A What If Scenario: If America Became A Theocracy - Page 2

lew · 09-30-2006, 10:56 PM

Originally Posted by SICKGUY

generally an athiest is going to have an agenda based on common sense. "is this good or bad for the general population?" sort of thing. it seems that christians only think in terms of "would god approve?" as much as it seems like it sometimes, this country has no official religion.

An atheist has no more claims to "common sense" than a Christian.

Diesel66 · 10-01-2006, 12:22 AM

Originally Posted by Dumpy Dooby

It depends on how you're backing it.

btw, this is a typical stance of Christian folk.

Yet here I am a non-Christian making the statement

They polarize themselves with the non-Christian (Cold War ... anyone?). I don't think it's a coincidence that you would immediately jump to "abortion," in fact, I predicted you would. I also predicted that your hypothetical would depict a religious person being in favor of banning abortion. Why not the other way around? Why not have the religious character granting the right to have abortions?

you predicted something that is one of the most controversial laws and I have argued against numerous times.

Well because the Bible says He knew us before born plus all the ideas about life being worth something to protect

Religious (specifically Christians in America) people go after political issues and values in a herd-like manner, and they back it with the "word of God." When you have a group of people that go after a political issue with their Bibles in their hand, then it becomes rather obvious if they're backing their stance with religiosity or independent conviction. These people are regressive and horrifying.

Again why does it matter if the law in question is being pushed by a religious vs non-religious person.

Either way you have a law pushing someone's morals on the rest of the country. The issue at hand should be rights vs the wants of the politicans.

Diesel66 · 10-01-2006, 12:22 AM

Originally Posted by SICKGUY

generally an athiest is going to have an agenda based on common sense. "is this good or bad for the general population?" sort of thing. it seems that christians only think in terms of "would god approve?" as much as it seems like it sometimes, this country has no official religion.

Originally Posted by SICKGUY

shit, i have very strong reservations about my children being exposed to religion. i teach them common sense, morals and manners, but dont want religion anywhere near them.

And what are you basing your common sense, morals and manners on ? Society ? Your personal beliefs ?

Nonphixion · 10-01-2006, 07:09 PM

Originally Posted by Diesel66

Well because the Bible says He knew us before born plus all the ideas about life being worth something to protect

Actually the most accurate teachings on life in religion (Christian Bible Scholars) is that the "7 days" period isn't the literal time but a period of times. So in actuality does not equate to 1/4 of a month (in our Gregorian Calendar).

It's all probably over your head -- but they say "a life" only truly begins at Day 49 when the soul enters the body. So miscarriages are allowed and e'erybody's happy

Diesel66 · 10-01-2006, 09:47 PM

Originally Posted by Nonphixion

Actually the most accurate teachings on life in religion (Christian Bible Scholars) is that the "7 days" period isn't the literal time but a period of times. So in actuality does not equate to 1/4 of a month (in our Gregorian Calendar).

It's all probably over your head -- but they say "a life" only truly begins at Day 49 when the soul enters the body. So miscarriages are allowed and e'erybody's happy

??????????????????????????

BibleGateway.com - Passage*Lookup: Jeremiah 1: 4-10

Wtf are you talking about ?

IminWonderland · 10-02-2006, 01:07 AM

Originally Posted by Diesel66

??????????????????????????

BibleGateway.com - Passage*Lookup: Jeremiah 1: 4-10

Wtf are you talking about ?

4Now the word of the LORD came to me saying,
5"Before I (A)formed you in the womb I knew you,
And (B)before you were born I consecrated you;
I have (C)appointed you a prophet to the nations."

Isn't God talking TO Jeremiah in this passage? Isn't he telling Jeremiah that he is a prophet? Why does this apply to EVERY fetus? God is saying he knew HIM, and that he was APPOINTED to be a prophet.

Jeremiah was a prophet who was struggling with BEING a prophet, so wouldn't it make sense for God to tell him "Look, this is what I made YOU for". Isn't this more of a parable, than it is a concrete description of when God puts a "soul" into someone?

lew · 10-02-2006, 09:49 AM

Originally Posted by IminWonderland

4Now the word of the LORD came to me saying,
5"Before I (A)formed you in the womb I knew you,
And (B)before you were born I consecrated you;
I have (C)appointed you a prophet to the nations."

Isn't God talking TO Jeremiah in this passage? Isn't he telling Jeremiah that he is a prophet? Why does this apply to EVERY fetus? God is saying he knew HIM, and that he was APPOINTED to be a prophet.

Jeremiah was a prophet who was struggling with BEING a prophet, so wouldn't it make sense for God to tell him "Look, this is what I made YOU for". Isn't this more of a parable, than it is a concrete description of when God puts a "soul" into someone?

If God knew Jeremiah before he was born, why wouldn't He know everyone?

Dumpy Dooby · 10-02-2006, 09:58 AM

Originally Posted by Diesel66

Well because the Bible says He knew us before born plus all the ideas about life being worth something to protect

So ... your reason is the Bible. Makes sense, coming from a "non-Christian."

Again why does it matter if the law in question is being pushed by a religious vs non-religious person.

It doesn't. It matters if it's being pushed by religion or independent conviction. The former scares me, the latter is gravy.

Either way you have a law pushing someone's morals on the rest of the country. The issue at hand should be rights vs the wants of the politicans.

I don't trust the religiosity of the rest of the country. We aren't a Christian nation, and we shouldn't act like one. Christianity has no place in our government; even if the statistics were to show that 99% of the nation is Christian, it still would have no place in our government.

Dumpy Dooby · 10-02-2006, 10:02 AM

Originally Posted by lew

If God knew Jeremiah before he was born, why wouldn't He know everyone?

If your argument is that God knows the future, then you're taking away man's free will.

lew · 10-02-2006, 10:30 AM

Originally Posted by Dumpy Dooby

If your argument is that God knows the future, then you're taking away man's free will.

No, you're not.

And FYI, large percentages of Christians don't believe in "free will."

I do, but there is no disharmony between free will and God's knowledge.

Dumpy Dooby · 10-02-2006, 11:39 AM

Originally Posted by lew

No, you're not.

Logically, you are.

And FYI, large percentages of Christians don't believe in "free will."

Hardly a "large percentage." Calvanists make up less than 0.3% of the American Christian population. I'll admit it's not really something I know a lot about, but I do know that Catholics, Baptists, Presbyterians, and Methodists believe in free will and they make up the majority of the American Christian population. Which sect(s), besides Calvanism, do not believe in free will?

I do, but there is no disharmony between free will and God's knowledge.

From a logical standpoint, that's wrong. You can bring your alogical mumbo jumbo ("God can do what he wants"), but pulling out the alogical card makes for an illogical argument.

Or are you having a difficult time seeing they conflict, logically?

lew · 10-02-2006, 11:55 AM

Originally Posted by Dumpy Dooby

Logically, you are.

Hardly a "large percentage." Calvanists make up less than 0.3% of the American Christian population. I'll admit it's not really something I know a lot about, but I do know that Catholics, Baptists, Presbyterians, and Methodists believe in free will and they make up the majority of the American Christian population. Which sect(s), besides Calvanism, do not believe in free will?

From a logical standpoint, that's wrong. You can bring your alogical mumbo jumbo ("God can do what he wants"), but pulling out the alogical card makes for an illogical argument.

Or are you having a difficult time seeing they conflict, logically?

There are numerous sects that don't believe in free will.

If you want a good thread about free will, look on LAOT for threads with cleverest and cls_terp debating it.

And how am I being illogical? Please tell me how it's illogical to believe in free will and God being all powerful.

Dumpy Dooby · 10-02-2006, 12:17 PM

Originally Posted by lew

Please tell me how it's illogical to believe in free will and God being all powerful.

It's not illogical to believe that. It's illogical to believe that you have free will and God knows the future. The distinction being: God can know everything that can possibly be known, which doesn't mean that his knowledge is atemporal. If you claim that he can see the future, then you're suggesting that his knowledge is atemporal, and therefore hold a belief that is incompatible with free will.

I've posted the logical layout of it in two threads in LAOT (after the second time you accused me of "spamming in numerous threads"). But here it is again anyway...

Causal Determinism
Causal Determinism is the thesis that everything is caused.

Freedom
We act and talk as if some of our actions are free.

A Paradox
We believe that everything has a cause.
Example: Suppose your car won't start. You can't find anything wrong, so you take it to a mechanic. He checks everything, and finally announces that there is no cause why your car won't start. It just won't start, and that is all that is wrong with it.

But if everything is caused, then so are those actions that we think we freely choose to perform.

But then they are the result of those causes and so are not free.

The Determinist Position
The paradox is resolved by accepting the thesis that everything has a cause and rejecting the belief that some of our actions are free.

Those actions only seem free to us because we are ignorant of the causes that made us "choose" them.

The Hard Determinist's Argument
Every event has a cause.

If every event has a cause, then there are no free actions.
So,

There are no free actions.

The Libertarian Position
The paradox is resolved by holding onto the belief that some of our actions are free and rejecting the belief that everything is caused.

The Libertarian Response to the Hard Determinist's Argument
The libertarian rejects the first premise of the hard determinist's argument:

Every event has a cause.
And so, the libertarian can also reject the conclusion:

There are no free actions.

The Compatibilist Position
The paradox is resolved by rejecting the claim of both the determinist and the libertarian that if everything is caused, then there are no free actions.

The compatibilist holds that it is true both that everything is caused and that some of our actions are free.

The Compabilist Reponse to the Hard Determinist's Argument
The compatibilist accepts the first premise.

Every event has a cause.
But the compatibilist rejects the second premise:

If every event has a cause, then there are no free actions.
And, the compatibilist therefore rejects the conclusion:

There are no free actions.

Incompatibilism
Incompatibilism is the thesis that freedom and determinism cannot be reconciled.

Hard determinism and libertarianism are both incompatibilist views.

Other varieties of Determinism
Epistemic Determinism
Maimonides:
... God certainly knows that all will transpire...[so] if He knew that a person would be righteous, then it would be impossible for that person not to be.
The argument could just as well read:

God certainly knows all that will transpire... [so] if He knew that I will sacrifice my own immediately selfish interests to perform an act of kindness on May 4, 2010, then it would be impossible for me not to do so.

Logical Determinism
There is a set of true statements about everything that has ever happened or will ever happen. Since no one can make a true statement false, everyone will act exactly as described in that set of true statements.

An Argument for Incompatibilism, Based on Epistemic Determinism
A Prediction
Suppose someone claims, "I know it's not going to rain here tomorrow."

Clearly, they could possibly be wrong.

It might just rain here tomorrow.

Determinism and Foreknowledge
Is there anything about the future that you know in such a strong sense that you couldn't possibly be wrong?

Another Prediction
"I know that the earth is going to keep on spinning tomorrow."

Could this claim possibly turn out to be false?

It is extremely unlikely that this prediction will turn out to be false, but it is logically possible that it could.

A Safe Prediction
What about this claim: "I know that either it's going to rain tomorrow or it isn't"?

This claim is true. It can't possibly turn out to be false that it's either going to rain or it isn't.

A More Interesting Safe Prediction
"A thousand years from now, if there are still humans living on Earth, it will still be wrong for one of them gratuitously to inflict pain on another."

I claim that this is a necessary truth, i.e., that it can't possibly turn out to be false.

Our Safe Predictions
The predictions that we can claim to know in this strong sense can't possibly turn out to be false.

Some of these safe predictions can be about human behavior, too.

Example: Either you will thoughtlessly hurt someone's feelings tomorrow or you won't.

Does Foreknowledge = Coercion?
Our knowledge doesn't force or cause the prediction to become true. The prediction just is true, as a matter of logic or as a conceptual truth.

Our Unsafe Predictions
The predictions that we can't know to be true in this strong sense can turn out to be wrong.

Example: A student who has always been late to class might turn up on time for once.

God's Knowledge
Is God's knowledge like our knowledge in the same strong sense? Or is it like our knowledge in the weak sense of a prediction that we have very good reason to believe will turn out to be correct, but that might turn out to be wrong?

On the traditional conception of God's knowledge...

In one way, it resembles our knowledge in the strong sense.
It resembles our knowledge in the strong sense in that it will not turn out to be wrong.

In another way, it resembles our knowledge in the weak sense.
It resembles our knowledge in the weak sense in that it covers not only things that we can understand as logical or conceptual truths, but also the things that for us are not logical or conceptual truths.

Further Explanation
Whatever God knows, He knows just as surely and as unerringly as we know that 2 + 2 = 4, and that either you will thoughtlessly hurt someone's feelings tomorrow or you won't.

But He also knows things that we don't know for sure. He knows whether or not you will thoughtlessly hurt someone's feelings tomorrow.

What about Freedom?
If someone predicts that tomorrow I will wear the hat that I usually wear, they have made a reasonable prediction, but they might turn out to be wrong.

Among the reasons why they might turn out to be wrong is that I am free either to wear or not to wear it, and I might choose not to wear it.

But if someone predicts that either I will wear it or I won't, I am not free to do something that will make that prediction turn out to be false.

Freedom and God's Predictions
We suppose that God can make predictions that he knows, in the strong sense, to be true -- and not only about the same kind of logical or conceptual thruths that we can safely predict, but about the kinds of things that we can't safely predict.

For example, God can predict, with no possibility of being wrong, not only that either I will wear a cap tomorrow or I won't, but also whether I will wear it or not.

Our knowledge of God's Predictions
God doesn't actually make known to us predictions about such matters. If he did, then we, too, would know.

Human Foreknowledge, Divine Foreknowledge, and Freedom
I cannot falsify your foreknowledge of the logical truth that I will either wear a cap tomorrow or I won't.

We suppose, likewise, that neither can I falsify God's foreknowledge about whether or not I will wear it.

That Is to Say...
I am not free to make false the prediction that I will either wear the cap tomorrow or I won't.

Neither am I free to make false God's foreknowledge about whether or not I will wear it.

And that is not because the truth in either case forces me to act one way rather than another, as a kidnapper might force me into a trunk of a car.

It's just that, since it is true, that is what's going to happen.

That Implies
Given my ignorance of God's foreknowledge, it certainly seems to me that it is up to me whether I will wear a cap tomorrow or not. That is, I could wear it, or I could not wear it, and both possibilities are open to me.

But if God really knows, already, which way it is to be, that implies that it isn't really up to me, after all.

How Can It Seem That Something Is Up to Me, When It Isn't?
Here is an analogy to show how it can seem that something is up to me when it really isn't.

A hypnotist could put me into a trance and tell me that I am going to sing the Star Spangled Banner at noon on next Friday. He could also tell me that I will remember nothing about his instructions to me while I was in the trance, or even that I had been hypnotized.

Then it could happen that on the next Friday, as noon approached, I found myself humming a tune and began to feel a strong urge to sing. Sure enough, promptly at noon, I burst into song and feel that it is exactly what I want to do at that moment.

It would certainly seem to me that I had done it of my own free will, since I remembered nothing at all about having been hypnotized.

Limitations of the Example
The example is intended to show only how it is possible to feel that you are doing something out of your own free will when, in fact, you aren't.

In the example, the will of the hypnotist is being imposed on me, and we explicitly say that God's foreknowledge is not like that. In doesn't force me to do something, like the hypnotist of the example.

Conclusion
I claim that IF God's foreknowledge is like our knowledge of conceptual truths, in that it can't possibly turn out to be wrong, and IF it is like our knowledge in the weak sense, in that it covers not only conceptual truths, but also every detail about what happens, then...

Our belief in God's foreknowledge is not compatible with our belief that some things are not genuinely up to us.

IminWonderland · 10-02-2006, 12:37 PM

Originally Posted by lew

If God knew Jeremiah before he was born, why wouldn't He know everyone?

Not necessarily. I wouldn't necessarily interpret it that way. Because there aren't Bible stories about him knowing the ordinary person. He seems to only know prophets...a prophet isn't a regular person, they are annointed by God for a specific purpose.

Diesel66 · 10-02-2006, 01:00 PM

Originally Posted by Dumpy Dooby

So ... your reason is the Bible. Makes sense, coming from a "non-Christian."

You asked what was the religious reason. Why not the other way around? Why not have the religious character granting the right to have abortions?

You didnt ask what my reasons were. They are simply we should protect life, especially the truly innocent. If we throw people into prison for abusing their unborn child, why is it ok for them to get an abortion

It doesn't. It matters if it's being pushed by religion or independent conviction. The former scares me, the latter is gravy.

And how do you determine which one a law is based on ?

I don't trust the religiosity of the rest of the country. We aren't a Christian nation, and we shouldn't act like one. Christianity has no place in our government; even if the statistics were to show that 99% of the nation is Christian, it still would have no place in our government.

So you are going to force all the Christians to not have any say in the govt ? Yet you allow any non christians to push their moral views ?

Sounds pretty bigoted

Dumpy Dooby · 10-02-2006, 01:10 PM

Originally Posted by Diesel66

And how do you determine which one a law is based on ?

I didn't say that there is a way of determining the difference. But I did mention "political" issues being backed by nothing but of a bunch of people with Bibles in their hands. With something like that, it becomes rather obvious to derive from which side of the coin they are making their inferences.

The Westboro Baptists, for example, say that gay marriage should be banned because "God hates fags." (that's literally what they say)

So you are going to force all the Christians to not have any say in the govt ? Yet you allow any non christians to push their moral views ?

Are you dense or what? That's not what I've said, nor implied.

Sounds pretty stupid.

motivez · 10-02-2006, 02:19 PM

Originally Posted by lew

An atheist has no more claims to "common sense" than a Christian.

Maybe he should have said rational thought, since it applies better and is more specific.