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77
45
Sound Unsound
Debate Score:122
Arguments:100
Total Votes:126
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 Unsound (45)

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The Freewill Argument for the Nonexistence of God: Sound?

The Christian God is defined as a personal being who knows everything. According to Christians, personal beings have free will.

In order to have free will, you must have more than one option, each of which is avoidable. This means that before you make a choice, there must be a state of uncertainty during a period of potential: you cannot know the future. Even if you think you can predict your decision, if you claim to have free will, you must admit the potential (if not the desire) to change your mind before the decision is final.

A being who knows everything can have no "state of uncertainty." It knows its choices in advance. This means that it has no potential to avoid its choices, and therefore lacks free will. Since a being that lacks free will is not a personal being, a personal being who knows everything cannot exist.

Therefore, the Christian God does not exist.

- Dan Barker

Sound

Side Score: 77
VS.

Unsound

Side Score: 45
2 points

This makes a lot of sense. God doesn't exist whether because of this or not.

Side: Sound
2 points

You cannot claim to have a god that creates free will and yet has a plan for everything, its a contradiction.

Side: Sound
Jolly169(12) Disputed
1 point

How so?

'Many are called few are choosen'

You presuppose a plan for "everything" and everyone.

Not sure that's an idea the Scripture supports

Side: Unsound
WastingAway(340) Disputed
3 points

It is, as is supported by the scripture God knows all. He is omniscient. This means that he knows everything that is going on, everything that has ever happened, and everything that will happen. He plans it all out. This means that, going by Christian scripture, while a person might feel as if they have free will they do not because God has already decided what they are going to do, or at a minimum knows what they are going to do, and how everything will turn out no matter what happens. You cannot have free will if there is one path that is pre-decided.

Side: Sound
Saintnow(3684) Disputed Banned
0 points

The contradiction is you going against God. You are being contradictory against God by your own choice, and you will give account of every word, thought, and action to God on Judgement Day. God won't buy your arguments against Him, He does not accept "I'm ignorant" as an excuse.

Side: Unsound
WastingAway(340) Disputed
3 points

You didn't actually dispute the point, you just went on your usual rant.

Side: Sound
umaroth(7) Disputed
1 point

You go on a lot of temper tantrums, don't you? How old are you? Three?

Side: Sound
2 points

It's time to go to church. I was glad when they said unto me, let us go into the house of the Lord.

Side: Sound
2 points

If an omniscient being knows every decision it is to make an eternity before, and if knowledge is "true (as in it is correct), logical belief" then that would mean it is incapable of making any other decision otherwise it wouldn't know it's own decisions. However I'd argue that "responsibility" combined with "omniscience" can never coexist with free will so

Side: Sound

I really like how you wrote that. You explained why you thought that and even had some proof. I agree with you.

Side: Sound
1 point

Not only Christian God really, but I suppose most religions with similar "free will" lies, can fall under this argument

Side: Sound
1 point

You might want to check out my debate on the same topic:

I Have Free Will vs. I Must Be Stupid

http://www.createdebate.com/debate/show/ Free WillvsIMustBeStupid

Side: Unsound
Jace(5222) Disputed
4 points

That is not a debate and it is not the same topic.

Side: Sound
Saintnow(3684) Disputed Banned
1 point

it's the same topic and it's a debate. That's why you say stupid things such as "non-existent free will" trying to deny responsibility for your own actions, as if God denies responsibility for His actions.

Side: Unsound
2 points

This has nothing to do with the existence of your stupidity; that issue has long been settled. It definitely exist.

Side: Sound
Saintnow(3684) Disputed Banned
1 point

This argument against God implies He cannot be responsible for His actions because being omniscient somehow would exclude Him from being able to choose His actions. It's a simplistic concept based on ignorance. That fact that I know what I am going to say here does not mean I have no choice in saying it. God says what He wants to say when He wants to say it, and how in the world could you or Him enjoy yourself if you don't limit yourself in your choices?

This kind of irrational reasoning against God always depends on the hypothesis that He is not God. That is always the starting point, and ending point, of this stuff. It's silly, and somehow people buy it and scratch their heads as they try to grasp the emptiness portrayed as something tangible and they say.....hmmmmm, I think that makes me smarter, stronger, and better than God because I feel like I have proved Him to be impotent. Fools dying and saying they don't need to be saved, making suckers out of "intellectuals" who think they can outsmart God and get away with it and not have to be imprisoned in Hell as renegades, reprobates turned against their Creator who would mess up His heaven the same as they mess up the world.

Side: Unsound
Firnen Disputed
2 points

Too bad you have not learned how to use your brains to have an adult discussion. How old are you? Let me know somewhere else please.....you failed to humor me with your childishness here so you can't respond here.

Side: Sound
1 point

This stuff is so dumb. God does what He wants to do when He wants to do it. This is nothing but an attempt to change God into something you can, in you can believe you have gotten rid of.......God created us of His own free will, and He gave us free will because He made us like Himself. I can't believe people actually get college credit for chewing on a cud like this. This stuff is just plain dumb.

This is not talking about God, it's just a fool talking about his own imaginations. God knowing what He is going to do does not mean He has no choice in doing it, that's nonsense. I know that I am going to say 2 plus 2 equals 4, but that never meant I could not have changed my mind and not said it. I had free will from the start to the finish and still do have free will.

This is just gobblety gook jibberish when people talk like this as if it's an intelligent argument against God, and then to my amazement a bunch of eggheads will sit around and scratch their heads and say ...hmmmmmm, that sounds very good.

Side: Unsound
Jace(5222) Disputed
3 points

You are so blinded by your ardent faith that you have completely missed the actual argument being advanced, which attempts to establish a contradiction in the idea of God arising from his purported omniscience and omnipotence. It fails, incidentally, but certainly not due to any of your assertions and ad hominem.

Side: Sound
Saintnow(3684) Disputed Banned
1 point

How do you know if somebody is blinded when you believe there is no objective standard and no meaning in life? Your belief is a belief in being blind. You don't make any sense at all.

Side: Unsound
Saintnow(3684) Disputed Banned
1 point

the argument "attemps" to establish a contradiction against God. The only contradiction being established is that the individual who wastes the time God gave Him to run around in circles with nonsensical implications that God cannot be God is dying and will end up in Hell.

"....the idea of God arising from his purported omniscience and omnipotence" is a nonsensical statement. God is not God if He arises from anything. He is self-existent, always was throughout eternity past, and always will be throughout eternity future.

You are only fooling yourself with arguments which start by saying there is no God, and therefore anything you say against God is valid if you feel like it has the slightest bit or reasoning regardless of being inconclusive. When you make the conclusion that there is no God, then anything you say against Him is valid in your mind and it all will be used against you on Judgement Day before you are cast away from God forever in the Lake of Fire if you will not repent and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ.

You and your stupid add homomen. "Fallacy, Fallacy, ad hominem and circular reasoning, therefore I win the argument." Yeah right, and you can just wait and see if Hell is for sinners, can't you?

Side: Unsound
Saintnow(3684) Disputed Banned
1 point

What is being "purported" is you purporting yourself to be not guilty and not worthy of Hell. Who are you trying to fool?

Side: Unsound
Saintnow(3684) Disputed Banned
1 point

It is you who is "purporting" that God arises from His omniscience and omnipotence. God does not arise from anything. The way you are twisting logic around is by starting with a lie against God which implies He arises from something rather that that He is the unchanging and self existent Creator of all things. The God you argue against is not God, it is the god of your own imagination, your own reasoning, who you worship as you flatter yourself pretending to be smart by saying things in such twisted ways that you make it impossible for yourself to hear the simple truth. Your pride is going to take you to Hell and it's justice against you who is against your Creator. He didn't bring you into existence because He wanted more brainiacs to make more complicated nonsensical arguments against His goodness. He's being patient with you now and you are running out of time in the place where you can know His mercy. Eternal condemnation in the Lake of Fire is justice, and it's good to know God executes justice. You should know, but you want to find out by experience rather than by being honest and conceding to the truth.

Side: Unsound
foil7(346) Disputed
2 points

If God does what he wants to do, it means that he made me Buddhist just so I could go to Hell after I die?

Side: Sound
2 points

Where did you come up with a stupid question like that? If you end up in Hell, it's because you are a sinner who is against God an by your own nature He has no place for you but in Hell. Blame yourself. God made the way for you to be saved from Hell. He brought you into existence so you can be with Him forever in eternal life. You want a place where you have no evidence that God is good, don't you? You want a place with nothing good from God, right? That place is Hell, and you are asking for it like a fool. God does not want to give it to you, but you keep asking for it and He's going to let you have it.

Side: Sound
Saintnow(3684) Disputed Banned
1 point

If you want to be a Butthist, that is your choice. You can stick your head in the sand if want to.

Side: Unsound
umaroth(7) Disputed
1 point

You go on a lot of temper tantrums, don't you? How old are you? Three?

Side: Sound
1 point

This argument relies heavily upon the assumption that free will is integral to being a personal being, but this is by no means given since personal being could just as well be defined as something altogether independent from free will. "Knowledge" can also be understood in numerous ways, including being defined as understanding of all that can be understood rather than as everything altogether. Moreover, there is no apparent reason to conclude that the laws which apply to human beings would necessarily apply as well to a creator being.

Side: Unsound
Cartman(18192) Disputed
2 points

Here is how I understand it: The argument is not trying to claim that God follows the same laws, but that if He interacts with humans His interactions must follow the same laws.

Side: Sound
Saintnow(3684) Disputed Banned
1 point

You understand that you are responsible for every word, every thought, and every action in every moment of your time, right? If not, you are trying to fool yourself which is probably what you are doing, thinking you have the right to exist as a sinner outside of Hell.

Side: Unsound
Jace(5222) Disputed
1 point

Where do you read that? As I already stated, this seems to be an assumptive premise of the argument rather than something it actually proves. My other points are still also relevant insofar as they hold true even if that assumptive premise is proven, because they challenge the additional assumptions about the nature of creation just as much as the nature of the creator.

Side: Unsound
Saintnow(3684) Disputed Banned
1 point

You can't understand God if you won't admit that you need His mercy and deserve His execution of justice against the breaking of His law.

Side: Unsound
Harvard(666) Clarified
2 points

While I agree entirely with your point, his point is specifically referencing the fallibility of christian theology that necessitates free will embodying personal beings - your point somewhat supplements his. You both illuminate the fault in constructing a deity with human qualities (which, to a degree, is unavoidable since a deity fundamentally requires human perception; and that our perception inexorably taints all that we conceive).

Side: Sound
Saintnow(3684) Disputed Banned
2 points

The point is an attempt do deny God's goodness, it's foolishness. There is no sound argument against God. When you invent this kind of gibberish, it only goes against you as you lose the entire argument in death and then you find out that you don't escape existence and you must give account for every moment of your time, in word, thought, and action, to God who rules over you if you like it or not. Me, I like it. I know He is merciful and kept me out of Hell and gives me life, eternal life, now. You, you are asking for it by fooling yourself into thinking you are smarter, better, stronger than God by the power of your imagination.

Pride goes before a fall. You can fall on your face before God and seek His mercy and believe on His forgiveness in the resurrection of Jesus Christ who died for you, or you can fall in your pride into the fire of Hell insisting you are as good as God while you are rejected by Him in death the same as you rejected Him in life after He died for you. He will be your Judge if not your Saviour, your blood will be on your own head if your sins are not paid for, covered by His blood which He gave for you to save you from Hell.

Side: Sound
Saintnow(3684) Disputed Banned
2 points

You don't want God to have "human qualities" because that means He understands JUSTICE, and more than that, as God He is altogether righteous in His judgements because as your Creator He is your RULER.....and you cannot measure up to Him so you will fall before Him in JUDGEMENT because of your SINS.

So you come up with this nonsense argument trying to imply God has no power over you while He gives you time outside of Hell and you beg for proof of the reality of Hell and you will get it if you keep asking for it like a fool.

You don't want God to be your ruler because you are too proud to admit He is better than you and you are unworthy of life. Even though you are dying, you can't admit that you are unworthy of life as a sinner and deserve to die and burn in Hell. You love your pride in your vain imagination, and the momentary pleasures of your sin more than life and you think it's worth it if you wake up in Hell or not....but you will realize how wrong you were when you wake up in Hell, if you won't repent and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and be saved.

You need to hear it, who else is going to tell you the truth?

Side: Sound
Jace(5222) Disputed
2 points

I admittedly lacked that context, although I would contest that the assumptions made in this argument are necessarily categorical assumptions made by all Christians. For instance, there are some Christians and sects which have denied the existence of free will in humans altogether.

Assuming that the premises could be assumed on the basis of actually corresponding to Christian beliefs, I still doubt the conclusion necessarily follows. The greatest flaw seems to be the assumption that God must exist in linear time, which I'm not sure Christians would even agree to given their imagination of God as an omnipotent being.

Side: Sound
Saintnow(3684) Disputed Banned
1 point

The error is in implying God has the human quality of being able to be wrong.

Denial of this error makes it impossible for you to understand God.

The fallibility of your theology is in that you are denying a god who is not God, and refusing to acknowledge that God is God.

The god you are implying is not God is indeed your own god which is your own imagination and power of reasoning. The fault is in you, and the same fault is in me but I have admitted to being wrong when God was always right. There is a new me who will never be wrong again when the old me is forever done away with, and God Himself took it on Himself to take it away from me when He became sin for me and took my place in death so I am forgiven in His resurrection.

You can know today that your sins are forgiven and you are going to heaven. Today could be your last chance to seek God's mercy. Harvard intellectual meanderings denying God will take you to Hell. Professors who teach people to deny God are not friends of those people.

Side: Sound
Saintnow(3684) Disputed Banned
1 point

"our perception inexorably taints all that we conceive"........It sounds so beautiful, so eloquent, to say you are incapable of believing the truth. Your perception does not have to be inexorably tainted, the truth will set you free.

Why in the world people believe eloquence is admirable rather than deviant when they say they are inexorably tainted in perception...i.e., hopelessly unable to see reality clearly is baffling. There is objective truth. If you really want to know it, you will find it. Once you resign yourself to being "inexorably tainted", you are declaring yourself hopeless. If you don't seek the truth, you won't find it and you will get what you deserve for not caring about it.

Side: Sound
Saintnow(3684) Disputed Banned
2 points

mumbo jumbo jibberish. Can you say that three times, or does your lack of free will prevent you from saying it three times? Or does you lack of free will prevent you from reading this post, or does it force you to read this post.

How stupid can you be to believe you have no choice in your actions. You are just trying to deny responsibility for your sins, you are a fool who is going to wake up in Hell if you wont' repent and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and be saved from it.

Side: Sound
Jace(5222) Disputed
0 points

Neither my ability nor inability to regurgitate your inarticulate nonsense establishes the existence of free will or intelligence either way. You have not remotely begun to prove the existence of free will, although you arguably have gone great lengths to prove your stupidity. This thread is not even about the existence of free will, and my comment is not arguing that free will does not exist but rather that free will is not proven integral to the existence of beings. Get on topic or GTFO.

Side: Unsound
Saintnow(3684) Disputed Banned
1 point

Why do you pretend to be so stinking smart?................

Side: Sound
IAmSparticus(1516) Clarified
1 point

He doesn't, most people just look that way when talking to you.

Side: Sound
1 point

The future is not predetermined. God can predict a infinite number of possible futures and exercising his freewill in deciding which one to follow.

Side: Unsound
Harvard(666) Disputed
2 points

The future is predetermined since god created everything while knowing all that would follow from his creation. So there is no need for 'prediction' if god already knows the future (which, by definition of his nature, he would know the future). There is also no such thing as a 'decision' for a being who already know the the answer in advance.

To refute either of these statements suggests that either (1) god does not know everything (which contradicts his nature); or, (2) god does not have control over the future.

Side: Sound
Atrag(5666) Disputed
1 point

The future is predetermined since god created everything while knowing all that would follow from his creation.

I don't think that is a necessary property of God that he has to only predict one possible future for him to be considered God. It is enough that he sees a number of possible outcomes from his creation and their relative probabilities of occurring. This is still consistent with him knowing everything.

(2) god does not have control over the future.

He can control it but 1) he is able to contorl it but choose not to (he merely appreciates the probability of how things will turn out) or 2) there are a number of strings of time existing alongside each other. In our universe Adam took the apple from the tree, for example, but in another he didn't and time took a different course. This is not to say that God didn't foresee both those outcomes and exists outside the various dimensions.

I proposed a similar debate here

http://www.createdebate.com/debate/show/ If Godexistsoutsidethelimitsoftimethenfreewilldoesnot

Side: Unsound
Saintnow(3684) Disputed Banned
1 point

You have a choice. You are making your future predetermined in Hell if you will not seek God's mercy through the blood of His Son who He gave as the propitiation (you might want to study that word) for your sins. It's your choice if you don't want to admit you need God's mercy to live. You can only blame yourself if you end up in eternal death in the fire of Hell. God is trying to get you saved from it. He is the Creator who became a man and paid for your sins so you can be forgiven and not have to pay in Hell for your sin. Repent of your sins and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ in His resurrection and you will be saved from Hell.

Saying you are not making any choice is choosing to do nothing, and remain as you are, dead in your sins, a walking talking dead man with one foot in the grave and the other on thin ice melting over the fire of Hell.

Side: Unsound
Saintnow(3684) Disputed Banned
1 point

This is stupid. It's just fooling yourself. God can limit His knowledge. He indeed does limit Himself giving us time. He gives you time to choose to believe He is good and come to know Him personally, which is what He desires for you, to give you eternal life. You are going against Him asking for proof by reasoning that He is not good. Your whole argument is an attempt to slander Him as not being good, but rather impotent. It's foolishness on parade. The time of your death is in God's hands, and you are dumb to sit there and say He has no control over it.

I can just see your face as you twist your brain around with this kind of reasoning....straight face innocent look, as if you have reached the only possible conclusion and there is no way you can believe God is good. It's a dumb look you can always see on the faces of atheists when they use this kind of gibberish argument....also when they say the simplistic lie of their belief; "I have no god-belief". It's dead nonsense logic, trying to prove you have the right to exist outside of Hell when you don't even have the right to live for crying out loud.

Side: Unsound
Saintnow(3684) Disputed Banned
1 point

You can't understand God if you won't admit that you need His mercy and deserve His execution of justice against the breaking of His law. If you will not concede to the truth, you can come up will all kinds of goofy arguments against God in which you feel like you make yourself better and smarter than Him.

If you have concluded you do not need His mercy, or that you deserve His forgiveness because of the good things you do, you have excluded yourself from knowing God and will have nothing but uncertainty even in the fire of Hell where you won't be able to believe it is eternal punishment because part of you will always feel like it's not fair but you will never be able to get out of Justice.

You need to rethink what you are doing, and stop letting yourself box yourself into futile arguments against God.

Side: Unsound
Cartman(18192) Disputed
2 points

But, if it is God exercising His free will on the outcome how can the humans involved be said to have the free will?

Side: Sound
Atrag(5666) Disputed
1 point

Their freewill merely create another dimension where that choice has been made. God also looks ober the dimensions in which a different choice has been made.

Side: Unsound
Saintnow(3684) Disputed Banned
1 point

Either you have free will or you must be stupid and have no choice about it. I'm beginning to think more and more that you must be stupid when you say things implying you are not responsible for what you say, think, and do.

Side: Unsound
Saintnow(3684) Disputed Banned
1 point

You can't understand God if you won't admit that you need His mercy and deserve His execution of justice against the breaking of His law. If you will not concede to the truth, you can come up will all kinds of goofy arguments against God in which you feel like you make yourself better and smarter than Him.

If you have concluded you do not need His mercy, or that you deserve His forgiveness because of the good things you do, you have excluded yourself from knowing God and will have nothing but uncertainty even in the fire of Hell where you won't be able to believe it is eternal punishment because part of you will always feel like it's not fair but you will never be able to get out of Justice.

You need to rethink what you are doing, and stop letting yourself box yourself into futile arguments against God.

Side: Unsound
Saintnow(3684) Disputed Banned
1 point

Well how about that, a halfway intelligent statement about God.

Side: Sound
1 point

It's redundant to say "an option that is avoidable."

Knowing everything makes it possible to avoid everything.

Therefore God has free will.

Side: Unsound
Saintnow(3684) Disputed Banned
1 point

another intelligent statement about God, very good.

"redundant" is a good description of this goofy argument against God. It's nonsense twisted around in circles, each step depending on the erroneous idea that God has no choice of action being omniscient. The fact that I know as I am typing that I am going to say this whole gibberish argument is stupid does not mean I did not say it by my own choice, my own free will.

God limits Himself at times, He can do that whenever He wants to. He gives us choices, and yes He knows in advance (if He wants to know, I think He often does not want to know so He can enjoy watching to see what we will do, and then pass judgement or give His blessing) God made us for Himself to enjoy, He didn't create us because He wanted to listen to stupid arguments which try to slander Him.

You can read the summation, the final chapter, in Revelation. God has a plan and it will be carried out. He will avenge Himself against His creatures who have turned against Him. He created us because He is good, He delights to give, to show mercy, He gives life. Those of His creatures who are turned against Him will suffer the eternal torments of Hell which they deserve for going against the love of God and being self-centered instead of giving thanks to their Creator.

Side: Sound
1 point

"A being who knows everything can have no "state of uncertainty." It knows its choices in advance."

Uncertainly is not about knowing choices, it's about knowing or rather not knowing the outcome of those choices.

"This means that it has no potential to avoid its choices"

How so? It leaves open all possible choices, and a bigger Choice of which choice to Choose, that reality allows avoidance of one choice over another.

", and therefore lacks free will."

No it doesn't.

"Since a being that lacks free will is not a personal being,"

God is certainly more then simply a personal Being

"a personal being who knows everything cannot exist."

Your point?

Side: Unsound
1 point

You can't understand God if you won't admit that you need His mercy and deserve His execution of justice against the breaking of His law. If you will not concede to the truth, you can come up will all kinds of goofy arguments against God in which you feel like you make yourself better and smarter than Him.

If you have concluded you do not need His mercy, or that you deserve His forgiveness because of the good things you do, you have excluded yourself from knowing God and will have nothing but uncertainty even in the fire of Hell where you won't be able to believe it is eternal punishment because part of you will always feel like it's not fair but you will never be able to get out of Justice.

You need to rethink what you are doing, and stop letting yourself box yourself into futile arguments against God.

Side: Unsound
1 point

You are confusing God's omniscience with Him also having "destiny" in mind for all of us. The two need not necessarily go together. God could very well know everything that is going to happen, IF we follow his plan for us. But His plan, His preferred paths for us, don't necessarily need to be "etched in stone." The Free Will we were imbued with--through His Grace, could allow us to stray from His chosen Path.

Of course, if we do so, we should be prepared for the consequences, which might include not attaining Heaven. Or being a part of His Grace after Death. God's feeling being along the lines of: "Well, you didn't take advantage of my gifts and promptings for you back in the World, so why do you think you have earned a ticket to the next level with me and those Believers who DID allow my Grace into their lives?"

If there IS such thing as a personal and theist sort of God, this is most likely how He would reason. Having said that, I now am compelled to conclude by admitting I am an Atheist. And I am playing Devil's Advocate here for the sake of the Believers who do not agree with your Theology. Or who think you in any way disproved their God in your OP.

Thanks.

Side: Unsound
1 point

The God of the Christian faith is not only of the human specimen. Its God, three in one: Father, Spirit, Son. And the evidence supporting the existence of the God of the Christian faith is incredible, as well as verifiable. If you don't believe me read the bible then "Evidence Demands a Verdict" or "Darwin's Black Box" for further support.

Before making an ignorant comment about something which does not address all there is, I would both suggest and appreciate it if you would put some effort into making an intelligible argument after the understanding of who God really is.

Side: Unsound
IAmSparticus(1516) Clarified
1 point

Out of curiosity, have you read any responses or critiques of those books?

As someone who is familiar with both the books and the critiques, I recommend you familiarize yourself with the latter to understand why they are not going to appeal to non-Christians.

I recommend you start here: http://www.americanscientist.org/bookshelf/pub/a-review-of-darwins-black-box-the-biochemical-challenge-to-evolution-by-michael-j-behe

Side: Sound