Omnipotence = being able to do all that is doable — Philosopher19

Is it doable to move any amount of weight? Yes.

Is it doable to create a weight that is so heavy that it's not movable? Yes.

So if the perfect thing can move the weight, he fails in the doable creation.

So if the perfect thing cannot move the weight, he fails omnipotence in the doable action of moving the weight.

Omnipotence in and by itself is a construct that is self-contradictory, therefore impossible.

This precision-truth renders this of your claims false, since one of the criteria can never be attained:

If x is not omnipotent and omniscient, then x is not truly free. Nor is he able to ensure that everyone gets what they truly deserve. If x is not omnipotence and omniscient, then a truly perfect existence is impossible. — Philosopher19

I just showed you that your thing you call god is not perfect, because he is not omnipotent; and as he is not omnipotent, he is not perfect, because the perfect existence is impossible.

But wait! You defined "perfect" as the "greatest of which none is better." So if god can't have omnipotence, and nobody else can either, then god can still be the best and greatest than which none is better.

So you are back in square one, if you only would be willing to throw out the "omnipotent" bit.

So if you say an infinite amount of time has passed up to the present day, then you must also say that it passed since some point in the timeline, otherwise I've no idea what you mean when you say an infinite amount of time “passed” — Amalac

I actually said, if you would kindly check, that an infinite number of years passed, not an infinite amount of time.

I understood this question by you, and I answered this way:

"an infinite number of years have passed in a series of infinite number of points in time, each point being between two consecutive years." — god must be atheist

I appreciate that my composition is awkward. So please consider this. It has your point you insist on, it has infinity, and it has the years. It's all in there. Please read carefully.
"A year passed after a point in time that marked the end of the previous year, in an infinite series."

You are forcing me to mince words, and you know that; it's fine, I can do with some English construct exercises. Thanks.

If you have trouble understanding a simple English word, then my teaching you the meaning of "passed" may have some dire difficulties.

If you need to know how I defined "passed", which is a commonly used English term or word, then how can I be sure ahead of time that the terms I use in the definition will be clear to you? You may turn around and ask me to define each word in the definition. It is not an impossible expectation by me that you will, because if you don't know what "passed" means, then there are very likely a lot of other things you don't know.

“5 years have elapsed since 2016 to today” has a clear meaning for me — Amalac

I would venture to assume that if you can conceptualize five years that have passed since a point in time, then you can also conceptualize one year passing since a point in time.

Something that happened since “never” is something that in fact didn't happen. — Amalac

I did not say "It happened since never."

I answered your question. Which part of "infinite number of points each of which are between two consecutive years" do you not understand? I'm willing to work with you on that.

And then it's clear that there are an infinite number of years that have passed already to the present day.
— god must be atheist

...since when? — Amalac

Time elapses “since” some moment in time (not necessarily a beginning in time) “to” some other moment in time.

If not, then I don't understand what you mean by “passed”. — Amalac

By "an infinite number of years that have passed" I meant "an infinite number of years each of which came after another".

If you want to pinpoint the phrasing to points in time, then "an infinite number of years have passed in a series of infinite number of points in time, each point being between two consecutive years." This is just one way of an infinite way of saying the same thing.

Yes. The gift I expect is that you refrain from posting for a month. :-) -- don't take me seriously, please.

If the infinite is an adjective as you say, — Mww

you are using it as a noun.

You used it as a noun when you quoted Kant.

I wish to know how the two concepts in Kant's definition are described: infinite and infinity.

This is where the buck stops. Until you enlighten me, we are stuck in this discussion.

...since when? — Amalac

That is not a valid question. Much like you can't say, "what year will time end?" A question or statement with "since" implies a point in time. The beginning of time does not exist, and therefore there is no point in time that is the beginning.

If x is not omnipotent and omniscient, then x is not truly free. Nor is he able to ensure that everyone gets what they truly deserve. — Philosopher19

Who decides what everyone truly deserves? A perfect decision maker. The perfect decision maker also makes the rules of how to decide things.

In this sense there is a system which is governed by a director, who makes up the rules, and expects compliance with the rules. However, if you yank this decision maker out of his position, and put in his place a different decision maker, who has different criteria and rules for what's expected and how to reward the achievers, then you have a different system which is equally as perfect, except it's different. It's not different from the first one in perfection, but the rules and the system of rewards are different.

And let's say our system is perfect: let's assume that given how it operates, the rewards are given to the best possibility of the perfect giver and judge.

But if you introduce a different judge with a different set of expectations and a different set of rewards, you may have an equally perfect system, and the two can't battle it out.

Yet in your definition perfection is that which is the greatest. Well, given two or more equally great systems, neither or none of them are greater than the others.

Well, our difference is that you differentiate between two infinities, whereas I say if you define it one way, and you define it another way, it's still infinity. To you infinity is different from itself depending on how you define it.

I can live with that, if you can.

Now, just as the unit which is taken is greater or smaller, the infinite will be greater or smaller — Mww

This is actually not right. There is no such thing as "infinite" other than to describe a feature of infinity. If infinity is the same whether you take a smaller or a larger unit, then the infinite, which is an adjective, not a noun... hence the confusion. You are familiar with Kant. Has he actually defined the "infinite" somewhere, or he is just using this word? If he defined it, then his definition is different from "infinity", maybe; and therefore he can't equate the two.

I would really like to see Kant's explanation of what he envisions as the infinite. It is an adjective in modern English, but this has been translated, and the translations bastardized the original. Maybe we could ask you to give us the German words he used for infinite and infinity? or maybe we (that is, I, let's be frank) could ask you, like I said, a definition or an explanation what Kant means by infinite? he can't mean infinity when he says infinite, since he makes a distinct difference between the two (without explaining it, here; but elsewhere there may be an explanation.) I repeated myself enough times in this paragraph.

The upshot is that since he does not equate the infinite with infinity, his proof breaks down because he is comparing apples with oranges, so to speak. He is proving there are no infinite number of years, because infinity contains infinite number of years, but the INFINITE does not.

Hence, Kant is pulling the wool over the eyes of some. He says that although we believe A is B, and we know that C is D, therefore A cannot be B. This is completely fallacious.

The time to believe something is when there is good evidence for it. However, this just kicks the debate down the road into the what-counts-as-evidence territory. — Tom Storm

Many know, manier don't, that to believe is stronger than to know.

In my opinion human knowledge is based on belief. Not religion or in faith in god, but in belief, which COULD be religion or faith, but does not have to be necessarily.

This I arrived by believing Hume (everything could be only coincidental, and it's possible that no determinism exists as causation does not have to exist to experience the world as we do), and by believing solipsism; I think even if we experience the real world, and our senses give us true feedback, the overall effect is not any different from living in a solipsistic world. That is so because we are string puppets, either by the solipsistic director, or by reality, because then reality acts as a director that uses us as string puppets.

you're right, I agree and I simply acted as a spokesperson for Don. I don't agree with his position, but you asked for a transliteration, and I simply provided that.

I wish you'd read my post that came from my own thoughts, and commented on it. Nobody EVER comments on my posts. It's either because they think it's total gibberish or because they think it closes the argument properly, after which there is nothing to say, and that is not fun. Or else, like Banno, they have complete and utter, pure as hell disdain for me, and they would rather die than express an agreement with what I say.

The upshot is I feel like I am leaving posts for the fucking wall.

I would like to return to the op because I find Kant's argument fascinating. Wrong, but fascinating.

There are two ways of thinking about infinity: something that has no limit; and the other way, no matter how much you add to it, that is, no matter how far you push its limit, it will not end.

Kant is using the second way of thinking about infinity, and he says no matter how much you add to it, it won't end, but it won't be infinite, either. As long as you are in the process of adding, you have a finite number, and the finite number will never become infinite, as long as you are in the adding stage, even if the adding theoretically never ends.

This is an interesting concept to refute on an intuitive level.

The only way I can challenge it is by saying that the two ways to approach infinity both indicate a quantity that is infinite. As long as you stipulate that the adding will never reach a limit no matter how much of the thing you add to it, you can't divorce the one type of infinity from the other.

Once this equivalence has been established, then there is a way to assert that there are inifinite years ahead of us. We can't count them all by pushing the upper limit of the number of years we keep adding, no matter how many years we add to extend the reached limit of years in the future. But we know, because of the equivalence of infinity defined by the two ways, that there are an infinite number of years ahead of us.

And then it's clear that there are an infinite number of years that have passed already to the present day.

None. Life is not the kind of thing that has an 'after'. The idea itself is a conceptual mistake, like a square circle. It is not the kind of thing that even rises to the dignity of evidentiary search.
4 minutes ago — StreetlightX

I think you are using an equivocation. There is the concept of soul-life; and there is the concept of bodily life. The two can be and are believed to be coincidental when the body is alive. The body can be alive without the soul being alive, and the soul can be alive without the body being alive. You, by calling both simply "life", are giving a perfectly shining example of what Aristotle called the fallacy of equivocation.

It's not clear to me what you are wanting to say here, unfortunately. — Janus

I think I understand Don Kotlos. He is saying, and please correct me if I am wrong, that there is an experiment that will prove the existence of afterlife, except we don't know what that experiment is, nobody has designed it yet. The experiment should show furthermore, that the soul survives the body, via a soul-transplant operation or process. Mr. Kotlos further states, that even if machines acquire the complexity, the structure, and the inner workings of the human brain, the machines will never have a soul, thus proving that machines will never have a soul, because their mind is a copy of the human mind, since their cognitive / emotive construction not a host of the human mind.

I don't fully agree with Mr. Kotlos, but I think the above is a reasonably enough close transliteration of what he said.

Mr. Kotlos is a neuroscientist by his own admission. What does a neuroscientist do? What activities does he conduct that he gets paid for? What's a professional neuroscientist's mandate?

But what type of evidence would be reasonable to convince skeptics that an afterlife probably is a real possibility? — TiredThinker

If you are after real possibility, any evidence is sufficient, or even the lack of evidence is sufficient, as the possibility, both real and unreal, and probable and unprobable, is there for any imaginable event.

If you ended your sentence with "real" and also took out "probably", then we would need to think like the other contributors to this thread have thought (that is, their thinking and opinions right now are superfluous).

Skeptics don't argue that the possibility of afterlife is not probable. The argue that afterlife is not evidenced, and not supported by any evidence.

To me, if you reworded the question, the only proof would be personal. That is, I die, and I realize that my soul has survived. That's the only argument I'd accept at this point.

Only one thing is truly existing — Philosopher19

Where did you get that? It's simply not true. You certainly exist; I certainly exist; we are one and the same? Then how come we disagree?

If x is not omnipotent and omnipresent, then x is not a perfect being (or perfectly existing), because better being/existents than it can be conceived of. — Philosopher19

There may be a view that being omniscient and/or omnipotent is not a feature of the perfect being. We, humans, assume that; but it can't be proven, therefore it is not a matter of truth, but a matter of human opinion acquired by human intuition.

Smarter compared to what? — Nils Loc

Foxes are smarter than any of the cells alone and singly in their bodies and brains.

Sea mollusks are smarter than any one of the cells that make them up.

Cells are smarter than any one of their components taken singly: cell wall, miasma, nucleus, protoplasm.

Breast implants look smarter on a woman than any one of the molecules alone that make up the implant.

How often is this intuition a correct assumption of an actual intelligent person, or is it probably always too subjective to be true and they could totally be a dumbie? I assume recognizing intelligence must be evolutionarily necessary? — TiredThinker

I judge male humans for their intelligence beyond age 36 by looking at their forehead. If there is an accented blood vessel running through their forehead, up-and-down, then I assume they are intelligent.

With women, if they are nicely appointed, with facial make-up and mascara, and look elegant, I assume they are highly intelligent. Unfortunately some porn on the Internet where these types of women sock and do all kind of other things, destroyed this illusion for me.

If a man or a woman speaks with a learned British accent, I assume that they are indubitably very intelligent.

If a person takes off his glasses, my perception of his or her IQ drops 20 points. If he or she puts the glasses back on, the perception returns to the original IQ impression.

We're all the embedded cells of a non-human superorganism. — Nils Loc

Funny thing is that superorganisms by historical example are always smarter than the component organisms. Think of cells and a fox that they make up.

Society and corporations, other systems with human components, are more powerful, but definitely dumber than humans, with no discernible IQ.

This is a first.

You are claiming China is all-in for liberty and individuality? Really? — fishfry

Where the heck did you get this cockamamie opinion? Not from me? You read into text like a bible-interpreter: with complete disregard to the actual content. You are not worthy arguing against.

For your information: all states have some degree fostering individuality, and some degree of fostering state interests. You are against that? Why? Please state your reason.

And again, the original convo was the State versus the individual. You are claiming China is all-in for liberty and individuality? Really? — fishfry

This is a question. I don't argue with questions as they have no truth value. State your case in nominative sentences.

To wit, no state is all-in for liberty and individuality. If you want to bring an existing example of a state that is all-in for individuality and not at all for the state, please show me that system.

And again, the original convo was the State versus the individual. You are claiming China is all-in for liberty and individuality? Really? You have a hard sell, but I have an open mind. Make your case. — fishfry

I made my case. Your intellectual deficit in math makes it impossible for you to appreciate my case. Case closed.

By your own numbers, their population has doubled in 60 years, implying an annualized population growth rate of 1.2% per year. So you're not making much of a case. — fishfry

To you. Since you don't know the first thing about math. It is not my fault. Go back to your high school and give hell to your principal, the math teacher and the school board.

I'd be grateful for references. I've been reading about China's population control measures for decades. If the literature is wrong, or if there's alternative literature that I should be aware of, I would be happy to be educated on the subject. — fishfry

It's not literature you need to see my point. It's brains. And nobody can give you brains beyond what you have already.

I am really at odds with you. There is a perfectly clear explanation that Chinese families on the average had more than two children each for many decades non-stop. Math don't lie. Since you can't understand the concept, I am incapable of convincing you. Don't even try.

I can only go by the published literature on the subject. — fishfry

I believe that. Simple people have no critical ability, and therefore they can't analyze meritfully the publications they read.

B) Whatever's perfectly existing, is indubitably existing — Philosopher19

This can be reduced to "Whatever is existing is indubitably existing" and therefore it has no informative value as it is a tautology. (The "Whatever" can be perfect, imperfect, green, married or statuesque, it is existing. Its quality has no bearing on the fact that it exits, once it has been established that it exists.)

Perhaps you would care to put your authoritarianism into context, lest I misunderstand you.

Or do I perhaps understand you far too well? — fishfry

You seem to understand nothing that is farther away from you than the tip of your nose. Please see above for the support of my claim.

You know I just happened to learn yesterday that China will now allow married couples to have three children. That's an increase from the two they were formerly allowed to have, which is itself an increase from the one kid they used to be allowed to have.

Based on your viewpoint, I assume you wholeheartedly support the right of the government to control who may reproduce and how many offspring they may have. — fishfry

This is a huge, huge, huge lie. Chinese families had more than two children on the average per two parents. This is so easy to prove that you will fall off the chair.

Hungary has had a less-than-two-children society. Not because of enforcement, but due to parents' choice. This resulted first in a stagnation per number in the society, which in the last decade started to dwindle.

If, and only if, Chinese families had one or two children, like you and the rest of the math-stupid people claim, their numbers would have equalled the growth rate of Hungary. Because you guys with a North American education can't conceptualize the truth, that it does not matter whether you have a thousand people or a thousand billion, if each parent has two children, the growth rate should stay stagnant.

But you and a billion other math-imbecilic people can't understand this. You are blinded by the huge population of China, so to you it's no surprise that in sixty years China has doubled its population, going on fast to tripling it.

The Chinese are shrewd, and they know math. And they know the rest of the world hates math. This was a ridiculously easy sell for them.

So don't give me this crap that that the Chinese forced their population to have one, later only two children. This is a myth they threw in your face, my friend, and you bought it as it were cupcakes.

If self-actualization is a goal - what if your best self is as an efficient serial killer? — Tom Storm

Then you'd make a great team with those whose self-actualization goals are to be victims of serial murderers.

It is all an illusion. — praxis

You are going form the general and non-specific to be absolutely lost, aimless and incapable.

Okay, so that's what self-actualization means. Got it. Check.

flexible standards lead to favouritism and bias. Standards should not be flexible. Is a meter or a yard flexible in tolerance to length? Is the speed of light flexible in speed? Is the marriage vow flexible in fidelity? Standards are by definition rigid.

And I am not asking for a rigid, inflexible forum. All I am asking is for the bread and butter of philosophy to be observed: to become and remain logical and reasonable. This is not negotiable in philosophy, yet there are some users here who rampantly ignore this call by philosophy.

I don't know if you read my post or just a few sentences of it.

1. I did not mean that members should oust other members. It remains in the hand of the moderators.
2. I offered an objective measure instead of a subjective one that could be used to see if people are fit to use the service.
3. It would not be cliquey and elitist if it applies to all equally, which it would.

I don't know how much more you could have possibly misunderstood and misrepresent my intention and my solution.

4. Ignoring posts that are cutting and contain obviously false accusations is not easy. Accusations of calling the other's opinion wrong by wrongful judgment is very difficult to ignore. You make it sound like it was child's play to ignore those.

The entire idea of the site is exchange of ideas. If people ignore each other's posts (like you did with my content and just making a judgment on it after a superficial reading, which I presume has happened), then the site loses its intended functionality.

I inserted the following post in the "Bannings" forum, as its subject is tightly bound to that topic area. I was asked nicely to post it here instead. So I did.

------------------------------------

Today I started a thread in the Lounge forum, and now I realize it ought to have been inserted here.

Here's the body of my original post for that thread in its entirety. I offer it for consideration to the executive body of the forum... that is, for the moderators to decide if this proposal should be used or not, in the way I wrote it or in some other forms with parameters changed.

-----------------------------------

There is no hard-and-fast rules for ousting members. Some guidelines are presented.

I suggest that a number be established within a time frame. The number be X, and the time frame, a period Y.

In this scheme, if any user can be shown clearly without a shadow of doubt that the user uttered greater than X number of logical fallacies within a time period of Y, then the moderators can be asked by users to exclude the offender from membership. Temporarily at first offence, for a longer period temporarily for the second offence, then permanently at the third offence.

I suggest, X to be 10, and Y to be a week (seven days duration). There would be a time period Z, the passing of which past the last day of Y would declare amnesty for the offender. That is, if no one brings a complaint against the offender by the end of Z, then a statute of limitations will apply after Z period, which could be a month (Z=30 days).

I really wish this to be made effective. It is a philosophy forum. Here the only "judge" should be reason and lack of ill or faulty reason. If someone keeps using faulty reasons, by way of using fallacies and other errors in arguments, then it must be punished, for they insult the judge itself.

There would be a clear basis, which is the occurrence of clear and indubitable fallacy or ill reasoning.

Your objection of "culture of exclusivity" applies, because... this is a philosophy forum. All philosophy relies on logic and reason. If you base some claim on other than that, it is not philosophy... and therefore it does not belong to a philosophy forum.

It's like anything else. If you go to a forum on flowers, and you keep talking about elephants, you can get banned. If you go to a political forum, and you keep talking about your medical condition that the doctors are trying to fix, you can get banned. If you go to a medical forum, and try to talk about how the last election was fixed, then you can get banned. If you go to a philosophy forum and you make claims that are not based on philosophical considerations, then you ought to get banned.

Yes, it's exclusivism. So is everything else. The army, the education system, work, even your family depends on exclusivism. You can't let just anyone have sex with your wife. You can't have just anything said on a forum.

I simply typed into the box that is ready to take the next post. The same way you did. I used no tricks or trickery. I saw the box, and I typed into it. Not rocket science.

Maybe someone switched the "closed" toggle to off? I don't know how this site is programmed. I am just a philosopher.

First problem: your autonomous moral code theory is still voluntary. Animals, including people, do not always save their young, neither do we necessarily feel any guilt over not saving them. So there is no actual autonomous moral code, although I can see why the idea has appeal. Without the concept of autonomous morality your premise is bankrupt. — Book273

If the perceived risk is too high, then we do not save our young. Barring that, I can argue (without proof) that the lack of guilt or the lack of trying may be the response in individuals whose moral gene is either mutated or otherwise compromised. This is possible, and probable.

However, providing general guidelines (always try for maximal Good) will be much more productive. — Book273

Maximal Good is not morality; it is just doing good. This I covered in the preamble of the article.

The imperative "Try for Maximal Good" can be a moral imperative, if you instill it in people that they must feel guilty when they don' try for maximal good. However, "good" itself is undefinable; what's good for one person may be detrimental to another, and what's good for one person NOW may be detrimental to him in the future. Aside from that, "Maximal Good" can't be established unless first you decide what comprises good in a particular culture. This destroys the universality of "maximal good".

Third problem: Some of us feel no guilt. — Book273

according to my theory, the total lack of ability to feel guilty is a mutation.

-------------

I thank you for being the only person on the boards who took the time and trouble to express criticism on my paper. This I really appreciate, and our differences of opinion does not take away from my gratitude to take me seriously enough to respond meaningfully, and to chew through the entire paper in the first place. Thank you, I really appreciate both of your efforts.

Today I started a thread in the Lounge forum, and now I realize it ought to have been inserted here.

Here's the body of my original post for that thread in its entirety. I offer it for consideration to the executive body of the forum... that is, for the moderators to decide if this proposal should be used or not, in the way I wrote it or in some other forms with parameters changed.

-----------------------------------

There is no hard-and-fast rules for ousting members. Some guidelines are presented.

I suggest that a number be established within a time frame. The number be X, and the time frame, a period Y.

In this scheme, if any user can be shown clearly without a shadow of doubt that the user uttered greater than X number of logical fallacies within a time period of Y, then the moderators can be asked by users to exclude the offender from membership. Temporarily at first offence, for a longer period temporarily for the second offence, then permanently at the third offence.

I suggest, X to be 10, and Y to be a week (seven days duration). There would be a time period Z, the passing of which past the last day of Y would declare amnesty for the offender. That is, if no one brings a complaint against the offender by the end of Z, then a statute of limitations will apply after Z period, which could be a month (Z=30 days).

I really wish this to be made effective. It is a philosophy forum. Here the only "judge" should be reason and lack of ill or faulty reason. If someone keeps using faulty reasons, by way of using fallacies and other errors in arguments, then it must be punished, for they insult the judge itself.

That would reduce the number of participants in the forum to .9^n where n is the number of iterations of this process. In other words, if you take out the bottom ten percent, there is still a bottom ten percent left. That's A. B. is that you need to establish some sort of infallible metric to see who the bottom ten percent is. Part of my proposal, that is, and arbitrary number of demonstrably bad logic would suffice, so you still need my proposal at least part of it.

Lack of respect includes 1. Not responding to direct questions 2. Responding with fallacious reasoning 3. ignoring statements and arguments. These three are very vexing. You may think swearing at others is disrespectful. But when one is at his wit's end for there is no response to reasoned arguments, one tends to lose his patience.

As to your will to live... you several times in the forums defended the notion of free will. Will something different than to be on the forum to be your life's meaning. Easily done, you have free will.