Publications
1. What's the problem with personites? (forthcoming), Disputatio.
(draft)
Abstract: According to four-dimensionalism, objects persist in virtue of having temporal parts. But my life could have been shorter than it actually is. So, a subset of my temporal parts—a personite—would have composed a person in some other possible world. Johnston (2016a, 2016b) thinks the existence of personites entails moral disaster. Kaiserman (2019) argues that Johnston’s personite problem only applies to perdurantists. I argue that Kaiserman’s escape is technical at best—stage theorists still face the moral concerns which motivate the problem. To the extent stage theorists can escape the motivating concerns, perdurantists can, too. Thus, personite-like problems persist for all four-dimensionalists or none of them. But the four-dimensionalist is not without ethical response: I offer ways four-dimensionalists can diffuse the problem.
2. An open future is possible (forthcoming), Journal of Analytic Theology.
(penultimate version)
Abstract: Pruss (2016) argues that Christian philosophers should reject Open Futurism, where Open Futurism is the thesis that “there are no true undetermined contingent propositions about the future” (461). First, Pruss argues “on probabilistic grounds that there are some statements about infinite futures that Open Futurism cannot handle” (461). In other words, he argues that either the future is finite or that Open Futurism is false. Next, Pruss argues that since Christians are committed to a belief in everlasting life, they must deny that the future is finite. From here, Pruss concludes that Christians must reject Open Futurism. In this essay, I respond to Pruss’s argument on behalf of Open Futurism: pace Pruss, the open futurist can consistently believe in everlasting life while also accepting the basic principles of probability theory.
3. Epistemic paradox as a solution to divine hiddenness (2023), Perichoresis, Vol. 21 (4).
(penultimate version)
Abstract: I offer a new, limited solution to divine hiddenness based on a particular epistemic paradox: sometimes, knowing about a desired outcome or relevant features of that desired outcome would prevent the outcome in question from occurring. I call these cases epistemically self-defeating situations. This solution, in essence, says that divine hiddenness or silence is a necessary feature of at least some morally excellent or desirable states of affairs. Given the nature of the paradox, an omniscient being cannot completely eliminate hiddenness, just as an omnipotent being cannot create a rock so heavy that they cannot lift it. Epistemically self-defeating situations provide an undercutting defeater for the assumption that any nonresistant nonbeliever could always, at any time, be in conscious relationship with a perfectly loving God. Thankfully, silence is a temporary feature of epistemically self-defeating situations: once the outcome is achieved, agents can know in full.
4. Freedom, foreknowledge, and betting (2023), Philosophical Issues, 33, 223-236. (DOI: 10.1111/phis.12255)
(penultimate version; please cite published)
Abstract: Certain kinds of prediction, foreknowledge, and future-oriented action appear to require settled future truths. But open futurists think that the future is metaphysically unsettled: if it is open whether p is true, then it cannot currently be settled that p is true. So, open futurists—and libertarians who adopt the position—face the objection that their view makes rational action and deliberation impossible. I defuse the epistemic concern: open futurism does not entail obviously counterintuitive epistemic consequences or prevent rational action.
5. Against the inside out argument (online 2022; in print June 2024), Analytic Philosophy, Vol. 65 (2), 187-202. (DOI: 10.1111/phib.12275)
(penultimate version; please cite published)
Abstract: Bailey (2021) offers a clever argument for the compatibility of determinism and moral responsibility based on the nature of intrinsic intentions. The argument is mistaken on two counts. First, it is invalid. Second, even setting that first point aside, the argument proves too much: we would be blameworthy in paradigm cases of non-blameworthiness. I conclude that we cannot reason from intentions to responsibility solely from the “inside out”—our possessing a blameworthy intention cannot tell us whether this intention is also blameworthy in deterministic worlds.
(draft)
Abstract: According to four-dimensionalism, objects persist in virtue of having temporal parts. But my life could have been shorter than it actually is. So, a subset of my temporal parts—a personite—would have composed a person in some other possible world. Johnston (2016a, 2016b) thinks the existence of personites entails moral disaster. Kaiserman (2019) argues that Johnston’s personite problem only applies to perdurantists. I argue that Kaiserman’s escape is technical at best—stage theorists still face the moral concerns which motivate the problem. To the extent stage theorists can escape the motivating concerns, perdurantists can, too. Thus, personite-like problems persist for all four-dimensionalists or none of them. But the four-dimensionalist is not without ethical response: I offer ways four-dimensionalists can diffuse the problem.
2. An open future is possible (forthcoming), Journal of Analytic Theology.
(penultimate version)
Abstract: Pruss (2016) argues that Christian philosophers should reject Open Futurism, where Open Futurism is the thesis that “there are no true undetermined contingent propositions about the future” (461). First, Pruss argues “on probabilistic grounds that there are some statements about infinite futures that Open Futurism cannot handle” (461). In other words, he argues that either the future is finite or that Open Futurism is false. Next, Pruss argues that since Christians are committed to a belief in everlasting life, they must deny that the future is finite. From here, Pruss concludes that Christians must reject Open Futurism. In this essay, I respond to Pruss’s argument on behalf of Open Futurism: pace Pruss, the open futurist can consistently believe in everlasting life while also accepting the basic principles of probability theory.
3. Epistemic paradox as a solution to divine hiddenness (2023), Perichoresis, Vol. 21 (4).
(penultimate version)
Abstract: I offer a new, limited solution to divine hiddenness based on a particular epistemic paradox: sometimes, knowing about a desired outcome or relevant features of that desired outcome would prevent the outcome in question from occurring. I call these cases epistemically self-defeating situations. This solution, in essence, says that divine hiddenness or silence is a necessary feature of at least some morally excellent or desirable states of affairs. Given the nature of the paradox, an omniscient being cannot completely eliminate hiddenness, just as an omnipotent being cannot create a rock so heavy that they cannot lift it. Epistemically self-defeating situations provide an undercutting defeater for the assumption that any nonresistant nonbeliever could always, at any time, be in conscious relationship with a perfectly loving God. Thankfully, silence is a temporary feature of epistemically self-defeating situations: once the outcome is achieved, agents can know in full.
4. Freedom, foreknowledge, and betting (2023), Philosophical Issues, 33, 223-236. (DOI: 10.1111/phis.12255)
(penultimate version; please cite published)
Abstract: Certain kinds of prediction, foreknowledge, and future-oriented action appear to require settled future truths. But open futurists think that the future is metaphysically unsettled: if it is open whether p is true, then it cannot currently be settled that p is true. So, open futurists—and libertarians who adopt the position—face the objection that their view makes rational action and deliberation impossible. I defuse the epistemic concern: open futurism does not entail obviously counterintuitive epistemic consequences or prevent rational action.
5. Against the inside out argument (online 2022; in print June 2024), Analytic Philosophy, Vol. 65 (2), 187-202. (DOI: 10.1111/phib.12275)
(penultimate version; please cite published)
Abstract: Bailey (2021) offers a clever argument for the compatibility of determinism and moral responsibility based on the nature of intrinsic intentions. The argument is mistaken on two counts. First, it is invalid. Second, even setting that first point aside, the argument proves too much: we would be blameworthy in paradigm cases of non-blameworthiness. I conclude that we cannot reason from intentions to responsibility solely from the “inside out”—our possessing a blameworthy intention cannot tell us whether this intention is also blameworthy in deterministic worlds.
6. Time and the nature of the Atonement (2022), Oxford Studies in Philosophy of Religion, Volume 10.
(penultimate version; please cite published)
Abstract: Standard practice in philosophy of religion is to evaluate certain theological positions with respect to how well they comport with desirable philosophical positions and vice versa. The ontological status of the atonement has not received much of this treatment, in no small part due to disagreement regarding what constitutes a proper account and the abundance of metaphor. The metaphysical nature of the atonement depends on questions about existence, properties, and time. Examining atonement via theories of time thus helps make clear these disagreements and offers solutions. The ontological specifics of the atonement will vary depending on whether one is a presentist or eternalist.
(penultimate version; please cite published)
Abstract: Standard practice in philosophy of religion is to evaluate certain theological positions with respect to how well they comport with desirable philosophical positions and vice versa. The ontological status of the atonement has not received much of this treatment, in no small part due to disagreement regarding what constitutes a proper account and the abundance of metaphor. The metaphysical nature of the atonement depends on questions about existence, properties, and time. Examining atonement via theories of time thus helps make clear these disagreements and offers solutions. The ontological specifics of the atonement will vary depending on whether one is a presentist or eternalist.
7. In defense of flip-flopping (with Andrew M. Bailey), (online 2021), Synthese, 199 (5-6): 13907-13924.
(DOI: 10.1007/s11229-021-03403-1.)
Abstract: Some incompatibilists about free will or moral responsibility and determinism would abandon their incompatibilism were they to learn that determinism is true. But is it reasonable to flip-flop in this way? In this article, we contend that it is and show what follows. The result is both a defense of a particular incompatibilist strategy and a general framework for assessing other cases of flip-flopping.
(DOI: 10.1007/s11229-021-03403-1.)
Abstract: Some incompatibilists about free will or moral responsibility and determinism would abandon their incompatibilism were they to learn that determinism is true. But is it reasonable to flip-flop in this way? In this article, we contend that it is and show what follows. The result is both a defense of a particular incompatibilist strategy and a general framework for assessing other cases of flip-flopping.
Monograph (in progress)
The Problem of Sin and Salvation (under contract with Cambridge University Press)
Cambridge Elements Series on The Problems of God, ed. Michael Peterson.
Abstract: The Problem of Sin and Salvation explores and problematizes the foundations of religious belief: How did we get to be in the position in which we find ourselves, and what (if anything) is our deliverance? I explore our place in the narrative of suffering, evil, and salvation, with special attention given to the nature of the fundamental issue in need of solution. Differing theological traditions locate the problem in different places, which explains the difference in solutions –- that is, in what is seen as salvific. The mechanisms –- or “hows” –- of salvation depend on why we need redemption in the first place.
There are two major approaches to the nature of salvation: “make it stop” approaches, which favor non-existence, and “make it better” approaches, which favor some sort of return or atonement. Exploration of these issues will involve discussion of God’s providence and foreknowledge, human freedom, whether all will be saved, and whether existence is fundamentally good or comprised of suffering. These issues are all central to discussion of problems of evil. However, this volume is not re-treading a well-worn path. The issues listed above presuppose answers to central questions about the nature of evil, sin, and salvation. In this volume, I provide a much-needed introduction to the philosophical and theological problems which either motivate or diffuse problems of evil. Problems of evil are generated by issues of goodness, the necessity or introduction of evil, and problems of identity. Who is suffering, and who is saved? And why are we suffering and why are we saved (or not)?
Cambridge Elements Series on The Problems of God, ed. Michael Peterson.
Abstract: The Problem of Sin and Salvation explores and problematizes the foundations of religious belief: How did we get to be in the position in which we find ourselves, and what (if anything) is our deliverance? I explore our place in the narrative of suffering, evil, and salvation, with special attention given to the nature of the fundamental issue in need of solution. Differing theological traditions locate the problem in different places, which explains the difference in solutions –- that is, in what is seen as salvific. The mechanisms –- or “hows” –- of salvation depend on why we need redemption in the first place.
There are two major approaches to the nature of salvation: “make it stop” approaches, which favor non-existence, and “make it better” approaches, which favor some sort of return or atonement. Exploration of these issues will involve discussion of God’s providence and foreknowledge, human freedom, whether all will be saved, and whether existence is fundamentally good or comprised of suffering. These issues are all central to discussion of problems of evil. However, this volume is not re-treading a well-worn path. The issues listed above presuppose answers to central questions about the nature of evil, sin, and salvation. In this volume, I provide a much-needed introduction to the philosophical and theological problems which either motivate or diffuse problems of evil. Problems of evil are generated by issues of goodness, the necessity or introduction of evil, and problems of identity. Who is suffering, and who is saved? And why are we suffering and why are we saved (or not)?
Further Works in Progress (drafts available on request):
Metaphysics:
The Advantages of All-falsism*
(*Material from this paper has been circulating since 2010, and became part of Chapters 1 and 2 of my dissertation. A central argument from this paper is cited as a definitive response to Rea's "Presentism and Fatalism", by Rea in Metaphysics: the basics and by Fischer and Todd in Freedom, Fatalism, and Foreknowledge.)
Abstract: I develop and defend an overlooked but plausible view in the philosophy of time: all-falsism. According to this view, undetermined contingent propositions about the future do not lack a truth value; rather, they are false. I demonstrate that all-falsism is better off than many have thought and especially useful to the presentist.
In particular, I show that all-falsism neutralizes two prominent objections to presentism. According to the first objection, presentists must either abandon bivalence or accept fatalism. According to the second, presentists can offer no plausible story about how past and future truths are grounded. I argue that presentism, when supplemented with all-falsism, can overcome these objections. Based on these benefits, all-falsism appears to be a highly advantageous position. However, one major charge stands in the way of an endorsement of all-falsism – namely, that is incorrect, since it is obvious that there are true undetermined propositions about the future. I argue that this is not obvious at all. I conclude that all-falsism is an attractive option for presentists and should no longer be overlooked.
Settling the Open Future*
(*Major arguments from this paper also comprise Chapter 3 of my dissertation.)
Abstract: If the future is open, the future is metaphysically unsettled. But there is dispute regarding what the nature of this metaphysical unsettledness. I settle the dispute. The openness of the future requires the rejection of the commonly assumed Priorian tense logic axiom (HF): p → HFp (i.e., If p, then it has always been the case that it will at some time be p). I use this requirement to examine purported open future views (OFVs). The requirement will show one popular method of approach—the thin red line—fails the test of an OFV. I examine the remaining OFVs and show that one of them—all-falsism—is superior.
Modal Realism and the Garden of Forking Paths
Abstract: Kodaj (2014) has argued that open future views (OFVs) are inconsistent with modal realism. Modal realism requires that possible worlds are maximal, including every proposition or its complement. Kodaj argues that this maximality is inconsistent with OFVs. Kodaj is mistaken. While many OFVs are inconsistent with modal realism, he has forgotten about all-falsism. As it turns out, this all-falsist account provides theists with particularly attractive way of addressing the problem of evil.
The Advantages of All-falsism*
(*Material from this paper has been circulating since 2010, and became part of Chapters 1 and 2 of my dissertation. A central argument from this paper is cited as a definitive response to Rea's "Presentism and Fatalism", by Rea in Metaphysics: the basics and by Fischer and Todd in Freedom, Fatalism, and Foreknowledge.)
Abstract: I develop and defend an overlooked but plausible view in the philosophy of time: all-falsism. According to this view, undetermined contingent propositions about the future do not lack a truth value; rather, they are false. I demonstrate that all-falsism is better off than many have thought and especially useful to the presentist.
In particular, I show that all-falsism neutralizes two prominent objections to presentism. According to the first objection, presentists must either abandon bivalence or accept fatalism. According to the second, presentists can offer no plausible story about how past and future truths are grounded. I argue that presentism, when supplemented with all-falsism, can overcome these objections. Based on these benefits, all-falsism appears to be a highly advantageous position. However, one major charge stands in the way of an endorsement of all-falsism – namely, that is incorrect, since it is obvious that there are true undetermined propositions about the future. I argue that this is not obvious at all. I conclude that all-falsism is an attractive option for presentists and should no longer be overlooked.
Settling the Open Future*
(*Major arguments from this paper also comprise Chapter 3 of my dissertation.)
Abstract: If the future is open, the future is metaphysically unsettled. But there is dispute regarding what the nature of this metaphysical unsettledness. I settle the dispute. The openness of the future requires the rejection of the commonly assumed Priorian tense logic axiom (HF): p → HFp (i.e., If p, then it has always been the case that it will at some time be p). I use this requirement to examine purported open future views (OFVs). The requirement will show one popular method of approach—the thin red line—fails the test of an OFV. I examine the remaining OFVs and show that one of them—all-falsism—is superior.
Modal Realism and the Garden of Forking Paths
Abstract: Kodaj (2014) has argued that open future views (OFVs) are inconsistent with modal realism. Modal realism requires that possible worlds are maximal, including every proposition or its complement. Kodaj argues that this maximality is inconsistent with OFVs. Kodaj is mistaken. While many OFVs are inconsistent with modal realism, he has forgotten about all-falsism. As it turns out, this all-falsist account provides theists with particularly attractive way of addressing the problem of evil.
Philosophy of Religion:
Must God Satisfice if Unable to Choose the Best?
Abstract: If there is no best possible world, there is no best-known action regarding world creation available to God: for every world God could create, God knows God could create a better one. It appears that an omniscient being must satisfice if (s)he is to create. Thus, an omniscient being is in a bind, given a plausible maximizing principle: a morally good agent always chooses the best-known action available to them. (S)he cannot be omnibenevolent (and thus no being can have all of the traditional three omni-properties). However, an open future theorist could reject the following central claim: If there is a range of infinite, increasingly good worlds, then for every world any being could create, there is always a better world it could create. One can reject this and still uphold omnipotence—there is a modal mistake being made regarding how worlds are actualized, which the open future theorist helps us see clearly. Namely, if the future is metaphysically open, then which world is actual is not entirely up to the creative choice of an omnipotent being.
Eschatological Problems for Four-Dimensionalists
Abstract: I argue that four-dimensionalist views of persistence through time are incompatible with a key desideratum of the doctrine of unlimited atonement: That all thinking things, capable of suffering and sinning, are themselves identical with something that can be redeemed.
Epistemology and the Open Future:
Open Futurists are a Purist's Best Friend*
(*The major argument of this paper comes from Chapter 4 of my dissertation.)
Abstract: Open futurists can provide an explanation of our behavior in widely discussed cases of pragmatic encroachment, where the stakes seem to drive up the standards for proper attribution of knowledge. Importantly, open futurists can accomplish this without committing to pragmatism about knowledge; their analysis does not require a rejection of closure principles or belief that knowledge depends on practical interests. Open futurism thus provides a principled way for the purist about knowledge to account for cases of supposed pragmatic encroachment.
Selected Additional Projects:
Intrinsic Determinism (discussed at the 2023 Pacific APA)
Abstract: Much has been made of the distinction between intrinsic and extrinsic properties; we are supposedly able to utilize this distinction in order to test modal claims, locate duplicates, and discover the nature of objects “in and of themselves”. I argue that this distinction fails us when we need it most: either we are unable to reliably identify intrinsic properties or the laws of nature—which are paradigmatically extrinsic—end up being intrinsic properties of objects. I demonstrate this by considering two spacetime worms which are supposed intrinsic duplicates; one in a deterministic universe and one in an indeterministic one. According to the best tests for intrinsicality, being deterministic is an intrinsic property of the world history of the spacetime worm. It is thus an intrinsic property of the worm itself since the worm is a fusion of its temporal parts.
Circumstantial Luck Generates Moral Luck
Abstract: A common intuition is that to avoid moral luck, everyone must have equal moral opportunity. Swenson (2020) presents a mathematical account according to which everyone does have equal moral opportunity: all have an expected moral desert of zero. I argue that Swenson’s account does not escape the sort of luck he wishes to avoid. Swenson makes a distinction between moral luck and other sorts of circumstantial luck. But if moral luckiness can depend on circumstantial luck, then these two sorts of luck will be inextricable for purposes of calculating moral desert. Thus, Swenson’s account falls to the same sorts of luck concerns (at a meta-level) while introducing additional concerns which make the account counterintuitive.
The Worst Possible World?
Abstract: What’s the worst thing that could happen? If God exists and is morally perfect, there is a lower bound of goodness, a threshold below which God could not create. Many of the worst things we could imagine, such as a world consisting only of an infinite number of beings tortured for all eternity, turn out to be impossible.
Difficult disputes about ideal agents, satisficing, and the problem of evil are, at heart, disputes about the modal location of the lower bound of goodness: Which worlds make the cut? Do we find ourselves in a world a perfect being could not bring about? How would we know? I argue that, according to assumptions shared by atheists and theists, God would not allow a certain kind of unredemptive suffering. If God exists, impossible worlds appear to share a common feature: suffering which does not allow for the possibility of redemption of either the suffering itself or the sufferer.
Abstract: Much has been made of the distinction between intrinsic and extrinsic properties; we are supposedly able to utilize this distinction in order to test modal claims, locate duplicates, and discover the nature of objects “in and of themselves”. I argue that this distinction fails us when we need it most: either we are unable to reliably identify intrinsic properties or the laws of nature—which are paradigmatically extrinsic—end up being intrinsic properties of objects. I demonstrate this by considering two spacetime worms which are supposed intrinsic duplicates; one in a deterministic universe and one in an indeterministic one. According to the best tests for intrinsicality, being deterministic is an intrinsic property of the world history of the spacetime worm. It is thus an intrinsic property of the worm itself since the worm is a fusion of its temporal parts.
Circumstantial Luck Generates Moral Luck
Abstract: A common intuition is that to avoid moral luck, everyone must have equal moral opportunity. Swenson (2020) presents a mathematical account according to which everyone does have equal moral opportunity: all have an expected moral desert of zero. I argue that Swenson’s account does not escape the sort of luck he wishes to avoid. Swenson makes a distinction between moral luck and other sorts of circumstantial luck. But if moral luckiness can depend on circumstantial luck, then these two sorts of luck will be inextricable for purposes of calculating moral desert. Thus, Swenson’s account falls to the same sorts of luck concerns (at a meta-level) while introducing additional concerns which make the account counterintuitive.
The Worst Possible World?
Abstract: What’s the worst thing that could happen? If God exists and is morally perfect, there is a lower bound of goodness, a threshold below which God could not create. Many of the worst things we could imagine, such as a world consisting only of an infinite number of beings tortured for all eternity, turn out to be impossible.
Difficult disputes about ideal agents, satisficing, and the problem of evil are, at heart, disputes about the modal location of the lower bound of goodness: Which worlds make the cut? Do we find ourselves in a world a perfect being could not bring about? How would we know? I argue that, according to assumptions shared by atheists and theists, God would not allow a certain kind of unredemptive suffering. If God exists, impossible worlds appear to share a common feature: suffering which does not allow for the possibility of redemption of either the suffering itself or the sufferer.