The Omnipotence paradox.
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Good to see you can use logic to figure out that your god is not all powerful. Do you still believe your god is all powerful?
Yes I do but I am using powerful in a different way than you, so you haven't shown any logical inconsistencies on my part.
I don't think it is powerful to do evil or to create a square circle or to make 2+2=5. Do you?
How do you use powerful? Do you limit what your god can do? Your god did plenty of evil, mass murder, and commanded greater evil to his chosen people, it commanded them to commit mass murder, slavery, and the raping of young girls. You have already stated your god can't make a rock to heavy to lift. That means your god is not all powerful.
http://taylormarshall.com/2012/01/did-god-command-genocide-in-deuteronom...
That article answers well at least one verse that is used to say that God is a mass murder. I am not familiar with God ordering rape in the Bible. What verses?
Deuteronomy 20:14 But the women, and the little ones, and the cattle, and all that is in the city, even all the spoil thereof, shalt thou take unto thyself; and thou shalt eat the spoil of thine enemies, which the LORD thy God hath given thee.
Taking the women captive, you can bet the women were raped.
Judges 21:12 And they found among the inhabitants of Jabeshgilead four hundred young virgins, that had known no man by lying with any male: and they brought them unto the camp to Shiloh, which is in the land of Canaan.
Young girls taken as captive to be wives. You can bet they were raped.
Deuteronomy 22:28-29 (28)If a man find a damsel that is a virgin, which is not betrothed, and lay hold on her, and lie with her, and they be found;
(29)Then the man that lay with her shall give unto the damsel's father fifty shekels of silver, and she shall be his wife; because he hath humbled her, he may not put her away all his days.
This is the rape law.
1. No where does God say in any of these verses to rape the women. I am sure it happened some, but apparently our own male soldiers in the U.S have raped there own women soldiers.
2. The last one about after having sex (possibly raping) with a women and then having to pay her father is actually just if you understand what the culture was like. No one would marry a women who was raped. If you weren't a virgin, you would already have a hard time fininding a husband, but if you were raped you could dforget about it. Furthermore, in some cultures they kill the raped because it's such a shame, although I don't think they did it in Semitic culture at that time. Anyways you get the point. Furthermore, what happens if you don't get married and your father is ashamed of you? You get kicked out and becoming a harlot is your best chance of not starving. So taking all of that into consideration, marrying the man who had sex or raped you isn't as bad. Notice the last verse: "because he hath humbled her, he may not put her away all his days." Why would he want to put her away for all of his days? Because no one wants her. You can think of it as a you break it you buy it policy. It's brutal and the culture was messed up but what other practical solution was there?
So you condone the rape law of the jews at that time? Would you condone a rape law like that in modern times? Those girls were taken a sex slaves by the jews. Do you condone having slaves?
Where did God say they should be sex slaves? You are assuming that which you haven't proved. As you like to say, where is your proof?
No I don't condone rape and neither does the Bible. Apparently you can't read in between the lines even with help. The rapists would not want to take there victims as wives because it would shame them and those women had very little hope unless they married them. It was punishmeant to the man and probably one of the better things for the woman.
And no, I would not want that law today because our culture has gotten better at least in that area.
So, an all powerful being can do everything EXCEPT: things that are logically impossible.
So god is powerful, but not ALL powerful, god can not doing things that are merely, currently to us, seemingly: logically impossible.
I suppose you can change the definition of the word "all" if you want to fit your narrative. But if you go about changing accepted word definitions we can get to the point we no longer communicate with you as communication relies upon agreed upon definitions. Especially if you do not tell us you are changing word definitions to fit your narrative.
Every time theist use absolutes, they are going to create paradoxes and logic flaws. Ones that are easy for anyone that is not trying to maintain the same narrative you have, to find. Unfortunately with theist, they have to write in absolutes when describing their god, otherwise their very definition of "god" begins to fall apart. God is powerful, but not ALL powerful. God knows everything, (omnipotent), but does not know what choice you will make, (or there really is no free will.) God is good, but not ALL good.
God is powerful, knows a lot and is good. That leaves room for some other god that knows even more, even more powerful, even more good. The very definition of the word god uses words like omnipotent, all powerful etc. A being that is only: powerful, knows a lot and is good, is by definition not a god.
Quite the little quandary theist got themselves eh? They cannot logically defend their "god" idea. Compounding the bad news when they have no physical testable real evidence to support their god either versus an enormous amount of evidence that says man created this "god" idea. The god ideas also fail reasoning tests.
You may be confident your god exist, but I am even more confident in my assessment that: there is no god, all the evidence, logic, and reasoning points towards it, strongly.
All powerful Simply means that god has power over everything
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"So, an all powerful being can do everything EXCEPT: things that are logically impossible."
yeah, because what is logically impossible is not a thing at all. it's an inconceivable meaningless arrangement of words.
there's a logical Rule states that Predication/assertion is a branch of conceptualization.
So in order to make assertion about something you must have a concept of the essence of that thing.
So we'd say that the deficiency would be in the affected side not the affector side.
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"God is powerful, but not ALL powerful. God knows everything, (omnipotent), but does not know what choice you will make, (or there really is no free will.)"
it appears to me that your differentiation between 'powerful' and 'all powerful' is that powerful means that he can do somethings but all powerful means he can do all things even logical impossibilities.
We simply could point out that what we mean by powerful or all powerful is that he has power over everything and logical impossibilities are not even things.
why god being knowing for your choice would mean that you do not have free-will?
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"They cannot logically defend their "god" idea."
yes, we can.
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"they have no physical testable real evidence to support their god"
if you are considering a logical argument to be ' testable real evidence', then we do have.
if you mean by 'testable real evidence' only empirical evidence, then you don't have to reply to this comment because you do not even know what subject you're talking about.
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" I am even more confident in my assessment that: there is no god, all the evidence, logic, and reasoning points towards it, strongly."
what might 'all the evidence' that points towards the non-existence of god be like?
Why do you place limitations on a god being able to do anything it wanted to do, even if it seemed illogical to humans? Peripatetic do you believe in a god? Do you have any proof your god you believe in is real? Any testable evidence? Evidence that will pass peer review?
Even if i write an argument for god's existence, which i did, the next time u'll see a comment from me, you still gonna paste the same thing asking for an argument for god's existence, even if it's a reply on a comment that argues for god's existence, you'd just ignore it and ask me for an argument for god's existence. it's really useless to discuss anything with you.
Evidence that will pass peer review! You're funny dude
I don't paste my posting to you. Your the funny one. You know your argument for a god will not pass peer review.
I will hold you to that definition.
That is fine, while I will not say they are completely meaningless arrangement of words, (we can understand the concept given.) Describing something like the heavy rock paradox is just that a thought process that does not exist in reality. A paradox using an all encompassing word like "all" in front of a word like "powerful." Are just thought exercises challenging commonly accepted meanings of words.
Do you have a concept of the essence of god? It will help me frame just what you mean by what you said here, you can probably guess at my follow up questions/comments based on a yes or no answer. Just turning around the affected/affector sides to you as well if we want to apply those rules of understanding of things in this debate.
Yep I would say that is an accurate statement of my thoughts of what "all powerful" should mean. All meaning... ALL. I also accept for you when using the word all for the definition of omnipotence it is special case where it means all except for things that are logically impossible. I get we are dithering/arguing over word definitions. I will stop, I now understand your definition of omnipotence and why that definition circumvents the paradoxes of "all" because that definition changes the commonly accepted simple definition of all.
We, and other atheist have argued with you about this for a while now, seems we can not cross the divide on thinking on this. I will try one more time and then stop trying.
If god knows everything in advance, (hey look its another absolute word! [everything] here comes the absolute paradoxes!) Then he must know all our decisions before we were ever born. God could write down: on August 18th year 2017 of the Gregorian calendar, the person that uses the online moniker LogicForTW will decide to post in the thread "the omnipotence paradox" on the atheist republic forums. He could show me that writing yesterday. If I choose not to write in this thread on this day based on that information, god was wrong and did not know everything. He did not know, that if I was presented with a piece of written word that says I will post today, will make me decide not to post. God could know I was not going to refuse the moment he handed me that written note, (and known it since before i was born,) about his prophecy, sure, but regardless, an all knowing "god" already knew what I was going to do. I can not go "off path" of what I was going to do, even god could not change what I was going to do if he always knew exactly what I was going to do since the beginning of time. There is no free will, everything I was going to do has already been set, because god knows everything. It is not the all knowing"god's" fault either, simply that everything, (including god himself) has to be predetermined, outcome already made, regardless of what one feels at the time, for one to know "everything." If an all knowing god has knowledge that I will die on September 25th 2084, for that knowledge to be true I cannot diverge in decisions in my life that lead me to there. God knows I will not commit suicide tomorrow because he knows I live to September 25th 2084 or that he is wrong and does not know everything.
You could say: god see's all possibilities of what you are going to do, as one goes through life making millions of "freewill" decisions in ones life, but you then this all knowing god is missing a piece of knowledge, which of those millions of possibilities available to us, what we free will people are going to do. Suddenly god does not know "everything." This god idea knows all possibilities but not which one you will pick. Pretty huge piece of "all knowing and all powerful" if god does not even know which free will decision you will make even if he see's the result of every possible "free will" decision you will make.
You are right, you can, I should not of said that, I apologize. I can say my version of logic you cannot without contradicting my version of logic, but your version of logic you certainly most can. You just did.
Yes I mean empirical evidence. I feel I know what subject I am talking about. If you want me to say empirical evidence from the get go, I can do that.
Empirical evidence, logic evidence, reasoning evidence. It is a very long list. One way I can put it is: the enormous amount of evidence that man made god, over the near non existent amount of evidence god made man. Is over whelming. I can write a short list if you like, or I can post links to other people that put together a much more exhaustive list of details.
What is it like? First we start with the lack of evidence of (any) god in the empirical sense. Then the ease to completely discredit any major religion holy book about a god, discredit the people that have "special knowledge of god" then we discredit the few actions like prayer or attending church of a particular god having any effectiveness over other gods or atheist/agnostic practices. This process of evidence and argument for the non-existence god has been going on for thousands of years as science fills many holes in human knowledge about our existence, the universe around us and why things happen. You can see it in the revisions of holy books, the abandoning or great decline of god ideas, (greek/roman gods anyone?) that did not move to protect them selves from ever shrinking room of "the god of gaps." Now that current religions are down to 4-5 various variations "proofs" of their god we can show even these "proofs" do not implicitly name their god, or hold a candle to the "mountain" of various evidence and logic/reasoning points that say man made god.
And this is when the burden of proof is required and can never be demonstrated by theists.
Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, and that which asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence.
This is how the paradox stands up well to it.
There is no genuine non bias evidence, the closest you'll get is the Roman historian Tacitus, who wrote about 'Chritus'... Just a shame Tacitus wasn't born until 56AD
@ Random hero are you responding to me or another.
No it wasn't directed at you @Dumb Ox
But I feel I have a very good grasp of the English language, omnipotence by definition is (of a deity) having unlimited power.
"God is described as omnipotent and benevolent"
Unfortunately of late, Christian apologists/philosophers tend to try to make words fit their narrative.
Not of late, I can think of one very famous Christian who you lived about a thousand years ago who has a more nuanced and in depth idea of an all powerful God. And that's just off the top of my head. If I thought about I could go back much latter.
Very often the problem with atheists and people in general is that they attack straw men and don't let the other side define what they mean.
Is your god all powerful or just powerful? If your god is all powerful, then it could make a rock it can't lift.
"Could God create a rock so heavy that he couldn't lift it himself". This particular so called "omnipotence paradox" is old and played out (with all due respect). It has been debunked for ages and I surprised the question is still being asked in 2017. First of all, atheists seem to falsely think that the attribute of "omnipotence" means that one has the power to do things that are impossible, and that is simply not true.
Omnipotence does not mean that one can do something that is logically impossible, such as make 2+2=5 or make squared circles. Those kind of things are logically impossible, and not even God can do it. But then again, if God can't do it, NO ONE can do it. In other words, if God can't do it, then it can't be done, PERIOD.
So the question becomes "is it possible for there to exist a rock so heavy that God cannot lift it?"...and the answer is undoubtedly no. Ultimately, the question is loaded and therefore fallacious.
If you want to define omnipotence to simply mean: "great power" we can go with that. If you want to define omnipotence to mean unlimited power, or all power. Then we go down this road, of logical paradoxes.
If great power, you have another paradox, most everyone defines their god as the "supreme being" if your supreme being is merely someone with great power, it is all to easy to deduce their something else with even greater power, or there are somethings god does not have the power to do like what? It is never explained what god cannot do. We now have to guess on our own what god cannot do simply because he is only of "great power."
Which is why theist are forced to use words like "all powerful" or "unlimited power."
Probably your safest bet would to be to say: "god is powerful enough to do anything except stuff that is logically impossible."
Just does not sound as impressive as all powerful does it? It immediately points out what god cannot do.
@logic,
wrong omnipotent means having unlimited power, not "great power" great is different than unlimited...syntax in itself. don't vacillate, the two are not synonymous. us "theist believe that there is no God or power, or otherwise that predicts, overcomes, or makes one or anything happen. Simply put, an atheist does not believe in anything related to a " higher power" safe to say, you are reaching!
Right! The Greeks were careful not to apply absolutes to their deities as they get you into trouble very quickly.
Ah sorry, a quick google failed me there. if you google omnipotence, the first definition it gives is:
"the quality of having unlimited or very great power."
I actually, before I read that today, always assumed it meant absolute, unlimited power. Was kind of surprised by it, but was fine to accept that definition. I looked again just now, and most all of the initial links stick to: the absolute power definitions.
I guess there is some contention on the definition of omnipotence. I am fine with agreeing on Merriam Websters definitions. If everyone else is. Which labels omnipotence as an absolute power.
Of course going by its Latin roots, Omni potens, Omni being: "all," and Potens being "powerful."
FTK
So you put human limitations on your god? So your saying your god is not all powerful? If something is logically impossible for human, would it be impossible for your god to do?
FTK
So you are placing limitations on god? Either god is all powerful or it's not. If god can't make a rock to heavy to lift, then god is not all powerful. If god decided that 2+2=5, then it would be just that.
omnipotent means all encompassing, please elaborate on the lifting the rock thing? What God, or being, expresses this, be specific.
Talking about the christian god making a rock it couldn't lift. If god made a rock it can't lift, then it is not all powerful.
Here is long but worthwhile passage from the Summa:
"I answer that, All confess that God is omnipotent; but it seems difficult to explain in what His omnipotence precisely consists: for there may be doubt as to the precise meaning of the word 'all' when we say that God can do all things. If, however, we consider the matter aright, since power is said in reference to possible things, this phrase, "God can do all things," is rightly understood to mean that God can do all things that are possible; and for this reason He is said to be omnipotent. Now according to the Philosopher (Metaph. v, 17), a thing is said to be possible in two ways.
First in relation to some power, thus whatever is subject to human power is said to be possible to man.
Secondly absolutely, on account of the relation in which the very terms stand to each other. Now God cannot be said to be omnipotent through being able to do all things that are possible to created nature; for the divine power extends farther than that. If, however, we were to say that God is omnipotent because He can do all things that are possible to His power, there would be a vicious circle in explaining the nature of His power. For this would be saying nothing else but that God is omnipotent, because He can do all that He is able to do.
It remains therefore, that God is called omnipotent because He can do all things that are possible absolutely; which is the second way of saying a thing is possible. For a thing is said to be possible or impossible absolutely, according to the relation in which the very terms stand to one another, possible if the predicate is not incompatible with the subject, as that Socrates sits; and absolutely impossible when the predicate is altogether incompatible with the subject, as, for instance, that a man is a donkey.
It must, however, be remembered that since every agent produces an effect like itself, to each active power there corresponds a thing possible as its proper object according to the nature of that act on which its active power is founded; for instance, the power of giving warmth is related as to its proper object to the being capable of being warmed. The divine existence, however, upon which the nature of power in God is founded, is infinite, and is not limited to any genus of being; but possesses within itself the perfection of all being. Whence, whatsoever has or can have the nature of being, is numbered among the absolutely possible things, in respect of which God is called omnipotent. Now nothing is opposed to the idea of being except non-being. Therefore, that which implies being and non-being at the same time is repugnant to the idea of an absolutely possible thing, within the scope of the divine omnipotence. For such cannot come under the divine omnipotence, not because of any defect in the power of God, but because it has not the nature of a feasible or possible thing. Therefore, everything that does not imply a contradiction in terms, is numbered amongst those possible things, in respect of which God is called omnipotent: whereas whatever implies contradiction does not come within the scope of divine omnipotence, because it cannot have the aspect of possibility. Hence it is better to say that such things cannot be done, than that God cannot do them. Nor is this contrary to the word of the angel, saying: "No word shall be impossible with God." For whatever implies a contradiction cannot be a word, because no intellect can possibly conceive such a thing."
http://www.newadvent.org/summa/1025.htm#article3
I can do all things that are possible. It is possible for me to roll my tongue. I rolled my tongue. It is possible for me to run, hey I can run! It is not possible for me to flap my arms fast enough to fly, no problem it was never possible. I am omnipotent! I am god!
I can do all that I am able to do. Just like your god "He can do all that he is able to do."
You are going to have to continue to edit your own special definition of omnipotent...
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