علم مطلق الهی و چالش گزاره‌های ایندکسیکال

نوع مقاله : مقاله علمی پژوهشی

نویسندگان

1 دانش‌آموخته دکتری فلسفۀ دین، دانشگاه تهران، تهران، ایران

2 دانشیار گروه فلسفه و کلام اسلامی، دانشکدۀ الهیات و معارف اسلامی، دانشگاه تهران، تهران، ایران.

چکیده

یکی از باورهای خداباوری سنتی باور به مطلق بودن صفات الهی است، و یکی از صفات الهی که مشمول این قاعدۀ کلی می‌شود صفت «عالم مطلق» است. اما پیرامون این صفت مانند بسیاری دیگر از صفات الهی چالش‌های متعددی شکل گرفته است. یکی از این چالش‌ها مربوط به گزاره‌های ایندکسیکال است. از میان انواع گوناگون گزاره‌های ایندکسیکال، دو نوع گزاره، یعنی گزاره‌های معطوف به زمان حال و گزاره‌های معطوف به گوینده، مورد توجه فیلسوفان قرار گرفته است. دربارۀ گزاره‌های معطوف به زمان حال گفته شده است از آنجا که گزاره‌هایی که زمان حال را نشان می‌دهند مانند «اکنون ساعت ... است»، در هر لحظه تغییر می‌کند، علم خداوند به این گزاره‌ها نیز می‌بایست دائماً متغیر باشد، که این مستلزم وجود تغییر در خدا است؛ یعنی وضعیتی که با صفت تغییرناپذیری خدا ناسازگار است. در مورد گزاره‌های معطوف به گوینده نیز، مانند «من اکنون بیمار هستم»، گفته شده است که تنها خود شخص گوینده می‌تواند به چنین گزاره‌هایی علم داشته باشد. لذا گزاره‌هایی وجود دارد که عالم مطلق نسبت به آن‌ها فاقد علم است؛ در نتیجه موجود عالم مطلق نمی‌تواند وجود داشته باشد. در این مقاله این اشکالات و پاسخ‌های ارائه‌شده برای آن‌ها ارزیابی شده و پاسخ‌هایی نیز از طرف نگارندگان برای آن‌ها ارائه می‌شود. در پایان نتیجه گرفته می‌شود که این اشکالات نمی‌توانند مخل خداباوری باشند.

کلیدواژه‌ها


عنوان مقاله [English]

Omniscience and the Problem of Indexicals

نویسندگان [English]

  • Mohammad Ali Mirbagheri 1
  • Abbas Yazdani 2
1 Ph.D in Philosophy of Religion, University of Tehran, Tehran, Iran
2 Associate Professor, Department of Islamic Philosophy and Theology, Faculty of Theology and Islamic Studies, University of Tehran, Tehran, Iran
چکیده [English]

One of the traditional theistic beliefs is the belief in God’s absolute attributes. One of these absolute attributes is “Omniscience”. But there are some challenges concerning this attribute and one of them addresses indexical propositions. Among all kinds of indexicals de presenti -propositions that inform about present time, the de se propositions are considered by philosophers. Philosophers who criticize Omniscience use these propositions in different ways. In this article, these challenges and responses to them will be scrutinized.
De presenti propositions are troublesome for traditional theism because it seems that the knowledge of different present moments causes a change in God and this contradicts God’s immutability. For example, if God knows that “it is 9 a.m. now”, then He should know “it is 10 a.m. now” an hour later. So, His knowledge changes from time to time which means God Himself changes.
There are some responses to this problem:
1- To change de presenti propositions to non-indexical ones. For example, the audiences of The Proclamation of Constitutional Monarchy of Iran could say: “Today, the Proclamation of Constitutional Monarchy was declared” or say: “The Proclamation of Constitutional Monarchy is declared on August 5, 1906”. Therefore, the knowledge of such propositions is fixed through time.
2- To claim that God is timeless. That is, God is outside the boundaries of time and His knowledge of different moments, unlike human beings, is immutable.
3- Final solution: to modify the interpretation of the concept of God. Theologians traditionally have presupposed that any kind of change in an absolutely perfect being brings it down from its absolute perfection. But this is not so clear. It can be shown that some changes in God, including changes in His knowledge of different moments, do not affect His perfection.
Also, knowledge of de se propositions like “I’m in the hospital”, is challenging for God being Omniscient because only the person who utters such propositions, not God, can know them.
There are some responses to this problem:
1- To distinguish between the content of a proposition and the proposition itself. Although “I’m in the hospital” can only be explained by the patient himself, it indicates a situation in the world, that is, that person X is in the hospital, which can also be explained by other people. Although God's knowledge does not belong to the de se propositions themselves, it belongs to the content of such propositions,
2- Theists can claim that knowledge does not belong to propositions themselves, but belongs to their truth. In such a case, the Omniscient can know “I’m in the hospital” is true.
3- Final solution: to modify the interpretation of the concept of God. According to this solution, theists can consider what atheists put forward against Omniscience not as a denial of the existence of God, but as an illumination of the concept of God, and by accepting it, restrict the extension of the absolute knowledge of God.
In this article, we first try to show that some of the objections against solutions for the problem of indexicals could be avoided. So, responses like God’s timelessness or distinction between a proposition and its content can overcome the problem. At the same time, the final solution in each part, which is to modify the interpretation of the concept of God, is a way for those who think other responses do not work.

کلیدواژه‌ها [English]

  • Knowledge of God
  • Omniscience
  • indexicals
  • God’s timelessness
  • God’s immutability
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