Can God create a rock so big that he cannot lift it?

[otseng]

This question and other similar ones have been brought up, so I'm going to create a topic to address it.

This question has some other variations:
Could God create a universe in which He never has existed?
Is God almighty enough to do anything He wants including acts that violate his own character?
Can God create another God that is superior to himself?
Can God make a triangle that is round?

The atheists state that since God cannot do these things, therefore God is not all powerful and cannot exist.

However, the problem is not a lack of answers, but the validity of the questions. By asking a question that is inherently impossible, a valid answer cannot be reached. By starting off with an illogical question, you cannot deduce any logical conclusions.

Omnipotence is not the fact that he can do anything (including defying truths) but that he is all powerful within the limits of truth.

[nanikore]

Can God make an immovable object? Can God make an irresistible force? What happens when the irresistible force meets the immovable object? Can God divide by zero? Can God identify two different rational numbers with no irrational numbers between them?

No. If God could do any of these things, then they would not be impossible.

One way to blow through games of semantics is to examine practical consequences.

How could the irresistible force manifest in this world as? Let's have a hypothetical practical example. How about the immovable object? I could then ask why would God make one? Is it to amuse Himself? Just because He can? Ability does not equate necessity, and possibility does not equate actuality (I saw a post somewhere early in the thread stating that God can make any existence, therefore one without him exists... That is wrong on so many fronts I don't even know where to begin). "Ought" does not equate "is", and vice versa.

My computer "can" divide by zero... it just produces an error

What does the phrase "impossible" practically mean? When we use words in the dictionary, are we doing it with the knowledge that each of us is omnipotent, or limited?

[williamryan]

That's a little unfair, Otseng. You can't have evidence of the non-existence of something. Although absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, I could just as easily say there is a big pink bunny sitting in the chair next to me that only I can see, and not a single person on this earth can prove me wrong.

True, this statement was made a little while ago, and I just happened upon it because I'm new to this site, but I thought I needed to respond to this common misconception.

People often say, "Hey! You can't prove that!" As in the oft heard phrase, "You can't prove a negative." But that's not exactly true. The trouble in that "prove" can mean two different things: (1) proof with 100% certainty, or (2) proof that is more likely than not.

While this may seem a minor difference, it is actually quite crucial. And the fact is that we can no astonishgly little via the 100% certainty approach to proving things. We "know" or "prove" most things via the more likely than not approach.

So what's this got to do with the inability to "prove" that God does not exist. When Corcus says that we cannot prove that God does not exist (aka "proving a negative") he is right if he means 100% certainty. But you are aware, the theist cannot prove that God exists with a 100% certainty. So the whole debate grinds to a stand still if one side shouts, "Hey! I can't prove that God doesn't exist (with 100% certainty)!"

Therefore, almost all the debates about whether God exists center on the more likely than not type of proof. And in that realm it is possible to "prove" that it is more likely than not that God doesn't exists if you can show that: (1) the the very concept of "God" is incomprehensible or self-contradictory, or (2) that things exist that are incompatible with God's existence, or that (3) things don't exist that we would expect to exist if God existed.

Check out this excellent debate between William Lane Craig (Christian) and Austin Dacey (atheist) at California State about the existence of God held last year: http://www.veritas.org/3.0_media/talks/147. Both debaters deal with being able to prove that God doesn't exist.[/u]

[nanikore]

Therefore, almost all the debates about whether God exists center on the more likely than not type of proof. And in that realm it is possible to "prove" that it is more likely than not that God doesn't exists if you can show that: (1) the the very concept of "God" is incomprehensible or self-contradictory, or (2) that things exist that are incompatible with God's existence, or that (3) things don't exist that we would expect to exist if God existed.

Check out this excellent debate between William Lane Craig (Christian) and Austin Dacey (atheist) at California State about the existence of God held last year: http://www.veritas.org/3.0_media/talks/147. Both debaters deal with being able to prove that God doesn't exist.

Could you summarize for me the major compelling point that was offered for God's nonexistence?

[williamryan]

Nanikore asked me to summarize the debate b/t Craig and Dacey that I directed readers to in an earlier post.

Dacey (atheist) presents 5 things that we would expect to find or not find as evidence that makes it more likely than not that God does not exist (proving a negative , i'll summarize 4 here (frankly, b/c I don't understand one of his arguments)

1. The Hiddenness of God

Dacey says that if God existed then we would expect to find a large consensus of people agreeing on God's existence. Instead, we find the opposite: numerous, mutually exclusive religions, agnostics, and atheists.

2. The Success of Science

If God existed, Dacey argues, it would be likely that we would discover his work in the world. Yet, science has been incredibly successful dealing with natural explanations for our world w/o every positing God's existence.

3. Evolution

If God existed we would expect to see care and efficiency in creation. Yet we see lots of waste (i.e. vestigial structures on male mammals like nipples, and a tale bone) and inefficiency (i.e. that the birth canal is too narrow).

4. Pointless Pain and Suffering

Dacey points out the amount and kind of evil in the world and posits that if God existed, then we would expect to not find these things.

Craig's Basic Response (Christian)

I'd love to give Craig's responses to each of these arguments, b/c I think Craig actually wins this debate and his responses are stronger than Dacey's arguments, but here's Craig's basic critique. Craig says that all of Dacey's arguments look like this:

1. If God exists, then we would expect to see (or not see) ____ (fill in the blank).
2. But we don't find ____.
3. Therefore, God probably doesn't exist.

Craig points out that Dacey must prove both premise 1 and 2 for 3 to be correct. He then, in my view, goes on to refute each of Dacey's arguments. For a detailed refutation of each of Dacey's arguments, check out the debate for the url I listed in an earlier post. For a detailed look at a refutation to the problem of suffering, see the topic if started entitled, The Problem with the Problem of Evil.

[captaincaustic]

I would answer one of these questions by saying that God is not limited to any laws that humans perceive. To ask if God could make a rock that He couldn't lift is irrelevant in the sense that God's reality would not contain factors such as gravity. Also, more complex answers that might work are cyclical in nature and cannot fully be understood by the human mind. My answer is that the real answer to this question is far beyond any human's comprehension, and that one is asking a simple question expecting a simple answer when one in this case is infinitely impossible.

[captaincaustic]

I would answer one of these questions by saying that God is not limited to any laws that humans perceive. To ask if God could make a rock that He couldn't lift is irrelevant in the sense that God's reality would not contain factors such as gravity. Also, more complex answers that might work are cyclical in nature and cannot fully be understood by the human mind. My answer is that the real answer to this question is far beyond any human's comprehension, and that one is asking a simple question expecting a simple answer when one in this case is infinitely impossible.