Is there a problem of creatio ex nihilo ? A reply to Pao-Shen Ho
- PDF / 499,770 Bytes
- 4 Pages / 439.37 x 666.142 pts Page_size
- 84 Downloads / 204 Views
Is there a problem of creatio ex nihilo? A reply to Pao‑Shen Ho Jacobus Erasmus1 Received: 14 November 2019 / Accepted: 23 December 2019 © Springer Nature B.V. 2020
Abstract Pao-Shen Ho attempts to argue that the Christian doctrine of creatio ex nihilo (creation out of nothing) violates modal logic and is necessarily false. More precisely, Ho argues that, if God creates the universe out of nothing, then the non-existence of the universe is both possible and impossible, which is logically incoherent. I point out, however, that Ho commits the (all too common) modal scope fallacy by confusing the scope of necessity in the argument and, therefore, Ho’s argument is unsound. Keywords Pao-Shen Ho · Creatio ex nihilo · Creation out of nothing · Kalam cosmological argument
Introduction Pao-Shen Ho (2019) attempts to argue that the Christian doctrine of creatio ex nihilo (creation out of nothing) “violates modal logic and is necessarily false” (Ho 2019: 1). More precisely, let “the universe” refer to everything that exists outside or apart from God, and let “creatio ex nihilo” refer to the view that God creates the universe out of nothing, that is, without the use of pre-existing created stuff. Accordingly, Ho (2019: 6) thinks that creatio ex nihilo leads to the following inconsistent propositions: (A1) If God creates the universe out of nothing, then it is possible that the universe does not exist or, in other words, it is not necessary that the universe exists. (A2) If God creates the universe out of nothing, then it is necessary that the universe exists or, in other words, it is impossible for the universe not to exist.
* Jacobus Erasmus [email protected] 1
School of Philosophy, Faculty of Arts, North-West University, Private Bag X6001, Potchefstroom 2520, South Africa
13
Vol.:(0123456789)
International Journal for Philosophy of Religion
Thus, if God creates the universe out of nothing, then the non-existence of the universe is both possible and impossible, which is logically incoherent. Consequently, according to Ho, creatio ex nihilo is impossible because it leads to a logical contradiction. But why does Ho affirm (A1) and (A2)? First, as regards (A1), Ho thinks that the proposition is true because God’s freedom implies that, if God creates the universe out of nothing, then God could have refrained from doing so: God is traditionally taken to be a maximally free agent, such that He could do otherwise than what He in fact does. Accordingly, if God creates from nothing, then He could also hold back from creating anything at all. … Thus, the fact that creation of everything is what a maximally free agent chooses to do entails that possibly, nothing [or the universe] is created (Ho 2019: 6). Ho (2019: 9) admits that, if God is not absolutely free and creates the universe out of necessity, then (A1) is false and creatio ex nihilo is not inconsistent. However, Ho argues that theists or proponents of creatio ex nihilo have traditionally held that God is free. Hence, Ho’s argument is concerned exclusively w
Data Loading...
