Free will? I dont think so

[Usagi]

Let’s put it another way. Putting out the chicken has to happen . It’s in your future. It’s fixed. I’m able to see the future and I see it happening. Can you change your mind and give the dog beef?

I’ll give the answer for you to speed up the discussion: It’s an emphatic ‘NO’.

So the question then becomes: Do you have free will to change your mind if you cannot change your mind?

But what he does is what you see.

If he had chosen to give the dog beef, that’s what you would have seen in the future.

Your observation isn’t restricting or controlling his actions; it’s the other way around.

 

[Freddy]

Freddy:

Again, I am NOT saying you didn’t make a choice. I am saying that there was only one path you could take. There must have been because God knew what it was before you took it.

You keep trying to apply time to God, as if God, at the Big Bang, knows you’ll choose chicken and then has to sit around until you make the choice. But that isn’t what I’m saying. To God, your future decision is Present to him. He doesn’t ‘know’ what decision you will make; he sees you making the decision in His present.

In His ‘present’? That makes no sense whatsoever.

 

[SPBlitz]

In His ‘present’? That makes no sense whatsoever.

How so? It seems to make perfect sense to me. The present - what we are both in right now. The present moment. This is the closest we get to how God experiences reality as a whole.

 

[RepetantCatholic]

I’m confused by this discussion. It sounds like we are discussing Calvinism. Not all Evangelicals believe in Calvinism. Were you talking to a Calvinist?

I don’t think God’s omniscience precludes our free will. OK, let me complicate that. There are some people predictable by sin. Sure, like an animal you place temptation before someone who sins without repentance they will go for the sin. But part of aspiring for the Holy Spirit is our uniqueness, when sin is presented we choose a plethora of other avenues that don’t include sin.

Again, Job covers this. We know Satan will ruin a man’s life so they may turn away from God, but when it comes to someone like Job, all God wants to know is the sincerity of love and Faith. Again, even Genesis explores the continuous fall of man into slavery until Moses and Exodus. David himself serves God at moments himself at others. Jonah runs from God. None of this is predestined which is why it makes it sacred scripture. Good decisions and bad decisions are made in the service and awareness of God.

Again Paul covers this in Romans where he says we become a slave of sin.

I don’t know what more to write, but we Catholics aren’t Calvinist. Hence why a life of prayer, repentance, rectitude, and a humility for the common good is required.

Again, the Calvinist Evangelical believes simply by being Christian they are saved because nothing they can do merits Heaven. Well, I agree with them that it is by God’s grace alone May we enter His Home, I do believe there is our own personal effort that comes in the form of prayer, mass, and confession. So, yes, we have choices. The less we sin, the more responsibility we take the more choices we have. The more we sin the more we become slaves to sin. Again theologically the Devil wants slaves. We who aspire for the Holy Spirit want freedom.

 

[Latin]

The question is NOT we have FREE WILL or we don’t have.

We all have free wills, because we FREELY DECIDE every act we choose to do.
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The question is: Do we choose our actions with Libertarian free will or with Aided free will?

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There are two kinds of free will, Libertarian free will and Aided free will.

LIBERTARIAN FREE WILL
Libertarian free will is basically the concept that, metaphysically and morally, man is an autonomous being, one who operates independently, not controlled by others or by outside forces.
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AIDED FREE WILL
Aquinas said, "God changes the will without forcing it. But he can change the will from the fact that he himself operates in the will as he does in nature,” De Veritatis 22:9. 31. ST I-II:112:3. 32. Gaudium et Spes 22; "being …

There is a supernatural intervention of God in the faculties of the soul, which precedes the free act of the will, (De fide).

St. Thomas teaches that God effects everything, the willing and the achievement. S. Th.II/II 4, 4 ad 3.

The Divine will is cause of all things that happen, as Augustine says (De Trin. iii, 1 seqq.).

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Only God has Libertarian free will no one else, God has given us aided free will.

Libertarian free will would be useless for us.

The Council of Sens (1140) condemned the idea that free will is sufficient in itself for any good. Donez., 373.

Council of Orange (529)
In canon 20, entitled that Without God Man Can Do No Good. . . Denz., 193; quoting St. Prosper.

In canon 22, says, “ No one has anything of his own except lying and sin. Denz., 194; quoting St. Prosper.

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CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA Divine Providence explains;
Life everlasting promised to us, (Romans 5:21); but unaided we can do nothing to gain it (Rom.7:18-24).

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GOD HAS GIVEN US AIDED FREE WILL AS FOLLOWS

The Father William Most Collection
St. Augustine on Grace and Predestination

I.(1) On human interaction with grace: Every good work, even good will, is the work of God.
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De gratia Christi 25, 26: “For not only has God given us our ability and helps it, but He even works [brings about] willing and acting in us; not that we do not will or that we do not act, but that without His help we neither will anything good nor do it”
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De gratia et libero arbitrio 16, 32: “It is certain that we will when we will; but He brings it about that we will good … . It is certain that we act when we act, but He brings it about that we act , providing most effective powers to the will.”
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St. Augustine is called, rightly, the Doctor of Grace, for his great work. Augustine showed very well our total dependence on God.

God Designed, Decreed, Foreordained from all eternity all our free actions and He orders all our FREE actions. – CCC 307, CCC 308, Ez.36:27, Eph.2:10, etc.
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God bless

 

[Gorgias]

No. If God can see the choice that you have made before you make it

He doesn’t. He sees the choice that you make in time. You are free to make that choice in time.

 

[Freddy]

Freddy:

In His ‘present’? That makes no sense whatsoever.

How so? It seems to make perfect sense to me. The present - what we are both in right now. The present moment. This is the closest we get to how God experiences reality as a whole.

There is no ‘present’ for a God that exists outside of time.

 

[Freddy]

Freddy:

No. If God can see the choice that you have made before you make it

He doesn’t.

That denies His omniscience

 

[SPBlitz]

There is no ‘present’ for a God that exists outside of time

Existing outside of time means you exist in pure, unbounded ‘present’. That’s what eternity means - all moments being present.

 

[SPBlitz]

That denies His omniscience

Only if you insist on applying time to God. If God didn’t know for some period of time, and had to wait around to find out what your choice is, then yes it would deny his omniscience. Bit that’s not what we are saying. To God, all your choices are equally present to him. He doesn’t wait for you to make a choice - he sees you making it.

 

[Freddy]

Freddy:

That denies His omniscience

Only if you insist on applying time to God. If God didn’t know for some period of time, and had to wait around to find out what your choice is, then yes it would deny his omniscience. Bit that’s not what we are saying. To God, all your choices are equally present to him. He doesn’t wait for you to make a choice - he sees you making it.

So in your today God knows what you will do in your tomorrow. If I were able to ask him today ‘Will SPBlitz make choice A or B?’ then He could tell me. Let’s say He tells me that you choose A.

Is it at all possible you could choose B and prove God wrong?

 

[SPBlitz]

So in your today God knows what you will do in your tomorrow. If I were able to ask him today ‘Will SPBlitz make choice A or B?’ then He could tell me. Let’s say He tells me that you choose A.

Is it at all possible you could choose B and prove God wrong?

No, because if I choose B, he would see me choosing B instead of A. I’d imagine if you asked him my ‘future’ choice he merely wouldnt answer you.

 

[Freddy]

Freddy:

So in your today God knows what you will do in your tomorrow. If I were able to ask him today ‘Will SPBlitz make choice A or B?’ then He could tell me. Let’s say He tells me that you choose A.

Is it at all possible you could choose B and prove God wrong?

No, because if I choose B, he would see me choosing B instead of A.

Yes. So God would have seen the future you choosing B. Can the present you now choose A and deny God’s omniscience?

 

[Usagi]

So in your today God knows what you will do in your tomorrow. If I were able to ask him today ‘Will SPBlitz make choice A or B?’ then He could tell me. Let’s say He tells me that you choose A.

Is it at all possible you could choose B and prove God wrong?

No, but not because God knows it. His knowledge doesn’t make it happen.

I can’t (or rather I don’t) choose B because I freely choose A instead, with no external constraints on my choice. If I had chosen B, then that’s what God would have seen and told you.

The fact that only one future actually comes about (and God knows what it is eternally) doesn’t mean we don’t really make choices. Unless we are positing a multiverse, it’s always the case, with or without God, that I actually choose either A or B, and the other one remains an unrealized possibility, even though both are open to me before I choose.

 

[SPBlitz]

Yes. So God would have seen the future you choosing B. Can the present you now choose A and deny God’s omniscience?

No, because then God wouldn’t see me choosing A. He would instead see me choosing B in a misguided attempt to thwart him.

I imagine it would depend on if telling you my choice would causally effect my decision. For example, if he tells you I chose ‘A’and then locks you in a cell, then your foreknowledge has no effect on my decision making process, therefore I maintain free will. If, however, you would go tell me Gods prediction, knowing I’ll try to thwart God, then he simply wouldn’t tel you my choice, therefore avoiding a paradox. Either way, the decision God sees me making is the one I make in the present moment.

I think there’s a reason we are forbidden to fortune tell.

 

[Usagi]

Right. The paradox and locked-in feeling comes when you imagine that you know beforehand what choice you will make. Someone else knowing (but not forcing you) isn’t the same unless they insist on telling you … and God doesn’t.

 

[Latin]

God would have seen the future you choosing B. Can the present you now choose A and deny God’s omniscience?

Good question, but that is not possible, because God Designed, Decreed, Foreordained FROM ALL ETERNITY and He CAUSES every our acts, and we FREELY perform it without even knowing it.
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St. Thomas teaches that all movements of will and choice must be traced to the divine will: and not to any other cause, because Gad alone is the cause of our willing and choosing. CG, 3.91.
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CCC 2022; The divine initiative (supernatural intervention of God in the faculties of the soul) in the work of grace precedes, prepares, and elicits the free response of man.

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Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma by Ludwig Ott;

For every salutary act internal supernatural grace of God (gratia elevans) is absolutely necessary, (De fide).

There is a supernatural intervention of God in the faculties of the soul, which precedes the free act of the will, (De fide).
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The Divine will is cause of all things that happen, as Augustine says (De Trin. iii, 1 seqq.)
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Aquinas said, "God changes the will without forcing it . But he can change the will from the fact that he himself operates in the will as he does in nature,” De Veritatis 22:9. 31. ST I-II:112:3. 32. Gaudium et Spes 22; "being …

As God Himself operates in our wills, we don’t even have to know that we are FREELY cooperating with His will. – CCC 307, CCC 308, etc.
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Nothing that is outside of God’s creating, sustaining, and governing will.
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We FREELY will what God wills us to will, and we FREELY do what God wills and causes us to do.

God Designed and cast into stone every our acts FROM ALL ETERNITY.
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God bless

 

[Gorgias]

That denies His omniscience

Nope. But, it helps you make your case if you selectively quote my answer.

He sees the choice you make in time. You are free to make that choice in time.

Feel free to continue to avoid that part of the answer. After all, you have the free will to do so.

 

[lelinator]

To me I’ve seen this as really simple.

You know what George Washington did. Does that fact mean he didn’t choose it?

Our view of time is different from God’s, so it would be like what I will have chosen has already happened.

That’s how I’ve understood it.

This has long been my view as well.

But it would seem to me that there’s an inescapable problem with the argument that God exists outside time, and that He’s simply an observer of our free will choices, and not a cause of those choices.

The problem is this: What about God’s choices? When did God decide to send His Son to die for our sins?

If God truly exists outside of time, then His decision to send Christ must have been co-eternal with the act of creation itself. It wouldn’t seem to be possible that God was reacting to something that “we” did. Specifically, the choice that Adam made. Creation was a one time event, not an ongoing process. Therefore the sending of God’s Son must have been preordained within the very act of creation itself, and if the sending of God’s Son was preordained, then the fall of man must have been preordained as well. Which would mean that Adam’s free will choice, wasn’t a free will choice at all, it was preordained within the very act of creation.

It couldn’t be that God knew before the act of creation, the choice that Adam would make, because there was no before the act of creation. So it would seem that Adam’s choice, and the fall of man were both preordained by God.

 

[Kei]

But it would seem to me that there’s an inescapable problem with the argument that God exists outside time, and that He’s simply an observer of our free will choices, and not a cause of those choices.

Well, He is a motivating cause in our choices, but doesn’t override our free will. He gives Grace.

What about God’s choices?

Well, time is certainly different when it comes to God as compared to us. I’d say we are dealing with something way beyond human experience here. We’re within space-time.
We have never experienced no time. We have no experiential idea what it would be like to not be constrained by space-time.

You ask about this specific event in which God entered space-time, but this concerns each and every time God interacts with us in real time, not just the Incarnation.
There are multiple ways of understanding this, I’m sure. As I’ve said before, I’m no expert.
But, say, if God knows all the future events, He can choose to act in the appropriate time frame as we would see it from all Eternity.
The way I see it, I don’t see why the Fall has to be any different. He knew people would fall from the beginning, and knew from the beginning that He would send His Son. It’s right there in the “proto-Gospel” of Genesis 3. But I think you’re limiting God here when you try to say He couldn’t have known the fall and factor that free choice into His plan from the beginning, but that this must have been different somehow. Just like any other event to which God responds, I don’t see why He couldn’t know “beforehand”, in human terms, and plan accordingly.

EDIT: I am speaking in ‘human’ terms here. God is obviously far above us in His Will, “predestination”, etc.