Objective and subjective immortality

• Based around process theology
• David Griffin

  • American professor of philosophy of religion and theology
  • 9/11 conspiracy theorist
• David Griffin developed A.N. Whitehead's ideas around process theology
• Griffin holds the view that God is not the creator
• Process theology

  • The universe is uncreated and eternal
  • Panentheistic
  • God persuaded the world into order
• Panentheistic- the universe is in God and God is in the universe
• STRENGTHS

  • support from quantum mechanics
  • fits with the Big Bang Theory and the Theory of Evolution
  • Explains the problem of evil
  • Claims probability rather than certainty for its views
• LIMITATIONS

  • claims God is not omnipotent: goes against what many people and Christians believe a divine being should be
  • A God who is not omnipotent isn't worthy of worship in many people's eyes (Epicurus)
• Panentheism is the view that God is persuading the universe
• Just as humans have embodied minds, it makes sense to think of God as the soul of the universe
• Our experiences are integrated by the mind, the experiences of the entire universe are integrated in the mind of God
• Process theologians tend to believe in objective immortality
• Objective immortality- after death, all individual entities in the universe remain forever as 'objects' in the mind of God, so in a sense, they never die
• Subjective immortality- the view that beings have the potential to exist forever as "irreducibly subjective units of experience"
• Subjective immortality says that when we die, we will always exist as thinking, feeling subjects. We keep our thoughts, memories and experiences
• Subjective immortality is believed by most Christians
• Some Christians believe that subjective immortality is only for humans
• Roman Catholics do not believe animals have souls
• Objective immortality rejects the idea that only humans have value in God's eyes to be granted immortality after death
• Process theology rejects anthropocentric views
• The problem of redemption

  • What about those who suffered in this life
  • They won't know whether all their suffering will be redeemed