Dr. James Anderson’s Tu Quoque — and Why It Falls Flat

I recently posted this tweet (X) for my Calvinist friends to consider:

Here’s the argument I want my Calvinist friends to consider:

1. If God determines all things, then He determines every thought, belief, and action.

2. All people—including Christians—hold false theological beliefs.

3. Therefore, God determines all people to affirm false theological beliefs.

4. A being who intentionally determines people to believe falsehoods about ultimate reality is—by definition—functioning as a deceiver (even if it’s said to serve a “greater purpose”).

5. Therefore, if exhaustive divine determinism (EDD) is true, God functions as a “deity of deception.”

   
   

This is a question about logical entailment: Does consistent Calvinism entail EDD—and if so, how do you avoid this “deity of deception” problem?”

I intentionally kept my post on X short and straight to the point.

Enter Dr. James Anderson

Dr. James Anderson, a Calvinist philosopher whose work I deeply respect, joined the conversation. In fact, he quoted my post on his own account. Anderson responded on X (formerly Twitter):

Tim is a Molinist. Molinism is also a form of exhaustive divine determinism (see below). On Molinism, God infallibly ordains all things, and thereby determines (non-causally) every thought, belief, and action. Thus, Tim’s argument targets his own Molinism no less than Calvinism.

He added:

The only way for Tim to escape this tu quoque problem is to argue that one of the premises of his argument is true for causal determinism but not true for non-causal determinism. Good luck with that.

And:

Tim adds: “If God’s decree provides those sufficient conditions for your false theological beliefs (and everyone else’s), then God determines those false beliefs...” But the antecedent is just as true given Molinism.

First Things First: What Do I Mean by “Determine”?

Before we go further, let me define my terms clearly for readers (and for James).

By determine, as I have explained in my blogs, videos, and in the academic literature, I mean:

“To provide antecedent conditions sufficient to necessitate an outcome.”

If those prior conditions are present, the outcome cannot fail to occur.

This is the definition used by Calvinist philosophers like Paul Helm and Guillaume Bignon when they defend exhaustive divine determinism (EDD). It's the position I raised in debate against Chris Date and Dr. James White (a view they sought to defend). If you grant EDD, you grant that God’s decree is setting up the necessitating conditions for every single belief—including false theological beliefs.

That’s the target of my argument.

Why Anderson’s Tu Quoque Doesn’t Stick

Anderson’s move is a classic tu quoque: “If your argument sinks Calvinism, it sinks your Molinism too.”

Here’s the problem:

Molinism is not exhaustive divine determinism.

Molinism affirms exhaustive divine predestination, yes—but that’s not the same as exhaustive divine determination.

On Molinism, God infallibly ordains all things—but He doesn’t provide antecedent conditions that necessitate every choice or belief. Instead, He actualizes a world where libertarian agents (humans in God's likeness) make free choices.

That’s exhaustive predestination . . . not determination!

Calling Molinism “non-causal determinism” (as Anderson does) is like calling a conditional prophecy “inevitable determinism.” It muddies the modal waters. That leads to another common confusion, one Anderson hints at in his tweets: the assumption that if God chooses which world to actualize, then everything within that world is determined in the same way.

Actualization ≠ Causation

A common follow-up objection—sometimes implicit in Anderson’s comments—is:

“But if God chose which world to actualize, aren’t all things in that world still determined?”

No. Choosing to actualize a world in which a libertarian agent freely makes choice X doesn’t mean God caused or necessitated that libertarian agent’s free choice of X. That's an incoherent combination of words.

Think of Doctor Strange in Avengers: Infinity War. Strange possessed knowledge of 14,000,605 possible futures. In one of those futures, Thanos, Tony Stark, Captain America, and the rest of the Avengers and villains all freely made certain choices that led to the ultimate victorious "endgame." Strange didn’t causally determine Tony Stark or Thanos to make those decisions—he didn’t override his will or determine his will in the first place—he simply chose to bring about the one feasible freedom-permitting scenario where Tony Stark would freely make them.

That’s how Molinism frames God’s choice. God knows what every free creature would do if He actualized a certain freedom-permitting scenario. He selects which world to actualize, but He's not a "micro-manager" who deterministically scripts every choice into necessity. The creatures’ freedom remains genuine within that chosen world.

Granting Anderson His Premise for Fun

Now, here’s where I pushed back at James directly:

That’s simply false, Dr. Anderson.

Molinism is a form of exhaustive divine predestination, not exhaustive divine determination. Yes—on Molinism God infallibly ordains all things—but that doesn’t mean He provides antecedent conditions sufficient to necessitate all things. That’s what determination means, and Molinism denies it by definition.

But then I added:

Let’s have some fun and grant it for the sake of argument. Assume your (false) view is true and Molinism really is a kind of EDD. If that’s the case, then both Calvinism and Molinism collapse under the same epistemic weight.

That’s what makes Anderson’s tu quoque self-defeating: if he’s right, both systems collapse. It doesn’t rescue Calvinism—it just desperately tries to pull Molinism down with it.

And I told him plainly:

And that’s exactly why your tu quoque move is fallacious — if it were true, it just drags me down with you. Are you ready to join me in abandoning incoherence and finding a better model—maybe even kicking the tires on nuanced views of Open Theism together?

I’m more committed to truth than to any single system—including Molinism. If my own argument undermined Molinism, so be it (but fortunately, it doesn't).

The Real Question for Anderson (and Any Calvinist)

My response ended with this challenge:

Here’s a better option. Which one of the premises of my Deity of Deception argument are false? Please explain.

If you think the whole argument collapses, great—show me where.

Reject Premise 1? Then God doesn’t determine all things. Reject Premise 2? Then somehow Christians don’t hold false beliefs. Reject Premise 3? Then you’ve broken basic logic. Reject Premise 4? Then you’re redefining “deceiver.”

But simply tossing out “Molinism too!” isn’t a refutation—it’s a dodge.

Conclusion

Dr. Anderson is a serious thinker, and I’m glad he engaged. But his tu quoque fails for two reasons:

• It misrepresents Molinism. Molinism isn’t determinism by another name—it’s exhaustive predestination, which is not the same thing as setting up necessitating conditions for every thought, belief, sinful action, and everything else.

• Even if his tu quoque worked, it would be mutually assured destruction. If my argument undermines Molinism, it also undermines Calvinism—and Anderson hasn’t escaped the “deity of deception” problem.

  
  

So here’s my standing question for James (and for any Calvinist who thinks EDD can bear the weight):

Which premise of the Deity of Deception argument do you actually reject?

Because until someone answers that, the epistemic problem remains unsolved.

Why the Conversation Matters

1. If EDD-Calvinism is true, then God determines every human thought and belief — meaning He provides antecedent conditions sufficient to necessitate each outcome.

2. Some of the thoughts and beliefs humans hold — including each Christian — are false theological beliefs, including beliefs about God Himself and His promises.

3. Therefore, if EDD-Calvinism is true, God determines humans (including each Christian) to hold false theological beliefs about God and His promises. (from 1 & 2)

4. If God determines each human to hold false theological beliefs about Himself and His promises, then God intentionally causes each human to believe falsehoods about ultimate reality.

5. To intentionally cause others to believe falsehoods about ultimate reality is, by the standard philosophical definition, to function as a deceiver — even if the deception is claimed to serve a “greater purpose.”

6. Therefore, if EDD-Calvinism is true, God functions as a deceiver — a “deity of deception.” (from 3–5)

7. If God functions as a deity of deception, then His claims and promises are not epistemically trustworthy — because He is the ultimate source of both true and false theological beliefs, and humans would have no basis to distinguish between them.

8. If God’s claims and promises are not epistemically trustworthy, then Scripture — which He authored and inspired — is also not epistemically trustworthy.

9. If Scripture is not epistemically trustworthy, then we have reason to doubt every theological belief we infer from it, because we cannot reliably sort determined truth from determined falsehood.

10. If we have reason to doubt every theological belief we infer from Scripture, then we have reason to doubt EDD-Calvinism itself, since it is one of those theological systems often inferred from the same text.

11. If we have reason to doubt EDD-Calvinism itself, then we also have reason to doubt any other theological doctrine inferred from the text — including the gospel message and the grounds of salvation — because the same epistemic problem infects them all.

12. If we have reason to doubt the gospel message and the grounds of salvation, then we cannot rationally possess assurance of salvation or confidence that we are believing truth rather than divinely determined falsehood.

13. A theological system that entails humans cannot rationally trust their beliefs about God, Scripture, or salvation produces total theological epistemic collapse.

14. Therefore, if EDD-Calvinism is true, then the result is theological epistemic collapse: God functions as a “deity of deception,” Scripture loses epistemic authority, and no theological belief — including Calvinism itself or assurance of salvation — can be rationally trusted.

It's much better to just reject EDD-Calvinism.

Stay reasonable (Isaiah 1:18),

Dr. Tim Stratton (@TSXpress)