Graham said:
Except that, if God knows the future, the future is determined going forward and has been determined from the very start.
Thus, by creating the universe the way it is, exactly the way he did, God has in fact done something to direct or influence the course of action of all future events.
In my opinion, that is quite an impressive knock-down argument. You deserve this clapping smilie thing
I'll reiterate anyway...
Because God(s) knows the future, does that somehow imply Fatalism (which is the Philosophical theory that all events are predetermined in advance for all time and human beings are powerless to change them)?
See
compatibilism:
Compatibilism, also known as "soft determinism" and most famously championed by Hume, is a theory which holds that free will and determinism are compatible. According to Hume, free will should not be understood as an absolute ability to have chosen differently under exactly the same inner and outer circumstances. Rather, it is a hypothetical ability to have chosen differently if one had been differently psychologically disposed by some different beliefs or desires. Alternately, Hume maintains that free acts are not uncaused (or mysteriously self-caused as Kant would have it) but caused in the right way, i.e., by our choices as determined by our our beliefs and desires, by our characters. While a decision making process exists in Hume's determinism, this process is governed by the so-called causal chain of events. For example, a person may make the decision to support Wikipedia, but that decision is determined by the conditions that existed prior to the decision being made.
To summarize:
Humans have "free will" (the ability to consciously make "choices" at their own accord). A person will only "choose" differently provided the inner and outer cirumstances are not identical (to test this theory, you'd probably need a time machine...).
By Compatibilism, a God(s) that sits in the sky and merely acts as an observer to the real world permit both human's "free will" and a God(s) which knows the future. To an extent (though not a reasonable extent as you'd need to twist quite a bit of crazy Philosophy) you
could say God(s) influencing of the environment allows Free Will, as long as he is not taking away a human's ability to freely make decisions at his own accord*.
Of course, the Philosophical conundrum is: If God(s) knows the future, does God(s) have "free will".
Note: Free Will (ability to make choices) does not imply Free Action (ability to perform anything; omnipotence), which is why rape does not nullify free will (Hobbes would disagree with me, but only on a basis of semantics).
* I'm sure if I put in a little effort, I could weasel out of the knock-down argument by either seeking refuge behind the definition of "free-will" and the semantics of "influencing future event". You'll notice in the example I provided, I quite conveniently neglect that God(s) would be taking away the "free-will" of the objects he manipulates (provided that they are capable possessing free-will), so if God manipulates a bunny to entertain a child for a few seconds (possibly so they wouldnt wander into the road to get squished by a car), that would be an example of God(s) removing "free-will". [EvenMoreSemantics]But of course, you could away with that by saying "humans have 'free-will', but God(s) can take it away at anytime... that doesnt make "free-will" nonexistant, nor does it make "free-will" and illusion (for clarification, I'm describing how "Free-Will" and "Devine-Will" can be compatible).[/EvenMoreSemantics]
