hereticzero Posted October 21, 2013 Share Posted October 21, 2013 Exodus 9:12 "And the Lord hardened the heart of Pharaoh, and he hearkened not unto them; as the Lord had spoken unto Moses."'s If God says you will not listen then God will use his magic powers to make you not listen. That way God gets to kill your oldest son. When I bring up tidbits from the OT, I get responses from Christians that run sort of like "the OT is a historical reference (that always cracks me up). The NT is the book we live by (hypocrisy is choking)." My view is that the NT was written under the assumption the OT is true and without error, and the NT was written by different kinds of believers than those who wrote the OT. The NT was written by those who were not Jews at heart but believed in a different set of principles to live by. Christians proclaim free-will so that they can compare it with God's-will to make sure they are in compliance with almighty Woo's word. It's also more BS apologetics aimed at nonbelievers to condone believers who obviously live according to God's plan for their lives while criticizing nonbeliever's free-will that condemns them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mymistake Posted October 21, 2013 Share Posted October 21, 2013 This thread is going... Nowhere. This thread will run and run without resolution or until the Mods lock it. Respectfully I disagree. Every month or so exC gets an Authentic Believer who stirs things up the standard Christian apologetics. Now it is true that we will never see that Authentic Believer admit that their apologetics were refuted and they have no logical reason to believe so they are walking away from their faith. That will never happen. But that shouldn't be the purpose of the resulting threads. Instead what we see is an opportunity for ex-Chrisitans to shoot down the type of apologetics that trapped us. For the newest deconverts this could be the first time they realized the apologetics they have heard from the pulpit is flawed. For the old timers it's fun to strike back at the ideas that did so much harm. The Authentic Believer gives us a topic that serves as a jump off point for us to give therapy to each other. And those who are really struggling with their bondage to the cult get to watch the likes of OrdinaryClay and Thumbelina be defeated and sneak away. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest end3 Posted October 21, 2013 Share Posted October 21, 2013 It's both, and really frustrating that 99.9% + can't imagine that. Limited free will. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mymistake Posted October 21, 2013 Share Posted October 21, 2013 It's both, and really frustrating that 99.9% + can't imagine that. Limited free will. As former Christians most of us can imagine all kinds of strange things. That we realize that limited free will does not make sense doesn't mean we can't imagine it. Heck, I use to imagine Jesus Christ sitting in a throne next to the throne where God the Father sits while the Holy Spirit floats around them like smoke even though they are the same God. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LivingLife Posted October 21, 2013 Share Posted October 21, 2013 Free will is probably an oxymoron and if one rather talks along the line of being a free agent of ones own destiny, it may open up other ideas. I do not believe that we are free agents in the truest sense as that would infer we determine our own destiny. This of course is what theists assume when the end goal is to avoid their mythical hell and gain entrance to a fucking mundane heavenly existence. Free agency is still just a play on semantics and like I said, we are are not free agents. We are free to choose based on the choices presented to us but these choices are outside our sphere of influence. However one arrives at any major decision unlike brushing one's teeth or overriding the urge to take a dump, these decisions come to us from external factors which may or may not be as result of earlier choices. This then leads to the other aspect we call causality, which is closer to what happens in real life. It really matters not to a woo as they will invariably try and make their paradigms fit within any of these definitions. The Calvin model of predestination is closer to the truth than Arminianism (free will) and although Calvin took it to extremes theologically, folk do not like to accept that from a distance, it does appear our fate in life is in fact pre-determined. If any of you watched the series Flash Forward, this aspect is explored as a theme of the series. Basically what happens, there is this huge global experiment carried out on a Haldron type collider and the entire globe is hit by some mystical time wave, folk pass out and have visions of their future and some have no flash forward experiences. These all die barring one that manages to survive whose destiny and another's are somehow intertwined to the demise of either one to survive forward from the flash forward date. This aspect is even in older movies like Back to the Future where the phrase "space time continuum" was coined. Whenever I discuss free will, these themes are mulling in my head. The other aspect of predestination could also be referred to as simple random chance and coincidence. We sentient beings are too proud to contemplate that our mere existence in this vast universe is down to chance, but it is. When you take predestination and put a sky fairy in charge of it all, it makes no sense at all. With death being the universal equaliser, no one really can explain why people die when they do or how they die. Most of us accept that when it is your time it is your time. If we actually knew how or when we would die, that would be some scary shit. All these needs for some kind of afterlife is to appease the finality of death that many folk refuse to embrace. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ravenstar Posted October 21, 2013 Author Share Posted October 21, 2013 "The other aspect of predestination could also be referred to as simple random chance and coincidence. We sentient beings are too proud to contemplate that our mere existence in this vast universe is down to chance, but it is. When you take predestination and put a sky fairy in charge of it all, it makes no sense at all." This^^^ This is the crux of it I believe... and the religious really have a problem that chance, or probability actually, is the nature of the universe. It leaves us with the realization that we are not in control of our fate - not in any meaningful way. We can make choices within our limited scope and circumstances, but that's as far as it goes, some of those choices may give us some small latitude in comfort or survival, but that's all. One gamma ray burst or unsuspected aneurism, and it's all over. It's frightening to be out of control... probably even more so for our forbearers who faced a brutal and harsh life. I can see why it was comforting, in the face of ignorance, to ascribe it all to a deity, at least an anthropomorphic deity can be humanized... nature, not so much. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LivingLife Posted October 21, 2013 Share Posted October 21, 2013 Yup, and it was an aneurysm that killed my otherwise healthy wife, totally unexpected and we are still baffled as to what brought it on. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RipVanWinkle Posted October 21, 2013 Share Posted October 21, 2013 The fact is that if we look at life of every kind on this earth, it is exactly what we would expect it to be like through evolution and no god. Otherwise, the only kind of a god that makes any sense would be a monster. I simply refuse to believe that. But with "probabilities" in charge, it is hard to take the responsibility for finding meaning in life, and that has been made harder for us exchristions who were indoctrinated to believe that a benevolent god would take care of us. But if we insist on being intellectually honest we each have to take on that responsibility. I think many Xtians who have allowed themselves to think, block out their thoughts because they are afraid to take on the responsibility for making their life meaningful, perhaps thinking it cannot be done. But it can be done, as demonstrated by many of the members here and great atheists and agnostics throughout history. bill 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OrdinaryClay Posted October 22, 2013 Share Posted October 22, 2013 If at the moment of creation God knew exactly how everything would pan out, why did he bother? Why did he get pissed off so much in the OT if he KNEW it was going to happen? Explain that! Why do I need to explain it. There is no need to explain it. Whether we have an explanation or not is of no difference to the mater at hand. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mymistake Posted October 22, 2013 Share Posted October 22, 2013 If at the moment of creation God knew exactly how everything would pan out, why did he bother? Why did he get pissed off so much in the OT if he KNEW it was going to happen? Explain that! Why do I need to explain it. There is no need to explain it. Whether we have an explanation or not is of no difference to the mater at hand. Yes, it will still be nonsense whether you try to explain it or not. Your efforts are doomed to failure so you are better off not trying. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OrdinaryClay Posted October 22, 2013 Share Posted October 22, 2013 We went through all this with OrdinaryClay back in April. Now he's returned and posts the same stuff as though nothing had been said before. That is typical troll behavior. OC has the burden of showing that: 1. making a choice = having free will (we've been over this many times) 2. verses that talk about creatures' choices trump verses that assert God's predetermination of events, incl. those choices (OC has never refuted Centauri on this) 3. Molinism is not vitiated by equivocating on "we." 1) A freely made choice is by definition free will. Arbitrarily claiming choice means something different from normal english places a burden on you to justify this semantic change 2) Claiming the two sets of verses are mutually exclusive is a false choice 3) 3 is jibberish Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OrdinaryClay Posted October 22, 2013 Share Posted October 22, 2013 Don't confuse "free to choose between poop or crap" with any strings that may be attached. There are strings attached to every free will decision we make, even in real life, because choices involve (include) consequences. I agree with the existence of consequences and with their attachment to our choices; and yes, in real life, that is exactly how it works. However, when it comes to the christian doctrine of free will, I refer back to my analogy of the father taking his son into the candy store and saying, "You can have anything you want but if you don't choose what I want you to choose, I will beat you." This is not a proper cause/effect relationship; this is the cruelty of a tyrannical despot lording authority over his subjects. The son in this analogy is not free to choose; he is compelled to please his father. You're right. It is not a cause and effect. That's why we have free will. Whether you perceive God to be cruel or not has absolutely nothing to do with whether we have free will. Because a choice has consequences does not negate the fact that you have a choice. That is exactly why people tell you there are consequences. So you can change your choice. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LivingLife Posted October 22, 2013 Share Posted October 22, 2013 We went through all this with OrdinaryClay back in April. Now he's returned and posts the same stuff as though nothing had been said before. That is typical troll behavior. OC has the burden of showing that: 1. making a choice = having free will (we've been over this many times) 2. verses that talk about creatures' choices trump verses that assert God's predetermination of events, incl. those choices (OC has never refuted Centauri on this) 3. Molinism is not vitiated by equivocating on "we." 1) A freely made choice is by definition free will. Arbitrarily claiming choice means something different from normal english places a burden on you to justify this semantic change2) Claiming the two sets of verses are mutually exclusive is a false choice 3) 3 is jibberish 1 is not the def of FW, nice try 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OrdinaryClay Posted October 22, 2013 Share Posted October 22, 2013 Sad, because I was enjoying the foray into the concept of free will as used by religion. It is a highly misunderstood thing which begs to be questioned and examined critically. Really? So where have you discussed and examined this subject before? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OrdinaryClay Posted October 22, 2013 Share Posted October 22, 2013 Speaking only for myself, I do so for the sake of those lurking and observing these threads. I think you speak for many others as well. There is no other valid reason for engaging such a mindset. Doubt Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OrdinaryClay Posted October 22, 2013 Share Posted October 22, 2013 I mentioned in an earlier post that there is a verse in which god will send a "strong delusion" so that many will believe a lie. What kind of god would do something like this? Belief in this delusion will likely result in many going to hell--- yet GOD is the one manipulating them. Then take Revelation where god "allows" the devil his time to deceive many and then in the end these same people are sent to a lake of fire. What kind of manipulative asshole would do this kind if thing? It was stuff like this that made me question and then eventually decide I couldn't worship a god who would do things like this. Free will my ass-- this is total manipulation and abusiveness!!! Then that lawless one will be revealed whom the Lord will slay with the breath of His mouth and bring to an end by the appearance of His coming; that is, the one whose coming is in accord with the activity of Satan, with all power and signs and false wonders, and with all the deception of wickedness for those who perish, because they did not receive the love of the truth so as to be saved. For this reason God will send upon them a deluding influence so that they will believe what is false, in order that they all may be judged who did not believe the truth, but took pleasure in wickedness. (2Th 2:8-12) Context is everything. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mymistake Posted October 22, 2013 Share Posted October 22, 2013 I mentioned in an earlier post that there is a verse in which god will send a "strong delusion" so that many will believe a lie. What kind of god would do something like this? Belief in this delusion will likely result in many going to hell--- yet GOD is the one manipulating them. Then take Revelation where god "allows" the devil his time to deceive many and then in the end these same people are sent to a lake of fire. What kind of manipulative asshole would do this kind if thing? It was stuff like this that made me question and then eventually decide I couldn't worship a god who would do things like this. Free will my ass-- this is total manipulation and abusiveness!!! Then that lawless one will be revealed whom the Lord will slay with the breath of His mouth and bring to an end by the appearance of His coming; that is, the one whose coming is in accord with the activity of Satan, with all power and signs and false wonders, and with all the deception of wickedness for those who perish, because they did not receive the love of the truth so as to be saved. For this reason God will send upon them a deluding influence so that they will believe what is false, in order that they all may be judged who did not believe the truth, but took pleasure in wickedness. (2Th 2:8-12) Context is everything. Oh so people who didn't choose the right religion back when there was no clear reason to think one was any better than the thousands of other religions - those are the people God is going to curse with a delusion and force them to believe what is false. God is an asshole. God being an asshole ". . . in order that they all may be judged who did not believe the truth . . . ". But God is the one who made them not believe. So that God can torture them forever. What a dick! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OrdinaryClay Posted October 22, 2013 Share Posted October 22, 2013 We went through all this with OrdinaryClay back in April. Now he's returned and posts the same stuff as though nothing had been said before. That is typical troll behavior. OC has the burden of showing that: 1. making a choice = having free will (we've been over this many times) 2. verses that talk about creatures' choices trump verses that assert God's predetermination of events, incl. those choices (OC has never refuted Centauri on this) 3. Molinism is not vitiated by equivocating on "we." 1) A freely made choice is by definition free will. Arbitrarily claiming choice means something different from normal english places a burden on you to justify this semantic change2) Claiming the two sets of verses are mutually exclusive is a false choice 3) 3 is jibberish 1 is not the def of FW, nice try The burden is on you to show a choice is not free. It is not mine. You are the one making the counter claim. A choice is clear evidence of free will. If you think there is a counter explanation for how a choice can be made then present it. You are arbitrarily shifting the burden of explanation. btw - did you change your handle name? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Astreja Posted October 22, 2013 Share Posted October 22, 2013 Because a choice has consequences does not negate the fact that you have a choice. That is exactly why people tell you there are consequences. So you can change your choice. It is not a free choice if one option has obvious negative consequences, A free choice means no coercion. If anything, the Christian "turn or burn" forced dichotomy is a damned {morally} if you do, damned {physically} if you don't. Frankly, OC, I don't know which would be worse -- Physical punishment in a literal flaming hell with My integrity intact, or the psychological punishment of being bullied into saying words I never believed in order to avoid being tortured. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mymistake Posted October 22, 2013 Share Posted October 22, 2013 The burden is on you to show a choice is not free. It is not mine. You are the one making the counter claim. A choice is clear evidence of free will. If you think there is a counter explanation for how a choice can be made then present it. You are arbitrarily shifting the burden of explanation. What a good Christian liar! We are not talking about "will". We are talking about "free will". You are mixing the two concepts. That is not valid. Humans make choices so they do have will. But since you think "free will" exists you need to demonstrate that positive claim. Those who doubt what has little or no evidence are not the ones who have the burden of proof. Seeing how there is no God who is going to throw anybody into Hell (which also doesn't exist) it's all quite pointless. But within the mythology we can talk about how silly it to pretend God exists, God is all powerful, God is all good, God is all knowing, God created us so that God can get revenge on us for the thing that God made us do except if we take it on blind faith that for a few days God killed one of God's persons so that God could forgive . . . and so on. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
♦ ficino ♦ Posted October 22, 2013 Share Posted October 22, 2013 We went through all this with OrdinaryClay back in April. Now he's returned and posts the same stuff as though nothing had been said before. That is typical troll behavior. OC has the burden of showing that: 1. making a choice = having free will (we've been over this many times) 2. verses that talk about creatures' choices trump verses that assert God's predetermination of events, incl. those choices (OC has never refuted Centauri on this) 3. Molinism is not vitiated by equivocating on "we." 1) A freely made choice is by definition free will. Arbitrarily claiming choice means something different from normal english places a burden on you to justify this semantic change 2) Claiming the two sets of verses are mutually exclusive is a false choice 3) 3 is jibberish 1) has been answered by others 2) mere assertion. Your failure to do justice to 1) makes your attempts to answer Centauri and others ineffectual. 3) a very complicated, somewhat technical point, related to the Grounding Objection. So far your answers over 18 or so months show that you do not understand how to construct an argument. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ravenstar Posted October 22, 2013 Author Share Posted October 22, 2013 IF there was no other negative consequence than natural death it would maybe be free will, but when there is a consequence of eternal torture then it is blackmail of the most monstrous kind. There is no other way to interpret it.. it's pretty damn clear. Doesn't make sense though even then... because the 'promise' is of eternal life. Why would any being resurrect it's creations just to torture them? The Bible does not teach that man (after Adam, and that is only inferred) is naturally immortal - that is a gift, supposedly. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Storm Posted October 22, 2013 Share Posted October 22, 2013 This thread is going... Nowhere. This thread will run and run without resolution or until the Mods lock it. Respectfully I disagree. Every month or so exC gets an Authentic Believer who stirs things up the standard Christian apologetics. Now it is true that we will never see that Authentic Believer admit that their apologetics were refuted and they have no logical reason to believe so they are walking away from their faith. That will never happen. But that shouldn't be the purpose of the resulting threads. Instead what we see is an opportunity for ex-Chrisitans to shoot down the type of apologetics that trapped us. For the newest deconverts this could be the first time they realized the apologetics they have heard from the pulpit is flawed. For the old timers it's fun to strike back at the ideas that did so much harm. The Authentic Believer gives us a topic that serves as a jump off point for us to give therapy to each other. And those who are really struggling with their bondage to the cult get to watch the likes of OrdinaryClay and Thumbelina be defeated and sneak away. I agree with your premise MM. I have learned a lot over the past few days. While I am sure this subject has been hashed and rehashed over and over, it is relatively new to me, and I have gotten a lot out of it (see my free will discussion thread). I used to believe very much in free will, but now that the blinders are gone, I see that it was and is an illusion. Thanks for keeping this stuff going. I appreciate that I can read it and learn from it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Super Moderator TheRedneckProfessor Posted October 22, 2013 Super Moderator Share Posted October 22, 2013 Don't confuse "free to choose between poop or crap" with any strings that may be attached. There are strings attached to every free will decision we make, even in real life, because choices involve (include) consequences. I agree with the existence of consequences and with their attachment to our choices; and yes, in real life, that is exactly how it works. However, when it comes to the christian doctrine of free will, I refer back to my analogy of the father taking his son into the candy store and saying, "You can have anything you want but if you don't choose what I want you to choose, I will beat you." This is not a proper cause/effect relationship; this is the cruelty of a tyrannical despot lording authority over his subjects. The son in this analogy is not free to choose; he is compelled to please his father. You're right. It is not a cause and effect. That's why we have free will. Whether you perceive God to be cruel or not has absolutely nothing to do with whether we have free will. Because a choice has consequences does not negate the fact that you have a choice. That is exactly why people tell you there are consequences. So you can change your choice. Again, Clay, you have completely missed a point I was trying to make (this is twice now!). The point of this analogy is to demonstrate categorically that we do not have free will, being that the punishment attached to the wrong choice is severe enough to ensure conformity. Honestly, man, if you don't understand me, just say you don't. Secondly, I made the point earlier that if I can change my choice, then god could not know which choice I would make and therefore god is not omniscient. I forget which bosley-hack argument you used to counter me; something about god's omniscience knowing which choices I would make given different circumstances, or whatever. I find it ironic that you would now be claiming that I can change my choice after being so vociferous against the idea just a few short days ago. Did I convince you so easily, or do you just contradict yourself anytime it is convenient to to do? Either way, victory is mine, saith the Redneck. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bornagainathiest Posted October 22, 2013 Share Posted October 22, 2013 To MyMistake and Storm... This thread is going... Nowhere. This thread will run and run without resolution or until the Mods lock it. Respectfully I disagree. Every month or so exC gets an Authentic Believer who stirs things up the standard Christian apologetics. Now it is true that we will never see that Authentic Believer admit that their apologetics were refuted and they have no logical reason to believe so they are walking away from their faith. That will never happen. But that shouldn't be the purpose of the resulting threads. Instead what we see is an opportunity for ex-Chrisitans to shoot down the type of apologetics that trapped us. For the newest deconverts this could be the first time they realized the apologetics they have heard from the pulpit is flawed. For the old timers it's fun to strike back at the ideas that did so much harm. The Authentic Believer gives us a topic that serves as a jump off point for us to give therapy to each other. And those who are really struggling with their bondage to the cult get to watch the likes of OrdinaryClay and Thumbelina be defeated and sneak away. Please note the wording I used, guys. "This thread is going... Nowhere. This thread will run and run without resolution or until the Mods lock it." I was addressing the possibility of this thread having some kind of final resolution. With Clay unable and unwilling to back down from his entrenched position and with us unwilling to let him get away with perpetrating his delusion, this thread will run and run until some other factor brings it to an end. Please note that I did not say that this thread was without merit, without point or without value. The first (final resolution) is not like second (merit/value) and shouldn't be seen as the same. The first focuses only on the threads termination and the second focuses on the value and merit of it's content, along the way. So, if others can gain something from this thread while it runs and runs, then I'm all for it. Ok? Thanks, BAA Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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