Flaws in the Christian concept of God

The awnser to all your questons is simple really. God is a concept we can not understand. Just as an amoeba can not analyse the internet we can not analyse God. He is too far beyond our lmited abillity to reason that we have no hope of understanding. The best we can do regardless of our religon is have faith.

My issue with that answer is that the Bible constantly attempts to describe God, or attribute things to him.
If God is truly ineffable and transcendent of this universe then how does he affect it

edit; see here and do a search for 'ineffable'

[edit on 24-9-2004 by browha]

browha

edit; Modern philosophical thought has been debated and refined for hundreds of years to arrive at today's arguments. For many philosophers, it takes a moment of inspiration to come up with an argument like the rock argument.

Firstly, read mwm1331's BRILLIANT counter-essay.

Secondly, where does this �inspiration� come from?

Have you ever gone to a zoo? Go sometime and take your best jokes with you. Tell them to the monkeys. See how many of them laugh.

The ���rock��� example is a conundrum. How can it be proved?

If I cut my hand off can I still move the fingers?

The answer is the same-

why would I bother?

*read the bible- hundreds of examples of how God does all kinds of things.

[edit on 24/9/2004 by PublicGadfly]

I dont see MWM1331's counteressay anywhere in the thread
Inspiration, where does it come from? Wherever.. looking at a function in nature and realizing you could construct a similar thing to solve a problem in real life, trying out varying solutions to a mathematical equation to no sucess and then realizing that a new radical approach can solve it...
A hard question, but if I think what you are hinting, then no way even near.
I do not comprehend your zoo question.
The rock example, is because it is paradoxical. Any way you answer it presents flaws for God. This is in direct contradiciton to his property of being all-powerful.


The Bible is a very nice book, but dont forget it is also a biased source... And knowing alot, and knowing everything, is extremely different... Having alot of money, and having all the money, for example.

Originally posted by browha
My issue with that answer is that the Bible constantly attempts to describe God, or attribute things to him.
If God is truly ineffable and transcendent of this universe then how does he affect it

edit; see here and do a search for 'ineffable'

[edit on 24-9-2004 by browha]

I don't know how he does it, I do know he knows how he does. The bible is the word of god as the men who wrote it understood it. Any mistakes are the result of the translators inabillity to understand what they were told or to communicate it effectively. Look at it this way compared to understanding the nature of God a unifed theroy of physics is finger painting and yet we still don't have one. Even if we did how many of us have the abillity to undertand the theory, all of the math, all of the ramifictions of that theory. Of the few (very few) who could understand the theory and all of ts ramifictions how many of us could write a book whch would be able to explain it to the average person?

[edit on 24-9-2004 by mwm1331]

Fair enough..
With the unification field theory.. The point here is that anyone could understand it if they went and learned the mathematics for it.
We've already got potential answers to the unification theory, but they just need more work.. .And in fact one of the few things stopping us is the size of particle accelerators. We could easily 'crack' the theory if we had the money and the determination, whereas with God, how many people would directly understand him?

Could we? Could any one person really understand the entire theory, all the math, every single ramification? Look at any of our sciences how many people really understand it all? Most of the genuses specialse. Yes einstein came up with relativity but did he undrstand the interacton of complex chemical chains? What about his understanding of the enzyme, hormone and chemical balance of the tmber wolf as compared to that of a white shark? And even so how many of us can understand or even have the abillity to comprehed the maths alone? What percentage of the population? Now take the sum of all human knowledge, all sciences, all philosiphy, all history ,all anthropology, and multiply the amount of knowledge and the sheer brain power that would be needed to undertand and more importantly comprehend all aformentioned knowledge, and multiply it by infinity. That is what it would take just to be able to actually understand the question "what is the nature of God?" It will not ever be awnsered because no man can even comprehend what we are really asking.

The Rock

The rock paradox is only a paradox if you do not break it down into steps. My earlier explanation of the loop only holds true if one does not stop to check to see if an action is complete.

Man to God: Create a rock so big it cannot be moved.
God to man: Ok.
God then creates a rock that fills the entire universe. There is no where the rock can be moved.
God to Man: There you go.
Man to God: Nice, now move it.
God to man: Ok.
God then increases the size of the universe and moves the rock.
God to Man: There you go.
Man to God: But the rock is no longer so big that it cannot be moved.
God to Man: It was when I made it.
Man to God: I'll be damned.
God to Man: Only if you choose to be.


Edit:
Or if you prefer the loop:
The universe is so big it cannot be moved. There is no place in space to which you can move the whole. However, from our perpsective the outer boundary is moving away from us.

Now imagine an layer of rock touching the outer boundary of the universe, that expands at the same rate as the universe. This layer of rock cannot be moved as there is no where to move it. However, from our perspective it is moving away from us.

The immovable is moving.





[edit on 24-9-2004 by Raphael_UO]

bee-u-tee-ful

- - -
The zoo-
no matter how smart the monkeys they won't get the joke.

Like the other (better) examples given, if God explained things we still wouldn't get it.

My issues;
The universe/rock thing..

I say to a watchmaker : Make a watch that tells the time
Watchmaker makes a watch that tells the exact time when it was made
Five seconds later
I say to watchmaker : This watch no longer tells the correct time.

Similar issue, in my opinion, with the universe/rock thing.
Another way of thinking of it is by 'assigning' God a physical body, similar to that of a human, can he lift an infinite load then? Either way you argue has flaws.

Another thing;
God is in every atom and is in every point of being at every time of being.
God is in particle A.
Particle A collides with anti-matter particle B
A + B = total annihilation

Thus has a part of God been destroyed?

test for pic thank you

Any rebuttal from anyone?

Originally posted by browha
My issues;
The universe/rock thing..

I say to a watchmaker : Make a watch that tells the time
Watchmaker makes a watch that tells the exact time when it was made
Five seconds later
I say to watchmaker : This watch no longer tells the correct time.

Similar issue, in my opinion, with the universe/rock thing.
Another way of thinking of it is by 'assigning' God a physical body, similar to that of a human, can he lift an infinite load then? Either way you argue has flaws.

Comparing my rock reply to your first example is more like telling a watch maker to make a watch that tells exact time, and you move to another time zone and tell the watch maker it no longer tells the correct time. Then you complain to that he doesn't know how to make a watch!

Once you "assign" God a finite body, the abilities of that body are finite even if they are arbitarily large. The limitting of God to prove your point is the source of the flaws.

Another thing;
God is in every atom and is in every point of being at every time of being.
God is in particle A.
Particle A collides with anti-matter particle B
A + B = total annihilation

Thus has a part of God been destroyed?

Without going into paritcle/anti-particle physics and explaining how it is derived, I will simply say: Annihilation is a temporal occurance. To God, both the partical and the anti-particle still exist. Thus have not been annihilated.

Or if you prefer, I could explain using the many worlds quantum theory how the particle/anti-particle did not collide.

Why do I get the idea you are not a theoretical physicist?

This entire discussion is beginning to devolve into an "is not", "is too" debate.

Regardless, as a scientist you should know you cannot prove "a negative". The only way to "prove a negative" is to attempt to prove the positive and discount the positive due to lack of evidence. You are attempting to prove that God is not omnipotent. Do you see the flaw in your process here?

Originally posted by browha
Please note that this is an original work. Not necessairly the ideas or arguments, but the composition of the essay, was done by me personally.
Please read before you slate it, the discussion in there is quite widely held by philosophers.
(snip)

Good thing God isn't limited by our finite capacity for reason.

Put simply, if we could comprehend the length and breadth of God, what kind of lame-o god would He be?

Originally posted by browha
My issues;
The universe/rock thing..

I say to a watchmaker : Make a watch that tells the time
Watchmaker makes a watch that tells the exact time when it was made
Five seconds later
I say to watchmaker : This watch no longer tells the correct time.

Scientist says to God: We don't need you anymore. We can create life ourselves.
God: Okay, prove it.
*Scientist begins collecting organic material for test tube*
God: Hold it!
Scientist: What?
God: Use your own dirt.

Similar issue, in my opinion, with the universe/rock thing.
Another way of thinking of it is by 'assigning' God a physical body, similar to that of a human, can he lift an infinite load then? Either way you argue has flaws.

Asserting that one can comprehend the infinite with a finite mind has flaws.

Another thing;
God is in every atom and is in every point of being at every time of being.
God is in particle A.
Particle A collides with anti-matter particle B
A + B = total annihilation

Thus has a part of God been destroyed?

Uh, a lot of premises here. That analogy looks a lot like a straw man to me.

Originally posted by Raphael_UO
Why do I get the idea you are not a theoretical physicist?

Ironically....

I suppose, yes, bringing in multiverses into it.. But then you need to consider in some universes the particles never even existed, so then you have to say a part of God both existed and didnt exist... Sounds alot like Schroedinger's Cat.. but who is our observer

Originally posted by browha

Ironically....

I suppose, yes, bringing in multiverses into it.. But then you need to consider in some universes the particles never even existed, so then you have to say a part of God both existed and didnt exist... Sounds alot like Schroedinger's Cat..

Awareness of other parallel universes does not mean duality exists. This or that universe is a matter of perception.

but who is our observer

I have often said, "I would be nothing without God."