling. And then the fourth state, a believer in heaven.

52:26

So, okay, so blessed in heaven, I would say that they have freedom to choose between good options, or at least could have freedom to choose between good options.

52:35

I actually would also say that that's the same of God. God can choose between good options.

52:41

Unbelievers in hell, perhaps they have freedom to choose between evil options. So I would say, yeah, so I would affirm libertarian free will at each point, but the question is, well, how do we apply it satirologically?

52:54

When do they have choices between good and evil? And that's really in the state one and in state three.

53:01

Okay, thank you for that, Dan. Tyler, do you have anything to add to that? I mean, I just don't think libertarian freedom is coherent in God's creation, so I don't think that's libertarian freedom at any point, yeah.

53:14

Right, okay. All right, thank you. That makes our job much easier. Okay, thank you very much. All right,

53:20

Consistent Calvinism Podcast asks, do you recognize the difference between choosing what we want and choosing what to want?

53:28

If we choose what to want to choose, would that not be inserting an extra layer of choice?

53:35

Want me to read that again? No, I think I got it. Okay. So, I mean,

53:41

Tyler, I don't know if you want to go first on this or you want me to just give it a shot? Yeah, it almost reminded me,

53:47

I love Colin from Consistent Calvinism, but the last sentence reminded me of like, if you choose to choose, sir, from Fox and Socks.

53:56

Anyways. Yeah, so, I mean, so I'm a compatibilist, so I'm gonna see this difference of choosing what you want and choosing what to want, because yes,

54:08

I think if we say, he's trying to respond to a very common incompatibilist argument that if we don't have the, if we don't have the ability to choose the things that we desire, then we aren't free if our desires determine our choices.

54:27

If our choices determine our actions, right? And he's saying, well, in that case, then all you have to do is back up the step and say, okay, well, why did you choose to want the thing that you desire, right?

54:36

It just keeps, you know, ad infinitum, you just get this infinite regress of, well, why did you want to choose that?

54:42

Why did you want to choose that? Like, you never get to a point where that stops, where there actually is a causal explanation, there actually is a sufficient explanation for it.

54:51

So, yes, I do accept the difference, and I think that it is an important one.

54:59

If someone is making that objection that you have to have this kind of direct doxastic control over the things that you want in order for those things that you want to determine what you do, otherwise you're not free.

55:14

It works, I think it's important distinction in that context of that particular disagreement. All right, here's a question for me.

55:22

Eli, do you feel responsible for encouraging Tim Stratton to use the Avengers in his Molinism debate? No, I think

55:30

I remember telling him to be careful using analogies and sticking with the text of scripture, especially if you're debating

55:36

Dr. White. I had spoken to Dr. White and Tim prior to the debate, and I tried to give some advice to, you know, after telling him

55:46

I hope he loses, because I'm a Calvinist, right? I told him if I were to debate

55:51

Dr. White, I would stick as close as possible to the text. If you're going to argue, is

55:57

Molinism biblical? I would focus on some exegesis with a sprinkling of some of those philosophical arguments that need to be thrown in there, because once you remove yourself from the text, which

56:09

I think Tim kinda did, in my opinion, that's not gonna work with someone who's listening to Dr.

56:15

White. Whether you agree with Dr. White or not, he tries to go through the text. You know, you could disagree with the exegesis, but for people who are really wanting to see someone walk through the text to demonstrate their position, that comes off more powerfully for a person kind of on the fence, so to speak.

56:31

So the more analogies and things, I mean, they're helpful, but I definitely didn't encourage him to use that.

56:37

So that's just my little take there. So if I could throw something in. So I, you know, there are some funny memes, like, you know, turn me to Avengers 3 .16.

56:49

But they're funny, but I'm gonna stand up for Tim and I'm gonna say, look, there's nothing wrong with people appealing to movies to make analogies, like, calm down.

56:58

He was totally fine to do so. Lots of people do it. William Lane Craig, you know, in his defenses, appeals to Christmas Carol to talk about, like, it's fine, guys, it's totally fine.

57:12

Now, I don't think his analogies worked, but people need to stop freaking out as if he was doing some crazy thing by talking about the

57:19

Avengers. Right, I don't wanna get too off topic, but I agree there's nothing wrong with using analogies.

57:25

It's just by way of, like, a strategy. If you're debating Dr. White, that's going to work against you, especially with the audience that you're trying to convince.

57:33

So that's just my opinion, but I do think there's nothing wrong with them in principle. But let's move on here. Let's see here.

57:40

Did it, it's a question bought with a price. Asks, why does John 830 area?

57:46

That's what it says. Why does John 830 area describing Jesus must set you free, not just eliminate libertarian free will?

57:54

Just as a kind of a throwing, you know, throwing a couple of things out here. If you're gonna ask a question, just double check the grammar of your question because it feels really awkward to ask the question if it sounds weird.

58:05

So I do apologize, bought with a price, but I don't know if you guys understand that question. Why does John 830 area describing

58:14

Jesus must set you free, not eliminate libertarian free will? That's for you, Dan, I suppose.

58:20

So I suspect they probably mean John 832 and you will know the truth and the truth will set you free.

58:26

So this is definitely talking about slavery to sin. So I think it's a slightly different category than the type of libertarian freedom where we've been talking about.

58:36

So we're dealing mostly with the philosophical issue rather than a soteriological issue. But to address directly the soteriological issue, we are slaves to sin.

58:47

We're born, that which is born of flesh is flesh, right? So we're born slaves to sin. And unless Christ frees us, we can't free ourselves.

58:54

We need him. But in my opening speech, I actually use that as a argument against Tyler's position.

59:02

And I'm curious if he wants to respond to it. But let's take, for example, the language. The language uses lack of freedom, slavery, and inability specifically.

59:11

So in John 644, right? It says, you can't come to me unless the father who sends me draws him.

59:19

That's incompatibilist language. It's not compatibilist language. It's not saying you can if you want to, you can if it's your strongest desire.

59:27

No, Christ says you can't come to me unless the father who sent you draws him.

59:32

So Christ is making an incompatibilist claim. Interesting. What say you,

59:38

Tyler? Yeah, so first, I agree with the response that the type of freedom talked about in 832.

59:44

It's just freedom from bondage. It's not talking about this philosophical sense of freedom of the will. So I'm not sure it's relevant. My response is, nah -ah.

59:52

It just seems to me that that's compatiblist language, right? It's saying you can't, you couldn't do otherwise, and yet you're responsible.

59:58

You can't come to me unless I do it, but I'm still gonna, if they don't, I'm still gonna judge you as responsible and send you to hell.

01:00:06

So it actually seems to me to be compatibilist language that even though they couldn't do otherwise, and even though they didn't have the contra -causal ability to do otherwise, they didn't have the eidetic ability to do otherwise, they're still responsible, which is with incompatibilism.

01:00:27

So I just don't see how that's strictly incompatibilist language. Okay, thank you for that.

01:00:34

Augur strikes again. What is a positive philosophical argument? Now being more specific,

01:00:40

I know they asked a similar, this person asked a similar question earlier. What is a positive philosophical argument for believing compatibilism is possible?

01:00:49

Yeah, so it wasn't really the scope of this one because again, I was the negative position, so I was trying to show that libertarian freedom is false.

01:00:59

Without taking up too much time, I would just reference someone to go read,

01:01:05

Fischer and Braviza, to read Preciado, to read Bignon's book, right? There are all kinds of arguments arguing in favor of compatibilism in the philosophical sense.

01:01:17

But for these debates, I'm just far more interested in biblical arguments. And then again,

01:01:23

I do offer a couple of theological arguments. One of them that borders on philosophical, although it probably falls under theological, although theology is just philosophy about God.

01:01:33

It's just thinking hard about God. It's the one that I actually had to cut from my opening statement for time is it seems that, let me preface by saying,

01:01:45

I'm not saying that knowledge is causal. It's not the argument. So if the reaction is knowledge is causal, you're missing the argument.

01:01:53

That's not actually the argument. My argument is if God foreknows or God knows, what

01:02:00

I'm going to do tomorrow, right? We all agree we're not open theists, right? If God knows what

01:02:06

I'm going to do tomorrow, right? Knowledge just is true belief, right?

01:02:13

If he knows what I'm going to do tomorrow and God is impeccable, right?

01:02:18

God is infallible in his knowledge. It's not even possible for God to be wrong. Then it's not possible for me to not do the thing that he knows tomorrow.

01:02:28

Because if God knows tomorrow that I'm going to do X infallibly, it's not possible for me to do, it's not possible that he'd be wrong.

01:02:36

For me to be able to do not X, right? That's just what's called synthetically identical with God's knowledge being wrong, right?

01:02:45

So Tyler doing not X just is synthetically identical with the falseness of God's knowledge.

01:02:51

But God is, it's not even possible for God's knowledge to be false. But those two things are identical, right?

01:02:57

They're just analytically or synthetically identical. So if one of them is false, the other one is necessarily false, right?

01:03:05

So it just seems obvious that if God is infallible in his knowledge, then

01:03:12

I cannot do other than the thing that he knows I'll do. Not because his knowledge is causal, whatever the causal change,

01:03:19

I'm not making claims for how that metaphysically works out. It just seems to be a necessary logical condition of God having infallible knowledge of future free choices.

01:03:32

Okay, Dan, did you have something to respond with there? Yes, I think that might be a better argument for determinism than compatibilism per se.

01:03:43

We could do a whole debate on God's foreknowledge, but I think the quick answer is that, I'm somewhat of an alchemist, right?

01:03:50

So that if we were to do otherwise, then

01:03:59

God would have known that, right? But let me focus on Augur's question.

01:04:07

So there is a superficial contradiction in compatibilism, which is you can and you cannot do otherwise, right?

01:04:17

I think that there just is. Now the question is, can that be fixed, right?

01:04:22

In the attempt that's made, at least what I had beyond was, well, there's two different senses of can, right?

01:04:28

And one it will say is this conditional sense and one is categorical, right?

01:04:33

And so the conditional senses, I could have done otherwise if I had wanted to, right?

01:04:38

So I think that doesn't avoid the contradiction and here's why. So for starters, it sounds good, but it's not, because not all conditional senses are compatible with determinism, right?

01:04:50

So we're looking for a specific type of conditional sense. So as long as the condition is possible, it's still libertarian.

01:04:59

But if the condition is impossible, so let's say I can if I want to, but it was impossible for me to want to because of God's decree, right?

01:05:10

That's a problem. Now we have not just a conditional analysis, but an impossible conditional analysis.

01:05:17

And that's not a normal sense, right? And that's not a sense that we should be using in exegesis of scripture, at least we'd need an argument for why that's what the biblical authors mean.

01:05:28

You know, in the many passages where they talk about our choices and abilities and that sort of thing. And then isn't it still just retreating the contradiction one further step saying you can do otherwise because it is impossible for you to do otherwise.

01:05:43

And isn't it also taking our ability to do otherwise and moving out of this world, out of reality and putting it in a hypothetical world that doesn't exist and can't exist, right?

01:05:55

So I don't think that the conditional analysis holds good. So ultimately, I don't think that there is an answer to get around the contradiction that compatibilism just is the contradiction that you can and cannot do otherwise.

01:06:08

Do you have any thoughts on that, Tyler? I have a lot of thought. I mean, this was a big point in the cross -examination.

01:06:14

Go watch Dan's, because I brought this up. I don't think that that analysis holds. I mean, the first of all, it's inaccurate to call it a contradiction because the instant that we make a conceptual distinction, right, so something is only a contradiction if it says

01:06:29

X and not X in the same way, right? Well, we just don't mean X and not X in the same. So you can do it and you can't do it, but we don't mean that in the same way, right?

01:06:38

It's just flat out not a contradiction. Now, you might not think one of those obtains, that's fine, but it's just flatly not a contradiction.

01:06:48

Yeah, so it'd be like saying, well,

01:06:54

I'm hungry and I'm not hungry at the same, right? Because I'm hungry for food, but I'm not hungry to go to a party, right?

01:07:03

In that kind of desire sense, right? Well, I can say I'm hungry and not hungry in those two different senses, and that's just not a contradiction, right?

01:07:12

Now you might say, okay, but you say you're hungry for food, but you're not actually hungry for food.

01:07:17

So that's just not true. That's fine. And we can go on from the conditional sense. But what

01:07:23

I find interesting is that on Molinism, on Dan's view, that's actually, it's funny that he said that like, in this hypothetical world, you're free, but not in the actual world.

01:07:35

Because on Molinism, that's actually one of my main objections to Molinism is that in this middle knowledge, in this kind of ethereal world that God somehow knows what

01:07:44

I would do in this totally ungrounded way where I, I can't even say

01:07:49

I, it's the pre -incarnate Tyler in the mind that's somehow autonomous from God's decree, doing something.

01:07:58

And somehow God knows that I would, like you have all these grounding problems. He'd know what I would libertarianly do.

01:08:04

And so, you can listen to Tim Stratton's opening where he says, look, I think that God predestines everything because God knows the world and he actual, he decrees that world and not some other world.

01:08:16

That means that God is causally determining that that world and no other world be the case.

01:08:25

And so in this actual world, I can't do otherwise. I could have done otherwise in this kind of supra feasible possible world.

01:08:37

That's where my real libertarianism was, not in the actual world, because in the actual world,

01:08:43

I can't falsify the decree of God. God has predestined that I do that.

01:08:49

But wouldn't they say that, well, in that hypothetical ethereal world, if God knew the counterfactuals of creaturely freedom, that's all that's necessary to make one morally responsible in the actual world, because -

01:09:03

But look what that does. That means that God has decreed, he's causally, he is predestined that I will do

01:09:11

X tomorrow, right? But I can't do not X because that's just synthetically identical with his knowledge being wrong.

01:09:18

Well, I think they wouldn't do such a thing. So I'm free, I'm libertarianly free in middle knowledge, but then

01:09:24

I have a different, I have a predestined freedom in the actual world. So actually, that knowledge of my libertarian choice isn't actually a one -to -one correlation because in that world,

01:09:36

I have a different type of hypothetical freedom than I have in the actual world. So God's middle knowledge doesn't even trace on to the actual.

01:09:44

There's just, there's so many metaphysical problems. Let's let Dan give a little pushback there. Yeah, so, okay.

01:09:50

So let's make a distinction in terms of possibility. So there's causal possibilities and there's joint, what

01:09:57

I'll call joint logical possibilities. So think of a syllogism, right? So if you have two premises, two valid premises in a syllogism, the conclusion is necessary.

01:10:08

You can't conclude otherwise. That's what I mean by a logical, a joint logical necessity, right?

01:10:15

So in that sense, you're right. So if you have the truth that God has predestined this, you're not gonna come to any conclusion and that's what will happen.

01:10:28

Now, from a causal standpoint, which is a different animal, it's not, a causal standpoint isn't a syllogism.

01:10:35

It's a cause and effect, or what's the interaction, causal relationship. So in that sense, yeah, you can cause something else.

01:10:45

So what I would say is you can do otherwise than God knows that you will do, but you won't.

01:10:53

Now, here's another analogy. Think of a teeter -totter, right? And so think of a teeter -totter.

01:10:59

So you have one side, think of that as the past. Then the other side, that's the future, right?

01:11:05

So, and then if the fulcrum, think of that as the present, right?

01:11:10

So if God knows that I'm going to eat ice cream, right? You know, those things are related.

01:11:17

And if God knows that I'm going to eat chocolate, it's gonna go the other way. So you're gonna have a different past.

01:11:23

Now, the choice, the ability at the fulcrum point, right? You can do otherwise, but you won't do otherwise.

01:11:32

Now, compare that to the same teeter -totter to the conditional analysis.

01:11:41

You could if you wanted to. That's the actual past, your desire.

01:11:47

That was in your actual past. So now you have kind of this broken teeter -totter. To get to the ability to do otherwise, you need a different past than actually existed.

01:11:57

That's the problem. So what I'm saying is if the future would be different, then the past would have been different, right?

01:12:06

But on the compatibilist conditional analysis, for the ability, for the fulcrum to be there, the past would have to have been different.

01:12:15

That's the problem. But that's interesting though. So, I mean, I have a couple of pushbacks. One is the instant you say,

01:12:20

I could do otherwise, you've just denied infallibility. You've said his knowledge is inerrant.

01:12:26

It won't be wrong, but it could be wrong, right? You just denied infallibility.

01:12:31

So you just have to bear that burden. Maybe you're willing to bite that bullet. I'm not, right?

01:12:37

So because me doing otherwise than what God knows, if I could do that, that's just synthetically identical with God's knowledge being possibly wrong.

01:12:46

So it's just infallibility is out the window. The other thing that I push back though, what's really interesting when you make the seesaw is if the past is not causally determinant of the future, you can't have that arrow going in the other direction.

01:13:02

You can't say that if I would have done otherwise, then the past would have been different because that means the past would have been causally determinant of the outcome.

01:13:13

Or the connection is not causal but logical in the other direction. God knows what we'll do because that's what we'll do at that moment.

01:13:21

So tomorrow, when I wake up and eat Wheaties, God's knowledge of that today is based on tomorrow.

01:13:29

Now he's outside of time. We don't understand all that, got it. But the basis of God's knowledge is the future event, right?

01:13:37

So if it was true that I will eat strawberries instead of Wheaties, then

01:13:43

God would have known that. So the logical relationship is the other way around.

01:13:49

Right, now in terms of infallibility, again,

01:13:55

I don't deny a logical necessary conclusion, right?

01:14:02

So given the premises, you're gonna come to the conclusion but that's a totally different animal than causal connections and causation.

01:14:12

Okay. Yeah, I mean, I would just push back and say that that's just, it's just, it's just moving the goalposts, right?

01:14:26

So if we stipulate right now, right? Ignore timelessness, right?

01:14:31

And again, I'm not saying God's knowledge is the thing that's causal. Actually God's decree is the thing that's causal, right?

01:14:37

So if, but if we say right now at 7 .15

01:14:43

for me, I think it's 9 .15, 10 .15 for you guys? 10 .15. 10 .15. God knows that with respect to at T1 tomorrow,

01:14:56

I will choose to eat Froot Loops, right? To say then tomorrow at T1, do

01:15:05

I have the, if the pass is already baked in, you can't change.

01:15:10

Well, God would have known otherwise. That's just to move the goalposts because we've already stipulated as part of the argument that God knows in advance what

01:15:20

I'm going to do, right? In the actual sequence of events at T1 tomorrow, when it comes choice, time for me to choose to eat or not eat, do, can

01:15:30

I have, not the faculty, right? I'm not, again, we're not talking about if my arms move. Do I have the real metaphysical possibility to choose other than that thing that God knew?

01:15:44

You can't move the goalposts. You can't say, well, God would have known otherwise because that's just moving the goalposts. That's just changing it.

01:15:49

Why is that moving the goalposts? Because that's like saying, okay, we set this initial condition for this thought experiment, right?

01:16:00

You get to a certain point in the thought experiment where you don't like it anymore. You say, okay, but then the original conditions, those would have been different.

01:16:08

Well, now you're just kind of in an ad hoc manner. You're changing the agreed upon initial conditions of the thought experiment.

01:16:13

It's just entirely ad hoc. It's just, you're just moving the goalposts of what we've already agreed upon.

01:16:19

Okay, so I think maybe this would help. Maybe it won't, but what I would say is this.

01:16:24

The contradiction is if you actually do other than what

01:16:31

God knows that you would do, right? So if God, no, no. Even if it's possible. Remember, if it's possible for me to do

01:16:38

X, that's just synthetically identical with it's possible for God's knowledge to be wrong. I could push further and say, if it's possible that God could be wrong, that's just categorically something

01:16:48

God wouldn't know because he'd be wrong about it. And so now you actually get to this, God can't actually know that he knows.

01:16:54

You started getting into all these types of problems. I'm just gonna cut in if Dan could just finish his pushback there.

01:17:01

Yeah, so again, I would just say, look, if you actually do something different than God knew, there's a contradiction there.

01:17:09

But if you just can, there's no contradiction. And ultimately what I'm saying at the base level is there's a difference between the word can and the word will.

01:17:20

And unfortunately in this argument, I think they're getting, well, I don't wanna accuse

01:17:26

Tyler of anything, but honestly, I'm saying you can do something that you will not do.

01:17:32

That's it. All right, I'm gonna stop that folly for a moment just so that we can get some more questions, but that was a good exchange.

01:17:40

Just to be clear, so God can be wrong, he just won't be wrong. No, no.

01:17:47

So you would get to the... So I would say it's incompossible that you will do otherwise, but it's possible that you can do otherwise.

01:17:56

But the combination is impossible. It's the combination that's impossible.

01:18:02

Okay. In essence, what I'm saying is you're committing a division fallacy. We decided to start.

01:18:12

It'd be interesting maybe in some other time, some other time. That was my favorite response so far. Gotta bottom this thing out.

01:18:19

Dan, listen, you're committing a division fallacy. All right, let's move on.

01:18:27

That was an excellent exchange there. I hope folks are enjoying. We still have a pretty decent crowd here.

01:18:32

Give a thumbs up to this video if you're really finding these sorts of discussions helpful. I think both of these gentlemen are doing an excellent job, and I highly encourage you to go back to their respective

01:18:41

YouTube channels to check out the other portions of this debate. I'd like to say thank you to Sparks Links for your $1 .99

01:18:49

Super Chat. Thank you so much for that. I appreciate it. Our next question, or it's kind of a statement that perhaps both of you guys can kind of interact with.

01:18:57

Lawrence Stanley says Ephesians 1 .11 and Romans 11 .36, God indeed determines everything.

01:19:03

There are no exceptions to all things. So let's tackle just Ephesians 1 .11, which states, in him we've obtained an inheritance having been predestined according to the purpose of him who works,

01:19:16

I'll have to say it like a very zealous Calvinist, for him who works all things according to the counsel of his will.

01:19:23

All means all. That's an interesting kind of phrase there. We won't get into that.

01:19:28

So it seems like God works all things after the counsel of his will.

01:19:34

So he has a counsel that is an extension of what he wills, and it encompasses all things.

01:19:41

And so this person is suggesting that that is pointing to a kind of determinism, which seems to be a contradiction to what,

01:19:48

Dan, the form of argumentation that you're taking here. What would you say to that? Well, where's the word determine, right?

01:19:55

So of course God works all things according to the counsel of his will. I think he's got a plan for everything, but I just don't see the word determined or this concept of sufficient causation or the sorts of things that would be necessary to bridge from the language of Paul to determinism.

01:20:14

Okay, thank you for that. Tyler, you have any thoughts on that? Yeah, I mean, I would just say that, you know,

01:20:19

Roman, sorry, Ephesians 1 .11, in the context of all the predestination, that language that comes before it,

01:20:26

I think this actually is coming, you know, this is a determining language. When you conjoin it with Romans 11 .36

01:20:34

and Hebrews 1 .3 and other passages, it just seems obvious that it's, you know, the

01:20:42

Romans 11, you know, from him and through him and to him are all things, right? So from him are all things.

01:20:50

You know, that just is some type of causal relationship. So we could, you know, we could split hairs.

01:20:59

You know, I think that there are exegetical reasons why Dan wouldn't read it that way. It's why these are the verses that I didn't,

01:21:07

I think that are compelling, but I didn't use them in my opening because I don't think that they strongly disprove anything like libertarian incompatibility.

01:21:16

So, I mean, I would just simply respond. So from him is creation language, through him sounds like concurrence, and then to him is the goal, the end state, the ultimate plan that God has.

01:21:30

Okay, thank you for that. This next question is quite concerning. I hope baptized by Jesus is not suggesting anything, but baptized by Jesus asked, is it possible for a born again

01:21:40

Christian to murder with no remorse? I hope that's not the case, baptized by Jesus.

01:21:47

Hopefully he didn't murder anyone and hopefully if you did, you feel remorse, but how would you guys tackle that question?

01:21:56

Yeah, I mean, I think of the example of David and Uriah, but I, yeah, especially the without remorse part, that really is troubling.

01:22:10

It does seem inconsistent with saving faith, but at the same time, you know, there's forgiveness for everything and, you know,

01:22:20

David poured out his heart in Psalms 51. So if anyone is in that situation, just turn to Christ and the cross.

01:22:28

But, you know, that's a difficult question. So I'll leave it at that.

01:22:36

Okay, thank you for that. I just encourage you guys, Martin Luther, not the one from the

01:22:42

Reformation, but Martin Luther says, thanks for the very civil discussion, such a breath of fresh air. It's so enjoyable to listen to, praise

01:22:49

God for the both of them. I would agree, isn't it so much nicer to have these sorts of discussions where people aren't breathing fire down each other's throats, where you could actually learn more without having to kind of push away the unnecessary debris of emotions?

01:23:03

I think you guys have been doing an excellent job going back and forth. So I wanna thank you for that. And thank you for those words of encouragement,

01:23:09

Martin. Let's see here. My car, love the new background.

01:23:15

Thank you very much. Tried to spice things up a little bit. Okay, so Cranman, I think that's

01:23:21

John Cranman. Thank you for the $4 .99 Super Chat. Tyler, can you offer a compatibilistic reading of 1

01:23:28

Corinthians chapter 10, verse 13, that makes sense of the promise

01:23:33

God offers us? Yeah, so. And before you answer, let me read 1

01:23:40

Corinthians chapter 10, verse 13, because that was actually one of the questions I was going to insert of my own, because I knew it would come up.

01:23:47

As a matter of fact, through my Pentecostal spiritual giftings, I knew John Cranman would ask this question.

01:23:52

I'm just kidding. So 1 Corinthians chapter 10, verse 13, says, no temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man.

01:24:00

God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability. But with the temptation, he will also provide the way of escape that you may be able to endure it.

01:24:09

And that is from the ESV. I'm not sure if that matters, but that's the translation I was reading from. Yeah.

01:24:15

Yeah, I mean, just really, really, really briefly, without going too far in it,

01:24:20

I just don't see anything that's incompatibilistic in here. It just is that there are a range of options, right?

01:24:29

Compatibilists don't deny that. And what I find interesting is that if you read this in an incompatibilist way, and you kind of force that onto here, it almost wants to look at certain clauses super literally and not other clauses, right?

01:24:47

So notice, so this is the NASB. No temptation has overtaken you except something common to mankind, and God is faithful.

01:24:55

So he will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you're able, right?

01:25:02

Notice this, if we want to take that literal, it's not saying, hey, there's these options, you should like choose good, otherwise you're gonna, it's saying, it's a promise.

01:25:13

God's not gonna let you be tempted beyond what you're able. Ever, right? And what's also interesting is it says, but with the temptation will provide a way of escape also.

01:25:23

Well, if libertarian freedom is true, why does God need to provide a way of escape? Isn't there already, if I have libertarian freedom, can't

01:25:30

I just, don't I always have the ability to do and not do and have that contracausal choice?

01:25:38

And then the other thing, just very, very quickly, Steve Hayes has written a long article on this,

01:25:45

Paul Monado wrote a brilliant article on this that basically shows that even under libertarian philosophers, right?

01:25:53

Dan had mentioned will -setting as an example, right? If will -setting is the case, then it actually seems to be the case that even on libertarianism, there isn't always, you don't always have the ability to choose otherwise, right?

01:26:08

Because you could have done certain things to set your will such that you can't do otherwise, and yet you're still responsible, even if there are these ways of escape.

01:26:16

And so even if you hold, even if you kind of hold libertarian feet to the fire on this, it doesn't work out that way.

01:26:24

I'll flat out say that there are some passages that just don't lend themselves, and I don't mean this as a cop -out, because this is just true for all positions.

01:26:33

I don't think compatibilists should look to this first. I don't think incompatibilists should look to this first. I think there are some passages that are just meant to be pastoral, and they're not trying to do philosophical heavy lifting.

01:26:46

This is just one of those passages. I think that if you're trying to milk this fruit for any type of philosophical juice, you're just doing violence to the text.

01:26:57

Milk this fruit to make philosophical juice. That's an interesting fruit.

01:27:03

It's got the milk and juice at the same time. That seems to be a contradiction. No, I'm just kidding.

01:27:09

Did you have any thoughts on that, Dan? Sure, so I guess

01:27:16

I think the passage is fairly straightforwardly read in a libertarian way, but obviously I think that.

01:27:22

So here's the thing. So when you're a baby or whatever, you're a toddler, you're gonna start thinking you have this ability to do this and the ability to do that.

01:27:29

Now, let's say for the sake of argument, I don't have this case, but let's say Tyler came to the belief in determinism because of his exegesis of Acts 428, right?

01:27:37

That was long after he was a toddler coming around, right? And I think that's the case normally.

01:27:43

Normally, the belief in determinism is gonna come later in life, you know?

01:27:50

And so the question is really, can you integrate determinism with your previous beliefs or do you have to modify them?

01:27:59

And I think Calvinists ride the fence on these things, right, unfortunately. So, you know,

01:28:04

I think frankly, Tyler gave a libertarian reading of the text initially, but if I pushed him on it, he would say, oh, you could if you wanted to, it's a conditional sense or that sort of thing.

01:28:17

Now, try to read that into the text. That's where the problems start to surface.

01:28:24

Once you analyze what exactly is this conditional sense and is that what Paul meant here? But if you just take the straightforward reading, you know,

01:28:32

I would say that it is something that is strongly resistant to the belief in determinism.

01:28:38

And the plain sense, it seems to indicate that every time a Christian sins, God enabled them to do otherwise.

01:28:45

And then as far as Paul Minotta, you know, I wrote a 30 -page article on this.

01:28:51

I responded to Paul's well -sounding argument, but to be honest, it was like 15 years ago. So I don't even remember what

01:28:57

I said, but I'd have to look back at his well -sounding argument.

01:29:02

But I think it's something to do with like, well, you know, does God enable you to revisit some higher level commitments or that sort of thing?

01:29:10

Yeah, I think I would just push back and say, you know, anyone can make the claim that it's just the plain reading, right?

01:29:19

So, and I'm not trying to be cheeky, but I'm just gonna say, I just don't think it is the plain.

01:29:24

I just don't read that because remember, libertarian freedom is the conjunction of incompatibilism and that we make some free choices, right?

01:29:35

So take, so I just take it that no one reads this and say, oh, well, I have the metaphysically real ability of contriety and a principle of alternative possibility and metaphysical ability.

01:29:45

Like none of that's in here, right? So there's a sense where I'm gonna say, again,

01:29:50

John Cranman's like, it's his question. He's freaking out, give a reading. He's opting out, he's shifting.

01:29:57

I'm not shifting focus. My answer is, I don't think anyone should give an incompatibilist or a compatibilist reading the passage because I just don't think what this passage is about.

01:30:08

It's like when people say, give a young earth or an older account of Genesis one. And I'm sitting over here as a

01:30:13

Temple Decks guy and being like, I'm not gonna do either because I don't think that's what the text is about. Yeah, so I'd say this text is a specific instance of libertarian freedom, not the principle in the abstract, but it does seem to be saying that, well, at least the strong implication is every time that I sin,

01:30:29

God enabled me not to. Yeah, we're gonna move on from here.

01:30:35

I mean, it's hard for me to not give my two cents. I'm trying to be as neutral as possible. Go for it. Which is really hard because I'm a presuppositionalist and I preach that neutrality is impossible.

01:30:45

I'm just kidding. I don't care what you have to say. To be perfectly honest, if I wasn't a

01:30:51

Calvinist, I still wouldn't think that this is teaching one or the other.

01:30:56

So that John's question to offer a compatibilistic reading of this is unnecessary because I don't think it's trying to suggest what

01:31:05

I believe in terms of my broader compatibilism, nor do I think it's enough to establish a libertarian reading.

01:31:11

So if you take, for example, the differences between categorical and conditional ability, the passage where it says here, let me read it here.

01:31:21

No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability. It's just not telling us the nature of that ability because the text isn't talking about that.

01:31:31

It may very well be. If libertarianism is true, in my opinion, you just don't get it from that text necessarily.

01:31:39

And I think that's the reason why we need to be careful and you guys haven't committed this, but some people often do in these sorts of discussions, they just need to be careful with the nature of proof texting and trying to make a passage say more than it actually does.

01:31:52

So if I was a libertarian, I wouldn't use that as a like, look, this is what the

01:31:57

Bible's teaching. I probably would use it like, hey, I believe libertarianism here. And this verse seems to be consistent with it if you understand my argument over here with some other passages and things like that.

01:32:08

So I don't think it's enough to be kind of like an adequate proof text. That's just my opinion. But okay, let's move along here.

01:32:16

Well, thank you. Let's see here. Um, let's see here.

01:32:22

Do, do, do, do, do. Oh, that's an odd.

01:32:29

Okay, it's not a question, but it's a weird statement. Maybe, I'm just gonna, I'm gonna post it anyway. It's a little strange, strangely worded, but I'm sure

01:32:36

Dan would wanna interact with it. Molinism is false because Jesus is the truth.

01:32:42

Because Jesus is the truth, there cannot exist any truth if it is truth at all that does not have its grounding in him.

01:32:51

So this is an interesting way of formulating the grounding objection. What would be your answer to the grounding objection?

01:32:58

As a Molinist, this is something that pops up a lot. Of course, Dr. White has focused on it, regardless if one agrees, whether he's explained it and argued sufficiently, establishing that it's a problem.

01:33:11

I hear a lot of Molinists say that it's not a big deal. To be perfectly honest, I have not understood the

01:33:19

Molinist response to it other than to say that, you know, if God is omniscient, omniscient, he has middle knowledge and so it's grounded in his nature.

01:33:29

That doesn't seem the best answer to me, but perhaps you have a different way of explaining that or unpacking that.

01:33:34

What are your thoughts on the grounding objection, Dan? So there's a lot going on here.

01:33:41

So there's a sense in which Lawrence is correct that Jesus Christ is the creator of all things.

01:33:48

And even hypothetically, you know, let's say God could have, you know, Jesus could have created Spider -Man or something.

01:33:54

He didn't, but he could have. Well, still he would be the creator of Spider -Man. So in that sense, he's right, but here's the issue.

01:34:01

So I hear, I think it's possible that you're right, that perhaps Lawrence has been misled by James White.

01:34:11

And James White in this debate with William Lane Craig made it out as if there's these existing things out there that ground middle knowledge and they're uncreated by God.

01:34:23

That's really bad. And that's not what Mohannes believe, right? So what we think is that if those things existed, if those things happened, then that would be the grounding.

01:34:38

So let me give you two contrastive examples from scripture. So in, I think it's in 1 Kings 11, two, it says, based on Deuteronomy, it says that, you know, if you intermarry, you know, foreign wives, they will lead you into idolatry.

01:34:57

And then Solomon intermarries, you know, and then he's actually led into idolatry.

01:35:03

So the grounding for that truth, although it's true that God created Solomon, that God enabled

01:35:08

Solomon to do what he did, Solomon's actual actions, his actual choices are what grounded the truth of that statement, right?

01:35:17

So, and God knew that by his middle knowledge. So now there's a grounding right there. It's concrete, it's actually Solomon, that's the ground.

01:35:24

And that's true of everything that actually exists. So you have the grounding. Now, the question is sometimes comes up, well, what about counterfactual, not just actual?

01:35:33

So an example of that would be, let's take, for example, Christ's statement in Matthew 11, 21 through 23, where, you know, the people of Kalil, oh,

01:35:46

I'm sorry, no, yeah, I'm sorry. These people of Sodom and Gomorrah would have repented in sackcloth and ashes if the same works were done.

01:35:57

So if Christ had gone to Sodom and Gomorrah, they would have repented. Okay, well, that didn't happen.

01:36:02

So that's not concrete. So where's the grounding? And the grounding in that case does not exist, but it would exist if that had happened.

01:36:13

That's the only grounding that we can offer. It's not something that actually exists out there that God didn't create.

01:36:20

And that's James White's, unfortunately, I would call it a straw man of Moanism. We're not saying that there's something that exists that God didn't create.

01:36:28

What we're saying is that if that happened, if Christ had gone to Sodom and Gomorrah, they would have repented.

01:36:35

And there, in that hypothetical scenario, would be the actual grounding. Okay, did you wanna add anything to that,

01:36:44

Tyler, or just by way of - Yeah, so this is where I think that Moanism always just, reminds me of one of those

01:36:51

Rube Goldberg machines where you kick a ball and all these complex things goes around, where I can just look at it and say, well,

01:36:58

God's the ground because God can know, had I decreed that to happen, then that's what would have happened.

01:37:04

I don't need all the, I don't need, I just, I don't need all the machinery of Moanism to get that.

01:37:13

So. Okay. All right, thank you for that. Consistent Calvinism asks, can

01:37:20

God take an action which results in you doing what you want to do, but it's also what

01:37:26

God wants you to do? If so, do you then admit God can determine everything about your free choices?

01:37:36

So yes to the first question and no to the second, because it depends on whether God knows what you would do or he determines what you would do.

01:37:47

And if he determines it, then it's not free. So that's the contradiction of, you know, so the second question basically is self -contradictory.

01:37:57

Okay. Yeah, this is where I would push back, because I mean, I would look at some passages, like the one that I commonly bring up is 2

01:38:04

Thessalonians 2, 11 through 12, right? And this is an example, again, of God, it's not just compatibilism, it's not just determinism, it's actually

01:38:14

God determining and causing sin. So 2 Thessalonians 2, 11 through 12 reads, for this reason,

01:38:22

God will send upon them a diluting influence so that they will believe what is false, right?

01:38:29

So God is causally bringing about this thing with the outcome, the guaranteed outcome, this is

01:38:38

God's desired outcome, this is his intended outcome, this is what will happen, that they will believe what is false.

01:38:45

Why does he do it? And the text tells us, in order that they all may be judged who did not believe the truth, right?

01:38:53

So not only is God causing them, causing this, he's sending this thing, he is the one causally acting and determining that this is going to be the outcome that they don't believe, the purpose is so that he can judge them for that thing, but he also gives the condition on the imac side.

01:39:10

Why are they being judged? Is it because God determined them to do it? No, he tells us, but they took pleasure in wickedness.

01:39:19

So in that one statement, you have God is causally determining, he's intending this outcome, it's an evil outcome, so that whole like, well, does

01:39:28

God determine the sin that you take because that would make God evil? Like those objections don't work because we have all kinds of biblical examples where God does this.

01:39:35

God causes, brings about them to do something evil so that he can judge them and it's because they love their wickedness, right?

01:39:46

So you just have all of those, all the things in conjunction in one verse, that just is combativism, there's no libertarian freedom in there at all.

01:39:59

Okay, John Cranman strikes again with a super chat. Thank you so much. Tyler, if compatibilism is no less deterministic than hard determinism, then what is the distinction with the difference?

01:40:10

In essence, what's the difference between soft determinism and hard determinism? Yeah, so that's like asking if a stroke and a homicide are both equally fatal, then how are they different?

01:40:22

Because means matter. The, I'm sorry, but this is, this is just, be nice.

01:40:31

Even if you don't, even if you don't believe determinism is true, this is just like, this is just very, very simple things in the literature.

01:40:38

So the reason why, so the difference between compatibilism and hard determinism is not that they're both determined.

01:40:47

The difference is hard determinism is actually deterministic incompatibilism.

01:40:52

So the difference just is compatibilism is that determination and freedom is, that are compatible, sufficient for responsibility.

01:41:01

Whereas hard determinism is that determinism is true such that you are not responsible for your actions in a morally way.

01:41:09

You are, maybe you're responsible simply because God says that you are, but it's not actually this type of, this type of, the type of responsibility and the control condition that we're talking about in the literature.

01:41:19

Maybe there's some other reason than why God holds you to accountability, but it's not this type of, freedom preserving responsibility.

01:41:28

And I think also just to add, and even if you think soft determinism is not sufficient, doesn't demonstrate the compatibility, that's irrelevant as to knowing the difference between the two types.

01:41:42

So you'd need to know the claims of both. So whether you disagree with soft determinism and hard determinism together, you say,

01:41:47

I don't see a difference. Well, definitionally, there is a stipulated difference whether you agree with it or not. So you can't say they're the same thing.

01:41:55

And if you wanna say there's no difference because neither of them are free will preserving because one just denies free will flat out because it's incompatibilism.

01:42:08

Libertarian incompatibilism says they're incompatibilism, but you're free. Hard determinism says they're incompatible, but you're not free, right?

01:42:15

They're two sides of the same coin. Compatibilism says they are compatible. Now, you may want to argue that determinism, that compatibilism entails that you're not free, that there's something about the relationship such that incompatibilism is true, but you can't say that definitionally they just are the same thing.

01:42:38

And you'd have to give what's called an independent reason. You can't just say, well, if compatibilism is true, then it's deterministic, therefore you're not free.

01:42:48

Because all that does is saying, if I assume incompatibilism, if I assume that something is determined, then it's not free, then therefore compatibilism is false, right?

01:42:59

Well, that's not gonna be convincing to a compatibilist because all you've done is beg the question of incompatibilism.

01:43:04

You need to give an internal critique or an independent reason why we ought to think that that incompatibility relies even within the confines of compatibilism.

01:43:17

That's just how internal critiques work. All right, Dan, did you have any thoughts on that? Do you agree, disagree?

01:43:24

Do you agree on the surface, but then in your heart you think, yeah, but I don't think compatibilism is actually compatible.

01:43:31

Yeah, you guys just need to repent of your heart and determine. No, so I guess

01:43:37

I'd say, yeah, sure. If you read Vivlon, who's a compatibilist, it's gonna be very different than,

01:43:43

I guess, Parabohm or something like that, who's a hard determinist. And you just, you know, just reading a few chapters, you're gonna pick up on that sort of thing, you know?

01:43:51

So it may be Sam Harris would be another, you know, hard determinist. And yeah, there's gonna be a difference if you look off the page.

01:43:58

Now, are there certain questions in which it probably doesn't make that much difference? Sure, I'm not so sure it, let's say, for example, in the question of theodicy or, you know,

01:44:09

God commanding the impossible or that sort of the question. Yeah, you know, when it comes down to the author of sin question or things like that,

01:44:19

I, it probably doesn't make a difference because determinism is determinism is determinism.

01:44:26

Okay, I'm just going to now just modify things. I know that when I ask a question, I usually give both sides to respond, but just for the sake of time and we wanna get to as many questions as we possibly can,

01:44:37

I'm just gonna ask the questions and whoever wants to answer it just answers it and then we'll move on, okay?

01:44:43

All right, so Jet Morgan Bork asks, if we have libertarian free will with regards to evil and good as believers, how is a state of sinless perfection not possible unless it is a possibility in your framework?

01:44:59

I suppose that's a question for Dan. Hmm, yeah, that's a good question. I'm not sure that, wow, that's a really tough question.

01:45:12

I think I like the way Aquinas answered it in that in each individual action, you can do the right thing, but when you look at the collection of all of them, it becomes impossible, but you know,

01:45:26

I'm not a hundred percent sure I've got a clean cut answer on that.

01:45:33

It makes it sound as if theoretically it's possible to be sinlessly perfect and I don't think that's the right answer either.

01:45:42

I don't think that's necessarily the case. So to be honest, Jet, you've got a really good question. I suspect

01:45:49

Aquinas is in the right neighborhood, but I haven't nailed that one down yet. I think that's one of the key questions that Guillaume Bignon asks as well, at least something along those lines.

01:45:58

So it is definitely a question that is in the literature as an objection. I could help,

01:46:04

Dan, I could probably help you because I actually don't think that, I don't think this is actually a strong objection for a historic

01:46:10

Arminian, right? Because you hold a total depravity, right? So it seems to me that you could say, okay, well, prior to the fall, sinless perfectionism was possible, but given the fall, right?

01:46:21

Because you've already said that libertarianism, you can have kind of this ability of contriety, but all the options are bad.

01:46:31

And so sinless perfectionism, it's still impossible because even though I could choose between a range of options, none of them are good options.

01:46:40

They're all gonna be tainted with sin. So I don't have the ability of contradiction, right? So this is

01:46:47

Guillaume's question though, is Guillaume comes back and says, okay, and I think this is

01:46:54

Edward's question that Guillaume is regurgitating or fine tuning, which is, yeah, but there's a single command to be holy as your father is holy.

01:47:06

And you don't seem to have the ability to keep that one. And so I think he's gonna say,

01:47:13

I think the out for the sinless perfection is, well, you're a historic Arminian, you agree with total depravity, but I don't think that resolves

01:47:21

Guillaume's question. Yeah, I know you're moving faster time, but so that would apply more to unbelievers in a pre -regenerate state.

01:47:28

And I would just say, yeah, you cannot obey the God's law, especially not without God's grace.

01:47:36

Okay, let's continue on. Big Yehuda asks a question for both of you, just real quick, if you can do it as succinctly as possible.

01:47:43

If God's foreknowledge precedes our existence and God's foreknowledge can't be contradicted, how can libertarian free will exist?

01:47:52

I guess that's for Dan. I'd probably be repeating, I'm an alchemist.

01:47:58

So, you know, it's, we can do differently than God foreknows. And if we did, the past would have been different and God would have known what we were gonna do.

01:48:10

Okay, Letitia asks, does God have libertarian free will? I think I asked that earlier. And if you say yes, how is it that the scripture says

01:48:18

God cannot do evil? It doesn't say will not, but rather says cannot. By the way,

01:48:24

Eli, I love your analytical skills. Well, thank you, I appreciate it. The little skills that I have, but I appreciate it.

01:48:31

Anyone wanna tackle that question? I already kind of answered it. And I think both of us kind of already answered it, but I will actually say this is where I think we can ramp it up a little bit too.

01:48:42

It's not only that God cannot evil, this is actually an example of why

01:48:47

I find the true love argument not convincing, right? Well, you have to have libertarian freedom. You have to have the ability to do otherwise in order for true love to exist.

01:48:55

And I'm gonna say, well, no, the father does not have the ability to not love the son. So, and that's true love.

01:49:02

You do not have to have the ability to do otherwise for true love to exist. And we see that in God. Okay, Dan.

01:49:10

Yeah, so I do think God has libertarian freedom. I think it's right there in Genesis 1, 1 and also passages where he has alternative possibilities.

01:49:16

Like in Exodus 9, 15, where he says that he could have destroyed

01:49:21

Egypt already if he had wanted to. So I guess, so I would say yes to that first question.

01:49:27

And then God can choose between good options, but he can't choose evil options. And I will table the discussion on love, but I think, actually,

01:49:36

I think I'll just probably say that you're onto something, Tyler. I think there's a little nuance that we could add to it, but I think you're on the right track.

01:49:46

Okay. Jacob Glass asks, in a libertarian view, if God knows that a person would never choose him, why would he need to harden them?

01:49:54

Anybody, that's up for anybody who wants to take it. So in my view, the hardening takes place by a subtraction of grace, rather than God positively inspiring evil into the person or something like that.

01:50:08

So it's the exception that proves the rule, right? So there is prevenient grace and God removes that to accomplish this specific purpose at a specific time.

01:50:18

Okay. Another one from Jacob. If a scientist knew if he released a virus, it would kill millions, wouldn't he be in some way responsible for it?

01:50:26

Isn't this militiamen view? That's what it says. God knew and still chose to create anyways.

01:50:33

It's up for anybody. Maybe he means the Molinist view, perhaps.

01:50:39

Yeah, it could be. So I guess then I'll take it. Yeah, so Molinism isn't a get out of jail free card.

01:50:47

Yeah, so if God is using mental knowledge or Molinism in an inappropriate way, then yeah, so that's true.

01:50:58

I think the bullet bill analogy that Greg Weddy puts out shows that point nicely.

01:51:04

So I'd go back to the party analogy, the party and then there's a mess gonna be made, then you have a robot that's gonna clean it up.

01:51:10

The reason to have the party isn't because of the mess, right? That's not the reason you throw the party, but you have a solution for it.

01:51:18

Okay. If I could add these types of questions, I'm just finding myself increasingly,

01:51:27

I just increasingly dislike questions like this because I think all too often, they basically like, hey, if God was a moral human like us and I just think that the creator creature distinction is lost because there are all kinds of things that God does in the

01:51:47

Bible that if we did them, we'd be terrible if we did them. I mean, just think of the book of Job and replace yourself with God and Job with your kid and Satan with a serial killer, you're a wicked person.

01:52:03

And yet none of us blame God for what he did. He even takes credit in Job 42 that he brought all the evils upon Job.

01:52:10

So I just increasingly am finding that the issue with these questions isn't so much, well,

01:52:17

God is gonna be evil or not. The issue is, well, God's holy no matter what he does. And he's not a creature that he should act like us.

01:52:26

Okay, thank you. Consistent Calvinism says, why would God provide a way of escape for someone he infallibly knows will not take that way?

01:52:36

Isn't God establishing their responsibility by providing the way he knows they won't take?

01:52:45

I mean, I think it's so that they're responsible and that they're able to do otherwise.

01:52:53

So it's kind of baked in. If you take that out, then there goes the ability to do otherwise and responsibility in that case.

01:53:01

All right, thank you. Richie, thank you so much for your 1999 super chat, declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient times, things which have not been done, saying my plan will be established and I will accomplish all my good pleasure,

01:53:15

Isaiah 46 .10. I suppose that's supporting from his perspective, kind of a

01:53:20

Calvinistic understanding. But again, he just quoted the passage. Does anyone wanna comment on the passage?

01:53:25

Perhaps Dan, you'll probably disagree with the heart behind quoting this passage because I know you believe this passage, but don't understand it the way that perhaps the

01:53:37

Calvinist would. Yeah, sure. So this isn't, I think in the context of the, especially the

01:53:43

Cyrus prophecy and absolutely God planned that out and accomplished his plan.

01:53:51

100 % don't disagree with that. What I don't see in this passage is that God is a sufficient cause.

01:53:57

There's sufficient cause for everything that we do. Everything is determined. That kind of language just isn't there, but God definitely gets his way.

01:54:05

He wins. All right, thank you for that. Now, that is all. There are some, a couple of questions, but I have to go back and find them.

01:54:14

And I think we've gone almost two hours. So this has been an epic Q &A session.

01:54:20

I hope that I was thinking I was gonna be spearheading the question, but there are so many questions here that everyone made my job easier.

01:54:25

So thank you so much. But folks, I hope you guys have enjoyed this discussion.

01:54:31

I have one more question that I'm gonna conclude with, but if you guys really wanna get the context for kind of their broader argumentation, go to their channels.

01:54:41

Tyler, if you can share your channel one more time and point to folks where they can find your presentation in the debate, and then

01:54:48

Dan can do the same right after you. Yeah, so it's The Freed Thinker on YouTube.

01:54:55

That's where the debate, where the opening and my portion of the

01:55:00

CrossX was. Okay, and what about you, Dan? So I have a joint channel with Turd and Fan.

01:55:06

The channel name is Turd and Fan, and we have a subtopic called Conversations in Calvinism.

01:55:11

Sometimes we'll disagree on Calvinism. Sometimes we'll agree. We debate Catholic apologists from time to time or open theists and that sort of thing.

01:55:19

But yeah, it's just called Turd and Fan, and the program is called Conversations in Calvinism.

01:55:25

All right, very good. Thank you so much. Now, my last question is for both of you, and I want you to think really hard about this one because I know that it's easy to just be like, well,

01:55:34

I don't know. I can't think of anything. Tyler, in your opinion, what is the best argument or evidence for libertarian free will?

01:55:45

And then I'm going to ask the opposite for Dan. Yeah, I mean,

01:55:50

I think that there's a couple different ones, but I think the consequence argument that comes up is a strong argument that really is kind of like the gold standard in the literature that's going to be,

01:56:06

I think, one of the only good arguments in literature for incompatibilism, but it's a strong one.

01:56:12

The other one, and I don't mean this too cheeky, I think that there's an intuitive play that can be made.

01:56:24

I don't necessarily think that's a bad thing to happen, but I think it plays to their own side, right?

01:56:34

So if you already kind of have this intuition that you have libertarian freedom, then the arguments about, well, don't you just, you have this intuition that you choose otherwise is going to be very, very strong to people that already share that intuition.

01:56:53

I think that's going to have a very strong kind of compelling force to it. Okay, and Dan, what do you think is the strongest argument for a

01:57:03

Calvinistic compatibilistic understanding of determinism?

01:57:10

So this is Daniel 11, 36. The king shall do as he wills.

01:57:16

So the king is doing what he wills. So it's a volition. He shall exalt himself and magnify himself above every

01:57:24

God and shall speak astonishing things against the God of gods. He shall prosper till the indignation is accomplished for what is decreed shall be done.

01:57:34

Okay. I'm not saying that there's not explanations for it, but I think it's one that requires a lot of attention.

01:57:41

Sure, excellent. Well, there's one question here, just so people are curious. Keith is asking,

01:57:47

Eli, are those Van Til books on your shelf? They most definitely are. Of course, I'm the, look,

01:57:52

I told you, I have a Bonson coffee mug. I'm the presuppositionalist guy. Of course I'm gonna have some

01:57:58

Van Til in the back. What's wrong with you? No, I'm just kidding around. Dan and Tyler, you guys did an excellent job and I know folks are gonna go back and watch this in kind of more closely.

01:58:08

There's a lot of ground that you guys covered, but again, folks, I strongly encourage you to check out their YouTube channels for those other segments of the debate.

01:58:16

It's better if you watch it all together. But of course, this discussion has been super fun and exciting.

01:58:21

Both of you guys are very intelligent and know your stuff. And I'm sure folks who have been listening have been greatly benefited by giving their time here and joining us.

01:58:30

Are there any last words you'd like to say before we close off this live stream? Either of you. Thank you.

01:58:36

Thank you so much. I appreciate both of you. Well, I hope I did an okay job moderating this informal discussion.

01:58:43

And I hope you guys felt like I treated you guys fairly. And I had fun doing it.

01:58:50

Thank you for having me. All right. Well, that is it for this live stream. Folks, thank you so much for listening.

01:58:56

If you like the content, please share, give the thumbs up, the little hearts make me feel nice. I feel nice inside when

01:59:02

I see someone loves a video. And hopefully, just ultimately, I hope you guys are really finding the content useful.