Theists: How can predetermined fate and free will coexist?

[robvalue]

Well yes, exactly. If all my contributions are merely scripted events, I'm a self-aware domino. "I" haven't had a single original thought or had any input at all outside of the story chosen for me. It's just use of language to suggest more is going on than it really is. For all we know, dominos are self-aware and "feel" they are making decisions too.

What I don't get is why. You've tried extremely hard to make something sound like a choice when, to me, you've admitted it really isn't, when you can simply say we do have a choice. There's no requirement or expectation for God to know an indeterminate future, because it's logically impossible. So it appears, to me, you're making things extremely hard for yourself and with no payoff.

I appreciate you can't change what you believe, of course. The end result from this is also an unbelievably sadistic God, from my point of view, with absolutely no excuse for the suffering it manufactured to the letter. There is no "means to an end" when you are all-powerful. Trying to explain why this thing would ever do anything at all is difficult in itself. What motivation could it possibly have? It already knows everything it will "learn" from a story it already wrote. At least giving us a real choice would have been something to watch; and would have given it some degree of excuse to hide behind for suffering that occurs.

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PS: Regardless of "God", it's my estimation that I am indeed probably a self-aware domino. That's just how it is. Weird that a domino would come to that conclusion about itself. Haha!