Free will, miracles, and omnipotent god are mutually incompatible. Flaws in the argument?

I disagree.

Determinism and an atheistic, non-spiritual universe undermines the concept of free-will.

In fact, its only through a transcendental soul that exists outside of deterministic effects that you can truly have free will.

I would even argue that applying logic to he who created logic is not logical

I would even argue that God is permitted to have self-contradictory qualities... because, like I said, he created logic. There is no reason outside of God why it is not possible in our universe. Why should he be subject to his own creations?

It makes more sense that God first set the rules in motion, then in keeping with his ethics chooses to abide by them.

Self-contradiction occurs all the time on the Quantum level of existence... and atheists never seem to cite that as an example that undermines their own position against gods apparent contradictions. If an electron can exist here and there and nowhere simultaneously, what is the problem with an omnipotent God also being omniscient?

What Christians call miracles and fate, a quantum physicist would refer to as the random effects of quantum uncertainty. What Christians refer to as omniscience, a quantum physicist would refer to as quantum entanglement.

There is no way to reconcile the idea of an omniscient creator with free will in the created.

Your second answer tries to nonsense it's way out by pointing to a "transcendental soul", which is not only an unfounded assertion, but simply false in terms of the question. This "soul" would still not be transcendent to God's foreknowledge. Saying God is not subject to logic is the other non-answer people give. Since language usage *is* subject to logic, they would then be required to admit nothing else about their deity could be meaningfully said, and STFU. They never do.

As for miracles; if they exist, then 1) we have no way to say *everything* is not simply occasionalism, which leaves us with 2) no ability to predict anything, and 3) free will is still undermined.

The only thing is you should have used the word "omniscinet" rather than "omnipotent" at the end there.

Good. Good organization. (if I may say)

Yes, clearly free will and God being omniscient clash in our understanding of those things. It may be, though, God being God, that He instantly un-knows, re-learns, and at the same time now has always known, the new thing once we do it.

What I really suspect tho, from looking around the place, is that god is a shotgunner. He fills creatures with the desire to reproduce and figures out of the billions of orange trees or humans or yaks or whatever, some substantial percentage of them will do it successfully, but he doesn't care which individuals it is, esepcially, or on what night of the week.

So it may have been enough for him to open our tank, pour in some bio-gonna-be, close the tank, and know that life would then evolve. We may in fact be someone's aquarium. So in a sense you know what's going to happen in your aquarium, fish are gonna swim around, but you don't know, or care, which ones, exactly are gonna turn left or right at any particular time.

Why do you assume there is a god? the first mover argument does make sense to me because once you say no there had to be a first move your are saying the cause and effect notion is wrong. once you have done that there are two possibilities an infinite being making the first move and nothing making the first move (kind of bring you back were you started). I believe that us trying to figure out if god exist is equivalent to a dog trying to figure out what metaphysics is.. i just don't think we have the mental capability to even imagine what really is happening

The flaw is in imagining God in human terms, as if He is a human being. People in our culture tend to view God as the most powerful person imaginable, a king with the greatest powers we can imagine. So they come to all kinds of illogical questions and conclusions about God and about the relationship between God and man.

But the fact is that God by definition cannot be such a being. God is not on the same level as His creation--that is to say, God is not a creation at all. He is the source of all creation. He does not have the same relationship to His creation as a human "creator" has to human "creation". A human is on the same level with his creation. Humans don't actually create; we can only re-create. We don't create out of nothing. But God creates out of nothing. He Himself is uncreated, unmanifest, Absolute, Infinite, Pure Being. He does not exist in the way we do; He is the GROUND of existence.

So then, what is the relationship between God and man? Essentially, man is God with limits. Man is infiniteness that takes on finiteness in order to have a human experience. So man and God are not really separate, or rather, their separateness is a transcendental choice and not a incontrovertible fact. Man is to God as an ocean wave is to the ocean.

As for the question of free will: God is pure free will. Man, insofar as he is finite, is ruled by fate. He is free insofar as he accesses the infinity out of which he has his being.

Flaws, no. Mystery, yes. The Creator of the universe would not be very impressive if average man/woman could figure all this out. That is where faith comes in. By the way, scientist still have a way to go to explain all of creation. Who knows what they will find in years/centuries to come.

I'm atheist, but I'm capable of seeing other arguments. The Deist Founders of America, particularly Thomas Paine, argued that God stayed out of the affairs of men precisely because he gave them free will. He expected men to use His gift properly, but if they did not, it was in the afterlife that they would know it.

Miracles--No comment.

i am quite confused with your question i was rereading it but my head hurts. this is my understanding of the free will that God gave us.. He gave us the power of choice. it is our own free will to decide what to do.. God knows what the outcome of EITHER choices. a line from my fave song:

But even He can't do a thing

If He sees the heart's not willing

And so we ask what's going on

We want what's right and still do wrong

as for miracles... they happen coz we ASKED for it. ask and you shall receive.....

so there is NO flaw. i dont know with you.

...yes...

...life is for living...using free will, miracles or luck...doesn't matter which...

...god is a creation of man...

...that said all is good to go...

free will is an illusion if our understanding of cause and effect is real.