Philippe*

luvluv, I think the omnibenevolent side is quite not so evident at all in the case of the christian God, when I read the Bible, I don't see an omnibenevolent one, I see a God who is benevolent to some extent but acts in lunatic ways, far from being omnibenevolent. He is so irrational that I don't find what there is so confortable about him, and I understand this typical western/semitic god-fearing attitude. If he is omnibenevolent, there would not be this absurd eternal hell christians try always to justify in vain, the doors of salvation would not be closed at the end of this life, for me it is like 1+1=2. But if he is truly omnibenevolent, I say OK of course.

Philippe

show_no_mercy

How exactly is it a separate question?

luvluv

You can lack free will and not be bored. It's possible to not be bored in a deterministic universe, or a deterministic heaven.

Catholic Convert

Those who pass the test of their "free will" on earth have no further desire to sin after attaining Heaven.

At that point their free will is used to enjoy and choose from an infinite amount of (good) activities.

That is not robotic, but is true freedom, since there is no more need to deal with enslavement to the "lower self."

Jobar

A good answer, luvluv. However, it isn't the answer to the question you asked; what would keep us from being bored if we were made eternal?*

As I understand it, neurologists think we would fill up our memory capacity if we lived to about 150, IIRC. After that, saving new memories would mean erasing old ones.

OK, I know you're going to object that soul 'brains' don't need to have the limitations of physical brains. But still, if we are to remain unbored for ALL ETERNITY, then in some way we must become infinite. Which is, I think, the chief attribute of God. We would have to become at least god-like, if not merge with the infinite which is God.

I'd like to ask you, do you think that souls in heaven stay always separate from God? As you may recall, when I wear my pantheist's hat I say that in this very life, we are not really separate from the infinite. Have you ever considered that entering Heaven is just an anology for the realization that we have never been anything but infinite?

*And before anyone says it, no, I don't mean this eternal.

luvluv

Jobar:

Well, first off, remember that Christians do not believe in disembodied spirits existing in an ethereal heaven. They believe in a physical ressurection and a (more or less) physical afterlife.

As far as the neurology thing goes, that's above my pay grade. But I will say that the Bible teaches that our ressurected bodies will have different capacities than our normal ones. That may include increased memory capacities.

Family Man

Then I'll explain it again.

A common theistic argument is that not having free will would be a horrible thing because would be God's puppets and it would a miserable existence. In other words, free will is God's gift to us and a good thing. If you claim that:

Then it's clear that not having free will is not necessarily a bad thing, and you've removed any motivation God has for giving us free will. God, being omnimax, could and would have to create the without evil and without free will. (Of course, he could create the world with free will and without evil.) But any way you look at it, the free will argument resolves nothing and is completely undermined by your argument.

It also leaves open the question of why do we even have this world in the first place. Why not just have heaven and let it at that?

Do you understand now?

show_no_mercy

Because a slave that just happens to like doing everything his master wants him to do is no longer a slave... (and if the slave happens to want to do something that his master doesn't want him to do, he's "kicked out")

Catholic Convert

If I may comment about this...

The "free will" phase to choose good or evil, is here and now in THIS life, which is our TEST.

Those who pass the test move on to Heaven where we are restored with a new body, and a perfect intellect and will. At this point we will have no more desire or temptation to do evil and will have many good choices before us.

Family Man

Yes, CC, I do know this is Christian doctrine. The problem is that it appears to be an ad hoc explanation designed not to explain why the world is the way that it is, but rather to justify religious beliefs.

To put it another way, the most parsimonious explanation for evil in this world is that there is no God. As a rule, parsimonious explanations are better than explanations that add on extraneous layers, such as gods and heavens.

Which is why it is not meaningful to claim that this world is a test and in the next world we'll have perfection. Unless this explains something the godless explanation doesn't, then the intellectually honest thing to do (in my opinion) is to jettison the whole god/heaven thing.

When thought through, the free will defense isn't much of a defense. It's basically an attempt to set the rules so that God cannot lose instead of giving us a solid reason to believe he exists. I don't buy it, and I see no reason why anyone should buy it.

I'm not going to adopt a belief simply because it is appealing, but because it fits the requirements of all beliefs I adopt: that it is grounded with solid evidence and parsimonously explains the world.