Is God omniscient? Start Over.

[DT_]

Okay. I have two questions. The second question is dependent on the answer to the first one.  I'm interested in your opinions.

Is God omniscient?

Edited August 17, 2022 by DT_

[ksfisher]

1 minute ago, DT_ said:

Okay. I have three questions. The third question is dependent on the answer to the first two.  I'm interested in your opinions.

Can God count to infinity in five minutes?  

Is God omniscient?

[The Nehor]

 

Edit: Beaten to the punch.

Edited August 17, 2022 by The Nehor

[MiserereNobis]

6 minutes ago, DT_ said:

Okay. I have three questions. The third question is dependent on the answer to the first two.  I'm interested in your opinions.

Can God count to infinity in five minutes?  

Is God omniscient?

Take some DMT and get back to us  

[DT_]

Okay. No further questions. I'll just take the above as an "I don't know".

16 minutes ago, MiserereNobis said:

Take some DMT and get back to us  

It's on my bucket list.

Edited August 17, 2022 by DT_

[MiserereNobis]

Just now, DT_ said:

Okay. No further questions.

It's on my bucket list.

I spent some time exploring psychedelic spirituality, including with the Native American Church. There are some threads you could search for and read the discussions.

Also, I think any deep understanding of God is going to involve poetry and paradox.

[DT_]

10 minutes ago, MiserereNobis said:

I spent some time exploring psychedelic spirituality, including with the Native American Church. There are some threads you could search for and read the discussions.

Also, I think any deep understanding of God is going to involve poetry and paradox.

Interesting.

[CV75]

55 minutes ago, DT_ said:

Okay. I have two questions. The second question is dependent on the answer to the first one.  I'm interested in your opinions.

Is God omniscient?

Relative to me, yes. I also think God is "omnifides."

[Stargazer]

2 hours ago, DT_ said:

Okay. I have two questions. The second question is dependent on the answer to the first one.  I'm interested in your opinions.

Is God omniscient?

OK, I'll bite.

In the revelations that Joseph Smith received, one that I have quoted to you in another thread, God says of himself:

Moses 1:35,37 ...but all things are numbered unto me, for they are mine and I know them... And the Lord God spake unto Moses, saying: The heavens, they are many, and they cannot be numbered unto man; but they are numbered unto me, for they are mine.

It appears that for this Universe, God is omniscient. He knows everything that has transpired, everything that is transpiring, and everything that will transpire. He is also well aware of the fate or course of life of all of his children. 

But I cannot say whether He is omniscient about everything outside this Universe.

[bluebell]

3 hours ago, DT_ said:

Okay. I have two questions. The second question is dependent on the answer to the first one.  I'm interested in your opinions.

Is God omniscient?

I'm going to go with a simple yes.

[MustardSeed]

Sure why not.  It’s comforting to think so anyway. 

[webbles]

5 hours ago, DT_ said:

Okay. I have two questions. The second question is dependent on the answer to the first one.  I'm interested in your opinions.

Is God omniscient?

He is in my frame of reference.

[DT_]

1 hour ago, bluebell said:

I'm going to go with a simple yes.

I see. Please allow me to ask some questions. Is God able to recall everything that happened in the past? There was no beginning, so would you agree an infinite number of things happened in the past? Recalling all past events would be the same as counting to infinity in an instant. Do you believe God can instantaneously count to infinity?

To clarify, I honestly don't believe there was a beginning. A true beginning would create many problems, but infinity in the real world also creates problems (paradoxes).

3 hours ago, Stargazer said:

It appears that for this Universe, God is omniscient. He knows everything that has transpired, everything that is transpiring, and everything that will transpire. He is also well aware of the fate or course of life of all of his children.

Do you believe God created an infinite number of worlds? If so, can God name all of them in an instant?

 

4 hours ago, CV75 said:

Relative to me, yes. I also think God is "omnifides."

Same questions.

Edited August 18, 2022 by DT_

[MiserereNobis]

2 minutes ago, DT_ said:

I see. Please allow me to ask some questions. Is God able to recall everything that happened in the past? There was no beginning, so would you agree an infinite number of things happened in the past? Recalling all past events would be the same as counting to infinity in an instant. Do you believe God can quickly count to infinity?

To clarify, I honestly don't believe there was a beginning. A true beginning would create many problems, but infinity in the real world also creates problems (paradoxes).

Do you believe God created an infinite number of worlds? If so, can God name all of them in an instant?

 

Same questions.

You’re trying to understand God, or at least ask us questions about Him, using a human frame of reference: time, location, etc. That will not work and is a fruitless exercise.

[MustardSeed]

38 minutes ago, DT_ said:

I see. Please allow me to ask some questions. Is God able to recall everything that happened in the past? There was no beginning, so would you agree an infinite number of things happened in the past? Recalling all past events would be the same as counting to infinity in an instant. Do you believe God can instantaneously count to infinity?

To clarify, I honestly don't believe there was a beginning. A true beginning would create many problems, but infinity in the real world also creates problems (paradoxes).

Do you believe God created an infinite number of worlds? If so, can God name all of them in an instant?

 

Same questions.

I guess I’m curious why it matters.  I feel a gotcha coming on, so maybe I’m suspicious.

[blackstrap]

3 hours ago, Stargazer said:

they cannot be numbered unto man

Hard to imagine this because man can make some very big numbers eg. 10 to the power of 80 which supposedly is the number of particles or molecules in the entire universe. Maybe the folks around at the time of the scripture did not have access to scientific notation. 

The human mind can play around with infinity .... but eventually it is going to start to hurt. 

[rodheadlee]

28 minutes ago, blackstrap said:

Hard to imagine this because man can make some very big numbers eg. 10 to the power of 80 which supposedly is the number of particles or molecules in the entire universe. Maybe the folks around at the time of the scripture did not have access to scientific notation. 

The human mind can play around with infinity .... but eventually it is going to start to hurt. 

Might be able to number them but do you know each and every planet and star system?

[CV75]

10 hours ago, DT_ said:

I see. Please allow me to ask some questions. Is God able to recall everything that happened in the past? There was no beginning, so would you agree an infinite number of things happened in the past? Recalling all past events would be the same as counting to infinity in an instant. Do you believe God can instantaneously count to infinity?

To clarify, I honestly don't believe there was a beginning. A true beginning would create many problems, but infinity in the real world also creates problems (paradoxes).

Do you believe God created an infinite number of worlds? If so, can God name all of them in an instant?

 

Same questions.

Again, where infinite (to me) means indeterminate, yes, He can count indeterminately further than I can, and in a personally less taxing manner through unity and delegation (see John 17), which is where the “omnifidence” comes in handy. In the same way, I believe God created/creates an infinite number of worlds and names all of them in an instant. For me, omniscience and “omifidence” are two forms of the same thing, “omniexperientis.”

[Amulek]

15 hours ago, DT_ said:

Is God omniscient?

I believe God knows everything that can be known.

So, depending on how you define omniscience, I guess that's either a yes or a no.

 

[LoudmouthMormon]

Anyone else hoping the James Webb telescope finds weird red-shift and blue-shift galaxies that challenge the big bang theory?

I suppose this conversation might show someone something new, that they haven't previously considered, so that's nice too.

 

Edited August 18, 2022 by LoudmouthMormon

[BlueDreams]

14 hours ago, Stargazer said:

OK, I'll bite.

In the revelations that Joseph Smith received, one that I have quoted to you in another thread, God says of himself:

Moses 1:35,37 ...but all things are numbered unto me, for they are mine and I know them... And the Lord God spake unto Moses, saying: The heavens, they are many, and they cannot be numbered unto man; but they are numbered unto me, for they are mine.

It appears that for this Universe, God is omniscient. He knows everything that has transpired, everything that is transpiring, and everything that will transpire. He is also well aware of the fate or course of life of all of his children. 

But I cannot say whether He is omniscient about everything outside this Universe.

Technically, that's not what the scripture actually says. It says he knows all things....as in all of his creation. That's not the same as knowing all events.

 

17 hours ago, DT_ said:

Okay. I have two questions. The second question is dependent on the answer to the first one.  I'm interested in your opinions.

Is God omniscient?

I see 3 or 4 options. 

1.) classic omnicience. That's where he knows all things and all that is to come, etc. This, to me, fuels debates around fate v agency and how fair is it really that he set up a universe that some were fated to fail. Scriptures about God knowing it all usually fuel this version.

2.) he knows all his creations and all possible futures. Which helps with things like contigency plans for if JS loses some pages of translation. This helps reduce the problem of agency, but then adds questions around infinity and how this works. Which is fine. It could technically be out of our current scope to understand. 

3.) somewhat similar to #2. He knows all his creations and the ultimate eternal future where there's only really one course that will play out in our time that's lasting. All other paths outside this are less known but also less important because they're dead ends on the eternal field. All that really needs to be known about them is how to restrict the alternate dead ends from destroying the eternal path. That doesn't necessarily need infinite know how....but complete knowledge on how to heal and care for all Their creations. It's kinda like the parable of the olive trees in the BOM. What's known is what the trees fruit should be like and the care needed to best foster the results and hedge the damage that's happening when it's found. It doesn't need a classically omnicient God for this to work. Just a God that knows what we may face, our weaknesses and strengths, and what we need in order to heal and grow. The rest is a work of cultivation, care, and preparation against the potential problems. 

4.) none of these. All talk of omnisence in scripture is poetic and a little hyperbolic. This opens up ignoring this question all together but also just fuels doubt about what we should actually count as informative on the nature of God, what we can really know about God, and whether there is a god of any sort to begin with. This one is the most problematic if one wants to believe in God or aspects of ours or a judeo-christian faith.

 

 

Personally, I definitely believe God's knowledge is far more expansive than my own. But I don't know what the limits of it are. I'm good not filling in the blank and insisting on one meaning to omniscience, even if I have my personal leanings. 

 

With luv,

BD

[bluebell]

13 hours ago, DT_ said:

I see. Please allow me to ask some questions. Is God able to recall everything that happened in the past? There was no beginning, so would you agree an infinite number of things happened in the past? Recalling all past events would be the same as counting to infinity in an instant. Do you believe God can instantaneously count to infinity?

I was going to say something very similar to what Miserere said in his post.  I don't think there is a way for us, with our extremely limited human framework, to describe or understand godly omniscience.

It would be like asking an 8 year old to explain how calculus or physics works.  It's not possible, a lot because they don't even know what they don't know.  But even if they did know what they didn't know, they still wouldn't be able to explain it accurately.

I feel like we are on the same level as an 8 year old trying to explain incredibly advanced things, on this topic.  And even the stuff that we do know, isn't completely trustworthy.

Dr. Joshua Sears told this story in a podcast with Hank Smith and John Bytheway.  

He said:

Quote

"When I went to high school, I remember being in science class and learning about the nature of the atom. And we learned that there's a nucleus with the protons and neutrons, and then that the electrons orbit around the nucleus in the same way that planets orbit around the sun. So that was fine. And you can use that to do things like, "Okay, if you got an atom here and an atom here with these mini electrons in their outer orbit, and then that means they'll stick together and form molecules. We did a lot with that. Then I got to BYU and took Chem 105, which was for me a really hard class. And I learned that that model, the atom--it's called the Bohr model--is not only inaccurate, it's been inaccurate since the 1920s.

And so I remember feeling so confused. Why did my high school science teacher teach me something that we've known was wrong since far before that teacher was born? And I asked this to the Teaching Assistant in class, and I'll never forget what she said. Two things are what she said.

Number one, the Bohr model is a lot easier for high school students to understand than nuclear physics, which is, the modern conception is electrons are in these probability clouds, and they're somewhere in there, but you can't always tell. So a modern model looks like a balloon animal with these clouds sticking out everywhere. But she said, that's harder for high school students for one.  

But number two, maybe more importantly, that Bohr model is extremely useful for doing a lot of things. You can make a lot of predictions in chemistry and physics using that older model. Eventually it stops working when you get to more advanced stuff, that's why you have nuclear physics today, but it does quite a lot. You get quite a lot of traction out of it. So that's another reason why you just do that in high school, because it might be wrong ultimately, but it is very useful."

I think that often God explains things (or presents things) to us in the same way that high school chemistry teachers still use the Bohr model:  it's not completely accurate but good enough for what we are working with and what we need to accomplish with that knowledge here in mortality.  It's probably simplified to the point that it's ultimately wrong, but it works for now.

So while I think there is purpose in trying to understand God's omniscience as it applies to us, I don't think we--with the knowledge that we currently have--can get even close to understanding how it actually all works.  And I think that anything we try to extrapolate from 'what we do know' is also likely to be completely wrong.

That's a very long way to say that I couldn't even begin to try to answer your questions, and I don't really see a reason to even try.
 

[pogi]

15 hours ago, DT_ said:

There was no beginning, so would you agree an infinite number of things happened in the past? Recalling all past events would be the same as counting to infinity in an instant. Do you believe God can instantaneously count to infinity?

I don't know about you, but I don't have to count every single memory in regress until I get to my memory of taking swimming lesson at the Rec Center when I was 5 years old.  The memory is just there.  Instant recall.   It is not possible for our brains to really process/focus on much more than one bit of info at a time.   We should not be tempted to limit God to the capacity and confines of the mortal human brain.  I have a theory that knowledge and memory in heaven is more like a connected network of intelligence via the medium of the light of Christ.  Kind of like a glorified "cloud" or internet.  The info is just there...all the time.   It is not like he is a computer that processes info from the internet, I think it is more like he is the internet.  He is "one" with this network.  It emanates from Him/them.   "God/Elohim" to us is not singular.  Tapping into the light of Christ in its fullness is like tapping into all knowledge - the all seeing eye of God/gods.  It is what makes him omniscient, omnipresent, and omnipotent - as far as what is possible.   I also think God may have a different relationship with time and space than we have - so you are putting mortal limitations on God that might not exist for him/them.  

Edited August 18, 2022 by pogi

[Stargazer]

17 hours ago, blackstrap said:

Hard to imagine this because man can make some very big numbers eg. 10 to the power of 80 which supposedly is the number of particles or molecules in the entire universe. Maybe the folks around at the time of the scripture did not have access to scientific notation. 

We can make lots of numbers, yes. What we can't do is count the worlds that God has created. Simply because we can't detect them. That's all that means.

You cannot number my bank account, because you have no access to it. No doubt if you gained access you'd be able to do it. 

17 hours ago, blackstrap said:

The human mind can play around with infinity .... but eventually it is going to start to hurt. 

It is said to have driven mathematician Georg Cantor insane.

[Stargazer]

6 hours ago, BlueDreams said:

Technically, that's not what the scripture actually says. It says he knows all things....as in all of his creation. That's not the same as knowing all events.

Events are things, are they not? 

But then, how do we define "thing"? Patriotism is a thing, as is love. 

Why would He not know all events?

6 hours ago, BlueDreams said:

I see 3 or 4 options. 

1.) classic omnicience. That's where he knows all things and all that is to come, etc. This, to me, fuels debates around fate v agency and how fair is it really that he set up a universe that some were fated to fail. Scriptures about God knowing it all usually fuel this version.

There really isn't any problem with fate vs. agency in God's perfect foreknowledge. Your not knowing what will happen does not extinguish the fact that God knows, nor does it extinguish your agency. He knows what you will choose, and you cannot surprise Him. Our ignorance is immaterial.

Some are concerned because it seems to defeat agency, but as long as you don't know the outcome the test is fair. He has seen everything in advance, not as predictive only, but in certainty. Can God be surprised by an outcome?  I don't think so. If He could be surprised, then He would not be God.

Some might say, if God knows whether I will do everything as required and be eligible for exaltation, then why does He bother putting me through all this? As soon as He had created me as a spirit/soul, He must have known already what was going to happen, so there's no point in going through it. EXCEPT, if you don't go through the test, He cannot know. It's actually quite a neat package. 

This bothered me, too, when I figured this out (or rather, was told about it) and went through a little trial of faith before I realized that God's foreknowledge does not impair my agency. 

6 hours ago, BlueDreams said:

2.) he knows all his creations and all possible futures. Which helps with things like contigency plans for if JS loses some pages of translation. This helps reduce the problem of agency, but then adds questions around infinity and how this works. Which is fine. It could technically be out of our current scope to understand. 

It's not just technically out of our scope, it's actually out of our scope. But I think you know that.

6 hours ago, BlueDreams said:

3.) somewhat similar to #2. He knows all his creations and the ultimate eternal future where there's only really one course that will play out in our time that's lasting. All other paths outside this are less known but also less important because they're dead ends on the eternal field. All that really needs to be known about them is how to restrict the alternate dead ends from destroying the eternal path. That doesn't necessarily need infinite know how....but complete knowledge on how to heal and care for all Their creations. It's kinda like the parable of the olive trees in the BOM. What's known is what the trees fruit should be like and the care needed to best foster the results and hedge the damage that's happening when it's found. It doesn't need a classically omnicient God for this to work. Just a God that knows what we may face, our weaknesses and strengths, and what we need in order to heal and grow. The rest is a work of cultivation, care, and preparation against the potential problems. 

You have to realize that time goes both ways. The universe has been carefully crafted so that all roads lead to the Father's knowledge. Let's say that I could "turn back time," as Cher said. And having said one thing or did one thing, and the outcome did not match what was needed, so I went back ten minutes and did it over. Because I had gone back and modified the starting condition, the previous outcome was gone, replaced by the new outcome.  Each one of us is tested exactly to the point where it becomes clear what we truly desire, be it righteousness or unrighteousness. Sometimes we choose unrighteousness, and then realize our mistake, and then we repent. This doesn't erase our wrong act, but in our Father's eyes the act is deemed gone, and through Christ's infinite Atonement, everything is as if it had never happened. Though of course, if you robbed a bank the bank would stay robbed, and you'd still be in prison for a time. Though, if you'd repented, God would be like "What bank?"

6 hours ago, BlueDreams said:

4.) none of these. All talk of omniscience in scripture is poetic and a little hyperbolic. This opens up ignoring this question all together but also just fuels doubt about what we should actually count as informative on the nature of God, what we can really know about God, and whether there is a god of any sort to begin with. This one is the most problematic if one wants to believe in God or aspects of ours or a judeo-christian faith.

It's become clear to me that He knows the end from the beginning, and there are no dropouts from that knowledge. 

6 hours ago, BlueDreams said:

Personally, I definitely believe God's knowledge is far more expansive than my own. But I don't know what the limits of it are. I'm good not filling in the blank and insisting on one meaning to omniscience, even if I have my personal leanings. 

The omniscience of God is an implacable fact. But I don't let it bother me. I just keep on keeping on as if His foreknowledge was soft, and not hard. I know I can't surprise Him, but so what? I can still surprise myself, and that is all that counts for the moment.