"Рэймонд Смаллиан. Две философские сценки (англ.)" - читать интересную книгу автора

GOD: Well of course! What else could conceivably be bad about sinning?
MORTAL: All right, you know that, and now I know that. But all my life
I unfortunately have been under the influence of those moralists who hold
sinning to be bad in itself. Anyway, putting all these pieces together, it
occurs to me that the only reason you gave free will is because of your
belief that with free will, people will tend to hurt each other--and
themselves--less than without free will.
GOD: Bravo! That is by far the best reason you have yet given! I can
assure you that had I chosen to give free will, that would have been my very
reason for so choosing.
MORTAL: What! You mean to say you did not choose to give us free will?
GOD: My dear fellow, I could no more choose to give you free will than
I could choose to make an equilateral triangle equiangular. I could choose
to make or not to make an equilateral triangle in the first place, but
having chosen to make one, I would then have no choice but to make it
equiangular.
MORTAL: I thought you could do anything!
GOD: Only things which are logically possible. As St. Thomas said, "It
is a sin to regard the fact that God cannot do the impossible, as a
limitation on His powers." I agree, except that in place of his using the
word sin I would use the term error.
MORTAL: Anyhow, I am still puzzled by your implication that you did not
choose to give me free will.
GOD: Well, it is high time I inform you that the entire
discussion--from the very beginning--has been based on one monstrous
fallacy! We have been talking purely on a moral level--you originally
complained that I gave you free will, and raised the whole question as to
whether I should have. It never once occurred to you that I had absolutely
no choice in the matter.
MORTAL: I am still in the dark!
GOD: Absolutely! Because you are only able to look at it through the
eyes of a moralist. The more fundamental metaphysical aspects of the
question you never even considered.
MORTAL: I still do not see what you are driving at.
GOD: Before you requested me to remove your free will, shouldn't your
first question have been whether as a matter of fact you do have free will?
MORTAL: That I simply took for granted.
GOD: But why should you?
MORTAL: I don't know. Do I have free will?
GOD: Yes.
MORTAL: Then why did you say I shouldn't have taken it for granted?
GOD: Because you shouldn't. Just because something happens to be true,
it does not follow that it should be taken for granted.
MORTAL: Anyway, it is reassuring to know that my natural intuition
about having free will is correct. Sometimes I have been worried that
determinists are correct.
GOD: They are correct.
MORTAL: Wait a minute now, do I have free will or don't I?
GOD: I already told you you do. But that does not mean that determinism
is incorrect.