The stone paradox reframed.

[shunyadragon]

Unless Munster has been moved a long way north.
Not a chance.

I guess God can lift the stone and move it whether it is orange or green.

 

[Brickjectivity]

The Blarney Stone?

Call this new problem the Orangey Stone Problem.

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

So, perhaps the question can be seen as asking whether G-d can create a stone with attributes that exist only in the mind of G-d which are in some way "too much" for Him to move. But at this point, I become baffled.

And I get baffled at the point that you start talking about G-d's mind.

By the way, I assume that the god being spoken of here is not the generic "god" but rather the G-d of Abraham?

That was not my intent.

And if so, that might introduce a twist to this conversation: Namely what it would mean to say "Humanity is created in G-d's image" ...

Parenthetically: I believe that Gen. 1:26,27 deals with (is limited to) issues of sovereignty and, as such, is not particularly relevant to this thread.

All in all, the question strikes me as interesting mostly because it throws us back onto the issue of how much we anthropomorphize deity.

If G-d, if Preternatural Agency, many of the omnipotence paradoxes may simply reflect cognitive bias: everyone 'knows' that -- when moving a stone -- mass is relevant and color is not. I mean. it's obvious. No?

No.

(I find myself thinking of Flatland.)

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

And if pigs could fly...

If the God you've assumed can't manifest its own will, doesn't that make the whole question moot?

 

[Terrywoodenpic]

Religions are saturated in Paradoxes.
One can only assume that God Thrives on them....
And that he is not limited by them in any way.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

If G-d, if Preternatural Agency, many of the omnipotence paradoxes may simply reflect cognitive bias: everyone 'knows' that -- when moving a stone -- mass is relevant and color is not. I mean. it's obvious. No?

You can't swing a cat on RF without hitting an aficionado of the Fine Tuning Argument who argues that the laws of the physical universe were designed by God.

If that's the sort of God that your hypothetical assumes, why wouldn't we allow the possibility that God could create the conditions where the colour of an object is relevant to how hard it is to lift?

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Religions are saturated in Paradoxes.
One can only assume that God Thrives on them....
And that he is not limited by them in any way.

Is that more plausible than the idea that your "paradoxes" come out of religion being the creation of fallible humans, often working with limited information?

 

[RedDragon94]

Can G-d create a stone too orange for Him to move?

Can God create a plant he cannot crush? It's like, how does that disprove anything? All you have to say is no.

 

[Terrywoodenpic]

Can God create a plant he cannot crush? It's like, how does that disprove anything? All you have to say is no.

These seeming paradoxes are All of the format Can God Defeat himself?

If you ask stupid questions, you get stupid answers.

 

[RedDragon94]

These seeming paradoxes are All of the format Can God Defeat himself?

If you ask stupid questions, you get stupid answers.

How is God all powerful by not being able to lift a stone?

 

[Terrywoodenpic]

How is God all powerful by not being able to lift a stone?

who said he could not lift a stone...?
So far people have only asked that question of each other.
I will wait for God to answer for himself.

I am not surprised the we can not answer these questions.
God on the other hand is all knowing and all wise as well....

 

[Thief]

who said he could not lift a stone...?
So far people have only asked that question of each other.
I will wait for God to answer for himself.

I am not surprised the we can not answer these questions.
God on the other hand is all knowing and all wise as well....

also omnipotent
He can lift anything
but a stubborn spirit

 

[Thief]

I do suspect a limitation ...

if you set in place all that makes reality.....real
and someone would ask of you an exception

do you allow it?

stone to bread?
water to wine?

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

..., why wouldn't we allow the possibility that God could create the conditions where the colour of an object is relevant to how hard it is to lift?

You mean where the colour of an object is relevant to how hard it is [for preternatural agency] to displace it ....

I'm not at all sure that 'hard' (or, for that matter, 'harder') is relevant.

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

You can't swing a cat on RF without hitting an aficionado of the Fine Tuning Argument who argues that the laws of the physical universe were designed by God.

So you're really questioning the possibility of a cat too heavy or too orange to swing?

 

[McBell]

Can G-d create a stone too orange for Him to move?

yes

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

You mean where the colour of an object is relevant to how hard it is [for preternatural agency] to displace it ....

Yes. Harder in a similar sense to how heavier things are harder to lift than lighter things: could God set the rules of the universe such that the colour of an object affects how much force is needed to lift it?

BTW: you keep on throwing the word "preternatural" in; what difference do you think it makes?

I'm not at all sure that 'hard' (or, for that matter, 'harder') is relevant.

If we're talking about lifting, then it's relevant. We can measure the ease or difficulty of lifting a rock in terms of a quantifiable value: the force needed to lift it. It's meaningful to say that a heavier rock is more difficult to lift than a lighter rock, even if both rocks are well within the lifting capacity of whoever is lifting them.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

So you're really questioning the possibility of a cat too heavy or too orange to swing?

If we're taking as given that God designed the rules of this universe (and could have presumably have designed them some other way), what reason would you have to conclude that God couldn't or wouldn't ever design a world where the weight or inertia of an object is a function of its colour?

 

[McBell]

If we're taking as given that God designed the rules of this universe (and could have presumably have designed them some other way), what reason would you have to conclude that God couldn't or wouldn't ever design a world where the weight or inertia of an object is a function of its colour?

it would definitately make the world more interesting.

"You cannot move that pebble, it is orange"
"THEN LET US PAINT IT BLUE"

 

[Ponder This]

Can G-d create a stone too orange for Him to move?

Maybe it's important to note that you've used the word "move" instead of "lift".
If He had to lift the stone, then we might ask how He is physically manifesting Himself to directly lift the rock, but since he only needs to move the rock, can we do away with the need for Him to take physical form and have Him simply bend time and space?

If you have an orange rock and there is no light around to see it, is it still orange?

"THEN LET US PAINT IT BLUE"

How do we know the stone isn't still orange on the inside?