The Implications of True Belief

This is not the first article ever written on the subject of free will. Whether in relation to God or Government, or both, it seems that most people have had concerns about whether they were truly free, and the implications of their answer to that question.

One early example is from the Greek Tragedies, from the phrase "deus ex-machina":

Understood in my context below:

To be most specific, I mean "God AS machine". Whatever form God takes, even human form, such as Roman Emperors. In another context, God as some form of puppeteer.

Let us assume that "God" can control us. If God is our controller, and also our judge, why should we face punishments for our behavior? Obviously, it raises the question that we must have some choices, or "free will" in our actions.

Supposed God was the CEO of McDonald's Company. He wants to know whether you are loyal to him. He doesn't tell you that he is God. Instead, he creates alternative French Fry Restaurants, such as Burger King.

God knows that he makes the best French fries. Everyone knows that McDonald's makes the best French Fries. The question is, why do you regularly buy your fries at Burger King when you could just as easily buy your french fries at McDonald's?

Obviously, you are angry at God.

So God gets a list of who has been buying French fries from Burger King. He wants to understand, why are these people angry at me. Maybe they're having some kind of problem.

Of course they would be having problems. McDonald's clearly has the best fench fries, so Burger King French fry customers are suffering from a poor diet. They could develop health problems by making poor dietary choices.

So, instead of sending you a December Holiday present, God sends the social worker to your house. Suddenly, you have to see a psychiatrist about "why do you make poor dietary choices". The government might spend all sorts of money on dieticians to improve your diet.

The guy across the street got a Power Ranger in December, but you got sent to a social worker. You're angry with God. Why didn't he give you a Power Ranger?

Yet, in fact, God spent more money on you than he did on the boy with the Power Ranger.

So, you might wonder, when you die, do you go to the Pearly Gates? Probably not, but you might make it to the Golden Arches.

All kidding aside, I was recently thinking about this idea in the modern day movement for defunding the police.

We do need to have our choices, but how exactly could we have a society with choices, yet without various forms of police, including social workers and dieticians?

If we all made perfect choices, and never violated the law, we would onlyu have McDonald's. There would be no Burger King.

In fact, before there was life on earth, it was basically a big rock revolving around the sun.

Perhaps the first "people" followed God perfectly. So, in a sense, they revolved around God. There was little difference between the living, and the non-living. The organic and the inorganic.

So perhaps life itself was an illusion.

When people realized that life was an illusion, God created new illusions, to keep them believing that it was better to be alive then dead, better to go to McDonald's than Burger King. Yet, in fact, God owned both restaurant chains.

How then do we make our choices? God created television and the internet to tell us which products were good and which products were bad. He created different kinds of personalities to purchase different kinds of products.

So pretty soon, by looking at people, you could tell who ate at Burger King and who ate at McDonald's.

Once people figured that trick out, God started to confuse them once again, by putting McDonald's looking customers at Burger King, and Burger King looking cutomers at McDonalds.

In the end, all we can ascertain, regarding our free will from God, is that God will always offer you better and worse choices, and if you start to feel bored, God will always create new games to keep your mind occupied.