Quote:
Originally Posted by lagtight
Analogy:
A painter has the capacity to paint a picture from his pallet of, say, twenty colours. The painter doesn't have to use every color.
If light didn't exist, we would have no concept of darkness. Darkness is not an attribute of anything; it is the absense of an attribute of something.
If sound didn't exist, we would have no concept of silence. But that doesn't mean that silence "exists" as some entity.
You're really saying that labels like 'dark' and 'quiet' (and let's add 'cold') are NOT
characteristics?
If it's the middle of the night, far from civilization, somewhere in Siberia, you'd better not characterise this as dark, quiet, or cold.
This is silliness, or should I say the absence of being sensible.
Quote:
Originally Posted by lagtight
God made humans with the capacity to sin. Sin is the absense of holiness. God is holy. The fact that man can sin does not mean the God has the property of sin. God gave man free will, which man can use for sin or holiness.
The Morris quote is consistent with all that.
Just make sure you're consistent with this position, that sin (or sinful nature) is NOT a characteristic of human beings, in all future endeavours.
This is moot of course, since there are countless characteristics that describe humans (or anything you consider created) but not to the God you believe in.
e.g. bipedal / warm-blooded / fallable / mortal / social-species
or solid, or liquid, or gaseous, or monochrome, or hairy, or smooth, or aromatic, or venomous, or evergreen, or nocturnal...etc
Quote:
Originally Posted by lagtight
Right. The "First Cause" (so to speak) of the experiment was the smart guy. He created the dominos to achieve an effect. That's why (in this case) the cause is greater than the effect.
I thought you might catch on to my point, but seems like you didn't, so here it is:
Why is the cause of the falling fourth domino the experimenter, and not the third domino?
You said it was because the experimenter was the cause of the sequence of events. But to use a phrase you're familiar with,
according to your worldview the experimenter is not the cause, God is the cause, since God is the First Cause of ALL sequences of events.
Otherwise, you're arbitrarily picking one particular mid-point cause and proclaiming it to be the cause for the effects that follow, while rejecting other mid-point causes (the preceding dominoes) as being causes.