A New Euthyphro-style Problem and a New Reflection on the Old Euthyphro Problem
Consider the Euthyphro Dilemma. In thinking about the relation between God and goodness, one might ask the following question, as Socrates does in the eponymous dialogue:
Is (a) that which is good a good thing merely because God endorses it, or (b) does God endorse what is good because it is intrinsically good? If the former, then goodness seems wholly arbitrary, and hence by approving of them God could make good those acts which are evidently evil, such as genocide and rape. But this is an unacceptable consequence. Some acts are clearly objectively evil and can’t be made good by someone’s imprimatur, even if a divine one. If the latter, then it seems that the good is independent of God, and thus that God lacks aseity and hence is not supremely perfect. This consequence is also problematic. What is the resolution?
Some have suggested that the formulation of the problem is a false dilemma because there is a third option: God endorses what is good because he is good. In other words, God is identical to the Good. He is what Plato called “the Good.” Therefore, goodness is not independent of God, nor is goodness merely what God happens to accept. To my mind, this is a plausible response, though I’m not sure that it’s a tertium quid. Rather, it seems to be a way of articulating (b), namely, that God endorses what is good (i.e., his own nature and whatever good things reflect it) because it is intrinsically good. On this way of construing (b), the problematic consequence is blocked; that is, the good is not independent of God. The Good itself is identical to God, and all other good things are ontologically dependent on God.
Now consider a new Euthyphro-style dilemma: Is (i) a true proposition true merely because God believes it, or (ii) does God believe a true proposition because it is itself true? If (i), then truth is merely subjective to God, and hence by believing them God could make true those propositions which are evidently false, such as “There are round squares growing on trees in Atlanta, Georgia” or “The red shoe is colorless.” This is an unacceptable consequence. But if (ii), then it seems that truth is independent of God, and thus that God is not the creator of all things other than himself. How, for example, could God create the true proposition “God exists”? He’d need to exist as a precondition for creating and therefore the proposition would be true (logically) prior to his creation and hence couldn’t be something that he created.
I don’t think one can legitimately make a similar move by saying that God is identical to truth. Arguably, truth is a relation of correspondence between a proposition (or thought, belief, declarative sentence) and the fact or aspect of reality which that proposition is about. On this account of truth, truth is a relation (i.e., an abstract object) and thus God cannot be identical to it.
And yet it might not seem problematic to say that truth exists and is what it is independent of God. Why then is it problematic to say that goodness exists and is what it is independent of God?