GT_WT, My main point is that you can not disbelieve in an omniscient God, i.e. the Christian one, for the reasons you state and trust in scientific observation at the same time and be logically consistent. You have to choose one or the other.
Free will requires choice, choice requires variability, variability precludes determinism and determinism is a requirement of omniscience. Ipso facto, free will and determinism are mutually exclusive. There is not a solution as the words themselves have specific meanings.
The question is, did God create time and is he unconstrained by it? If the answer to either of those questions is no, then God is neither omnipotent or the creator of all. If the answer to either question is yes, then your redefining of the word omniscience can't apply. If time can be transcended then then fluidity that we perceive for 'the present' is false and the universe is a single rigid structure extending in no less than four dimensions. Time just exists as another directional mile marker in this universe. Which is to say a time transcendent God also requires a universe with determinacy. *fixed a misspelling*
I don't think i was implying any form of tense. I'm implying an omniscience that is aware of the outcomes of your own decisions.
Yes ... I believe God exists outside of time, and therefore, is aware of what happens at any point in our understanding of time. The way I think of it is that he can see the future, the past, and the present, all at any moment, because he exists everywhere.
Well then you've just disproven yourself. If he KNOWS I will pick the orange, how can you argue that I'm free to pick the apple?
man, this is hard What I've been trying to explain is this. Think of God, sitting outside of time, observing everything we've done, everything we're doing, and everything we're going to do. You have the free will to do whatever you want. Whatever God knows to be true, it's because YOU made it true. You made the decision, YOU excersized free will. God has an awareness of your decisions AND the decisions you will make, however far down the road. I don't think knowledge translates to God actually making it happen. You make it happen by your decisions. (i'm also not invoking the concept of deism, saying that God sits off to the sideline, because he is constantly involved as well in our lives)
Yes, this is hard. But if the outcome (orange) is known, even if not by the participant (me), then I don't understand how you could say that I have free will to make a choice. I'm not saying God "makes" me pick the orange, but he knows I'll pick the orange and thus I do not have the capacity to pick the apple. I may feel like I'm making a decision, but if the outcome is already known, I'm simply carrying out a plan that is already known. If I am free to pick the apple or the orange, then my decision cannot be known before I make it, because there is no decision at all until I make it.
Bayerithe, so you are offering that God knows all of what was, is and will be. If we are taking that as granted, then the creation is, past/present/future, fixed at every point. The movement of every atom and the result of every choice can only proceed in a single manner which is knowable. Things flow from A to B, but never from A to B' (B' is an alternate outcome of A). This type of universe would be described using the term "deterministic". If the future is knowable, this is a requirement, regardless of how you attribute 'responsibility'. If we presume that this is how it works then all of creation past/present/future can be viewed as a single entity, like a football. The creation happened on the left side of the ball, time passed like sections through the ball until eventually we come to the end of creation on the right side. It is not possible that what started a football will end up being a basketball, because the shape of the creation is knowable and therefore fixed. If God is unconstrained by time, then it is important to note that this football shaped universe is exactly what was conceived by God at the moment of creation, and it couldn't have occurred any other way. A timeless God can't create the left tip of the ball without also creating the right tip of the ball, and therefore things in all time frames can exist only as God created it. Both omniscient and creator means that God alone gets to choose the form of the creation, and by extension the result of every interaction within it. The alternative is to presume that God is not omniscient and is bound by time, but at that point God becomes "most powerful" instead of "all powerful", but that's no slouch either.
Interesting thread- got a couple of thoughts- here's the one that flirts with heresy (I consider myself a devout Christian, but ponder these things anyway) This idea that God is omnipotent, omnipresent and omniscient- that's not in the Bible. That's an idea that was deduced by theologians. Ever wonder if we ascribe stuff to God that we shouldn't? Another thought- about the question "Why does a loving God allow awful things like the Holocaust to happen to innocents?" I guess I would respond with- "If the only way mankind needs angels to descend from heaven to keep us from building death camps, we really aren't worth saving, are we?" IOW, I think God wants and expects us to fix our messes most of the time. BTW, I believe that all of us will be surprised by how many make it to heaven.
