From: utzoo!decvax!microsof!uw-beaver!cornell!vax135!ariel!houti!hogpc!houxm!5941ux!dje
Newsgroups: net.religion
Title: Re: Free will and predestination make no sense
Article-I.D.: 5941ux.252
Posted: Fri Apr 22 10:17:41 1983
Received: Sun Apr 24 06:55:25 1983
References: unc.5022

Tim Maroney makes several points I wish to address.  First, those who
try to reconcile free will with predestination are not using their God-given
intellect in matters of religion.  Second, if there is an omniscient and
omnipotent God, then He has made all our choices for us in advance and we are
powerless to do anything else since everything has already been decided.

The notion of an omnipotent God means that God is capable of anything (well,
anything that is not self-contradictory).  It does not mean that anything
that takes place has been performed or decided by God.  If we take our
choices as being decided and performed ourselves and not by God (i.e. free
will), this does not go against the notion of omnipotence.  An omnipotent God
CAN decide things, but that doesn't mean He necessarily DOES decide everything.

The notion of an omniscient God with foreknowledge of future events presents
the difficulty Tim points out.  If God knows what we will choose before we
choose it, then has the choice been decided for us?  The knowledge and the
decision-making are NOT THE SAME.  Free will and foreknowledge are compatible
if the decision making process (in ourselves) is not prejudiced by God's
knowledge of how we will decide.  In all my experience, I haven't heard any
voices rumbling out of the sky telling me what I will wind up doing.  From my
point of view, God has kept His foreknowledge to Himself.  He may know what I 
will do, but He hasn't made the decision for me.  At least in a relative sense,
I seem to be free.

Maybe there is no God.  I certainly can't PROVE God exists.  It's a matter of
pure, individual faith for me, and my faith doesn't impede my free will.

In summary, God may know what will happen, but that doesn't mean He is the
one who decides it.  Whether or not there is such a God, I retain free will
and my beliefs are self-consistent (even if they are counterfactual, which
can never be logically established either way).  Nobody else HAS to believe
as I do; all I'm saying is that my beliefs hold together internally just
as much as the beliefs of atheists that there is no God.

Dave Ellis / Bell Labs, Piscataway NJ
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