Wednesday, July 28, 2004

(im)Mortal Failure


Daniel Pi proposed an argument [full thread] against God's existence. Briefly paraphrased:

Suppose God is necessarily both immortal(unlimited life) and omnipotent(unlimited power).

[A]Could God commit suicide?

[i]If so, then God is not immortal. [ii]If not, then God is not omnipotent.

Therefore, God (as defined) does not exist. Now, that sounds airtight...until you think, "Are mortals omnipotent?" (Not that I know...) After all, if an inability to die disproves omnipotence, then an ability to die proves it, right?

More specifically, Could mortals commit suicide, and if so, does that entail omnipotence?

To take the first part, Could mortals commit suicide?:

Yes. Why? Because mortals are able to die, it is definitely possible, and unless mortals had no power whatsoever, they can not avoid death by themselves. (Observation shows that some mortals do commit suicide.) Therefore, mortals could commit suicide.

So does that entail omnipotence? No. Mortals are already limited by the fact that they can die. Moreover, though suicide is a special case of death, it does not require a special amount of power. (It just requires some power.)

Therefore, if mortality does not entail omnipotence, then immortality must entail it. What does this say about the original question [A]? It means that [A] [ii] is incorrect. If God could not commit suicide, it is at least possible for God to be omnipotent.

[Note: this does not prove God's existence, but only that this particular argument does not disprove it.]

Discuss.

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