Connection between free will and a known future?

[polytropos]

So, the ‘time’ at which my grandson acts differently is not present to God? Why not?

How did you get that from what I said? He can reveal that your grandson will do X as long as revealing is consistent with your grandson doing X. This follows from the law of non-contradiction and just about any account of omnipotence in which God cannot do what is logically impossible. The time at which your grandson acts is present to God.

There is no time at which your grandson acts differently than he does act, since that would be a contradiction. That time isn’t present to God simply because it was not created by God and won’t ever exist.

I think a few words are missing in your text here, polytropos. I think I knwo what you mean here, but I am not quite sure.

I’m saying that God’s revealing does not prevent your grandson from choosing what he was going to freely choose.

 

[inocente]

This is an ill-conceived understanding of the issue.

No, I understand alright that you’re just trying to make out you are superior.

Our free will does not stand in contention or opposition to God’s knowledge. It is concupiscence that makes us think that God is our enemy. In fact, to put it simply, God IS our free will. Our will IS free to the extent that we will what God does for us. His will for us is the embodiment of perfect free will for ourselves, anything else detracts from our own freedom and makes us less free and more compelled by the forces around us.

Nice little piece of doublespeak, but with the unfortunate connotation that it was God’s perfect will that all those in the Holocaust died, and it is God’s perfect will that children starve to death, etc.

You’re confusing God’s knowledge with God’s will. Try again.

*This doesn’t follow. God knows what Judas would do BECAUSE Judas was going to do it, Judas did NOT do what he did BECAUSE God knew it. You have the causal connection backwards, which is fallacious thinking (retrospective determinism) on your part. *

Playing with words. God knows what Judas will do, whatever Judas would or could do. Judas has no choice but to do it. This is why the doctrine of omniscience has been a problem all these years.

*That point entirely misconceives who and what God is. Furthermore, it is you arguing that “we can’t do other than what God knows” in a deterministic sense, so it is you arguing that we are puppets.

In any case, how could we do “whatever we feel like” if we are puppets?*

To believe that God is omniscient is to believe that whatever we do, we are slaves to God’s knowledge, so let’s drink and be merry since God knows that’s what we’ll do.

*My view is that we have made ourselves puppets and God seeks to set us free from the strings that we are entirely content to tie ourselves up with because freedom, in the true sense of taking ultimate responsibility for our actions, is a frightening proposition we would sooner find any reason to avoid than take on.

We are responsible because we are free and we are free precisely because God makes us autonomous agents and is continually using his knowledge to “cut the strings” that we keep retying. A sure sign of this is our compulsion to keep tracing the blame back to God being responsible for what we do, ad tedium.*

The problem with your inventing opaque theology on the fly is you appear to be suggesting that God wants us to all be atheists, because not believing in God is the best way to cut the strings so we don’t blame Him.

But of course we don’t get to choose whether to be atheists, because God knew before we were born how we’d turn out, and there’s nothing we can do to change that.

Sure, and Einstein’s general theory of relativity appears to be “duff” to a slug that doesn’t understand it.

So you’re saying those who agree with you are intelligent enough to understand and those who don’t agree with you are too thick to understand. Thanks a lot.

 

[Peter_Plato]

No, I understand alright that you’re just trying to make out you are superior.

Ad hominem. I could be wildly inferior, but still have a superior argument.

What appears to be the concept of “free will” that is being argued by you, belorg and Roscoe is limited.

If libertarian free will simply means the capacity to act at random not unencumbered by any constraints, then I see no point for that form of free will to have any value over mere determinism since a capacity to act randomly, of its own, results in no better outcome, necessarily, than determinism or fate. I see no point to argue for that form of free will, in any case.

If free will is to have any merit or value, it must be the capacity to act unconstrained in order to achieve the good or final end, the achieving of which provides full worth and meaning. Without that, there would be no point to acting freely.

A more robust understanding of free will requires that an agent be free FROM constraints in order to be free TO achieve their final good. We cannot separate the former capacity from the latter.

In all of that, God, in the traditional classical theistic view, is exactly that final end or final good.

Your view seems to view God as some external agent totally unrelated to the final good for each human agent, but who, rather, poses, at least potentially, some kind of stumbling block in the road to prevent human beings from attaining some other final good.

That is where your view stumbles over “free will” to begin with.

Unfortunately, I have no time at this moment to go further, but will come back to this.

 

[Roscoe_Turner]

Ad hominem. I could be wildly inferior, but still have a superior argument.

What appears to be the concept of “free will” that is being argued by you, belorg and Roscoe is limited.

If libertarian free will simply means the capacity to act at random not unencumbered by any constraints, then I see no point for that form of free will to have any value over mere determinism since a capacity to act randomly, of its own, results in no better outcome, necessarily, than determinism or fate. I see no point to argue for that form of free will, in any case.

If free will is to have any merit or value, it must be the capacity to act unconstrained in order to achieve the good or final end, the achieving of which provides full worth and meaning. Without that, there would be no point to acting freely.

A more robust understanding of free will requires that an agent be free FROM constraints in order to be free TO achieve their final good. We cannot separate the former capacity from the latter.

In all of that, God, in the traditional classical theistic view, is exactly that final end or final good.

Your view seems to view God as some external agent totally unrelated to the final good for each human agent, but who, rather, poses, at least potentially, some kind of stumbling block in the road to prevent human beings from attaining some other final good.

That is where your view stumbles over “free will” to begin with.

Unfortunately, I have no time at this moment to go further, but will come back to this.

We are saying the same thing. It’s like the notion that a catholic should follow his conscience in all things (regardless of church teaching) provided that he has a well formed conscience. How does one know if one has a well formed conscience? It aligns with the church.

You are saying the same with free will. You are free to chose as long as you chose gods will. Aka… you can have it in any color as long as it’s white.

It’s the illusion of choice.

 

[Peter_Plato]

We are saying the same thing. It’s like the notion that a catholic should follow his conscience in all things (regardless of church teaching) provided that he has a well formed conscience. How does one know if one has a well formed conscience? It aligns with the church.

If God is the source of all that is, then to choose some other end apart from what actually is the good as a real possibility - recall that God is the source of all being - is what is the illusion. Your perspective seems to be freedom is only valuable when a choice is totally your choice regardless of the outcome. But why would such a choice be of any worth if the outcome means that your choice has cut you off from all other possibilities that are not your choice? Unless your choice offers a real possibility of achieving a real good as an aspect of what actually exists in Being itself, of what value would having it “your way” actually be?

Again, the problem is viewing God as just another being that could conceivably interfere with your plans for what you want, rather than viewing God as the ground of all existence from who all good comes. There is no good apart from God, so there would be no point to choosing other than what the good actually is.

It is a faulty concept of God that creates the issue for you.

You are saying the same with free will. You are free to chose as long as you chose gods will. Aka… you can have it in any color as long as it’s white.

It’s the illusion of choice.

Here you demonstrate that you don’t really get what I am driving at.

It is not true that you are “free to choose as long as you chose gods will,” it is more like you are ONLY completely free to choose when you actually do choose God’s will precisely because God is the source of who and what you are. You are nothing apart from Being (Ipsum Esse Subsistens) so a choice apart from Being is merely making a final choice not to be free to choose. God’s will is our free will precisely because only God’s will is a non-encumbered will.

The reality is you can only have any colour if you align with God’s will because your will limits you, eventually, only to choosing white.

 

[Roscoe_Turner]

If God is the source of all that is, then to choose some other end apart from what actually is the good as a real possibility - recall that God is the source of all being - is what is the illusion. Your perspective seems to be freedom is only valuable when a choice is totally your choice regardless of the outcome. But why would such a choice be of any worth if the outcome means that your choice has cut you off from all other possibilities that are not your choice? Unless your choice offers a real possibility of achieving a real good as an aspect of what actually exists in Being itself, of what value would having it “your way” actually be?

Again, the problem is viewing God as just another being that could conceivably interfere with your plans for what you want, rather than viewing God as the ground of all existence from who all good comes. There is no good apart from God, so there would be no point to choosing other than what the good actually is.

It is a faulty concept of God that creates the issue for you.

Here you demonstrate that you don’t really get what I am driving at.

It is not true that you are “free to choose as long as you chose gods will,” it is more like you are ONLY completely free to choose when you actually do choose God’s will precisely because God is the source of who and what you are. You are nothing apart from Being (Ipsum Esse Subsistens) so a choice apart from Being is merely making a final choice not to be free to choose. God’s will is our free will precisely because only God’s will is a non-encumbered will.

The reality is you can only have any colour if you align with God’s will because your will limits you, eventually, only to choosing white.

Another analogy showing we are saying the same thing. A train on a track if it derails it doesn’t go anywhere if it stays on the track it reaches it’s destination. Not much a choice. There is one track.

 

[tonyrey]

Another analogy showing we are saying the same thing. A train on a track if it derails it doesn’t go anywhere if it stays on the track it reaches it’s destination. Not much a choice. There is one track.

A train cannot decide to avoid ITS destination: a person can…

 

[Peter_Plato]

Another analogy showing we are saying the same thing. A train on a track if it derails it doesn’t go anywhere if it stays on the track it reaches it’s destination. Not much a choice. There is one track.

If it were a matter of a free agent getting to a destination called “the good” you might have what could loosely be called an analogy.

That is not what we have here. It isn’t a matter of the same agent going somewhere, it is a matter of the agent him/her self being transformed into something much greater, the agent changing from a limited and constrained person to a complete and free one.

To use your analogy, it is not the same train arriving at a different destination, but rather the train itself being completely transformed.

Freedom is not freedom to act from a limited human nature, but rather freedom to act from and in harmony with the creative fullness of God.

 

[tonyrey]

If it were a matter of a free agent getting to a destination called “the good” you might have what could loosely be called an analogy.

That is not what we have here. It isn’t a matter of the same agent going somewhere, it is a matter of the agent him/her self being transformed into something much greater, the agent changing from a limited and constrained person to a complete and free one.

To use your analogy, it is not the same train arriving at a different destination, but rather the train itself being completely transformed.

Freedom is not freedom to act from a limited human nature, but rather freedom to act from and in harmony with the creative fullness of God.

Rather than self-centred freedom…

 

[Roscoe_Turner]

If it were a matter of a free agent getting to a destination called “the good” you might have what could loosely be called an analogy.

That is not what we have here. It isn’t a matter of the same agent going somewhere, it is a matter of the agent him/her self being transformed into something much greater, the agent changing from a limited and constrained person to a complete and free one.

To use your analogy, it is not the same train arriving at a different destination, but rather the train itself being completely transformed.

Freedom is not freedom to act from a limited human nature, but rather freedom to act from and in harmony with the creative fullness of God.

All agents are traveling toward the good. God in his act creation “saw it was good” it was the whole of creation, all time, all acts.

Maybe a better analogy would be the kiddie cars on tracks. You can “steer” but the car but you still follow the track and end where the ride ends. The steering is an illusion, keeps you busy but doesn’t accomplish anything but asmusment. Your ride can be bumpy or smooth but you still end up at the same place. You are along for the ride.

 

[Peter_Plato]

All agents are traveling toward the good. God in his act creation “saw it was good” it was the whole of creation, all time, all acts.

Maybe a better analogy would be the kiddie cars on tracks. You can “steer” but the car but you still follow the track and end where the ride ends. The steering is an illusion, keeps you busy but doesn’t accomplish anything but asmusment. Your ride can be bumpy or smooth but you still end up at the same place. You are along for the ride.

Yes, of course, this is the way YOU see it. Thank you for explicating your view. You are welcome to it.

I see no way of accepting it because it ignores much about reality, has serious metaphysical issues and virtually ignores all of Christian theology.

You are obviously “free” to keep thinking it.

 

[Roscoe_Turner]

Yes, of course, this is the way YOU see it. Thank you for explicating your view. You are welcome to it.

I see no way of accepting it because it ignores much about reality, has serious metaphysical issues and virtually ignores all of Christian theology.

You are obviously “free” to keep thinking it.

What specific part of reality is being ingored?

God created. Called it good. As you’ve pointed out, every moment is “present” to god. In his act of creation he created every moment. It must all be moving toward the good or he couldn’t call the sum of it “good”

Any attempt by us to change the script or befoul his plans, even for ourselves is for naught. It’s simply us bouncing around the rail that keeps us moving toward the good.

Tell me where I’m coloring outside the lines.

 

[Peter_Plato]

What specific part of reality is being ingored?

God created. Called it good. As you’ve pointed out, every moment is “present” to god. In his act of creation he created every moment. It must all be moving toward the good or he couldn’t call the sum of it “good”
.

The good of creation is not in question.

The question is whether free human agents will arrive at the good by making appropriate choices. It is in that “moving” that “all” are not necessarily involved. The good will come about for those who do, in fact, choose it.

You ignore that it is a choice, or, rather, a series of choices. We are active participants in becoming “good,” not passive recipients of goods. We become “good” by making choices in harmony with the active will of God each moment of the day, to the extent that we refuse to participate is the extent to which the good will not be achieved.

 

[Roscoe_Turner]

The good of creation is not in question.

The question is whether free human agents will arrive at the good by making appropriate choices. It is in that “moving” that “all” are not necessarily involved. The good will come about for those who do, in fact, choose it.

You ignore that it is a choice, or, rather, a series of choices. We are active participants in becoming “good,” not passive recipients of goods. We become “good” by making choices in harmony with the active will of God each moment of the day, to the extent that we refuse to participate is the extent to which the good will not be achieved.

The good is set. We aren’t recipients, we are part of it. Part of the creation. He didn’t say " it’s good, well… except that stuff and those guys" Its all good. Being part of it we have no choice.

 

[Peter_Plato]

The good is set. We aren’t recipients, we are part of it. Part of the creation. He didn’t say " it’s good, well… except that stuff and those guys" Its all good. Being part of it we have no choice.

Actually, he did say, “except that stuff and those guys.” Most of the OT is about that stuff and those guys. In fact, the “it’s good” seems to come to an abrupt end at the fruit tasting, until the coming of a certain promised guy.

 

[Roscoe_Turner]

Actually, he did say, “except that stuff and those guys.” Most of the OT is about that stuff and those guys. In fact, the “it’s good” seems to come to an abrupt end at the fruit tasting, until the coming of a certain promised guy.

Then god is subject to time, or isn’t omniscient.

If all moments are “present” when he states “it is good” it means all of creations at all time. The rest is slight of hand.

Like hell, how can you separate from an omnipresent being? If he’s omnipresent there is no place he is not, you can’t get away from everywhere and everything.

 

[Peter_Plato]

Then god is subject to time, or isn’t omniscient.

Non sequitur. We’ve been through this all before. I see no reason to rehash. The posts are archived.

If all moments are “present” when he states “it is good” it means all of creations at all time. The rest is slight of hand.

Like hell, how can you separate from an omnipresent being? If he’s omnipresent there is no place he is not, you can’t get away from everywhere and everything.

A great deal of presuming going on here.

I haven’t a clue as to “how” I can conjure a thought in my mind or “how” I can be present to myself. The fact that I can’t explain the “how” of things does not stop me from accepting that they might be true regardless.

You want me to explain how omnipresence works when the idea itself - like the idea of gravity or the idea of self-awareness - baffles me completely. I don’t doubt omnipresence any more than I doubt gravity or self-awareness.

If you want to postpone acceptance until you completely grasp the how, go for it. I am under no such compulsion.

 

[Roscoe_Turner]

Non sequitur. We’ve been through this all before. I see no reason to rehash. The posts are archived.

A great deal of presuming going on here.

I haven’t a clue as to “how” I can conjure a thought in my mind or “how” I can be present to myself. The fact that I can’t explain the “how” of things does not stop me from accepting that they might be true regardless.

You want me to explain how omnipresence works when the idea itself - like the idea of gravity or the idea of self-awareness - baffles me completely. I don’t doubt omnipresence any more than I doubt gravity or self-awareness.

If you want to postpone acceptance until you completely grasp the how, go for it. I am under no such compulsion.

It’s not about mechanics but rather what we accept.

If we accept that every moment of time is “present” to god then we can’t qualify he statement of goodness with; now but not then, or in the future. To make a qualifier of time makes gods experience linier and not outside of time.

I don’t have to know how it is possible that he is everywhere to accept that he is. If we accept that omnipresence means present everywhere the idea of hell as separation from god is meaningless. If he is everywhere there is no place he is not.

 

[polytropos]

God knows what Judas will do, whatever Judas would or could do. Judas has no choice but to do it. This is why the doctrine of omniscience has been a problem all these years.

I don’t see the incompatibility in God knowing what Judas will do freely. God knowing that Judas will do something does not entail that Judas does it because God knows he will. It’s what he will do (freely). God’s omniscience just means that he knows what Judas will use his free will to do, and God’s role as creator means that God will actualize Judas’s free choice. There is no prima facie contradiction with Judas’s free will here; if one wants to argue that this entails a contradiction, then there is philosophical work to do, which has not been done.

Take the bolded sentences. In the second, “it” seems as though it refers to nothing other than what God knows Judas will do. But if what God knows Judas will do is what Judas will do freely, then the argument has no force: God knows what Judas will do freely, and Judas has no choice but to do what he will choose to do freely. The reason he has “no choice” to do what he will do freely is not because he lacks free will, it is just the law of non-contradiction. Judas will choose one thing; the fact that he only chooses one thing is consistent with his choosing that thing freely. (And one only needs consistency here.)

 

[Tom_Baum]

For those that believe in God and for those that do not believe in God, could both attempt to suspend your beliefs for just a moment.

It seems that quite a few who believe in God have God all figured out or at least think they do, some even think God is a Catholic, even tho they profess to believe that God-Incarnate was born a Jew, lived as a Jew and died a Jew.

It also seems that quite a few who do not believe in God, don’t believe in the “conception” of God that many believers spew out.

Of course, believers and non-believers cover all areas of the spectrum in their beliefs/non-beliefs, I just mentioned two of the obvious in this post.

Something to think about: If God could create absolutely everything out of absolutely nothing, don’t you think that God could be capable of some other things that we, mere mortals, can’t figure out?

I, personally, do not believe in the “conception” of God that many, who happen to know God’s Name, have of God.

Predestination is not God predetermining that some would be slung into hell for ever and ever and ever and ever and ever and …, but that God knew that some would never repent, taking responsibility for their use of their free will, this side of breath therefore God came up with a Plan, even before creation, that is, ultimately, for ALL to be with God.

This “predestination” ties in directly with our free will and God’s Omniscience.

If God knows everything past, present and future and we have free will, in spite of the fact that God knows exactly what we will do, than we are responsible for our use of our free will, whether or not we accept that responsibility this side of breath.

If God knows everything past, present and future and we do not have free will than we are no more than puppets on a string, might be fancy puppets, but puppets none the less.

The reason that we can’t figure everything out about God could be that God is beyond our figure-out ability and that sure does irk some people, seems as if both believers and non-believers are among some of those that are irked.