The Futile Arguments Thread

[Event_Horizon]

Pre-known does not equal pre-determined.

It does if you cannot prove God wrong. If God is always right and he sees the future, then you cannot change the future and therefore have no free will.

Also, if I can defy his plans, that means I can prove God wrong, and am therefore more powerful than him in that respect. If I cannot defy his plans then I have no free will.

If you state that evil is necessary for the greater good, then you are then limiting your God's power. You admit that God is not all powerful because God cannot do evil, then what powers does your God have? Why call him God? To say God does not have the power to remove evil from the world, and must have evil in order to make his plans complete, makes him a weak God. This is the logical paradox that all Christians accept. An all powerful, all good, all knowing God cannot exist. Only two of those parts in any combination can exist logically, and since you say God cannot do evil, or requires evil for his plans, it makes him not omnipotent.

[Event_Horizon]

Also, I saw the posts on Satan further back and I feel the need to disspell some myths.

#1 is Satan is not the Devil. If you look at the writings of Christian and Jewish biblical scholars as well as the character in the Bible, Satan is not evil, or a devil, or against God, but he is actually part of God's court, and in colloquial terms we would refer to him as God's prosecutor. Satan is referred to as The Satan, where as the word Satan is simply a title meaning adversary. The Satan is really "the adversary" or what we would call the antagonist. Imagine if thousands of years from now future humans based a religion on our literature and thought that every single villain was really one shape-shifting devil called "The Antagonist".

If we look at the Book of Job we see Satan sitting beside God in heaven, and saying that he can freely move between heaven and Earth. Satan challenges God on Job's devotion, and God freely gives Satan the fire of heaven to do as he wishes. Satan is given his power, and is allowed to do what he wants all within God's orders.

#2 Lucifer is not the Devil. If you read the entire passage, Lucifer is simply the title given to a king of Babylon nicknamed "the morning star" who fell from power in his kingdom. This is not Satan's fall from grace.

#3 The Devil is what Christians think The Satan to be, and characterize him to be some kind of angel turned demon who seeks to force man against God. This only really appears in the New Testament, and highly concentrated in Revelations, where the ancient Greek mythology seeps into the Christian scripture. The Devil is what people think of when they say Satan and Lucifer, but in regards to the Bible they are not the same thing.

The concept of the Devil is strange considering that any idiot knows they have no chance against a supposed all powerful creator of the universe, so his mere presence is logically absurd. The Devil's war against heaven would be like an ant against a nuclear submarine. It's simply another thing that just doesn't make sense in the Christian religion.

[Stevil]

The authority of a Moral law has to be an external force that is ultimate good from which we can base our individual notions of Good off of. - God

I wonder what the definition of a Moral law is, I doubt we have a common definition. For me, I have a set of values, on how to behave, on how to treat others. I feel it is important to treat people kindly and with respect. To accept differences and be tolerant. It is quite simple really. With regards to this I feel the external forces have been my parents, my education, my culture, my peers, and also an aspect of my internal desire to be a good person, my ability to think things through, my ability to adapt. I do not see the necessity for an ultimate good from which good comes and from which Moral law is dictated.

The objective morals are written on every mans heart by God to regard things as good and things as evil.

This can't be right. I see homosexuality as loving and hence good, but you see it as evil. Was there a misprint on one of our hearts? Why do Christians sometimes forgoe their inner thoughts for the writings of the bible?

For instance, why do you define good and evil? and How?

Actually I don't really have a definition for Good and Evil, although I do understand that some actions are beneficial and some are detrimental.

Is homosexuality a sin? Yes.

How can love be a sin? Only if God sees love as an act of defiancy. I very much doubt that homosexuals get in an angry rage against God and then make love to each other in an act of defiancy to God. Actually I don't think it is about God at all. It's probably similar to when I make love with my wife. It's fun and enjoyable, the world and our troubles disappear as we enjoy a very intimate and personal activity together with each other and focussing only on each other. I'm not sure what God has to do with it and actually I'm not sure what anyone else other than me and my wife have to do with it, we certainly do not need anyone's approval and certainly don't expect anyone's disapproval. What we do in the privacy of our own home, mutually and respectfully is our own business.

Why? it defies God's creative order and is unnatural to reproductive society.

Are you advocating that all things people do must be natural to reproductive society?
When we talk about natural, well, who comes up with the definition?
Is an ice cream natural? I know we can't go and pick a fresh one off an ice cream tree.
Or are you advocating natural uses only for our body parts?
Are our feet only for walking or running? What if I want to kick a soccer ball, is that an unnatural use of my feet?
Or are you advocating natural uses only for our reproductive organs?
Did you know that there is a large percentage of women that don't get orgasms via penetration during sex. Do we say tough bikkies, or do we try other things, e.g. cunnilingus, or stimulation with the fingers? Is this unnatural? It certainly doesn't contribute towards reproduction.
What about couples that are infertile? Would it be immoral for them to have sex for pleasure?
As far as I am concerned, what people do behind closed doors, as long as it is consentual and noone is getting hurt, is their business, I personally have no right to bestow my opinions onto their lifestyle. We should see love as something special, something to be encouraged not vilified.
If Christianity is against this then it could be said that Christianity is against love.

If someone doesn't have objective values, they still paint their own world black and white

Painting the world black and white is very dangerous, this attitude creates intolerance and hate. Adhering to a view of Good and Evil is the ignition required for war. Only being open to discussion, being open to other viewpoints, being open to compromise will we be able to not only avoid conflict but to move forward towards common goals. The best way to defeat your enemy is to make them your friend.

So I refer back to my initial point, how and why do you define morals?

I don't define morals. I hold to a stance that I have no morals.
However on a similar vein, I have built up a set of personal values, they are my values and I don't force them on others, these values help me to act quickly in a mannor that I am comfortable and accepting of. they help me resolve inner conflict and make sometimes difficult decisions. However, often I am faced with situations that require deep thought, to rationalise and understand things fully before making a decision. Sometimes these moments make me realise that my personal values need to be reassessed.

[AnimatedDirt]

Wow, incredible. You've cut my response into so many pieces Animated, that I will simply have to respond to you in a clean post.

I'll do this in small responses, so we can get somewhere, so I don't have to continue dealing with assertions and contradictions on your part.

Maybe instead of making accusations, you should point these out.

First of all let me get a simple question answered:
Post "fall of man", can your God be wrong about anything at all? Ie: If he knows already I will have a bagel for breakfast tomorrow morning, can I have eggs instead thus making him wrong?

If He is God, He cannot be wrong.
If He knows you will have a bagel or not DOES NOT REMOVE THE FACT THAT THE BAGEL WAS YOUR CHOICE!

You see, because the point I'm trying to help you understand is that foreknowledge does matter, if the one with the foreknowledge cannot be wrong. Do you get that?

It doesn't as I just explained above in 11 words.

So we'll take this one step at a time, starting with very simple questions.
So concerning my bagel example, is your answer yes or no? Can he be wrong about me eating a bagel, or can he not be wrong?
This is a yes or no question, you can do it.

You can stop with the condescending tone.
The answer is God cannot be wrong.  He is right in knowing what you will choose.  You are 100% free to choose what you want for breakfast.  The fact He knows, bears no weight on whether you have free choice or not.

[Tank]

You can stop with the condescending tone.
The answer is God cannot be wrong.  He is right in knowing what you will choose.  You are 100% free to choose what you want for breakfast.  The fact He knows, bears no weight on whether you have free choice or not.

Maybe Tokage would be less condescending if you were less preachy.

[AnimatedDirt]

You can stop with the condescending tone.
The answer is God cannot be wrong.  He is right in knowing what you will choose.  You are 100% free to choose what you want for breakfast.  The fact He knows, bears no weight on whether you have free choice or not.

Maybe Tokage would be less condescending if you were less preachy.

Preachy?  I'm answering his questions and points.  I have not preached.  Maybe it's the nature of the subject RELIGION on this forum, but a certain amount of what to you seems "preachy" is in order to maintain a discussion.

If you have a problem with me preaching, please use the REPORT button on the upper right corner.
Thanks for your input.

[defendor]

If there is no moral law, there is no evil.  If there is truly no evil, then you cannot disclaim God on moral boundaries.

But now one may wonder: why do you actually need a moral law giver if you have a moral law? The answer is because the questioner and the issue he or she questions always involve the essential value of a person. You can never talk of morality in abstraction. Persons are implicit to the question and the object of the question. In a nutshell, positing a moral law without a moral law giver would be equivalent to raising the question of evil without a questioner. So you cannot have a moral law unless the moral law itself is intrinsically woven into personhood, which means it demands an intrinsically worthy person if the moral law itself is valued. And that person can only be God.

So you value people enough to set a moral standard, but yet you can't claim why you value people as a whole.

[Tank]

You can stop with the condescending tone.
The answer is God cannot be wrong.  He is right in knowing what you will choose.  You are 100% free to choose what you want for breakfast.  The fact He knows, bears no weight on whether you have free choice or not.

Maybe Tokage would be less condescending if you were less preachy.

Preachy?  I'm answering his questions and points.  I have not preached.  Maybe it's the nature of the subject RELIGION on this forum, but a certain amount of what to you seems "preachy" is in order to maintain a discussion.

If you have a problem with me preaching, please use the REPORT button on the upper right corner.
Thanks for your input.

You're welcome.
Fine. I made it official and reported your post.

[Stevil]

So you value people enough to set a moral standard, but yet you can't claim why you value people as a whole.

That's a mistaken assumption.
Empathy, survival instincts, society conditioning, teachings from parents, family ties,...

[BadPoison]

The answer is God cannot be wrong.  He is right in knowing what you will choose.  You are 100% free to choose what you want for breakfast.  The fact He knows, bears no weight on whether you have free choice or not.

I disagree with this. If an entitiy has knowledge of a future action playing out in a certain fashion then that action can only play out that way. It's as if the "choice" has already been decided. The individual certainly feels that they made the choice and from the individual's perspective they did. However, they could only have made the choice the all-knowing entity already knew they would make.

Put more simply:
If god knows that tomorrow I'm going to eat cheerios for breakfast, then tomorrow I will eat cheerios for breakfast. God knows that I 'choose' to eat cheerios, so the only 'choice' I can make is to eat cheerios, therefore I'm truly not making my own choice.




I'm an atheist and I don't believe in 'free-will' for entirely different reasons than what has been described so far.

[AnimatedDirt]

The answer is God cannot be wrong.  He is right in knowing what you will choose.  You are 100% free to choose what you want for breakfast.  The fact He knows, bears no weight on whether you have free choice or not.

I disagree with this. If an entitiy has knowledge of a future action playing out in a certain fashion then that action can only play out that way. It's as if the "choice" has already been decided. The individual certainly feels that they made the choice and from the individual's perspective they did. However, they could only have made the choice the all-knowing entity already knew they would make.

Put more simply:
If god knows that tomorrow I'm going to eat cheerios for breakfast, then tomorrow I will eat cheerios for breakfast. God knows that I 'choose' to eat cheerios, so the only 'choice' I can make is to eat cheerios, therefore I'm truly not making my own choice.

The FACT REMAINS...YOU made the choice of Cheerios on your own.  You could've chose Rasin Bran, a much better choice, but YOU chose Cheerios.  Regardless of the fact that God knows your choices does not remove the fact that YOU choose freely from many choices of cereal or breakfast items.

Your choice is not programmed into you, it is simply known.

[Whitney]

I think this might help...

[youtube:2yuh2685]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9sWHd3b8Y68[/youtube:2yuh2685]

If I were a theist would go with his solution to the premise (item 1); that god knows all possible outcomes; thus biting the bullet and admitting god's knowledge is limited to past and possiblity.  I also disagree with the god outside of time idea as it is nonsensical...time is essentially movement a being outside of time wouldn't be able to act.

The only part I disagree with this guy on is that god not existing somehow solves the freewill dilemma...even a naturalist view of reality brings into question the existence of free will.

[AnimatedDirt]

• 1.  God knows, before we are born, everything we will do.  (Diving Foreknowledge)
• 2.  If God knows, before we are born, everything we will do, then it is never in our power to do otherwise.  (Premise)
• 3.  If it is never in our power to do otherwise, then there is no human freedom.  (Doctrine of Freewill)
• 4.  Therefore there is no human freedom.  (Conclusion)

First of all, I'm going to be repeating myself again.

The premise is easily denied as the entity with the power to choose of its own freewill is not limited in choice by the KNOWLEDGE of that choice from God.  One must prove this to be so.  Simply stating a premise doesn't make it true.  Premise 2 and 3 fail.

The conclusion is then wrong.

On the matter of a man being put into a room unconscience and wakes up to a party and decides to stay...is not much of a proof point in that God has not locked anyone anywhere.  Everyone is free to choose God, unchoose God, or simply say God doesn't exist (by default, choosing against God)

[Whitney]

• 1.  God knows, before we are born, everything we will do.  (Diving Foreknowledge)
• 2.  If God knows, before we are born, everything we will do, then it is never in our power to do otherwise.  (Premise)
• 3.  If it is never in our power to do otherwise, then there is no human freedom.  (Doctrine of Freewill)
• 4.  Therefore there is no human freedom.  (Conclusion)

First of all, I'm going to be repeating myself again.

The premise is easily denied as the entity with the power to choose of its own freewill is not limited in choice by the KNOWLEDGE of that choice from God.  One must prove this to be so.  Simply stating a premise doesn't make it true.  Premise 2 and 3 fail.

The conclusion is then wrong.

On the matter of a man being put into a room unconscience and wakes up to a party and decides to stay...is not much of a proof point in that God has not locked anyone anywhere.  Everyone is free to choose God, unchoose God, or simply say God doesn't exist (by default, choosing against God)

I think you are going to have to spell out how you are denying 1 and why 2 and 3 fail; because I don't get why you think they are wrong and they don't obviously fail as they are logical valid if 1 is true....my philosophy of religion professor didn't think they failed but suggested that we could look at 1 differently (that god doesn't know everything we will do before we are born).

[AnimatedDirt]

• 1.  God knows, before we are born, everything we will do.  (Diving Foreknowledge)
• 2.  If God knows, before we are born, everything we will do, then it is never in our power to do otherwise.  (Premise)
• 3.  If it is never in our power to do otherwise, then there is no human freedom.  (Doctrine of Freewill)
• 4.  Therefore there is no human freedom.  (Conclusion)

First of all, I'm going to be repeating myself again.

The premise is easily denied as the entity with the power to choose of its own freewill is not limited in choice by the KNOWLEDGE of that choice from God.  One must prove this to be so.  Simply stating a premise doesn't make it true.  Premise 2 and 3 fail.

The conclusion is then wrong.

On the matter of a man being put into a room unconscience and wakes up to a party and decides to stay...is not much of a proof point in that God has not locked anyone anywhere.  Everyone is free to choose God, unchoose God, or simply say God doesn't exist (by default, choosing against God)

I think you are going to have to spell out how you are denying 1 and why 2 and 3 fail; because I don't get why you think they are wrong and they don't obviously fail as they are logical valid if 1 is true....my philosophy of religion professor didn't think they failed but suggested that we could look at 1 differently (that god doesn't know everything we will do before we are born).

1.  Not denied - There is no need to deny or reword this.  It fits fine.

2. and 3. Denied on the point that (again) simply knowing the choice does not make choosing or freewill impossible.  It's just knowledge.  God is not dictating what your choices are, He simply happens to know, being God, what your choice is.  To choose otherwise is impossible since YOUR choice is YOUR choice.  It matters not how many times you change your mind, God knows ultimately how many times you'll change your mind and ultimately knows your last and final choice being chosen of full freewill.

4. Conclusion is based on wrong premise, Conclusion then is that freewill remains exactly that no matter who knows your choice before you choose.  It remains YOUR choice.