The free will argument demonstrates that christians don't understand free will.

[FifthElement]

Second, given a god that knows all things possible to know and able to do anything fully conceivable, could such a god create an ideal world. I don't know. No one knows so any argument that takes that premise as given is not sound.

Don't you guys tend to consider heaven to be an ideal world?

Touche

[Neo-Scholastic]

Don't you guys tend to consider heaven to be an ideal world?

Clever. Except you moved the goal post without addressing your unsupported premise that a god worthy of the name could fully conceive and create the fullness of reality free from suffering. You avoid defending that premise by suggesting that heaven is equally inconceivable. Such is not the case, since heaven is a subset of the total reality and even at that may not be entirely perfect according to your impossibly high standard for what constitutes perfection.

For that matter, what is it that you expect? I suppose God could have just created a giant flawless crystal sphere and stopped at that. Or maybe He could have given us over to all be Lotus Eaters, living in pleasure and doing nothing useful or growing as people.

[Little lunch]

Heaven is a subset of the total reality?
It's either 100% real or it's not.
That's how reality works.

If heaven isn't absolutely perfect then maybe hell ain't so bad.

Perfection is an impossibly high standard, only a god could achieve it.

My idea of heaven is living in pleasure and doing nothing useful. :-)

[fr0d0]

Lol, someone reading this thread might think I'm a Christian. xD

Poe!

[Zen Badger]

But the whole free will issue (in terms of doing good or evil) is completely meaningless.
Because the only thing that will get you into heaven is worshipping god.

And he doesn't give a fuck what you've done as long as you are prepared to kiss his arse for eternity.

So what does it matter if you've been good or bad?

[DarkHorse]

I've been given free will to believe that free will is a pile of crap.

[Silver]

I view free will as the consciousness to choose to either do something or not do it.

One can either have coffee in the morning or not have coffee in the morning. The choice to either drink coffee or not drink it is known as free will.

That is why free will is the bane of prophecy, because prophecy falsely claims to be a set event that cannot be changed. Free will indicates otherwise.

[Drich]

Here is a simple solution: We don't have the Greek born concept of free will. The bible tells us the opposite. We either are slaves to sin, or we serve God.

[Silver]

We either are slaves to sin, or we serve God.

False Dichotomy.

[Esquilax]

Clever. Except you moved the goal post without addressing your unsupported premise that a god worthy of the name could fully conceive and create the fullness of reality free from suffering.

How is that moving the goalposts? The traditional view of heaven is that it's a place that's free of suffering without sacrificing free will, which is a position that necessitates that we be able to do everything that we can on earth there, at the very least.

Besides, a god "worthy of the name" would be a god, which, as we can see from the bible, is a being capable of influencing human behavior and thought; the removal of human-made suffering should be trivial, given that according to your own holy book he has all the abilities to accomplish this.

You avoid defending that premise by suggesting that heaven is equally inconceivable.

That's not what I was saying. I was saying that within the bounds of your theology you already have an answer to your question, and that answer is yes, god can create a world free of suffering, because he already has.

Such is not the case, since heaven is a subset of the total reality and even at that may not be entirely perfect according to your impossibly high standard for what constitutes perfection.

Impossibly high standard? Perfection, by definition, would be devoid of negative aspects; suffering is a negative aspect, even god sees that since he uses it as a punishment, and therefore it's a fairly trivial claim that a perfect place would not have this particular negative aspect.

Hell, I don't get stabbed in the lungs in my house, and yet you're telling me that asking god to ensure the same in his own domain is an impossibly high standard?

For that matter, what is it that you expect? I suppose God could have just created a giant flawless crystal sphere and stopped at that. Or maybe He could have given us over to all be Lotus Eaters, living in pleasure and doing nothing useful or growing as people.

He could, with a thought, prevent the negative consequences of every action that would lead to suffering, without impacting the free will of the person attempting that action: guns jam when fired in anger, rapists become flaccid around their victims... they would still have the choice to perform those actions, just without the suffering. Free will doesn't guarantee success, after all.