I'm sorry but which god are you talking about here? Which religion's?

The right one.

The right one.

Do you want what I honestly think? Or do you want the religious answer?

Well, since everybody has already said the religious answer (free will), I'll give you mine.

It's very likely that god, well, doesn't exist. Or at the very least, not in any way that would be recognizable to us. The Universe is just too old and too vast for any sort of supreme being to give half a fuck about what the dominant species of some tiny planet in the middle of nowhere that has only even really been dominant for what? 3-4K years? That's less than the blink of an eye in the grand scheme of things.

And like I said, that's assuming a sentient overlord even exists. Which is very unlikely simply because...why would it? There's a lot we don't know about the universe, but that doesn't mean we should hold on to ancient stories about where we come from or why we're here.

"Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?" Epicurus

tag. Let me take out my bag of popcorn!!

If we were all pawns on Gods chessboard, why would we have free will?

I'd actually like to take a moment to talk about Pascal's Wager for a moment.

In case anyone doesn't know, Pascal's Wager is the idea that the punishment for not believing in god and being wrong, outweighs any benefit from not believing in god and being right. Which just means that you might as well believe in god, because what's the harm in it, especially since you're dammed forever if you don't and end up being wrong.

I have some serious issues with this.

First, there are so many different religions (roughly 20 major ones currently) and they have so many different rules that how are you supposed to know which ones to follow? And that's assuming that one of the current, major religions is right and it's not some other thing that nobody has thought of, or that the Mayans were right or something.

Secondly, I've never been religious, but I never thought that believing in god was something you could really...choose. Don't you just, believe or not? I can't make myself believe in bigfoot, because I don't think he exists. Why would god be any different?

If you are discussing God and religion, you will need a brush up on logic and how to use it;

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=pQjqxayxwt4

User was warned for this post

-Super_Boom

I'd like to add to that: Pascal's Wager seems to also assume a higher omniscient power would not be able to see through false pretenses.