Yes it does. Not the "must" but the "might." That is, the fact that something can happen means that it might happen. That's exactly what it means. To say something can happen means it might happen. To say something might happen means it can happen.



The tenses here don't combine. Knowing what will happen means knowing what won't happen. For example, knowing Christ will be successful means knowing He is not at risk to fail. Or, to use a conditional form, knowing that Christ would succeed means knowing there was no risk of His failing.



If Jesus risked failing, that means there was a possibility that He would not succeed. If God was 100% certain that Christ would succeed, there was no possibility of His failing.



Yes they are. If God is 100% certain that something will happen, there is no risk that the thing He is certain will happen will not happen.

A comment from Einstein about the probabilistic nature of quantum mechanics:

Einstein's opinion of this was well known. I don't know any physicist who holds it today. Do you?

I should also ask, do you think that quantum mechanics is incorrect? (i.e., the nature of the motion of subatomic particles is not really based on probabilities, but only appears to be so because of a lack of knowledge in regards to physics).

I don't. But it is also well known that scientific consensus does not guarantee truth, as Copernicus, Galileo, and Kepler would attest.


I have not made a decision one way or the other. Einstein's assertion is that the psi function is not a complete description of an object's properties. How can one dispute that? It is not possible to say, "There is nothing I don't know." It is probably more a philosophical problem than a physical one.

In any case, from a physics standpoint, I don't believe quantum mechanical effects, particularly the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle, can be used to say that moral decisions are probabilistic in nature. The aggregate of the brain's subatomic parts function in a very orderly and predictable way. That's why Jesus said that we can be judged by our fruits.

Do you know of any physicists who invoke the HUP to explain psychology? Yes, economists and other fake scientists might, but I'm talking about real scientists. While we're at it, are there any reputable scientists who invoke the HUP to explain Chaos Theory? The most "macro" effect of the HUP that I can think of is in the activity of electrons in electronic devices such as diodes and gates. Even so, we all know that computers are very deterministic in their function; any uncertainty, as that caused by the infamous Pentium bug, is unacceptable.

Theologically speaking, the fact that there is a judgment tells us that our choices and actions are not a matter of chance. If our choices were merely the product of probabilistic phenomena, the concept of culpability would be meaningless. We can always say, "That's not my fault; my brain just happened to choose to sin this time because a few electrons jumped unexpectedly."

This question I'm interested in has to do with the nature of the Universe. Did God create spontaneous, random things? (which are such by nature, meaning even for Him) Or is everything in reality deterministic, and these things just appear spontaneous and random to us because of our ignorance. Personally I find the fact that God, being infinite in intelligence, can create things which are spontaneous and random even for Himself to be cool beyond words.

Did God create spontaneous, random things? Possibly. But one thing is clear to physicists: When you put a bunch of these spontaneous, random objects together and consider the aggregate, their behavior is extremely predictable. It is this incredible level of predictability that gives quantum mechanics the honor of being one of the most successful theories to date. (In the case of scientific theories, success means being able to accurately predict future events. Unreliable and inaccurate predictions are useless, except in the realm of fake "science" like astrology.)

In any case, what is cool to us does not impact what is cool to God. There was a time I thought it was cool to have multiple girlfriends simultaneously. That wasn't good. Then I improved to having multiple girlfriends serially. But that still wasn't good. It wasn't until later that I learned about the "one woman man" plan that God has in mind. What's cool to us may be an abomination to God.

Certainly, the aggregate behavior would have to be predicable, or you couldn't have predictable chemical reactions and so forth. But if God created things to be spontaneous, including inanimate things, that ties in nicely to the idea that God is a lover of freedom, and of spontaneity, both of which I think are true.



We're talking about spontaneity and freedom here. If God created things deterministically, that says something about His character.

Do you believe chemical reactions are deterministic?

I'd say the probabilistic element would enter into things more in regards to whether or not the chemical reaction occurred, as to how it would act, but since you bring up the question (I hadn't thought about it before) it seems likely to me that there must be reactions which behave in different ways depending upon various factors, so it seems likely to me that there are probabilistic elements involved here as well.

The probabilistic effects seen in quantum mechanics involve identical conditions that result in different outcomes. (Einstein used that as one definition of insanity, which is not surprising consider what he thought of QM's statistical nature.) If reactions behave differently under different conditions/factors, that doesn't count as probabilistic.

There is a probabilistic or statistical element to chemical reactions. For one, we don't know how each atom collides with other atoms. This is impacted not only by the number of atoms involved and the temperature, but also by the orientation of the atoms relative to each other. Our lack of knowledge makes it a statistical matter of how fast and how far the reaction will go.

Furthermore, underneath that are the quantum mechanical interactions between the electrons of each atom. These are genuinely impacted by the HUP - we're not quite sure exactly where the electrons are or where they're going or how fast they're moving to get there. This makes it impossible, as far as current physicist believe, to know how any individual interaction will unfold.

However, when considering the reaction as a whole, with reactants measured in moles, it is very predictable. We can say with great certainty what will happen. Of course, while there is a non-zero probability that something totally weird would happen, just like there is a non-zero probability that the sun would suddenly disappear and reappear 1000 light years away, it is very unlikely.

Does that make sense?