In an essay published yesterday at the New York Times, philosophy professor Peter Atterton claims that the idea of a morally perfect, all-knowing, all-powerful God is incoherent. If this is true, then those who believe in such a God are in a bad spot. It’s not just that they don’t have enough evidence for their belief in God. The problem is that the very notion of the God they say they believe in is contradictory. Given the law of non-contradiction, this means that it is logically impossible for God to exist. This is about as bad as it gets for any idea.
Fortunately for those who do believe in such a God, Atterton is wrong.
To see the rest of my reply, go to https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/ethics-everyone/201903/problems-god-problem
Elliott
Good article, Mike! It seems that Atterton failed to distinguish between propositional knowledge and knowledge by acquaintance. Omniscience is a matter of the former, not the latter. Thus, an appeal to items not included in God’s knowledge by acquaintance does nothing to show that the concept of (propositional) omniscience is logically incoherent.
To make such an argument is like trying to show that the concept of soccer is incoherent by counting the number of players on a baseball field.