God and his omniscience.

[Random Man]

I've been thinking about this on and off, and it's sort of been bothering me. Before I begin, sorry if my thoughts seem scrambled or whatnot. I'll try to have it flow neatly, but no promises. I don't always word everything the best way I can but hopefully you understand what I'm trying to get at.

God (in the Christian sense) is said to be omniscient, omnipotent, etc. I've seen a bunch of arguments saying that omniscience and omnipotence are contradictory because how can one know everything that will happen but still be able to change that. One response to this was that God sort of has everything laid out. So he doesn't see everything as it's happening right now, he sees what and how it happened.

The way I understand this is sort of like random.org. Say (for sake of argument; I'm not sure if it's true) one person created the website. He coded the number generator to generate a number randomly. When he clicks generate, he gets some number (end result).
Basically, that's how I see omniscience. God "coded" the universe, pressed generate, and sees the end result.

Maybe I'm interpreting it wrong which is why I'm posting this here for discussion.


What I'm trying to conclude from my interpretation is that God still can't be both omniscient and omnipotent, since how can he interfere with the end result? You can't change the number the number generator generated, so he can't change the way the universe turned out.


P.S. I'm an atheist. I just want some insight.

 

Well, we don't really have to go that far, in my opinion. Because if you look at omnipotence paradoxes it seems it isn't logical to be omnipotent or all-powerful at all.

Example 1: Can God create a mountain he cannot lift? If yes, then his power is limited and he has a weakness. If no, then there is a task the being cannot perform.

Example 2: Can God create a triangle on a flat surface whose angles do not add up to 180 degrees? A shape like this cannot exist in our known Universe; thus God is limited by mathematics and cannot be all-powerful.

And so on.

 

[Random Man]

Well, we don't really have to go that far, in my opinion. Because if you look at omnipotence paradoxes it seems it isn't logical to be omnipotent or all-powerful at all.

Example 1: Can God create a mountain he cannot lift? If yes, then his power is limited and he has a weakness. If no, then there is a task the being cannot perform.

Example 2: Can God create a triangle on a flat surface whose angles do not add up to 180 degrees? A shape like this cannot exist in our known Universe; thus God is limited by mathematics and cannot be all-powerful.

And so on.

But then people will argue "Oh, God is still bound by logic." and whatnot, which is why I went this far.

 

[ilovegold69]

Besides the fact that you can't generate a random number with any everyday computer the questions you're asking are really kind of perpetual. It reminds me of a "what if" question in which there is honestly no correct answer because of the impossible criteria.

I understand you might just be doing this for the sake of theological argument but that subject is really tired in my opinion. There's no use making sense of it because all the arguments are out there and it is just arrogance in the way of acceptance at this point.

I'm getting really off topic here but in my opinion religion will be dead, or at least dying, in a century. That is assuming we don't devolve our society because of rapid consumption of resources.

 

[Random Man]

Besides the fact that you can't generate a random number with any everyday computer the questions you're asking are really kind of perpetual. It reminds me of a "what if" question in which there is honestly no correct answer because of the impossible criteria.

I understand you might just be doing this for the sake of theological argument but that subject is really tired in my opinion. There's no use making sense of it because all the arguments are out there and it is just arrogance in the way of acceptance at this point.

I'm getting really off topic here but in my opinion religion will be dead, or at least dying, in a century. That is assuming we don't devolve our society because of rapid consumption of resources.

Wasn't really the fact of the computer, it was more of the "write code -> generate randomness" I was trying to make an analogy of.

Anyways, I agree that religion will be dying (it is dying), but I don't think it will be dead for a while.

 

[Emperor Nero]

Religion is two things and Marx covered them both fairly. A drug that makes people feel good and self righteous and a controlling mechanism for masses of people.

 

[T V]

Well, we don't really have to go that far, in my opinion. Because if you look at omnipotence paradoxes it seems it isn't logical to be omnipotent or all-powerful at all.

Example 1: Can God create a mountain he cannot lift? If yes, then his power is limited and he has a weakness. If no, then there is a task the being cannot perform.

Example 2: Can God create a triangle on a flat surface whose angles do not add up to 180 degrees? A shape like this cannot exist in our known Universe; thus God is limited by mathematics and cannot be all-powerful.

And so on.

As my comparative religion professor put it, yes God can create those things, and yes He can transcend them.


That's the conflict between logic and divinity.

That is assuming we don't devolve our society because of rapid consumption of resources.

Or depletion of morality