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

sorry, warner, I don't agree that omniscience and omnipotence are compatible, and I'm not sure that Gif is completely convinced of it either.

My view is that an omniscient and omnipotent (never mind omnipresent) entity is a logical impossibility. Of course, a simple omnipotent entity is also a logical impossibility. Can god make a rock so big even he can't lift it? (thank you mr. carlin) This sort of paradox is precisely why theologians redefine omnipotent to mean 'able to do anything which is not logically impossible.' Now, if we redefine omnipotent in this way, what happens to omniscient? Is omniscience logically impossible on its own? I don't suppose so. Would it be logically impossible for an omniscient entity to change something? Let's see:

let's pretend that next election I intend to vote for the New Democratic (this is Canada) Candidate in my riding. God has always known this. God wants me to vote for the Liberal, something God has also always known. God downloads a trojan to my brain, something He has always known He would do, which induces me to throw away my vote something He has always known I would do. God gets what He wants.

Okay, no particular paradox (except maybe that it's just stupid, not what one would expect from a God).

but -- and here's the key point -- God didn't change anything. God always knew that I would throw away my vote. His omnipotence precludes both His freewill and His omnipotence and absolute omnipotence is of course logically impossible. So . . .

Omnipotence is only logically possible if it isn't really omnipotence.

Omniscience precludes both free will and omnipotence.

Granted, as I throw away my vote, it will seem to me like I have free will, but I don't now, do I? I've got that divine trojan controlling me.

Sorry warner, no compatibility here.


Let me offer another analogy:

Your God is a viewer standing in a timeless art gallery with His eyes locked onto a vast unchanging painting. He painted the painting himself (it breaks down a little here [as does the concept of an eternal timeless god] because there is an implied time of creation somehow coming 'before' the vignette I've just described, a logical impossibility [oh, look. a god who could create the universe must also be able to create a rock so big even he can't lift it].) So, in God's timeless now, he can't change the painting: He's already (whatever that means in His timelessness) finished the painting and put on a couple of nice coats of varnish. He's staring at an unchanging canvas.

Now, you might like to say 'ah, but he could make changes while he was painting it'. Certainly, but then He wouldn't be omniscient now, would He? And the timelessness would be out the window.

Sorry, warner. The concepts are incoherent.

Taliesin
>>To my finite mind, a concept must at minimum be coherent, before it can be deemed either true or false.<<
All of us have finite minds (well I have). If I try to go into great details in pure maths ..
I suppose some people have more talent than others in that department.
I can't accept theorems or statements that I don't find plausible, either.

"This kind of infinity (the mathematical kind) is a lot easier to get a hold on than the vague stargazing kind, and allows us to show some surprising things about infinity, in particular that there are different infinities." >> A593552

So omniscience is another concept of infinity. I think it could be proved by mathematical means, that it is compatible with intentionality. But in our discussion, I'll just stick to words, if you don't mind

anhaga,
What are you like at maths and physics?
Well , to start with
>>Can God make a rock so big even HE can't lift it?<<
No, He can't, beacause He can lift an infinetely big rock.

>>Almighty God is like a viewer standing in a timeless art gallery with His eyes locked onto a vast unchanging painting.<<
Now that's a good analogy!

>>So, in God's timeless now, he can't change the painting: He's already (whatever that means in His timelessness) finished the painting and put on a couple of nice coats of varnish.<<
That's also true, but so what! That doesn't change "our reality" of being unable to see the future and make decisions etc.

>>God downloads a trojan to my brain, something He has always known He would do, which induces me to throw away my vote something He has always known I would do.<<
That's not so good. We have free-will, God does not induce us against our will. As I have said, everything we do has a consequence, which most people find rational except for perhaps when God is involved in the equation.

So, right, God created the universe. When did He start creating it? If He can see everything past, present and future, then He knew that He would create it from the beginning. Oh dear .. There's no such thing as beginning for an omnicient being.
I also suggest that you ponder over the concept of infinity that omniscience implies. It might be beneficial for us to use calculus and other mathematical concepts, if we're unable to see the plausability.

warner:

I'm pretty good at math and physics. What's your point?


'That doesn't change "our reality" of being unable to see the future and make decisions etc.'


You seem to be talking two sides with this free will thing. By 'our reality' I think you mean 'our subjective experience'. I don't see any reason to postulate multiple realities in this context. You seem to be admitting that from god's point of view we don't have free will while it seems to us that we do. To an amputee with phantom limb, it seems that he has two legs. But he doesn't.

As for your infinity red herring, I did not claim that there was a beginning for your infinite omniscient god. I used an analogy (the timeless art gallery) to point out the logical incoherence of your omniscient, omnipotent god.

seriously, warner, with or without mathematics, no matter how many degrees of infinity you invoke, the concepts you are presenting are incoherent.

anhaga
We'll see about that !

Hi Taliesin

re omniscience...treats the future as also immutable - not subject to change

The amazing thing about God's omniscience is that in the foreknowledge of God, the future is both mutable on the finite, earthly plane but immutable on the infinite, eternal plane. And we of a finite order simply cannot sort this out.

God does not change His mind on the eternal, infinite plane but in response to prayer and other factors centred on man's free choices, there are changes galore here in the finite. Christians are called to pray that the will of God that is bound in heaven would also be bound on Earth. Prayer definitely changes things. I do think, for the most part, that such resultant changes pertain chiefly (though not exclusively) to the speeding up/slowing down of God's agenda, though God will allow 180 degree changes to occur for times and seasons. God is evidently in no hurry to wind things up since the infinite plane is in no way dependent on what occurs within the finite plane.

RC

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special_theory_of_relativity#Reference_frames.2C_coordinates_and_the_Lorentz_transformation

I think it's important to (re)focus this discussion on the concept of predestination, and how it is inextricably linked to the concept of omniscience.

Let us for the moment put aside the question of free will, which, while undoubtedly a fascinating, and debatable topic, is separate from the one we are examining.


I think we can agree there are acknowledged limits to human intellect, but that shouldn't prevent our use of simple logic.

Please try to avoid appeals to incoherent or highly speculative hypotheses such as time travel, immaterial realms or alternate planes of existence. These are belief claims, and hardly advance our discussion.
One could as easily claim the Flying Spaghetti Monster exists in some 'higher dimension'
Such belief claims are, at best, of the form of circular argument, (supernatural stuff exists in the supernatural realm), or are appeals to incomprehensibility, (we cannot comprehend the incomprehensible).

Although I greatly admire the scientific method, I am not a scientist, and I feel it is not necessary to indulge in abstruse mathematical formulae or advanced theoretical physics.


Let's try to keep things simple, and stick to the topic, shall we?


To restate the question:

Is predestination a valid, (coherent), concept?

Because predestination requires the current or prior existence of an omniscient, intelligent agent, it must first be demonstrated that the concept of an omniscient agent is itself valid or coherent.

As previously defined, and agreed upon, omniscience literally means all-knowing:

Further, we have agreed that in order to satisfy the definition, omniscience must be unfettered by linear time
Omniscience implies that future events are as 'known' as are past ones.
Therefore, just as past events are immutable, so are future ones
Therefore, in the omniscient view, there is no difference whatsoever between past and future events, in terms of 'past' or 'future'
All events are 'now', 'concurrent', and are thus fixed in timelessness.

Omniscience requires that all causes and effects have effectively already occurred, or, more accurately, are presently simultaneously occurring.


Similarly, I think we can agree on a functional definition of agency:

An agent is a thing or a person that acts, in a purposeful manner, to produce a certain result.
The causal, (past/future), relationship is implied: act, (cause) --> result, (effect).
An intelligent agent has intentionality, by which the actions, or 'acts' it performs as an agent, are 'purposed'; intended, or planned, in order to bring about certain predictable or desired results, and reduce the likelihood of others.

An intelligent agent thus is defined as a purposeful entity which chooses, and modifies its actions, (causes), intent on affecting desired, uncertain yet-to-occur events, (effects), but is powerless to affect those past events which have already occurred.

The purposeful, future-oriented, goal-seeking actions performed by an intelligent agent define it *as* an intelligent agent.

Our reality appears to be consistent, in that past events are immutable. Purposeful agency cannot exist in an inconsistent reality.

For the same reason, omniscience cannot exist if future events are subject to modification. The knowledge of future events, immutable as are those past, obviates purposeful agency -- planning, or goal-seeking

Omniscience requires the same absolute knowing for both past and future events, and the knowledge of the past/future event would no longer be true to fact, or consistent, if it were to become different from what it has been/will be


Thus, intelligent agency and omniscience are, by definition, mutually exclusive.

Therefore, an omniscient intelligent agent is self-contradictory

Therefore, by inference, the concept of predestination is invalid.

QED

>>God does not change His mind on the eternal, infinite plane but in response to prayer and other factors centred on man's free choices, there are changes galore here in the finite.<<

Excellent. 100% correct. Well stated RC

Taliesin
>>I feel it is not necessary to indulge in abstruse mathematical formulae or advanced theoretical physics.<<
I'm not so sure; trying to understand an infinite concept, with finite thinking.

>>Similarly, I think we can agree on a functional definition of agency<<
Can we?

>>An intelligent agent thus is defined as a purposeful entity which chooses, and modifies its actions, (causes), intent on affecting desired, uncertain yet-to-occur events, (effects), but is powerless to affect those past events which have already occurred.<<
No, sorry. 'Your' intelligent agent is not omniscient; Almighty God is. There is no such concept of past events in omniscience.

How's about: "The universe is expanding at a finite rate as it happens on the physical boundary of our universe. The outer edge is the non existing one because there is no time in the infinite nothing."
Noggin points out the problem with boundaries in >> A22853883

I like to think about the concept of a circle with infinite diameter. If we take an arc of a finite circle, we get a 'crescent shape'. As the diameter approaches infinity ( Can it ever get there? ), the arc becomes a straight line.
If we take this concept further, we can then imagine this 'straight line' as the linear time line, and notice the problem with beginning and end disappears, or the beginning becomes the end and vice-versa, as an infinite sized circle has no beginning or end ... ie. eternal


To be continued ...

Of course, if we find it all too much, to 'expand our minds' and ponder, we can just accept the fact that it IS plausible that:

"In simple words, God knows our past, present and future choices and where they led us, however, we humans only know our past and present, and make choices that lead to our future."

If you can't 'see the plausability', IMO, there can be at least two reasons:

1) You don't want to see it
2) You're not very talented in infinite concepts

or
3) I'm wrong, in which case prove it to me from an omniscient agent's point of view, which does not have concepts such as what will be or what was

Hi Warner

A decent summary. I was thinking on a reply of my own but you seem to have covered the essentials well. We certainly can't limit the Divine to our rudimentary understanding of " intelligent agency " since as an infinite, spiritual being, God operates outside simple logic, the scientific method, and its derived axioms.

RC

Pure mathematics is, in its way, the poetry of logical ideas.
Albert Einstein

I shall never believe that God plays dice with the world.
Albert Einstein

I do not believe that civilization will be wiped out in a war fought with the atomic bomb.
Perhaps two-thirds of the people of the earth will be killed.
Albert Einstein