RE: Christians, what is your VERY BEST arguments for the existence of God?
January 27, 2010 at 8:12 pm
(January 27, 2010 at 7:57 pm)Zhalentine Wrote:Hmmm, it seems my definition of straw man was inaccurate, which si what led to the current misunderstanding. Okay! I take it back, it is not a 'straw-man'. I still say it is a feeble counter-point. Why?Quote:You would be coorect, haha! When one really thinks about this, to say that something is 'mere coincidence' is a rather feeble counter-point, and a strawman at that.
"A straw man argument is an informal fallacy based on misrepresentation of an opponent's position.[1] To "attack a straw man" is to create the illusion of having refuted a proposition by substituting a superficially similar proposition (the "straw man"), and refuting it, without ever having actually refuted the original position." - Wikipedia
I did not misrepresent your position and then refute that misrepresentation, thus I did not create a straw man.
Quote:A rather feeble counter-point? That is up to opinion. Frankly, I think that saying God influenced your friend is a rather feeble and naive explanation for what happened. Forget about how the brain and body works making you react to every situation you are in, God did it.Every action has an equal and opposite reaction. Therefore, nothing can occur by 'mere coincidence', because there had to be an original action which caused it. To brush something off as coincidence is feeble because that would deny there was an original action which caused the reaction. A clear contradiction is plain.
Furthermore, the body and mind work in very complex ways, I do not deny that. But my friend's body did not cause each of the events within this scenario, nor did his mind, other than the decisions he made and the path he took that night. If you can provide me with a more likely and logical idea of how his body or his mind conspired to cause the events that night, I will gladly listen. But the most likely cause, in my eyes, of the reactions that night which occured is that the universe/God was conspiring to help my friend.
Quote:Quote:Have you ever formed a strong emotional connection with someone in your life? Most people have. Has tehre ever come a time when, despite your own plans, that person asked you to make a decision between your plan, option A, and their plan, option B? Now let's propose that normally you wouldn't go with option B, but that you were so emotionally connected to the person offering it to you, you were instantly able to decipher it's preprecussions and purpose in relation to you, and went with option B.
You did not go with option B because the person offering it to you took away your free will, but because you understood perfectly why option B was there and in what ways it could benefit you. God presents us with the options, and the capability to nderstand those options, but if we choose to deny that, it muddles the reasoning and ultimately decisions become unclear and hard. He doesn't take away the will of the person, just gives them the answers and the tools with which to find them.
The person did not take away my free will. With your hypothetical situation, you said that I chose to go with option B; therefore, I made a decision based off of free will. To take away free will would require an external force (god) to make me choose a path. The person in your hypothetical is not making me go with them.
Nor is God within the hypothetical situation. In the scenario, you are able to see your friend's position clearly and understand it completely because you are emotionally connected to them, and can read between the lines of what they are saying. You still have the option to go with option A if you wish, but option B has been made clearer because you understand the person offering it to you, and by extension, you understand their proposition.
Quote:Perhaps you'll counter and say, "well god didn't make my friend choose those options."
Free will is defined as "the power of making free choices unconstrained by external agencies" (link) Whether your god made an option look more appealing or forced you to do something, that violates the free will he has given you because the choice is no longer unconstrained.
God did not make it 'look more appealing' or 'force' anyone to make the decision. But if you accept God as a friend who is offering you a choice, and understand the choices He lays before you, then you have greater capacity to make the choice in an informed and understanding way.