Does God Foreknow The Future?

[Doubting John]

Prophecy and Biblical Authority.

Predictive prophecy is used as a support to Biblical authority. In order to predict the future God must have foreknowledge. Can he predict the future, especially of free-willed human beings? What is the basis of God’s foreknowledge? There are philosophical as well as Biblical considerations.

Philosophical Considerations.

What would be the basis of God knowing the future? That is, how is it logically possible for God to know with absolute certainty that a specific kind of event performed by a free-willed human being would take place?

1) Theological determinism. God simply determines what happens. This is the position of Calvinism. God decrees every event in human history. If God does this then it’s no problem at all for God to foreknow and to predict the future. There are three excellent books that take issue with Calvinism from a traditional Christian understanding: Grace Unlimited and The Grace of God, the Will of Man, both edited by Clark Pinnock, and What the Bible Says About God The Ruler, by Jack Cottrell. An excellent debate on the subject can be found in Basinger & Basinger, eds, Predestination and Free Will. Suffice it to say that if theological determinism is true, then God cannot be a good God because he decrees all of the evil we experience in human history. All of it. No belief in “God’s inscrutable ways” can absolve God of this guilt. And no alternative definition of human freedom can absolve God of this guilt, either. Furthermore, if God told us to do good things and yet decrees that we should do evil things, then he’s lying to us. He’s telling us that he wants us to do something good, but behind the scenes he’s decreeing that we do the exact opposite. That makes him a liar, plain and simple.

2) God is outside of time so he sees everything as present. If this were so, God would have no problems with predicting the future because it is not actually in the future. He’s merely seeing the present from his perspective. Stephen T. Davis, in his book, Logic and the Nature of God (Eerdmans, 1983), argues against this view by claiming that such a timeless being is “probably incoherent.” If God created this universe, then there was a time when it didn’t yet exist, and then there was a later time when it did exist. So he argues: “it is not clear how a timelessly eternal being can be the creator of this temporal universe.” It would also make 2005 B.C and 2005 A.D. simultaneous in God’s eyes. But they are not simultaneous in human historical space and time. Davis argues, “we have on hand no acceptable concept of atemporal causation, i.e., of what it is for a timeless cause to produce a temporal effect.” (pp. 8-24).

From the timeless view of God come the doctrines of God’s immutability (that he cannot change), and impassibility (God cannot suffer).

The notion of a timeless God can be traced to Greek philosophers. Plato argued that God must be an eternally perfect being. And since any change in an eternally perfect being must be a change for the worst, God cannot change. Aristotle argued that all of God’s potentialities are completely actualized. Therefore, God cannot change because he cannot have unactualized potentialities. Christian thinkers like Augustine, Boethius, and Aquinas brought these concepts to the Bible. Boethius: “God lives in an everlasting present.” According to Aquinas God has no past, present or future since everything is “simultaneously whole” for him.

But Plato’s argument, for instance, “is straightforwardly fallacious, because it rests on a false dichotomy. It rests on the assumption that all change is either for the better or for the worst, an assumption that is simply false.” We want a watch to reflect the correct time, and so it must change with the time of day. The watch that stays the same all day long, and didn’t change, would be imperfect. Likewise, “when God began to create the universe he changed, beginning to do something that previously he had not done.” Such a change implies no imperfection in God. [(From William Hasker, in, The Openness of God, IVP, 1994, pp. 132-133). See also Thomas Morris, Our Idea of God, and Ronald Nash, The Concept of God.].

The whole notion that God doesn’t change seems to imply that God never has a new thought, or idea, since everything is an eternal NOW, and there is nothing he can learn. This is woodenly static. God would not be person, but a block of ice, a thing. To say he does nothing NEW, thinks nothing NEW, feels nothing NEW, basically means he does nothing, thinks nothing, feels nothing, for it’s all been done. What would it mean for a person not to take risks, not to plan (for it’s already been planned), or to think (thinking involves weighing temporal alternatives, does it not?). But if God cannot have a new thought then he cannot think--he is a block of ice.

4) The Inferential View. God just figures out from the range of options which choices we will make. He does this because he knows who we are completely and thoroughly as the “ultimate psychoanalyst.” He can take us in our present state and absolutely with certainty know what we will do next, and next, and next, and so on, and so on. He knows the future because he deduces it from who he knows us to be now. This option actually means, however, that what we do is somehow "programmed" into us. The determinist claims that it's all in the genes and environment, so this viewpoint commits the believer to the same position as the determinist. If God can predict future human actions 500 years from now, based upon what he knows about people living today, then we are merely environmentally and genetically programmed rats. There is no human freedom.

5) The innate view. God just has comprehensive knowledge of the future. He just “sees it” because he is omniscient. But this isn’t an explanation at all! When I asked Dr. William Lane Craig in class how it is that God has foreknowledge, Craig, who would normally have elaborate arguments and defenses for his views, merely said, as if this is all that needed to be said, "It's innate, God just has it." What? How? This answer actually triggered my mind, and in time led me to reject God’s foreknowledge of future human free-willed choices.

From these philosophical considerations, I just don’t see any real basis for believing that a good God can have absolute and certain foreknowledge of future truly free-willed human actions. Therefore, along with a great many recent Christian philosophers, I do not believe God can predict the future of human history with certainty. And since I also reject theological determinism, then there is no basis for predestination either, whether due to God’s supposed foreknowledge of what we will do, or in God’s decrees.

Biblical Considerations of God’s Timelessness.

The Bible does say that God is eternal. (Psalms 90:1-4; Psalms 102:25-27; Revelation 22:13). But this only means that God has always existed and will forever exist. The Bible never says God is timeless, experiencing no past, present or future. The Bible does say that a thousand years is as a day to God (Psalms 90:4), but this verse cannot support the weight of a timelessly eternal view of God. The passage is merely contrasting God’s everlasting existence with man’s temporal existence. That is, unlike people, God always has existed and will forever exist. [See Nicholas Wolterstorff, “God Everlasting,” in God and the Good, eds Clifton Orlebeke and Lewis Smedes (Eerdmas, 1975)]. “If God is truly timeless, so that temporal determinations of ‘before’ and ‘after’ do not apply to him, then how can God act in time, as Scriptures say that he does? How can he know what is occurring on the changing earthly scene? How can he respond when his children turn to him in prayer and obedience?” William Hasker in The Openness of God, (p. 128).

The Bible does say that God is unchanging (Exodus 3:14-15; 34:6-7; Numbers 23:19; Psalms 33:11; Malachi 3:6; Hebrews 13:8; James 1:17). But this only refers to God’s nature, character and purposes. God is described as changing is several passages in the Bible (Genesis 6:6-7; Exodus 32:10; Deuteronomy 9:13; I Samuel 15:11; Psalms 106:44-45; Jeremiah 18:8-10; Joel 2:13; Amos 7:3, and Jonah 3:10). Besides from these specific verses, according to Clark Pinnock, the Bible presents “a God who responds to us like a dancer with her partner” (in Predestination and Free Will, p. 158). He answers prayer, directs his people, and redirects his people.

The impassibility of God is the weakest link and the most dubious of the doctrines that follow from in a timeless view of God. One would have to deny almost every book in the Bible here, for nearly all of them speak of God’s pain and grief over human beings (Genesis 6:1-5; Judges 10:16; Psalms 95:10; Jeremiah 3:1-3; 13:26-27; 31:20; Hebrews 5:7). Jesus felt the same way (Matthew 23:37; John 11:35), especially on the cross.

Biblical Considerations of Predictive Prophecy.

God is described as declaring what will happen in the future (Psalms 139:4,16; Isaiah 46:10-11; Hebrews 4:13). But these verses do not demand that God has absolute certain foreknowledge of what we humans will do. Just as God does not have the power to do an absurdity (Can he create a rock so large that he cannot lift it? Can he ride a horse he isn’t riding?), neither can God know our future free-willed choices because they simply cannot be known. The Bible speaks often as if God doesn’t know the future (Genesis 22:12; Deuteronomy 13:3; Jeremiah 3:7, 19-20; 26:3; 32:35; Ezekiel 12:3 and Jonah 3:10).

Even from a Biblical perspective predictive prophecy can be explained in one of three ways: 1) God is announcing ahead of time what he plans to do (Exodus 6:6-8; 7:3; Isaiah 46:10-11). 2) God offers predictions based upon his exhaustive knowledge of the past and present (Exodus 3:19-21). Knowing people as intimately as God does he can pretty much predict what they will do in certain limited situations, although, the further into the future human history moves then the more it becomes impossible even for God to predict. 3) Prophecy can also be understood as a warning, and is thus conditional and based upon human responses (Jonah 3:2,5,10; Isaiah 38:1-6; and Jeremiah 18:7-10). [See Richard Rice, “Divine Foreknowledge and Free-Will Theism,” in The Grace of God, The Will of Man (Zondervan, 1989, pp. 121-139)].

How the New Testament Writers Used Predictive Prophecy.

One of the major things claimed by the New Testament in support of Jesus’ life and mission is that Jesus fulfilled Old Testament prophecy (Luke 24:26-27; Acts 3:17-24). But if not even God can predict the future as it moves farther and farther into the distance, then neither can any prophet who claims to speak for God. None of the Old Testament passages in the original Hebrew prophetically applied singularly and specifically to Jesus. Early Christian preachers simply went into the Old Testament looking for verses that would support their view of Jesus. They took these Old Testament verses out of context and applied them to Jesus in order to support their views of his life and mission. None of the ones we’ve discussed proves anything of the sort of what was written about Jesus.

Many of the claimed prophecies came from the book of Psalms. But the Psalms are simply devotional prayers. Among other things in the Psalms we find prayers for help in distress, for forgiveness, and wisdom, and so on. They declare praise to God, and they express hope that their enemies will be defeated. There is nothing about them, when reading them devotionally, that indicates they are predicting anything at all! But the New Testament writers quoted from several of them and claimed they predicted several things in the life, death and resurrection of the Messiah, Jesus (i.e., Psalms 2, 16, 22, 40, 69, 110, and 118).

Psalms 2 expresses hope for the Messiah, the anointed one. But any Jew writing about his hope for a future Messiah could have said these same hopeful things. A hope is not a prediction. Besides, Psalms 2 and 110 were most likely to be read at the coronation of Jewish kings. Psalms 110:1 reads: “The Lord says to my lord: ‘Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for you feet.” The New Testament writers make a big deal out of the fact that David wrote this Psalm in which he calls someone else “lord.” This supposedly refers to David’s future Messianic son, Jesus--his divine nature and mission. But it’s fairly obvious that if David wrote this Psalm he did it on the coronation of his son Solomon, whom he subsequently called, ‘lord.” He did this because of Solomon’s new status, which placed him as a ruler even above the aged David himself.

The other Psalms do not predict anything at all. They are prayers to be interpreted within the range of the writer’s experiences alone. Any extrapolation of them to Jesus is reading Jesus into the text, and not justified by the text itself. It is more probable that the New Testament writers were influenced in the construction of their stories about Jesus by making his life fit some of these details. That may explain Luke’s concoction of a census in order to get Mary to Bethlehem so that Jesus could be born there, according to “prophecy” (Micah 5:2, Matthew 2:6).

Notice also that Matthew 21:2 has Jesus requesting both a donkey and also a colt to ride into Jerusalem on, based upon a misunderstanding of Zechariah 9:9, which reads: “Rejoice…your king comes to you…gentle and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey.” Zechariah’s prophecy is an example of Hebraic parallelism in which the second line retells the point of the first line. There is only one animal in Zechariah, but Matthew thinks he means there is a donkey and also a colt, so he wrote his story based upon this misunderstanding in order to fit prophecy! [Mark (11:1) and Luke (19:30) both say it was a “colt.” John (12:14-15) says it was a “donkey”, and then quoted Zechariah: “your king is coming, seated on a donkey’s colt.”].

The Prophetic Paradigm.

Paul J. Achtemeier in The Inspration of Scripture (Westminister Press, 1980), “It is precisely because the prophet is the one into whose mouth God placed his own words that the prophet became the model for an understanding of the inspiration of Scripture. This way of understanding the inspiration of Scripture was then applied to the other books of the Bible, and to other literary forms: poems, songs, histories, wisdom sayings and all the rest. Behind the books of the Bible stand the inspired authors, each of whom wrote down what God wanted to be written down.” (p. 30-32).

But the model of the prophet receiving the very words of God is not a good paradigm for understanding the Bible as a whole. In the first place, prophetic speech claiming “thus says the Lord” is not seen much at all in the Old Testament, although it is true that it is common in the prophetic books. We don’t read, for instance, “the priests, who were heads of families, numbered 1,760,” ’ thus says the Lord’ (I Chronicles 9:13). Or “I am the rose of Sharon, a lily of the valleys,” ‘thus says the Lord’ (Song of Songs 2:1). According to James Barr, in his excellent discussion on this whole subject, such a prophetic paradigm “is not applied to the total literature of the Old Testament by that literature itself. Large tracts of Old Testament material are not in any normal sense ‘prophetic’ and these tracts make no pretension to possessing the features of being words directly given by God such as we find in the speeches of the prophets themselves.” Beyond Fundamentalism (Westminister Press, 1984), p. 21-23.

But when we do look at those passages where the prophets use the phrases like, “thus says the Lord,” what do we find? “For the most part the content concerns the divine judgment and the divine promise upon Israel, Judah and other peoples (See Amos).” “It is a warning of disaster that will come unless one’s ways are mended. What a prophet says, then, is characteristically not an absolute. What the prophet says is conditioned. It may be affected by repentance of the persons affected, or by the pleas and prayers of the righteous on their behalf.” (Barr, p. 23-24). Jeremiah 18:5-10 describes this best. It reads: “The word of the Lord came to me: ‘If at any time I announce that a nation is to be uprooted and destroyed, and if that nation I warned repents of its evil, then I will relent and not inflict on it the disaster I had planned. And if at another time I announce that a nation is to be built up and planted, and if it does evil in my sight then I will reconsider the good I had intended to do for it.”

Isaiah prophesied that Hezekiah would die, but because he prayed to live, God gave him an additional 15 years (Isaiah 38:1-6). Technically speaking, what the prophet Isaiah predicted was not fulfilled. But that didn’t bother Isaiah because “his utterances were not absolute statements of fact, past, present or future; they were warnings, threats, appeals.” (Barr, p. 25). Jonah (3:2,5,10) obeyed “the word of the Lord” by prophesying to the people of Nineveh, “forty more days and Nineveh will be overturned.” They repented and God did not destroy them. But didn’t Jonah prophesy that Nineveh would be overturned? We see this throughout the prophets. Barr: “Prophecy was not concerned with accuracy, but with communicating the will and judgment of God. The belief that the prophetic paradigm supports ideas of accuracy and inerrancy can be maintained only if the actuality of what the Old Testament prophets were like is ignored.” (p. 29).

Where the prophets do predict the future, according to Barr “the vast majority” of them are fairly short term ones, and as we’ve seen, most all of these are conditioned upon the responses of the hearers. The prophets did describe a future ideal messianic age in which pain and suffering would be eliminated (Isaiah 11:6-9), but “these are not really ‘predictions.’ They are expressions of aspirations and ideals which, the prophet is confident, God will bring to realization. They do not ‘predict’ how or when or in what degree these expectations may be realized.” (pp. 101-102). Furthermore, “it is not the case that prediction is possible only with supernatural aid or guidance. People do it all the time. A number of the predictions which Old Testament prophets make could have been made by a capable newspaper columnist of the period.” (Barr, p. 102; see Jeremiah 34).

From what I’ve said it will be clear that I do not believe Michael Drosnin’s claims in his 1997 book, The Bible Code, that there are any hidden meanings or prophecies in the Bible. See the part in Jeffery L. Sheler’s book, Is The Bible True? How Modern Debates and Discoveries Affirm the Essence of the Scriptures (Harper, 1999) that discusses the Bible Code. He debunks Drosnin’s claims more than adequately. See Sheller’s arguments also in U.S. News & World Report’s special issue: “Mysteries of the Bible,” November 2004.

What Then of Biblical Authority? The traditional prophetic paradigm does not adequately model what the Bible is like. If there is no predictive prophecy, then the life and times of Jesus were not predicted in advance either, except as aspirations of hope, human guesswork and misinterpretation. Along with other things, this leads me to believe that the Bible does not contain the very words of God. It has no authority over us.

[Raptor]

DJ,

Please do not post back to back.

[Xmansmommy]

John, welcome to the dark side! (Open Theism :wink:)

[Doubting John]

I've moved beyond Open Theism into honest doubt.


How the New Testament Writers Used Predictive Prophecy.

One of the major things claimed by the New Testament in support of Jesus’ life and mission is that Jesus fulfilled Old Testament prophecy (Luke 24:26-27; Acts 3:17-24). But if not even God can predict the future as it moves farther and farther into the distance, then neither can any prophet who claims to speak for God. As we have seen with regard to the virgin birth of Jesus, the claim that he was God Incarnate, and of his resurrection, none of the Old Testament passages in the original Hebrew prophetically applied singularly and specifically to Jesus. Early Christian preachers simply went into the Old Testament looking for verses that would support their view of Jesus. They took these Old Testament verses out of context and applied them to Jesus in order to support their views of his life and mission. None of the ones we’ve discussed proves anything of the sort of what was written about Jesus.

Many of the claimed prophecies came from the book of Psalms. But the Psalms are simply devotional prayers. Among other things in the Psalms we find prayers for help in distress, for forgiveness, and wisdom, and so on. They declare praise to God, and they express hope that their enemies will be defeated. There is nothing about them, when reading them devotionally, that indicates they are predicting anything at all! But the New Testament writers quoted from several of them and claimed they predicted several things in the life, death and resurrection of the Messiah, Jesus (i.e., Psalms 2, 16, 22, 40, 69, 110, and 118).

Psalms 2 expresses hope for the Messiah, the anointed one. But any Jew writing about his hope for a future Messiah could have said these same hopeful things. A hope is not a prediction. Besides, Psalms 2 and 110 were most likely to be read at the coronation of Jewish kings. Psalms 110:1 reads: “The Lord says to my lord: ‘Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for you feet.” The New Testament writers make a big deal out of the fact that David wrote this Psalm in which he calls someone else “lord.” This supposedly refers to David’s future Messianic son, Jesus--his divine nature and mission. But it’s fairly obvious that if David wrote this Psalm he did it on the coronation of his son Solomon, whom he subsequently called, ‘lord.” He did this because of Solomon’s new status, which placed him as a ruler even above the aged David himself.

The other Psalms do not predict anything at all. They are prayers to be interpreted within the range of the writer’s experiences alone. Any extrapolation of them to Jesus is reading Jesus into the text, and not justified by the text itself. It is more probable that the New Testament writers were influenced in the construction of their stories about Jesus by making his life fit some of these details. That may explain Luke’s concoction of a census in order to get Mary to Bethlehem so that Jesus could be born there, according to “prophecy” (Micah 5:2, Matthew 2:6).

Notice also that Matthew 21:2 has Jesus requesting both a donkey and also a colt to ride into Jerusalem on, based upon a misunderstanding of Zechariah 9:9, which reads: “Rejoice…your king comes to you…gentle and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey.” Zechariah’s prophecy is an example of Hebraic parallelism in which the second line retells the point of the first line. There is only one animal in Zechariah, but Matthew thinks he means there is a donkey and also a colt, so he wrote his story based upon this misunderstanding in order to fit prophecy! [Mark (11:1) and Luke (19:30) both say it was a “colt.” John (12:14-15) says it was a “donkey”, and then quoted Zechariah: “your king is coming, seated on a donkey’s colt.”].

The Prophetic Paradigm.

Paul J. Achtemeier in The Inspration of Scripture (Westminister Press, 1980), “It is precisely because the prophet is the one into whose mouth God placed his own words that the prophet became the model for an understanding of the inspiration of Scripture. This way of understanding the inspiration of Scripture was then applied to the other books of the Bible, and to other literary forms: poems, songs, histories, wisdom sayings and all the rest. Behind the books of the Bible stand the inspired authors, each of whom wrote down what God wanted to be written down.” (p. 30-32).

But the model of the prophet receiving the very words of God is not a good paradigm for understanding the Bible as a whole. In the first place, prophetic speech claiming “thus says the Lord” is not seen much at all in the Old Testament, although it is true that it is common in the prophetic books. We don’t read, for instance, “the priests, who were heads of families, numbered 1,760,” ’ thus says the Lord’ (I Chronicles 9:13). Or “I am the rose of Sharon, a lily of the valleys,” ‘thus says the Lord’ (Song of Songs 2:1). According to James Barr, in his excellent discussion on this whole subject, such a prophetic paradigm “is not applied to the total literature of the Old Testament by that literature itself. Large tracts of Old Testament material are not in any normal sense ‘prophetic’ and these tracts make no pretension to possessing the features of being words directly given by God such as we find in the speeches of the prophets themselves.” Beyond Fundamentalism (Westminister Press, 1984), p. 21-23.

But when we do look at those passages where the prophets use the phrases like, “thus says the Lord,” what do we find? “For the most part the content concerns the divine judgment and the divine promise upon Israel, Judah and other peoples (See Amos).” “It is a warning of disaster that will come unless one’s ways are mended. What a prophet says, then, is characteristically not an absolute. What the prophet says is conditioned. It may be affected by repentance of the persons affected, or by the pleas and prayers of the righteous on their behalf.” (Barr, p. 23-24). Jeremiah 18:5-10 describes this best. It reads: “The word of the Lord came to me: ‘If at any time I announce that a nation is to be uprooted and destroyed, and if that nation I warned repents of its evil, then I will relent and not inflict on it the disaster I had planned. And if at another time I announce that a nation is to be built up and planted, and if it does evil in my sight then I will reconsider the good I had intended to do for it.”

Isaiah prophesied that Hezekiah would die, but because he prayed to live, God gave him an additional 15 years (Isaiah 38:1-6). Technically speaking, what the prophet Isaiah predicted was not fulfilled. But that didn’t bother Isaiah because “his utterances were not absolute statements of fact, past, present or future; they were warnings, threats, appeals.” (Barr, p. 25). Jonah (3:2,5,10) obeyed “the word of the Lord” by prophesying to the people of Nineveh, “forty more days and Nineveh will be overturned.” They repented and God did not destroy them. But didn’t Jonah prophesy that Nineveh would be overturned? We see this throughout the prophets. Barr: “Prophecy was not concerned with accuracy, but with communicating the will and judgment of God. The belief that the prophetic paradigm supports ideas of accuracy and inerrancy can be maintained only if the actuality of what the Old Testament prophets were like is ignored.” (p. 29).

Where the prophets do predict the future, according to Barr “the vast majority” of them are fairly short term ones, and as we’ve seen, most all of these are conditioned upon the responses of the hearers. The prophets did describe a future ideal messianic age in which pain and suffering would be eliminated (Isaiah 11:6-9), but “these are not really ‘predictions.’ They are expressions of aspirations and ideals which, the prophet is confident, God will bring to realization. They do not ‘predict’ how or when or in what degree these expectations may be realized.” (pp. 101-102). Furthermore, “it is not the case that prediction is possible only with supernatural aid or guidance. People do it all the time. A number of the predictions which Old Testament prophets make could have been made by a capable newspaper columnist of the period.” (Barr, p. 102; see Jeremiah 34).

What Then of Biblical Authority? The traditional prophetic paradigm does not adequately model what the Bible is like. If there is no predictive prophecy, then the life and times of Jesus were not predicted in advance either, except as aspirations of hope, human guesswork and misinterpretation. Along with other things, this leads me to believe that the Bible does not contain the very words of God. It has no authority over us.

[Xmansmommy]

Obviously you don't hold to biblical innerancy. :wink: What is your definition of prophecy? What is the biblical definition? Are they the same? If not, why not?

[jpholding]

Nothing like being able to copy and paste from your own book huh DJ. :thumb:

[Doubting John]

JP, you asked for it, and now you've got it.

The work of an apologist is very dangerous work, so be forewarned.

If you want to continue policing this website I'm going to keep you very busy. Good luck to you and your girl Tophet.

[Jin-Roh]

Nothing like being able to copy and paste from your own book huh DJ. :thumb:

Yeah someone should report him for posting copy righted material.

[Doubting John]

Hey stupid. I hold the copyright.

[db8man]

Yeah, I could spend my valuable time critiquing DJ's ideas, but I would need to post a thesis-sized chunk of info to even begin to deal with the ridiculously large thread starter he has used. Just proves that DJ isn't really after discussion, just a chance to sound nice and intellectual. Oh, and BTW, l don't think I'm alone in that I generally ignore threads started by DJ - if you want to sell your book, I suggest you go and sit at a department store with some signed copies; this is a forum for sharing, discussing and arguing ideas and theology, NOT the pedalling of your own merchandise :wink:

[gharfish]

Heck, even I foreknew that Doubtable John would post this exact thread and it's sassy comebacks, almost word-for-word too, and I am as far from the Divine as one can be.





Mr. Raptor: Your avatar is Will Farrell on SNL, posing as the cowbell player for...(what real band ?)

[Raptor]

Mr. Raptor: Your avatar is Will Farrell on SNL, posing as the cowbell player for...(what real band ?)

Blue Oyster Cult. :teeth:

[gharfish]

THAT'S IT ! Thank you. It's been driving me crazy...right on the tip of my brain.

(hey wait a minute; haven't all those righteous bros. killed themselves and gone on to hell by now ? ...didn't fear the reaper quite seriously enough ?!)

*Farrell IS looking very late 70s there though !*

[Doubting John]

Yeah, I could spend my valuable time critiquing DJ's ideas, but I would need to post a thesis-sized chunk of info to even begin to deal with the ridiculously large thread starter he has used. Just proves that DJ isn't really after discussion, just a chance to sound nice and intellectual. Oh, and BTW, l don't think I'm alone in that I generally ignore threads started by DJ - if you want to sell your book, I suggest you go and sit at a department store with some signed copies; this is a forum for sharing, discussing and arguing ideas and theology, NOT the pedalling of your own merchandise

So Db8man, a discussion to you means one liners?

And you don't buy books?

I see.

[Captain Ochre]

This is a topic that interests me.
I think that the development open theism is unnecessary, and that objections to a god who transcends our flow of time are weak.


Philosophical Considerations.

What would be the basis of God knowing the future? That is, how is it logically possible for God to know with absolute certainty that a specific kind of event performed by a free-willed human being would take place?

1) Theological determinism. God simply determines what happens. This is the position of Calvinism.

Calvinists vary on this, in my experience. The central doctrine of distinctive Calvinism with respect to the freedom of the will is that God causes salvation. Other models of causation are available to the Calvinist, depending on his view of meticulous control.
I don't see any need to comment on this section in any great detail.

2) God is outside of time so he sees everything as present. If this were so, God would have no problems with predicting the future because it is not actually in the future. He’s merely seeing the present from his perspective. Stephen T. Davis, in his book, Logic and the Nature of God (Eerdmans, 1983), argues against this view by claiming that such a timeless being is “probably incoherent.” If God created this universe, then there was a time when it didn’t yet exist, and then there was a later time when it did exist. So he argues: “it is not clear how a timelessly eternal being can be the creator of this temporal universe.” It would also make 2005 B.C and 2005 A.D. simultaneous in God’s eyes. But they are not simultaneous in human historical space and time. Davis argues, “we have on hand no acceptable concept of atemporal causation, i.e., of what it is for a timeless cause to produce a temporal effect.” (pp. 8-24).

1) The future exists, but our future is not God's future at the same time and in the same sense, using a model that has God progressing (timewise) in a distinct temporal dimension (additional dimensions are implied by mathematics, and at least some physicists believe that some of the expected dimensions are temporal) other than ours.
2) Davis' argument as presented in this thread is an insistence that there is only one sense of "time", otherwise it is an argument from incredulity, IMHO.
3) Events in our time-space continuum would not be simultaneous in God's eyes (at least they wouldn't have to be). They would be known by God simultaneously as soon as it was possible to know the events without contradiction (I hold that neither omniscience nor omnipotence means "able to do the impossible", else no disproof of God based on contradiction could proceed since the ability to exist despite being contradictory would be child's play to a being capable of doing the impossible).

From the timeless view of God come the doctrines of God’s immutability (that he cannot change), and impassibility (God cannot suffer).

They can be derived merely from scriptural accounts suggesting that God knows the future--albeit not with certainty.

4) The Inferential View. God just figures out from the range of options which choices we will make. He does this because he knows who we are completely and thoroughly as the “ultimate psychoanalyst.” He can take us in our present state and absolutely with certainty know what we will do next, and next, and next, and so on, and so on. He knows the future because he deduces it from who he knows us to be now. This option actually means, however, that what we do is somehow "programmed" into us. The determinist claims that it's all in the genes and environment, so this viewpoint commits the believer to the same position as the determinist. If God can predict future human actions 500 years from now, based upon what he knows about people living today, then we are merely environmentally and genetically programmed rats. There is no human freedom.

I'd agree with the conclusion, based on the truth of premisses (for the sake of argument), at least with respect to libertarian free will (LFW). I have yet to encounter a view of compatibilism that makes sense to me, but I'll allow that perhaps such a view could be advanced successfully.

5) The innate view. God just has comprehensive knowledge of the future. He just “sees it” because he is omniscient. But this isn’t an explanation at all! When I asked Dr. William Lane Craig in class how it is that God has foreknowledge, Craig, who would normally have elaborate arguments and defenses for his views, merely said, as if this is all that needed to be said, "It's innate, God just has it." What? How? This answer actually triggered my mind, and in time led me to reject God’s foreknowledge of future human free-willed choices.

I cannot appreciate that objection. One doesn't know how something can be self-existent or how something can be created from nothing.
This seems to be another argument from incredulity.

From these philosophical considerations, I just don’t see any real basis for believing that a good God can have absolute and certain foreknowledge of future truly free-willed human actions.

How about the fact that the view is not self-contradictory?
You haven't advanced any case for contradiction, AFAICT.

Therefore, along with a great many recent Christian philosophers, I do not believe God can predict the future of human history with certainty. And since I also reject theological determinism, then there is no basis for predestination either, whether due to God’s supposed foreknowledge of what we will do, or in God’s decrees.

I've commented on the parts I find interesting. The rest isn't so interesting to me, and replying to it would tend to hamstring the progression of the thread since the OP is so ponderously long.

[Doubting John]

Captain:

I'm not all that sure I can respond without being "ponderously long," but here goes.


2) God is outside of time so he sees everything as present.

1) The future exists, but our future is not God's future at the same time and in the same sense, using a model that has God progressing (timewise) in a distinct temporal dimension (additional dimensions are implied by mathematics, and at least some physicists believe that some of the expected dimensions are temporal) other than ours.

There are Christian philosophers who debate this issue, I know. But from my perspective, I've landed.

Anyway, if God had a "different time" than us, then how could God know what time it is for us right now? How could he know that I'm experiencing things at 9:56 PM right now? There would be something God doesn't know, right?

[Captain Ochre]

Captain:

I'm not all that sure I can respond without being "ponderously long," but here goes.



There are Christian philosophers who debate this issue, I know. But from my perspective, I've landed.

Where you bring the issue for debate, I expect you to provide a rationale for your claims, especially if you suggest that foreknowledge is not compatible with meaningful freedom.
Some of your posts barely make any significant claim, however.

Anyway, if God had a "different time" than us, then how could God know what time it is for us right now?

Same way you know when Gollum tears the ring from Frodo's finger in that fantasy time-line, in general.

How could he know that I'm experiencing things at 9:56 PM right now? There would be something God doesn't know, right?

1) I don't think that I need to explain how omniscience works in the practical sense. Maybe that's not what you're asking. Hopefully my response referencing Tolkien's universe answers your question.
2) There would be the "problem" (if such it is) of God not absolutely knowing the future with respect to his own timeline except where he purposes something and brings it to pass. I don't see why this would be a big problem, though I'll entertain suggestions as to why I should change my mind about it.

[bar Jonah]

John, I'm curious as to whether my signature means anything to you. (Not bragging, I didn't come up with it or anything. It's a sincere question.)



EDIT: What the heck??? Where's my signature? :rieek: It just suddenly disappears, the moment I try to post about it? This is bizarre.... I just double-checked my settings, I DO have a siggy, it is set to appear, but it's not there!

Okay, here's what my siggy is supposed to say:


Fulfilled prophecy is evidence there is a God.

Unfulfilled prophecy is evidence that God is righteous.


Any thoughts?

[Doubting John]

Fulfilled prophecy is evidence there is a God.

Unfulfilled prophecy is evidence that God is righteous.

So where's the fulfilled prophecy?

There's so much unfulfilled prophecy that your conclusion doesn't follow.

Unfulfilled prophecy is just that, unfulfilled.

[bar Jonah]

So where's the fulfilled prophecy?

There's so much unfulfilled prophecy that your conclusion doesn't follow.

Unfulfilled prophecy is just that, unfulfilled.
John, if the Jonah prophecy had been fulfilled and Ninevah "surely" destroyed on that day... would that be a good thing or a bad thing?

If that prophecy had been fulfilled, then this would prove God is unrighteous. Not only is this not a problem, but it's a wonderful thing! Something to rejoice in! Jeremiah 18, the part after the potter parable, is an excellent example of exactly this. If every prophecy in the Bible came about as stated, it would be evidence against the Bible! It would show that God is terrible and unrighteous, while simultaneously claiming He is perfectly good and righteous. But what do we see? God's responsiveness, His dynamic relationship with humanity that is at once both loving and just -- something that inevitably creates conflict for God. A problem for God. No one faces the problem of evil more than He does. But His responsive nature is testimony to His just character.

If He says He will destroy a nation, and it genuinely repents, would you have Him destroy them anyway? Or an individual man, like Saul? God regretted making him king. His "repentence" wasn't genuine at all.

Indeed, the Bible clearly states that God changes His mind numerous times in the OT. To the point that He says, Himself, that He is "weary of repenting!" Why? Because of His failure? No, the failure of men.

The author of the above quote also noted, "If only men would always repent, God would never have to."

[Not_Registered]

Doubting John, you provided an informal argument in your original post which attempted to show that given an inferential view (of God's foreknowledge) it follows that "[t]here is no human freedom." Using your own words, your argument (given an inferential view) can be formally presented as follows: "God just figures out from the range of options which choices we will make."
"He knows the future because he deduces it from who he knows us to be now."
"This option actually means, however, that what we do is somehow 'programmed' into us."
Therefore, "[t]here is no human freedom."I don't believe this conclusion is accurate, given an inferential view. I don't believe premise (3) follows premise (2), if your speaking of "programmed" in a deterministic sense (which seems to be the case based on your conclusion). Premise (2) seems to say that God's foreknowledge is deduced (passively) from what He omnisciently knows we will do. This premise allows and even implicitly asserts that we are the determining factor. Premise (3) then implies that we are not the determining factor, but that we, and our destinies, have been "programmed" (actively) by external forces.

An example to emphasize the differences follows. Say you have a friend who you know will become angry if during a basketball game someone shoves him. Sure enough, that event occurs, and your friend acts according to your knowledge. You in no way caused your friend's reaction. Nevertheless, you did foreknow it and, thus, you were able to determine it (although not in a causal sense).

I would say that the innate view (of God's foreknowledge) is the view the bible holds, because the bible doesn't explicitly discuss how God's foreknowledge is formed (or even if it is formed). The bible merely states that it is. The inferential and determinist views are just explanations speculating on how God's innate view of the future is possible. (I believe the discussion should center around how God's foreknowledge is possible, as opposed to how it is formed. Because the latter implies that God lacked foreknowledge at one point.)

Also, I do not believe that determinist and inferential views are equivalent, as you have concluded them to be when you said the following:This option [i.e., the inferential view] actually means, however, that what we do is somehow "programmed" into us. The determinist claims that it's all in the genes and environment, so this viewpoint commits the believer to the same position as the determinist.In the determinist view we have no choice and our future not determined by us, rather, it is determined by external forces. In the inferential view we do determine our future; it's just that God knows what we will determine. The difference lies in our ability to choose and, more importantly, determine. In the inferential view, we are free agents. In the determinist view, we are hostages. Also, the inferential view as you have interpreted it and the determinist view make the theistic God equivalent to the deistic God: God initially gets the ball rolling and then everything unwinds itself.

I would add that, given the views as you have depicted them, there is no basis for God having to perform miracles, answer prayers, or intervene in any manner in the unwinding of that which He has created. In other words, divine intervention would be unnecessary.


If there is no predictive prophecy, then the life and times of Jesus were not predicted in advance either, except as aspirations of hope, human guesswork and misinterpretation. Along with other things, this leads me to believe that the Bible does not contain the very words of God.
You comment that because the bible (namely the Old Testament) doesn't contain future predictions it is not from God. But, if I'm not mistaken, your whole issue up to this point was how could God foreknow the future. So, if you question God's ability to foreknow events, then, there should be no suspicion, from your perspective, as to why a book claimed to be God-inspired does not contain prophecies (which would require God to posses foreknowledge that you believe He doesn't possess). And, even if God does foreknow future events, rejecting a book because it doesn't contain future predictions is not an adequate reason. However, if a book contained teachings that legitimately seemed not to be God-inspired or it contained inaccurate predictions then a rejection of divine revelation would be reasonable.


The innate view. God just has comprehensive knowledge of the future. He just “sees it” because he is omniscient. But this isn’t an explanation at all! . . . [Dr. William Lane Craig] says "It's innate, God just has it." What? How? This answer actually triggered my mind, and in time led me to reject God’s foreknowledge of future human free-willed choices.
You said that the simple answer Craig gave, which bypassed any concerns of the how, was what eventually led you to reject God's foreknowledge. But, if you rejected this concept (that is, God's foreknowledge) simply because you couldn't comprehend it, then I must ask why you didn't reject Christianity altogether a long time before this point, due to other well-known aspects of Christian doctrine which are seemingly more perplexing, such as the Trinity and the double-nature of Jesus. Also, if your criterion for rejection is simply incomprehension then this will lead to the rejection of many concepts independent of Christianity (or any religion). For example, time is not a fully understood concept, nor is space. Also, do you have a complete comprehension for how the universe came to be or why anything exists at all? If not, then given your criterion for rejection you should have to become an extreme nihilist, that is, believe that nothing exists. (Also, given your criterion no one could be a theist because no one understands God.) To avoid these absurd rejections it seems you will have to modify your criterion for rejection. A better condition would be to reject that which is illogical or irrational, not just incomprehensible. Existence, while somewhat incomprehensible, is not illogical, because here we are. Also, this would solve the problem for the previous rejections that I noted, as well as for a rejection of God's foreknowledge based on the premise that it is incomprehensible.

[Doubting John]

Bar Jonah:

If every prophecy in the Bible came about as stated, it would be evidence against the Bible!

Really? Then I cannot win either way. You've put me into a catch-22 that I cannot escape from. But then on the other hand you've now placed your belief into the category of an unfalsifiable one. That is, what would have to happen for you to deny that prophecy is evidence on behalf of the Bible being God's word? If it comes true it's of God. If it doesn't it's of God.

And who is this person called Not Registered?

I had wondered if Bill Craig would hear of what I'm arguing here and write a few rebuttals. Is that you? Send me a private message if so, and I'll keep your secret.

Doubting John, you provided an informal argument in your original post which attempted to show that given an inferential view (of God's foreknowledge) it follows that "[t]here is no human freedom." Using your own words, your argument (given an inferential view) can be formally presented as follows:

"God just figures out from the range of options which choices we will make."
"He knows the future because he deduces it from who he knows us to be now."
"This option actually means, however, that what we do is somehow 'programmed' into us."
Therefore, "[t]here is no human freedom."

I don't believe this conclusion is accurate, given an inferential view. I don't believe premise (3) follows premise (2), if you're speaking of "programmed" in a deterministic sense (which seems to be the case based on your conclusion). Premise (2) seems to say that God's foreknowledge is deduced (passively) from what He omnisciently knows we will do. This premise allows and even implicitly asserts that we are the determining factor. Premise (3) then implies that we are not the determining factor, but that we, and our destinies, have been "programmed" (actively) by external forces.

An example to emphasize the differences follows. Say you have a friend who you know will become angry if during a basketball game someone shoves him. Sure enough, that event occurs, and your friend acts according to your knowledge. You in no way caused your friend's reaction. Nevertheless, you did foreknow it and, thus, you were able to determine it (although not in a causal sense).

So the difference is between God passively knowing something from external forces causing something in us. Maybe there were some implied premises here, since I wasn't arguing on the Harvard yard. But tell me this: What follows if God can infer the human state of affairs (if we exist) 500 years to the day from now based on the state of affairs today? What if God can describe everyone who exists down to what they are wearing, what they ate that day, what they are thinking that day, what they will do that day? Even if this were passively known that wouldn't make a difference. It would mean that we are all environmentally and genetically programmed rats, would it not?


I would say that the innate view (of God's foreknowledge) is the view the bible holds, because the bible doesn't explicitly discuss how God's foreknowledge is formed (or even if it is formed). The bible merely states that it is. The inferential and determinist views are just explanations speculating on how God's innate view of the future is possible. (I believe the discussion should center around how God's foreknowledge is possible, as opposed to how it is formed. Because the latter implies that God lacked foreknowledge at one point.)

I thought that's what I was discussing, but I see the point.


Also, I do not believe that determinist and inferential views are equivalent, as you have concluded them to be when you said the following:
This option [i.e., the inferential view] actually means, however, that what we do is somehow "programmed" into us. The determinist claims that it's all in the genes and environment, so this viewpoint commits the believer to the same position as the determinist.

Okay, but see below:

In the determinist view we have no choice and our future not determined by us, rather, it is determined by external forces. In the inferential view we do determine our future; it's just that God knows what we will determine. The difference lies in our ability to choose and, more importantly, determine. In the inferential view, we are free agents. In the determinist view, we are hostages. Also, the inferential view as you have interpreted it and the determinist view make the theistic God equivalent to the deistic God: God initially gets the ball rolling and then everything unwinds itself.

Then let it be said that the results are the same.

I would add that, given the views as you have depicted them, there is no basis for God having to perform miracles, answer prayers, or intervene in any manner in the unwinding of that which He has created. In other words, divine intervention would be unnecessary.

I don't see how that follows, but I don't believe God does these things.

You comment that because the bible (namely the Old Testament) doesn't contain future predictions it is not from God. But, if I'm not mistaken, your whole issue up to this point was how could God foreknow the future. So, if you question God's ability to foreknow events, then, there should be no suspicion, from your perspective, as to why a book claimed to be God-inspired does not contain prophecies (which would require God to posses foreknowledge that you believe He doesn't possess). And, even if God does foreknow future events, rejecting a book because it doesn't contain future predictions is not an adequate reason. However, if a book contained teachings that legitimately seemed not to be God-inspired or it contained inaccurate predictions then a rejection of divine revelation would be reasonable.



But earlier I did say that many prophetic predictions of the future never came to pass.



Quote: Originally posted by Doubting John

The innate view. God just has comprehensive knowledge of the future. He just “sees it” because he is omniscient. But this isn’t an explanation at all! . . . [Dr. William Lane Craig] says "It's innate, God just has it." What? How? This answer actually triggered my mind, and in time led me to reject God’s foreknowledge of future human free-willed choices.

Not Registered:

You said that the simple answer Craig gave, which bypassed any concerns of the how, was what eventually led you to reject God's foreknowledge. But, if you rejected this concept (that is, God's foreknowledge) simply because you couldn't comprehend it, then I must ask why you didn't reject Christianity altogether a long time before this point, due to other well-known aspects of Christian doctrine which are seemingly more perplexing, such as the Trinity and the double-nature of Jesus. Also, if your criterion for rejection is simply incomprehension then this will lead to the rejection of many concepts independent of Christianity (or any religion). For example, time is not a fully understood concept, nor is space. Also, do you have a complete comprehension for how the universe came to be or why anything exists at all? If not, then given your criterion for rejection you should have to become an extreme nihilist, that is, believe that nothing exists. (Also, given your criterion no one could be a theist because no one understands God.) To avoid these absurd rejections it seems you will have to modify your criterion for rejection. A better condition would be to reject that which is illogical or irrational, not just incomprehensible. Existence, while somewhat incomprehensible, is not illogical, because here we are. Also, this would solve the problem for the previous rejections that I noted, as well as for a rejection of God's foreknowledge based on the premise that it is incomprehensible.

Bill, I think I know you well enough to know I've heard this same line of reasoning from you when I first told you I was a doubter. I have a deep respect for you, and you are far better than I as an apologist for the Christian faith.

But there are simply far too many things that are incomprehensible for me within the confines of the Christian faith--far too many to believe.

And I suppose there are incomprehensible things within the Muslim tradition, and the Jewish tradition too, not outright contradictions. Contradictions and illogical things within a belief system are slippery things to find, and given some additional premises very difficult to nail down and proclaim that I found one. So the best we can do as people is the reject the beliefs that seem incomprehensible.

And it's not the same as quantum science, or space travel, and time warps, either. Because these things have a mathematical system to them, and some cold hard evidence behind them. Incomprehensible for now, but since there must be a reason for this universe and its form, then scientists should continue trying to figure it out.

But with regard to God, whether he exists (and I think he does), what his goals are, what we should do--all of that is of things we don't experience, and so we may just be explaning something that doesn't need explained.

[bar Jonah]

Bar Jonah:

Really? Then I cannot win either way. You've put me into a catch-22 that I cannot escape from. But then on the other hand you've now placed your belief into the category of an unfalsifiable one. That is, what would have to happen for you to deny that prophecy is evidence on behalf of the Bible being God's word? If it comes true it's of God. If it doesn't it's of God.
You seem to be completely missing my point. That's not what I'm driving at.

My point isn't that no matter what happens, God is right. In fact, I explicitly pointed out the contrary. Let me put it in even simpler terms, this time.
1. If God promises a blessing and the person/nation is righteous, and God blesses them, this is evidence that God is righteous. This is evidence that the Bible is consistent.

2. If God promises a blessing and the person/nation is righteous, and God destroys them, this is evidence that God is NOT righteous! This would clear evidence that the Bible is false!

3. If God promises to destroy a person/nation, and they repent, and God repents of destroying them, this is evidence that God is righteous. This is evidence that supports the Bible.

4. If God promises to destroy a person/nation, and they repent, and God destroys them anyway, this is evidence that God is NOT righteous. This would be evidence that disproves the Bible!
What we see consistently is 1 and 3, and not 2 and 4. So, when you say that no matter what happens, God is right... you are incorrect. When you suggest that it is non-falsifiable, you are mistaken. Numbers 3 and 4 prove that this IS a falsifiable issue! Those are the two ways you could falsify the Bible regarding prophecy.

So many people look at predictive prophecy through too simplicistic a perspective. They -- like you -- think that if the prophecy didnt' come true as stated, well then, let's stone the prophet, or deny God... because either the prophet lied to us, or God did. But this simply isn't the case. Often, the opposite is true.

God's ability to change His mind is one of the most important aspects of His character! God "repents" 26 times in the OT alone. He changes His mind more often than that, but it's simply described with other words. The point is that the Bible repeatedly showcases the fact that God changes His mind. So we should expect that some prophecies don't come true, and in fact we should hope that they won't come true.

For many of these prophecies, if they did come true, it would be evidence against the Bible and Christianity!

The whole point is that this is a falsifiability test for the Bible, and the Bible passes this test with flying colors. When God promises to bless them, and they turn wicked, He doesn't bless them! That doesn't make God a liar. It means the people were wicked, and God's response to them was just and righteous. If the Bible is true, that's what we should expect to see -- that the prophecy didn't come true as stated.

A more familiar example might be this: You promise your child that tomorrow you'll take him to ice cream and a movie. Then, tonight, he breaks things, hits you and cusses at you. Are you going to take him to ice cream and a movie? I hope not! No, you will not. Does that make you a liar? The truth is that if you do take him to ice cream and a movie, this would be evidence that you're a bad parent! If the "prophecy" comes true as stated, it is evidence against you! But such will not be the case, will it? No, your parenting skills here are quite falsifiable, but you will pass the test with flying colors. You can't say that no matter what you do, you're a great parent... can you? The same is true of God in the Bible.

You want to use all of these unfulfilled prophecies against the Bible. But, in all the cases in which it would be wrong for the prophecy to come true... it doesn't come true. And this is evidence for the Bible, not against it. Yes, unfulfilled prophecy is evidence for the God of the Bible.

If only more people lifted up God's responsiveness, and His ability to change His mind. As my signature says, "If only men would always repent... God wouldn't have to!"

:riblack:

[Doubting John]

Son of Jonah,

You don't seem to get my point either.

Without pondering this question for very long I'll ask it anyway: Name me one prophecy in the Bible that is not conditioned by those who hear it.

Even the prediction that Jesus will return to earth someday in the future is conditioned by the people on earth, I would suppose (providing you're not a preterist, and even then the fulfillment was contitioned by those people of that day).

But think about this. If I were to say to the world, "tomorrow I'm leaving for Canada," and then tomorrow comes and I don't go, then I didn't keep my word. And if prophecy is meant to support the Biblical claims and God says something and doesn't do it, then the skeptic has every right to ask how that supports the Biblical claims. After all doesn't the Bible say this?:

And if thou say in thine heart, How shall we know the word which the LORD hath not spoken? 22 When a prophet speaketh in the name of the LORD, if the thing follow not, nor come to pass, that is the thing which the LORD hath not spoken, but the prophet hath spoken it presumptuously: thou shalt not be afraid of him. (Dt 18:21-22).

And didn't I point out some prophets who were wrong and yet their words are "inspired" and consequently canonized in the Bible?

[Not_Registered]

. . . objections to a god who transcends our flow of time are weak.
Captain Ochre, when you say God "transcends" our flow of time, do you then assume God is timeless or that He is in some sort of hyper-time, which could be some kind of "superior" time in relation to ours?


The future exists, but our future is not God's future at the same time and in the same sense, using a model that has God progressing (timewise) in a distinct temporal dimension (additional dimensions are implied by mathematics, and at least some physicists believe that some of the expected dimensions are temporal) other than ours.
I am not sure how meaningful it is to say that God can exist in some time other than ours. That's like Stephen Hawking's "imaginary" time or talk of a negative amount of men. (In high school, when using the quadratic formula in solving for an amount of, say, men if one received –3 and 4 as answers the useful solution would be 4 men because –3 men is realistically unintelligible.) No one knows what those concepts ("imaginary" time and negative men) translate to in reality. I believe the same is true for talk about "hyper-time." It sounds nice and may be fun to contemplate theoretical, but it has no actual meaning as far as I can see. Do you think that God's 5:00 is different from ours? Time is not defined by clocks. "Clock time" is simply a man-made convention.

It seems as though you may lean towards a static view of time, as opposed to a dynamic view of time. In a static view of time, the entire time-block is already laid out and our perception of time is merely subjective. In a static view, all moments in time exist and there is no objective "now." Here, we can only speak of various moments in time having the relations of being earlier or later than, because there is no definite "now." In a dynamic view of time, "now" is objective, in that, the only moment that exists is the "now." In this view, moments in time are related based on their association to the "now" (i.e., the present). Hence, time (and more specifically a moment of time) was future, is present, and will be past.


Events in our time-space continuum would not be simultaneous in God's eyes (at least they wouldn't have to be). They would be known by God simultaneously as soon as it was possible to know the events without contradiction (I hold that neither omniscience nor omnipotence means "able to do the impossible", . . .)
What is the reason for your assertion that events in our space-time continuum would "not be simultaneous in God's eyes"? You claim that they don't have to be simultaneous but also say that they will not be. However, you have given no reason for the assertion that they will not be. I am then confused when you go on to say that these events in fact "would be known by God simultaneously." I think I may be misconstruing what you were intending to convey. Could you clear this up?


Same way you know when Gollum tears the ring from Frodo's finger in that fantasy time-line, in general
You said this in response to Doubting John's comment:Anyway, if God had a "different time" than us, then how could God know what time it is for us right now?I think the obvious rebuttal to your comment is that we are completely detached from this fantasy timeline that you propose. We can have no causal relations with it, other than speeding or slowing it down in relation to out timeline. So, instead of answering Doubting John's objection, I think this analogy raises the question of how then can God be causally active in our timeline, given your analogy, if He exists in another?

[Captain Ochre]

Captain Ochre, when you say God "transcends" our flow of time, do you then assume God is timeless or that He is in some sort of hyper-time, which could be some kind of "superior" time in relation to ours?

I favor a model that posits a "hyper-time" that encompasses our time dimension as the third dimension relates to the second dimension (MOL).

I am not sure how meaningful it is to say that God can exist in some time other than ours. That's like Stephen Hawking's "imaginary" time or talk of a negative amount of men. (In high school, when using the quadratic formula in solving for an amount of, say, men if one received –3 and 4 as answers the useful solution would be 4 men because –3 men is realistically unintelligible.)

I think that it's more like saying that God exists in more dimensions of time then we do, like a cube exists in more dimensions than the two dimensional entities that might intersect its existence.

No one knows what those concepts ("imaginary" time and negative men) translate to in reality. I believe the same is true for talk about "hyper-time." It sounds nice and may be fun to contemplate theoretical, but it has no actual meaning as far as I can see.

Maybe that's why I'm not a theoretical physicist nor a math genius. :smile:
I read and understand what I can, and from what I understand the model that I propose seems workable to me--not that I've got plans in the works for a TARDIS that is supposed to allow me to travel to other dimensions of time.
That someone doesn't understand what it means exactly for a being to exist in a different dimension of time doesn't strike me as a compelling argument against my model, which is generally used as a counterexample to claims of contradiction rather than as my revelatory idea of what god is really like. I find that it tends to suit the purpose.

Do you think that God's 5:00 is different from ours?

I don't know what "God's 5:00" is, period. Our 5:00 is our 5:00 to God, I expect.

Time is not defined by clocks. "Clock time" is simply a man-made convention.

I fail to see why that's a problem for the model.

It seems as though you may lean towards a static view of time, as opposed to a dynamic view of time. In a static view of time, the entire time-block is already laid out and our perception of time is merely subjective.

I'm not sure that follows. Wouldn't the meaning of time be established by causal relationships that might exist despite time being "already laid out"?

In a static view, all moments in time exist and there is no objective "now." Here, we can only speak of various moments in time having the relations of being earlier or later than, because there is no definite "now." In a dynamic view of time, "now" is objective, in that, the only moment that exists is the "now." In this view, moments in time are related based on their association to the "now" (i.e., the present). Hence, time (and more specifically a moment of time) was future, is present, and will be past.

You could say that I'm not on board with presentism.

What is the reason for your assertion that events in our space-time continuum would "not be simultaneous in God's eyes"? You claim that they don't have to be simultaneous but also say that they will not be.

I don't think that the causal relationships need disappear regardless of our timeline being subsumed in a greater dimension of time. I've contemplated the ramifications for divine action in such a sub-dimension of time and the only problem I've detected so far is literal reverse causation (which seems to be a logical limitation rather than a contradiction of the model).
Feel free to suggest more. The model is no sacred cow, I trust.

However, you have given no reason for the assertion that they will not be. I am then confused when you go on to say that these events in fact "would be known by God simultaneously." I think I may be misconstruing what you were intending to convey. Could you clear this up?

I'm referring to the causal relationships being intact regardless of the perceptions from the greater dimension of time. Even if I read "The Lord of the Rings" backwards, I could know that the events in the book follow from the beginning to the end rather than the other way around. Likewise if I read it (or wrote it) all at once.

You said this in response to Doubting John's comment:Anyway, if God had a "different time" than us, then how could God know what time it is for us right now?I think the obvious rebuttal to your comment is that we are completely detached from this fantasy timeline that you propose. We can have no causal relations with it, other than speeding or slowing it down in relation to out timeline. So, instead of answering Doubting John's objection, I think this analogy raises the question of how then can God be causally active in our timeline, given your analogy, if He exists in another?

Is there a problem that I need to resolve? Should I suppose that God cannot be causally active in our timeline from a dimension of time that relates to ours as the third dimension relates to the second? The analogy was intended simply to illustrate knowledge of the passage of time, and no more than that.
I can understand the request for an explanation intended to resolve a particular problem, and if I were running around saying "this is what you should believe about how god and time" then those I would presume to teach might well ask me for an explanation.
It's not quite so involved as that. This is the model I use to answer assertions of contradiction. If the model turns out not to work so well, then hopefully I have the option of changing it or adopting another.

No presentism, though.
:wink:

[Doubting John]

Not Registered:

You've been on TWEB since March, posted one polling question, and then boom, you address this thread with intelligent critiques?

I sure want you on my side, but alas, I don't think I'll get what I wish for.

Thanks for the criticism of Captain Orche's views. He's in way over his head dealing with you.

People who are educated recognize each other, and respect each other.

Even though you may trash me, I'd rather have an intelligent discussion/debate with someone like you than with the others I have to deal with here on TWEB.

[Captain Ochre]

Not Registered:

You've been on TWEB since March, posted one polling question, and then boom, you address this thread with intelligent critiques?

I sure want you on my side, but alas, I don't think I'll get what I wish for.

Thanks for the criticism of Captain Orche's (sic) views. He's in way over his head dealing with you.

It almost looks like you're going to use his presence in the thread as (part of) an excuse to continue ducking my replies to your posts.

People who are educated recognize each other, and respect each other.

Even though you may trash me, I'd rather have an intelligent discussion/debate with someone like you than with the others I have to deal with here on TWEB.

If it weren't intended as an ad hominem attack against me (and others), then it could have been said in a private message, IMHO.
What does the philosophy teacher have to say about that?

An educated person who has been treated with respect shouldn't need to resort to ad hominem, IMO.

[Doubting John]

Quote: Originally posted by Doubting John

Not Registered:

You've been on TWEB since March, posted one polling question, and then boom, you address this thread with intelligent critiques?

I sure want you on my side, but alas, I don't think I'll get what I wish for.

Thanks for the criticism of Captain Orche's views. He's in way over his head dealing with you.



Orchre:
It almost looks like you're going to use his presence in the thread as (part of) an excuse to continue ducking my replies to your posts.

Not at all, it's just that with him here I can focus on other threads. Time is short ya know.


Quote:
DJ:
People who are educated recognize each other, and respect each other.

Even though you may trash me, I'd rather have an intelligent discussion/debate with someone like you than with the others I have to deal with here on TWEB.


Orchre:
If it weren't intended as an ad hominem attack against me (and others), then it could have been said in a private message, IMHO.
What does the philosophy teacher have to say about that? An educated person who has been treated with respect shouldn't need to resort to ad hominem, IMO.

Captain, you're not a bad debater, but sometimes you just say things that show a lack of understanding. For instance, did you say that what I wrote above is an "Ad Hominem attack?" Do you even know what an Ad Hominem argument is? Would you like me to tell you?

Okay, it's not dealing with the argument of an opponent, but rather with who he or she is as a person. That would be like me dismissing your argument by saying something like "Orchre's argument is stupid because he looks stupid in his avatar."

However, if I say Orchre's arguments are weaker than "Not Registered" because Orchre's arguments are weaker, then I did no such thing at all! And that sums up what I said, except that I didn't single you out.

Now where did I resort to an Ad Hominem? Where? And if you continue to maintain that I commited this fallacy it will only further reveal your ignorance about what it is.

[Captain Ochre]

Not at all, it's just that with him here I can focus on other threads. Time is short ya know.

Seems to me that you just repeated what I just said but in different words.

Captain, you're not a bad debater, but sometimes you just say things that show a lack of understanding. For instance, did you say that what I wrote above is an "Ad Hominem attack?" Do you even know what an Ad Hominem argument is? Would you like me to tell you?

Sure. It would be funny to see a philosophy professor switch terms from "Ad Hominem attack" to "Ad Hominem argument" and then presume to tell me the difference between the fallacy and the mere insult.

Okay, it's not dealing with the argument of an opponent, but rather with who he or she is as a person. That would be like me dismissing your argument by saying something like "Orchre's argument is stupid because he looks stupid in his avatar."

Your approach probably qualifies either way. You're not dealing with my arguments (you don't have much time, evidently), but you're willing to post publicly (what could have been a private message) in a way that effectively dismisses my posts as uneducated: In effect Ochre's argument is stupid because he is uneducated.
Regardless, it gave every appearance of being an ad hominem attack given the fact that you chose to publish in public what you could have said privately.
Appealing to personal considerations rather than to logic or reason.
http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=ad%20hominem
The expression now also has a looser use in referring to any personal attack, whether or not it is part of an argument, as in It isn't in the best interests of the nation for the press to attack him in this personal, ad hominem way. This use is acceptable to 65 percent of the Panel.
http://www.answers.com/topic/ad-hominem
You, DJ, haven't criticized my arguments on logical grounds. Rather, you just got done criticizing my arguments indirectly through the insinuation that I am uneducated.
I shouldn't have to explain this to a philosophy professor, IMHO.

However, if I say Orchre's arguments are weaker than "Not Registered" because Orchre's arguments are weaker, then I did no such thing at all!

What you actually wrote bears scant resemblance to your distillation above. It's also obvious that simply declaring my arguments weaker without providing any justification for the assessment is an empty argument (unsupported assertion), and when we look for the support for the notion that my argument is weaker we're going to find the insinuation that I'm not educated (ad hominem).

And that sums up what I said, except that I didn't single you out.

:ahem:
Thanks for the criticism of Captain Orche's (sic) views. He's in way over his head dealing with you.


Right. You could have been referring to any "Captain Orche".

Now where did I resort to an Ad Hominem? Where? And if you continue to maintain that I commited this fallacy it will only further reveal your ignorance about what it is.

FYI, if you claim that I look stupid in my avatar, it's an ad hominem even if you actually deal with my argument on the basis of reason. It simply wouldn't count as a fallacy. In the present case, however, you haven't addressed my argument, but you do seem to have insinuated that I am uneducated. Thus you are probably guilty of having indulged in an ad hominem (circumstantial) fallacy (Ochre's arguments are not good because of his circumstances (uneducated)).
I had generously granted you the benefit of the doubt concerning the fallacy in my previous post.

The major difficulty with labeling a piece of reasoning as an ad hominem fallacy is deciding whether the personal attack is relevant. For example, attacks on a person for their actually immoral sexual conduct are irrelevant to the quality of their mathematical reasoning, but they are relevant to arguments promoting the person for a leadership position in the church. Unfortunately, many attacks are not so easy to classify, such as an attack pointing out that the candidate for church leadership, while in the tenth grade, intentionally tripped a fellow student and broke his collar bone.
http://www.iep.utm.edu/f/fallacies.htm#Ad%20Hominem

We just saw that DJ apparently doesn't fully understand what "ad hominem" means. We're also left without a legitimate example of "sometimes you just say things that show a lack of understanding" unless we pay attention to the irony.

[Doubting John]

Well then, by what you have said I'll give you an Ad Hominem attack and be done with you.

You're an idiot!

And I'll try to avoid your blather from now on.

Claim victory, as I know you will, but that will just prove you are as I say.

Or, if I know you well enough, you'll just quote from this post and place a laughing smile under it. You're so predictable. But if you posted such blather on www.ex-christian.net, it would be YOU who would be laughed off the site. Come join us there. My username is the same.

Funny, eh?

[Captain Ochre]

Well then, by what you have said I'll give you an Ad Hominem attack and be done with you.

You're an idiot!

And I'll try to avoid your blatter from now on.

Claim victory, as I know you will, but that will just prove you are as I say.

:lol:

[Captain Ochre]

Well then, by what you have said I'll give you an Ad Hominem attack and be done with you.

You're an idiot!

And I'll try to avoid your blather from now on.

Claim victory, as I know you will, but that will just prove you are as I say.

Or, if I know you well enough, you'll just quote from this post and place a laughing smile under it. You're so predictable.

It's kind of hard to believably claim to have predicted my response when your edit has received a time stamp subsequent to my response.
I wouldn't have predicted quite so lame a response from you. You claim to have master's degrees and stuff, after all. Second-rate trickery should have been beneath your dignity.

But if you posted such blather on www.ex-christian.net, it would be YOU who would be laughed off the site. Come join us there. My username is the same.

Funny, eh?

It is, actually. You set up a trap for me by saying that you predict I'll claim victory, and then you proclaim your own victory ('cause you supposedly know that I'll proclaim victory) before the fact.
Then, despite all your degrees and higher learning that would utterly dwarf my own (to hear you tell it), you challenge me to meet you on your own turf, as though your degrees and higher learning really aren't enough.
Yeah. That's funny stuff. I think that you should tell the folks at ex-christian.net about it and see if they agree with me that it's pretty funny. Link them to this thread and see what they think.
I dares ya.
:teeth:

[Doubting John]

Ochre:

I was answering a fool according to his folly, but I'll do it no more.

I thought you'd get a kick out of what I did, but the way you described it might make people wonder exactly what I did, but I guess you can only laugh with people you agree with.

See my last thread, to be started soon, called: Parting Thoughts From Doubting John.

You will miss me----Kiss.

[Captain Ochre]

Ochre:

I was answering a fool according to his folly, but I'll do it no more.

That's smart, since your technique is only likely to make you look foolish.

I thought you'd get a kick out of what I did, but the way you described it might make people wonder exactly what I did, but I guess you can only laugh with people you agree with.

My description should be sufficient for one who frequents message boards formatted along these lines. And sorry to inform you, but having received some apparently sincere attacks from your direction has lessened the degree of camaradarie that I might otherwise share with a fellow truth-seeker.

See my last thread, to be started soon, called: Parting Thoughts From Doubting John.

You will miss me----Kiss.

Hmmm. I dunno about that. I enjoy a stimulating and difficult debate ... and it's hard to imagine one coming from you based on your posts so far (at least the ones I've read). Maybe you were just here selling your book.

The victory I'd have liked to declare was in succeeding in drawing you to argue the place of random particle generation according to your definition of a miracle. I guess you'll be denying me that victory.
Best to your wife, and good luck to you.

[betzerg]

Captain:

I'm not all that sure I can respond without being "ponderously long," but here goes.



There are Christian philosophers who debate this issue, I know. But from my perspective, I've landed.

Anyway, if God had a "different time" than us, then how could God know what time it is for us right now? How could he know that I'm experiencing things at 9:56 PM right now? There would be something God doesn't know, right?

G-d has no time..and all the time ...so, from the moment of his thought of creating man he saw the outcome of it all. Just as a computer can predict, weighing all the varibles (and G-d created all the varibles) the outcome of certain data. G-d is outside of time and space. He knows what man will chose given the ability to CHOSE...and sees the results of his choices. (without determining them). This is why G-d created repentence, Messiah (slain from the foundation of the world) Torah...before the world was even created. It was like one big mathmatical equation with infinite variables but when considered contained all the information to reach a conclusion.

this is our G-d. He's way smart.

Shalom,

BETZER