I bring prosperity and create disaster; I, the Lord, do all these things

[Tiberius]

I live in the present day, not in the past.
It is not my responsibility to go back and look at previous posts and argue about what I meant.
Take a look. Nobody does that but you.

What, you trying to say you're a time traveller now? You weren't alive in the past?

 

[Tiberius]

Why are you quoting what I said BEFORE? Time marches on.
That is not what I said in the post you are responding to.

I said:
No 'ordinary human' can ever understand direct communication from God. Messengers are not ordinary humans, they are BOTH divine and human.

Only God's chosen Messengers can understand God speaking through the Holy Spirit and they can understand God because they have a divine mind. Nobody else has a divine mind so nobody else can understand God directly.

God sends Messengers who act like Mediators between God and man, and since they have a twofold nature, both divine and human, they can understand God and humans and they can relay communication from God back to humans in a form that humans can comprehend.

God can never speak to any ordinary human and be understood by that ordinary human.
Messengers of God are human but they are not ordinary humans because they have a human nature AND a divine nature.

Oh, absolute garbage.

You said what you said, and if you can't remember that, then you apparently have memory problems and should seek medical advice.

That is not what we were discussing. We were discussing why you could not understand God if God spoke to you and the passage from Baha'u'llah explains why you cannot understand God if God spoke to you.

Tiberius said: It's Monday morning. You're walking down the street, doing whatever it is you do on a Monday morning, when God speaks to you. He tells you, "On Friday, Tiberius is going to win the lotto after playing the numbers 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5. He will be the only winner."

That is within the realm of what God can do, right?

Trailblazer said: No, it is not within the realm of what God can do because God can never speak to any human and be understood by that human.

We covered this many times before. ONLY the Messengers of God can ever understand God.

Again, wrong. In this situation, God would be passing information to YOU, not me.

 

[Tiberius]

It is not a claim, it is a belief, and as a belief it can never be PROVEN. Get over it.

The fact that you can't prove it is painfully obvious to everyone.

You STILL don't get it. God is not a human being who can "step in."
Fallacy of false equivalence.

So God is not omnipotent.

Just because it does not pass YOUR examination, THAT does not mean it is not the truth.
It means you cannot believe it is the truth, that is ALL it means.

Just because it passes your examination, doesn't mean it is the truth.

Do we need to go over what it means for God to be Omnipotent again? Apparently we do, since you made a joke out of what I said in my post about God's Omnipotence on the other thread.

The Omnipotent God does whatever He pleases and does nothing He does not choose to do. This is what atheists do not understand. Atheists think Omnipotent means that God can do anything, which really means God should be doing everything they expect Him to do. They do not understand what Omnipotence really means.

Omnipotence means that God can do anything but God only does what God chooses to do.

An omnipotent God has all power to do anything, but an omnipotent God only does what He chooses to do, not everything He can do.

Below, Baha'u'llah explained what Omnipotence means in a nutshell.

“Say: O people! Let not this life and its deceits deceive you, for the world and all that is therein is held firmly in the grasp of His Will. He bestoweth His favor on whom He willeth, and from whom He willeth He taketh it away. He doth whatsoever He chooseth.” Gleanings, p. 209

“Say: He ordaineth as He pleaseth, by virtue of His sovereignty, and doeth whatsoever He willeth at His own behest. He shall not be asked of the things it pleaseth Him to ordain. He, in truth, is the Unrestrained, the All-Powerful, the All-Wise.” Gleanings, p, 284

“God witnesseth that there is no God but Him, the Gracious, the Best-Beloved. All grace and bounty are His. To whomsoever He will He giveth whatsoever is His wish. He, verily, is the All-Powerful, the Almighty, the Help in Peril, the Self-Subsisting.” Gleanings, p. 73

By this logic, I also am omnipotent. I do only what I choose to do.

Comparing God to a human and expecting God to do what humans do is a classic case of the fallacy of false equivalence.
If you can't take the heat, get out of the kitchen.

Oh look, a soundbite claim with no support, then a smug figure of speech designed to make you look cool.

Did I say that? No, I did not say that. I said that God does not 'come on down' to earth and play Superman because God is NOT a man.

God does not intervene in people's free will choices because God gave us all free will to use.
If people choose to do harm to others it is not God's job to stop them.
Everyone knows that except a few atheists who think 'God can do anything' means 'God should do everything' that they think God should do.

If you don't even bother to read what I have already posted twice about what it means for God to be Omnipotent, then it is YOU who is not following the discussion. Rather that responding, you just ignore what I post because you think it is a joke or because you don't agree with it. That is not a discussion.

God doesn't appear to actually do anything.

 

[Tiberius]

I always knew that.

Because that is what you keep saying. You keep saying that you have to do what God knows you will do and you cannot choose to do anything else, which is the same as saying that God's knowledge of the future is boxing you into a corner and forcing you do to do what God knows you will do.

No it is not the same thing.

"X knows Y will do Z, therefore X's knowledge is what makes Y do Z."

This statement is wrong.

It is wrong when X = Tiberius, Y = Spock, and Z = die in Star Trek 2, and it is wrong when X = God, Y = Tiberius, and Z = wear the red shirt on Friday.

Now stop bloody saying it! If you keep repeating this strawman I will report you.

 

[Trailblazer]

It is logically contradictory because free will can not exist in a universe where the future is set in stone.

All we have is the present moment. The future is not here yet. Nothing is set until we make choices and act on them.

A person cannot be both free to choose whatever they wish while at the same time being locked into a single course of action.

Nobody is locked into a single course of action. We can choose whatever we want to choose.

 

[Trailblazer]

What, you trying to say you're a time traveller now? You weren't alive in the past?

I was alive in the past but I do not LIVE in the past.
The past is gone.

 

[Trailblazer]

Oh, absolute garbage.

You said what you said, and if you can't remember that, then you apparently have memory problems and should seek medical advice.

I said:
Why are you quoting what I said BEFORE? Time marches on.
That is not what I said in the post you are responding to.

I have no memory problems but apparently you have reading comprehension problems.
I was wondering why you were quoting what I said BEFORE instead of responding to what I said in the post to which you were responding.

Again, wrong. In this situation, God would be passing information to YOU, not me.

Trailblazer said: No, it is not within the realm of what God can do because God can never speak to any human and be understood by that human.

I am a human so God cannot pass information to ME since I can never understand God.
We covered this many times before. ONLY the Messengers of God can ever understand God.
Do you have memory problems or did you just ignore everything I said?

 

[muhammad_isa]

A person cannot be both free to choose whatever they wish while at the same time being locked into a single course of action.

You're thinking intuitively..
The problem with your way of thinking is that you feel that the person is forced to choose what they choose, just because it is known .. but your intuition would be wrong. It makes no difference whether the future is known or unknown, it will be what it will be be.

It can only be one outcome .. it is just that you feel that if it is unknown then we are free to choose it, but if it is known then we are not .. it's simply wrong .. it's all in your mind.

The future is a series of events, and they are determined by your choices. It is only you who claim otherwise. Believers tell you that G-d somehow knows what choice you will make OF YOUR OWN FREE WILL.
..but you say no, and claim that "they only have one course of action", so no free will.
It's nonsense. The "one course of action" is the one you choose of your own free-will .. it's just a case of misleading statements.
..either accidentally .. or purposely .. only God knows why people say what they do.

 

[Trailblazer]

So God is not omnipotent.

God is omnipotent but God is not a human being who can "step in."
To equate God with a human is the fallacy of false equivalence since God is not a human.

Just because it passes your examination, doesn't mean it is the truth.

I never said it was the truth because it passes my examination.

By this logic, I also am omnipotent. I do only what I choose to do.

No, that is not logical at all.
To be omnipotent you have to be all-powerful AND choose to do only what you want to do.
You are not all-powerful so you do not meet the first requirement.

Oh look, a soundbite claim with no support, then a smug figure of speech designed to make you look cool.

It is not designed to make me look cool, I am just calling you out on one of the most common logical fallacies that atheists commit. Expecting God to do what humans do is the fallacy of false equivalence because God is not equivalent to a human being.

God doesn't appear to actually do anything.

Not anything you can SEE, but as the Bible says, no man has ever seen God at any time.
(John 1:18, 1 John 4:12, John 5:37, 1 Timothy 6:16)

 

[Trailblazer]

No it is not the same thing.

"X knows Y will do Z, therefore X's knowledge is what makes Y do Z."

This statement is wrong.

"God knows Tibs will do Z, therefore God's knowledge is what makes Tibs do Z."

You are saying this statement is wrong but you still have been unable to tell me what makes you do Z.

If God's knowledge does not make you do Z, why do you have to do Z, instead of A, B, C, or D?

 

[Tiberius]

Nobody is locked into a single course of action. We can choose whatever we want to choose.

Except for the fact that God knows right now what I am going to do next weekend, and there's nothing that can stop from doing that.

 

[Tiberius]

I was alive in the past but I do not LIVE in the past.
The past is gone.

Where did it go? Did you lose it?

 

[Trailblazer]

Except for the fact that God knows right now what I am going to do next weekend, and there's nothing that can stop me from doing that.

So what if God knows?
You keep saying that God's foreknowledge doesn't force you to make a choice.
That means you can choose to do whatever you want to choose to do next weekend.

 

[Tiberius]

I said:
Why are you quoting what I said BEFORE? Time marches on.
That is not what I said in the post you are responding to.

I have no memory problems but apparently you have reading comprehension problems.
I was wondering why you were quoting what I said BEFORE instead of responding to what I said in the post to which you were responding.

Because you were still talking about the same issue.

As usual, you flip flop on your position depending on what is most convenient to you at the time, and you try to avoid taking any responsibility for any earlier comments you might have made.

That's intellectual dishonesty.

Trailblazer said: No, it is not within the realm of what God can do because God can never speak to any human and be understood by that human.

I am a human so God cannot pass information to ME since I can never understand God.
We covered this many times before. ONLY the Messengers of God can ever understand God.
Do you have memory problems or did you just ignore everything I said?

You don't expect me to believe this, do you? "God can't speak to any people! Except for the people that God can speak to."

You're like a person saying, "I have never committed any crimes. Except for the robbery. And the fraud. And that one time I smacked a guy and was found guilty of assault. But I've never done any crimes!"

 

[Tiberius]

So what if God knows?
You keep saying that God's foreknowledge doesn't force you to make a choice. That means you can choose to do whatever you want to choose to do next weekend.

Yeah, provided that it's what God has foreseen I will do. I can't do anything else, can I?

 

[Trailblazer]

Where did it go? Did you lose it?

The past is gone, it will never be repeated, and I thank God for that every day!

 

[Tiberius]

You're thinking intuitively..
The problem with your way of thinking is that you feel that the person is forced to choose what they choose, just because it is known .. but your intuition would be wrong. It makes no difference whether the future is known or unknown, it will be what it will be be.

It can only be one outcome .. it is just that you feel that if it is unknown then we are free to choose it, but if it is known then we are not .. it's simply wrong .. it's all in your mind.

The future is a series of events, and they are determined by your choices. It is only you who claim otherwise. Believers tell you that G-d somehow knows what choice you will make OF YOUR OWN FREE WILL.
..but you say no, and claim that "they only have one course of action", so no free will.
It's nonsense. The "one course of action" is the one you choose of your own free-will .. it's just a case of misleading statements.
..either accidentally .. or purposely .. only God knows why people say what they do.

That's not intuition. It's logically sound. It's P =/= ~P.

 

[Tiberius]

God is omnipotent but God is not a human being who can "step in."
To equate God with a human is the fallacy of false equivalence since God is not a human.

Yeah, someone came up with an justification to explain why God's impotent. This is nothing more than the old, "God works in mysterious ways" argument, which I learned long ago means, "There's no real explanation, but just shut up and believe it anyway."

No, that is not logical at all.
To be omnipotent you have to be all-powerful AND choose to do only what you want to do.
You are not all-powerful so you do not meet the first requirement.

I am all powerful.

Prove I'm not.

It is not designed to make me look cool, I am just calling you out on one of the most common logical fallacies that atheists commit. Expecting God to do what humans do is the fallacy of false equivalence because God is not equivalent to a human being.

Still got no support for it though. All you do is assert, assert, assert, but never anything more. Anyone can assert anything they want, but without support, those assertions are meaningless.

Not anything you can SEE, but as the Bible says, no man has ever seen God at any time.
(John 1:18, 1 John 4:12, John 5:37, 1 Timothy 6:16)

The Bible says otherwise. I've already provided you with an extensive list. But as usual, you chose to ignore it and come up with ways to avoid it. "Oh, those passages are metaphorical, not literal." As usual, you pick and choose what you want to believe.

 

[Tiberius]

"God knows Tibs will do Z, therefore God's knowledge is what makes Tibs do Z."

You are saying this statement is wrong but you still have been unable to tell me what makes you do Z.

If God's knowledge does not make you do Z, why do you have to do Z, instead of A, B, C, or D?

As I have repeatedly answered this question: I DON'T KNOW.

Also, it is not required that I know in order to show that foreknowledge of the future means we have no freewill.

 

[Trailblazer]

You don't expect me to believe this, do you? "God can't speak to any people! Except for the people that God can speak to."

God cannot speak to ordinary humans and be understood because God is and has always been immensely exalted beyond all that can ever be perceived by any ordinary human.

IN OTHER WORDS, GOD IS TOO GREAT TO BE UNDERSTOOD BY YOU.

I could not care less if you believe it or not. It is an essential tenet of the Baha'i Faith that there can NEVER be any direct communication between God and ordinary human beings, and that is why God sends Messengers to act as intermediaries between God and humanity.

This is not rocket science, a very simple concept that any third-grader could understand.