Questioning the faith

[Lord Mord]

Pita Enigma,

Woot wrong!

Change 4 to: Human beings are incapable of appreciating the sheer dimension of god, unless God himself makes them understand it. Because he's omnipotent, and he can do it, and nothing you've said implies that he can't.

Hey, no argument here. I'm not the one who thinks that human beings can't understand God.

I'm only saying that if God doesn't make us understand, then our not-understanding is his choice and his fault.

[Prince Who Was Promised]

Double-predestination. It is a theological conundrum that a number of theologians have tried to escape in the manner of Harry Houdini.

But...knowing something is going to happen and making something happening are two different things.

[Lord Mord]

PWWP,

But...knowing something is going to happen and making something happening are two different things.

Suppose that I know that Oswald is going to shoot the President. I sit at home and eat potato chips. Wouldn't you say that I did something wrong? I had knowledge and I did nothing.

The question arises, What could I have done to stop it? Well ... I could have called someone. The fact that I just couldn't be bothered speaks against my character. Could I have prevented the assassination? It depends on what I knew, when I knew it, and who I was able to reach when I called. Even supposing that nothing I did could have stopped it, it's still a mark against me if I don't even bother to try.

That's me. I have very limited power.

Now let's take a look at God. Unlimited power. No limits whatsoever. And now, suppose that she knows a baby is choking in his crib, and everyone else nearby is asleep. The question arises, What could she do to stop it? The answer? Anything. Or, alternately, everything. And now suppose that God is sitting at home and eating potato chips.

People give God a lot of credit, saying, "Well, her ways are mysterious but always good," and so they'd just stop questioning at that point and say, "Well, if eating potato chips is what God did, then it's what was appropriate." The way I look at it though is that God has to prove what she was doing instead was more important, or else conclude she wanted the baby to die.

[Prince Who Was Promised]

I'm not sure if the President and the human race are very good analogies, but alright, I see what you're trying to say.

But one might argue that Jesus was the result of God setting down the potato chips and leaving the couch for a while.

According to Genesis, the human race (all two people) was given a choice. They failed. God didn't have to do anything, so one might argue that only a God that cared would set down the potato chips and sacrifice Himself for the race of people who screwed up and kept screwing up diliberately.

EDIT: Just wondering, but why refer to God as "she"?

[IheartTesla]

What I see alot in real life is people having blind arrogant faith in science, anyone pontificating that here? Faith in "Science" is just as blind as faith in an omnipotent God. There is no unified Science, no Progress, no teleological universe. There's something very much in common in these two groups, they both have faith in their all powerful science or God, what happens when that faith is lost?

When our Faith in the Science of Gravity fails, we float towards the heavens. And those who are tethered to the ground work out a new theory of gravity. What do your fellow co-religionistas do when their faith fails?

[Matrim Fox Cauthon]

But...knowing something is going to happen and making something happening are two different things.

If in your omniscience you had the power to see all the possible outcomes brought about through the multitude uses of your omnipotence, then what is the semantic difference between "knowing something is going to happen and making something happening"?

[Prince Who Was Promised]

In your omniscience you could forsee all possible outcomes through the multitude of your omnipotence, but that doesn't mean you cause it. You KNOW it, yes, but knowing is different from acting.

[Matrim Fox Cauthon]

In your omniscience you could forsee all possible outcomes through the multitude of your omnipotence, but that doesn't mean you cause it. You KNOW it, yes, but knowing is different from acting.

Actually, it does in this case. Your choices could also bring about worlds in which everyone achieved salvation or that there was no suffering, or that Adam and Eve did not eat from the ToKoGaE. If you deny God's causal powers, then you deny God's sovereignty and continued divine providence in the universe.

If I set off a Rube Goldberg machine (e.g. the board game Mousetrap), I know through looking at the system with my omniscient foresight what the result of my actions will be. And with my omnipotence, I can change the set-up for the device to achieve any outcome with any sequence of interconnected tasks between. If I control the gravity and physics of the game too, how am I not the cause?

[Lord Mord]

PWWP,

I'm not sure if the President and the human race are very good analogies, but alright, I see what you're trying to say.

But one might argue that Jesus was the result of God setting down the potato chips and leaving the couch for a while.

According to Genesis, the human race (all two people) was given a choice. They failed. God didn't have to do anything, so one might argue that only a God that cared would set down the potato chips and sacrifice Himself for the race of people who screwed up and kept screwing up diliberately.

EDIT: Just wondering, but why refer to God as "she"?

Why not? :)

So, what you're saying is that as the result of a single mistake, God decided to abrogate all the responsibility that comes with absolute power. He made these children, and then set up an arbitrary rule without any apparent reason or benefit to anyone. Amazingly, the children violated this arbitrary, inexplicable restriction, due to the nature of the personalities created for them by the parent. The parent could have created any kind of personality he wanted, but he deliberately created personalities that he knew (omniscience) were going to definitely break this one silly, unnecessary rule.

Now this parent had the opportunity to protect the child from any and every disaster. But because he set up this inevitable sequence of events, he seized on the outcome as a pretext for denying any help thereafter.

There was Jesus, but there's no real was to analogize here, only because the actions of being with Absolute Power Over Everything can't really have a scale of things that are more meaningful than another. But we can judge the actions by the consequences: did sending Jesus end human suffering on Earth? Hardly -- arguably his time here only enhanced human strife by providing millions of new religious excuses and motives for violence and abuse. Or else, perhaps, he saved all mankind, or at least most of it in the afterlife? Well, we're not really given that expectation from the Bible.

So, then I suppose we should all just be grateful that we're given any chance at all to save ourselves? Well, that makes sense if our initial failure wasn't predetermined by the God that could have prevented our having a nature disposed to disobedience and chose not to bother.

[Ser_not_appearing_yet]

Ser_not_appearing_yet ...

I'm mostly thinking of this bit here:

Silent stalker was arguing for progress of ideas. You pooh-poohed that his philosophy could possibly objectively progress, and then went right on to say that you also used to believe in progress until you [paraphrase] progressed [/paraphrase] past that kind of thinking. Then you went on to deride the notion of progress as pointless, egoistic, and idiotic.

Based on that understanding of what was said, I think you can see where I thought your statements were so quixotic as to suggest pretty strongly they were satire. Of course, if I've made a mistake in interpretation then my whole position is wrong, and very likely offensive. If that is the case then I apologize.

I think at that point in the night i was just angry at being told i wasn't fit to reproduce. I struck out.

Silent stalker, if it makes it any better I don't think you're a robot. Sorry mate. :P

[the silent speaker]

What you seem to be arguing for is a world where everything bad is forestalled. In such a world, everything good would be forestalled also -- nothing for nothing -- and you end up with a universe of nothing.

It seems to me that the whole question boils down in the end to "why is the universe this way, and not that way?" To which I think you run up against the anthropic principle in its legion of forms and an answer of "Nu? If it was, you would ask why it is that way, and not this way."

[Prince Who Was Promised]

PWWP,

Why not? :)

So, what you're saying is that as the result of a single mistake, God decided to abrogate all the responsibility that comes with absolute power. He made these children, and then set up an arbitrary rule without any apparent reason or benefit to anyone. Amazingly, the children violated this arbitrary, inexplicable restriction, due to the nature of the personalities created for them by the parent. The parent could have created any kind of personality he wanted, but he deliberately created personalities that he knew (omniscience) were going to definitely break this one silly, unnecessary rule.

Now this parent had the opportunity to protect the child from any and every disaster. But because he set up this inevitable sequence of events, he seized on the outcome as a pretext for denying any help thereafter.

There was Jesus, but there's no real was to analogize here, only because the actions of being with Absolute Power Over Everything can't really have a scale of things that are more meaningful than another. But we can judge the actions by the consequences: did sending Jesus end human suffering on Earth? Hardly -- arguably his time here only enhanced human strife by providing millions of new religious excuses and motives for violence and abuse. Or else, perhaps, he saved all mankind, or at least most of it in the afterlife? Well, we're not really given that expectation from the Bible.

So, then I suppose we should all just be grateful that we're given any chance at all to save ourselves? Well, that makes sense if our initial failure wasn't predetermined by the God that could have prevented our having a nature disposed to disobedience and chose not to bother.

According to Genesis, God created Adam and Eve in His image, and they were without sin, resulting in perfection. They had all they could want or need, and were in a perfect world without disease and death and so on. God gave them but a single Law, and clearly laid the consequences for breaking the Law, and all was perfect. But they broke that one, tiny Law anyways. The natural response is similar to the dissapointed parent who says "We give you everything, and ask but little in return and you can't even do THAT?"

Thus sin entered the world, blah blah blah. Now, Adam and Eve chose their sin, and it ruined to world. From now on, all mankind suffered their curse. God chooses a group of people, the Isrealites (which He didn't even have to do, but did), and chose to exalt them. The Israelites were close to God, and not like the other tribes who had forgotten Him. And they STILL disobeyed Him, even after His prophets stressed repeatedly the consequences. So even in God's face they sinned.

Then, the Bible says, God delievers a Saviour unto the world, presenting them with a road to righteousness and salvation. It seems you disapprove of this method because He didn't save the entire world or end all human suffering. But to go to them and end their Free Will by exorting one's absolute authority and MAKING them do what they DID NOT want to do, I have a feeling many here would call Him unjust.

In order for salvation to come, one's Free Will would ideally remain intact. You come not to Him because you are forced, but because you want to.

[Stalker]

So, what you're saying is that as the result of a single mistake, God decided to abrogate all the responsibility that comes with absolute power. He made these children, and then set up an arbitrary rule without any apparent reason or benefit to anyone. Amazingly, the children violated this arbitrary, inexplicable restriction, due to the nature of the personalities created for them by the parent. The parent could have created any kind of personality he wanted, but he deliberately created personalities that he knew (omniscience) were going to definitely break this one silly, unnecessary rule.

You are assuming determinism. Is PwwP a Calvinist?

Added:

I don't see how that follows. Why wouldn't logic permit it?

Start with a universal statement like: "All jeans are made from denim."

Then find a specific unit of the type described: "(x) is a pair of jeans."

Then, from the universal, apply the description to the specific unit: "(x) is made from denim."

Your own example is a good illustration. If you compare it to your earlier statement, you'll notice that the second step is missing. That's not allowed in formal logic.

1. Universal statement: "Anything which is omnipotent has no limits."

2. Next: "God is omnipotent."

3. Therefore: "God has no limits."

Now apply the statement that was recommended, that God isn't limited, but humans are.

4. You might say: "Any one who might consider making humans understand the dimensions of God will find they are limited from doing so."

5. From the universal, employ a specific example: "God might consider making humans understand the dimensions of God."

6. Therefore: "God will find he is limited from making humans understand the dimensions of God."

Therefore: "God has no limits, and God will find he is limited."

What's the logical problem here?

This one has no formal errors, tho' steps 4 to 7 are unnecessary since 3 itself is not allowed.

One might object to your definition of omnipotent though. It brings the entire thing too close to equivalence for my tastes. From the point of logic, you can define it however you like, of course.

[Stalker]

I think people are a bit defensive here, I don't think it's a stretch to say that a lot of people don't quite understand or grasp how science is supposed to work, (which doesen't even neccessarily prevent them from making important scientific discoveries) and/or that people often have an exaggerated, mistaken or misplaced faith in what science is or can do.

The former does not lead to the latter. While people often have a poor understanding of science, that misunderstanding is usually not derived from faith. At least not unless we consider groups like religiously justified Conservatives, where it may well be a willful misunderstanding. Fortunately, those people re less common these days.

[moot]

According to Genesis, God created Adam and Eve in His image, and they were without sin, resulting in perfection. They had all they could want or need, and were in a perfect world without disease and death and so on. God gave them but a single Law, and clearly laid the consequences for breaking the Law, and all was perfect. But they broke that one, tiny Law anyways. The natural response is similar to the dissapointed parent who says "We give you everything, and ask but little in return and you can't even do THAT?"

Thus sin entered the world, blah blah blah. Now, Adam and Eve chose their sin, and it ruined to world. From now on, all mankind suffered their curse. God chooses a group of people, the Isrealites (which He didn't even have to do, but did), and chose to exalt them. The Israelites were close to God, and not like the other tribes who had forgotten Him. And they STILL disobeyed Him, even after His prophets stressed repeatedly the consequences. So even in God's face they sinned.

Okay, but here's the thing: wasn't the tree they weren't supposed to eat from the Tree of Knowledge? Wasn't it only after they ate the fruit that they realised what they did was wrong?

So God gave his perfect creatures everything … except the ability to differentiate right from wrong out of the starting gate. They have Free Will, a sense of curiosity, the ability to understand an order, and they're given free reign in the Garden except for the Tree whose fruit would give them the ability to tell right from wrong.

This sounds like entrapment to me. The only test here is temptation to do something (the One Thing) you were told not to do, but without having been given a good reason not to (aside from being told). So are you testing Free Will? Ability to obey? How do you even know that disobeying is the wrong thing to do, if you can't tell the difference between right and wrong? How can you punish an infant for the rest of eternity for doing one thing when you knew that infant didn't have the knowledge it would take to pass the test? Sure they chose to sin, but they didn't know it was a sin until after they did it.

And given God's omniscience, I'd say it was a set-up all along.

[Matrim Fox Cauthon]

Okay, but here's the thing: wasn't the tree they weren't supposed to eat from the Tree of Knowledge? Wasn't it only after they ate the fruit that they realised what they did was wrong?

Yes. Nope. They only realized that they were naked and sewed together loincloths. Even when they heard God and hid from God, we are told by Adam, "I was afraid because I was naked, so I hid." Guilt and wrong-judgment ironically never figures into it.

But it could be argued, perhaps rightfully so, that the ability of Adam and Eve to discern right and wrong was immaterial to them disobeying God's command, which would only require obedience to instruction.

[TrueMetis]

I think at that point in the night i was just angry at being told i wasn't fit to reproduce. I struck out.

Silent stalker, if it makes it any better I don't think you're a robot. Sorry mate. :P

No problem and I'm sorry I implied you weren't fit to reproduce.

[Stalker]

Yes. Nope. They only realized that they were naked and sewed together loincloths. Even when they heard God and hid from God, we are told by Adam, "I was afraid because I was naked, so I hid." Guilt and wrong-judgment ironically never figures into it.

But it could be argued, perhaps rightfully so, that the ability of Adam and Eve to discern right and wrong was immaterial to them disobeying God's command, which would only require obedience to instruction.

But why should they be obedient to instruction?

[Errant Bard]

Actually, it does in this case. Your choices could also bring about worlds in which everyone achieved salvation or that there was no suffering, or that Adam and Eve did not eat from the ToKoGaE. If you deny God's causal powers, then you deny God's sovereignty and continued divine providence in the universe.

What if god isn't benevolent and, well, tortures us on purpose, or what if omniscience was worse than being forced to not know and suffer petty (from a point of view) disasters, and Santa Heaven was a lie?

e.g. you know Oswald will shoot but you 1) don't care 2) want him to shoot either because you're not "good" or 3) because you know this is better.

ETA: I guess 3) cannot happen without making god not quite omnipotent, though

[Matrim Fox Cauthon]

But why should they be obedient to instruction?

Ultimately, because God the Creator of All Things said so. But you are bound to get numerous other explanations: love for God, they no reason to doubt God, God informed them of the consequences, etc. I've never really been too keen on the popular fixation of trying to shift blame of the expulsion from humanity to God in this narrative, when it seems pretty clear from a literary standpoint. Even in a Godless deterministic universe we hold people responsible for their actions whether or not they are ignorant of the law or of unsound judgment.

What if god isn't benevolent and, well, tortures us on purpose, or what if omniscience was worse than being forced to not know and suffer petty (from a point of view) disasters, and Santa Heaven was a lie?

Then theodicy is not a problem, as it denies that God is benevolent. Traditionally though, theologians are extraordinarily reluctant to relinquish this assertion.