Regarding the Existence or Absence of God
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True, except it depends how far you want to go with "truth." The fact is, science and math are based on unprovable assumptions and foundations, and even modern physics demonstrates that we must often use parts of contradictory models to explain many basic things in the universe because ultimately, the universe is so complex and outside our real of comprehension. Science is simply the best we have for making sense of the universe, even when so much of what we know in science is based on unprovable assumptions.
I can hold up a cause or principle as being very noble. It doesn't mean that I will always represent it well. This does not defeat the cause, let alone a "God." Either God exists or God doesn't. God's existence is not dependent on whether this guy jokes about pissing on someone's fries because the other guy belittled his professional potential.
Originally posted by goldenarm
While we DO know what free will means, we DON'T know how to define a being of unlimited power. Therefore, you can't define the properties of God. Comparing a defined term to an undefined term yields an undefined result.
Daniel_m, if I serve you at McDonald's I'll be sure to piss on your fries!
this is actually very true, and an important reason why free will and "omniscient" may not be mutually exclusive.
God wouldn't have to directly interfere, in the terms that we are discussing this, because he created us and, if God knows what we will do, it would mean that we were programmed to do what we do. Thus, we have no choice.
The Star Trek example was wrong because those people are making educated guesses. We're talking about God "knowing" what will happen with the beings God created. In this context of "knowing," it would mean that we don't have a choice.
Originally posted by MUChris
I think we have a choice as to the way we live out our lives. A good point though is that even though it feels like a choice, it has already been made by us before we make it.
I seem like I'm babbling but follow me on this. Think of tim as this line:
______+______
Now lets say for agument that the present is the middle of the line marked +. At this point we all "feel" like we have infinite choices. I could continue typing this post, trade 10,000 S&P Contracts) and my decision is irrevocable since my present has become your past.
Now I know the correction you will all make, you're going to say, but Chris, I can't travel through time, you're full of shit. If its impossible to travel through time though, then nothing can travel through time (since if something could travel through time, you(God) can too). And if nothing can travel through time, time is not linear anymore but a single point:
+
where everything (including God) is situated and the future is not fixed, (and the past is forever gone, even to God).
By the way, you can not choose to believe that God can not place himself in another time, make it his present and also make him omnipotent, so you have to make a choice here, whether you believe time is a line or a single point.
I personally believe time is a point, so in my universe God CAN exist, and so can my free will.
Anyway, let me know what you think!
MUChris
Extremely good way of explaining it. I was going to work my way to trying to explain that if a God exists, and if it is omniscient, then to describe what God "knows" about "our futures" is to define God (which inherently limits God) by our standards of space, time and "knowing." The first two (limiting God by space and time) you have offered a good perspective on, although there could well be other explanations beyond our understanding (which is why this becomes a semantic game again, like it or not).
Originally posted by axeman
Thanks! You too surf!
Just for the record Surf.
If the creator actually DID exist, then I would agree
that the creation probably cant fully fathom the creator.
However, the existence of the creator is the very
thing we are debating, which has not been proven, so
that statement cannot be used in the argument or
it would be circular reasoning.
peace
axeman
It would only be circular reasoning if he used the above claim to try to prove that God MUST exist, but not if he merely used it to assert that God CAN exist.
couple of things:
1) we DO know how to define an all-powerful being, but such a being would be self-contradictory. to the extent that the existance of such a being is possible, our knowledge of him becomes impossible.
2) we have no reason to believe that such a being of unlimited power exists. (a being who is usually claimed to exist in order to account for a "creation" event we have little justification for believing happened. wonderful)
3) if a being/s exist/s in a realm beyond our 5 senses and rational faculty, we have NO REASON to assume that being has unlimited power.
4) if it is possible for a very powerful/all powerful "creator" to exist outside this realm of reason, it possible for countless other beings with varying degrees of power, like dragons, fairies, 7 headed medusas, to also exist. in any case, we are justified in believing in none of them.
3) Why????? Makes no sense.
4) This being very well can exist outside OUR realm of reason. Math and science have proven over and over that their foundations are made up of unprovable assumptions and even some contradictions. Dragons and fairies are very knowable creatures that humans have dreamed up, just like the God of the literal bible. But to believe or consider that an infinite being is responsible for the order of the universe is as reasonable as unreasonable!
why does (3) make no sense?
here it is again:
3) if a being/s exist/s in a realm beyond our 5 senses and rational faculty, we have NO REASON to assume that being has unlimited power.
is there is an entity, a "being" that exists beyond the capacity of our rational faculty, why must such a being have UNLIMITED power? why can there not be a limit to its powers? there is no reason to ASSUME that it has LIMITLESS powers. it is likely that if it exists beyond our rational faculty that it would have increased powers (and i'm not including its "special" kind of existance as one of these), but there is no reason to automatically assume that there is no limit to its powers.
re (4)
to believe that an INFINITE being is responsible for the state of the universe, i think, is quite uneasonable. unless you can show that such a being, if he exists, MUST be infinite.
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