Strong Atheism - Super-omnipotence

[Cheerful Charlie]

Anselm of Bec famously claimed God is that that is so great, nothing greater can be imagined. So I will start by imagining the greatest God possible.

William of Okham and Rene Descartes bot claimed God was truly omnipotent, what I will call super-omnipotence. God creates all the laws, rules, metaphysical necessities of the Universe, the very logic of the Universe. God could if he so desired, make 2 + 2 = 5 if God so desired. God could change the laws of the Universe at will to achieve his desires.

God is defined as good, the highest level of Good possible, again, defined by Anselm as an attribute of the greatest God imaginable. Such a highly, morally good God would if possible eliminate as much moral evil a can be eliminated.

God has a good nature. God has free will. If God wished to eliminate moral evil, he would have created man to have a god-like good nature and a god-like free will, and man would of his free will never do moral evil.

Any possible reason offered why God could not do so is false and not true, since the greatest possible God creates th logic of the Universe and can eliminate any problem by fiat that thwarts his desires.

But the Universe has moral evil. The super-omnipotent God of Okham and Descartes does not exist. God then does not create or control the logic of the Universe, the laws, rules or metaphysical necessities.

Logically,these are limits on God and not created by God. There is no super-logic that gets God off the hook.

Thus not only do we disprove this supergod's existence, we establish logically that naturalism does exist and is superior to the greatest God imaginable.
If we drop the idea of super-omnipotence as per Okham and Descartes, we are then logically assuming that naturalism exists and is outside of God's control and creation.
One might argue whether there is a God, but there is no argument that there is a naturalism, a natural Universe and Logic of the Universe not reliant on God or any species of supernaturalism, which may not exist at all.

God is defined as creator of all, but obviously God does not create this greater naturalism. Another contradiction. When it comes to creating the Universe as it is, naturalism does the heavy lifting. God is a superfluous hypothesis.


William C. Barwell Oct 31, 2013

[Lion IRC]

Doesn't the existence of a moral evil prove that there is a datum against which such an evil can be compared - or even detected?

[Cheerful Charlie]

Doesn't the existence of a moral evil prove that there is a datum against which such an evil can be compared - or even detected?

Yes. Now try this one. Is evil a metaphysical concept that could be eliminated by a truly omnipotent, super-omnipotent God? Would evil as a concept be allowed to exist by a truly omnibenevolent super-omnipotent God?


.

[Lion IRC]

Doesn't the existence of a moral evil prove that there is a datum against which such an evil can be compared - or even detected?

Yes. Now try this one. Is evil a metaphysical concept that could be eliminated by a truly omnipotent, super-omnipotent God?

You answered that in your own Op.
"...God could change the laws of the Universe at will to achieve his desires."

...Would evil as a concept be allowed to exist by a truly omnibenevolent super-omnipotent God?

Obviously.
The concept either exists or it doesnt.

It exists in the same way as compass points on a map exist.
I would say its a good thing that we have a sense of moral righteousness - a moral compass with a "true North".

If God wasnt loving He would leave us to drift without a compass.
The pedophile, rapist murderer who drinks and drives and smokes in the movie cinema while talking loudly on their mobile phone would be merely "unpopular" - not evil and deserving of punishment.

[T.J.]

Your premise seems redundant. As an omnipotent being you already have unlimited power, how does having super unlimited power makes the former any different or better as is the purpose?

[Brakeman]

Obviously.
The concept either exists or it doesnt.

Ohh deep! Deeply meaningless.

It exists in the same way as compass points on a map exist.
I would say its a good thing that we have a sense of moral righteousness - a moral compass with a "true North".

If you think christians have a special moral compass, show us the evidence. I can't see any morals that aren't socially based. Give us an example.

If God wasnt loving He would leave us to drift without a compass.
The pedophile, rapist murderer who drinks and drives and smokes in the movie cinema while talking loudly on their mobile phone would be merely "unpopular" - not evil and deserving of punishment.

So you say that without god's moral guidance, society would be just fine with a pedophile murderer walking our midst? That's pure stupidity. We atheists love our fellow man and we love our children and we expect our fellow citizens to behave with respect to each other. If someone misbehaves against society, then they do deserve to be punished, in relation to the crime. This moral compass from god you speak of is morally flawed in it's punishments, as it's proscribed punishments are eternal damnations in a fiery hell for victim-less crimes where the extenuating circumstances of having an imperfect brain and very poor reliability in the god instructions are ignored.

[Doubting Thomas]

Your premise seems redundant. As an omnipotent being you already have unlimited power, how does having super unlimited power makes the former any different or better as is the purpose?

Maybe it's like how there's the devil, and then there's the super devil. The devil is totally evil, but the super devil is even more evil.

[Walking Void]

Wait... is that the marmalade that makes people commit adultery?!

[Doubting Thomas]

Yep. It's pretty tasty, too.