Jonathan H. B. Lobl

When the novelty wears off, it will be replaced by tedium. Be patient. It gets worse.

I suppose it had to happen. It is a philosophy class. "What is the good life?" This too shall pass.

As a matter of history, "Free Thought" has been an umbrella term for Agnostics and Atheists. I'm not trying to be the label police. I do think you're making confusion. Words do change their meaning over time. If you think this really expresses what you are about, then by all means. If your goal is to be understood, with a minimum of confusion -- I think this is a mistake. Just my opinion. Feel free to ignore it.

Remember the wisdom of Groucho Marx. "I would never join a country club, that would have me as a member."

It goes with my Agnostic outlook. Often, "I don't Know" is the best answer.

Usually, questions about Free Will are based on imponderable metaphysics. "Do I have free will? Or do I only have the illusion, of free will? Not everything is definable. Some things resist definition. For instance, "life". We can define the characteristics of life. Living things have reproduction, movement, digestion, elimination, etc. We can't actually define "life." We can still make a distinction between things that are alive, things that are dead, and things like rocks, that are neither living nor dead. I think this is what we are up against, when we talk about free will, we are up against similar problems. Your question number one, is the kind of thing that a philosopher would ask. Questions like -- "If a tree falls in the forest, does it make a sound?". It's the kind of thing that we can argue about forever and never answer. Since I don't even understand the distinctions you are making; I really don't want to answer. Question number two. Born with free will? What free will are we born with? What free will does a baby have? It can't even decide if it's going to wet itself. This is not free will. Really, we must watch out for those invisible assumptions. We make lots of silly assumptions about free will. Assumptions like "God given" free will. No. I don't think it's valid to speak of being born with free will. Question number three. Not choosing is a choice. At least, as a general principle. I'm sure that there are exceptions that I can't think of.

We are making this overly complicated. We have free will. There are stronger forces that counter free will. Free will can be overcome.

A traffic ticket can be survived. Resisting slavery can mean slow death by torture. Not all consequences are equal. Or endurable.

Slavery is not a choice. Unless we think that being beaten to death is an optional alternative. I despise hat kind of ideological purity. It's easy enough to have absolute standards, in the abstract. Not so easy, when the decision must be made by an actual enslaved person.

Demonstrating that free will can be defeated, by an outside force, is not the same as demonstrating that free will does not exist.

That depends. Sometimes, free will has a price. Like death. In theory, we have free will. If we can pay the price.

All true. Once the purerists take over a board -- the board usually goes into a death spiral. It's a sad thing, when Atheists act like Fundamentalists. Such is life.

The core value of the Jain religion is to be harmless. A serious Jain will walk carefully lest he kill an insect. The more extreme a Jain is, the more harmless he becomes. The question does indeed become -- what values is a person extreme about? That includes the importance of being "right". Of having to "win" arguments. IMO. I judge extremists by their actions. It's not such a rare thing for an Atheist to be rude or condescending. I never heard of an Atheist suicide bomber. I conclude from this that there is a huge difference between an Atheist extremist and a Muslim Jihadi. As you noted, not all extremes are the same.

A Muslim minority in Burma, is under attack by Buddhist mobs. We don't have to wonder. There are fanatical Jains. The more extreme a Jain gets in being harmless -- the less anyone else has to worry about. In this, the Jains are an exception. We should remember that Richard Nixon had a Quaker background. His upbringing seems to have failed.

I think it's an ongoing conversation. I have encountered Atheists who regard it as a debate. I should explain that. I had to drop out of several Atheist groups on Facebook. It's a pattern I discovered. Yet again, someone would ask a recurring question. If you had to choose a religion -- which one would you pick? I said Agnostic. I thought it was funny. These groups were sadly lacking in humor. They had a pile on. Rather than deal with their crap -- I left/ I don't enjoy stupid arguments with Atheists, any more than I enjoy stupid arguments with the pious. Extremists are just plain tedious.

There is also the distinction between knowledge and belief. I can talk about what I know and how I think I know it. I don't believe -- is a conversation killer.

I have been finding the Agnostic label, more useful than the Atheist label. By useful, I mean that it gets me into fewer stupid arguments. I enjoy friendly conversation. At this point, I don't enjoy arguing. Even less so, when there are no objective and verifiable facts.

In my understanding, "forgiveness" is a way of releasing anger. Releasing anger is good for the person who has been harmed. Releasing anger prevents additional harm. "absolution" is about releasing the person who did the harming, from his guilt. People pray for "absolution". "Forgiving" is about releasing and letting go of anger.

The procrastinators will put off doing the work, and will not be ready.

You seem to have missed the line that I was responding too. Here it is. professing to be a Christian and being a Christian are two different things. possibly the majority of this "Christian majority" are not Christians. When people tell me that they are Christian, I don't question it. As to your point -- when Christians and Muslims try to define me -- it irritates me, but I don't argue about it. At least, not the way I used to.

If we begin with a few basic assumptions -- God is the author of Scripture -- God wants Scripture to be understood -- that God, the All Knowing, knows in advance everybody who will ever be confused by Scripture -- it's disturbing. Unless we give up these assumptions. God can do anything. This is God's best work? God's perfect work? God's message to all, which must be clearly understood? No room for improvement? At minimum, God should have only put out one Book. Or prevented the other Books. Or enjoys all the arguing and mayhem and blood. If God were All Knowing, All Powerful and All Good.

I let people define themselves.

The assumption here is that the Bible has authority.

I take it as a given, that when people own slaves; they do themselves great harm in the process. It is not possible to harm others, without being harmed in the process.

When you're rowing against the current, drop anchor and wait. I'm not sure what that means in this context ...........