If you had the keys, would you release prisoners from their cells?

No, I think 'you' don't understand. I see no evidence that you do, anyway. So, at the moment I don't see why being able to do anything would mean one created everything. Explain please. Or am I right and it is sufficient that the omnipotent being 'could' make it such that he created everything, and 'could' destroy everything if he so wished?

I think the problem here is that you don't understand the definitions you're given.
I gave you a very clear definition of God. Then you asked if God has created the universe. I don't know. How is it relevant to the issue under discussion? It might be, of course - but how? For instance, is 'not' being the creator of the universe incompatible with being able to do anything?

The point I made was simply that this is not just the attitude of 'most contemporary philosophers of religion' but also of the Scholastics, and that it doesn't gel with your understanding of what 'omnipotence' must mean. — Wayfarer

I know. I mentioned philosophers because this is a philosophy forum and I thought it might be interesting to expose such a widely and uncritically held view as the absurdity that it is. (Pick up an introductory book to philosophy of religion and see how quickly my kind of view is rejected - it is normally dismissed in a paragraph).

And like a lot of people, you have a lot of strongly-held views which strike you as 'obvious', meaning that those who oppose them are 'confused' or 'deficient', of which I'm probably one, so I'll spare you the odious task of trying to set me straight. — Wayfarer

No, you're like most people. You prefer not to think. Not too much anyway. A philosopher would want to be put straight. Anyway, I tried putting you straight by explaining why an omnipotent would not be bound by reason.

But is this a God that designed the universe, and set it going? Because in that case - good and bad are aspects of that design? Or this this an omnipotent kid poking at an ant pile in no-space, deciding what is good or bad on an ad hoc basis? — counterpunch

Being able to do anything does not mean one has done everything. God 'could' make it the case that he created the universe. He could take out of existence anything that is in it. But from this we can't, I think, reliably conclude that he did, in fact, create everything that exists. But perhaps he did, I am unsure in no small part because why my reason tells me about free will implies that God did not create us. Anyway, I am simply not sure.

Re morality: as I said, what's morally right is determined by God's will. For an action to be right is for it to be an act that God is ordering us to perform (that is, God tells us - via our reason - that in such-and-such circumstances it is imperative that you do X; well that command 'is' the rightness of Xing). And for something to be morally good is for it to be valued by God. Note, rightness and goodness are not like paints that God is applying to things; for paint can exist independent of the painter, can't it? No, rightness is the property of being commanded by God (so 'what it is' for X to be right, is for God to be commanding us to do X); and goodness if the property of being valued by God.

Note, there is independent reason to think this is true (which I will not supply here), but it is also entailed by God's omnipotence, for if things were otherwise - if morality bound God - then God would not be omnipotent.

You, like so many, then suggest that this makes rightness and wrongness ad hoc. Well, it doesn't. For God is Reason and nothing is ad hoc with Reason. For what does it mean to say that something is ad hoc or arbitrary? It means 'for no reason'. But God 'is' Reason, and so to suggest that his willings and attitudes are arbitrary just shows that you don't know who you're talking about - it is like suggesting that it is just 'ad hoc' that 2 + 3 = 5. In no meaningful sense is that ad hoc.

What I was trying to explain to you is that the topic you've raised was the subject of a debate that went on for centuries in theology - not only Christian but also Islamic theology. — Wayfarer

And why did you do that? I know it. It's irrelevant.

Why don't you address the argument I made rather than categorize things? There have been people in the past who have held my view - I mentioned two: Jesus and Descartes. Shall we list more? Shall we put a label on them and then smuggle under that label other views, tangential to that one, so as to muddy any debate we have on the issue and turn it into a label-fest? Shall we do that? Why would we do that? What would that achieve? You're a labeler, yes? When you hear a view, you like to put it in a jar and put a label on it. That's not thinking. That's not philosophy. It's just a weird kind of collecting that many people mistake for thinking.

Now, once more, a being who can do anything is not going to be bound by the laws of logic, for if they were they would not be able to do anything, but only those things that logic permits.

How could there be a being who is not bound by logic? Well, if logic itself is no more or less than the edicts of that being, then the being in question would not be bound by logic precisely because he is the source of it. As Hobbes put it "Nor is it possible for any person to be bound to himself; because he that can bind, can release; and therefore he that is bound to himself only, is not bound". So, if God is the source of the imperatives of Reason - of which those laws we call 'logic' are a subset - then God will not be bound by logic. And thus God will be able to do anything - including make contradictions true.

That is an argument. That is not a rejection of reason, but an employment of it - I am employing my reason to show that reason itself tells us that its source is God and that God is not bound by it.

That wouldn't be omnipotence. He wouldn't be able to make contradictions true.

I don't see the problem. Once we take seriously that God can do anything, surely no problems arise? An all powerful being has the power to make himself less than all powerful. He doesn't have to exercise it to have it. It is sufficient that he 'can' make himself less than all powerful.

Of course, an all powerful being can also make himself less than all powerful and all powerful at the same time - a prospect that makes no sense at all to us, but that's because what we use to determine whether something makes sense is logic which, by hypothesis, God is not bound by (which is not to say he flouts the laws of logic - he just could if he wanted, for he made them up).

So God can genuinely cede his omnipotence, and he can genuinely cede his omnipotent and remain omnipotent. These are two powers he has. Just as I can pat my head and pat my head and rub my tummy at the same time, so too God can cede his omnipotence, and cede his omnipotence and maintain his omnipotence at the same time. The latter we cannot fathom, but that's not a problem so much as entirely to be expected, given that we're talking about someone who is not bound by logic.

Oh, okay. I won't prove God then. (I thought it was a perfectly good point - an all-powerful being would exist - and so I was going to prove that he did).

Do you think there's reason to think that, or no reason to think it, but you think it anyway?

God can do anything, therefore he can divest himself of his omnipotence if he so wishes. And one way to do that would be to create a thing too heavy for him to lift.

But as God can do anything, he can also - if he wishes - create a thing too heavy for him to lift, and lift it.

You are not omnipotent, for though you have powers in common with an omnipotent being (for anything you can do, an omnipotent being can do too), you cannot make a thing too heavy for you to lift and lift it, can you?

Just a bunch of assertions. I am not ignoring logic, but using it. See above.

These are epistemic questions that don't directly bear on the issue at hand.

But I can know that an omnipotent being exists by means of ratiocination. There is at least one argument that establishes the existence of such a being. And by understanding that argument, I can know of such a being's existence.

And as omnipotence involves being able to do anything, I know that this omnipotent being is capable of being omnipotent and not-omnipotent at the same time. But the argument establishes the existence of an omnipotent being, not a being who is actually omnipotent and not-omnipotent at the same time. So, whether he's exercising that ability or not, is not something I know how to know. But, like I say, I don't think that's relevant.

Because he's being omnipotent at the same time. Only an omnipotent being can be omnipotent 'and' not-omnipotent at the same time. So if I encounter a being who's managed to make himself both omnipotent and not omnipotent at the same time, I know I'm dealing with God.

But even if I could never know such things, the important thing is that God can know them - he knows everything.

I should also add, of course, that God is not in fact omnipotent and not-omnipotent. He's just omnipotent.

Yes, that's really no harder than making a square circle or a married unmarried man, so I am sure he can make himself both of those.

I was trying to think of an example of something logical and illogical, just for the purposes of illustration. Given God can do anything, God can make a square circle. That's illogical - if something is square it is not also circular. But God uses himself to make one. That's logical, given he's the only person who can do everything.

On the contrary, it tells us what goodness is - it is something like 'having a quality that God values you having" or some such.

Note, when we say 'torture is bad' we do not mean that torture is torture. We mean that torture has the property of badness. What, then, is that property? We can't just say 'torture!' for once more that is to reduce one's judgement that torture is bad to the empty judgement that torture is torture. We must, then, be saying more than 'torture is torture' or 'rape is rape' when we judge them bad.

The property in question, then, is the property of being a way of behaving that God does not value us engaging in. God clearly disapproves of us behaving in those ways and nothing I've said suggests otherwise. (And maybe he always has and always will - again, all entirely consistent with what I've argued).

Incidentally, it would be metaphysically possible for, say, torture to be morally good regardless of who or what determines the content of morality. Make the source of morality a platonic form, or make it human conventions, or whatever....it still remains possible, for what stops a Platonic form from overnight valuing torture, or what stops human convention changing so that torture becomes valued? Nothing.

Yes. That's a contradiction of course. But he can do those.

I don't see that at all. Being all powerful means being able to do anything. How does talking about what such a being has actually done or is doing or whatever, 'introduce a deficiency'?

You're just expressing your disbelief in God. That's fine, but irrelevant. What I am doing is exploring what it means to be all powerful. If one wants, one can bracket the issue of whether such a being actually exists (they do, of course, even if you imagine they don't). (Also, there 'do' seem to be limits to what we, at least, can imagine; can you imagine a square circle?)

Not sure I see the point yet. To be able to do anything, God would have to be able to determine the content - and indeed, existence - of morality. If he could not do this, then he would lack a power.

So, what 'being morally perfect' involves is determined by God. As we can see just by reflecting on what it means to be omnipotent. As such nothing stops God from being omnipotent and morally perfect, for God's omnipotence means he himself determines whether or not he is morally perfect.

I am not sure what you're saying.

That seems clearly false. An omnipotent being can do anything. That doesn't mean they do everything. They do what they do. Their omnipotence consists of the fact that they have the ability to do anything at all.
I do not understand your point about long term implications. For by hypothesis, they have the power to determine what implications their actions have.

You've just told me about some labels and then told me, on the basis of no argument whatsoever, that there is no point in arguing for the view I argued for. How silly. I argued for it, didn't you see?

Not sure what you're on about now. It doesn't really connect to anything I've said.
This is a philosophy forum, not a rhetoric forum. Philosophy involves using reason to try and find out what's true. The test of a good argument is its rational plausibility, not its persuasiveness. Like I say, bad arguments can persuade people and good arguments can leave people cold.
Most people are going to have kids and aren't remotely interested in whether it's ethical to do so or not. I mean, have you met people?

Why? — Isaac

Because most people do not live morally superlative lives (nor ought they, of course). Kind of obvious.

Why not? — Isaac

I explained. It's the wordy bit that followed-on from that quote.

All you have here is bog standard antinatalism. — Isaac

How?

Sorry, but no. You are free, of course, to ignore this reply. But you quoted me and then said "I have NO comment.." which implies that you think that what I said in that quote was beyond the logical pale or something. Which it isn't - what I said was demonstrably true.

If something exists of necessity, does it therefore lack a cause? No. Imagine causal determinism is true. Well, if causal determinism is true then everything that happens was necessitated - it had to happen given the past and the laws of nature. Well, assume that both the past and the laws of nature are necessary. Now everything that happens could not not have happened. And that means that everything that has come into being exists of necessity. Yet they've been caused, yes?

Now, if you want you can draw a distinction between different sorts of necessity. But that won't help you where saving Avicenna's argument is concerned, it's just a bit of label juggling. All you'll end up doing is drawing a distinction between those things that exist of necessity and have been caused to exist, and those things that exist of necessity and have not been caused to exist. Yet what you actually need to do is show how 'existing without a cause' 'entails' that the thing in question exists of necessity. You cannot do that by any amount of re-labelling.

So the idea of something existing of necessity and the idea of something existing uncaused are not the same idea. You think you are because Avicenna thinks they are, yes? That's not evidence that they are.

And we can go the other way as well. Existing 'contingently' does not entail that the thing must have a cause.

We know, by the light of reason, that if anything has been caused to exist, then there must exist at least one thing that has not been caused to exist. That argument - an argument that makes no mention of contingency or necessity - is sufficient to establish the existence of an un-caused existent, and unmoved mover. Yet because that argument makes no mention of contingency or necessity, whether the un-caused existent exists of necessity or contingently is left open. That argument therefore does not permit you validly to conclude that there exists a necessary existent.

And if God provably exists - and he does - then we have in God a positive counterexample. For God exits and can do anything. And as I've argued extensively above - and you've said nothing to suggest there is anything wrong with the arguments, you've just reiterated your position - if God can do anything, then God can destroy himself. So, God exists, God has not been caused to exist, and God can destroy himself - and thus exists contingently.

I labour these points because so many contemporary theists insist that God exists of necessity and insist that God is restricted by logic. These ideas are preposterous. They have no basis in reason and upon a bit of reflection one can surely see that a God who is restricted by logic is not a god at all, but someone of remarkably stunted powers.

I would like to be able to convince people of its soundness. But my priority is to find out whether it actually is sound. After all, it is irresponsible to try and convince people of a view whose truth one is unsure about. So the priority should be to check if a view is true - which one does by careful rational scrutiny.
It can often be hard to appreciate a good argument - hard to recognise just how much probative force it has. Most people prefer soundbites and simplicity and don't have much time to give a view the amount of thought it needs to uncover its problems or to see its truth.
Imagine trying to convince a 12th century detective of the value of DNA evidence as opposed to dunking people in ponds and seeing if they float. It wouldn't fly. Does that mean DNA evidence isn't good evidence - or wasn't in the 12th centruy? No, of course not. Yet it wouldn't have convinced anyone back then.

Right. So a population of well-behaved people are perfectly likely to deserve all the pleasure they get (and more) and thus there is no 'badness' in giving birth to them because the pleasure they will revive in life truly does outweigh the suffering, — Isaac

I don't see how you get to that conclusion. First, you need to be more than merely well-behaved. Being well-behaved is morally required, not morally superlative. Yet it is the latter that makes one positively deserving of pleasure as opposed to merely non-deserving. And it is unreasonable to suppose that one's offspring will live morally superlative lives. So, the suffering that a well-behaved person undergoes prior to becoming an agent is undeserved, and the suffering they undergo through the rest of their life - well, most of that is going to be undeserved as well. That may well operate to make many of their subsequent pleasures deserved (though not necessarily - desert is not a simple matter), but it's not going to tip the balance in any particular case. That's because although the goodness of a deserved pleasure is greater than that of a non-deserved pleasure, it is not going to be better than not having suffered the undeserved suffering. We typically recognise this at an intuitive level. For instance, let's say I know that, other things being equal, Janet is going to experience 10 units of non-deserved pleasure tomorrow. I reason that if I subject Janet to 10 units of undeserved suffering right now, then those 10 units of pleasure that she'll experience tomorrow will become deserved and thus will count for more, goodness-wise. Now, does that give me some moral reason to subject Janet to that suffering? No, of course not. That's why knowingly creating undeserved suffering that deserved pleasure may come of it is wrong, at least in most of the cases I can conceive of.

Note as well that if one lives a superlative life, that operates to make the undeserved suffering that you experience even worse, morally speaking. As I said, the better you behave, the worse your suffering becomes - not necessarily in quantity or quality, but in its moral badness. For the better you behave, the more undeserving of suffering you become.

So I think you need to re-sit your moral accountancy exams.

Right, so you're not talking about God at all. By 'God' you mean 'a necessary existent' and not someone who can do anything. I think it's fair if I put inverted commas around 'God' when it refers to what you're talking about, as it certainly isn't the meaning anyone else attaches to the term.

You've provided no sound argument for thinking any necessary existent exists. Avicenna's argument fails for reasons I've explained. He wrongly assumes that if something exists contingently, then it has a cause of its existence (and conversely, that if something exists of necessity, then it doesn't have a cause of its existence). Such assumptions are demonstrably false. So the argument fails.

But anyway, back to the necessary existence that you've labelled 'God'. This being cannot defy logic (unlike you and I) and cannot take himself out of existence (unlike you and I). Of course, you're operating with quite the wrong idea about what laws of logic are - you are thinking of them as cosmic forces, when in fact they are instructions (hence why we can defy them). But putting that gigantic error to oneside for the sake of argument: this logical straightjacket that you've put 'God' in (and that we're not in, or not in to the same extent).....who made it? Did 'God' make it and then put himself in it? Or did someone else make it and put 'God' in it? Or was it a necessarily existing straightjacket that 'God' simply finds himself in?

It seems to me whichever answer you give, you will either end up with my view or else a view about 'God' that is further and further away from the being the rest of us are talking about. For if you say that 'God' himself made the straightjacket, then 'God' was my God prior to his doing so. That is, prior to making it - prior to weaving logic - your 'God' could do anything, and was thus God proper. Alternatively, if you say that someone else made it, or that it existed of necessity, then 'God' in addition to being straightjacketed in ways that none of us are, also did not create something, namely the straightjacket.

And in fact, if you think the straightjacket exists of necessity - and I really don't see how you can't without giving up and adopting my view (for if you think someone else made the straightjacket, then that person would be God proper) - then you have even less reason to think that 'God' exists of necessity.
For the law of parsimony tells you not to multiply kinds of entity beyond what's necessary. And although we do not need to posit necessary existents to explain contingent existents, you think we do....but we only need to posit one, don't we? I mean, that's why you posit the one 'God'. But now we've discovered that the logical straightjacket in which you insist 'God' resides must - must - exist of necessity. So now it turns out that the straightjacket - which is not 'God' - is the necessary existent that must be posited to explain all else. Thus it now turns out that your 'God' doesn't exist of necessity, only the straightjacket that you put him in does. This poor creature that you are calling 'God' doesn't exist of necessity, didn't create the universe he finds himself in, and he can do barely anything! I don't see how your view differs, then, from atheism given that an atheist who nevertheless thinks there exists a nice bloke who doesn't have much power is now someone who holds a view no different from yours.

No doubt you will once more insist that you mean an 'omnipotent being', but that by 'omnipotent' you mean 'bound by logic'.

All I can do when it comes to that is try and find as many ways of driving home how weak such a being would be, and how ludicrous it would be to judge such a creature 'all powerful'.

For instance, it seems to me that you are arguing fallaciously. That is, I think you - you - are defying the laws of logic. You are drawing conclusions that you are not entitled to draw and making leaps that you are not entitled to make. No doubt you think it is I who is doing that. Doesn't matter, the point stands. One of us, perhaps both of us, are defying logic here, in this thread. At least one of us is drawing conclusions that logic forbids us from drawing.

That, on your definition of omnipotence, is something God cannot do. So you it turns out, are more powerful than your God, at least in some respects!! You can defy logic, but God cannot. How ludicrous is that? You and I can do what your God cannot!

This just underlines how ridiculous it is to define omnipotence in terms of logical possibility. You end up with a creature who can do barely anything. And to label such a person 'omnipotent' just shows that when you use omnipotent you are not using it to denote a being who is so powerful he can do anything, but a horribly constrained creature who can do barely anything. Label it God if you want, but it isn't the God the rest of us are talking about and wondering at the existence of.

Forget me - my position is consistent, and I've now explained to you at length how it is consistent, and explained what function the laws of logic perform.

But forget me and focus on yourself. Which premise in this argument do 'you' deny:

1. God can do anything, including destroy anything
2. If all things are destructible, no things are necessary existences.
3. Therefore, if God exists no things are necessary existences.

It's 1, yes? And you deny it because you are using the word 'God' to mean 'necessary existent' and not 'omnipotent, omniscience, omnibenevolent person' yes? (And you use 'absolute' to mean this as well). These are abuses of the word God, of course, but you are free to use a word how you like.

So, once more, and just to be clear, when you say "God exists" you're not talking about the God that jesus and the Koran are talking about, and you're not talking about the God whose existence philosophers puzzle over. You're just talking about a necessary existence. And you're just insisting one exists. And insisting one exists on the basis of an unsound argument.

I think you're making the same mistake, that is you're conflating having an ability with exercising it. I can do X, does not mean I 'am' doing X.

God is not subject to the laws of logic, for they're his laws. As Kant said, "there's nothing higher than Reason". Quite right. But there's nothing higher than God too. So Reason and God must be the same and the laws of logic, being the laws of Reason, are God's laws. And being God's laws, they do not bind him. So, he can do absolutely anything, including things that the laws of logic forbid.

But God uses the laws of logic to tell us how things are with his creation and with him. You, no doubt, see the laws of logic as curious cosmic forces. But they're not - that is a category error - they are communication mechanisms. They're ways God tells us about how things are, and tells us how to behave. The law of non-contradiction, for instance, tells us that no true proposition is also false. It's telling us something - telling us something about the world.

How, then, can God tells us that there are no necessary existences? All things are possible with God, so we can't, just by recognizing that alone, come to any conclusion one way or the other on the matter. But if we listen to our reason, our reason tells us that if God can do anything, then he can destroy anything that exists. And our reason tells us as well that if everything that exists can be destroyed, then everything that exists exists contingently. And if everything that exists exists contingently, then there are no necessary existences. There: that's God telling us, by means of his language, the language of reason, that there are, in fact, no necessary existences.

Now of course, because all things are possible with God, it is possible for God to be a necessary existent 'and' for God to be able to destroy himself. But that possibility makes no sense to us, right? It is rebarbative to our reason. That is, our reason - God's communication mechanism - tells us "that makes no sense!!". Again, how else could God convey to us how things actually are, as opposed to how they could be?

God, then, is not bound by anything and could make reality any way he wanted. But then there's how things actually are with reality. And logic is how God tells us about it. He's not using logic to tell us about how things 'could' be - for they can be anyway as all things are possible with God - but rather to tell us how things actually are. For reality is where we actually live.

Laws of logic do not bind him, because they're not forces in any way shape or form (logic is not a strange kind of gravity or glue). They are communications from God, addressed to us. And they tell us, in part anyway, how things are with reality. They describe how it will behave, and tell us as well how we are to behave in it (those laws being 'normative' - that is, they prescribe rather than describe). But they do not place any restrictions on God. They are simply God's way of telling us about his creation.

Again your first premise is false because if God can do anything even if logically impossible,therefore He can create a being that's immune to God therefore God won't be able to destroy that being. — BARAA

No, God can create such a creature. But if he did, he wouldn't be God anymore.

God can divest himself of omnipotence if he so wishes. He wouldn't be omnipotent unless that were so.

You're making the mistake I mentioned sometime earlier - you're thinking that if John is a bachelor, then John lacks the ability to have a wife.

I mean, imagine a tree falls on me and pins me to the ground. Well, that's cost me some abilities - I now can't get up. If Baraa comes up to me and points out that this tree is on as a matter of necessity and that I am actually omnipotent because I can do all things logically possible and it just so happens that freeing myself from the tree is not logically possible, I would say that he was being very silly indeed.

Maybe, but that's beside the point, for if I turn out to be a necessary existent then I would lack a power. I currently believe - perhaps mistakenly - that it is possible for me not to exist and that I myself have the power to bring it about that I do not exist. If I am mistaken, then I have less power than I thought I did. And it will make no difference if it is pointed out that it it is by the laws of logic that I am unable to take myself out of existence, for it was the fact - whether necessary or not - that I am unable to do it that impoverishes my power.

So, just to be clear, by 'absolute' you mean 'exists necessarily' yes? So you're saying that the definition of God is 'a being who exists of necessity'?

That's not the definition of God. God is a being who is omnipotent, omniscient, and omnibenevolent. Those are the 'essential' attributes of God. There are other attributes that there's debate over, but those three are sufficient to make the creature that has them God.

Now here's my defence of my premise 1. Which premise do you deny?

1. God can do anything, including destroy anything
2. If all things are destructible, no things are necessary existences.
3. Therefore, if God exists no things are necessary existences.

No doubt you will - you must - deny premise 1, as premise 2 is a conceptual truth.

But that means that by 'God' you do not mean an omnipotent being. You are just using the word 'God' as a synonym for a 'necessary existent' yes? That's all you mean by the term 'God'. Correct? You don't mean what, say, Jesus meant by 'God'; you don't mean the God of the Koran or the God of philosophical debate or the God people wonder about the existence of?

No, completely wrong. Look, you're the one who doesn't really respect logic, for I have used logic to refute your position and suddenly you don't care about that - rather than revise your view or address the criticism, you turn instead to me. So your respect for logic doesn't run too deep, does it?
I have already answered your question. But let me express it in the form of an argument and you can then tell me which premise you deny:

1. If God exists, no necessary existent exists
2. God exists
3. Therefore, no necessary existent exists

Not pointless, you've just been decisively refuted, yes?

Am I wrong in saying that to get from 'contingent things exist' to 'there is a necesary existent' you need to assume that all contingent things have causes of their existence?

You do. For it is only if you make that assumption that we then get a regress of causes that can only be blocked by invoking a necessary existent.

So your case - your case 'for' a necessary existent - depends on a false premise.

And am I wrong in saying that if God exists of necessity then God cannot take himself out of existence - a power that even I have? No, you can't deny that. And yet that is obviously inconsistent with God being all powerful.

So you're trying to reach a destination that, if you reach it, will demonstrate God's nonexistence! You've set out in a broken car - so you won't get there - but were you to do so, you'd be an atheist!

As to your question - it seems you haven't been following at all what I have been arguing. No. I do not believe a necessary existent exists. I believe God exists. You, it seems, do not. What you believe in is not God, but a hobbled creature who must bow to laws of logic he did not create.

You claim to esteem logic, but like so many it seems you are only interested in listening to Reason when she tells you what you want to hear.

I don't follow you. To be omnipotent is to be all powerful. So you can't be omnipotent 'and' constrained. For those constraints operate as limits on one's power - they wouldn't be constraints otherwise. And as reasoned reflection reveals, a being who was not subject to those constraints would be more powerful than one who was not. Yet, again by reasoned reflection, no-one can be more powerful than an all powerful being.

So, an omnipotent being is not constrained by the laws of logic. And indeed, those laws would have to be in that being's gift, for how else could the being escape being bound by them?

The point can be made in numerous ways. I mean, imagine that I - uniquely among us - exist of necessity. Well, now I lack a power that you have - I can't take myself out of existence. That's a real constraint, yes? I really can't take myself out of existence, whereas you can. What difference does it make to point out that as it is a true by definition that a necessary existent cannot not exist, I cannot not exist. That's to miss the point spectacularly. It's just to make a point about the concept of necessity, but it does nothing whatever to imply that I do not, in fact, lack a power.

Now just apply this to God. If you say of God - as you are trying to do - that God exists of necessity, then God is constrained. And you can play about with definitions all you like, the fact is going to remain that God is constrained. If you redefine omnipotence in such a way that this God, this God who cannot take himself our of existence, turns out to satisfy your revised definition, then all you've done is show that your definition of omnipotence is worthless and no longer refers to a being who is all powerful.

Look, your case is faulty in two directions. First, you can't 'get to' a necessary being. You're starting with contingent things, yes? But then you - or you on Avicenna's behalf - are then assuming that if something exists contingently it must have a cause of its existence. That assumption is essential - you can't get to the conclusion that a necessity existent exists without it. Yet that assumption is demonstrably false.

So, the way is blocked - you/Avicenna cannot get to your desired conclusion. You have not provided us with any reason to think that there exists a necessary being. You've just made a leap - you've leapt from 'exists contingently' to 'needs a cause for its existence'. But that's clearly a mistaken leap - that is, a leap that reason itself - logic - tells you is a mistake if you listen carefully. For something can exist contingently yet be uncaused, and something can exist of necessity yet be caused. So you have leapt in defiance of logic, and it is only by defying logic that you have reached the conclusion that a necessary existent exists - a conclusion that logic will also tell you is flatly inconsistent with God existing.

That's the other direction - in addition to not having shown a necessary being to be needed to stop the regress of causes, no necessary existent can be God. So your foundation is faulty, but so too is the building you've constructed on top of it.

God is 'not' a necessary existent, for God is all powerful and so can take himself out of existence if he so wishes - thus he can not exist.

There are other problems too (though what I've said above is decisive, I think). I mean, if God is constrained by logic, then logic is a curious force in the universe that exists independently of God, yes? So now you're positing a Platonic universe in which there is some Form of Reason that determines what else can exist and what that which exists can do. That's not a universe created by God, that's a universe in which God finds himself. Which is, of course, inconsistent with God being God if, that is, we make - as most religions do, I think - 'being the creator of everything apart from himself' - a defining characteristic of God.

Nothing I've said above is illogical. Nothing I've said above implies that I reject the laws of logic. And nothing said above implies that God himself defies them. That God can do things that defy them does not mean he actually is or has. So nothing I have argued above involves a rejection of logic. All we are talking about is logic's power - and you think logic has power 'over' God, whereas I think that logic itself - that is, reasoned reflection - tells us if we engage in it carefully that God, being all powerful, has power over logic.