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Slimebeast on 12 May 2012
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IIIIITHE1IIIII said:
Slimebeast said:

Why doesn't it make sense?

Let's pretend God is truly almighty and knows who will end up in Hell and who will end up in Heaven (and who will be immediately destroyed after Judgement day) and thus ultimately it means no human has true free will. So humans have no free will but religion teaches us to act as we have free will. A dilemma, right?

But how is that different from a naturalist atheist point of view? There's not a single proof that humans have free will and yet we all act as like we have free will. Every person makes thousands of moral decisions in his life as if he has free will and there is always somebody (including yourself) who will hold you responsible for your actions if you made a bad choice in a given situation. Exactly the same dilemma. Don't pretend that atheists are any smarter regarding this dilemma.

The bottom line is that it's not religion that doesn't make sense, it's the fact that we don't have free will that doesn't make sense.


You are absolutely right; it is the same dilemma. Naturalist-atheists don't mind if there is no free will though, while religious people would have to question their entire faith. If there is a free will though, then they'd have to question if God truly is almighty or not, which is another dilemma.

Bottom line: In both scerario's the Abrahamic religions makes no sense, as they claim that God is almighty and gave humans free will.

If there's something that I'm missing, feel free to fill me in.

Yes they do. No one acts is if there exists no free will.

If I said I hate a certain race or a certain sexual orientation I would have tons of intellectuals condemn me and try to make me feel bad and guilty. No one, absolutely no one, would say "I understand you, your opinion makes perfect sense for you, you couldn't have any other opinion than what you just expressed. I don't agree with you and I would like to change your opinion but if I can't change it you should feel harmony about the opinion you have, even if I happen to believe it is severely wrong. You are no worse person than me in any way, we are perfectly equal".

If I molested a child no one would explain to me that my action made perfect sense to me and that I have no reason to feel guilt and no reason to be punished.

You just don't feel indifferent to the moral choices (or lack of choices) of a person like Khadaffi and think "I don't condemn any of his actions, he did what he had to do, he couldn't have done anything in any other way". No one does. I have never ever met such a person no matter how non-reglious, scientific or naturalistic they claim to be. No one behaves as if there doesn't exist free will no matter what they claim to believe in theory.

A guy like Dawkins (who claims to be rooted in science and fact, and who probably would support the notion that there isn't proof of free will) constantly walks around and condemns religious people and makes them feel bad (don't try to convince me he only does it for maximum effect to change other people's behaviour, because he also makes a moral judgement).

Btw, Ambrahamic religions do not directly claim that humans have free will. They imply that people have free will, but that's for the reader to interpret. There are theologians and followers of Abrahamic religions who believe everything is pre-determined and known by God, but for some reason God put this show in motion and we as human individuals have to act through this theater of life until the end, no matter how meaningless it might appear.