Originally posted by James R
There really are lots of ways around the problems you're raising. My introduction of the idea of a timeless god was just one possibility among many I could have used to show that a god is not logically inconsistent.
I'm sure we can continue in this spirit until hell freezes over. You can keep coming up with imaginative ways for a god to exist, and I'll keep demonstrating that those ways are either logically inconsistent or severely demeaning for the deity (not to mention removing any grounds whatsoever for postulating the deity as a solution to the infinite regress of existence.)
Another possibility would be for God to have Her own timeline, so that She lives in a universe with time, able to communicate or "cross over" to our universe, yet still exist independently of it.
Then such a god is not really very special. It's much like you and me, only a little more advanced. It still exists within some universe and is subservient to that universe and limited by the applicable laws.
That would avoid some of the problems you are raising, but it's not the only way to do that.
Keep 'em coming...
<i>If a timeless domain cannot support state (which I'd argue it can't) then there can't be any communication between a time-bound and a timeless domain.</i>
Who knows what a timeless domain can and cannot support? We have no experience of a timeless domain.
Well since you want to know who, then me for starters. State is an inertial concept. By definition it is either maintained or changed through interaction. Both modes of existence involve time. Even remaining unchanged over time still means remaining subservient to time.
An omniscient god would never learn anything, since He/She/It/They would already know everything. The timeless part of such a god would never need to change.
Well, now you've done it. You've gone and dragged omniscience in.
First of all, it's easy enough to show that total omniscience is impossible (the god would have to know every detail of itself including its own knowledge, which leads to infinite regress.) So the omniscience must be relative to our universe.
Now consider that the god is omniscient with respect to our universe. That means the god contains the complete worldline of everything in existence. Which means that the god cannot change anything within the universe, ever. Because if it did, that would alter the worldline and hence invalidate the god's prior omniscience, not to mention involving the god in self-modification and moreover binding the god into time again due to its changing state. Some god it's turning out to be...
Moreover, we have to wonder how the god can possibly know anything at all (not to mention everything) about our universe if the god cannot ever exchange information between our universe and the god's domain (you sidestepped that paradox without resolving it.)
And finally the god still cannot do anything (because there's no concept of time, so no action of any sort is possible.) Yet, what can possibly provide the meaning of "knowledge" under such a constraint? So what the heck is this god turning into? Some non-existent thing, that's what.
One-way communication from the timeless to the time-bound poses no such problems.
A timeless entity has no way of penetrating into time-governed domains, because it is excluded from time by definition. It would have to be able to interact with spacetime before it could tinker with it. Interaction implies sequential behavior for both parties, and therefore imposes time on both.
And presumably a timeless god would "always" have knowledge of all time in a time-bound domain "simultaneously". Again, the language fails, but hopefully you get the idea.
That's the point: there is no idea to get. "Always" is another time-bound term. Conceiving of some god as merely unchanging does not put the god outside of time. In fact, it kills the god.
I've already said it many times and I'll say it again. No brain originating within and confined to this universe could ever conceive in a valid way of anything that cannot at least in principle be manifested within certain fundamental laws of this universe (with time being amongst that irreducible set.) Any attempt to do so will result in paradoxes. Which summarily invalidates all human attempts at imagining some sort of a supernatural entity. Within the human conception of existence, no such entity can exist.