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Bringing you atheist articles and building active godless communities takes hundreds of hours and resources each month. If you find any joy or stimulation at Atheist Republic, please consider becoming a Supporting Member with a recurring monthly donation of your choosing, between a cup of tea and a good dinner.
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@Tin Man
You said: AND (more importantly) the doctor did not create that patient nor the patient's illness.
Okay, do you want an omniscient, omnipotent doctor? Let’s have one. So the doctor creates the man, and the disease. The doctor also creates the causes by which the man would contract that disease. Say for example, the man would contract the disease if he drank alcohol. And not just that, the doctor also creates 2 choices for the man to choose from… A. to drink alcohol, B. Not to drink alcohol. Further, the doctor also creates a mind for the man to think. And the doctor being omnipotent, he gives the mind the power to make choices. The man uses this power given by the doctor and chooses to drink. He falls sick. And dies. And all along, the doctor being omniscient, knew this is exactly what’s going to happen. Could the doctor have used his omnipotence to make the man make a different choice? Yes, certainly. But then, if he did so, the doctor would be defeating his own purpose behind the creation of mind (namely the power to make choices).
@royism
You know you really want to say god, instead of doctor. But, then that leads to atheist asking for objective evidence that any god is real. Evidence that no faithfool has yet to prove.
@Xenoview
You said: “You know you really want to say god, instead of doctor. But, then that leads to atheist asking for objective evidence that any god is real.”
Goal shifting fallacy! When the question is about omniscience of God and freewill, the very premise of it is arising from an assumption that ‘God exists”. Otherwise, you can directly ask for evidence of God instead of beating around the bush.
@royism
Can you prove your god exist?
@ROYISM: "Free Will" Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha.... More ignorant bullshit from the theists.
Knock knock
Whose there?
Allah
Allah who?
Use your free will and let me in.
Why?
So you don't burn for ever in the Christian Hell the Muslims stole from them.
Royism would not understand "Free Will" if it jumped up and bit him in the ass.
@ROYISM: I created a HELL for you in my backyard. You can become an Atheist or be tormented by eating worms sleeping with dogs and burning in the fires forever, Choose now or burn forever. You have free will to do as you like.
@ROYISM Re: Cog - "You can become an Atheist or be tormented by eating worms sleeping with dogs and burning in the fires forever..."
Hey, don't listen to Cog's empty promises. Nothing to worry about. I mean, after all, I became an atheist because I was told there would be free cookies for everybody. And ya know what? I have YET to get a single damn cookie. Ain't that some misleading shit? Besides, if that hell is in COG'S backyard, then the worms, dogs, and eternal fire are the LEAST of your worries.
@ROYISM: Now we have an all powerful doctor asserted into existence without any evidence at all. Isn't it time for the evening prayer? Surely you can find something else to do than make yourself look ignorant with inane assertions, unsubstantiated ramblings and all the sense of an air conditioner for an igloo.
If the doctor knows everything, and created everything; that means the doctor created the person and their illness; and even knew in which second the person would get the disease, and in which second the person would die from the disease; and knew all that before the patient was even created. Then yes, that doctor would be the cause of that patient's death.
If you know everything and are the creator of everything; then you are responsible for everything.
@Nyarl
You said: “If you know everything and are the creator of everything; then you are responsible for everything.
Not if you also created the mind, and gave it the power to make choices.
Re: "Not if you also created the mind, and gave it the power to make choices."
Oh-dubble-fookin-crykee!... *double face palm*... Christ on a popsicle stick! I don't know whether to laugh my ass off at the sheer absurdity, or cry myself to sleep due to the obvious lack of functioning brain cells that generated that remark.... *silently searching soul for appropriate reaction*... Let's try this for starters...
God creates the human. God creates the brain/mind in that human. God gives that brain/mind the ability to make choices. God created that brain/mind knowing EXACTLY Every... Single... Thought... And... Choice... that brain/mind will Ever make. PERIOD. Moreover, God KNEW EXACTLY what would happen to that person and WHEN it would happen EONS before that person ever existed. So, YES, God IS responsible for everything.
...*still trying to decide whether to laugh or cry*... *mumbling to self*... Shit on a shingle... A damn FIVE year old child can understand that.... *shaking head in amazement*... Hmmm... Maybe this way...
You are an aircraft engineer. You design a passenger plane engineered with computer-controlled autonomous flight capabilities. In other words, the aircraft has no human pilot, and it can make vital decisions and act accordingly to the extreme dynamics of flight. And as the designer, you know EXACTLY every single choice that computer will make during EVERY SINGLE situation it encounters. You also KNOW that computer program will malfunction at a very specific time at a very specific altitude with a very specific number of passengers on it. As such, you KNOW that malfunction will cause the aircraft to totally lose control and crash, thereby killing all the passengers who are on it. You KNEW this would happen when you created and programmed the computer, and you could have VERY EASILY changed the program to avoid that malfunction. But you chose not to do that. Soooooo..... YES! You ARE absolutely, no-holds-barred, without any doubt whatsoever, in every single way shape and form, COMPLETELY responsible for that crash and the deaths of those passengers.
I swear, this shit is not even REMOTELY complicated to understand. And that is an incredibly STRONG indication to me that the individual not able (or willing) to comprehend it is in DIRE need of some serious therapy.
@Tin Man
You said: “In other words, the aircraft has no human pilot, and it can make vital decisions and act accordingly to the extreme dynamics of flight.
You can’t say the flight is making decisions… all that it’s doing is following an algorithm. If situation X, then do X1. If situation Y, then do Y1… and so on. That’s why you don’t attribute freewill to a plane or punish if it malfunctions and puts lives at risk.
You said: “And as the designer, you know EXACTLY every single choice that computer will make during EVERY SINGLE situation it encounters.”
The engineer’s knowledge of the plane’s decisions is not like God’s knowledge of freewill. In the engineer’s case, he gave instructions to the plane as to what choices to follow in a given situation. Not so in the case of God.
Re: "The engineer’s knowledge of the plane’s decisions is not like God’s knowledge of freewill."
Ugh... I stand corrected... *hanging head sadly*... Apparently, there is another possibility I missed. That being, the individual INTENTIONALLY REFUSES to understand/acknowledge the glaringly obvious simplicity and sound reasoning of the concept being discussed.... *deep sigh*...
Hmmm... Now I'm wondering.... *tapping lips with index finger*... I'm not sure which is worse: Being naturally ignorant due to genuine lack of ability to understand things? Or WILLFULLY playing ignorant for the purpose of promoting/defending an agenda?... *shrugging shoulders*... Oh, well. Way above my pay grade, either way.
@ROYISM - RE: "If a doctor is certain that a patient would die in 3 days, and the patient does die in 3 days, would you blame the doctor for the death?"
Let's get very clear here. If an Islamic doctor was certain a patient would die in three days, he would have the patient drink camel piss 5 times a day to cure the malady. Camel piss cures everything. And it tastes good too. Yum!!!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r-F4yjuWCfs
WE KNOW IT'S TEMPTING.
After all, who hasn't gotten the urge to sip a glass of chilled camel urine every now and then? But, according to the World Health Organization, it could be deadly.
https://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2015/06/10/stop-drinking-camel-urin...
@Tin-man
"I was told there would be free cookies for everybody"
I don't know who you where talking to at the time of your conversion
but I got cookies AND beer!
best decision I ever made
@Southern Re: "I don't know who you where talking to at the time of your conversion but I got cookies AND beer!"
WHAAAAAT?!?!?!?.... Son... Of... A...- That's it! I'm pissed! Somebody's been holding out on me! Where the hell is the complaint department? I'm filing a formal grievance.... *patting pockets repeatedly*.... Uh, anybody got a pen I can borrow?... Or a crayon. That will do just as well... *rummaging through desk drawer*...
@ROYISM - If a doctor is certain that a patient would die in 3 days, and the patient does die in 3 days, would you blame the doctor for the death? Did the doctor’s certainty cause the patient’s death?
If the doctor has the capability to cure him (as god would have) and chooses not to cure him then yes
he/she is to blame
@Southern Atheist
You said: “If the doctor has the capability to cure him (as god would have) and chooses not to cure him then yes he/she is to blame.”
That’s a different question. The argument is whether the doctor’s knowledge of the patient’s impending death can be deemed as the cause of his condition? The answer is NO. But if the doctor does not save the patient in spite of that knowledge, then it’s a question of the doctor’s morality. IN the context of God, what you have raised is not a question pertaining to freewill… rather it pertains to God’s morality. If you are interested, I can provide the answer for that as well.
@royism
Can your provide objective evidence your god is real?
@royism
Still waiting for any evidence your god is real.
@ Jo
[answering an earlier exchange of posts on this thread but put here, because otherwise it will be lost in the infernal mechanics of this forum.] :)
Generally, I still insist, the issue of the trinity has never been resolved. The Jews and Muslims are not convinced Christians don't worship three gods; they have never had the need to split their 'one true god'.
Christian Trinitarians still condemn Unitarians as heretics and "not true christians", bound for the fires of hell, and vice versa, I am sure. And the details are vague and disputed between sects of christians who do subscribe to it.
The bible, which I do not consider an authoritive source for anything, other than Jewish cultural history, having been written by sincere, but passionate men, by default, remains a very uneven collection of writings, reflecting a lack of unity of ideas and expression, particularly regarding the nature of god'.
N. T. Wright the much published biblical theologist refers to the “creational monotheism,” of the bible in which Yahweh rules a cosmos populated with good and fallen angels all masquerading as the true god. He insists that “we have very few examples of ‘pure’ monotheism anywhere, including in the Hebrew Bible.”
Some sources claim the OT is a monolatraic work in which there are many gods, but only one is worth worshipping and in which heresy is seen as a form of spiritual adultery. It doesn't suggest other gods do not exist. Its all part of the baggage of older polytheistic beliefs that Judaism was once part. There is even the term "Henotheism" which refers to many gods each worshipped, without penalty, by their own specific tribe or people.
In some parts of the OT the Jewish god is called the only god, in others he is greater than all other gods, Jewish or pagan. In Psalms Yahweh overthrows the council of Hebrew gods formerly headed by El. For every reference to a single god there are any number of references to many. "...among the gods there is none like unto thee, O Lord." Psalms 86:8
Exodus 12:12 says: "...on all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgments: I am the LORD."
In Judaism real shift to monotheism begins around the time of Isaiah, the time of the doomsayer prophets, the unexpected discovery of Deuteronomy in the Temple in which it is alleged that Moses demands the destruction of the temples and shrines of other gods that the Israelis were worshipping along with Yahweh. None of this really helped because the kingdoms of Judah and Israel were invaded and the people taken into slavery anyway.
It was the exile in Babylon that saw the loss of the old social order, the Temple and the traditional priesthood and the emergent belief that their god, unlike any other god, had manipulated history and used another race to punish them which finally pushed Judaism towards monotheism.
Second Isaiah wrote just prior to the release from exile c. 539 BCE, "Remember the former things of old (Abraham and Moses): for I am God, and there is none else; I am God, and there is none like me." (Isaiah 46:9).
If previously there were no other gods why does Deuteronomy 5:9 say about them, "Thou shalt not bow down thyself unto them, nor serve them: for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me." Jealousy of other non-existent gods resulting in such a severe and unfair punishment does not seem reasonable or loving, or even worthy of an omnipotent god.
It is quite true the word 'trinity' does not appear in the bible, probably because the concept only becomes important in Christianity after the clamour of the Arian Heresy in 325 CE. The word 'christian' appears only three times in the entire bible. The word 'transubstantiation' can't be found in the bible either, but the bread is still considered by many to be Yeshua's flesh, the wine his blood.
@ Grinseed
I can't answer for all the Christians, or for all the Churches.
I just focus on what the Bible says. That is the final arbiter.
You make many good points that I agree with.
Our understanding of God has gotten better than it was before the exile, for example.
But the fundamental attributes of God have never changed.
He has always been one.
Everyone did not always realize that he was the only God.
Sometimes they thought he was just the most powerful God.
But it was their understanding that was flawed and not that God changed.
The same one God in Genesis is the same one God in Revelation.
The Bible is about God revealing himself to us.
So we understand better as more is revealed.
We start with an introductory course and end with an advanced course.
But the thing we are studying has not changed.
So essentially, believing I'm your particular God, makes you feel warm and fuzzy.
Cool.
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