h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

The concept of omnipotence is problematic.

Typical paradoxes are e.g. could an omnipotent being create both an unmovable object and an unstoppable force? It is not difficult to think up many similar ones.

If there was an omnipotent God then presumably it would be capable of restricting its own omnipotence. This, in my opinion, is the best argument for those who claim that God gave us free will. By giving us free will God sort of 'franchises' out some of his power to control things to us. Hence he is no longer omnipotent, but he once was.

If I was a theist (which I am not) I would also be tempted by the often touted argument that it is in fact evil that does not truly exist. This is the 'best of all possible worlds' argument. People scoff at it because they think they know better than God what constitutes a good world, which if it comes from someone who doesn't find the concept of God ludicrous is pretty daft.

Of course, most of these problems simply dissappear if you reject the (to me) bizarre concept of an all-powerful Deity in the first place...

I agree totally. If you were omnipotent, you would get bored of it very quickly. If God does exist, then he probably messed around with being omnipotent before he came up with the Universe as a sort of "project" to create someone to share life with. How can he share life with someone who is in His complete control? He is then just sharing it with himself. He would be a lonely man (or woman or whatever he is, if he does exist). This is why He gave us free will, and this is why he cannot eliminate evil.

Luckily, I'm agnostic, so it doesn't bother me either. What do Christians themselves think of this all?

I dunno about Christians, being an atheist myself, but let's look at omnipotent. Does omnipotent mean all powerful? If it does, it does not necessarily infer all controlling. I may have the power to control something but choose not to control it.

On good and evil, you can't have one without the other. If you have no evil, how do you define what is good? If you have no good, how do you define what is evil?

Just a couple of thoughts

This entire article is a long-winded adaptation of one of my favorite famous quotes, as it proves ultimately that there is no god (without us having to discover a babelfish first).

"Either God cannot abolish evil, or he will not. If he cannot, he is not all-powerful. If he will not, he is not all good."

And, as in most famous quotes, I have NO idea who said it.

Fairly shoddy proof, then.

What if it's a test? Line people up, show them the tree, tell them bad things will happen if they eat, then stand back... Eventually, after a long, long time, people will either stop eating, or die. People have to be able to learn, and that requires pain.

Or, to be simple about it, destroying evil also destroys the choice of good over evil, and that makes us no better than puppets.

"Free will... it's like butterfly wings. Once touched, and they never fly again." -Al Pacino.

Trying to second guess God in order to prove he doesn't exist never works.

I wouldn't call Al Pacino one of the great thinkers of the modern era...

As for proving God doesn't exist, there is no reason to. It is an outrageous claim by the believers, and the burden of proof is upon them. If I were to come running in and tell you I'd just seen Elvis in a purple jumpsuit walking on water, curing leprosy, and jumping into a spaceship shaped like a pink Cadillac, you wouldn't believe me for a second. If I have to disprove God, you're saying that I can make that Elvis claim and do so reasonably, because you cannot prove I didn't see it.

But you know better. You know that if I make that claim, I'd better be able to back it up with purple jumpsuit threads, photographs, healed lepers, and Cadillac-spaceship tire marks. And until I can, you are fully justified in disbelieving me. So let it be with God. Until science uncovers a single shred of credible evidence of an invisible deity, I will remain confident in my disbelief.

The only problem with requiring scientific proof is that, assuming God exists outside his creation (which most believers would accept) and chooses only to affect it locally and arbitrarily (the odd burning bush here and there) then the likelyhood of submitting his actions to scientific study is small. Science requires repeatability and predictability. God's documented behaviour doesn't appear to show either.

I personally suspect he's holding back, just so all the scientists in the world don't suddenly feel enormously insecure (not to mention all the atheists).

I love that particular paradox: "what happens when an unstoppable force meets and immovable object?"

Have you read "Walking on Glass" by Iain Banks? That question forms one of the central themes.

GB-For a long time now I have been searching for proof that there is a God.
A friend told me researching ancient texts was not the way to go,that I needed
to pray,invite,or beg the holy spirit for faith.Although I have been reading ancient
texts I have yet to pray.
As far as proof of God there are people that believe the Bible Code is it.
Have you read the book by Michael Drosnin?

You are, I believe, talking about the Omega Code. The idea is that the Bible was meant to be retained in its original Aramaic text, and the words were laid out in a precise grid. Then, words would appear in diagonal, up & down, and reverse, which would predict the future.

The proof for this theory is incredibly flimsy. You see, none of the original transcriptions of any Bible book exist any longer. Many no longer even exist in Aramaic, having been transcribed in Hebrew, Greek, Latin, etc. Many of them were never in Aramaic to begin with. So in order to prove his theory, the guy translates the texts to Aramaic, then, because the grid pattern is completely unknown, he puts it into a computer, and the computer rearranges the text for a while until it finds a few words it can make sense of. Take several thousand pages of text, and rearrange millions of times, and sooner or later, a few related words are going to appear together, like "Hitler" and "invade" and "1939." I remain unimpressed. What he did with his computer is the equivalent of the old "give a million monkeys a typewriter" saw.

Just remember, Nostradomus is credited with predicting WWII as well. A lot of people took him seriously, and they decided that he had also predicted that on a sunny spring day in April 1988, the state of California was supposed to shake off the continental shelf during a massive earthquake and slide into the ocean. A lot of people wasted money investing in worthless perspective beach-front property in the Arizona wasteland. My friends and I passed an amuzing day in school, chiding each other about our impending doom, and looking off to the horizon for that ultimate wave.

Interesting...

2 things: according to the standard defenition, God doesn't live outside the universe; he IS the universe. He is all, both creator and creation. And, perhaps, just a little bit more.

and

The fundamental difference between deists and athiests seems to be this: Athiests demand proof in the existence of God, while Deists listen, look around a bit, and go "Yes, that makes sense. It's as good an explanation as any."

I'll forbear to comment, but I know which one I'd pick.

I think the difference is that the atheist looks around, reads a bit of evolution theory, and says "yes, that makes sense, and certainly seems more plausible than what the guy with the pointy hat and the oily smile is saying."

... while the agnostic says "neither of you have enough evidence to convince me. And you never will. You will only find out what happens when you die by dying."

But can you imagine how much you would hate your dad if he went down to the school and fought off all your bullies? You would be furious. God, if he exists, would realise this. And besides, as I have already said, God would be lonely if he hadn't created the universe, and more life. But he wanted to create some sort of life that he could be with, not control. Why would he enslave us all when he is omnipotent?

Bullies, eh? Interesting. Never saw it put quite that way before.

How do athiests explain the creation of the universe? Because, either way, it doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

Either the Big Bang just sort of happened (and science grows notoriously vague at this point), and then you have to wonder why, or God created the universe, and then you have to wonder where he is (and religion grows notoriously vague at this point).

And then you have to ask yourself: "Who ever said the universe was logical?" and then you have to buy another round.

Yeah. That's why I'm agnostic.

GB-Yes I see your point.Perhaps I do need to look inside for these answers.
I've been delving into the Nag Hammadi Codices and in The Gospel of Thomas
(which some claim was written by Jesus) it says God is within each of us.

Omnipotence: infinite in power, unlimited authority or power.

God has also been described as Omniscient: having infinite, complete knowledge.

God would not have to create us to find out what would happen. He'd know already. Experimentation with no point is useless; a waste of time. If time is not important to God, it is important to me, and he should stop, as I don't like being toyed with.

The only God that could possibly exist would be one that is not Omnipotent: at least to justify mine and your existance. This is the only justification for a bored God creating universe hypothesis, or an experimenting God creating universe hypothesis.

God as an Evil/Good character sorter: much the same as above. Having two separate piles of different attributes at the end of the universe, or at the very least all of our lives, has very little use, unless he plans to make some 'good' pie, or is inviting the in-laws over, and wants to make sure that their stay is unpleasant on their 'really bad' mattress. I have no wish to be a resource, and would like to take this opportunity to voice my displeasure with this end if it is the case.

The universe is God. Where will he damn us to if we don't fit his idea of goodness? Does God have excretory functions? Does this invite the possibility that God, as the omnipotent universe, might have to contend with outside influences, which could also be omnipotent?

God as bad; likes toying with us; torturing us. Almost justifiable. He could be killing close personal friends off to play with our emotions, and in the end, damning us to perpetual hellish tortures. This sounds fun to me. This God, though, is definitly not Omnipotent, though, as an Omnipotent/Omniscient God would realise the pointlessness of these actions.

God as us. After all, God is in all of us, right? If this is true, God cannot be Omniscient, for he would only know what humanity knows; if one is unwilling to accept the possibility that God is in all living things. Even then, God only knows what all living things know. I feel left out in this, as I don't know everything that all living things know. This God would not be Omnipotent; as not everything can be alive.

So, is there a point? Does there have to be to justify our existance? Obviously not, at least not one we can all agree on.

There does not have to be a point. There does not have to be a higher purpose. There does not have to be a God. We're here. God is the possibility. Not us.

-jb

Or....we may not be here at all.There is that theory that we are someone else's dream.
I can't see how a dream could be so detailed and what kind of a being could possibly
be dreaming of an entire universe but you do have to consider all possibilities.

According to Quantum Physics, some things are random, no matter how intelligent you are. For example, if you shoot a photon (light particle) at a beam-splitter, then it will go in 1 of 2 directions. You cannot possibly know which from the starting conditions alone. This aside, one who is omniscient cannot necessarily predict the future, since our behaviour is almost certainly dependant on such random events.

Omniscience means all-knowing. If that means he does not know the future, then he is not omniscient, because there is something he doesn't know. No amount of sophistry is going to change that.