Responsibility and Blame - Part I

Religious people have a double standard when it comes to figuring out what their god(s) is responsible for.
When we are about to be held responsible for something, two things come into play:

• Knowledge of whatever we're being held accountable for;
• Power to affect whatever we're being held accountable for.

Let's imagine a parent and a toddler in a room.
The parent holds the child while considering putting him/her down to wander the room.
Before that happens, the parent spots broken glass all over the floor (or sparking wires, or whatever your favorite type of problem may be).

In this example, the possibilities would be:

• Protect the child by avoiding the glass (by cleaning it, or deciding that both should leave the room).
• Let the child walk and learn the room and hope for the best.

Let us assume that the parent goes with the second option, and lets the child walk around the room.
All will go well until the child gets hurt with the glass.

Who's responsible for this?

The answer is pretty obvious: The parent.
My claim is, knowledge and power affect guilt. Had the glass been hidden from the parent's view, but in reach of the child anyway, we would call it an accident (knowledge). Had the child been near an exploding window, the parent would have no power to avoid glass and it too would be deemed an accident (power).

An all knowing god, has the knowledge of all "glass". Even before "glass" is created. An all knowing god will know where the glass will be, and who will get hurt with it before it happens. Also, it will have all the power in the universe to change and/or solve any glass problem.

So when I look at this beautiful world but also full of glass, and hear religious people saying we're all god's children, who is to blame when some of us step on the glass that this parent (god) not only knew about, but created, and decided to put us and it in the same room for us to step on (power and knowledge)?

Omnipotent - Part IV - Motivation

The problems of Omnipotence - Part IV

Motivation can be all sorts of reasons, feelings, cravings, fears, desires, that all put together create this need that moves us towards achieving something.
Just like that thirst we have while we search for a drink and then disappears once we're done drinking. Or that sleepiness that goes away once we get tired of being in bed sleeping... Motivations go away once what they crave gets realized.

We live our lives in search of meaning, satisfaction, purpose and all other goals that the universe did not provide us with at birth. We compete with each other, at school, at work, for a better life. We live.
All that we do, is motivated by what we are not. The word "not" is the important word here. Our lack of power to be what we are not (richer, healthier, happier, whatever...) is what drives all of us.
What choices and options will a omnipotent god have?

No matter what you can think of as being one of god's needs, no one must ever forget that in god's all power, the power to instantly satisfy those needs exists, and no reason exists for that power not to be realized.

Take your lack of power, now turn yourself into an all powerful, omnipotent being, and what would you get for motivation? Think about it. What does an all powerful being need to crave for, that it does not already have? What is it waiting for? And why wait and waste time to begin with when you do not need to?
All these questions search for reasons, for answers. Oh wait, omnipotent beings do not have choices to go through, nor their reasons...

So if you were an all powerful being existing alone before anything else existed, knowing all outcomes of all your actions, with a needless perfect satisfied state of mind, and no reason to do anything, why create the universe? Totally pointless.

Once done with the power to do anything, there will be one thing always left to do: nothing.

Omnipotent - Part III - Choices

The problems of Omnipotence - Part III
We've seen here, how omnipotence can be a tricky concept.

When we walk a path and that path splits, a choice is presented to us. Do I turn left, or right? We do not have the power to go to both paths at the same time. You can walk both paths simultaneously only if your power is limitless, only if your are omnipotent.

If we can do everything, the power to perpetually enjoy a certain state of mind, to enjoy all my favorite states of mind, or even to create an infinite number of states of mind and enjoy them all at the same time, is possible. Being at perfect bliss is not an aspiration of an all powerful being, it is just something such beings always have, because there is nothing stopping them from having it - they are all powerful.
Again, nothing you can think of has "no" for an answer.

Given this, the word "choice" will lose meaning. When regular beings choose something, there is always a motive or a reason for choosing A instead of B. And even when the choice is random, there is usually a reason for that too: indifference, no time or patience to choose, etc...

Omnipotent beings will be presented with a dilemma: their choices never have a reason behind it, because they have absolute power. Why? They can change the choices they are about to have, change themselves not to need the choice, make themselves able to choose both, whatever... There is never a "no" to "can a Omnipotent being do this or that?".

If you can do everything, you don't choose anything. Choices are options that only limited beings need to go through. Example: "Should I stay single, or get married?". An all powerful being knows the lives of all married people and of all single people, from the past and the future (omniscience). Such being can know the pros/cons of all people of both groups and enjoy both at the same time. Better yet, without the cons.

So next time you hear someone say God did something this way instead of that way, and they give you an explanation as to why that choice was the way it was, remember how Omnipotent beings don't deal with choices. Choosing is a thing for us power limited mortals. And as for the reason or explanation given: Omnipotent beings are not limited by anything, so there are never reasons to go one way instead of another.

So what would motivate an all powerful being to do anything?

Omnipotent - Part II - Pleasure

The problems of Omnipotence - Part II

Think about some of the few great pleasures you are able to enjoy in life. Pick your favorites.
Not that perfect afternoon at the golf course, nor that perfect walk by the beach, nor that perfect night partying with friends. Try to breakdown those complex feelings into all those smaller ones that make those mentioned above.

Think instead of simpler, more intimate forms of pleasure:

• sleeping
• laughter
• sex
• eating while hungry
• drinking while thirsty
• breathing fresh air
• stretching in the morning

etc...

You can usually find some of these simple pleasures in the complex things we love to do everyday. However, there is a point in our day, our week or our month when we feel like we are missing some of the pleasures we have experienced before. From the simplest ones to the more complex ones. Lacking some of the more important pleasures in our lives will make us pursue them more intensely. The hungrier we get, the harder we will try to eat, the thirstier we get, the harder we will try to get something to drink, and so on...

I wish I had unlimited financial resources to pursue my sources of pleasure.
To own that perfect house, that perfect car, to climb a mountain, to go into space, to have my own jet, my own yacht, to take my friends on a cruise, then on a submarine, to afford it all several times... All that to get my intimate pleasure(s) and share it with whomever.

What if I had health problems that money could not solve? Money will not provide me with all forms of pleasure I may think of. There is more than just the power of money.

What if my power was limitless?

• Would I eat my favorite steak all the time?
• Or would I eat just that first perfect bite when I am the hungriest and freeze that feeling in my head forever?
• Would I get tired of that feeling being always there?
• Or would I remove boredom from my head forever and enjoy it forever?
• Would I then drink my favorite drink after that bite of steak?
• Or would I freeze that drinking feeling, that first sip when we are the thirstiest, along with the steak bite forever?
• Would I then add my favorite music to the whole thing?
• Or would I add that musical bliss to my brain forever along with the sip and bite...?
• What would keep me from making this list of things grow forever in my head?

Steak, Drink, Music, Company, Games, Winning, Pleasing, Being Pleased, Ice cream, Sports, Excitement, a Massage, a Swim, Sky Diving, World Peace, everything!

Let us assume that I added and absorbed all pleasures in life just because my power is limitless. Just because I can.
If you had the power to do anything and everything, what pleasure would you not add, and why?

[Definition] Omnipotent

Omnipotence: unlimited power to do anything.

Omnipotence raises a lot of problems to any god. Some even argue it is impossible, contradictory, and even paradoxal. What does it mean, and how?

Unlimited power means that everything we can think of, one can do. Because of having a somewhat wild imagination, I reached a point where, already a non-believer, the concept of Omnipotent (or all powerful) stopped making sense.

We all experience good and bad in one way or another. Being hungry is a bad thing that our own biology makes us feel, but then it drives us to eat and feel the great thing that is to eat when hungry. The same can be said for thirst. Although dying of thirst can be a horrible thing, few things compare to drinking that perfect cool glass of water when you were the thirstiest.

However, all this happens in a world with power limits. I do not have the power to change myself to never need to eat or drink. Nor do I have the power to grab that feeling that happens when food or water is entering your body when you want it the most and make such feeling last forever and at all times. These unreasonable changes are things that only an omnipotent being could do.

Our lives happen because of our power limitations.
We will die, so we make our lives safer and we cherish it, because we will lose it.
Car crashes usually hurt, so we came up with seat belts.
Eating the wrong stuff is bad for us, so we label things.
We enjoy other people and we make more people, because we would all die and disappear if otherwise.
We search fun because we know how boredom feels like.
We search what we find beautiful because we know what ugly is.
We travel, we search, we wait, we learn, we build, we live, kill and die, because we usually know the consequences of not going after the good, and avoid the bad.

So, if one was actually omnipotent, had the power to do and change anything and everything, what would you do?
I will share my view of the problems of such power very soon.

[Definition] Omnibenevolent

Omnibenevolence: unlimited or infinite benevolence.
(Benevolence: the quality of being kind and altruistic.)

If one is the universe's creator, and one is the God of any major religion, they are omniscient in that creation. God would know exactly what such creation is going to turn out to be, whatever the circumstances, whenever the circumstances. Given that perfect knowledge, the universe will still be created, and everything that will ever exist is going to be exactly the way the creator knew it would be. Such creator is omniscient.

Once God created the universe, everything in it is included in God's plan. I do not know if there was a plan to begin with, but knowing that God knows all, then everything will go according to that infinite knowledge, on in other words, according to the plan. Everything will be the way God knows and wants it to be, always.

Gods in major religions are seen as forgiving, merciful, compassionate, and kind in a infinite way. However, they chose to create evil, knew all, so they knew the consequences of that evil, and created beings that are evil, which is still included in God's initial plan., because all is included. If God knew all before creation and still created all this way, then that was the plan.
So why forgive what or who is happening according to plan (evil or not, that was the plan)?
Why punish whoever is happening according to plan? Is there anything or any one thing that has not or will not go according to God's plan messing up God's omniscience?

God's cannot be just, or merciful, or kind, or evil. All in the universe is just the way it is supposed to be from the start, because all omniscient beings knew it would be this way, and that is how they created everything.
Therefore, omnibenevolence is not a quality any omniscient god can have. At least not the ones that created hell and eternal punishments along with the universe (If they claim that quality, they're faking it!). Eternal punishments after death seems like a sentence given to someone that had messed up the plan of the universe's supreme being. Can that be possible?

[Definition] Omnipresent

Omnipresence: is the property of being present everywhere.

There seems to be no present major religion with god(s) that are omnipresent but not omniscient. Given this assumption, what would the purpose of omnipresence be, after already being omniscient?

We go to places to interact with its contents. No one ever goes somewhere to do exactly what one can do where they already were to begin with. At least no one ever does that rationally.
We can read a book at home, but if we choose to read it outside, it is because the outside has something else to offer us, and so on...

If you are omniscient and know all, you are in the position of not needing interaction. Whatever that interaction was supposed to give you, you already have perfect knowledge of its outcome. Unless you plan on affecting the environment actively, why go there in the first place?
Knowing all (omniscience) is a concept that includes what being everywhere provides you with, because if you know all, you know the same (or more) as if you were everywhere.
The same way that being under water includes having your hands wet.
So why the trouble of being everywhere when you know everything at all times?

Unless you need to do something actively instead of passively watching, being everywhere at every time, forever and ever, and being omniscient at the same time seems pretty useless.