All About GOD - Growing Relationships with Jesus and Others
Free Will & The Mechanics of Emotion part 2 please read
This guy is agnostic and I need to know what kind of answers I can give to him about this..
This has to be one of the hardest topics to discuss, mainly because it indirectly questions the legitimacy of a person's character; And calling someone illegitimate is, needless to say, rather offensive and disrespectful.
So allow me to give this topic a proper introduction before it goes up in flames. (sorry if this seems long, but I believe it's worth the discussion)
People have an uncanny ability to observe the nature of Causes and Effects. We do it all the time, in obvious ways, and not so obvious ways. For example:
Cause Arrow Effect
If you feel hungry, then you eat.
If ice is heated, then it will melt.
If a flower is cut, then it will die.
If a ball is dropped, then it will bounce.
People also have the ability to question these causes and effects. We know that when we feel hungry, we should eat something. For animals, that's all they care to know, and so they go hunt some prey and call it a day. A human, however, can inquire: Why do I feel hungry? Why does ice melt? Why does a flower die? Why does a ball bounce?
We are all familiar with this field of study as The Scientific Method! Mankind's quest to observe, hypothesize, experiment, and coclude about everything we lay our senses on.
It has come to my observation that emotions seem to control every aspect of what we, as people, choose to do. We will put ourselves through incredible circumstances to achieve what makes us "happy." Feelings such as "love," "vengeance," "grief," and "happiness," and so many more, have us making decisions and choices almost automatically. So this sparks topic question #1:
Question What is "Free Will"?
When applying our actions and choices to the concept of Cause and Effect, one can only notice that our emotions and feelings tend to be the underlying Cause for all our actions. This would suggest that our actions are purely the effects derived from the causes of our emotions and feelings.
Exclamation Our actions are always either conducted as an effort to
A) overcome/avoid a negative emotion/feeling or
B) they are made as an effort to achieve/sustain a positive emotion/feeling.
Seriously think about it and try to find something in your life that you do, have done, or want to do, that is exempt from that statement.
Exclamation This implies that Free Will does not exist, because we aren't ever making our own decisions freely, we are making them in service to our emotions.
So with the power of our human ability to question things, we can ask topic question #2:
Question What are emotions? And how do they work?
Now I suppose we can break out the bio-chemistry text books if we have to, but let me start this conversation off with some food for thought.
Here are a couple facts to consider when thinking all of this over:
-The feelings you recieve from a particular emotion are chemically and electrically induced within your nervous system, accordingly, with observations made by atleast one of your 5 senses (sight, smell, sound, touch, taste)
-Hormones and the pituitary gland are essential in producing the flow of certain emotionally responsive chemicals.
With this information alone, it has been tested and concluded that when deprived of certain chemicals, such as dopamine, lifeforms will cease to aspire anything, and naturally they waste away carelessly.
And on the flip side, lifeforms injected with excess chemicals, such as dopamine, will go beyond the logic of survival to obtain their source of desire.
Ultimately this suggests that all lifeforms are reacting only as they have to in order to achieve or avoid natural highs, in the form of neuro-chemical releases which we have come to label with titles such as happy, sad, angry, hungry, horny, lonely, hot, cold, excited, scared, etc etc.
Taking this one more step further, there is the topic of Natural Instinct, in which we have observed life's tendancy to survive.
Animals, function entirely on instinct to eat, hibernate, migrate, reproduce, lead, follow, raise young, etc etc, and the failures to do so successfully are consequently removed from the gene pool, resulting in the modern concept of evolution via natural selection.
The significance of this concept lies in determining the source of emotions..
If we make decisions based on our emotions-
And our emotions are merely feelings we experience from neuro-chemical reactions-
Then what exactly is the source of the command to release these chemicals?
The vague answer is "survival instinct" but until you can break down and explain the mechanics of what exactly governs instinct, then crediting it as the source of emotions is just as good of an answer as saying that our emotions just appear out of thin air; Which is just as logical as the Big Bang Theory or God.
What this also concludes is that the source of our emotions is an enigma; just like God, just like the Common Ancestor, and just like the Big Bang, which makes it absolutely logical to wonder if, and how, emotions and a higher power are related.
Question EDIT
Also, on the subject of free will, I have a question concerning the all-knowingness of God, and a person's ability to make choices freely..
To my understading, God created free will because true love is something genuine, and can not exist without an opposite to choose from. However if God is indeed all-knowing, then doesn't he know the outcome of a soul's life on earth before he even creates it?
Essentially what I'm saying is that if God knows everything, then he knows my thoughts, he knows what I'm going to do before I do it, and he therefore knows that I'm going to Hell when I die. So it's safe to say that God created me from the start with the intention of watching me burn in Hell. Or, alternately, if I do in fact possess free will, then I can make decisions for the future that neither I, nor God, have any idea of; Which also suggests that God is not all-knowing.
(may I remind this forum that I am not an athiest, nor do I mock the possibility of a God. But as with all questions, I seek answers.)
Conversion of an agnostic starts here! lol.
But seriously, does anyone have an opinion on this subject?
Did I explain it clearly? I'd be glad to rephrase.
But essentially what I'm saying is that the concept of God (as defined by Christianity) is dependent on the existence of free will.
Also the purpose of God creating Man is dependent on free will, in the sense that our purpose is to genuinely follow and love God.
I don't believe I have EVER whitnessed an example of free will by myself, nor anyone else, nor have I heard of one in the known history of the universe.
In the argument of free will, the term for my belief is known as "Nomological Determinism," or "Casual Determinism."
In short, this belief is defined by the idea that all future events, down to the most minute detail, are already set in place by the outcome of past events, combined with laws of nature, begining with the origin of the universe.
This idea revokes any and all merit from the validity of "emotions," "coincidences," "All-knowing dieties," and "purpose."
Ask me questions if you have them because it's very important that you understand this concept. Even if you don't believe it yourself, IMO it's still very important to understand, and I really want to hear argurments for oposing points of view.
part 2
At this point the debate turns to the origin of instinct. From a non-Christian POV, instinct is something that is learned in the developmental years of a young life form, and/or that it is innate, simply as a result of possessing senses and a nervous system. I suppose the Christian POV is that these senses are evidence of creationism and an example of God's intention for life. The idea being that we could agree that, yes; we do operate fundamentally on emotion, but that it is set in place by God, and so it is a reliable, “good”, and genuine, means of observation appraisal.
To disrupt the natural balance of God's intention with excess or deprived amounts of necessary ingredients/chemicals would indeed be sinful and sensibly at fault for the malfunction of an organism’s chemistry; however, the natural chemical balance of organisms is not hard evidence for creationism, it is merely compatible with either belief or theory: (creationism/evolution). But still, a valid and important argument.
You also mentioned that sensations, such as hunger, are not emotions despite the fact that I use them in my arguments. That is why I refer to, what I consider, the foundation for all actions to be emotions/feelings, because I, as well, do not recognize sensations like hunger, etc, to be emotional; however I do recognize them as agents for survival decision making, hence they are feelings (non-emotional) and significant to the argument of free will.
You also make the valid point that parts of my argument are based on the assumption that God does not exist. Well, that's kind of true. It's safe to say that I do not assume the Christian God exists, however I always leave room for the existence of a higher power, however it may be defined, including the possibility of the Christian God. Also, since faith is an acquired trait, it would be, practically, more illogical for one to assume that God does exist while constructing a genuine belief; Because fabricating faith on the basis of a specific faith-based concept is to be closed-mindedly developed (sheltered/bias). As long as I do not deny the possibility of God, I can not approach this with a closed mind; only a questioning one.
As far as the subject of good and evil goes, it seems I have been treating them both as ingredients for love. By my logic, in order for love to exist, hate must also exist as well, seeing as love is a positive force and the perception of positivity is relative to a perception of negativity; In fact, the comprehension of such a thing as positivity is dependent on the awareness of negativity; polar opposite comparison. If white was the only color you ever saw, you would never think of it as bright because you've never seen it in comparison to grey. Even if you saw it in comparison to grey, you would not be aware of how bright it is in comparison to black. In this sense, I struggle to comprehend the value of love when it has nothing in contrast to compare to. It seems like this concept of divine love would have to be sooo great, and universal, that Man would literally have NO reason to ever think twice about it, on account of no one would know anything better; and I imagine that's how a relationship with God would be, but still I have to argue that the significance of free will is canceled out if Man is not given an alternative to choose from. Is this where Satan somehow comes into play? If so, then there should be a thred dedicated to temptation and the fall of man or something, because we can go on with that tangent, to debate the legitimacy of love and emotion... however, there are issues within this subject of free will that need to be resolved before agnostics, and other non-believers, can consider those ideas pertaining to Christian origins.
moving along...
This is the first time I've heard a Christian idea that descendants of Adam and Eve are not creations of God, just the products of what God has permitted Man to create (if I’m understanding correctly: We are 3rd-party creations of God). I still don’t see how this becomes an exception. An all-knowing God should certainly know of the downfall of Adam and Eve before he created them. Perhaps Adam and Eve are good in God's eyes, and it was just their downfall to Satan that screwed everything up, but shouldn't God have known about the downfall of Satan and his temptation of Eve before it all even took place? It still seems an all-knowing God chose to kick-start this, literally, Hell-raising process, and finding it worthwhile within Himself to allow it all to unfold, despite His divine knowledge that it was all going to Hell in a handbasket. Indeed, angels do fall first.
As for my belief in predetermination and its conflict with an all-knowing deity, you pointed out the oxymoron in such a belief as one with a planned fate, but no planner.
Of course I believe that a higher power could be responsible for even a predetermined world, however the deity would not, in theory, have a “plan” nor would it be concerned with concepts such as good and evil; which are strictly POVs. If the Nazis won WWII, the history books would not speak of the heroic allied forces, nor would they preach about the evil, persecuting Nazis. Either there is a sovereign God who has defined, for us, a platform for good and evil (even if evil is merely a byproduct of the absence of good), or it is equally plausible that these points of view are meaningless to a higher power.
The concept of God, by Nomological-Determinist belief, includes the view that a being which is aware of EVERY natural law and EVERY past event, beginning with the origin of the universe, would be able to predict the entirety of the future, simply by knowing how and when events would unfold and interact with each other, via energy transfer, down to the most specific detail. This includes the energy and chemical relationships associated with decision making and actions of life forms.
Quoting ‘hard determinist’ Galen Strawson:
“it is impossible for one to be responsible for the way one is in any respect. This is because in order to be responsible for the way one is in some situation S , one must have been responsible for the way one was at S-1 . In order to be responsible for the way one was at S-1 , one must have been responsible for the way one was at S-2 , and so on. At some point in the chain, there must have been an act of origination of a new causal chain. But this is impossible. Man cannot create himself or his mental states.”
So the Nomological-Determinist POV is agnostic in the sense that it acknowledges the need for some higher being, or force, to exist in order to be held responsible for the origination of our known universe. The conflict with Christianity, again, is presented with the eradication this theory places upon free will.
I don’t want to sound like my intentions are to disprove Christianity. If anything, I’m bringing forward the current obstacles that have me unable to believe in such a religion. However, I can neither say that I have the intention of becoming Christian, as that would be extremely irrational and manipulative for a questioning soul; however, I welcome the day that I can genuinely place my faith in a particular religion.
This has to be one of the hardest topics to discuss, mainly because it indirectly questions the legitimacy of a person's character; And calling someone illegitimate is, needless to say, rather offensive and disrespectful.
So allow me to give this topic a proper introduction before it goes up in flames. (sorry if this seems long, but I believe it's worth the discussion)
People have an uncanny ability to observe the nature of Causes and Effects. We do it all the time, in obvious ways, and not so obvious ways. For example:
Cause Arrow Effect
If you feel hungry, then you eat.
If ice is heated, then it will melt.
If a flower is cut, then it will die.
If a ball is dropped, then it will bounce.
People also have the ability to question these causes and effects. We know that when we feel hungry, we should eat something. For animals, that's all they care to know, and so they go hunt some prey and call it a day. A human, however, can inquire: Why do I feel hungry? Why does ice melt? Why does a flower die? Why does a ball bounce?
We are all familiar with this field of study as The Scientific Method! Mankind's quest to observe, hypothesize, experiment, and coclude about everything we lay our senses on.
It has come to my observation that emotions seem to control every aspect of what we, as people, choose to do. We will put ourselves through incredible circumstances to achieve what makes us "happy." Feelings such as "love," "vengeance," "grief," and "happiness," and so many more, have us making decisions and choices almost automatically. So this sparks topic question #1:
Question What is "Free Will"?
When applying our actions and choices to the concept of Cause and Effect, one can only notice that our emotions and feelings tend to be the underlying Cause for all our actions. This would suggest that our actions are purely the effects derived from the causes of our emotions and feelings.
Exclamation Our actions are always either conducted as an effort to
A) overcome/avoid a negative emotion/feeling or
B) they are made as an effort to achieve/sustain a positive emotion/feeling.
Seriously think about it and try to find something in your life that you do, have done, or want to do, that is exempt from that statement.
Exclamation This implies that Free Will does not exist, because we aren't ever making our own decisions freely, we are making them in service to our emotions.
So with the power of our human ability to question things, we can ask topic question #2:
Question What are emotions? And how do they work?
Now I suppose we can break out the bio-chemistry text books if we have to, but let me start this conversation off with some food for thought.
Here are a couple facts to consider when thinking all of this over:
-The feelings you recieve from a particular emotion are chemically and electrically induced within your nervous system, accordingly, with observations made by atleast one of your 5 senses (sight, smell, sound, touch, taste)
-Hormones and the pituitary gland are essential in producing the flow of certain emotionally responsive chemicals.
With this information alone, it has been tested and concluded that when deprived of certain chemicals, such as dopamine, lifeforms will cease to aspire anything, and naturally they waste away carelessly.
And on the flip side, lifeforms injected with excess chemicals, such as dopamine, will go beyond the logic of survival to obtain their source of desire.
Ultimately this suggests that all lifeforms are reacting only as they have to in order to achieve or avoid natural highs, in the form of neuro-chemical releases which we have come to label with titles such as happy, sad, angry, hungry, horny, lonely, hot, cold, excited, scared, etc etc.
Taking this one more step further, there is the topic of Natural Instinct, in which we have observed life's tendancy to survive.
Animals, function entirely on instinct to eat, hibernate, migrate, reproduce, lead, follow, raise young, etc etc, and the failures to do so successfully are consequently removed from the gene pool, resulting in the modern concept of evolution via natural selection.
The significance of this concept lies in determining the source of emotions..
If we make decisions based on our emotions-
And our emotions are merely feelings we experience from neuro-chemical reactions-
Then what exactly is the source of the command to release these chemicals?
The vague answer is "survival instinct" but until you can break down and explain the mechanics of what exactly governs instinct, then crediting it as the source of emotions is just as good of an answer as saying that our emotions just appear out of thin air; Which is just as logical as the Big Bang Theory or God.
What this also concludes is that the source of our emotions is an enigma; just like God, just like the Common Ancestor, and just like the Big Bang, which makes it absolutely logical to wonder if, and how, emotions and a higher power are related.
Question EDIT
Also, on the subject of free will, I have a question concerning the all-knowingness of God, and a person's ability to make choices freely..
To my understading, God created free will because true love is something genuine, and can not exist without an opposite to choose from. However if God is indeed all-knowing, then doesn't he know the outcome of a soul's life on earth before he even creates it?
Essentially what I'm saying is that if God knows everything, then he knows my thoughts, he knows what I'm going to do before I do it, and he therefore knows that I'm going to Hell when I die. So it's safe to say that God created me from the start with the intention of watching me burn in Hell. Or, alternately, if I do in fact possess free will, then I can make decisions for the future that neither I, nor God, have any idea of; Which also suggests that God is not all-knowing.
(may I remind this forum that I am not an athiest, nor do I mock the possibility of a God. But as with all questions, I seek answers.)
Conversion of an agnostic starts here! lol.
But seriously, does anyone have an opinion on this subject?
Did I explain it clearly? I'd be glad to rephrase.
But essentially what I'm saying is that the concept of God (as defined by Christianity) is dependent on the existence of free will.
Also the purpose of God creating Man is dependent on free will, in the sense that our purpose is to genuinely follow and love God.
I don't believe I have EVER whitnessed an example of free will by myself, nor anyone else, nor have I heard of one in the known history of the universe.
In the argument of free will, the term for my belief is known as "Nomological Determinism," or "Casual Determinism."
In short, this belief is defined by the idea that all future events, down to the most minute detail, are already set in place by the outcome of past events, combined with laws of nature, begining with the origin of the universe.
This idea revokes any and all merit from the validity of "emotions," "coincidences," "All-knowing dieties," and "purpose."
Ask me questions if you have them because it's very important that you understand this concept. Even if you don't believe it yourself, IMO it's still very important to understand, and I really want to hear argurments for oposing points of view.
part 2
At this point the debate turns to the origin of instinct. From a non-Christian POV, instinct is something that is learned in the developmental years of a young life form, and/or that it is innate, simply as a result of possessing senses and a nervous system. I suppose the Christian POV is that these senses are evidence of creationism and an example of God's intention for life. The idea being that we could agree that, yes; we do operate fundamentally on emotion, but that it is set in place by God, and so it is a reliable, “good”, and genuine, means of observation appraisal.
To disrupt the natural balance of God's intention with excess or deprived amounts of necessary ingredients/chemicals would indeed be sinful and sensibly at fault for the malfunction of an organism’s chemistry; however, the natural chemical balance of organisms is not hard evidence for creationism, it is merely compatible with either belief or theory: (creationism/evolution). But still, a valid and important argument.
You also mentioned that sensations, such as hunger, are not emotions despite the fact that I use them in my arguments. That is why I refer to, what I consider, the foundation for all actions to be emotions/feelings, because I, as well, do not recognize sensations like hunger, etc, to be emotional; however I do recognize them as agents for survival decision making, hence they are feelings (non-emotional) and significant to the argument of free will.
You also make the valid point that parts of my argument are based on the assumption that God does not exist. Well, that's kind of true. It's safe to say that I do not assume the Christian God exists, however I always leave room for the existence of a higher power, however it may be defined, including the possibility of the Christian God. Also, since faith is an acquired trait, it would be, practically, more illogical for one to assume that God does exist while constructing a genuine belief; Because fabricating faith on the basis of a specific faith-based concept is to be closed-mindedly developed (sheltered/bias). As long as I do not deny the possibility of God, I can not approach this with a closed mind; only a questioning one.
As far as the subject of good and evil goes, it seems I have been treating them both as ingredients for love. By my logic, in order for love to exist, hate must also exist as well, seeing as love is a positive force and the perception of positivity is relative to a perception of negativity; In fact, the comprehension of such a thing as positivity is dependent on the awareness of negativity; polar opposite comparison. If white was the only color you ever saw, you would never think of it as bright because you've never seen it in comparison to grey. Even if you saw it in comparison to grey, you would not be aware of how bright it is in comparison to black. In this sense, I struggle to comprehend the value of love when it has nothing in contrast to compare to. It seems like this concept of divine love would have to be sooo great, and universal, that Man would literally have NO reason to ever think twice about it, on account of no one would know anything better; and I imagine that's how a relationship with God would be, but still I have to argue that the significance of free will is canceled out if Man is not given an alternative to choose from. Is this where Satan somehow comes into play? If so, then there should be a thred dedicated to temptation and the fall of man or something, because we can go on with that tangent, to debate the legitimacy of love and emotion... however, there are issues within this subject of free will that need to be resolved before agnostics, and other non-believers, can consider those ideas pertaining to Christian origins.
moving along...
This is the first time I've heard a Christian idea that descendants of Adam and Eve are not creations of God, just the products of what God has permitted Man to create (if I’m understanding correctly: We are 3rd-party creations of God). I still don’t see how this becomes an exception. An all-knowing God should certainly know of the downfall of Adam and Eve before he created them. Perhaps Adam and Eve are good in God's eyes, and it was just their downfall to Satan that screwed everything up, but shouldn't God have known about the downfall of Satan and his temptation of Eve before it all even took place? It still seems an all-knowing God chose to kick-start this, literally, Hell-raising process, and finding it worthwhile within Himself to allow it all to unfold, despite His divine knowledge that it was all going to Hell in a handbasket. Indeed, angels do fall first.
As for my belief in predetermination and its conflict with an all-knowing deity, you pointed out the oxymoron in such a belief as one with a planned fate, but no planner.
Of course I believe that a higher power could be responsible for even a predetermined world, however the deity would not, in theory, have a “plan” nor would it be concerned with concepts such as good and evil; which are strictly POVs. If the Nazis won WWII, the history books would not speak of the heroic allied forces, nor would they preach about the evil, persecuting Nazis. Either there is a sovereign God who has defined, for us, a platform for good and evil (even if evil is merely a byproduct of the absence of good), or it is equally plausible that these points of view are meaningless to a higher power.
The concept of God, by Nomological-Determinist belief, includes the view that a being which is aware of EVERY natural law and EVERY past event, beginning with the origin of the universe, would be able to predict the entirety of the future, simply by knowing how and when events would unfold and interact with each other, via energy transfer, down to the most specific detail. This includes the energy and chemical relationships associated with decision making and actions of life forms.
Quoting ‘hard determinist’ Galen Strawson:
“it is impossible for one to be responsible for the way one is in any respect. This is because in order to be responsible for the way one is in some situation S , one must have been responsible for the way one was at S-1 . In order to be responsible for the way one was at S-1 , one must have been responsible for the way one was at S-2 , and so on. At some point in the chain, there must have been an act of origination of a new causal chain. But this is impossible. Man cannot create himself or his mental states.”
So the Nomological-Determinist POV is agnostic in the sense that it acknowledges the need for some higher being, or force, to exist in order to be held responsible for the origination of our known universe. The conflict with Christianity, again, is presented with the eradication this theory places upon free will.
I don’t want to sound like my intentions are to disprove Christianity. If anything, I’m bringing forward the current obstacles that have me unable to believe in such a religion. However, I can neither say that I have the intention of becoming Christian, as that would be extremely irrational and manipulative for a questioning soul; however, I welcome the day that I can genuinely place my faith in a particular religion.
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Comment
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Comment by becky brightwell on May 19, 2009 at 10:16pm
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Thank you, This help a lot. I sent him your reply.
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Comment by Leonard T on May 19, 2009 at 3:25pm
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Greetings Becky,
It has come to my observation that emotions seem to control every aspect of what we, as people, choose to do.
This observation is only partly correct. Emotions are part of who we are, but do not make the whole of a human being. We also draw from experience, knowledge and reason when making decisions. Emotions have an influence, but only in extreme cases would they be viewed as in complete control. Those completely controlled by emotion alone would not fit into society. They would kill when mad, rape when sexually aroused, steal when they want, etc…. Emotions left unchecked have no restraining force, but when found within the realm of the whole human existence they play an important part.
We will put ourselves through incredible circumstances to achieve what makes us "happy." Feelings such as "love," "vengeance," "grief," and "happiness," and so many more, have us making decisions and choices almost automatically.
The premise here is not a life with out choice, but a life out of control. That is a completely different thing. There are many things I would like to have, but I do not steal to acquire them, nor work myself to death to earn them. There is balance that comes from reason and understanding. When someone makes me mad I do not just wail on them, because my emotions are checked by reason. Reason tells me that this is the wrong response so the emotion is subdued. The Bible says that we are to take every thought captive. Reason also tells me that there are consequences for wrong behavior. This in not emotionally driven, but again driven by a mind that is under control. Romans 8 speaks well to this issue too. You will find that there is balance to all of this, for the Bible also says that we are “wonderfully made” (Psalm 139:13-14). You must also take into account the difference between a person who has come to know Jesus and are changed (2 Cor. 5:17) and a person who is still lost in their sin (Rom. 8:5-8).
So this sparks topic question #1:
Question What is "Free Will"?
When applying our actions and choices to the concept of Cause and Effect, one can only notice that our emotions and feelings tend to be the underlying Cause for all our actions. This would suggest that our actions are purely the effects derived from the causes of our emotions and feelings.
This is an unsubstantiated premise. You are focusing in on one aspect of humanity and trying to apply it as the driving factor and this cannot be, for we are more than emotions.
Exclamation Our actions are always either conducted as an effort to
A) overcome/avoid a negative emotion/feeling or
B) they are made as an effort to achieve/sustain a positive emotion/feeling.
There are some things people do in life that pass our understanding, like why a person would jump on a grenade in a hostile land to save the child of some one from that hostile land. There are times that our minds will misread something and we react by the read, emotions are included. An example of this is coming upon a stick in the woods that your mind perceives as a snake. In that moment the person is reacting to the situation, often in fear. But fear came as a result of a false read by the mind and the experience (previous knowledge) that snakes are dangerous. Reason, experience and emotions all work together even here, even when the reason is a misread.
Seriously think about it and try to find something in your life that you do, have done, or want to do, that is exempt from that statement.
I pay my electric bill without having any emotional response to it. I reason that I have used the electric and owe the money to the company. I write the check based on reason and experience.
Exclamation This implies that Free Will does not exist, because we aren't ever making our own decisions freely, we are making them in service to our emotions.
The real question is “what is freewill?” Man has certain liberties, but is not free to do anything he wishes. I cannot fly, even if I want to, because of gravity and other forces that exist. I cannot live underwater without a breathing apparatus no matter how much I would like to. Within parameters I am free to make certain choices. I choose where I want to live. There are factors that will go into that decision and some that can even prevent me from making that choice. When prevented I can then choose how I will respond. The Israelites were carried off to Babylon. That was not their choice. In Babylon they had certain liberties, freewill, to make choices within the parameters of their existence. This is true of all human life. I can choose which pair of pants I want to wear today. This is a preference and the selection is a choice. At the bottom of this I will include an article I wrote on Freewill and Predestination” a few years ago.
So with the power of our human ability to question things, we can ask topic question #2:
Question What are emotions? And how do they work?
Now I suppose we can break out the bio-chemistry text books if we have to, but let me start this conversation off with some food for thought.
Here are a couple facts to consider when thinking all of this over:
-The feelings you recieve from a particular emotion are chemically and electrically induced within your nervous system, accordingly, with observations made by atleast one of your 5 senses (sight, smell, sound, touch, taste)
-Hormones and the pituitary gland are essential in producing the flow of certain emotionally responsive chemicals.
You describe the basic wiring of humanity. My heart beats because of electrical impulses. I can raise my right hand or type this response because of the electric impulses and other factors within my body. Some of these we can control and others we cannot. Oxygen flows into my lungs is used by the body to sustain life. The blood flows feeding the brain and other parts to sustain life. This is a great example of how wonderfully we are made, not proof that emotions drive us as you suppose.
With this information alone, it has been tested and concluded that when deprived of certain chemicals, such as dopamine, lifeforms will cease to aspire anything, and naturally they waste away carelessly.
And on the flip side, lifeforms injected with excess chemicals, such as dopamine, will go beyond the logic of survival to obtain their source of desire.
Anything created has a schematic regarding how it is made, operates or exists and for what purpose it exists. Change or alter the master schematic and you end up with a product that will not work at optimum performance. God created us in such a way that when our make-up is changed, as in the change in the chemical dopamine within us, that we do not operate as designed. This is evidence of a master Creator who designed us meticulously and argues against random creation or natural selection that will allow for far more variance than God’s original design. Take for instance our body temperature. Our bodies need to be 98.6 (with very little variation). Increase by several degrees or decrease several degrees and we cease to function correctly or die. The masterfully created body maintains that temperature even when the external temperature is a 110 or 50 degrees outside. To be clear, even the body can adjust to the external only so much before it is overtaken, but it will strive to make that adjustment even then.
Ultimately this suggests that all lifeforms are reacting only as they have to in order to achieve or avoid natural highs, in the form of neuro-chemical releases which we have come to label with titles such as happy, sad, angry, hungry, horny, lonely, hot, cold, excited, scared, etc etc.
A better explanation would be that the so called “life form” is striving to achieve balance as the God created him to be.
Taking this one more step further, there is the topic of Natural Instinct, in which we have observed life's tendancy to survive.
Animals, function entirely on instinct to eat, hibernate, migrate, reproduce, lead, follow, raise young, etc etc, and the failures to do so successfully are consequently removed from the gene pool, resulting in the modern concept of evolution via natural selection.
The significance of this concept lies in determining the source of emotions..
The instinct by which the animal lives is given to them by their Creator. They are simply being what they were created to be. We know that some human beings need medication to reach a balance in their life, if they do not receive it they live a very altered existence. I speak from experience as my mom went through this for many years. Your argument does not take into account that animals may also have a deficiency and thus cause the out-side-of-the-box behavior. If diagnosed and medicated would they not be able to function with balance? The lab test tells us yes. For we know that when normal animals are given too much or if the item is withheld from them they begin to act differently as you have stated. This again only proves the meticulous perfection of the body. The problem is not in the Creators design, but in the initial alteration caused by sin that altered the world from that day until now.
If we make decisions based on our emotions-
And our emotions are merely feelings we experience from neuro-chemical reactions-
Then what exactly is the source of the command to release these chemicals?
The vague answer is "survival instinct" but until you can break down and explain the mechanics of what exactly governs instinct, then crediting it as the source of emotions is just as good of an answer as saying that our emotions just appear out of thin air; Which is just as logical as the Big Bang Theory or God. Instinct is not driven by emotion alone, as we have already discussed there are several aspects that make upon the whole of a human being, including the spiritual, which is missing until one is change by God. What we call instincts are God given and normal for us. The connection of linking the “Big Bang or God” is a leap and does not fit, but sounds good if one does not accept that there is a God. But sounding good does not make it true. You claim that instinct is controlled by emotion. Let’s look at one example that you have already used. When I become hungry, that is not an emotion, but an alarm within the design of the body that tells me that I need nutrition to stay alive. I can choose to eat or ignore it. At some point if I do not eat I will die. The hunger was not emotion driven, yet eating is instinctive.
What this also concludes is that the source of our emotions is an enigma; just like God, just like the Common Ancestor, and just like the Big Bang, which makes it absolutely logical to wonder if, and how, emotions and a higher power are related. You attempt to put God outside of the creation process and assume that it was a natural event instead of recognizing Him as the Master Creator who designed and gave us emotions.
Question EDIT
Also, on the subject of free will, I have a question concerning the all-knowingness of God, and a person's ability to make choices freely..
To my understading, God created free will because true love is something genuine, and can not exist without an opposite to choose from.
There are two problems with this statement. 1) What is “genuine love?” Man cannot know the love of God apart from coming to know God. This does not change the fact that God loves us all, but for us to experience it in a deeper experience and be able to reciprocate we must come to know Him. The “Bible says “we love, because He first loved us” (1 Jn. 4:19). “Agape” love is not an emotion, but a state of being that affects how we live. 2) The idea of opposite is not correct either. Evil is not the opposite of Good or God, but is the absence of God. Hate is not the opposite of love, but the absence of it.
However if God is indeed all-knowing, then doesn't he know the outcome of a soul's life on earth before he even creates it?
There is a great difference between knowing something and causing something. There are times that God interacts and causes and other times things are the result of our choices. This is covered in the article I will include.
Essentially what I'm saying is that if God knows everything, then he knows my thoughts, he knows what I'm going to do before I do it, and he therefore knows that I'm going to Hell when I die. So it's safe to say that God created me from the start with the intention of watching me burn in Hell. Or, alternately, if I do in fact possess free will, then I can make decisions for the future that neither I, nor God, have any idea of; Which also suggests that God is not all-knowing.
The concept that God created every human being is a stretch. God created the factors that allow human beings to be conceived and then born. These things are called the “Natural Laws of Nature.” There are some He has specifically been involved in their conception, but many are the results of the principles that He has established. It is true that children are gifts from God, but that does not necessitate that He personally created each one as you suppose. Here is an example that illustrates the “Natural Law” over God creating each person individually. Two people live together and are not married. They engage in sex, the Bible calls that sin. For them to have a child that is designed specifically by God and given to them would mean that God condones that relationship. Instead the child is born through the natural laws. All humans when they come into the world are born into sin, the sinful nature, and need redemption. The offer of salvation is on the table. Jesus has already gone the way of the cross.
(may I remind this forum that I am not an athiest, nor do I mock the possibility of a God. But as with all questions, I seek answers.)
Conversion of an agnostic starts here! lol.
But seriously, does anyone have an opinion on this subject?
Did I explain it clearly? I'd be glad to rephrase.
But essentially what I'm saying is that the concept of God (as defined by Christianity) is dependent on the existence of free will.
Freewill exists within parameters. Read below.
Also the purpose of God creating Man is dependent on free will, in the sense that our purpose is to genuinely follow and love God. .
Freewill exists within parameters. Read below.
I don't believe I have EVER whitnessed an example of free will by myself, nor anyone else, nor have I heard of one in the known history of the universe.
In the argument of free will, the term for my belief is known as "Nomological Determinism," or "Casual Determinism."
Freewill works within parameters. Read below.
In short, this belief is defined by the idea that all future events, down to the most minute detail, are already set in place by the outcome of past events, combined with laws of nature, begining with the origin of the universe.
This idea revokes any and all merit from the validity of "emotions," "coincidences," "All-knowing dieties," and "purpose."
If there is no Deity what causes all things to be interconnected down to the last detail that man has no choice in the midst of it? That is an oxymoron. For something to be controlled in the future there has to be a controller. Events of the past can line up certain things, but cannot cause specifics to come to pass.
(Article below)
Lord Bless,
LT
Predestination Vs. Freewill
Predestination and free will. It is not an either or, but actually "both." God has a plan that will come to pass. The prophesies have been given. The "end time" event will come to pass as God has said. God is sovereign and He is in control. These truths do not necessitate that God has to micromanage our life. God, in His authority and will, has given man freedom of choice (liberties). We have the freedom to choose many aspects regarding our life. We can choose our career, spouse, and location to live. These choices are limited by the interaction with other humans, such as choosing to marry a person, but one's choice choosing to reject them as theirs and therefore no marriage occurs. You also have the freedom to surrender to Jesus or reject Him. You can choose to go to church or reject church. The choice is yours because God has extended that liberty to you. Your activity will not derail the plan of God that arcs over all that is going on in the day to day activity of man.
God's plan has a purpose and will come to pass. God knows the future of each day's activity in advance. He knows when the end will come. Not because He predestined it to the last minute, but because in His foreknowledge He sees the culmination of all things. He did not set an hour glass into motion and say when the last grain falls the end is up. In fact He gave a clue to the timing in Matthew 24:14 "And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come." (NIV) There is a difference in knowing the timing and causing the timing.
Therefore, God's plan is unfolding and coming to pass and at the same time, in the midst of it all we have the freedom to make choices. God knows the choices we will make in advance. This knowledge does not mean that He made you act this way or that. He knew what you would do and fits it into His plan and purpose. He also plans your blessings along the way as well as the discipline that He may have to apply to our lives to help us become what we ought to be as believers. An example of a blessing awaiting one who comes to Jesus is the gift of the Holy Spirit to come and indwell us. The blessing is prepared for us, but not actually received until we accept Jesus as Savior. Being filled with the Holy Spirit is a blessing that we may have coming, but not actualized until the time of sanctification. God also knows who will completely reject Him. This knowledge does not force Him to treat them any different. He loves them fully. They enjoy a full life on earth and often even prosper. What is amazing is that in His forbearance He knows they will reject Him and He gives them full life while the whole time they break His heart. God does not rejoice in anticipating their judgment, but weeps over their rejection and impending damnation due to their rejection of His Son.
One more aspect must be included. Sovereign God has given man free will, but He also may intervene at any moment overriding that will. For example, if a robber were to hold you at gun point and desire to take your life. The robber has chosen to kill you, God can intervene and save your life. We have multitudes of stories where God has done just that and there are times He does not intervene. In those times we must find comfort from His Word, such as Rom. 8:28. He may work on the will of an unbeliever to surrender something to His cause. He may use them for a certain purpose, such as Pharaoh. The Bible is clear on this and that is God hardened his heart. He did not harden it towards God. Pharaoh’s heart was already hard toward God. He hardened it toward Israel, because God knew what needed to happen to awaken the Israelites and the process that God would use to deliver them and to demonstrate His power.
A better way of saying what we have is "liberty" instead of free will. There is a limit to our freedom and God limits His interaction with us allowing us these liberties.
Summary (Sorry for the length, but I see no way of stating this in a short form).
* God's plan is coming to pass and man cannot stop it.
* God is sovereign and has made a ruling that established man's liberties.
* Man has liberties in this life to make decisions affecting our life on earth and with Him, but we do not alter or strop His plan from coming to pass.
* God's foreknowledge enables Him to know our choices in advance.
* In that foreknowledge He establishes our blessing and discipline, prepared for the right moment. He uses us and our decisions to fit into his plan. (Can you imagine God's plan as pliable. It can be stretched and altered in shape, but never broken or eliminated. It is flexible daily and yet set for eternity. The end will come.)
* He has the sovereign privilege to override our decisions.
Thus we find that God is still fully sovereign and we have liberties in this life granted us by God.
What about Judas? Father God knew the choices that Judas was going to make. God positioned Judas to be Judas (Jesus selected him) and at the same time fulfill God's plan all the way to the 30 pieces of silver, the betrayal, the kiss and even his death. God used Judas. God did not make Judas do these things. Judas was being Judas. This is impossible for us to orchestrate, but simple enough for our omniscient, omnipotent, omnipresent Father in heaven to accomplish.
Last thought: Until I came to Christ I did not love Him. Now I freely love Him. If God pulled me out to soon my love would not be of freewill, even though He knew I eventually would love Him. I had to live my life and come to that point for it to truly be a love of choice and not compulsion.
Lord Bless,
Rev. Leonard R. Traina
Principles for Life
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