The logical consequences of omnipotence

[Cinjin]

Although many christians still subscribe to the long-upheld view of the all-powerful all-knowing god, I know many christians who have since dumbed him down a bit due mostly to the content of the Bible.

If god is perfect how can he change his mind? Shouldn't his choices always be perfect?
If god knew everything why did he bother creating us?
If god can read minds ....... etc etc etc. You get the idea.

For me the fact that he is not all-knowing and omnipotent only serves to further unmask the story.

Working on the assumption that the christian god is not all-powerful and all-knowing:
One has to look first to the fall of Lucifer. Long before mankind was walking around having unmarried sex with their family members, Lucifer was plotting to overthrow the big man himself. Since we're assuming that this was possible because god didn't know what he was thinking, or for that matter what a billion other angels were thinking, it would seem highly plausible, even likely, that this or a "fall" similar to it could happen again.

You see, even if god knows a million times more than any other being in the universe, it pales in comparison to the actions of billions upon billions of souls of which he cannot predict. Even the angels have free will (even if they can never have that coveted conditional love Drich is always talking about) [insert massive eyeroll here] and have clearly made use of it. If you can't read people's minds and know all the future possible outcomes than you can't guarantee eternity.

For all we know, this (the human race, the fall and all the bull shit) has all happened before.
What's to stop another angel from becoming complacent, jealous, and power hungry after everyone's been sucked up into Heaven? What's to stop a soul in Heaven from getting bored and trying to undermine the system?? Answer: Nothing. In fact, if god is not all powerful, I would wager every dime I have that at least a few dozen of the billions will use his or her free will to cause yet another fall - or at least some kind of version of it.

Imagine you're in heaven for a trillion years ... it seems pretty damn likely that somebody's going to go and throw a wrench in it. An angel with a chip on his shoulder or a bored human? Possibly an alliance between both? Maybe one of Lucifer's spies will break him outta hell? I know to a christard it seems far-fetched but to us intelligent people, they're right in context with the rest of insane story. If you can believe in the original fall of Lucifer, talking snakes, dirt men, burning bushes, the walking dead, and an infinite universe created in mere days than this should all seem very probable.

Hell for all we know, we've been in an infinite loop for all time. We fall, god saves a few, kills most of us, gives a phony eternal guarantee and then does the whole thing again. In the end it's a bit ironic: an omnipotent god is contradictory to their Bible and only an impotent god satisfactorily explains the current system of eternity, souls, and the whereabouts of a missing messiah.



ewuhh - [shakes it all off] Thank you common sense. I wish you were available for everyone.

[fr0d0]

when really what he's saying just doesn't make sense.

When you get it, I tell you that you get it and you'll say again that you don't get it.

Then you'll make some incomprehensible conclusion and state that you get it, when you don't.

I think there's no hope for you!

it's astoundingly arrogant of you to pity us or assume moral superiority over us just because you have to delude yourself to find happiness.

If you've read what I wrote you'll see that I don't claim any moral superiority. Your bias is strong.

You're still at the beginning of our conversation. You refuse, even tho you demonstrate acceptance of the logical reasoning, to grant me the respect of holding an alternative and viable opinion to yourself. In other words, you are contradicting yourself calling me deluded.

---

How did you gain access to the worldview considering you were an atheist?

I considered the information, trusted it to be true and acted upon it. That has to be possibility or no one would ever change from not believing to believing. Everyone, without exception, starts out not believing.

---

For me the fact that he is not all-knowing and omnipotent only serves to further unmask the story.

You know that your logic fails badly right. That's OK then. Carry on

[Brian37]

Everyone, without exception, starts out not believing.

Right, because a baby brain isn't poisoned with superstition at that point. They get poisoned by adults growing up and are too ignorant to question what their parents and society sell them.

I considered the information, trusted it to be true and acted upon it. That has to be possibility or no one would ever change from not believing to believing. Everyone, without exception, starts out not believing.

That's the problem, you trusted. Scientific method does not require trust it requires kicking the shit out of the tires and independent verification.

So where is your "evidence" that a disembodied material being is even a possibility? You have independent peer reviewed "evidence" I am quite sure.

[fr0d0]

So where is your "evidence" that a disembodied material being is even a possibility? You have independent peer reviewed "evidence" I am quite sure.

Sometimes there is so much fail no answer is needed.

[Captain Scarlet]

So where is your "evidence" that a disembodied material being is even a possibility? You have independent peer reviewed "evidence" I am quite sure.

Sometimes there is so much fail no answer is needed.

Rearrange your own words for your position Fr0d0

"Sometimes there is so much no answer a fail is needed"

[Esquilax]

Sometimes there is so much fail no answer is needed.

Hey! You described religion in a nutshell!

Seriously though, do you really think that enhances the credibility of your position?

[fr0d0]

Seriously though, do you really think that enhances the credibility of your position?

Other peoples stupidity? Calling them out on that? Not repeating the reasoning why once more?

Only if you think my position is based on morality. You don't get to believe in God through being good. It's a free gift to everyone. No one deserves it.

[Mystical]

And what if it is?

If it is then your outlook is bleak. If hate wins sometimes, your position would be to take that into account. Instead of a happy, positive person, you would be a sometimes cruel, hurt person. This is simply a result of your world view.

I just can't stop myself from wanting to butt in on your conversation which I've read front to back seeing as how it's my fiancees' thread.
I'd like to point out that your view of an athiest is ignorant at best. You may have known unhappy negative athiests, but I definitely know unhappy negative theists. We all can be cruel and hurtful, you're not exempt from this spectrum of humanity just because you believe in god or because of your "world view". What's more is you're no more a good person for your beliefs than I am for my non-beliefs. I'm a good person because I choose to do good. What's good, what's bad? For you everyone whose a christian and has the holy spirit within them, has a sense of right and wrong. Athiests have this too, how do you account for this?
First, lets take a look at that world view you've been gushing about having that no one here has. I've lived it all my life until this year, let's just take a look. What do you see and what do I now, see?

You see a hurricane and it's a natural disaster, just as I see it. But you look at it like a positive thing because you reason that it happened only because god allowed it to happen, therefore there must have been a reason for it that we will never know and only he knows. So you would look at a devastating event for your 'brothers and sisters', as a good thing. I would look at that same event and be saddened, yes. But at the same time I would know why it happened. Nature, chaos. You don't know why because god simply never tells his sheep why, yet you rationalize a good feeling out of something completely horrific. Even if one really good thing came out of a number of bad things, it is still a bad thing. But you see it as a good thing.
One example from real life of someone living in your "world view" applying this thinking in a hurtful way would be Pat Robertsons' assertion that New Orleans was a result of divine retribution.

You see an unrepentant murderer, I see the same. You see an evil soul destined for hell to be punished for his actions, I see a man whose done wrong in his life, yet there is nothing besides earthly justice for his crimes. What's done is done, I have peace in knowing that there's nothing that can be done besides look to the future and try to learn from the past. You on the other hand, watch him die by lethal injection with a sense of vindication knowing that he will be in hell for his actions. I see him die and cry because he was probably mentally ill or hurt so irreparably by someone else, that he became something incomprehensible. What's more is he's dying for a notion of "an eye for an eye", and in your bible it is not murder to kill a murderer for their crime.
I cry for him, and his victim, and I don't just stop there. I see hope that humanity can stop hurting one other one day by holding itself accountable, not in the next life but in this one. I hope that one day humanity can stop killing those that need the most study and understanding. I hope that mankind can stop fulfilling its' selfish want of retribution in order to bring light to what causes such evil in the first place, and avoiding it from continuing.
Yet at the time of this murderers' (justified in your eyes) death, you stop there, you brush your shoulders, and you move on. I don't forget, I can never forget, and I do everything in my power to help those who have been hurt so they won't hurt others, I fight mental illness in my own family and friends with as much conviction as you hold in your god assertion. I make a stand, in essence, with life--in hopes of improving it one person at a time. You have a passive at best attitude towards it that is the same attitude that allows these travesties to go on. So your belief system upholds the quid pro quo and then revels in punishing it, with no hope held of life being anything other than what it is. You wonder why athiests are hostile towards innocent zittle ole you: you're holding humanity back with your beliefs, not the other way around.

Oh I could go on all night with this, but I best not. If you want more examples, feel free to ask for specific ones, I'd be happy to discuss them with you. But in essence, I'm saying with this post, that your position that athiests are nothing but unhappy, sometimes cruel or hurtful people--is totally unfounded in every way imaginable, and I could definitely say the same about you. Whether you or I believe in god is immaterial because you and I both have the freedom of choice to choose right from wrong, and right from wrong is not dictated by a higher power. Nor am I unhappy in seeing reality for reality and not through your limited looking glass.
Maybe athiests have been cruel or hurtful to you but in all honesty--that would be a product of your own ignorance, I'm betting.

I have never been happier in my entire life, as I am now. It would take pages and pages for me to list all the reasons why, but in essence: I'm free of your 'world view'.

[Ryantology]

No one deserves it.

You're right. No one deserves the 'gift' of being 'saved' by God, because gifts are given freely and all we're being saved from is a nightmare of virtually endless torment God himself is responsible for making, all because we break rules we were designed never to be able to adhere to.

There must be something wrong with the human brain that this kind of shit makes sense to billions of people.

[fr0d0]

Thank you again for your affirmation Ryan.