The Problem of the Wholly New

Ever heard the saying “there’s nothing new under the sun”? Well, what if there was?

Imagine we come across an object that is, in the most literal sense, a novelty? This object does not possess any property that we are familiar with. Rather the object possesses the following properties: it is schlep, schloop, and schlorp. 

I know what you’re thinking, “that doesn’t make any sense!” 

Exactly. 

Such an object would be wholly other and would have no basis in our experience. We cannot wrap our head around it or even begin to comprehend it. We cannot even conceive of such a thing. It is totally unknowable, mysterious, and cannot be distinguished from something that is nonexistent.

The point is simply that the intelligibility of our experience is contingent on there being no novelties (in the true sense of the word) in our experience. We would like to think that there is nothing new under the sun. Sure, there may be things which we do not understand. However, whatever it is we experience, we always can make sense of it in some way even if not fully. But if there truly are no novelties in our experience - if there truly is nothing new under the sun - then we must ask what it is that makes it that way. 

From our brief thought experiment, we see that for something to not be a novelty, it must possess some property that we can relate to our experience. We must be able to incorporate it into our system of concepts and relate it to other things that share similar properties. 

But, you see, our system of concepts - our conceptual scheme - is totally internal to our minds. There is absolutely no reason why every possible temporal fact that we could come across in our experience must be relatable to that conceptual scheme. And if we think about it a bit more, we can see that there is no objective difference between the objects we normally experience (and make sense of) and the novel object in our thought experiment. 

When we come across an object and make sense of it (by identifying its properties and relating it to objects with similar properties), all we’re doing is internal to our minds. The act of individuation is purely mental and dependent on our system of concepts. But there is no reason why the relation that occurs within our minds should have any bearing on mind-independent reality. After all, the facts in the world are not instantiated in virtue of our internal mental activity. 

This is the problem of the wholly new: unless there is a system that relates all possible temporal facts objectively, then all facts are novelties. The only way a temporal fact is not a novelty is if it shares properties with some previously instantiated fact. But how can a newly instantiated temporal fact share properties with a previously instantiated temporal fact if there is no system that relates them both prior to their instantiation?

To avoid novelties in human experience, not only must there be a comprehensive system that timelessly relates all temporal facts, the human conceptual scheme must also reflect in some way this timeless system.  Only the Christian understanding of reality makes this possible.  The eternal counsel of God serves as the timeless system that relates all temporal facts prior to their instantiation. And divine revelation furnishes the human mind with interpretive categories and concepts that reflect the mind of God on a created and finite level. 

For the Christian, there is nothing new under the sun because there is nothing new for God. For the unbeliever, though, novelty rules history. This is another illustration that without a Christian understanding of reality, nothing would make sense. And it is one illustration among many contained in The Best Argument for Christianity. You can get it here.

God bless!

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