What does Satan represent?

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What I know of the Bible itself, the tree of knowledge in garden of Eden, the massive deaths in the Noah legend, the sophomoric teasing of Job, even the primitively cruel testing of Abraham are not the actions of any superior intellect, they are prime exhibitions of sadistic brutality that no decent being would commit. Extra terrestrial or not, this is no creature that in any way represents intelligent morality.

Your emotional decision that there was something supernatural in your luck to get a decent education is naive in the utmost.

Most [intelligent?] people prefer to understand why they're doing something, especially if they feel there might be a better way, instead of blindly following orders. That's one of the reasons people hate McJobs with no thought and no skill required.

And I have an allegory for you, too:

Logic dictates that a collection of meaningless words cannot be true. So what do 'all-present', 'all-knowing', 'all-powerful', 'infinite knowledge' and 'infinite wisdom' mean?

Bear in mind problems like 'can god make a rock that it cannot lift?'

Except questions like verifiable and falsifiable evidence for existence of god?

Sortof. Logic dictates that an all-knowing, all-present being would also have to be amoral. Not to mention there's that whole "second law of thermodynamics" that you'd have to account for, as well. Unless, you feel like absolutely redefining physics...which you're more than welcome to. I hate the second law of thermodynamics and think it's a limited law that can only apply in a specific field of the macro...but I also don't have the knowledge or ability to disprove it outside of its current capacity which, in turn, makes it universally applied until proven otherwise.

That's a lazy rebuttal. You can do better. Not to mention, if god possesses multidimensional properties then in a technical sense, he could be in a cat state where he could both lift the rock and be unable to lift the rock at the same time. You gotta do better than that.

Physicists build a "quantum cat" out of light.

It's really funny that all somebody has to do is mention "multidimensional" and all bets are off. The restrictions apply to all dimensions. If there is an unliftable rock anywhere it screws up the concept. Of course the concept is basically meaningless anyway.

The "cat state" doesn't limit itself to multidimensional* properties but considering that the easiest way to induce such a state is with beams of light, which (to me) hint at multidimensional* properties, an entity that is itself, timeless, hints at similar multidimensional* properties.

Al theoretical...but like I said: there are good examples that are within our knowledge and assumed understanding of physics and logic that would negate AngelRho's arguments. The supposed paradox of being in two states simultaneously at the same time isn't one of them anymore with physics as we know it today. Get your arguments updated.

I'm not in a pro-deity stance, I'm overall neutral...but that doesn't mean I'll be some brainless cheerleader who won't hold "my own side" to the level of scrutiny that's fair to all. I've already made my stance clear that religions are wrong and are worthless to society. It's time to move beyond that and to analyzing the actual concept of a higher being and what that might entail and what logic it might follow given our own natural state of order, given what we know.


To be dismissive as you are to my physics counter betrays your intelligence in favor of your biases and I know you can do better than that.


*I should say "extra-dimensional" so that I'm specific as to that I mean something that exists beyond our own, limited three dimensions and implies that there could be more at work within the "fourth dimension" or however many will end up filling up "time" as we choose to define it.

I was not dismissive of your physics, I was saying it was irrelevant. If something exists as unliftable in any dimension or where ever, it remains a total challenge to an all perfect being. Bringing in interdimensionality has nothing to do with the problem.

Oh...you failed to understand the example. The example is the quantum state of matter existing in two states at once. It's best summed up in an analogy described as Schroedinger's Cat.

[url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schrödinger's_cat]Schrödinger's cat[/url]

This has been observed within our three dimensions but all the examples, so far, end up using light in some manner to fully achieve the effect. Light, as you know, travels at the speed limit of our dimensions and also, as you know, if an object goes faster than the speed of light (or even approaches it), they experience relativistic effects and can, theoretically, travel backward in time. Given these facts, I include the extra-dimensional aspect (time) because it seems to be the link to the effect...but it is definitely observable in our three dimensions. It also fits in the description of a deity that it must be timeless...meaning it exists within the dimension of time or above.

Does this make AngelRho any more correct? Hell no. The Christian god is a farce as much as any other religions' gods are. However, it does mean that atheists need to be more on top of their game for arguing and I actively encourage that and encourage such knowledge being propagated so that a focus on a fallacy doesn't form.

But anyways, back to "unliftable": what it means is that a fourth dimensional entity might possibly be able to render a three dimensional avatar that is simultaneously able to lift and unable to lift said theoretical rock simultaneously. So, to our experience and our direct knowledge and interaction, the answer would be both meaning that a deity could create a rock that is unliftable to it while simultaneously being able to lift it at the same time. Though, given basic logic, if a deity were to do that, they quickly negate themselves as a deity in the reality in which they failed to lift the rock....so the end result would most likely be "yes, but won't" with a few splintering realities getting a quickly humanized fourth dimensional entity and a "godless" world (assuming there is only one fourth-dimensional entity which would be foolish if we're going to start making such assumptions).

In immediate practical aspects, the answer is as pointless as asking if there is a god to begin with. In less practical aspects, it poses a question that we can answer more thoroughly with our current knowledge and guesses.

I am familiar with the indeterminacy involved in Schrodinger's theory. All I am pointing out is that unliftability cannot exist under any circumstances with absolute power. One is a total and absolute contradiction of the other.

Incidentally, another thing an all powerful being cannot do is create another all powerful being.

Another supposed characteristic of God is that He is claimed to be perfect. A perfect being cannot create anything imperfect. Yet there are so many instances in the Bible where things have gone wrong from Adam and Eve onward. That would seem to indicate God was full of imperfections. But what the hell...you can't make sense of theology.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-11161493

Adam and Eve and the rock...

Look, a perfect God will not create something that is imperfect. God didn't create imperfection. My whole point about human arrogance is that we take what has been made perfect and corrupt it by trying to best God. God didn't create human beings as imperfect beings. God DID, however, "take a risk" by giving them the choice to decide whether to obey or disobey. What Adam and Eve did was no accident. And because of their actions, they became imperfect. You can't blame God for something human beings do. My little girl is close to being dismissed from her daycare because her immunizations aren't up-to-date. If it's right to blame God for something He didn't do, it would make an equal amount of sense for me to blame YOU for the health department failing to give us accurate information as to our compliance with immunization regulations (it had to do with how the computer system reports those records, which at a glance appeared to be in compliance when, in reality, they aren't).

OK... About that whole "Can God create a stone too heavy for Him to lift?" question.

Look, that's nothing more than a silly word game. You might as well ask "Can God eat oatmeal that no one can eat?" If God can create a stone too heavy for anyone to lift, then there's a task that God cannot do, which is lift any conceivable stone. But if God can lift any stone, then there's a different task God cannot do, which challenges the existence of an all-powerful God.

Let me ask you this: Is doing something like that, for example, an all-powerful being creating an all-powerful being, an actual, REAL, possibility? Can you, Sand, make the concept of justice dance with the number 2? I doubt it. Neither justice nor the number two can actually dance!! !

Another question: The logical problem of an all-powerful God creating an all-powerful being or creating a stone He cannot life assumes that "logic" is greater than God. That cannot be. "Logic" does not name or describe something concrete or abstract that can carry out tasks.

Yet another: Can you do anything that is contradictory, like make a square circle? No. Why not? Is there some force we call "logic" restraining you? Of course not. That's because of two laws of logic: The law of identity and the law of noncontradiction. These are not "laws" like laws of nature (gravity/motion), but ARE necessary conditions of there being anything at all and for there being thought and language about anything at all. God the Son (Jesus) is referred to in the NT as the Logos (word). Many of us understand that this implies logic and reason are part of God's nature.

So going strictly on logic, this silly word game about God making a stone He can't lift or other such impossibilities has no real legitimacy concerning the nature and existence of an all-powerful God. Now, that does raise other questions, like "Can the God of the Bible commit suicide? Tell lies? Do evil for its own sake?"

First, God CAN bring about any of these conditions. God is not COMPELLED to do so, however, because God is essentially good. This in no way diminishes God's omnipotence.

Second, why should we think of divine omnipotence exclusively in terms of the bare scope of power? Many of us believe that God's power is also supremely good. Do you think that the power to do evil for its own sake is really a worthy, good power? Most people in general would not agree that it is. God's power is the power to do good, not evil. I think a serious discussion of God's power would be above silly word-play.

God didn't invent crack, George H.W. Bush just made sure it was distro'd on the streets.

Where no one had to consume it if they did not want to.

ruveyn