objective immortality in process thought Flashcards
whats objective immortality?
the belief (in process theology) that every living thing exists for ever in mind of God because they are literal objects ‘in’ God.
whats subjective immortality?
the belief that after death the thinking self continues as the same subject of consciousness - the same ‘I’.
whats panentheism?
the philosophical view that everything that there is exists ‘in God’
whats prices theology?
-rejects idea that God created universe out of nothing, proposes instead both physical universe and God are uncreated and have always existed.
-‘reality’ is both mental + physical, just as humans exist as a unity of mind+body, realities whole is made up of mind and matter.
-to describe this relationship process theologians say that God and universe exist panentheistically.
-those christians who believe that G created universe out of nothing are (according to PT) wrong
explaining process theologian view
-try to imagine G + primitive matter existing together without any beginning. PT think this matter would have been chaotic.
-by comparison with primitive matter, even an electron has structure. PT argue that God decided to bring chaotic matter in order, and God foresaw that, eventually, matter could become so orderly that it would form intelligent beings such as ourselves.
-Gods task in creation was therefore to persuade chaotic matter into ever-increasing order. This kind of God, can’t be all-powerful, coz matter that has to be persuaded must always have some ability to resist Gods persuasion
what does exist according to Griffin?
-‘God-and-a-world”
-just as humans have embodied minds, it makes sense to think of God as the should of the universe. Just as human bodies experiences are integrated by the mind, the experiences of the entire universe ate integrated by mind of G.
Process theologians + LAD
-since God and universe exist poanentheistically this means further that God must experience every single process within the universe, and its this belief that dictates how process theologians think about LAD.
belief in objective immorality
-PT therefore tend to believe in ‘objective immortality’ after death, all individuals entities in the universe remain forever as ‘objects’ in the mind of God, so in that sense they never die.
in the view of objective immortality..
-all actions, thoughts + ideas continue to exist in every minute detail as objects in Gs memory, and since G is eternal in that sense we are too eternal, but objectively not subjectively .
what would subjective immortality say?
-view that beings such as ourselves have potential to exist forever as irreducibly subj units of experience meaning that when we die, we will exist always as thinking, feeling subjects with our own thought processes, memories and continued experiences and nobody else (not even G) will experience them for us. Most Christians believe in subjective immortality.
to evaluate
-most Christians appear to believe that subj immortality is for humans, not for other animals. Defo case for catholics who believe animals don’t have soul
-idea of obj immortality does away with anthropocentric (human-centred) idea that only humans have sufficient value in Gods eyes to be granted immortality after death.
-idea that humans somehow more valuable than rest of creation is seen by some to be wishful thinking with PT, all entities have obj imm. all entities are valued forever and for their own sakes which sounds like reasonable and fair viewpoint
objective mortality is a meaningless form of words…
-some ppl think idea of objective mortality is a meaningless form of words. After death ‘I’ am no longer conscious, so ‘I’ no longer have any subj experiences about anything, so how can it matter to ‘me’ that ‘I’ am obj present in Gs memory.
in christian terms..
-satisfactory answers to problem of evil include belief that those who have suffered injustice in this life will have their suffering redeemed in the next.
-but if next life is merely obj form of immortality, I will not exist subjectively to know that my suffering has been redeemed, so in reality as far as I am concerned it never will be redeemed.
