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Friday, October 25, 2019

Dodging a bullet

Atheists make breezy claims about how God could make the world a better place by changing a variable here and there. During this interview, Jonny Somerville illustrates the hairbreadth difference one variable can make to the future:

My great-grandfather was a soldier. He fought in WWI in the Battle of Somme. One of the worst battles of our time. You know...like…if a bullet had gone slightly to the left or right I may not even be here–which is a sobering thought. 


Tweaking variables to improve the future has humanly incalculable consequences. Glib pronouncements to the contrary notwithstanding, we're in no position to judge what changes would be the world a better, worse, or both better and worse in different ways. 

2 comments:

  1. That's the premise of 11.22.63 by Stephen King.

    A man goes back in time and adverts the Kennedy assassination. When he comes back to the present America is unrecognizable. In a bad way.

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  2. Considering that finite man cannot know what all the effects will be of even the least of his actions (or lack thereof) today and in this life, let alone for eternity, nor make them work out as planned and for good, then it is preposterous to presume that man can pass judgment upon what God ordains and allows or disallows.

    For only God can and does know what all the effects will be of even the least of our actions (or lack thereof) today and in this life and for eternity, and makes them all work out as planned, for the good of His own, who love God and thus Good, to the glory of God.

    However irrational it is though for us to even doubt or question God, yet as with Job, we do so, to our shame.

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