How can God know everything and let us have free will?

[thatkidakayoungguy]

I believe I have the answer but an atheist put a good rebuttal to it, so I'm doubting myself.

[Philip]

Hamster: I was fortunate enough to have met a woman a while back who was given that very gift. She was able to see her entire life happening at once. But not just her life, the lives of her entire lineage, past, present and future - down to the minutest details - all happening at once.

OK, so this lady says she sees the lives of her entire lineage - past, present, and future. And you believe this about the past and future, WHY? YOU can't see these past lives, and YOU can't see the future. So, you have no way of knowing she's telling the truth about any of that! Scripture reveals that there are but two kinds of prophets: Those of God, and false ones. The prophets of God didn't go around doing parlor tricks, telling people about their relative's pasts, nor of their future, UNLESS, it had something to do with future plans of God's pivotal actions in the world. They never were merely about the mundane, everyday things about people, that had no real point. Anyone babbling about their entire lineage in ways unprovable - A) You should be VERY skeptical, B) You have no way of confirming the truth, C) The inclusive mundaneness of what she supposedly holds knowledge of it is a clue that she is not a prophet of God, because God's prophets don't due trivia of people - there's no precedent in Scripture of such. No prophet in Scripture ever knew such things about every individual thing about many people, nor perfectly of their own future. What you describe sounds like a false, self-proclaimed prophet. And Scripture has dire warnings of and for such deceivers.

Hamster, why would you buy into claims you can't possibly know the truth of???!!! I bet she voted for Hillary?

[Philip]

But Hamster did get the first part correct, God sees ALL things, inner thoughts, motivations, and ALL actions and events, of ALL people who ever have or will exist, and all things that will ever occur - ALL AT ONCE!

[thatkidakayoungguy]

But Hamster did get the first part correct, God sees ALL things, inner thoughts, motivations, and ALL actions and events, of ALL people who ever have or will exist, and all things that will ever occur - ALL AT ONCE!

I don't see his post. Did he delete it?

[BigHamster]

But Hamster did get the first part correct, God sees ALL things, inner thoughts, motivations, and ALL actions and events, of ALL people who ever have or will exist, and all things that will ever occur - ALL AT ONCE!

I don't see his post. Did he delete it?

Yeah, I was going to re-write it because it sounded a bit mystical. Every time I post experiential stuff on here people question it a bit as its a bit different to scripture (as Phillip has). There a many gifts that people have received from the holy spirit (including myself) that are not specifically mentioned in scripture.

[PaulSacramento]

God knows all possible possibilities of every decision you can possible make, regardless of which you choose to make.
It isn't all that daunting when you realize that there are only FINITE choices to every situation and that God is INFINITE.

[Kurieuo]

How can God know everything and let us have free will?

First, God innately knows, there is not process by which God gains His knowledge.

To answer the question in full, I see is best done with questions back. If a fortune teller knew your future, does that mean that you don't have will of your own to bring about your own known future? No, at most it means that in the knowledge of a fortune teller they knew the conclusions of the decisions you would make. Or, how about knowing everything about our past that we do, does that necessarily mean our past actions weren't volitional in some way? No.

The premises aren't sound in the argument being made, it must be shown that God's knowledge of everything is incompatible with free will. This argument doesn't follow to its conclusion without additional unpacking to argue for #1.

1) If God knows the future, then we have no free will.
2) God knows the future.
3) Therefore we have no free will.

More arguments need to be given to support the first premise. I see no clear contradiction between God knowing what we do, and our having a free will to act and decide. So the burden is still on the person making this argument to flesh it out further.

[PaulSacramento]

Free will is about making a choice, it doesn't even matter what motivates the choice really, it is the simple acting of choose A over B.

[thatkidakayoungguy]

I tried using an analogy of a parent figuring what choices the kid would make, that they figured the kid would do bad yet also could do good.

[patrick]

Well personally, similar to what K said, I think this apparent contradiction is based in a lot of assumptions both about God's nature as well as what free will really is in terms of its Biblical relevance. (Consulting a dictionary as some atheists are wont to do just makes their question theologically irrelevant -- depending on their definition, it'd become quite possible for Christianity and determinism to be compatible. I think this post by Jac sums up free will pretty well if you haven't read it before: http://discussions.godandscience.org/vi ... ll#p194574)

Since I'm not being presented with an argument to refute, the idea I generally see is that God must know what decision a hell-bound person will make, so when He creates this person, He is already fully aware that in creating him the way He did, he would be damned. I think this actually hedging two perspectives though, and once you decide one way or another, it's clear that it's not problematic.

Basically, if God made you different from how you are, would you still be you? It's a pretty deep question, but I think it's pretty much a given that either one is defined by their nature or not. If one is, God's choice is either to allow a hell-bound person to exist for a time or to not exist at all, and the Bible seems pretty clear that God considers existence better than non-existence. (Instances where the Bible suggests it'd be better if someone never existed for committing evil strike me as principally illustrations for what people who could go to heaven should fear.) If one is not, God's omniscience is something that exists independently of a person's ability to self-create (and thus have free will).

[PaulSacramento]

To those that believe that there is no such thing as free will ( Sam Harris) I say this:
The simple fact that we are discussing this, refutes your view and if you don't understand why that is, maybe you should take a basic philosophy class before you think you are "equipped" to debate such things.
It's along the lines of stating an "absolute negative" ( Atheism) or stating that there are NO absolutes.

[thatkidakayoungguy]

To those that believe that there is no such thing as free will ( Sam Harris) I say this:
The simple fact that we are discussing this, refutes your view and if you don't understand why that is, maybe you should take a basic philosophy class before you think you are "equipped" to debate such things.
It's along the lines of stating an "absolute negative" ( Atheism) or stating that there are NO absolutes.

See what gets me is that the person I was discussing this with was an ex-Christian, who should've known that God can both allow free will and know the future. But, we all have our hang ups.

[BigHamster]

"A man is a very complex organism developed by evolution from the simplest organisms, and who has now become capable of reacting in a very complex manner to external impressions. This capability of reacting in man is so complex, and the responsive movements can appear to be so far removed from the causes evoking them and conditioning them, that the actions of man, or at least a part of them, seem to naive observation quite spontaneous. The average man is indeed incapable of the single, smallest, independent or spontaneous action or word. All of him is only the result of external effect. Man is a transforming machine, a kind of transmitting station of forces. Man differs from the animals only by the greater complexity of his reactions to external impressions, and by having a more complex construction for perceiving and reacting to them." - Mr G


Free-will-less Zombies.....you are

[BigHamster]

Hamster: I was fortunate enough to have met a woman a while back who was given that very gift. She was able to see her entire life happening at once. But not just her life, the lives of her entire lineage, past, present and future - down to the minutest details - all happening at once.

Hamster, why would you buy into claims you can't possibly know the truth of???!!! I bet she voted for Hillary?

Only because I've experienced some of it myself. Relax Philip - I've been receiving various gifts for the last 20 years - some of which are in scripture, some not, some too abstract to even talk about. The only reason I mention them is to make people aware of the possibilities of what things the H.S. can do.

[Philip]

Hamster: Only because I've experienced some of it myself. Relax Philip

This lady has made up stuff you can't possibly know - so, please don't defend it. She's made up such an outrageous number of things she asserts to know: "I was fortunate enough to have met a woman a while back who was given that very gift. She was able to see her entire life happening at once. But not just her life, the lives of her entire lineage, past, present and future - down to the minutest details - all happening at once."

So, this lady had knowledge far beyond what any apostle ever did? What she was given included trivial details of thousands of her ancestors? I can't smoke enough stuff to believe that. And there is no way you could know if she was telling the truth about ANY of it. Don't be so gullible! Even Shirley McClaine, as whacked out as she is, won't claim something THAT outrageous! I've heard people say stuff like this in certain circles - but never any proof. It's just like churches supposedly filled with folks with healing gifts - go by any Sunday and there's always empty parking spaces. Jesus shows up - they had to cut a hole in the rood to get someone in. Somethings obviously wrong with such claims of these supernatural gifts. Where's the proof?