It makes sense to me that God could create a universe that has actual randomness in it and people who have actual free will, even though God knows every event that will happen in the universe before it happens. It isn't God's knowing that something will happen that causes it to happen. It's the thing's happening that causes God to know that it happens. It isn't God's knowing that I will choose to do x tomorrow that causes me to do it. It is my choosing to x tomorrow that causes God to know that I will choose it.
I realize that there are problems with this view. I keep promising myself that someday I'll study and resolve them.
Meanwhile, there is a related problem. Possible worlds. Suppose that there are possible or potential worlds. We're not saying that possible worlds actually exist. Maybe they do or maybe they don't. But we are saying that they at least have the potential to exist. Now imagine the following:
In possible world 1 I choose to do x.
In possible world 2 I choose not to do x.
Is it possible for me to choose not to do x in world 1?
Is it possible for me to choose to do x in world 2?
Let's suppose that the answer to both questions is yes. Then even though I choose to do x in world 1, I could have chosen not to do x in world 1. And even though I choose not to do x in world 2, I could have chosen to do x in world 2. If we define free will as having the ability to do other than I actually choose to do, then I seem to have free will in both possible worlds.
If so, then we seem to have a problem with what is known as the "free will defense against evil." This is the argument or theodicy that God must allow the possibility of evil, if He wants us to have free will. But let's look at possible world 1 and world 2. Let's suppose x is a morally evil action. Couldn't God choose to create world 2, where I do not do x? And wouldn't I still have free will? If so, then it seems possible for God to create a possible world where I have free will and a morally evil action does not occur. And it seems that God could ensure that I wouldn't do x by creating world 2, instead of world 1. Likewise, it would seem that God could create a possible world where we all have free will and no evil actions occur. And it seems that God could ensure that no one would choose to commit evil actions by creating this possible world.
I suspect there is a problem with this view, and that it is not possible for God to ensure that a possible world where we all have free will, will also be a world where we do not choose to commit evil actions.
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