Logical Possibility - Where Do I Even Begin? (1)

If you're going to puff yourself up as a "serious" philosopher, then the least you could do is provide an argument that wasn't already decisively proven false over 100 years ago.

Source video from Philosophy Lines:

Further reading:

Further viewing material:

"Midnight Mathematicians - Incompleteness and Gödel's incompleteness theorem"

Undecidability Tangent (History of Undecidability) - Computerphile

[deepashtray]

As a fictional character, God can do anything within the human imagination.

[ArguingFromIgnorance]

What I find most interesting about this video is that many of the comments aren't simply engaged in self-congratulatory complacency, they're actively trying to break AntiCitizenX's reasoning by raising objections to the rock paradox that might still allow an omnipotent god to exist.

Ultimately, this is why skeptics win and religious dogmatism loses. It is only the former that actually seeks the truth; the latter will try to defend their position in spite of it.

[AntiCitizenX]

I'm just going to start copy-pasting the following response:


Do you understand that, at the end of the day, all I'm asking for is a list? You say God is omnipotent, but I don't know what that word means. So please write down a list of all the things that an "omnipotent" being can do. Or if that's too hard, then give me a formula that will decide whether or not some propositional act falls into that set.

Christians often define omnipotence as "the capacity to do all that is logically possible." That is a formulaic definition. Therefore, if I hand you some proposition X, all I have to do is ask is, "is X a logically possible state of affairs or not?" In other words, can I imagine some state of affairs wherein that proposition is a viable, logical description of what is going on?  If the answer is YES, then it goes on the list of logically possible things that can be done. And if it goes on the list, then by definition it qualifies as a thing God can do. 

So let's try it, shall we?

1) Truthfully state the words "My name is Richard."
2) Truthfully state the words "My name is not Richard."

Both of those things qualify as logical possibilities. Therefore, by definition, they must both be things God can do.  End of story.  That's the formula you gave, so let's stick with it.

The problem is that if God can do either one of those things, then He necessarily cannot do the other.  Because I don't know how many times I've had to say this, but *the mere capacity to do certain acts automatically negates the capacity to do others.*  You must therefore *pick and choose* the items that go onto God's list if you want that list to be consistent.  This is a basic logical and mathematical theorem, that shares many features with Russell's paradox and Godel's incompleteness theorems - *Your list can either be complete, or it can be consistent, but never both.*

To avoid this conflict, Christians will typically backpedal by saying certain actions are logically possible for you and me, but not necessarily logically possible for God.  That's fine.  But can we all be grown up enough to admit that this is not the same set formula as "able to do all that is logically possible?"  You've changed it, and then pretended like it was really your original definition all along.  Please don't give me that crap.

So what exactly can God do?  Well, apparently, God is omnipotent, and an omnipotent being is capable of doing all that is logically possible for that being.  Therefore, God can do all that is logically possible *for God.* 

This is a perfectly valid set definition and it does indeed avoid the paradox of the stone.  The only issue with this answer is that it tells me absolutely nothing about omnipotence.  The statement "X can do all that is logically possible for X" is trivially true for any and all X you can think of.  That includes you, me, my T-shirt, this rock, and tribbles.  You have defined omnipotence in terms of a vapid tautology.  The set of things God can do is, apparently, the set of things God can do.

*Well no shit, genius!*

So again, can we please just be grown up enough to admit that this utterly destroys the definition of omnipotence? 

To get around this yet again, you might hear something to the effect that "Just because it is logically possible for you, that does not mean it is something you can do." 

I don't even know what this means.  You've said it's possible for me to do it, except that I just can't do it.  That is gibberish.  For any agent X, there exists a logical description of that agent which defines X's constraints and capabilities.  Anything that is inconsistent with X's constraints is not logically possible for X.  This is trivially true for any and all X, including "God." 

[tonydarcy]

1 ) It is logically possible that Christian apologists exist.
2) It is logically possible that Christian apologists talk nonsense.
3) Christian apologists do necessarily exist
4) Therefore it is logically possible that Christian apologists must talk nonsense .

[sniperalexander]

You are one of the most underrated youtubers! I hope you continue to make more videos

[hunn]

If theists were even remotely concerned about the existence of god, then they would do research to find out which religion, if any, is the one true religion. Instead, each theist touts that theirs is the one, which also happens to be the religion they were born into, or surrounded them since birth.

[cerldude]

AntiCitizenX damn man you are brilliant. The longer "fine tuning" video you made is seriously one of the most brilliant videos I think I have seen on youtube. Keep up the good work

[Quiestre]

OH GOD I LOVE YOU FOR THIS.

I saw your fights with Philosophy lines. Really looking forward to this series.

[BruceRiggsGamer]

I mourn for your sanity, friend. If you keep battling these theists you will lose your mind. (However, I love your videos. Please keep making them. =D )

[TheGlobalAtheism]

It's great to lead a theist down the path of "that which is logically possible" to see what it entails. Ignoring the fact that's not how it's defined in the Bible (see Matthew 19:26, Luke 1:37, Mark 10:27 ec.) And I'll even ignore Russell's paradox because I'm nice like that. The video even alludes to the problem, God can't move an immovable object so it follows that God can't reverse an irreversible reaction. So if we define death as complete and irreversible loss of brain function then you exclude the entire concept of any resurrection. Then we could get into the issue of creatio ex nihilo (is that logically possible?) and miracles being violations of the nature of existence (i.e that which is logically possible) then it just becomes an exercise in metaphysical cherry-picking. Until you get to the point that they have to presuppose naturalism or they just end up arguing for whatever they want in whatever way they want.

Apologists have one job: define God in a coherent way and they can't even do that given do that. Considering they've had a few thousand years to get it right it's staggering in the 21st century they still can't produce a coherent definition that they can stick to.

[patnewbie]

I love your brief yet concise definitions of the halting problem and Gödel's theorems in this video.
You were right, omnipotence is just one of those things that gets inside your head.

[unmensch]

Mother of god, did PhilosophyLines *actually* just laud Plantinga as a "serious philosopher"?! The mind boggles.

[djsUltra]

As far as I can think of, these are the only two definitions of omnipotence that are consistent:
1. "The ability to do anything except that which would limit the ability to do everything" - eg. Not able to create a rock so large that it couldn't lift, or remove itself from existence.
2. "The ability to do anything, even if an action removes the ability to do anything" - eg. able to turn itself into a lifeless rock.

[cmarqz]

ACX, great videos. Could you please expand and explain more the unrestricted comprehension in more layman terms, thanks!

[jamesrands]

I love the fact that philosophical lines tries to caricature the "New Atheists" as relying on populist writers and then cites serious philosophers such as Swinburn (Meh - good when he isn't talking about God) and Craig (fucking PMSL).

[Pebkio_Nomare]

As you've said, in a previous video, we *all* can create an object that we can't lift.  If the concept of "not logically possible" actually covers something that everyone can do, then that definition of "logical" is dumb-dumb-dumb.  It's dumb cubed.

But that's not what theists are trying to do, here.

What else, that we're be able to do any given day, wouldn't be logically possible for god?  Run enough distance that our muscles go out?  Have our skin broken by a sharp object?  Die from a variety of causes?

I bring those up because a theist will then try to claim that those are "not logically possible" for, specifically, god (special pleading) because god has definitions that exclude the possibility of getting tired, bleeding, and dying.  So, carrying it all forward: it's logically impossible for *god*(again, special pleading) to create an object that god can't lift because they can just claim that as a part of god's definition.

There: logical paradox resolved by defining it away with a little application of special pleading.  Therefor god

[YOSSARIAN]

Good to have you back havent heard from you much in a while +AntiCitizenX 

[AntiCitizenX]

+Ansatz66

Let's jump to this thread, since we seem to be breaking some original ground.

[cnault]

"the least you could do is provide an argument that wasn't already decisively proven false over 100 years ago."

Theist: but that's all I

[UltimatePerfection]

8:58 While I agree with you in general, this would result in a draw. And since draw is not a failure state (no one won, but no one losed either), I don't think this argument should be used. The same argument could be used for any game that can't end in a draw, such as Monopoly.