The Free Will Defense by Alvin Plantinga

The Free Will Defense by Alvin Plantinga (1977)

-                 -  Aaron Potter

Plantinga goes into great depth explaining the logic behind his free will claim. He introduces the terms, among many others, “actual states of affairs” and other “possible worlds.” Actual states of affairs are the events that actually occur in the real world; events that make up the actual world. These said events are causal of God giving actuality free will. Actuality obtains (existence), because free will causes it. This is where Plantinga then applies the concept of other possible worlds. “The basic idea is that a possible world is a way things could have been; it is a state of affairs of some kind,” (349). The usage of other possible worlds is an attempt to explain that though God is omniscient and omnipotent, He cannot “… eliminate every evil state of affairs,” (349-354?) because in other possible worlds we seek to eliminate the possibility of evil. However, when we do so, we eliminate the option of their being a choice to do either good or evil.

Plantinga puts it like so: “… [S]adly enough, some of the free creatures God created went wrong in the exercise of their freedom; this is the source of moral evil. The fact that free creatures sometimes go wrong, however, counts neither against God’s omnipotence nor against His goodness; for He could have forestalled the occurrence of moral evil only by removing the possibility of moral good,” (347).

Consider this example: I offer Jeffery $20 to do my math homework and Jeffery is free to either deny or accept my proposition. However, the actual state of affair in this scenario turns out to be that Jeffery actually does accept my offer and proceeds to do my math homework. We could consider this an “evil,” so in an attempt to make sense of this evil we propose another world in which Jeffery always does what is right. In this world, it is possible that Jeffery always does what is “right,” but up until the point in which he denies my $20 this “possible world” becomes impossible. It eliminated the evil, yes, but it also eliminated Jeffery’s free will of which is a direct violation that the actual world exists in the first place. I.e. the actual state of affair in which Jeffery accept my $20 in the real world do not become actualized and therefore is considered impossible.

Two things need to be noted after considering this example:

            1)      The “evil” that we are referring to here is what Plantinga distinguishes as a moral evil. This is different from natural evil. Thus, the primary focus of Plantinga’s argument is concerned with moral evil.

            2)      The bulk of Plantinga’s free will argument comes forward when he says God created “… the heavens and the earth and all that they contain. But He has not created states of affairs,” (351). With this in mind, it brings to light that your actions resulting from your free will are unknown to God up until the point in which you do said action. [Give lunch example!]

Another relevant point to consider is Plantinga’s distinction between the Free Will Theodicy and the Free Will Defense. Leibniz’s "Best of all possible worlds" presents a theodicy that attempts to explain that out of all of the possible worlds that God could have created that the “real” one is the best one possible. Plantinga argues against this as well with the Free Will Defense by saying that it isn’t that God could have created other “better” possible world, but that this is the world God had to create if creation were to have free will, and it is because of the existence of evil that this is so.

Some other significant term definitions:

Explicit Contradiction – “Paul is a good tennis player, and it’s false that Paul is a good tennis player,” (339).

Implicit Contradiction – “George is older than Paul; Paul is older than Nick; George is not older than Nick,” (339).

Formal Contradiction – “If all men are mortal, then Socrates is mortal; All men are mortal; Socrates is not mortal,” (339).

Transworld Depravity – Jeffery!

-              -     This is the scenario that Plantinga gives us in which Jeffery “suffers” in every possible world in that he only does what is supposedly right. This act of doing what is right includes what is morally significant for him, but at the same time Jeffery is supposedly free to do said moral action. This actuality, however, is inclusive to Jeffery’s either doing said act or refraining from doing said act. Thus, given that Jeffery is free to do or not to do what is “right,” there will be worlds in which there is “evil” hence the case in which he accept my $20 to do my homework (moral evil).

Discussion Question:

Does Plantinga’s argument appeal more to the Theistic Personalism or Classical Theism?

Jeffery's Picture