God’s Necessity on Anselmian Theistic Genuine Modal Realism

Collier, Matthew James

doi:10.1007/s11841-018-0659-4

Cited by 9 publications

(13 citation statements)

References 21 publications

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“…I find it uninteresting given the view's radical detachment from God's simplicity (God has no proper parts) and the difficulties in explaining how all His world-parts are unified. But these are mere sketches of possible objections and so I refer the reader to Vance (2016, 563) and Collier (2019, 342–345) for better criticism. A more promising option is that of a possible individual God existing wholly in a world.…”

Section: Genuine Modal Realism and God's Existence In The Pluriversementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Even if sense could be made of a plurality of different gods, there is a more devastating objection. Collier (2019) presents a ‘modal collapse problem’ against a possible individual God 6 . Suppose, for definiteness, that this world-bound God exists wholly in our actual world; 7 call him, @-God (where ‘@’ denotes our actual world).…”

Section: Possible Individual God and Modal Collapsementioning

confidence: 99%

“…But, since GMR-worlds [Genuine Modal Realism worlds] are causally isolated individuals, this implies that there exists only one world, and thereby total modal collapse ensues. (Collier (2019), 339)…”

Section: Possible Individual God and Modal Collapsementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Premise (2) on the one hand looks well motivated: first, the assumption follows from God's maximal greatness – intuitively, a being not responsible for all reality would not be maximally great (see also Collier (2019), 339) – and, second, from scriptural authority given for example by the Nicene Creed. On the other, we may dispute a literal reading of the Nicene Creed and reject God's creational power over some abstracta (van Inwagen (2009) ).…”

Section: Assumptionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Collier (2019, 342) writes that ‘if God is causal, as He should be, He cannot exist outside worlds, as causation is in worlds – so, God must be causally inert if He exists outside worlds’. It is unclear how to reply because it is unclear what the objection amounts to.…”

Section: Can a Non-individual God Be Causal?mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Theistic modal realism and causal modal collapse

Maia

2020

Rel. Stud.

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Theistic modal realism argues for an extension of Lewis's modal realism capable of accommodating a theistic God. By affording elegant solutions to many atheistic challenges, the view is of great theoretical utility for the theist. However, it has been objected that within a Lewisian framework God cannot be causally efficacious on pain of collapsing intuitively distinct modal notions. In this article I explain why these worries are ill-founded and show how God's existence and causal power over the pluriverse can be consistently understood. If successful, the proposal offers a congenial theistic way to adopt modal realism and address the atheological problems.

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Section: Genuine Modal Realism and God's Existence In The Pluriversementioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Possible Individual God and Modal Collapsementioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Possible Individual God and Modal Collapsementioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Assumptionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Can a Non-individual God Be Causal?mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Theistic modal realism and causal modal collapse

Maia

2020

Rel. Stud.

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God’s place in the world

Collier¹

2020

Int J Philos Relig

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Lewisian theism is the view that both traditional theism and Lewis’s modal realism are true. On Lewisian theism, God must exist in worlds in one of the following ways: (1) God can be said to have a counterpart in each world; (2) God can be said to exist in each world in the way that a universal can be said to exist in worlds (if universals exist), i.e. through transworld identity; (3) God can be said to be a scattered individual, with a part of God existing in each world; and, (4) God can be said to exist in each world, through His existing from the standpoint of each world. In the literature, (1)–(4) have been rejected as viable options. I grant that (1) and (3) are not viable. However, I believe that (2) and (4) have been too hastily rejected. Herein, I develop ways to respond to objections to (2) and (4), and conclude that (4) is a viable option for Lewisian theists.

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Necessary Suffering and Lewisian Theism

Collier¹

2021

SOPHIA

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One can readily conceive of worlds of horrendous, gratuitous suffering. Moreover, such worlds seem possible. For classical theists, however, God, amongst other things, is perfectly good. So, the question arises: for classical theists are such evil worlds possible? Many classical theists have said no. This is the modal problem of evil. Herein, I discuss a related problem: the problem of evil worlds for Lewisian theism. Lewisian theism is the conjunction of Lewis’s modal realism and classical theism, and a leading Lewisian theist, Almeida, thinks that Lewisian theists should admit the existence of on-balance evil worlds. I do not. Herein, I present a dilemma for Almeida: either give up God’s sovereignty and the reductionist account of modality or make God blameworthy for evil.

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God’s Necessity on Anselmian Theistic Genuine Modal Realism

Cited by 9 publications

References 21 publications

Theistic modal realism and causal modal collapse

Theistic modal realism and causal modal collapse

God’s place in the world

Necessary Suffering and Lewisian Theism

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