My understanding of God

[Bogdan]

6 minutes ago, Xonas Pitfall said:

Wouldn't this be a "limit" on God, a form of "finitude," and therefore contradict the very definition of God (Infinity)?

No because God is Absolute/True Infinity, which is paradoxical.

What you're referring to is relative infinity, which has relative finitude as it's counterpart. Absolute Infinity has no opposite.

[Xonas Pitfall]

3 minutes ago, Bogdan said:

No because God is Absolute/True Infinity, which is paradoxical.

What you're referring to is relative infinity, which has relative finitude as it's counterpart. Absolute Infinity has no opposite.

Yes, but that was exactly my point. Absolute infinity should have infinite knowledge of itself, hence no finite limitation of "not knowing." The experience of not knowing arises from finitude, from a finite or relative point of view.

[Bogdan]

2 minutes ago, Xonas Pitfall said:

Yes, but that was exactly my point. Absolute infinity should have infinite knowledge of itself, hence no finite limitation of "not knowing." The experience of not knowing arises from finitude, from a finite or relative point of view.

But knowledge is itself such a limitation. It's as if an ant is asking "does God smell pheromones infinitely?" Well... It's a weird question. Smelling pheromones is an ant communication thing. It doesn't apply infinitely. Only in very specific states of Consciousness.

[Leo Gura]

 

Quote

The experience of not knowing arises from finitude, from a finite or relative point of view.

No, not-knowing is a feature of the Infinite.

Infinity is why not-knowing is a thing.

God is too profound to be knowable as humans expect to know things. Knowledge is limited and you guys are not taking this issue seriously.

God can be in various states. God can be very conscious or alseep. When God is asleep it knows barely anything. And when it is very conscious, knowledge becomes impossible from the limitations of knowing.

If we shoot you in the head, will you have infinite knowledge, or will you just be Infinite?

Edited 1 hour ago by Leo Gura

[Xonas Pitfall]

Maybe we just have different definitions of knowledge.

Knowledge isn't necessarily a "human" property, is it? By that same line of reasoning, you could argue that God is something "beyond infinity" because infinity is merely a human mathematical concept.

But when we use these absolute terms, we're pointing toward something beyond their ordinary "human" conceptual meanings. When I say "infinite," I mean absolute infinity, not infinity in the "human" mathematical sense.

Similarly, when I say "knowledge," I don't mean intellectual, academic, or conceptual "human" knowledge. I mean absolute self-knowledge, God's complete awareness of itself.

If God is all that exists, and there is nothing outside God, then what could possibly prevent God from knowing itself absolutely? There is nothing external that could impose such a limitation. The only thing that could limit God is God itself. But then, is that really a limitation in the absolute sense?

And more fundamentally, if knowledge is inherently a limitation, why wouldn't the absence of knowledge also constitute a limitation? On what grounds are you assuming that knowledge is necessarily finite rather than potentially absolute?

[Leo Gura]

Knowledge is a somewhat technical term. It needs to be because we have the issue of not-knowing.

God is a profound state of not-knowing. Consciousness of God is not knowledge per se.

Knowledge and understanding are different things.

Knowledge is conceptual, dualistic, relational.

Consciousness is prior to knowledge, so to speak.

Edited 1 hour ago by Leo Gura

[Xonas Pitfall]

22 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

Knowledge is a somewhat technical term. It needs to be because we have the issue of not-knowing.

God is a profound state of not-knowing. Consciousness of God is not knowledge per se.

Knowledge and understanding are different things.

Knowledge is conceptual, dualistic, relational.

Consciousness is prior to knowledge, so to speak.

How do you define it? I may or may not agree, depending on what the "technical" definition is.

The same can potentially apply to the term "infinity." You could use its "technical" definition, but then one could argue that it's merely a human-made concept.

For example, infinity can be defined as an indefinitely great number or amount. But by that definition, God wouldn't be infinite. We'd need some entirely different word that hasn't even been invented yet, because the definition itself relies on terms like "number" and "amount," which are also finite human concepts.

Hope that makes sense.

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/know

know

: to perceive directly : have direct cognition of

(2): to have understanding of

importance of knowing oneself

: to recognize the nature of : discern

: to recognize as being the same as something previously known

: to be acquainted or familiar with

: to have experience of

: to be aware of the truth or factuality of : be convinced or certain of

b: to have a practical understanding of

This fits quite well, in my opinion, when it comes to God's "capabilities, properties."

Edited 1 hour ago by Xonas Pitfall

[Leo Gura]

12 minutes ago, Xonas Pitfall said:

How do you define it?

In philosophy, knowledge usually means "true justified belief". Knowledge is usually propositional: The Earth is round, or the moon is not made out of cheese.

When you say that God should know everything, that would mean that God should know how many ants are in Australia right now at 2:23 pm, Nov 15th 2026.

You should not expect God to have that kind of knowledge.

You can, of course, define terms however you like, but you have to be careful because you can define terms in counter-productive ways.

Do you know how many ants there are in Australia right now? Neither does God.

Edited 1 hour ago by Leo Gura

[Xonas Pitfall]

10 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

In philosophy, knowledge usually means "true justified belief". Knowledge is usually propositional: The Earth is round, or the moon is not made out of cheese.

When you say that God should know everything, that would mean that God should know how many ants are in Australia right now at 2:23 pm, Nov 15th 2026.

You should not expect God to have that kind of knowledge.

You can, of course, define terms however you like, but you have to be careful because you can define terms in counter-productive ways.

Interesting. Thanks for the input!

I guess, out of curiosity, I understand why we as humans wouldn't be able to achieve that, but why not God?

If I were an ant, and everything surrounding it, observing it over infinite, boundless time, wouldn't I eventually acquire practically perfect knowledge of that observed point and every other point?

Imagine you're a being that has infinite time, and you are simultaneously everything that's being observed and everything that's observing it. You're both the observer and the observed.

Why would complete omniscience be an issue?

Quote

Do you know how many ants there are in Australia right now? Neither does God.

That makes sense from the perspective of a human or an ant.

But what if you ARE every ant that has ever existed or will ever exist, the ground beneath them, the wind touching them, the colonies they've built, the queen ants, the worker ants, and even the scientists observing and experimenting on them?

What if you are literally all of these things simultaneously, across all of time, including everything observing and everything being observed?

If you ARE all of it, every perspective, every experience, every interaction, across infinite time, then wouldn't that necessarily imply omniscience?

[Bogdan]

@Xonas Pitfall as Leo said, we get to define our terms. And I think in doing this work we ought to find more accurate definitions than the people before us, that do not engage with this work. 

And to try to add to Leo's point about how many ants are in Australia at a specific time: 

It's basically impossible to KNOW-Know, because there probably are individual ants that are so genetically mutated you can't even tell they're ants anymore. Do you count the unhatched ants? Do you count only alive ants? What if it's alive but half of it was eaten? What about the ones that are half out of the egg at that specific time? What about an ants that got themselves in the ocean? Does that still count as Australia? How many centimeters or miles at sea does it still count as Australia? 

Even God doesn't "know" this, because it's all too fluid. Knowing is more for pragmatic human stuff in my view.

[Xonas Pitfall]

6 minutes ago, Bogdan said:

It's basically impossible to KNOW-Know, because there probably are individual ants that are so genetically mutated you can't even tell they're ants anymore. Do you count the unhatched ants? Do you count only alive ants? What if it's alive but half of it was eaten? What about the ones that are half out of the egg at that specific time? What about an ants that got themselves in the ocean? Does that still count as Australia? How many centimeters or miles at sea does it still count as Australia? 

Yes, this is completely valid if we're talking from the relative perspective of an observer. But we're talking about God. If God is the substrate of everything (and not just "substrate" but IS that), then all these things are essentially God.

So when you ask:

Quote

"It's basically impossible to KNOW-know, because there are ants so genetically mutated you can't even recognize them as ants. Do you count unhatched ants? Half-eaten ants? Ants in the ocean? Where exactly does Australia end?"

My point is that the ants, their mutations, the eggs, the ocean, Australia, the boundaries, and even the observer making these distinctions are all God. Every single aspect of that scenario is God itself.

Hence my original question:

What if you are literally all of these things simultaneously, across all of time, including everything observing and everything being observed?

If you ARE all of it, every perspective, every experience, every interaction, across infinite time, then wouldn't that necessarily imply omniscience?

After all, what could possibly be unknown to God if there is nothing outside of God to begin with?

---

However, if your point is that when we ask about an "ant," we haven't clearly defined what we mean by "ant," then sure, I agree. But that's more an issue with how the human asking the question defines their terms, not an issue with knowledge itself.

There's no reason God wouldn't know about half-eaten ants, mutated ants, unhatched ants, or any other variation. When you ask, "How many ants are there right now?" you simply need to define what counts as an ant, what "right now" means, and where exactly you're counting.

The ambiguity lies in the question, not necessarily in God's capacity to know the answer.

Hope I'm making sense 

Edited 41 minutes ago by Xonas Pitfall

[Leo Gura]

45 minutes ago, Xonas Pitfall said:

I guess, out of curiosity, I understand why we as humans wouldn't be able to achieve that, but why not God?

If I were an ant, and everything surrounding it, observing it over infinite, boundless time, wouldn't I eventually acquire practically perfect knowledge of that observed point and every other point?

Because you guys are overlooking the relativity of knowing anything. To even know that something is or is not an ant is already a construction.

Construct-awareness and relativity mean that there's really no such thing as "an ant" which you can count. What counts as an ant? For whom? By what criteria?

When you naively assume that God knows everything, you are assuming that there are objective things called ants that God can simply count. But that's not how it works. You are taking "ant" for granted.

In a sense, God does "know" everything, but that "knowing" is Infinity itself. But you are not going to be happy with that answer because you expect detailed scientific human knowledge.

What God does not have is detailed scientific human knowledge, because that requires a human into invent it.

In short, there is no science and no McDonalds in Heaven.

If I gave you pure Infinity, would you consider it knowledge of everything? No. You would complain.

Edited 7 minutes ago by Leo Gura

[Xonas Pitfall]

Just now, Leo Gura said:

Because you guys are overlooking the relativity of knowing anything. To even know that something is or is not an ant is already a construction.

Construct-awareness and relativity mean that there's really no such thing as "an ant" which you can count. What counts as ant? For whom? By what criteria?

When you naively assume that God knows everything, you are assuming that there are objective things called ants that God can simply count. But that's how it works. You are taking "ant" for granted.

In a sense God does "know" everything, but that "knowing" is Infinity itself.

Gotcha, then I understand. If the issue is how you'd define or even pose the question, since the question itself relies on relative definitions, then sure, I agree.

God would still know all the "ants", but the issue would be in posing the question precisely enough to define what you're actually asking. I feel like that's a more accurate way of framing it.

But in terms of "knowing" as in absolute self-knowledge of its own infinity, I think that still necessarily follows.

[Bogdan]

@Xonas Pitfall I was gonna say but Leo beat me to it - there is no such thing as an ant, ultimately. Or Australia. Or humans. Or time, or numbers.

It is One Continuous Infinity. Zoom into "the ant". It's not an ant. There is no clear boundary where the ant stops and "not ant" begins. And that's the truth. And that truth is not found through knowing but through Consciousness.

So I think should define knowing as related to human survival and not mix it up with Consciousness.

[Leo Gura]

15 minutes ago, Xonas Pitfall said:

God would still know all the "ants"

Would it?

What if God's POV is so high that ants literally don't exist for God?

What if the only thing that exists for God is pure Infinity?

What if "all the ants" is something you invented which does not exist for God because God is too united?

Edited 14 minutes ago by Leo Gura

[Bogdan]

2 minutes ago, Xonas Pitfall said:

But in terms of "knowing" as in absolute self-knowledge of its own infinity, I think that still necessarily follows.

I think this is not accurate, and I find it similar to the "infinite hate" problem - of God is truly infinite, then surely there is room for infinite hate as well, no?

Well, ultimately no, because hate is, just like knowing, a finite human thing, and when you take any finite thing and make it infinite, it stops being that finite thing and simply completely dissolves back into infinity itself.

So hate, knowing etc simply dissolve into infinite Consciousness.

It's like, I can keep playing a mental game of insisting - yeah but still, God's infinity implies that he can smell itself infinitely. Well ... If we are being accurate, No.

@Leo Gura may I ask for some feedback? Am I being accurate enough?

[Leo Gura]

2 minutes ago, Bogdan said:

 

@Leo Gura may I ask for some feedback? Am I being accurate enough?

You are making great points which shows that you are thinking deeply.

[Bogdan]

@Leo Gura Thank you!