Omnipotence paradox facts for kids
The omnipotence paradox is a puzzle that comes up when people think about what it means to be "omnipotent," or "all-powerful." It asks if an all-powerful being can do anything, even things that don't make sense logically. For example, could an all-powerful being create a square circle? This puzzle has been used by some to question if an all-powerful God can exist. Others try to solve it by thinking carefully about what "omnipotence" truly means.
This paradox has been around for a long time, since at least the 900s. Thinkers like Averroes and Thomas Aquinas discussed it. An early version of the puzzle asked if God could "deny Himself."
The most famous version of the omnipotence paradox is called the paradox of the stone. It asks: "Could God create a stone so heavy that even He could not lift it?" This is a tricky question. If God *could* create such a stone, then He wouldn't be able to lift it, which means He's not all-powerful. But if God *couldn't* create such a stone, then there's something He can't do, which also means He's not all-powerful. Either way, it seems to suggest an all-powerful being isn't truly all-powerful.
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What the Paradox Means
The stone paradox is a good way to understand the problem. It presents a dilemma:
- If an all-powerful being *can* make a stone it cannot lift, then it's not all-powerful because it can't lift that stone.
- If an all-powerful being *cannot* make a stone it cannot lift, then it's not all-powerful because there's something it can't create.
In both cases, the being doesn't seem to be truly all-powerful.
This puzzle is similar to another old riddle: "What happens if an unstoppable force meets an unmovable object?" One way to answer this is to say that if a force is truly unstoppable, then there can't be an unmovable object. Or, if an unmovable object exists, then no force can be unstoppable. They can't both exist in the same way.
Kinds of All-Powerful Beings
Augustine of Hippo, a famous thinker, wrote that God is called all-powerful because "He does what He wills." This means if God wants to do something, He can and does do it.
Philosophers also think about different kinds of all-powerful beings:
- An essentially omnipotent being is one that *must* always be all-powerful. It cannot stop being all-powerful.
- An accidentally omnipotent being is one that *can* be all-powerful for a while, but might lose that power later.
The omnipotence paradox might be answered differently depending on which type of being you're talking about. Some thinkers also believe that there might be different *levels* of being all-powerful, not just "all-powerful" or "not all-powerful."
Possible Answers to the Paradox
All-powerful doesn't mean breaking logic
Many thinkers, especially Christian philosophers, say that the paradox uses the wrong idea of "all-powerful." They argue that being all-powerful doesn't mean you can do *anything at all*. Instead, it means you can do *anything that is possible according to your own nature*.
For example, God cannot do things that are logically impossible. He cannot make 1 + 1 = 3. He also cannot create a being greater than Himself, because He is already defined as the greatest possible being. So, God's actions are limited by what makes sense and by His own nature. The Bible even says it's "impossible for God to lie."
Philosopher George Mavrodes said that asking an all-powerful being to make a "round square" isn't a real task. It's a "pseudo-task" because it contradicts itself and doesn't make sense.
However, some, like Harry Frankfurt, have argued that if God can do one logically impossible thing (like creating the stone), why couldn't He do another (like lifting it)?
If a being is accidentally omnipotent, it could solve the paradox by creating a stone it can't lift. By doing so, it would become *not* all-powerful. This might seem to solve the puzzle for that type of being.
If a being is essentially omnipotent, it cannot stop being all-powerful. So, it cannot create a stone it cannot lift, because that would mean it stops being all-powerful. Augustine of Hippo believed this, saying God "cannot do some things for the very reason that He is omnipotent." God cannot do anything that would make Him stop being God.
God and Logic
Some theologians believe that the laws of logic are part of God's eternal nature. God follows these laws not because they are above Him, but because they are part of who He is. Just as God is always good, He is also always logical. So, God cannot make a stone so heavy He cannot lift it because that would break the rules of logic. It would be like creating an unmovable object and an unstoppable force at the same time, which doesn't make sense.
The question itself is meaningless
Another answer is that the question "Could God create a stone so heavy that even He could not lift it?" doesn't make sense. If God is truly all-powerful, then the idea of Him "not being able to lift" something is meaningless.
Thinkers like C. S. Lewis argued that asking if God can create a stone He can't lift is like asking if God can draw a "square circle." Both ideas are logically impossible. The question forces a contradiction: God would have to be able to lift the stone and not be able to lift it at the same time. Lewis said that nonsense doesn't suddenly make sense just because you add "God can" in front of it.
Matthew Whittle suggested in 1999 that an all-powerful being *could* make itself not all-powerful. So, God *could* make a stone too heavy to lift. But then, if you ask "Can He lift it?", the answer would be "No, assuming He made the rock." And if you ask "Is God thus not all-powerful?", the answer is "God is all-powerful *until* such time as the rock is created." This way, the "paradox" isn't really a paradox.
Language and All-Powerful Beings
The philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein thought that human language might not be able to describe the kind of power an all-powerful being would have. He suggested that some topics, like God, are "transcendental," meaning they are beyond what we can talk about with words. He famously said, "What we cannot speak of, we must pass over in silence."
Wittgenstein's idea suggests that trying to even ask the omnipotence paradox question is pointless. This is because our words and logic might not be able to grasp the concept of true omnipotence.
Other Versions of the Paradox
In the 500s, Pseudo-Dionysius discussed a version of the paradox about whether God could "deny himself." In the 1000s, Anselm of Canterbury also said there are many things God cannot do, but He is still considered all-powerful.
Thomas Aquinas asked if God could create a triangle whose angles *didn't* add up to 180 degrees. He believed God could not do this because it goes against the basic rules of geometry and logic. Even with the later discovery of "non-Euclidean geometry" (where angles can be different), the core question remains: Can an all-powerful being escape the logical results of the rules it created?
The paradox can also appear in other areas. For example, can a government that has total legal power make a law that limits its *own* power?
The classic stone paradox comes from older ideas about physics. Modern physics talks about acceleration instead of just lifting. But the basic idea of the paradox still holds true. You could change the question to: "An all-powerful being creates a universe with certain physics laws. Can it then create a stone so heavy that it cannot lift it within *those* laws?"
Ethan Allen, a thinker from the 1700s, argued that even an all-powerful being cannot make animals immortal, because change and death are part of what it means to be alive. He said God cannot make things that contradict nature, like existing and not existing at the same time.
Descartes used a similar idea to argue against atoms. He claimed God could not create things so small that He couldn't divide them further.
See also
In Spanish: Paradoja de la omnipotencia para niños
- Problem of evil
- List of paradoxes
