Jon, List,
Jon, although at times you have seemed open to a possible panentheistic
interpretation of Peirce’s views, in this paper you have apparently
rejected that possibility. Here I'll outline the case for a Peirce-based
panentheism. [Note: For those who find the idea of 'God' problematic, I see
no harm in substituting 'Mind' for it in the discussion below, although I
think Jon might disagree. Peirce writes that “the only possible motive for
the hypothesis of God is the need of accounting for the reasonableness of
the universe” (CP 6.300), and elsewhere that “there is an element of mind
in the universe, and it is that element which is the cause of the growth of
reason” (CP 4.536).]
Your argument against panentheism seems structured around this classical
theistic premise: God’s being must be necessary, self-sufficient, and
independent of all existential being. You maintain that panentheism
illegitimately makes the universe a component of God’s being and allows
natural processes to affect God and, in doing so, they compromises the
aforementioned divine attributes. That is, if God’s being were in any way
internally constituted by cosmic processes, God could no longer be understood
as necessary, self-sufficient, and independent, that a claim that the
universe is 'in' God implies a two-way *constitutive relation*.
However, I would
argue that the idea of being 'in' God need not be symmetric but can be
viewed asymmetrically (to be argued below). This is to say that a panentheistic
view need not hold that the universe alters God’s being, that it 'feeds
back' into God’s independence and self-sufficiency, or that it affects God
in any way that compromises God's attributes just mentioned.
Considering that the universe is ongoing, evolutionary, such that it
involves novelty and growth, if reality is genuinely continuous it becomes
at least plausible to say that the universe is 'in' God, not as an
externally created 'product', but as a *continuous divine utterance*: an
internal relation of expression, meaning, and final causation, by which I
mean that *God draws the universe toward intelligibility* (and coherence and
value).
Semiotically, God is not only the dynamic object of the universe, its
ontological Alpha, but also cosmologically its Omega, fully revealed in the
final interpretant of the universe's semiosic process. Seen this way, the
universe is intrinsically ordered toward God as its telos. And God, as the
dynamic object of the universe as symbol, *constrains* *and orients its
growth without determining it*. God, as telos of the cosmos, governs (in
the sense of constraining) the universal process, but is in no way
constituted by it.
I think that the theistic argument perhaps may be conflating* immanence *
with* constitutive dependence*. As I see it, immanence represents a manner
of *present* involvement: The world 'in' God is, in my panentheistic view,
both the *expression of God* (the Word of God) and *sustained by God*.
Constitutive dependence, on the other hand, is an ontological claim: God’s
being is partially composed of, or somehow dependent upon the universe (in
the sense of 'feedback'). If I'm correct, in your paper -- and in other
papers, and on List and off List discussions -- immanence is treated as if
it necessarily entails constitutive dependence.
If one reads transcendence solely ontologically then it requires God to be
metaphysically external to the universe. Now I am sure that we both agree
that (a.) God is not an object among objects and (b.) is known only through
signs. So a panentheist might offer the analogy that God transcends the
created universe in the way the meaning of any dynamic object transcends
its (possible and actual) individual signs. As I read him, what Peirce denies
is *causal feedback* that would alter God’s necessity and independence. I
can fully accept this while still holding that the universe is God’s
ongoing self-expression, and that the fullness of God includes the *utterance
of his** Word** in the world*.
So I would hold that Peirce’s religious metaphysical language, in
combination with certain facets of his semeiotic, doesn't exclude a
panentheistic interpretation. God fully revealed at/as the Omega of cosmic
evolution suggests that creation is ongoing and that the universe functions
as a symbol of God: God is both Alpha (the *creative* dynamic object) and
Omega ("God fully revealed" in the final interpretant of the argument that
is this grand cosmic symbol, our universe). We are *drawn* to the reality
of God. These ideas tend to support panentheism unless one insists on a
sharp creator/creation dualism which, it would seem, classical theism does.
As a theist, Peirce rejected immanentism, agreed. But at least some of
his views (not necessarily all of those of "A Neglected Argument for the
Reality of God") can be seen to point toward panentheism.
So the question as I see it is this: Does Peirce hold that God is related
to the universe merely as its explanatory ground or, also, as its immanent
meaning and the final cause to which the universe/we are drawn? You argue
for the former; some panentheists argue for the latter. I, and arguably,
Peirce see the *possible* 'truth' in both, and the ambiguity seems to me
not to be a defect but, rather, a consequence of his (perhaps unconscious)
and my refusal to precide that which ought to (perhaps *must*) remain vague.
Another way of stating all this is that a Peirce-inspired panentheism
doesn't make the world a mereological part of God, does not place God as
some sort of 'part of' or 'object' within the three universes, doesn't make
God dependent on the world in any way.
This theistic/pantheistic dispute would seem to mirror a related tension
that I’ve elsewhere framed as that between *ontological 3ns* and *cosmological
3ns*. Ontological 3ns names the aboriginal condition of mediation,
continuity, and intelligibility as such, i.e., the condition of there being
a cosmos at all. Cosmological 3ns names the emergence in time of qualities,
habits, laws, and sign relations. You argue for ontological 3ns as ground;
panentheists of my ilk can agree with you there, but see cosmological 3ns
as unfolding upon the utterances of that ground. So I see God as both
primal creator of and also the telos of the cosmos such that ontological
3ns and cosmological 3ns are ultimately united. A full-blown theory of
continuity would seem to me to demand something like that.
My view of panentheism (which, I admit, is not universally held even by
panentheists), is that 'in' God names, shall we say, a kind of *teleo-semiotic
involvement*, but not a constitutive one. The universe grows *toward* God
"fully revealed" through physical and spiritual evolution (Peirce's
'evolutionary love').
Peirce believed that if the reality of a benign God could be proved that it
would be a great benefit to mankind, indeed "a good outweighing all others." In
my view, failure to keep the logical-metaphysical levels discussed
above distinct
-- for example, by collapsing immanence into dependence, and viewing
transcendence as exteriority -- is where metaphysical/cosmological inquiry
can get blocked. I believe a broader view than the classic theological one
is needed should we ever hope to evolve anything approaching a universal
religious understanding, and I believe that a fuller, deeper reading of
Peirce's semeiotic as it relates to his metaphysical ideas may yet point a
way to the development of that universal *summum bonum*, that "good
outweighing all others."
Best,
Gary R
On Wed, Jan 21, 2026 at 10:16 AM Jon Alan Schmidt <[email protected]>
wrote:
> List:
>
> The subject line of this post is the title of my paper (
> https://doi.org/10.2979/csp.00048) that appears in the latest issue of
> *Transactions
> of the Charles S. Peirce Society* (https://muse.jhu.edu/issue/56250). If
> you do not currently have access to that journal, then I encourage you to
> consider subscribing electronically for less than $40 per year (
> https://iupress.org/journals/transactions/), which includes membership in
> the Society (https://peircesociety.org/).
>
> As I acknowledge in the final endnote, I prepared this text on the basis
> of a series of List discussions that took place in August-November 2024,
> initiated by Gary Fuhrman and joined by others including Jeffrey Downard,
> Helmut Raulien, Gary Richmond, and Edwina Taborsky. Here is the abstract.
>
> Charles Peirce begins his best-known text about religious metaphysics by
> defining the proper name "God" as *Ens necessarium*. In two previously
> unpublished manuscripts, he advocates the hypothesis of such a "necessary
> being" as the only "rational explanation" that is "adequate to account for
> the sum total of reality," namely, "the three universes" that together
> encompass "all the phenomena there are." Combining key statements from
> those passages into a series of distinct steps yields a cosmological
> argumentation for this conclusion, one resembling that of Gottfried
> Leibniz. In conjunction with Peirce’s other relevant writings, it has
> implications for the attributes of God, as well as for the relationship
> between God and the universe, while also raising questions that call for
> further study.
>
>
> One of the anonymous reviewers suggested several such questions, which are
> listed in the conclusion as follows.
>
> - To what extent was Peirce directly influenced by Leibniz’s writings
> in developing his own cosmological argumentation? How do the differences
> between their approaches affect the persuasiveness of their formulations,
> especially in the context of each one’s overall logical and metaphysical
> views?
> - How does Peirce’s cosmological argumentation interact with his
> better-known "Neglected Argument"? Are they fully complementary, or
> conflicting in at least some respects?
> - Exactly what does Peirce mean by advocating theological
> anthropomorphism? How does it square with his insistence on a concept of
> God that is "vague in the extreme"?
> - If God is only vaguely conceived as a hypostatic abstraction, "that
> which creates this universe," does anything testable or practical follow
> from that hypothesis? If not, does it violate Peirce’s pragmaticism?
> - In what sense does this universe that we know through experience
> follow as a necessary consequence from the hypothesis of *Ens
> necessarium* as "that which would Really be in any possible state of
> things whatever"? Why this universe, rather than any other?
>
> Please consider this an invitation to share your thoughts about possible
> answers and/or comment on the content of the paper itself. As I state in
> its very last sentence, "My sincere hope is that others will now build on
> the preliminary groundwork laid here by pursuing these and related topics."
>
> Regards,
>
> Jon Alan Schmidt - Olathe, Kansas, USA
> Structural Engineer, Synechist Philosopher, Lutheran Christian
> www.LinkedIn.com/in/JonAlanSchmidt / twitter.com/JonAlanSchmidt
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