Is God Completely Omniscient?

[JDaniel]

I suppose that depends on how one defines omniscience. If we define the holy attribute as knowing all that is possible to know, then I don’t see how God can have omniscience. Please tell me: Is experience knowledge?

Spockrates:

How is it possible that an infinite being (inclusive of everything, everywhere and every when) could have missed any possible reaction to human experience? “Experience” that is past, becomes knowledge. But, remember, God’s view of things is incredibly shorter than even our two-hour movie view of the history of Rome! Once we’ve seen the movie, all that took place during the movie is now “knowledge.”

God bless,
jd

 

[JDaniel]

I hope you won’t be offended by my asking this: Does God know what the pleasure of sexual intercourse feels like? (I won’t get any more explicit than that, but the question needs to be asked.)

Spockrates:

He is the stuff of all materiality; how could He not? But, as I said, your example is an anthropomorphism. You may think that it is the ultimate pleasure, while God’s concept of memorializable pleasure more than likely infinitely exceeds it.

God bless,
jd

 

[JDaniel]

Yes, God can observe the sexual pleasure a husband and wife share. But is that the same as having the same experience himself? Consider this: Jimi Hendrix sang, “Have you ever been experienced? Well, I have.” So are you thinking God would know what what the experience Hendrix had experienced felt like, even though God had never had the same experience himself?

Spockrates:

Your question is a good one. But, we don’t really know for sure if we experience it! Material interaction may be nothing more than what God implants in our minds. Your dilemma postulation presumes that we are absolutely separate beings from God. If God is truly infinite - in all ways - how, then, are we completely separate? When we are dead, how does any infinitesimal instant of our futurum exactum persist as futurum exactum?

God bless,
jd

 

[JDaniel]

Does anyone disagree that God has not been completely experienced, and so there are some things we know, which he never will?

Spockrates:

I’ll be your Huckleberry. Look, we consist of point particles immersed in Infinite Space - which we may think of as God’s Mind. Experience is nothing more than the memory of a single reconfiguration of the point particles that are each of us, or a series of reconfigurations of “our” point particles. That’s all.

Remember, St. Thomas believes that as everythings cause, the Infinite Cause must contain all of the determinants of the effect(s). So that our minds and our memories are contained, in the mind of the Creator and First Cause.

God bless,
jd

 

[Shike]

Spocrates:

I believe, and I’m pretty sure the Church agrees, that God causes everything. The only things God does not cause is our intentions.

It seems like there are some important distinctions to be made. Sure, since God is the sustaining cause of all that is, everything insofar as it exists, is caused by God.

In the case of sinful actions not only are we concerned with a different kind of cause, the kind of cause that involves intentions, motives, and ultimately guilt, but there’s something about them that take away existence. Disorder and perversion take away from a thing’s perfection and so there is less for God to sustain.

Spockrates. I really hope you are a different poster than the previous, RIP, Spock.

 

[davidv]

Do you know what pain feels like, David?

Not until I experience it. The experience of pain is a feeling. Feelings are not knowledge. Until the intellect processes the feeling, there is no knowledge.

 

[JDaniel]

It seems like there are some important distinctions to be made. Sure, since God is the sustaining cause of all that is, everything insofar as it exists, is caused by God.

Shike:

Read this. Then we’ll discuss it.

God bless,
jd

 

[Marc_Anthony]

You might be right, but I’d like to think this through with you. If experience is not knowledge, then please tell me: What is it?

I’m not really sure what you mean by this. To me it’s like saying, “If sight is not knowledge, what is it?” Sight is sight. What we see is what brings us the knowledge, not the physical ability TO see.

So what is experience? It’s not really anything but experience. It’s distinct from knowledge and everything else-it’s its own thing.

I can’t really “say” what it is except by example. Losing a loved one is an experience, but the knowledge of what grief feels like is not the same as the actual experience of losing the loved one.

As an example-imagine that you are totally emotionless. You lose a loved one (love is not an emotion but an act of will), but you feel absolutely no grief at the loved one’s death. You’ve just experienced the death of the loved one without having any knowledge of what grief feels like. The two are connected, but they ARE different things.

 

[spockrates]

Spocrates:

I believe, and I’m pretty sure the Church agrees, that God causes everything. The only things God does not cause is our intentions. Sin is in human intent. Physical acts are simply natural, physical acts or events, and as such, possess nothing that could seriously be called, good or evil. Only our intentions possess such ethics.

“Temptation” is nothing more than materiality: consisting of both act and potency, It requires an agent to consummate any evil. The agent becomes the efficient cause and his intentions, the final cause. E.g., jewelry is nothing more than materiality. By my over-ardent desire to possess it and my design to obtain it, I supply the ethic.

But, don’t trust me, run this by a Priest.

God bless,
jd

Yes, I agree that God does not cause our intentions. So we agree God does not cause everything.

 

[spockrates]

Spockrates:

I can think of many, but here’s just two: (1) God is not Simple (rather, He is complex) and, (2) God is less than, or merely equal to His creation(s).

God bless,
jd

I agree with (1), but don’t know why it’s illogical. Not sure I agree with (2). Please tell me why you believe it’s true.

 

[spockrates]

Spockrates:

I think your example is an anthropomorphism. Along those lines you could say, “God has never had to recover from a fever.”

God’s knowledge of Himself as well as of all changeable reality is a single act of understanding. In light of this, I think God is completely experienced.

God bless,
jd

I forgot to thank you for your replies, JD.



My wife once told me having a kidney stone hurt worse than giving birth to our two sons. I wouldn’t know. For I’ve never had either experience. How would Jesus know, since he also has never had either experience?

You see, I’m defining pain as that which can only be truly known by experiencing it. If God can know my wife’s pain (not just know of it, but know how it feels) then he must somehow know the experience of it, I think. Are you thinking differently? If so, please let me ask you this: If my definition of pain is wrong, then what is pain?

 

[spockrates]

Spockrates:

How is it possible that an infinite being (inclusive of everything, everywhere and every when) could have missed any possible reaction to human experience? “Experience” that is past, becomes knowledge. But, remember, God’s view of things is incredibly shorter than even our two-hour movie view of the history of Rome! Once we’ve seen the movie, all that took place during the movie is now “knowledge.”

God bless,
jd

I agree that God obseves all. I don’t yet agree God experiences all. I observed the pain my wife felt when giving birth and passing kidney stones. I still don’t KNOW what that feels like. But please tell me: How do you know God knows what that feels like? Is this conclusion based on your understanding of what omniscience is, based on a teaching of the Church, or scripture? Or do you have another reason why you surely know what God alone knows?

You see, you’ve told me what you believe. Now I’m wondering why you believe. For I won’t know whether what you believe is true till I consider why you believe, too.

 

[spockrates]

Spockrates:

Your question is a good one. But, we don’t really know for sure if we experience it! Material interaction may be nothing more than what God implants in our minds. Your dilemma postulation presumes that we are absolutely separate beings from God. If God is truly infinite - in all ways - how, then, are we completely separate? When we are dead, how does any infinitesimal instant of our futurum exactum persist as futurum exactum?

God bless,
jd

(Please Note: This uploaded content is no longer available.)

If God is not infinitely evil, then how can he be infinite in ALL ways?

 

[spockrates]

It seems like there are some important distinctions to be made. Sure, since God is the sustaining cause of all that is, everything insofar as it exists, is caused by God.

In the case of sinful actions not only are we concerned with a different kind of cause, the kind of cause that involves intentions, motives, and ultimately guilt, but there’s something about them that take away existence. Disorder and perversion take away from a thing’s perfection and so there is less for God to sustain.

Spockrates. I really hope you are a different poster than the previous, RIP, Spock.

Did this other user make use of the Socratic Method, too?

 

[spockrates]

Not until I experience it. The experience of pain is a feeling. Feelings are not knowledge. Until the intellect processes the feeling, there is no knowledge.

David, I appreciate the reply, but I’m not sure what you mean. Are you saying perception is not knowledge? That is, what I see, hear, smell, taste and touch (or otherwise feel) is not what I know?

 

[spockrates]

I’m not really sure what you mean by this. To me it’s like saying, “If sight is not knowledge, what is it?” Sight is sight. What we see is what brings us the knowledge, not the physical ability TO see.

So what is experience? It’s not really anything but experience. It’s distinct from knowledge and everything else-it’s its own thing.

I can’t really “say” what it is except by example. Losing a loved one is an experience, but the knowledge of what grief feels like is not the same as the actual experience of losing the loved one.

As an example-imagine that you are totally emotionless. You lose a loved one (love is not an emotion but an act of will), but you feel absolutely no grief at the loved one’s death. You’ve just experienced the death of the loved one without having any knowledge of what grief feels like. The two are connected, but they ARE different things.

Thank you for the reply, Marc. Yes, I think I see what you mean. What I see, hear, smell, taste, touch (or otherwise feel) is what I percieve with my senses. Would you agree that these sensual experiences are unknowable, or can they be known? If they can be known, then how do you and I know them, except through experience?

An example: When my firstborn son was just an infant, my wife fed him brussell sprouts from a baby food jar. He was excited with anticipation of tasting something good, until it touched his tongue. He then made the most adorable look of displeasure that made my wife and I laugh. I’m thinking there was no way my son could know the taste of brussell sprouts until he had the experience of tasting them. What are you thinking?

This experience reminds me of the scripture:

Taste and see that the Lord is good;
blessed is the man who takes refuge in him.

(Psalm 34:8)

The analogy seems to me to be this: Just as one cannot know something tastes good without first tasting it, so too one cannot fully know how good God is without first experiencing him. Don’t you agree that things like these can only be fully known through experience?

 

[Shike]

David, I appreciate the reply, but I’m not sure what you mean. Are you saying perception is not knowledge? That is, what I see, hear, smell, taste and touch (or otherwise feel) is not what I know?

I am not davidv, but it seems apparent that the act of perception is different than the object of perception. You are equivocating the two. Once acts of perception and objects of perception are distinguished, your apparent argument disappears.

 

[Shike]

Thank you for the reply, Marc. Yes, I think I see what you mean. What I see, hear, smell, taste, touch (or otherwise feel) is what I percieve with my senses. Would you agree that these sensual experiences are unknowable, or can they be known? If they can be known, then how do you and I know them, except through experience?

Although I am not Marc…
Strictly speaking, experiences are knowable insofar as the object of perception is known. Also, if experience (the act of perception) is knowledge then it doesn’t fit the rational definition of knowledge that classical theism is concerned with. So if it is still insisted that experience is knowledge, a new thread should be made as it is talking past the OP.

Yes, you are correct that there do seem to be some things that we can only know through experience. But the ways of God are different than the ways of man. There is no reason to bind God to the same limitations of that as man, especially when there is no logical contradiction.

 

[Marc_Anthony]

The analogy seems to me to be this: Just as one cannot know something tastes good without first tasting it, so too one cannot fully know how good God is without first experiencing him. Don’t you agree that things like these can only be fully known through experience?

I agree that they can only be known by us, with our little, limited human minds, through experience. God, though-that’s a different matter.

 

[Marc_Anthony]

Yes, you are correct that there do seem to be some things that we can only know through experience. But the ways of God are different than the ways of man. There is no reason to bind God to the same limitations of that as man, especially when there is no logical contradiction.

Not only is there no reason to bind God as long as there is no logical contradiction, it falls squarely into the traditional definition of omniscience-to hold otherwise is to abandon omniscience and drift into heresy.