Against Swinburne's Epistemic Distance Argument · Inspiring Philosophy Academy

Jan 28 (edited) • General

Against Swinburne's Epistemic Distance Argument

I am about 50 pages into Swinburne's "The Resurrection of God Incarnate." So far, I have really enjoyed it and appreciate his rigor. For the most part, I find much of what he says to be quite plausible. But I have some hesitations regarding his argument from epistemic distance to explain why, if God exists, He is not in constant loving connection with humans. Here are a few of my reflections. Please, feel free to share your thoughts and poke any holes in my thinking (there will likely be many)! I also apologize if it is a bit wordy.

Swinburne claims that "epistemic distance" (He cannot make his existence/presence too obvious) is needed so that we do the right things for the right reasons (e.g. we may only act righteously to be thought of well by God, to avoid Hell, to gain a reward like Heaven) and to ensure our freedom (that is, so we are not compelled by God's obvious presence to do good instead of evil). I am not particularly compelled by this argument.

Is it really true that God would secure such goods by keeping Himself epistemically distant? Drawing from a parental analogy, I can see some plausibility. If a child is in the presence of a parent or authority figure, perhaps they will behave well merely in virtue of the fact that the authority figure is present. This seems less valuable than if the child behaves well in the absence of the parental figure, simply because the child deems such behavior virtuous. However, I don’t think this is analogous in the case of God.

The believer in God, to the extent that they are rationally compelled by the existence of God, will not perceive God as being epistemically distant. Furthermore, they will believe that God is omnipresent. Back to the parental analogy, the believer is like the child, but wherever the child goes, they believe the parent is inevitably present. If Swinburne is correct, then it seems like the goods gained by God's epistemic distance are not secured, at least for believers in God. Would this imply that believers are being robbed of their freedom and being compelled by God's existence to do good, that believers' motives for their actions are, in a sense, corrupted by their belief in God? I am not entirely sure, actually, but there seems to be some tension here.

Besides the earlier point, the argument also seems to conflict with Christian tradition. Namely, because there are several instances, especially in the Old Testament, where God is clearly present and explicitly outlines rewards/punishment for human behavior. Nonetheless, humans in the Old Testament are not compelled to act righteously. In fact, they very frequently fall into evil acts. So, the claim that God must remain epistemically distant to ensure that people have true freedom to choose between good and evil seems to fall flat if Christianity is true.

On a side note, Swinburne argues that God cannot make the reward of Heaven too obvious either for similar reasons. However, he also claims that it is good for God to encourage us to do good by providing us with the uncertain possibility of Heaven. This seems contradictory. If Swinburne is right that doing a moral action for a reward is not as good as doing a moral action for the sake of goodness, then it does not make a difference whether my motive is the certainty of receiving a reward or the possibility of receiving a reward. Either way, the motive is not the "right" one.

I could write more, but this post is already too long. Would love to hear y'all's thoughts!

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