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Most religions preach 'Love Thy Neighbor', which basically says do right by your fellow human. Right as in peace, as in love, as in happiness and joy. No struggle no war.

Technology, it seems can provide said totalitarian peace in ways even religion cannot. Perhaps God offers peace and eternal love through death, but what we choose to do with what we have to us in this world, can offer peace and eternal love through life.

Why only bless humans?? Why not bless all forms of life, dogs, cats, self-conscious superhuman femtoprocessors, humans that have transformed themselves into superhuman femptoproccessors?

Most religions also preach that higher forms of life are above lower forms, human to animals for example, that we should rejoice in eating said animals if it keeps us alive. However, the relationship between machines and humans is completely different, as machines don't need to eat humans to survive, machines don't need sustenance at all.

In fact, as we expand our consciousness, we will be more divine and righteous in God's eyes by the same logic in the Bible and Hinduism as humans being greater than animals.

You should merge with Eninn.

But seriously, I'm pretty sure the whole point of most major religions is that it's possible for humans to become greater and holy and (in some cases, as in Christianity and Islam) eternal through faith and/or good acts without needing to change what humanity is.

Jesus died to pay the sin debt of humanity, not post-humanity.

It's really that simple. Do you know what happened the last time there was a huge "post-human" movement? God had to wipe out pretty much the entire world (save 8 people and 2 of every animal) because of it.

Read Genesis 6 to find out what happened.

Originally posted by Bat Dude
Jesus died to pay the sin debt of humanity, not post-humanity.

It's really that simple. Do you know what happened the last time there was a huge "post-human" movement? God had to wipe out pretty much the entire world (save 8 people and 2 of every animal) because of it.

Read Genesis 6 to find out what happened.
That's the one where God wipes out humanity because he's afraid that they'll become as great/better than him, right?

No, he wiped humanity out for erroneously believing they could be better than God.

Post-humans are nothing but another spec to God, if that's what He is.

They were trying to breach the clouds with a simple man-made structure, that's nothing like the idea of being smarter and living more righteously, it's a stupid idea, "Heaven is up in the clouds so we'll just build a Temple tall enough to breach them".

Originally posted by Omega Vision
You should merge with Eninn.

But seriously, I'm pretty sure the whole point of most major religions is that it's possible for humans to become greater and holy and (in some cases, as in Christianity and Islam) eternal through faith and/or good acts without needing to change what humanity is.
That does not mean believers shouldn't strive to be better in this mortal world just because they don't have to.

You're both wrong.

Genesis 6 is when "the sons of God saw the daughters of men, that they were fair" and "took wives all that they chose". The unholy union between angel and man spawned the nephilim, which was/is only part human, but vastly superior to humans in all physical and mental capacities (strength, intelligence, etc.). They were referred to in the Bible as "the mighty men of old, the men of renown." They are also called giants.

The Tower of Babel happened after the flood, led by Nimrod and Semiramis.

To put it all together, 'post-human' is a stench in God's nostrils. He never intended for man to do those things. And again, Jesus is the Saviour of mankind, not post-mankind.

Originally posted by Bat Dude
You're both wrong.

Genesis 6 is when "the sons of God saw the daughters of men, that they were fair" and "took wives all that they chose". The unholy union between angel and man spawned the nephilim, which was/is only part human, but vastly superior to humans in all physical and mental capacities (strength, intelligence, etc.). They were referred to in the Bible as "the mighty men of old, the men of renown." They are also called giants.

The Tower of Babel happened after the flood, led by Nimrod and Semiramis.

To put it all together, 'post-human' is a stench in God's nostrils. He never intended for man to do those things. And again, Jesus is the Saviour of mankind, not post-mankind.

Again, technology is man-made, Angels are divine as in made by the Lord. Tampering with human DnA is what probably will cause a Jihaadist movement or two. Just like Stem Cell research. That's just the way it is with religion.

And many religions do argue against technology and also against tampering with DnA. However, neither argument can be made as specific post-human science related were never brought up in the texts of the time.

Any argument would be theoretical. It's not impossible that we have a Lord that encourages positive innovations to ourselves and what we can do.

It is also possible that in that particular instance, we were trying to create a master race, but breeding with Angels really does sound sacrilegious, it's not us improving on our own, we're using a short cut.

This is the problem with accepting religious ideas even partially. New eccentricities have to be developed to incorporate the incongruities of the earlier ideas.

In this iteration of the confusion, humans are blessed/saved/etc. but that leaves the problem of other intelligences. Religious literalists will claim only humans as we currently exist are saved. But most compassionate people will realize that consciousness is almost certainly possible outside a human form, or at another stage of evolution (natural or directed). In fact, it probably already exists in many developed animals.

But instead of retreating from the initial religious idea and seeing ourselves as animals like the rest, the whole "saved" system has to be reinterpreted to appeal to transhumanists or animal advocates.

Dolos, I'm not going to convince you of anything here. There's not much point in trying anyway. But, you ask "Why only bless humans?" It's a good question once you encounter the problem you did. But there are three possible answers.
- More than humans are "blessed"
- Only humans are blessed
- No one is

Make sure you give equal consideration to all three, as your train of thought only seems to allow for the first two.

Originally posted by Bat Dude
To put it all together, 'post-human' is a stench in God's nostrils. He never intended for man to do those things. And again, Jesus is the Saviour of mankind, not post-mankind.

Just as I'm sure the God of a few million years ago hated the putrid stench of homosapiens as they naturally came into being. Maybe God will send a new savior for post-Mankind...RoboJesus or something.

Much more alarming to me is how your position - excuse the term - dehumanizes any possible consciousness that could arise outside ourselves. A thinking, feeling, synthetic consciousness would be "a stench in God's nostrils" according to your logic here. I hope this type of thinking has largely died off by the time these sorts of advances happen, though I fear it won't.

Originally posted by Bat Dude
To put it all together, 'post-human' is a stench in God's nostrils. He never intended for man to do those things. And again, Jesus is the Saviour of mankind, not post-mankind.

Do you have a full list of things that weren't intended?

Do glasses remove one from humanity? Contacts? Retinal implants? If a person loses a leg and is given a prosthetic one have they become a stench in God's nostrils?

Originally posted by Bat Dude
He never intended for man to do those things.

if God is both omniscient and omnipotent, this is actually impossible...

Free Will. It answers all God-based paradoxes.

Originally posted by Oliver North
if God is both omniscient and omnipotent, this is actually impossible...
It can be possible--if God is incredibly capricious, and creates humanity such that it will disappoint him so that he can punish them

Originally posted by Omega Vision
It can be possible--if God is incredibly capricious, and creates humanity such that it will disappoint him so that he can punish them

but then he would have intended for us to do them

Originally posted by Oliver North
but then he would have intended for us to do them
Point taken. I'm sure Bat Dude will appeal to the old "God gave us free will", which I've never understood, because it should be impossible to do anything against God's will unless he's impotent or completely uninvolved, and if he's all knowing then there's no way to choose any action that doesn't line up with what God knows will happen (no deviation from the script).

but if he knows the future and everything is a product of his will, free will or not, you can't argue he didn't intend for it to happen, moral consequences aside.

idk, I agree, I don't get the argument either.

Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
Do you have a full list of things that weren't intended?

Do glasses remove one from humanity? Contacts? Retinal implants? If a person loses a leg and is given a prosthetic one have they become a stench in God's nostrils?

Glasses do not change your humanity, do they?

Or contacts?

Retinal implants?

Prosthetic arms and legs?

No, they do not. You are still human. "Post-human" is something beyond human, hence the name.

I'm not talking about glasses/contacts to fix eyesight or prosthetic legs to walk. I'm talking about changing the basic nature of humanity, such as brain augmentation or DNA manipulation.

As someone who used to LOVE comic books (especially Batman and Spider-Man) I can confidently say that Spider-Man is an abomination before God. He's not even really human, but rather a "post-human" or a "hybrid", and the new film (and even the old 2002 film) elaborates on that.

God made humans to be human, not "post-human", just like he made gorillas to be gorillas, fish to be fish, eagles to be eagles, spiders to be spiders, plants to be plants, amoeba to be amoeba, etc.

Originally posted by Bat Dude
Glasses do not change your humanity, do they?

Or contacts?

Retinal implants?

Prosthetic arms and legs?

No, they do not. You are still human. "Post-human" is something beyond human, hence the name.

I'm not talking about glasses/contacts to fix eyesight or prosthetic legs to walk. I'm talking about changing the basic nature of humanity, such as brain augmentation or DNA manipulation.

As someone who used to LOVE comic books (especially Batman and Spider-Man) I can confidently say that Spider-Man is an abomination before God. He's not even really human, but rather a "post-human" or a "hybrid", and the new film (and even the old 2002 film) elaborates on that.

God made humans to be human, not "post-human", just like he made gorillas to be gorillas, fish to be fish, eagles to be eagles, spiders to be spiders, plants to be plants, amoeba to be amoeba, etc.

Technically we're still human even if technology augments or even replaces most of our bodies.

Technology will never be able to replace our organic brains, it will be able to assimilate our consciousness by replacing our brain with a similar structure, but composed of nanobots as opposed to cells.

That seems a holy sacrifice to me, a sacrifice for the evolution of intelligent life. More intelligent beings are closer to God, more in His likeness, because according to every religion our God is an intelligent one.

Originally posted by Oliver North
idk, I agree, I don't get the argument either.

Coherence.

It's okay I understood you.

My argument is that God would desire the technological singularity.

My idea of God is the Transcension Hypothesis, Accelerating Returns, when viewed from an end-point. The idea is that there is no limit to intelligence or technological sophistication, so the end-point is unreachable, but nothing is unreachable for an omnipotent consciousness, and the ultimatum of an infinitely accelerating consciousness is an imaginary exponent, a concept, infinity, omnipotence.

So from a non-linear, duo-existential viewpoint, God both created existence and consciousness to evolve, and is the endpoint of that consciousness. Sounds impossible? Nothing is impossible for omnipotence.

Originally posted by Bat Dude

As someone who used to LOVE comic books (especially Batman and Spider-Man) I can confidently say that Spider-Man is an abomination before God. He's not even really human, but rather a "post-human" or a "hybrid", and the new film (and even the old 2002 film) elaborates on that.

God made humans to be human, not "post-human", just like he made gorillas to be gorillas, fish to be fish, eagles to be eagles, spiders to be spiders, plants to be plants, amoeba to be amoeba, etc.
God should have stopped the spider from biting him then. I find it odd that you sympathize enough with Spider-Man to read his comics despite thinking that he's an abomination. Or do you not share God's disgust?

I would love to hear your definition of what makes an eagle an eagle, what constitutes "eagleness."

Originally posted by Omega Vision
God should have stopped the spider from biting him then. I find it odd that you sympathize enough with Spider-Man to read his comics despite thinking that he's an abomination. Or do you not share God's disgust?

I would love to hear your definition of what makes an eagle an eagle, what constitutes "eagleness."

Not having prosthetic wings that increase their flight speed.

However, if their prosthetic wings don't increase their speed, they are still eagles.

If they decrease their speed, than they are RIGHTEOUS.

Originally posted by Bat Dude
Glasses do not change your humanity, do they?

Or contacts?

Retinal implants?

Prosthetic arms and legs?

No, they do not. You are still human. "Post-human" is something beyond human, hence the name.

I'm not talking about glasses/contacts to fix eyesight or prosthetic legs to walk. I'm talking about changing the basic nature of humanity, such as brain augmentation or DNA manipulation.

Have you ever heard of the ship of Theseus? The sailor replaces the mast one year, replaces the hull the next, and replaces the deck the year after that. Is he still on the same ship? If he isn't, when did it change?

Glasses do not make me an abomination, okay.

If I put on night vision goggles I now have an ability much unlike an human. I suspect you will accept that this has not made me an abomination either. However, if my DNA is changed to give me night vision then am I an abomination? I think you will say yes. But I don't know what you will say about a similarly permanent mechanical change (replacing my retina with a specialized device).

None of this is to say that Spider-Man isn't an abomination before god. The question is where do we draw the line? What are the things that matter? This is a question that should matter a lot to you, agreeing to the wrong medical procedure could send you to hell.

If it is the surpass normal capacity (a pretty good way of defining post human) then steroids should makes people abominations as should prosthetic legs specialized for running.

As for augmenting the brain or DNA what do we do with people have have a genetic disorder. Does fixing them render them abominations? Does it turn them suddenly human? A person born without legs is allowed to get prosthetics but should he avoid a biological fix that will regrown them for him?

Originally posted by Dolos
Technically we're still human even if technology augments or even replaces most of our bodies.

What is the technical definition of "human"?

Originally posted by Dolos
Technology will never be able to replace our organic brains, it will be able to assimilate our consciousness by replacing our brain with a similar structure, but composed of nanobots as opposed to cells.

So . . . technology will never replace our organic brains until it replaces our organic brains.

Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
What is the technical definition of "human"?

Technological implants don't change our species specification as each implant is unique per individual preference. We are still apart of that same group as long as we're alive, Human V 2.0 some call it, however, it's just a bunch of amputations if you think about it. That technology is an extension of our bodies, not apart of our bodies.



You're missing the point, a person wouldn't survive the transition. A new consciousness is made in the process, one that isn't human.

Originally posted by Omega Vision
God should have stopped the spider from biting him then. I find it odd that you sympathize enough with Spider-Man to read his comics despite thinking that he's an abomination. Or do you not share God's disgust?

I would love to hear your definition of what makes an eagle an eagle, what constitutes "eagleness."

I stopped reading comics (DC, Marvel, etc.) quite a bit ago. I used to love them at one point, though.

Originally posted by Dolos
Most religions preach 'Love Thy Neighbor', which basically says do right by your fellow human. Right as in peace, as in love, as in happiness and joy. No struggle no war.

Technology, it seems can provide said totalitarian peace in ways even religion cannot. Perhaps God offers peace and eternal love through death, but what we choose to do with what we have to us in this world, can offer peace and eternal love through life.

Why only bless humans?? Why not bless all forms of life, dogs, cats, self-conscious superhuman femtoprocessors, humans that have transformed themselves into superhuman femptoproccessors?

Most religions also preach that higher forms of life are above lower forms, human to animals for example, that we should rejoice in eating said animals if it keeps us alive. However, the relationship between machines and humans is completely different, as machines don't need to eat humans to survive, machines don't need sustenance at all.

In fact, as we expand our consciousness, we will be more divine and righteous in God's eyes by the same logic in the Bible and Hinduism as humans being greater than animals. This seems more propaganda to me then informed.

Originally posted by Oliver North
but if he knows the future and everything is a product of his will, free will or not, you can't argue he didn't intend for it to happen, moral consequences aside.

idk, I agree, I don't get the argument either. I haven't really believed in the bible for a long time but I never got that argument against God. I mean I understand the idea behind it. If logically something creates a paradox of thinking then it shouldn't be able to exist.

But if you credit a supreme being with being able to do all things and see all things then it never made sense to me that you can discredit them because you can not comprehend them doing something.

If they are supreme and can do anything that means that they can do the things even you can't imagine them doing.

ie if they can do anything then them creating free will and knowing everything and still being just doesn't actually sound off to me because they can do anything and everything if they exist.

Originally posted by Omega Vision
That's the one where God wipes out humanity because he's afraid that they'll become as great/better than him, right? That's actually a theme that goes through all of the Bible. Gods fear that his "children" will surpass him. From the garden of eden where he punishes them for wanting to be like him through the Tower of Babel and the flood. Even culminating in him reinventing himself as his own "son" to hang with the cool kids, but being better than all his real "children".

http://cdn.ballerstatus.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/2012-10-15-old.jpg

God, in essence.

Originally posted by Newjak
This seems more propaganda to me then informed.

I haven't really believed in the bible for a long time but I never got that argument against God. I mean I understand the idea behind it. If logically something creates a paradox of thinking then it shouldn't be able to exist.

But if you credit a supreme being with being able to do all things and see all things then it never made sense to me that you can discredit them because you can not comprehend them doing something.

If they are supreme and can do anything that means that they can do the things even you can't imagine them doing.

ie if they can do anything then them creating free will and knowing everything and still being just doesn't actually sound off to me because they can do anything and everything if they exist.
We're not talking about God's limitations Re:Free Will, we're talking about the impossibility of Free Will in a world created by an omnipotent, omnscient, and proactive being. You can't just handwave those arguments by saying "God is all powerful." In fact, that God is supposedly all powerful and all knowing is precisely why free will doesn't work. And so free will becomes a kind of sophistry used by religious people to reconcile the problem of evil.

Originally posted by Omega Vision
We're not talking about God's limitations Re:Free Will, we're talking about the impossibility of Free Will in a world created by an omnipotent, omnscient, and proactive being. You can't just handwave those arguments by saying "God is all powerful." In fact, that God is supposedly all powerful and all knowing is precisely why free will doesn't work. And so free will becomes a kind of sophistry used by religious people to reconcile the problem of evil. Actually you can hand wave those arguments by saying God is all powerful.

If God exists and God can do anything and everything God wants then God could create Free Will and still be all the things you described because God can do anything and everything even the things you can't comprehend happening.

Like I said it never made sense to me to say if God does exist and can do anything then God can't do this because if God exists and can do anything God can't do that even though they can do anything they want.

Originally posted by Newjak
Actually you can hand wave those arguments by saying God is all powerful.

If God exists and God can do anything and everything God wants then God could create Free Will and still be all the things you described because God can do anything and everything even the things you can't comprehend happening.

Like I said it never made sense to me to say if God does exist and can do anything then God can't do this because if God exists and can do anything God can't do that even though they can do anything they want.
This is a copout argument that makes it impossible to talk seriously about God because it throws out conventional logic and human reason. It's the same sort of "we can't comprehend a perfect being, so don't try to understand God's motivation for creating evil." It is only a way for theists to compensate for the inherent weaknesses of their positions and to save Sunday-School volunteer teachers from the tricky questions of precocious children. The logical conclusion of your position is such: God knows everything, but seeing as God gave humanity free will it follows that humans have the capacity to choose a course of action that God did not predict. Yet God still predicted their actions because God knows everything. But it was not predicted. Yet it was predicted. God has a plan, and it is in his will that some of his creations act against his will. But it was still his creations that chose to act against his will, even though nothing can break from his divine plan because he is all knowing and all powerful.

So, not only is it a copout, it's an example of double-think. It makes much more sense to say that free will doesn't exist in a world created by an omniscient, omnipotent God, or to not make any claims about God at all if you can't back them up with justifiable reasoning. In order for an omniscient, omnipotent God to allow free will he would have to be completely uninvolved in the workings of the Universe, and even that might not be enough.

Originally posted by Newjak
I haven't really believed in the bible for a long time but I never got that argument against God. I mean I understand the idea behind it. If logically something creates a paradox of thinking then it shouldn't be able to exist.

But if you credit a supreme being with being able to do all things and see all things then it never made sense to me that you can discredit them because you can not comprehend them doing something.

If they are supreme and can do anything that means that they can do the things even you can't imagine them doing.

ie if they can do anything then them creating free will and knowing everything and still being just doesn't actually sound off to me because they can do anything and everything if they exist.

thats not really the point, nor am I making an argument about God. Rather, I'm talking about what have to be the consequences of a being that is all powerful and all knowing creating something.

So, Bat Dude said God didn't intend for man to be post-human. However, if it happens, then certainly you can't say God didn't intend for it to go this way. He would have known this outcome and it was totally within his power to stop.

The thing is, issues like free will are moot in what I'm saying. It doesn't matter if you are predestined or not, it really doesn't even matter if God doesn't like the consequences of your choices, in terms of intent, God created it that way.

Basically, in a situation where you have both power over your actions and full knowledge of their consequences, you can't argue that the outcome of that action wasn't intentional. If something happens in the universe, God intended it.

I get what Newjack is saying. I also have a way for it all to work, logically.

Originally posted by Omega Vision
This is a copout argument that makes it impossible to talk seriously about God because it throws out conventional logic and human reason.

I don't see a problem.


Basically, you're saying, "Let's talk about an illogical, beyond-science being, with logic and science."

That doesn't and should never make sense. It would be like describing the mass of an object with it's color: "The car has a mass of blue."

It just cannot happen.





But here is how it works, logically:


We all have free-will which is the essence of Godliness. Our ability to chose, of our own accord, is what makes us have a semblance to God.

However, God is acutely aware of all potential outcomes for each and every individual. But God does NOT know exactly which of the nearly infinite paths our life's journey will take. God can get extremely close due to his wisdom and knowledge of us but he technically does not know with a 100% surety where our free will takes us along the nearly infinite amount of choices we can take.

But he is still aware of all of those paths.



Therefore, he knows all potential outcomes: still omniscience. One could argue that knowing all potential outcomes rather than just the 1 true outcome is a superior version of omniscience.





I can claim that my God is better than your God, now. WEEE!

Originally posted by Omega Vision
This is a copout argument that makes it impossible to talk seriously about God because it throws out conventional logic and human reason. It's the same sort of "we can't comprehend a perfect being, so don't try to understand God's motivation for creating evil." It is only a way for theists to compensate for the inherent weaknesses of their positions and to save Sunday-School volunteer teachers from the tricky questions of precocious children. The logical conclusion of your position is such: God knows everything, but seeing as God gave humanity free will it follows that humans have the capacity to choose a course of action that God did not predict. Yet God still predicted their actions because God knows everything. But it was not predicted. Yet it was predicted. God has a plan, and it is in his will that some of his creations act against his will. But it was still his creations that chose to act against his will, even though nothing can break from his divine plan because he is all knowing and all powerful.

So, not only is it a copout, it's an example of double-think. It makes much more sense to say that free will doesn't exist in a world created by an omniscient, omnipotent God, or to not make any claims about God at all if you can't back them up with justifiable reasoning. In order for an omniscient, omnipotent God to allow free will he would have to be completely uninvolved in the workings of the Universe, and even that might not be enough. Are we talking about a limitless being or not?

Cause a limitless being that can do anything can in fact do anything, once you say they can't do something they are now limited. So if our initial assumption is they are all knowing and all powerful than everything you say afterwards is null in void because under that assumption they can do anything even the things you don't believe they can do.

You can't argue that caveat away unlimited power and knowledge is unlimited meaning without limits, and that doesn't take away serious discussion about God. It removes a stance that doesn't really accomplish anything. About the only thing it tries to do imo is make theists sound completely irrational. Which if you talk to people who believe in God most really aren't irrational people at all even if you feel that one aspect of their life is irrational.

This of course doesn't pertain to what Bat Dude is saying. Also I'm using God as an insertion point for an all knowing all powerful being.

Originally posted by Oliver North
thats not really the point, nor am I making an argument about God. Rather, I'm talking about what have to be the consequences of a being that is all powerful and all knowing creating something.

So, Bat Dude said God didn't intend for man to be post-human. However, if it happens, then certainly you can't say God didn't intend for it to go this way. He would have known this outcome and it was totally within his power to stop.

The thing is, issues like free will are moot in what I'm saying. It doesn't matter if you are predestined or not, it really doesn't even matter if God doesn't like the consequences of your choices, in terms of intent, God created it that way.

Basically, in a situation where you have both power over your actions and full knowledge of their consequences, you can't argue that the outcome of that action wasn't intentional. If something happens in the universe, God intended it. See above.

Originally posted by Newjak
Like I said it never made sense to me to say if God does exist and can do anything then God can't do this because if God exists and can do anything God can't do that even though they can do anything they want.

Of course this argument also means that we don't need god since a god that can defy logic can do all of this without existing. Parsimoniously there's no reason to believe in god.

Originally posted by Bat Dude
I can confidently say that Spider-Man is an abomination before God.

I have so much to say to this. So much. But I'm oddly amused by it as well. The beautiful dichotomy of bemused glee and twitching nerd rage has rendered me unable to respond.

BD reminds of the Westboro Baptists, though. I.e. "This is what God thinks, we know this for certain, and it includes damning all kinds of otherwise-moral people."

Originally posted by Newjak

Cause a limitless being that can do anything can in fact do anything, once you say they can't do something they are now limited. So if our initial assumption is they are all knowing and all powerful than everything you say afterwards is null in void because under that assumption they can do anything even the things you don't believe they can do.

You can't argue that caveat away unlimited power and knowledge is unlimited meaning without limits, and that doesn't take away serious discussion about God. It removes a stance that doesn't really accomplish anything. About the only thing it tries to do imo is make theists sound completely irrational. Which if you talk to people who believe in God most really aren't irrational people at all even if you feel that one aspect of their life is irrational.

This of course doesn't pertain to what Bat Dude is saying. Also I'm using God as an insertion point for an all knowing all powerful being.
I'm not arguing that unlimited power is limited. I'm arguing that you can't simply dismiss the question: "Can God create a rock so heavy that even he can't lift it?" by saying "He can" and then not admitting that you're not respecting classical logic.

But answer this: how do we have a serious discussion about a God who can contradict himself without contradiction?

Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
Of course this argument also means that we don't need god since a god that can defy logic can do all of this without existing. Parsimoniously there's no reason to believe in god. True except he can also exist as well, in fact he could in theory exist and not exist at the same time


Originally posted by Omega Vision
I'm not arguing that unlimited power is limited. I'm arguing that you can't simply dismiss the question: "Can God create a rock so heavy that even he can't lift it?" by saying "He can" and then not admitting that you're not respecting classical logic.

But answer this: how do we have a serious discussion about a God who can contradict himself without contradiction? I would say a being without bounds is not bound by classical logic. In fact the idea of a being that can do anything itself defies classical logic, but if we are going to assume such a being exists then the fact they can defy classical logic must also be brought in and thus they defy classical logic simply by existing.

We can have a serious discussion on God based on how you define God. Are we talking biblical God? Finite God? Islamic God, are we talking about the various aspects that a limited God can not over come. What types of things could limit God. Do we believe there can exist a being that could be limitless in nature(note I said can exist not assuming one already exists)?

As for can God create a Rock even God themselves can not lift? Sure they can. They also can't cause technically an all powerful being can do anything even the act of being able to not limit themselves. They can do it and not do it all

Originally posted by Newjak
True except he can also exist as well, in fact he could in theory exist and not exist at the same time

Exactly. The point is once you propose a god unbounded by logic you now have a god about which, by definition, nothing is known and nothing can be known. Since its impossible (or at best meaningless) to believe in such a god it isn't really worth discussing any farther.

Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
Exactly. The point is once you propose a god unbounded by logic you now have a god about which, by definition, nothing is known and nothing can be known. Since its impossible (or at best meaningless) to believe in such a god it isn't really worth discussing any farther. Exactly which is why it never made sense to me start an argument by assuming an all powerful all knowing God exists then trying to say they can't do something logically.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ATRUx4CljDg
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Originally posted by Newjak
True except he can also exist as well, in fact he could in theory exist and not exist at the same time


I would say a being without bounds is not bound by classical logic. In fact the idea of a being that can do anything itself defies classical logic, but if we are going to assume such a being exists then the fact they can defy classical logic must also be brought in and thus they defy classical logic simply by existing.

We can have a serious discussion on God based on how you define God. Are we talking biblical God? Finite God? Islamic God, are we talking about the various aspects that a limited God can not over come. What types of things could limit God. Do we believe there can exist a being that could be limitless in nature(note I said can exist not assuming one already exists)?

As for can God create a Rock even God themselves can not lift? Sure they can. They also can't cause technically an all powerful being can do anything even the act of being able to not limit themselves. They can do it and not do it all
Going by your own standards its also equally valid to say that an all powerful God is also powerless and is nothing but limited because every statement is equally true and false in this post-modernist world of yours.

We certainly cannot have a serious discussion about your concept of God, no more than we could about an invisible green monster.

Originally posted by Omega Vision
Going by your own standards its also equally valid to say that an all powerful God is also powerless and is nothing but limited because every statement is equally true and false in this post-modernist world of yours.

We certainly cannot have a serious discussion about your concept of God, no more than we could about an invisible green monster. True you could say that.

It's not my concept of God, it's the concept of God if they were all powerful and all knowing.

Originally posted by Newjak
True you could say that.

It's not my concept of God, it's the concept of God if they were all powerful and all knowing.
On another note, couldn't you say "It" instead of "they" to be PC?

My point was that your line of reasoning was in a practical sense useless to any kind of metaphysical discussion. Debate and argument proceed from an assumption that it's possible to be correct or incorrect, otherwise we're not in philosophy, science, or even theology but more in the realm of poetry. And if you're going to do poetry it had better be deep and pretty. uhuh

Originally posted by Digi
I have so much to say to this. So much. But I'm oddly amused by it as well. The beautiful dichotomy of bemused glee and twitching nerd rage has rendered me unable to respond.

Hey man, there was a time on this forum that 90% of my posts were in the Batman and Spider-Man sections. I do have background knowledge on it (I was a fan from age 2 to just recently at age 20). And if you look at it from a Biblical, Christian perspective, Spider-Man (and even Batman, but for different reasons) is an abomination to God.



By the standards of men, there are a lot of nice people that will be damned. Mother Theresa was a wonderfully nice person, but she is not in heaven.

But in reality, none of us are "good people" or "moral people". We all sin. Whether we realize it or not, we sin every single day of our lives. And even the littlest sins are still sins and are more than enough to damn us to hell. "For there is not a just man upon earth, that doeth good, and sinneth not." (Ecclesiastes 7:20)

There is a way for our sins to be forgiven, and that is through the Lord Jesus Christ. His sacrifice on Calvary paid the debt our sins have accumulated once and for all. The stain of sin is washed away. But you have to believe that He did it for you, and that it's the only thing necessary for salvation (you can't earn it yourself). You have to believe He is who He says He is, and yield to His Lordship over your life. Do these things, and I can guarantee to you that you will live forever in heaven.

If you don't do those things, you won't get saved and you will, unfortunately, end up in hell and ultimately the lake of fire (two separate places) for eternity. That's not a fate I would wish on my worst enemies. I don't want anyone, including you all, to go there, especially when the method of salvation is so simple!

Originally posted by Bat Dude
Hey man, there was a time on this forum that 90% of my posts were in the Batman and Spider-Man sections. I do have background knowledge on it (I was a fan from age 2 to just recently at age 20). And if you look at it from a Biblical, Christian perspective, Spider-Man (and even Batman, but for different reasons) is an abomination to God.



By the standards of men, there are a lot of nice people that will be damned. Mother Theresa was a wonderfully nice person, but she is not in heaven.

But in reality, none of us are "good people" or "moral people". We all sin. Whether we realize it or not, we sin every single day of our lives. And even the littlest sins are still sins and are more than enough to damn us to hell. "For there is not a just man upon earth, that doeth good, and sinneth not." (Ecclesiastes 7:20)

There is a way for our sins to be forgiven, and that is through the Lord Jesus Christ. His sacrifice on Calvary paid the debt our sins have accumulated once and for all. The stain of sin is washed away. But you have to believe that He did it for you, and that it's the only thing necessary for salvation (you can't earn it yourself). You have to believe He is who He says He is, and yield to His Lordship over your life. Do these things, and I can guarantee to you that you will live forever in heaven.

If you don't do those things, you won't get saved and you will, unfortunately, end up in hell and ultimately the lake of fire (two separate places) for eternity. That's not a fate I would wish on my worst enemies. I don't want anyone, including you all, to go there, especially when the method of salvation is so simple!
Does it concern you that most "Christians" are going to Hell?

Originally posted by Omega Vision
On another note, couldn't you say "It" instead of "they" to be PC?

My point was that your line of reasoning was in a practical sense useless to any kind of metaphysical discussion. Debate and argument proceed from an assumption that it's possible to be correct or incorrect, otherwise we're not in philosophy, science, or even theology but more in the realm of poetry. And if you're going to do poetry it had better be deep and pretty. uhuh Theoretically you could use all terms how does that sound

What is the point of bringing up an all powerful and all knowing being only to limit them in the next sentence so they are no longer all knowing and all powerful?

And like I said before it doesn't make practical sense to me to declare something without limits then try to make a point about said entity being limited. To me it is senseless cause that being could do anything and everything by the definition of what you declared them to be.

Originally posted by Newjak
Theoretically you could use all terms how does that sound

What is the point of bringing up an all powerful and all knowing being only to limit them in the next sentence so they are no longer all knowing and all powerful?

And like I said before it doesn't make practical sense to me to declare something without limits then try to make a point about said entity being limited. To me it is senseless cause that being could do anything and everything by the definition of what you declared them to be.
From how I see it, it's not the limitation of the being but the limitation of the concept of free will. Free will as defined by theologians is logically impossible if God is all knowing. If you want to dispense with logic, that's fine, but know that most self-respecting theologians and apologists throughout history haven't, and even when they had terrible arguments like Aquinas and Augustine they still on paper respected the rules of logic. You can look at it three ways: (1) free will does not exist because God is all knowing/all powerful (2) free will exists because God is not all knowing/all powerful or (3) (your stance) God is everything and nothing, thus free will exists but then it also doesn't.

To sum up: I don't care if you take issue with how I define omnipotence, because at least my assessment doesn't lead to a nonsense world where nothing is true or false.

(You should note that outside of this kind of debate I'm more of your view--that truth and falsehood are hard to define and that there may not actually be logic to the universe. At least that's how I approach things in my creative work, but when we're debating I use logic because that's the language of debate.)

Originally posted by Omega Vision
Free will as defined by theologians is logically impossible if God is all knowing.

Originally posted by dadudemon
...here is how it works, logically:


We all have free-will which is the essence of Godliness. Our ability to chose, of our own accord, is what makes us have a semblance to God.

However, God is acutely aware of all potential outcomes for each and every individual. But God does NOT know exactly which of the nearly infinite paths our life's journey will take. God can get extremely close due to his wisdom and knowledge of us but he technically does not know with a 100% surety where our free will takes us along the nearly infinite amount of choices we can take.

But he is still aware of all of those paths.



Therefore, he knows all potential outcomes: still omniscience. One could argue that knowing all potential outcomes rather than just the 1 true outcome is a superior version of omniscience.

Originally posted by dadudemon

Looks like we've got a Roderick Chisholm here.

Seriously though, that might be your idea of omniscience, but to me that sounds more like "Cosmic Awareness." If God isn't certain of the outcome then he can't be said to have known it, that's just Epistemology 101.

On a sidenote, one of the most interesting kinds of limited omniscience I've seen in fiction is the Intellectus in the Dresden Files, where someone possessing this power can know anything they want, but they have to "ask" the right question (e.g. you want to know how many lizards there are in a forest, and you suddenly realize that there are 4,298 lizards and 59,245 unhatched lizard eggs), but you can't know something if you don't know to ask yourself the question/think about it. For instance if you had no idea there was a planet called Xandor in the Andromeda Galaxy you couldn't learn if it had life on it or not.

Originally posted by Omega Vision
Does it concern you that most "Christians" are going to Hell?

I should concern him more that I've been gradually turning him into a lizard person over the last several years, ensuring that he is an abomination doomed to Hell.

Originally posted by Omega Vision
From how I see it, it's not the limitation of the being but the limitation of the concept of free will. Free will as defined by theologians is logically impossible if God is all knowing.

Actually I'd argue that theologically speaking, time perception and free will are unrelated, because Angels are -supposed to be, by certain traditions- outside of time. They still choose to be good or to be bad, but it doesn't happen through a lifetime nor through an eventual redemption. So the issue about free will comes from the notion of time and is unrelated with knowleged, for human beings the future is only future because we don't know it, and in the same way, we can only experience the past and the present partially. This is pretty much our definition of ignorance regading time phenomena, which means that when we say God being all-knowing attacks the notion of freewill, we aren filtering our knowledge by the limitations of our personal temporality. The problem is not what God knows, the problem is that for us the universe only exists through ignorance -through time which is future, through future which is ignorance-.

Originally posted by Omega Vision
Looks like we've got a Roderick Chisholm here.

Seriously though, that might be your idea of omniscience, but to me that sounds more like "Cosmic Awareness." If God isn't certain of the outcome then he can't be said to have known it, that's just Epistemology 101.

If God is aware of all possible outcomes, that is omniscience. In fact, it is superior to knowing just one of the nearly infinite outcomes. We don't know if all other potential paths cease to exist when we make a decision: it could be possible that all exist. But from our perspective, all those possible outcomes are just one continuous experience and all those possible outcomes collapse into our own subjective experience.

My version of omniscience>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>your version of omniscience.

In fact, my version is so much better that it is nearly infinitely better in regards to the amount of information known.

Originally posted by Omega Vision
On a sidenote, one of the most interesting kinds of limited omniscience I've seen in fiction is the Intellectus in the Dresden Files, where someone possessing this power can know anything they want, but they have to "ask" the right question (e.g. you want to know how many lizards there are in a forest, and you suddenly realize that there are 4,298 lizards and 59,245 unhatched lizard eggs), but you can't know something if you don't know to ask yourself the question/think about it. For instance if you had no idea there was a planet called Xandor in the Andromeda Galaxy you couldn't learn if it had life on it or not.

That is called Inherent Omniscience...which I think I got from comic books, actually.

Actually, the sounds remarkably close to some Mormon Theology. The Urim and Thummim is supposed to be used similarly and how Joseph Smith claimed to have translated the Book of Mormon.

Originally posted by Omega Vision
From how I see it, it's not the limitation of the being but the limitation of the concept of free will. Free will as defined by theologians is logically impossible if God is all knowing. If you want to dispense with logic, that's fine, but know that most self-respecting theologians and apologists throughout history haven't, and even when they had terrible arguments like Aquinas and Augustine they still on paper respected the rules of logic. You can look at it three ways: (1) free will does not exist because God is all knowing/all powerful (2) free will exists because God is not all knowing/all powerful or (3) (your stance) God is everything and nothing, thus free will exists but then it also doesn't.

To sum up: I don't care if you take issue with how I define omnipotence, because at least my assessment doesn't lead to a nonsense world where nothing is true or false.

(You should note that outside of this kind of debate I'm more of your view--that truth and falsehood are hard to define and that there may not actually be logic to the universe. At least that's how I approach things in my creative work, but when we're debating I use logic because that's the language of debate.) To me placing limitations on any concept also indirectly( or directly which ever you prefer) put limitations on an all knowing/all powerful being.

Like I said the idea of an all powerful all knowing being to me is itself illogical based on the definition of such a being being able to know and do everything it/they/her/him/nothing desires/undesires to do/do not

Originally posted by Omega Vision
From how I see it, it's not the limitation of the being but the limitation of the concept of free will. Free will as defined by theologians is logically impossible if God is all knowing.

Take God out of the equation for a second. We can't presume to know His qualities anyway, even if he were to exist.

But free will as defined by most religions is impossible if the universe adheres to physical laws. Period. I see that as the bigger hurdle, not in proving what God is or isn't like and playing a logic game from there.

Because as soon as you say "if God is this..." you're conceding a point that theists have literally no evidence for, empirical or logical. It's easily refutable without appealing to the unknown, so it's much better to stay there.

Originally posted by Bat Dude
Hey man, there was a time on this forum that 90% of my posts were in the Batman and Spider-Man sections. I do have background knowledge on it (I was a fan from age 2 to just recently at age 20). And if you look at it from a Biblical, Christian perspective, Spider-Man (and even Batman, but for different reasons) is an abomination to God.

If you look at it from your Biblical, Christian perspective. Don't pretend to speak for any kind of majority.

You've managed to accurately pinpoint why I hate dogmatic morality though. It creates negativity where none exists. People or acts with no ill intent and no negative outcome are labeled as sins simply to match a prescribed document, or rather, one sect's subjective interpretation of that document.

But I've had that debate on much more nuanced, controversial topics where the line is trickier to pinpoint. You're just blindly hateful, so the example is more stark.

Originally posted by Digi
Take God out of the equation for a second. We can't presume to know His qualities anyway, even if he were to exist.

It goes further than that, since God is assumed to be THE origin, it forcibly stems from an axiomatic stance where every definition, every quality or value should come from God to be a "real" definition. And the limitation here isn't a limitation of God, it's a limitation for language itself.

Originally posted by Digi
Take God out of the equation for a second. We can't presume to know His qualities anyway, even if he were to exist.

But free will as defined by most religions is impossible if the universe adheres to physical laws. Period. I see that as the bigger hurdle, not in proving what God is or isn't like and playing a logic game from there.

Because as soon as you say "if God is this..." you're conceding a point that theists have literally no evidence for, empirical or logical. It's easily refutable without appealing to the unknown, so it's much better to stay there.



If you look at it from your Biblical, Christian perspective. Don't pretend to speak for any kind of majority.

You've managed to accurately pinpoint why I hate dogmatic morality though. It creates negativity where none exists. People or acts with no ill intent and no negative outcome are labeled as sins simply to match a prescribed document, or rather, one sect's subjective interpretation of that document.

But I've had that debate on much more nuanced, controversial topics where the line is trickier to pinpoint. You're just blindly hateful, so the example is more stark. I'll free will you uhuh


I do agree with most of what you are saying although I don't necessarily follow the us vs them angle of it

Heh. Fair enough. It's not a vs. mentality though. I've just seen a lot of religious debates, and for some reason the theists are routinely allowed to assume certain ideas or properties to either the universe or the divine without a serious challenge. So it's not antagonism, it's just holding everyone accountable.

That's what free will comes down to though. Literally every time you make a decision, a miracle has to occur that circumvents or transcends the laws of physics in order for religious free will to exist. Such blatant and omnipresent phenomena would either be readily apparent to testing, or create irreconcilable contradictions in our understanding of the universe's physical laws. We have exactly zero evidence of either of those.

It's also egotistical. We're made of the same stuff as the rest of the universe. And our brains, while more sophisticated, are scarcely different in form and function than numerous other animals. The onus is on advocates of free will to show how humans and humans alone are able to defy universal laws. Appeals to a soul only push the question further out into more unknowns.

Quantum theorists have tried, to no avail. And it makes sense, since uncertainty is an inherent trait of quantum mechanics. But even if quantum effects happened in the brain (they don't as far as we know), they're still too tiny to have any affect on practical decisions that we associate with free will. And classical physics certainly doesn't allow for this type of ambiguity.

Free will as it exists colloquially in society isn't taken seriously outside of religious circles, and any explanations of how we are non-causal beings are incoherent to me.

...and we don't even have to reference the Big Guy.

Originally posted by Bentley
It goes further than that, since God is assumed to be THE origin, it forcibly stems from an axiomatic stance where every definition, every quality or value should come from God to be a "real" definition. And the limitation here isn't a limitation of God, it's a limitation for language itself.

That's entirely not where I was taking my post. But ok.

Originally posted by dadudemon
But God does NOT know
Then God is no longer omniscient.
Originally posted by Omega Vision
Seriously though, that might be your idea of omniscience, but to me that sounds more like "Cosmic Awareness."
That sounds about right. Plus, Cosmic Awareness is also supposed to an extremely limited/downscaled version of omniscience.

Originally posted by dadudemon
If God is aware of all possible outcomes, that is omniscience. In fact, it is superior to knowing just one of the nearly infinite outcomes. We don't know if all other potential paths cease to exist when we make a decision: it could be possible that all exist. But from our perspective, all those possible outcomes are just one continuous experience and all those possible outcomes collapse into our own subjective experience.

My version of omniscience>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>your version of omniscience.

In fact, my version is so much better that it is nearly infinitely better in regards to the amount of information known.

Knowledge of possible outcomes is not knowledge of the actual outcome. A God who knows all the possible outcomes but not the actual outcomes is not only not omniscient, that God isn't even truly clairvoyant. This model of God is more akin to an incredibly powerful computer that can create infinite projections that are all feasible and equally possible but none of which are--by your own admission--certain predictions. In fact, to take it further, you might not even be able to say that this God "knows" these possible outcomes if they're all only "can happen" and none of them are "will happen."

To paraphrase Saul Kripke's objection to Lewis's Modal Realism: "No one would care to know if they were the possible president, they'd rather know if they were to be the actual president."

Originally posted by Omega Vision
Knowledge of possible outcomes is not knowledge of the actual outcome. A God who knows all the possible outcomes but not the actual outcomes is not only not omniscient, that God isn't even truly clairvoyant. This model of God is more akin to an incredibly powerful computer that can create infinite projections that are all feasible and equally possible but none of which are--by your own admission--certain predictions. In fact, to take it further, you might not even be able to say that this God "knows" these possible outcomes if they're all only "can happen" and none of them are "will happen."

Its significantly worse than that. The computer would at least have some concept of what is likely or probable and thus could make some kind of decisions based on that, God cannot even have a concept of likelihood within endangering free will. Dadude's concept of God is identical to a being that knows nothing.

Originally posted by Digi
Quantum theorists have tried, to no avail. And it makes sense, since uncertainty is an inherent trait of quantum mechanics.

No it doesn't, it makes no sense at all. Free will is "the ability to make choices". If quantum mechanics randomly picks a choice for you that's determinism, not free will.

considering actions are determined by the processes of neurons in the brain, I can't fathom what QM would have to do with it anyways. Quantum uncertainty may be relevant to whether a particular ion moves through a particular membrane channel, it isn't when talking about human behaviour.

Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
No it doesn't, it makes no sense at all. Free will is "the ability to make choices". If quantum mechanics randomly picks a choice for you that's determinism, not free will.

Well, that's kind of the point. I'm in agreement with you. Intuitively, I meant, not mathematically or empirically.

Originally posted by Omega Vision
Does it concern you that most "Christians" are going to Hell?

It does.

Most people in the pews of a church these days aren't saved. They give their hour every Sunday morning and then go out and live the complete opposite of what God tells us in His Word. They don't even really believe what the Bible says, anyway. If they did, they wouldn't live the way that they do.

The problem is that the pastors are more interested in making money and "not rocking the boat" than preaching the Gospel and the Word of God.

All you hear in the modern-day church is "God loves you and wants you to be prosperous." You don't hear about sin, condemnation, hell, or even salvation.

Joel Osteen, one of the most popular televangelists out there, tells flowery little stories and anecdotes about how God loves you and wants you to prosper, but doesn't preach the Gospel. How can a person get saved if they have never heard the Gospel message?

So yeah, it concerns me quite a bit.

Originally posted by Bat Dude
How can a person get saved if they have never heard the Gospel message?

Grace.

Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
Grace.

"For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast." (Ephesians 2:8-9)

"Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Jesus Christ, that we might be justified by the faith of Christ, and not by the works of the law: for by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified." (Galatians 2:16)

"Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen." (Hebrews 11:1)

"So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God." (Romans 10:17)

We are saved by the grace of God through faith.

The faith that saves us is centered on Jesus Christ.

Faith comes by hearing the word of God.

Originally posted by Bat Dude
"For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast." (Ephesians 2:8-9)

"Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Jesus Christ, that we might be justified by the faith of Christ, and not by the works of the law: for by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified." (Galatians 2:16)

"Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen." (Hebrews 11:1)

"So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God." (Romans 10:17)

We are saved by the grace of God through faith.

The faith that saves us is centered on Jesus Christ.

Faith comes by hearing the word of God.

You're too religious.

Moreover, you base far too many of your decisions and form your ideas of reality according to your perceptions of one religion. It's the same as biasm against religions such as Hinduism or Muslim and fits my description of philosophical closed-mindedness.

Though I doubt you'd claim scientific knowledge without empirical backing like I half-seriously tend to do sometimes.

Originally posted by Omega Vision
Knowledge of possible outcomes is not knowledge of the actual outcome.

Except that it is.

It includes the set of actual outcome and I also requote myself for why even the seemingly "unknown" portion is still pretty much known under my definition of omniscience.

Originally posted by Omega Vision
A God who knows all the possible outcomes but not the actual outcomes is not only not omniscient,

By your narrow definition of omniscience, maybe.

By my narrow definition, it is not.

Originally posted by Omega Vision
that God isn't even truly clairvoyant.

I think you missed this part:

Originally posted by dadudemon
God can get extremely close due to his wisdom and knowledge of us but he technically does not know with a 100% surety where our free will takes us along the nearly infinite amount of choices we can take.



Originally posted by Omega Vision
This model of God is more akin to an incredibly powerful computer that can create infinite projections that are all feasible and equally possible but none of which are--by your own admission--certain predictions.

I would remove the "equally possible" portion of that statement because not all outcomes/choices would be equal in such a scenario: see above requote for why I say this.

Additionally, the computer aspect of God's intelligence is only one faucet of such a being.

Originally posted by Omega Vision
In fact, to take it further, you might not even be able to say that this God "knows" these possible outcomes if they're all only "can happen" and none of them are "will happen."

But how would you go about proving that unless you yourself we also omniscient, as I defined it?

Originally posted by Omega Vision
To paraphrase Saul Kripke's objection to Lewis's Modal Realism: "No one would care to know if they were the possible president, they'd rather know if they were to be the actual president."

Which would be a/n bad/off statement regarding the intelligence of God if God is omniscient in the way I describe.

"God, should I take this job on the other side of the world?"

"No, because you are needed more at your current location."

God can answer that prayer because God knows all the possible outcomes had the person moved to the other side of the world.

In fact, my definition of God's omniscience is more useful than the narrow and paradoxical one you are using. You like your definition specifically because it creates the paradox. Mine avoids it while still allowing at least spiritual interaction.

Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
Its significantly worse than that. The computer would at least have some concept of what is likely or probable and thus could make some kind of decisions based on that, God cannot even have a concept of likelihood within endangering free will. Dadude's concept of God is identical to a being that knows nothing.

I think you are talking about a being I did not describe. The being you refer to is the one Omega created but was not representative of the qualities I assigned the word "omniscience."

Originally posted by Bat Dude
"For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast." (Ephesians 2:8-9)

"Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Jesus Christ, that we might be justified by the faith of Christ, and not by the works of the law: for by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified." (Galatians 2:16)

"Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen." (Hebrews 11:1)

"So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God." (Romans 10:17)

We are saved by the grace of God through faith.

The faith that saves us is centered on Jesus Christ.

Faith comes by hearing the word of God.

http://home.snu.edu/~hculbert/heathen.htm


The Heathen is saved by Grace, as well.

Thank the Lord, I'm saved.

I'd rather be saved than "open-minded".

Originally posted by dadudemon
http://home.snu.edu/~hculbert/heathen.htm


The Heathen is saved by Grace, as well.

Only if they are converted.

"Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me." (John 14:6)

"He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life: and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him." (John 3:36)

Jesus is the only way to heaven. It's not the popular answer, but it's the answer nonetheless.

Originally posted by Bat Dude
Thank the Lord, I'm saved.

I'd rather be saved than "open-minded". http://cdn.memegenerator.net/instances/400x/30809527.jpg

Originally posted by Bat Dude
Only if they are converted.

"Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me." (John 14:6)

"He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life: and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him." (John 3:36)

Jesus is the only way to heaven. It's not the popular answer, but it's the answer nonetheless.

*high five*

I agree, fully. They must be genuinely converted when given that chance either upon death (there was a scripture that site referenced stating that they would be given a chance immediately upon death to accept it) or in life.

Originally posted by Lord Lucien
http://cdn.memegenerator.net/instances/400x/30809527.jpg

crylaugh

Originally posted by dadudemon
*high five*

I agree, fully. They must be genuinely converted when given that chance either upon death (there was a scripture that site referenced stating that they would be given a chance immediately upon death to accept it) or in life.

Hebrews 9:27 totally debunks this notion, though.

So does the part in Luke about Lazarus and the rich man. The rich man died, and when he awoke, he was in hell. No second chance. No "postmortem evangelization."



"For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness; but unto us which are saved it is the power of God." (1 Corinthians 1:18)

I do hope one day the Lord shows you this truth, Lucien. I don't want you to find out that hell is a very real place... by ending up there.

You see my main problem with the bible and hell has always been it just seems so unjust a punishment in some cases for a crime no one knows they committed.

For instance Native Americans were living in America after Christ but had no idea he existed. Did they go to Hell simply because they had no idea there was a Christ? Am I to believe they should burn for eternity simply because of that. It's not a just punishment to me.

What about the guy who has done good in his life way more than they ever did bad, are you telling me a decent human being will get tortured forever simply because they did not believe in Christ's grace? That once again seems like an unjust punishment to me.

IMHO, "organized religion" is the watered-down version of what was revealed to men and women with evolved consciousness, and then passed on. Being watered down, the revelation experience becomes "lost in translation"; metaphors are taken literally, and humanity's wonderful propensity for us-them thinking turns what could have been much more beneficial into quests for superiority, whether at the gross organizational level or on a subtler personal level.

Like all living things, human beings crave power: that which distances one from death terror. And when you have "God" on your side, well, it just doesn't get any better than that.

/sermon

Originally posted by dadudemon
It includes the set of actual outcomes

In that case we are all omniscient and you've rendered the world meaningless.

Originally posted by Bat Dude
Hebrews 9:27 totally debunks this notion, though.

So does the part in Luke about Lazarus and the rich man. The rich man died, and when he awoke, he was in hell. No second chance. No "postmortem evangelization."



"For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness; but unto us which are saved it is the power of God." (1 Corinthians 1:18)

I do hope one day the Lord shows you this truth, Lucien. I don't want you to find out that hell is a very real place... by ending up there.
Ahh yes, the good old fashioned "I hope you burn in Hell" speech. Real classy. Glad to see you love your enemies as Jesus wanted.

I'm not speaking for the majority. Unfortunately, Biblical Christianity has ALWAYS been a minority, even during the supposed "age of Christian dominance" in the world.

The road to hell is paved with good intentions. I'm sure you've heard that saying before.

Originally posted by Omega Vision
Ahh yes, the good old fashioned "I hope you burn in Hell" speech. Real classy. Glad to see you love your enemies as Jesus wanted.

I never said that, and am actually pretty offended that you think I did. Re-read what I posted.



I said I DIDN'T want Lucien to end up in hell. I want God to show him the truth before it becomes too late for him. I want him to go to heaven, but he won't if he doesn't repent and believe Jesus is Lord.

Maybe my wording wasn't the best, but I wasn't saying I hope he goes to hell. In fact, if we go to the previous page in this thread, we can see that I said the following:



But I'm just a mean old hater, right?

Originally posted by Bat Dude
I'm not speaking for the majority. Unfortunately, Biblical Christianity has ALWAYS been a minority, even during the supposed "age of Christian dominance" in the world.

Again, YOUR Biblical Christianity. Many would argue they follow the Bible quite well, and they aren't as narrow-minded and hateful as you are. There's a special form of condescension that presumes to be the/an authority on something literally millions have followed in some form, and that your only method of being more right is faith...which, ironically, is the same mechanism used by all the other "right" interpretations. I'd be insulted, but I think you're just uneducated and/or unwilling to use your critical faculties to examine other perspectives honestly.

Originally posted by Bat Dude
But I'm just a mean old hater, right?

By your profile you're, what, about 20? So you're not old. No argument on the others, though.

Originally posted by Digi
Again, YOUR Biblical Christianity. Many would argue they follow the Bible quite well, and they aren't as narrow-minded and hateful as you are. There's a special form of condescension that presumes to be the/an authority on something literally millions have followed in some form, and that your only method of being more right is faith...which, ironically, is the same mechanism used by all the other "right" interpretations. I'd be insulted, but I think you're just uneducated and/or unwilling to use your critical faculties to examine other perspectives honestly.

Just read a Bible. It's not my opinion, it's what is written in there. I try to stay away from my opinion when it comes to issues like these. I couldn't care less about opinion, unless it's backed up by scripture.

When I make a statement on religion, I try to always back it with scripture. Again, that's not my opinion, that's what the Bible says.



Great addition to the discussion, btw...

Batdude: would you be able to enjoy heaven knowing there are people suffering for eternity?

Originally posted by Oliver North
Batdude: would you be able to enjoy heaven knowing there are people suffering for eternity?

That's a valid question.

"For the Lamb which is in the midst of the throne shall feed them, and shall lead them unto living fountains of waters: and God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes." (Revelation 7:17)

"And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away." (Revelation 21:4)

It says multiple times that "God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes." It also says that there will be no sorrow or crying or pain. What that tells me is that in heaven, you will not dwell on nor remember anything that happened on earth regarding someone that is not in heaven with you (let's say you get saved but your mom doesn't. You won't remember your mom, as weird as that may seem).

If you can dwell on loved ones that didn't get saved, that would cause pain and sorrow because you'd realize you'd never see them again. In heaven, God will spare you the sorrow and you'll be so happy to be with Him, it'll never occur to you anyway.

What I think people who debate with Bad-Dude don't get is that in his world God is inherently good. No matter how evil something God does is (by Bat-Dude's morality or yours) the action is still good simply because God did it. If Jesus stabbed a baby in front of him that would be fine, purely because Jesus did it.

Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
In that case we are all omniscient and you've rendered the world meaningless.

Incorrect: that's only one of the nearly infinite and we do not know the end result of our life-line until we experience the whole thing. We are not even omniscient with our own personal life's experiences because we don't even remember everything from our own lives, much less the nearly infinite possibilities for our life or the even greater set for all lives (which would include all other life in this universe and possibly others...if you believe in the attribute God has like Mormons do).

Originally posted by Bat Dude
Hebrews 9:27 totally debunks this notion, though.

So does the part in Luke about Lazarus and the rich man. The rich man died, and when he awoke, he was in hell. No second chance. No "postmortem evangelization."


You must take those scriptures out of context and add in the new concept of hell (which was not there, originally, but was added later) in order for your interpretation to be correct. Then, on top of that, there are plenty of scriptures that say ALL men will be saved:

Luke 3:6
All mankind will see God's salvation. (Isaiah 40:5)

John 12:32
But I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to myself.

Romans 5:18
Consequently, just as the result of one trespass was condemnation for all men, so also the result of one act of righteousness was justification that brings life for all men.

1 Cor. 15:22-28
For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive. But each in his own turn: Christ, the firstfruits; then, when he comes, those who belong to him. Then the end will come, when he hands over the kingdom to God the Father after he has destroyed all dominion, authority and power. For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. The last enemy to be destroyed is death. For he "has put everything under his feet." Now when it says that "everything" has been put under him, it is clear that this does not include God himself, who put everything under Christ. When he has done this, then the Son himself will be made subject to him who put everything under him, so that God may be all in all.

Philippians 2:9-11
Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow,in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.


And those who seek genuinely seek God, they will find Him:

Hebrews 11:6
And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him.

Does not put a stipulation whether in this life or whether or not they are the "Spirits In Prison" which Jesus himself visited during his 3 day stent away form this mortal realm.


And here is the mast damming scripture against your position: it says places, even Sodom, would have repented had the miracles that were performed in Korazin and Bethsaida were performed in Sodom:

Matthew 11:21-23
Woe to you, Korazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! If the miracles that were performed in you had been performed in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. But I tell you, it will be more bearable for Tyre and Sidon on the day of judgment than for you. And you, Capernaum, will you be lifted up to the skies? No, you will go down to the depths. If the miracles that were performed in you had been performed in Sodom, it would have remained to this day.


Quite clearly, people are saved in their ignorance and quite clearly, they will be preached to after they are dead. Else Jesus go to the spirits in prison and minister to them during his 3 day vacation?


The final nail in your perspective's coffin:

7. Postmortem evangelization and outreach: people will receive an opportunity to hear about Christ and to accept or reject him after death.
To top of page

Proponents say Mark 16:15-16 indicates that only those who explicitly reject Christ will be damned.
Matthew 12:40
For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of a huge fish, so the Son of Man will be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.
Mark 16:15-16
He said to them, "Go into all the world and preach the good news to all creation. Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned."
John 15:22
If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not be guilty of sin. Now, however, they have no excuse for their sin.
2 Thessalonians 1:8
He will punish those who do not know God and do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus.
2 Timothy 1:16-18
May the Lord show mercy to the household of Onesiphorus, because he often refreshed me and was not ashamed of my chains. On the contrary, when he was in Rome, he searched hard for me until he found me. May the Lord grant that he will find mercy from the Lord on that day! You know very well in how many ways he helped me in Ephesus.
1 Peter 3:19-20
Through whom also he went and preached to the spirits in prison who disobeyed long ago . . .




Originally posted by Bat Dude
"For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness; but unto us which are saved it is the power of God." (1 Corinthians 1:18)

Originally posted by Bat Dude
I do hope one day the Lord shows you this truth, Lucien. I don't want you to find out that hell is a very real place... by ending up there.

Hell does not exist as you believe it. That is a newer concept injected into the word. You should know this if you study the history of the bible. Not even the Jews believed in hell. They called it Shoele which is basically the "spirit world" where spirits await their final judgement.

Lord Lucien will not go to hell unless he wants to go there...then it is technically not hell, at all. Remember, as the scriptures indicate, you will chose in the Spirit World, for sure, before final judgement.

Also, who is to say Lord Lucien would not forsake his current faith system if those miracles were performed in front of him and the spirit testified to his soul of the righteousness and correctness of those miracles? I know for sure that I would have absolute no faith issues if I got to experience those miracles and that testament directly from the Holy Ghost. If I got to experience that...I'd become like...a super prophet or something!


Originally posted by Newjak
You see my main problem with the bible and hell has always been it just seems so unjust a punishment in some cases for a crime no one knows they committed.

For instance Native Americans were living in America after Christ but had no idea he existed. Did they go to Hell simply because they had no idea there was a Christ? Am I to believe they should burn for eternity simply because of that. It's not a just punishment to me.

What about the guy who has done good in his life way more than they ever did bad, are you telling me a decent human being will get tortured forever simply because they did not believe in Christ's grace? That once again seems like an unjust punishment to me.

No, they will be judged according to the light and truth of righteousness that they had to live by. This is in the same Bible Bat Dude reads. Any Christian who tells you you are going to hell because you don't believe is explicitly wrong: it says so right in their own scriptures. However, if you were given a sincere chance to hear and adhere to the gospel of Christ (not just some man's church), then you will not get as much of a lenient judgement as say the heathens or ancient man.


Originally posted by Mindship
IMHO, "organized religion" is the watered-down version of what was revealed to men and women with evolved consciousness, and then passed on. Being watered down, the revelation experience becomes "lost in translation"; metaphors are taken literally, and humanity's wonderful propensity for us-them thinking turns what could have been much more beneficial into quests for superiority, whether at the gross organizational level or on a subtler personal level.

Like all living things, human beings crave power: that which distances one from death terror. And when you have "God" on your side, well, it just doesn't get any better than that.

/sermon

I agree with this for the most part. I also think this revelation has happened multiple times and not just once.

Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
What I think people who debate with Bad-Dude don't get is that in his world God is inherently good. No matter how evil something God does is (by Bat-Dude's morality or yours) the action is still good simply because God did it. If Jesus stabbed a baby in front of him that would be fine, purely because Jesus did it.

It is called "Mysterious ways"...which I find to be a bullshit argument. However, sometimes, that argument really does seem legit and we are just too ignorant to understand the bigger picture...not possessing omniscience n'all that.

Originally posted by Bat Dude
Just read a Bible. It's not my opinion, it's what is written in there. I try to stay away from my opinion when it comes to issues like these. I couldn't care less about opinion, unless it's backed up by scripture.

When I make a statement on religion, I try to always back it with scripture. Again, that's not my opinion, that's what the Bible says.

One of my personal heroes, Penn Jillette, is fond of saying that the best way to become an atheist is to read the holy texts of major religions. I've only read the Bible and scattered others (I'm fond of the Tao Te Ching), so I can't quite corroborate his claim with the same level of thoroughness he has achieved. But it always amused me.

Scripture is factually unfounded, written by scientifically illiterate, superstitous men thousands of years ago. It is self-contradicting in dozens of places, cruel in others, and frequently does not hold up to historical or scientific inquiry. All of this is verifiable from a number of unbiased, usually peer-reviewed sources, and is also quite evident with even a modicum of critical thinking.

Believe in it if you must. There are other valid conclusions to the question of divinity.

Originally posted by Bat Dude
Great addition to the discussion, btw...

Oh, come now. I'm hell-bound with a bright red bow on my head. Would you expect any less?

I actually harbor the slight but nagging suspicion that you're some kind of troll. But I have to continually remind myself that A. people like you do exist, and B. you'd be trolling yourself harder than anyone else with all of your detailed replies.

Originally posted by Bat Dude
I'm not speaking for the majority. Unfortunately, Biblical Christianity has ALWAYS been a minority, even during the supposed "age of Christian dominance" in the world.

The road to hell is paved with good intentions. I'm sure you've heard that saying before.



I never said that, and am actually pretty offended that you think I did. Re-read what I posted.



I said I DIDN'T want Lucien to end up in hell. I want God to show him the truth before it becomes too late for him. I want him to go to heaven, but he won't if he doesn't repent and believe Jesus is Lord.

Maybe my wording wasn't the best, but I wasn't saying I hope he goes to hell. In fact, if we go to the previous page in this thread, we can see that I said the following:



But I'm just a mean old hater, right?
Oh, that's my fault for misreading then. I apologize for that. But I maintain that your beliefs are repellent re:afterlife. Not to mention smug and baseless.

Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
What I think people who debate with Bad-Dude don't get is that in his world God is inherently good. No matter how evil something God does is (by Bat-Dude's morality or yours) the action is still good simply because God did it. If Jesus stabbed a baby in front of him that would be fine, purely because Jesus did it.

He must have been through some baaad things to cause him to lose his sanity like that. That's scary, if he can't trust his own morality and except things based on empirical understanding or even his own God-given moral compass over his Faith to one book that's so open to misinterpretation and not necessarily relevant or morally correct when one's own heart is taken as irrelevant next to some old 'text'.

Originally posted by Bat Dude
If you can dwell on loved ones that didn't get saved, that would cause pain and sorrow because you'd realize you'd never see them again. In heaven, God will spare you the sorrow and you'll be so happy to be with Him, it'll never occur to you anyway.

God will cause you not to care about the people you love? That doesn't really sound appealing...

Originally posted by Digi
One of my personal heroes, Penn Jillette, is fond of saying that the best way to become an atheist is to read the holy texts of major religions. I've only read the Bible and scattered others (I'm fond of the Tao Te Ching), so I can't quite corroborate his claim with the same level of thoroughness he has achieved. But it always amused me.

Scripture is factually unfounded, written by scientifically illiterate, superstitous men thousands of years ago. It is self-contradicting in dozens of places, cruel in others, and frequently does not hold up to historical or scientific inquiry. All of this is verifiable from a number of unbiased, usually peer-reviewed sources, and is also quite evident with even a modicum of critical thinking.

Believe in it if you must. There are other valid conclusions to the question of divinity.



Oh, come now. I'm hell-bound with a bright red bow on my head. Would you expect any less?

I actually harbor the slight but nagging suspicion that you're some kind of troll. But I have to continually remind myself that A. people like you do exist, and B. you'd be trolling yourself harder than anyone else with all of your detailed replies. I do agree with the idea the more you read scripture the more you notice how broken it can be.

I still feel a certain amount of animosity coming from your posts though about the subject

Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
What I think people who debate with Bad-Dude don't get is that in his world God is inherently good. No matter how evil something God does is (by Bat-Dude's morality or yours) the action is still good simply because God did it. If Jesus stabbed a baby in front of him that would be fine, purely because Jesus did it. Yeah I've known people like that they are crazy.

Originally posted by Newjak
I do agree with the idea the more you read scripture the more you notice how broken it can be.

I still feel a certain amount of animosity coming from your posts though about the subject

I refrain from insulting - it's detrimental to debate and discussion - but I don't pull punches when I think something or someone is wrong, delusional, hateful, etc. It rubs many the wrong way, because they can't separate attacking an idea someone has from attacking the person as a whole. We can't be expected to be tolerant of things we find abhorrently wrong. I think it would be a greater disrespect to the person if we didn't say exactly what we thought.

You'll notice this in the aforementioned Jillette. He celebrates others' right to believe whatever they want and say whatever they want. He has an immense respect for those that will debate him and call him wrong to his face. Yet it doesn't stop him from calling those people wrong or even crazy. Calling others out on their bullsh*t constantly, and being willing to have his own bulsh*t called out, is one of the big reasons he's a hero of mine.

Originally posted by Digi
I refrain from insulting - it's detrimental to debate and discussion - but I don't pull punches when I think something or someone is wrong, delusional, hateful, etc. It rubs many the wrong way, because they can't separate attacking an idea someone has from attacking the person as a whole. We can't be expected to be tolerant of things we find abhorrently wrong. I think it would be a greater disrespect to the person if we didn't say exactly what we thought.

You'll notice this in the aforementioned Jillette. He celebrates others' right to believe whatever they want and say whatever they want. He has an immense respect for those that will debate him and call him wrong to his face. Yet it doesn't stop him from calling those people wrong or even crazy. Meh most ideas to me especially when we talk about religion seem more like tools. It's about the person wielding them and that person is what makes for good or evil or indifference if you will.

So I'm guess I'm the exact opposite I can be very tolerant of ideas but I hate people who misuse them.

Originally posted by Digi
I actually harbor the slight but nagging suspicion that you're some kind of troll. But I have to continually remind myself that A. people like you do exist, and B. you'd be trolling yourself harder than anyone else with all of your detailed replies.

He's legit. His arguments are too specific for him to be a troll. His type of arguments I grew up hearing all the time, against Mormon beliefs, and it comes from lots and lots of studying...which no troll would genuinely invest that much time into.

I could also say I prayed about it and the Holy Ghost said he was sincere in his beliefs. 313

Originally posted by Oliver North
God will cause you not to care about the people you love? That doesn't really sound appealing...

If you no longer cared then it would be okay to you. However, I do not hold what he says to be accurate. In Mormon theology, every person is assigned to where they WANT to be. If you're evil, you would not want to be in God's presence. Supposedly, there is something different about being eternal beings as opposed to corporeal beings. Our subjective experience is much different in such an existence: being in front of a perfect being like God is so painful (unsure in which way) that we cannot bear it. It may have something to do with possessing a perfect knowledge of both righteousness and our unrepentant actions while in the flesh.

Originally posted by Digi
You'll notice this in the aforementioned Jillette. He celebrates others' right to believe whatever they want and say whatever they want. He has an immense respect for those that will debate him and call him wrong to his face. Yet it doesn't stop him from calling those people wrong or even crazy. Calling others out on their bullsh*t constantly, and being willing to have his own bulsh*t called out, is one of the big reasons he's a hero of mine.

It's why I love the utter living shit out of that guy. I think he's a major a**hole and is clearly wrong about his approach and ideas about some things, but he rocks my socks off.

Originally posted by Newjak
Meh most ideas to me especially when we talk about religion seem more like tools. It's about the person wielding them and that person is what makes for good or evil or indifference if you will.

So I'm guess I'm the exact opposite I can be very tolerant of ideas but I hate people who misuse them.

Fair enough. But it's not the person's fault. We're all just products of our upbringing, genetics, environment, and education. Very, very few set out with the idea that they will do evil in the world with an idea or tool, as you put it. The most hateful evangelists think they're doing good. To us, Bat Dude sounds uninformed, condescending, and hateful, but to him he's doing God work. He's trying to make the world the better place, as he sees it. It's tough to stomach from the opposite perspective, but it's hard for me to say "No, don't do what you think is right and good. You're a terrible person." It is the idea that needs deconstructing, not the person, even if the person is off their rocker.

But then if you pull out the big guns tearing down an idea, mincing no words, you inevitably end up in personal insults sometimes. Comes with the territory, and I'm no saint in that department. But it's a goal to strive for.

Originally posted by dadudemon
He's legit. His arguments are too specific for him to be a troll. His type of arguments I grew up hearing all the time, against Mormon beliefs, and it comes from lots and lots of studying...which no troll would genuinely invest that much time into.

I could also say I prayed about it and the Holy Ghost said he was sincere in his beliefs. 313

lol. You could.

Originally posted by dadudemon
It's why I love the utter living shit out of that guy. I think he's a major a**hole and is clearly wrong about his approach and ideas about some things, but he rocks my socks off.

He's got the best approach in the world. Let's take our gloves off, punch the **** out of our ideas, then laugh and have a beer. Metaphorically, of course. But still. Soooo few can actually follow through on that kind of philosophy. I certainly can't. We get too angry over stuff. But it's brilliant to watch.

Not to change topics, but I'm still shocked you haven't left Mormonism. There are problems, man. Like, overt racism is built into the holy text. I know most don't practice it anymore, but it literally says that darker skin is a stain put upon them by God (paraphrasing, but I'm sure you know what I'm referring to). How do you circumvent that in your mind to believe it's divinely inspired?

Originally posted by Digi
Not to change topics, but I'm still shocked you haven't left Mormonism. There are problems, man. Like, overt racism is built into the holy text. I know most don't practice it anymore, but it literally says that darker skin is a stain put upon them by God (paraphrasing, but I'm sure you know what I'm referring to). How do you circumvent that in your mind to believe it's divinely inspired?


The system we have in place accounts for stuff like that. The original translated text from Joseph Smith does not make it seem so clear as racist. It edited, later, to make it seem quite clearly a racism thing. The initial version/s make it seem like a countenance thing. There were, quite clearly, racist Mormons in leadership.

Another example of this clear leadership error stuff is the line in the preface to the book of Mormon about the Lammanites being the primary ancestors of the Native Americans. Well, there happens to be a story about why this was put in there: Bruce R. McKonkie, a very smart and very instrumental man in organizing a lot of gospel stuff for Mormons, acted on his own without counseling with the First Presidency or the other 11 apostles when he wrote that preface. The error was almost immediately found out AFTER it went to publication. It took almost 20 years to get that error removed from that edition and one of the reasons they held off so long in changing that edition of the Book of Mormon was due to how many other things were being debated and discussed for correction (they wanted to do the corrections all in 1 batch and the time period for editions seems to be once every 20-40 years...they are quite slow to make error corrections). Anyway, when Bruce R. McKonkie wrote that preface and it was published, it immediately caused an uproar by some members because the topic was highly debated within Mormon scholars at the time. It pissed quite a few people off and probably caused a few to leave the church.



The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints is far from perfect. One thing that some more ignorant Mormons do not know or do not take the time to ask is, "From whence commeth these mistakes? Why are there even mistakes if the LDS Church is supposed to be the 'True' church?" The simple answer is, they are asking the wrong questions. It is not the "one true church" as is often stated. That is phrase is taken out of context by the Mormons who do not know what that means. In the context that those people are using it, it would be more correct to say, "The LDS Faith has the Truest Precepts and Theology as it pertains to God and His Laws." But what the original meaning of that phrase means is, "The LDS Faith is the only faith on this earth that has the Holy Priesthood to officiate and operate under God." That is what is meant by "True Church", not the accuracy thing.


So, in that regard, when people ask me about the clear problems and errors within the church and the clear sins that were committed by the leaders throughout the years, it is simple to answer/address: they are humans and NONE of them were perfect. Not even Joseph Smith was perfect and he stated multiple times that he wasn't perfect (some of his sermons covered how much more he had to grow as a person and where he went wrong).

To make it more clear, there have only been 3 or 4 official Church Doctrine confirmations and this is the key way in which the LDS Faith establishes the belief structure and this is ALWAYS done by a unanimous vote by both the first presidency and the Twelve Apostles:
Here they are:

1. The Confirmation and Official Organization of the Church.
2. The Confirmation and Official Declaration of the Scriptures we would use for our gospel doctrine (it was the original and very flawed Book of Mormon).
3. The Official Declaration that all worthy males could hold the Priesthood (banning the racist discrimination against those of Sub-Saharan African decent).
4. The Official Confirmation regarding the "The Family Proclamation to the World."


That's it. All other actions regarding doctrine are of the individual and not the official way by which doctrine is established or declared. So if a General Authority, Apostle, or even Prophet say something that is incorrect, that is the fault and/or sin of the individual and not "The Brethren" as it is said. The reason this system was setup as it is is due to man being flawed and full of mistakes so that when something official had to come about, it had to be a unanimous decision by "The Brethren." By the way, they come to this decision by prayer, as individuals. They are not allowed to argue about the decision as that is consider sacrilegious. If it is not unanimous, the First Presidency will meet with the individual, privately, in the temple, to discuss why that person disagrees. It has never gotten to that point, however. The closest it got was when President W. Kimball considered the notion of giving all worthy men the priesthood. He said he prayed about it 3 times and on 3 separate occasions and only upon the third time did God tell him the Mormon church was "ready". Also, it is believed, but not officially declared, that the reason that discrimination was allowed to happen was due to the unworthiness of the MEMBERS themselves to experience a more liberal social perspective. It had nothing to do with them being part of the Seed of Cain: that was a Mormon Myth that has long since been debunked. Basically, as was described by The Brethren, we the members were unworthy to live a higher law because we were too racist and intolerant and we had to grow as a faith, socially, before we could be worthy enough to get that privilege. Similar to Moses not being able to live in the Promised land because he was not worthy of it. It is considered living a "Higher Law". Also, and here is another issue with that, thousands upon thousands of "black" men STILL held the Priesthood, regardless of the unofficial rule about blacks not being able to hold the Priesthood. Go figure? Let me emphasize that it was "Unofficial". The Brethren never met, prayed, and came to a unanimous decision about the Priesthood excluding African Americans. It is not found in our official doctrine (see my #2), anywhere.





But, yeah, the biggest problem I ever had with Mormonism was the racism. That always made me the most frustrated and shook my faith at one time when I was a wee laddie.

Interesting. Thanks for the explanation. It couldn't have been quick to type out, so I appreciate it. I can't exactly discuss canonical revisions and such with you - it's hardly my area of expertise - so I won't try to contribute. But I at least enjoy seeing your perspective.

Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
What I think people who debate with Bad-Dude don't get is that in his world God is inherently good. No matter how evil something God does is (by Bat-Dude's morality or yours) the action is still good simply because God did it. If Jesus stabbed a baby in front of him that would be fine, purely because Jesus did it.

Q: Why would Jesus stab a baby?

A: He wouldn't. These were Jesus' own words:

"It were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and he cast into the sea, than that he should offend one of these little ones." (Luke 17:2)

Q: What has God done that is evil?

A: "...what evil hath he done?" (Luke 23:22) "The fear of the LORD is to hate evil: pride, and arrogancy, and the evil way, and the froward mouth, do I hate." (Proverbs 8:13)

Nothing.



"The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?" (Jeremiah 17:9)

I don't base my life on my opinion... Again, if my opinion conflicts with the Word of God, my opinion, no matter how heart-felt, is wrong.

Oh, and thanks for the kind words, btw...



God isn't gonna make you apathetic to someone's suffering. It's not like, "Oh, my mom's down there. Oh well. I'm up here now, who cares!" It'll be like you have amnesia regarding that particular person. I know that my grandmother, whom I loved dearly, was not saved when she died. It hurts me incredibly that she won't be in heaven with me, and that I won't remember her when I get there (especially because I tried so hard to witness to her. I don't want my family, or anyone for that matter, to be in hell). But that will not worry me then. It only worries me now, because sorrow and crying and pain and tears have not passed away.

It's not an easy thing to explain. The Bible says that "we see through a glass, darkly" (1 Corinthians 13:12) so we can't claim to have EVERYTHING figured out.



Funny, because I could have sworn that the rich man was in TORMENTS in HELL right after he died, according to Luke 16:23.

"And in hell he lift up his eyes, being in torments, and seeth Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his bosom."

The rich man even asked if he could warn his relatives so that they don't END UP LIKE HE DID.

"The wicked shall be turned into hell, and all the nations that forget God." (Psalm 9:17)

"For thou wilt not leave my soul in hell; neither wilt thou suffer thine Holy One to see corruption." (Psalm 16:10)

"Let death seize upon them, and let them go down quick into hell: for wickedness is in their dwellings, and among them." (Psalm 55:15)

"Her feet go down to death; her steps take hold on hell." (Proverbs 5:5)

"Her house is the way to hell, going down to the chambers of death." (Proverbs 7:27)

"But he knoweth not that the dead are there; and that her guests are in the depths of hell." (Proverbs 9:18)

"The way of life is above to the wise, that he may depart from hell beneath." (Proverbs 15:24)

"Thou shalt beat him with the rod, and shalt deliver his soul from hell." (Proverbs 23:14)
(This passage is in reference to spanking a child when they do wrong, not in reference to physical abuse. If you do not correct a child in error, they will continue to live in error. Lack of discipline is one of many reasons why our children act the way they do now. The previous verse says, "Withhold not correction from the child: for if thou beatest him with the rod, he shall not die."

"It is as high as heaven; what canst thou do? deeper than hell; what canst thou know?" (Job 11:8)

"The sorrows of hell compassed me about; the snares of death prevented me;" (2 Samuel 22:6)

"For a fire is kindled in mine anger, and shall burn unto the lowest hell, and shall consume the earth with her increase, and set on fire the foundations of the mountains." (Deuteronomy 32:22)

This is the definition of the Hebrew word that is translated "hell" in the OT:

Sheol - the OT designation for the abode of the dead

1) place of no return
2) without praise of God
3) wicked sent there for punishment
4) righteous not abandoned to it
5) of the place of exile (fig)
6) of extreme degradation in sin

Combine that with the following verses in the NT regarding hell:

"For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord." (Romans 6:23)

"And fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell." (Matthew 10:28)

"Ye serpents, ye generation of vipers, how can ye escape the damnation of hell?" (Matthew 23:33)

"For if God spared not the angels that sinned, but cast them down to hell, and delivered them into chains of darkness, to be reserved unto judgment;" (2 Peter 2:4)

If that isn't hell, I don't know what is...



Scripture?

Though I will agree with you on this: God doesn't send anyone to hell, they send themselves.



You wouldn't have faith issues because it wouldn't be faith. If you see miracles, you believe what you see. Little to no faith required.

"Jesus saith unto him, Thomas, because thou hast seen me, thou hast believed: blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed." (John 20:29)

We also need to be VERY careful of signs and wonders, because they lie. Satan can perform signs and wonders, too.

"A wicked and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign; and there shall no sign be given unto it, but the sign of the prophet Jonas. And he left them, and departed." (Matthew 16:4)

"For false Christs and false prophets shall rise, and shall shew signs and wonders, to seduce, if it were possible, even the elect." (Mark 13:22)

"For there shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall shew great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect." (Matthew 24:24)

Originally posted by Bat Dude
God isn't gonna make you apathetic to someone's suffering. It's not like, "Oh, my mom's down there. Oh well. I'm up here now, who cares!" It'll be like you have amnesia regarding that particular person. I know that my grandmother, whom I loved dearly, was not saved when she died. It hurts me incredibly that she won't be in heaven with me, and that I won't remember her when I get there (especially because I tried so hard to witness to her. I don't want my family, or anyone for that matter, to be in hell). But that will not worry me then. It only worries me now, because sorrow and crying and pain and tears have not passed away.

It's not an easy thing to explain. The Bible says that "we see through a glass, darkly" (1 Corinthians 13:12) so we can't claim to have EVERYTHING figured out.

I'm actually speechless...

Originally posted by Bat Dude
Funny, because I could have sworn that the rich man was in TORMENTS in HELL right after he died, according to Luke 16:23.

"And in hell he lift up his eyes, being in torments, and seeth Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his bosom."

The rich man even asked if he could warn his relatives so that they don't END UP LIKE HE DID.

"The wicked shall be turned into hell, and all the nations that forget God." (Psalm 9:17)

"For thou wilt not leave my soul in hell; neither wilt thou suffer thine Holy One to see corruption." (Psalm 16:10)

"Let death seize upon them, and let them go down quick into hell: for wickedness is in their dwellings, and among them." (Psalm 55:15)

"Her feet go down to death; her steps take hold on hell." (Proverbs 5:5)

"Her house is the way to hell, going down to the chambers of death." (Proverbs 7:27)

"But he knoweth not that the dead are there; and that her guests are in the depths of hell." (Proverbs 9:18)

"The way of life is above to the wise, that he may depart from hell beneath." (Proverbs 15:24)

"Thou shalt beat him with the rod, and shalt deliver his soul from hell." (Proverbs 23:14)
(This passage is in reference to spanking a child when they do wrong, not in reference to physical abuse. If you do not correct a child in error, they will continue to live in error. Lack of discipline is one of many reasons why our children act the way they do now. The previous verse says, "Withhold not correction from the child: for if thou beatest him with the rod, he shall not die."

"It is as high as heaven; what canst thou do? deeper than hell; what canst thou know?" (Job 11:8)

"The sorrows of hell compassed me about; the snares of death prevented me;" (2 Samuel 22:6)

"For a fire is kindled in mine anger, and shall burn unto the lowest hell, and shall consume the earth with her increase, and set on fire the foundations of the mountains." (Deuteronomy 32:22)

This is the definition of the Hebrew word that is translated "hell" in the OT:

Sheol - the OT designation for the abode of the dead

1) place of no return
2) without praise of God
3) wicked sent there for punishment
4) righteous not abandoned to it
5) of the place of exile (fig)
6) of extreme degradation in sin

Combine that with the following verses in the NT regarding hell:

"For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord." (Romans 6:23)

"And fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell." (Matthew 10:28)

"Ye serpents, ye generation of vipers, how can ye escape the damnation of hell?" (Matthew 23:33)

"For if God spared not the angels that sinned, but cast them down to hell, and delivered them into chains of darkness, to be reserved unto judgment;" (2 Peter 2:4)

If that isn't hell, I don't know what is...

So you didn't know that "Hell" is a newer concept introduced later into scripture? You should study the historical and political origins of the bible.



Originally posted by Bat Dude
Scripture?

It's in the same post you quoted.

Originally posted by Bat Dude
Though I will agree with you on this: God doesn't send anyone to hell, they send themselves.

Indeed.

Originally posted by Bat Dude
You wouldn't have faith issues because it wouldn't be faith. If you see miracles, you believe what you see. Little to no faith required.

Wrong and I clearly gave a scripture that shows you're wrong. Faith is still required, but not nearly as much.

Originally posted by Bat Dude
Q: Why would Jesus stab a baby?

A: He wouldn't. These were Jesus' own words:

"It were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and he cast into the sea, than that he should offend one of these little ones." (Luke 17:2)

If you met a man who you knew in your heart was Jesus and he told you to kill a child would you do it? If Jesus killed a child in front of you for no reason would you say he had done something evil?

I suspect, however, that you cannot even imagine these things. It reminds me of 1984 (which is a comparison I generally hate, for the record). This was in one of Orwell's appendixes.

It would have been possible, for example, to say Big Brother is ungood. But this statement, which to an orthodox ear merely conveyed a self-evident absurdity, could not have been sustained by reasoned argument, because the necessary words were not available. Ideas inimical to Ingsoc could only be entertained in a vague wordless form, and could only be named in very broad terms which lumped together and condemned whole groups of heresies without defining them in doing so. One could, in fact, only use Newspeak for unorthodox purposes by illegitimately translating some of the words back into Oldspeak. For example, All mans are equal was a possible Newspeak sentence, but only in the same sense in which All men are red-haired is a possible Oldspeak sentence.

Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
If you met a man who you knew in your heart was Jesus and he told you to kill a child would you do it? If Jesus killed a child in front of you for no reason would you say he had done something evil?

If I met a man that I knew in my heart was Jesus? It would have to line up with scripture. Jesus will not return until the second coming at the battle of Armageddon. So anyone that my heart tells me is Jesus before that day comes, is a false Christ. And remember, as I stated previously, "The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?"

And besides, Jesus would not kill an innocent child, anyway, so your hypothetical is moot. Remember His direct quote from before?

There is one time in the entire Bible that God commanded an innocent child by slain. God once told Abraham to kill his son, Isaac. Abraham was going to do it (reluctantly), but God stopped him. God didn't really want Abraham to kill his son. Basically, it was a test of faith. Would you listen to God no matter what?

God wants obedience and faith from us, but He is not cruel or wicked. An innocent child is obviously not going to receive God's wrath, so again, your hypothetical is moot.

What about God commanding genocide when the Hebrews conquered Canaan, betraying and slaughtering their erstwhile allies? Do you stand by that?

This single proposition transformed me into an agno-theist;

A sentient abstraction that can do anything and everything, that is capable of all actions simultaneously, will perform all actions simultaneously. Anything and everything, possible or impossible, has happened, because this thing, the God, that is so beyond the comprehensions of all other consciousnesses, that is so beyond the capacity of any lesser sentience, has done anything and everything, possible or impossible.

An infinity of im/possible things exist, in which this linear time-stream is an infinitely minute part of.

Originally posted by Omega Vision
What about God commanding genocide when the Hebrews conquered Canaan, betraying and slaughtering their erstwhile allies? Do you stand by that?

Do you understand why God said to do that?

Let's take a look at exactly who those people that dwelt in that land were:

"And they told him, and said, We came unto the land whither thou sentest us, and surely it floweth with milk and honey; and this is the fruit of it. Nevertheless the people be strong that dwell in the land, and the cities are walled, and very great: and moreover we saw the children of Anak there. And there we saw the giants, the sons of Anak, which come of the giants: and we were in our own sight as grasshoppers, and so we were in their sight." (Numbers 13:27-28, 33)

"There were giants in the earth in those days; and also after that, when the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men, and they bare children to them, the same became mighty men which were of old, men of renown. And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. And it repented the Lord that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart.

The Canaanites and the other people that God told the Israelites to wipe out were the "post-human" fallen ones, the nephilim. God had caused the flood to eradicate them before, but as it says in Genesis 6, they were in the earth in those days "and also after that."

Originally posted by Digi
Fair enough. But it's not the person's fault. We're all just products of our upbringing, genetics, environment, and education. Very, very few set out with the idea that they will do evil in the world with an idea or tool, as you put it. The most hateful evangelists think they're doing good. To us, Bat Dude sounds uninformed, condescending, and hateful, but to him he's doing God work. He's trying to make the world the better place, as he sees it. It's tough to stomach from the opposite perspective, but it's hard for me to say "No, don't do what you think is right and good. You're a terrible person." It is the idea that needs deconstructing, not the person, even if the person is off their rocker.

But then if you pull out the big guns tearing down an idea, mincing no words, you inevitably end up in personal insults sometimes. Comes with the territory, and I'm no saint in that department. But it's a goal to strive for.



While I don't disagree with what you're saying, that we are a by product of our tangibles both in nature and nurture, and that ideas should be freely dissected I don't think it excuses someone whose actions have brought about 'bad' consequences for others. I'm not saying everyone should be super punished either or that we should not try and reform. That's not a conversation I'm attempting to have.

I'm also not saying all ideas fall into this notion that's its the person and not the idea itself that is flawed.

What I'm saying is that much like a knife, a very helpful tool even to this day, the person wielding the idea can turn it into something that can either be used for help or hurt and that almost nothing falls out of this notion. Even science used in the hands of fanatics can be used for pain. Simply because they chose to bend it to their will and other people blindly follow(I don't mean faith I mean blindly following the orders of another man) regardless of whether the person themselves feel they are doing good.

I'm not trying to say religion is the same as science either but to me the same notion of twisting and abusing science and all manner of ideas or thoughts follows religion as well.

Originally posted by Bat Dude
Do you understand why God said to do that?

Let's take a look at exactly who those people that dwelt in that land were:

"And they told him, and said, We came unto the land whither thou sentest us, and surely it floweth with milk and honey; and this is the fruit of it. Nevertheless the people be strong that dwell in the land, and the cities are walled, and very great: and moreover we saw the children of Anak there. And there we saw the giants, the sons of Anak, which come of the giants: and we were in our own sight as grasshoppers, and so we were in their sight." (Numbers 13:27-28, 33)

"There were giants in the earth in those days; and also after that, when the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men, and they bare children to them, the same became mighty men which were of old, men of renown. And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. And it repented the Lord that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart.

The Canaanites and the other people that God told the Israelites to wipe out were the "post-human" fallen ones, the nephilim. God had caused the flood to eradicate them before, but as it says in Genesis 6, they were in the earth in those days "and also after that."
Genocide is genocide.

New low for you.

Originally posted by Newjak
While I don't disagree with what you're saying, that we are a by product of our tangibles both in nature and nurture, and that ideas should be freely dissected I don't think it excuses someone whose actions have brought about 'bad' consequences for others. I'm not saying everyone should be super punished either or that we should not try and reform. That's not a conversation I'm attempting to have.

I'm also not saying all ideas fall into this notion that's its the person and not the idea itself that is flawed.

What I'm saying is that much like a knife, a very helpful tool even to this day, the person wielding the idea can turn it into something that can either be used for help or hurt and that almost nothing falls out of this notion. Even science used in the hands of fanatics can be used for pain. Simply because they chose to bend it to their will and other people blindly follow(I don't mean faith I mean blindly following the orders of another man) regardless of whether the person themselves feel they are doing good.

I'm not trying to say religion is the same as science either but to me the same notion of twisting and abusing science and all manner of ideas or thoughts follows religion as well.

Ok, cool. Your stance is a pretty reasonable one. You're right, though, we're close to a big tangent. I kinda of want to veer this into talking about moral responsibility for right/wrong actions. But we'd be well into left field there, and my views on the subject are somewhat in the minority even among the non-religious (i.e. I don't believe in moral responsibility).

Originally posted by Digi
Ok, cool. Your stance is a pretty reasonable one. You're right, though, we're close to a big tangent. I kinda of want to veer this into talking about moral responsibility for right/wrong actions. But we'd be well into left field there, and my views on the subject are somewhat in the minority even among the non-religious (i.e. I don't believe in moral responsibility). Understandable and I will throw you a bone , what exactly about moral responsibility do you not like?

Judging by your previous responses I can guess but I would like to read it in your own words.

Originally posted by Newjak
Understandable and I will throw you a bone , what exactly about moral responsibility do you not like?

Judging by your previous responses I can guess but I would like to read it in your own words.

The core of it stems from the implications of a deterministic universe. We have no reason to believe we don't live in a deterministic universe, and most current philosophical debate over moral responsibility (that doesn't have a religious agenda) starts with that as an assumed position.

So then each action is a logical and necessary conclusion to the causes that preceded it, going backward in time ad infinitum. Therefore, no action can be the personal responsibility of the person who enacts it.

To be clear, this isn't to say right and wrong don't exist. They do. Just that the blame or praise is not inherently that person's.

It can be tough to wrap your mind around, because we're VERY trained to take moral responsibility for granted. But I have yet to see a fully coherent version of morality where we're able to reconcile these two ideas.

There are several implications of this, but a common complaint is "if no one is to blame, do we not punish them?" We still would, but not as retributive punishment. "You broke {X law}, therefore {Y punishment}" would go away. Instead, we'd punish based only on the potential for reform and the potential continued danger to members of society. There's a lot more nuance to this line of thinking, but it's actually possible that getting rid of moral responsibility would be a more peaceful and just system.

Detractors come from one of a few camps: religious, which contends that free will exists in a non-deterministic manner (i.e. a miracle happens each time we make a choice); those who hold a naturalistic view (determinism) but see ways for responsibility to find their way in based on future outcomes or societal standards. Some even invoke the abstract that is consciousness and higher-level awareness to disagree. There are others, but I'd likely do them injustice.

There is, of course, much more to this debate, and my summary is just that, a woefully incomplete layman's summary. If you're interested in the topic, here's a great comprehensive treatment of the subject:
http://www.amazon.com/Against-Moral-Responsibility-Bruce-Waller/dp/0262016591/ref=sr_1_1_bnp_1_har?ie=UTF8&qid=1368207553&sr=8-1&keywords=against+moral+responsibility
...my only complaints are niggling ones. The books throws a a lot of terminology at you in a hurry. It's worth reading some cliff's notes online on the free will debate first to get a sense of terms and "camps." Second, he retains use of the term "free will" but does not use it in the same way religions do. This is, likely, a marketing tool...a way to make his ideas seem less foreign. However, it can be a bit confusing if you aren't initially aware that he's re-branding the term.

Originally posted by Digi
The core of it stems from the implications of a deterministic universe. We have no reason to believe we don't live in a deterministic universe, and most current philosophical debate over moral responsibility (that doesn't have a religious agenda) starts with that as an assumed position.

So then each action is a logical and necessary conclusion to the causes that preceded it, going backward in time ad infinitum. Therefore, no action can be the personal responsibility of the person who enacts it.

To be clear, this isn't to say right and wrong don't exist. They do. Just that the blame or praise is not inherently that person's.

It can be tough to wrap your mind around, because we're VERY trained to take moral responsibility for granted. But I have yet to see a fully coherent version of morality where we're able to reconcile these two ideas.

There are several implications of this, but a common complaint is "if no one is to blame, do we not punish them?" We still would, but not as retributive punishment. "You broke {X law}, therefore {Y punishment}" would go away. Instead, we'd punish based only on the potential for reform and the potential continued danger to members of society. There's a lot more nuance to this line of thinking, but it's actually possible that getting rid of moral responsibility would be a more peaceful and just system.

Detractors come from one of a few camps: religious, which contends that free will exists in a non-deterministic manner (i.e. a miracle happens each time we make a choice); those who hold a naturalistic view (determinism) but see ways for responsibility to find their way in based on future outcomes or societal standards. Some even invoke the abstract that is consciousness and higher-level awareness to disagree. There are others, but I'd likely do them injustice.

There is, of course, much more to this debate, and my summary is just that, a woefully incomplete layman's summary. If you're interested in the topic, here's a great comprehensive treatment of the subject:
http://www.amazon.com/Against-Moral-Responsibility-Bruce-Waller/dp/0262016591/ref=sr_1_1_bnp_1_har?ie=UTF8&qid=1368207553&sr=8-1&keywords=against+moral+responsibility
...my only complaints are niggling ones. The books throws a a lot of terminology at you in a hurry. It's worth reading some cliff's notes online on the free will debate first to get a sense of terms and "camps." Second, he retains use of the term "free will" but does not use it in the same way religions do. This is, likely, a marketing tool...a way to make his ideas seem less foreign. However, it can be a bit confusing if you aren't initially aware that he's re-branding the term. It's next to impossible to reconcile this type of topic into a 10000 character post without it being in a woefully incomplete layman's summary.

So you don't like the idea of moral responsibility(mainly Free Will) essentially because you feel it breaks the logical chain of actions reactions that precede everything?

I do agree with a lot of what you say in terms of looking at the causes of why certain events happen and figuring out ways to provoke less of some actions and more of others instead of just straight up punishing someone and hoping that deters them and others from repeating that action.

That always seemed like treating a symptom instead the illness itself and never made much sense to me.

As for Free Will existing in the same type of universe you prescribe to. Couldn't it be said that Free Will does exist but simply possessing Free Will(Moral Responsibility) does not exclude one of outside circumstances that effect their ability to choose? As in having the ability to do something does not always mean you can exercise that ability?

And I'm not trying to sit here and act like what I'm saying is some big breakthrough I'm sure it's been brought up multiple times before me. I was just asking cause it makes sense to me and wanted to see how you would look at that idea?

Free will as it's commonly understood is that when given two options and needing to choose only one, that we could choose either one. We can't. This is an illusion in a deterministic universe. If you chose A. over B. in a scenario, then rewound time and reset the universe in the exact same setup (with no prior knowledge of the previous iteration, of course), you would choose A. 100/100 times, a million out of a million, etc. Saying that you would sometimes choose A. and sometimes B. is religious free will. Exact same setup, different outcome. Wholly incompatible with a determined universe.

Free will as it is sometimes understood (and how I think you used it) is having the freedom to choose according to your own will. Nobody is forcing you to make a particular decision through coercion, force, deception, etc. The choice is yours alone (free), determined as it may be. This version of the term is compatible with determinism/naturalism.

Moral responsibility almost solely regards the blame or praise due to the person for their actions (or not due, depending on your view). Moral responsibility implies that you should be personally responsible for a determined action. I can't abide that. If A. is the evil choice, and B. is the good choice, and you choose A. every time (from the earlier thought experiment), you have chosen poorly but are not to blame. The action can be corrected, or the impulse that led to it, but we can no more blame a person for the action than we can an apple for falling from the tree prematurely.

Does...does that answer your question(s)? I don't want to repeat what you already know - I know you get the concepts - I'm just trying to put it all in my own terms as clearly as possible.

Originally posted by Omega Vision
Genocide is genocide.

New low for you.

I don't feel like arguing today (and I'm sure you don't either), so I'll make this short, sweet, and to the point.

What is more merciful?

Killing those that are unredeemable (meaning they cannot get saved. It is literally impossible for them to be saved) to:

a) spare those that ARE redeemable from being corrupted
b) spare those unredeemable souls (like the nephilim) from an even worse punishment in the lake of fire (for corrupting those that were)

or

Allowing those that are unredeemable (such as the nephilim) to corrupt everything and everyone (like they did in Genesis 6) and make everything unredeemable and an abomination?

What you have to remember is that the nephilim were half-demon and half-human. They CANNOT be saved. They were also pretty much pure evil. As it says in Genesis, their thoughts were only evil continually. And they corrupted mankind so much that mankind (outside of Noah and his family) became unredeemable. God had to wipe everything out and start over with Noah.

I'm sure you would have no problem with a serial killer, that killed something like 15 people, being put to death. Now imagine someone even worse. Adolf Hitler, for instance. He had millions of people killed in the name of "natural selection". I'm sure you would have no problem with him being executed for his crimes.

The nephilim were even worse, and they couldn't be redeemed in any way. No matter how much you evangelize. No matter how much you pray for them. No matter how much you witness to them. They will never get saved. Ever.

Originally posted by Digi
This is an illusion in a deterministic universe. If you chose A. over B. in a scenario, then rewound time and reset the universe in the exact same setup (with no prior knowledge of the previous iteration, of course), you would choose A. 100/100 times, a million out of a million, etc. Saying that you would sometimes choose A. and sometimes B. is religious free will. Exact same setup, different outcome. Wholly incompatible with a determined universe.

I kind of disagree. The free will universe person would still chose whatever option they were going to chose, 99.9999 out of 100 times. (Because their experiences and knowledge would lend itself to a very particular choice at that very moment in time, almost every time, but the uncertainty factor of "true" free will would still play a small role).

Here's a variation of your setup: let each of the testees* know that time was rewound and they chose a particular option in future but do not reveal which option they chose.

In the Free Will universe, the person would supposedly go back and forth, being unable to determine which option they may have chosen due to the uncertainty of "true" free will (the uncertainty would play a larger role in this setup partially because I arbitrarily say so because I am assigning this particular attribute to free will and also because uncertainty of the person in making this decision plays a much larger role in the decision: in fact, the point of this setup is to maximize uncertainty while they try to determine which setup they chose in the future). The deterministic universe would still have the person picking the same option (over and over, no matter how many times this new setup is repeated) regardless of the knowledge that they chose a particular option (but the option they chose this time could be opposite...heck....even in a deterministic universe, the variance could be that some people chose the same option despite knowing in the future, they chose a particular option....and some people chose the opposite option....and then you must determine if this is another objective truth you just discovered and decide if you really live in a deterministic universe).




So here's the plan: you create a reliable time machine, I'll setup the test, and we run this experiment. No worries: I'll compile the data in absurdly detailed excel spreadsheets. Do you want to be the testee* or should I be the testee*? Wait, we can both be the testees*.


*teehee...balls. WEEEEEEE!

Originally posted by Bat Dude
I don't feel like arguing today (and I'm sure you don't either), so I'll make this short, sweet, and to the point.

What is more merciful?

Killing those that are unredeemable (meaning they cannot get saved. It is literally impossible for them to be saved) to:

a) spare those that ARE redeemable from being corrupted
b) spare those unredeemable souls (like the nephilim) from an even worse punishment in the lake of fire (for corrupting those that were)

or

Allowing those that are unredeemable (such as the nephilim) to corrupt everything and everyone (like they did in Genesis 6) and make everything unredeemable and an abomination?

This makes a lot of metaphysical assumptions that I really don't care to address because they're morally irrelevant.


Well, we're unfortunately coming at this from different (probably unreconcilable) angles. You see half demons, I see people. You read the Bible literally, I read it as a semi-historical document. As I understand it, the ancient Hebrews wanted Canaan, so their God told them it was alright to kill the people living there down to the last child.

You're making an assumption here, that I support capital punishment. I do, but only in rare cases as a means of preventing others' deaths, since as a deterrent it's not worth it's price, and vengeance is a feeble, antiquated concept that I don't belongs in modern law. You're also Godwinning the discussion by bringing up Hitler, but I agree--I would have no problem with Hitler being executed.

However...

There is no reason for us to believe that the Nephilim existed, and that the people of Canaan were sinful beyond belief, or even as cruel and savage as the Hebrews who exterminated them. Now, at this point, I should admit that it's disingenuous to bring up an event from the Bible of uncertain historicity (the aforementioned genocide) and then discount another part of the Bible--the Nephilim--however, as I mentioned above, I see the Bible as a semi-historical literary text, and I can believe that there was a desert tribe whose "God" gave them the green light to slaughter an entire people. I'm talking about God qua concept (think of a book character), not qua being, as you would probably always discuss him. To me, the concept of the Hebrew God is disgusting: a callous, jealous, spiteful, hateful, misogynist. Whether or not he exists, I think he is immoral and petty based on how he is described.

Originally posted by dadudemon
I kind of disagree. The free will universe person would still chose whatever option they were going to chose, 99.9999 out of 100 times. (Because their experiences and knowledge would lend itself to a very particular choice at that very moment in time, almost every time, but the uncertainty factor of "true" free will would still play a small role).

Here's a variation of your setup: let each of the testees* know that time was rewound and they chose a particular option in future but do not reveal which option they chose.

In the Free Will universe, the person would supposedly go back and forth, being unable to determine which option they may have chosen due to the uncertainty of "true" free will (the uncertainty would play a larger role in this setup partially because I arbitrarily say so because I am assigning this particular attribute to free will and also because uncertainty of the person in making this decision plays a much larger role in the decision: in fact, the point of this setup is to maximize uncertainty while they try to determine which setup they chose in the future). The deterministic universe would still have the person picking the same option (over and over, no matter how many times this new setup is repeated) regardless of the knowledge that they chose a particular option (but the option they chose this time could be opposite...heck....even in a deterministic universe, the variance could be that some people chose the same option despite knowing in the future, they chose a particular option....and some people chose the opposite option....and then you must determine if this is another objective truth you just discovered and decide if you really live in a deterministic universe).




So here's the plan: you create a reliable time machine, I'll setup the test, and we run this experiment. No worries: I'll compile the data in absurdly detailed excel spreadsheets. Do you want to be the testee* or should I be the testee*? Wait, we can both be the testees*.


*teehee...balls. WEEEEEEE!

Your longest paragraph there got a bit hard to follow. But if you adhere to a model in which someone would choose option A. 99.9999 out of 100, the onus is still on you to show how identical conditions could logically lead to anything but A. Simply appealing to "uncertainty" doesn't explain the how.

You also mention awareness of iterations of such a test. Obviously if we allow for that, it won't always be the same choice, because knowledge of past iterations changes the starting conditions.

In your one scenario, where they're told they picked a certain option, but not which choice they made, iteration #1 of the test would possibly have a different outcome than iteration #2, because the starting conditions are different (there was no "you made a choice" announcement before #1). But in each subsequent iteration, the choice made would be the same as in iteration #2, presuming the message is presented in the same way and the subject isn't allowed to know how many iterations they've been through.

Essentially, you're not adding any nuance, you're just changing various iterations. We could make a test where sometimes it's choice A., sometimes B. and sometimes the subject punches himself in the face and calls it a day. But it would only be because the causes preceding those different outcomes were different, even if it's only in subtle ways. The central principle remains the same: identical starting conditions = identical outcome. If you agree with that, you're a determinist, because that's a handy thought experiment to describe how it works. Call it cause & affect, naturalism, determinism, whatever. It just means that the physical laws of the universe determine our actions, and to have any actual "choice" (i.e. classical free will) is to transcend, circumvent, or defy those rules. And it is, according to the best of our current knowledge, the universe we live in.

P.S. I'm not gonna bite on the balls thing. {edit} oh wait...

Originally posted by Digi
Your longest paragraph there got a bit hard to follow. But if you adhere to a model in which someone would choose option A. 99.9999 out of 100, the onus is still on you to show how identical conditions could logically lead to anything but A. Simply appealing to "uncertainty" doesn't explain the how.

Simple: maximize the uncertainty of the testing and by the arbitrary powers I am assigning to each universe, we would get less deterministic results.

Originally posted by Digi
You also mention awareness of iterations of such a test. Obviously if we allow for that, it won't always be the same choice, because knowledge of past iterations changes the starting conditions.

No, they will only be aware of 1: their first. And from then on out, they will be observed and recorded.

Originally posted by Omega Vision
This makes a lot of metaphysical assumptions that I really don't care to address because they're morally irrelevant.

I don't see at all how it is irrelevant, but ok.




Callous?

He gave His only begotten Son.

Jealous?

The Lord is a jealous God in the sense that He will have no other gods before Him. There is no other god, and He will not share His glory with gods that don't exist.

Spiteful?

"And he said, Oh let not the Lord be angry, and I will speak yet but this once: Peradventure ten shall be found there. And he said, I will not destroy it for ten's sake." (Genesis 18:32)

God would have spared Sodom and Gomorrah for the sake of ten righteous people (in both cities combined).

Hateful?

"For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved." (John 3:16-17)

Misogynist?

How on earth is He a misogynist? That's ridiculous.

You find God disgusting, immoral and petty?

"Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!" (Isaiah 5:20)

Originally posted by Bat Dude
Callous?

He gave His only begotten Son.

It's Its only begotten Son because It says so in one of the infinite potentialities of existence - yet in all potentialities of existence.



It is peerless because it says so. It is also transcendental and transcended because It says so. It does all actions, is susceptible to all possibilities, even if they are impossible, for Its capacity is infinite, if It says so. If not, it is finite. Omnipotence is omnipotence.

However in infinity realities It is a spec of dust next to a larger sentience, which both is and is not an extension of Its will.



In infinite potentialities It'd spare Saddam and Gomorrah for 10 righteous men, in another infinite potentialities It would spare it for infinity and or negative infinity righteous men simultaneously. Omnipotence knows logic but is not confined by logical nature, but both illogical and logical nature, and neither.



What I am getting at is;

In a chaos of infinite existences, everything is a matter of perspective.

You call God just, you say he is this and that, OV says this is this and that is that. Mere relativistic perspectives.

Originally posted by Dolos
This single proposition transformed me into an agno-theist;

A sentient abstraction that can do anything and everything, that is capable of all actions simultaneously, will perform all actions simultaneously. Anything and everything, possible or impossible, has happened, because this thing, the God, that is so beyond the comprehensions of all other consciousnesses, that is so beyond the capacity of any lesser sentience, has done anything and everything, possible or impossible.

An infinity of im/possible things exist, in which this linear time-stream is an infinitely minute part of.

So, therefore, the only inherent order in the cosmos is that which is created by perspective.

Sort of like how the brain has been hypothesized to seek out patterns from chaos even they're not there. In the omnipresence of the infinite that is described by most human beings as God, whose to say we aren't being omnipotent ourselves and creating our own order from chaos with every action?

Just giving y'all some perspective.

Originally posted by dadudemon
No, they will only be aware of 1: their first. And from then on out, they will be observed and recorded.

Then #2 through #infinity would be the same, unless you're doing something like telling them which # iteration this is, which would create different starting conditions.

You're saying that one of the universes is a "free will" universe. Fine, ok. It exists entirely in the hypothetical, though. If we're to make a case for free will in our universe, that uncertainty you ascribe to it would still need to be explained.

Originally posted by Digi
Free will as it's commonly understood is that when given two options and needing to choose only one, that we could choose either one. We can't. This is an illusion in a deterministic universe. If you chose A. over B. in a scenario, then rewound time and reset the universe in the exact same setup (with no prior knowledge of the previous iteration, of course), you would choose A. 100/100 times, a million out of a million, etc. Saying that you would sometimes choose A. and sometimes B. is religious free will. Exact same setup, different outcome. Wholly incompatible with a determined universe.

Free will as it is sometimes understood (and how I think you used it) is having the freedom to choose according to your own will. Nobody is forcing you to make a particular decision through coercion, force, deception, etc. The choice is yours alone (free), determined as it may be. This version of the term is compatible with determinism/naturalism.

Moral responsibility almost solely regards the blame or praise due to the person for their actions (or not due, depending on your view). Moral responsibility implies that you should be personally responsible for a determined action. I can't abide that. If A. is the evil choice, and B. is the good choice, and you choose A. every time (from the earlier thought experiment), you have chosen poorly but are not to blame. The action can be corrected, or the impulse that led to it, but we can no more blame a person for the action than we can an apple for falling from the tree prematurely.

Does...does that answer your question(s)? I don't want to repeat what you already know - I know you get the concepts - I'm just trying to put it all in my own terms as clearly as possible. Yes that very much answers my questions and thank you for taking the time to write that out.

I think second version of free will is more to what I adhere to as in it is our choice but there enough outside factors influencing any decision we make. Although considering the mixed life most humans live I think the wide range of factors we consciously or even subconsciously still give a wide range of options to choose from even so that even when making a decision we can still have conflicting factors on that decision.

For the first version of Free Will I see what you're saying and why you are apprehensive about even the possibility of it nor would I think you are alone in your line of reasoning. It's logical although I don't necessarily believe that what you described inherently dismisses the notion of Free Will as described by you in the first paragraph.

If you rewind time perfectly and you put someone under the same circumstances it's next to impossible to sit here and say they will choose a different option because all evidence would point to them picking option A again since we can't rewind time. But ultimately even if we assume someone will always pick option A it doesn't inherently disprove Free Will as described in the first paragraph. What I mean is that even if someone always chooses option A it does not mean they didn't have the ability to also pick option B or the free will to do so. It just means even if they do have Free Will they freely decided to go for A every time.

I hope what I'm saying is clear, I often am able to see the point I want to get to and the gap between it but I have trouble bridging where I'm at to get over the gap to the point I want to make. I've gotten better, I credit the Comic Book Vs Forum for that, but still can have difficulties with it.

Ultimately you can't prove Free Will and we are always under constant influence from outside factors from society to our own biology so that in all choices we make the circumstances of our life will play a key roll in the decision we ultimately make. I can understand why someone would look at that and say Free Will does not exist and it's the perfectly reasonable way of looking at it. And the most constructive things we can change come from taking that reasonable view point and expanding on it. Such as understanding that if we want to change the decisions human beings make we need to look at the cause and effect of why things happen and not so much about punishing the person.

But I understand Free Will as a concept that we can pick and choose different options based solely on our Free Will. So to me Free Will is something that would be considered a perfect concept because the only way to really test it would be to put the concept in a perfect world and observe perfectly. Since we can not do such a thing and observe it we ultimately can not know if Free Will exists or not.

What I'm trying to say and this might be a bit redundant at this point is that Free Will could exist and a person given a choice of option A or B or C could choose all options presented or may even other options not listed yet since we live in an imperfect world we may have the ability of Free Will as the concept describes but not the means to execute it properly.

This is generally how I look at most meta-physical concepts like Free Will and try and reason with them.

I personally think most problems start when people blindly follow the meta-physical concepts to the point where it becomes unproductive and hurtful to society. As in people who only want to punish someone because heh Free Will instead of looking at the circumstances to try and prevent it from happening in the future.

Originally posted by Digi
That's entirely not where I was taking my post. But ok.

Just trying to add something to the conversation

Originally posted by Newjak
Since we can not do such a thing and observe it we ultimately can not know if Free Will exists or not.


This is a very reasonable conclusion, however it raises an equally reasonable question. How does fiction happen?

Let me explain: Free Will is the manifestation that sets appart things that will exist and those that won't, in general, we think in the basis of hypothetical assumptions to understand the universe because we cannot fully experience anything. So Free Will is producing hypothetical situations, and those fictions are implied through each choice but they never actually exist. Its a machine that makes lies. But some lies could've happened, while in deterministic models there is just one thing that happens and contains the rest, what do we do of that things that were potentially possible in opposite to those that could've never happened anyways?

I think there is something inherently disappointing about that, as if our mind placed some sympathy towards missed opportunities.

Originally posted by Digi
Then #2 through #infinity would be the same, unless you're doing something like telling them which # iteration this is, which would create different starting conditions.

You're saying that one of the universes is a "free will" universe. Fine, ok. It exists entirely in the hypothetical, though. If we're to make a case for free will in our universe, that uncertainty you ascribe to it would still need to be explained.

Take a step back and pretend you're God.

In a universe with free-will (which I am defining as uncertainty regarding a choice outcome even if time is rewound), a test that maximizes the uncertainty of a choice that comes from free-will would see randomization.

Just telling the people what they chose, in their very first iteration (and continuing to tell them only what they chose in their first iteration) should maximize that uncertainty and everyone would randomly chose 1 or the other...maybe there would still be a favoring due to the sum of the person but this version is intended to maximize the uncertainty of choice. It is like a dice roll in a D&D Game but you're playing with 3 dice so you have an absolute knowledge of what the highest and lowest results will be in every test: all 1 or all the other (the lowest or the highest possible dice-roll).


This universe? Heck yes. It is waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay more uncertain than either of our two hypothetical universes. So much so that I have no clue how the test would work. Shit just be cray cray in this universe.

If Digi was God would he still mod the Comicbook forums?

Originally posted by Bentley
If Digi was God would he still mod the Comicbook forums?

No, he'd create a planet full of hot women with large breasts that only wanted his D. Then he'd give himself infinite stamina and make them all ageless and immortal.

He would spend eternity in his Mormon heaven.



crylaugh

Originally posted by Newjak
Since we can not do such a thing and observe it we ultimately can not know if Free Will exists or not. Which is why I regard FW as a functional 'as-if'.

Originally posted by Newjak
I personally think most problems start when people blindly follow the meta-physical concepts to the point where it becomes unproductive and hurtful to society. Sounds almost like the United States Congress.

Almost? Isn't that the idea behind the US Congress?

Originally posted by Mindship
Which is why I regard FW as a functional 'as-if'.

Agreed, since we cannot act as though free will doesn't exist there is no point trying to do so.

Originally posted by Mindship
Which is why I regard FW as a functional 'as-if'.

Sounds almost like the United States Congress. Sounds right to me on both points.