Problems With God's Perfection.

Hi, Critical Rationalist; welcome to EvC! I see a major flaw in this argument: the truth isn't reliant on our knowing it for it to be truth. When two people hold belief systems that are mutually irreconcilable, the only conclusion that we can actually draw is that at least one of them is wrong. But, there is no rule that says that somebody has to be right.Just because God doesn't match any existing paradigms, doesn't mean that God doesn't exist. Scriptural scholars and theistic PhD's have argued essentially this forever: What did God mean when He said _________? Obviously, if God said "I'm perfect," He was clearly using His own definition of perfect. It's not too hard to imagine that He could fill his own definition without filling somebody else's: a lot of people have stupid beliefs about what "perfect" means. We just have to accept that, whatever He ends up being like, that fits His definition of "perfect."Edited by Bluejay, : I changed "perspectives" to "paradigms": I've always wanted to use that word!

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There was a point to this [post], but it has temporarily escaped the chronicler's mind. -modified from Life, the Universe and Everything, Douglas Adams

I agree with you. But, I don't understand what difference it would make. If people are wrong, people are wrong: God certainly shouldn't be expected to cater to somebody's wrong opinion. To believe so would suggest that we have some sort of power over Him That's the general idea of my argument. If I described my wife to you right now, your belief that she is a redhead (when, in fact, she is blonde) would not make her a redhead. If somebody else on EvC thought she was a brunette, somebody else thought she was black, and others thought she was Asian, Hispanic, Eskimo, brown-eyed, buck-toothed or Polynesian, none of you would be right. But, that doesn't mean she doesn't exist. Well, this would be the case for moral codes stemming from belief in God or gods. However, many people subscribe to moral codes without feeling that it was given them by a deity. I think such people have superior morality: they do what they consider to be "good" just because the consider it "good," not because they'll go to heaven for it, or that they'll finally rid themselves of the cycle of rebirth into a polluted and sorrowful world. Furthermore, these moral codes don't come with the superiority complex inherent in us who follow religious moral codes.We religious people naturally believe our own religion to be the only true religion. If you believe your religion is true, you cannot also accept that a religion that is different is also true, without completely trivializing the word "true." Thus, because I am Mormon, I must reject Catholicism, Protestantism, Orthodoxism, Buddhism and all other forms of religion as at least partly wrong. I grew up looking down at people who drink beer, or who don't go to church on Sunday, or who believe their minister when he preaches that reading the Book of Mormon pollutes one's soul. I was a missionary in Taiwan, and I described their local religions as a smattering of superstitious nonsense and their philosophies as stupid and unfounded.Of necessity, every religion must denounce every other religion, or trivialize the importance of their own religion. Therefore, when we get down to it, if any existing religion is right, it will only include a small fraction of the human race. From the diversity of opinions and beliefs I've seen in my own religion (some of us believe in evolution, some believe in magic and some believe in bits and pieces of both), I can only assume that, even if one religion is found to be correct in its beliefs about God, only a small fraction of its membership will be allied to the truth, while most of the rest are still wrong.

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There was a point to this [post], but it has temporarily escaped the chronicler's mind. -modified from Life, the Universe and Everything, Douglas Adams

I don't know if this counts as "explicitly describing God as a perfect being incapable of error," but there is a little statement from the Beatitudes (Matthew 5:48):

quote:

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48 Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.

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Mormon scripture has even more references to perfection that are even more direct. Half of our scriptures are written in early 19th century English (Joseph Smith's time), instead of King James English, so they're slightly more intelligible than the Bible. The Mormon belief of God is very much like the idea from Bruce Almighty: He can't interfere with free choice. Therefore, we, as Mormons, do believe that God is somewhat limited (at least in some sense). However, we still hold the belief that He is omniscient.We belief God is primarily a teacher, and His purpose is to prepare us to be like Him. Therefore, He puts up with us and all our wickedness (as opposed to destroying us or having not created us) because His main goal is to teach us how to become like Him, a process in which this life is the first step.

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There was a point to this [post], but it has temporarily escaped the chronicler's mind. -modified from Life, the Universe and Everything, Douglas Adams

Well, I can't argue with that. Except that, since we rely on third-degree translations of the Bible that span hundreds of years, several languages, and very little archeological/historical evidence outside of it, I'm not so sure we can state with any kind of certainty what the early Christians did or didn't believe.What was always interesting to me is that most Christians think it's blasphemy to compare oneself with God, yet they all refer to themselves as the children of God. But, don't children grow up to be like their parents?

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There was a point to this [post], but it has temporarily escaped the chronicler's mind. -modified from Life, the Universe and Everything, Douglas Adams

At least you’re honest enough to admit it. The world would be a much better place if more people were willing to do the same. Debates would certainly be a lot less interesting (and funny), but we would certainly get along better. You certainly don’t hear any mention of anybody writing anything until Paul’s letters, do you? If more people paid attention to stuff like this, we wouldn’t have trouble with people claiming the Bible is perfect, infallible and written by the Hand of God, would we? There’s a reason the different parts of the Bible are called “books”: they were written separately and were not originally intended to be compiled into a single, coherent volume.And, because they weren’t intended to be a single, definitive volume, they can’t be viewed as a comprehensive textbook for the practices, doctrines and truths of Christianity. This would be akin to compiling several hundred random letters and essays by scientists through a certain period of time and tauting them as the fundamental principles of science.Therefore, I must agree with you that my former appeal to the Bible as backing up God’s perfection is a logical fallacy and a complete non sequitur. The Bible is not proof that God is perfect. In fact, if He wrote it, I would say it is very good evidence to the contrary. Well, this is always a possibility, too. From my viewpoint, though, once you start interpreting things in the Bible as metaphors, you begin to realize that the line between literal and metaphorical is a little hard to resolve, and you can’t really be certain that anything in the Bible isn’t a metaphor (including God Himself). That, I think, is why the “biblical literalist” school (including everybody’s favorite wacky PhD, Ken Ham) doesn’t want to delve into possible metaphors in the Scriptures. Yet, these people still translate “Children of God” as something other than a father-son sort of relationship, which wouldn’t be a literal translation.Metaphorical interpretations add another layer of potentially confounding information to Critical Rationalist’s list: maybe God’s perfection is only a metaphor. Maybe references to His perfection are only a teaching aid, or a motivational gimick to get us to be good and to believe that God can save us. If God weren't perfect, He would certainly benefit from the support this would give Him, right?

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There was a point to this [post], but it has temporarily escaped the chronicler's mind. -modified from Life, the Universe and Everything, Douglas Adams

How is knowing the truth putting you in anybody's clutches? Isn't knowing the truth equated with freedom (John 8:32)? Why on earth would you withhold the truth, just so people could be free to not believe it? That doesn't make any sense (unless free will is as important as I argued it was in our first discussion together). What wouldn't be fair is to withhold the truth from everybody because some people want the opportunity to escape from it.But, is fairness part of perfection? Does God have to be fair to be perfect? I mean, despite what religions and motivational speakers insist, everybody is not equal, and you can't really do anything you set your mind to: there are limitations, and they don't always balance out with your strengths (nor do they always balance out with other peoples'). Maybe, then, He doesn't tell people the whole truth because it would be unfair to the people who don't have the intelligence or capacity to understand the deeper parts. His rules are also set to the least common denominator of the populace so that individual limitations wouldn't be as big a factor in determining salvation. In other words, He's trying to be fair. Maybe this is "perfect fairness."Edited by Bluejay, : No reason given.

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There was a point to this [post], but it has temporarily escaped the chronicler's mind. -modified from Life, the Universe and Everything, Douglas Adams

Faith, my good man. That's how you "know" anything and everything in western religions. The Mormon church has a prophet (considered by us to be the equal of Paul, Moses and all the rest in every way), and we believe that he has visions and revelations just like John and Isaiah. Of course, we can't really prove any of this (thus, we can't really "know" it, but we go ahead and claim that we do anyway).We also take God's perfection on faith. That seems prudent, right? If God exists, and if He did what He claims to have done (or something like it), we would do well to do what He says, yeah? If He wants us to believe He's perfect, and He can hold or "salvation" or "immortal soul" contingent on believing it, why not just do it? Ah, I see what you're saying. We've deviated considerably from your original intent with this thread. Let me go back and do a summary of what I tend to agree with from this thread.I think omniscience is theoretically possible for a being with infinite brain capacity (or equivalent measure). Infinite intelligence would also lead to infinite wisdom. Perfect fairness may be possible for a being with infinite wisdom and an intimate, perfect knowledge of each individual. Perfect forgiveness, as iano has put forth, is also likely from this. Ability to do absolutely anything is probably not: this would have too much potential for contradictions. A complete lack of restrictions would render most of our beliefs contradictory (God is just, but doesn't have to be if He doesn't feel like it) or meaningless.

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There was a point to this [post], but it has temporarily escaped the chronicler's mind. -modified from Life, the Universe and Everything, Douglas Adams

I hope you see that the bolded phrases are complete contradictions of one another. This was exactly my point. Were you arguing with me, or agreeing with me? It felt like an argument, but you just said the same thing I said. But, this doesn't really answer any questions. "Calculator" is not the answer to "How is multiplication done?" This is only the way to reap the rewards without having to learn or even to think. It only tells us what we have to do, not how the whole process works. In other words, this is only watered-down truth, not real truth. It's the simple answer written for the least common denominator of the intended audience. That's what I said before. It's easier to explain "I did it," than to give all the details about how I did it, and it's easier to say "I am omnipotent" than to spell out all the things that I can and can't do, especially when the audience is never going to run into something I can't do.If this is the tenor of "truth" in the Bible (and I think it is), all creationists should shut up right now and close the DI and the ICR and the Creation Museum. Don't get me wrong: I think my religion is absolutely essential to my salvation and my family's happiness, but I don't think God has to be magic and all-powerful to be God.

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There was a point to this [post], but it has temporarily escaped the chronicler's mind. -modified from Life, the Universe and Everything, Douglas Adams

Critical Rationalist: there's a little "reply" button at the bottom right corner of each post. If you use this, your reply will post as a reply to a specific message. Generally, it's better to use this one, because it's easier for your readers to tell who you're talking to.Also, use the "peek" button beside that "reply" button to see how I quote you like this: I thought you were challenging His omnipotence with your opening post.I explained in my previous post (to iano) the notion of narrow truth: what is written in the Bible is the truth as far as we need to know to reach salvation (i.e. it contains answers like "calculator"), but is not necessarily the entire mechanistic description of the universe.Therefore, God doesn't have to be "perfect" in every sense in order to be "perfect" as far as our salvation is concerned. It follows that He doesn't have to be "omnipotent" in every sense in order to be "omnipotent" as far as our salvation is concerned.Edited by Bluejay, : Capitalized "His": it's more respectful.

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There was a point to this [post], but it has temporarily escaped the chronicler's mind. -modified from Life, the Universe and Everything, Douglas Adams

This is exactly what I have been arguing: the word "truth" is used differently in the Bible than it is used in a courtroom. Therefore, because the intent of this "truth" is not to answer questions, IT SHOULD NOT BE USED TO TRY TO ANSWER QUESTIONS!!! The Bible (and you, just now) defines "truth" as "the prerequisites or aids for salvation," not as "the mechanistic descriptions of natural functions and processes" (which is what I think "truth" means).Therefore, that the Bible says "God is perfect," is not evidence that God is actually perfect in the usual sense of the word, but is only an aid to man's search for salvation. Likewise, God's omniscience only means (as far as we can be certain) that He knows everything that He needs to know to save you. God's omnipotence means (as far as we can be certain) that He can do everything that He needs to be able to do to save you. His omnipresence means (as far as we can be certain) that He can be everywhere He needs to be to save you (note that Mormons do not belive in God's physical omnipresence).

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There was a point to this [post], but it has temporarily escaped the chronicler's mind. -modified from Life, the Universe and Everything, Douglas Adams

Well, my point is that, if God's intent wasn't to answer mechanistic questions, we shouldn't assume that He did give us answer them. In fact, it makes more sense to assume that He didn't, and try to work it out on our own. If our independent work ultimately converges on what He did say, then we could easily make the transition to believing that He did give the answers. This brings up an interesting concern for me: does "calculator" really free me from the lack of knowledge about math? I would argue that the learning process is more important than the result is. If God just gave us the answers to our questions without expecting us to work for it, it would in fact be a great detriment to us. There would be no point nor purpose for our big brains, which would then be a waste of 25% of our metabolism.I think a perfect God would have to be one who understood this and utilized it in the way He/She/It/They managed our affairs. That would be the best reason that I could think of why He doesn't just show Himself to us and directly tell us all the answers.I also don't understand why a perfect God would have made us if the only point of our existence was to give up that which is most unique and defining about us. It seems like He's taken a lot of work upon Himself just for the sake of taking a lot of work upon Himself. That doesn't sound like a perfect (or even intelligent) God to me.

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There was a point to this [post], but it has temporarily escaped the chronicler's mind. -modified from Life, the Universe and Everything, Douglas Adams

I don't consider it mechanistic, either. I was using the word "mechanistic" to distinguish the type of question I was talking about from questions like that one. I'm not separating "answering question" from "setting free": I'm separating "why" and "what" questions from "how" questions. I contend that the Bible was designed to answer "what" and "why" questions, not "how" questions. So, the Bible says what God did and why He did it, but it doesn't say how He did it.I know that Christ died for our sins, but I don't know how such a sacrifice accomplished it (neither does any biblical or other scriptural scholar on the face of our plant). I know that God created the Earth, but I don't know how He did it (though I have a vergy good theory). I'm pretty sure the Bible (nor the Book of Mormon, for that matter) does not contain information as to the mechanisms used to accomplish miracles, the Creation, the Atonement, etc. I agree almost completely with this. I think mechanistic questions are "truths" that we can work out on our own--we have the sensory and intellectual capabilities to observe, question, test, predict and conclude. This is the reason I would propose for why God does not include answers to mechanistic questions in the Scriptures. In light of this, the Bible is a very good testament to the perfectness of God.You know, reading this, I think I understand a little better where you're coming from with the idea of man having only a sinful will. I think I agree with at least as much as you state here (i.e. "we need God to attain salvation"), but I still disagree with the idea that we can't do anything good on our own. However, I do agree that our goodness is only made perfect by God's grace.Edited by Thylacosmilus, : Fixed dBcodes

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I'm BluejayDarwin loves you.

You're probably right, given the God we're all assuming. However, I'd say, given the temper that is attributed to Him in the Bible, and given the astounding lack of coherence and sensibility people seem to be capable of, the "work" would likely be quite frustrating.Still, I'm not sure the God we're assuming (the omnipotent, omniscient, etc. Christian God) can pass CR's test of plausible perfection, though.