Philosophy Now Forum

The traditional view has been that God is timeless in the sense of being outside time altogether; that is, he exists but does not exist at any point in time and he does not experience temporal succession. https://iep.utm.edu/god-time/ The eternity of God concerns his existence beyond time. Drawing ...

It cannot be both the case that God knows everything I will do, and that I have free will; those two things contradict each other. If you could see 5 seconds into the future, then you would know what happens ... every result of determinism, free-will or complete randomness. So a god which is "...

God knows exactly what the future holds, but he is not controlling or influencing the future, he just has knowledge of it. God is always 100% right in his predictions about the future, and it could never be otherwise. The future is always what God knows it will be, but God does not interfere in ord...

A person can most definitely predict without knowing, there is an entire gambling industry predicated on exactly that. If his prediction were ever to be 100% guaranteed to be correct every time, as God's is, then it's certainly a form of knowing. There would be no important distinction between know...

No, we've settled that. You can't render your argument as any kind of syllogism, without equivocating "know" and "made happen." So that's settled, at least so far as logic is concerned...unless you can do it now. I'm not sure that anyone else who has been following the conversat...

If the future is not predetermined, God could be mistaken when predicting future happenings. God cannot be mistaken when predicting future happenings. Therefore the future is predetermined. Something like that? Well, that sort of form, maybe...but the obvious error in premise 1 would make that syll...

Well, maybe you ought to be afraid. :wink: Maybe it's a pretty fearful thing to start to realize that the thing you've been believing cannot be made rational. It would mean one has to change one's mind -- a thing one cannot possibly do in a Non-Theistic universe, since everything is predetermined -...

I don't agree with you, I'm afraid. Well, maybe you ought to be afraid. :wink: Maybe it's a pretty fearful thing to start to realize that the thing you've been believing cannot be made rational. It would mean one has to change one's mind -- a thing one cannot possibly do in a Non-Theistic universe,...

You can't mean "knows." You must mean "arranges." "Knowing" never makes anything happen. I do mean "knows". You said God knows the future, and I explained what I thought the logical consequences of that would be. God arranging the future was one possibility, ...

Is that how it seems to you? I mean, is that how life seems to you? Is that the supposition on which, for example, you're acting at the present moment? I think not. So that should alert you to the fundamental flaw in that reasoning. That reasoning is based on the hypothetical scenario that God both...

God could not possibly know what the future will be if the future could possibly be different to what God knows it will be, so, in other words, the future has to be what God knows it will be, which means it has to be set, fixed, predetermined. Is that how it seems to you? I mean, is that how life s...

You're using a linear timeline. God isn't within time...He transcends it. As Isaiah says, he spans the entirety of time. You read it. You may not believe it, but that's how the Bible says it is. It doesn't really make any difference what God is, or how much he is modified, or how many super powers ...

You say God knows everything that is going to happen, but that is only possible if the future is fixed. You're using a linear timeline. God isn't within time...He transcends it. As Isaiah says, he spans the entirety of time. You read it. You may not believe it, but that's how the Bible says it is. ...

No. It's possible for you to do various things God would prefer you didn't, and some He'd rather you do. But he knows what you're going to do, even when you don't yet know that. If what God knows will happen in the future is bound to happen, no matter what, I really can't see how that is anything o...

tales of whimsy and of traveling the globe, of attacking windmills, but no mention of our modern concerns, profits, fame, material possessions, titles, and power.....these medieval/modern books were written for fun and entertainment and also attacking current institutions like the church and state ...