Armand Jacks Destroys ID in One Sentence

_{Barry Arrington

April 16, 2017

Intelligent Design}

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Armand Jacks says he has a knock down show stopping argument to rebut ID’s claim that intelligent agency is the only known cause of specified complexity.

Get ready.

Hold on to your hat.

Here it is:

Using the same argument, the only known causes of everything we have ever seen in the entire universe are material causes.

Are blind unguided material forces capable of typing the post you just posted AJ? If you say “no” your argument is refuted. If you say “yes” you look like a fool or a liar or both. Talk about the Scylla and Charybdis.

AJ, you really should stop and think for 10 seconds before you write something like that down. I know, I know. Thinking is hard, and 10 seconds is a long time. But still.

As for the title of this post, on reflection maybe I overstated AJ’s accomplishment a little.

Comments

Gun, maybe the omniscient god crowd could benefit from the multiverse theory. But I have not seen it supported here at UD.Armand Jacks_{April 17, 2017
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kf,
GUN, I note how you twisted we watch and know the outcome of a game on tape, into suggesting that the players involved in the live process had no freedom of action while they were playing.
No, what I actually said is that things on a tape are determined. (Is there anyone that would disagree with that?) Although, I think most would, indeed, say that if it were possible, in principle, to watch a tape of the game before the game was played then the players didn’t actually have free will. The players certainly felt as though they did, but that it was an “illusion” as everything was already determined before the game was played (otherwise, how would it be possible to watch such a tape? And what sense would it make to say that the outcome of the game was decided by decisions the players made if everything was determined before the decisions?) Compatibilists would differ, and argue that even though everything was, indeed, determined, that the players still had free will as such foreknowledge didn’t cause their decisions. From your responses I can’t tell what, if anything, you actually disagree with in my posts. I also can’t tell what your position. Are you saying that events on a tape aren’t determined? If you agree that they are determined, in what way aren’t you a compatibilist?goodusername_{April 17, 2017
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WJM:
Oh dear Lord the things meatbots say.
I guess it was too much to expect that WJM could rise above the level of childish taunting.Armand Jacks_{April 17, 2017
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Oh dear Lord the things meatbots say.William J Murray_{April 17, 2017
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PaV:
Consider this: I’m out for the day. I’ve taped the Maple Leaf hockey game. On the way home, I hear the final score. Does this mean that when I watch the game on replay, there is no free will involved at all, e.g., the losing side pulling its goalie?
So you believe that god has no knowledge of the future? If he exists, I agree with that assumption. Unfortunately, you would be at odds with many Christians (and Jews and Muslims).Armand Jacks_{April 17, 2017
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WJM:
No, it does not. Good lord. Please think before you write. Try to understand – actually understand – what is being written. **IF** free will exists, materialism cannot logically ground it. That doesn’t “presuppose” that free will exists.
Good lord. Please read the comment I am responding to before you criticize others. There was no **IF** anywhere in that comment. All you said was that materialism can't ground free will. And that is definitely a circular argument. It presupposes that true free will exists. And by free will I mean that the thought/decision precedes the chemical changes in the brain that result in our action.
Please try and understand how utterly irrelevant this is. It doesn’t matter in this argument one iota if materialism can give us the illusion that we have free will; the argument here is about the logical consequences between (1) having actual free will, and (2) not having actual fee will. Whether the feeling or sensation or perception that one has free will is produced as a kind of illusion is meaningless.
Of course it is relevant. Do you have any evidence that the thought precedes the chemical change in the brain? If you do, I would love to read the paper. If not, the inevitable logical conclusion is that the thought and decision are the result of theses changes rather than being caused by them.
The turing test is not a test of free will, Armand. Oh, Jeez. Please, please try and understand this.
Oh, Jeez. Please, please stop being such a condescending little child and attempt to have a civil discussion. A Turing test attempts to use a computer to fool a person into thinking they are having a real conversation with a person rather than a program. Perceiving free will in the responses is definitely one of the ways we decide whether we are talking to a person or a program.
if we can create a robot that there is absolutely no way for us to determine if it has free will/independent consciousness or not. It’s utterly irrelevant to the point.
Bolding the last sentence doesn't make it any more valid.
If we do not actually have free will, then we are all meatbots that think and say whatever physical processes dictate, whether or not they have anything to do with truth and reality because we have no supernatural capacity (meaning, power over the dictates of the physical) to discern truth or to impose that truth upon the physical nature of our physical systems.
Nonsense. My brain has trillions of synapses that can react in trillions of different ways to trillions of different inputs. If you can devise a test to control for the trillions (-1) inputs so that you can demonstrate that free will is real, you would have a point. Until then, the best you can say is "I don't know". As I do. If this brain pattern and process couldn't discern between what is to our advantage and what is not, we would long be extinct. Notice that I didn't say "truth" because "truth" is the pervue (and delusion) of the theist.Armand Jacks_{April 17, 2017
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JAD, You are correct, sir. There are many levels of wrongness with the Atheist/Materialist religion. Andrewasauber_{April 17, 2017
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Andrew @ 46, “Based on the tiny speck of evidence their sphere of perception yields, they can determine, somehow, what’s not out there somewhere, and it’s God that’s the only thing that is not Out There.” Not only that but AJ, according to his own worldview, IS just an insignificant speck. How can one speck another speck what to think and believe? Isn’t that a little bit presumptive? I actually agree with Bill Nye on this point. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8kBbEQvgJecjohn_a_designer_{April 17, 2017
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AJ: The complexity and connections in the human brain dwarf the complexity of these computers. If the complexity in these computers can give the perception of free will, or at least come close to it, why can’t the brain?
Who is duped by the brain here? You are pulling a consciousness which has perceptions out of thin air. How do you ground this consciousness? It reminds me of the writings of A.Rosenberg
FOR SOLID EVOLUTIONARY REASONS, WE’VE BEEN tricked into looking at life from the inside. Without scientism, we look at life from the inside, from the first-person POV (OMG, you don’t know what a POV is?—a “point of view”). The first person is the subject, the audience, the viewer of subjective experience, the self in the mind. Scientism shows that the first-person POV is an illusion.
Who has been tricked, Rosenberg? Who is "we"? If consciousness is an illusion, who is having the illusion?Origenes_{April 17, 2017
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Armand Jack:
Of course it does. If I know that the Toronto Maple Leafs are going to win the next game, the free will of the players on both teams mean absolutely nothing. If god knows that the Maple Leafs will win the next game, the same applies. Free will is dead.
Here is the nub of your error in thinking. Consider this: I'm out for the day. I've taped the Maple Leaf hockey game. On the way home, I hear the final score. Does this mean that when I watch the game on replay, there is no free will involved at all, e.g., the losing side pulling its goalie? This makes no sense in terms of the normal persons everyday experience of things. You need to make some sensible statement of how 'free will' is absent here.PaV_{April 17, 2017
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The argument that God's omniscience invalidates free will is dependent upon a hidden premise, that God *in the past* infallibly knows what will happen in the future. However, traditional accounts of omniscience also claim that God is not within time, and consequently it cannot be said that God is in the past. As we see with the videotape example, if the knower's knowledge does not temporally precede the event, then the knowledge does not impinge on anyone's free will. Likewise, if God is outside of time, then it is a category error to say His knowledge precedes any event. Thus, the dilemma of omniscience and free will disappears.EricMH_{April 17, 2017
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The other thing that gets me with materialists and atheists is their beliefs about the universe based on really really small sample sizes. Based on the tiny speck of evidence their sphere of perception yields, they can determine, somehow, what's not out there somewhere, and it's God that's the only thing that is not Out There. Everything else could be out there though, from the boring to the unimaginable, to peanut butter pancakes. Undefinable, undetectable, and in infinite numbers, there are multiverses acting in combinations that All Things emerge from. Heavens Yes and Amen! God? Nah. Andrewasauber_{April 17, 2017
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Armand said:
That presupposes that free will as an absolute truly exists.
No, it does not. Good lord. Please think before you write. Try to understand - actually understand - what is being written. **IF** free will exists, materialism cannot logically ground it. That doesn't "presuppose" that free will exists.
It’s a circular argument.
No, it is not. If free will exists, materialism cannot account for it. It is a true dichotomy which is why compatibalism was invented.
Our brains have 100 billion cells and 100 trillion synapses (1 trillion by some accounts). Can you say with certainty that this level of complexity cannot give us a perception of free will.
Please try and understand how utterly irrelevant this is. It doesn't matter in this argument one iota if materialism can give us the illusion that we have free will; the argument here is about the logical consequences between (1) having actual free will, and (2) not having actual fee will. Whether the feeling or sensation or perception that one has free will is produced as a kind of illusion is meaningless.
We have come close to beating the Turing test (some say we have beaten it) with computer programming and power that is minuscule when compared to that of the brain. And before you say that a Turing test isn’t a test of free will, I suggest that you think hard about it.
The turing test is not a test of free will, Armand. Oh, Jeez. Please, please try and understand this. It doesn't matter one bit if we can create a robot that there is absolutely no way for us to determine if it has free will/independent consciousness or not. It's utterly irrelevant to the point. The point is the difference between what it means (logical ramifactions) of actually having free will and actually not having free will. A thing being able to give the impression of having free will doesn't change the logical ramifications of not having actual free will. If we do not actually have free will, then we are all meatbots that think and say whatever physical processes dictate, whether or not they have anything to do with truth and reality because we have no supernatural capacity (meaning, power over the dictates of the physical) to discern truth or to impose that truth upon the physical nature of our physical systems.William J Murray_{April 17, 2017
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You may want to look at the following article which looks at the Eastern Orthodox view of freewill. (The author’s quotes are from the 1672 Synod of Jerusalem document the “Confession of Dositheus.”)
“We believe the most good God to have from eternity predestinated unto glory those whom He has chosen, and to have consigned unto condemnation those whom He has rejected; but not so that He would justify the one, and consign and condemn the other without cause.” The key here is that while believing in predestination, they do not believe that it is “without cause.” The agent of the cause is not God’s sovereign will, as is the case in the “unconditional predestination” of Calvinists, but in man’s free will. “But since He foreknew the one would make a right use of their free-will, and the other a wrong, He predestinated the one, or condemned the other.”
http://www.reclaimingthemind.org/blog/2010/10/an-eastern-orthodox-view-of-predestination/ Personally I think Christian theology across the spectrum gets a little too presumptive, especially when it comes to questions of God’s foreknowledge, predestination and human freewill. We humans are not God, and while the Bible is very clear that we are made in the image of God and that we can relate to God in personal way as children to a father, it is also is very clear that we cannot understand the mind of God or what it is to be God (See Isaiah 55:8-9, Romans 11:34, I Corinthians 10-16.)john_a_designer_{April 17, 2017
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AJ @ 25 said: "The accusation against any atheist/materialist/physicalist when discussing ID, religion, morality, etc. Is that we are hyperskeptical." Wrong. The accusation is NOT that you are hyper-skeptical. The accusation is that you are a religious zealot of a faith-based philosophical worldview (atheism/materialism)...PRETENDING to be objective. You are a deeply religious person with a tremendous amount of faith...in atheism/materialism.Truth Will Set You Free_{April 17, 2017
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F/N: It seems that someone refuses to study computational substrates and how they work, imagining that calling things bare assertions is enough to avoid thinking through what is involved. Likewise, that person refuses to ponder the forces and factors at work in the physical world, once agency is ruled out: blind chance working through stochastic and chaotic butterfly effect factors and/or mechanical necessity. neither of these can properly account for rational insight, choice and action. The real bare assertion is that one can do so, which was made in the name of the poof magic of emergence. It is time for serious rethinking. KF PS: An illustrative case in point, from Reppert:
. . . let us suppose that brain state A, which is token identical to the thought that all men are mortal, and brain state B, which is token identical to the thought that Socrates is a man, together cause the belief that Socrates is mortal. It isn’t enough for rational inference that these events be those beliefs, it is also necessary that the causal transaction be in virtue of the content of those thoughts . . . [[But] if naturalism is true, then the propositional content is irrelevant to the causal transaction that produces the conclusion, and [[so] we do not have a case of rational inference. In rational inference, as Lewis puts it, one thought causes another thought not by being, but by being seen to be, the ground for it. But causal transactions in the brain occur in virtue of the brain’s being in a particular type of state that is relevant to physical causal transactions.
PPS: Modifying bodily temp set-point in an endothermic individual is not to be confused with the underlying process that emerges -- proper sense -- as temperature. That is, the average random energy per degree of molecular scale particle level freedom as further adjusted i/l/o quantum considerations. Where a typical body in that sense has 10^20 - 10^26 or so particles in it. PPS: No, the Turing test is not a proper test of understanding, responsible rational freedom or of many other things. It is a functional test that in effect says you cannot tell the difference between performance of a live individual and that of a suitably programmed machine under certain rather restricted circumstances.kairosfocus_{April 17, 2017
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Yes. At bottom, Christianity, religion, are founded on great imponderable mysteries, paradoxes, oxymorons that just happen to be true. It's perhaps the one thing our atheist interlocutors get right. But that is how it was meant to be, since it is the heart not the head that will see us in heaven or hell. God always leaves some wriggle-room for the malcontents. After all He could make it a 'slam dunk' for his worshippers to evangelise if He'd wished to, as He could have done, himself, while on earth. However, it's noteworthy that Jesus (simultaneously, true God and true man) kept his most staggering miracles of unambiguously divine power for his small band of disciples, Peter, James and John and sometimes one or two others. That is to say, all of them except his raising the already-putrifying Lazarus from the dead ; which was probably necessary to bring about his crucifixion. And even then, though the politico-religious authorities must have know its implication of uniquely-divine power, they were only concerned with its possible political, worldly implications.Axel_{April 17, 2017
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GUN, I note how you twisted we watch and know the outcome of a game on tape, into suggesting that the players involved in the live process had no freedom of action while they were playing. In short, there are ideologically loaded fatal ambiguities in your forced re-reading of what I wrote and the dynamics at work in a taped event. To loose the tangle, I again come back to: can we truly love? That is decisive. If your answer implies, no, your scheme of thought is patently absurd. If it is yes, then you face the need to adjust your worldview to one in which genuine freedom exists. KFkairosfocus_{April 17, 2017
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WJM:
You offer a false dichotomy without even realizing it because of your apparently limited exposure to theistic/existential alternatives. God may not be all-knowing or all-powerful in the sense that you might imagine or define it.
I believe that is what I said at comment 29.
Whether or not god is all-knowing doesn’t change the logical fact that materialism cannot ground free will.
That presupposes that free will as an absolute truly exists. It's a circular argument. Our brains have 100 billion cells and 100 trillion synapses (1 trillion by some accounts). Can you say with certainty that this level of complexity cannot give us a perception of free will. We have come close to beating the Turing test (some say we have beaten it) with computer programming and power that is minuscule when compared to that of the brain. And before you say that a Turing test isn't a test of free will, I suggest that you think hard about it.Armand Jacks_{April 17, 2017
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KF:
changes traceable to forces of blind chance and/or mechanical necessity acting on matter and energy in space-time cannot account for freedom in the relevant sense.
This is merely a bald assertion.
No matter how complex or hard to specifically trace.
This is simply not true. Computers that have beat the Turing test, or come close to beating it, do so because complexity in programming and shear force of computing power. The complexity and connections in the human brain dwarf the complexity of these computers. If the complexity in these computers can give the perception of free will, or at least come close to it, why can't the brain? I am not saying that this is what actually happens, but simply dismissing it out of hand is an example of selective hyper skepticism.
Rise or fall of temperature in a body . . . a result traceable to an endlessly complex interaction of particles and their degrees of freedom to move in the mechanical sense . . . is not a subject of responsible, rational freedom.
Actually, there are studies to show that humans can use meditation techniques to modify body temperature, but that is an aside. I just mention it because I find it interesting.
The decision as to what to type in a comment here is; and if it were instead reduced to blind factors, its rational and responsible sense would inevitably be lost. KF
How do you know that my comments are not the results of a computer designed for a Turing test? :)Armand Jacks_{April 17, 2017
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Armand Jacks @ 25: You offer a false dichotomy without even realizing it because of your apparently limited exposure to theistic/existential alternatives. God may not be all-knowing or all-powerful in the sense that you might imagine or define it. So? Whether or not god is all-knowing doesn't change the logical fact that materialism cannot ground free will. You're either a meatbot, or you have a supernatural capacity. That is a true dichotomy which no amount of flowery terms or dodgy phrases can escape, and philosophers have realized this for centuries, and it is why atheistic materialists invented "compatibalism" - so they could redefine and thus simply use the term "free will" and not sound like blithering idiots when they had to admit they didn't have free will by the old definition.William J Murray_{April 17, 2017
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LM, as with you, I am agnostic to the existance of free will. Mostly because I can't think of any way to test it without accepting that you are not controlling for millions of variables. No scientist would accept the outcome of such a test.
Firstly, reduce free will to a cause. Secondly, insert it into a causal matrix. Thirdly, place that causal matrix within a structure of time that can be randomly accessed from some externality.
I'm not sure I understand what you are suggesting here. If you reduce free will to a cause, are you not eliminating free will? I suspect that is not what you are saying. I am probably not understanding what you mean by reducing free will to a cause.Armand Jacks_{April 17, 2017
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Armand Jacks, I would like to have your definition of a "material cause".LocalMinimum_{April 17, 2017
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kf,
The simple analogy of watching a video a second time after the fact not changing the reality of choices made by participants seen in the video then shows that knowledge of what will happen does not inherently force what happens. God would be in a position to see the video so to speak outside of our temporally constrained domain. I think you may imagine that as the future emerges through cause-effect bonds and chains, only an act in the present that utterly controls it to the point that agency is a delusion could lead to foreknowledge.
I'm not saying that foreknowledge is causation - we agree that it isn’t. What I've been saying is: If - in principle - there's a future to know - then the future is already determined. If I'm watching a tape of a sporting event from last year, and someone asks "why are you watching that, you already know who won," and I said that that isn’t determined, I'd get strange looks. If God could see the future as if watching a tape, then the future is determined (if the word has any meaning at all). OTOH, if the future isn’t determined, then there’s no future to see. (BTW, many scientists and philosophers make the same argument regarding time travel. Many would say that if, in principle, one could build a machine that will transport someone 1000 years into the future, then there is no free will, as it means that the future is determined - otherwise there would be no future to travel to. But they’re not saying, obviously, that the act of time traveling somehow determined the future.) The compatibilists, however, say that determinism is compatible with free will since foreknowledge is not causation nor coercion. But IMO that’s using “free will” in a much more restrictive sense than how most people use it.goodusername_{April 17, 2017
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WJM @23 Barry @24 This is an often overlooked but incredibly important topic. The article by theoretical physicist Paul Davies is IMHO a must read: Frozen Accidents: Can the Laws of Physics be Explained? excerpt:
But what are these ultimate laws and where do they come from? Such questions are often dismissed as being pointless or even unscientific. As the cosmologist Sean Carroll has written, “There is a chain of explanations concerning things that happen in the universe, which ultimately reaches to the fundamental laws of nature and stops… at the end of the day the laws are what they are… And that’s okay. I’m happy to take the universe just as we find it.” Conventionally, the job of the scientist is to simply assume the laws and get on with the job of applying them to real problems. ... There has long been a tacit assumption that the laws of physics were somehow imprinted on the universe at the outset, and have remained immutable thereafter. Physical processes, however violent or complex, are thought to have absolutely no effect on the laws. There is thus a curious asymmetry: Physical processes depend on laws but the laws do not depend on physical processes. Although this statement cannot be proved, it is widely accepted.
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F/N: changes traceable to forces of blind chance and/or mechanical necessity acting on matter and energy in space-time cannot account for freedom in the relevant sense. No matter how complex or hard to specifically trace. Rise or fall of temperature in a body . . . a result traceable to an endlessly complex interaction of particles and their degrees of freedom to move in the mechanical sense . . . is not a subject of responsible, rational freedom. Nor, is the output of a computer programmed to print Hello World on pressing a certain key, or even one programmed to mimic Rogerian counselling techniques, etc. The decision as to what to type in a comment here is; and if it were instead reduced to blind factors, its rational and responsible sense would inevitably be lost. KFkairosfocus_{April 17, 2017
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AJ:
We are being asked to believe that our free will can affect the outcome of something that is already known to happen. If there is something that warrants skepticism, this is it. All of this nonsense about god being out of time etc. is nothing more than an attempt to dance around the irrefutable logic.
I have no idea how free will would operate, where it comes from, etc. I'm agnostic with respect to it; but this is really not as hard as you're making it. Firstly, reduce free will to a cause. Secondly, insert it into a causal matrix. Thirdly, place that causal matrix within a structure of time that can be randomly accessed from some externality. BOOM! Free will independent from foreknowledge. Yes, it's hypothetical; but it's not at all contradictory.LocalMinimum_{April 17, 2017
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F/N: Not all atheists resort to the error of selective hyperskepticism, as some are a lot more careful in argument and in standards of warrant. Unfortunately, the particular circle we face and have faced for years does have the problem and are often resistant to the comparative difficulties process that solves it. From the Elevatorgate controversy, the same problem has surfaced even in assessing complaints about misbehaviour of men in atheist conventions. The problem occurs when there is a double-standard of warrant, often expressed as "extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence," or in the claim "there is no evidence," used to sweep away a case based on evidence that the atheist would dismiss. The answer is, that in real world cases we must recognise when we face a momentous, unavoidable choice (where dunno is not good enough) and where we must decide with much in the stakes, on the evidence we have or may access, not the evidence we could imagine or self-servingly demand. This means we need to look at adequate, consistent standards of warrant for comparable cases and responsible decision. Greenleaf's observations have been noted long since. KF PS: Greenleaf, yet again:
Evidence, in legal acceptation, includes all the means by which any alleged matter of fact, the truth of which is submitted to investigation, is established or disproved . . . None but mathematical truth is susceptible of that high degree of evidence, called demonstration, which excludes all possibility of error [--> Greenleaf wrote almost 100 years before Godel], and which, therefore, may reasonably be required in support of every mathematical deduction. [--> that is, his focus is on the logic of good support for in principle uncertain conclusions, i.e. in the modern sense, inductive logic and reasoning in real world, momentous contexts with potentially serious consequences.] Matters of fact are proved by moral evidence alone; by which is meant, not only that kind of evidence which is employed on subjects connected with moral conduct, but all the evidence which is not obtained either from intuition, or from demonstration. In the ordinary affairs of life, we do not require demonstrative evidence, because it is not consistent with the nature of the subject, and to insist upon it would be unreasonable and absurd. [--> the issue of warrant to moral certainty, beyond reasonable doubt; and the contrasted absurdity of selective hyperskepticism.] The most that can be affirmed of such things, is, that there is no reasonable doubt concerning them. [--> moral certainty standard, and this is for the proverbial man in the Clapham bus stop, not some clever determined advocate or skeptic motivated not to see or assent to what is warranted.] The true question, therefore, in trials of fact, is not whether it is possible that the testimony may be false, but, whether there is sufficient probability of its truth; that is, whether the facts are shown by competent and satisfactory evidence. Things established by competent and satisfactory evidence are said to be proved. [--> pistis enters; we might as well learn the underlying classical Greek word that addresses the three levers of persuasion, pathos- ethos- logos and its extension to address worldview level warranted faith-commitment and confident trust on good grounding, through the impact of the Judaeo-Christian tradition in C1 as was energised by the 500 key witnesses.] By competent evidence, is meant that which the very-nature of the thing to be proved requires, as the fit and appropriate proof in the particular case, such as the production of a writing, where its contents are the subject of inquiry. By satisfactory evidence, which is sometimes called sufficient evidence, is intended that amount of proof, which ordinarily satisfies an unprejudiced mind [--> in British usage, the man in the Clapham bus stop], beyond reasonable doubt. The circumstances which will amount to this degree of proof can never be previously defined; the only legal [--> and responsible] test of which they are susceptible, is their sufficiency to satisfy the mind and conscience of a common man; and so to convince him, that he would venture to act upon that conviction, in matters of the highest concern and importance to his own interest. [= definition of moral certainty as a balanced unprejudiced judgement beyond reasonable, responsible doubt. Obviously, i/l/o wider concerns, while scientific facts as actually observed may meet this standard, scientific explanatory frameworks such as hypotheses, models, laws and theories cannot as they are necessarily provisional and in many cases have had to be materially modified, substantially re-interpreted to the point of implied modification, or outright replaced; so a modicum of prudent caution is warranted in such contexts -- explanatory frameworks are empirically reliable so far on various tests, not utterly certain. ] [A Treatise on Evidence, Vol I, 11th edn. (Boston: Little, Brown, 1888) ch 1., sections 1 and 2. Shorter paragraphs added. (NB: Greenleaf was a founder of the modern Harvard Law School and is regarded as a founding father of the modern Anglophone school of thought on evidence, in large part on the strength of this classic work.)]
kairosfocus_{April 17, 2017
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Barry:
But free will exists.
I am not arguing against free will. Or at least the possibility that the chemical and physical factors that trigger a decision being so numerous and complex that what we have is indistinguishable from free will. What I am arguing is that you can't have an all knowing god and free will. You can certainly have a god that does not know the future, but that conflicts with some theistic teachings.Armand Jacks_{April 17, 2017
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If there is no or freewill or freedom of choice then there is no basis for morality… As someone has said, “ought implies can.” The clear teaching of Jesus parable of The Prodigal Son (Luke 15:11-32) is that the son made a willful intentional moral choice to leave his father and then later, when he realized the consequences of his first choice, and an equally intentional choice to repent and return to his father. However, maybe we do use the word “free” and “freewill” a little too loosely, because the sons “willful” first decision actually led to him losing his freedom. Is that a contradiction or a paradox?john_a_designer_{April 17, 2017
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