contradiction of omnipotency

[I, Brian]

Originally Posted by Marsh

For example, it is in his power to send an angel right now into my room to give me a wedgie. Fortunately enough for me, that's not the kind of guy he is.

Heh.

As for God making sense - quantum mechanics often works against common sense - yet science has no problem accepting this.

[Quahom1]

I'll go one further,


To be "ABSOLUTE", is to be finite. GOD never said he was absolute, we assumed...

If I recall correctly GOD said, "I am the Alpha and the Omega".

Big difference

[mirrorinthefog]

Well, most of what I wanted to say has already been covered ^.^ so I'll try to be brief in my reply. The question is a loaded one doubtless, much like asking someone if they've stopped torturing small puppies yet. Still, I'd agree that God, if there is a God, is beyond our concepts of what is absolute and what is 'logical', therefore operates in dimensions and on concepts we cannot begin to comprehend. He is above the concept of time and at the same time enclosed in it by the attributes we give Him/Her/It. So the answer to the question, to me, would be all of the above. Yes, no, maybe all and maybe none of these. Just because our concepts of something are contradictory doesn't make it contradictory. It just means we're limited by the world around us in what we are able to understand and the conditions under which we operate. So...ummm...that's it

[NewAgeNerd]

Excellent question, and props to lunamoth for a beautiful post. I do not think it is a contradiction. When G-d creates, he defines laws. G-d does not create individual things, He creates formulas and definitions. He does not work in the world of the physical but the spirtual. So it is possible for G-d to create a physical world with an unsolvable puzzle, unsolvable only by the definitions and laws of that reality. Take a look at the famed 15-14 puzzle. Even for G-d, if he forces himself to work within our three dimensional reality then this puzzle is unsolvable. However, he could create a reality where he could solve this puzzle.

So to summarize, G-d could create one reality with a puzzle even he could not solve, but then later create another where he could solve that same puzzle. Atleast, this is as I understand it.

[NewAgeNerd]

I was pondering my last post and thought that perhaps I should add some clarification. What follows is an addendum to the post above it.

G-d is a spirtual being, infinite in nature, and One who dwells on a spirtual plane. On the spirtual plane there are only pure concepts and nothing remotely resembling things like puzzles or bowling balls. To create a puzzle or a bowling ball, G-d creates first a reality in which these pure concepts can thus manifest. This reality will be defined with a full set of laws even before the particular item that G-d wishes to incarnate comes into being. Such is the nature of the spirtual world, physical things cannot exist there unless they are part of a cordoned off non-spirtual reality.

If, for example, G-d wishes to create a reality in which the 15-14 puzzle can exist and is unsolvable, such a reality can be created, ala ours. It is also possible for G-d to solve this puzzle in such a reality, however such a situation would require flooding that reality with G-d's infinite nature thus undoing the laws and rules that bind that reality and destroying it. This is because reality can only function if G-d's words are absolute and uncontradictory. If ever a finite reality is filled with infiniteness, it returns to its spirtual essence, it is no longer physical, and thus it ceases to be.

So in summation, G-d is omnipotent in an absolute sense. On the spirtual plane, He creates and destroys at will. However, because he is infinite, and what he creates is finite, if he wishes a reality to continue to exist he must avoid flooding it with his infinite essence. So for all intents and purposes, and in relation to our finite reality, G-d can in fact create unsolvable puzzles. This is only a temporary situation(and as G-d knows no time, this is hardly a problem for Him), and undoubtedly there are an infinite number of realities in which G-d is presently solving the 15-14 puzzle simply to prove how omnipotent He is.

[Bandit]

Amen!
Very good writings. Everyone.

[I, Brian]

Hi NewAgeNerd and welcome to CR.

[NewAgeNerd]

Hey, thanks for the welcome!

[human1111]

Originally Posted by Brien

Is ominpotency an intrinsically contradictory term? I have heard people argue that it is by posing questions like "can god made a crossword puzzle so hard that he can't solve it." Then if you say god is not contradictory they will reply then is his limitations in crossword puzzle making or crossword puzzle solving? Can anyone come up with a good response for this question?

Very easy reply is: G-d is perfect, It has no need to (insert a paradox).

[believer142]

Thats actually a really hard question to answer. The only thing that would make God less powerful is if he made himself non-omnipotent(if thats a word lol). If he created a crossword puzzle that he couldnt solve at the moment, if he wanted, he could make himself smarter or more skilled at crossword puzzles. Considering that god probably is very smart, he most likely wouldnt do something so stupid. If he did then he wouldnt be considered omnipotent because being omnipotent also entails that his intellect is verry powerful as well. If that makes sense

[smkolins]

Originally Posted by Brien

Is ominpotency an intrinsically contradictory term? I have heard people argue that it is by posing questions like "can god made a crossword puzzle so hard that he can't solve it." Then if you say god is not contradictory they will reply then is his limitations in crossword puzzle making or crossword puzzle solving? Can anyone come up with a good response for this question?

I offer Godel's Theorem of Incompleteness a strict version of which states:

"For any formal theory in which basic arithmetical facts are provable, it's possible to construct an arithmetical statement which, if the theory is consistent, is true but not provable or refutable in the theory."

Put another way, you can never discover all necessary true statements in a consistent world (not that all statements are true.) Given that then approaching the limits of truth, phrased less than perfectly, I propose, end in paradoxes.

Put another way, a paradox is an inalienble right of a point of view. Take it literally. Sitting on a couch, looking at a scene of a tree in the foreground and a forest in the background - there is a sharp edge where the tree ends and the forest begins behind. The rules governing the forest don't allow for a sharp edge - let alone leaves and branches which have dependencies (trunk, etc.) But from a point of view a branch of the forest emerges from next to the tree without reference to the hidden trunk. It is and is not possible. Paradox. Change the point of view and that paradox may be fixed - but another emerges.... A non-point of view - that of light itself for example - can reconsile all points of view, but it may be rather hard to get to it (kind of like relativity - start from a point of view and no matter how fast you add permutations, you'll never get there, all points of view simulaneously, and the energy of grinding out each purmutation will weigh you down.) The solution is to give up and accept, even paradoxes, as a reasonable attempt at the truth.


eh?

Somewhere after that, two look at eachother and recall the paradox as a good inside joke!

[Quahom1]

Originally Posted by smkolins

...Put another way, a paradox is an inalienble right of a point of view. Take it literally. Sitting on a couch, looking at a scene of a tree in the foreground and a forest in the background - there is a sharp edge where the tree ends and the forest begins behind. The rules governing the forest don't allow for a sharp edge - let alone leaves and branches which have dependencies (trunk, etc.) But from a point of view a branch of the forest emerges from next to the tree without reference to the hidden trunk. It is and is not possible. Paradox. Change the point of view and that paradox may be fixed - but another emerges.... A non-point of view - that of light itself for example - can reconsile all points of view, but it may be rather hard to get to it (kind of like relativity - start from a point of view and no matter how fast you add permutations, you'll never get there, all points of view simulaneously, and the energy of grinding out each purmutation will weigh you down.) The solution is to give up and accept, even paradoxes, as a reasonable attempt at the truth...

A paradox is an apparently true statement or group of statements that seems to lead to a contradictionor to a situation that defies intuition.

Intuition is a quick and ready insight seemingly independent of previous experiencesand emperiical knowledge.

Where is the inalienable right of point of view? How does insight play into this? Do you presume that intuition is a given?

I am of course, playing "devil's advocate".

v/r

Q

[smkolins]

Originally Posted by Quahom1

A paradox is an apparently true statement or group of statements that seems to lead to a contradictionor to a situation that defies intuition.

Intuition is a quick and ready insight seemingly independent of previous experiencesand emperiical knowledge.

Where is the inalienable right of point of view? How does insight play into this? Do you presume that intuition is a given?

I am of course, playing "devil's advocate".

v/r

Q

I am saying that no point of view, no paradigm, no system as defined pratically at any point in time, is so finished that it will account for all truth. Thus Godel's theorem. To me intuition is another paradigm. Intuitionally, trueth must be felt. But not all truth is felt. Systematic logic is another paradigm. It too will encounter truths it cannot substantiate. Is there a greater paradox that something is true and is not true?

[believer142]

I change my mind it isnt a hard question to answer. In fact, its really easy. There is one thing God cannot do and that is contradict himself. He cant be omnipotent and not omnipotent at the same time. Thats like saying turn into a gas, now a liquid, now a solid, now all at the same time or be honest and dishonest at the same time. God is either omnipotent or not.