When I send my Dorfs to dig a tunnel and they go berserk and drown everyone that does not necessarily mean it was my intention for them to do so, though it was in their capacity to do so
But if you also designed the dorf's AI then you're going to have a fair idea of what they're likely to do
Read Toady's devlog to see why that's wrong
Yeah, but he's not also omniscient.
Entertaining thought I had: god might not actually know anything at all, at least not how we use the term. Why would you need to build a mental model of reality if you have instantaneous and direct access to reality unbounded by time? There's no need to maintain state if you have no latency and you never lose access to anything, and there is no need to predict anything if you can always see the outcome.
I've considered similar ideas as well. A truly omniscent being would have paradoxially have no need to think. It would never need to process information, only to access it.
This is the one tiny concession I'll grant to double-talking ID advocates who claim that god is actually "simple"/"non-complex". It's not much of a concession though as even the greatest thinking mind would be absolutely dwarfed in complexity simply by the data contained in an omnipotent mind; especially one that is also eternal (effective omniscience could be achieved with only the set of all knowledge that's actually going to ever come up, which is likely to be finite for a finite being, but an eternal being on the other hand may be reasonably be expected to encounter a transfinite number of different situations). Complete memorization of every digit of Graham's Number alone would account for more complexity than the entire solar sysyem and in fact quite likely even more complexity than the entire observable universe, let alone memorization of every digit of pi...
When you tie this with information theory, you come to the conclusion that such an entity cannot physically exist inside our universe, because its information density would be greater than the universe's ability to hold such information.
This is just one of the many signs that indicate to me that the christian god must be extradimensional, or at least exists outside of our universe in some kind of hyperspace. From that vantage, our universe (and all of its permutations over time) would appear static, since time would manifest as another spacial dimension. For this reason, and many others, I find the "There is no proof of this being existing (inside this universe), so this being does not exist!" to be a conceit. The implied fallacy being that the universe we inhabit is all that can possibly exist. I reject that notion, especially considering that multiverse theory is totally a thing, and has some limited support in empirical science. By its necessity to exist outside of our universe, we lack any means of testing for it. Due to that being the case, I cannot assert with certainty that it either does or does not exist, any more than I am able to tell you with certainty what the contents of your wallet are, given that I am many hundreds of miles away from you, and have no tools nor means with which to ascertain this information. I cannot even determine if your wallet exists or not. Does that mean I should take the presumption that your wallet is a fantasy?
I personally favor the christian god being non-thinking/non-sentient, but having multiple types of manifestation. The most primal, and most correct being, in my opinion, "the holy spirit"-- it being non-sentient, but perfect and pure. It represents more honestly what the omniscient and omnipotent god actually "is". The second is "god the father", or the manifestation of some purpose or will of this divine force. This is the more executive face of this entity/force-- or more aptly, the diffuse power and knowledge of the holy spirit given a meaningful purpose and will. The last one is "god the son", or "jesus, the christ." et al-- This is the manifestation of compassion and justice. This is more to say, that these apparitions are the interpretations of people, attempting to understand the non-thinking, non-sentient, but all knowing and all powerful omniscient god, which is best described as the holy spirit type manifestation.
In the bible, this "holy spirit" it given as a new kind of instinct, to supplant the dangerous sin instinct that humans have by nature. The Christ figure states that belief in this force grants amazing abilities, eg, "If you have but the faith of a mustard seed, one can move mountains", etc. It is the same power that the Christ wielded, and the mocking/blaspheming of this power/force is the single unforgivable sin. In popular dogmatic teachings in christianity, this force is a kind of compulsion-- it instructs people and tells them to do things, but does so without using words. (If you believe the testimony of various people that can be found on the internet. For some people, it apparently does use words, but for most it is simply an urging to action.) In many places in the bible, this "indwelling of the holy spirit" is synonymous with "indwelling by god". This looks pretty strongly like it is the "true" manifestation of the christian god. This would at least partially explain why there is a prohibition in the bible against creating depictions of god-- a diffuse, abstract god does not have a form to depict, thus any depiction thereof would be incorrect, and possibly blasphemous.
It is likewise important to note that I do not see support for the popular description of "Hell" within the bible. The best I can find in old testament and supporting literature, is the prison of the angels described in Enoch, chapter 21.
1. And I proceeded to where things were chaotic. 2. And I saw there something horrible: I saw neither a heaven above nor a firmly founded earth, but a place chaotic and horrible. 3. And there I saw seven stars of the heaven bound together in it, like great mountains and burning with fire. 4. Then I said: 'For what sin are they bound, and on what account have they been cast in hither?' 5. Then said Uriel, one of the holy angels, who was with me, and was chief over them, and said: 'Enoch, why dost thou ask, and why art thou eager for the truth? 6. These are of the number of the stars ⌈of heaven⌉, which have transgressed the commandment of the Lord, and are bound here till ten thousand years, the time entailed by their sins, are consummated.' 7. And from thence I went to another place, which was still more horrible than the former, and I saw a horrible thing: a great fire there which burnt and blazed, and the place was cleft as far as the abyss, being full of great descending columns of fire: neither its extent or magnitude could I see, nor could I conjecture. 8. Then I said: 'How fearful is the place and how terrible to look upon!' 9. Then Uriel answered me, one of the holy angels who was with me, and said unto me: 'Enoch, why hast thou such fear and affright?' And I answered: 'Because of this fearful place, and because of the spectacle of the pain.' 10. And he said ⌈⌈unto me⌉⌉: 'This place is the prison of the angels, and here they will be imprisoned for ever.'
Note that this is a place of punishment for angels, not people. The "place for people" is described very differently in chapter 22.
1. And thence I went to another place, and he showed me in the west ⌈another⌉ great and high mountain [and] of hard rock. 2. And there were †four† hollow places in it, deep and very smooth: †three† of them were dark and one bright; and there was a fountain of water in its midst. And I said: '†How† smooth are these hollow places, and deep and dark to view.' 3. Then Raphael answered, one of the holy angels who was with me, and said unto me: 'These hollow places have been created for this very purpose, that the spirits of the souls of the dead should assemble therein, yea that all the souls of the children of men should assemble here. And these places have been made to receive them till the day of their judgement and till their appointed period ⌈till the period appointed⌉, till the great judgement (comes) upon them.' 5. I saw (the spirit of) a dead man making suit, and his voice went forth to heaven and made suit. 6. And I asked Raphael the angel who was with me, and I said unto him: 'This spirit which maketh suit, whose is it, whose voice goeth forth and maketh suit to heaven?' 7. And he answered me saying: 'This is the spirit which went forth from Abel, whom his brother Cain slew, and he makes his suit against him till his seed is destroyed from the face of the earth, and his seed is annihilated from amongst the seed of men.' 8. Then I asked regarding all the hollow places: 'Why is one separated from the other?' 9. And he answered me saying: 'These three have been made that the spirits of the dead might be separated. And this division has been made for the spirits of the righteous, in which there is the bright spring of water. 10. And this has been made for sinners when they die and are buried in the earth and judgement has not been executed upon them in their lifetime. 11. Here their spirits shall be set apart in this great pain, till the great day of judgement, scourgings, and torments of the accursed for ever, so that (there maybe) retribution for their spirits. There He shall bind them for ever. 12. And this division has been made for the spirits of those who make their suit, who make disclosures concerning their destruction, when they were slain in the days of the sinners. 13. And this has been made for the spirits of men who shall not be righteous but sinners, who are godless, and of the lawless they shall be companions: but their spirits shall not be punished in the day of judgement nor shall they be raised from thence. 14. Then I blessed the Lord of Glory and said: 'Blessed art Thou, Lord of righteousness, who rulest over the world.'
From this description, there is only one of these four "compartments" that is in any way resembling the popular hell--
10. And this has been made for sinners when they die and are buried in the earth and judgement has not been executed upon them in their lifetime. 11. Here their spirits shall be set apart in this great pain, till the great day of judgement, scourgings, and torments of the accursed for ever, so that (there maybe) retribution for their spirits. There He shall bind them for ever.
In context, this seems to refer specifically to people who knew they were sinning, knew about god and the proper law (this text predates the Christ by some 300 years.) , and chose willfully to sin anyway. From the initial description, which applied to all of them collectively, these places are "very smooth" and made of stone. Not made of burning fire, as the angel's prison is. (So, more like a dungeon than firey hell.) The final compartment is much more benign, and is for people who have never heard the law, or heard of god.
13. And this has been made for the spirits of men who shall not be righteous but sinners, who are godless, and of the lawless they shall be companions: but their spirits shall not be punished in the day of judgement nor shall they be raised from thence.
Granted, that is from an apocryphal source.
In the bible proper, we see in Revelation 20 a description of the final judgement, which does depict a lake of fire into which "hades" and "Death" are consigned, along with the accuser/satan, and those he deceived.
1And I saw an angel coming down out of heaven, having the key to the Abyss and holding in his hand a great chain. 2He seized the dragon, that ancient serpent, who is the devil, or Satan, and bound him for a thousand years. 3He threw him into the Abyss, and locked and sealed it over him, to keep him from deceiving the nations anymore until the thousand years were ended. After that, he must be set free for a short time. 4I saw thrones on which were seated those who had been given authority to judge. And I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded because of their testimony about Jesus and because of the word of God. They had not worshiped the beast or its image and had not received its mark on their foreheads or their hands. They came to life and reigned with Christ a thousand years. 5(The rest of the dead did not come to life until the thousand years were ended.) This is the first resurrection. 6Blessed and holy are those who share in the first resurrection. The second death has no power over them, but they will be priests of God and of Christ and will reign with him for a thousand years. 7When the thousand years are over, Satan will be released from his prison 8and will go out to deceive the nations in the four corners of the earth--Gog and Magog--and to gather them for battle. In number they are like the sand on the seashore. 9They marched across the breadth of the earth and surrounded the camp of God's people, the city he loves. But fire came down from heaven and devoured them. 10And the devil, who deceived them, was thrown into the lake of burning sulfur, where the beast and the false prophet had been thrown. They will be tormented day and night for ever and ever. 11Then I saw a great white throne and him who was seated on it. The earth and the heavens fled from his presence, and there was no place for them. 12And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne, and books were opened. Another book was opened, which is the book of life. The dead were judged according to what they had done as recorded in the books. 13The sea gave up the dead that were in it, and death and Hades gave up the dead that were in them, and each person was judged according to what they had done. 14Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. The lake of fire is the second death. 15Anyone whose name was not found written in the book of life was thrown into the lake of fire.
I have highlighted in teal, that those who are martyred are the ones first resurrected, and that these people do not get judged in the "second death." Likewise, those who will be consigned to the lake of fire are not resurrected yet at this time. It is after this 1000 year period where christ reigns with his martyrs, that the deciever is one again released from temporary imprisonment, and allowed to run amok. After which, he causes the whole of the rest of humanity to besiege the kingdom of heaven, and for this they are consigned to the lake of fire with him-- highlighted in yellow.
Pretty much all other places in the bible where "hell" is translated, derives from either "hades" or "Sheol" in the original texts, and better align with the enoch description. Note, that "Death" and "Hades" are thrown into the lake. Those are methaphorical, and likely represent an end to the concepts of death, and the destruction of any residency for dead souls, since death no longer is a thing.
Given the HIGHLY metaphorical nature of Revelation, and the many other references in the bible to "death" and "being unmade", I would likely conclude that the author of this text intends to point out that punishment is being meted out, but that the outcome is more in line with being rendered into a null state of no longer existing, rather than torment, (You cant exactly torture death, now can you?) using the metaphor of a cleansing fire.
References to the imagery used in this text appear all over the bible, with the book of life making a reference as early as Exodus, and the concept of being blotted out from it appearing in exodus 32.
From the perspective of an outsider to this faith, the reference to the lake of fire appears to be derived from the prison for the angels first described in the apocryphal book cited. This concept became altered through changes in popular understanding of the concept, and through interaction with other cultures (EG, greeks and their conception of Hades and Tartarus) into the place of final disposition of unrepentant sinners, along with the satan and his fallen angels.
Amusingly, this ties right back into the "omniscient" god angle, where the omniscient god does not think in the way we properly consider "thinking" to happen in, but simply knows in a timeless state of being. Sin exists, therefor, sin exists timelessly. To god, the existence of sin, however temporary to our perception, is eternal. Committing a sin once, is fundamentally the same as committing it eternally, because the event is eternally etched into time. Likewise, a similar understanding could be derived from this act of disposal; It happens once, and those cast in cease to be afterwards-- but the act itself is just as eternal, and thus "forever and ever". Likewise, the bible describes sin as something that causes suffering, so those committing sins are suffering. Thus to god, suffering is happening, and it is eternal, as a consequence of sin existing.
A great deal makes much more sense when considering god as a timeless construct that simply "is", rather than as an anthropomorphized agency.
This interpretation of "Disposition" rather than "Herpa derp, lets torture all those people, actively, for all eternity!" makes even more sense when you take the very next chapter of revelation into account, which then states that both the heavens and the earth are finished/ended, and recreated anew all over again. If the lake of fire is a place where people are tortured "eternally", then where does it exist? It does not exist, or have a reason for existing, in this new creation. How can somebody be tortured forever in a place that no longer exists after the people get thrown into it? The only place it CAN exist, is inside the mind/knowledge of god, which is eternal-- which then explains why it is an eternal place of punishment.
I kinda get irritated when I keep reading people complain about how horrible god must be to torture people for eternity. The scope of comprehension of how a timeless being must perceive our universe is very lacking in such evaluations. Remember kids, in biblethumpia land, god invented time. Not the other way around. The way god experiences the universe is very different from the way you do. Revelation and pals is written from the timeless "god's view of creation" standpoint. Not your own "Time bound, temporal" one. You stub your toe? To god, you are stubbing your toe for all eternity. Reflect on that.
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