All Powerful?

LOL.

It's funny, because advocates of the Design Argument, who propose that there must be a God, because everything is designed perfectly such as humanity, animals, etc.

Someone mentioned that the human eye is a perfect example of this. This person proposed that since God is "all-powerful", he created the human eye perfectly because it fulfills a certain function....its made to see!

Then again!

If this God was "all-powerful", then why are people sometimes born with severe dementia, augmentism, short-sightedness, or even blindness in the eye. This is hardly the work of an "all-powerful" creator..

Ush> from where I’m sitting there’s something wrong with the statement: “the definition of 'all-powerful' is that of a person who can do ALL the things that are on the list of being possible.”

You have put a limitation of “All-powerful” in there – simply by saying “list of being possible.” What is MEANT by possible when it comes to some omnipotent divine being?
The all-powerful should not be limited by what humans can conceive of. So it should be possible for this being to create a person with two and four arms, at the same time. Heck, even quantum mechanics can do its version of that – a quantum coin can be both heads and tails at the same time.

Omnipotent is a self-contradiction as Lil Bitchiness says. Unless, of course, we assume that it is impossible to create a stone so heavy this being cannot lift, and still be able to lift it – but the divine can DO the impossible as well.
OR – you could ask: What would be the heaviest stone imaginable? A stone that weighs an infinite amount of kilograms.
Our omnipotent being CAN – of course – lift an infinite amount of weight. So lets add a kilogram more. Infinite mass+1 kilogram= still infinite mass.
So… 🙂

(I love math)

😑

I think I agree with Omega.

If this being is 'all-powerful' (for want of a better word), then surely they can do the impossible, lift the unliftable. Regardless of mass, because mass is a limit. Even when that limit is infinite.

Ush said that the being can only do what is on the 'list' of being possible. Who decides what is on that 'list'?

Syren> Actually... My above musings means that this being CANNOT create something so heavy it can't lift it.

If the heaviest object is infinite kilograms, there is nothing heavier. (But should such a being CREATE this stone, the Universe would collapse. This stone would act as a black hole without any horizons or anything.)

Ehrm... I managed to confuse myself completely now...

Aren't the space singularities in Black Holes thought to have infinite density?

maybe

Shaber> That’s what it looks like without the quantum theory for gravity. Fortunately we’re protected by event horizons and stuff.

horizon as in the magazine the Lutheran churches here in Norway bugged us with during our communion/confirmation 😠 😠 I received that crap for years 😠

Finti> 😆 I doubt a religious magazine could protect anyone from a black hole singularity!

Maybe you could wedge it in there.

doubt a religious magazine could protect anyone from a black hole singularity!

The age old stone question instantly creates a paradox. If God is indeed able to create a stone heavy enough that he could not lift it, it would as in the film Dogma, create a major paradox, that could prove God imperfect and fallible since it would seem even he has limitations. And if this is true, he wouldn't be all powerful and omnipotent now wouldn't he?? It's best not to ponder questions like these concocted by feeble mortal intellects and try to apply our limited knowledge to a being that is infinitely beyond anything we could ever imagine.

try to apply our limited knowledge to a being that is infinitely beyond anything we could ever imagine.

Bah I say! Trick question, but I'll put in my 2 cents anyway.

This being could infact create a boulder that he himself could not lift, what would make him omnipotent, would be that he could create a third party that WOULD be able to lift the boulder. Just like humans use a lever and pulley to lift really heavy crap.

them ush that's deep