How does an omniscient god overcome skepticism?
In order for God to become omniscient he had to overcome philosophical skepticism. Presumably the same philosophical problems of skepticism that apply to us also apply to a supposedly omniscient god. How does God know he's not a brain in vat? How does God know there is an external world? How can God know that there are other minds? How does god justify the presupposition that the future will resemble the past? I mean does the problem of induction not apply to God?
Suppose God can overcome philosophical skepticism, then that would mean the skeptical problems of philosophy are solvable, at least in principle. But then there is hope! Skeptical problems are not insoluble!
Suppose God can overcome philosophical skepticism, then that would mean the skeptical problems of philosophy are solvable, at least in principle. But then there is hope! Skeptical problems are not insoluble!
Comments (20)
Nicely put. God himself has his own God. His unknown creator from the reality level above him. God has to watch his step like us else he won't go to heaven.
Maybe the top level God knows the answer to 'why is there something rather than nothing?' or is that ever possible?
That's all a good example of anthropomorphism.
It's the kind of funny posts that result when Atheists expound about God.
Michael Ossipoff
I think that by definition omniscience precludes philisophical skepticism. Its knowledge of all that is, including all the facts, all the answers to all the questions, what is certain, what isnt certain, how everything works, what skepticisms are true or untrue...everything.
He knows he isnt a brain in a vat because he knows everything. Nothing is beyond his knowledge, so if he was a brain in a vat he would know that too.
I don’t think your question is sensical, how does he know? He is omniscient.
Perhaps you could start with something like Tillich "God is the ground of being, not a being"?
Hide ‘n’ Seek
“God likes to play hide ‘n’ seek, but because there is nothing outside of God, he has no one but himself to play with! But he gets over this difficulty by pretending that he is not himself. This is his way of hiding from himself. He pretends that he is you and I and all the people in the world, all the animals, plants, all the rocks, and all the stars. In this way he has strange and wonderful adventures, some of which are terrible and frightening. But these are just like bad dreams, for when he wakes up they will disappear.
“Now when God plays "hide" and pretends that he is you and I, he does it so well that it takes him a long time to remember where and how he hid himself! But that's the whole fun of it - just what he wanted to do. He doesn't want to find himself too quickly, for that would spoil the game. That is why it is so difficult for you and me to find out that we are God in disguise, pretending not to be himself. But - when the game has gone on long enough, all of us will wake up, stop pretending, and remember that we are all one single Self - the God who is all that there is and who lives forever and ever.
You may ask why God sometimes hides in the form of horrible people, or pretends to be people who suffer great disease and pain. Remember, first, that he isn't really doing this to anyone but himself. Remember too, that in almost all the stories you enjoy there have to be bad people as well as good people, for the thrill of the tale is to find out how the good people will get the better of the bad. It's the same as when we play cards. At the beginning of the game we shuffle them all into a mess, which is like the bad things in the world, but the point of the game is to put the mess into good order, and the one who does it best is the winner.
Then we shuffle the cards and play again, and so it goes with the world”
Alan Watts - from "THE BOOK on the taboo against knowing who You are"
If God somehow appeared, stopped the world spinning on its axis, spilt the Atlantic in 2, made Trump incapable of telling a lie, then announced that love Me and each other and have eternal life thing full of a happiness you can't imagine. One would have to be an idiot not to. But would it have any meaning?
Philosophy is the study of reality and existence, when that leads, inevitably, into the study of the nature of the divine it becomes theology, so I suppose I've crossed over from the philosophers camp to the theologians camp.
I do wonder why I've joined this forum.
Or any forum for that matter! Especially as I don't like camping or belonging to a camp.
Ill second andrewk, you are asking real questions. Philosophy isnt just about the catagory of existence, anything is fair game up until (imo) it overlaps with science. Zenos may have been able to create a paradox with his philosophical efforts but needs to quickly step aside when low and behold Achilles wins the race and the turtle turns out to indeed eventually finish the race.
I'm questioning whether omniscience is even possible. Some people say that the skeptical problems of philosophy are insoluble. In my OP I'm basically giving an ultimatum: either omniscience is impossible, or philosophical problems of skepticism are soluble.
Omniscience is an absolute quality. It is the same as omnipresence, omnipotence, etc. Whether it's possible or not, what has it to do with philosophical problems of skepticism. These are human problems, they are born of limitation (or ignorance).
Amazed
It was an honest mistake. Your post read as "TWI was saying my post was theology not philosophy" rather than "[replying to TWI] I was saying my post was theology not philosophy"
Why do we - particularly the atheists among us - continue to challenge God and religion by bringing them into a scientific/objective world? God and religion have little or nothing to do with that world. Is this just another God-bashing fest, or is there really a point to it? Atheistic schadenfreude, or something constructive? :chin: