Boethius on Divine Foreknowledge and Free Will
If God knew I was going to write this, was I really free to write it?
If God knows the future, does that mean we have no free will?
The problem of Divine Foreknowledge and Free Will, also known as the problem of Divine fatalism, is one of the most interesting problems in philosophy. It is so popular, it is one of the few problems that I have had to discuss with middle schoolers. There is something about it that just makes sense to everybody.
But if you have never heard of it before, it goes like this: It seems highly plausible that, if it is possible to know that an event is going to happen before it does, in fact, happen, then that event must have been necessary in some sense. If I only suspected something would happen, then I did not know it, and if I knew it, then it could not have failed to happen. But God knows that every event will happen before actually does, in fact, happen. Moreover, his knowledge is infallible; God cannot be mistaken, even if you take a fallibilist view of human knowledge.1
Thus, this problem arises due to the conflict of a few plausible beliefs about God, reality and free will:
God knows all things at all times, including the past and future, with infallible certainty.
If God knows all things at all times, including the past and future, with infallible certainty, then all of our willed personal acts are pre-determined.
If a willed personal act is pre-determined, then it is not free.
But,
If God has given us free will, our acts must be free.
Therefore, it seems obvious: if God exists, our free will does not.
