Roller

I'm sorry for my writing about free will, since I guess you already discussed it gazillion of times.

What I'm interested is, how can one achieve compatibility of omniscient God and free will?

I have read something how an "atemporal" God is no threat to free will?

And is it possible that such ("atemporal") God be the one from Old Testament? Since he's intervening on almost every step.

Thank you!

Roller

Keith Russell

Greetings:

Well, I don't really believe in 'free' will, but I do believe in individual will.

And the concept of an omniscient 'God' is incompatible with that as well.

Keith.

Shadownought

As far as I'm concerned, you can't.

1) If God is omniscient, then God knows the future.
2) If God knows the future, then the future is knowable.
3) If the future is knowable, it must be predetermined.
4) If the future is predetermined, we do not have free will.

The idea that God knows what we're going to do, but doesn't force us to do it, makes no sense.

Can you explain that? I don't know quite what you mean.

Zadok001

I presume by atemporal, you mean a God who exists effectively outside the dimension of time? That really doesn't solve any problems, but if you could provide a more detailed definition of that, we might be able to discuss it in depth.

Roller

Hello guys and thank you for your swift response

Thing goes something like this:

To God, everything is "now". Our "tomorrow" and our "yesterday" is "now" to him. You can’t find him in our time. He sees complete time simultaneously. And that when we say “now” or “future” those words have little sense for God.

Also, God’s knowledge of future men’s actions is not a cause but an effect of those future actions. I guess that effect precedes cause here. That’s what’s so confusing to me.

Shadownought

Silly me, I forgot my manners. Welcome to Infidels!


Er, whaa?

That's a nice way of confusing the issue, isn't it?

Does that mean that during creation, God was both working (the first 6 days) and resting (day 7) at the same time?

[ December 04, 2002: Message edited by: Shadownought ]</p>

Keith Russell

Roller said:
"To God, everything is "now". Our "tomorrow" and our "yesterday" is "now" to him. You can’t find him in our time. He sees complete time simultaneously. And that when we say “now” or “future” those words have little sense for God.

Also, God’s knowledge of future men’s actions is not a cause but an effect of those future actions. I guess that effect precedes cause here. That’s what’s so confusing to me."

Antics with semantics.

(In other words, nonsense.)

Keith.

Beoran

I even know better antics with symantics!

1. God is omnipotent.
2. God is omnipotent, so she can do anything, even make the illogical logical.
3. God is omnipotent, so even if it is illogical, she can give us free wil and still be omniscient.


This can be shortended as "God moves in mysterious ways, might makes right, so there!" ^_~

Edit: in case it isn't clear, I'm being ironic. I don't believe in such a god.

[ December 05, 2002: Message edited by: Beoran ]</p>

tronvillain

An omniscient or atemporal god is not a threat to free will, but possession of such "free will" is not a defense against the problem of evil. I do not believe in such a God, but see no logical problem with it - it would simply be interacting with the universe as a large static object.

[ December 05, 2002: Message edited by: tronvillain ]</p>

Thomas Metcalf

Originally posted by Roller:

"What I'm interested is, how can one achieve compatibility of omniscient God and free will?"

Theists will say that because free will exists, the future is indeterminate and therefore there are few true propositions about the future. God's omniscience is redefined to be knowledge of all things it is possible to know, and the contradiction disappears.

Unfortunately, the Bible says that God does indeed see the future with pretty good accuracy.