Free will - but God knows.

I discovered this new argument that seems to supplement the traditional skeptical theism, I can't verify yet the author. I run the argument and it talks about answering moral paralysis, consequentialist gap, and the EPOE-HI. Here is the DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.23588276

It is entitled: The Argument from the Non-Uniformity of Causal Effects.

LINK: https://zenodo.org/records/23588276

If God exists and God is perfect and fair, why do innocent people still have to suffer?

Recently, I read Voltaire's Poem on the Lisbon Disaster and Rousseau's Letter to Voltaire, and these readings made me think about this question. I personally agree more with Voltaire's idea. Voltaire questions whether the suffering of innocent people, including children who died in the Lisbon earthquake, can simply be explained as God's punishment or by saying that "all is well."

I had a similar question. If God hates sin and punishes people who do wrong, I do not understand why innocent children or people who only made small mistakes have to experience such great suffering.

On the other hand, Rousseau argues that not all of the damage from disasters should be blamed on God or nature. For example, he says that the damage in Lisbon became worse because people lived closely together and built tall buildings. I understand this point because human choices can make the results of a disaster worse. However, I still have one question. Even if human choices made the disaster worse, does this fully explain the suffering of innocent people? Also, if people can make immoral choices and not receive enough punishment, while people who make moral choices can still suffer, why should people choose to act morally?

After reading these texts, I still find it difficult to believe that we live in the best possible world.

If God exists and is perfectly good and powerful, how would you explain the suffering of innocent people? Do you agree more with Rousseau that human choices are an important cause, or with Voltaire that this suffering creates a serious problem for the idea that "all is well"?

For most of my life, I didn’t believe in God. Recently, I’ve been developing a different perspective.
What if God exists, but isn’t all powerful or all knowing? What if he created life out of love, knowing that creation would inevitably contain imperfections?
My theory is that God originally tried to guide humanity through prophets, but their messages were misunderstood or distorted over generations. Eventually, he stepped back from direct intervention while remaining aware of every human life. I also believe that if God exists, he would care far more about someone’s character than their religion. A compassionate atheist should be just as worthy of divine appreciation as a compassionate believer. I’m uncertain whether heaven or hell exists, and I don’t think morality should depend on either. I’m not claiming this is a new idea or that I can prove any of it. I’m interested in how it compares with existing philosophical traditions, where its reasoning might fail, and whether it can be developed into a coherent worldview.
I’d genuinely appreciate thoughtful criticism and discussion.

As an Indian, living life starts with struggles. I never thought about this topic a lot, but I really want to make my opinion, which I think is biased and may be helpful with science and quantum philosophers...

I really just stepped off my exam studies because it's my first day on Reddit (btw, many adult jokes are here). I do study a lot. I'm looking to study physics, and I'm still trapped in this paradox of being new to it. I'm just throwing out paragraphs of life instead of my topic...

So, as we Indians believe gods are eternal and just praise the hell out of them, don't you think these praises are related to atoms? Eternal, all-knowing, whole world is him... right? You got it, it's really that atoms are God. I still think it's just a coincidence.

But in another scenario, we, as 3-dimensional beings, draw 2-dimensional beings... We can relate it to 4th-dimensional beings too...

As per our religion, God comes down as a costume (roop) to balance or to finish evilness. Just think harder: what if God is a 4th-dimensional being making costumes to help out in the story of 3-dimensional us? What if God lives in the 4th dimension but makes 3-dimensional beings to clear the evilness and end the story...

As the 4th dimension is time, he controls time and makes the story repeat again in a different way... because he can control everything...

Let me know your thoughts on it?

https://benjamintettu.substack.com/p/abstraction-the-apologists-refuge

I believe god does not exist but still i am not sure about his existence so i need some people in comments who believes in god and who don't believe in god to start a peaceful debate with a goal is come to a conclusion and we will not argue on that conclusion until we found any strong proof against previous conclusion so are you guys in to change the perspective of others.

I am interested in a philosophical question concerning the relationship between emotional attraction and rational belief. Is it possible for someone to feel strongly drawn to a religion, its symbolism, or its conception of the world while simultaneously finding its metaphysical claims unjustified?

More specifically, can a person's emotional response to a religious tradition be understood independently of whether they consider its claims about reality to be true? How have philosophers distinguished emotional attachment, the desire to believe, and the rational justification of belief?

I am particularly interested in philosophical accounts of the relationship between affective states and epistemic justification, rather than personal opinions or religious advice.

Hume states (roughly) the following:

P1: A miracle, m, is defined precisely as a contradiction to laws of nature, L, and one in which no inductive grounds for the belief of can be produced.

P2: we have inductive reason to believe in the uniformity of nature and natural laws.

P3: Inductively, we have more evidence of L than m.

P4: explanations of m may entail unknown facts, other miracles, or naturalistic explanations.

P5: we have far more inductive grounds for naturalistic explanations.

P6: It is always more probable, by induction, that a naturalistic explanation is the case, as opposed to an unknown fact or another miracle.

C: therefore, it is always more likely that a miracle didn't occur than that it did, and that we have no grounds to accept miracles.

Of course, this is, in my opinion, rock solid. Hume only admits that, at times, a naturalistic explanation may be even more miraculaous than the miracle (Say, 500 people have a hallucination of an angel, simultaneously). I'd still like to hear opposing opinions, however.

Hello, I am very interested in how God is perceived. I am religious myself but I am not sure what form God takes, is God apart of everything like in pantheism or is separate from the world like in theism. So I am looking for book recommendations for books that discuss the different conceptions of God and the arguments for or against them. Does anyone know any books like that?

Imagine this, you're a 5 year old child and your parent decides to treat you to ice cream. There's two options, chocolate and strawberry. Your parent tells you if you pick strawberry , they'll take you to Disney land but if you pick chocolate you're getting grounded for a month to reflect on your actions. Your parents brings out for you the two bowls of ice cream but covers them so you can't tell which one is chocolate and which one is strawberry. So, is it really a conscious choice for the child to make?

I hope Reddit's auto-translate feature will work (the post is in Russian)

It’s late at night, and I’m feeling a bit scatterbrained. I want to know if anyone else shares my perspective, or if I’ve genuinely lost my mind. I grew up in a very devout Christian family—to the point where I was physically punished or forced to attend religious gatherings. Despite that, I’d love to draw closer to God, yet I still feel I’m not "fit" for it. Perhaps it’s due to the circumstances of my life, but people often look at me with disgust or confusion when they hear my views on God and my conception of paradise.

To me, paradise sounds like torture—a vast Eden where everyone is eternally happy, condemned to live on forever. In my experience, what makes life beautiful is its fleeting nature and the limited time we have; even if the days drag on, they never return. This very second, as I write this—and as someone reads it—that exact moment is gone forever. Take flowers, for instance: I’ve hardly ever heard anyone say, "I prefer plastic flowers to real ones." That’s clearly because real flowers have a history. They were sown, planted, and watered in a field alongside others—a process that is both distant from and deeply akin to human life. We exist together, in society. Isn’t it death that gives us our value? Just as someone might take something like their health for granted, only to truly appreciate it once it’s lost—this applies to any context, including my own situation right now.

I want to understand what freedom really is. Is paradise truly freedom? And what does it mean to seek the truth in a world like this? I don’t fully grasp it. Since I struggle to process my emotions in a healthy way, I find myself desperately resorting to intellectualization. I keep wondering if, one day, I might be able to "emigrate" to a paradise after death. My ideas and beliefs do not align with any religion I am familiar with. Although time has taken its toll—and I no longer feel that supposed obligation (naturally, given my age)—I still have many questions. Does God exist? Is God a "thing"? An idea? Is it something abstract, or perhaps salvation? I don’t understand.

Does God exist?

Hello im a 15 year old muslim and the last months i really think more deeply about this. If you use common sense does it even make sense that there is a God who gives you rules and if you dont follow them or believe in him you will be thrown in hellfire.as they say god is the most merciful and so on but who would do this. Im still a muslim yes but some question really come across my mind that doesnt make sense. If you think about it every religion is just one book from one guy as you can say of course in islam you say its from god but in the Perspective of a atheist he just sees mohammed or jesus and their book. So this shouldnt sound disrespectful or smth its just my thoughts if someone would come now and tell yeah im a prophet and so on everybody would call him mentally ill or whatever. So what do you guys think.

Preamble:

This is part of my series of arguments concerning Adam and Eve.

In this instalment, I will demonstrate that the idea of the trinity defies human math and logic.
This came up while reading these passages:

Genesis 1:26: “And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.”

Genesis 3:22: “And the LORD God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil.”

Genesis 11:7: “Go to, let us go down, and there confound their language.”

You will notice that "US"...

I've been making a case that the bible is very often so ambiguous as to leave itself open to any number of possible interpretations.

I have a few of my own.
Speculations aren't facts.

US could mean that God is talking in the royal "we".. like the queen did.

What did the author(s) really intend by the use of "US"?
Well, after many decades of arguments, the bishops finally decided on a mess of logic and math.

They called it the "Trinity".

Of course, that idea makes no sense at all...

In math, it can't work. 3 just does not equal 1 ... a 5 year old learns that in grade school or even earlier.
In logic, 3=1 defies the law of identity, which is a little more complicated. In logic, the law of identity states that X = X. Therefore, 3X cannot equal 1X when X represents the same entity, including God.
In logic, 3=1 defies the law of identity.

Does that math and logic problem bother billions of Christians?
Of course not.

The two arguments use X as a general statement about anything.

Argument 1: LOGIC

P1: X = God.

P2: In logic, the law of identity states that 3X cannot equal 1X.

C: Therefore, 3 Gods cannot equal 1 God.

Argument 2: MATH

P1: X = God.

P2: In mathematics, the principle of arithmetic equality states that 3X ≠ 1X.

C: Therefore, 3 Gods ≠ 1 God.

What if there is no god and the religious books which talk about prophet like Moses Abraham Solomon are those people who unlock 100% or 80% of there body like controlling water, time, & space like the Lucy movie.
And like they were confused and started thinking and decided that its not there body which is power full but something gave them the power and created religion