Robots and Will Worshipers

[Whetstone]

If you are going to think of praying for something as going against God's will, then it might benefit you to be logically consistent and also think that to pray for forgiveness of sins is also going against God's will, since you were willed to be a sinner. But then, do you not think you would be rejecting the Gospel?

If I was created by God then I was created as a sinner or as a construct that would inevitably become a sinner either through genetic inheritance from my ancestors or as a result of the environment I was placed in and a myriad of other factors. To ask God to forgive me for being what I was created to be is nonsensical. Like designing a cat to be super agile and inherently geared towards catching mice and then suggesting that catching mice is a sin and the cat should seek forgiveness for it. Any way you present this picture it makes no sense which can only mean that our understanding of who and what God is must be wrong in some way and in turn our understanding and interpretation of the Bible must be similarly off.

 

[Rudometkin]

To ask God to forgive me for being what I was created to be is nonsensical.

Then you think that the Gospel is nonsensical. What are you doing here in a Christian forum?

 

[Whetstone]

Then you think that the Gospel is nonsensical. What are you doing here in a Christian forum?

I simply don't see God in the same way you do, nor do I interpret the Bible the way you do. Lot's of parts of the Bible are nonsensical if you read them in a certain way. A cryptic crossword is completely nonsensical to those who don't know how to do them and/or those who don't understand the "language" they utilise.

But you are digressing. This thread is not about me. You are playing the man not the ball.

Do you believe God has created every human?

Do you believe that every human is sinful at birth?

If so, what choice do humans have?

 

[Behold]

Also, it is not my position that people's wills have been removed. It is that people's wills continuously depend on God to exist, so God provides the state of existence that the will is in, at all times. In this view, man does not have a free will from God.

Are you choosing to continue to post your opinion?
And the next time you post it again?
Is that God causing it or is it your freewill in action?
Who is deciding what you post next?
If its not you, then who?
Is someone posting through you because you have no mind of your own to do it?
So, If its not your freewill to choose what to say, then what is it?

Its true that God gives you life, as all life Exists by and through Christ.
Colossians 1:16
...and God created your mind, but its not true that God is causing you to post your opinion, or use it as you will.
Thats your will, freely in operation as all your choices.
That's you given by God a mind that exists to react according to how you choose to do so.
That's your freewill, in action.

 

[Behold]

Yep, he very much did.

God holds you accountable for Christ Rejection.
God redeems you and allows you into His family by a freewill choice you make.
God can't hold you accountable for Christ rejection, if you have no freewill to reject Christ.

Today, all day long you will make choices, and you made them all.
That's free will, in operation.

 

[Whetstone]

Today, all day long you will make choices, and you made them all.
That's free will, in operation.

Your argument is circular. You simply maintain that because you perceive something as choice that you must therefore have freewill.

I have argued that your perception is skewed, that it isn't choice because it is steered always by the myriad of factors impacting you all the time and that your actions are thus predictable.

We get nowhere by repeating the same mantra

Let me try to frame this in a way that you might understand

If today you feel you are making a choice between thing A and thing B

Tell me, where did the choices of A and B themselves come from?

And why is there no Choice C, D, E, F ====> Z?

I give you the choice of a piece of chicken or a piece of fish for your dinner

Which will you choose?

You would choose according to a myriad of forces and impacts. Your body chemical composition will naturally favour one over the other in terms of its nutritional needs, your body sense of smell would influence the choice, your past experiences with chicken or fish might influence it, how the chicken and fish looked to your eyes would influence it, what you had previously eaten today would influence it, what you ate yesterday and indeed during the week would influence it. What you've seen and read about both would influence it. The manner in which they had been killed and prepared might influence it. All these processes are happening consciously and subconsciously and on multiple levels. The decision is inevitable.

More still the fact that you have been offered chicken or fish is a gross limitation. There is almost an infinite variety of things in the world to eat and you're being offered just 2. That is not choice, that is restriction, limitation, confinement, the steering of eventuality by an external force (in this case by me in only offering those 2 food items).

There is no such thing in this universe as randomness. Not one single thing is random. Everything happens because it was caused to happen by the myriad of forces in play. That we look at a pair of dice and roll them and "think" they appear random is merely a failing of the human mind which is a Sinclair Spectrum compared to Douglas Adam's mighty "Deep Thought" computer. We are simply fooled into thinking that something is random because we just don't have the knowledge and computational power to process all the variables. The outcome of the dice is utterly inevitable and predictable but we humans can't make that prediction, so we call it random, but the truth is it is not random at all.

Choice is likewise. It feels like choice because we don't have the computational power to process the variables. We don't have the information about what's going on inside our brains and our body. We live in a limited bubble which provides very limited resources and which limits greatly everything we can do. I can not for example simply leap up from the ground and fly like Superman. I would dearly love to and whizz around the Earth and then on into space to explore the galaxy. But that choice is denied me. I do not have the choice or freewill to do that. I am limited to walking on the Earth and can only take to the skies in planes and helicopters and balloons and the like. It's the chicken or the fish again.

Thus in the end your argument comes down to the definition of free will and choice and in this you must come to terms with a simple precept.

If choices are deliberately or artificially restricted, limited or otherwise confined is that actually choice and free will or is it a steered outcome?

If you can not see and accept that by offering you chicken or fish for dinner the outcome has already been steered and narrowed down to just 2 outcomes then I'm not sure we will ever be able to resolve our differences in this.

 

[Behold]

Your argument is circular. You simply maintain that because you perceive something as choice that you must therefore have freewill.

I have argued that your perception is skewed, that it isn't choice because it is steered always by the myriad of factors impacting you all the time and that your actions are thus predictable.
We get nowhere by repeating the same mantra
Let me try to frame this in a way that you might understand
If today you feel you are making a choice between thing A and thing B
Tell me, where did the choices of A and B themselves come from?
.

Your continuing argument is circular.
Your reasoning is the reason..

Listen, you can't seem to realize that choice requires you making one.
Making a choice......who controls that, when you do it?

You just chose to read what i wrote.
Did i make you, or did choose it for yourself?
Was this choice free, or were you ordered to do it, ?

Your next response......are you choosing to make it?
Is that choice freely made, or are you being made to do it, because i control you?

Well, maybe i do, but maybe you control yourself.
If you are doing things , making choices, and you are not choosing to make the choices you are making then you have a split personality.
Lets hope that's not the case, as in that case, you would be right about yourself.
You would not be in control, as it would be the other you, causing it.

 

[Heart2Soul]

I think there's only so far I could go in pleasing God if I were a robot.

I can only imagine the warmth He would feel at having me by His side in eternity:

I think there's only so far I could go in pleasing God if I were a robot.

I can only imagine the warmth He would feel at having me by His side in eternity:

 

[Rudometkin]

God can't hold you accountable for Christ rejection, if you have no freewill to reject Christ.

You are arguing that responsibility presupposes freedom, but we are held responsible precisely because we are not free. Responsibility presupposes captivity.

 

[Behold]

You are arguing that responsibility presupposes freedom, but we are held responsible precisely because we are not free. Responsibility presupposes captivity.

Listen, if you are a secularist, or a pragmatist, then do you believe that you are bound, or controlled by any religion, or morality, ?

Have you ever read the Satanic Bible?
It has one "law"... 1,) ."do what tho wilt, shall be the whole of ...the law".

Paraphrase...
Do what you want to do, do what feels good, do unto others as you want to do it and if it harms them then that is their problem for being available. There is no such thing as sin... you are your own god, there is no higher power, there are no rules, and you are free from guilt.

That is actually Scientology, more or less, and its also Mary Baker Eddy, and Gnosticism, more or less.

So, you said...>"held accountable"..

That's your conscience, that came from God.
He put that in you, so that even if the 10 Commandments are removed from all schools and from all the entire world, you will always have this moral CODE in your conscious that stings your feelings if you do what you know is not right.
So, that conscience is your Ruler, that you ither obey or you sear and burn, until it no longer causes you to listen or feel.

Here is the thing now...

There is no freedom without consequence, because there is no doing that does not cause a reimbursement.
So, within that rule, you are free to operate knowing that rule.
Do anything you want, knowing that that rule is in effect.

Choices are seeds you plant that harvest as your destiny.
This is why you have to be careful of the seeds you plant, as the crop can be a real killer.
Today's deeds, will harvest tomorrows destiny.
So, in that respect, your choices are never totally FREE, as they will produce your destiny as their end result.

 

[Rudometkin]

I believe in a combination of the two ideas.

Thanks for your response, Devin. Do you believe that those two ideas contradict each other?

 

[dev553344]

Thanks for your response, Devin. Do you believe that those two ideas contradict each other?

I think we have free will unless God commands us thru the Body of Christ and the Holy Spirit. There have been times I have been commanded to avoid accidents and such and narrowly escaped tragedy. And I think if we ask for Gods will sometimes we are given to do his will. But I still think we are free to choose.

 

[Rudometkin]

I think we have free will unless God commands us thru the Body of Christ and the Holy Spirit. There have been times I have been commanded to avoid accidents and such and narrowly escaped tragedy. And I think if we ask for Gods will sometimes we are given to do his will. But I still think we are free to choose.

OK, so I'm very curious. From an ontological point (you know, just regarding the nature of being,) do you think that men have power to 'think', as in, power that is not controlled by God?

 

[dev553344]

OK, so I'm very curious. From an ontological point (you know, just regarding the nature of being,) do you think that men have power to 'think', as in, power that is not controlled by God?

Yes, and I also know that God provides thoughts for us for our good, like driving the birds to food:

Matthew 6:26

King James Version

26 Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they?

 

[Rudometkin]

Yes, and I also know that God provides thoughts for us for our good, like driving the birds to food...

You believe man has power to think which is not controlled by God, but you believe God controls all things.

This is a logical contradiction.

If we are going to speak in simple and direct terms, then we should say you really don't believe God controls all things. Is that correct?

 

[dev553344]

You believe man has power to think which is not controlled by God, but you believe God controls all things.

This is a logical contradiction.

If we are going to speak in simple and direct terms, then we should say you really don't believe God controls all things. Is that correct?

God does not commit evil, which is both thought and done, and probably there is good, evil and nature.

 

[Rudometkin]

God does not commit evil, which is both thought and done, and probably there is good, evil and nature.

Thanks Devin, but does this answer my question?

 

[dev553344]

Thanks Devin, but does this answer my question?

Man can indeed think thoughts not controlled by God. Does that answer?

 

[Rudometkin]

Man can indeed think thoughts not controlled by God. Does that answer?

Yes, thank you. You do not believe in the Determinism defined in this thread.

So when you say you believe in a combination of Determinism and Free Will, you mean you do not believe in Determinism.

Is that all correct?

 

[Heart2Soul]

You believe man has power to think which is not controlled by God, but you believe God controls all things.

This is a logical contradiction.

If we are going to speak in simple and direct terms, then we should say you really don't believe God controls all things. Is that correct?

What I believe he intends to convey is that God gave man the ability to choose for himself what he wants to believe and do.
God is all powerful and if He chooses He could easily control everything that happens here on earth. But that's defeating the purpose of allowing free will isn't it....and in order to claim that He judged each man fairly on judgment day indicates that He had to step back while mankind made his own decisions.
He did converse with man through the Holy Spirit to send messages....but it is still man's choice to hear the message and be obedient to it or reject it and disobey His instructions.
Obedience brings a reward...
Disobedience brings punishment.
If you are a boss of a company that uses hired help to operate the business then you enter into an agreement which explains what the company expects from the employee and what the reward is for meeting those expectations....and contrary to this is what happens if the employee does not meet expectations and what the punishment is.
It's like to be fair and just it is essential to know all the rules.