So to start off I will tell you guys a little about Mark's account of Jesus' encounter with the devil; Mark tells us that the last thing Satan tempts Jesus with is the ultimate temporal power, but Jesus declines. Why? To accept such from Satan would be denying mankind free will. Really, without free will everything we do will be the result of being chemically interlocked into a system of reactions - thus we return our train of thought to the notion concerning the chemicals reacting, not reasoning!! Christians must believe that there is a dualism of the mind and matter (are we really chemically interlocked into a universal system of chemical reactions?)! In fact, the matter of reality in itself which you percieve around yourself every day is really just the cotton wool that is pulled over your senses and reality is really just electrical signals interpreted by your cognitive faculties (it is kind of like going to the cinema in Glasgow to watch a fim filmed in London, you would become immersed in the audio and visuals of London hence you may feel as if "you're in London", but you yourself are actually in Glasgow and are being decieved - this probably isn't the best analogy one could use; your immaterial, ineffant concousness may actually be the same - you may reckon that you are at your desk reading this on the computer monitor directly in front of you, but the mind that actually is you may actually be elsewhere, perhaps in a seperate entity of reality altogether!). In order for one to acknowledge their own existence, they must be able to think (Rene Descartes once wrote "je pense donc je suis", literally meaning "I think therefore I am") and to be able to think presupposes a mind. A non-chemical, personal mind is truly what would make me I and you you (and no, the double instance of you is not a typo). If the mind were to be chemical then your thinking processes would be driven by impersonal forces, which means you can not trust your thinking (or reasoning). Put it this way: say there was a being that popped into existence not long after the birth of the universe. This being - however - was equipped with unlimited intellegence and memory, and knew about all of the scientific laws that governed the way in which the universe functions; by that token this being learned all the properties of every single particle in existence within reality. Ergo, this being can work out and therefore predict that you will be reading this article right now if you are not with free will. Another paradox that comes from being purely material is that atoms are constantly leaving and becoming part of your body as you eat, walk, run, wash, drive, study, talk, travel, play and work - but where do you draw the line? If a ship was to have its yellow sail replaced by a white sail then it would still remain a ship even though it is different now than it was yesterday; say the same ship was to have all its parts removed bar a chest of drawers and a house were to be constructed around the chest of drawers thus encapsulating it into a bedroom, would this still be known as a ship? How can someone who is without free will truly be the same person now as they were fifteen years ago? They're not, so an immaterial soul (if that is what you wish to ascribe free will to, it wouldn't be contradictory to Judeo-Christian philosophy if you did) would be the constant excluded from such a rule of physics. Believe it or not, modern science shows us that for so long as there is general relativity this will happen in some scale to some extent unless, of course, the object in question is immaterial.
Furthermore to the point, natural selection on its own accord breeds automata for survival, but I would like to think that people can be altruistic without the ulterior motive of surivival of the fittest.
However an issue that derives from being capable of free thought is that of morality. So, where does morality come from? Is morality the product of experience or is there, even if it is to a finite extent, a moral law giver or director? The existence of absolute moral codes presupposes that there must be some divine, transcendent moral authority to grant such. Let us suppose for a moment that moral relativity is the philosophically sound way to go. Well, if it is then we must declare that:
1) no action is truly better than another, for example stealing someone's car is no more wrong than leaving them alone or treating them to a meal at Pizza Hut (or some other restaurant)
2) morality will always be a matter of opinion, regardless!
...logically it doesn't seem very robust to me hence why I believe that our God (how can EVRYONE be obligated by something subordinate/equal to them?) is a director of morality hence why we feel guilt if we steal (there ARE exceptions, but have you ever noticed that even the thieves make their excuses? i.e. I steal food because if I didn't, I would starve!!!). Without absolute moral values society would perhaps render itself to anarchy (relative morality could work by coincidence, but who's to say that the chances to get it right are infinite?). Anyway, moral relativism is self-refuting. Why? The right reserved by one to hold such an opinion of this IS ABSOLUTE ergo we've reason to believe in absolute morality...
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