If God created, and really, invented us, and everything about us, then aren't all of our thoughts and actions dictated by how God created us combined with our experience and past thoughts and actions?
Yes I know what you are going to say. "That's why he gave us free will." But even if we have the ability to choose whatever we want, the brain we use to choose was created by God and so is subject entirely to how God designed it.
2007-01-19 03:06:38 · 12 answers · asked by Anonymous in Arts & Humanities ➔ Philosophy
Mary, maybe you should read the rest of the question before you answer
2007-01-19 03:14:13 · update #1
Yes, that is what I am saying is that the idea of a God who made us with free will doesn't make any sense.
2007-01-19 03:21:19 · update #2
Sure, God doesn't force us to do anything. But he created who we are so our decisions are dictated by how he created us.
2007-01-19 03:32:07 · update #3
SillyLilly, my "scope" isn't too narrow, you just completely missed the point of what I was saying. Whenever I present this argument, people always say, as you did, that we choose who we are or that we choose our experiences. But think about what it means to choose. We "choose" to do or not to do something with our minds, which God created, and with our knowledge, which has been dictated by our past "choices," by the world around us, and by our ability to remember it all (also decided by God.)
2007-01-19 03:58:04 · update #4
You are making a statement that is philosophical with religious connotations in it. When posted that way, people will answer with a religious mind rather than a philosophical one.
It sounds as if you are questioning determinism and compatibilism. There are many different forms of determinism which says that each action is basically a snow ball effect from the very first action and each goes against the thought of free will. Compatibilism takes into account that each action is a snowball effect but also that humans have a choice as to which direction that snowball may take. Determinism says that it has already been chosen.
It seems similar to the question of fate, destiny and free will. Does one have the ability to make choices or are their lives predetermined?
According to the Bible, God gave man the ability to make choices for him or herself once they were kicked out of the Garden. It was up to them to succeed or fail. God could not stay out of their lives completely though. So while humans were allowed to make their own choices God could still step in like a parent overseeing the raising of their child and supersede their decisions.
The Bible says, "God has a plan for you." so if you're asking if God has predetermined our lives...according to the "Good book" yes.
2007-01-19 06:59:22 · answer #1 · answered by Kalypso 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
The Biblical origin of the soul is that you are a soul, not that you have a soul. The soul is you. Everything about you makes you a soul; your body, mind, emotions, and life force, etc. When God created Adam he was not given a soul, "he became a living soul". Genesis 2:7 Thus, when God molded the man out of the dust of the ground into the human form along with water and finally brought him to life, he became a living soul. Job 10:8-12 This initial creation was perfect. Deuteronomy 32:4 Adam was created with a sense of law (of right and wrong) "by nature" in his heart, just as humans are born with this same sense. Romans 2:14,15 Adam was created with a perfect conscience and with the faculty of free will. People today also have free will. God is not responsible for the decisions a person makes. While God did create the natural world he is not responsible for the way man chooses to live in it. We are born with capacities and potentials for many things. How one chooses to develop these is their own choice. How people and the world influences a person is the choice of other people and the world man has made for himself, not God. We are not predestined, everyone has a choice. "therefore choose life" Deuteronomy 30:19 If a person had no choice it would make no sense for God to admonish humans to "choose life". Humans are responsible for their own actions.
2016-03-29 04:41:06 · answer #2 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
Your scope on this question is much too narrow. Would you want to control a single speck of pollen in a 200,000 acre field of daisies? Please try to think on a grander scale. It is said that we all choose our own families and bodies before we come back to this life. That is why we have free will. In my mind God set it all up and then just lets it all happen as we choose it to happen. We have a general plan to go by but we each have choices to make according to the life lessons we want to learn this time around. I don't see God's actions as individualized as you do.
In the case of evil, I think there are people born into this world who have forgotten how to love, they were never taught how to be compassionate. It is a shame but without the dark we would not be able to appreciate the beauty.
2007-01-19 03:51:24 · answer #3 · answered by O Wise One 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
I don't see the connection between assuming God created you and assuming He controls all your thoughts and actions. What good would such creatures be to a creator? What point? Robots? He doesn't seem to eat us or otherwise use us other than our minds and souls, so a robot would do as well if you didn't care about the soul part.
Or do you imagine there could be such a thing as a human soul without free will? What would it consist of? The source program for a robot, no more. Not a soul, but perhaps a DNA, if you get my drift.
We'd be nothing whatever without free will.
2007-01-19 03:17:07 · answer #4 · answered by auntb93again 7 · 1⤊ 0⤋
He did not make "robots" he gave us a brain to help us determine what actions we want to take. So we could think for ourselves. It is our souls that seek to have a relationship with a Higher power and even other people. Free will is the ability to choose wheter or not we want to follow\obey and love God. Only human beings have this ability. Animals do what comes naturally to them. In a way, they (animals) are "programed" to act the way they do, by insticts, while human beings have been given the gift to be able to diferentiate the difference bettween wrong and right, good and bad.
2007-01-19 04:14:38 · answer #5 · answered by onecrazypeach 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
God is the only one who truly has "free" will. The term free will is used too loosely these days.
Humans are not robots. Humans are free to do what they want within reason. But the problem comes in with what humans want. Are human desires "free". The Bible says God created us with a sinless nature. When Adam choose to disobey God, Adam received in himself a corrupted nature. God choose to pass on that nature to Adam's descendants. Therefore our desires are not "free". We are weakened not by our ability to choose but by what we desire.
I recommend Martin Luther's Bondage of The Will. But it is kind of heavy, so don't read it until your ready for that.
2007-01-19 04:48:52 · answer #6 · answered by Mister Farlay 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
God is like a watchmaker. A watchmaker creates his master peice and then lays it down, does it stop ticking? No. It keeps on going. God did the same thing with us. He created us, then he let us go to make our own choices and decisions. Although he created us, we run on our own.
Your theory may be disproven by stating that IF God created every "brain" and it was subject to God's design, what would you say for the brains of satanists. Do you think a brain that functions with their mindset was designed to be that way by God?
2007-01-19 03:16:52 · answer #7 · answered by Kamryn's Mommie 2 · 2⤊ 1⤋
God did not create us. We are projection from 'Source'. Since 'Source' has free will we have free will.
2007-01-19 04:19:02 · answer #8 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
Free will is possible is possible because God created us with it, just as He has free will and as His angels do.
2007-01-19 03:11:25 · answer #9 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 2⤋
Personality changes. It is not something that is the same year after year.
2007-01-19 05:27:46 · answer #10 · answered by DDLynn l 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋