Theists: How can predetermined fate and free will coexist?

[robvalue]

Sure, you're taking about how you could actually know the future. But theists don't tend to go into much detail about that side of it. Generally it's magic, or some idea of being outside of our timeline. Magic is nonsense of course; being outside our timeline reduces our reality to a slideshow. The whole thing becomes a VHS tape, with clearly no real choices because there could never be any others. Saying there could have been different choices if the initial conditions were different is true but irrelevant (I'm not saying you're suggesting this). You might as well say the characters in a video are making choices because you could have watched a different but similar video. The characters feeling the illusion of choice doesn't make the choices real or "free". (Again, this isn't aimed at you.)

Indeed, running that point in the future over and over would indeed be the same as watching the vid over and over. However, in a reality where genuine choices are actually being made, you're only watching a replay of one possible choice. Sure, you're watching a decision being made, but not a "new" one. I find the idea of traveling in time incoherent anyway, especially when you're dealing with futures that can "change".

The point is that for precognition to be possible, for the knowledge to be obtainable somehow, there must be only one fixed future event which cannot change. If it's at all subject to change, then you're only seeing one possibility.

I don't know how I can explain this any more clearly to our theists. I guess I'll just have to give up now.