E-MAIL AND FEEDBACK RECEIVED (Page 4)

My email address is estle46224@yahoo.com



Red indicates feedback writing.
Blue indicates my writing; editorial comments are in italics.

Quick Links to Letters on this Page

More free will, my favorite topic.
My collective work is taken... I don't know... bizarrely.
A philosophy rundown.
More free will, with a small response this time. Could I be getting weary of free will?
A Return to answering letters. With patronization like this, how could I not respond?

Received 02-15-03
From Brian Gaide, brian_gaide@mail.utexas.edu
Subject: web page- free will

Hi,

I stumbled upon your web page while looking for arguements for and against some popular topics. I believe there are some misconceptions in your arguement on omniscience/free will.

Some of these may get me stoned by orthodox Christianity, but I stand by them nevertheless. Being omniscient, God obviously knows what our choices will be for eternity, and where we will spend it. He created us so that love could exist. God is love, and God by Himself cannot love for there is nothing to love. So out of necessity to express this love, He created us. Love can only exist when there is TRUE free will.

Your arguement on God controlling our destinies presupposes a lack of true free will. I'm assuming you believe that free will exists, some don't; but since you have spent so much time and effort defending your choices, I will assume that you do.

"No free will cop-outs here. If God set everything into motion, all of human history up to and around my birth, determining my physical mind and surroundings of influence, then my "choice", my "free will" is set by factors outside my control. My mind and surroundings are supposedly part of the divine plan, so the divine plan must be for me to disbelieve. God becomes responsible. " Your above statement assumes that the "will" is nothing more than a combination of genetics and environment. You suppose from the beginning that God controls us like robots through history and the creation of our brains. God intervenes in human history, but He does not control it. The only time He intervenes is in the events of miracles (by definition). If He constantly controlled history, there would be no free will, for every cause we initiated, God would control the effect. Sure environment/genetics can slant our view of reality, but that does not remove our free will.

God made everything, he knows exactly who will accept him and who will reject him, and being omnipotent he could have made things differently, right? Couldn't he have made a universe where I was never born at all, but everything else is the same? Couldn't he have made one where all people "freely" choose to believe and love him? So I ask again: Why did this deity create a universe where billions are condemned to eternal, horrible suffering? God may not "make" people love him, whatever that means, but he knew when he set it up exactly who would love him, and could have set it all up differently so that a different group of people would love him. God could have made things differently. Could God have created a universe of free-willed beings where everyone "freely" chose Him? No. This is a logical contradiction. Even God cannont make logical contradictions. The only way God would be assured of having all His creation love Him is by denying their free will. You can argue that He could have set up an environment in which everyone freely chooses Him, but you deny true free will from the start if you do so.

What about hell, or "eternal suffering"? Hell is a necessary consequence of heaven. God wants a perfect relationship with man. Man messed this relationship up by sinning (rejecting God's relationship (or love itself) with him in favor of loving himself (pride)). God still wanted this perfect relationship, so He gives mankind a chance to be with Him for eternity (heaven) by making the choice on earth, once and for all. However, in order for God to be just, He must accept the rejection of the atheist who chooses to reject him. If He didn't, He would once again be denying the atheist's free choice. Since the atheist chooses to reject God, the atheist cannot be with God in the afterlife, so he must go somewhere where God is not. Thus God creates hell. Hell is basically a necessary holding place for those that reject God. Hell is not a place of God-induced torture. The "lake of fire" described in Revelation is a metaphor for the mental and physical anguish the atheist will experience in hell - the real torture probably comes from the fact that the atheist realizes what life is like in the absense of God, in the absense of any real love, where all of man's basest evil desires dominate, or something like that. God does not actively judge us and send us to hell, He passively accepts our choice and leaves us to our own desires.

"Why would your god allow billions to exist, including me, if he knew we would end up in hell for eternity?"

Because the sum is greater than the parts. The love that God can share or give to His believers for eternity must be greater than the total pain and rejection caused by the non-believers. This is the best possible life construction out of any possible one, for God is omniscient. The meaning of life is not happiness, nor is it trying to avoid pain. If it were, God would have created a horrible universe. But if the meaning of our existence is to love God, and for Him to show His love in our lives and the next, then this universe is pretty damn good for the cause in which it was designed.

The Christian definition of good and evil are measured by choosing to be selfish or selfless, to love or to hate, to choose God or to reject Him. In this worldview, suffering is not evil in and of itself, since it does not prevent us from choosing to love or hate. God would be evil in causing suffering if He did it for no reason. But if God causes suffering (which is rare, most of it is man-caused- this is in the occurance of miracles), it is to bring about a greater good. God routinely disciplined the Israelites by making them suffer, and in that discipline brought His people closer to Him. God allowed Satan to cause Job to suffer, because it built character, it magnified love, and it showed Job what the true meaning of life was. The suffering caused by our fellow man is irrelevant- in fact, it only strengthens the intensity of love. It is more loving to forgive someone who beat you within an inch of your life than to love someone who loved you first.

I hope this helps you in your search for truth. I struggled with many of the same issues you do. It helped me.

Brian

My Response:

Dear Brian:

You had so much potential. You come very close to making some excellent points, but then you devolve into the same old stuff I've heard a thousand times. Come on! This is MY topic. Do you have any idea how much mental time I've dedicated to it? I can't say for sure, but it's a lot. In short, you're in the big leagues. You have to bring your "A" game.

Starting out, yes, I believe that will is nothing more than genetics and the environment. When you strip away all the BS, every decision we make is based on: 1. What we have experienced, and 2. How we naturally are. If there is something else I am missing, please let me know. You seem to differentiate between these things and free will. Whuh? All we are talking about is decision-making. Period. Free Will is the fanciful idea that in a god-filled universe, those decisions are independent from god.

Now, not to sound arrogant, but I am pretty good at spotting logical contradictions. Where is the logical contradiction in God making a universe where everyone freely chooses to love him? You yourself said that he knows who will end up where, so why is it impossible to make one where everyone loves him without removing their free will? Hell, I could imagine how it would go down. Everytime he thinks up a new model for the universe, he uses his God Powers to see what the people will freely choose. As soon as he finds a person going to hell, he scraps that model and tries again.

So man messed up God's perfect creation by sinning, huh? This is the perfect case study to illustrate the problem with omniscience. Didn't God know Adam and Eve would sin? Why did he make them, and make them the way they were, if he knew they would screw everything up? As I have asked elsewhere, did he expect the Evil Opportunity (the forbidden fruit) to sit there, uneaten, for all eternity? Doesn't the almighty master of the universe at least have his own version of Murphy's Law?

The close of your letter is mostly the fuzzy sales pitch, but I have a small problem with this part: "The Christian definition of good and evil are measured by choosing to be selfish or selfless...." I beg to differ. The Christian offer is based entirely on the listeners enlighted self-interest. Don't get me wrong, I'm a huge capitalist, so I'm all about self-interest, but let's not pretend that a strong desire to live forever in happiness (and avoid hell) is a strong motivating factor, and selflessness has nothing to do with it. As a matter of fact, a Christian need not do a single selfless thing to get the hand stamp.

Nathan

2nd Letter:

Dear Nathan,

Thanks for the reply. I would have written sooner but I've been fairly busy, and I wanted to think about a couple of the points you made. I'll try and clarify some things here that were written last time.

Dear Brian:

You had so much potential. You come very close to making some excellent points, but then you devolve into the same old stuff I've heard a thousand times. Come on! This is MY topic. Do you have any idea how much mental time I've dedicated to it? I can't say for sure, but it's a lot. In short, you're in the big leagues. You have to bring your "A" game.

Um, Ok. Cool. I won't let the benchwarmers play this time. They didn't have a very good attitude anyway.

Starting out, yes, I believe that will is nothing more than genetics and the environment. When you strip away all the BS, every decision we make is based on: 1. What we have experienced, and 2. How we naturally are. If there is something else I am missing, please let me know. You seem to differentiate between these things and free will. Whuh? All we are talking about is decision-making. Period. Free Will is the fanciful idea that in a god-filled universe, those decisions are independent from god.

What you have stated is that we are basically complex self-aware robots. And we really don't even make decisions, because the mere act of making the decision requires a free will. We are aware of the inputs and outputs that go through our mind processor, but we can't control any part of it. In fact, we can't even "see" the computations that go on inside our head, i.e. why we choose to pick up the newspaper this morning over walking straight to the car. For if we saw them in detail, we would understand that they are merely combinations of memories and genetic dispositions and there was no will that influenced them. So our lives involve only observing - motor movements, "thought" processes, etc., all automatic- we can't even choose what to observe.

Your own writing seems to be inconsistent with this notion, though. You consistently get angry at Christians for believing the things they do, yet in your reality it's really not their fault. You speak of decisions and choices you made yourself, and why your choice was better than the alternative.

This idea of no free will is a valid stance- in a deterministic world, where science tells us our cognition resides in a physical brain, it makes some sense to say that we are in fact merely self-aware computers. However, I know of no one that actually lives their lives to the full ramifications of this statement. Furthermore, there are many things about the mind that we do not yet understand, like self-awareness. If scientists could in the future electrically probe the brain and cause decisions to be made that the patient regards as his own, and if we are able to make self-aware machines and perform certain tests on them, I may have to change my theory, but for now I consider free will equally valid.

Now, not to sound arrogant, but I am pretty good at spotting logical contradictions. Where is the logical contradiction in God making a universe where everyone freely chooses to love him? You yourself said that he knows who will end up where, so why is it impossible to make one where everyone loves him without removing their free will? Hell, I could imagine how it would go down. Everytime he thinks up a new model for the universe, he uses his God Powers to see what the people will freely choose. As soon as he finds a person going to hell, he scraps that model and tries again.

If you make your assumption of the absence of free will, then I would agree with you- God could have recreated the world in His mind over and over until He found a set of initial conditions that led to a perfect society. But a lack of free will denies the existence of true choice from the start, and so this a meaningless arguement. Our whole purpose for being created rides on the actions of our free will. God would have no reason to create a society like this.

If we assume however that free will exists, then things get more interesting.

Since God does not control us in a free-will environment, He cannot guarantee a perfect society once He creates it. You can argue that genetics/environment slant the probabilities on a free agent's decisions, but even then it is not 100%. So even with an large magnitude of initial conditions to pick from, I don't think you can say with certainty that God could have created a perfect society (especially if you multiply this probability by 30 billion or whatever the number of humans that existed is).

However, I have run into an interesting dilemma. I've always believed I will have free will in heaven. If this were true, God could have indeed created a world in which everyone freely chose Him, unless our condition previous to heaven (here on earth) somehow caused the perfect free choice to work (and that is a possibility).

In my mind, the only way we could always freely choose the right is if we had enough knowledge to see the folly of our sinfulness in its entirety, how it leads to a path of self-destruction and hate, etc., and maybe God gives us this knowledge after the ressurection. This begs the question, though, of why didn't we have this knowledge to begin with? That's what I'm trying to understand now, since there must be some morally sufficient reason (something greater comes from a society of sin, suffering and death then one without them) for our initial creation to have occured. Maybe it is to learn something that we wouldn't have otherwise learned, maybe it's so God can show us His love and a sinful existence magnifies this love, I don't know. Or maybe we don't have free will in heaven. I'm still trying to understand all of this.

So man messed up God's perfect creation by sinning, huh? This is the perfect case study to illustrate the problem with omniscience. Didn't God know Adam and Eve would sin? Why did he make them, and make them the way they were, if he knew they would screw everything up? As I have asked elsewhere, did he expect the Evil Opportunity (the forbidden fruit) to sit there, uneaten, for all eternity? Doesn't the almighty master of the universe at least have his own version of Murphy's Law?

Of course God knew they would sin; to say He didn't denies his omniscience. If the evil oppurtunity had not existed, there would be no moral choice, and thus no existence of love. Without the potential to do evil, free will cannot exist. Without free will, true love cannot exist, for love requires a choice between two alternatives.

The close of your letter is mostly the fuzzy sales pitch, but I have a small problem with this part: "The Christian definition of good and evil are measured by choosing to be selfish or selfless...." I beg to differ. The Christian offer is based entirely on the listeners enlighted self-interest. Don't get me wrong, I'm a huge capitalist, so I'm all about self-interest, but let's not pretend that a strong desire to live forever in happiness (and avoid hell) is a strong motivating factor, and selflessness has nothing to do with it. As a matter of fact, a Christian need not do a single selfless thing to get the hand stamp.

What you are saying is that Christians choose to be Christian because of the reward they believe they will receive in the next life, and therefore Christianity is innately selfish. Certainly there are some "Christians" that choose Christianity for this reason, although I would see them as counterfeit. True Christians choose to have a loving relationship with God because that is what we were designed by the creator to do- they want to fulfill their purpose. How can one love and be selfish simultaneously? Love is the absense of selfishness. As I mentioned before, Heaven is eternity with God. If you constantly choose your own will over God's (selfishness), then why would you really want to go to Heaven? If I chose to reject God here on earth, why would I want to spend an eternity with Him in Heaven- that's Hell in and of itself. In this case I would rather be in Hell.

There are many Christians that have died for their faith in God. If these Christians knew that they would be in Heaven after they died regardless, why would they continue to profess their faith knowing full well it would bring about their death? There is no selfish benefit here.

Lastly, the Christian must do at least one "single selfless thing to get the hand stamp." He/She must put his faith in God, which involves the submission of his/her will to God's will, which is a selfless act.

Brian

My Response:

Brian:

Here is the long awaited response. (Terribly sorry for the extended delay).

To start off, I am all about personal responsibility. It is a central tenet of my political philosophy and a source of great angst for someone living in these United States, which seem to have abandoned it without so much as a shrug.

Therefore, I, of course, do not think of people as robots, or beings whose "outputs" if you will, are nothing more than a function of their "inputs". However, that is the result of basic Christian theology. One must conclude, based on it, that we are all God's robots, doing everything as he knew we would, as he planned for us to do, because after all, this way is exactly the way he chose to make us, despite an infinity of options.

It is an interesting philosophical point to say that none of our decisions can truly be ours, since everything we are is determined by something external or inherited. And, I suppose, that is what I said. But this has no practical application, particularly when we assert that human beings are responsible for using their reason and conscience when making decisions. Indeed, people who have no such capacity (children, the retarded or insane) are treated exactly as though they had no choice.

But, while you cringe from the philosophical point, as did I, you offer no alternative. Is there something else involved? What is it? This is the meat and potatoes of the issue.

Now, moving on to the part dealing with creation of the universe and the Adam & Eve example. There are so many contradictions in the theology that I could make here, that I have a hard time keeping them all straight. I am bound to forget one.

1. God gets angry for the sin of Adam/Eve. I know this was not brought up, but we were in the neighborhood, and it makes a similar point. God cannot get angry. He can't feel any reactionary emotions. Anger, shock, grief, happiness, etc. only come about as a result of surprise, of events transpiring differently than expected. God, were he omniscient, could not be surprised. You said that he knew A&E would sin. So why throw a temper tantrum punishing all of us, as well?

2. God is feels awfully sad for the people he sends to hell. See above.

3. Relating to #1, and the punishment of all of us for the sins of A&E. Group punishment for individual transgressions really only exists under tyrannical regimes, or in elementary schools or the military. It is not applicable to "free" people who make their own choices.

(As a side note, should we really even be talking about Garden of Eden stuff? Surely you don't believe that whole fairy tale? I'd be happy to drop it.)

4. Creation/Humans. You don't find it the least bit silly to believe that an all powerful force made the entire universe, needs nothing, and is perfect in every way, but at the same time demands praise and worship from some hairless apes? Plus, let us not forget that The Master of All is deeply concerned and saddened by Jane Doe's sex life.

5. The big one. You seem to believe that the existence of free will is synonymous with the existence of evil. No. An omniscient creator could create a universe where everyone freely, of his own faculty, chooses to believe. Now maybe you consider this to be rigging things and therefore negating free will. That is exactly what has happened, with this universe. If there is an omniscient creator, he knew, before making it, how this one would turn out, and he made it anyway. It is no different than making a 100% good one, or a 100% bad one, where everyone goes to hell. (For all we know, we might be living in one of those.)

Our major stumbling block, it seems to me, is hidden in this line: "But a lack of free will denies the existence of true choice from the start, and so this a meaningless argument." I am saying that free will is a fanciful notion invented by Jews or Christians to justify hell (or maybe for some other reason). It never "existed" in the first place. It cannot possibly exist alongside an omniscient creator.

In conclusion, I would just point out that using the classic "not real Christians" line of thought is highly unpersuasive, considering that you yourself are probably not a "real Christian", according to Jesus. (http://www.oocities.org/estle46224/real.html)

Best wishes,

Nathan
Received 02-20-03
From Josh Mark, ubisunt@msn.com
Subject: Interesting site, indeed...................

Nathan -
Stumbled across your site by accident - and have been enjoying it now for a half hour. I was once a Christian also and much of what you write resonates in my own experience. Regarding your question: Why would God allow billions to exist knowing they'll burn in hell for eternity - I think the answer is that god is irrelevant in human affairs and the Bible is a work which should be taken no more - and no less - seriously than the 1001 Nights or Hesiod. The Old Testament, first of all, is simply a long, long tract against the matriarchal religion of Astarte (in which Jahweh was a minor god, a cup holder for Baal, Astarte's consort) and the New Testament is the creation of Paul's epistles which were all the rage before whoever wrote Mark took stylus in hand. The OT was written, in large measure, to discredit the religion of the indigenous people of Canaan whom the Hebrews conquered (and it was a very potent religion, by all accounts) and the NT was written to create a character, JESUS: SON OF GOD out of an itinerant Jewish rabbi. Paul the writer putting a new cast on the dying and reviving gods of the past. You know, think Homer Simpson: "God - he's my favorite fictional character."
So I don't think the question, at least as you phrase it, has any real meaning to anyone with a brain. You seem to be interpreting this 2 - 4000 year old book as though it really were, somehow, the word of god or as though it could possibly have any inkling of what the after-life could be. It's just a book, man - written by some really good writers. I once believed it was THE BOOK, myself - but, hey, when I was child I thought like a child - when I became a man I put away childish things (yeah - I think Paul was a delusional megalomaniac but I still like some of his phrases). In every thing you write I see you know what you're talking about and I respect your intelligence and, as I said, I've enjoyed reading what you've set down here. I just don't think you should trouble yourself over a `final destination' which doesn't exist and never has. If you want to use the old book, though, are you aware that in the original Greek of the synoptic gospels there is no `hell'? Not at all. Christ refers to Gehenna (kept in the King James & revised but, I believe, changed in the NIV) the garbage dump outside of town where trash was burned. All the guy's saying is if you don't believe the story I'm telling you, you're going to wind up like that trash outside of town - i.e. you're not going to live good, productive lives. All this eternal damnation stuff comes in long after Jesus is pushing up daisies and is stolen from the Greek Tartarus with admixtures from the Mithra cult - upon which much of Christianity is based.
I also wouldn't worry too much about trying to convert Christians to reason - it's a hopeless task, first of all, and it seems those who think will eventually think their way clear of it - and those who don't, well, to take a line from The Godfather, "They're animals anyway, so let them kill each other."

Take care - and thanks for the ride - it's been a pleasure ................................Pryst

My Response:

Dear Pryst:

Thank you for your comments...I think.

I'll just say that the idea of God sending billions to torture is not based on any specific scripture, just two theological tenets: 1. There is a god who is omniscient. 2. This god sends non-believers to a place called hell.

And by the way, not every Xtian is hopeless. You can have major influence over the fence-sitters, like my conversion found here.

Take care,

Nathan
Received 03-08-03
From Kathy Sabol, kqs@zoominternet.net
Subject: Your web site

You're raised a lot of important points on your web site. If one can prove the inaccuracy and fallibility of the scriptures, then Christianity (and even Judaism) doesn't have much of a leg to stand on. A key part about being a Christian is being able to "Stand upon the Word of God"

I've been a Christian all my life. I'm 42 years old. This year, I really started questioning my beliefs about everything. I do definitely believe in a God, a supreme deity. I believe that a human being named Jesus really lived on this earth, and that he was crucified by the Romans. I believe in the resurrection or a different "dimension/plane" of existence that the soul goes onto after human life. I believe in a spiritual realm, and that God continues to influence life today.

But as for believing and defending the writings of specific scriptures or doctrines of man... first of all, there are so many different "versions" of the Bible, translations, etc... most people look for one that says it how they want to hear it. I have a lot of problems with Paul (I think he's a male chauvinist). I have problems reconciling the God of Judgment of the O.T. with the God of Love of the N.T. Which God do I believe in?

I believe that a lot of Genesis (Garden of Eden stuff) is probably an allegory, but then again Jesus talked about Noah and Abraham as real people... Each book of the Bible is someone's own perspective. There are contradictions in the Gospels. I wish people hadn't waited so long to write everything down. You know... it's like asking twenty friends at your 25th high school reunion to tell what happened at the senior prom... people remember some details, imagine others, purposely make up others, forget some important details....so who's telling the truth?

My favorite book in the Bible is Psalms. It's the real-est book in the Bible. David didn't hold back any of his feelings. I find comfort reading them. As for the doctrines of faith, how do we really know anything? I want the truth, and yet, no one seems to know what that exactly is? There have been debates forever, going back to councils of Trent and Nicea... how did certain books get canonized and others dropped off? Etc. etc.

Whether I believe in something or not doesn't change the truth. I guess I'll find out eventually. I try to live the best way I can... to me, Jesus' code of ethics seems like a decent way to live...but that's because I've been taught that way from childhood. Many people were drawn to his teachings.

But why did he heal some people and not others? If I had the gift of healing, I'd heal every sick person on earth, get rid of war, unpolluted the environment, make sure everyone had enough to eat, make everyone happy & love each other... but as God, he didn't do any of that!!! That doesn't make sense to me. So why do I think that a perfect eternal life (heaven) --as I conceive heaven to be---is waiting for me when I die? What if all that stuff isn't true? What if the only heaven we get is how we live our lives today? What if heaven is really a state of mind and an attitude?

It's been proven that being a Christian won't keep bad things from happening to you. The question I keep asking myself is... "How is my life really better because I am a Christian?" And "Why do I think someone else's life will be better if he becomes a Christian?" The only answer I get now, is that "faith" (in God, in a heavenly Father, in Jesus, in a "higher" spiritual realm) gives me "hope"... a way to "make it thru" the hard times of life. Maybe it's just an illusion. But without it, I'd be hopelessly miserable. Hey, I'm not the most contented Christian!

The Bible says, "He has set eternity in the hearts of men" New Agers believe that we all have a spark of divinity within us. Even Paul says, "It is Christ in me..."... so, um, if God is in me, then the only God I need is me, then, right? Why would I need any other? I know this sounds like heresy, but I'm just connecting the dots. The Bible says Jesus died for my sins. Thank you God! That's what I want to believe... that I don't have to pay the consequences of my sins... but how true is that? I pay consequences every day. If I don't pay my taxes, they'll throw me in jail... I doubt the defense "Jesus died for my sins" is going to help me much there. And every criminal could use that line too. Some people tell me that's true... that I will see Adolf Hitler and Atilla the Hun... etc. in heaven too, because Jesus died for the sins of the whole world... not just for the ones who believe in him. In closing, I do often think about the early Christians... you know, they must have really believed in their faith, in order to die for it. And Paul himself said, "If our 'hope' (in the resurrection) is only for this life, then we are to be pitied most among men..." so he really believed it. But a lot of people believe stuff today that is wrong, too.

And how do we know that God stopped speaking the infallible truth 2000 years ago with the Bible? Many Christians believe in the prophetic word... "God speaking today", and yet, nothing anyone writes in the 21st century is given as much credibility as stuff written down 2000 years ago! (and longer) Why would their "words" from God be more right that people's "words from God" today?

Maybe we're all here on this planet to provide daily entertainment for the Almightily. We're all players on a stage... each life is a command performance.

If I were raised a Muslim, how would I be writing to you today? If I were raised Buddhist or Hindu....or New Age...? A lot of it has to do with heredity... how we were raised. The Bible does say, "When I was a child, I spoke as a child, reasoned as a child... now that I have become a man, I must put away childish thinking..." Are a lot of our Christian doctrines childish teachings? I guess only time will tell. We'll find out one way or another.
Don't be afraid to speak your truth. Don't be afraid to seek "the" truth. I do believe in absolute truth. But I don't necessarily believe that I have found it yet myself. I must be faithful to live according to the truth that I have found.

Kathy

No response given.

Received 03-19-03
From Wade A. Tisthammer, tisthammer@hotmailcom
Subject: Free Will

I am writing in regards to your web page at http://www.oocities.org/estle46224/freewill.html on your website.

I mostly have an interest in philosophy rather than debating religion per se, so I will focus more on that topic here.

It’s not that I don’t understand the argument. I do. I just disagree with your views on this matter.

“Here's my version of the argument. I always pose the same question:"Why would your god allow billions to exist, including me, if he knew we would end up in hell for eternity?" That's it.”

Well, here’s my answer. I don’t know that you’re going to spend an eternity in hell. Some have differing views of hell. One theory is called conditionalism: people suffer a limited period of punishment (presumably for whatever wrong one did in bodily life, the severity and duration will likely be shorter for those who haven’t been so bad) followed by annihilation of one’s consciousness.

But let’s skip all that for now. Why would God allow people to exist whom he knew they would go to hell?

Here comes a disputable point which I think you’ll have to recognize before you claim that Christians and other theists do not understand the question:

DISPUTABLE POINT: On those who could have avoided hell (for there is that possibility for all mortals in the Christian worldview) is it better for God never to have given those people a chance to do what is right and go to heaven? That hardly seems fair. Or is it better for God to give people a chance, knowing they’d screw it up? Not a pleasant dilemma, but I think would choose the latter.

My answer to your question is that God allowed for such people to exist out of fairness. Those who were known to screw up do so, but at least they were given a chance. It simply isn’t fair to eliminate them from ever existing for something they did not do (if they never existed, they did nothing wrong and were never even given a chance to do right). (On a tangent, on an episode of Xena: Warrior Princess, Xena was also faced a problem regarding Callisto when she went back in time; she did not kill the evil Callisto when she was a child because Callisto had done nothing wrong and Xena believed it would be unethical to kill her even though Xena knew she would eventually turn to evil). You may disagree on the correct solution to the dilemma, but you have to recognize that I do understand the question and this is my honest opinion on it.

“This is where I hit a brick wall, so Christians try to understand: If God knows all things, he already knew the end result of my choice, my free will, eons ago, long before I was born.”

This is true. Keep in mind this isn’t just true of Christians, but often theists in general.

“That's it. It's a valid, vitally important theological question. Unfortunately, some people don't quite get it.”

I get it, but my answer to the dilemma I described is the one I gave. You obviously disagree, and that is your opinion; but please don’t make the mistake that people just don’t understand the question. People who share my views on this issue do. We just disagree on the answer to it.

“If God set everything into motion, all of human history up to and around my birth, determining my physical mind and surroundings of influence, then my "choice", my "free will" is set by factors outside my control.”

That does not logically follow. While it wouldn’t be unreasonable to assume that such factors would have some influence (for instance, it may affect what you “feel like” doing, but one could choose to not give into those feelings), in the end what you choose is still up to you. That’s the inherent nature of free will, and neither God nor anyone else would be responsible for your actions.

Of course, you may doubt that free will exists in the first place. I personally am puzzled why anyone would think so; my own direct perceptions would seem to indicate otherwise. Do something, anything at all, that you don’t think nature or anything else were planning for you to do. Can you do it? Can you choose an action from other possible alternatives? It would seem so. Hence, direct and apparent perceptions (my own and many others, I cannot say for certain that you have them also) seem to indicate that, whatever influences there may be, we are indeed capable of choosing our own actions.

“First of all, no, God does not simply know the future without influencing it. This would make a good argument if it weren't for the fact that theists credit their god with making the universe and butting in on occasion. If I could magically know what Bob's future would be, but didn't tell Bob and treated him exactly as I otherwise would, Bob would still have his free will. “

Indeed, I agree that you wouldn’t take away Bob’s free will in this instance.

“I did not, however, create the universe with full knowledge beforehand of Bob's life and choices, or influence history knowing precisely how it would affect the future Bob.”

There’s a bit of a problem here. Okay, suppose you created the universe and then created intelligent creatures with free will. What’s wrong? There is no logical contradiction for an entity to create a universe and simultaneously have created beings that possess free will. As you seem to know already, simply knowing what beings will freely choose does not in the least rob them from their freedom (i.e. having free will). According to Christian theology, God did pop in from time to time and thus had some sort of influence in human history, but it is monumentally unclear how this would even remotely remove anyone’s free will. Influences can exist without removing free will, and neither the volitional beings being created nor their universe being created nor their occasional visits from their creator seem to necessarily remove their free will, as I have explained in this paragraph.

Now I don’t expect this e-mail to immediately convert you, but if you continue in your atheistic beliefs please understand my point of view here. I understand the question fully, I just disagree with you (confer my “disputable point” section)

My Reply:

Please forgive the lateness of my reply. I have been very busy.

Your Disputable Point begs the question I was exploring. You offer the Hobson's choice, between a person having a chance to choose to (perhaps) avoid hell or never existing at all. The point is irrelevent, because if there is no free will, the Hobson's choice is between never existing or going to hell. The person is never really given a chance at all. Nor am I. Nor are you. The real question, the one I tried to explore is: Is there a choice? With an omniscient creator, I say no.

Having gone over this topic many, many times (I have a running conversation going on right now at http://www.oocities.org/estle46224/feedback4.html ...the same page this will be posted on), I have no desire to go into all that. I'll just touch on one thing:

"Do something, anything at all, that you don’t think nature or anything else were planning for you to do. Can you do it?" This is almost exactly like a part of the free will page at Wasteland of Wonders (the best personal atheism page on the 'net, in my opinion). Of course that one, and I am quoting, challenges:
"Try it for yourself.

"Right now, this minute, exert your free will.

"Do something, anything at all, that you don't think God could have possibly known you were going to do.

"Can you do it? Can you surprise God?

"If you can, then God is not omniscient - he is not all-knowing. And if he is not omniscient, then how can he be omnipotent - unlimited in his ability?

"If you cannot, then how can you think you have free will? You cannot do anything other than that which God already knows you are going to do."

(taken from http://www.abarnett.demon.co.uk/atheism/freewill.html )

And most importantly, I would add, God knew what you would do before, during, and after the creation, and being God, could have made the whole thing different, so that you did something different, or were never born at all. Omniscience is not contradictory to free will, but omniscient creation is.

Nathan
Received 02-29-04
From Chris Gagliano, crgag@comcast.net
Subject: The "Moral" of the story

Nathan,
What an "elaborate" site for one who doesn't believe! You've spent a great deal of time on trying to make God go away. If I was a bettin' man I would bet the following. (Allow me to be wrong but take a shot.)
1. You had a rough upbringing amongst "Bible-thumping" fundamentalists who present salvation as purely "The Absence of HELL." (Maybe even an ABUSIVE upbringing.) Which explains part of your struggle.

2. I would bet that the other part of the struggle is really one of a moral nature. There is something in your life that you can't seem to reconcile with Christian morality and so.... (I won't speculate any further.)

Nathan,
I have trouble believing that all who have called on the Lord throughout time have been either charlatans or fools. Give some of them credit. Maybe, just maybe, they've experienced something you haven't...yet. Is that possible? Have you experienced everything? Can you be honest and say maybe there is something out there that you haven't experienced, but others have? A wise man knows enough to say he doesn't know it all.

You say that the Christian belief that GOD is mystery is a "cop out." And yet I ask you again, can you know and understand fully all things? Is there nothing bigger than Nathan out there in the vast universe? If your answer is "yes," then you yourself are a mystery. If you answer "no," then holding to your erronoeus presupposition that Nathan's brain can know and understand all things, and hence, there can be no mysteries is where you've copped out, intellectually.

God's not waiting to send you to Hell, Nathan. He just wants to love you, that's all. That's why he made you. Give Him a chance. Forget the Christians of your past. Forget the TV evangelists, etc. Forget what you've been told. Answers only come with peace.

Peace.
Chris Gagliano

My Reply:

Chris:
Here is my reply to your two bets.
1. No, no abuse. Not a rough childhood at all. It couldn't have been much more average, as far as Midwestern United States upbringings go. And my parents were and remain pretty much middle-of-the-road protestants. P.S. I have no "struggle" with this subject of religion, as far as I am aware.

2. I am not quite sure what this means. I certainly violate parts of modern Christian morality with impunity, but really only those parts that relate to religious fidelity. For example, I see no need to "keep holy" someone else's "Sabbath". And if the implication is that I engage in some chronic "sin" that prevents me from signing up (for example, being gay), sorry...nothing there either. As far as I can tell, I am no more or less "sinful" on average than my Christian friends. Yes, there are parts of biblical or denominational morality that I would find evil. But these notions came much later, and had little to do with my deconversion, to the best of my recollection. The purported policies of the Sky Tyrant played more prominently, as far as moral outrages went.

You then proceed to challenge my aversion to Christian cop-outs with...a cop-out. Yes, there are all sorts of things that we have not and will never experience. There is an endless number of new things to learn, blah, blah, blah. Point being? If I decline to stamp the word "god" on all of life's mysteries, and instead insist on a real explanation, I don't see how that makes me the one who has "intellectually copped out".

Besides all that, I was a Christian, so I have experienced "God's love" and all that other silliness. I have seen-ah, the light-ah! And then I concluded that it was self-delusion, group think, wanting to be and believe. None of those warm and fuzzy notions change the fact that the Christian notion of a deity, like all others, makes no sense. And not in some "duh...me no understand Jesus..he too comp'cated" way, but in a "these are mutually exclusive propositions" way.

Since you closed with blatant patronization, and I like to respond to patronization in kind, five-fold, here goes:

Don't you worry your little head, Christopher. There are no big bad demons trying to get you to do things. There are no magical fluffy clouds in the sky for you to play your harp on. Just wait. One of these days, when you grow up, you figure out that there's just this world, right here in front of you, to explore and shape and master to the best of your natural abilities. And you can do whatever you want. You are a sentient, powerful, *individual*, not a worker bee in some hive. Give YOURSELF a chance. You might surprise you. You don't actually need a magical bearded guy to watch, protect, or punish you. And if you should decide, one day, when you're older, to tell that figment of your imagination to go screw himself, there will be no lightning bolts, or thunderous quakes, or eternities in hell. It won't matter at all.

Hey! I'm getting that warm and fuzzy feeling again...

Nathan

2nd Letter:

Nathan,

You have a very colorful way of writing. You must be a great typist, unlike myself.

Anyway. You still have only discounted your own experience, which you say was self-delusion. Granted, it may have been. But, you haven't, and never will be able to discount the experience of millions who have had total life transformations, physical healings, miracles, etc. (You're pretty dogmatic in your own interpretation of reality...which is something you have in common with us believers, or should I say, "Gullible followers of groupthink.")

Is it really possible that with millions of followers of the "bearded guy in the sky" over a 2000 year period, that ALL of them were charlatans or gullible fools. Can you really dismiss that many people from so many walks of life, cultures, time periods, and not to mention, intellectual capacities? Can their experiences all be dimissed by your own?

Again, I say that there is something more that drives you than just the notion that the idea of God is unreasonable. You're no Atheist. I can tell that in your tone. (And I quote: "if you should decide, one day, when you're older, to tell that figment of your imagination to go screw himself.") When you realized Santa didn't exist, did you tell him that? Do you spend alot of time cursing fictitious entities? You don't doubt GOD - you just don't like HIM. (the "Sky Tyrant", that is.) A true non-believer would never waste his time debating with people over the existence of imaginary beings. I mean, you don't have a website devoted to the refutation of the existence of unicorns or the Easter Bunny, or do you? It all wreaks of Lady Macbeth's struggle to "wash that blood incarnadine from her hands."

No, Nathan, you believe and it drives you crazy. Don't feel alone though, you're like us in that respect, too. We struggle with unbelief: you struggle with belief. It haunts you like unbelief does the believer. But fear not. When "the Hound of Heaven" catches up with you, it's not a bad thing.

Peace
Christopher

My Reply:

Chris:

Other people have all sorts of fanciful notions, but that doesn't make them true. Sure, there have been lots of believers, and I would wager that many of them were quite sincere. But, as a wise man once said, if 100 million people believe a foolish thing, it is still a foolish thing. What is or is not true is not decided by popular vote, nor is it decided by whatever silly thing pops into the head of that guy down the street.

No, I do not attach significance to other people's experiences, nor should I. These things are not evidence. I never attempt to make the case that this deity or that one do not exist. (The exception being cases where believers attach contradictory attributes to said deity, making its existence logically impossible.)

Believer? Who, me? Oh, my terrible secret has been found out! Come now. Don't confuse arguing to a believer with arguing as a believer. You are incapable of imagining for one second what it would be like to live in a universe without a god, so there's really not much point in me arguing from that perspective. It would get us nowhere (which is not to say the alternative did much better).

So why, oh why, would I argue against something that I really believe to be false? First off, I consider it not only foolish for people to believe in such things, but harmful. It continues a way of thinking fostered in them from a young age (with our good friends, Santa and that pagan fertility bunny) that there are hidden forces, benevolent and malicious, affecting both them and their surroundings. It causes people to halt the thinking process, cease any exploration of reality, and rely on ancient superstition. If I can get one person to stop doing that (which I have), then I have made the world a better place with a bare minimum of effort.

Second, religious notions and practices are widespread, to the point that they are codified into law and affecting me, a non-adherent. Where I live now, it would be illegal for me to purchase alcohol this Sunday. Why? Because some Christians, somewhere, don't like the idea of me doing so. It may seem trivial, but let us not forget what it means to make something like this a law. It means that should some brave merchant decide, in defiance of the tyranny of others' morals, to sell alcohol on Sunday, armed men will come and force him to stop. And should he resist that action strongly enough, they will kill him. That's what it means, that's what it always means, to make something illegal.

So, anything I can do to change that kind of culture, both the puritanical one that creates such laws, and the morally bankrupt one that approves of their implementation, I'm going to do.

And please, save me the "Don't feel alone" B.S. As I have said many times before, petty emotionalism only works on liberals or morons. I am neither.

Nathan

3rd Letter:

Nathan,

What your wise man said cuts both ways: If a 100 million people don't believe that which is true - this doesn't make it untrue.

"No, I do not attach significance to other people's experiences, nor should I. These things are not evidence."
Then what is evidence? (other people's experience is evidence in a court of law) Does everything have to be held in Nathan's hands in order for it to be true? Do you have to put your own hand in the fire or can you sometimes rely on other people's experience as sufficient evidence? We rely on the testimony of others all the time in this life.
"It causes people to halt the thinking process, cease any exploration of reality, and rely on ancient superstition." Like St. Augustine, Anselm, Thomas Aquinas, Cardinal Newman, GK Chesterton, Gerard Manley Hopkins, Fulton Sheen...?

Quit justifying your position with uneducated fundamentalism. The Church's history is ripe with foolish and superstitious thinking, (AND you SHOULD educate people out of that), but that in NO way disqualifies the great Saints and the great minds that have explored reality - WITH FAITH.

You cannot use Blue Laws as a sincere argument for the non-existence of a Divine Creator. Besides, this is a product of Biblical fundamentalism, which is a distortion of the truth.

"morally bankrupt": What is this? Is there a universal set of moral laws? If every man is left to his own understanding, with no influence from another's beliefs or experiences, then there is nothing that is moral or immoral. Your terminology implies some universal absolutes.

But all of these are minor points.

What I really want from you is something solid. WHAT are the supposed contradictory attributes of GOD that you speak of as foregone conclusions?
Is it the Trinity? That He is Just and Merciful? That He could love us but allows us to turn away? What? Is it free will and grace? I believe that I'm well-versed in the attributes of GOD, and I haven't perceived any of them to be contradictory? Is it Calvin's notion of predestination? (Then I would agree with you.)
Please elaborate. (Or should I say educate me.)

As a closing note:
"If I can get one person to stop doing that.., then I have made the world a better place...."
St. Francis of Assisi, Mother Cabrini, Fr. Damien of Molokai, Mother Teresa, and many, many more said that what they did for the poor, the lepers, etc. was done purely out of their belief in and love for Jesus. Could it be that all of their work was simply the result of superstition or "groupthink." Were they ALL just big hearts with really small minds? Was it just a result of "positive" brainwashing? If you could have, would you have educated Mother Teresa out of her "superstition?"

With Faith,
Chris

My Reply:

Chris:

I am going to try to keep this as succinct as possible, since you have an annoying habit of reading what you want to read, and not what I wrote.

Other people's internal experiences are not considered evidence in a court of law. The factual information they claim to have witnessed is, however, as notoriously unreliable as it may be.

I have never once used Fundamentalism (or Blue laws) as evidence of non- existence. Stop saying that. These things were supplied in response to your question of why I have a site. I occasionally mock these things, but they are not my argument; they are my site's raison d'etre.

Listing St. Augustine et al. is useless. Oh, yes. How can I possibly imply that believers are fools when they included all these great, thinking men...men who were famous for their thoughts about...being believers. And don't bother sending the list of people who were great at something useful. I don't care, and I have asserted nothing for such a list to "disprove".

When I say "morally bankrupt", assume I mean according to my morals. Universal? Perhaps. It's a long subject, which I have explored thoroughly with others. I can already see that I have no desire to explore it with you. There would be nothing in it for me, and I hate intellectual hand-holding. Let's veer away from it.

Now, let's get to the good stuff. You say you want me to give you something solid. Excuse me?

Who initiated this conversation? And did you type in my e-mail address by random chance? You know where you found me. What the hell do you think that website is there for? If you want an argument, read that. I'm not going to re- type everything in a slightly different way for your benefit. And while you're at it, read all of the letters I have already received from people like yourself. (Francis Thomas D Ocoma is coming to mind.) Then we can continue.

In conclusion, Mother Teresa was overrated, to say the least. (See "The Missionary Position" by Christopher Hitchens). Plus, wouldn't it have been better if the people you listed had done their charity out of a genuine empathy, rather than because they were told to in the Bible or because they want to get holy Brownie points?

Because they love Jesus? No. Because they want to get into heaven. How selfish.

Nathan
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