WMN: t3_2ctoax_t1_cjkffxq--TIO2

[TITLE]

CMV:If the biblical God exists, then he is as much or more responsible for human behaviour than humans are.

[FeloniousMonk94]

The typical Christian resolution to the problem of evil is to state that it is humans, through the exercise of their (presumably metaphysical) free will (a scientifically and philosophically implausible concept) have disobeyed god and brought sin and its attendant woes into existence. Fine, let's assume that to be the case. It is nevertheless unclear how God is obviated of moral responsibility even if we concede this to be the case, because he/she/it is omniscient. If God is omniscient, then it knew the exact actions that humans would take. If God knew the only outcome its actions would produce (creating the world and humans and then human disobedience) it follows that it is responsible for what it willed into being. If I *know* that taking action x (creating the world and humans) will result in outcome y (human disobedience), I must naturally take responsibility when y occurs as a result of x instead of, say, z (human obedience) The conclusion? God, by virtue of omniscience, *must* be responsible for human disobedience, and he *must* have willed it.

[lnava]

Hey man, I think I got a good one, albeit kind of silly, if your still interested: God is the trinity, one being expressed as three separate but equal entities: the father, the son, and the holy spirit. Free will is consistent with an omniscient, omnipotent creator god because while God may be these things, no single entity has all three traits. Now I have never heard this expressesly stated, it us somewhat backed up by scripture. The father is the creator. His role in the bible is as a parental figure, and is mostly associated with the creation of the Universe, and of Jesus, though he is ocassiobally mentor. The father himself though has no direct connection to the universe, and is neither omniscient nor omnipotent. The holy spirit is omnipotent. The father accomplishes all things through the holy spirit. Adam was born when he was filled with the holy spirit. The prophets and saints and gospel writers where inspired through by the holy spirit. While god is the architect, the designer, the creator, it is the holy spirit that build reality. The holy spirit is neither omniscient nor is he the creator. The son is omniscient. His role in the is mainly as a teacher. Jesus spreads the word of the lord. Jesus knows the nature of the holy spirit. He straight up products the future a few times. As the son of the creator, he himself is obviously bit the creator, and as a human he was not omnipotent, and ultimately died just like the rest of us. He is neither the creator nor is he omnipotent. With the powers thusly divided, I hope you believe this leaves room for free will under the biblical god.

[FeloniousMonk94]

Interesting and kinda fun conception, but it doesn't alleviate the tension between omniscience and free will entirely. Jesus, if being fully omniscient, would preclude free will through the virtue of omniscience alone. Of course, the pivotal moment of original sin is pre jesus, so one can explain the problem of evil without omniscience butting in. So, you've provided a way in which original sin and the problem of evil can be accounted for. Good job. ∆ for being a great sport and having an interesting solution.

[DeltaBot]

Confirmed: 1 delta awarded to /u/lnava. ^[[History](/r/changemyview/wiki/user/lnava)] ^[[Wiki](http://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/wiki/deltabot)][[Code](https://github.com/alexames/DeltaBot)][[Subreddit](http://www.reddit.com/r/DeltaBot/)]

[uniptf]

I'm going to argue only part of your view: If Yahweh/Allah, the god of the Jews, Christians, Muslims, (and Mormons!) exists, then so do all the other thousands of divine and semi-divine, super-powerful, supernatural entities that humans have dreamed up and written stories about throughout our more modern history; and *all* of them are responsible for human behavior as their respective myths say they are.

[FeloniousMonk94]

Sure, I agree with you as an agnostic atheist. But the CMV is predicated on us conceding Yaweh to be the case.

[StoneyBoi]

Why will "God" not clear up this ambiguity to if he exists or not? He could quite easily appear to us all and just say "Look I'm here, there is no need to kill each other any more. Just chill the fuck out and enjoy your lives in peace and harmony and when you die you will have eternal life in heaven". It would be as easy as that. Maybe he enjoys watching all of the suffering, or maybe he he is too busy playing the holy Xbox 1 million or some shit like that! HAHA Come on man this is the 21st century, enough with the fairy tales people!

[nogginrocket]

You speak of the Christian "God", but you say nothing of Christ who not just offers, but demonstrates, the reconciliations for these problems. How does Christ, as both human and divine, fit into your view?

[FeloniousMonk94]

This just introduces more problems. Why did God create christ to save man? Why didn't he just save man from the start? If he's omniscient, he knew in advance that he'd have to save man through christ. If he's omnipotent, why didn't just do that to begin with? Why did he want or need christ to save man when he could just will it so? Remember, he knows in advance who will and won't accept Christ's teachings, by virtue of omniscience. Why doesn't he just save all those that *would* have accepted christ without Christ as the middleman?

[nogginrocket]

These are all very logical questions, and you seem to seek logical answers. Any sufficiently deep reading of the Bible reveals teachings that are distinctly paradoxical. Forgiveness and grace are both extremely illogical, and are used to seek *transformation* rather than to seek *understanding*. I'd like to think that a follower of Christ would tell you that these questions you have asked are very much the beginning of transformation. (And I apologize if these seems like evasion; that is not my intention. I'm just afraid you would not accept non-logic based answers.) If you intend to "understand" the Bible by studying it's logical arguments you will not find what you seek because God's intent is, first and foremost, to transform you from what you think you are into who you really are. Perhaps if you think of your reading the Bible as transformation rather than information, I feel you will be on a path to find a truer understanding of the Christian god.

[FeloniousMonk94]

Your fears are well founded. Why ought anyone accept non-logical answers? All that is real can be reduced to mathematical statement, including my thoughts as I type this and yours as you read this. If all that is real is expressable through mathematic statement, then all that cannot be expressed in mathematic statement is unreal or not real. Anything that is not fundamentally reducible to mathematical statement (at least in principle) is devoid of semantic content. That which is devoid of semantic content is literally meaningless. Are you therefore arguing that religions espouse meaningless doctrines? however-much I might tend to sympathise with such a notion, it doesn't seem to be what you're saying, but it does seem like a natural consequence of what you're saying.

[nogginrocket]

Interesting you bring up mathematics. Remember that by Gödel's Incompleteness Theorem any formal mathematical system necessarily has true statements which are not provable. So if we require 'all that is real' to be described mathematically, we are also saying that there can exist portions of 'all that is real' that cannot be described mathematically. By this logic you necessarily need non-mathematical means to explain some portions of 'all that is real'. Here I'm only trying to point out the major flaw of logic (and as a bonus the flaws of the human ego, by the way); logic demands a logical explanation of all things, but logic is, by it's own definition, incapable of providing that explanation. Logic seeks only logic and is incapable of discovering something greater than itself. It is also incapable of transforming into a more useful form. Logic is static, and God (like humanity) is infinitely dynamic. But this is not my point. My point is this; you seek an explanation for a very unimportant aspect of God (omniscience) in order to explain his actions in the world. I would have you know there are more descriptive, and more illogical qualities (forgiveness, gifts of grace, divine love), that would provide both better understanding, and better fodder for debate about his actions in the world. Edit: changed omnipotence to omniscience

[FeloniousMonk94]

Godel's work relates to things like the barber paradox, doesn't it? Like sets of all sets being paradoxical because they aren't members of themselves? Logic is not self-justifying (it cannot prove itself), but appears to provide consistency to all phenomena at all scales of observation. When does reductionism fail? Are there examples of phenomena that are not reducible to the behaviour of their constituent entities? (be they atoms, or subatomic particles, or whatever there may be below that that we may discover) But anyway, I don't see omniscience as a trivial quality by a long-shot, and the same goes for omnipotence. The whole god-concept is about an entity so great that it is perfect in an aristotelian sense (cannot be improved upon or made greater) and in comparison to which nothing greater can be conceived. Omniscience, omnipotence and omnipresence, then, are of great importance to the god-concept.

[nogginrocket]

I'm guessing you have your back to God. How can you learn anything about something you are not observing directly? --- Addendum: Many apologies, that was impulsive and not technically a fair question. I'll respond more thoroughly shortly. --- [STA-CITE]> I don't see omniscience as a trivial quality by a long-shot, and the same goes for omnipotence. The whole god-concept is about an entity so great that it is perfect in an aristotelian sense (cannot be improved upon or made greater) and in comparison to which nothing greater can be conceived. Omniscience, omnipotence and omnipresence, then, are of great importance to the god-concept. [END-CITE]The issue I have with this is that the Christian god is not one that cannot be made greater. The Christian god is made greater in every redemption, and if you've seen humanity lately, you know there is always more to be redeemed. Christians describe God succinctly: "God is love." Love does not seek control in the way you describe. Love only seeks more love, and will unconditionally allow any behavior that brings more love. It does not matter that the worldly evils are caused by man or by God, what matters is that evils create more space for grace, and forgiveness, and love to take hold. These are the 'mysterious ways', also described in the Bible. So I guess my point is that I don't understand why you call your description of God to be "Biblical" and "Christian". As a christian (as you probably determined that I am), I do not recognize the God you are describing. A description of the nature of unconditional love and the grace that reveals such a love through forgiveness of "disobedience" is a more proper description of a christian God. The christian God requires Christ; who is wholly divine and wholly human. This Christ said: "Follow me," which to this christian means that any human is capable of divine love. **TL;DR:** This is my argument: you do not include the nature a christian God (i.e. God is love) in your definition, so any argument you make (logical or otherwise) about the consequences of that definition are based on faulty assumptions about christian beliefs. Basically, God's omnipotence and omnipresence are not general qualities like you describe, but have the quality of unconditional love which applies differently to the actions of humanity.

[FeloniousMonk94]

I don't think anyone can observe god directly, at least not the judeo-christian kind. And it would be playing with the concept of God to posit one that is amenable to direct observation, given a god is usually referred to as an entity beyond or outside the temporal and spatial. What I *can* do, however, is examine the popular and commonly held conceptions of god (god as creator [deist], god as creator and custodian [theist] gods as humanlike, capricious entities [Ancient Greek polytheism]) and point of logical inconsistencies with common descriptions of god. Whether god is "real" or not is somewhat peripheral to this endeavour, which is understanding the contradictions inherent in many popular conceptions of what god is and what it does. The point I'm trying to raise in this CMV is that whatever the reality or otherwise of the judeo-christian god, the nature of its conception by predominant monotheistic religions is such that there is a logical contradiction between the most prevalent god-concept and the mythos common to the Abrahamic religions.

[nogginrocket]

I've given a more descriptive response in my previous comment. --- Also: [STA-CITE]>I don't think anyone can observe god directly [END-CITE]I grant you that, but the spirit of my question was this: how can you find something you're not looking for? =]

[FeloniousMonk94]

Cheers. But one problem I see with it is God's love *is* conditional on one accepting his/her/its existence and seeking forgiveness. If he *could* save you no matter what, but doesn't unless you accept and love him, then either he doesn't love non-believers enough to save them, or he has an eccentric way of displaying affection. Whether disobedience by itself, even of a supernatural being, constitutes an act that needs forgiving is another matter entirely. (although you can probably intuit my opinion on the matter.) Also, I'm not sure your interpretation of God is representative of most christians. You seem quite liberal in your faith orientation, whereas the catholic church is quite stringent in extolling the immutable and unimprovable nature of God as the most supreme conceivable being.

[Cyridius]

Omniscience doesn't mean knowing for a fact exactly what we'll do. It means knowing what *could* happen; Humans could've just as easily blindly followed him and ignored our curiosity. It was ***our*** choice that ***we*** made. That is what free will is. God created us to have free will, and because we have free will we are, as such, responsible for our own actions.

[FeloniousMonk94]

[STA-CITE]>Omniscience doesn't mean knowing for a fact exactly what we'll do. [END-CITE]Yes it does. To be all knowing, one must necessarily know all. Human behavior is a subset of "all", so if one is "all knowing" then one knows what humans will do in advance of them knowing what they will do. Hence the incompatibility. Anything *less* than knowing *everything* is not omniscience.

[HumpRAWR]

Do you see your conclusion as inconsistent with Christianity? or are you just arguing against Christians that disagree with your conclusion?

[robeph]

We all have free will, unless we do bad things, then satan made us do it.

[hacksoncode]

You seen to have an oddly limited view of the powers of an omnipotent being that is viewed as the actual source of, and complete authority on, morality. If the Christian god wanted humans to be *actually* responsible for their actions instead of Himself, he merely need declare it to be so. If He says that the moral responsibility for evil belongs with humans, then it does, by the definition of the Christian God and the definition of morality as they see it. Yes, this is simply taking the simpler horn of the euthyphro dilemma, but so what?

[Nixon_Cranium]

The Crux of your viewpoint seems to be that freewill is nonexistent, and there are great arguments for the deterministic side, but consider the following: You use reason to think about the nature of freewill, there is nothing biologically determined to create a specific philosophical idea, and you had to actually think about your idea, examining it, weighing the possibilities. These things are the result of the rational mind. While the unconscious mind governs a huge part of your brain, it is affected by the consciousness. Like a rider on an elephant, the rider is small compared to the beast, and the elephant walks on his own accord, but the rider can direct the elephant. The brain can examine and make choices, and since someone can reasonably discern between two choices. If you can pick between choices with your rational mind, you have freewill.

[Nixon_Cranium]

Why do you find freewill so unlikely? Do you believe every action is unconsciously determined? How do you feel about the inherent randomness of subatomic particles? I believe we have freewill, and if we do not the illusion is incredibly deep. A better question would be if freewill exists, but on your post, if there are multiple possibilities that can occur, and Man chooses one, is God responsible? Think of a road map with many routes, and you can choose which way to go, but another person already knows which way. He doesn't cause your choice, he simply knows it. This is an independent event. You choose to take the road, and the other simply foresaw your free action. A dependent event would be if God made you take a particular path. Knowing something is different from causing something. My stock market prediction that was correct didn't cause the market to be good, they were two independent events.

[FeloniousMonk94]

But God *necessarily* chose for you if he knew what action you would take, whether or not you have "free will". If he brings you into being knowing which of your choices you will act on, he necessarily is responsible (causally, not necessarily morally) for the fact that you will act in the way it (he/she, whatever) knows you will

[Nixon_Cranium]

If there are multiple possibilities from a single event, if you can choose two possibilities, (let's say something as mundane as a coin-flip, something with a 50% chance) you would be responsible for the choice. God may have responsibility for creating the chooser, but to indict the creator of a system in which the chooser has agency, even the agency to do wrong seems strange to me. If I create a videogame were the player has the ability to kill civilan NPCs, but this is not endorsed, is the developer responsible, outside of simply letting it exist?

[FeloniousMonk94]

Developers are not generally *completely* omniscient. If they were, they'd know the future actions of each and every player within their constructed environment, including who would kill civilians. Also, players are part of the game environment itself and players are created by the developers. With those elements folded into your analogy, it's hard to see a way in which the game devs *wouldn't* be responsible.

[Nixon_Cranium]

I'm saying they are, but they are also not responsible. The game gives you the ability to kill civilians, but you choose to do the killing and are entirely responsible for the action. The revs allowed you to go either way, giving you freedom

[FeloniousMonk94]

But you missed the point: Omniscient devs that also created the players know exactly how those players will behave, and therefore know that they will kill civilians. If the devs didn't program the "players" with foreknowledge of all their behaviour, they wouldn't be omniscient developers. So your analogy only starts to work if you say God isn't omniscient, or that the "players" are capable of action that the "dev" doesn't know about. If a dev programs "players", then he knows not only all the ways in which players *can* act, but also all the ways in which the players *will* act. This foreknowledge contradicts free will, and also makes god responsible for all actions of all players.

[Nixon_Cranium]

Knowing someone's actions does not cause their action, the two events are independent of eachother. God forsees the possible actions of the individual and the individual does the action.

[FeloniousMonk94]

No, knowing someone's action doesn't cause it. What an astute observation. But knowing someone's action then bringing about the necessary conditions for that person's action, including that person's existence? That makes you *responsible*. I've also plainly stated that *complete* omniscience would include not just knowledge of the *potential* actions of an entity, but what their *actual* actions will be. For fuck's sake, I've said this maybe 20 times to other people in this thread and most of the time I've been reiterating very simple concepts. Am I being obscurantanist or vague? Why can't anyone else (except one guy) clearly piece together these concepts? Please excuse my tetchiness, you haven't done anything worse than the rest of the commentors, but this comment broke the camel's back. Constant repitition is tedious as fuck for all involved.

[ebonifragaria]

This is how I think of it: I am assuming that God is outside time and space. From this perspective, you might observe our world as a timeline laid out in front of you. You can see every person, every decision, every cause and effect that happens within that timeline. You know every decision a given person is ever going to make. But from the perspective of that individual, their decision is very much a decision. They see the paths they might take spread out before them, and must decide which path to take, given the circumstances (whether by conscious or unconscious action, or most likely, both.) Yes, they will ultimately take only one specific course of action, which is what you see from the outside perspective. But knowing the decision ahead of time doesn't change anything from the perspective of the decider. The possibility of choosing, that is free will.

[FeloniousMonk94]

Sure- but God brought about the necessary conditions for humans committing evil. The humans committing evil may feel fully responsible for their actions, and without a god they would be. However, if God knew that bringing about the necessary conditions for evil and sin would cause man's alienation from God, then he effectively engineered that alienation and he's responsible for evil.

[ebonifragaria]

On the contrary, the conditions for committing evil are a prerequisite of free will. If those conditions didn't exist at all, we would truly have no choice in the matter, and thus no free will. So in creating the world the way it is, his only intention was that we have true free will--nothing more. He did not will that we disobey him, only that we have the capability to do so.

[FeloniousMonk94]

Like I said, free will is incompatible with complete omniscience anyway. A god who cannot see what action you will take, free will or no, in advance, is definitionally not omniscient.

[ebonifragaria]

I don't understand why you say free will is inherently incompatible with complete omniscience. [STA-CITE]> If God is omniscient, then it knew the exact actions that humans would take. If God knew the only outcome its actions would produce (creating the world and humans and then human disobedience) it follows that it is responsible for what it willed into being. [END-CITE]How does it follow that God is responsible for the actions of the independent beings he created? Beings he purposefully gave the capability of responsibility? I see another comment of yours saying that God is responsible causally, if not morally. But as I argued, the only thing he is responsible for is the creation of independently responsible beings. You could say that he created and controls the environment in which free will is expressed, since it is given that God is all powerful and utterly in control of everything, and thus he controls the actions made within that environment. But we are called to obey regardless of environment: any stain of sin cannot be reconciled with the total perfection of God, regardless of how it got there. And it is technically possible for us to suffer everything this life can throw at us and remain righteous, but none of us (aside from Yeshua, the son of God) are strong enough to do that. Is that callous? Cruel? Perhaps. But he did make it possible for us to be reconciled, didn't he? Thus he is at once judge and pardoner. So it isn't as cruel as it might seem at first. Why does it have to be this way? I don't know, but I'm certain there's a reason--probably one we can't understand. Maybe it's that to God there's a need for both perfect judgement and perfect mercy. Penance must be paid, a sacrifice must be made, but there is nothing we can give that's good enough to save us. So he offered his son instead. Perhaps this is a way to satisfy both aspects of the divine. Although he is certainly capable of controlling us, I think he purposefully does not, instead allowing us to choose between obedience and disobedience. By allowing us this autonomy, a legitimate relationship between us and him is possible. Aside from that, if God is by definition perfectly lawful and good, I don't think he would hold us responsible for things we had no choice in. I don't -think- he would do that, but he certainly could if he wanted to. It would still be perfectly just, as he is the judge by which the definitions "good" and "evil" exist. Same with just totally wiping us out. But I think that creation is morally good, and preserving life is also morally good. Instead of simply destroying us all, he has made us a way.

[FeloniousMonk94]

Try this thought experiment: You know with complete certainty that if you have a son, he'll go on an office-shooting spree of his own "free will", and you know this for a fact, because you're *completely* omniscient. If you know this to be the case, and allow this son to come into existence, then cause and effect dictates that the result is 19 dead office workers. Now, if you know this and go ahead with having that son, even if you do everything within your power to convince him not to, and he goes and shoots up the office, are you causally responsible? Yep. Is he also responsible? Yep. He might be more responsible (he has greater causal proximity to the event) but you are also responsible. Responsibility is not a zero sum game, as previously stated. You brought about the circumstances that were necessary (although not necessarily sufficient) for the crazed gunman antics of this hypothetical son. Responsibility = causal proximity + knowledge of likely outcomes.

[ebonifragaria]

If God did everything in his infinite power to stop humans from doing evil, they would stop. But clearly this isn't the case, so he must allow it to happen (for an unknown purpose). In this we are in agreement. But even if he is responsible in this way, we are still held accountable for our actions. What then? You put free will in quotes, so I'm not sure if I swayed you on it, but I think that's not really the core of the issue. Are you arguing that God's hand in it makes human responsibility irrelevant, whether it exists or not?

[placebo-addict]

Your statement doesn't take into consideration that we, as humans, are flawed. We translate and read the word of God poorly. We have the human condition of assigning blame and responsibility. We are compelled to label things *good* and *evil* without having the ability to remove our ego and emotion from the equation. We can't comprehend what "just is". God is (by definition) completely beyond the human constructs of "human behavior." It is our inherent flaw that causes us to break things down in this fashion.

[FeloniousMonk94]

I'm having a hard time seeing what your reply addresses about my OP. When I say "responsibility", I mean causal responsibility. God can think, or so it is claimed, so it *knew* the outcome of its action if it is indeed omniscient.

[placebo-addict]

My point is that our terms like *think*, *knew*, *responsibility*, etc, are terms for concepts that don't relate to God. *We* invented them. They are inherently flawed because we are inherently flawed. Our entire description of God is imprecise because we can't fully comprehend him.

[FeloniousMonk94]

If we can't fully comprehend "him", then why worship an entity of which we have limited (at best) understanding of? How can we be sure of *anything* claimed of or about "him", including the notions that "*think*, *knew*, *responsiblity* etc," do not apply to him? This line of criticism seems self-defeating.

[lnava]

This is the most common response from the clergy. He is stool worshipped because we have been inspired to by the holy spirit (through the prophets and saints). This is why faith is a requirement of religion

[placebo-addict]

Please note, I'm a huge fan of dinosaurs, science, evolution, etc. I just see them as ways humans classify stuff to our own definitions. None of these disprove a "maker". Our *need* to understand is our inherent flaw. I come from a point that you feel that believing in those things can't include God. God is bigger. It includes your disbelief. It doesn't even care, because "caring" is a human invention. It's ego.

[FeloniousMonk94]

Huh? There's literally nothing at all in this reply that relates to anything I've said in this thread. You still haven't answered the question of how you know that God doesn't or can't have thoughts, responsibilities, will etc., you've just said something about how dinosaurs don't prove God doesn't exist. I don't think I said otherwise, did I?

[placebo-addict]

My point is that "responsibility" is a human construct. It can't be applied to God. You assume you know something that God doesn't when assigning "responsibility" with your interpretation of *good* and *bad* behaviour.

[FeloniousMonk94]

Really? Let's try this one on for size- "respiration and reproduction are human constructs. They cannot be applied to non-humans like insects, reptiles, plant life etc" I never mentioned "good and bad behaviour".

[placebo-addict]

[STA-CITE]>"respiration and reproduction are human constructs." [END-CITE]No, they aren't. Those are innate actions, with results, that we can observe and identify, as well as quantity. They are nature. "Responsibility" is nurture. It is taught. It happens after we are born. It is a human construct. God can't be held to that measurement. It's too simplistic.

[FeloniousMonk94]

No, responsibility (at least in the sense I am using it) is a concept describing causal proximity between an observed cause and an observed effect.

[KevinWestern]

I'm not religious, but look at the situation as if it were a "test". God creates man, sets man loose with "free will" (so man's essentially operating autonomously), and then leaves it up to man to find the way back to divinity. If he wins, he goes to heaven, and if he loses he goes to hell. "Evil" or whatever you call it, occurs because of man's disassociation with the divine. It's what occurs as a part of the conditions of this test that is taking place. God is responsible for setting the test up, sure, however man is responsible for his subsequent choices as he claws his way back to heaven. You need to think of this (again) as a sort of test, rather than just "an existence". Maybe this answered something - I really don't know, lol.

[kittenco]

But why would God test blank slates? They didn't know the concept of God and evil until after the apple. Before that, they're like sheep in a pasture. You can tell your sheep not to eat a specific area of grass, but the sheep have no understanding of consequences until you flog it for disobeying. It's a Pavlov's dog situation.

[silverionmox]

[STA-CITE]> But why would God test blank slates? [END-CITE]I suppose God's a sadistic jerk.

[Londron]

There are several problems with the test thing imo. 1) Tests by nature have to be fair. Me, being raised by loving parents in a rather rich environment with private schools etc. kinde make it unlikely that I would for example, start stealing. Why the hell would I? 2) He already knows the outcome of the tests so what the hell is the point again?

[KevinWestern]

1.) Often times it's wealthier people who fall into the trap of becoming obsessed with money, themselves, excess, leisure, etc while the poor individuals (out of necessity) learn to live selflessly, righteously by helping their family, etc. Perhaps YOUR test is to see if you can truly learn to live selflessly when there's really no factors pushing you to do so. Some could say that's a harder test. Look at the way many of our celebrities behave vs a poor girl in India looking after her 3 siblings. Perhaps the path the poor lead might appear harder (from our perspective) when in fact it's your test (the guy born into a world where everything was easy and given to you) that actually turns out to be the more difficult one. 2.) Does he? Perhaps he doesn't. Perhaps each and everyone of us are just "a piece" of him that he set loose (for whatever reason) and those pieces are trying to become whole again. Some might make it back, some won't. I don't think the Bible ever says "God knows exactly who and who won't make it to heaven" (though I'm not sure, I don't read it).

[FeloniousMonk94]

On the second point, if god is indeed "omniscient" that means it knows *everything*. Which presumably includes knowing who will and won't "make it" so to speak.

[KevinWestern]

We can still have free will alongside an omniscient God who knows all of our future choices right? He may know that we're going to pick the red car on January 3rd, 2018 at the Mercedes dealership, however we in fact will have the ability to choose black - right?

[FeloniousMonk94]

Well no, because free will *cannot* coexist with omniscience- Omni means all, right? And science = knowledge (literally, etymologically.) If he knows *everything*, a subset of everything is what make, model and colour of car you will choose to buy. Of course, knowing that demolishes any possibility of free will. That's the incoherence of claiming both are true.

[KevinWestern]

It's hard for me to fight your position because I am not a Christian and largely agree that the premise has a lot of logical problems. However, let me propose something different. Say God is less of a separate being and more so the sum of everything in the eternal universe. God is not disconnected with you or I because God *is* us. In that scenario you and I are exercising our free will as individual pieces of God acting on our accord, yet when you add us all up together there is essentially this all knowing "thing" (for lack of a better word) that knows all and is omniscient. In that scenario, can't both free will on an individual level and an omniscient "god" co-exist?

[FeloniousMonk94]

That's a nice, creative and almost poetic definition of God that unfortunately has little to do with the biblical God. I appreciate your notion of God but it isn't the one under discussion. Yours deviates markedly from the judeo-christian god. Also, it assumes that the sum of every conscious entity's knowledge is equal to omniscience, which I'm not sure is true. It's probably the case that reality is more complex than all of any intelligent being's collective knowledge can fully address.

[KevinWestern]

Yes, agree. Just some fleeting thoughts sparked by the discussion. Here's one more thing.. Perhaps Omniscience doesn't occur until the *entire sum* finally unites and moves in perfect unison with itself. Because if even one piece is slightly separate from the whole, the sum of all future actions are still impossible to predict because there's this element that can't be fully accounted for.

[Chris6395]

To my understanding of Christians believe God exists outside of time or is extra temporal. If that is indeed the case then he would know all points of the timeline since he can see all points of the timeline and does possess Omniscience. However, Omniscience does not imply Omniderigence, merely because he knows does not mean he causes you're conflating two entirely different ideas. God created all humans with free will his knowledge of what choices we will make is not incompatible with the idea that we still make those choices. God does use his infinite powers to make us choose a certain path, instead we are left to our own devices to pick and choose as we see fit. His knowledge of our choices is not incompatible with our ability to choose, it's incompatible with his acting to make our choices for us.

[FeloniousMonk94]

This doesn't make sense though- if an entity knows the outcome of a process, and chooses to initiate that process, they are responsible for that outcome. Do you deny this? In this case, being omniscient means being responsible for every act you perform, since you know the outcome. If you know the outcome of action X but still perform X then any outcome of X is, at least partially, your responsibility.

[Chris6395]

"If you know the outcome of action X but still perform X then any outcome of X is, at least partially, your responsibility." Problematically though your viewpoint is that God is as much responsible or more responsible. I might disagree and claim that God bears no responsibility, but for now all I have to demonstrate is that humans bear 51% of the blame (not that this breaks down into such percentages). You state he is partially responsible, very well, how partially. Are you arguing that someone who commits the act is less responsible than the person who allowed such an act to proceed without intervening?

[ignotos]

I think the point is that, when God created the universe, he could see the future of the universe he was creating laid out in front of him. Presumably he could have decided to change or tweak things before deciding on the final universe that he would create - moving the Moon closer to the Earth, changing the boiling point of water, populating it with different souls, whatever. By going ahead and creating the current universe (and not some other, slightly different possible universe), knowing how it would unfold, he has effectively set the entire course of history in motion. By doing this, he has caused (and is responsible for) everything which happens. Free will is irrelevant, because he chose to create the people/souls will full knowledge of everything they would do. Choosing to create me (and not some alternate version of me), knowing exactly how I will act, is equivalent to choosing everything that I will do.

[FeloniousMonk94]

Not necessarily. I'm just saying God has some *causal* responsibility for the actions of man, having been able to see what man would do. Imagine you can bring a human into existence but you know they're going to shoot up an office, or something. Are you telling me if you do so, and the office shooting happens, that you're not responsible in the least? Morally *or* causally?

[FeloniousMonk94]

But he had to know the outcome of that will, otherwise he wouldn't be omniscient. He would be ignorant. (of how humans would behave).

[srs117]

Ok, couple of issues, you assume free will cannot "scientifically" or "philosophically" exist, which is nonsense, there is no consensus on the subject. So at this point you either choose to believe in free will or you don't (or you don't choose, you simply believe as all variables determined you would, if free will doesn't exist, as it so happens). Secondly, in the context you are talking about, you are assuming a chronological sequence of events, "god did x then humans did y, therefore god must have known humans WOULD do y because he is omniscient" etc. Most theology assumes god exists (at least to some degree) outside of both Space AND time. For instance consider the "start" of the universe. If you have any knowledge of modern physics, or cosmology, or the big bang, than you know that there is no such thing as "before" the big bang, as both time AND space started then, because time and space are connected. When talking about something outside the scope of time and space, I don't think it is appropriate to use chronology to make a logical argument. Consider for instance the possibility that God is all - knowing because in some sense, in God's frame of reference everything has already happened, is happening, and will happen, simultaneously. Sorry if this isn't very helpful, I can't really convince you one way or the other, but as a scientist, i feel your underlying argument seems flawed.

[KroganNuclearBomb]

But if God acts in this world, doesn't he have to be somewhat in it? So then, wouldn't god not be outside of space and time?

[FeloniousMonk94]

Well, I disagree heartily that there is no consensus on the concept of *magical* free will, the notion that one could have *purposefully done otherwise*. Daniel Dennett has defended his notion of free will which amounts to responsiblity and his conception of free will is entirely compatible with determinism. As for the scientific side of things, neuroscience has tentative experimental data suggestive that free will is illusory, and that mostly unconscious processes percolate up into consciousness but the conscious element of cognition has little if any causal role in explaining our behaviour. See Libet's study. It is possible to see the arbitrary choice someone makes (red button or green) *seconds* before a person is conscious of having made that choice. Secondly, I think you're wrong that my criticism is temporally bound. God willed existence according to the mythos, it makes no matter *whatsoever* what the temporal relation is between the event of his will and the occurrence of existence. So your latter criticism seems wholly irrelevant to the matter of discussion.

[srs117]

Thank you for the response, sorry if I came across hostile at all, I didn't intend to. This seems like an intelligent and friendly conversation so thank you for that, it seems to be a rare thing on reddit. At this point I am more interested in asking you questions than trying to answer yours, if that's ok? You make some excellent points, so I did some thinking and reading. The experiments measuring that the human brain makes a subconscious decision before one can realize they made a decision seems logical in principle, but the specific experiments I found data on only seemed to confirm brain activity prior to being able to communicate that they have made a decision which really doesn't Prove anything does it, am I missing something? On a fundamental level, if the world is fully deterministic, then you are correct, I cannot think of a way in which choices can be anything but determined. But by my knowledge of quantum mechanics, there is ALWAYS a non - zero probability of things happening contrary to all influence, such as electron tunneling, even on the macroscopic level (though the probability is extremely small, it exists). So I guess my question is, how can the universe be truly deterministic? Do you belive it is, and if so why? Also I see no way that causality can be divorced from time. Isn't causality by definition bound by the temporal?

[FeloniousMonk94]

Okay, I answer in two parts. Firstly, on Libet's study. My understanding of the methodology is that Libet gave participants a clock of some sort and asked them to note the time at which they first become conscious of their choice of one button against another. They then remembered that time and reported it. This raises the issue of objectivity vs subjectivity. The methodology used to monitor their brain activity was objective, but the report of the subjective experience of becoming aware of making a decision is necessarily subjective. Also, there may be (almost definitely is) some delay between subjects becoming aware of making their decision and noting the time reported by the clock. But the time difference between which one can predict what people will choose and the time they reported becoming conscious of this decision is large enough that you can adjust for the time difference between becoming aware of choosing and noting the time and Libet's experiment *still* seems to show that unconscious processes precede conscious awareness. You're right about quantum effects etc., and the universe may be fundamentally indeterministic or probablilistic in some way. But even if this is the case, that doesn't get us closer- not even a little bit- to free will. It only gets us closer to random will, and that's assuming the level at which the brain operates is susceptible to quantum effects. As for causality and time? Usually, and when discussing physics, sure. But when discussing metaphysics, we can easily conceive of instantaneous causation or some form of causation that is not contingent on concepts like "before" and "after".

[srs117]

Thanks for the response. I'm not entirely convinced about the experiments, because the data I saw was not the data you are claiming. Not that you are wrong, but I couldn't find the data. You are correct, a random/probabilistic universe does not get us closer to free will, but does get us farther from disproving right, or am I thinking about that wrong? And I do kind of have trouble considering a causality apart from time, even though one could be conceived, what gives it validity? That it is intuitively similar to temporal causality? Didn't we already establish human intuition is flawed? Sorry I am trying to understand, not argue. I had a thought. Forgive me if this is stupid, I don't have an agenda, but I want to believe in free will, so I'm trying to wrap my brain around every thing. Could the action of belief in free will, give one free will? By "maintaining free will" or "distancing decisions from influence" being one of the primary determining factors in the brains decision making process, doesn't some semblance of classic "free will" emerge? On a related but perhaps irrelevant note, it seems (though I have no non - anecdotal evidence for this) the human mind naturally (perhaps because of consciousness) Wants to believe in free will. As a scientist/engineer, (and as a Christian) Again thank you for your response, I am genuinely trying to learn here.

[FeloniousMonk94]

Free will isn't something that can be disproved, but that's because (imo) it isn't a coherent concept. Strive for a strict definition of free will, and you will find that you cannot find an internally-consistent definition that comports with reality as we understand it, unless you're arguing for a very watered-down definition of free will that compatibilists defend. (They define free will as the ability to make decisions but concede these decisions are determined or governed by naturalistic processes) The second point you raise is a problem with metaphysics, which is not amenable to empirical investigation. What can we do without the tools of empirical investigation? We can only speculate postulates and reason from those postulates, there is no error correction and there is no way to know which postulate we adopt is the right one. But if you recall, you said that if God exists, it is extra-(spatio)temporal, and correctly identified my statement of him knowing of human behaviour "before" creating existence as inappropriate. I would agree, but it is difficult to escape temporal description in the same way that it is difficult to avoid personifying natural processes like evolution; our speech is not sufficiently specialised to clearly discuss matters of that sort. I earlier charged you with minor pedantism, because it is not generally disputed that god created the universe, (or rather, it is not disputed if one accepts the existence of god) and it's not relevant to the discussion "when" he created it and "when" it came about, the act of will on god's part is what allowed the necessary conditions for man's capacity of sin to exist. The thought you mention in the latter half of your comment is compatibilist; it suggests that there is "free will" in the sense that we can deliberate, ponder and agonise over important matters and reach conclusions about certain things. I would not dispute this conception of "free will" at all, nor begrudge you its use, except to say that I'd prefer it if compatibilists called it something else. In the sense free will is usually meant, there's this metaphysical, floaty magical component that siphons free will from the aether or some such nonsense. Note that "free will" in the sense you propose can equally be applied to computers, which can take inputs and apply numerous levels of abstract manipulation to and yield highly complex outputs. The free will you suggest is every bit as mechanical as a dreary determinist would claim. I would also resist your claim that the human mind wishes itself to have "free will" as (popularly conceived) as being a fact of nature rather than nurture. Although I can't evidence this contention, It's highly likely this is culturally dependent. For example, eastern mysticism tends to say that the self is illusory. If the self is illusory, there is nothing there to exercise free will, merely process layered upon process. Neuroscience has (broadly speaking) gravitated towards this notion. I would also point out there can be psychological boons to disabusing oneself of the traditional notion of free will- one is more forgiving, tending to rehabilitative thinking rather than punitive thinking, one is freed of egoistic turmoil about one's significance, one is unified with their constituent matter to provide a sense of wholeness and continuity with all matter, animate and inanimate. (Mind *is* body vs mind *and* body)

[silverionmox]

[STA-CITE]> It is possible to see the arbitrary choice someone makes (red button or green) seconds before a person is conscious of having made that choice. [END-CITE]That just modifies a bit with the timing of the decision, but does not in any way contradict free will.

[FeloniousMonk94]

unless you believe your conscious decision can traverse time and travel to the past, then yes, it does. If it's unconscious neural activity first THEN conscious awareness, the conscious awareness of that choice is an epiphenomenon. It's just an echo of a completed process, not causality relevant to your behaviour.

[silverionmox]

How does that contradict free will?

[FeloniousMonk94]

Because conscious deliberation playing a causal role is so inextricable from the common notion of free will that you can't have common free will without it.

[silverionmox]

There's nothing to prevent free will from determining actions even if our thoughts are themselves also an echo of a previous decision. That decision still can be free will.

[FeloniousMonk94]

You can call anything you like free will. That doesn't mean it has even the slightest resemblance to what other people mean by the term. Language is a consensual process, yadda yadda etc. etc. And your use of "decision" in this context is suspect. Light hitting your retina and travelling down the optical nerve and being processed in your visual cortex isn't your decision; it's an autonomous process that doesn't require your conscious input. So is breathing, and so are automatic thoughts. Of course, you could just redefine all biological occurences to be "decisions" and preserve a notion of free will in that way, but that would just be perverting language when we agree on the fundamentals. (or do we?)

[KevinWestern]

Scientific research on freewill, might I add though, is by no means conclusive. There's still quite a few things that test can't explain, and as a whole there's quite a few things that modern science can't explain either. It may very well be the case that in 1,000 years from now we'll have an entirely different "scientific" opinion on the matter. Heck, we only figured out the dang earth was round not that long ago. We know next to nothing.

[FeloniousMonk94]

Sure, but this could be said of conceivably any finding. And I made sure to qualify that statement with "tentative" and "suggestive". But imo, the scientific work on free will is a bit of a waste of time as free will as a concept is logically impossible if you accept causality *anyway*.

[lnava]

I think you are talking way to concrete about "free-will" vs. determinism. Describe to me a measurable difference between a universe with "free-will" and a universe that is deterministic. Until you do, then there is no scientific difference between "free-will" and determinism.

[FeloniousMonk94]

That's impossible, because there is no conceivable universe in which "free will" exists because the concept of "free will" cannot be coherently or cogently defined. It's philosophically meaningless. The universe can only be random or determined. Random will isn't free will any more than determined will is free will.

[lnava]

[STA-CITE]>It's philosophically meaningless. [END-CITE]Then doesn't that make this entire discussion meaningless? [STA-CITE]>The universe can only be random or determined. [END-CITE]This seems like a false dilemma to me. What does that even fucking mean? In some sense, the universe is random, and moving to a state of more randomness (increased entropy), but you could also say its determined for the exact same reason (we know which direction the universe is headed). Statements about how the universe *must* be is outside the realm of logical thought. The universe **could** exist in multiple state simultaneously (and as far as we are aware, it does) and we don't really understand the correlation between these multiple states and the universe we experience. These kind of statements should especially be avoided in conversations about God, because "God" made the universe, and he could conceivably make it again in a new way. We shouldn't even assume that God is limited by the laws of math or physics or even logic. God could create a universe that completely changes state every moment (another possibility that could be true of our universe). You are taking huge theological queries and forcing them into small boxes so they can be easily understood by humans.

[FeloniousMonk94]

No, why would it make the discussion meaningless? Please elaborate. And no, the universe isn't "both" random and deterministic. It is either. Of course, at the quantum level there appears to be indeterminate phenomena, and that means the universe is fundamentally indeterministic. It's just at macroscopic levels of observation, there appears to be determinism in just the same way that Newtonian physics is just fine for the majority of our day-to-day needs but isn't complete. And in contradiction to your objection to me "forcing down [huge theological queries] into small boxes", the majority of theologians that do indeed suggest that God would be constrained by the laws of mathematics and logic. But anyway, it doesn't matter a solitary fuck whether or not God creates a universe that "changes state" (presumably from determinism to indeterminism) from moment to moment; the contradiction between "free will" (whatever that might be said to be) and omniscience is still present.

[hacksoncode]

If you know that much about the standard argument against free will, surely you are aware of the Compatiblist view on what "free will" actually means. It doesn't have to be magic and it doesn't have to be non-deterministic in order to be a useful concept that explains the actions of conscious actors.

[FeloniousMonk94]

Well it's a good thing I'm talking about magical free will, as stipulated in my other replies, because the compatibilist notion of free will is completely compatible (lol) with determinism. I'm arguing against the folk notion of free will, not the kind people like Dennett defend.

[KevinWestern]

I don't know really. I'm at work, can't spend too much time on this, sorry - lol.

[man2010]

My understanding is that people committing a sin wasn't necessarily a guarantee when the world was created according to biblical creation theories. As such, it's not God's fault that people sin, but rather the fault of the people themselves. Let's say I have a child, and a raise that child well. Despite me being a good parent, my child turns into a serial killer. Is it then my fault that my child turned into a serial killer because I'm the reason that he is alive in the first place?

[FeloniousMonk94]

If God didn't know man would sin, then he is definitionally NOT omniscient.

[bluefyre73]

Is God often described as being omniscient? I'm more familiar with the concept that he is omnipresent, so he knows everything that is and has happened, but cannot know the future because human beings have free will, something God cannot chance.

[teryret]

The problem is that omniscience is required for infallibility, which the bible is quite clear on. God didn't fuck up once in that book, so he must have known in advance what choices were the right ones. But in either case, that line of thinking puts time as a more fundamental concept than God, and while there is clear evidence of that in the bible (cite: it took 6 days to create heaven and earth) I doubt most believers would find that a comfortable position to take, because then the question becomes where did time come from. It fits better with the mythos to have God as more fundamental than time (biblical evidence be damned (so to speak)), in which case the question of when knowledge is available to God is clearly "whenever he cares to look", which is omniscience.

[FeloniousMonk94]

Well, yes. The four O's are ascribed to god, these being: Omnipresence (God is everywhere) Omnipotence (God is all powerful) Omniscient (God is all-knowing) Omnibenevolence (God is all-good)

[man2010]

My understanding is that people committing a sin wasn't necessarily a guarantee when the world was created according to biblical creation theories. As such, it's not God's fault that people sin, but rather the fault of the people themselves. Let's say I have a child, and a raise that child well. Despite me being a good parent, my child turns into a serial killer. Is it then my fault that my child turned into a serial killer because I'm the reason that he is alive in the first place?

[kittenco]

If you locked your child in a room, would provide them only good information and influences, yet later leave a key to the outside, it is your fault. If you wanted an unquestioningly obedient child, don't provide them with a chance to learn otherwise. There was no need for God to create Lucifer (whose outcome he clearly knew, being God), nor was there a need for the tree of knowledge. Or why let Lucifer into the garden? You know your children are obedient creatures, and they know you created everything. It would make sense for them to think that you created the snake that told them to eat the apple as well. They LITERALLY didn't know the difference between good and bad until they bit the apple.

[llazerwolf]

If we take account of theory of multiple dimension and multiverses that God created. Its plausible that God has created every single possibilities of action we would ever do, and from our perspective we only experience our single reality which gives an impression of no free will. Because we can never take two path at once. These possibilities if viewed from higher dimension (in God's reality) would seems to happen simultaneously at once, because there is no dimensional boundaries such as time, space and possibilities. In a way whichever path we take will create our own reality, which in turn become our responsibility.The reality we live in is our responsibility, even though the possibilities have been laid out by God. [STA-CITE]>The conclusion? God, by virtue of omniscience, *must* be responsible for human disobedience, and he *must* have willed it. [END-CITE]Of course God knew that some of the humans will use their power to disobey. In order to create free will God must give choices and possibilities, because without evil, good would be meaningless. Those disobedience is the consequences of the free will we are bestowed by God. We would be put on trial of how would we use our power and freedom for. The possibilities are given to us, but it's still our decision to choose which path we will go. TL;DR : God created multidimensional possibilities, while human choose out of those possibilities. In turn, we are still responsible with our choices which shape our personal realities.

[FeloniousMonk94]

So wait, if you're going to drop some many-worlds intepretation inspired theology on me, you'd have to tell me whether or not I'm responsible for all the me's running about in other universes. What about the one where I have a tumor depressing my frontal lobes and go on a shooting spree, as has happened to previously upstanding people? Do I claim the merits of another me that designed a solution to world hunger and population growth? The point of the many-worlds interpretation isn't that all those other "worlds" are possibilities- it's that reality actually branches off into functionally infinite universes. Whatever continuity you experience isn't due to your merits; it's a given of the notion. In other universes, other yous are conscious as well. I find the many-world idea a bit questionable, but even if we grant it to be the case, it still solves nothing. When you say: [STA-CITE]>The reality we live in is our responsibility, even though the possibilities have been laid out by God. [END-CITE]The reality "you" live in is just one of many according to the many-worlds interpretation, with others populated by different yous. In other words, all those times you *could* have done something reprehensible and fucked up, you did. And you didn't. and whichever is true when you look back into your history created a branch. And this is true for all of us. You don't get to pick and choose which you you are.

[lnava]

All those things could have happened, and maybe for some people it did, but you chose your path. The mechanism behind this would obviously be mystical, but it allows god to know everything and you to have choice in how you experience his creation.

[teryret]

[STA-CITE]> It is nevertheless unclear how God is obviated of moral responsibility even if we concede this to be the case, because he/she/it is omniscient. [END-CITE]It's a question of semantics. That question is coherent for non-Christians because non-Christians don't define morality in terms of God. The trick is, Christians do. From the Christian perspective 'morality' means something to the effect of "concordance with God's will". His actions are, by definition, moral.

[excultist]

In a mystical concept of reality, both God and humans are magical beings. Human decisions are not deterministic, we can choose *anything* as a result of our free will. You may believe that our past history and training, our biology, our inherited response patterns, evolutionary pressure, social pressure, and any other relevant factors will force us to make a specific decision. But we transcend all of that because we are magical beings. Of course, you may not believe that, however, it does fit into the hypothetical situation which you have described. The authors of the bible were telling us a parable to explain why the world is such a mess. Why is childbirth so painful, does this indicate the perversity or sadism of the Creator? How can we convince women to be always obedient to their husbands? These, and other urgent questions are conveniently answered by the parable of the Garden of Eden and the Original Sin which happened there. We cannot blame God for these things because God is much more powerful than we are, and He will punish us if we do not worship and obey him. Get it?

[FeloniousMonk94]

But free will is incompatible with omniscience- if God does not know in advance what actions we will take, then it isn't omniscient. Omniscience and free will cannot coexist because contradictions immediately arise.

[Cruxius]

Free will and omniscience are only exclusive if all actors involved are bound by our universes laws of logic and physics. Since god is allegedly not bound by the laws of the universe he created, there is no contradiction. It's why he could in theory create an object so large he couldn't move it, then move it anyway. It's a paradox for us, but not for god, if that makes sense.

[FeloniousMonk94]

I don't know, CS Lewis, for example, claims that God's omnipotence is not the kind which can achieve logically impossible feats. I guess it comes down to whether or not you subscribe to his school of thought.

[excultist]

I don't think that we have to interpret the concept of omniscience in such a literal manner. Omniscience means knowing everything that can be known. This still allows that some things can't be known, such as, what decisions will be made by a magical being who has free will.

[KroganNuclearBomb]

Maybe, but many people see omniscience as having all true knowledge. Not sure how free will fits into that picture.

[excultist]

Many people have all sorts of weird ideas, but logically, if something cannot be known, then even an omniscient being would not know it. This compares to that famous old paradox which asks if God can create a stone which is so heavy the He cannot lift it. No matter which answer you give, yes or no, it negates the idea that God is omnipotent. However it is not really a paradox, because even an omnipotent being cannot do things that are impossible to do, just as even an omniscient being cannot know things that are impossible to know.

[KroganNuclearBomb]

So what counts as unknowable in this case of omniscience? This is interesting to me because most Christians I've known don't hold this view.

[excultist]

I have already said that if human beings truly have free will, then the decisions made by human beings are not actually the inevitable consequence of the situation that they are in, and those decisions cannot be predicted in any absolute manner (they could still *sometimes* be predicted, of course - people are not necessarily going to do whatever you least expect, and you could make a lucky guess) even by God. The proposal of this discussion is that if God placed the tree with forbidden fruit in the Garden of Eden, and being omniscient He *knew* that Adam and Eve would violate His command to refrain from eating the forbidden fruit, then it is actually God, and not Adam and Even, who is responsible for this terrible sin for which the human race has been relentlessly punished ever since, and which eventually (so Christians believe) required the horrible, agonizing death of Jesus Christ on the cross, to suffer on behalf of the human race in order to make it possible for God to forgive us for our original sin (which is a pretty bizarre idea upon which to construct a religion - I'll take the Flying Spaghetti Monster any day, in preference to that). So I am arguing that even an omniscient God does not necessarily know everything, if some things are impossible to know.

[FeloniousMonk94]

But God created reality in such a way that allowed man to sin. If the environment it designed for man was such that it provided no opportunity to sin, then man would not have sinned. This doesn't compromise man's free will anymore than God thwarted the free will I might have to walk through walls or fly unaided.

[excultist]

Of course, according to the bible, God created the world in such a way that humanity had an opportunity to sin, but that also means that humanity had an opportunity to choose not to sin. If sin were not even possible, then the only reason you don't sin is because you can't, and that is not an accomplishment. If it were truly necessary to prevent human beings from sinning, of course God could have made it impossible, but where's the fun in that? Lord of the Rings becomes a much less interesting story, if Sauron does not exist.

[FeloniousMonk94]

Argument from narrative interest? Nice one, don't think I've seen that one before.

[excultist]

Clearly, the universe exists for the amusement of God. We are His entertainment.

[Gaargod]

Whilst that's a *very* possible interpretation for an omnipotent, omniscient being... It does not allow for omnibenevolence. If God created us with deliberate flaws for his own amusement (and especially if he then punishes us for not acting perfectly), that is not a wholly 'good' act, by any reasonable interpretation.

[excultist]

God clearly is not that benevolent, if we accept biblical reports of His activities, such as drowning the whole world and killing everybody except for Noah and his immediate family, as a punishment for some kind of undefined wickedness of which the human race was found to be guilty. I find it hard to believe that even tiny babies in their cradles were guilty of wickedness. And that is only one example of many. The Book of Job would be another interesting example of God's less than benevolent intentions. In any event, my discussion has been about a very specific proposition, which is that God is as much or more responsible for human behavior than we humans are. That argument rests upon God's supposed omnipootence and omniscience, without particularly requiring Him to be omnbenevolent.

[Gaargod]

You might have *intended* that, but you specifically said 'Biblical' God. And one of the (informed) characteristics of the Biblical God is omnibenevolence; Psalm 145:17. [STA-CITE]>The Lord is righteous in all his ways and kind in all his works. [END-CITE]Now, I personally think that there's obvious contradictions between what we're told about God's character and his actual actions, but that's not the issue here. God being omnibenevolent just makes the problem of free will greater.

[KroganNuclearBomb]

I like this response. Why couldn't god have made it so humans can only do degrees of good?

[lnava]

As long as there is a gradient, there will be "good" and "bad", all you are doing is moving the goal posts

[FeloniousMonk94]

This is only true if you do not distinguish between a relative sense of good and bad and an absolute sense of good and bad.

[caustictoast]

Arguably he did. People will only do what they think is right and good. You wouldn't go out and do something you think is wrong would you? But more on target because that wouldn't be free will. That would be doing as he wanted not what we wanted.

[FeloniousMonk94]

Good and evil, right and wrong are only meaningful to those equipped with the brain structure necessary to comprehend them. Psychopaths lack any such notions- good and evil are confusing and irrelevent to them and they act entirely for their own pleasure. How does monotheism account for the psychopath? (who isn't *necessarily* "evil", it's worth adding)

[caustictoast]

A psychopath is like a child. Like you said they're ill equipped. They aren't evil it's just they don't know any better. Things go wrong sometimes and because of it some people are less accountable for their actions

[Neurotikitty]

[STA-CITE]> They aren't evil it's just they don't know any better. [END-CITE]That raises some interesting questions though. Why give (most) humans the capability of understanding the difference between right and wrong, if they cannot do evil in ignorance? Which goes back to the story of the Fall, and why God would have placed a tree in the middle of the garden of Eden that could confer moral knowledge in the first place. Since Adam and Eve were ignorant, they couldn't have known that eating the fruit was "wrong", yet all humans with the Moral Sense that came after them are punished for having this ability. I would think an omnipotent being could have stopped that from happening in the first place, right? If so, then He would bear at least some responsibility for humans acquiring the *ability* to do evil.

[caustictoast]

There's something in Catholicism called culpability. It has to do with how responsible you are for your actions. Being ignorant something is wrong or being forced into doing it(and various other circumstances) make you less culpable. It doesn't remove the evil of the act but you're less responsible. And Adam and Eve knew it was wrong actually. God specifically told them not to eat from that tree. Literally any other one than that one. If they ate from it it would bring about their death. The tree was a test. A test Adam and Eve ultimately failed that brought about death and sorrow for mankind. God could have stopped it sure, but that would violate free will. The devil that tempted Adam and Eve didn't force them to eat the fruit. They ultimately made the decision themselves. We aren't punished for having this ability, we are held responsible for our actions, good or bad. You're punished for doing bad and rewarded for doing good. And I guess you're right. He's responsible for it, but he also created the universe and everything in it. So he's responsible for everything in the end if you want to make that case

[Palidane7]

So at it's most basic, sin is disobedience to God, right? So if you remove sin from humans, you remove their capacity to disobey. Making them nothing but servants. That's not really free will. Part of choosing is being able to choose wrong.

[FeloniousMonk94]

Or god might abstain from issuing edicts, thereby removing the ability of man to sin while preserving "free will". But I anticipated this argument in the comment you're replying to: Did God violate my will by designing me in such a fashion that I cannot walk through walls or fly? If not, why not? It might indeed be my will to do those things, but God has sorely disappointed me in these respects. Has he not thwarted elements of my will then?

[Palidane7]

So God might not have created us, thereby giving us free will? What? Free will doesn't mean you get whatever you want. It's not freaking omnipotence. Free will is being able to make choices and attempt to fulfill them. You wanting to fly is choice, and an exercise of free will. Being able to actually fly, however, is another matter entirely.