Did God deliberately plan for me to become an atheist ?
Offline My former Christian belief system viewed God as a sort of Divine Police Officer who never allowed anything into the life of a believer ( referring to myself ) except by his divine will. There are no accidents; all circumstances, whether pleasant or unpleasant, were permitted by God.
My question to theists is this: Why would God allow me to encounter skeptic resources, atheist web-sites, books, etc when he knew that doing so would destroy my faith ? If he is truly the engineer of circumstances why did he allow me as a Christian to discover arguments that completely decimated my belief in him ?
If it was a test, was it really worth the the destruction of my faith and the loss of my "eternal soul" ...especially since he supposedly already knew the outcome in advance ?
"But those enemies of mine who did not want me to be king over them, bring them here and kill them in front of me." Jesus, (Luke 19:27)
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x8uln_drowning-pool-tear-away_music
I've often wanted to ask christians the same thing. "God me me atheist,who are you to question him?' You'll get some nonsense about free will.
What's up with all god's testing anyway? You hear about it constantly. You'd think having people that believe in him would be enough.But no, he has to test their faith.See if he can make them break. You know how many christians I've seen go through hard financial times or personal loss and just say,'It's just a test from god.' One more thing that doesn't fit the 'all loving' bill. Isn't it enough to torture sinners after death, he likes making people miserable here too?
Psalm 14:1 "the fool hath said in his heart there is a God"-From a 1763 misprinted edition of the bible
Life is good, and people who believe in afterlife fail to understand this.- Mindcore
But if free will is nonsense, if our thoughts and beliefs are simply the sum of electrochemical reactions in the brain as a result of previous experiences, then I am just as inevitably bound to be a theist. If there is no free will, if we are truly incapable of making choices, then punishing crime is futile since that person wasn't responsible for his actions, but was instead the innocent victim of a series electro-chemical reactions over which he had no control. Remove free will from man and you inevitably remove responsibility. You'v achieved the ultimate predestination, far beyond anything Calvin could ever possibly imagine.
Now there's some true nonsense.
"With its enduring appeal to the search for truth, philosophy has the great responsibility of forming thought and culture; and now it must strive resolutely to recover its original vocation." Pope John Paul II
It seems "Free Will" is the stock answer for Christians to any problems of this sort. I think Robert Ingersoll put it well "If my brain and the Bible are both the work of the same infinite god, who's fault is it that they do not agree?"
Science works whether you believe in it or not.
Yes, but my question dealt with the choices that God makes. As a Christian I assumed that God knew my limitations and weaknesses and would preserve me from more than my faith could bear. I was raised to view God as my provider and protector, not someone who would lead me into a theological minefield just to see if I would survive or not.
"But those enemies of mine who did not want me to be king over them, bring them here and kill them in front of me." Jesus, (Luke 19:27)
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x8uln_drowning-pool-tear-away_music
[God] will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can stand up under it." (1 Corinthians 10:13)
Apparently god will tempt you,but not so that you break. So he's testing your faith but he knows you wont break becaue he will stop before then..so what's the point of the testing!!
Psalm 14:1 "the fool hath said in his heart there is a God"-From a 1763 misprinted edition of the bible
Life is good, and people who believe in afterlife fail to understand this.- Mindcore
I'm not implying free will doesn't exist, just free will as prescribed by god.As has been debated several times on this board,a all knowing god and free will just don't mix.
Psalm 14:1 "the fool hath said in his heart there is a God"-From a 1763 misprinted edition of the bible
Life is good, and people who believe in afterlife fail to understand this.- Mindcore
Yes, I was thinking of that very verse as I typed my previous post. What is the purpose of any test if the outcome is already known ?
The issue of free will for God is an altogether different proposition than it is for mankind. Our free will amounts to the freedom to grope around in the dark, never knowing what the outcome may be, but God is not encumbered by such disadvantages....so again, why would God allow me to fall into a situation that he knew would be fatal to my relationship with him ?
"But those enemies of mine who did not want me to be king over them, bring them here and kill them in front of me." Jesus, (Luke 19:27)
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x8uln_drowning-pool-tear-away_music
Makes about as much sense as a woman testing her husband's faithfulness by inviting 3 hot young women over to sit naked with her husband and an open liquor cabinet while she leaves the house for a few hours every night. Then when he cheats the wife can say, "Ah ha! I knew you didn't really love me!"
If God wants to test faith that way he's either really dumb or he's an ass hole.
"The Bible looks like it started out as a game of Mad Libs" - Bill Maher
It wasn't God. Don't forget Satan ... the Devil made you do it!
I always wondered about this Satan thing. If God is so powerful, and supposedly so loving and protective of us, why would he let Satan have any influence on us at all?
"The Bible looks like it started out as a game of Mad Libs" - Bill Maher
...Because Satan has robots?
Winged beings that live in cloudy care bear land are no match for robots.
CAUTION:
This human being has more accumulated hours playing GI Joes in the bathtub than he has sleeping, owns more polyhedral dice than he does articles of clothing and has invested more money into his personal computer than most people do on their cars.
Communicate at your own risk.
Actually, the 1 Corinthians quote doesn't guarantee you won't break, only that God will provide you the means to avoid it. Whether you choose to avail yourself of it is still up to you.
That said, the 'free will' twist that we've seen here, with the theist saying 'ah, but if I'm just a sum of electrochemical processes, then I can't help but be a theist!' is a dodge.
"Free Will" is irrelevant. It doesn't matter if I have any choice whether or not to make the choices I make, because I don't know it in advance. So regardless of whether I have the capacity to choose differently doesn't matter, because when the moment comes, I still think I'm making the choice. So. Is the Atheist possibly ignoring God? Yup. Is the Theist possibly just living in denial and refusing to admit that they really, deep down, know better? You betcha!
All we can know is what feels like the truth to us. If you believe you cannot be swayed, you will ignore evidence to the contrary. If you, instead, embrace that ultimately, you cannot know the truth with the finite experiences you have in this life, you remain free to live your life according to the world view that you feel is more likely to be true... and free of the constraints that claiming to know places upon your options.
You have no way to prove, beyond 'It feels right' whether or not anything is real, God included, except yourself. Embrace that, and let every day be a wellspring of possibilities and wonder.
"You've got to remember that these are just simple farmers. These are people of the land. The common clay of the new West. You know... morons." - The Waco Kid
If there is a supreme being that created the entire physical universe, including the earth, and Man, and crafted human nature to be as it is, with all the resulting idiocy and interpersonal cruelty we see... then I posit to you that not only does nothing prevent Him from being an asshole... but the theory of God = Asshole squares pretty well with observable data.
"You've got to remember that these are just simple farmers. These are people of the land. The common clay of the new West. You know... morons." - The Waco Kid
"Condemned to be free" Sartre .... (((((( damn it! I want my sky daddy
Life is a piss off ..... just ain't fair , hey but there is love , yin yang ..... (btw, we is god)
http://atheism.about.com/b/2006/09/20/existentialism-abandonment-condemned-to-be-free.htm
This has been regurgitated many times, but why would an all-knowing being need to test anyone? The idea that such an entity could exist and still need to test human beings to see what they would do in a particuliar situation is just ridiculous. Didn't god send angels down to sodom and gemorrah to test the inhabitants to see if they were worthy to live? Well, we all know how that turned out now don't we? God did what it was going to do anyways.
"Always seek out the truth, but avoid at all costs those that claim to have found it" ANONYMOUS
The answer to both is...
God is a Sadist
"You are like a delightful random cruelty generator, master, poisoning all you touch. You are a testament to all organic meatbags everywhere." HK-47
I want to know, if Satan [sic] Lucifer was the brightest of the angels... why is he to slavishly follow the path predicted by the bible? Surely, he's read the book. It seems to me that if he truely wants to win, all he need do is 'nothing' at all...
LC >;-}>
Christianity: A disgusting middle eastern blood cult, based in human sacrifice, with sacrements of canibalism and vampirism, whose highest icon is of a near naked man hanging in torment from a device of torture.
And with this the death of the concepts of duty, obligation and responsibility. Well done.
Not so. Living your life free of constraint is not freedom, it is license. License leads inevitably to the violation of the rights and dignity of others. True freedom is the ability to use a given thing in accordance with its nature, that is in accordance with the truth of the object. Take, as an example, my car. The manufacturer assures me that the nature of my car requires that I use gasoline for fuel. I believe that my car will run on vinegar and fill my tank accordingly, "freeing" myself from the constraints placed on my by the automaker. Regardless of what I believe, the truth is my car will not run on vinegar, by denying the truth of the nature of my car, I have lost the freedom to use my car for its intended purpose.
"With its enduring appeal to the search for truth, philosophy has the great responsibility of forming thought and culture; and now it must strive resolutely to recover its original vocation." Pope John Paul II
Do I need a "purpose" to just want to be ? A purpose of being ? How bout , I am just what I AM? No grand plan. Oh but the NOW and the needless suffering we do .... Is that the plan? Why? Silly plan I'd say ......
Divine ??? Let's make religion simple and just say LOVE is our law. Break this law of love and we all suffer .... I don't ask "why" or what's the "purpose"? It just is. I do ask HOW this is so ....
Go Louis. Bells are ringing in my head. A philosophy of "do nothing". Where is that folder, damn it ? Well I do remember it had an interesting pacifist leaning ....
Then that theist dogma inventor devil lied. Why? The answer is a long one. More than 14 billions yrs old in it's coming from that recent little tiny BIG BANG transition ..... What is big, what is small, when all is ONE ? ! 
Anyway, as I went looking, I came across that Pascal dude, the "Religious Wager" guy, we atheists like to laugh at. Then I realized we are all fucking nuts ! The moral of this story in three words is, "We are God". ( and Jesus/Buddha said so ! )
.... confused Pascal - http://radicalacademy.com/adiphiloessay143.htm
Sigh. Obviously I'm His Divine Will, so I'll fill you in:
I talked to God about this, and He says it was all part of his plan for you to become an atheist. I believe His Holy Words were, "Prozac? Yeah, he's supposed to be an atheist. Why do you ask?"
I was a little intimidated about asking the follow-up question, but he answered anyway. (Sometimes He's a swell guy.)
"It's because otherwise, what do you have? You have a bunch of sheep. You have sheep who just want to read one book and tell everyone they've got Me figured out. How can I let that stand? So I made atheists. C'mon, who would you rather hang out with, these crazy characters, or a bunch of people who think they can 'speak in tongues' and who believe anything someone's saying as long as he's at the front of a room? That's just embarassing."
Will: no gyration without funkstification.
Well, that clears up some things, HisMetatron-ness. Did you ask about the nachos? What's the Word on Proper Nachos?
--
maybe if this sig is witty, someone will love me.
And religious blind faith does an excellent job of taking that ability away.
"The Bible looks like it started out as a game of Mad Libs" - Bill Maher
No, not at all. Look, if there is free will, then such concepts are, quite obviously, of unparralleled importance in our decision-making process. If there is no free will, if all we are is an aggregate of stimulus-response of unrivaled complexity, then those concepts as we understand them become part of the aggregate stimuli. Regardless, if we don't know in advance what our decisions will be, then the importance of understanding, and committing to, concepts such as these cannot be overstated. My point is: regardless of whether we do or do not have 'free will', we still think we're making decisions of our own accord, and so must make our decisions under that rationale. Someone who makes decisions thinking 'I have no free will' isn't going to actually make very many at all, he's just going to go with the flow and be swept along.
Frankly, I don't see where you even got your conclusion from my earlier statement. When the moment comes, I still think I'm making the choice. Thus, I must at least attempt to make the best decision I can.
You'll notice I did not say 'free from all constraints'. I said 'free of the constraints that claiming to know places upon your options'. And that is the freedom to search for the truth of reality in accordance with its nature, without automatically rejecting possibilities simply because we don't like them. Your example is horribly, horribly flawed. You haven't 'freed' yourself by believing something, you've shackled yourself to that belief. I would say, rather, that 'cars need gasoline' as a limiting belief is also flawed; some cars run in diesel. Some run on cooking oil. Some out there run on electricity and solar power. Now, if you're willing to reject your belief, and seek to find out the true nature of your car, go for it. My advice to you, though, would be to do so in ways that you can demonstrate won't impair your ability to continue the search for automotive understanding later. Simply pouring canola oil into the gas tank and hoping strikes me as no different than say... deciding to venerate Odin, and immediately going out and getting yourself killed attacking a cop. Maybe you'll get to Valhalla. Maybe you won't. But you've ceded your ability to explore further.
"You've got to remember that these are just simple farmers. These are people of the land. The common clay of the new West. You know... morons." - The Waco Kid
Is it too late to change my name to Metatron? Dammit, now I need a name change!
Anyway, I thought the Holy Documents were clear on the Nachos. Proper Nachos must be uniformly covered, in layers, of plenty of non-processed cheese, grated. Certain locations in Southern California have already created Perfect Nachos, Nachos which, in His Almighty's Sight, are worthy of His Holy Consumption. The Holy Pilgrimage to discover such Divine Nachos is fraught with peril.
Will: no gyration without funkstification.
To recap, then; you believe that we think we're making a free choice and I believe we are actually making a free choice. Do I have that right?
And what of the constraints you do observe? If they don't originate from "knowing", where do they originate? If we are incapable of knowing, doesn't truth lose its relevance? If truth is irrelevant, then the search for it would amount to nothing more than mental masturbation; it becomes an unproductive exercise.
Which is why I limited my example to a specific automobile, ie my 1995 Cadillac DeVille with its internal combustion engine. It's not my belief which limits my options with that car, it is the nature of the car itself. That's the truth of the nature of my automobile.
Why should I continue to search for the truth of the nature of the car when it's already been revealed to me if I only read the owner's manual supplied by the manufacturer?
I agree completely. In both cases I have seriously misinterpreted the true nature of the objects of my actions.
"With its enduring appeal to the search for truth, philosophy has the great responsibility of forming thought and culture; and now it must strive resolutely to recover its original vocation." Pope John Paul II
You are not bound by determinism in the way you think, we can still manipulate you, we live in a constantly unfolding calculation of physics and mathematics but we still communicate with the same understanding of ourselves as 'free' the way we did 2 minutes ago. What strikes me as odd is how people - when faced with determinism - suddenly goes "oh OK! SO NOTHING MATTERS!??!!?" or perhaps the more common "Oh, so... nobody's responsible?", well, we are responsible in the same way we've always been responsible bar the philosophical implications.
The philosophy behind democracy is to handle the majority of the people's interest so that most of us are satisfied, sometimes this means putting away people with (most notably) conflicting behaviors, I don't see how this should change anything dramatically except perhaps more tolerance in some cases (less dogmatism).