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#1
04-23-2005, 03:15 PM
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Thoughts on free will vs. determinism
For the following we will assume a god does exist.
Imagine i have free will. imagine we all do. complete free will. That means I can do anythiing i want, anyone can, and god can't stop them. god cant' control the fate of humanity, god can't control the fate the universe, god can't even choose who get's into heaven and hell since that's dictated by people's behavior and beliefs. Free will reduces god to a helpless observer. Imagine a state of total determinism. God planned everything that happens in the world from day one. He decided that the holacause was going to happen, that i'm giong to type this, that little children will die of hunger, all the pain and suffering inflicted on innocent lives is not only endorsed by god, but made that way at his discretion. (note male gender use of god only be convention). So determisism makes god evil and sadistic Imagine any state between the 2 extremes. We have partial free will, but god intervenes and changes some things as he sees fit. In this case, where god chooses what to fix and what to leave alone, clearly he chooses not to fix innocent people dying, kids starving, holacausts, and so on. So even though it would be easy for him to fix and he does fix things, he just chooses not to, he doesn't care. So we have 3 models Free will: God is impotent Determism: God is evil Both: God is apathetic. Which do you like? 
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#3
04-23-2005, 04:15 PM
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Re: Thoughts on free will vs. determinism
[ QUOTE ]
So we have 3 models Free will: God is impotent Determism: God is evil Both: God is apathetic. [/ QUOTE ] "God is impotent" and "God is not all powerful" are different things, and there is no reason to jump to the former when we note that bad things do happen in the world. But you do not adress this in your 'in between' - you assume that God is all powerful but is not making rational, understandable, good choices. This leans towards your "God is evil" model. Why can you not consider an 'in-between' model that leans towards impotence? How about - God wants to do good things, God's actions are 'good' in our sense, but God is not all powerful. You have already considered the possibility that God is powerless (something that many scholars might not), so surely you can imagine a possibility where God has limited power. An Excerpt from my last essay: Kushner describes "The Old Trilemma" as the theological problem of the logical relationship between the following three statements: "God is good. God is powerful. Evil is real"5. Jonas phrases the problem as three attributes of God: Absolute goodness, absolute power, and intelligibility6. In either description, "The conjunction of any two of them excludes the third"7, therefore one inferior claim must give way to the other two. Denying the goodness of God ("God's mind works in different ways"5), or denying the intelligibility ("Somehow or other, everything that happens to us is meant for our own good"8), are possible solutions, but denying God's omnipotence ("Maybe God does not cause our suffering"9) is also possible and seems aesthically more appealing.
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#4
04-23-2005, 04:22 PM
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Re: Thoughts on free will vs. determinism
[ QUOTE ]
For the following we will assume a god does exist. [/ QUOTE ] Maybe this is the source of your trilemma [ QUOTE ] Imagine i have free will. imagine we all do. complete free will. That means I can do anythiing i want, anyone can, and god can't stop them. god cant' control the fate of humanity, god can't control the fate the universe, god can't even choose who get's into heaven and hell since that's dictated by people's behavior and beliefs. Free will reduces god to a helpless observer. Imagine a state of total determinism. God planned everything that happens in the world from day one. He decided that the holacause was going to happen, that i'm giong to type this, that little children will die of hunger, all the pain and suffering inflicted on innocent lives is not only endorsed by god, but made that way at his discretion. (note male gender use of god only be convention). So determisism makes god evil and sadistic Imagine any state between the 2 extremes. We have partial free will, but god intervenes and changes some things as he sees fit. In this case, where god chooses what to fix and what to leave alone, clearly he chooses not to fix innocent people dying, kids starving, holacausts, and so on. So even though it would be easy for him to fix and he does fix things, he just chooses not to, he doesn't care. So we have 3 models Free will: God is impotent Determism: God is evil Both: God is apathetic. Which do you like? [/ QUOTE ] GG
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#5
04-23-2005, 06:02 PM
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Re: Thoughts on free will vs. determinism
god granted free will on all humans. he cannot intervene against someone's free will because that would break a law that he set for himself. if he intervened free will, then there would be no free will.
god can intervene things that do not oppose others free will. in heaven free will does not exist. its really not complicated. youre being retarded.
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#6
04-25-2005, 06:50 PM
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Re: Thoughts on free will vs. determinism
[ QUOTE ]
in heaven free will does not exist. [/ QUOTE ] Phew, then I guess I don't have to worry about wanting to get there after all. Logically a case can be made that God is either impotent, somewhat sadistic or non-existent. Which of those it is, I leave to others to speculate. If he is all-powerful, he has the power to end human suffering, and he obviously hasn't stepped in to do that just yet. Personally, I suspect in the grand scheme of things as far as we're concerned, he's largely just dissinterested. God speaks, to some he says to kill, others he says to heal. Those that heal we say have devine influence, those that kill we condemn as deranged. Regardless of the value or morality of the actions so spoken to, both cases have one thing in common, it's all in their head. Everything you experience, is all in your head. "If God did not exist, man would have to create him." Or put another way... "Man created God in his own image."
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#7
04-23-2005, 11:51 PM
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Re: Thoughts on free will vs. determinism
[ QUOTE ]
Thoughts on free will vs. determinism For the following we will assume a god does exist. [/ QUOTE ] God in a deterministic Universe? Are the two compatible? Everything depends on your definitions of course, but in most instances I would say not. Consequently I think the rest of your post looses most of its value.
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#8
04-24-2005, 02:56 AM
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Re: Thoughts on free will vs. determinism
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ] Thoughts on free will vs. determinism For the following we will assume a god does exist. [/ QUOTE ] God in a deterministic Universe? Are the two compatible? Everything depends on your definitions of course, but in most instances I would say not. Consequently I think the rest of your post looses most of its value. [/ QUOTE ] I believe it to be easy to imagine God in a deterministic universe, though I do not believe in it.. God makes the world in a set of initial conditions, then the world follows a path determined solely by the natural laws. It's not a foreign thought to theologians, notably Baruch (Benedict) Spinoza
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#9
04-24-2005, 04:09 AM
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Re: Thoughts on free will vs. determinism
Maybe your thoughts about God are all in your head.
PairTheBoard
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#10
04-24-2005, 01:47 PM
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Re: Thoughts on free will vs. determinism
How much longer is it going to be before humanity erases this stupid god-thing from it's collective memory?
I mean, we have science, we have schools, we have common sense. Why, oh why, do we put up with this religion-nonsense? Nothing good is ever going to come from it. I honestly believe that religion is the root of most evil in the world.
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