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?

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?"

[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!!

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 ?

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?

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.

"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

The answer to both is...

God is a Sadist

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.

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 ....

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 ! )   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 ? !           

.... confused Pascal - http://radicalacademy.com/adiphiloessay143.htm

Well, that clears up some things, HisMetatron-ness.   Did you ask about the nachos?  What's the Word on Proper Nachos?

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.

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.

I would say that we cannot demonstrate we are not making a free choice, and so must proceed from the position that we are, else we reliquish our autonomy and become passive, become helpless infants once more.

They originate from perception. However, we cannot ever truly verify the accuracy of our perceptions. We are trapped interacting with the universe we perceive, with no way to know the truth of that universe, because we have no way of knowing the truth of our own mind. The search for observable truth, however, does not become irrelevant, because in the end, it amounts to one of two things: either an understanding of the universe around us, or an understanding of the universe in our own mind. At the very least, striving to understand the surroundings we are forced to interact with provides a means to stave off madness. And in the end, who knows? What we think we know might actually be right.

Yes, but you see, that truth comes from your awareness of a thing that it is within the capacity of your species to create from raw materials, created to the specifications you're citing. It's a very different thing than the nature of reality or the existance of the divine.

That only holds if you know you can trust the manual. If someone walks up to you and hands you a book labelled 'OWNAR'S MANUEL: UR CAR'... I'd trust The Bible a lot more if it told me that the earth was created over the course of an incomprehensible span of time through the slow accretion of rubble in a vast disk around the sun. It doesn't. So why should I believe the other things it says?

Indeed. And while you can demonstrate that gasoline dependence is accurate knowledge of the nature of your care, you cannot demonstrate the same about your choice of deity. So then it must be asked: why assume you know? why not continue to search?

Why does an atheist attempt to indict a non-existent God?

Wouldn't be much of a discussion without having to pretend for a moment, would it? To get theists to attempt to explain the obvious contradictions regarding the workings of their supposed God then we have to ask questions as if there were a God. How else would we discuss it? Or am I not understanding your question?

YUP, but when you are G O D , it's all just silly, said a buddha  ....  When the east  heard the message of jesus, who said I AM ONE with the father, I AM GOD,  many said, "hey that's cool, a Jew finally figured it out" ..... 

So, for all practical intents and purposes we're back to the point where one chooses theism or atheism out of free will, since the existence of free will is the assumption we must operate under.

Then isn't my point of view just as valid as yours?  As a matter of fact, living under such a system, can there be any beliefs which aren't valid?

I don't think so.  I think that one can begin with acknowledging nothing other than one's own existence and still come up with a pretty convincing case for the existence of a deity.

I didn't mean to take the discussion "biblical" with this comment.  While I believe the Bible is illustrative of much of objective truth, and contains many of those, it is certainly not the complete revelation of objective truth.  My contention is that a natural law exists which is the objective truth. 

Furthermore, I wholeheartedly believe that science has as much to say about the nature of reality as metaphysics does, but in my estimation a "sola ratia" approach to existence is just as flawed as the "sola fide" approach brought about by the Reformation (forgive my Latin here, I'm no Latinist).  Separating faith and reason degrades both.

As far as my views on the literal interpretation of Scriptures, suffice it to say that I am opposed to such an approach, but to delve much further into my beliefs about Scriptural veracity and interpretation would seriously degrade the track of this thread even further than we have.

Again, I think it can be reasonably done starting from the single simple point upon which we agree, that is, that the only thing of which we can be sure is our own existence.

Eloise, a buddha goddess, a karma of a wise caring teacher, as was our late friend Alan Watts.  I wish ALL would know him. My old Alan folders are a bit unorganized, and I forget my favorites but can promise all of you, that spending a week with that Alan will enrich you. Lot's of him on the internet. Youtube vids, and podcasts too etc

     Be the wiser, hang out with atheist Alan Watts, the western blue jean hippie buddha messanger  ...... I will try to post some favorites later and an Alan thread would way cool.

Yeah, of course we are god. What else could we be? We are connected to the air, the ground, the sun, the stars, everything there is, was, and will ever be! .... thanks Eloise and Alan !   

Yes, ronin-dog, there is bad bad Jesus too , very very bad, and wrong, and stupid ! We could call him the Devil !  Then there is, a message of ONE , some attribute to another Jesus or buddha etc.   The only truth is, I am god as all is god. Abandon all superstition but keep the "AWE" , call it what ever you want, but don't make up domga lies ..... Go Science .... what am I  ? ....  

  Oh BTW , COOL VID, I will send to my Xain friends, thanks ....

Frankly, I AM feeling disappointed (again)  "Vague" is what we are ! Why is it Eloise is poetry to my ears. Wait, I used my eyes .... ? 

Alan Watts knows , well I can't argue with him ..... 

Alan Watts, one of the greatest recent teachers ever, an atheist spiritualist some call him, whatever that means!?  Well I say a uniter and a healer. I bet all will benifit from knowing Alan. (bet ya bet ya) ..... I would say he is a QM co-inventer philosopher, ahead of his time, ahhh so buddha rising ! AWAKE!

Shit, that dude tried LSD and did a mushroom high too ! Timothy Leary put him up to it !  ..... He was drinker toker too, a bad boy for sure ! (((  I meant a good old boy,  ..... he hung out in the east like RRS DG .... humm does the east make west people smarter ???  Yes it can ....

Alan Watts: Man in Nature pt 1 - 8 min http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7G-WH-My640

Alan Watts The Middle Way p1-6 - 9 min http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yQ6NYI4k-v0&feature=related

ALAN WATTS MEANINGLESS LIFE 8 min http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m72iWC-0UpU&feature=related
notes: when does a baby begin, how big is the sun ! WAR? , no separate events ...

Alan Watts - Work as Play (part 1)  9 min  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0caqNCIUSZM&NR=1
Notes:  the problem with compultion, suffering is not virtue ....

Alan Watts Interviews Bertrand Russell; Trend of Philosophy 2 min http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FWMq8PD8BRw&feature=related

Watch all that, and get back to me in a moon minute you all.

I want to know everything .... Please help  

   ..... and hey Eloise , you is good for me  , thanks 

Logic does not dictate that I must defend your conception of God.

In the deterministic worldview of atheistic materialism, there are no accidents either. Every circumstance and situation you encountered could not have been otherwise. See how that works? So this begs the question: "Why are you whining?" Answer: You want to blame God for your miserable, wretched life. Sorry to disappoint, but the atheist does not have this luxury.

Paisley, review your answer to discover why the whining is acceptable ;-p

Even if this is so,the primary difference is atheism does not claim to give you this freedom,where as christianity very much does.

Sorry to disappoint,but my life is neither miserable nor wretched.

I'm not resorting, this is a direct statement- there is no way to answer that question without presupposing a definition of self and inserting that definition into the conclusion. Usually the being implied in answers to this question, and questions like them, is undeniably inaccurate. It's that simple.

No, it's taken for granted that it is not vague, but it is vague, and it does need redefinition. I stand by that.

I didn't dodge the question by stating that becoming was non sequitur, I still addressed the question of being as an atheist and whether such exists as an asshole 'god' that would make people what he doesn't want them to be in order to punish them. I addressed this point fairly so I don't believe I dodged at all.

I beg to differ that the layer is unnecessary. And this, by the way, has nothing to do with God or religion and nothing to do with fitting 'god' into a worldview, we can drop this platform and I will still say it, what is taken for granted to be true about self in most philosophical presuppositions is deeply flawed.

It doesn't matter that you're an atheist to some arbitrary standard, unless it's gods standard, and if it is God's standard then you are god. I don't even need to redefine self to make that claim, I can just give a logical argument as to the parsing of god's standard. But I am more philosophically concerned about flawed concept of self than about defending god, so I stand by my tack there, we can do better than to cling to false pretences of what we are.