Evidence for God from Science

okay guys, made this new thread. I'm copying my postS here

For those who need to catch up, the first two posts is a recap.

Pro wrote

So, if God knows what you will have for breakfast tomorrow, where does that leave free will at breakfast time tomorrow?

I replied

I personally think that God knows what will happen in future. But I don't think he exercises this in contradiction to human will. As that would be make no sense. If God knows I will eat cereal the next morning then it is predestined, and it overrides free will. I think God does not see past our choices until we make them. In some cases he does. And when he does, what he says happens. So to me he does not let his will over rides our's, Except in rare or prophetical cases. That to me makes sense, as in, this is the only way I think God's will and human free will does not contradict. Otherwise as someone said - all the world's a stage and we're mere actors.

Please if someone has a better way to sort this thing out, I am more than happy to learn.

by Short1 on Wed Nov 02, 2011 6:00 pm

Wouldn't it be free will regardless of what God thinks? Even if it is His will?

His plan and His knowledge have ZERO influence on the fact that we get to choose what we want to do. In the here and now, we have free will. Therefore, we are responsible for our choices. We choose what God gets to know about. (Again, not really, but I think His knowledge has nothing to do with whether we get a choice, because right here right now, we have a choice, hence free will.)

my reply

I think there is a fine line here, short. Look at it this way, as you said earlier, we get to choose what God knows, then it means God knew we were going to do it nonetheless. If this is the case then whatever we do, God knows it before hand and to God it would be an almost infinite number of choice probabilities, since you have to remember that we can change our mind any time.

Otherwise the whole thing becomes pointless to begin with.

RickD on Wed Nov 02, 2011 6:24 pm

Those of you who don't think God could know the future, think about this: if God doesn't know the future, that would mean He's " in" time, as we are. But, God transcends time, because He created time. Time is part of creation. I believe God sees the future in the same way He sees the past. IMO, saying God doesn't have the ability to know everything in His creation, undermines His omniscience.

ME

I didn't say he can not know the future, I said, he purposely don't, except in prophecies, otherwise his knowing would be true and since it would be true, it will cancel out free will from teh present time to the foreseeable future.

RickD on Wed Nov 02, 2011 6:37 pm

neo-x wrote:
I didn't say he can not know the future, I said, he purposely don't, except in prophecies, otherwise his knowing would be true and since it would be true, it will cancel out free will from teh present time to the foreseeable future.

I see what you're saying, neo. But, I disagree. I don't understand how God knowing what we will choose to do, equates with us not being able to choose. Please explain how that connection is made.

neo-x wrote:
I didn't say he can not know the future, I said, he purposely don't, except in prophecies, otherwise his knowing would be true and since it would be true, it will cancel out free will from teh present time to the foreseeable future.

I see what you're saying, neo. But, I disagree. I don't understand how God knowing what we will choose to do, equates with us not being able to choose. Please explain how that connection is made.

It's quite simple rick, what God knows we will do in future, would have to be true at any given time. If I choose to do something else down the road then it cancels out what God knew to be true.

e.g
1. I want to go to dinner to cafe X on coming Saturday.
2. God knows I will go to cafe X before hand, even before I made the plan.
3. Since God knows I am gonna do that, it must be true.
3. At the last minute I have a change of plans, I go to Cafe Y.

Now one can say that God already knew I would go to Cafe Y, If that is true then really I cannot change my plan can I? The plan is already there, It would have to be Cafe Y.

What if on the route to cafe Y, I plan to stop at Cafe Z and then go back home. You see it is an endless chain.

Did God know from the start that I was going to cafe Z?

God's knowledge has to be true at any time or it is not true. I think nothing is that hard set in stone, except prophecies. If my will is the same as it is in God's thoughts then my plan of action is already set, I cannot deviate. I will end up at Cafe z, no matter what I do.

Take Jonah's example, he was sent to Nineveh, he chose to go to tarsus, God drove him back, this is a rare case.

Now imagine you are in a CD shop, no ones looking and you contemplate to steal some CD's, does God already know you are going to steal or he knows you walked away. suppose you walk way. Now you never committed the crime, only thought about it but at the end you either weren't brave enough to take the risk, or someone came or you had a change of heart, whatever.

Now imagine the same with lust, you're eyeing a beautiful young lady, you covet, you start lusting, but you never do anything else. Now, did God knew you would be lusting after that woman from the start or did at any point you had a choice, that you don't have to do it. If so, did God already knew you would turn away? its either God knew you would lust or you would turn away. And note, an any case it would have to be true. You can't have both at the same time because if you say God knew both way then it would only come down some steps to my position that God doesn't see past the choices that we make.

If God knew even before you were born that you would lust, then who made that decision, you? NO, it was already set that you would make that decision. But what if you are aware of that choice and you don't wanna do it. You would have to do it. This is a hair line problem here Rick. You can't say, God knew I would lust but then it was my choice to lust. How can it be your choice to lust when God ALREADY knew it would be this way? What God knows must be true Rick, at all times.

I'll give you the example of Eli,

"27 Now a man of God came to Eli and said to him, “This is what the LORD says: ‘Did I not clearly reveal myself to your ancestor’s family when they were in Egypt under Pharaoh? 28 I chose your ancestor out of all the tribes of Israel to be my priest, to go up to my altar, to burn incense, and to wear an ephod in my presence. I also gave your ancestor’s family all the food offerings presented by the Israelites. 29 Why do you[e] scorn my sacrifice and offering that I prescribed for my dwelling? Why do you honor your sons more than me by fattening yourselves on the choice parts of every offering made by my people Israel?’
30 “Therefore the LORD, the God of Israel, declares: ‘I promised that members of your family would minister before me forever.’ But now the LORD declares: ‘Far be it from me! Those who honor me I will honor, but those who despise me will be disdained. 31 The time is coming when I will cut short your strength and the strength of your priestly house, so that no one in it will reach old age, 32 and you will see distress in my dwelling. Although good will be done to Israel, no one in your family line will ever reach old age. 33 Every one of you that I do not cut off from serving at my altar I will spare only to destroy your sight and sap your strength, and all your descendants will die in the prime of life."

Look, God had promised to Eli's ancestors, but then it says in verse 30 "But now the LORD declares: ‘Far be it from me!" Apparently God had a change of plans here. When he made that promise centuries ago to a certain family but now it has to be changed because someone didn't walk with God as he should have had. If God already knew that down the road Eli was the weak link, then dare I say, Eli had no choice.

Lets take it up one more notch. Did God knew before hand that Lucifer would rebel. If he knew about it, he must have known it before Lucifer was even created. What choice does Lucifer have.

So I think there is a problem when we say, God already knew what I was going to do, but the choice was mine. No, if God already knew, then it is true and you would have to do it. Since God knew that from forever, before you were ever born.

In this way a sinner could be without excuse, and God is not justified.

Hope this clears my point up.

I still dont see conclusive evidence that God knowing an outcome before it happens would negate freewill, i really think this comes down to our limited understanding of time and the multi dimensional nature of God..............its a mind bender.

Dan, I can't convince you if you do not see it from my side. The point is, if God knows something will happen, the only reason it is that way, because it will happen. How else do you explain it?

I still get sometimes surprised as how people just overlook this.

And by the way Dan, there is no conclusive evidence either way, I mean to the best of our abilities we can only make a good case. I mean what is there to suggest, conclusively that God sees time they way you think he does and not mine. Peace

One question if like you said God doesnt know by choice wouldn't that go against the nature of God being all knowing?

neo-x wrote:Dan, I can't convince you if you do not see it from my side. The point is, if God knows something will happen, the only reason it is that way, because it will happen. How else do you explain it?

I still get sometimes surprised as how people just overlook this.

And by the way Dan, there is no conclusive evidence either way, I mean to the best of our abilities we can only make a good case. I mean what is there to suggest, conclusively that God sees time they way you think he does and not mine. Peace

Dont get me wrong Neo i see both sides of the problem quite well, that is why i posted on another thread.
Im kinda stuck in a loop at the moment in my head like an old scratched record.

Dan I replied to this question in the first post on this thread, let me re-paste it

I personally think that God knows what will happen in future. But I don't think he exercises this in contradiction to human will. As that would be make no sense. If God knows I will eat cereal the next morning then it is predestined, and it overrides free will. I think God does not see past our choices until we make them. In some cases he does. And when he does, what he says happens. So to me he does not let his will over rides our's, Except in rare or prophetical cases. That to me makes sense, as in, this is the only way I think God's will and human free will does not contradict. Otherwise as someone said - all the world's a stage and we're mere actors.

and then this

I didn't say he can not know the future, I said, he purposely don't, except in prophecies, otherwise his knowing would be true and since it would be true, it will cancel out free will from teh present time to the foreseeable future.

Dont get me wrong Neo i see both sides of the problem quite well, that is why i posted on another thread.
Im kinda stuck in a loop at the moment in my head like an old scratched record.

I understand Dan, I'm just trying to help, bro.

You see to me, God, not purposely seeing past our choice until we make them, does not affect his Omniscience at all. After all, we are not questioning God's abilities, only how he does them.

I didn't say he can not know the future, I said, he purposely don't, except in prophecies, otherwise his knowing would be true and since it would be true, it will cancel out free will from teh present time to the foreseeable future.

But wouldn't this only cancel out free will from his perspective but our perspective of free will would still be intact?

But wouldn't this only cancel out free will from his perspective but our perspective of free will would still be intact?

I am not sure I got your point, cud you please elaborate a little, Dan?

Well because we live inside our time from our perspective we have freewill to choose our destiny so to speak, but because God is outside time and is all knowing our destiny in his perspective is determined.
Thats the best explanation i can make with my limited mental powers, so i guess my view of free will comes down to where you are looking at it from either inside our time or outside our time.
does that make sense? lol

I must say the more i think about your perspective it seems just as rational as mine and either could be true... maybe...maybe not haha

For your consideration- Molinism, I know William Lane Craig is pretty popular around here and he's one of the most ardent defenders of Molinism.

Some links explaining the basics of Molinism, some opinion in both (I'll abstain from giving my opinion at the moment). I'm not an expert in this but I think they attribute some things to Molinists that I don't think WLC would agree with-

http://www.gotquestions.org/molinism.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Molinism

Craig also regularly defends Molinism on his website. I haven't made up my mind on all this stuff yet, but I think its important to affirm predestination, free will, and omniscience... how that all fits together, boy. It makes for an interesting discussion.

neo-x wrote:Dan, I can't convince you if you do not see it from my side. The point is, if God knows something will happen, the only reason it is that way, because it will happen. How else do you explain it?

Craig would say middle knowledge. You make the choice, but he knows all possible choices in all possible worlds and he knows which choice you will choose.

Thanks for that post narnia it is indeed a deep and interesting subject.
I kinda like this idea

God has middle knowledge of all feasible worlds, and He chooses to create the world in which the most people would be saved.

anyway i am going to keep reading..... just posting my thoughts a long the way.