Hi Anthony,
There is nothing obviously self-contradictory in the way Savage laid out the argument. If you think there is--please show it.
He did the right thing by substituting x in the argument for God. Now we can ask the question about any being.
"Can x make something x cannot lift?" is not a self-contradictory statement. Now let's substitue x for Anthony: Can Anthony make a boat so big or heavy that Anthony cannot lift it? Again there is nothing self-contradictory in the statement it the no-matter what is substitued for x the logic will be the same.
For your analog to work, namely, "Can Anthony the musical draw a round square?", you would have to show how "x creating something so heavy that x cannot lift" is a
self-contradictory task. But obviously it is not.
As I said above the only the "self-contradictory" (George Mavrodes has probably the best example) refutation can work is if you assume that God exists and God-is-omnipotent is a necessary truth--but again, that is the point of the arguement, to show how omnipotence is logically impossible.
If I have time later, I'll spell out in detail how he "solves" the problem (I alluded to it earlier in a post above), which I think he does a *great* job.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Civbert  Hi Brian L. Great post.
Nicely put. That does lay it out clearly.
But here he is wrong. The point that the stone is a self-contradiction is the secret to this false paradox. You can put any self-contradictory object in it's place and the "paradox" appears: Can God create a round square? You see, as long as the object of God's omnipotence is itself a contradiction, it seems like an insoluble paradox. But the problem is not in the meaning of "omnipotence". I can also substitute any other predicate for "omnipotence" and the paradox remains. In fact, I can change the subject to anything and the paradox is still there: Can Anthony the musical draw a round square? No? Does the prove I am not musical? No. It is because a round square is a self contradiction.
Try it.
Can (insert adjective) (insert subject) (insert verb) (insert self contradictory object).
Can a homeless cat produce a soundless bang. No. Ergo, a homeless cat is a paradox?
What is sneaky about the question of the omnipotent being is it appears the the meaning of omnipotent is the cause of the paradox - but any subject no matter what adjective you attach to it will suffer from the same problem.
What I think the question demonstrates is that the logically impossible is logically impossible. A stone so massive it can not be lifted by any power is a contradiction - and is logically impossible. Saying God is omnipotent does make contradictions into non-contradictions.
Can an omniscient cow know A and not-A (at the same time and manner)? No? Then an omniscient cow does not know something? Therefore omniscient is a contradiction? No, A and not-A are a contradiction.
I need to go to bed now so I don't have time to clean this up, but please think about it. It really does not matter what the subject of the question is, or what attributes it has - it can never cause, create, bring about, etc, anything that is a self-contradiction because the self-contradiction is meaningless in itself. Omnipotent, omniscient, omni(whatever) can not meaningfully do the meaningless. So not even omnipotent beings can do what is logically impossible (no more than the homeless cat can).
This works every time. What do you think? |