Could God...

[lookinforfat]

In the spirit of being a bored and crotchety polemic, I propose another useless, philosophical question to this board: "Could God make a boulder so big even He Himself could not lift it?" Ooh! Paradoxes are fun!

[pavili255]

Dude, if God could create the universe, I don't think he'd have a problem moving what would be (to him) a pebble...

Where the heck would you put a rock that big anyways?

Oh wait... it could be a planet...

[lookinforfat]

Ah, but it's not a pebble. It's a rock so big "even He Himself could not lift it."

[AFatChance]

Fair is foul and foul is fair.

[pavili255]

Yes, but if he can create it, he can move it! At least that's how I see it...

Oh, and thanks for the Macbeth quote, Chance... we're reading that in English right now...

[lookinforfat]

I love this question. Both traditional answers undermine God's omnipotency: If he can make it (a boulder too big for him to lift), that means he can't lift it because it's too big for him to lift. If he can lift it, that means he can't make it (a boulder too big for him to lift), because then that means he can lift anything and is incapale of making something too big for him to lift. Now I'm dizzy...

[spezialemic]

The answer is No, God can't make a rock so big that he can't move it—and it's a good thing, too. That would mean that God could do the nonsensical, the self-contradictory, and therefore that God would be totally untrustworthy.

[spezialemic]

Also, this answer still leaves God with his omnipotence, since he is able to move the boulder. This contradiction or whether or not God could make a boulder so big he himself could not move it is founded on paradoxical restrictions limited to our own interpretation of physical law, to which God would be exempt, being God.

[Icarus]

In simple terms my answer is:

No, cause if he can't move it, then noone can, and you'd be ****ed if you needed to move it :p

[troodon]

In the spirit of being a bored and crotchety polemic, I propose another useless, philosophical question to this board: "Could God make a boulder so big even He Himself could not lift it?" Ooh! Paradoxes are fun!

I love this one lol, because after careful thought have actually figured it out... it's not as paradoxical as it may seem if you give semantics some certain definitions.

For starters let's define "God" as an omnipotent being...

And define "omnipotent" as have an unlimited amount of power available to expend...

Now think of it this way... how much force does it take to move (or lift) a rock that weighs 1 pound? Exactly 1 pound of force...

So how much force does it take to lift an infinitely large rock? An infinite amount of force...

How much force can an omnipotent God expend? Infinite...

So is there any rock, even infinitely large, than an omnipotent God can not lift? No. Doesn't matter how big God makes that rock, he can still lift it.

So there's your answer; God can not create a rock so big that he can not lift it. Ironically, this is not because his power is limited, but because it is not. (if his power was limited, then he could... he'd just make a rock that requires more power than he has to move.)

If you were to presume that God holds himself to the laws of physics and logic because he either must or chooses to then the answer to this question stands at no... to create a rock he can't himslef lift would require him to create a rock with more than infinite mass, both physically and logically impossible. If you decide on a definiton of "omnipotent" as "having the ability to do anything," even the physically and logically impossible, then God could create such a rock even though it's not physically or logically possible for him to do so. The spirit of this question, being a logical exercise, one would have to presume that the laws of physics and logic apply even to God, or whatever power you believe governs the universe, otherwise this question would not only be unanswerable, but meaningless.

A good example of both an unanswerable and meaningless question would be something like "What happens when an unstoppable force meets an unmovable object?" If any force was unstoppable, then no object would be unmovable, and vice-versa.

[jaybear]

I've tried to stay away from this thread, but...

So why would God even want to lift a rock? He has humans and (whatever) other beings to devise ways to do it for him!!! And presumably he has other more important things to think about!

[Matuso]

No, because he doesn't exist ahahahahahahahaha

Seriously, though, I do enjoy questions like that. Like Schrödinger's Cat. If a woodchuck made a burrito so hot it couldn't eat it, would it die when you opened the box?

[AFatChance]

I like the interesting question: If you traveled back in time and killed your grandfather would you cease to exist?

However, if you never existed then you could never kill your grandfather. But if your grandfather is dead so is the blood line that leads to you and you never existed, so, how do you kill your grandfather...? @_@ Paradoxes...x_x

[pavili255]

Simple... you kill him after your grandmother gives birth to your father/mother! Then you can still kill your grandfather, AND you'll still exist!

However, if you kill him before your father comes into existence... well, then you're up poo poo creek without a paddle.

[sweet282]

I assume if God can create it, he can move it and if thats not the case well thats a pretty poor god.

"I like the interesting question: If you traveled back in time and killed your grandfather would you cease to exist?"

Problem with the question is we have no clue what happens with time travel. Since you are already born and you are travelling back in time, I assume based on the Back to the Future movies that you still would exist but the world might be very different.

[Icarus]

However, if you kill him before your father meets your mother, then you might **** it up even more, because the depression of you killing your fathers father might deviate him from his original life course, and he might not meet your mother, or might not get her pregnant, because he's depressed or there's something not right in his head...

[sweet282]

True, which if the case I would imagine you would somehow begin to disappear as you no longer will be created.

[FatNJ812]

however if you never existed then how could go back to kill him?

this was in an episode of Futurama where Fry goes back in time and accidentally kills his grandfather but at the same time unknowling has sex with his grandmother so therefore becoming his own grandfather

[bud12345]

This question reminds me of the Simpsons Episode where Homer asks Ned if God could make a burrito so hot that He himself could not eat it.

Hilarious.