Intermediate step to beginning of life uncovered

[Benton]

(06-15-2015, 05:07 PM)WhoDeyWho Wrote: * Indeed

** What do you mean "presuppose"?  By definition it isn't a free choice if I was created to behave in a certain way.

*** Why would I view time as anything but?  

**** Humans are "created".  Supposedly by this all-knowing God character.  Instead of being "told" (he doesn't speak), he programmed us to behave in accordance to his foreknowledge of our behavior.  Otherwise, he wouldn't be omnipotent and we could act in a way counter to his knowledge.

That seems like the most reasonable deduction based on the supposed evidence of his omniscience (knowledge of our actions before we have consciousness) and omnipotence (the fact that he created us with foreknowledge of how we would act).  Computer programs behave similarly.

We are ultimately computer programs if God exists.  

** Presuppose. As in, you have to presuppose that to make it work.

*** Because it's a theory older than Newton's. We hold onto Newton's because it makes things easier to measure and quantify but read up on Immanuel Kant.

**** Frame it that way ("he programmed us to behave in accordance to his foreknowledge of our behavior") and no, there isn't free will. Unless He didn't program us. Maybe He provided some basic building blocks (DNA) a few billion years ago and let it work itself out. It turned into you, me and a few trillion other people over the years. All with the ability to think reason and make decisions.

He defined our abilities (DNA) but not what we did with them (free choice).

And that's how I consider the creation allegory. God made matter, God defined some of it and created the basics for life (DNA) and let it grow. The fact that it took billions of years didn't matter as time is relative to the person experiencing it.