God’s Subjectivity

This post was inspired by a post from another blog. http://themostlikelystory.wordpress.com/2013/01/28/the-view-from-nowhere-and-self-identity/

It’s interesting to think of God’s subjectivity. Many discussions concerning God have to do with wether or not we can prove he/she/its existence, and some conversations perhaps about what we can know of his expectations of us mere mortals. But the fact that God would still be a subject of experience is kind of cool. How does God see the world? Does God believe in good and evil? Free will?
Beyond wether or not God is a real entity, it’s even interesting as a theoretical construct, as some ideal subject. And then what would be the point of his authority? To direct us towards an “objective perspective,” if that phrase could possibly make any sense, to have a perspectiveless perspective… No I suspect the point of considering an ideal subject is to help us to attain our own, closer to perfect, subjectivity. Something along the lines of Heideggerian authenticity.
Kant did some work destroying all existing rational proofs of the existence of God only to put forth his own moral proof. God (even as mere theoretical entity) represents absolute freedom, possibly the only truly free entity in existence. That as we pursue or own duty towards the principle of freedom, wherever it may be found, the reward will be to achieve communion with such an idealized state of freedom.
The free will debate usually assumes we are either free or not, that we are always in one condition or the other. Relatedly, philosophy of identity issues ask whether we are the same person through time. But maybe that’s the point, that we are not the same person through time, and that we must learn how to achieve our potential, at the summit of which is the self-realization of freedom.

We’re moving towards Hegel at this point, but Hegel thinks of it in terms of Universal History. Heidegger is also worth considering, but his version is more personal (eg. existential). The answer has to be somewhere between the extremes.

In 19th century American Philosophy, there were two directions idealism could go, one towards the collectivist, or universal experience, for which we should consult Josiah Royce, and the other towards the individual or personal experience of being in the world, for which we need to read some Ralph Waldo Emerson.