Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by archaeopteryx on August 6, 2012 at 11:35pm

It would seem to me, that to envision all possibilities, would require an infinite imagination, of which, I'll be the first to admit, I fall a little short.

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Permalink Reply by Jonathan Chang on August 6, 2012 at 11:43pm

I agree. This is one of the core concepts when I say I am agnostic atheist. It is logically impossible to test for omnipotence because any knowledge we have must be inferred from supporting knowledge, so knowledge is inherently limited.

To begin with, I would question whether an omnipotent being could know he is omnipotent since it would take infinite time to perform every power; it's paradoxical. An omnipotent being that knows he is omnipotent would also know that, at any given time, he has only used an infinitely small, approaching 0, percent of his power; no matter how hard he tries, he will never reach his theoretical potential... But that contradicts omnipotence -- so I would actually conclude omnipotence, or omni-anything, is logically impossible.

In other words, even if you could simultaneously recite all the digits of pi, you would still fail...

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Permalink Reply by archaeopteryx on August 7, 2012 at 12:06am

@Jonathan - RE: "I would actually conclude...omni-anything, is logically impossible."

I can't 100% agree, I've SEEN omni-ignorance --

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Permalink Reply by Jonathan Chang on August 7, 2012 at 12:13am

Omni-ignorance can't be omni since it approaches 0. But haha, I know where you're coming from.

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Permalink Reply by archaeopteryx on August 7, 2012 at 12:59am

Jonathan - are you forgetting that there are negative numbers?

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Permalink Reply by Jonathan Chang on August 7, 2012 at 1:04am

If you are negatively ignorant, does that make you smart?

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Permalink Reply by archaeopteryx on August 7, 2012 at 1:25am

Reminiscent of "W," I view it as negatively intelligent.

Permalink Reply by Jonathan Chang on August 7, 2012 at 1:57am

But there's a cap, right? If you take every single bit of knowledge you were ever made aware of, and replaced it with idiocy, that's the most ignorant you could ever be. I don't think it's possible to be infinitely ignorant.

To be completely ignorant would be to lack any concept of any knowledge. For example, a rock, having no knowledge, is as ignorant as possible. So person striving for ignorance could only be as dumb as a rock as an endpoint.

But I guess it might be my mistake to view this in a singular scale. Surely there is some difference between a person that is made aware of, say, 10 pieces of knowledge and understands 10 pieces of knowledge; and a person that is made aware of 1000 pieces of knowledge, yet only understands 10 pieces of knowledge.

It's simplified, but perhaps if it's possible to be dumber than a rock, then it would be a person that's somehow made aware of god-like levels of knowledge, but understands absolutely none of it -- that might approach some negatively infinite level of intelligence.

Permalink Reply by archaeopteryx on August 7, 2012 at 2:47am

I'm just throwing it out there for speculation Jonathan - I do that from time to time - sometimes someone else picks it up and runs with it, other times, it just lies there, while people step carefully over it.

At least you'll have something to think about this evening.

G'night.

Permalink Reply by Jonathan Chang on August 7, 2012 at 12:10am

Hmm... It just struck me after reconsidering my musings on the logical impossibility of omnipotence: would agnosticism still make sense? I'm thinking it would, since it would still be impossible to test for a god that exists in a separate dimension, and designed the universe, but remains hidden, even if it is not omnipotent. Or would it? I'm going to have to dwell on this a bit. I doubt any of you care -- it's a bit late to be thinking this hard.

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Permalink Reply by archaeopteryx on August 7, 2012 at 1:00am

It's never too late to think hard - I hope to be doing it with my last breath.

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Permalink Reply by Loren Miller on August 6, 2012 at 10:13pm

Omnipotence, omniscience, et cetera ... it's ground we've been over, one way or another, a thousand times.

A god that truly WAS a god would only remain hidden if there was a genuine, constructive purpose to being hidden.  A god who doesn't remain hidden because it needs the adulation of his creation is nothing more than homo sapiens on steroids, a god with an ego on, a god with all the human frailties of the humans who conceived it in the first place.

Maybe there is such a being somewhere.  My response remains: So Fucking What?  Does that being's status as a god immediately warrant worship?  Veneration?  Devotion?  Why?  A truly omnibenevolent god wouldn't need such, though a petty, narrow, emotion-driven god would almost certainly INSIST on it.  Consider what happened to Gary Mitchell in the Star Trek pilot, "Where No Man Has Gone Before."  He may have had the power of a god, but with all the human weaknesses which he had owned the day before.  Absolute power does its thing yet again, corrupting absolutely.

Could such a being erase any of us from this existence?  More than likely.  Could it demand and actually achieve our devotion or worship?  Not mine, bubby.

Could a god exist?  ANYTHING might exist ... but getting me to give a damn about it is an entirely separate matter.

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