Strange Results from Heaven War

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Everybody Wang Chung
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Re: Strange Results from Heaven War

Post by Everybody Wang Chung »

Marcus wrote:
Tue Jul 22, 2025 5:30 am
Everybody Wang Chung wrote:
Mon Jul 21, 2025 3:26 am
Image
I think I saw that in L.A.Story! : D
How could Joseph have known? He truly is the world's best guesser.
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sock puppet
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Re: Strange Results from Heaven War

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Everybody Wang Chung wrote:
Tue Jul 22, 2025 5:56 pm
Marcus wrote:
Tue Jul 22, 2025 5:30 am
I think I saw that in L.A.Story! : D
How could Joseph have known? He truly is the world's best guesser.
Well, as depicted, it was the little head in the end of the wiener that drove him.
"There will come a time when the rich own all the media, and it will be impossible for the public to make an informed opinion." Albert Einstein, ~1949 "It is difficult to free fools from the chains they revere." Voltaire
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IWMP
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Re: Strange Results from Heaven War

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I Have Questions wrote:
Tue Jul 22, 2025 1:52 pm
Marcus wrote:
Tue Jul 22, 2025 1:46 pm
I don't think it's a matter of assuming everything negative is what god might want or plan, it's that there is no logical reason to assume positive things are what god wants or plans without making the same assumption about the negative things.
That’s the problem. If you believe God can physically intervene in this life, then you have to explain why God chooses not to intervene to prevent child abuse. If you don’t believe God can physically intervene in this life, then you have to accept good things happening are down to luck, chance, coincidence, or human ingenuity, and are nothing to do with anyone abstaining from eating food and making a supplication to God. It’s one or the other.
I don't believe God intervenes at all. You can't give people free will or choice and then takeaway the bad choices they might make. We don't see the bigger picture. I have experienced abuse. I wouldn't expect God to take it away to make me feel better. If that didn't exist we would think why does God allow something else to happen and we would perceive other things to be the worst thing that can happen because of our relative experience. What if there were far worse things that could have happened that God prevented that we just can't visualise because it has never existed in our experience?
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sock puppet
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Re: Strange Results from Heaven War

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IWMP wrote:
Tue Jul 22, 2025 8:54 pm
I Have Questions wrote:
Tue Jul 22, 2025 1:52 pm
That’s the problem. If you believe God can physically intervene in this life, then you have to explain why God chooses not to intervene to prevent child abuse. If you don’t believe God can physically intervene in this life, then you have to accept good things happening are down to luck, chance, coincidence, or human ingenuity, and are nothing to do with anyone abstaining from eating food and making a supplication to God. It’s one or the other.
I don't believe God intervenes at all. You can't give people free will or choice and then takeaway the bad choices they might make. We don't see the bigger picture. I have experienced abuse. I wouldn't expect God to take it away to make me feel better. If that didn't exist we would think why does God allow something else to happen and we would perceive other things to be the worst thing that can happen because of our relative experience. What if there were far worse things that could have happened that God prevented that we just can't visualise because it has never existed in our experience?
But God did intervene to help Sister Jones find her car keys so she could drive Jordan to her orthodontist appointment. D&C 59:21--confess God's hand in all things.
"There will come a time when the rich own all the media, and it will be impossible for the public to make an informed opinion." Albert Einstein, ~1949 "It is difficult to free fools from the chains they revere." Voltaire
MG 2.0
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Re: Strange Results from Heaven War

Post by MG 2.0 »

IWMP wrote:
Tue Jul 22, 2025 8:54 pm
I Have Questions wrote:
Tue Jul 22, 2025 1:52 pm
That’s the problem. If you believe God can physically intervene in this life, then you have to explain why God chooses not to intervene to prevent child abuse. If you don’t believe God can physically intervene in this life, then you have to accept good things happening are down to luck, chance, coincidence, or human ingenuity, and are nothing to do with anyone abstaining from eating food and making a supplication to God. It’s one or the other.
I don't believe God intervenes at all. You can't give people free will or choice and then takeaway the bad choices they might make. We don't see the bigger picture. I have experienced abuse. I wouldn't expect God to take it away to make me feel better. If that didn't exist we would think why does God allow something else to happen and we would perceive other things to be the worst thing that can happen because of our relative experience. What if there were far worse things that could have happened that God prevented that we just can't visualise because it has never existed in our experience?
You make another good point, IWMP. It all comes back to this concept of agency reigning supreme. If agency is the prime mover for what humans do within the constraints of their ability to do so we might expect that the result in many cases is going to result in an opposing force. Opposition in all things. Whether or not God steps in at times and when is an interesting question that I don't think we really can answer. One thing we might hypothesize though is that we act and we are acted upon. And we can test that in action as we simply observe the world and how it works.

If God were to 'act' every time one of His children were either acting or acted upon, we would recognize His hand in the world in no time flat.

One might then ask the question as to whether or not this would fit within a plan which requires testing and faith. I know, there are critics and others that would question the whole idea of life on earth being a testing ground which requires faith. If you go that route then you might ask the question, even in good faith, why does God not step in we get in a pinch. Why isn't the earth a Utopia? And if it's not, what's up with God, right?

Regards,
MG
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Everybody Wang Chung
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Re: Strange Results from Heaven War

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sock puppet wrote:
Tue Jul 22, 2025 6:06 pm
Everybody Wang Chung wrote:
Tue Jul 22, 2025 5:56 pm
How could Joseph have known? He truly is the world's best guesser.
Well, as depicted, it was the little head in the end of the wiener that drove him.
There's no way a simple, uneducated farm boy could have come up with that symbolism on his own. Either that, or Joseph was the world's greatest guesser.
"I'm on paid sabbatical from BYU in exchange for my promise to use this time to finish two books."

Daniel C. Peterson, 2014
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Re: Strange Results from Heaven War

Post by I Have Questions »

IWMP wrote:
Tue Jul 22, 2025 8:54 pm
I Have Questions wrote:
Tue Jul 22, 2025 1:52 pm
That’s the problem. If you believe God can physically intervene in this life, then you have to explain why God chooses not to intervene to prevent child abuse. If you don’t believe God can physically intervene in this life, then you have to accept good things happening are down to luck, chance, coincidence, or human ingenuity, and are nothing to do with anyone abstaining from eating food and making a supplication to God. It’s one or the other.
I don't believe God intervenes at all. You can't give people free will or choice and then takeaway the bad choices they might make. We don't see the bigger picture. I have experienced abuse. I wouldn't expect God to take it away to make me feel better. If that didn't exist we would think why does God allow something else to happen and we would perceive other things to be the worst thing that can happen because of our relative experience. What if there were far worse things that could have happened that God prevented that we just can't visualise because it has never existed in our experience?
I’ve concluded the same as you, God doesn’t intervene at all. No matter the prayers, no matter the abstaining of some food, what people see as a positive intervention from God, is just luck, chance, coincidence, or human ingenuity.
Premise 1. Eyewitness testimony is notoriously unreliable.
Premise 2. The best evidence for the Book of Mormon is eyewitness testimony.
Conclusion. Therefore, the best evidence for the Book of Mormon is notoriously unreliable.
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Re: Strange Results from Heaven War

Post by MG 2.0 »

I Have Questions wrote:
Tue Jul 22, 2025 10:54 pm
IWMP wrote:
Tue Jul 22, 2025 8:54 pm
I don't believe God intervenes at all. You can't give people free will or choice and then takeaway the bad choices they might make. We don't see the bigger picture. I have experienced abuse. I wouldn't expect God to take it away to make me feel better. If that didn't exist we would think why does God allow something else to happen and we would perceive other things to be the worst thing that can happen because of our relative experience. What if there were far worse things that could have happened that God prevented that we just can't visualise because it has never existed in our experience?
I’ve concluded the same as you, God doesn’t intervene at all. No matter the prayers, no matter the abstaining of some food, what people see as a positive intervention from God, is just luck, chance, coincidence, or human ingenuity.
Agency is a bit*h, isn't it?

Regards,
MG
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Re: Strange Results from Heaven War

Post by I Have Questions »

sock puppet wrote:
Tue Jul 22, 2025 9:14 pm
IWMP wrote:
Tue Jul 22, 2025 8:54 pm
I don't believe God intervenes at all. You can't give people free will or choice and then takeaway the bad choices they might make. We don't see the bigger picture. I have experienced abuse. I wouldn't expect God to take it away to make me feel better. If that didn't exist we would think why does God allow something else to happen and we would perceive other things to be the worst thing that can happen because of our relative experience. What if there were far worse things that could have happened that God prevented that we just can't visualise because it has never existed in our experience?
But God did intervene to help Sister Jones find her car keys so she could drive Jordan to her orthodontist appointment. D&C 59:21--confess God's hand in all things.
I attended a fast and testimony meeting where a member, as part of their testimony, related an experience that proved to her that God existed and that the Church was true. She was stood in a passport line waiting her turn to go through passport control. She was there with her family going on holiday. She became exceptionally worried that she wouldn’t be allowed through, and would be carted off and arrested. So she prayed for divine intervention to get her through passport control. She got through passport control no problem. She had a valid passport, no criminal history, was carrying no contraband etc. She, like hundreds of others with valid passports but who didn’t pray to be allowed through passport control, got through passport control. But that was her confirmation that God exists and the Church was true.

Imagine asking that member to explain why God intervened to help her through passport control, but didn’t intervene in <insert child abuse situation in which God didn’t intervene>. What would they say? I think secretly they would think they were special, which is why they were picked out for special help.
Premise 1. Eyewitness testimony is notoriously unreliable.
Premise 2. The best evidence for the Book of Mormon is eyewitness testimony.
Conclusion. Therefore, the best evidence for the Book of Mormon is notoriously unreliable.
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Re: Strange Results from Heaven War

Post by Moksha »

Everybody Wang Chung wrote:
Tue Jul 22, 2025 10:05 pm
sock puppet wrote:
Tue Jul 22, 2025 6:06 pm
Well, as depicted, it was the little head in the end of the wiener that drove him.
There's no way a simple, uneducated farm boy could have come up with that symbolism on his own. Either that, or Joseph was the world's greatest guesser.
D&C 62:7
 7 I, the Lord, am willing, if any among you desire to ride upon tapirs, or alpacas, or in chariots, he shall receive this blessing, if he receives it from the hand of the Lord, with a thankful heart in all things.
Cry Heaven and let loose the Penguins of Peace
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