Philosoft

If the system in question lacked any of the above qualities, it wouldn't be a Gahzu at all. Degrees of 'goodness' only exist if you define them. If a sphere in the system orbited at a variable speed, it would be possible to then have an imperfect Gahzu if and only if a perfect Gahzu was defined as having a constant-speed orbit and if 'constant-speed orbit' wasn't a necessary condition for being a Gahzu (perhaps only an orbit of any speed).

In this vein, God could only be described meaningfully as perfectly good if we had a prior definition of "perfectly good." Simply describing God as 'perfect' is meaningless.

seebs

Hmm. I just don't agree; I think numbers are "real". And no, I don't think they have physical form; I merely think that numbers and immutable rules are real, and external to us, and exist whether or not any of us exist.

I wonder if this belief correlates strongly with theism.

Vorador

I'm new at this stuff. What might those assertions be?

As for the Gahzu, the orbit itself does not change. But my point is not what you seem to think it is =P A perfect being, a sentient being who is supposed to be perfect, could not change, because he's perfect. If a being is perfect, why would his nature ever need to change? And yet, for this perfect being to create the universe, he would need to undergo a change to do it, because he was perfect -before- the creation of the universe.

Why would he need to create the universe, or anything at all, even? He would be perfect unto himself. He would need no companions (Angels) and there would be no reason for the universe to exist at all.

[ June 23, 2002: Message edited by: Vorador ]</p>

advocate_11

This was precisely the intention of my third paragraph. I would not attempt to advance such a definition of God.

Perhaps a more illustrative example would have been to define the component of the Gahzu that orbits the other, but I will stay with it as stated.

Just as a Gahzu perceptibly changes (and perhaps it was not the best example), if God is defined as a being of the sort that by nature creates whatever it is said he created, then in that respect, God is a perfect being of that sort.

However, I do not of course propose that it is reasonable to define God fully as a being of the sort that does what God has done and therefore say that God perfectly fulfills the requirements of a being of type, "God"; that would be entirely uninteresting.

My suggestion is merely that it seems possible that a definition of God could be introduced that allows for human-perceptible change, and which would perfectly predict that God has taken precisely the action that it is alleged he has taken; thus God could be a perfect being of that sort.

Perhaps then what I propose is a definition of God that provides such things through a set of rules, such that there is less than a 1-to-1 correspondence between rules and alleged actions.

Does this make sense?