The Limits of Omnipotence

Excellent! I'd like to thank Esiar for this opportunity to discuss a frequently overlooked topic in theology. I look forward to an interesting debate. Back in the day deities used their powers sustainably. The lightnings of Zeus and thunders of Thor were very impressive, Pele's eruptions had actual fire and brimstone and a variety of nature gods and goddesses made the crops grow. They fought incessantly but they all had the good sense not to try and be all-powerful. Then came the theological arms race that is monotheism and all-mighty gods became necessary. This stems from this simple fact that if you're a follower of The One True God then it simply doesn't do to have some smelly goat-herder brag about how his god can lift more oxen than your god can. Especially if you're a smelly goat-herder too. The unfortunate result was that people from the "Because we have the biggest army!" school of philosophy who had to remove their sandals to count above ten went and added infinity to their gods. I've always thought that if God were all-powerful he'd at least be limited to exercising power in logical and sensible ways. It's a pretty dim-witted deity that arm-wrestles itself by trying to make rocks so big that it can't lift them. There is at least some dim hope for an all-powerful-within-the-limits-of-reason God as outlined above. If God's power extends to committing paradoxical acts then it is entirely beyond our comprehension and unworthy of any further consideration. God may be beyond the rules of logic but you and I and the rest of the universe are not. To comprehend a God that could commit a paradox we would have to believe two contradictory axioms and any logical system that contains contradictory axioms suffers the principle of explosion [1]. The principle of explosion is actually fairly simple. If a logical system holds any two contradictory axioms then it can be used to derive anything, including more contradictions. It explodes, hence the name. Let A represent any old axiom, it doesn't matter which. In this case, "The sky is blue." Now, if a logical system holds both A and Not A as true then it's true that "The sky is blue." and "The sky is not blue." Now add another axiom. Again, it doesn't matter which one. In this case let's let SCE represent "Santa Claus Exists." Now for the explosion. - (A or SCE) is true. We know this because A is true. - However, A is also false. - Thus since (A or SCE) is true then SCE must be true. - QED, Santa Claus Exists! (and a ding-dong merrily on high.) It should be fairly obvious why contradictory axioms and the principle of explosion are to be avoided when one is trying to understand a deity, figure out one's place in the grand scheme of things or derive a moral code. It's worse than that though. Using the principle of explosion we can prove that God does not exist with the same ease that we can show that Santa does. Any deity that can commit contradiction is unknowable to the mortal mind. The single possible exception to this would be a deity that is capable of paradox but conceals that from us. This deity would have omnipotence unbound by the rules of logic but would be indistinguishable to us from a deity that was constrained by logic and so is the same thing for the purposes of this or any discussion. Thus, either an omnipotent deity is limited by logic in what it can and cannot do or it is utterly incomprehensible and thus unworthy of any further consideration. In anticipation of Esiar's reply I have a question for him for next round. Can God elevate a mere mortal to status greater than his own? Could God make a person into an even-more-omnipotent God? Yes, I know that looks foolish but that's what happens when you start trying to describe contradictions using the English language. Sources [1] Gary Hayden's Popular Philosophy Blog - The Principle of Explosion http://garyhaydenspopularphilosophyblog.blogspot.ca...