Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site unc.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!unc!bch From: bch@unc.UUCP (Byron Howes ) Newsgroups: net.religion Subject: Re: Free Will vs. Omnipotence Message-ID: <6791@unc.UUCP> Date: Mon, 20-Feb-84 16:46:58 EST Article-I.D.: unc.6791 Posted: Mon Feb 20 16:46:58 1984 Date-Received: Tue, 21-Feb-84 08:01:23 EST References: <840@ssc-vax.UUCP> Organization: University of North Carolina Comp. Center Lines: 48 While I can't pretend to speak for Jon White, I think I understand what he is trying to say. It isn't really free will vs. omniscience, but rather than given omniscience, free will becomes somewhat irrelevent. Incidentally, this isn't a new problem for christianity. The Calvinists hit it dead-on and came up with a rather unique perception of grace and salvation that is still held by some flavors of Baptists today. First, let's take the theology out and merely hypothesize a being that is omniscient with respect to time and space -- that is to say that its perceptions are such that all things at all times and places are seen haas happening in the 'here' and 'now.' (This is a bit confusing, but such a being would have presumably found a way to adapt to it.) Given a sufficiently large viewpoint, such a creature might see a human life as a human being might see a piece of yarn on the floor: birth a death are events connected by something which is either straight or tangled but have no other implied relationship (Please! do not read any symbolism into that analogy, it is only a convenience.) To this being, the beginning is the beginning and the end is the end. The endpoints of the yarn are not so much determined as they simply are in a state of existence. It really doesn't matter much whether the yarn knows where it is coming from or where it is going to. That is largely immutable. The Calvinists, seeing this, allowed that any individuals state of grace had been determined and was unchangeable. To question one's status, however, tantamount to blasphemy -- challenging G-d. One worked as hard as one could, however, do *demonstrate* one's status in this world as material possessions were seen to be a sign of grace along with success. Needless to say, Calvinism did not enjoy extreme popularity among the poor. In this sense, the notion of predestination exists irrespective of free will. It isn't that G-d has set people down and wound them up like little automatons to make preset choices, but that the outcome of the choices -- in fact the choices themselves -- are seen as are the knots and tangles of a string of yarn. I hope this helps and I welcome corrections to the Calvinist notion of grace described above as it has been a while since I studied it. -- "Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain!" Byron Howes UNC - Chapel Hill (decvax!mcnc!unc!bch)