Predestination

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20 Aug 2008, 9:03 pm

Dichotomy of predestination and free will, anyone?

In a Purely Newtonian universe, predestination can exist. In a quantum universe, it cannot, at least in the traditional Christain sense.

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20 Aug 2008, 9:06 pm

DentArthurDent wrote:

Orwell wrote:

God, in Christian theology at least, is not considered as being governed by any of the laws of the universe, because He created them, how could God be subject to His own creation? Plus, it's normally considered to be God who''s doing the predestining.

OK so where did god come from?

If you apply the regress argument to God, you eliminate the coherence of the universe by once again creating an infinite regress. God is defined, at least in the cosmological argument, as a being without cause (and thus, without origin).

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20 Aug 2008, 9:07 pm

Barracuda wrote:

Dichotomy of predestination and free will, anyone?

In a Purely Newtonian universe, predestination can exist. In a quantum universe, it cannot, at least in the traditional Christain sense.

That's dichotomy of predestination and randomness. I doubt many people would regard randomness as free will.

In either case, the end result is that individual beings such as humans have no actual "control" over their "destiny" or what-have-you because either it is predestined or it is random.

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20 Aug 2008, 10:47 pm

Why does god have to terminate the regress.

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20 Aug 2008, 10:51 pm

DentArthurDent wrote:

Why does god have to terminate the regress.

I think the confusion is that you are using a predefined idea of God and assuming that that is what terminates the regress. Rather, if we are to get back into the cosmological view, there exists something which terminates this regress, and it is assigned the name God. If something has to terminate the regress, which you aren't arguing against (at least not yet) then we must find a name for this entity. I suppose you could disagree with it being referred to as God, but that would just lead to some pointless back-and-forth arguments between us.

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20 Aug 2008, 11:07 pm

Get It you go for god others go for the bigbang, me I would not have clue. God in this sense could be absolutely anything. Thanks for your patience everybody.
Again I am comming at this from a point of complete ignorance - does the regress need to be terminated?

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20 Aug 2008, 11:10 pm

DentArthurDent wrote:

Get It you go for god others go for the bigbang, me I would not have clue. God in this sense could be absolutely anything. Thanks for your patience everybody.

Well, only if the big bang is held to be acausal, which makes little sense because physicists attempt to explain it in terms of physical laws, and it would seem that causation should apply to the Big Bang. Essentially, it does not seem to make much sense that existence should exist without some external force driving it. Not that that makes any sense either.

Quote:

Again I am comming at this from a point of complete ignorance - does the regress need to be terminated?

I would think that it does, but truthfully the matter is quite a bit beyond my comprehension anyways.

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20 Aug 2008, 11:28 pm

Orwell wrote:

If the Big Bang requires causation I can see no reason why the god of the bible should be acausal, other than the arguement of timelessness, which I feel is a very convenient answer.

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20 Aug 2008, 11:30 pm

DentArthurDent wrote:

Orwell wrote:

If the Big Bang requires causation I can see no reason why the god of the bible should be acausal, other than the arguement of timelessness, which I feel is a very convenient answer.

Because God is not a contingent thing. Ergo, he can't not exist, so he needs no cause.

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20 Aug 2008, 11:33 pm

DentArthurDent wrote:

If the Big Bang requires causation I can see no reason why the god of the bible should be acausal, other than the arguement of timelessness, which I feel is a very convenient answer.

Twoshots already answered you, but I'll throw in another possibility: no one in this discussion really has a decent grasp of what we're talking about because, quite simply, concepts such as infinity are more or less beyond human ability to fully comprehend them. We will naturally look for convenient answers, or else try not to think about the question at all.

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20 Aug 2008, 11:38 pm

Orwell wrote:

no one in this discussion really has a decent grasp of what we're talking about because, quite simply, concepts such as infinity are more or less beyond human ability to fully comprehend them.

I don't see anything terribly complicated about infinity. I use it all the time.

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20 Aug 2008, 11:51 pm

This is all very civil.

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21 Aug 2008, 12:17 am

Postperson wrote:

This is all very civil.

Yes, self-identified christians behaving rationally... who would have thought!

(I'm specifically referring to myself and orwell, but not excluding anyone else who fits the bill...)

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21 Aug 2008, 12:43 am

Yes it is all rather pleasant (spoken in my best english voice) :wink:

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21 Aug 2008, 12:58 am

ToadOfSteel wrote:

Postperson wrote:

This is all very civil.

Yes, self-identified christians behaving rationally... who would have thought!

(I'm specifically referring to myself and orwell, but not excluding anyone else who fits the bill...)

Hmmm let me see

Christianity is irrational
Therefore rational christians = contradiction in terms
Therefore Orwell and Toad of Steel cannot be christians and could conceivably be atheist :wink:

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21 Aug 2008, 1:43 pm

DentArthurDent wrote:

Christianity is irrational
Therefore rational christians = contradiction in terms
Therefore Orwell and Toad of Steel cannot be christians and could conceivably be atheist :wink:

Ever hear of an oxymoron? Two words or phrases that seemingly have opposite meaning but when put together mean something new

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