Intelligence, faith, and atheism (95)

I presume you mean this passage from Dawkins' The God Delusion.

"Incidentally, it has not escaped the notice of logicians that omniscience and omnipotence are mutually incompatible. If God is omniscient, he must already know how he is going to intervene to change the course of history using his omnipotence. But that means he can't change his mind about his intervention, which means he is not omnipotent. (pp. 77-78)"

Why should my awareness (or lack of it) of this load of nonsense have changed my way of thinking?

Dawkins MAY be a great biologist (many of his peers disagree with him, so it's hard to say).

As a logician, he has plenty of faults.

As a philosopher, he is an also-ran.

As a theologian, he is a non-starter.

What Dawkins IS good at is creating straw men for him then delightedly to dismantle.

His statement above is infantile.

Let's understand first of all what is meant by "omnipotence". God certainly, by definition, has it. That is God has all possible power. God does NOT have the power, for example, to make a square circle*. That is because THE POWER TO DO THAT DOES NOT EXIST.

God cannot tell lies* - if He did, He would not be infinitely good. It would be a negation of Himself. He - and all of us - would implode.

God is perfect, therefore cannot do something which would render Him imperfect. Any more than YOU could tell a "true lie"*.

So God, though all powerful, does not have the ability to make contradictions true. (And, if He did, then Dawkins' case would fall to the ground immediately. So if what Dawkins means by omnipotence is the capability of making contradictory statements or situations real, then God would be able to do what Dawkins says is contradictory anyway!).

Now, as God is - again by both definition and revelation - perfect, it follows his actions are perfect. And his decisions must also be perfect.

Perfection cannot be improved upon. Hence, if God decides on an action, that is based on His own perfection (and omniscience, His capacity to know everything at once). Thus, for God to "change His mind" would mean that His original decision was imperfect - which it cannot have been, as HE is perfect.

Moreover, the only reason to change His mind would be if He found out some new information. But, as He is OMNI-scient, that cannot be. If God knows EVERYTHING what "new" thing can He learn*?

Ah, but some will say, the Bible talks about God "changing His mind". Indeed it does. What is involved here is OUR perception, not any actual change in God Himself.

For example, consider Jonah and his trip to preach to Nineveh (after maritime adventures en route). God had declared that the wickedness of Nineveh deserved to be punished, and He intended to do so. But He sent Jonah to preach to the Ninevites, to warn them and get them to change. Jonah's preaching was successful, and the Ninevites repented. As a consequence, God "changed His mind" about punishing them.

In fact, God was remaining entirely consistent. He was (and has always been) fixed against wickedness, but willing to forgive the repentant. So, from exactly the same standpoint, God was as able to pardon the people of Nineveh when THEY changed, as He would have been justified in punishing them if they had not. The change was in them, but seen by them as a change of mind by God. God had not moved from His position. They had been on the receiving end of the same justice from God - holistic justice that pardons the penitent and punishes the guilty.

So, Dawkins is wrong - but not only because he is postulating a self-contradictory position. He is wrong because he seeks to contain God within a human frame of reference.

He forgets the most obvious thing about God - that He is infinite. As such, He is not restricted by time. He can interact with His creation within time, but is not bounded by it. God does NOT have a past or future. Only beings limited by time can have. For God, everything is an eternal "present". Hence when Dawkins says "[God] must know how He is "going to" intervene", that is meaningless. The meaning of "going to" only refers to a future - and it is WE who experience time as past, present and future - not God.

For God to change His mind would mean that there is "progress" in God. That He thinks or does one thing now, then thinks or does another a few moments later. But that would only be possible if God were kept within time. That would mean He is not infinite. And that would mean He is not God. Again, there is self-contradiction within the state of affairs Dawkins imagines.

The circumstance Dawkins theorises is impossible. With any understanding of God and theology or philosophy, that should be obvious. I am personally not surprised that it is not (apparently) obvious to Dawkins.

English

* I think these may be examples as you requested, of things which are impossible, which have no potential to exist.

"It may be that your sole purpose in life is to serve as a warning to others" - Anon

Edited 26 Oct 10, 5:43 PM by AnEnglishMaster

We have the rantings of a lunatic - and this proves the existence of God.

Yeah, I'm convinced.

Old Skool

Tawsingham, where everyone can be whomsoever they want to be @Tawsingham_Feudal guy@tawse.com PO Box 135, Hereford, HR2 7WL, UK +44(0)1432 343100

But it winds up the deluded which can be amusing, though rather akin to shooting fish in a barrel, as the Americans put it.

Tawsingham, where everyone can be whomsoever they want to be @Tawsingham_Feudal guy@tawse.com PO Box 135, Hereford, HR2 7WL, UK +44(0)1432 343100