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Thread: Evolutionism vs creationism

  1. #201
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    The trouble with grobblewobble's "exhaustive" case analysis is that it completely hinges on heaven or hell, or God's intentions, being a certain way - basically it limits itself to possibilities A and B where there are many, many more, and is thus anything but exhaustive. Thats what makes it wobbly. But who am I to continue to grobble about such things?

    (I am a bad person.)

    If God is omnipotent, one would think that the fair thing to do would be sending messengers everywhere to give everyone a fair chance. Even today, people born in many parts of the world don't have access to the Christian doctrine at all, while other people do, that seems quite unfair.
    Because Jesus is human (mostly). The only alternative would be to father multiple Jesuses. As far as I'm aware, being a heathen - i. e. not aware of the teachings of Christianity - counts as a mitigating circumstance, and if you still did good you would still get to go to heaven (and of course there are other, more restrictive views out there, I wouldn't want to believe those either). And this is also why missionaries were sent out into the world; to grant more and more people access to these teachings.
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  2. #202
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    Quote Originally Posted by Silfir View Post
    The trouble with grobblewobble's "exhaustive" case analysis is that it completely hinges on heaven or hell, or God's intentions, being a certain way - basically it limits itself to possibilities A and B where there are many, many more, and is thus anything but exhaustive. Thats what makes it wobbly. But who am I to continue to grobble about such things?
    You are Silfir, that is who you are. By all means, feel free to point out contradictions in my wobbly thinking.

    Surely, I've got to admit that I did make assumptions. I have certain views of what Christianity entails, so if I try to explain why the kind of Christianity that I have in mind is not acceptable to me, I first have to assume that this is indeed what Christianity is.

    So please, what is precisely the faulty assumption I am making? For sake of clarity, here are the "options" I allowed for:

    - If people in Heaven do not have a free will but they're still happy, ..
    - If people in Heaven do have a free will but this does not cause them to sin, ..
    - If people in Heaven do have a free will and it does cause them to sin, ..
    Reading back, the first missing option I notice is "people in Heaven do not have a free will and they're not happy". I must have missed some other options, too.

    Quote Originally Posted by Silfir View Post
    (I am a bad person.)
    You naughty boy.

    To Fasizi: it seems that what you believe is quite close to my view.
    Last edited by grobblewobble; 08-12-2010 at 12:33 PM.
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  3. #203
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    Quote Originally Posted by Silfir View Post
    The trouble with grobblewobble's "exhaustive" case analysis is that it completely hinges on heaven or hell, or God's intentions, being a certain way - basically it limits itself to possibilities A and B where there are many, many more, and is thus anything but exhaustive.
    If you divide the space of possibilities into "A" and "not A", you are being exhaustive, because A must be either true or false, and therefore it is always the case that either A or not A (law of the excluded middle).

    The exception would be if you are speaking about something which is gradual, like "John is tall", where you can have a middle ground between true and false (1.95 should probably be considered tall, 1.50 not tall, but 1.75 or 1.80 is doubtful). There you would use fuzzy logic or something similar where you don't have the law of the excluded middle. But in this case, it seems that the the propositions "people have free will" and "people are able to commit sins" do not allow for middle ground (either one has free will or hasn't, etc.) so this problem does not arise.

  4. #204
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    - If people in Heaven do not have a free will but they're still happy, did God really have to give us a free will an earth?
    Arguably, God doesn't "have" to do anything. Maybe the "free will experiment" is more important to him? Less boring? Maybe he thinks, whatever the cost, the experience of a life with individual decisions - free will - is worth it on the whole, even if it means some people go down the wrong path.

    - If people in Heaven do have a free will but this does not cause them to sin, how come God wasn't able to create such a situation on earth?
    Because on earth there are people who are dicks thanks to their free will. The dicks go to hell. The non-dicks go to heaven. Therefore, the people in heaven are non-dicks.

    The moment we were granted free will, God ceases to interfere with our actions. Whether he can't (limits of omnipotence) or won't is not really all that important. The important part would be that from this point on we have the choice to do good or bad.

    - If people in Heaven do have a free will and it does cause them to sin, doesn't that mean they should all end up in hell, by all fairness?
    Considering the people in heaven are non-dicks, if they do commit sins (why would they?) they are probably not all that bad.



    I don't think anything I wrote above is particularly new. My point is that there are assumptions littered throughout about what God would have to be or God would have to want that are not really consistent with my image of Christianity. That, I guess, might be the underlying cause for dissent - we're having a theological debate, only you're assuming a certain view of Christianity to try and argue against Christianity as a whole (which is not going to work, given 2.1 billion Christians around the world, with almost as many quite distinct views), while I'm merely trying to promote my own (also: fazisi's, sort of?) view of Christianity and demonstrate that it's perfectly okay to believe in that.
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  5. #205
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    Quote Originally Posted by Silfir View Post
    Arguably, God doesn't "have" to do anything. Maybe the "free will experiment" is more important to him? Less boring? Maybe he thinks, whatever the cost, the experience of a life with individual decisions - free will - is worth it on the whole, even if it means some people go down the wrong path.
    If free will is so important, what sense is there to punish people for exercising it?

    Quote Originally Posted by Silfir View Post
    Because on earth there are people who are dicks thanks to their free will. The dicks go to hell. The non-dicks go to heaven. Therefore, the people in heaven are non-dicks.

    The moment we were granted free will, God ceases to interfere with our actions. Whether he can't (limits of omnipotence) or won't is not really all that important. The important part would be that from this point on we have the choice to do good or bad.
    God doesn't separate people by "dicks" and "non-dicks". He separates them into "believers" and "non-believers". There are definitely some believers who are dicks, and definitely some non-belivers who are not dicks.

    Quote Originally Posted by Silfir View Post
    Considering the people in heaven are non-dicks, if they do commit sins (why would they?) they are probably not all that bad.
    Because Christianity does not require you not to be a dick. It requires you to believe in Jesus. I'd go so far as to argue that the single core belief that defines all of Christianity is that good works alone are not sufficient to get into heaven, but rather than belief in Jesus (with or without good works, depending on your choice of Christianity) is the most important prerequisite.

    Quote Originally Posted by fazisi
    I believe human kind will return to our natural state of action as Adam and Eve were in the garden of Eden before they ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. We will still have this knowledge from our time spent on earth but we will be reunited with God in a way that we never have been since gaining this knowledge. When we are back in the presence of God in this way, we will naturally act--freely choose--in ways that are good.
    A system where people have the choice between A and B but always choose B is indistinguishable from a system where people have no choice at all. If people have free will in heaven, some of them must choose ways that are not good. Otherwise, they do not have free will in any meaningful sense.
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  6. #206
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    @JellySlayer: In that case we have a fundamentally different understanding of Christianity, I'm afraid
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  7. #207
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    > Considering the people in heaven are non-dicks, if they do commit sins (why would they?)
    > they are probably not all that bad

    wasn't satan once there?
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  8. #208
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    Quote Originally Posted by gut View Post
    > Considering the people in heaven are non-dicks, if they do commit sins (why would they?)
    > they are probably not all that bad

    wasn't satan once there?
    Maybe, but that's in black text.

    According to the book of Job, though, Satan makes regular visits.
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  9. #209
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    Quote Originally Posted by Al-Khwarizmi
    Why? He is supposed to be omniscient, so He already knew they would do that. So why be upset then?

    In fact, omniscience negates free will. If there is an omniscient being who knows that I'm going to move my right arm in ten seconds, then I don't have much choice about moving my arm or not, right?

    So I think it is contradictory to defend at the same time that God is omniscient and that God gave us free will, like most Christianity does.
    How does someone knowing what you will choose to do affect your ability to choose? This makes no sense.

    Quote Originally Posted by Al-Khwarizmi
    Then why did He send Jesus only to a particular place on Earth where He would influence a small part of humanity? Didn't the Chinese deserve to get that chance to go to Heaven just like the Romans? How about the Africans, the pre-Columbian Americans, etc.?
    This is why one of Jesus' commands to his apostles was to spread the word to all the nations.

    Quote Originally Posted by grobblewobble
    To Fasizi: it seems that what you believe is quite close to my view.
    I said something similar to Silfir several pages ago.

    Quote Originally Posted by Silfir
    I'm merely trying to promote my own (also: fazisi's, sort of?) view of Christianity and demonstrate that it's perfectly okay to believe in that.
    I am mostly just trying to argue for the sake of arguing. I also like the idea of letting others know my twisted thoughts of Christianity/Catholicism. If enough of you are willing to give 10% of your income to me, I just might even start a church.

    Quote Originally Posted by JellySlayer
    A system where people have the choice between A and B but always choose B is indistinguishable from a system where people have no choice at all. If people have free will in heaven, some of them must choose ways that are not good. Otherwise, they do not have free will in any meaningful sense.
    I see it more as a choice between A1, A2, A3, B1, B2, and B3 where all the people in heaven will choose from A1, A2, or A3. Still not free will? Then I guess there is no free will in heaven in the way I imagine this fairytale land to be.
    I said it before, and I'll say it again. If I knew scripture like you, I'd prolly be an athiest too.. -gut

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    Quote Originally Posted by fazisi View Post
    I believe human kind will return to our natural state of action as Adam and Eve were in the garden of Eden before they ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. We will still have this knowledge from our time spent on earth but we will be reunited with God in a way that we never have been since gaining this knowledge. When we are back in the presence of God in this way, we will naturally act--freely choose--in ways that are good.
    There is a lot on which we differ, but this is a specific part on which I could "almost" agree (though I still perceive things a bit different). In any case, it seems a lot more reasonable than "if you screw up during your short life on earth you will burn in the pits for all eternitity, with no second chances whatsoever". You also said your perception of God was a bit similar to mine.

    Hey, how about this. Why don't you and I start a sect? I propose that we replace the old-fashioned word "God" by "Catwoman" and make it the sect of catworship. Or maybe the sect of cats and dogs (otherwise Gut will never join). But no mass suicides, please (I hate cleaning up the mess after mass suicides).
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