Just_An_Atheist

My point is that if free will is defined simply as being successful at one sets out to do, then if God did create us as people who are programmed to be believers, then it would be a person's desire to be a believer, and one tries to be a believer and one is successful, then one still possesses' free will in the compatibalist sense. Consequently, one can have free will, and he can still gear things wear there are a significant raise in the amount of believers. If this is true, then one cannot accept compatibalism, and insist that God couldn't do things where there arn't more believers.

Furthermore, it doesn't matter whether God predestines things for the positive rather than the negative, because we would still be considered "puppets" because we couldn't do otherwise than what we did; either way, we'd still be puppets either to God's foreknowledge, or to God's deliberate action.



"I don't follow the argument directly above but I would not defend it anyway since I assume incompatibilism is the opposite of compatiblism, which I nearly identify with.
It seems that your deduction that free-will in nonsense is premised upon a false dichotomy."

What you must do is describe the third option, and demonstrate that it is a false dichotomy before one can say that it committs that fallacy. As far as I can tell, you havn't done that.

And as for a clarification of the randomness objection to the incompatibalist sense, it has to do with the definition of "causation". As far as I can tell, when an agent commits an action, it's still the result of a cause by an agent. And if there isn't a reason, or a cause for the action, then there is no reason, nor any cause. This seems to me like saying that I'm free if my arm just flew up into the air without cause.


"So, God's typical attributes are not up for debate, are they?"

They are if the attributes are unintelligable. If they are, then there is no way to know their implications.


"In the context of our discussion, I am not trying to establish the God of Christianity. I do not concede that God and an eternal universe are equally probably, just that neither can be established emprically, thus requiring faith in one or the other as the first cause. If you think an eternal universe is probable, then to which model of Cosmology do you prescribe?"

Good point. I'd say that the inflationary model has been vindicated as of late, so I'd say that I subscribe to that one.

"I now understand your counter-assertion though I do not see how my original assertion is falsified by empirical evidence. Can you share this falsifying evidence? Much thanks. "

The evidence is the amount of people who claim that they don't disbelieve because they don't want to. It would seem to me that they're the authority on their own minds, so it would be a little out of place to call them a liar without justification.

Just_An_Atheist

I feel like I didn't give a good answer to your charge that I presented a false dichotomy. I guess that "weak" determinism might help, but it doesn't seem relevent to the discussion of God's foreknowledge, because God already knows' all of our actions, one can only retreat to an extreme version of the compatibalist version of free will. If God knows everything, then they're already true. If everything is already true, then it is logically impossible to make the converse true as well.

But in any case, it seems to be unlikely that one can combine the two definitions, because an action can't both be determined and indetermined at the same time. Furthermore, even if the action is only weakly determined, the only difference that this would make is that there would be some randomness involved. This wouldn't make one difference for free will.

nemesis855

How is man's "best interest" be served by allowing a free-will choice of enternal hell?

- nemesis855

Cross Examiner

The 4th graders really enjoyed the trip to the State Capitol, Sutter's Fort, Old Town Sacramento etc. yesterday. My wife, their teacher and trip organizer, was glad to have me and the other chaperones along, and I was glad to go. It was good talking to you in-person the other day. You are more well-read than any college freshman I've met. I'll try to respond to your comments now.

I could not agree more.

Danger Will Robinson! My qualm with the above is that programming us to be believers negates free-will, as defined in your first clause, which definition I agreed to whole-heartedly.

The above is logical but the seemingly incongruent presupposition (to which I obejcted) it is based upon must be addressed before I could agree to it all. On an aside, are you suggesting that there should be more believers?

Isn't that a paraphrase of what I wrote? Creating robots, regardless of said robots final destination, negates free-will. I think we are agreed on this.

I'd agree except that allowing two methods, and two methods only, for describing the battle between causality and free-will is so obviously and foundationally flawed to the point that it is a self-evident mistake that needs no further prosecution from me. That is, I do not need to prove the issue transcends two methods, or add a third method, to say such creates a false dichotomy; it is a prima facie assertion. I'm not trying to opt-out on a technicality but I think the over-simplification of this issue is detrimental to our discussion if allowed to persist.

Yes, you can still be free even if your arm, surprisingly, shoots into the air. Folks w/ disabilities can demonstrate this well enough. As such, not all acts are reasonable or voluntary. Given your definition though:

"And if there isn't a reason, or a cause for the action, then there is no reason, nor any cause."

it would mean that involuntary acts, like one's hands suddenly grabbing the sky, would be acausal. This does not hold. Even though I am unfamiliar with all the philosophical terminology, I do understand, conceptually, the difference between willful causation and physiological causation. The latter can easily cause the arm shooting into the air without need for the former.

I assume by unintelligible you mean:

"Being such that understanding or comprehension is difficult or impossible; incomprehensible"

to which I would disagree with regards to a description of God's traditional qualities. Is it impossible to understand that God knows all things? Most children have no problem understanding this. But all of this aside, isn't whether God is/can be omni-max a debate for another day, another place? I thought we were discussing free-will in the context of God's allowance for evil to occur and/or for man's self-determination with regards to his final destination. If this is so, we have to allow for God's traditional attributes to be admissable, which are essential to my argument, for the sake of the free-will defense and our discussion as a whole. Denial to allow this is either unjustly antagonistic or an attempt to redirect to another, seperate issue. Neither of which do I think you intend given my belief that you are both good-natured and honest. So, which discussion is it that you want to have?

Scholars typically classify all Cosmological models as either causal or acausal. The Inflationary model is acausal. I have a problem with that but will leave that subject for another day. If you want some thought on it, check out:

http://www.apologeticspress.org/defd...1/dd-01-17.htm

Note: though I find the results objective enough, there is a theistic overtone that I will not deny. Conversely, all human writing exhibits bias, even from atheist authors! I've got plenty of alternative support but I like the article referenced above most since it is in summary form and covers multiple models, for those who lead busy lives

No one called anyone else a liar. From my own experience, I've found people believe whatever they wish. There is ample evidence to be an atheist, a theist, or a Christian. Being such, or something else, is not a function of the mind but of the will, of your choice, which is, after all, the heart of our discussion. Right?

Cheers,
Josh

An addendum:

I just realized you replied twice to my prior post. So, for the sake of simplicity, I'll address your follow-up here.

How does soft/weak determinism not apply to God's foreknowledge of our choices? Why must one retreat to extreme compatibilism? I didn't follow your reason as stated in the following clause:

"...because God already knows' all of our actions, one can only retreat to an extreme version of the compatibalist version of free will."

It feels like I got a fragment of what you're attempting to communicate to me--though it sounds interesting.

Right. I also see determinism and indeterminism as mutually exclusive. Frankly, I see all natural causes as having natural effects. Though I believe that the supernatural, being greater than the natural and a superset of the natural, can manifest itself naturally (e.g. miracles: resurrection, spiritual regeneration via belief in Christ's atoning act etc.) though the inverse cannot be so (e.g. our earthly bodies will not present in eternity, ashes to ashes and dust unto dust). Maybe this is the source of our impasse :banghead:? You may preclude the supernatural while I do not?

Cross Examiner

Howdy nemesis855. You wrote:

Hell is not fire and brimstone with little red devils poking you with tridents. If that, or something like that, was your image of Hell then you're thinking of the caricature of Dante's Inferno. Don't get me wrong, I think Hell is a terrible fate. It is ever-lasting, conscious seperation from the goodness of God for eternity; though some evangelicals do not think it is eternal, and there are even good arguments against eternal seperation, I personally do see it as eternal as I read and understand Scripture.

But to answer your question, yes, man's best interest is self-determination, not to what place he chooses. How is this his best interest you say? If man is not free, then he is not a man but a machine. This is an imcomplete picture however since the cheif aim of God is not that man determine his own fate, though He does allow it, but that He be glorified by creation, which includes man. No doubt the latter will start a furor at infidels.org as it would at humanismiscool.com.

Philosoft

Actually, this doesn't answer the question. Why does self-determination entail a heaven/hell dichotomy? Why not heaven/Albuquerque?
Yeah, inasmuch as it makes God look like an unashamed egomanaic.

Mageth

This is an imcomplete picture however since the cheif aim of God is not that man determine his own fate, though He does allow it, but that He be glorified by creation, which includes man.

I just asked this question in response to a similar comment on another thread: why would an omnimax god need to be glorified by anything? Is he omninarcissistic as well?

Cross Examiner

Hello to Philosft; location: at the end of a gun?!? I hope not

Sure it does. The question was, as posed by nemesis855:

"How is man's "best interest" be served by allowing a free-will choice of enternal hell?"

not:

"Why does self-determination entail a heaven/hell dichotomy? Why not heaven/Albuquerque?"

as you've objected. Though some could convincingly argue that Albuquerque and Hell are synonymous The heaven/hell dichotomy was not posited by me but by men far wiser than I, who's writings explicitly stated or implied divine inspiration. I'm mearly acknowledging the dichotomy, not offering a defense for it. That is to say, you're bringing up a brand-new issue. We can go there, if you want to though.

If ever there was a justified case for one being an egomaniac, it would be God's. If I were to insist on being worshipped, well, that'd be another issue entirely. If you created the entirety of the Cosmos we, the creation, would do well to acknowledge it.

Philosoft

Nah. It's an homage to James Bond movies.

If these men claim their writings were divinely inspired, maybe they're not so wise as you are led to believe.
I think my comment is related to what nemesis wrote. Let me elucidate: we make many choices between things far less polarized than heaven and hell. Thus, a polar distinction is not necessary for a choice to obtain. If it's the act of determining that's ultimately important rather than the destination, why does the destination need to be a place/state of eternal suffering?

Cross Examiner

Hello again Mageth. Glad to see we're still on speaking terms. I see I've done gone and sown the wind and am now reaping the whirlwind. Am I the only theist on these boards or are my comrades just hiding? No doubt we're a minority here, for once. I'm fairly comfortable in this position though so here I go:

Why would a doctor need us to acknowledge the cancer in the x-rays? To validate himself? To comfort him; that he did not waste all that time and money at Tulane School of Medicine? Or, so that we can truly come to grips with reality and see our deficiency, our smallness, and come to him for the cure. As I mentioned just previously, if you created the Cosmos, we would do well to acknowledge this.

Does anyone know if Majody, the original poster, ever commented on all these answers we've provided? Or is this another case of hit and run?