God and Free Will

[chezlaw]

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How long do we have to wait to pass judgment?

Working it into to an omni- would it limit what it could want or what it could do? How could it do anything without knowing it was good if the goodweighers may have to wait millenia to figure it out themselves.

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As long as we reach that state in a finite amount of time and remain in it for eternity then it doesn't matter when.

For god to be good, god would have to want to be good.

chez

[DougShrapnel]

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About 100 years ago a pregnant lady stepped in front of a Beer wagon. A passerby pulled her back in the nick of time, she died but they managed to save the birth. It was a good thing, she was carrying Albert Einstein. oh,..ooops, it was Adolf Hitler.. this 'good' stuff is tricky.


[/ QUOTE ] Can we really make judgements about the goodness of action based off of unrealated ex post facto's.

[DonkNitUP]

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God clearly cant be all knowing yet still give free will.

[/ QUOTE ] Sure he can refer to the fate and free will post, specifically bunny's post.

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some kind of all-good god that is!

[/ QUOTE ] This I agree with, it doesn't seem possible to have so much sufferening in this world, as well as suffering in the after life just for a lack of belief if god was all-good. He could have just as easily spared the sinners their existance.

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I went back and read Bunny's post about time. And I have to admit I know absolutely nothing about it so I did a search to see what I could find. After I started reading I got more and more confused. Hell I dont even know how we could possibly go back in time, yet alone thinking about block time with (present past and future) all on one "landscape" [img]/images/graemlins/confused.gif[/img]

[Copernicus]

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Everything I believe is based on the principle of 'preponderance of evidence' ...

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How about your belief in the principle of preponderance of evidence? [/q

That is not a belief, it is a standard used to judge the plausibility of a proposition.

Eg. there is a preponderance of evidence that you are a twit (and not even an upperclass twit), and there is no evidence to the contrary. Therefore one can make that judgement without any other underlying beliefs, until and unless it is proven/disproven to a stricter standard.

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Look up the word “belief” and see that its definition is not inconsistent with my use of it referring to an accepted tenet, you low-grade self-soiling troll.

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it is irrelevant that its consistent with your reference as an accepted tenet, it is not consistent with it being a standard by which to judge, which is neither a tenet nor a belief, you obfuscating, illogical descendent of the most ignorant of apes.

[yukoncpa]

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you low-grade self-soiling troll.

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you obfuscating, illogical descendent of the most ignorant of apes.



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These are most beautiful examples of invective. May I have permission from both of you to use these lines in future novels?

[Sharkey]

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Hell I dont even know how we could possibly go back in time, yet alone thinking about block time with (present past and future) all on one "landscape"

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That sort of simultaneous past and future has been adopted by theoreticians as 4-dimensional spacetime in which the course of a person’s life might be represented by a so-called world line.

[bunny]

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Assuming an omni3 (omniscient, omnipotent, omnipresent) god created you, he must know all the choices you will make in your lifetime. So it seems those choices will be made by god, not yourself.

Is it possible to reconcile this god with the idea of free will? For theists and non-theists alike.

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I think it is crucial to the theist position that God not exist within time. I also think it is crucial to the Christian faith that free will exists.

It seems to me that your question presupposes that God has a temporal existence - something along the lines of God exists and thinks "I'm gonna make bunny who will choose such-and-such" God then makes me an lo and behold I choose such-and-such. There does seem a good argument here that God has made the choice, not me, (or at least that he is partly responsible) as he could have made me differently.

I think this is an erroneous conception of the theistic God as I believe he must exist outside of time and space. I claim that God experiences time all-at-once. He creates me (voluntarily limiting his omnipotence to allow me freedom of choice amongst alternatives), observes my entire life, sees every choice I make, watches all consequences of those choices, etc etc...all-at-once. (Even this "all-at-once" involves a concept of time - I dont think this is accurate either but it is the best I can do).

As I have mentioned before - this conception of omniscience doesnt contradict free will since all times are the same for him - his knowing a choice I will make in my future has no more bearing on my freedom to choose it than his knowing a past choice I have made.

With regard to - "He made me, and I chose option A. He could have made me such that I would choose option B. Therefore God chose option A." I think this is incorrect as it seems to presuppose determinism. That is, it seems equivalent to "God could have created me, predetermined to choose option A or predetermined to choose option B. He created me predetermined to choose option A. Therefore God chose option A."

My belief is that God left it up to me (and saw my choice and its consequences in the same moment). I think free will is an "obvious" fact about the world and the burden of proof lies with the determinist.

Parenthetically, Omnipresent is not part of my conception of God as I dont understand what it means. I conceive of God as omniscient, omnipotent and benevolent.

Paraparenthetically (?) - benevolence is the most difficult property to reconcile with the world as I experience it. Omniscience and omnipotence are so fuzzily defined and I think this is what leads to confusion or contradictions. I dont find them probelmatic once I have nailed down exactly what I mean by them. Benevolent is easy to understand and is what I find hardest to defend.

[Sharkey]

Fine by me.

What you run into on message boards.

[DougShrapnel]

Omnipresent = God experiences time all-at-once

It's a foundation of your argument

[Copernicus]

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you low-grade self-soiling troll.

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you obfuscating, illogical descendent of the most ignorant of apes.



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These are most beautiful examples of invective. May I have permission from both of you to use these lines in future novels?

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Feel free, though my comment was not meant as invective, just two statements of fact and one belief based on a standard (!= belief) of preponderance of evidence.