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From: faustus@ucbvax.ARPA (Wayne Christopher)
Newsgroups: net.philosophy,net.religion
Subject: Re: Omnipotence
Message-ID: <1804@ucbvax.ARPA>
Date: Thu, 6-Sep-84 01:40:15 EDT
Article-I.D.: ucbvax.1804
Posted: Thu Sep  6 01:40:15 1984
Date-Received: Sat, 15-Sep-84 07:30:59 EDT
References: <213@laidbak.UUCP>
Organization: University of California at Berkeley
Lines: 26

> 1)Doesn't that mean that the characteristics of being Omnipotent cannot
>   exist in a Universe with any  real physical laws?
> 2) Or , does it only imply that perhaps there is a faulty notion of
> what a physical law really is?
> 3) Or is it possible that physical laws are only a reflection of the
> capabilities of those making them, i.e. could Super Being(s) still
> exists, and that our physical laws just do not apply to It(them), and if
> this is the case, then could there  be some beings of "intermediate"
> capabilities, who are not Omnipotent, who have the capability to disobey
> some of our physical laws, but some other kind of "physical laws"
> still apply to them?
> 4) Am I starting from the wrong foot?

Well, you have to understand that a physical law is not a law. A
physical law is merely an observation of a regularity that there seems
to be in nature. If in fact there are omnipotent beings, they must act
with great regularity (if they cause the phenomena that we percieve),
because the universe seems to be pretty regular. However, the very idea
of an omnipotent being is incoherent in the first place, because of
paradoxes like "Can God create a rock too heavy for Him to lift?" It's
not enough to say "He wouldn't be stupid enough to try to do it" or
something like that, and I doubt that anybody would be willing to grant
that God can violate the laws of logic in addition to our (percieved)
physical laws... 

	Wayne