Re: MR: Disc: Saber es poder

[Henry Best <jstrauss@gmu.edu>]

Poster: Henry Best <jstrauss@gmu.edu>

> > >Omniscience is an incidental byproduct of omnipotence. If one is
> > >all-powerful, then amongst one's powers is omniscience.
> >
> > Now, now, Henry. Surely, knowledge and power are separable quantities. Of
> > course, if you accept the paradigm that "Knowledge is power", then your
> > assertion is actually backward--omnipotence is an incidental byproduct of
> > omniscience...oohhh...that would be Leifr's basic assumption.
> 
> Non sequitur.  Leifr said that omniscience was _necessary_ for omnipotence,
> but he didn't say it was _sufficient_.
> "You can't open that box without the key" is NOT the same thing as
> "If you have the key, you can open that box."
> The box might be buried under a mile of rock.
> 

Remember: there is a HUGE difference between being all-powerful and very 
damn powerful. Don't confuse the path to power with what it must be like 
at the full attainment.

Absolute Power, omnipotence, is probably an impossibility and a mere 
artifact of our flawed language system. (If God is omnipotent, can he 
make a rock so big he can't lift it? Questions like that are the 
Wrigley's Chewing Gum of the psuedointellectual.) But, if such a thing 
existed, it would perforce include the ability to know anything one wanted.

But that is a far cry from merely being real powerful and not being wise 
enough to wield your power properly. Arguments which deal in anything but 
pure absolutes have no bearing on the question of omni-anything.
And at the absolute level, knowledge and power are equivalent terms.

If I am omnipresent, do I still have to use those extra four digits after 
my zip code?

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| Ld Henry Best		| "People don't quit playing because they   |
| John Strauss		| grow old. They grow old because they quit |
| jstrauss@gmu.edu	| playing." 	    -Oliver Wendell Holmes  |
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