Many an argument has been proposed on the topic of divine omniscience, determinism and free will. It has been said that God has foreknowledge of all future events, and nothing he knows can be false, it is then difficult to conceive that something that has been previously known by a higher being, could be changed by an arbitrary decision of an individual in the present or future. This argument has been exposed by Pike in a very logical and clear way.
Supposing that God, say 80 years ago, knew that a person would watch a movie on Friday; and if God is omniscient and all knowing, meaning that he has foreknowledge of all future events and does not hold any false beliefs (meaning that for Him, Believing X means Knowing X and that X is true); it follows that that person would not have the power to do anything different than to watch a movie on Friday . If that person would in any instance have such power, it would cause God to either hold a false belief, or would cause God to cease to exist in the past. This then makes the concept of Free Will absurd, since it would give a human being the power of denying the existence of God, or the existence of one essential attribute of God .
Holding both concepts of Divine Omniscience and Free Will as true is then unacceptable for Pike, as he concludes that defending both suppositions would be absurd when he says “if one affirms the existence of God, one is committed to the view that no human action is voluntary” .
This argument has been taken for opening a broader discussion among theologists, and gives logical grounds to the Open Theism movement that now discusses topics such as determinism, omniscience, omnipresence and the existence of evil, without challenging the existence of God.
Bibliography
Pike, Nelson. "Divine Omniscience and Voluntary Action." The Philosophical Review (1965): 27-46.
