Was humanity set up for failure in the Garden?

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Was humanity set up for failure in the Garden?

Post by _SoaringEagle » Sun Jul 09, 2006 3:27 pm

Did God set humanity up for failure in the Garden? If so doesn't this show Him to be cruel, schizoid, or psychotic?


This, and many other closely related questions are attached with it to show the absurdity of the Character of God. However, I have found the best response out there to ALL of these questions, from our good friend and apologist, Glenn Miller.

Go here for his resposes. For the best outcome, go to a local library and print them out. There are five parts by him, and each part has many pages worth of material. This definately is not a desparate pat answer or attempt to reconcile these objections. Enjoy

http://www.christian-thinktank.com/gutripper.html
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Re: Was humanity set up for failure in the Garden?

Post by _Asimov » Fri Jul 21, 2006 12:59 am

SoaringEagle wrote:Did God set humanity up for failure in the Garden? If so doesn't this show Him to be cruel, schizoid, or psychotic?


This, and many other closely related questions are attached with it to show the absurdity of the Character of God. However, I have found the best response out there to ALL of these questions, from our good friend and apologist, Glenn Miller.

Go here for his resposes. For the best outcome, go to a local library and print them out. There are five parts by him, and each part has many pages worth of material. This definately is not a desparate pat answer or attempt to reconcile these objections. Enjoy

http://www.christian-thinktank.com/gutripper.html
I don't get it.
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Post by _SoaringEagle » Fri Jul 21, 2006 7:25 pm

Surely you are familiar with the question Reggie Finnley has asked in his discussion with Gene Cook, Matt Slick, and Steve Gregg concerning God knowing the Future "His Omniscience" and the temptation that Adam faced in the Garden along with God's command to not eat from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, right?

There are other questions that comes in to play that are closely related to this that makes us even more curious about God's character and nature found in the Holy Scriptures.

Anyways, this question IMO is thoroughly answered at the link above. You should read it sometime :wink:

Your Friend,
SoaringEagle
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Post by _Asimov » Fri Jul 21, 2006 7:32 pm

SoaringEagle wrote:Surely you are familiar with the question Reggie Finnley has asked in his discussion with Gene Cook, Matt Slick, and Steve Gregg concerning God knowing the Future "His Omniscience" and the temptation that Adam faced in the Garden along with God's command to not eat from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, right?

There are other questions that comes in to play that are closely related to this that makes us even more curious about God's character and nature found in the Holy Scriptures.

Anyways, this question IMO is thoroughly answered at the link above. You should read it sometime :wink:

Your Friend,
SoaringEagle
I did read it. I don't think he answered it.

He stuck some "wildcard" about free will in there that I don't think is applicable with omniscience.
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Re: Was humanity set up for failure in the Garden?

Post by _CFChristian » Fri Jul 21, 2006 8:00 pm

SoaringEagle wrote:Did God set humanity up for failure in the Garden? If so doesn't this show Him to be cruel, schizoid, or psychotic?


This, and many other closely related questions are attached with it to show the absurdity of the Character of God. However, I have found the best response out there to ALL of these questions, from our good friend and apologist, Glenn Miller.

Go here for his resposes. For the best outcome, go to a local library and print them out. There are five parts by him, and each part has many pages worth of material. This definately is not a desparate pat answer or attempt to reconcile these objections. Enjoy

http://www.christian-thinktank.com/gutripper.html

NO :!:
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2 Corinthians 5:10 For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ; that every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad.

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Post by _SoaringEagle » Fri Jul 21, 2006 8:52 pm

you (Asimov) wrote
He stuck some "wildcard" about free will in there that I don't think is applicable with omniscience.
Is that so? True, he "touched" on the "complexity" of choice, but when I say touched, I do mean touched, as in, that was only a "small" part of His very long response that consists of 5 pieces.

If you want do down grade his material to this challenging question to the Character of God as some "wildcard", you are certainly free to do so. But this only makes it seem like you didn't even read all of what he said, and does sound more like some of the weaker apolgetic responses to this question which you more or likely have heard, and it makes it seem like you pressupose he takes the same direction with his answer, which seems like you didn't read all of his material. That's just what it seems.

What Glenn Miller did do was show the problems with the premise and conclusion of God's character from the skeptics perception, and on each of these stated problems he explains why this is so:

1) The first major problem with his construction of the dynamics of the Garden is that it makes too much of too little.

2) Secondly, the skeptic's position oversimplifies the complexity of choice and influence, between the agents in the story and even relative to us.

3) Thirdly, also out of whack here is the relationship between the serpent and the humans.

4) Fourth, the skeptic has made a rather common error of caricaturing the nature of the afterlife.

5) Fifth, the metaphor of the nuclear bomb, although clever and forceful, is quite backwards

6) Sixth, the remark about the whole thing being "orchestrated to make us feel dependent upon God" is pure conjecture (and maybe even unjustified paranoia).

7) Seventh, the comment about God "staking the future of mankind on this one event" is likewise confused.

8) Eight, the scenario commits a rather odd type of blame-shifting.

9) Nine, the objection fails to appreciate (or take seriously) the nature and value of history.

10) Tenth, the position has the methodological burden-of-proof problem of all conspiracy theories--it takes more data to prove these second-order theories than it does to accept the more simpler first-order theories.

11) Eleventh, as a predictive model, this view of God's character fails rather significantly.

Also, free will is completely applicaply with Omniscience. It is entirely possible that God's knowledge of the future no more determines the future than our (humans') knowledge of the past determines the past.

Your Friend,
SoaringEagle
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Post by _Asimov » Sat Jul 22, 2006 12:43 am

SoaringEagle wrote: Is that so? True, he "touched" on the "complexity" of choice, but when I say touched, I do mean touched, as in, that was only a "small" part of His very long response that consists of 5 pieces.
Yes, but if his entire diatribe rests on a fallacy that free will is applicable with omniscient beings then his whole house of cards falls apart.
Also, free will is completely applicaply with Omniscience. It is entirely possible that God's knowledge of the future no more determines the future than our (humans') knowledge of the past determines the past.

Your Friend,
SoaringEagle
Of course it does.

Knowledge = Justified True Belief.
Free Will = The ability to refrain from making a specific choice (x) at a specific time in the future (t).

Premise:
1. If God has always foreknown that Asimov would eat pizza at t, then it is not within Asimov's power to refrain from eating pizza at t.
2. If it is not within Asimov's power to refrain from eating pizza at t, then Asimov's eating pizza at t is not a libertarian free action.
Conclusion:
1. Therefore, if God has always foreknown that Asimov would eat pizza at t, then Asimov's eating pizza at t, is not a libertarian free action. (from P1 and P2)
2. If God has foreknowledge of every human action, then no person's action is a libertarian free action. (from IC, parity of reasoning)

Conclusion, God knowing the future makes all future actions facts. Facts are immutable. If it were not a fact that a specific action would occur at a specific point in time in the future, then it would demonstrate that God does not have total knowledge.
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Post by _SoaringEagle » Sat Jul 22, 2006 11:52 am

You (Asimov) wrote:
Yes, but if his entire diatribe rests on a fallacy that free will is applicable with omniscient beings then his whole house of cards falls apart.


Notice that your word "IF". That's the thing with Miller's Material. His entire diatribe does not rest on free will being applicable with omniscence. Not in the sence that all the rest of his material stands on that foundational premise. So his whole house of cards still stands.

You (Asimov) wrote:
Knowledge = Justified True Belief.
Free Will = The ability to refrain from making a specific choice (x) at a specific time in the future (t).
Let me give you further understanding of Free will. J.P. Moreland and W.L. Craig have this to say about it (which I believe):
There is freedom of moral and rational responsibility - that freedom, whatever it turns out to be, that is part of human action and agency, in which the human being acts as an agent who is in some sense the originator of one's own actions, and in this sense, is in control of one's own action. This type of freedom serves as a necessary condition for moral, and some would say, intellectual responsibility.

Premise:
1. If God has always foreknown that Asimov would eat pizza at t, then it is not within Asimov's power to refrain from eating pizza at t.

I would say that this is an example of a non sequitur; your argument does not follow consistently from the premise. Because of this, point 2) of your premise and the rest of your conclusion is flawed. Here is why:

Let's say God does foreknow all future choices. That knowledge alone does not compell or interfere with the present choices of human beings, just like our memory of the past does not interfere with our past choices. God's knowledge of the future bring in no force, influence, or anything that compells us with our choices.


My question to you is:

If our knowledge of the past doesn't interfere with the present choices we make in the past, then why is it that God's knowledge of our future choices must interfere with them?
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Post by _Derek » Sat Jul 22, 2006 12:40 pm

Asimov,

God simply knows the final outcome of our freewill choices.

Whatever is going to happen, is going to happen. He simply knows in advance.

This does not take away the fact that what happens is a result of our freewill choices.

That God has always know you would eat pizza at t, does not change the fact that you ate at t of your own free will. You always had the "power" to not eat there, it is just that God knew in advance that you would not exercise said "power".
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Some trust in chariots, and some in horses: but we will remember the name of the LORD our God.
Psalm 20:7

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Post by _Asimov » Sat Jul 22, 2006 1:08 pm

SoaringEagle wrote: I would say that this is an example of a non sequitur; your argument does not follow consistently from the premise. Because of this, point 2) of your premise and the rest of your conclusion is flawed. Here is why:

Let's say God does foreknow all future choices. That knowledge alone does not compell or interfere with the present choices of human beings, just like our memory of the past does not interfere with our past choices. God's knowledge of the future bring in no force, influence, or anything that compells us with our choices.
Listen, SE. If the future is set and is a fact, then we as humans cannot change those facts. Facts are immutable. Our memory of the past doesn't interfere with our past choices because they've already happened. The future hasn't yet.

Knowledge itself does not force, influence, or compell....but the fact that our future choices are already set means that we cannot change them.

Even if we are told that in the future Asimov would eat pizza at t, I would be unable to change it if it were a fact. I cannot prevent or changet that because it is a fact.
My question to you is:

If our knowledge of the past doesn't interfere with the present choices we make in the past, then why is it that God's knowledge of our future choices must interfere with them?
For one, the past has already happened. The future being set interferes with our ability to retrain from making specific choices in the future.
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