Determinism vs. Freewill
by Derek J. Sansone
Moses was indeed an exterior force. He had a huge effect on humanity. But just because an exterior force confronts you, doesn’t mean we can't probe it with our minds to see if we desire to trust it. If you don't trust what Moses wrote it is only due to the lack of exterior forces that have not given you the necessary amount of desire to do so.
Personal local (Social) construction is a part of global universal construction. What was happening to people in Asia effected what was happening to people in The Middle East. The Romans centurions were living out only what they were allowed to when whipping Jesus. Nothing is supposed. An effect can't possibly be deliberate. We don’t know the first cause...Evolution can’t give origin, neither can Theism….
We all observe a world of conflicting desires. That's it. Each of us interacts with the unstoppable mixing of inner-reflexive human necessities that our bodies automatically need. Our human bodies demand that we eat or we will loose nutrients and ultimately starve to death. Or we get fatigued when not resting. The stomach needs food to break these elements down for energy to function. The nerves signal these cravings and we are left with decisions, how to consume appropriately.
In addition, the weather drives the global macro pattern of human behavior. It is the exterior force we must reckon with. As a result of the weather, we plan our lives accordingly. No one goes on a picnic in the middle of a snowstorm...We can, but we don't.
Greater desires always win out, despite the object being chosen...options are impossible to avoid, they are around us and command a choice. Desire is rooted in the will, but the desires can change the will only when you have experienced the appropriate amount of results or effects from your choices. These results bring more knowledge and understanding. This process stops when you die. Desires can change.
A tree falling on you is less desirable than not falling on you. But why do I know this? Personal familiarity with gravity and large objects – I have maybe seen someone get squashed by a falling tree. So, when a tree is falling and I jump out of the way as a reflex…it is only because I have a knowledge of it’s potential effects on a person my size…
If a cruise ship enters into the middle of a hurricane, I doubt that any passengers are going to playing water volleyball in the outside pool. They will be inside doing something else; this effect sets stronger exterior forces forward. The passengers call their sons and daughters, the phone calls interrupt dinner and so on...
This is why we are not free from our interior human forces or exterior weather forces. The external weather forces trickle down and we observe the ripple effect being spread universally.
No human is free, we all use our memory bank of "effect observation" to evaluate and decide. You may attain something monetarily free, but even the object came at some personal effort. This effort is just reactivity of on going human exhaust that is inescapable. So, who ever decided to give you something just so happened to be in the giving mood when you just so happened to be in front of him. There are no accidents or deliberate actions. The man giving you the object did not know you were going to be in his life at that moment. He may even had known you and decided to choose who he was going to give this object, but the mere fact that he even knew who you were was not in his control. You had to have met sometime in the past. Again. This past is what makes us and gives desire - he had a giving desire and you had a receiving desire
How can I give you a desire for cheesecake if you have already tried it from some other exterior force? Your desire to have it may be greater than the contrary. But I didn't give the desire, I only influenced it. But the influence is also built on past influences from other exterior forces. These forces are added to the will that you were forced to develop from your infancy. The will is built on desire.
The desires are what force us to react. We don't choose desires. We don't choose options. Options are just exterior forces that demand a choice or response. This response may be silent, but it is inescapable. We still make a choice. Our social construct builds these particular desires, and the desires handle every single decision...
I have a desire to eat lobster today for lunch. Why? Well because I have had it before and it was pleasing to my taste buds. It goes deeper...There was a time where I had never had lobster. I was at some point introduced to the idea and probably saw my father eating it at the dinner table in a nice restaurant. After seeing he eats it and observing the effects, I had no choice but to have some sort of feeling of safety. I mean, he didn't eat it and get sick at the table. He didn't start convulsing on the floor. He was enjoying it. He was pleased.
Now, fast forward to the moment I was first offered lobster. At the point of me having to answer the waiter or my father on what I was going to eat, I had no choice but to revert back, using my library of memory images, to weigh my desires. Either my desire was greater to try lobster for myself, due to what I witnessed with my father, or my desire was not greater to try it due to my witnessing of my father. But since I had only one time to revert back to, and this one time was positive, I made a decision to order the lobster based on that experience.
What allowed me to make the decision was desire. All of us have desires, but they are uniquely based on our personal social construct. We can only make choices because of parts of past knowledge from a similar scenario -, as we were a personal witness of exterior effects from others. If we don't know the outcome of a proposed choice, we can go into our memory tank and create or imagine the potential effect. Our desire is based on what the mind records and plays back to us. Personal constructs depend on circumstantial personal experiences.
If I decide to do something out of a desire and willingness to do it, I have to also inevitably perform the physical necessities to carry out the decision. If I am going to clean a tanning bed at my salon, I have to get up out of my seat (stand) use my legs to walk over to the bottle, use my hands to grab the bottle, and all together, have to walk to the dirty tanning bed. In other words, each second, each human mechanic has to be done from knowledge to do so. This knowledge is learned from exterior forces from the day we are born.
You can't give me a will. You can only be an external force to me. But just you being an external force are nothing other than you reacting from other external forces and us happening to be crossing the same point on the map.
You present observations of effects to me; I am affected and then become an exterior force back to you. This back and forth effect observations can increase or decrease amount of desire. The will continually reforms and is subjected to the social climate of effect observations.
Even the day I decided to trust Christ and repent. My desire was greater to, than my desire not to. Why? Years and years of observing the effects of Christ lead me to those particular exterior forces that demanded a choice (my pastor). There was comfort in that memory lane, and I was not free from having to think or react from that force. My decision came from past event evaluation in my head.
Imagination
What is an imagination?
Parents imagine their children being kidnapped after watching the evening news and are now more protective. They see the tears of a mother who has lost a loved one in a car accident and store those pictures in their own memory banks. They relate to people because of memories in common.
Women imagine themselves walking down the isle on their wedding day. Men imagine themselves scoring the winning three pointers when shooting basketball by themselves in the driveway.
When we are about to go on a trip we see pictures of the resort and automatically imagine ourselves walking in our rooms and enjoying the amenities.
Jesus says that a man who lusts over a woman commits adultery. That means that when a woman, to your sexual satisfaction walks by; we can't even allow our image player to start rolling or we are going to hell. There is just no way to stop this unless there is something else that catches our attention. These images are stored from day 1 and are useful in many areas of our lives. But now, because we have been told how sinful and depraved we are as a result of Adam and Eve's sin, we must fight the very natural things that are inescapable. There is no peace within this system. There is only a big giant support group.
Could you imagine what something looks like without eyes? No. Without the ability to capture images with eyes you couldn't remember what something looks like or could possibly look like. But because we see humans and watch their movements and also watch our own, we can visualize images on the movie screen in our head.
Throughout life we pick these images up and store them. They are what give us understanding when someone is trying to describe something that we have not seen.
God's biblical moral basis
Of course there is a moral absolute in the Christian worldview. But this only exists if you subscribe to the biblical view of man. When Paul says in Romans 1that all men know God by nature, this is circular as well. An aborigine living in the Australian outback, does not know who Paul is, and has his own moral codes to live under. Outside of the bible there is no universal moral absolute.
How can we say that the moral law in the Bible is not true? Well, God is the One who had given us this brain to use. To not use it is impossible. To not use logic is impossible. So with this same ability, we look and probe our special revelations. How would we be able to test a spirit without thorough conflict or effect analysis? How then are we to make a judgment about who we need to spread the gospel message? How do we know what and who to do anything to?
This human ability to see, taste and feel is what we use to store and record experiences. These memories describe things and construct our able ness to decide. We have no choice but to use these tools and to turn and question Moses - is not unbiblical or un-Christian.
Logic is rooted in each person’s desire. You should do something because you have a desire to do it. You have the desire to do something because someone (exterior force) exposed you. Effects or (things) aren't always what they seem.
It may be logical for you to move your car into the passing lane in traffic if you want to move forward faster and lessen your time in your car, you may have to get home faster...maybe you were held back late at the office.
But it also may be logical for you to stay exactly in the same lane because saving time isn't of importance, and getting home faster may be less desirable then de-stressing in your quiet car alone, away from the chaos at home. Your family could benefit from a more relaxed you. You also benefit from more desirable effects from them....
Emotions are also socially constructed. The human brain just stores the instruments that are used to show them. But see, I’d not use the term to define the effects as “emotions”. I would just simply say they are effects. Information comes into the brain (exterior force) then our brain records how we react. But we only react as much as we possibly can. It is 100% pure honesty…
The effect is due to our minds translating the information and mixing it with our past knowledge of the item presented. But without a social construct there is no way to react. Everything would be new. No memory means total unawareness and unawareness means no responsibility for our effect displayed. But we are still without freedom to choose. Our choices are exterior forces that just so happen to be in our way on the road of life. NO one is free. Inclinations are only possessed through personal awareness and knowledge.
Alice in wonderland had 4 choice when at the fork I the road. She had to make one choice. That choice was based on prior knowledge and there is nothing arbitrary about her decision. She had to think of which choice was more desirable. Desire is not universally absolute and therefore is personal to her social construct. She had no choice but to choose what she chose.
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We must honestly apply the same criticism that we apply to strangers that we are about to witness. We can't turn logic off and on only when convenient to our personal faith. I can't possibly do that because I am determined to do that. If someone has not than it is only a matter of exterior forces that reshape their desires and then the choice may be different.
Since my time as a Christian, I have looked at people with the intention of evangelism. Each "heathen/pagan" I encountered I felt this holier then thou attitude inside me. I felt, this is my big moment to be a good Christian. This person may see Christ in me, so they may ask me about this good that is in me...
I'd look at people as if they were purposely acting the way they did. I looked at everyone this way. Now as I see that there is no alternative than (this second) reality, and that alternative choices only exist because of our imaginations, we can't do anything but what we do. Its funny how people will say, "if I could go back and do it again, I'd change it. or if I knew back then what I know now, I' wouldn’t have done ___________.
But this is precisely my point. It is only because you have observed the effects of what you have personally done (reacted to) that you are able to look at the images and now apply the appropriate amount of desire to them. This means you like what your desires tell you.
I look at the fruit that we eat and see that the size almost fits perfectly into our stomachs. Our apples are not the size of Volkswagens. Nor are they the size of basketballs. Now watermelons are different... But, I see so many examples of design. Design as I see it, which of course is not concrete. But I question the special revelation we are said to have. Agnosticism seams more appropriate. But just because we do know everything doesn’t mean we can’t know somethings. I know for certain that getting kicked in the groin hurts very much. I don’t need to have all knowledge to make that positive statement.
If you look at the bible it is hard to question Paul’s passion and dismiss it as meaningless propaganda. I see so much powerful encouragement. His intensity is beyond understanding. His exterior force??? That's the tough part. He is basing his theology on Moses’ view of man. Which I reject.
Why does Paul get Jesus as the external force on the road to Damascus and we, 2000 years later get Priests who rape little young boys and Pastors who sleep with Hookers and so on. I know that being a Christian is not about perfection in life and is about forgiveness. But see, this all rests on the fall of mankind.
There are layers that have to be dealt with. If you go backwards, you could dismantle the entire Judeo-Christian faith. Without sin, there is no need for a Savior. No atonement is needed for not having received anything. I pay my phone bill because I use my phone. But without a phone there is no use and no need to pay.
The OT is based on Moses and the Torah. Remember that the Tribe of Israel had prophets, men that proclaimed divine revelation and spoke with authority as Gods messengers. They didn't have little pocket
torahs in their robes, so the messages would understandingly be vague, choppy and open to misunderstandings and misinterpretations.
I don't have that many problems with the moral basis in the Christian worldview, although effective and universally applicable, its origin is still Moses. Be it by God or man, it is circular. Outside of the Christian system there are many other rules to live by. But the main problem with all moral systems is that they have redefined words that are too relative to human behavior that I don't think they permit a concrete definition.
When someone says, "that is immoral", I'd pry, "What is a moral?" There are too many words to describe physical actions. If I kill someone it is because I had the desire to. Why have the desire to kill? Well, maybe I was raised in a community or culture that permitted killing under certain circumstances. We know that in Texas, we get lethal injection when committing a first-degree capital murder, but in other states the punishment is life in prison.
We know that each culture has its own rules or moral laws to live by. So when you ask why one has a desire to kill, it is only a social construct that permits such action. Effects from a cause, which is the issue. What effects are justified? Well that depends on who taught them what, and how to handle such causes. Yes, the causes, well what cause allows such effects? Such effects???
You can't do a thing if not been taught by personal observation. So, if an African tribesmen comes to downtown Dallas and shoots a woman for wearing makeup in a disrespectful manner, to him, he is going to jail. But if we were in his native country, he may be praised for upholding the law.
This fits perfectly within determinism because we are determined by our social upbringing that is unique to us, but not isolated apart from the global community. If I fly to New York from some African country with a mosquito that is infected with the West Nile virus, guess what? I have just affected the New York social community. No one is free from out side external forces..............They move us, we move back.
Remember in High School when you walk into the lunchroom you'd see the jock heads sitting with jock heads, head bangers sitting with head bangers, etc, etc...
These "clicks" draw in more members. But the desire for a student to join the click comes from some comfort or pleasure in this particular social group. It goes deeper though, way back to day one in the child’s beginnings. Somewhere on the road of the past he/she learned acceptance. Now whom they accept is pending on desire, which we now know comes from personal trial and error.
Based on the evidence I have, within the ultimate, naturally perceptual, boundaries, we are unable to escape determinism. This is verifiable without the use of meta-physics. A belief must be based on evidence of natural physical sense experience. (Touch hear smell see) To state that you experience feelings of the super natural or meta physical is begging the question.
Determinism just simply is. The very existence of human determinism or the idea of being determined by preceding effects cannot be denied. It’s like denying you exist. Determinism cannot be contradicted by words or physical action because in determinism there is no alternative choices. We are trapped in determinism.
This is not dictated by logic. Even if a given human action or perception is virtually certain, you would need evidence that it is so virtual. But without evidence, it must remain empirically certain.
My findings, which hold the basis for my position, are rooted on evidence which render them highly probable; and due to the miserable failure to show probability of the contrary, this is existentially and empirically undeniable.
Theism must incorporate physical and meta-physical concepts to support itself. But that only works assuming meta-physics to be true, which is circular…
Recap time…
Someone would have to show me how we, as human creatures, are not social constructs. Once you have shown that it is impossible to avoid social, external forces combined with internal human necessities, you cannot be responsible for anything. There is nothing we are free from.
Our will is based in desire. Our desire is built within our social climate that is unique to us and therefore commands us to act accordingly. No one can give someone a desire; we can only present new information as an exterior force that can influence the amount of desire within.
The concept that man has fallen does not logically hold up. There are gaps in Gen. 2. A Christian has to assume that God had instructed Adam and Eve prior to the temptation by the serpent. But even if this were so, God would then be the author of the punishment. A punishment that was given for disobeying a command. A command that could not logically be obeyed.
The command would be impossible to obey because they didn't even know what knowledge of good and evil meant. Even if you look at what the serpent says you have to agree that they could not imagine anything without a mental image bank and the ability to reason based on parts of past observations.
What effects did they observe? We don't know. We assume they were created mature, but that would not mean that they were mentally prepared for conflict analization. And without observing other exterior forces, we are without knowledge and understanding. Without that, God’s words would logically have no choice but to evaporate into thin air.
Without a fall there is no sin. It is circular and that is my problem. I have been defending bible inerrancy for over two years. Doing a dang good job at it too. Proposing debates with Atheist and Muslims. Driving to see William Lane Craig debates and funding my own apologetic website and forum. But my ability to logically reason was young and underdeveloped. It was a matter of external forces presenting new information that lead me to my conclusions.
I am in a scary position. On one hand I am denouncing my faith, on the other I have a love for God and a desire to worship and serve Him. I am certainly in a period of reform.
Moses was indeed an exterior force. He had a huge effect on humanity. But just because an exterior force confronts you, doesn’t mean we can't probe it with our minds to see if we desire to trust it. If you don't trust what Moses wrote it is only due to the lack of exterior forces that have not given you the necessary amount of desire to do so.
Personal local (Social) construction is a part of global universal construction. What was happening to people in Asia effected what was happening to people in The Middle East. The Romans centurions were living out only what they were allowed to when whipping Jesus. Nothing is supposed. An effect can't possibly be deliberate. We don’t know the first cause...Evolution can’t give origin, neither can Theism….
We all observe a world of conflicting desires. That's it. Each of us interacts with the unstoppable mixing of inner-reflexive human necessities that our bodies automatically need. Our human bodies demand that we eat or we will loose nutrients and ultimately starve to death. Or we get fatigued when not resting. The stomach needs food to break these elements down for energy to function. The nerves signal these cravings and we are left with decisions, how to consume appropriately.
In addition, the weather drives the global macro pattern of human behavior. It is the exterior force we must reckon with. As a result of the weather, we plan our lives accordingly. No one goes on a picnic in the middle of a snowstorm...We can, but we don't.
Greater desires always win out, despite the object being chosen...options are impossible to avoid, they are around us and command a choice. Desire is rooted in the will, but the desires can change the will only when you have experienced the appropriate amount of results or effects from your choices. These results bring more knowledge and understanding. This process stops when you die. Desires can change.
A tree falling on you is less desirable than not falling on you. But why do I know this? Personal familiarity with gravity and large objects – I have maybe seen someone get squashed by a falling tree. So, when a tree is falling and I jump out of the way as a reflex…it is only because I have a knowledge of it’s potential effects on a person my size…
If a cruise ship enters into the middle of a hurricane, I doubt that any passengers are going to playing water volleyball in the outside pool. They will be inside doing something else; this effect sets stronger exterior forces forward. The passengers call their sons and daughters, the phone calls interrupt dinner and so on...
This is why we are not free from our interior human forces or exterior weather forces. The external weather forces trickle down and we observe the ripple effect being spread universally.
No human is free, we all use our memory bank of "effect observation" to evaluate and decide. You may attain something monetarily free, but even the object came at some personal effort. This effort is just reactivity of on going human exhaust that is inescapable. So, who ever decided to give you something just so happened to be in the giving mood when you just so happened to be in front of him. There are no accidents or deliberate actions. The man giving you the object did not know you were going to be in his life at that moment. He may even had known you and decided to choose who he was going to give this object, but the mere fact that he even knew who you were was not in his control. You had to have met sometime in the past. Again. This past is what makes us and gives desire - he had a giving desire and you had a receiving desire
How can I give you a desire for cheesecake if you have already tried it from some other exterior force? Your desire to have it may be greater than the contrary. But I didn't give the desire, I only influenced it. But the influence is also built on past influences from other exterior forces. These forces are added to the will that you were forced to develop from your infancy. The will is built on desire.
The desires are what force us to react. We don't choose desires. We don't choose options. Options are just exterior forces that demand a choice or response. This response may be silent, but it is inescapable. We still make a choice. Our social construct builds these particular desires, and the desires handle every single decision...
I have a desire to eat lobster today for lunch. Why? Well because I have had it before and it was pleasing to my taste buds. It goes deeper...There was a time where I had never had lobster. I was at some point introduced to the idea and probably saw my father eating it at the dinner table in a nice restaurant. After seeing he eats it and observing the effects, I had no choice but to have some sort of feeling of safety. I mean, he didn't eat it and get sick at the table. He didn't start convulsing on the floor. He was enjoying it. He was pleased.
Now, fast forward to the moment I was first offered lobster. At the point of me having to answer the waiter or my father on what I was going to eat, I had no choice but to revert back, using my library of memory images, to weigh my desires. Either my desire was greater to try lobster for myself, due to what I witnessed with my father, or my desire was not greater to try it due to my witnessing of my father. But since I had only one time to revert back to, and this one time was positive, I made a decision to order the lobster based on that experience.
What allowed me to make the decision was desire. All of us have desires, but they are uniquely based on our personal social construct. We can only make choices because of parts of past knowledge from a similar scenario -, as we were a personal witness of exterior effects from others. If we don't know the outcome of a proposed choice, we can go into our memory tank and create or imagine the potential effect. Our desire is based on what the mind records and plays back to us. Personal constructs depend on circumstantial personal experiences.
If I decide to do something out of a desire and willingness to do it, I have to also inevitably perform the physical necessities to carry out the decision. If I am going to clean a tanning bed at my salon, I have to get up out of my seat (stand) use my legs to walk over to the bottle, use my hands to grab the bottle, and all together, have to walk to the dirty tanning bed. In other words, each second, each human mechanic has to be done from knowledge to do so. This knowledge is learned from exterior forces from the day we are born.
You can't give me a will. You can only be an external force to me. But just you being an external force are nothing other than you reacting from other external forces and us happening to be crossing the same point on the map.
You present observations of effects to me; I am affected and then become an exterior force back to you. This back and forth effect observations can increase or decrease amount of desire. The will continually reforms and is subjected to the social climate of effect observations.
Even the day I decided to trust Christ and repent. My desire was greater to, than my desire not to. Why? Years and years of observing the effects of Christ lead me to those particular exterior forces that demanded a choice (my pastor). There was comfort in that memory lane, and I was not free from having to think or react from that force. My decision came from past event evaluation in my head.
Imagination
What is an imagination?
Parents imagine their children being kidnapped after watching the evening news and are now more protective. They see the tears of a mother who has lost a loved one in a car accident and store those pictures in their own memory banks. They relate to people because of memories in common.
Women imagine themselves walking down the isle on their wedding day. Men imagine themselves scoring the winning three pointers when shooting basketball by themselves in the driveway.
When we are about to go on a trip we see pictures of the resort and automatically imagine ourselves walking in our rooms and enjoying the amenities.
Jesus says that a man who lusts over a woman commits adultery. That means that when a woman, to your sexual satisfaction walks by; we can't even allow our image player to start rolling or we are going to hell. There is just no way to stop this unless there is something else that catches our attention. These images are stored from day 1 and are useful in many areas of our lives. But now, because we have been told how sinful and depraved we are as a result of Adam and Eve's sin, we must fight the very natural things that are inescapable. There is no peace within this system. There is only a big giant support group.
Could you imagine what something looks like without eyes? No. Without the ability to capture images with eyes you couldn't remember what something looks like or could possibly look like. But because we see humans and watch their movements and also watch our own, we can visualize images on the movie screen in our head.
Throughout life we pick these images up and store them. They are what give us understanding when someone is trying to describe something that we have not seen.
God's biblical moral basis
Of course there is a moral absolute in the Christian worldview. But this only exists if you subscribe to the biblical view of man. When Paul says in Romans 1that all men know God by nature, this is circular as well. An aborigine living in the Australian outback, does not know who Paul is, and has his own moral codes to live under. Outside of the bible there is no universal moral absolute.
How can we say that the moral law in the Bible is not true? Well, God is the One who had given us this brain to use. To not use it is impossible. To not use logic is impossible. So with this same ability, we look and probe our special revelations. How would we be able to test a spirit without thorough conflict or effect analysis? How then are we to make a judgment about who we need to spread the gospel message? How do we know what and who to do anything to?
This human ability to see, taste and feel is what we use to store and record experiences. These memories describe things and construct our able ness to decide. We have no choice but to use these tools and to turn and question Moses - is not unbiblical or un-Christian.
Logic is rooted in each person’s desire. You should do something because you have a desire to do it. You have the desire to do something because someone (exterior force) exposed you. Effects or (things) aren't always what they seem.
It may be logical for you to move your car into the passing lane in traffic if you want to move forward faster and lessen your time in your car, you may have to get home faster...maybe you were held back late at the office.
But it also may be logical for you to stay exactly in the same lane because saving time isn't of importance, and getting home faster may be less desirable then de-stressing in your quiet car alone, away from the chaos at home. Your family could benefit from a more relaxed you. You also benefit from more desirable effects from them....
Emotions are also socially constructed. The human brain just stores the instruments that are used to show them. But see, I’d not use the term to define the effects as “emotions”. I would just simply say they are effects. Information comes into the brain (exterior force) then our brain records how we react. But we only react as much as we possibly can. It is 100% pure honesty…
The effect is due to our minds translating the information and mixing it with our past knowledge of the item presented. But without a social construct there is no way to react. Everything would be new. No memory means total unawareness and unawareness means no responsibility for our effect displayed. But we are still without freedom to choose. Our choices are exterior forces that just so happen to be in our way on the road of life. NO one is free. Inclinations are only possessed through personal awareness and knowledge.
Alice in wonderland had 4 choice when at the fork I the road. She had to make one choice. That choice was based on prior knowledge and there is nothing arbitrary about her decision. She had to think of which choice was more desirable. Desire is not universally absolute and therefore is personal to her social construct. She had no choice but to choose what she chose.
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We must honestly apply the same criticism that we apply to strangers that we are about to witness. We can't turn logic off and on only when convenient to our personal faith. I can't possibly do that because I am determined to do that. If someone has not than it is only a matter of exterior forces that reshape their desires and then the choice may be different.
Since my time as a Christian, I have looked at people with the intention of evangelism. Each "heathen/pagan" I encountered I felt this holier then thou attitude inside me. I felt, this is my big moment to be a good Christian. This person may see Christ in me, so they may ask me about this good that is in me...
I'd look at people as if they were purposely acting the way they did. I looked at everyone this way. Now as I see that there is no alternative than (this second) reality, and that alternative choices only exist because of our imaginations, we can't do anything but what we do. Its funny how people will say, "if I could go back and do it again, I'd change it. or if I knew back then what I know now, I' wouldn’t have done ___________.
But this is precisely my point. It is only because you have observed the effects of what you have personally done (reacted to) that you are able to look at the images and now apply the appropriate amount of desire to them. This means you like what your desires tell you.
I look at the fruit that we eat and see that the size almost fits perfectly into our stomachs. Our apples are not the size of Volkswagens. Nor are they the size of basketballs. Now watermelons are different... But, I see so many examples of design. Design as I see it, which of course is not concrete. But I question the special revelation we are said to have. Agnosticism seams more appropriate. But just because we do know everything doesn’t mean we can’t know somethings. I know for certain that getting kicked in the groin hurts very much. I don’t need to have all knowledge to make that positive statement.
If you look at the bible it is hard to question Paul’s passion and dismiss it as meaningless propaganda. I see so much powerful encouragement. His intensity is beyond understanding. His exterior force??? That's the tough part. He is basing his theology on Moses’ view of man. Which I reject.
Why does Paul get Jesus as the external force on the road to Damascus and we, 2000 years later get Priests who rape little young boys and Pastors who sleep with Hookers and so on. I know that being a Christian is not about perfection in life and is about forgiveness. But see, this all rests on the fall of mankind.
There are layers that have to be dealt with. If you go backwards, you could dismantle the entire Judeo-Christian faith. Without sin, there is no need for a Savior. No atonement is needed for not having received anything. I pay my phone bill because I use my phone. But without a phone there is no use and no need to pay.
The OT is based on Moses and the Torah. Remember that the Tribe of Israel had prophets, men that proclaimed divine revelation and spoke with authority as Gods messengers. They didn't have little pocket
torahs in their robes, so the messages would understandingly be vague, choppy and open to misunderstandings and misinterpretations.
I don't have that many problems with the moral basis in the Christian worldview, although effective and universally applicable, its origin is still Moses. Be it by God or man, it is circular. Outside of the Christian system there are many other rules to live by. But the main problem with all moral systems is that they have redefined words that are too relative to human behavior that I don't think they permit a concrete definition.
When someone says, "that is immoral", I'd pry, "What is a moral?" There are too many words to describe physical actions. If I kill someone it is because I had the desire to. Why have the desire to kill? Well, maybe I was raised in a community or culture that permitted killing under certain circumstances. We know that in Texas, we get lethal injection when committing a first-degree capital murder, but in other states the punishment is life in prison.
We know that each culture has its own rules or moral laws to live by. So when you ask why one has a desire to kill, it is only a social construct that permits such action. Effects from a cause, which is the issue. What effects are justified? Well that depends on who taught them what, and how to handle such causes. Yes, the causes, well what cause allows such effects? Such effects???
You can't do a thing if not been taught by personal observation. So, if an African tribesmen comes to downtown Dallas and shoots a woman for wearing makeup in a disrespectful manner, to him, he is going to jail. But if we were in his native country, he may be praised for upholding the law.
This fits perfectly within determinism because we are determined by our social upbringing that is unique to us, but not isolated apart from the global community. If I fly to New York from some African country with a mosquito that is infected with the West Nile virus, guess what? I have just affected the New York social community. No one is free from out side external forces..............They move us, we move back.
Remember in High School when you walk into the lunchroom you'd see the jock heads sitting with jock heads, head bangers sitting with head bangers, etc, etc...
These "clicks" draw in more members. But the desire for a student to join the click comes from some comfort or pleasure in this particular social group. It goes deeper though, way back to day one in the child’s beginnings. Somewhere on the road of the past he/she learned acceptance. Now whom they accept is pending on desire, which we now know comes from personal trial and error.
Based on the evidence I have, within the ultimate, naturally perceptual, boundaries, we are unable to escape determinism. This is verifiable without the use of meta-physics. A belief must be based on evidence of natural physical sense experience. (Touch hear smell see) To state that you experience feelings of the super natural or meta physical is begging the question.
Determinism just simply is. The very existence of human determinism or the idea of being determined by preceding effects cannot be denied. It’s like denying you exist. Determinism cannot be contradicted by words or physical action because in determinism there is no alternative choices. We are trapped in determinism.
This is not dictated by logic. Even if a given human action or perception is virtually certain, you would need evidence that it is so virtual. But without evidence, it must remain empirically certain.
My findings, which hold the basis for my position, are rooted on evidence which render them highly probable; and due to the miserable failure to show probability of the contrary, this is existentially and empirically undeniable.
Theism must incorporate physical and meta-physical concepts to support itself. But that only works assuming meta-physics to be true, which is circular…
Recap time…
Someone would have to show me how we, as human creatures, are not social constructs. Once you have shown that it is impossible to avoid social, external forces combined with internal human necessities, you cannot be responsible for anything. There is nothing we are free from.
Our will is based in desire. Our desire is built within our social climate that is unique to us and therefore commands us to act accordingly. No one can give someone a desire; we can only present new information as an exterior force that can influence the amount of desire within.
The concept that man has fallen does not logically hold up. There are gaps in Gen. 2. A Christian has to assume that God had instructed Adam and Eve prior to the temptation by the serpent. But even if this were so, God would then be the author of the punishment. A punishment that was given for disobeying a command. A command that could not logically be obeyed.
The command would be impossible to obey because they didn't even know what knowledge of good and evil meant. Even if you look at what the serpent says you have to agree that they could not imagine anything without a mental image bank and the ability to reason based on parts of past observations.
What effects did they observe? We don't know. We assume they were created mature, but that would not mean that they were mentally prepared for conflict analization. And without observing other exterior forces, we are without knowledge and understanding. Without that, God’s words would logically have no choice but to evaporate into thin air.
Without a fall there is no sin. It is circular and that is my problem. I have been defending bible inerrancy for over two years. Doing a dang good job at it too. Proposing debates with Atheist and Muslims. Driving to see William Lane Craig debates and funding my own apologetic website and forum. But my ability to logically reason was young and underdeveloped. It was a matter of external forces presenting new information that lead me to my conclusions.
I am in a scary position. On one hand I am denouncing my faith, on the other I have a love for God and a desire to worship and serve Him. I am certainly in a period of reform.
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