> It would seem that even if there were no physical universe -- no matter, energy, or physical laws, the higher realm of potentiality would remain. There would still be "possible universes" that could be created (by God, if God exists). Even higher than that is the realm of absolute logical truth. No matter what the universe is like, and higher up, no matter what a divine creator might wish, nothing can change absolutes such as the Pythagorean theorem, the infinite size of the set of primes, and even subtler things like Fermat's Last Theorem. Non-mathematical examples could probably be thought up as well, I suppose. We might suppose that the universe could lack the proper framework to make it likely that those truths would ever be discovered, or even, in the lack of a physical universe, that any entity *could* contemplate them, but they'd be truths nonetheless.

I think limiting God's abilities to a set of mathematical rules that He created is really putting Him in a box. Whether you believe in God or not, the very concept of an omnipotent being implies the ability to do anything, regardless of physical or mathematical laws. As we discussed in a previous thread, God is outside of time and can change the past, present, or future. In the same way, I'm sure He could design a triangle that doesn't match up with the Pythagorean Theorum. Heck, if He created the entire universe from the largest galaxy to the smallest quark, I'd wager He could conjure up some crazy-complex geometrical form that everybody thought was "impossible" without so much as breaking a sweat. So what if it's beyond the grasp of *our* reason, *our* way of perceiving the truths of reality? This is what makes us mortal, and really pretty stupid in comparison to an ultimate deity.

Scientists and mathematicians use numbers and formulas to describe the way things work around them. They certainly don't MAKE the physical laws, but only try to predict how objects operating within these laws will behave. If, in an experiment, something acts totally different from the scientists' predictions, the scientists realize that maybe they didn't understand that law as well as they thought they did. Then they go back and tweak their formulas to reflect the new information they've discovered. It's obvious that our understanding of physical laws is only temporal, a compilation of observations amended over time. Usually our guesses are pretty accurate. But since when did we decide that these rules are "absolute logical truth," even higher than the power of a divine God?

Granted, you said you weren't talking about physical laws, but the "higher realm" of potentiality. Basic mathematical stuff. Maybe even things as simple as the basic number system. Whether you say "one two three," "uno dos tres," or anything else, numbers have a specific meaning for us... they are abstract representatives of concrete objects: whatever we might be counting at the time. A number is not a "real" thing like a frisbee or a glass of lemonade. It's a concept which doesn't do much outside of the realm of math. I'd also say that it's a human creation, or at least something whose understanding was made possible for humans by God. How natural is it, I wonder, to have an imaginary entity representative of a physical object in one's mind for the sake of knowing how many objects there are? For that matter, what is the concept of "how many," anyway? Could we even get along without these concepts? When you consider the true nature of numbers, it's a stretch to say that God is bound by them. I'd say that He created them just like He created gravity, light, and cytoplasm. And then all mathematics (prime numbers and the theorums you mentioned) build on this basic concept of the number system, and thereby also cannot limit the actions of God. To say these things are absolutes is only proof of the limitations of the human mind to perceive a world without them.

I see no reason why God couldn't create another universe, separate from ours, governed by a completely different set of rules. Different at a fundamental level: the dimensions of height, width, depth, and time wouldn't exist, but instead there would be radical alternatives that we can't even begin to comprehend. Simply put, God could start from scratch and create a new system, with new physical and mathematical laws (provided physics and math even existed in this place), and nothing that we know or percieve to be absolute would apply there. And most likely, the citizens of this place would also try to define these rules within some logical context -- of course they wouldn't have numbers -- and these beings would be as unable to comprehend the structure of OUR universe as *we* are to understand THEIRS.

In summary (deep breath), God makes the rules and can't be limited by them. What's to stop Him from breaking the rules any more than a soccer player can break the rules of that game? It surprises people and seems awfully out of place, but it certainly isn't IMPOSSIBLE by any means. Especially for the One who wrote the book. Just because our puny minds can't perceive any possible alternatives to the rules and order of this universe doesn't mean that they couldn't be created by God and/or function as well as the reality that we all know and love.

-useless"DUDE, that was HEAVY"ness