Pre-Established Harmony and the Predetermination of All Things
Leibniz, Classical Theism, and the Problem of Evil - Chapter 4 (4 of 4)
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To date, I have posted the Introduction, Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3, and the first 3 parts of Chapter 4. Today, I post the fourth installment of Chapter 4, Pre-Established Harmony and the Predetermination of All Things. This installment marks the end of Part I. We’ll jump into Part II next week.
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Pre-Established Harmony and the Predetermination of All Things
The threat of determinism only worsens when we consider Leibniz’s theory of substance and the concept of Pre-Established Harmony (PEH). Well established by this point is that Leibniz understands a subject to bear in his person, as it were, every true predicate about his past, present, and future. And as discussed in previous chapters, the monadology supplies the metaphysical explanation of why: “God … gives to each substance in the beginning a nature or internal force that enables it to produce in regular order … everything that is to happen to it” (L 457). In this theory, the psychological determinism, argued by Russell, and superessentialism, argued by Bluemenfeld, converge upon every building block of the cosmos. To see why, let’s begin by briefly reviewing the monadology and specifically PEH.
Recall that Leibniz is an idealist of a certain kind, believing our world is composed of souls. Unlike the lifeless bits of matter dreamed of by the Mechanical Philosophy, Leibniz understands the building blocks of our world (monads) to be psychic in nature. Not every monad is rational or even sentient, but every monad is alive. And in keeping with Leibniz’s principle of the “identity of indiscernibles,” he believes that every monad is unique. But this uniqueness is not based on size or shape. Rather, the defining traits of monads are equally psychic in nature — each one having unique “perception” (its psychic now), “appetition” (its tendency to move from one psychic state to the next), and “spontaneity” (its power to change).
Recall also that Leibniz understands shifting perceptions to arise spontaneously from the monad itself, its own unfolding nature moving either toward greater perfection (action) or receding from it (passion). Rather than perception arising through a mechanical reception of external stimuli, as espoused by Locke and the empiricists, Leibniz’s monads are “windowless” — closed systems that experience only their own perceptions that arise spontaneously from their own nature. These inner perceptions represent to the monad its unique place within the cosmos, offering a glimpse or mirror of the world from that monad’s unique vantage point. As for how these windowless building blocks engage the world they inhabit, recall that Leibniz’s answer is that the perceptions of monads harmonize with one another, each monad bearing a nature whose unfolding perceptions perfectly coincide with the perceptions of the other monads in its world.
The foregoing we illustrated using the analogy of a virtual reality simulation. You and I each represent one monad. As I enter the simulation and move about, I perceive colors that give the impression of space, objects, relationships, and my place in the virtual “world.” You, likewise, enter the simulation and perceive the same types of representations. However, our experiences are not identical, since we occupy different “places” within the virtual world, perceiving it from different vantage points. Nonetheless, our experiences harmonize. We could describe in objective mathematical terms the space, objects, and relationships within the virtual place, along with its rules or laws, and we would discover harmony between our perceptions that describe a common world, despite our unique vantage points.
Recall, however, that our analogy required several caveats. The first is relatively benign, as far as freedom is concerned. In the analogy, both of our representative monads, you and I, are rational, but Leibniz does not believe that every monad is rational. The second and third caveats are where freedom comes under threat. In our analogy, our perceptions are produced by something external to us — the virtual reality machine to which we are connected. For Leibniz, however, our own nature is the virtual reality generator, as it were — all of our perceptions arising spontaneously from our own nature. Such was our second caveat.
Now, recall that by making our experience of the world phenomenological, Leibniz introduced one of the strongest forms of concomitance and incompossibility. As argued in our section on providence and the good, if the nature of monad γ produces perceptions harmonious with cosmos A1 and monad δ also has a nature that produces perceptions harmonious with A1, then monad γ and monad δ are compossible with one another and with cosmos A1. But neither γ nor δ are compossible with any other cosmos. They are compatible with only one world. For if anything about A1 were different — which is to say, were it any other world — then the perceptions of γ and δ would no longer harmonize with it. And if monad ε bears a nature that produces perceptions harmonious with cosmos A2, then monad ε is incompossible with every world other than A2 (such as A1), and with every monad that does not harmonize with A2 (such as γ and δ). In short, each monad proves to be compossible with only one cosmos, with one history, and with only the monads whose perceptions perfectly harmonize with that one world. No other world and no other monads are compossible with it.
As we also saw, this account of compossibility turns into a strong form of concomitance. For the compossibility between γ and δ includes the perception of δ in A1 and vice versa. This means the harmony between γ, δ, and A1 are conjoined. To produce A1 with γ but not δ would disrupt the harmony of that world. Hence, γ, δ, and A1 are not just compossible but joined by concomitance. Not only is each monad compossible with only one world, then, but it is inextricably conjoined by concomitance to every building block within that world.
Such a strong theory of concomitance and incompossibility raises the worry of determinism. If our γ monad is an example of a rational monad — say, the soul of Julius Caesar — and thus (supposedly) possesses “free” spontaneity, in what sense are γ’s spontaneous “choices” free? For any choice other than the choices that γ in fact makes are utterly incompatible with its world and every being within it.
Perhaps one could reply that our perceptions within our virtual reality simulator are also harmonious, and necessarily so if we are to occupy the same virtual world. But the conditional is key. The harmony ensures that we occupy the same virtual world. But the fact that our virtual reality generator successfully coordinates our spontaneous choices in no way undermines the free spontaneity of those choices. In other words, the necessity is not in our choices; the necessity is in the requisite harmony of us sharing a common experience: If our perceptions are to be of a common virtual world, then our perceptions must harmonize, perfectly mirroring the choices we freely make.
Such a reply would work just fine if our perceptions were responsive to our choices in real time. That is, just as the virtual reality generator produces perceptions in response to my choices moment to moment, so monads produce fresh perceptions moment to moment to reflect the most recent happenings in the world. The problem, of course, is PEH. And here we reach the third and most troubling caveat for our analogy.
Our analogy, like the above reply, suggests that perceptions arise ad hoc — that is, perceptions are generated responsively to our choices, moment to moment. Yet, Leibniz does not think the same is true for monads. Rather, God has “preprogrammed” (to stick to the analogy) every future perception of each monad. Thus follows PEH: The harmony of monadic perceptions is “pre-established” by God from the dawn of creation (or even before, in the realm of the possibles), giving to each monad a nature that will unfold in harmony with every other monad. If the perceptions of each monad, including the perceptions that unfold spontaneously in (so-called) free monads, are baked in from the start, then in what sense could any monad — free or otherwise — possibly be otherwise?
We touched on one possible reply when modifying our analogy to accommodate PEH. We imagined that our virtual reality generator was not a responsive machine but a pre-programmed machine. Yet, such programming worked in cooperation with our free choice. How? In our thought experiment, God gave to the programmer of the virtual reality generator a taste of divine foreknowledge. Hence, before you and I entered the virtual reality simulation, the programmer already knew all the choices we would make. Rather than letting the virtual reality respond in real time to our choices, he programmed in advance every virtual twist and turn of the simulation to match our future choices. When you and I stepped into the simulation, the perfect correspondence between our choices and the simulation gave us the impression that the simulator was responding to our actions in real time because it perfectly mirrored our choices. But the impression was false. The simulation was pre-programmed to mirror our (foreknown) choices.
Now, as mentioned when introducing this modified analogy, we took this thought experiment from Leibniz. And his point was to demonstrate how perfect correspondence between pre-programmed phenomena and free spontaneity are compatible, the former in no way infringing on the latter. Leibniz’s analogy drew on Reformed theologian, Isaac Jacquelot, who offered his own hypothetical.
Individual A knows in advance all that individual B will ask of his servant. So, individual A designs a robot servant to perform every request exactly as requested, when requested. The thought experiment is meant to show two things: First, the free spontaneity of individual B is in no way negated by the actions of individual A, and second, the “interactions” between Individual B and his automaton would lead an observer to believe the robot hears and spontaneously responds to the requests of individual B, even though it does not (G 6:137). From this Leibniz concludes,
Even so would that automaton, that should fulfill the servant’s function … in virtue of the knowledge of him who, foreseeing my future orders, would have rendered it capable of serving me at the right moment all through the morrow. The knowledge of my future intentions would have actuated this great craftsman, who would accordingly have fashioned the automaton … (G 6:138-9/H 159)
Leibniz believes something quite similar is true of monads. Speaking specifically about the harmony between the perceptions of soul and of body, he writes:
This had already happened when God ordered beforehand the harmony that there would be between them…. For insofar as the soul has perfection and distinct thoughts, God has accommodated the body to the soul, and has arranged beforehand that the body is impelled to execute its orders. And in so far as the soul is imperfect and as its perceptions are confused, God has accommodated the soul to the body, in such sort that the soul is swayed by the passions arising out of corporeal representation. (G 6:138-9/H 159)
Such is the nature of PEH. Having foreknown all futurities, God gave to each monad a nature suitable to its place within the world, which produces in regular order every experience it will ever have.
In this way, Leibniz makes PEH little different from the foreknowledge problem. To choose one possible formulation:
If God foreknows at T1 that Belle will choose p at T2, then it is necessary that Belle choose p at T2.
If it is necessary that Belle choose p at T2, then Belle is not free regarding the choosing of p at T2.
Therefore, if God foreknows at T1 that Belle will choose p at T2, then Belle is not free regarding the choosing of p at T2 (from 1 & 2).
God foreknows at T1 that Belle will choose p at T2.
Therefore, Belle is not free regarding the choosing of p at T2 (from 3 & 5).
The problem is as ancient as the problem of evil.1 Scholastics, such as Aquinas, Duns Scotus, et al., point out that hypothetical necessities can be read in one of two ways, one problematic and the other unproblematic. Take, for example, the sentence: Everything which is, when it is, is necessary. This can be read in a divided sense, where “when it is, is necessary” modifies “Everything which is.” On this reading, the sentence indicates the modal necessity of existing things — something like, Everything which is, is necessary when it is. This type of necessity indicates that the consequent thing (necessitas consequentis) is modally necessary and cannot be otherwise. Read in the composite sense, however, “is necessary” modifies all that precedes it, indicating only a logical entailment, or necessity of the consequence (necessitas consequentiae) — Everything is when it is.
Applied to foreknowledge, a statement like, If God foreknows that Belle will choose p, then Belle choosing p is necessary, can be read in one of two ways. The problematic way suggests that Belle necessarily chooses p, lacking any power of contrary choice (necessity of the consequent). The alternative claims only that there is necessary correspondence between God’s foreknowledge and whatever is foreknown. In other words, if it is true that Belle will choose p, then it is necessary that God’s foreknowledge of the future reflect this fact, despite the contingency of p (necessity of the consequence).2 In short, in a hypothetical, “if p, then q,” does the necessity apply to q (the consequent) or the hypothetical (if-then)?
To make the point less abstract, let’s imagine a man, William, sitting at a dining table, and before him there are three doors. Behind each door is a chef. Each chef, having libertarian freedom, is free to cook any breakfast he likes. The chef behind door A chooses to cook eggs; the chef behind door B cooks crepes, and the chef behind door C makes waffles. Equally free is William, so he can choose door A, B, or C. Each possible choice entails a hypothetical necessity: If William chooses door A, then he necessarily receives eggs. If William chooses door B, then he necessarily receives crepes. If William chooses door C, then he necessarily receives waffles. Yet, none of these statements indicate a modal necessity.
Let’s take our first possibility, If William chooses door A, then he necessarily receives eggs. There is no necessity in this chef choosing to make eggs, nor is there any modal necessity in William choosing door A — both have libertarian freedom in these matters. However, given that the chef behind door A has freely chosen to make eggs, a necessity of the consequence applies: If William chooses A, then he gets eggs. But this type of necessity is no threat to either William’s freedom or the chef’s.