How omniscient is God?

[Solmyr]

This is my last post in this thread, not only because it’s off topic, becoming personal, and will probably be shut down soon anyway for those two reasons, but also because there’s not any progress forthcoming.

As you wish. The offer is still open, however.

I highly recommend Dr. Feser. He’s got a REALLY nice blog, in addition to his books.

Yeah, I read some of his stuff there, too. Was not “impressed” - for lack of a better, stronger, but maybe not very charitable term. As I said, I am not interested in “arguing” with a book, or a blog.

 

[Bradski]

Don’t be silly. It only works for a monotheistic God, not any entities like Zeus, Athena, etc. You seriously need to read more philosophy if you think it works for any God.

You just said ‘any god’. Singular. Yes, I think it works for any singular God. That would be a monotheistic God. Silly me.

Furthermore, it isn’t like Christians stop here. We use this to prove the existence of a God, then argue further about what God is like and has done. This ought to be obvious if you have read any Christian arguments.

Then make the connection. ‘This is a god and it is MY God because…’

Make a connection from that point.

So you think it works…? If you think it works then there’s no “whether or not.”

No. It works for any god. Whether it exists or not. See above and then take it up with Fractal. Let me know when you guys have it sorted out.

 

[Nixbits]

It’s a shame that e_c has decided to leave the thread. I wanted to continue our discussion about the three 'omni’s. Hey ho.

In particular, I wanted to respond to this:

e_c:

The best “definition” of God that we can provide is “esse ipsum subsistens,” in English, “being itself subsisting.” More simply put, God is Being. Anything that is “in being” must be bound up with God, Who is Being. Does this help?

This doesn’t help me. Does anyone else find it illuminating? It suggests that God is ‘existence’ itself. But the concept of ‘God’ carries with it a load of other connotations. The two concepts are simply not synonymous. It certainly does nothing to shed any light on God’s purported omnipotence or omniscience, as far as I can see. It sounds like a deepity to me.

 

[Solmyr]

This doesn’t help me. Does anyone else find it illuminating?

It is not illuminating for me. It is just an attempt to create a “definition” which says: “this entity exists”, as if it would be possible to create something by defining it into existence.

A (not very) hypothetical conversation:

Skeptic: “Can you prove that God exists”?
Apologist: “God exists by definition! It is the fundamental property of God, that he exists! God exists necessarily. It is impossible for God NOT to exist”.
Skeptic: “Is this your proof?”
Apologist: “Don’t you understand? If God did not exist, he would not be God, would he?”
Skeptic presents arguments against God.
Apologist: “But those arguments are just a caricature of God. I don’t believe in YOUR distorted version of God either”.
Skeptic baffled.
Apologist adds: “Of course you don’t even understand what I said. Read X, Y, Z’s books and blogs (several hundred pages each) and then you will understand what I am talking about”.
Skeptic: offers a conversation, where the apologist can use his OWN words.
Apologist: “Bah, I am not going to waste time on you!” and walks away indignantly.

And then the apologist is surprised that he is not taken seriously any more.

It suggests that God is ‘existence’ itself. But the concept of ‘God’ carries with it a load of other connotations. The two concepts are simply not synonymous. It certainly does nothing to shed any light on God’s purported omnipotence or omniscience, as far as I can see. It sounds like a deepity to me.

I would like to see a rigorous definition of these omnimax attributes.

It is also funny that the apologist keeps flip-flopping between the “god” of philosophers and the “God” of Christianity - as if they would be interchangable.

 

[Charlemagne_III]

It is also funny that the apologist keeps flip-flopping between the “god” of philosophers and the “God” of Christianity - as if they would be interchangable.

The god of philosophy is a mere shadow of the God of Christianity.

Some of the Christian’s God’s traits are barely glimpsed through natural theology (a branch of philosophy). But certainly only the skeleton of the Christian God can be approached by unaided reason.

By the same token, the atheist cannot begin to find the Christian God without also annihilating the God of natural theology.

Where natural theology finds a first cause and an intelligent designer (because it looks like there was a first cause and an intelligent designer) the atheist has to assert that the First Cause and the Intelligent Designer must be displaced by a Multiverse of possibilities that discard the need for either a First Cause or a Designer.

Unfortunately for the atheist, there is nothing in this universe that looks like it was the baby of another universe. But if it was the baby, it looks like the parent universe was its first cause and intelligent designer. Do universes have babies and intelligently design them (fine tune them) for the maximum product possible?

Do you see how this begins to approach the discussion of how many angels can sit on the head of a pin?

Imagination runs wild here, because reason cannot be tamed by the realities we know.

 

[Solmyr]

The god of philosophy is a mere shadow of the God of Christianity.

Some of the Christian’s God’s traits are barely glimpsed through natural theology (a branch of philosophy). But certainly only the skeleton of the Christian God can be approached by unaided reason.

According to the catechism, the EXISTENCE of God (and the catechism obviously speaks of the God of Christianity) can be ascertained by using reason only. The trouble is that the catechism does not go into the details.

Where natural theology finds a first cause and an intelligent designer (because it looks like there was a first cause and an intelligent designer)…

The operating word is “looks like”. Just because something “looks like” it is not evidence, much less convincing evidence. If there would be a designer, the last adjective one would use is “intelligent”.

…the atheist has to assert that the First Cause and the Intelligent Designer must be displaced by a Multiverse of possibilities that discard the need for either a First Cause or a Designer.

Nope. “The” atheist is under no such obligation. The “multiverse” is an unsubstantiated and therefore “empty speculation”, just like the “god” of natural theology. It might be a good candidate for a novel, but it cannot be accepted as a serious proposition - even if there are some people who propose it.

 

[Charlemagne_III]

Nope. “The” atheist is under no such obligation. The “multiverse” is an unsubstantiated and therefore “empty speculation”, just like the “god” of natural theology. It might be a good candidate for a novel, but it cannot be accepted as a serious proposition - even if there are some people who propose it.

I agree that the atheist isn’t obliged to assert Multiverse, but my reading of the literature of most atheist cosmologists is that they are very open to the Multiverse because they see no other way of escaping the implications of the Big Bang and cosmic fine tuning.

David Berlinski does a fine job of making this point in his really interesting book, The Devil’s Delusion : Atheism and It’s Scientific Pretensions.

 

[Solmyr]

I agree that the atheist isn’t obliged to assert Multiverse, but my reading of the literature of most atheist cosmologists is that they are very open to the Multiverse because they see no other way of escaping the implications of the Big Bang and cosmic fine tuning.

David Berlinski does a fine job of making this point in his really interesting book, The Devil’s Delusion : Atheism and It’s Scientific Pretensions.

Gotta love this “precision” of “most atheist cosmologists”. Percentages? Names? Statistics? There is no “fine tuning argument”, so there is no need to “escape it”.

Of course to try to argue based upon some ill-defined and hazy statistics can only work for those people who subscribe to the “ad populum fallacy”.

 

[Charlemagne_III]

Of course to try to argue based upon some ill-defined and hazy statistics can only work for those people who subscribe to the “ad populum fallacy”.

No, that’s the strategy of atheists who use the scientific establishment as a club to beat down the Intelligent Design advocates.

 

[Charlemagne_III]

The operating word is “looks like”. Just because something “looks like” it is not evidence, much less convincing evidence. If there would be a designer, the last adjective one would use is “intelligent”.

“Looks like” can be deceptive. But it can also be correct.

In either case, the thing to do is research and find out if the “looks like” is definitely real or deceptive. There is of course no way to prove that the world is not intelligently designed. It certainly does not look that way. So why not go with appearances rather than try to hypothesize our way out of them with a phony Multiverse?

If it “looks-like” to you that the world is not intelligently designed, would you explain why I should prefer your view to the view of Isaac Newton and Albert Einstein?

“This most beautiful system of the sun, planets, and comets, could only proceed from the counsel and dominion of an intelligent Being.” Isaac Newton

“I’m not an atheist and I don’t think I can call myself a pantheist. We are in the position of a little child entering a huge library filled with books in many languages. The child knows someone must have written those books. It does not know how. It does not understand the languages in which they are written. The child dimly suspects a mysterious order in the arrangements of the books, but doesn’t know what it is. That, it seems to me, is the attitude of even the most intelligent human being toward God.” Albert Einstein

 

[Nixbits]

Charlemagne, do you get paid each time you use this same partial quote from Einstein? You seem peculiarly fond of it.

 

[Bradski]

Charlemagne, do you get paid each time you use this same partial quote from Einstein? You seem peculiarly fond of it.

He has it on the keyboard equivalent of speed dial. I keep telling him that people gave up reading it ages ago (and if they are like me, skip the post entirely), but…

 

[Solmyr]

There is of course no way to prove that the world is not intelligently designed.

Just like there is no way to “prove” that there is NO magical, invisible, seven-headed, fire breathing dragon in your basement. This double negative of “you CANNOT prove that there is NO… whatever, and therefore it is a legitimate hypothesis” is getting very boring.

Only in a formal, axiomatic system (like math) can you PROVE a universal negative. But this has been presented zillions of time to you, and you still don’t SEEM to get it. So I will go by the appearance, and hypothesize that you DON’T get it.

It certainly does not look that way.

It has order, but order does not imply “design”. The apologists try to argue both sides of the coin. On one hand they say: “Look, there is a miracle! Surely that proves God’s existence”. On the other hand they point to the order in the universe and they argue: “Look, there is NO miracle! Surely that proves God’s existence.”

Sorry, you can’t have you cake and eat it, too.

 

[Solmyr]

He has it on the keyboard equivalent of speed dial. I keep telling him that people gave up reading it ages ago (and if they are like me, skip the post entirely), but…

Both he and tony and the GIF-queen. I suspect that they have a special file with those “arguments”, and they simply copy and paste them, even when they are not applicable. But they are “excellent” FILLERS (this comes from the computer language COBOL). Why argue, when you can have slogans?

 

[Charlemagne_III]

Charlemagne, do you get paid each time you use this same partial quote from Einstein? You seem peculiarly fond of it.

I just find it an irritable reminder for you folks that you have no real answer to an intelligently designed universe.

So if you would answer Einstein instead of carping about how often I use him, that would be nice!

 

[Charlemagne_III]

He has it on the keyboard equivalent of speed dial. I keep telling him that people gave up reading it ages ago (and if they are like me, skip the post entirely), but…

Like Nixbits, you have no way to refute Einstein.

Man up and do it or stop carping?

 

[Charlemagne_III]

It has order, but order does not imply “design”. The apologists try to argue both sides of the coin. On one hand they say: “Look, there is a miracle! Surely that proves God’s existence”. On the other hand they point to the order in the universe and they argue: “Look, there is NO miracle! Surely that proves God’s existence.”

Sorry, you can’t have you cake and eat it, too.

Yes we can. The whole universe and all its natural laws are the result of a miracle … the Creation.

 

[Charlemagne_III]

Just like there is no way to “prove” that there is NO magical, invisible, seven-headed, fire breathing dragon in your basement. This double negative of “you CANNOT prove that there is NO… whatever, and therefore it is a legitimate hypothesis” is getting very boring.

Again, boring because you are powerless to refute it?

When you are ready to assert the existence of that “magical, invisible, seven-headed, fire breathing dragon” in my basement, we can begin the debate.

You might, for example, discuss what purpose the creature serves. Did it create the universe? Does it care about us? Is it out to get us? Have at it!

Until then, your analogy goes nowhere and might be the most boring post in the CA universe.

 

[Charlemagne_III]

Both he and tony and the GIF-queen. I suspect that they have a special file with those “arguments”, and they simply copy and paste them, even when they are not applicable. But they are “excellent” FILLERS (this comes from the computer language COBOL). Why argue, when you can have slogans?

People repeat quotations all the time in order to remind others of what they are missing, especially when they seem determined to miss it.

By the way, when you get to a quote you have seen umpteen times, it takes little effort to sigh and pass over it. But there may be others in the forum who are new and seeing it for the first time. Think of how immensely they might profit from the quote even if you can’t.

 

[Solmyr]

Yes we can. The whole universe and all its natural laws are the result of a miracle … the Creation.

So there is nothing “natural”, everything is created. Why should anyone bother to investigate the nonexistent laws of nature? All you have to say: “Hey, it is a miracle! Goddidit. Somehow…” Fortunately no scientist - not even the religious ones would accept that as a starting point.

When you are ready to assert the existence of that “magical, invisible, seven-headed, fire breathing dragon” in my basement, we can begin the debate.

I never asserted that. YOU are the one who asserts the existence of that “dragon”, or its analogical equivalent, God. And it is YOUR argument that it is rational, because it cannot be refuted.

YOU are the one who presents a generic argumentation method, which is this: “if you cannot refute it, it is a legitimate hypothesis”. Don’t you get how ridiculous it is? No, I guess, not…