the "can good do this, such that he can't do it anymore" bit

I think today's as good a day as any to do so... is it possible that at some point God renounced his omnipotence? As an omnipotent being, he would certainly have the power to do so... but of course he might not be able to undo it afterward, being no longer omnipotent. Perhaps he painted himself into a corner that way.

Just a though. Most people say stuff like:

'Can God make a rock so heavy or something so hot, that God himself can no longer lift the rock or will burn himself trying'...

But I would say, no, because if it is too heavy/hot he can just make himself stronger or make his temperature tolerance higher.

However, this example puts him in a bind. Maybe he was sitting around one day, and decided to play around with his powers and see what else he could do.

On another note...I was watching 'Dr.Who', and Dr. Who had built a security system in a building that involved 3 inch steel walls built on every door/window/and wall.

The goal was to prevent people from ever getting inside to steal the precious item. The problem was, people were inside when it went off...including Dr. Who.

quote:Originally posted by Aeon:

I think today's as good a day as any to do so... is it possible that at some point God renounced his omnipotence? As an omnipotent being, he would certainly have the power to do so... but of course he might not be able to undo it afterward, being no longer omnipotent. Perhaps he painted himself into a corner that way.

Just a though. Most people say stuff like:

'Can God make a rock so heavy or something so hot, that God himself can no longer lift the rock or will burn himself trying'...

But I would say, no, because if it is too heavy/hot he can just make himself stronger or make his temperature tolerance higher.

However, this example puts him in a bind. Maybe he was sitting around one day, and decided to play around with his powers and see what else he could do.

On another note...I was watching 'dr.who', and Dr. Who had built a security system in a building that involved 3 inch steel walls built on every door/window/and wall.

The goal was to prevent people from ever getting inside to steal the precious item. The problem was, people were inside when it went off...including Dr. Who.

How did you see Dr. Who??? I haven't seen Dr. Who since, like, 1983...

[Sephiroth]

There's a new series on Sci-Fi...the old one is still played occasionally on PBS.

[Sephiroth]

Omnipotence has its own natural limits. God can't contradict his own nature, he can't lie without unmaking the universe, he can't create a rock bigger than he can lift, et cetera. The word used to denote God's omnipotence in the Bible (Shaddai), actually means something closer to "all-sufficing" (from the roots Shaddu and Shad). "Omnipotent" has certain linguistic consequences that reach logical boundries (if God lifts the rock, he's just ceded his ability to create a rock 'bigger than he can lift') and make the word a rather clumsy invention. In any case, the All-Sufficing God is good enough for me.

quote:Originally posted by Sephiroth:

Omnipotence has its own natural limits.

I disagree. The very definition of omnipotent is having unlimited power.(i.e. NO LIMITS!). So if god were to have limits on his power, he would then not be omnipotent. These logical problems are what make omnipotence self-contradictory, and present a hard-pressed case for the fundamentalists. To further the argument, if he is limited, how do we know exactly what he can and can't do? Maybe he has enough power to create, but not enough power to control? We can never know, and this too presents a problem.

However, back to the original post, if god was omnipotent, he could renounce his own omnipotence, and therefore make his power limited. The only problem is that he would have to define what powers he then did and did not have. If he retained the power to make himself omnipotent again, then really he never was limited and could just simply revert back. On the other hand, if he did not retain that power, then from that point on he could no longer consider himself omnipotent, as he has limits (even though he could still do everything else, which basically just pokes another hole into the idea of omnipotence in the same way the boulder argument works).

Hmm, this has been a quite enticing thought experiment.