For me it's the book more than the concept of a great designer.

I'm an Agnostic. I have a lot of sympathy for the aetheist camp as we're dominated by religious values handed down over centuries from a time when people were less critical and informed to make decisions about wether what they were being told was credible or not.

For me though...

Thank you for that contribution! My friend seems to have addressed some of the points to it (and with greater depth than I could have managed), so I will not through anything else into the mix (perhaps later). I truly enjoy, though, how you have considered the implications of your worldview in regards to both design arguments and materialist positions. Sometimes I envy those that have found a comfortable position on the fence, as it were!

I am agnostic, I cannot be other. Agnostic means "I don't know", and I don't. I have ideas, I have listened to a lot of ideas, and a lot of theories, but at the end of the day I don't know. I won't pretend that I do.

I think that, in at least some sense, we all walk without perfect certainty, and must all claim to be agnostic. It seems to me to be a perfectly natural state in a world with so very many questions, and so few answers. How we chose to engage those questions varies, though, and which tools we accept the epistemological validity of.

This is where the scale of belief that I referenced earlier comes into play. But I think that there are more believers out there that are of the "I 100% know that there is a god" camp than you will find atheists in the "I 100% know there is no god" one.

I think that in true numbers that is doubtless so. I wonder about percentages, though? I know quite a few non-theists that would give some lip service to the idea, but if get them to be up front about their allegiance to philosophical materialism you would likely get quite a different answer. Richard Lewontin and Dawkins, at different moments of especial frankness, have been pretty clear about that. But, heck, we may all be materialists in a generation or two.

This is where the scale of belief that I referenced earlier comes into play. But I think that there are more believers out there that are of the "I 100% know that there is a god" camp than you will find atheists in the "I 100% know there is no god" one.

I think that in true numbers that is doubtless so. I wonder about percentages, though? I know quite a few non-theists that would give some lip service to the idea, but if get them to be up front about their allegiance to philosophical materialism you would likely get quite a different answer. Richard Lewontin and Dawkins, at different moments of especial frankness, have been pretty clear about that. But, heck, we may all be materialists in a generation or two.

Dawkins himself said he was a 6 on the scale (1 being 100% sure there IS a god, and 7 being 100% sure there is not) in "The God Delusion." Scientists don't really view things in 100% absolute because they know that new discoveries can always change things.

I think you misunderstand me. I am separating their perspective on atheism form their perspective on materialism (which drives atheism in most scientists). Lewontin has made it clear that materialism must survive, must win out, at all costs. His commitment to that is 100%. Dawkins has made similar claims. So they may speculate about God, but the philosophy that eliminates God is a 100% go. Nothing, sadly, is simple.

Another? If God knows everyting that will happen, (omniscient), then why did he make the Devil? Was it God that created evil? If not, then the Devil must also have creative powers. But then the Devil would be a god, and we're told that God is the only god.(capitalization/lack of was intentional to attempt to add clarity)

How about the Devil? If the Devil exists, God made him, right? If God made him, and he knew what he was creating and all that it would bring about....then God's not much different than the Devil, eh?

Allow me to clarify a few things, from my perspective (not to imply that these are the way things truly are). I say that evil is not a thing to be created. By that, I mean that:

"evil is in created things under the aspect of mutability, and possibility of defect, not as existing per se : and the errors of mankind, mistaking the true conditions of its own well-being, have been the cause of moral and physical evil (Dion. Areop., De Div. Nom., iv, 31; St. Aug., De Civ. Dei. xii). "

That is, we have free will, and for our will to be free we must contain the possibility of rebellion, and the possibilily of harming our self and others while still thinking that we are doing ourselves good. I steal because I think it is to my good to have the others property, and I am convinced that his good is of no relevancy to mine.

My view of omniscience is that God has knowledge of all things that are necessarily so, things that could be so, and things that are contigently so. That is, God knows what must be, what could be, and what is. With that knowledge, He was able to make a world that took into account all of our free choices (after running through what all possible choices we could make), and was still the best possible world. He could not make a world, I assume, free of evil choices without limiting (vastly) the number of people that would be present in it. Perhaps He could not call into being a world without that specific fallen angel, there would have been multiple of his sort (rather than just demons), or people in that world would become largely self assured, loveless libertines.

Think of it in these terms: causally prior to the creative act, God foresaw every possible outcome of every created beings possible choices. IE, if Joe was in this position, with my complete foreknowledge of every possible outcome, I know that he would make choice A. There is no chance of him making choice B, no matter what I do (for he is free), so I will never put him in that situation (and the world in which choice B occurs is not possible, and the world of choice A is undesirable). So even with omniscience of this degree (much greater than is often attributed to Him) and with omnipotence, some worlds are just not possible. What God did do, and I have faith in this, is call into being the world in which the most possible people come to love, both Him and each other. Now, I am talking about over the course of all of history, and in the face of the rather awful choices we are want to make. This what we call The Best Possible World, and it is by no means logically inconsistent with the existence of a fallen angel or two, or terrorists attacks, etc. Let us say that the good of people like you (who do love) is worth the cost of a Satan. This world He so loved, as He saw it in his foreknowledge, that it was worth that cost, and remember, the cost of a Son on the Cross.

Obviously, this is only if A) you take the Bible as seriously as I do you think Molinism is a viable design for omniscience.

I would love feedback on this!

What I have seen a lot of here, though, is people failing to acknowledge that what they don't like is the representation of the concept of divinity through the lens of a particular religious creed, rather than the idea itself, and going into battle, teeth bared on both sides of the debate, on the basis that if you deem a belief or lack of illogical, then those who think differently are foolish, unintelligent and credulous. Yes, we are here to debate, but the venom that this seems to provoke is disturbing when neither side can be proved absolutely, especially when we all, I'd be willing to bet, hold beliefs of some sort that could be equally called illogical.

That much, particularly the last sentence, is clear. The greatest challenge to any kind of productive discourse is our inability to see the inconsistencies, assumptions, presuppositions, and biases inherent in our own worldview. But to work those out, we would need to talk more than, at this point, we are willing to do. So, such is life.

I know for a fact that I don't take the Bible as seriously as you do. I think it is inspiring, and can be instructive in some areas of life, but I don't see it as the end-all authority.

As an end-all authority, even I admit it is challenging, at best. We will continue to debate legitimate methods of interpretation forever.

I'm curious about the concept of "Best Possible World". That isn't a Biblical idea, so where did it come from?

Orginally, molinism itself (and the concept of middle knowledge) came out of the counter reformation. More recently, Alvin Plantinga (our greatest living philospher) developed it with the idea of counterfactuals and the "many worlds" concept. It is not explicity stated in the bible, but it is based on the biblical concept of God's complete knowledge and foreknowledge.

It's interesting to think about, but I think it's a bit of a cop-out. For one, it kind of strips God of his omnipotence, huh? Even He wasn't capable of creating a world without all this suffering?

Omnipotence is one of the most contentiously debated of all of Gods attibutes. To simply assume that He can do absolutely anything, and then define that as true omnipotence, is to assume that He can make a square circle, or something so heavy that He cannot lift it, etc. I mean, it is to assume that He can make something irrational or incoherent, which makes Him irrational. Rather, we must assume that if God is real, then within Him is contained the model of all truths. He is coherent and rational, therefore all truth things will be as well. God's will is free, but there are certain things that, while technically possible, He will not do, such as evil. As well, while He could make a world without suffering, He could not do that while leaving every will free. That would be, for these purposes, making a square circle, or a married bachelor. This is less a limitation of His power than it is an expression of His willingness to honor our right to choose freely. That is, for us to truly be allowed to choose, He left us with A) incomplete knowledge (He could not make us all omniscient) the possibility of defect (the choices must be legit, the inability to make a wrong choice is an attibute of God, not us), C) the choice to not honor Him. I also think He limits our exposure to the Spiritual world, for all the same reasons.

If you take the Bible very seriously, the predictions in Revelation depict a paradise earth with us all living in peaceful harmonious happiness forever....if that can/will be achieved, why didn't we just start out that way instead of the big cosmic "game" ('let's see if they'll eat the apple' sort of seems like entrapment to me.)

I think this world has its own joys and purposes, some of which we will likely never know. However, it is all seen as "good" by God in the beginning. We must not be fooled into thinking that this is just a waiting game. This world has childbirth, childhood, marriage, growth and change, mystery, and choice! The New Earth, and the Kingdom of God, well, the defect is removed from us, we are sealed in the Spirit, and the Spirit of God (the Shekina Glory) is everywhere present. I believe that, at that point, we are infused with Love such that no one will (not to say that no one can) make an unloving choice. However, this is the swoon of God, not the woo. Here, so that we may choose Him fairly, He romances us from a distance. There, after we have chosen Him and endured to the end, He loves us passionately in tight embrace. We are the Bride of Christ, and that period is the honeymoon. However, there are those that will never chose Him. If they were placed in that situation, it would be something like Spiritual rape, with their choices overwhelmed and forced into His embrace. He will not do that, for it is the greatest spiritual evil. Though, He loves them still. (in this example, think of someone like Caligula or Pol Pot, and imagine what they would go through in their conscience and person being exposed to the glory of God, and embraced by love).

As to the apple, I consider that informed consent. When raising kids, we tell them what their limitations are, what the rules are. We know very well that by overtly mentioning the limits that they will specifically challenge them, but it is no choice at all if we never even tell them! Whether or not it occured exactly as written is a different matter. I have a belief of Genesis that is loyal to the spirit (creation from nothing, humans designed rather than chance driven, a fall from innocence, and a grand command and plan for man), but not literalistic. Christ, however, took adam and the fall seriously, so I do as well. God raised up the first man and woman (from something else), and they failed to obey some simple rules and lost paradise. They did, however, have a choice, and were still given the chance to live out His plan for life and salvation.

Also, I have a major problem with the story of Job. In it, God seems to be playing chicken with the Devil, using poor Job and all his family as the game pieces. Do you see Job as a parable or a historical account? Either way, the story itself is disturbing to me in a huge way. I'd never engage in any such activities that would do so much harm to my child, yet God who loves us more completely than any other is willing to torture Job almost to death, and does let his whole family get killed. If Satan is the one "doing" all these things to Job, but (omnipotent) God isn't stopping them, then He's kind of an accomplice, right?

I can honestly say that I do not have great insight into that book. Sometimes I honestly think it is a warning to Israel, and us after, that neither good fortune or bad, suffering or comfort, justifies us. That is, we cannot say that we are on the right or wrong path just by looking at what the world has given us. It also appears to be a reminder that we cannot look around us and see all truths, that the works of the Spiritual world are invisible to us. We cannot judge rightly all causes.

Now, how all that reflects on the relationship of God to us, and Satan to us, I see it as a reminder that God knows us, heart and soul, and that satan (or any other created being) does not. It demonstrated that God knew exactly how Job would stay true to the end, and satan, despite his accusations, would fail. I think, to some extent, it also foreshadows the Temptation of Christ. And, it may have also been a legitimate overture to a being with free will, a reminder to him that he remains wrong about God and man, and that he can return with nothing more than repentance. However, the book bothers me as well. I am a convinced Christian, but that does not mean that I am certain on many specifics, or that my knowledge is comprehensive.

I look forward to yor thoughts...

Indeed!

This is the very essence of why I believe we are all destined for Heaven. God gave us our free will because he knows that no matter how much we use it for actions that do not represent who we really are (creatures of God), we are all going to be re-embraced by Him when we die and rejoin Heaven.

Interesting words 'rejoin' and 're-embraced'. I understood you to say that you believed in transmigration and reincarnation, do you also believe in the pre-existence of souls? No big deal if you do, I think Origen did as well, just interesting.

I know this is very controversial, but I do not believe God has any preference in our behavior. If anything we were to choose ran counter to His will, and we were still able to carry it out....then we are thwarting His will. Since I don't think we are capable of that, I revert to actual, total, absolute freedom of choice.

Gosh, I am not that sure how to approach this. I have heard the argument that a perfect designer cannot make a creature that will fail in its purpose, but you stated that we do act in ways that do not represent who we are, so that is not your assertion. I hesitate to interpret this as saying that God has made His will permissive to the extent that it covers such behaviour, as that sounds like a perfect God compromising Himself. As such, I assume that it is a straightforward assertion of the irresistability of Sovereign Will. However, I struggle with how to reconcile that with radical freedom? It makes God radically free (in terms of agency), but seems to make us only free in terms of moral accountability. If we cannot freely reject Him, and have that choice honored after our deaths, where is our freedom?

I will say that I have a different view of how we fail morally. We are built to make free moral choices, our freedom as agents is one of the ways that we are like God. When we did whatever it was that we did to gain the knowledge of good and evil (that fruit of that one banned tree), we became just like God in this regard, as it is explicitly stated. But that did not save or condemn us. It just made us responsible for our much more informed choices. But I don't think it is "rule breaking" that damns us, or a lack of meticulous obediance to statute to code. It is not behaviours. Otherwise Christ would have celebrated Pharisees. No, it is a lack of love. Though we are just as responsible for the knowledge of good and evil as God is, we cannot love like Him, which is to say, perfectly. We cannot do unto others..., or love God with all our heart and minds. And, since we will always fail in that regard, we are left with Faith. But if faith saves, what is the point of love? The answer, for me, is that my very pursuit of love is what led me to God, and that my faith in Him is a hope that He will fill me with the Spirit of love, so that I might follow His command to love Him, and love my fellow man. Thus, though we lack love, it is our desire for it that leads us to faith, and then saves us. Truly, it is perfect love that brought Christ to the Cross, and imperfect love that brought me to Christ.

But you wouldn't set your kids up for failure....you wouldn't leave them alone in a room with a flamethrower and tell them not to burn down the house.....and then hold their greatgreatgreatgreatgrandchildren accountable for the burnt house.

Darn kids, always burning the house down with my military surplus. True enough! I take it, though, that we were given paradise, and dominion, and asked only to stay away from a single fruit of a single tree. As Christ said: "Whoever can be trusted with very little can also be trusted with much, and whoever is dishonest with very little will also be dishonest with much." As a people, we could not handle a single rule, and we lost our dominion over the first paradise, and condemned Jesus to the cross. But, hey, it was not the end of the road!

I am relieved to hear you're more inclined to see Adam/Eve as a parable than as a factual account. I'm always completely befuddled when I meet those who would insist that Adam/Eve are historical figures, and they were the first human pair. I try to reason with them, point out how any species with only 1 breeding pair is essentially extinct because of the tiny gene pool, but alas.

Genesis is always asked to do things I don't think it was ever designed for.

A thought on that.... I've heard the Adam/Eve stort defended because Christ referred to them, but my instant reaction was....so what? Just because Christ referred to them to tell a story doesn't mean they were actual people, just as if I was referring to Luke Skywalker or Johnny Appleseed. Just because the story has permeated culture to the point that we all know who that is....doesn't make it a factual account. Example: Betsy Ross is often credited with making the first American flag. Historically, this is a myth, but it has permeated culture so much that many many people would quote that as fact.

For me, as a believer that Christ is God, it is a little different. It is stated in more places than one that no one has ever seen God the Father, and that we only know of Him through what we have seen of Jesus. As such, it is my impression that it is the pre-incarnate Christ that has dealt with man from the get go. It is stated that all things were made through Him, so that supports the notion that it is Him calling reality into existence in Genesis 1:1. That would mean that, if God really walked through the garden and talked to Adam, it would have been Jesus. As such, He is referencing an incident from His personal experience. Anyway, as Jesus is the king of parables, I take it that it means that a very important lesson and truth is in there, but that I have no idea what the biographic details are.

Incidentally, I am mortified to see my typo in the earlier post.... I'm a teacher damnit and I hate leaving typos out there on the internet LOL

I was going to give you a hard time about that, except that I actually did not notice. I was too busy glowering over my own previous errors!!

O_C writes: What a fascinating idea - I like this. Thanks for sharing something to think about!


The great mysteries of neuroscience have a long way to go before anything conclusive is proved, in either direction - the greatest neuroscientist I know, and I know a fair few (medical/scientific family)...

Oddly enough, it is a neuroscientist that proposed that to me. A researcher from the UW, no less! He feels we cannot find the the mechanism by which faith works through analytics, but more through an apophatic, what it is not sort of way. I just wish I understood a larger percentage of what the heck he was telling me.

...is frequently heard to say that neuroscience is barely in it's infancy, and that the arrogance of those who believe they know a lot when they truly understand only an infinitesimal amount will hold the study of the brain and its' workings in the childhood phase for hundreds of years yet. (Interestingly, he's also a man of faith, who says that the only proof of God's existence he personally needs is the miraculous efficiency, capacity and adaptability of the human brain, the design of which, in his view, can only be explained by the existence of an omnipotent, omniscient creator.)

Indeed, my contact in the field was once on the way to becoming a monk in the Greek Orthodox faith (he is a Greek immigrant). Probably the most faith filled man I have ever known, while still managing to be quite the smartest. Perhaps these two are related?!

Glad you enjoyed my post - I just drop in every now and then, but have found this thread very worthwhile reading.

It got better once I realized that I had no real control over the narrative it wanted to tell!