How do you answer the omnipotence paradox?

[Alberti_Devoveo]

It looks like I will have to keep repeating the solution:

A “weight that cannot be lifted” doesn’t describe a weight. It doesn’t describe anything. It is no more a description of something than “£$%^&*” is a description of something.
There is no such thing, also, as “logical impossibility”.

Can’t anyone here see that this has nothing to do with deity?

That is one solution. And you do not have to keep repeating it. We saw it the other few times you posted it.

 

[Alberti_Devoveo]

But it’s not logically impossible.

It would only be logical that an all-powerful being could in fact have X and not have X at the same time.

If you believe that, then you need to go back and retake Logic 101.

 

[Jonesboy]

What do you mean by ‘it’s not an idea’? It is certainly an idea: namely the idea of a rock that no matter what cannot be lifted (even by God). Even if such an idea cannot have its realization in reality (for say hardcore metaphysical reasons), that does not say anything about its being a meaningful idea.

The “idea of a weight that necessarily cannot be lifted” is not an idea. So there is no paradox.

A weight, necessarily CAN be moved. Or it wouldn’t be a weight. There is no such thing as a weight that cannot be moved.

 

[Solus_vistor]

The word weight here is rather arbitrary. The question could be rephrased as “Can God create a thing He cannot change?” It is a self-referential paradox of our language about God. Like e.g. the Russsell’s paradox (The set of all sets that do not contain themselves) is a paradox of (naive) set theory.

You do not dismiss the concept of an omnipotent God just because of this kind of self-referential paradoxes, like you do not that of sets. Since Goedel we know that not even mathematics is reducible to logic. So why should the idea of an omnipotent God - expressed in such a way that both those who are “philosophically/theologically sophisticated”, as well as those who are not, can understand it - be immune from self-referential paradoxes?

 

[Jonesboy]

The word weight here is rather arbitrary. The question could be rephrased as “Can God create a thing He cannot change?” It is a self-referential paradox of our language about God. Like e.g. the Russsell’s paradox (The set of all sets that do not contain themselves) is a paradox of (naive) set theory.

You do not dismiss the concept of an omnipotent God just because of this kind of self-referential paradoxes, like you do not that of sets. Since Goedel we know that not even mathematics is reducible to logic. So why should the idea of an omnipotent God - expressed in such a way that both those who are “philosophically/theologically sophisticated”, as well as those who are not, can understand it - be immune from self-referential paradoxes?

So you want to say that nonsensical uses of specific terms (like “weight” in “Can God make a weight he cannot move”) aren’t nonsensical at all but are examples of the sort of paradox that self-reference brings us.
Self-reference isn’t a genuine paradox but is itself a different, specific example of nonsense. The nonsense in question confuses the whole with the parts - for example, “this sentence is false” confuses the meaning (given by the parts or words) with the method of identifying the meaning (given by the whole or general form of a sentence).

BTW Goedel wanted to show that Nature wasn’t reducible to mathematics. His famous theories were intended to show that. They failed in my mind because of their reliance on self-reference, even though Nature is not reducible to mathematics in any case.

 

[Solus_vistor]

So you want to say that nonsensical uses of specific terms (like “weight” in “Can God make a weight he cannot move”) aren’t nonsensical at all but are examples of the sort of paradox that self-reference brings us…

I did not make any statement about the “nonsensical uses of” the “specific term” “weight”. On the contrary, for the same reasons that you gave, I tried to remove it from the original question to expose the similarity of the (naively understood) concept of an omnipotent God with that of the set of all sets that is behind Russell’s paradox. And although there are ways (in mathematics that goes beyond high school maths) to avoid Russell’s paradox, so are ways in theology (that I am less at home with than with mathematics) to avoid the naive understanding of the concept of an omnipotent God. Nevertheless, for the vast majority of people the concept of sets as taught at high school is sufficient; the same with God’s omnipotence.

Self-reference isn’t a genuine paradox but is itself a different, specific example of nonsense.

Googling “self-referential paradox” gave me over 45 thousand links, so it is hardly mere nonsense. You can find there a list of known paradoxes but not a list of nonsenses. One tries to resolve a paradox but not a nonsense. See also the Wikipedia entry for “self-reference”, although my favourite popular explanation is in “The Mind of God” by Paul Davies (Simon&Schuster, 1992), page 99 onwards.

BTW Goedel wanted to show that Nature wasn’t reducible to mathematics. His famous theories were intended to show that. They failed in my mind because of their reliance on self-reference, even though Nature is not reducible to mathematics in any case.

I do not know what are Goedel’s “famous theories” dealing with Nature’s reducibility or not to mathematics. Goedel is most known for his two Incompleteness Theorems (about the logical incompleteness and consistency of mathematical systems) dealing with the relation between mathematics and logic. This is not a place to go into details, but the above reference to Paul Davies is also a good popular explanation of what it is all about. It is about logical, philosophical or mathematical paradoxes, not about physics or Nature.

I might add that Goedel was well aware of all these paradoxes, including the one this thread is about. Nevertheless, he was a firm believer in a personal God and afterlife in spite of his close friendship with Einstein who was not (Einstein was what today we call a deist).

 

[htmlman1]

Or you could think of it this way. Next time, ask the person, “Do you know what a rectangular circle is?” Obviously, they won’t, because such a thing does not exist. Also, God cannot create a “rectangular circle” because that is a logical contradiction and does not exist. Operating on the laws of logic, if you ask God to create something he cannot lift, he can’t, because it is a logical contradiction and so does not exist. Asking God to create something he can’t lift is like asking him to create a rectangular circle.

 

[PetrusRomanus]

If you believe that, then you need to go back and retake Logic 101.

Just wait til someone makes a thread about the Holy Trinity. Its also “impossible” to be one person thats three persons at the same time too, at least by human standards.

 

[Alberti_Devoveo]

Just wait til someone makes a thread about the Holy Trinity. Its also “impossible” to be one person thats three persons at the same time too, at least by human standards.

It is not impossible by human standards: I am father, brother and son, yet one person.

 

[Jonesboy]

I did not make any statement about the “nonsensical uses of” the “specific term” “weight”. On the contrary, for the same reasons that you gave, I tried to remove it from the original question to expose the similarity of the (naively understood) concept of an omnipotent God with that of the set of all sets that is behind Russell’s paradox. And although there are ways (in mathematics that goes beyond high school maths) to avoid Russell’s paradox, so are ways in theology (that I am less at home with than with mathematics) to avoid the naive understanding of the concept of an omnipotent God. Nevertheless, for the vast majority of people the concept of sets as taught at high school is sufficient; the same with God’s omnipotence.

Goedel wanted to show that nature was not reducible to mathematics and he used his incompleteness theorems in order to show that maths could not account for all systems. The theorems are based, however, on a non-mathematical manoeuvre involving sets and reference.

 

[Jonesboy]

Or you could think of it this way. Next time, ask the person, “Do you know what a rectangular circle is?” Obviously, they won’t, because such a thing does not exist. Also, God cannot create a “rectangular circle” because that is a logical contradiction and does not exist. Operating on the laws of logic, if you ask God to create something he cannot lift, he can’t, because it is a logical contradiction and so does not exist. Asking God to create something he can’t lift is like asking him to create a rectangular circle.

You are almost there. The last step is to remove the idea of an “it” that is logically impossible. There is no such “it”. There is no question of God, or anyone, being either able or unable to make “square circle” or similar.

 

[Eleve]

Goedel wanted to show that nature was not reducible to mathematics and he used his incompleteness theorems in order to show that maths could not account for all systems. The theorems are based, however, on a non-mathematical manoeuvre involving sets and reference.

This isn’t right at all… Goedel’s theorems are mathematical theorems, proved using mathematics. What they show is not that “maths could not account for all systems,” but rather something like the opposite: that every formal system, assuming that it is consistent, leaves some truth unproved.

 

[PetrusRomanus]

It is not impossible by human standards: I am father, brother and son, yet one person.

Those are three different titles that describe who you are, but you are not three different people.

 

[Jonesboy]

This isn’t right at all… Goedel’s theorems are mathematical theorems, proved using mathematics. What they show is not that “maths could not account for all systems,” but rather something like the opposite: that every formal system, assuming that it is consistent, leaves some truth unproved.

That’s what I said. Maths cannot give an account account for all systems - it leaves some truth unproved. Goedel used a non-mathematical maoneouvre to “prove” it.