on the existence of the supernatural

[Punarbhava]

Alright, so there's a heated discussion going on in another forum, and I can't remember enough to back up the point I just made (sucks to be me, right?). I wanna know what y'all think:

him: I think divine foreknowledge is one of the shakiest aspects of perfect being theology. Of course, there are always ways to redefine the terms to avoid objections like this. Some argue that God exists outside of time so "future" and "past" are meaningless concepts when talking about God. I'm not sure how much I agree with this objection, but it shows how malleable the concept of God really is. Now what I think you're saying is if we redefine terms in this way, eventually we're not even talking about a "God" anymore. But I think just because we're not talking about a "perfect" being doesn't mean we're not talking about a "God". For instance, if I were to define a being as follows:

- It can bring about almost any possible state in the universe.
- It knows almost every positive fact in the universe. (It doesn't know the future because it didn't make events predetermined).
- It is mostly benevolent.
- It exists outside of physical reality.
- It created the universe.

As far as I know, there are no internal contradictions and this being could still be considered a God.

me:

- It exists outside of physical reality.

IMO, anything that has any causal effect on reality/the universe must exist inside of it and be measurable in terms of the changes it causes. Else, it's just a completely imaginary construct and should be treated as such.

him:

IMO, anything that has any causal effect on reality/the universe must exist inside of it

I don't see any reason why this should necessarily be the case.

and be measurable in terms of the changes it causes.

The changes caused by God would still be measurable if God existed outside of the universe.

Else, it's just a completely imaginary construct and should be treated as such.

Are you saying something can exist and be imaginary at the same time? Or are you saying nothing can exist outside of physical reality? If so, what are your reasons for believing this?

What's the most appropriate way to deal with this, especially the line "The changes caused by God would still be measurable if God existed outside of the universe."? Thanks in advance.

[Samuel]

I do this all the fracking time.

(It doesn't know the future because it didn't make events predetermined).

All things boil down to determinism and randomness in the end. Nice to see he follows the second.

- It exists outside of physical reality.

Good- now cross out physical because existance is a property of physical bodies and you have something more accurate- it doesn't exist in reality.

I don't see any reason why this should necessarily be the case.

How do the two interact? If there is no connection, interaction is impossible. Even effects at a distance require interaction.

Are you saying something can exist and be imaginary at the same time? Or are you saying nothing can exist outside of physical reality? If so, what are your reasons for believing this?

1)No. Imaginary things do not physically exist.
2)Yes.
3)Burden of proof.

[Darth Wong]

There are a few very important points here:

As far as I know, there are no internal contradictions and this being could still be considered a God.

Here he uses the mathematician's mentality where he assumes something is a feasible idea so long as it lacks any internal contradictions. However, the same could be said of any well-crafted fiction. While the presence of an internal contradiction pretty much nullifies the possibility of something existing, the absence of such contradiction does not necessarily lend credence to its existence.

IMO, anything that has any causal effect on reality/the universe must exist inside of it

I don't see any reason why this should necessarily be the case.

That is because he has never seriously considered the concept of what it means to exist in our universe. How do we determine that the desk in front of you exists? By interacting with it. Simply looking at it involves physical interaction: photons bounce off its surface and are reflected to our eyes. If something interacts with our universe, it exists in our universe, in the same sense that anything can exist in our universe: the entire concept of existence is bound up in interaction with our universe.

Perhaps this logic will bounce off his iron skull, so let's try a different approach: to say that something can interact with our universe without existing in it is like saying that you can use an outside term to alter a mathematical equation but that outside term was never part of the equation (and no, multiplying both sides by two is not a real alteration; it's still the same equation). It simply doesn't work that way: the only way to alter an equation with an outside term is to put that term into the equation. It won't have any effect on the equation otherwise. If you write the equation y=2x+5 and you have a 4x term floating around outside the equation, it will not have any effect on the equation unless you stick it in there.

[Rye]

I would say that "Supernatural" is an incoherent term and internally contradictory. Anything that exists has a nature, meaning you cannot exist "beyond" it. There may be gods or godlike space haddock, but no matter their abilities, they only exist within the ultimate nature of reality. If they just mean magic, like something has the ability to fart planets into existence using only ass-speech, just call it magic and have done. Magic would still be part of the natural order of things. "Outside physical reality" is just flat-out nonsense. If something interacts with real things in a real way, it's part of physical reality.

[Darth Wong]

Supernatural is nevertheless the accepted term, even though the more accurate term would be "irrational". Basically, the idea of the supernatural is more accurately expressed as the idea that the universe itself does not conform to logic, and is fundamentally irrational. Ergo, anything can happen.

[Punarbhava]

thanks for the replies everyone. It helped.

The guy's last post was something about defining the universe as "a container of physical reality", and his definition of god could exist outside that container. I responded that in that case, my boxers are a universe and my dick is its god. He hasn't posted since.