The Student Room Group

Another god paradox.

Maybe you've all heard this one before but a friend reminded me of it tonight and I wanted to post it here to see what others think who may or may not have heard it.

A) If god is omnipotent then he must be able to lift any object.

B) If god is omnipotent then he must be able to create an object which he cannot lift.

Which means that it's impossible for god to be omnipotent.

/discuss.
Reply 1
This is just a lengthened version of the "can God create a stone he cannot lift?" paradox.
Do you even lift?
Original post by CJKay
This is just a lengthened version of the "can God create a stone he cannot lift?" paradox.


Yeah I don't actually know the original paradox but yeh it's basically that.
B) If god is omnipotent then he must be able to create an object which he cannot lift.

This basically says that if someone is x then they must be able to create a situation where they are not x.
And, of course, if God wishes to temporarily stop himself from being able to lift a stone- regardless of that stone's weight, God can.

So there's actually no contradiction even though people think that there is. It's just that people choose to imply that it must be something to do with the stone that stops God from lifting it rather than something to do with the level of power that God has decided to grant to himself on this occasion. His aim was to create a stone that he can't lift. He can't be called a failure when he succeeds in that task. The aim was never to lift the stone. His strength remains intact in the fact that he can choose how infinitely weak or infinitely strong he is.
(edited 9 years ago)
Reply 5
What you've stated is a version of the Paradox of the Stone which asks if God can create a stone which he cannot lift.

Original post by Nogoodsorgods
B) If god is omnipotent then he must be able to create an object which he cannot lift.

This basically says that if someone is x then they must be able to create a situation where they are not x.
And, of course, if God wishes to temporarily stop himself from being able to lift a stone- regardless of that stone's weight, God can.

So there's actually no contradiction even though people think that there is. It's just that people choose to imply that it must be something to do with the stone that stops God from lifting it rather than something to do with the level of power that God has decided to grant to himself on this occasion. His aim was to create a stone that he can't lift. He can't be called a failure when he succeeds in that task. The aim was never to lift the stone. His strength remains intact in the fact that he can choose how infinitely weak or infinitely strong he is.

The thing is your argument seems to work within the frame that God is omnipotent, but if you push your frame towards the moment where God has made himself temporarily unable to lift such a stone/object, then God ceases to be omnipotent.

The Paradox of the Stone lays out two paths. Either God can create a stone which he cannot lift (which is the route you took), or God cannot create a stone which he cannot lift. Either way you get to the conclusion that God cannot do at least one thing, thus he isn't omnipotent.
its just a matter of semantics

what makes you think that god has to conform to any logic that we set out for him?
Reply 7
Original post by Arithmeticae
its just a matter of semantics

what makes you think that god has to conform to any logic that we set out for him?

Could you clarify what you mean by saying it's just semantics? I'm pretty sure you could just generalise anything by saying "It's just semantics", which would be problematic considering how much of our knowledge of our world is known through the medium of language.

Whilst I agree that God may be out of our understanding, I think the God that we're talking about here is the classical concept of God as seen by the West, thus we really want this God to be as "personal" as possible. If God is out of our understanding then he must cease to be personal which also causes a problem.
Original post by 0x2a
What you've stated is a version of the Paradox of the Stone which asks if God can create a stone which he cannot lift.


The thing is your argument seems to work within the frame that God is omnipotent, but if you push your frame towards the moment where God has made himself temporarily unable to lift such a stone/object, then God ceases to be omnipotent.


OK- how about God chooses to get himself out of the paradox like a driver in a car would by trying to start it in 5th gear instead of 1st gear.
The driver is technically omnipotent to drive that car but he's chosen to do something that would enable him not to put that omnipotence in to practice. Being all powerful is not the same as wanting to put that power in to practice.
Reply 9
Original post by Nogoodsorgods
OK- how about God chooses to get himself out of the paradox like a driver in a car would by trying to start it in 5th gear instead of 1st gear.
The driver is technically omnipotent to drive that car but he's chosen to do something that would enable him not to put that omnipotence in to practice. Being all powerful is not the same as wanting to put that power in to practice.

I agree with your conclusion, but that's not what we're talking about here. The essence of the problem is that God CANNOT do it. It's not that God doesn't want to, God simply can't.

You can't simply wiggle your way out of a problem by saying you won't confront it. For example you might never have to solve the hardest philosophical problem, but that doesn't be the hardest philosophical problem doesn't exist at all.
(edited 9 years ago)
It's not so much that God cannot create the object, it's that the object is logically nonsensical. Can God draw a square circle, for example? Can he make a 3-dimensional square? Well, "square circle" is nonsense, as is "3-dimensional square (of course, there's the cube, the 3-dimensional analogue, but it's a cube, not a 3-D square), because squares are defined to be 2-dimensional, and circles are defined insofar that they cannot be square.

In the same way, "an object which God cannot lift" is nonsensical, because God - on account of his omnipotence - can lift all objects.

The real issue here is how you define omnipotence, and whether you include, in that definition, the ability to make and do things which make no logical sense.
(edited 9 years ago)
Original post by Nogoodsorgods
B) If god is omnipotent then he must be able to create an object which he cannot lift.This basically says that if someone is x then they must be able to create a situation where they are not x.And, of course, if God wishes to temporarily stop himself from being able to lift a stone- regardless of that stone's weight, God can.So there's actually no contradiction even though people think that there is. It's just that people choose to imply that it must be something to do with the stone that stops God from lifting it rather than something to do with the level of power that God has decided to grant to himself on this occasion. His aim was to create a stone that he can't lift. He can't be called a failure when he succeeds in that task. The aim was never to lift the stone. His strength remains intact in the fact that he can choose how infinitely weak or infinitely strong he is.
I understand what you are saying, however he still can't lift said rock, so is now not omnipotent.
Original post by StrangeBanana
It's not so much that God cannot create the object, it's that the object is logically nonsensical. Can God draw a square circle, for example? Can he make a 3-dimensional square? Well, "square circle" is nonsense, as is "3-dimensional square (of course, there's the cube, the 3-dimensional analogue, but it's a cube, not a 3-D square), because squares are defined to be 2-dimensional, and circles are defined insofar that they cannot be square.

In the same way, "an object which God cannot lift" is nonsensical, because God - on account of his omnipotence - can lift all objects.

The real issue here is how you define omnipotence, and whether you include, in that definition, the ability to make and do things which make no logical sense.


Just because it makes no logical sense to us doesn't mean it doesn't make sense. The concept of God doesn't really make sense.
Reply 13
Original post by KeepYourChinUp
Maybe you've all heard this one before but a friend reminded me of it tonight and I wanted to post it here to see what others think who may or may not have heard it.

A) If god is omnipotent then he must be able to lift any object.

B) If god is omnipotent then he must be able to create an object which he cannot lift.

Which means that it's impossible for god to be omnipotent.

/discuss.


I forget which Simpsons characters these were but:

"Can Bod microwave a burrito so hot that even He could not eat it?"

Is a variant on the theme, and my personal favourite:

"Could God create an argument so circular that not even He could not follow it?"

pretty much sums up why atheists are atheists.
Reply 14
Original post by StrangeBanana


The real issue here is how you define omnipotence, and whether you include, in that definition, the ability to make and do things which make no logical sense.


Agreed. That said, I'd rather logical laws were, y'know, logically impossible to break. And I'm pretty sure the evidence would agree with that suggestion.

On the topic of believing in a God which you cannot properly define, sincerely believe to be incomprehensible (in the strict sense) and that is allowed to break logical laws... why? Why God why?
Original post by cheeriosarenice
Just because it makes no logical sense to us doesn't mean it doesn't make sense. The concept of God doesn't really make sense.


Yes, it does. A rock that is simultaneously lift-able and non-lift-able makes no sense; there's no two ways about it. The concept of God is not logically nonsensical; the object or rock the paradox constructs is.
(edited 9 years ago)

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