[lit-ideas] Re: TUESDAY'S FORCAST
- From: Donal McEvoy <donalmcevoyuk@xxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Wed, 29 Jul 2009 21:59:25 +0000 (GMT)
--- On Wed, 29/7/09, Walter C. Okshevsky <wokshevs@xxxxxx> wrote:
> Hmmm ... Does an omniscient and omnipotent "being" really
> have reasons?
> Rendering this thought in transcendental locution: Is it
> *possible* for a
> "being" answering to this description to have reasons?
> (That we mere mortals
> often do attribute reasons and intentionality to god is not
> in question.)
As mentioned some years ago, the notions of all-knowing and all-powerful are at
odds with each other and in themselves paradoxical:
at odds because if God knows all then S/He must know what is to come, but if
this is known then God cannot be empowered to change what is to come because
the capacity to change it would mean it cannot be known in advance;
paradoxical because if God is all-powerful then God must have the power to do
something that even God is powerless to undo, in which case God is not all
powerful; and if God does not have the power to do something God cannot undo,
then God is also not all powerful;
paradoxical because if God is all-knowing then God must know all about God, but
if God knew all about God then S/He...actually I haven't thought this one
through.
Donal
If God cannot have reasons then S/He is not all-powerful, since S/He lacks the
capacity or power to have reasons. So there.
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