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But if God knows everything for a fact, then only one option is possible. If there can only ever be one outcome, how can it be considered a choice?
So you could have spared yourself all the forgoing paragraphs, and simply said, "I object to the very notion of predestination." Unfortunately, from a Calvinist's point of view, the Bible seems to be full of passages which explicitly, or implicitly, speak of predestination. We can kick against that as much as we like, but God doesn't consult us about the proper manner in which he should govern his creation.
Isn't this just special pleading?
I think you misunderstood me.
I never made any claims about what I think about predestination.
My only point is that both predestination / pre-ordaining of events can not exist in the same universe as free will.
They are mutually exclusive.
Either your future decisions are set in stone, or they aren't.
There is little point in arguing about the nature of free will. Philosophers can't agree about it, and there is no objective way of settling upon one definition rather than another.
I'm not talking about the nature of it either.
I'm talking about the concept.
Hence why I said that the underlying mechanisms don't really matter.
After all... what does "free will" mean, if not freedom of decision making.
And what does pre-ordaining / predestination mean, if not "not free of decision making, but rather compulsory decision making"?
Culpability implies that there is some authority, whose code of conduct you are obligated to obey. There is no authority higher than God, and therefore he cannot be held culpable. QED.
If the Newtonian picture of how the universe works on a macroscopic scale is anything likeaccurate, as it very obviously is, then there would appear to be only one option anyway.
Can't you get dressed without making it a philosophical/theological shouting issue?
But on the microscopic scale that isn't how it works. Quantum deals in probabilities and when you open the can of worms over the whole Copenhagen Interpretation of quantum indeterminance you travel through the looking glass.
Macro-scale and Micro-scale behaviors are on a continuum.
And that is merely restating what I said. It is a case of special pleading in that it arbitrarily defines God as the highest authority. God can do no wrong because He's God.
And, yet again, I am merely noting that this dispenses with Euthyphro by arbitrarily ignoring the other horn of the dilemma.
ERGO: it is not "rational", it is simply by caveat. QED.
What happens on a microscopic scale is irrelevant to what happens on the scale of even individual neurons.
Why? Neurons are functional chemicals, chemicals made up of atoms etc.
I understand that idea that there is some disjunct between the world of General Relativity and that of Quantum, but indeed, if any event anywhere in the universe can be indeterminant, it kind of destroys the idea of some form of macro-determinancy. It certainly renders it a "special case" and NOT the rule.
Either the Christian God exists or he doesn't. If he does, then he must have those attributes which Christian theology traditionally ascribes to him - by definition.
Whenever somebody does a calculation as to how much time would need to elapse, on average, before a macroscopic body exhibited quantum like behaviour, the number which pops out is always many times the age of the universe.
All things considered, that is probably just as well.
Anselm's definition of God as "that being than which none greater can be conceived" is obviously the most expansive and, unfortunately, the most fraught with these issues. How can God be ALL MERCIFUL and ALL JUST? Justice is tempered by Mercy. Can God create an unmovable object and toss an unstoppable force at it? Etc. YOU are simply choosing to wipe various of these away by merely decreeing that you don't wish to consider them. This is the specific problems related only to God.
I understand that, and indeed it is unlikely you, personally, could ever "tunnel" through a wall in the quantum manner because you are an ensemble of zillions of particles.
BUT that does not change one whit the concept I outlined that if anything in the universe is indeterminant then you cannot say that determinance is the rule.
For all you know a given choice you make today was set in motion because a radioactive element decayed at a certain point in time billions of years ago causing a crystal lattice to change which led to a rock being formed in a certain way which....add in all the steps over a billion years and you wind up making the decision you did. However it was predicated on a random event.
Anselm was offering his own personal definition, and I would like to have seen him derive it from the Bible. In theology, just as much as in physics, the data has to come from somewhere, and out of your own head is not a particularly good source.
Since "a rock which an omnipotent being cannot lift" is a self contradictory concept, the above question, although syntactically correct, is semantically meaningless. It is an abuse of language, along the lines of a square circle.
If we are not enslaved to a Newtonian or Einsteinian type universe, we are enslaved to random events. Either way, that does not bode well for self determinancy.
I don't believe I've ever heard anyone say Anselm had come up with a non-Biblical conception of God before. Interesting. I thought I had seen all the standard critiques of The Ontological argument (eg Guanilo, etc.) but this is new to me. Considering how your position seems to also use such a relatively straightforward God I am confused why you would argue against it.
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