coherence of god EVALUATION Flashcards
1
Q
the paradox of the stone objection 1
A
- omnipotence includes the logically impossible, so god can make and move the immovable stone
- Descartes understands God’s omnipotence as including logically impossible tasks. If God can do anything, including things that are logically impossible, then God can both make a stone bigger than God can move AND God can move that stone
- logical laws do not apply to God.
- therefore, of the paradox of the stone argument is false according to this view as God can do both.
2
Q
the paradox of the stone counter-response 1.
A
- This is the wrong (and an absurd) way to think about omnipotence
- argue that Descartes’ claim that God can do logically impossible tasks is absurd.
- aquinas claims that God can do anything which is logically possible.
- if we were able to write a list of all the tasks or actions in the world, then ‘God is omnipotent’ means that God can do all of them. For Aquinas and Swinburne, logically impossible tasks like making square circles are not really tasks, so they would not be on that list. God cannot make a square circle but that doesn’t mean God is not omnipotent, as that is not a possible task.
- If we accept that Aquinas’ definition of omnipotence is correct, the paradox of the stone appears to be sound. Making a stone that you cannot move is logically possible, and being unable to make a stone you cannot move is also logically possible.
- So there will always be a logically possible task that God cannot do, which means that God is not omnipotent if omnipotence means that God can do all logically possible tasks.
3
Q
the paradox of the stone objection 2
A
- God could make the immovable stone, but so long as God does not, God remains omnipotent
- Swinburne claims that God could make a stone that God cannot move if God wanted to.
- If God did this God would no longer be omnipotent. However, as long as God doesn’t actually make this immovable stone, there will be no object God that cannot move.
- God is (currently) omnipotent because God could make a stone that God couldn’t move and (so long as God doesn’t actually make the stone) God can move everything that currently exists.
- The paradox of the stone is not successful for Swinburne then, because it is not the case that there is currently a logically possible task that God cannot do: there is a task that God could do if God wanted - make an unmovable stone.
- Until God actually decides to make that stone (at which point he would not be able to lift it, and so would no longer be omnipotent), there are no logically possible tasks that God cannot do.
4
Q
counter-response for the paradox of the stone 2
A
- A being that could stop being omnipotent is not God (God is necessarily omnipotent)
- Some have argued that a being that could make an immovable stone would not be God, because this is a being that could possibly stop being omnipotent. God, on the other hand, couldn’t possibly not be omnipotent.
- they say that when we say ‘god is omnipotent’, we mean that god has always been omnipotent, will always be omnipotent and couldn’t possibly not be omnipotent. (i.e. God is necessarily omnipotent)
- If you agree that God, in order to be God, must be necessarily omnipotent, then you will have to conclude that Swinburne’s objection to the argument fails because it suggests that God could stop being omnipotent mean that God was merely contingently omnipotent
- if God is necessarily omnipotent then God could not possibly make an immovable stone because God can’t stop being omnipotent. Therefore, we still have a task that God can’t do.
5
Q
the paradox of the stone objection 3
A
- it seems that with the definition of omnipotence as ‘can do all logically possible tasks’, the paradox of the stone succeeds. Making a stone that you can’t move, and being unable to make a stone that you can’t move, are both (it seems) logically possible states of affairs.
- ‘making a stone bigger than you can move’ is not logically possible if the word ‘you’ refers to ‘God’, and so the fact that God can’t do it doesn’t stop God being omnipotent in Aquinas’ sense.
- If ‘making a stone God can’t move’ is a logically impossible task, then it does not appear on the ‘list’ of tasks that need to be completed to make you omnipotent.
- Mavrodes has argued that we can draw a parallel between the two following descriptions of an action: a) X is able to draw a square circle and b) X is able to make a thing too heavy for X to lift’. We have seen that [according to Aquinas’ definition] it is no limitation on God’s power that he cannot do something that is logically impossible such as that indicated in a).
- At first blush, b) does not look like a) and, when applied to a human being, this is so: no human being can draw a square circle, but plenty of human beings could make something too heavy for them to lift.
- However, Mavrodes argues that, when applied to God, b) [X making something too heavy for X to lift], like a) [drawing a square circle], involves a self-contradiction - it is logically impossible. If he is right, then it is no limitation on God’s power that he cannot do b).
6
Q
the paradox of the stone counter-response 3
A
- Swinburne argues against Mavrodes’ solution by claiming that Mavrodes’ is ‘begging the question’.
- Richard Swinburne has argued that Mavrodes’s solution is no solution at all He thinks it begs the question. After all, the point of the problem of the stone is to show that the concept of omnipotence
- is incoherent: it cannot be shown to be coherent by assuming that God is omnipotent, for this just begs the question concerning whether or not it makes sense to suppose he is.
7
Q
everlasting
A
claim that God exists within time and so has existed at each moment of past time, exists now, and will exist at each moment of future time
8
Q
eternal
A
claim that God exists outside of time. God does not, on this view, exist today, tomorrow or yesterday. God just exists
9
Q
omniscience vs free will objection 1
A
- God is everlasting (within time), knows everything it is logically possible to know, and this does not include propositions about the future and our future actions
- So God knows all true propositions (i.e. is omniscient) even if God does not know what I’m going to do in the future. God can’t know this until I do it because there is no ‘truth’ about whether I will do it until the moment that I do it.
- At any given point in time God doesn’t know the future but this is not a limit on God’s omniscience because there are no true future propositions. God knows everything it is possible to know - i.e. past and present truths.
10
Q
omniscience vs free will counter-response 1
A
- If God is everlasting, and there are no true propositions about the future, then God will come to learn things as events happen.
- god does not know that I will order pizza on Friday, when Friday comes, God has gained knowledge that God could not have had on Monday.
- If God has gained knowledge, this means that God has changed
- But to say that God changes is incompatible with another attribute that God is regarded to possess, which is being immutable
- t is reasonable to suppose that God is immutable because God is a perfect being, and a perfect being cannot change.
- if something is perfect and it changed, it could only change to being something no longer perfect.
- This solution to the problem of omniscience vs free will fails because it involves God changing, which is incompatible with God’s immutability.
11
Q
free will vs omniscience reply to counter-response 1
A
- God is still always omniscient (this characteristic is changeless), God still knows all true propositions
- God can still be thought of as immutable given the fact that God’s omniscience remains unchanged. It is always true that God knows everything (that can be known). This characteristic of God is unchanging.
12
Q
omniscience vs free will objection 2
A
- God is eternal and so knows what I will do without knowing this before I do it, so I am still free.
- If God is eternal (outside time) then God knows what I will do in the future because God ‘sees’ these free choices (what God knows depends on what I freely choose to do rather than God’s knowledge fixing my choice).
- God does not know about my choices ‘beforehand’ in a way that fixes or determines them, but sees my choices as I make them. But because God is outside of time, God sees all my choices ‘at once’.
- because God isn’t located in time (i.e. is eternal) God doesn’t foreknow what I am going to do in the future, God just knows what I do in the future because God ‘sees’ me do it. God is able to simultaneously see all of my actions (past, present and future) ‘at once.’
13
Q
omniscience vs free will counter-response 2
A
- If God is eternal then would mean that there is ‘tensed’ knowledge God cannot have
- If God is eternal, then this means that there seem to be particular truths that God cannot know, but which humans can know.
- God is unable to know tensed propositions i.e. propositions that contain a reference to past, present, and future.
- God can’t know tensed propositions like ‘I am now typing’, ‘It rained yesterday’” and can’t, for instance, know whether Theresa May is, was or will be the Prime Minister of the UK.
- If God cannot know these things, then God is not omniscient.
14
Q
omniscience vs free will reply 2
A
- God knows the same truths we know, but just in a different ‘non-tensed’ way.
- It can be argued that God knows the same truths that we know in a tensed way, but God knows them in a non-tensed way.
- God can have knowledge of the same state of affairs, but expressed in non-tensed propositions
- God can have knowledge of the same truths expressed in this non-tensed way
- so God is still omniscient.
