Searching for GOD...

[BeRational]

Dear Berational,

Father in Heaven, just a name, historically a male dominated religion, happily that is changing.

Mother nature, is nature female?

Gonnagle.

Nature is not a thing.

I just wondered why some Christians react so badly if God might be female.

Would it bother you?

[Gonnagle]

Dear Berational,

Ah well! There is a argument that God is not a thing.

And no, Gods sexuality does not bother me, should I wonder if God leaves the seat up or down.

Gonnagle.

[BeRational]

Dear Berational,

Ah well! There is a argument that God is not a thing.

And no, Gods sexuality does not bother me, should I wonder if God leaves the seat up or down.

Gonnagle.

So if god is no t a thing, what is it?

Christians never define what God is so that they can just move the goalposts all the time.

[Rhiannon]

Dear Berational,

Father in Heaven, just a name, historically a male dominated religion, happily that is changing.

Mother nature, is nature female?

Gonnagle.

The modern Essenes pray to the Heavenly Father and the Earthly Mother. Meh.

[Sassy]

Of course freewill exists..

No of course about it.

Who made you not believe in God.

Nature, murture and previous events.

Well then....freewill is a fact

No its not.

..and the evidence is that you can choose not to believe God exists.

That's not evidence of free will if that apparent choice is due to previous influences and events.

The reality is that it is stupid to argue freewill does not exist

No its not - and try not to use the word stupid - its not friemdly.

as then all the criminals in the world would have a reason not to go to prison.

Doesn't prove free will exists.

They can claim they did not choose to do what they did, as they had no freewill. They could not choose to do as they did, therefore had to do what they did  because they had no choice.

Doesn't prove free will exdists.

The truth is that freewill exists and the proof is that the laws show you can choose to break the rules and believe what you want...NO GET OUTS... Unless you want to turn all the prisoners especially murderers and rapist back on the streets.
Why don't you commit murder or rape.It is a choice and amongst everything else it about your freewill to choose.

None of that proves free will exists. The consequences for the legal system are complicated but just because of that it doesn't mean free will exists.

All your post has done is prove you know you have no argument against what I wrote.
It is clear logic that if freewill did not exist that no one could be guilty of sin or breaking the law.
Whatever is really all there is to say. FACT is you do have freewill and you chose to believe the rubbish you tried to spout here. FREEWILL is a fact. Get over it.

[Sassy]

Dear Leonard,

But you do believe that we possess freewill, for me it is a question I struggle with, Einstein calls it a delusion.

Gonnagle.

Because choices are limited does not change the fact you can choose what you want from them choices.

We have to understand that our choices are limited to our physical and the Spiritual choices are not limited to the physical.

[floo]

 

[2Corrie]

Dear Berational,

Ah well! There is a argument that God is not a thing.

And no, Gods sexuality does not bother me, should I wonder if God leaves the seat up or down.

Gonnagle.

So if god is no t a thing, what is it?

Christians never define what God is so that they can just move the goalposts all the time.

God reveals Himself through the creation and through His word, sometimes you just have to look and listen.

[Maeght]

All your post has done is prove you know you have no argument against what I wrote.

You obviously didn't read (or understand) it then. This does seem to be your standard reply to replies to your posts these days - part of your attempt to come across as the logical, intelligent one. No one is convinced.

It is clear logic that if freewill did not exist that no one could be guilty of sin or breaking the law.

No its not - laws have been put together by humans to set standards for what is considered acceptable behaviour within society. Law makers have assumed that people have freewill but this doesn't mean we have - its an assumption.

Whatever is really all there is to say.

What?

FACT is you do have freewill

Its not a fact, and putting it in capitals doesn't make it any more of one.

... and you chose to believe the rubbish you tried to spout here.

Ah, yes - spouting rubbish. The favourite 'response' when people don't understand the points being made.

FREEWILL is a fact.

Its not a fact, and putting it in capitals doesn't make it any more of one.

Get over it.

How old are you?

You cannot demonstrate freewill - and it is, I would say, virtually impossible to do so. You can quote any example of an apparent choice but none will demonstrate that that choice was made independent of previous experiences. What do you think is the process which takes place when we made an apparent choice?

[Gordon]

It is clear logic that if freewill did not exist that no one could be guilty of sin or breaking the law.
Whatever is really all there is to say. FACT is you do have freewill and you chose to believe the rubbish you tried to spout here. FREEWILL is a fact. Get over it.

Such certainty is breathtakingly worrying.

I'm not sure I have free will: at times I think I do, and I perhaps act as if I do - but do I?

Perhaps what I think I should do is what I would do anyway; or perhaps I really did choose from options. When I think about it I'm not really sure - I certainly seem to act freely, but when I think about it some more there are doubts about whether my apparent choice from various options was as much of a choice as I assumed it was - were all these options 'real' options?

Perhaps I should await more information - meantime I will another beer: I was undecided about having another beer; or would I have had another beer no matter what?

Opens another bottle of Cobra.

[Leonard James]

You cannot demonstrate freewill - and it is, I would say, virtually impossible to do so. You can quote any example of an apparent choice but none will demonstrate that that choice was made independent of previous experiences. What do you think is the process which takes place when we made an apparent choice?

Far from impossible, it is surprisingly easy to demonstrate our free will.

Your nature/nurture decides what your action will be in any given circumstance, but you can always choose to ignore it and do something else. Why would you do so? To prove that you can.

That is free will.

[Maeght]

You cannot demonstrate freewill - and it is, I would say, virtually impossible to do so. You can quote any example of an apparent choice but none will demonstrate that that choice was made independent of previous experiences. What do you think is the process which takes place when we made an apparent choice?

Far from impossible, it is surprisingly easy to demonstrate our free will.

Your nature/nurture decides what your action will be in any given circumstance, but you can always choose to ignore it and do something else. Why would you do so? To prove that you can.

That is free will.

If that choice to ignore it is determined by prior events then it is not a demonstration of free will. The fact that we can make apparent choices is not proof of freewill as you cannot show that these are free choices rather than being determined by nature/nurture etc.

[jeremyp]

Far from impossible, it is surprisingly easy to demonstrate our free will.

Your nature/nurture decides what your action will be in any given circumstance, but you can always choose to ignore it and do something else. Why would you do so? To prove that you can.

That is free will.

But since your belief in free will is part of your nature/nurture, then you are not ignoring what nature/nurture is telling you what to do.

[Alan Burns]

If that choice to ignore it is determined by prior events then it is not a demonstration of free will. The fact that we can make apparent choices is not proof of freewill as you cannot show that these are free choices rather than being determined by nature/nurture etc.

But it is not nature/nurture or prior history which makes the choice.  It is your conscious self.

[Maeght]

If that choice to ignore it is determined by prior events then it is not a demonstration of free will. The fact that we can make apparent choices is not proof of freewill as you cannot show that these are free choices rather than being determined by nature/nurture etc.

But it is not nature/nurture or prior history which makes the choice.  It is your conscious self.

You cannot demonstrate that your 'conscious self' is any less influenced by your nature/nurture or prior history so cannot demonstrate freewill.

[jeremyp]

If that choice to ignore it is determined by prior events then it is not a demonstration of free will. The fact that we can make apparent choices is not proof of freewill as you cannot show that these are free choices rather than being determined by nature/nurture etc.

But it is not nature/nurture or prior history which makes the choice.  It is your conscious self.

Which is informed by everything that has gone before including arguments about free will.  See Leonard thinks he can make a choice based on nature/nurture and then, because he has free will, ignore it.  But he's only doing that because his prior history includes arguments about free will, setting up in him a desire to prove he has free will.

[torridon]

If that choice to ignore it is determined by prior events then it is not a demonstration of free will. The fact that we can make apparent choices is not proof of freewill as you cannot show that these are free choices rather than being determined by nature/nurture etc.

But it is not nature/nurture or prior history which makes the choice.  It is your conscious self.

Your 'conscious self' in an expression of your nature as it currently stands. You cannot be free of your nature.

And notwithstanding that, we now understand that choices are made principally in lower levels of consciousness; your 'conscious self' is the last guy in the chain to find out when you have made a decision. Your conscious self discovers what decision you have made, it doesn't make it.

[Alan Burns]

If that choice to ignore it is determined by prior events then it is not a demonstration of free will. The fact that we can make apparent choices is not proof of freewill as you cannot show that these are free choices rather than being determined by nature/nurture etc.

But it is not nature/nurture or prior history which makes the choice.  It is your conscious self.

Your 'conscious self' in an expression of your nature as it currently stands. You cannot be free of your nature.

And notwithstanding that, we now understand that choices are made principally in lower levels of consciousness; your 'conscious self' is the last guy in the chain to find out when you have made a decision. Your conscious self discovers what decision you have made, it doesn't make it.

No doubt this will be labelled as incredulity, but here goes:
My most basic perception of reality tells me that I am in control of my own choices.  If all my choices were automated by previous event histories, there would not be any need for my conscious awareness to exist at all, since it is only a spectator looking at what has already occured.  But the reality is that conscious perception does have some control, because if you turn off the perception, things will stop happening and you will lose control.

[torridon]

But it is not nature/nurture or prior history which makes the choice.  It is your conscious self.

Your 'conscious self' in an expression of your nature as it currently stands. You cannot be free of your nature.

And notwithstanding that, we now understand that choices are made principally in lower levels of consciousness; your 'conscious self' is the last guy in the chain to find out when you have made a decision. Your conscious self discovers what decision you have made, it doesn't make it.

No doubt this will be labelled as incredulity, but here goes:
My most basic perception of reality tells me that I am in control of my own choices.  If all my choices were automated by previous event histories, there would not be any need for my conscious awareness to exist at all, since it is only a spectator looking at what has already occured.  But the reality is that conscious perception does have some control, because if you turn off the perception, things will stop happening and you will lose control.

There is a need for conscious awareness, clearly, I agree with you there; my understanding is that it must form a part of the decision making process, particularly for complex decisions that require extended contemplation, like who to marry or what career to embark on.  It feels like our conscious self is the guy in the driving seat, making the decisions, but that is not really consistent with the more subtle insights from research which reveal that we should view the conscious part as providing a service, in effect, to enable better decisions to be made.

Maybe the interplay between conscious and less-conscious parts of mind is too subtle and too enmeshed to be disentangled easily, and so we live our lives day to day without the need to understand how minds work at this level of subtelty. We have apparent freedom, and that is good enough for most purposes.  It only becomes an issue to ponder on when we reach a desire to understand what we are to greater depth, and this entails a process of dispelling our working illusions, one by one, to gain sight of the deeper but truer underlying realities of life.

[Outrider]

If you track the number of rare events (low) and the number of prayers  (inordinately high) eventually you are going to get some that coincide. To think otherwise is to significantly underestimate the number of things in the universe (to paraphrase Tim Minchin).

Tim Minchin eh?

Apparently Tim was about to give a performance but complained to his manager that he couldn't go on stage because he felt ''A bit funny''.

His manager told him to get ''get on quick before it wore off...''



You asked for it.

So in response to making a point about the topic, including a reference to a comedian of recent celebrity, you choose to fail to make a point about said comedian...

Oh well.

O.

[Outrider]

All your post has done is prove you know you have no argument against what I wrote.
It is clear logic that if freewill did not exist that no one could be guilty of sin or breaking the law.
Whatever is really all there is to say. FACT is you do have freewill and you chose to believe the rubbish you tried to spout here. FREEWILL is a fact. Get over it.

Claiming an argument is false because you don't like the conclusions is a logical fallacy. In most depictions, yes, the argument that Free Will doesn't exist does remove any justification for notions of sin or guilt - it doesn't eradicate the notion of breaking the law, but it does call into question a punitive justice system on the back, rather than rehabilitative.

Free Will is an claim that, logically, can't stand up, but psychologically is difficult to let go of.

O.

[Outrider]

You cannot demonstrate freewill - and it is, I would say, virtually impossible to do so. You can quote any example of an apparent choice but none will demonstrate that that choice was made independent of previous experiences. What do you think is the process which takes place when we made an apparent choice?

Far from impossible, it is surprisingly easy to demonstrate our free will.

Your nature/nurture decides what your action will be in any given circumstance, but you can always choose to ignore it and do something else. Why would you do so? To prove that you can.

That is free will.

Free Will - The brain is a series of neurons, which are essentially on/off switches. Either a neuron turns on or off in response to a stimulus (in which case the entire system is deterministic, and is not free) or there are random instances of the neurons simply changing state (in which case it's Free, but it's not Will, it's just the cascade effect of a random occurence).

O.

[Nearly Sane]

Tim Minchin eh?

Apparently Tim was about to give a performance but complained to his manager that he couldn't go on stage because he felt ''A bit funny''.

His manager told him to get ''get on quick before it wore off...''



You asked for it.

So in response to making a point about the topic, including a reference to a comedian of recent celebrity, you choose to fail to make a point about said comedian...

Oh well.

O.

To be fair to Vlad, this is an old joke that as an old joke he wheels out every time a comedian gets a mention. it's part endearing, part annoying but not serious.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

If you track the number of rare events (low) and the number of prayers  (inordinately high) eventually you are going to get some that coincide. To think otherwise is to significantly underestimate the number of things in the universe (to paraphrase Tim Minchin).

Gumball machine theory of God? Expectation that he should always answer prayer?

[Outrider]

If you track the number of rare events (low) and the number of prayers  (inordinately high) eventually you are going to get some that coincide. To think otherwise is to significantly underestimate the number of things in the universe (to paraphrase Tim Minchin).

Gumball machine theory of God? Expectation that he should always answer prayer?

No always, necessarily. Just any statistically significant demonstration that prayer has an effect in a fraction of cases would do.

As to the various 'prayer as a form of meditation' (somewhat of a simplification, perhaps) idea that prayer is for the benefit of the person doing the praying - I can buy the idea, but it feeds into the suggestion in the first place that people who say they are praying for you are actually praying for them.

O.