Question In response to question 26 [http://www.amherst.edu/askphilosophers/question/26], should it not be possible for an omnipotent being to create the possibility for a contradictory object to exist?

Accepted:
February 18, 2006

Comments

I'm not sure why that should be possible. Indeed, suppose we accept that it is not possible for an omnipotent being to make some contradiction true. Then—if we assume that anything possibly possible is possible (this is the modal axiom known as "4")—it follows immediately that such a being cannot make it possible for a contradiction to be true, either. If s'he could, then it would be possible that it was possible for a contradiction to be true, in which case it would be possible for a contradiction to be true, which it is not.

That said, there are some philosophers who think that some contradictions are true, and they would have an easier time, I take it, with this kind of question.

Question In response to question 26 [http://www.amherst.edu/askphilosophers/question/26], should it not be possible for an omnipotent being to create the possibility for a contradictory object to exist? Accepted:February 18, 2006

Question In response to question 26 [http://www.amherst.edu/askphilosophers/question/26], should it not be possible for an omnipotent being to create the possibility for a contradictory object to exist?

Accepted:
February 18, 2006