Does proof of God smack of coercion?

@pettytalk said
And perhaps he's not so omnipotent...he's not overriding FMF's will, but he should, since he's the only one who could. FMF is the chosen one? Black Sabbath's Paranoid.

Well, we thought that of Anakin Skywalker.

-Removed-

What about thinking you were in the Yakuza? Isn't that delusional?


Go on, flip the switch, make the connection. You can do it!

@ghost-of-a-duke said
I think, through scripture, we see clearly that God isn't above overriding human free will. The Pharaoh's heart being hardened is just one example of that.

Is it really "overriding" free will, when Pharoah would have hardened his own heart anyways? He made the decision he would always make, heart-hardening or no.

-Removed-

Why naysay me, when you don't even understand why you're doing it?

The point is far beyond your simple simon analysis.

@fmf said
Poetic references to the "heart", when we are actually talking about activity in our minds, only serves to obfuscate.

Do you realize how weak that is?

@fmf said
I'm just keeping it real about what the heart is. Assigning some of the brain's work to the heart, simply because poetic writers do so, does not disguise the fact that the differentiation between the emotional side of the brain and the rational side of the brain is a literary contrivance.

You're adamant about ignoring a well-known colloquialism.

@fmf said
But if you declare what I said to be "patently false" and then offer an analogy to explain, then surely that explanation is about what I said, right? I have never once claimed that "every single thing that passes in this forum is about" me.

No, it was about what *I* said, since you clearly needed elucidation.

And which point was actually IN the post you replied to.

@fmf said
What is this in reference to?

Your cogs are definitely slipping (a bit). You never used to be this slow.

@fmf said
Is God "the SoB" in this part of your analogy?

I would suggest to you to never offer any analogies (or thought exercises) ever again. It's clearly beyond your ken.

@fmf said
choice 3. Remain unrepentant and be annihilated (die).

My perception of death is that it is the absence of consciousness and therefore the absence of regret that life isn't still going on. Are you suggesting that, if I had knowledge of God, and I ended up being annihilated, I would continue to be conscious of a feeling of regret that I wasn't experiencing everlasting life?

How are you so unable to grasp simple concepts?

This is a weak strategy, akin to you quoting a word or two followed by a question mark, like you don't understand anything. Maybe a break from the stresses of an online forum is in the cards for you. (cue the "cards? what are you on about?" response) If you can't understand anything that is said, perhaps you should hang up this stressful hobby you can't understand anymore.

@ghost-of-a-duke said
I'm still struggling with the link between evidence and coercion. It sets evidence up as the enemy and ignorance of evidence as the hero.

Free will is not damaged by evidence, nor is it coerced. It is guided. - If a lighthouse truly wanted to save ships from the rocks, why wouldn't it put on its light?

No, no, no.

Your argument is logical, if one completely leaves out that we are talking about God here. And belief in that God.

Take everything God has made clear in the Bible. Now add in that the very existence of this omnipotent being has been proved, maybe he speaks to everyone on the planet. Who would dare oppose him, even to standing up and extending your middle finger and yelling at him (the omnipotent being, remember) that he can take his Bible and shove it and that you REFUSE to believe your own eyes and ears as to the proof of his existence, and the knowledge that you will die because of your choice to disbelieve. Since you have NO choice to NOT believe now, that you had before he showed up, because of the evidence directly before you, there is no room for free will. How can one DECIDE not to believe something that has been proven to your face? No free will. You are now in the position of being FORCED to believe in God. Force = Coercion.

Evidence is not the ten-dollar word here. That word is Belief. You are coerced to believe through the evidence of proof. Once proven, you have no choice (no free will) but to believe. Would you refuse to believe something that has been proven to you? Your free will to believe or not to believe something exists has been destroyed because you now KNOW it exists.