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NoobX
Undefeatable Hero
Now, this is a paradox...
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posted November 01, 2019 06:38 PM |
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I kind of expected that answer. That is another thing brought up very often. Couldn't God - being omnipotent, omniscient, and omnibenevolent - create a universe without any suffering, no matter how good the outcome of that suffering is? What the paradox boils down to is that you have to get rid of at least one of the three attributes for it to make sense. If you say God is beyond normal, logical comprehension then we really can't talk about him in any way; even saying that he is beyond comprehension is a problem because we shouldn't be able to comprehend that he is beyond comprehension. It keeps spiraling down into absurd.
____________
Ghost said:
Door knob resembles anus tap.
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Stevie
Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
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posted November 01, 2019 11:03 PM |
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Edited by Stevie at 23:04, 01 Nov 2019.
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Recent topic in my life too. After having debates with people, I've became pretty much convinced that free will is the only way things make sense, like the Bible in its entirety or everyday life. Although I would like to formulate a really good, exhaustive answer on the matter, I am just hard pressed for time lately so I can't afford to (and I also can't find a good read to recommend). So I'll rather do some bullet points, maybe that's helpful if only somewhat.
- I don't buy the logic that God's attributes are inconsistent or paradoxical. Ex: "If God is omniscient, does that mean He also knows what not knowing is? He can't, because He knows everything. But knowing everything would mean knowing what not knowing is too. Therefore paradox. Therefore God can't be omniscient." My answer to something along those lines would be: not knowing is not "something" to be known, it's "nothing", it doesn't not correlate to reality. You can't know something that does not exist as a logical necessity, it's not a refutation of omniscience, it's just a bad argument.
- Neraus has it right when he says that predestination comes into conflict with the nature of God. If predestination was true and every event in history was predestined to occur, then the ultimate cause of sin would be God as his agency alone determined it. Everything else just collapses from there.
- If salvation was predetermined, then it was inevitable. You were either condemned or saved no matter what you did. Either way, you never deserved the outcome.
- Calvinists have a warped understanding of God's sovereignty. They believe that a God who would allow free will would be a weak God subject to man's decision. They have a hard time understanding how a sovereign God can empower man witch the ability to choose.
- A loving God that says "whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have eternal life" (John 3:16) and "not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance" (2 Peter 3:9), simply cannot be a God of predestination because that would be a contradiction. God cannot be sincerely wishing for everyone to be saved and at the same time, in his omnipotence, preordaining billions to hell.
- From experience, Calvinists have a set of Bible quotes in support of predestination that is easier to explain satisfyingly (pretty hard nonetheless, it's a tough subject). But quotes like the one above leave little to no room for interpretation.
- And finally (I bet there's more, but I'm drawing blanks and just want to enjoy my weekend), I feel the most crucial aspect here is the fact that, in actuality, when you debate people, the meaning of the words tends to shift or expand, or become inclusive of something. Bait and switch tactics that just add to the confusion. That's just a very dangerous pitfall and it happens when people who decide at some point that winning the argument is more important than finding the truth and convincing yourself first and foremost of its truthfulness.
____________
Guide to a Great Heroes Game
The Young Traveler
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blizzardboy
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
Nerf Herder
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posted November 02, 2019 12:57 AM |
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What paradox? Free will and omniscience exist simultaneously. They are not mutually exclusive. This question doesn't even have anything to do with God, really. It can be framed within a purely atheistic mindset. Any ordinary person can have knowledge of an event and this in itself doesn't impact or influence the circumstances of the event.
Time is something that exists within the laws of physics. Knowing that somebody is going to do something is not the same thing as them not having a choice. It's analogous to watching a recording of somebody doing something, except you have this recording from the future or an alternate universe. Your knowledge of the event doesn't negate the free agency. Knowledge is passive.
This stuff was already all hashed out in the medieval ages almost a thousand years ago.
Calvin was a politician more than he was a theologian and he demonstrated many symptoms of obsessive compulsive disorder. He wanted order imposed on Swiss society and that meant a system where everything was as simple and mechanical as possible, including taking a lot of nuance out of theology that had previously existed from people like Aquinas, Bonaventure, etc. He wanted it dumbed down. And it wasn't particularly original either. Close equivalents to Calvinism already existed centuries earlier when the Roman Empire was still around. It died out within Christianity for awhile although Islam believed in an equivalent of Calvinist determinism up until relatively recently (some still do), so the idea caught on in popularity in the eastern empire and made its way further east. The idea is mostly popular among people who want to anthropomorphize God and put him inside linear time.
____________
"Folks, I don't trust children. They're here to replace us."
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artu
Promising
Undefeatable Hero
My BS sensor is tingling again
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posted November 02, 2019 01:40 AM |
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I am not in a position to find the link right now but the Uncertainty Principle is no more a measurment problem, in subatomic world, how photons will act out is actually uncertain, last I checked.
But even if that wasnt so, I think it is quite dull to carry out such quantum level stuff to matters such as free will etc. The subatomic level is... subatomic. If it has any efffect on your behavior, it’s like 0.00000000000000000000000001 versus 0.0000000000000000000000000002.
The philosophical question is still the old one: If there is determinism, there is no free will. That means there can be no responsibility about the way you act, hence, there can be no reward or punishment from a god. If you belive in a deterministic world, you can only be a pantheist in the Spinozian sense, not a theist.
If not, if there is choice, there can be no “omniscience” and naturally, no omniscient god. Future is either determined or not, no matter how you “space-time” your lingo, if it is not determined, no omniscience, if it is, no free will. It really is that simple.
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Are you pretty? This is my occasion. - Ghost
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blizzardboy
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
Nerf Herder
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posted November 02, 2019 02:13 AM |
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It depends what you mean by "determined".
The past is determined because it already happened. The future already happened as well even though we haven't personally seen it yet. That's why we (we personally: our generation) call it the future from our frame of reference. But our personal future can be another person's past. Since we exist in the year 2019, the choices of everybody from the 1700s are already determined. For somebody who exists in the year 2220, our future choices are already determined because they are the past. So on and so forth. That is not mutually exclusive from free will. There is no paradox there.
Now if you bring the subject of God into it, God transcends time and he exists infinitely into the future and the past. So everything that is going to happen from our frame of reference already happened and it's in the past.
Or you can bring it down further: just an ordinary physical being from another universe that doesn't exist in our time would be able to see everything from a panoramic view: our past, our present, and our future. Knowledge is passive so by itself it doesn't affect free agency.
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"Folks, I don't trust children. They're here to replace us."
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artu
Promising
Undefeatable Hero
My BS sensor is tingling again
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posted November 02, 2019 03:17 AM |
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Edited by artu at 03:19, 02 Nov 2019.
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Dude, saying things like “God transcends time” is just saying it. What is it to transcend time? How can anything transcend space-time? I mean, if somehow something does, you have absolutely no way of bringing an opinion about such a üveatükktggtf.
And of course, with or without god, there is a paradox because free will is only a meaningful definition if your will can make a difference. Which would mean, by your logic, there would be infinite pasts and nows and futures depending on which side of the bed you decided to sleep each pasts and nows and futures. That is to break down causality. Why do you think light is the limit of speed, because if it wasnt, then cause and effect breaks down. Words are easy, we can talk about a rectangular triangle. But can you actually imagine a rectangular triangle? Can you actually imagine a future determined yet also capable of change by choice?
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Are you pretty? This is my occasion. - Ghost
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blizzardboy
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
Nerf Herder
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posted November 02, 2019 03:26 AM |
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No, I can't imagine a rectangular triangle or have any hope of trying to explain such a thing.
Yes, I can imagine both free will and determinism. I don't see a paradox. I did my best to explain it. This is actually a pretty mainstream idea at least as far as the Christian religion goes. I keep repeating myself but I'll say again: knowledge of an event is passive and it does not affect free agency. We can look back on the actions of people in the 1700s and know what they did or didn't do but that doesn't mean they didn't have free agency during the time they were alive. It's just that for us, it is the past, whereas for them it was the present.
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"Folks, I don't trust children. They're here to replace us."
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artu
Promising
Undefeatable Hero
My BS sensor is tingling again
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posted November 02, 2019 03:38 AM |
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Edited by artu at 03:40, 02 Nov 2019.
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Knowledge of an event and knowledge of infinite probabilites are quite a different thing. You can only (hypothetically) know the future if there is one single future and if there is one single future, there is no free will.
There is one single past.
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Are you pretty? This is my occasion. - Ghost
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blizzardboy
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
Nerf Herder
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posted November 02, 2019 03:46 AM |
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Probabilities is separate from free will, which is more of a philosophical idea. Probability is mathematical. But just to play with that idea a bit:
If I roll a pair of dice there are certain probabilities of outcomes, with 7 being the highest and other numbers being lower.
But regardless of all the numbers I could hypothetically roll, I only end up rolling one of them, and once it is done it becomes the past and it is fixed. Does that mean there was a 100% chance of only rolling one number? No, because the law of probabilities remains the same.
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"Folks, I don't trust children. They're here to replace us."
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artu
Promising
Undefeatable Hero
My BS sensor is tingling again
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posted November 02, 2019 04:08 AM |
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So free will is a philosophical idea and probability is math, that’s why no matter the outcome, you can insert this idea into the equation. Sounds like quite the “sophist” thing to say. Free will is not seperated from probability because free will - by definition- means to be able to have some level of effect about this or that probability “ending up” as reality.
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Are you pretty? This is my occasion. - Ghost
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blizzardboy
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
Nerf Herder
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posted November 02, 2019 04:18 AM |
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I mean they're not exactly the same thing. There are probability of outcomes for a pair of dice but the dice don't have free agency.
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"Folks, I don't trust children. They're here to replace us."
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artu
Promising
Undefeatable Hero
My BS sensor is tingling again
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posted November 02, 2019 04:24 AM |
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It’s a flawed analogy. You have no free will over the outcome of the dice, free will is about whether to throw the dice or not throw the dice or play poker or play bridge or just lay in bed or go to a movie or.... It’s much different than statistics.
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Are you pretty? This is my occasion. - Ghost
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blizzardboy
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
Nerf Herder
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posted November 02, 2019 04:29 AM |
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Yes I don't think you can describe probability the same as free will. Say, if there is a 20% chance to do X, a 40% chance to do Y, and a 40% chance to do Z.
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"Folks, I don't trust children. They're here to replace us."
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Oddball13579
Supreme Hero
Grandmaster of the Hunt
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posted November 02, 2019 04:33 AM |
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I'd just like to put my two cents in. When it comes to the Bible and religion in general there are two things that stand out to me.
1. The "Problem of Evil". Does God want to stop evil, but can't? If so then he is not omnipotent. Is he able to stop evil, but chooses not to? If so then he is not omnibenevolent. — Problem of evil - Wikipedia You can read more here.
2. The "Omnipotence Paradox". If God truly is omnipotent then he should be able to do/create contradictory things such as square circles. If he truly is omnipotent then he should be able to create a stone that is to heavy for even him to lift. But if he can do this and not be able to lift it, then he isn't omnipotent. Same goes for if he can't create a stone. — Omnipotence Paradox - Wikipedia Again you can read more here.
So I thought I'd just pop in and drop these two things off with you guys. Food for thought, hmmmm?
Omnipotent, Omnibenevolent, Omniscient. According to above articles, God could only be 1 out of those 3. 2 depending on what they are.
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"Just slide her down a bit farther. I could wear her like a hat." - Gnomes
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tSar-Ivor
Promising
Legendary Hero
Scourge of God
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posted November 02, 2019 07:08 AM |
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NoobX said:
I kind of expected that answer. That is another thing brought up very often. Couldn't God - being omnipotent, omniscient, and omnibenevolent - create a universe without any suffering, no matter how good the outcome of that suffering is? What the paradox boils down to is that you have to get rid of at least one of the three attributes for it to make sense. If you say God is beyond normal, logical comprehension then we really can't talk about him in any way; even saying that he is beyond comprehension is a problem because we shouldn't be able to comprehend that he is beyond comprehension. It keeps spiraling down into absurd.
As for god being omnipotent, i don't believe that's the case, ending human suffering is virtually impossible without sacrificing a key element that makes us human (and suffering possible) and hence would reduce us to a state lower than human hence make our existence pointless, if we are here to solve a problem that first spawned our existence.
You see, my theory is that if there is a great being whose principles are iron law of the universe, but it suffers despite knowing that it is right and true, how does it go about resolving it? Right and true as in all it's ever known has brought it to that conclusion.
Same as a software or code, if it is seemingly perfect but with a critical flaw somewhere you break the whole damn thing down to the last atom and find the anomaly. Imho.
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"No laughs were had. There is only shame and sadness." Jenny
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Drakon-Deus
Undefeatable Hero
Qapla'
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posted November 02, 2019 07:30 AM |
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@Oddy
Your first point about evil reminded me of a verse that's not so often talked about. Emphasis mine.
Isaiah 45:7 I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the Lord do all these things.
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Horses don't die on a dog's wish.
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Stevie
Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
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posted November 02, 2019 07:42 AM |
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What Blizzardboy is trying to say, and I agree with him as I was convinced the same, is that God's foreknowledge does not cause an event, the event causes God's foreknowledge. The fact that God knew I'd write this post did not cause me to write this post, me writing this post caused God to know. And I wrote this post out of free will. That's how it goes.
Oddball, problem of evil is not hard to explain. A powerful and benevolent God gave man free will and called it good, man used it to sin. Man is responsible for the mess it caused and has to deal with the consequences. God just respects the free will he invested in humanity, leaving us to see for ourselves the consequences (death, suffering) so that we can draw the conclusion that God was right all along and that our sin is an unjustified abomination worthy of condemnation. He also gave us a way out, proving His loving nature once more.
Also, those paradoxes are poor arguments. If God is omnipotent, he should be able to make square circles, or stones He couldn't lift - no, those just fail the logical test, they're impossible by definition, contradictory within themselves. Claiming God should be able to follow through with illogical things is misunderstanding omnipotence.
____________
Guide to a Great Heroes Game
The Young Traveler
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monere
Bad-mannered
Supreme Hero
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posted November 02, 2019 08:27 AM |
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Quote:
The fact that God knew I'd write this post did not cause me to write this post, me writing this post caused God to know
God - if we agree that he/she/it is almighty - can also influence minds, not just read them. So, how do you know it wasn't his/her/its (for the sake of simplicity I'll refer to him/her/it as "it") will that made you write the post?
Quote:
And I wrote this post out of free will
if you know of a surefire way of telling free will apart from God's will please share! I've been battling this question for years
Quote:
God just respects the free will he invested in humanity
how do you know that this is what God does?
Quote:
If God is omnipotent, he should be able to make square circles
if there is a God indeed - when I say "God" I'm referring to an entity (not necessarily human being) capable of knowing and influencing everything in Universe at any given moment - then yes, it is able to make square circles since this is what omnipotency is all about. But the question is if you can tell the square circles when you see them. To create something like this (that seems impossible for our current level of knowledge) means you have a different type of logic, a different understanding and view of many things (the human psyche), the environment and how the human psyche interacts with it, and probably many other things. Do you have this understanding that allows you to see the square circles?
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Neraus
Promising
Legendary Hero
Pain relief cream seller
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posted November 02, 2019 09:41 AM |
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I'd like to give my three cents about the three terms that have been thrown around, since I lost the train of thought I had yesterday because I fell asleep.
Going to the realm of absurdities for a moment, I always like to give this image to explain what omnipotence is, imagine for a moment this: as you all know, our world is made essentially of quarks, that combine to form the subatomic particles we know, then they make particles, then they make molecules and so on. Now, imagine that for some unknown reason God decided that matter is made of miniscule flaming fluffy cats, that interact to form basically really fine meshes of said cats that interact in similar ways to current matter and are so fine that optically reality doesn't change it's appearance. You wouldn't notice. Not just because only the unseeable has been changed, but also because God could have simply overwritten your memories of how matter works to fit this new world.
It's like the squaring of a triangle, or making the stone impossible to lift, God could do that, but why? And how would you observe it? Can you understand it? Is it even a problem of God creating something that he couldn't "lift"? He could've made thousands upon thousands of those, and then, bored with them, could have found other ways to dispose of them, and so on.
Yes, it's indeed a spiral of absurdity, but God made the rules, so He can ignore them to His liking.
Omniscience is a simplification made to cater to us as well, what is knowledge after all? Simply God is aware of whatever is happening everywhere, and has full knowledge of what happened before that, even at the smallest grain. Thus, why shouldn't God know the future? Well, what if instead the future doesn't exist? After all, it's an abstraction made to place our predictions of subsequent events. What if instead God's foreknowledge is that on steroids?
Well, technically the past is too an abstraction of the cumulation of past phenomena on an object, so...
Transcending time is a consequence of being able to change an object to its very core, it's a null term because time is not an absolute.
Lastly, omnibenevolence, this is the most tricky of all, because it's the most subjective of the three, the easy Christian answer is basically that God is the embodiment of good, thus good comes from God and easy peasy, good is what is in accordance with God. The adjective in the context of Christianity thus has to obey that rule, otherwise... As any 4 years old and up knows, good is quite subjective when separated from an established code of rules, and so, if your good is my evil and viceversa, if God is omnibenevolent He has His own code of conduct, by wouldn't He technically do one of those things that you consider evil? Then we have to cue in the usual beer conversation of what even is evil.
Thus why there is the need to establish that an objective kind of good has to exist, otherwise this term becomes null, which is the reason why one finds contradictions in this term, you can't do all good if it's subjective, and thus you can find evil in what could be considered utilitarian acts.
Other two cents on evil. People tend to forget the other epithet that is attributed to God, and that is being the embodiment of justice. Thus, imagine this, you are threatened by a psychopath with a knife, you have a knife to defend yourself. What if God instead killed the guy, or immobilised him, or intervened in anyway. Would that be just for those that he didn't intervene in? Would it be just for the aggressor? What if that attempt was his lowest point and brought him to redemption? Sure you'd say, sucks to be you, you're dead... But then again, returning to a previous point, if you ended up in Heaven is that a problem for you? So use that knife and defend yourself, help yourself that God will help you as we say.
The problem of trying to eradicate evil is not simply a free will problem, it's also a matter of rights and giving everyone a fair chance.
I'm under the rain now.
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Noli offendere Patriam Agathae quia ultrix iniuriarum est.
ANTUDO
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monere
Bad-mannered
Supreme Hero
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posted November 02, 2019 09:59 AM |
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Quote:
...you are threatened by a psychopath with a knife...
if he is a psychopath and he threatens you with a knife then he's got nothing to do with God and he needs to be immobilized and then cured or jailed (depending on possibilities and circumstances). This, if we assume that God is benevolent, obviously. If he's just omnipotent and omniscient but neutral then yes, this scenario can be attributed to God's will. But God is supposed to be good, isn't it?
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