(06-15-2015, 03:44 PM)michaelsean Wrote: So can you actually go from free will to predestined if someone were to acquire knowledge of the future, and tells nobody?

(06-15-2015, 02:42 PM)Benton Wrote: And God loved him anyway. Hitler was a horrible being, but that doesn't mean he wasn't loved along with everyone else.

And knowing someone is going to do something (omniscience) is not the same thing as doing it. Knowing they will make the wrong choice doesn't mean He doesn't love them or make Him any less omnipotent. Which is not the same thing as omniscient.

I think your confusion is you're overlapping the two terms.

Omniscient means he knows everything. Omnipotent means he can do anything. One doesn't mean he has to do the other.

(06-15-2015, 04:07 PM)WhoDeyWho Wrote: "Free will" and an all-knowing god aren't compatible.  

(06-15-2015, 03:58 PM)Benton Wrote: Which isn't the same and I think you're mixing metaphors. Or something.

In your instance, God is omnipotent. He knows what's happening because he made every character act that way.

Which is different than the belief that god is omniscient. In that instance, He knows what's going to happen because to Him it's already happened. The concept of time (linear) is irrelevant because it's all the same experience for Him.

So, to fit your example into what the terms actually mean, God and I go to a movie. He knows the ending because He's already seen it. He knows He doesn't like it, but goes with me because I wanted to. I make it halfway through and realize, I don't really like Reese Witherspoon, so I leave. He didn't make me leave, although He could (omnipotent) He allowed me to make up my mind for myself and stay or leave as I wanted. And He knew I would (omniscient).

(06-15-2015, 04:08 PM)Beaker Wrote: Exactly. Free will has nothing to do with the point. The question is about god's choice, not the human's choice.

(06-15-2015, 03:52 PM)Benton Wrote: I'm not sure what point you're trying to make by saying it's different and then using that example which is the same thing. One, a parent says "do/don't do" and the other a parent says "do/don't do."

Neither a 6 year old nor someone of innocence at an older age (we assume, anyway, Genesis doesn't state their ages as it's all allegory), understand good and evil, only do/don't.

Want a mulligan?

(06-15-2015, 04:07 PM)WhoDeyWho Wrote: "Free will" and an all-knowing god aren't compatible.  

(06-15-2015, 04:07 PM)Beaker Wrote: I never said he wasnt loved. Whether he was loved or not was not the point. God's choice to create him ALREADY KNOWING how it would turn out is the point.

And I used the term omnipotent as a catch all. In my lead in I said the bible says god is (and therefore knows) the beginning and the end.

(06-15-2015, 04:07 PM)WhoDeyWho Wrote: "Free will" and an all-knowing god aren't compatible.  

(06-15-2015, 04:08 PM)Beaker Wrote: Exactly. Free will has nothing to do with the point. The question is about god's choice, not the human's choice.

(06-15-2015, 04:10 PM)WhoDeyWho Wrote: I think his point was if God has already seen the movie, the actions of the characters are fixed.  They cannot deviate from what is already known.  Consequently, you might think all these outcomes are possible, whereas the outcome is already known.  The actors don't have "free will" to change the outcome on subsequent viewings.  

(06-15-2015, 04:26 PM)Benton Wrote: You're still overlapping the terms.

Omnipotence = writing the characters
Omniscience = having seen the movie

In a movie they don't deviate because they were written that way. That's not the same thing as knowing how a character will react.


I'll toss you a bone. You can argue we don't have free will because circumstances of your life have already been dictated (genetic code determines your height and hair color, your ability to understand algebra, etc). You'd still be wrong, but you'd have a better argument than saying knowing is the same as doing.

(06-15-2015, 04:34 PM)WhoDeyWho Wrote: God supposedly knew my every thought and action before I existed.  Consequently the script of my life was written before I even had consciousness.  My character had to have been "written that way", otherwise he could not possibly know.  

Consequently, I'm only acting out the script that was predestined by him and his knowledge of my future thoughts and actions.  I can not have a thought or action counter to his previous knowledge of them.

I'm basically a movie character in a movie he has already watched.

Try watching a movie and see how many times it changes.  

(06-15-2015, 04:45 PM)michaelsean Wrote: By the same token, what you end up doing is what you were always going to do.  

(06-15-2015, 04:53 PM)WhoDeyWho Wrote: So God put Adam and Eve on earth to do what he knew they were "always going to do"?

So why get upset about it or bother telling them not to?  

(06-15-2015, 04:34 PM)WhoDeyWho Wrote: God supposedly knew my every thought and action before I existed.  * Consequently the script of my life was written before I even had consciousness.  ** My character had to have been "written that way", otherwise he could not possibly know.  ***

Consequently, I'm only acting out the script that was predestined by him and his knowledge of my future thoughts and actions.  I can not have a thought or action counter to his previous knowledge of them.

I'm basically a movie character in a movie he has already watched.

Try watching a movie and see how many times it changes.  ****

(06-15-2015, 04:22 PM)Benton Wrote: You guys need a thesaurus. And a dictionary.

Knowing something is going to happen is not the same as making it happen.

I know if I put a glass of water outside in summer it will get warm. The fact that I have no thermodynamic powers myself doesn't change that glass of warm water. Conversely, I can warm the water in a microwave set on high for two hours and not know the result (I can guess it's boiling water, but I don't know it will be).

Omniscience doesn't exclude omnipotence and vice versa.

(06-15-2015, 04:57 PM)Benton Wrote: * Omniscience
** Omnipotence, if done. Although that presupposes there is no free choice
*** If you view time as linear, yes. You are correct.
**** That's why I don't think it's a good example. A movie, by definition, is created. People are told what to do, they do it and someone edits it to make sure it's how they imagined it. Although I still think it's off, a play is a better example. People are given a basis and can follow as close or loose as they like while the director can always correct the show or stop it.

(06-15-2015, 04:45 PM)michaelsean Wrote: By the same token, what you end up doing is what you were always going to do.  

(06-15-2015, 04:57 PM)michaelsean Wrote: I didn't say God did that.  I'm saying if knowledge of the future by another negates your free will, then the fact that whatever you do you were always going to do, then that would also mean you have no free will.