Why did God create me?

Debate serious and interesting topics, rant about politics or pop culture, or otherwise converse in essay form about your opinions. The rules of conduct here are a little stricter.
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Postby Ampersand » 2009.05.22 (04:18)

Suki: Really? Gandalf *didn't* make you want to break some moral codes?

Also, s'why I'm agnostic. Once you get so far in debating religion as an Atheist, you can either purposefully stick to strict Atheism, or divorce yourself from it and be Agnostic.
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Postby t̷s͢uk̕a͡t͜ư » 2009.05.22 (04:39)

Ampersand wrote:Also, s'why I'm agnostic. Once you get so far in debating religion as an Atheist, you can either purposefully stick to strict Atheism, or divorce yourself from it and be Agnostic.
Oh, no, I'm an agnostic atheist, so I'm still quite atheist. I recognize that human knowledge is limited, but I still won't put my faith anywhere.
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Postby Ampersand » 2009.05.22 (04:48)

Tsukatu wrote:
Ampersand wrote:Also, s'why I'm agnostic. Once you get so far in debating religion as an Atheist, you can either purposefully stick to strict Atheism, or divorce yourself from it and be Agnostic.
Oh, no, I'm an agnostic atheist, so I'm still quite atheist. I recognize that human knowledge is limited, but I still won't put my faith anywhere.
Oh, by all means. I'm an Agnostic Theist, but we still share the Agnosticism.
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Postby yungerkid » 2009.05.22 (05:07)

Evil has always existed; thus God did not create it. what God did was introduce evil to the world. God did not create evil in the garden, but rather placed it upon humanity.

Jean-luc, God has no control over His actions if He is required to follow logic. And if He isn't, then how can we know truth? What other way besides logic do we have to discover truth? And if we can't trust logic to cover everything (that is, if God is able to transcend it), then how can we know which things it does and does not cover? How can we know anything without it, besides using (easily deceived) senses? I would propose that God does adhere to logic. I've seen no cases to contradict it so far.

You cannot read the Bible either way. "And you He made alive, who were dead in trespasses and sins..." - Dead people can't make choices to follow God. "For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God..." - Not of ourselves. Gift. There is only one way to interpret that verse. There are many more verses in support of this view. I can just keep coming with them. Look at it this way. From within the reference of time (our point of view), we do have free will. From within the reference of time, the future has not yet been decided. But to know the full truth (which is all that matters), we must look at free will from outside of time. From a perspective outside of time, the future has already been decided by a number of factors.

Again, I am not saying that God caused Adam and Eve to violate the law. What I said was this: God created Adam and Eve to be of a certain nature. He knew that that nature would be susceptible to an inevitable temptation by Satan, but created Adam and Eve to have a weakness in that area (of temptation) anyway. Thus, He was responsible for the entrance of sin into the world. It does not matter if He intended Adam and Eve to sin. And the Bible teaches that sin entered the world through Adam as a gateway. That Adam brought damnation on the rest of the world. If God was responsible for Adam's sin, then He is thus responsible for all of our sins. What part of the argument don't you understand? God's actions are reliant on humanity only insofar as He uses humanity to accomplish His goals; that fact on its own (the fact that God uses humans) does not mean that humans can rebel against His plan and foil Him (forcing an omnipotent Being into retreat and replanning). That notion is absurd.

In response to your illustration: of course. Even from a perspective within time (and after the events), surely you can see that they had to perform the action that they did. There is no such thing as not performing an action that one does (historically). God is both inside and outside of time; and His knowledge transcends time and penetrates it. And I allow that the mere fact that God knows our actions is not the prime proof of determinism (although it is certainly a correct one); it is much more definite to say that our actions are dictated by our natures. Besides, that statement has more concrete Biblical support.

Tsukatu, I for one agree with you on the point that omnipotent and omniscient beings do not produce unwanted/unintended results. Again, evil already existed, but then God introduced it (not created it!) to the physical realm. It does not agree with that idea; that's my whole point. If God was responsible for the introduction of evil into the world, then the introduction of evil into the world must have been God's intent. I was using that argument as an attack on God's character.

I did not say that evil was beyond God's power. I just said that it was outside of the physical universe. God did not create moral good either; it also is manifested to a limited extent in the physical realm, but extends out of it. You see? Evil already existed, but God placed it inside the physical realm. I was not implying that evil is beyond God's power.

In your numbered list, you did change my meaning. For option number three, the option is not simply that we could choose God. The option is either that we are offered choice, or that some are forced to go to Hell and some are forced to go to Heaven. This is the correct option, as promoted by the Christian faith (that I believe in).
God created everything, dude...Did both evil and God pop into being the same way?
God always existed, but so did morality. God's will has always existed. God did not create *everything*.
Free Will is entirely contingent upon the existence of unpredictable events.
That's an excellent and clear way of putting it. An unpredictable event is a random one, and where there is randomness, God does not have control. At all.

How do I know this? It is not difficult. Logic, the Bible, and things that we already know to be true. These things are simple if you know how to look at reality.

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Postby lord_day » 2009.05.22 (09:45)

jean-luc wrote:
incluye wrote:
Tsukatu wrote:An omnipotent, omniscient being does not produce unintended results; everything that happens must have been intended by God.
No, not at all. An omnipotent, omniscient being does not produce unforseen results;
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If an omnipotent, omniscient knows the results of all his actions before he does them, and can do any action, due to his omnipotency, then he can create any future he wishes now, by choosing the correct actions in the past. Therefore, if something happens in the future that is not intended by this being, it is either not omniscient because he didn't know it would happen, or not omnipotent because he couldn't choose the correct actions earlier to reach his desired future.
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Postby Atilla » 2009.05.22 (13:53)

jean-luc wrote:Some religions contend that evil is a result of human agency (free will) that god is not directly responsible, but does allow for. God is held to a higher law - he is unable to abridge the concept of agency. As a result, if you choose to do a bad thing, God will not stop you. Looking back at the bible, he has certainly interjected in human affairs, but this is certainly a minority of cases.
God is answerable to a higher law? Shouldn't we be worshiping that law, then, since it transcends even the power of an omnipotent god?

At any rate, even if you believe free will is possible with an omniscient and omnipotent god, there remains the fact that God knew damn well that there would be evil all over the shop and He chooses to do nothing about it. Being omnipotent, it should be entirely possible for God to eliminate evil while still achieving all his other goals - it follows that God is either 1. not omnipotent or 2. allows evil to exist when it is entirely unnecessary, in which case God is not omnibenevolent.

On another tack, I'd say that the assertion that God cannot remove evil from the world because he is bound by some other law necessarily implies that He is not omnibenevolent, as it means that His first priority is not the good of all, but adhering to this law, regardless of the harm it causes.
jean-luc wrote:The concept that god must have introduced evil is a nebulous one. Do you argue, then, that evil is not inherent? by the same turn, I would think that good is not inherent either - there is only what is. This is consistent with several schemes of belief which state that God authored the concept of good and evil. In order for there to be good, one would think there must also be evil. Perhaps God's hands are tied by the rules of logic.
If the concept of good or evil is inherent (that is, it transcends the creation of god), then there is something that transcends the creation of God. Some protestant sects allow for this, but to many it is blasphemous.
Most of the Christian sects I know of would argue vehemently against the idea that there is something that transcends God's creation (other than God and 100% natural God-derivatives like love, of course). Personally, I think that evil is mostly when you go around causing suffering and harm for no good reason. I don't really think you can have evil as some kind of metaphysical force which exists independently of all beings. What does evil even mean if there is nobody to hurt, nobody to suffer?

Regardless, I believe most Christian doctrine holds that, in the beginning, there was only God. Since evil manifestly exists now, if we assume the statement that only God existed in the beginning is true, there are three options:

1. Evil was a part of God and has always existed.
2. Evil was brought into being as a consequence of God creating the universe and so on.
3. Evil just magically appeared out of nowhere. Perhaps it snuck in from the universe next door while God wasn't looking.

God is supposed to be good, so 1 is out. You can argue 3, but... given that God is omnipotent and omniscient, He would have had to know that evil would appear and have the power to prevent it entering His creation, which would seem to imply that He condones evil. There's also the question of how this stuff is appearing if it's not a consequence of God's actions... can new metaphysical concepts just pop out of nowhere like that? Wouldn't that suggest that competing gods could hypothetically pop into existence? Or a manifestation of pure Law could suddenly occur and we'd have a second group of "fallen" angels tempting people to build courthouses?
jean-luc wrote:It is further believed that the presence of evil is for our good - without the despair and detachment from God known on Earth we would not truly enjoy heaven. But that's only a small part of it - much more significance is the place that evil has in bringing positive change to lives. Yes, this may seem counter to the common image of God and perfection, but many believe that there must be evil in order for the good to become heavenly. Some religions go so far as to say that Satan himself has a peculiar kind of exaltation, being called of God to tempt mortals. Without evil, we cannot learn to resist and overcome evil, and without evil, our resolve cannot be tested. Therefore the presence of evil in the world serves both to improve us and to test us.

Some extend this to mean that evil is simply another kind of good. No religious group has gone so far as to say this, but many philosophers wonder about it. We see what may be a biblical example of this in the betrayal of Jesus by Judas Iscariot. Some believe that Judas was not in fact evil and a traitor, but a man called of God to perform the emotionally difficult task of bringing about the crucifixion, which was necessary for the progression of man. Of course, still other religions believe that Judas was terrible person and a traitor all along, stealing money from the apostleship &c. I haven't so far seen any strong biblical evidence for this, however, and I'm skeptical of what little biblical evidence there is because of the 'interpretive' ways most modern editions of the bible were translated.
Random comment on Satan/Lucifer: the modern conception of Lucifer as some kind of anti-God would horrify church goers from way back. He was actually supposed to be God's persecution lawyer, so to speak, whose job it was to tempt people and thus test their piety. Not evil, but a valuable part of God's heavenly court room, the original devil's advocate.

Anyway... without evil, why the heck would we need to learn to resist evil? Will God one day create a ravaging army of purple unicorns so people can learn to resist purple unicorns? Plus, if suffering is so great, shouldn't we be stepping on the world's collective fingers so they learn to deal with it? The sad fact is that in many cases, facing evil does not make you stronger. It's no coincidence that violent criminals often had a violent upbringing, or that sexual abusers have often been victims of abuse themselves.
jean-luc wrote:Further, Most mainstream Christians agree that there are parts of religion and our reason for being here that are not for us to understand - God has a reason for everything, but he will not tell us all of his reasons until a later time (or perhaps never, depending on the sect). While I think this is no excuse not to attempt to understand (I believe that "the God excuse" -- that God did it and that's all we need to know -- is never acceptable in any field of reasoning), surely we must accept that an omniscient, omnipotent being would act with reasons beyond our understanding.
This is possible. However, as you have noted, it's not an excuse to just stick your head in the sand and pretend the problem doesn't exist, especially given that God doesn't seem to have been kind enough to leave a clear list of the things which are are supposed to understand and the things we are not.
yungerkid wrote:Atilla, your syllogism is incorrect because evil is not just part of the universe. It extends out of the universe, to an area God did not create. God did not create everything.
Blasphemy!

On a more serious note, though. Firstly, see my points addressed to jean-luc above, in particular those about evil being meaningless as an idependant entity, and the problem with stuff just popping out of the aether without God's approval.
yunerkid wrote:Say you've installed a light fixture in your living room, which you had recently built. You turn it on and it provides warming light to every corner of the room. Say, then, that you have purposefully left the light switch unattended, and someone comes and turns off the light.

Have you created the darkness?
Not a valid analogy.

Now, if the light was turned off by a robot which I built and released into the room for the express purpose of turning off lights (because God created people with a sinful nature), while I was standing right there watching it (because God is omniscient), and I refused to turn it back on despite the basket of kittens which I love unconditionally begging me to do so and making offerings of tuna on my altar, I think it's fair to say that I am in large part responsible for the room being dark.

Of course, in that situation, I think the only rational response would be to throw the robot into my bathtub for forty days and forty nights for turning off my light, then kill my own son so I can forgive the kittens for not being able to turn the light back on because I glued them to the bottom of their basket. While still refusing to turn the light back on, so that the kittens will learn to make lanterns out of fish oil. Or something. I've kind of lost track of where this was going, because I'm picturing a basket of kittens with tiny little paper lanterns and it's adorable.

Anyway, see Tsukatu's response. I'm not an omnipotent, omniscient being who created the very darkness itself. Plus, if the light staying on was of paramount importance to the wellbeing of billions of people, anyone with sense would refrain from installing a device which allows random losers to wander in and turn the light off.
yungerkid wrote:This is another generalization I've seen. "Anyone with an ounce of critical thinking skills can tell the dude [Jesus] never was [the Son of God]." Sherlock, we have about 5600 copies of the original New Testament, written less than 100 years after the actual events, by eyewitnesses (in other words, if you think Homer ever wrote the Iliad, you can't logically believe that the New Testament is bullshit), and they all tell correlating stories about this guy walking around, performing miracles in the middle of a crowd, and telling people he was God's Son, and then he died and rose again and ascended to heaven. You can generalize against that as much as you wish. Be my guest.
There are also thousands of people alive right now who believe they've seen Ganesha - an entity which your religion claims does not exist - appear and do miracles and all that stuff. Please explain why I should believe the second-hand word of people who have been dead for two thousand years over first-hand accounts from the present day. If you just happen to think that old scrolls give extra credibility, I've got some Buddhist ones from four centuries earlier than yours. And of course there's always all those Jews who think they have a direct line to God without all that guff about Jesus. And all those other stories about shape-shifting foxes, gods turning into swans and seducing young women, and so on. They had witnesses, too. They must all be true!

Also, I love your choice of text, since authorship of the Illiad is disputed:
Wikipedia wrote:The Iliad, and its sequel, the Odyssey, are attributed to Homer, but his sole authorship is doubted by some scholars who think the poems exhibit different poetic styles (dialect, idiom, metre) which may indicate several authors, a presumed characteristic of the Ancient Greek oral tradition. Twentieth century scholars dated these poems to the late-ninth and early-eighth centuries BC, notably G. S. Kirk, Richard Janko, and Barry B. Powell (who links its transcription to the invention of the Greek alphabet); however, Martin West and Richard Seaford, posit either the seventh or the sixth centuries BC, as the composition time(s) of this oldest extant literary work of Ancient Greece, and the world.
yungerkid wrote:There are hypothetically three options: either we all are forced to love God, which defeats the purpose of "love"; we all burn in hell, which is what we as sinners deserve: or we choose God, which both allows us to think for ourselves *and* allows us to love God. It's by far the most merciful alternative that God could have chosen for humanity. Do you see what I mean?
(Slightly out of order, I know. Sorry.)

See, I don't get this thing about "If everyone loved God, it wouldn't be real love!"

I mean, let's say, hypothetically, that you go and see this new movie. It's pretty good. You talk to your friends, and they all think it's pretty good too. In fact, you eventually conduct a survey of everyone on the planet, and as it turns out everyone likes this movie. Does this mean you were forced to like it and your approval is meaningless? No. It just means that the movie appeals to everyone.

To take another tack: you've been talking about free will, saying that people should be able to choose between good and evil. What if they can choose between good and evil - and they all choose good? How is this in any way a breach of free will? Is there a Law of Conservation of Choices which requires that for everyone who chooses to turn left, someone else has to turn right?

If I have a dozen children and they all love and respect me because of the way I raised them and my general conduct, does that mean they never had a choice and I forced them to love me? Because it seems to me that's the conclusion you have to come to if you believe the existence of evil is necessary for love of God to be "true". You're saying I have to have one bratty dug-addicted kid who hates my guts, or the rest of them don't really love me.
yungerkid wrote:Evil has always existed; thus God did not create it. what God did was introduce evil to the world.
How considerate of Him. Now, remember, I didn't create the rabid wolves, I just released them in your lounge room. That makes me totally benevolent.

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Postby otters » 2009.05.22 (16:01)

Atilla wrote:and I refused to turn it back on despite the basket of kittens which I love unconditionally begging me to do so and making offerings of tuna on my altar
No, no, no. For the analogy to work, the entire human race has to be light-turning-off robots, with a propensity for turning lights off, and the optional Turn-A-Light-Back-On package preinstalled.

Atilla wrote:There are also thousands of people alive right now who believe they've seen Ganesha - an entity which your religion claims does not exist - appear and do miracles and all that stuff.
I've just gone to Google that, and I can't find a single story, blog, anecdote, or otherwise of anyone who has ever indicated they saw Ganesha in person.

The only Zeus sighting I found, another deity I thought you might call me on, was a group of people who took pictures of a really big sea turtle. (Oh yeah, and some experiments codenamed after Greek gods and stuff.)

But why should we believe in a guy who did equally miraculous things? Because, quite simply, Jesus was the most believable. I reiterate, he performed miracles in the middle of crowds. Nobody does that. I mean, magicians have a stage or some kind of area where nobody can see behind them: but the townspeople had a nice little 360˚ view of Christ while he performed his good works. Remember that time he healed the bleeding woman? That was in a crowd packed tight enough that about thirty people were touching him all at once. That doesn't happen.

Besides that, we have the topics of Jesus' character, which I suppose are debatable: he didn't seem like the type of dude to lie, or the one who would be crazy enough to claim that he was the son of God without something to back it up.

Atilla wrote:Please explain why I should believe the second-hand word of people who have been dead for two thousand years over first-hand accounts from the present day.
I have no idea why you would do that. Except for two reasons: one, chronological snobbery is a logical fallacy.

There are no accounts of sightings of, say, Ganesha, online. I have searched, and I can't find them. Anywhere. If you show me, say, a news story of a man who woke up and saw a Hindu god cleaning up around his kitchen, that would become a cause for debate. I still have my scrolls (one of which is written by a dude who made recording history his profession).

Atilla wrote:If you just happen to think that old scrolls give extra credibility, I've got some Buddhist ones from four centuries earlier than yours.
Huh? No. Historically speaking, the New Testament is brand-friggin'-new compared to a lot of those other documents.

Atilla wrote:In fact, you eventually conduct a survey of everyone on the planet, and as it turns out everyone likes this movie. Does this mean you were forced to like it and your approval is meaningless? No. It just means that the movie appeals to everyone.
Or what if it turns out, when you went to see the movie, a shady-looking dude in a trench coat snatched you and implanted on your skull a device that forced your brain to produce endorphins so that you would enjoy the movie, however bad it was? (This reminds me of Twilight.) You went in and "enjoyed" the movie, but did it really mean anything?

Forgive me, but I don't really understand this analogy. You're throwing the effect, not the cause, of the existence of good into the mix. I'm still talking about the cause. And please correct me if I'm wrong, but did you mean to disprove the point that if a lot of people love God, he forced them to do it? Because I have pretty much the same opinion that you do.

Atilla wrote:What if they can choose between good and evil - and they all choose good? How is this in any way a breach of free will? Is there a Law of Conservation of Choices which requires that for everyone who chooses to turn left, someone else has to turn right?
It would be the best thing on earth if everyone chose good. I would love it. God would love it. And no, it isn't a breach of free will. You just used the verb "choose," which is the one I've been trying to explain all along.

lord_day wrote:If an omnipotent, omniscient knows the results of all his actions before he does them, and can do any action, due to his omnipotency, then he can create any future he wishes now, by choosing the correct actions in the past. Therefore, if something happens in the future that is not intended by this being, it is either not omniscient because he didn't know it would happen, or not omnipotent because he couldn't choose the correct actions earlier to reach his desired future.
No. God desired a perfect future, but he allowed humans to make actions that would change that future.

See above. "Allowed." That's one of the weird things about God that I'm still trying to understand, and trying to explain. Is God sustaining the world every moment? I believe so. Is God maintaining the laws of physics, chemistry, biology? Gravity? Magnetic attraction? I believe so. Is God causing everything to happen, like tipping that poor kid's tray out of his hands, and tripping up that girl on the sidewalk, and shoving that car so it will fishtail into the guardrail? NO. God has created a world: and now he allows it to move along its course, even though he can see exactly what its future will lead to.

Why would God make everything happen, constantly?
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Postby lord_day » 2009.05.22 (16:46)

incluye wrote:No. God desired a perfect future, but he allowed humans to make actions that would change that future.
If God is omniscient, he knows every action that every human will ever take. He also knows the results of all these actions. And by creating the universe in slightly different ways, he could have made humans take slightly different paths that lead them different places. And so why would he choose a path that leads to the creation of evil? If you argue that humans were /allowed/ to create evil (and I use that in the broadest sense of the word) then it is like going back to the robot analogy. Why would I create a robot that could turn the lights back on, but I know won't?

incluye wrote:See above. "Allowed." That's one of the weird things about God that I'm still trying to understand, and trying to explain. Is God sustaining the world every moment? I believe so. Is God maintaining the laws of physics, chemistry, biology? Gravity? Magnetic attraction? I believe so. Is God causing everything to happen, like tipping that poor kid's tray out of his hands, and tripping up that girl on the sidewalk, and shoving that car so it will fishtail into the guardrail? NO. God has created a world: and now he allows it to move along its course, even though he can see exactly what its future will lead to.

Why would God make everything happen, constantly?
What about diseases, natural disasters and all other accidental tragedy that befalls the human race? Does God control those? Because humans certainly don't.
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Postby Ampersand » 2009.05.22 (17:48)

"Man, God created everything. But don't be silly. God didn't create Evil. But God totally created everything! Except what's *outside* of the universe. And evil. And himself, but maybe himself, which might be included in everything. Which isn't included in everything, because everything isn't everything, it's just everything that's *inside* the known universe, which doesn't include evil, or everything. Even though he made it all. No, no, not *all* of it. Just the parts of it included in *everything*, which isn't anything or everything, really. No, not that kind of everything. The everything that isn't everything. The NON-evil everything."

And you wonder why atheists look at you funny?
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Postby otters » 2009.05.22 (20:00)

Ampersand, I *really* appreciate your contributions to this thread.

lord_day wrote:Why would I create a robot that could turn the lights back on, but I know won't?
To what are you attributing "turning the lights back on"?

Also, what are your other options? I repeat: humans have a sinful ("free") nature, and either we would have screwed up at some point and brought evil into the world, or we would have not been created at all. Those are the only alternatives. There is no humanity without sin, and there is no sin without humanity.

That's why God could never have created the universe so that we would have chosen everything correctly. With the freedom to choose, and a lack of human perfection, all paths lead to sin. It's similar to the rock conundrum: humans without sin is meaningless (e.g. water without wetness) because sin is a part of our nature: we cannot become apart from it until we accept he who is the opposite of sin.

lord_day wrote:What about diseases, natural disasters and all other accidental tragedy that befalls the human race? Does God control those? Because humans certainly don't.
I'm not sure of the cause of natural disaster, but I want to clear up the conception that if something occurs, and humans did not cause it, God did. (Spoiler warning: that's incorrect.)
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Postby jean-luc » 2009.05.22 (21:03)

Yungerkid: I frankly don't see how the verses you quoted support calvinism. You can most certainly read the bible either way, that's why there are multiple sects with greatly varying outlooks. If you want to discuss this one, however, I would take it to a different thread (it's a large and fairly freestanding issue).
yungerkid wrote:Jean-luc, God has no control over His actions if He is required to follow logic.
I'm not saying that he's required to follow logic in his decision making. I'm just saying that logic applies to him in the same way as us. We can make decisions and thus carry out actions that go against logic, but we can't just change the way logic works to make everyone exalted/happy/whatever. I'm applying the same argument to God.
lord_day wrote:
jean-luc wrote:
incluye wrote:No, not at all. An omnipotent, omniscient being does not produce unforseen results;
QFE
If an omnipotent, omniscient knows the results of all his actions before he does them, and can do any action, due to his omnipotency, then he can create any future he wishes now, by choosing the correct actions in the past. Therefore, if something happens in the future that is not intended by this being, it is either not omniscient because he didn't know it would happen, or not omnipotent because he couldn't choose the correct actions earlier to reach his desired future.
You assume that God is set on getting His desired outcome. Has it occured to you that God perhaps does not have a set desired outcome that he works towards? that perhaps he is intentionally allowing things to play out as they will (as an omnipotent being is surely able to do)? This is the situation in which an omniscient/omnipotent being allows for free will in His subjects. Your argument that there cannot be any actions for which God is not responsible assumes that He has a desired out come and that He further continuously intervenes to ensure that it comes about. This is not necessarily the case. You can read the bible as making it clear that God is permitting things to work themselves out, and many do.

This argument for free agency vs. predeterminance is thus dependent on the nature, intent, and means of god, an issue that religious sects are split on.
Atilla wrote:God is answerable to a higher law? Shouldn't we be worshiping that law, then, since it transcends even the power of an omnipotent god?
Would you worship a law? Scientists believe that the fundamental laws of physics are transcendent, but you don't see them worshiping them. Regardless of what laws he must obey God can still be the highest being, and still very much deserving of our worship.
Atilla wrote:At any rate, even if you believe free will is possible with an omniscient and omnipotent god, there remains the fact that God knew damn well that there would be evil all over the shop and He chooses to do nothing about it. Being omnipotent, it should be entirely possible for God to eliminate evil while still achieving all his other goals - it follows that God is either 1. not omnipotent or 2. allows evil to exist when it is entirely unnecessary, in which case God is not omnibenevolent.
This comes out to the limits of omnipotence. The presence of evil may be the best way for it to happen within the capabilities of God. If you think that his power transcends logic and all other factors (as many seem to believe) then there is no reason for evil to exist. But this is not necessarily the case, many religions disagree with this. The validity of this argument depends on the extent of God's omnipotence, which is not axiomatic.
Atilla wrote:Regardless, I believe most Christian doctrine holds that, in the beginning, there was only God.
The meaning of that is very much open for interpretation.
Attila wrote:Regardless, I believe most Christian doctrine holds that, in the beginning, there was only God. Since evil manifestly exists now, if we assume the statement that only God existed in the beginning is true, there are three options:

1. Evil was a part of God and has always existed.
2. Evil was brought into being as a consequence of God creating the universe and so on.
3. Evil just magically appeared out of nowhere. Perhaps it snuck in from the universe next door while God wasn't looking.
Number 1 is consistent with a number of non-christian and some less mainstream christian views. To my knowledge this is a component of some Jewish mysticism.
Number 2 seems to be the most consistent belief with the kind of mainstream christianity that you seem to refer to. This is also the core belief of many less mainstream Christian and neo/pagan groups.
Number 3 is unlikely but possible if God is less than omnipotent.
Atilla wrote:This is possible. However, as you have noted, it's not an excuse to just stick your head in the sand and pretend the problem doesn't exist, especially given that God doesn't seem to have been kind enough to leave a clear list of the things which are are supposed to understand and the things we are not.
This is exactly what I said. I argued only that we may not be able to interpret some things. You'll note that I said that this is never an excuse to not inquire.

I'd also like to restate here that the beliefs I'm arguing with right now are not necessarily my own. I'm using them to demonstrate that many of the concepts that seem to be held as axioms here are not necessarily true, and that there is great discord among Christians on matters such as free agency and the nature of God.
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Postby Ampersand » 2009.05.22 (21:23)

incluye wrote:Ampersand, I *really* appreciate your contributions to this thread.
I just enjoy summarizing the insanity for you fine folks. *Tips Hat*
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Postby yungerkid » 2009.05.22 (21:44)

First of all, there is a flaw in one of my earlier statements. I said that if God had created Adam and Eve a certain way, and that they were forced to act that way, that they were not responsible for their actions, and that thus God was responsible for their actions and the introduction of evil into the world. But if God is just as constrained as they are (and does not have free will), He cannot be responsible for His actions either. So there is a chain of responsibility here. If one thing is ultimately responsible for everything else in reality, then that one thing must have free will, which conflicts with several proofs put forward for determinism. So what I'm thinking is that there must be two entities or objects out there that are forcing one another to cause everything else to happen (such that responsibility does not fall on any one thing). There is a chain of responsibility extending to a certain point, one entity forcing another into its actions. What I'm discussing is the extent to which this chain is followed.
I frankly don't see how the verses you quoted support calvinism.
What? How can you not understand that when a person is spiritually dead, they are incapable of bringing themselves to life again (by choosing Jesus)? And how can you not understand from the second verse that our faith does not come from us (that, being your salvation and your faith, not of yourselves...)? There are two main views, not because there are two interpretations, but because over half of American Christians do not read their Bible. They do not see what the Bible clearly says, but instead distort its message to their own comfort and convenience. This debate is very relevant, because if we do not have free will, we cannot choose either Heaven or Hell (and for other reasons). There are many more verses in support of calvinism. Arminianism claims that God's will can be subverted (by human choice); I don't see how any reasonable Christian can possibly believe in that. Arminians do not believe in the same God that calvinists do.
This argument for free agency vs. predeterminance is thus dependent on the nature, intent, and means of god, an issue that religious sects are split on.
Then how can we say that God is or is not forced to perform His actions? If whether something has free will or not is dependent on God's nature, then the status of God's will cannot be determined. There are actions and other things that can be forced to happen as they do without depending on any aspect of God's personality.
Is God sustaining the world every moment? I believe so.
Why? Why not believe that God created the world one way, and let it follow that path? If God is controlling certain portions of the world and not others, then by all means He is neglecting not only the parts He doesn't control, but also the parts He does, because of the threat one part to the other. Are you still saying that evil is beyond God's power to stop? Are you still saying that human choice is beyond God's power to alter? Are you still saying that we can choose Him for ourselves? Evil may operate independently of God. But it is still a part of God's intent for the universe. If it weren't His intention, then His original intention was subverted, which means that He is not omnipotent (not even able to accomplish His own will!).
...I just released them in your lounge room. That makes me totally benevolent.
That's the idea. That's what I was trying to say. It is inevitable that God introduced evil to the world. And that is not benevolent.
if we assume the statement that only God existed in the beginning is true, there are three options
Why would we assume that? Good morality also existed in the beginning, for one thing. And I think that that makes it obvious that bad morality also existed in the beginning. Evil was either created or always existed. If it was created, it was created either by God or by Satan. If it was created by Satan, then was that a subversion of God's plan? But if God planned for it, then that means that God intended it, and thus introduced it to humanity. If evil always existed, then it must have come into the physical universe by either God or Satan. Same thing for that side; either God introduced evil to civilization, or (God is not omnipotent because His plans were subverted by Satan's interference or) God introduced evil to the world. More than those three options there.

Another argument to present. Why worship God? Forget emotion at having been released from an eternity of Hell; why worship anything? There does not seem to be any legitimate reason to me. The only reason I can see (besides mere emotion, which is not a real reason) is that it is God's will that we do so, and He has power enough to crush us if we don't. But that is of course a might-makes-right argument, not a legitimate reason. I can see no reason why we should be obligated to worship anything, besides being forced to by God's threatening presence. And the threat of a crushing by God does not mean that He is justified in expecting us to worship Him, just that we are afraid of Him. Believers worship Him because they are of a Christly nature; but of course Christ will worship God! They do not have a legitimate reason either. I protest.

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Postby t̷s͢uk̕a͡t͜ư » 2009.05.22 (23:00)

incluye,

Since you've taken the ostrich approach with my last reply, Im now forced to tempt you with extremely short responses:

You're deluding yourself if you think no one in history, or even today, has ever claimed to personally interact with supernatural beings not present in Christian doctrine.
My sandwich preferences are nowhere on the internet, either, but that doesn't mean that I've never expounded upon that subject at length.



On an unrelated note, I just wanted to comment that this made my weekend:
Atilla wrote:
yungerkid wrote:Say you've installed a light fixture in your living room, which you had recently built. You turn it on and it provides warming light to every corner of the room. Say, then, that you have purposefully left the light switch unattended, and someone comes and turns off the light.

Have you created the darkness?
Not a valid analogy.

Now, if the light was turned off by a robot which I built and released into the room for the express purpose of turning off lights (because God created people with a sinful nature), while I was standing right there watching it (because God is omniscient), and I refused to turn it back on despite the basket of kittens which I love unconditionally begging me to do so and making offerings of tuna on my altar, I think it's fair to say that I am in large part responsible for the room being dark.

Of course, in that situation, I think the only rational response would be to throw the robot into my bathtub for forty days and forty nights for turning off my light, then kill my own son so I can forgive the kittens for not being able to turn the light back on because I glued them to the bottom of their basket. While still refusing to turn the light back on, so that the kittens will learn to make lanterns out of fish oil. Or something. I've kind of lost track of where this was going, because I'm picturing a basket of kittens with tiny little paper lanterns and it's adorable.
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Postby SlappyMcGee » 2009.05.22 (23:55)

Seriously, though, Tsukatu makes a valid point. Debates about Jeeeeesssssusss ultimately end up extremely redundant because people, incluye perhaps especially, ignore large blocks of text in favor of finding singular lines they can be witty with.

So, in response, I'm only going to speak in taglines.

-If God knows everything, then he knew that he would make all people suffer by creating us. CON
-God also knew of all the happiness that he would bring! Pro!
-If God gave humans free will, then that means even if he would be aware of their futures, he would not determine it. Pro!
-God still created the world. Therefore, anything humans did not do was still created and caused by God. Natural disasters, plagues? The big guy. CON
-Or Satan? Pro!
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Postby otters » 2009.05.23 (03:13)

SlappyMcGee wrote:Debates about Jeeeeesssssusss ultimately end up extremely redundant because people, incluye perhaps especially, ignore large blocks of text in favor of finding singular lines they can be witty with.
I've addressed every major point in the last few posts. Well, except for jean-luc, who doesn't really seem to be disagreeing with me, yungerkid, who isn't making much sense at all, and Ampersand, who isn't contributing anything.

Come on, you guys are accusing me of being witty during debate?

Tsukatu wrote:You're deluding yourself if you think no one in history, or even today, has ever claimed to personally interact with supernatural beings not present in Christian doctrine.
My sandwich preferences are nowhere on the internet, either, but that doesn't mean that I've never expounded upon that subject at length.
I understand that. So *show* me. I would like to meet someone who saw a Hindu god, or see what they said about the experience. Telling me I'm delusional is less helpful than the original argument and doesn't really do anything. "See, people say they've seen gods." "Really? Who? I can't find stuff like that anywhere. Show me." "You're delusional if you don't believe it!"

On a slightly unrelated note, please explain the ostrich approach comment.

SlappyMcGee wrote:If God knows everything, then he knew that he would make all people suffer by creating us. CON
"people...ignore large blocks of text in favor of finding singular lines they can be witty with"
Have you read anything I posted?
God loves humans, even though we're flawed; he created us, because he loves us, knowing we would become flawed, but knowing that some people would fight the flaws.

SlappyMcGee wrote:-God also knew of all the happiness that he would bring! Pro!
Yeah!

SlappyMcGee wrote:-If God gave humans free will, then that means even if he would be aware of their futures, he would not determine it. Pro!
Oh, shit, you've begun to be witty and started ignoring my large blocks of text.

SlappyMcGee wrote:-God still created the world. Therefore, anything humans did not do was still created and caused by God. Natural disasters, plagues? The big guy. CON
Again, I'm wondering if you read my post before responding. Even if humans did not cause something, that does not mean God caused it. No dichotomy exists like this. "Something happened! It couldn't have been an accident! No! Did a man do this? No! God must have done it!"


I'm sorry if my answers seem exceedingly brief. It doesn't look to me like anyone has been answering my arguments. What happened to the old days, where you guys used to demolish me in six words? I've put some time into my responses, and the most I've recently got is
- One accusation of ostrich approach
- One accusation, without good reason, of delusion (that happens a lot)
- Six lines of mocking of my argument
- One short reply accusation of making short replies


Edit: Wait, I saw that yungerkid countered me a few times. Getting on that.
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Postby yungerkid » 2009.05.23 (03:24)

My main point here is that we as humans do not have free will, and neither does God. That God didn't give us free will, and that thus we are not responsible for our actions, including our sin. The debate at large is running helter-skelter all over the place, and its topic is difficult to pinpoint, at least for me.

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Postby SlappyMcGee » 2009.05.23 (03:52)

incluye wrote:
SlappyMcGee wrote:If God knows everything, then he knew that he would make all people suffer by creating us. CON
"people...ignore large blocks of text in favor of finding singular lines they can be witty with"
Have you read anything I posted?
God loves humans, even though we're flawed; he created us, because he loves us, knowing we would become flawed, but knowing that some people would fight the flaws.
Right, but that doesn't address what I said at all. When he created us, he created us fully knowing that I would be miserable. That people would be born without legs. That two lovers would be seperated by quarreling families. To say that there is a guy who can see the whole world in perfect clarity, who created this world not as an experiment, but fully knowing what would happen when he created the world, for such is the benefit of omnipotence, then he knew -when- he created us that we would go through all of that.


incluye wrote:
SlappyMcGee wrote:-God still created the world. Therefore, anything humans did not do was still created and caused by God. Natural disasters, plagues? The big guy. CON
Again, I'm wondering if you read my post before responding. Even if humans did not cause something, that does not mean God caused it. No dichotomy exists like this. "Something happened! It couldn't have been an accident! No! Did a man do this? No! God must have done it!"
I did read that completely unjustified statement you made. Let me rephrase what I said more eloquently:

God created the world. The universe as we know it was created by God.

God created Man. He may have given man free-will, but this is the item currently up for debate. If he did not give man free will, for he could not technically do so due to his omnipotence, then he knew everything that was to happen, and is the cause of these natural disasters AS WELL as everything done by Man, for He knew it would happen and he created it and got His intended results.

On the flipside, if Man does indeed have free-will, the universe was still created by your God. So, anything that happens in the universe that was not the direct result of humanity is therefore a direct result of a being of the creator, unless there are other beings with free-will in the world that caused the volcanoes and the plagues and smallpox and earthquakes.

The problem with the latter is that God cannot truly be both omnipotent (that is to say, entirely aware of the future), the creator (That is to say, that who decides the future), AND man have free-will (That is to say, other deciders of the future.)

EDIT: And just in case you couldn't find any recordings of someone citing a God that does no necessarily follow standard Christian faith, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Vision
Last edited by SlappyMcGee on 2009.05.23 (03:57), edited 1 time in total.
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Postby jean-luc » 2009.05.23 (03:54)

yungerkid wrote:What? How can you not understand that when a person is spiritually dead, they are incapable of bringing themselves to life again (by choosing Jesus)? And how can you not understand from the second verse that our faith does not come from us (that, being your salvation and your faith, not of yourselves...)?
I fully understand the concept of spiritual death and the need for faith from the trinity/the holy spirit. I don't see how this is extended to meaning that we have no free will.
yungerkid wrote:There are two main views, not because there are two interpretations, but because over half of American Christians do not read their Bible. They do not see what the Bible clearly says, but instead distort its message to their own comfort and convenience.
The more radical component of the other side would say the exact same thing about you. Refuting the other side by an attack on their faith or adherence to the word is an argument that I simply can't subscribe to.
The bible is interpreted in many ways, by many who read and study it very thoroughly and believe themselves to be assisted by God himself. Unfortunately, due to inaccuracies (both accidental and intentional) in translation and transcription of the Bible, and the great time that has passed since it's writing, it is difficult to determine the original intent of its authors; this is particularly true if you do not believe in continuing revelation.
yungerkid wrote:This debate is very relevant, because if we do not have free will, we cannot choose either Heaven or Hell (and for other reasons).
I am in full agreement. The question of determination is a key component of the concept of meaning in life (within a religious context).



I still believe the argument that free agency is not possible because it would restrict the omnipotence/omniscience to be invalid. Could anyone respond to the possibility that God intends for us to make our own choices? that he is intentionally not forcing our hands?
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Postby yungerkid » 2009.05.23 (04:02)

I fully understand the concept of spiritual death and the need for faith from the trinity/the holy spirit. I don't see how this is extended to meaning that we have no free will.
We can't choose our spiritual nature for ourselves. God chooses it for us. Besides just choosing whether we are in a sinful nature or a righteous one, God creates both natures to begin with, and we cannot act outside of those natures.
Refuting the other side by an attack on their faith or adherence to the word is an argument that I simply can't subscribe to.
That wasn't my refutation. I was simply noting that the Bible is clear enough on this issue to be able to safely lable Arminianism as an unacceptable ideology, based on what we know of the Bible's content. And yes, there are many translations, but we still do have the original Greek and Hebrew texts. So yes, we do know what the original authors intended to say. You are trying to say that just because people study it thoroughly they won't misinterpret it? They are wrong even still!

We can respond to that possibility. If we made our own choices, then God would not be able to say what our choices were. Because if He were able to say what our choices were, then that would mean that our futures are set and knowable, which would in turn mean that we can do nothing outside of what we *will* do. Also, how can we have free will? We are fully restricted by our natures. Simple proof is enough; the demonstration of a paradox on free will's side is not necessary to prove my point.

And my argument that worship (and worship of God) is not necessary? Do you think that that is valid? I posted it for a reason.

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Postby Ampersand » 2009.05.23 (04:39)

incluye wrote:Ampersand, who isn't contributing anything.
*Waves*

Are you asserting that you don't agree with my assessment of your argument? I thought my over-the-top quote was actually decently accurate.

But in all seriousness, I usually stop contributing when everyone else slams their fists into their ears, forearm-deep. That happened around three years ago or so, amd hasn't stopped since, so I usually only pop into these to put an end to these, which should have happened with my post an entire page-and-a-half ago. I've done this enough times to know all of the arguments, and I know how these things end - so I try and cut you all off at the pass. In either case, I'll see you guys when this thread hits 20 pages, and we finally decide to agree. *Toasts*
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Postby capt_weasle » 2009.05.23 (07:37)

Ampersand wrote:
incluye wrote:Ampersand, who isn't contributing anything.
*Waves*

Are you asserting that you don't agree with my assessment of your argument? I thought my over-the-top quote was actually decently accurate.

But in all seriousness, I usually stop contributing when everyone else slams their fists into their ears, forearm-deep. That happened around three years ago or so, amd hasn't stopped since, so I usually only pop into these to put an end to these, which should have happened with my post an entire page-and-a-half ago. I've done this enough times to know all of the arguments, and I know how these things end - so I try and cut you all off at the pass. In either case, I'll see you guys when this thread hits 20 pages, and we finally decide to agree. *Toasts*
Quit acting like a royal douche. No one is going to stop debating because you pop into the thread with an insulting "paraphrase" of someone's argument.
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Postby t̷s͢uk̕a͡t͜ư » 2009.05.23 (08:14)

incluye wrote:
Tsukatu wrote:You're deluding yourself if you think no one in history, or even today, has ever claimed to personally interact with supernatural beings not present in Christian doctrine.
My sandwich preferences are nowhere on the internet, either, but that doesn't mean that I've never expounded upon that subject at length.
I understand that. So *show* me. I would like to meet someone who saw a Hindu god, or see what they said about the experience. Telling me I'm delusional is less helpful than the original argument and doesn't really do anything. "See, people say they've seen gods." "Really? Who? I can't find stuff like that anywhere. Show me." "You're delusional if you don't believe it!"
I'm afraid I don't know any personally, because I tend to not make friends with such people.
I do assure you that they exist, though. I won't talk on their behalf because I'm not qualified to, so I'll drop the point, but I'll still say that this is something clear enough that doesn't need proving. At the very least, Mohamed and Joseph Smith have had personal revelations that disagree with your faith.
incluye wrote:On a slightly unrelated note, please explain the ostrich approach comment.
Oh, it's just that you completely overlooked this.
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Postby Ampersand » 2009.05.23 (09:42)

capt_weasle wrote:Quit acting like a royal douche. No one is going to stop debating because you pop into the thread with an insulting "paraphrase" of someone's argument.
Way to miss the post that I was talking about. I would elaborate and link to the hundreds upon hundreds of topics where we've hashed this over hundreds and hundreds of times before, but that's way too much work. I'd imagine by now ya'll work take my word for stuff like that.
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Postby otters » 2009.05.23 (12:27)

Tsukatu wrote:I'm afraid I don't know any personally, because I tend to not make friends with such people.
I do assure you that they exist, though. I won't talk on their behalf because I'm not qualified to, so I'll drop the point, but I'll still say that this is something clear enough that doesn't need proving. At the very least, Mohamed and Joseph Smith have had personal revelations that disagree with your faith.
Point taken.

Ampersand wrote:Way to miss the post that I was talking about. I would elaborate and link to the hundreds upon hundreds of topics where we've hashed this over hundreds and hundreds of times before, but that's way too much work. I'd imagine by now ya'll work take my word for stuff like that.
I'm pretty sure that everybody already knows that we've discussed these topics several times. You telling us that we've debated before doesn't really help anything. With that in mind, shut the hell up.

SlappyMcGee wrote:God created the world. The universe as we know it was created by God.
Wait, I understand it now. The gist of this post is that, since God created the world and knew the future, he effectively caused everything, even if he did not do it directly.

Yes, God did know exactly what future he was setting in motion when he created the universe. A world with no natural disasters or accidents at all couldn't possibly happen, due to the erroneous nature of human beings. Nor could a world with any more destruction be sustained for very much longer. Again, this world is the only option for a planet inhabitable by God's people that would have lasted this long. Due to the climate of this world (which still suits us very well) tornadoes, hurricans, and tsunamis *occur* naturally. Viruses change and spread across nations and are continuously snuffed out by humans. (Smallpox, as well as a dozen other deadly viruses for which vaccinations exist.)

SlappyMcGee wrote:The problem with the latter is that God cannot truly be both omnipotent (that is to say, entirely aware of the future), the creator (That is to say, that who decides the future), AND man have free-will (That is to say, other deciders of the future.)
The problem here is that you assume that by creating a different past, God could have changed the futures of mankind, whether they liked it or not. I agree that by changing factors he could have decided how plants grew, how animals behaved, how mountain ranges formed, and so on and so forth.
Humans are dynamic, powerful, more intelligent than all other life on earth, and often make the same decision regardless of physical factors around them. Whether God had created a different past would only affect the planet, not the people on it. We humans would still be free to make our own choices, and we would still act the same way.
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