This is part two of my follow-up to my original post on potentiality and inertia, where I respond to comments made by defenders of existential inertia. In the previous post we delved deeper into the nature of potentials, and saw that not everything we call a potential is equally deserving of the name. This helped us clarify the indifference of potentials, and how they relate to their actualizations. In my estimation, the indifference of potentials is the core reason for thinking that potentials depend on some other actuality for their continued actualization. In the course of this post, we will have an opportunity…

Recent comments by defenders of existential inertia have motivated me to return to the topic of my earlier post on potentiality and inertia. In that post I proposed that a key feature of potentials is that they are indifferent to what is actually the case. This, I explained, is the core reason for thinking that the continued actualization of a potential must depend on some other actuality. In this post we will clarify this further, and in the next post we will say more about the relation of all of this to inertia. Joe Schmid, of Majesty of Reason, has put forward…

This is the last of four posts on omni-instrumentality, a Thomistic model for divine providence. In the first three posts (here, here, and here) we outlined this model, the core of which is an account of divine concurrence as essential cooperation with nature. In this post we will be comparing our proposal with other views commonly held today — one of which is also from the Thomistic tradition — in the hopes that doing so will further clarify what we may have left unsaid thus far. As before, it is highly recommended that you read the previous posts before continuing…

This is the third of four posts on omni-instrumentality, a Thomistic model for divine providence. So far we’ve discussed cooperation (here), the distinction between nature and artifice, the analogy of cooperation, and our proposal that divine concurrence is God’s essential cooperation with nature (here). Although concurrence is the central component to our view on providence, it is not the whole picture. So, in this post we will discuss some of the other components the view, using what we have said so far as a basis. As before, it is highly recommended that you read the previous posts before continuing here.…

This is the second of four posts on omni-instrumentality, a Thomistic model for divine providence. The central piece of this model is an account of divine concurrence in terms of “essential cooperation with nature”. In the first post we discussed cooperation in general and essential cooperation in particular. In this post we will complete our discussion of concurrence, unpacking what it means for essential cooperation to be with nature. In the next post we will flesh this out into a fuller picture of divine providence as a whole, before we compare our model to others in the fourth post. It is highly recommended…

Divine providence is about God’s direction of all history in accordance with his plans, without thereby frustrating human freedom or undermining nature. Long-time readers will know that I was once a Molinist, but I have not said much on the topic since changing my views. I would describe the view I now hold as the Thomistic view, but others views go by that description and I have little interest in an exegetical defense. For the sake of clarity, then, we will use the name “omni-instrumentality”, since this view is built around the notion that all of nature is a divine…

Reader Ante asks the following question in the comments of my response to his previous question: The issue I have is with regards to God’s necessary existence. Since God’s essence and existence are identical, He exists necessarily. But the same thing could be said of matter as well, as it seems to me. Why could it not be the case that some fundamental layer of physical reality necessarily exists aka that it cannot fail to exist? Suppose that we are dealing with some form of “atomism”. How do we know that some kind of physical particles or fields don’t have…