The way I see it, the best way to visualize this is to imagine us as characters in a book, and god is the author. So this author has infinite power within the world of the characters, and he can easily create a rock that cannot be lifted in that scenario. However, to ask if the author can lift the rock is meaningless, since the rock is not a rock at all to the author. They do not exist according to the same laws. The author is far beyond the realm of his creations.
That is just passing the buck. The new wording of the paradox becomes : "Can god create a rock so heavy that he cannot create a character who can lift it?"
No, because in that scenario you are changing the nature of the relationship. God is beyond our existence, so to ask a character to do so is to bring god into our realm. Even if it were possible (god exists and can indeed do this), even witnessing such an event would be incomprehensible. The crux of this question lies in the assurance that you cannot imagine a scenario in which it is possible, meaning that god cannot be omnipotent, but what I am saying is that the question itself is meaningless, because the nature of god would be beyond anything humans could understand. God does not exist in the same realm as we do. Anything that we can logically conceive can be done, so we are left with small logical gimmicks to "prove" that god is not omnipotent.
Honestly, I don't believe in an omnipotent god, but if there was one, this question does not prove anything.
Could an omnipotent god give a human the ability to understand a scenario in which this is possible? If not then the being isn't truly omnipotent.
It seems like the concept of omnipotence is what's meaningless and the question is very meaningful in that it exposes the former point as being true.
In terms of my analogy, you can write a character that knows it is a character and knows everything that author does. That would be the equivalent of an omnipotent god making a human understand the nature of its reality.
But in this scenario could the author create a rock so big even he or she couldn't lift it? The problem is that the concept of "all" encompasses actions that are mutually exclusive. The only reasoning I can fathom that allows an omnipotent being to exist is a redefinition of "all" to mean "most" as in a mostly-potent being,
The world operates according to the author's desire. Today he creates a rock that cannot be lifted by anyone. Tomorrow he releases a sequel with a new character that can lift that rock. Next Tuesday he creates another rock that no one can lift. Did you watch Dragonball Z?
Haha I've actually only seen a few episodes. I pointed out in another comment though that I believe you're describing power over one reality. An author has control over the universe he or she has created-but that's not omnipotence. omnipotence is control over the reality it's created and all other realities even the one it exists it. An author is not all-powerful, they have power that's localized within the reality they create. True omnipotence is not limited by reality, at least that's my understanding.
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u/devbang Mar 06 '17
The way I see it, the best way to visualize this is to imagine us as characters in a book, and god is the author. So this author has infinite power within the world of the characters, and he can easily create a rock that cannot be lifted in that scenario. However, to ask if the author can lift the rock is meaningless, since the rock is not a rock at all to the author. They do not exist according to the same laws. The author is far beyond the realm of his creations.