God, Free-will, and the knowledge of God - Is his knowledge causation?

[firedragon]

I was agreeing with the impossibility of an omniscient God having free will, since God would know all his own future actions.

Who defines free-will that way? Do you know who? Only the dogmatic missionaries who don't know what in the world free-will even means.

I have read Dennett, and I think I understand him a lot better than you do.

Great. So where does he define free-will like you do?

I did. It wasn't totally coherent. Nobody argues that God's omniscience is equivalent to saying that knowledge is causation, but that's your straw man caricature of people you wish to argue against.

Where did I say knowledge is causation? Causation is a placeholder mate.That's to tell you directly that no knowledge can be determination because knowledge does not cause anything by default. Not that anyone claimed knowledge is causation. It's an inevitable aspect of that bogus claim.

It's you who claims that knowledge is "no free-will". You said that above. So who did the strawman?

Read the OP again.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

"as far as is known" .. meaning "we don't know"

We know quite a few things.
But I love how you basically admit that you are making an argument from ignorance.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

That's what our perception tells us, yes.

No, it's what basic logic tells us.
It's what the word "free" means.

..but as you know, our perception is all relative to space.

i.e. we measure time in terms of space

???

What does that even mean? Are you just throwing out words and pretending they make sense?

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

Doh! What is meant by "the observer", do you think?

All observers? You mean, all human observers in this universe.

I'm not aware of any observers outside of the universe.
And even if I assume there are, I see no reason why it would change anything about the arrow of time and what the word "free" means in "free choice".

All you are doing is arguing from ignorance and special pleading.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

No, it does not.


..but people use the term "determined" to mean a future that is known.
..so what's the difference?

The problem lies with the definition of "determined", and its consequences.

It's not about any "differences". It's about the causes being entirely irrelevant.

The future can only be fixed if the universe is completely deterministic - decisions of thinking agents included.
A completely deterministic universe is incompatible with free will.

You require special pleading to claim otherwise.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

Cheap Ad hominem.

Cheap irony / projection

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

Which does not mean that God does not exist in a spiritual realm that is beyond this realm.

It also doesn't mean that undetectable graviton pixies don't exist in a 27th dimension.
Random statement is random.

Of course that can never be proven so it is a matter of belief.

Right. And what is asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence.

Meanwhile, there still is nobody who properly addresses the point here that a universe with free will necessarily implies an uncertain future.
Nobody here properly addresses the point that a fixed future necessarily implies a completely deterministic universe, which is incompatible with the "free" part in "free will".

All you folks can do is repeat your claims and engage in special pleading.

I am not trying to convince you.

You aren't trying to properly address the points either.

I am just presenting what I believe.

This is a debate and discussion forum. You're supposed to address points raised and have a discussion.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

Just because there will be only one outcome, that does not mean that we were not free to make other choices before we made the choice we made

That's exactly what it means, IF that "one outcome" can be known before the choices are made.
Because that can only be the case if the choices in question aren't actually free.

If it can be known beforehand that I will order chicken instead of steak, then I was never "free" to order steak instead.
Instead, I was actually compelled (by whatever) to order chicken. At best, I was only under the illusion that I choose that freely.

I don't get why this is so hard to understand for you people.

, in which case the one outcome would have been different.

Not if it was known beforehand what the outcome was going to be. The point. You keep missing it.
If it can be known with certainty beforehand that you will choose chicken, and if that knowledge can't be wrong, then you were never free to choose something else.

Then choosing chicken was a compulsion and the idea that you choose it freely was only an illusion.

Case in point:

You get up in the morning and look in your closet for a shirt to wear.
There is a blue shirt and a red shirt in your closet.
You are free to choose to wear the red shirt or the blue shirt.
There will be one outcome, the red shirt or the blue shirt, but before you chose there were two possible outcomes, red or blue..
It is your choice between red and blue that determined the outcome.

Correct.
BEFORE you make the choice, there are two POTENTIAL outcomes.
And BEFORE you make the choice, there is UNCERTAINTY which of the two POTENTIAL outcomes will become the ACTUAL outcome.

However, if there is such a thing as "perfect foreknowledge" that it's going to be red, then BEFORE you chose, there already was only ONE possible outcome: red.
Your choice thus is no longer free. It's already determined to be red (by whatever). It has to be, otherwise it couldn't already be known that it was going to be red.

See?

Either there are two possible outcomes before you chose and there is free choice
or
There is only possible outcome before you chose and there is NO free choice.

You can't have it both ways.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

It's not that there is only one possible outcome when it comes to us. We have a multitude of possible outcomes based on our choices. God is a transcended being. He knows what we are doing because our end is his present. For God, it has already passed.

The problem with these missionaries is that they anthropomorphize God. And they even ignore a mathematical conception of a 4D being as stipulated clearly in the OP. Can you see them ignoring it just for their missionary activities?

What I would like is for theists to understand the argument better and embrace it. I hope you understand.

Cheers.

The argument ignores uncertainty implied by the "free" part in free choice.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

Only in a fully deterministic universe can the future be known by humans,

By anyone.

That's true, but notice that you said "The moment I decide which one to order". That indicates that you had a choice before you decided.

Or the illusion thereof.

Why is the future fixed?

I don't think it is.
But if perfect foreknowledge is a thing, then it has to be by necessity.

Who fixed it?

Why "who"?
Why can't it be a "what"?
And I don't know. It's not relevant to the point.

Why was it already decided ? How was it decided? Who decided it?

It matters not to the point.

Why couldn't you have chosen one of the other 9 dishes?

Because then the perfect foreknowledge would be wrong.

 

[Ajax]

God can see what the future is, but if God wants to change His mind about what He will do in the future He can do that because God has a will and God is free to do whatever He wants to do. The future is not "as if it is now" because the future is not here yet.

Few posts earlier you accepted that God can see the future "as if it is now", therefore he can not change it. If he supposedly changes it, which is impossible, then he did not "see" the real future, nor is omniscient.

God is not really changing His mind. God is all-knowing so God has always known what He would do in the future.

I repeat ... He can not change the future he sees, otherwise he was seeing the wrong future. How difficult is this to understand?

I do not know how God thinks. All we have are scriptures that were revealed to Messengers of God in order to know what God's Will is at any given time in history.

Setting aside the fact that one has to prove first that there is a God, you have to prove that the Messengers are really speaking on behalf of one God out of thousands of gods. Also, even if they are truly messengers for the same God, why should one believe Jesus and not Paul (who by the way, claimed he was a messenger), or the Writings of Baha'u'llah, or Joseph Smith, or....?

 

[muhammad_isa]

I was agreeing with the impossibility of an omniscient God having free will, since God would know all his own future actions..

That is anthropomorphizing G-d. There is no future (as in the future as we perceive) for G-d, so..
The only way one could possibly understand, is mathematically, and not in terms of future and past.

 

[muhammad_isa]

It's not about any "differences". It's about the causes being entirely irrelevant.

That is tosh!
If the causes are our choices, then it is quite obvious that it indeed matters!

The future can only be fixed if the universe is completely deterministic - decisions of thinking agents included.
A completely deterministic universe is incompatible with free will.

That is what we perceive, yes.
You just can't think "outside of the box". You take human perception of time as absolute.
i.e. 'time' is what it appears to be, and it rules over all

It does not rule over G-d .. G-d is not a person in the universe .. He created the universe!
..so He sees all .. He sees time as we see space .. that does not affect our ability to make decisions.

 

[muhammad_isa]

That's exactly what it means, IF that "one outcome" can be known before the choices are made.
Because that can only be the case if the choices in question aren't actually free..

No .. that is not the case. G-d created time-space, and is not part of it.

Then choosing chicken was a compulsion and the idea that you choose it freely was only an illusion.

No .. you are mesmerized by your own thoughts .. there is no such thing as a choice being an illusion.
It is 'time' itself that is an illusion i.e. the passing of time
Einstein said as much..

BEFORE you make the choice, there are two POTENTIAL outcomes.
And BEFORE you make the choice, there is UNCERTAINTY which of the two POTENTIAL outcomes will become the ACTUAL outcome.

Of course .. we all know that

However, if there is such a thing as "perfect foreknowledge" that it's going to be red, then BEFORE you chose, there already was only ONE possible outcome: red.

As far as we are concerned it is NOT 'going to be red' before we choose. You are confusing our
perceptions with that of G-d. You cannot logically mix the two together. You cannot suggest
that G-d knew "before" we did, because for G-d, it is as if it has already happened ..

Try imagining infinite concept, like that of differentiation. We say:
As x -> infinity .. or as x ->0 for some finite quantity, in order to understand what happens at a limit.

..so imagine our lives as a movie, and we see time moving as it is, but for G-d it's all speeded up,
until it reaches infinity.

 

[muhammad_isa]

I repeat ... He can not change the future he sees, otherwise he was seeing the wrong future. How difficult is this to understand?

It's not at all easy to understand, quite clearly, otherwise there wouldn't be all this confusion.
G-d "seeing the wrong future" means what, exactly?
You are anthropomorphizing G-d, by talking about Him seeing THE future, as we would see it.

Can you change what has already happened? No .. thought not .. but that does not imply that
we were not free to make choices.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

That is tosh!
If the causes are our choices, then it is quite obvious that it indeed matters!

If the causes are our free choices, then the future is uncertain and can't be known (by anyone).
If our choices aren't free, then there are causes for our choices. The the choices themselves are deterministic effects of deterministic causes - whatever they may be.

That is what we perceive, yes.
You just can't think "outside of the box".

You don't make sense.
That's like saying that a circle has no corners and you then saying in response "that is what we perceive yes, but you just can't think outside of the box"

A contradiction is a contradiction, no matter the box.

A bachelor isn't married. No matter if the bachelor is in the box or not in the box.
What, does logic not apply "outside the box"?

Fine if you think that is the case, but excuse me if I dismiss your argument at face value on the count of it being nonsensical if that is what you are saying.

You take human perception of time as absolute.

No. I take logic as being logic.
And I take things that are self-contradicting as self-contradicting.

You wish to imagine a setting where a bachelor can be married or where a circle can have corners. Be my guest, but I will not be joining you in the land where "up" means "down".

i.e. 'time' is what it appears to be, and it rules over all

I have exactly zero reason to assume it is not what it appears to be.

And you aren't giving me any reasons either, except some special pleading nonsense.

It does not rule over G-d .. G-d is not a person in the universe .. He created the universe!
..so He sees all .. He sees time as we see space .. that does not affect our ability to make decisions.

Can he make a rock so heavy so that even he can't lift it?

=> this is the level of stupid you are going for.

 

[muhammad_isa]

If the causes are our free choices, then the future is uncertain and can't be known (by anyone).

We are going around in circles.
The Creator of space-time can see 'time' as we see the dimensions of space.
i.e. all at once

I have exactly zero reason to assume it is not what it appears to be.

Well, you are not much of a scientist then?

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

No .. that is not the case. G-d created time-space, and is not part of it.

I don't see how that matters at all.

No .. you are mesmerized by your own thoughts

Projecting?

.. there is no such thing as a choice being an illusion.

I agree, but if my choices are actually predetermined and/or manipulated, then it can't be any other way. Then free choice being an illusion is the only possibility.

It is 'time' itself that is an illusion i.e. the passing of time
Einstein said as much..

It's actually funny because what you are, probably unknowingly, referring to is the so called "block universe". An idea where the present and future are just as fixed as the past. This idea assumes a fully deterministic universe where "free will" is just as much an illusion as our perception of time is.

Again this shows how you wish to have your cake and eat it too.

Let me repeat this: in the block universe where "time" is an illusion, "free will" is ALSO an illusion.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

We are going around in circles.
The Creator of space-time can see 'time' as we see the dimensions of space.
i.e. all at once

This is a claim. A claim that flies in the face of what we actually know.

Well, you are not much of a scientist then?

Indeed I am not, and neither are you.

And as I stated in the previous post: if you wish to assume the position of physicist who adhere to the idea of a block universe where "time" is an illusion.... part of that idea, by necessity, is that free will is also an illusion.

Again: you want your cake and also eat it. Can't have both.
You are trying hard to argue for mutually exclusive positions. It's one or the other.

Either there is free will and the future is an uncertain blur
or
There is no free will and the future is fixed.

Can't have it both ways.

 

[muhammad_isa]

..as I stated in the previous post: if you wish to assume the position of physicist who adhere to the idea of a block universe where "time" is an illusion.... part of that idea, by necessity, is that free will is also an illusion..

That is your belief, but I have shown you why this is not so .. but you dismiss it,
without clear evidence as to why ( as far as we know etc.)

Either there is free will and the future is an uncertain blur
or
There is no free will and the future is fixed.

You are a slave to your perceptions .. you just believe that 'time' is
what you perceive it to be, and nothing other.
Einstein has already 'put that one to bed'

Btw, it is 'now' which is the illusion in the 'block universe' .. and that implies that past, present and future
are only a perception.