I think many of the hypotheticals about 'what God would do', assume rather too much. If there is such a thing as 'omniscience', then how would our finite minds could even begin to imagine would it would mean? Too often, the result is positing how it would seem if I were all-knowing, in other words, it is a projection based on my own conception of what omniscience must mean. It's assumes the ability to argue from the proverbial 'God's eye view'.

In doing so we're forgetting a salient point - that the understanding is corrupted, we don't see the nature of the situation we're in, but instead hypothesise about something we could never know.

In doing so we're forgetting a salient point - that the understanding is corrupted, we don't see the nature of the situation we're in, but instead hypothesise about something we could never know. — Wayfarer

And this all came about because believers claimed that God was so and so. Atheists didn't invent omniscience or the perfectly good. The FWD exists because some believers wish to defend God's omnibenevolence.

I read an argument about G's supposed foreknowledge a while back. It went along the lines that God sees all of time: past, presence and future, but it is all past to him, and since he is perfect he can't change what he remembers, therefore we are free to act any way we want.

I read an argument about G's supposed foreknowledge a while back. It went along the lines that God sees all of time: past, presence and future, but it is all past to him, and since he is perfect he can't change what he remembers, therefore we are free to act any way we want. — Cavacava

That is an interesting and a bit unusual argument.

I recall a Christian explaining to me in college how the Garden of Eden was a setup. God wanted Adam and Evil to fall, because that was the only way to work out the potential of evil in creation, and deal with it.

I thought that explanation was better than most Christian explanations regarding free will and evil, but it would probably be considered heretical by many denominations.

If God was free to create, why did he choose to do so? — Thorongil

God created because He knew that it was good to do so.

Ignore my question if you are being ironic. But what guides or constrains the answer you give?

Free will can be argued as immoral only with the reference to morality. In that regard, all actions performed consciously with free will can only be considered immoral if they are done with no regard to morality. When regard to morality is given and yet an immoral outcome is observed, a penance of reorientation to morality must be made. This might sound familiar, but you can leave religion out of it completely and still find that this applies to any virtue hierarchies that have rules.

In the absence of such a hierarchy, you can have free will without morality. Unfortunately we don't have any evidence to indicate that we live in such a hierarchy, so we must presume that we do or we will face obvious consequences.

Free will is not exactly free, thanks to that. Will has consequence.

If you like, you can take the issue up with an archetypal deity, like you did with your first post. Unfortunately, no such deity will respond to you. You could conclude that the deity is amoral because of this, if you wish, but not immoral. You can't prove that it's possible for the moral to exist in the absence of the immoral. In the absence of both, free will would only exist for you and you would be a God with only yourself as a subject.

Ignore my question if you are being ironic. But what guides or constrains the answer you give? — Frederick KOH

I'm inclined to ignore your question because I really don't know what you're asking. Anyway, here's the answer to the best of my knowledge, my answer was guided, or constrained by Thorongil's question.

To be clearer, why would your answer be preferable to something like
"God created because He knew that it was evil to do so."
In what way would this alternative answer be less guided or constrained by Thorongil's question?

It's convention, what I've read in different books; it made sense to me, and so I'm just answering what I assume is common knowledge. Your alternative answer is inconsistent with what I've learned.

So, assertions about God are based on conventions.

Aren't all assertions based on conventions? That's what language is.

Eventually the rubber hits the road for some assertions. Like for example whether somebody is dead or alive. And then there are assertions of the sort made in mathematics.
What sort is
"God created because He knew that it was good to do so"?

How are the assertions made in mathematics essentially different from the assertions made in religion? They are both based in convention.

What is the convention on the divinity of Christ?
The existence of Thor?

How's that relevant? There are many things which do not have consistent conventions. That God created because he saw that it was good to do so is a very consistent convention. If you believe that the convention is based in some false principles, you should demonstrate this, as I have done in reference to the convention of imaginary numbers, on the other thread

God created because He knew that it was good to do so. — Metaphysician Undercover

So if he knew it was good to create, why didn't he create before he did? If he always ever created, then, once again, in what sense is he free?

So if he knew it was good to create, why didn't he create before he did? — Thorongil

I might be assuming an incorrect theory of time, but time might be thought of as a measurement of causation and movement. If there is no movement or causation, time does not exist. Therefore, God's first act of creation would cause time to come into being. As such, there is no time before God moves and God's first "movement", so to speak, could easily have been creation or the causally and logically necessary steps in order to create our world.

If he always ever created, then, once again, in what sense is he free? — Thorongil

I am a little confused by what you are saying here, but based on my understanding of the question:

We could always say that God does not have free will like we do. I believe Kant went down this line of thought. Because God is, by the very nature of God, perfectly good, he will always do the good option. Whether this means God is somehow logically compelled to do good or always just chooses to do good because of his nature is irrelevant.

God's first act of creation would cause time to come into being. As such, there is no time before God moves and God's first "movement", so to speak, could easily have been creation or the causally and logically necessary steps in order to create our world. — Chany

The scare quotes are precisely the problem here. In what sense can an "act" or "movement" not be in time? Both words presuppose time.

I am a little confused by what you are saying here — Chany

If God has always been a creator, then there couldn't have been a time when he freely chose to create. Otherwise, how is it a choice? If you've always had brown hair, then you didn't freely choose to have brown hair.

Whether this means God is somehow logically compelled to do good or always just chooses to do good because of his nature is irrelevant. — Chany

Why is it irrelevant? If he cannot but do good, and it is good to create, then he cannot but create. That's fine, but then he isn't free and his creation must be co-eternal with him.

So if he knew it was good to create, why didn't he create before he did? If he always ever created, then, once again, in what sense is he free? — Thorongil

As Chany says, time comes into existence with God's creation.

In what sense can an "act" or "movement" not be in time? — Thorongil

As a dualist, I recognize two distinct forms of actuality. One is activity, movement, and that necessarily requires time. The other is the actuality of existence, being, and this is the form of any existing thing. Any existing thing must have a form, and this is what makes it an actual thing. The form is a describable state of existence, and is therefore not an activity, nor a movement. Since it is not an activity, nor a movement, it is not necessarily "in time". In fact, whenever there is activity or movement, there is necessarily something which is moving, and this moving thing has a describable form. Since it is necessary that there is a thing which moves, that describable form is prior to activity, or movement. So if time is associated with movement, then this thing, which exists as a describable form, is necessarily prior to time.

If God has always been a creator, then there couldn't have been a time when he freely chose to create. Otherwise, how is it a choice? If you've always had brown hair, then you didn't freely choose to have brown hair. — Thorongil

Human beings have not yet conceived of what it means to be prior to time, so speculations such as this are really irrelevant.

Why is it irrelevant? If he cannot but do good, and it is good to create, then he cannot but create. That's fine, but then he isn't free and his creation must be co-eternal with him. — Thorongil

When God acts, he will do good, but he need not necessarily act, He acts by choice. To not choose to act, is not to do bad, because it isn't doing anything. Privation, which is a lack of good, is not the same thing as committing a bad act. So you need to consider three distinct things, a good act, a bad act, and no act at all. God will not make a bad act, but God has the capacity to refrain from acting. Isn't this how human beings obtain morality, by refraining from bad actions. God will always refrain from the bad action.

The other is the actuality of existence — Metaphysician Undercover

The actualization of existence doesn't take place in time? What does "actualization" mean, then?

Human beings have not yet conceived of what it means to be prior to time, so speculations such as this are really irrelevant. — Metaphysician Undercover

This is a cop out. "We don't know what we're talking about, but please accept our propositions anyway." Why would I be convinced of that? It can't just be that the objections are irrelevant speculations. The propositions to which they are addressed must be irrelevant speculations, too.

He acts by choice — Metaphysician Undercover

You haven't addressed my objection at all. Choosing still takes place in and presupposes time. If God had to create because he is good and creating is good, then he had no choice. So too would his creation be co-eternal with him.

time comes into existence with God's creation... — Metaphysician Undercover

My exceedingly vague notion of this idea is that it can be argued that the fundamental constants - those very small number of constants which are such that the universe can form stars>matter>life - can be depicted as pre-existing constraints or conditions which determine the parameters of existence. So, even though time doesn't exist 'before' the Singularity (as there is no 'before' in the same sense as there being 'nowhere further north than the North Pole'), once the Big Bang occurs, then those constants ensure that the process gives rise to life and mind. That is the drift of the anthropic cosmological argument as I understand it.

It is relevant because there is point to be made about the difference between

1) "multiplication is commutative"

and

2) "There is only one God and he had a Son"

Civilizations thousands of miles apart independently have conventions that assert 1) but not 2)

A point I was trying to make in response to:

Aren't all assertions based on conventions? — Metaphysician Undercover

and

How are the assertions made in mathematics essentially different from the assertions made in religion? They are both based in convention. — Metaphysician Undercover

The actualization of existence doesn't take place in time? What does "actualization" mean, then? — Thorongil

I didn't say "actualization", don't misquote me. I said "actuality". An actuality is something real, and it is quite possible that there is something real outside of time. You are simply trying to dismiss the dualist premise by saying that all actualities are necessarily activities, and therefore time dependent. The dualist doesn't believe that all actualities are time dependent, that's how we can talk about eternal things.

This is a cop out. "We don't know what we're talking about, but please accept our propositions anyway." Why would I be convinced of that? It can't just be that the objections are irrelevant speculations. The propositions to which they are addressed must be irrelevant speculations, too. — Thorongil

There is much that remains unknown to human beings, Why would you think that admitting so much is a "cop out"? Would you prefer to pretend that human beings know all there is to know? If logic indicates that it is possible that there is something outside of time, why not accept this as a real possibility, instead of closing your mind to what logic indicates?

You haven't addressed my objection at all. Choosing still takes place in and presupposes time. If God had to create because he is good and creating is good, then he had no choice. So too would his creation be co-eternal with him. — Thorongil

You seem to be mixing future with past. Prior to creation, God did not have to create, God had a choice. But what God created is good. He would not have created it unless he saw it as good. This is how free choice works, when an individual sees X as good, one acts on that. It is only after the act occurs that we can say that the individual saw X as good. It is the "seeing X as good" which causes the act. So it is neither "X", nor 'good", which causes the act, it is the individual who sees X as good, which causes the act.

Concerning your objection then, we say that God is good, because God created. But this does not mean that God had to create. God had a choice. If God did not create, then we could consider that God was not good, but we wouldn't be here to do that. If you think that choosing presupposes time, then you do not understand the nature of immaterial existence. "Time" as we know it is a concept derived from material existence. And experience demonstrates to us that nothing other than choice can be the cause of material existence.

It is relevant because there is point to be made about the difference between — Frederick KOH

So you are saying that some conventions are more widely accepted than others. That might be relevant if we were basing our judgements on how widely accepted the conventions are. But I don't think that's a good way of basing your judgements. We should judge on whether or not we think the convention is true. I think the convention which says that God created because He saw that it was good, is true. I believe this because that's how I understand free will, when we see that something is good, we act on that. So it is completely consistent to say that God created because He saw that it was good.

So you are saying that some conventions are more widely accepted than others. — Metaphysician Undercover

Actually I was providing data problematic for your claim that

How are the assertions made in mathematics essentially different from the assertions made in religion? They are both based in convention. — Metaphysician Undercover

To be clear, these are your words:

So you are saying that some conventions are more widely accepted than others. — Metaphysician Undercover

in response to

i

It is relevant because there is point to be made about the difference between

1) "multiplication is commutative"

and

2) "There is only one God and he had a Son"

Civilizations thousands of miles apart independently have conventions that assert 1) but not 2) — Frederick KOH

The words "widely accepted" are not in my comments.

So you are saying that some conventions are more widely accepted than others. — Metaphysician Undercover

Are there civilizations that assert statements that contradict the commutativity of multiplcation?

Are there civilizations that assert statement that contradict the commutativity of multiplcation? — Frederick KOH

How would I know, what is your point?

How would I know, what is your point? — Metaphysician Undercover

Just to make sure, by "the commutativity of multiplcation"
I mean 3 times 7 is the same as 7 times 3 - the order doesn't matter.
Contradicting it means saying there are cases where changing the order
would result in different numbers.

I don't think free will justifies the existence of evil, regardless. Not for a perfectly good God. A different sort of God, sure. — Marchesk

I think this is a strong, and moral position. Nothing can justify evil, no amount of good. This is the death knell of utilitarianism, at least. Yet God permits evil even if he does not create it, and it certainly looks like he creates it.

Now if life were a game of space invaders, one could readily see that the game maker needed to create the invaders, to make the game worth playing, even though the player has at all times to seek to destroy them. It is invidious from the comfort of the philosopher's chair or the preacher's pulpit, though, to explain to life's losers that their suffering makes a better game of life. So one should perhaps keep such insights to oneself, and simply fight against evil in the game of life one is playing without either condemning or justifying God's game plan.