Is God perfect?

You need not be an athiest to respond.

But athiests would have to agree that God is indeed perfect. After all, if perfection does not exist, neither does God. On the other hand, God is imperfect by not even existing. nobody's perfect...

Okay, in all seriousness, why is God perfect or otherwise?

(I also left in a 3rd party option, but it won't get you anywhere...)

"But athiests would have to agree that God is indeed perfect. After all, if perfection does not exist, neither does God. On the other hand, God is imperfect by not even existing. nobody's perfect..."

Why?

Why not crunchy granola bars? For breakfast.

God is perfect
No perfect being exists
therefore, God does not exist

is valid, but

God does not exist,
No perfect being exists,
Therefore God is perfect

is invalid. A similar argument would be

No dogs are reptiles
birds are not reptiles,
Therefore, dogs are birds.

NON SEQUITUR!

I went for "God is imperfect," since I identify "God" with the creator spirit and ultimate creativity might nevertheless be imperfect. As Hartshorne observed, paying metaphysical compliments to God does not get us very far.

I guess the question means "strong" atheists and atheists who are atheists for reasons related to that specific issue. ?

atheists can be atheists for a lot of reasons, or for no good reason, for that matter.

My Dad explained his atheism to me in terms of "panta rhe," though he didn't use the Greek: nothing is forever, and even if God had created the world, God would have perished in the billions of years since. I recall he used the word "perished" -- gave me creeps.

But this black and white stuff is just too simple. I am an atheist by the standards of the Roman Catholic Church, but not by the standards of most self-declared atheists, including my Pater.

I am an atheist by the standards of the Roman Catholic Church, but not by the standards of most self-declared atheists, including my Pater.

I assume you mean that you lack belief in the existence of any god, rather than having belief in the nonexistence of any god.

Is that what you meant?

I meant I believe in a Creator Spirit Whose will is at the basis of existence, but not a perfect nor impassable being -- rather one Who learns and is sometimes surprised by Her creations.

The "God" of Roman Catholicism (Thomism) and some other Christian orthdoxies is, by definition, perfect and impassable -- i.e. unchangeable.

So, if you accept that definition of God, that makes me an atheist.

On the other hand, since I do believe in an immaterial Creator Deity, which is denied by most atheistic orthodoxies, I am not an atheist by the definition common to most atheists.

(Sob) nobody wants me ....

Well, scratch the sob, actually. I'm cool.

Now can we do some proofs to show validity? ;-)

I'm taking my logic final today... I'm nervous/not nervous at the same time... its a weird feeling.

if being perfectly evil could be considered perfect.

I'm told that God has nagging self-esteem issues. Just when he's feeling good about himself, external events undermine his self-image. He's a self-improvement junkie who has read just about every book on the subject. The more he works at it, the worse he feels. "I was happier in Biblical times," said God in a recent interview. "When people offended me, I just smote them."

but there's a saying that goes along the lines of "If God is perfect, then he should be able to create a boulder that he cannot lift. If there is a boulder that he cannot lift, then he is not perfect."

An interesting conundrum, if you think about it. I'll see if I can find it again.

:D

they're two different things.

But could the atheist change her mind? If so, then God is not all-powerful.

Could god have made a universe where everyone not only had freewill and the ability to find their way to him, but did? Surely if god is as powerful and knowledgable as he/she/it is credited with they could have created a universe in which everyone by means of freewill were able to find their way to salvation and did so. Anything less than that would constitute a lesser universe. At least if finding the way to salvation is any measure of value.

(a moderately important 19th century American Protestant group, the remnant of which merged with the Unitarians to form the Unitarian Universalist Association) that's exactly what God did.

Got my chalice sitting down there. On edit: Well I did before they turned off the graphics.

To be specific the Universalists claimed that Jesus atoned for all sins. Period. Technically there was still the period of time between the garden and his sacrifice where things were .... messed up. But after his sacrifice the concept of hell was basically abolished.

Linguistic paradoxes and logical paradoxes. This is a linguistic paradox.

Your statement is this:

(A) If God is perfect, there must be a limit on his power.
(B) Since there is a limit on his power, he is not perfect.

You are using two different definitions of "perfect" between the two statements. Either:

I. A perfect being must have a limit on its power.
II. A perfect being must not have any limits on its power.

The paradox is resolved by picking a definition and sticking with it.

It sounded better in my head =/

I just tried to type it out three times, but I can't quite convey what I'm thinking correctly.

I'll try again after work

You did have the paradox right, and it is a paradox. I had a bit of an unfair advantage - the topic came up in my World Religions class.

:D

"Ultimates" lend themselves to paradoxes. The more traditional paradox (to which I alluded) has to do with the capability of God to create human beings with free will -- which implies that God is unable to control their actions. That has a central place in many Christian orthodoxies as an answer to the "problem of evil."

The "ontological argument for the existence of God" (which I do not endorse!) holds that God must be perfect in every way. Thus, any lack of power would be an imperfection. Anyway, I infer that from the argument itself, which (at least in one form) says that God must exist, since God is perfect and non-existence is an imperfection.

If perfect means perfect in every way, then arguments like "God could not create a stone so big He could not lift it" are genuine paradoxes and are implied by perfection.

You are only "imposing a limitation" by virtue of the language you use. I can say that God can both create and lift rocks of infinite size, and express the same idea as you expressed with your statement, resolving the paradox.

It is a question of conflicting ultimates. It doesn't matter whether the stone is infinitely large or not -- since there are always, yes, bigger infinities. If God cannot create a stone that is a bigger infinity than the infinitely large stone He can lift, then that is a limitation on His power.

The point is that some of the ultimates that are attributed to God are logically untenable ideas. "It is impossible, therefore believe it." The grade school joke about the stone (and I heard it there, too) is a perfecly good instance of that.

The problem is that you are measuring the ultimates against each other.

God can create a stone of infinite size.
God can lift a stone of infinite size.

There does not exist a "bigger infinity" than the infinite size of stone that God can lift, mathmatically, so it is not a limit of God's power.

Can God add 2+2 and make 5?

There are at least three (constructable) infinities:

aleph-null (the infinity of natural numbers)
aleph-one (the infinity of all real numbers)
and
aleph-two (the infinity of all Cartesian curves)

In addition, mathematicians in the tradition of Cantor would envision an infinite number (!) of hierarchically bigger infinities. These cannot be constructed (as I understand it) but can only be inferred by indirect reasoning, so a small minority of mathematicians have their doubts.

Either way. If the second view is correct, there is always a bigger infinity, so the postulation of a stone of infinite weight doesn't get one off the hook. If, on the other hand, you accept the first view, then God's (logically inevitable) inability either to make or lift a stone bigger than aleph-two -- or bigger than aleph-one, actually, since we measure weight in real numbers -- is a limit on God's power!

This is another good example of the fact that not only logic, but also "common sense" breaks down when confronted with "absolutes."

You're overexerting yourself.

The difference between aleph-null and aleph-one (I've never worked with aleph-two, so if you don't mind, I'll stick with these), is not that one is 'more infinite' in terms of value than the other, but that one is 'more infinite' in terms of cardinality.

For instance, in the set of natural numbers, there is only one number between 1 and 3 - the number 2. In the set of real numbers, there are an infinite number of numbers between 1 and 3.

So, imagine that we measure weight in natural numbers rather than real numbers. In such a system, following your logic, God may make no stone larger than aleph-null. But this is not a limit on God's power - it is a symptom of the way we weigh things. If we express weight in terms of real numbers, suddenly God becomes more powerful?

The answer is no - God can do what God could always do - make a stone of arbitarily large size. The only limiting factor is our ability to comprehend this act of creation.

I am troubled by one of your assertions, however. You claim that God can make no stone larger than aleph-one, since we measure weight in real numbers.

However, my (admittedly limited) understanding of the difference between the different sets of infinite numbers is the speed at which they grow. For instance, any arbitrarily large number that is a member of aleph-one can be surpassed by a number that is a member of aleph-null - just take the result of the ceiling function.

Therefore, even if God were "limited" to only making stones smaller than aleph-null, the resultant stones could still be as arbitrarily large as if God were "limited" to only making stones smaller than alpeh-one.

you keep asserting that the limits of logic and numbering are "imposed" by human convention on that which is discussed or numbered. I think you are mistaken, there. My view is that they are "imposed" on every real being by the fundamental nature of reality. Then if God is real, these limits are no less imposed on Her than on me, by virtue of Her reality.

This reflects my experience of mathematics, and of other things.

But you are right -- I was playing a bit loose with the distinction between number and cardinality. Honestly, I would regard "a stone of infinite weight" as being a phrase with no real meaning or bearing on the discussion.

Well, it has been a stimulating discussion, and thank heaven I haven't been very busy this week.

The existence of one logically precludes the existence of the other.

Atheists do not have to agree that God is perfect.

To an atheist, this is a rather zen-like unanswerable question.

If God does not exist, then how can you answer? Something that does not exist cannot be said to be either. However, the concept of God is then imperfect, to an atheist's point of view.

Implicit in any answer to "Is God Perfect?" is the notion that God exists.

Boolean Expression:
GodExists AND Statement1 AND Statement2 AND ... AND StatementN -> God is perfect.

or, alternatively:

GodExists AND Statement1 AND Statement2 AND ... AND StatementN -> God is imperfect.

Since an atheist believes GodExists is false, both implications are vacuously true - an atheist would have to answer that God is both perfect and imperfect.

Well, I guess they can't answer then, since that's not an option.

Consider the following code:

if ( GodExists && IsPerfect ) {
cout << "God is perfect" << endl;
}
else if ( GodExists && !IsPerfect ) {
cout << "God is imperfect" << endl;
}
else {
throw exception( "Improper question." );
}

Run that code through a theist's mind, and you get "God is perfect" or "God is imperfect". Run that code through an atheist's mind, and s/he'll take exception to it! :evilgrin:

Geeky coding puns aside, AND statements require all conditions to be true; if any one is false, the entire statement is false. Thus, if your question "Is God (im)perfect?" tacitly implies "God exists", then an atheist would have to answer no to both questions, "Is God perfect?" and "Is God imperfect?".

Your construction is substantively different than mine:

I said:
GodExists /\ S1 /\ S2 /\ ... /\ Sn -> GodIsPerfect

An implication (p -> q) is logically equivalent to:
!p \/ q

Therefore, because !p evaluates to true (since God does not exist), the whole implication evaluates to true.

This works for !GodIsPerfect as well.

Nice coding joke, though. CS, I assume?

Can you clarify your explanation further, and explain the symbols?

I assume /\ is "AND", \/ is "OR", ! is "NOT" and p -> q means "IF p THEN q". Am I correct?

I am mostly a physics geek, but I do a fair amount of coding, usually in C++, but lately in C#, too.

Yeah, /\ is AND, \/ is OR, ! is NOT, and (p -> q) means P implies Q.

jealousy, wrath, anger, vindictiveness...to name but a few, how can a self-proclaimed god be considered perfect?

man is imperfect, and he created god in his image, so god cannot be perfect.

the Bible does a B+ job at writing in self-protecting prophecies to scare off potential free-thinkers and non-believers, nobody remembered the immortal phrase "And God created man in His image." Whoops.

When He created Adam, He gave him an emotional need that He could not fulfill. God had to create Eve to satisfy that need.

He created a paradise in Eden, yet He also created the serpent and allowed evil to infest Eden.

He gave Adam & Eve an intellect and free will. He allowed them to be tempted by the serpent.

And Adam & Eve succumbed to the temptation that He set them up for, He cast them from paradise.

Would you describe the actions of a petulant child as those of a perfect being?

Adam and Eve were not fully human until they obtained moral knowledge.

I'd hesitate to qualify the serpent as "evil." As I recall, the serpent and Eve are the ones who told the truth in the Garden of Eden... God and Adam both lied.

Personally, I think the only way Genesis makes sense is if you interpret it as a parable (especially since there are two mutually exclusive creation stories).

You see, Adam and Eve obtained moral knowledge... therefore, they could no longer live in the state of ignorant bliss that is symbolized by the Garden of Eden.

A planet on the brink of annihilation. Given the effort poor old God did in making this planet, would God be pleased at what we are doing to it (not to mention each other?)

Genesis 2 describes the borders of the Garden...

14 The name of the third river is the Tigris; it runs along the east side of Asshur. And the fourth river is the Euphrates.

So the Garden of Eden was located between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers...... I guess it's fitting if the beginning of the human race and the end of the human race were in the same location.

Both Fundamentalists and atheists do seem to demand perfection from God and insist that certain things are or are not purely on that basis. I would say that God is not perfect in the most strict standards of how we humans define perfection.
The God of the Bible does seem to be quite a dymnamic character who discovers the right way to deal with His creation. I mean if He was perfect why the fall of Adam and Eve, why Cain and Abel, why the flood, why all the conflicts with "His people", and why did it take so long for Jesus to come?
If we believe though that God created the laws of the universe, everything happens exactly the way that is suppose to happen, and that God actively controls this or knew what would happen when He set it all in motion, how would it not follow that God is perfect?
I think that God is what God is and we should not try to God in a box created by our language. Yes, that is human but in trying to make God easier to understand in that way, we limit our understanding.
I don't know if I made any sense. This is heavy stuff.

What do you mean by that? How do atheists demand perfection from God, when they do not believe in God?

I have heard people argue that there cannot be a god because there is evil in the world, that the God of the Bible is unjust, they once believed but then God failed them, that perfection cannot exist, and other things along those lines or putting a strict definition on God.
I suppose that all atheists have different reasons for not believing in God but most athesists that I know in person don't believe in God for a reason related to God's perfection or imperfection.

Nice work. You should be proud. :-)

-- Allen

I add creativity, spice of life, a sense of adventure, all topped off with some innuendo that Paul Lynde would blush over in most of the posts I make, and all you say that THIS is the stupidest poll ever?!

:thumbsup:

:D

:yourock:

I can top this one in an attosecond too, just you wait! :evilgrin:

Just look around you.

implies a character flaw... IMHO;-)

God hates war
and God hates crime
but he really hates people
who color outside the lines
. . .
Good people get sent to the attic
Bad people get sent to the cellar
But there's a special kind of Hell
for those who just won't learn to color

God is gracious, God is good
so let's color in his book

God wears cotton, God wears rayon
He can mend a broken crayon

God is honest, he don't take payola
Let's all thank him for our crayolas

I'm a Christian and I truly believe that.

My imaginary god tells me that your imaginary god is not perfect.

Or perfectly imperfect on some days.

I am absolutely serious!