Free will and our "eternal souls" free will to exist

[FactsNBiases]

This is something that I have been bouncing around in my head for a while. I apologize that this is going to be horribly presented, and odds are some philosopher or theologian has already covered this, but I feel this may be a point if not valid it may be worthy of a discussion.

If I was to grant Christianity, and freedom of will to accept its tenets in some dichotomy of the right path or damnation, I would like to put this out there.

Did I have a choice to be created at all? If my soul is autonomous and is capable of free will, did we "souls" have a say in even entering this cosmic game show to begin with?

If free will, in the broadly excepted Christian sense is true, it seems to start at the age of accountability (after the soul has entered the human form). The argument from many is that after "that age" one is responsible for their actions and are responsible for their belief or disbelief. While that fits with a naturalistic understanding of brain development, and the development of social norms and morality, what about the "eternal soul"?

In this I am willing to grant the theists position, and even a Christian position, for the sake of argument.
With that said, did I have a say in my souls creation?
Did our souls have a choice before being thrust into the womb and sent into the "fallen creation"?
Was there a "before life" state of our soul?
If so, did we have a choice to enlist or not enter this earthly realm?

It seems inescapable that at some point your God must of forced creation of a autonomous soul, without it's free will consent, and shoved it into a situation that one did not know what it was getting into.

Thoughts?

[Keep The Reason]

Welcome, Factsnbiases. Well presented, and good point. I personally do not recall being asked to be created. I would say I had no say in the matter (or, non-matter, if you prefer).

I find free will to be quite obviously inconsistent in the Christian worldview.

[FactsNBiases]

Well it's nice to see my post wasn't as incoherent as I thought. I agree with what you said. Have you heard of that objection before? I'm interested in hearing what the faithful say.

Like I said in my post, I'm granting the possibility of a soul and free will for the sake of discussion.
I have never heard anybody discuss the soul, again granting it even exists, prior to human life.

Interesting topic or no?

[mitchellmckain]

This is something that I have been bouncing around in my head for a while. I apologize that this is going to be horribly presented, and odds are some philosopher or theologian has already covered this, but I feel this may be a point if not valid it may be worthy of a discussion.

If I was to grant Christianity, and freedom of will to accept its tenets in some dichotomy of the right path or damnation, I would like to put this out there.

Did I have a choice to be created at all? If my soul is autonomous and is capable of free will, did we "souls" have a say in even entering this cosmic game show to begin with?

Nope. It is logically impossible for you to choose whether to exist or not. All that you can choose is what to do with your existence once you have it. You can embrace the challenges of life, goodness and free will or you can reject it and embrace evil and death instead seeking self-destruction including the destruction of your own freedom of will. That choice is not why you have free will but complete freedom of will has to include that choice. Thus in deciding to create life (and free will), God created the possibility of evil. So God repeatedly says to us, "I set before you life and death, therefore choose life". BUT you have to choose life, for the other choice will always be there also.

If free will, in the broadly excepted Christian sense is true, it seems to start at the age of accountability (after the soul has entered the human form). The argument from many is that after "that age" one is responsible for their actions and are responsible for their belief or disbelief. While that fits with a naturalistic understanding of brain development, and the development of social norms and morality, what about the "eternal soul"?

I do not subscribe to this superficial bandaid on the seriously flawed theology of legalism. There is no "age of accountability". Free will is ALWAYS a quantitative thing that can either grow or diminish just as awareness (upon which free will critically depends) can either grow or diminish. Whatever freedom of will that we have, whatever choices that we make, that is what defines who we are and for that alone are we responsible.

In this I am willing to grant the theists position, and even a Christian position, for the sake of argument.
With that said, did I have a say in my souls creation?

Your soul is your creation and your creation alone. It is the product of the choices you make. If you choose life, goodness, creation and free will then your soul will be free, creative, rich and alive, but if you choose death, evil, destruction and bad habits, then your soul will be enslaved, feeble, corrupt and dead.

Did our souls have a choice before being thrust into the womb and sent into the "fallen creation"?

I do not believe in a soul or spiritual existence which is given to us. What we are given is existence and life. Our soul or spirit comes from what we do with it.

Was there a "before life" state of our soul?

No I do not believe in pre-existence of any sort. 1 Cor 15:44-46 "It is sown a physical body, it is raised a spiritual body. Thus it is written Adam became a living being; the last Adam became a life giving spirit. But it is not the spiritual which is first but the physical, and then the spiritual."

It seems inescapable that at some point your God must of forced creation of a autonomous soul

Incorrect. God created the physical universe based on a system of rules that allowed the self-organizing process of life. But since self-organization is the essence of life, there is nothing imposed upon anything -- such imposition is in fact the opposite of what life is. Thus although God may protect, encourage and stimulate the development of life to greater acheivements, it is the nature of living things that they are the prinicple participant in their own creation. But the choices that living things make creates something everlasting in the form we call spritual. Choice is the very substance of the soul.

But the consent to exist? That is not a logical possibility, for in order to consent to anything you must already exist.

[FactsNBiases]

@mitchell

I wrote four paragraphs to your very first response but soon realized the problem.
So I started over..lol.

We cannot continue until we clarify the inception of my "soul". Prior to conception it is some sort of cosmic waiting room hoping the folks do the deed? Or maybe it is at birth where my "soul" animates a screaming baby?
Either scenario, if the soul is what makes me, I "soul" had no choice to participate. God just throws me in? Only choice is to accept the rules or forfeit?
If this was basketball it is play with fingers crossed and hope you got it right or play and loose the game? How about not to play at all?
Why would a god that cares so much about freedom of choice to love him or burn, not give the same choice at the souls creation?
Is it sound to accept that dichotomy instead of at least questioning the souls very exsistence and it's subsequent free will prior to human form?
Do I understand you correctly that I had no choice to exsist or to not exsist?
Btw. Granting you a lot even accepting for the sake of argument of a non physical soul.

[OzAnt]

Hi FactsNBiases,

As entertaining as it is to watch what happens to people who turn up here without their brain cells in tow, I'm nevertheless going to clarify some things for you.

First up. Mitch isn't the kind of religious type you think he is. This is important to remember. You have a preconception – that really sticks out a mile – of what a Christian is and isn't and you've put Mitch in that box that you call Christian. Cut that out. For your own good.

We cannot continue until we clarify the inception of my "soul". Prior to conception it is some sort of cosmic waiting room hoping the folks do the deed? Or maybe it is at birth where my "soul" animates a screaming baby?

It's non-existent. It doesn't exist. That's what Mitch means when he says

Your soul is your creation and your creation alone. It is the product of the choices you make. If you choose life, goodness, creation and free will then your soul will be free, creative, rich and alive, but if you choose death, evil, destruction and bad habits, then your soul will be enslaved, feeble, corrupt and dead.

and when he says

I do not believe in a soul or spiritual existence which is given to us. What we are given is existence and life. Our soul or spirit comes from what we do with it.

and why he clarifies even further

No I do not believe in pre-existence of any sort. 1 Cor 15:44-46 "It is sown a physical body, it is raised a spiritual body. Thus it is written Adam became a living being; the last Adam became a life giving spirit. But it is not the spiritual which is first but the physical, and then the spiritual."

So... no you – no soul (or spirit). Got it?

Do I understand you correctly that I had no choice to exsist or to not exsist?

Seriously?!? The first and last things he says to you are:

Nope. It is logically impossible for you to choose whether to exist or not.

(first sentence)

But the consent to exist? That is not a logical possibility, for in order to consent to anything you must already exist.

(last two sentences).

I really really really don't see how he could have been any clearer.

I wrote four paragraphs to your very first response but soon realized the problem.

That you were making too much sense (it's hard to imagine you making less sense)? That your typing in this forum was impeding your ability to tank Ragnaros? That it's a bad idea to sniff super glue while typing?

Ant

[mitchellmckain]

We cannot continue until we clarify the inception of my "soul". Prior to conception it is some sort of cosmic waiting room hoping the folks do the deed? Or maybe it is at birth where my "soul" animates a screaming baby?

There is no sharp dividing line because the spirit is a product of the living process which highly quantitative. To be sure the quantitative difference between a single cell and a primate is a big one and I believe that human life has more to do with being a meme organism (a mind) than a gene organism (a biological species) and that is also big quantitative difference. Furthermore the puppeteer conception of the spirit/soul as something that animates physical organisms just isn't scientifically supportable.

Either scenario, if the soul is what makes me, I "soul" had no choice to participate.

I repeat, the idea that one should have a choice to exist is logically nonsensical. To make a choice you must already exist. On the other hand, with every choice you define yourself and thus become more than you were. It is by your participation in life that you become what you are.

God just throws me in?

No He does not. There is no pre-existent you to throw. Life is a self-organizing phenomenon that can occur when the conditions are right. God most certainly created those conditions in the design of the physical universe. Thus to be sure God is responsible for the existence of life. But surely you know where zygotes come from, and of course it could not decide to exist (nonsensical), it could only decide to live, a decision that was surely heavily guided by instinct. And then after about 20 weeks the human brain is fully formed and sometime after that the conditions are ripe for the beginning of another sort of self-organization which we call the human mind. But again there is no "God throwing you into life." It is life organizing itself in the right conditions and making its own decisions. Now to be sure these decisions are not made in a vacuum -- far from it. And thus we are open to a great variety of influences. As a Christian I believe that God is a participant and thus is one of those influences.

Only choice is to accept the rules or forfeit?

That's right. The laws of nature (which I believe God created) are a condition for life to exist in the first place, thus it is impossible for them to be either optional or negotiable.

Or is it possible that you are talking about some other set of rules, such as that taught to you by some religion. In that case you are certainly free to choose whether you believe such rules are rational, reasonable, moral or believable.

If this was basketball it is play with fingers crossed and hope you got it right or play and loose the game? How about not to play at all?

Exactly. Thus God says, "I set before you life and death, therefore choose life."

Why would a god that cares so much about freedom of choice to love him or burn, not give the same choice at the souls creation?

It is the same choice. We are the creators of our own spirit/soul by the choices we make. It is we who decide who and what we are. But again the idea that we could choose wether to exist or not is an absurd logical impossibility. I do not believe in a mafia boss God who says love me or else with some big gun pointed at our head. Such a god has nothing but my contempt and his threats and promises are irrelevant to me. I shall be content with defiance in good conscience even if it means hopelessly pushing a boulder up a hill over and over again for all eternity.

Is it sound to accept that dichotomy instead of at least questioning the souls very exsistence and it's subsequent free will prior to human form?

It is sound to think questioning everything. My conclusion is that there is no soul/spirit prior to our physical existence.

Do I understand you correctly that I had no choice to exsist or to not exsist?

How can you make a choice unless you exist already. There is only the choice between life and death -- to embrace the challenges of life seeking what is right and good and true, learning all you can and becoming all that you can -- OR to make no effort at all and to die to yourself until you are a mindless biological automaton governed by nothing but animal instinct.

Granting you a lot even accepting for the sake of argument of a non physical soul.

Sure. Naturally there is no demonstrable proof of any kind.

[Rhino]

I seem to remember my foster father referring to the Chamber of Guf. In one of his sermons out the soul.

[VickiRW]

A lot of this depends on how you define free will. Have you read any Dennett on the subject? I generally think we don't have free will - at least as it is commonly understood - and Christianity does seem to have a confused view on the subject. The question of free will in heaven, for example, seems problematic to me as well.

The question of free will prior to existence is interesting. I don't see how any definition of free will could apply to something that doesn't exist materially. Ideas (as in beauty, justice, etc) don't exist materially and the question of whether or not they have free will doesn't make sense. When I say that a rock doesn't have a free will, I can be saying something about the reality of the nature of the rock.

[mitchellmckain]

I seem to remember my foster father referring to the Chamber of Guf. In one of his sermons out the soul.

Oh yes there is no doubt that there are people who do believe in the pre-existence of the soul. Those religions that believe in reincarnation are principle among those that do and the Mormons are a pseudo-Christian variety that believe in such a thing. That you can find an example of such believers in Jewish mysticism is also not very surprising.

It seems to be implied however unspoken of in all sorts of pro-life rhetoric, which certainly puts the Catholics firmly on the list as well many funamentalist Christians and evangelicals. Though they can simply say that the soul is created at the time of conception rather than inserted into the zygote in some way.

A lot of this depends on how you define free will. Have you read any Dennett on the subject? I generally think we don't have free will - at least as it is commonly understood - and Christianity does seem to have a confused view on the subject. The question of free will in heaven, for example, seems problematic to me as well.

Of course. Dennet is a compatabilist. Like John Polkinghorne, I am incompatabilist. Regardless there is no conflict with science because as far as science is concerned at least, physical determinism is dead. You can still believe in determinism just as you can believe in fairies but for that you have to look outside the scientific world view.

Yes there are a lot of unclear thinkers and confused people in Christianity and atheism as there are in any human grouping.

Yes, Emery likes to point out the contradictions in some popular claims Christian about heaven -- claims that I certainly don't agree with.

In any case, I will grant you that free will is certainly a philosophically difficult topic. But as usual I spurn all the easy (inconsistent) answers (of both sides).

The question of free will prior to existence is interesting. I don't see how any definition of free will could apply to something that doesn't exist materially. Ideas (as in beauty, justice, etc) don't exist materially and the question of whether or not they have free will doesn't make sense.

hmmm... I have encountered this kind of non-christian Platonism before. I certainly don't subscribe to it. Beauty is an abstract idea, but no matter how abstract it may be, it is still an mental construct that exists in physcal human minds. You are leaving an open door for Neo-Platonist (christian) arguments for the existence of non-physical reality for which I think there is no necessity. Like words in human language, mental constructs have a variety of functions beyond that of merely refering to objects.

I do believe in a non-physical reality. I just don't believe that there can be any objectively valid argument for its existence. But as far as the mind-body problem goes, I am largely a physicalist -- i.e. I believe the mind is no less physical than the body. I do believe that there is a spiritual mind as well physical mind, just as there is a spiritual body and with regards to the relationship between physical and the spiritual I am mostly an epiphenomenalist.

I don't see how any definition of free will could apply to something that doesn't exist materially. Ideas (as in beauty, justice, etc) don't exist materially and the question of whether or not they have free will doesn't make sense. When I say that a rock doesn't have a free will, I can be saying something about the reality of the nature of the rock.

As an aside there is a tangential agreement between us here, since I believe that the physical universe was created for the very purpose of making free will a possibility. Before there can be free will, there has to be something that exists and acts outside the direct control of God's will and that is why I think that God created this system mathematical laws we call the physical universe. That is why I don't believe that the angels can have authentic free will or that some war in heaven before the creation of the universe can be the origin of evil.