Kland, let's establish a foundation first. If the Bible represents God fearing Jesus will fail then please post a plain, Thus saith the Lord. Citing King Saul's demise does not satisfy this quest.

Post 126911 goes into detail regarding a number of points you asked about. Please respond to that post.

Please confine your comments to what's actually said. This is a delicate subject, and I put effort into what I'm writing, trying to choose my words carefully. If you think what I'm writing is equivalent to something else which your asking about, please connect the dots to get from what I wrote to what your asking about.

I explained a few posts back that the foundational point has to do with the concept of risk, not simply some specific incident:



The *concept* of risk is what's foundational. Is God a God who takes risks?

Under your view, God takes no risk, regardless of the incident.

Regarding the use of "risk" and God's killing Saul, the point that kland was making was that in Scripture it says, "God killed Saul," even though He didn't. God is often presented as doing things which He permits. So this is a principle which explains how the direct language, taken apart from how it's used in Scripture, could be taken the wrong way can instead be understood correctly.

He was pointing this out as a way of not directly rejecting your idea that when Ellen White says that risk was involved, it really wasn't, and was inviting you to connect the dots in an analogous way to God's killing Saul.

Tom

Assuming God takes risks, and further assuming that taking a risk involves a real possibility for failing, would you say that we have evidence that God did fail once or more or not at all?

OK, it’s always used. What I meant by saying that I disagreed with it was that in Math there are some theoretical concepts which make no sense rigorously – for instance, raising something to the zeroth power. What I was pointing out is that the probability theory is the mathematical study of randomness, so speaking of probability for events which are certain rigorously makes no sense. But I don't remember what the importance was of discussing this at the time (I mean, this particular aspect of the discussion).


At the time I disagreed with your describing as a random event the drawing of a blue marble from a hat where there were two blue marbles. That either marble could be chosen is not in question – what is in question is the color of the drawn marble, which is not random. In the same way that if I do not live in the last generation, my probability of dying is 1. What randomness is there in this? None, of course.


Shame on Mark for resurrecting it! In fact you didn’t let me have the last word; it was just that at the time you were in the process of moving to another state, if I’m not mistaken. But I will let you have the last word this time.

The following is true for exponents: x^b / x^c = x^(b-c).

Consider x=2, b=4, c=3. 2^4/2^3 = 2^1 = 2, which is correct, since 16/8 is 2. Now consider x=2, b=3, c=3. Then 2^3/2^3 = 2^0 = 1. So that raising something to the zeroth power should be 1 makes sense.

Math is nothing if not rigorous. You could say there are concepts in Math which do not make sense intuitively, but I don't see how you could say there are principles which do not make sense rigorously, since if they didn't make sense rigorously, they wouldn't be a part of Mathematics.



This isn't what you were pointing out when you said this definition was sometimes used, but you disagreed with it. As I said, I looked at that post, and the previous posts, and there was nothing being said about randomness.



The general discussion had to do with foreknowledge, and my argument that:

1.Given that anything God is certain will happen will be certain to happen.
2.If God is certain something will happen, say X, then there is no risk that X will not happen.

You made some statements about probability which didn't make sense (I mean, that didn't make sense in terms of being incorrect), and that's how the discussion moved to those points.

God didn't take a risk that *He* would fail. The risk was that some creature He created might fail, and we have plenty of evidence that this happened.

The color of a drawn marble is neither random nor not random. The event of drawing a marble is what may be random. It is a random event if there is an equal probability of drawing either of the marbles.

You perform a random event, and then ask questions about it. For example, what is the probability that the marble drawn is blue? (P=1) Or, what is the probability that the object you picked is a rabbit? (P=0). What question you ask has no bearing on whether or not the event was random.



This has nothing to do with randomness. This is neither random nor not random. Randomness has to do with selection.

Here's the definition of "random," in the context of our discussion:

To me a number multiplied by itself zero times (which means it wasn’t multiplied by anything) is still itself. But it had to be defined to be 1 just to keep the formulas a^m.a^n = a^(m+n), a^m/a^n = a^(m-n), and (a^m)^n = a^(m.n). It’s something artificial, just like classifying an event which is certain to occur or not occur as having a probability of 1 or 0 (as if it was a random event).


Huh? This is precisely the argument I used in post #88407, where I said I disagreed with the concept.


That’s precisely the point I was trying to make. Probability has to do with randomness. If an event is a certainty, why speak of it in terms of probabilities? But you know that, in case you have just one marble in a hat, and the marble is blue, Math says that the probability of drawing a blue marble from that hat is 1 (or 100%), or that the probability of drawing a yellow marble from the hat is 0; in the same way, it’s mathematically correct to say that the probability of a human being dying is 1 (or 100%).
This discussion, however, was a silly one, for it has little - if any - relevance for the topic at hand.

This definition only makes sense for positive integers. But exponents can be any value.



This is sort of backwards. The formula is just a way of seeing that logically it has to be 1. The point your making about raising a number to the power of 0 could be made in regards to any number which is not a positive integer. Rather than being an "artificial" definition, it's the only definition which make sense mathematically. The example I gave was just one among many which could be given to illustrate this point.



This isn't artificial either. The definition of the probability of an event occurring is the number of favorable occurrences divided by the number of total occurrences (assuming random events). If none of the events are favorable, then the probability is 0; if all of them are it's 1. There's nothing artificial here; it's simply the definition of that the probability is. It's no more artificial if the probability is 0, 1, 1/2, or any other number between 0 and 1.



You wrote, "I simply disagree with your definition of probability." in post #88306. We weren't discussing random events in that post, or any posts near that one. It wasn't until #88407 that you brought up randomness.



Probability has to do with the chance that a given event will occur.



For the same reason you would speak of it in terms of probabilities if it were any other number between (inclusive) 0 and 1. It's the number of favorable events divided by the number of possible outcomes.



This isn't very precise.



It had relevance. For example, in the post where you disagreed with "my" definition of probability, you wrote:



This is very germane to our discussion.

My argument has been the following:

1.If God is certain an event will occur, say X, then X is certain to occur.
2.If X is certain to occur, then there is no risk that it will not occur.

So if God was certain that Christ would not sin, there is no chance that Christ would sin, and God undertook no risk whatsoever in sending Him.

This is so clear and straightforward, I don't see where the scope for argument is.