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Does God exist? (6 Viewers)

do you believe in god?


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Iron

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Har! So you admit that genuine religious experiences occur and can be distinguished!
You are begging for a conversion.
I must save your soul
 

moll.

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gibbo153 said:
predestination is an incredibly complex topic to get into, but in short answer to what you've said,

free choice (i.e. the ability to do whatever you want) doesnt actually contradict god being omniscient.

he knows everything you will do in your life, everything about you, before you were made

(ok ps noone reply with blah blah god didnt make us etc, im just explaining this from a theist perspective)

it all comes back to the garden of eden etc. god knew that those naughty kids were gonna take the bad fruit, even though they had perfection in the garden.

but, its easy to think, well that was just stupid of him to do, why did he make us if we are going to do whatever we want etc, which also leads to , 'why did god make people if he knew some were going to hell' and that sort of thing.

but it can be seen that god wouldnt just want to make people who don't have free will, who just obeyed everything all the time. obviously everyone would always respect and obey him. theres just no point.

god wants everyone to follow him, but without free choice, there's no point us even existing.

but yes, god does in fact know that some people he has made are destined not to be christian, some are.

you say, how can there be free choice if god knows what im going to do.

free choice as i said doesnt constitute a lack of omniscience. free choice, is the ability to choose uninterfered. god is not controlling you.
you are acting of your own self and being, its just that god in his infinite knowledge knows everything about you, and what you are going to do.

i hope that basically explained that free will isnt interfered with by omniscience
But God created each of us individually. Did he not also create our past, present and future? So he would have created us as a fetus and also us as a corpse, as well as everything else in between. Thus, he created our destinies and has complete control over them.
 

Kwayera

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Iron said:
Har! So you admit that genuine religious experiences occur and can be distinguished!
You are begging for a conversion.
I must save your soul
I think you're missing the point, dear.
 

Iron

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Kwayera said:
I think you're missing the point, dear.
enlighten me
Take me to your secular world. Bring me the pleasures of the secular flesh
 

Kwayera

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Iron said:
enlighten me
Take me to your secular world. Bring me the pleasures of the secular flesh
If "religious experiences" can be reliably induced by stimulation of the brain, simulating what can naturally occur - how can these experiences be then proof of the existence of (your) God?
 

gibbo153

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moll. said:
But God created each of us individually. Did he not also create our past, present and future? So he would have created us as a fetus and also us as a corpse, as well as everything else in between. Thus, he created our destinies and has complete control over them.
hmm i think creating is the wrong term.
god isnt creating our future as such, obviosuly god makes us all individually and before we are made knows what we are going to do.

god knows what will happen to an individual in their life, and knows the implication of making someone a person who will react to life in a different way, this is different to creating one's past present and future. god creates a person, who once born will live a life, god knows exactly what they will do but is not 'controlling' them.

two different senses of the world control are present in this issue, 1) being controlling as in the way a puppeteer controls a puppet, and 2) control of knowing what is going on at any given time.

god has control in the second sense. he has the power of course to be in control in the first sense.

also by the way i mean in control in explicit regard to people's actions.
 

gibbo153

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Enteebee said:
Free will isn't imo necessarily contradictory with omniscience... but it definantly is with omnipotence.
true in theory, however i was just explaining his question which only regarded omniscience

but in regard to omnipotence,

it only does not cause a conflict because,
god does have unlimited power over everything, but in regard to human actions does not exercise it, that is, he allows us free will by choice, for his purposes.
 

supercalamari

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Iron said:
Har! So you admit that genuine religious experiences occur and can be distinguished!
You are begging for a conversion.
I must save your soul
Dearest Iron,

I can never tell when you are joking.

Do enlighten me, I beg of you.

Yours,
supercalamari
 

katie tully

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supercalamari said:
Dearest Iron,

I can never tell when you are joking.

Do enlighten me, I beg of you.

Yours,
supercalamari
he is never joking

it just depends which one of his personalities got to wear the underpants today
 

gibbo153

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Kwayera said:
So what's up with all this "God's Plan" mumbojumbo?
gods plan - is in the shortest of terms, god's rescue plan

Firstly, by making humans with free will, humans inevitably disobeyed.

this in turns means that there is a problem, because although god loves us innumerably, he is perfect, and we aren't.

its not like god can just go 'well okkkkkkkkkkk you guys are pretty good i guess, you know what come on into heaven! pull up a pew etc'

it can't happen, because we are not perfect, we cannot be with god

hence, need for remedy = God sending Jesus who after living a perfect life, died for the sins of everyone.

therefore, god's 'wrath' on sin has been satisfied, and if we trust Jesus as our lord and saviour from our own sinful nature, and in turn being without god (hell, which i will just add is not god creating a fiery place with lots of burning and hot things and cruel and unusual punishment etc,
hell by definition is a lack of the presence of god.
the devil (who was an angel in heaven at one stage but he decided he was as important as god so god gave him the flick, now dwells in hell because he is imperfect and therefore can't be with god. so people who reject god's grace (undeserved gift) cannot be with god and therefore go to the place without god)

all of that minus hell (which is just an inevitable implication of God giving us free will, is God's plan

god knew we would stuff up before he made us, he didnt go i think ill make humans, oh crap, they disobeyed me, ahhh man ahh what do i do, oh wait ill just send my son to die etc

no

he knew all this was going to happen, but because he loves US, in his infinite wisdom, he created the world with a plan
 

Iron

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Kwayera said:
If "religious experiences" can be reliably induced by stimulation of the brain, simulating what can naturally occur - how can these experiences be then proof of the existence of (your) God?
Well the premise is totally mangled. You dare assume that if an experience ticks all these certain boxes, then that experience was religious - but smile, youre on candid camera, it was just your brain playing tricks.
Ok? I was unaware that science cracked the codes of the universe and found that the God thing was all in our minds?
You cant slam a cookie cutter over something like 'religious experience'
 

Kwayera

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A plan that included the murder of millions of people? Sucky plan, if you ask me.
 

Iron

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katie tully said:
he is never joking

it just depends which one of his personalities got to wear the underpants today
Katie, lets not be that couple, like Chadd and Katie in NS. We're better than that. We have playful internets disagreements
love bite?
 

supercalamari

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katie tully said:
he is never joking

it just depends which one of his personalities got to wear the underpants today
Ahh. Now I get it.

I wish I had multiple personalities, damnit.
 

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