From: utzoo!decvax!duke!unc!tim
Newsgroups: net.religion
Title: Re: omniscience and free will
Article-I.D.: unc.5075
Posted: Tue Apr 26 22:47:56 1983
Received: Thu Apr 28 02:43:27 1983
References: watmath.4960


I am about to bow out of this discussion, because I'm sick to death of
having to repeat myself. I often get the feeling that the people who
reply to my articles haven't read them. I state things in the plainest
terms possible, and these statements, both my assertions and my demon-
strations of their truth, are totally and entirely ignored. How can one
carry on reasonable discussion with people who ignore one's statements?

My final repetition follows. The physical world in the Christian cosmos
is not a causally complete system. Events in the physical world can
have their cause in some other domain, such as God, Hell, the soul,
and angels. Thus, in any question of Christian cosmology such as the
role of predestination, it is the entire System which must be considered,
and God is a part of this System, since events in other domains have their
causes in Him. Therefore, since there exists in the System The Rule by
which future states of the System can be entirely, absolutely, and
infallibly known, the entire System consisting of the physical world,
Heaven, Hell, God, Satan, angels, souls, and whatever else your sect
throws in, is deterministic. Christian doctrine strongly asserts that
there are manifestations of The Rule in the physical world (or was
Jesus lying when he said all those prophecies were really about him?)

I am not prejudiced against Christians. What I loathe is half-baked
sophistry, the justification of conclusions that have their true base
in faith, when if the intellect were allowed to consider the issue
freely and without preconception, the conclusions would be altogether
different. In short, deciding the answers before considering the
questions. Is there any person on the net who can honestly claim
that he or she arrived by reason at the conclusion that predestination
and free will are compatible without first belonging to a sect whose
dogma demanded this conclusion?

Opposition willing, I rest my case.

Tim Maroney