Think about these

[Guest]

Yes, it is possible for God to create a rock he cannot lift. Here is why. We have the quote from the bible that All things are Possible with God. If this is true then this means that all things are possible including having impossibilities. Let's say we have a set of possiblities p. By this setup All ~P are P. Let's denote lifting a rock as l. l is a member of p. ~l is a member of ~p. This means ~l is a member of p through the transitive property.

Putting it into sentence form. It is possible for it to be impossible for God to be able to lift some rocks he creates if the mass of the rock is greater then the amount of mass that God can lift at that moment. Therefore all things are possible with God including impossibilities of some things.

[Guest]

Think about these - Back to the Paradoxes

1. Let's say (hypothetically) there is a bullet, which can shoot through any barrier. Let's say there is also an absolutely bullet-proof armour, and nothing gets through it. What will happen, if such bullet hits such armour?

2. Can a man drown in the fountain of eternal life?

3. Your mission is to not accept the mission. Do you accept?

4. This girl goes into the past and kills her Grandmother. Since her Grandmother is dead the girl was never born, if she was never born she never killed her grandmother and she was born.

5. If the temperature this morning is 0 degrees and the Weather Channel says, "it will be twice as cold tomorrow,".... What will the temperature be?

6. Answer truthfully (yes or no) to the following question: Will the next word you say be no?

7. What happens if you are in a car going the speed of light and you turn your headlights on?

8. I conclude with this challenge:

Let the God Almighty create a stone, which he can not pick up (is not capable of lifting)!

The topic says "Think about these" not "answer these" but oh well...

1. Let's say (hypothetically) there is a bullet, which can shoot through any barrier. Let's say there is also an absolutely bullet-proof armour, and nothing gets through it. What will happen, if such bullet hits such armour?

1. The armour will be pushed... no one said it couldn't move

2. It says the bullet CAN shoot through any barrier, not that it will, so for example, straw (with the help of a tornado) CAN go through wood... but toss it yourself and what happens? it bounces off... so the answer to this is... tada! The bullet will ricochet

2. Can a man drown in the fountain of eternal life?

1. The Fountain of Eternal Life or The fountain of living waters, "fons vivus" is a baptismal font (a water fountain in which one is baptized, and thus reborn with Christ) therefore, it doesn't have life giving properties, so yes, you can drown. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fountain_of_life

2. you can go by the more socially accepted meaning that drinking from this fountain gives you eternal youth and therefore eternal life... in which case...

yes. the water is not absorbed through the skin, it must be drank from, so if a man had a plastic bag of regular water tied around his head and thrown in, he would indeed drown in the fountain of life/youth/any fountain really,

or the water can go to his lungs and not his stomach thereby not digesting and not adding life...

and if it could be absorbed through the skin, then he can wear a full body waterproof suit that is filled with regular water.

3. No. The fountain of life does not exist, therefore no man can drown in it... unless you created a fountain and named it "The Fountain of Life" in which case the answer would be yes... dang it, no definitive no answer

oh wait, someone already did that haha

The Fountain of Eternal Life, also known as the War Memorial Fountain and Peace Arising from the Flames of War, is a statue and fountain in Cleveland, Ohio designed by Cleveland Institute of Art graduate Marshall Fredericks and dedicated on May 30, 1964. The sculpture, which serves as the city's major memorial to its citizens that served in World War II, is situated on Memorial Plaza, which is part of the Cleveland Mall.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fountain_of_Eternal_Life

3. Your mission is to not accept the mission. Do you accept?

1. yes = immediate failure of the mission. so long as "the mission" is referring to the first mission stated

2. A mormon/christian/etc. priest could give a member of the church the mission to not accept the mission in the sense that the second mission is the type that sends you far away to preach the word. In which case you can accept the first mission and deny having to go far off to preach to strangers.

3. Of course not, you're not the boss of me...

besides, just because someone has done as you wished for them to do even if you told them, does not mean they obeyed you,

for expamle:

I command you to breathe!

you don't have to obey me to do it anyway,

just because you do it, does not mean you are obeying me.

To accept the mission is to accept the issuer as your superior,

and to follow his wishes,

that's 2 parts,

if you merely do as he said but only because it was something you were going to do anyway,

you have not accepted him as your superior, and therefore not obeyed him directly.

4. This girl goes into the past and kills her Grandmother. Since her Grandmother is dead the girl was never born, if she was never born she never killed her grandmother and she was born.

but if it was,

the answer would have to be...

1 of 3 things off the top of my head.

1. Alternate Timeline.

My favorite explanation for this is Robert Jordan's explanation in "The Wheel of Time".

2. The grandmother is merely a lady that married the grandfather with no actual relation to the granddaughter.

3. She kills the original grandmother, the grandfather marries someone else, the lineage continues regardless of the originals death.

4. if you take the sentence apart, it can be several people, not just those 2.

5. It doesn't specify how far back in time the girl went, if she went say... 1 day, it is still her grandmother, and her mom has already been born, and gave birth to the daughter who went back in time. So that would make it possible.

6. Futurama incident, kills original grandmother, and mates with grandpa giving birth to her mom.

5. If the temperature this morning is 0 degrees and the Weather Channel says, "it will be twice as cold tomorrow,".... What will the temperature be?

We were not told if this was Fahrenheit or Celsius. So convert to the other and multiply by 2 or -2, whichever makes the number smaller...(that has been posted already) or the answer could be 0 and the weather channel is just goofing on us

6. Answer truthfully (yes or no) to the following question: Will the next word you say be no?

1. This reminds me of:

"Guess what?"

"what?"

"you guess it."

so if you read it out loud, it would be "Will the next word you say be 'no'? haha, yes it was"

2. of course if someone asked you the question and you had to answer with either yes or no,

then the only thing to do after the question was asked would be to nod your head haha,

read that somewhere in this topic, clever guy that one

3. You could interpret "the next" to refer to the next one in a sequence, so you could say no, then utter any other words after like "it won't" and the "next word" was "it".

4. Are you allowed to use other forms of yes and no? if so, you could answer "negative" or "nope" and you would be answering truthfully.

7. What happens if you are in a car going the speed of light and you turn your headlights on?

ok, assuming this was even possible, there can be several answers...

1. "you are in a car going the speed of light" does not say the car is even moving, if you were inside a vehicle, somehow moving at the speed of light, turning on your headlights (would probably break the little lever or) would turn the headlights on.

2. assuming the car is traveling at the speed of light (and is still a functioning car and not energy) and you are merely sitting there like a lump, when you turn the headlights on, the headlights would come on, but it would not be apparent to you. It would be like standing on a black hole (also impossible but for the sake of argument...) you point a flashlight away from the surface and turn it on, you would not see the light come out of the flashlight though the flashlight would be on. Light would actually be traveling faster than the standard accepted "speed of light" but towards the center. Since the gravitational pull is strong enough to pull light that is traveling away from it, anything going away would be pulled towards it, and anything going towards it would increase speed, including light.

3. Relativity says the light would come out at twice the speed, but I think this would apply more to say, traveling at the speed of a bullet and firing a gun, the bullet is given an extra push, so it would come out faster than normal, whereas light is not pushed in any way, it is merely allowed to go.

4. Actually, I just realized this was merely asking what would happen, no explanation needed, so the answer would be "the lights would turn on" whether you could tell or not is not part of the question, the lights would be activated.

8. I conclude with this challenge:

Let the God Almighty create a stone, which he can not pick up (is not capable of lifting)!

1. assuming God decides to set a limit on himself temporarily, I see no problem at all, he can easily create it past his current limit.

2. now if this was phrased "Can God create a stone so heavy that not even he could lift... and lift it?"

then the answer could be:

yes, again, assuming he sets a limit on himself, he creates a rock above that limit, this rock would be so dense and so large, it would be to the earth as the earth is to a grain of sand. That being said, it would be so heavy that no one could lift it... but, it would also be so big, that it would be it's own planet, meaning it would be floating "weightlessly" in space and God could put a finger "under it" and lift it with ease even though it would be a weight which he could not lift.

How to disprove god:

after god has stated "I shall never pick it up"

He later wants to move it but cannot. Then finally; there is an instance of something god can't do. At this point he either is not all knowing, or not all powerful.

Where is your god now?

To avoid this one might say god can never speak in absolutes because they dont exist.

But then god isnt all creating is he?

Actually, to move the stone, God could easily teleport it, and he never picked it up. Problem solved.

God has been re-proven

1 thing God can not do, is sin. That would mean he is going against himself. He has no laws for himself, and if he does, he could never break them, and if somehow he DID, it would merely disprove our definition of God.

God is all powerful, all knowing, and can be anywhere and everywhere.

this does not mean that it is possible for him to not be able to do something.

It merely states that anything that requires power, he can do; anything that requires knowledge/wisdom/intelligence, he can do; anything that requires presence, he can do. It does not say that he can do everything, just anything that requires any and all of these 3 things.

Forgive me for being a little here, but I'm really very curious, I'd like someones opinion on this: In what dimension would you have to exist before you could travel through time?

This dimension. You travel through time now. Only forward, and 1 second at a time.

[Guest]

for number 4, time has a code to avoid paradoxes. if you do kill yourself, then time has ways to prevent paradoxes. like becoming your own grandfather.

1 you kill him, but you are too late to prevent yolur grandmother's pregnancy, meaning that your father does get born.

2 you are killed in the time machine to prevent disaster.#

3 your father may have been born just as you killed her.

4 you timeline is reset, but with a massive difference which changed the course of history. changing the couse of history will enevitably end up with a really confusing situation which was devised by some kind of anti-paradox equaasion of some kind.

5 chaos theory. a small change alters history, meaning you were never born. instead of creating a never- born paradox, this will mean that somebody else went back. however this may result in a time loop.

[Cavenglok]

The topic says "Think about these" not "answer these" but oh well...

1. Let's say (hypothetically) there is a bullet, which can shoot through any barrier. Let's say there is also an absolutely bullet-proof armour, and nothing gets through it. What will happen, if such bullet hits such armour?

1. The armour will be pushed... no one said it couldn't move

2. It says the bullet CAN shoot through any barrier, not that it will, so for example, straw (with the help of a tornado) CAN go through wood... but toss it yourself and what happens? it bounces off... so the answer to this is... tada! The bullet will ricochet

2. Can a man drown in the fountain of eternal life?

1. The Fountain of Eternal Life or The fountain of living waters, "fons vivus" is a baptismal font (a water fountain in which one is baptized, and thus reborn with Christ) therefore, it doesn't have life giving properties, so yes, you can drown. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fountain_of_life

2. you can go by the more socially accepted meaning that drinking from this fountain gives you eternal youth and therefore eternal life... in which case...

yes. the water is not absorbed through the skin, it must be drank from, so if a man had a plastic bag of regular water tied around his head and thrown in, he would indeed drown in the fountain of life/youth/any fountain really,

or the water can go to his lungs and not his stomach thereby not digesting and not adding life...

and if it could be absorbed through the skin, then he can wear a full body waterproof suit that is filled with regular water.

3. No. The fountain of life does not exist, therefore no man can drown in it... unless you created a fountain and named it "The Fountain of Life" in which case the answer would be yes... dang it, no definitive no answer

oh wait, someone already did that haha

The Fountain of Eternal Life, also known as the War Memorial Fountain and Peace Arising from the Flames of War, is a statue and fountain in Cleveland, Ohio designed by Cleveland Institute of Art graduate Marshall Fredericks and dedicated on May 30, 1964. The sculpture, which serves as the city's major memorial to its citizens that served in World War II, is situated on Memorial Plaza, which is part of the Cleveland Mall.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fountain_of_Eternal_Life

3. Your mission is to not accept the mission. Do you accept?

1. yes = immediate failure of the mission. so long as "the mission" is referring to the first mission stated

2. A mormon/christian/etc. priest could give a member of the church the mission to not accept the mission in the sense that the second mission is the type that sends you far away to preach the word. In which case you can accept the first mission and deny having to go far off to preach to strangers.

3. Of course not, you're not the boss of me...

besides, just because someone has done as you wished for them to do even if you told them, does not mean they obeyed you,

for expamle:

I command you to breathe!

you don't have to obey me to do it anyway,

just because you do it, does not mean you are obeying me.

To accept the mission is to accept the issuer as your superior,

and to follow his wishes,

that's 2 parts,

if you merely do as he said but only because it was something you were going to do anyway,

you have not accepted him as your superior, and therefore not obeyed him directly.

4. This girl goes into the past and kills her Grandmother. Since her Grandmother is dead the girl was never born, if she was never born she never killed her grandmother and she was born.

but if it was,

the answer would have to be...

1 of 3 things off the top of my head.

1. Alternate Timeline.

My favorite explanation for this is Robert Jordan's explanation in "The Wheel of Time".

2. The grandmother is merely a lady that married the grandfather with no actual relation to the granddaughter.

3. She kills the original grandmother, the grandfather marries someone else, the lineage continues regardless of the originals death.

4. if you take the sentence apart, it can be several people, not just those 2.

5. It doesn't specify how far back in time the girl went, if she went say... 1 day, it is still her grandmother, and her mom has already been born, and gave birth to the daughter who went back in time. So that would make it possible.

6. Futurama incident, kills original grandmother, and mates with grandpa giving birth to her mom.

5. If the temperature this morning is 0 degrees and the Weather Channel says, "it will be twice as cold tomorrow,".... What will the temperature be?

We were not told if this was Fahrenheit or Celsius. So convert to the other and multiply by 2 or -2, whichever makes the number smaller...(that has been posted already) or the answer could be 0 and the weather channel is just goofing on us

6. Answer truthfully (yes or no) to the following question: Will the next word you say be no?

1. This reminds me of:

"Guess what?"

"what?"

"you guess it."

so if you read it out loud, it would be "Will the next word you say be 'no'? haha, yes it was"

2. of course if someone asked you the question and you had to answer with either yes or no,

then the only thing to do after the question was asked would be to nod your head haha,

read that somewhere in this topic, clever guy that one

3. You could interpret "the next" to refer to the next one in a sequence, so you could say no, then utter any other words after like "it won't" and the "next word" was "it".

4. Are you allowed to use other forms of yes and no? if so, you could answer "negative" or "nope" and you would be answering truthfully.

7. What happens if you are in a car going the speed of light and you turn your headlights on?

ok, assuming this was even possible, there can be several answers...

1. "you are in a car going the speed of light" does not say the car is even moving, if you were inside a vehicle, somehow moving at the speed of light, turning on your headlights (would probably break the little lever or) would turn the headlights on.

2. assuming the car is traveling at the speed of light (and is still a functioning car and not energy) and you are merely sitting there like a lump, when you turn the headlights on, the headlights would come on, but it would not be apparent to you. It would be like standing on a black hole (also impossible but for the sake of argument...) you point a flashlight away from the surface and turn it on, you would not see the light come out of the flashlight though the flashlight would be on. Light would actually be traveling faster than the standard accepted "speed of light" but towards the center. Since the gravitational pull is strong enough to pull light that is traveling away from it, anything going away would be pulled towards it, and anything going towards it would increase speed, including light.

3. Relativity says the light would come out at twice the speed, but I think this would apply more to say, traveling at the speed of a bullet and firing a gun, the bullet is given an extra push, so it would come out faster than normal, whereas light is not pushed in any way, it is merely allowed to go.

4. Actually, I just realized this was merely asking what would happen, no explanation needed, so the answer would be "the lights would turn on" whether you could tell or not is not part of the question, the lights would be activated.

8. I conclude with this challenge:

Let the God Almighty create a stone, which he can not pick up (is not capable of lifting)!

1. assuming God decides to set a limit on himself temporarily, I see no problem at all, he can easily create it past his current limit.

2. now if this was phrased "Can God create a stone so heavy that not even he could lift... and lift it?"

then the answer could be:

yes, again, assuming he sets a limit on himself, he creates a rock above that limit, this rock would be so dense and so large, it would be to the earth as the earth is to a grain of sand. That being said, it would be so heavy that no one could lift it... but, it would also be so big, that it would be it's own planet, meaning it would be floating "weightlessly" in space and God could put a finger "under it" and lift it with ease even though it would be a weight which he could not lift.

Actually, to move the stone, God could easily teleport it, and he never picked it up. Problem solved.

God has been re-proven

1 thing God can not do, is sin. That would mean he is going against himself. He has no laws for himself, and if he does, he could never break them, and if somehow he DID, it would merely disprove our definition of God.

God is all powerful, all knowing, and can be anywhere and everywhere.

this does not mean that it is possible for him to not be able to do something.

It merely states that anything that requires power, he can do; anything that requires knowledge/wisdom/intelligence, he can do; anything that requires presence, he can do. It does not say that he can do everything, just anything that requires any and all of these 3 things.

This dimension. You travel through time now. Only forward, and 1 second at a time.

I disagree about the grandmother one. If you killed your grandmother, then your grandfather will either (A) get another wife or (B) not marry at all due to either depression (if he was already married) or just plain laziness. This depends on how they met. Point is, if he doesn't get another wife, you would never exist. Of course, probability says your grandfather will marry someone else. In that case, it goes to the crossroads of whether they will have children or not. If they don't, you don't exist. If they do, nice, you might exist. But then there's the factor of whether THEY will have children. That's you. If they do, you will be you, except slightly different. Your parents will, chances are, be very different from what they were from when you existed. SO either you won't exist or you will be very different from what you used to be.

[Guest]

Think about these - Back to the Paradoxes

1. Let's say (hypothetically) there is a bullet, which can shoot through any barrier. Let's say there is also an absolutely bullet-proof armour, and nothing gets through it. What will happen, if such bullet hits such armour?

2. Can a man drown in the fountain of eternal life?

3. Your mission is to not accept the mission. Do you accept?

4. This girl goes into the past and kills her Grandmother. Since her Grandmother is dead the girl was never born, if she was never born she never killed her grandmother and she was born.

5. If the temperature this morning is 0 degrees and the Weather Channel says, "it will be twice as cold tomorrow,".... What will the temperature be?

6. Answer truthfully (yes or no) to the following question: Will the next word you say be no?

7. What happens if you are in a car going the speed of light and you turn your headlights on?

8. I conclude with this challenge:

Let the God Almighty create a stone, which he can not pick up (is not capable of lifting)!

I thought these were a bit sillier than other paradoxes I've seen here.

1.) Neither of these things can be true. If we assume something is true, and come to a contradiction, then the typical thing to do is conclude that one or more assumptions were wrong. The answer here is that, as expected, a contradiction will arise out of illogical assumptions.

2.) If it existed, I thought that the fountain of eternal life only cured "aging". So I would say yes. In my thought then, there is no paradox. So I conclude that the fountain of eternal life as meant for this question will prevent death in any way. So now I would say no. There is no clear description of the imaginary object required for this "paradox".

3.) No I do not accept. If I were to accept, I would fail the mission. If I do not accept, then I can neither succeed or fail the mission, because the mission never commenced.

4.) I don't think this is possible. Forgetting thoughts about time travel, would you consider the following a paradox?

What if something existed. What if that same thing didn't exist?

I consider it silly and equivalent to 4.) .

5.) 0 degrees what? Celsius? Fahrenheit? The real reference point is absolute zero. This is the point of maximum or "pure" coldness, and increasing temperature signifies a reduction in coldness. I interpret this as saying, tomorrow, the weather will be twice as close to "pure" coldness (-273 deg Celsius). So tomorrow, the temperature will be about -137 deg Celsius.

6.) The constraints truthfully, yes or no, make this an impossible command to follow. This is not a logical paradox, just a command that cannot be followed. What if I commanded you: "While performing an action, do not perform that same action". Regardless of whether or not you perform the action, you will fail the command because the command cannot be completed.

7.) Einstein says all light travels at the same average speed and I believe him. He actually covered the case of comparing the speed of light between a moving source and a stationary source in his book on relativity. Read it!

8.) This is another ambiguously defined contradiction. There is no logical deduction in this "paradox".

Edited August 15, 2010 by mmiguel1

[Guest]

For number 4.

The theory given in the Pendragon series, is that if you change the past, the future changes accordingly, but you were in the past when the changes happened, so the differences don't affect you.

[Guest]

for number four, what would happen would be a disaster. One of the following MUST happen, due to a complex algorithm that prevents paradoxes.OK, not an aglorithm, but something.like:

1 you get killed before you can manage it.actually, there probably is an algorithim)

2 you are your own grand mother/father. so? it happened in futurama.

3 the paradox is carried out via your non- existance. obviously, this is impossible. so, what happens is a time loop. time keeps repeating itself, geocentric around the time of when your grandparent dies. this would mean that time past when you travelled back would not exist.

4 time ends.

5 it's not even possiblt to travel back in time anyway. time is a stream, and we are the fish. however, like the fish, we do not notice time, but we can measure it. as with water, the stream of time flows one way, and you can either slow down in it or speed it up. you cannot go back.

[Guest]

oh. my. god. if you can only travel through one timeline, dosent that make time one dimensional? or maybe zero-dimensional? as you can only travel in one direction, that means time is the "zero dimension". therefore, we live in the forth dimension, time being the first dimension. although theoretically, we only have three dimensions. as time is unnoticed and unseen, we must deduce that time is four dimensional and zero dimensional. in fact, who's to say that time actually exists at all? whose to say that we exist at all? back to the topic.

1: as the bullet can go through anything, and nothing can go through the barrier, we must deduce that the bullet is made of nothing, and nothing can go through any barrier. however, the rules say nothing about having to actually damage the barrier. therefore, the bullet passes right through the barrier, as nothing can penetrate it, and goes on forever.

2: no. as it is the fountain of eternal life, he/she never dies.

3: simply, the answer is no. as I haven't accepted the mission, I can still complete the mission.

4: see last post

5: first, you must know what measurement, ie. scale. is it celsius? kelvin? farenheit? plong? let's imagine this: water boils at 0 plong. therefore, we must say that if they were talking in plong, it will be 50 degrees celsius. as for celsius? well, there is just nothing as " half of zero". maybe zero?#

6: (nod nod) no.

7: if you can go aty the speed of light then this will happen:when you turn your lamp on, it trav les at the speed of light. however, this is impossible, as you cannot go at the speed of light. you can only accellerate more and more.for example:

speedo says:

99.9% SOL(speed of light)

99.99% SOL

99.999% SOL

and so on.

8:he makes a rock so small he cannot pick it up.

[Guest]

I disagree about the grandmother one. If you killed your grandmother, then your grandfather will either (A) get another wife or (B) not marry at all due to either depression (if he was already married) or just plain laziness. This depends on how they met. Point is, if he doesn't get another wife, you would never exist. Of course, probability says your grandfather will marry someone else. In that case, it goes to the crossroads of whether they will have children or not. If they don't, you don't exist. If they do, nice, you might exist. But then there's the factor of whether THEY will have children. That's you. If they do, you will be you, except slightly different. Your parents will, chances are, be very different from what they were from when you existed. SO either you won't exist or you will be very different from what you used to be.

actually,

his child would have to be your mom,

not you,

since he's your grandfather,

he has to conceive your mother,

but why does he have to remarry?

he could have illegitimate children running around,

if that's the case,

you might still be you,

but again,

it didn't specify how far back you're supposed to go,

if you go 3 days to the past to kill your grandmother,

nothing really changes,

except you're grandmother died...

also,

sometimes genes skip a generation,

I've met a few people who look just like the grandparent did when they were their age,

if that's the case,

it wouldn't even matter what your parents look like,

you would still be you,

and if you did change,

so would your memory,

you wouldn't remember having been different.

[Guest]

has it not been considered that if god is truly capable of anything, then he has the power to lift even an unliftable stone?

if God is capable of anything then he is not bound by logic, if fact he most likely created logic in the first place.

[Guest]

I disagree about the grandmother one. If you killed your grandmother, then your grandfather will either (A) get another wife or (B) not marry at all due to either depression (if he was already married) or just plain laziness. This depends on how they met. Point is, if he doesn't get another wife, you would never exist.

First off let's assume that the intent of the question was that ones grandmother is killed before your parent (mother of father) was conceived.

Actually no. As soon as your grandmother is removed from the picture, her particular set of genes is removed from the genepool. That would almost certainly remove any chance of "you" ever being conceived or born.

Of course, probability says your grandfather will marry someone else. In that case, it goes to the crossroads of whether they will have children or not. If they don't, you don't exist. If they do, nice, you might exist.

But any such offspring would be a mix of half of your grandfather's genes and a half of this "other" woman's. The odds of this mix resulting in exactly the same genetic code as your 'missing' parent is just astronomically improbable! But even then, would it be "your parent" even if that did happen? As this individual would be the product/offspring of different parents.

But then there's the factor of whether THEY will have children. That's you. If they do, you will be you, except slightly different.

No; "slightly different", in terms of having a different genetic code, equals a different person entirely.

Of course "You" will most likely exist, as that person that came out of somewhere and killed that poor woman. You of course would know that where you came from was a future that you have now caused to no longer come to pass (but it did exist 'at the time' that you left it.)

[Guest]

First off let's assume that the intent of the question was that ones grandmother is killed before your parent (mother of father) was conceived.

A paradox should not be based off assumptions,

that is why it's not a paradox,

don't assume,

you know what they say about that.

Actually no. As soon as your grandmother is removed from the picture, her particular set of genes is removed from the genepool. That would almost certainly remove any chance of "you" ever being conceived or born.

But any such offspring would be a mix of half of your grandfather's genes and a half of this "other" woman's. The odds of this mix resulting in exactly the same genetic code as your 'missing' parent is just astronomically improbable! But even then, would it be "your parent" even if that did happen? As this individual would be the product/offspring of different parents.

improbable, is not impossible,

besides, it wouldn't HAVE to be another set of parents,

why couldn't it be a sibling?

why can't grandma have a sister?

same basic DNA mix,

"you" could potentially still be "you",

who's to say personality/spirit/soul are genetic based,

"you" could be "you" but slightly different.

[Guest]

A paradox should not be based off assumptions,

that is why it's not a paradox,

don't assume,

you know what they say about that.

{Sigh} And why do you think I said to add that assumption as to the intent of the OPs 'Paradox'?! But to examine the real potential problem, and not silly trifles such as killing the grandmother after your, or your parent's birth?

improbable, is not impossible,

No, but in this case it is as near as is practically indistinguishable.

And even a perfect genetic match (all 3 billion base pairs a perfect match!) from different parentage (same father but different mother) would be at best a 'clone' of your parent. [Remember this was your grandmother, not your mother, the one not being born would then (given my added assumption of course) be your father or mother, not you.]

besides, it wouldn't HAVE to be another set of parents,

why couldn't it be a sibling?

why can't grandma have a sister?

same basic DNA mix,

No not the same basic DNA mix, just the same origin of that mix (their parents.)

1. There is the incredibly unlikely occurrence of that sibling having the exact same gamete DNA stands from both of their parents (your maternal great grandparents.) Only an identical twin could achieve that.

2. Then we have the little problem of mutations (random variations from that received). Humans have on average 128 such mutations from the zygote stage. Again this is possible but less probable, with identical twins.

3. Then there is the matter of in utero variation, that can result in more differentiation (evo-devo) to how the genetic code is actuated. We are still learning just how significant this can be, but already it is apparent that it is not inconsiderable.

4. Then even more mutations, an average of 30 per individual, that accumulates through ones lifetime. Not even an identical twin can save you with this one.

5. Then of course there is the issue that all you are doing here is trying to find a way to wriggle out of the real question/challenge being asked. In essence trying to shift the parameters of the thought experiment, by finding some kind of loophole in the question.

The question: If (somehow, how doesn't matter, but we can make up a story about familial homicide if we like) you travelled back in time and changed things such that your birth would never take place (Oh I don't know - eradicate a particular gene that you posses such that it can never appear) What would be the result, particularly in your own case? Could you do it (even if time travel were possible) as at first blush it seems that doing so would prevent the very possibility of you travelling through time in the first place.

Another scenario would be to travel back and kill those who came up with the means to travel through time such that it would not be invented in your lifetime - then how could you have travelled back to stop it?! That is pretty clearly the emphasis of the question.

"you" could potentially still be "you",

If one imagines that those unlikely occurences all coincide. But even then would that be you, or the equivalent of an identical twin?*

*Or do you also think that identical twins are one and the same person as well?!

Then there is the 'little' issue of life experience. For a start this individual would be the offspring of a different couple, that is likely to result in a different kind of child, DNA or not. A child who is then at all likely to meet and procreate with your other parent?! And do so in such a way as to combine EXACTLY the same DNA code that would give rise to you?!

who's to say personality/spirit/soul are genetic based,

Sorry, I don't believe in magic stuff. No supporting evidence don't ya know.

"you" could be "you" but slightly different.

What are the odds?

[Guest]

What if you kill the person who you think is your grandmother, but actually isn't.

[Guest]

What if you kill the person who you think is your grandmother, but actually isn't.

Then once again you have diverged from the parameters of the thought experiment. Because in that you grandmother dies, not "someone you think is your grandmother at the time."

It could be an interesting thought experiment itself, but would not be the one originally asked.

[Guest]

{Sigh} And why do you think I said to add that assumption as to the intent of the OPs 'Paradox'?! But to examine the real potential problem, and not silly trifles such as killing the grandmother after your, or your parent's birth?

most so called paradoxes are nothing more than silly trifles...

No, but in this case it is as near as is practically indistinguishable.

And even a perfect genetic match (all 3 billion base pairs a perfect match!) from different parentage (same father but different mother) would be at best a 'clone' of your parent. [Remember this was your grandmother, not your mother, the one not being born would then (given my added assumption of course) be your father or mother, not you.

#################################################################################

If one imagines that those unlikely occurences all coincide. But even then would that be you, or the equivalent of an identical twin?*

*Or do you also think that identical twins are one and the same person as well?!

Then there is the 'little' issue of life experience. For a start this individual would be the offspring of a different couple, that is likely to result in a different kind of child, DNA or not. A child who is then at all likely to meet and procreate with your other parent?! And do so in such a way as to combine EXACTLY the same DNA code that would give rise to you?!

that is why I said, it could still be YOU, just different.

you can look different and still be you.

no need to even look the same,

you is not defined by your physical appearance as this changes throughout your life anyway.

you can be you,

without anyone else knowing it's you,

so you can kill your grandma and still be you,

if you physical characteristics changed,

you would probably not notice because you would have been born with the changed characteristics.

also, the environment argument never really made sense to me,

sure you can be conditioned to a point,

but I've seen a ton of families with a ton of kids all raised pretty much the same,

and they can end up VERY differently,

only very few factors actually change in their environments,

yet siblings can be very different,

you can show the same thing to people,

and they will interpret it differently,

I don't think the environment is that big of a factor,

rather it's based on your own intellectual level and personality,

for example,

the child called it,

a lot of people have grown up in much happier homes,

and are way more bitter.

Sorry, I don't believe in magic stuff. No supporting evidence don't ya know.

you don't need to believe in something for it to exist

What are the odds?

do the numbers matter?

as long as there ARE odds,

it's possible.

5. Then of course there is the issue that all you are doing here is trying to find a way to wriggle out of the real question/challenge being asked. In essence trying to shift the parameters of the thought experiment, by finding some kind of loophole in the question.

The question: If (somehow, how doesn't matter, but we can make up a story about familial homicide if we like) you travelled back in time and changed things such that your birth would never take place (Oh I don't know - eradicate a particular gene that you posses such that it can never appear) What would be the result, particularly in your own case? Could you do it (even if time travel were possible) as at first blush it seems that doing so would prevent the very possibility of you travelling through time in the first place.

Another scenario would be to travel back and kill those who came up with the means to travel through time such that it would not be invented in your lifetime - then how could you have travelled back to stop it?! That is pretty clearly the emphasis of the question.

I'm not "trying to find a way to wriggle out of the real question/challenge being asked". A vague question was asked, I answered it, simple as that.

Now you ask a more specific question.

so I will attempt to answer this one as well.

My Answers:

this eliminates a lot,

so I'd have to go with either:

A: Alternate Timeline.

B: What you have used and believe to be "Time Travel" is in fact something else entirely, maybe a made up world like some matrix thing, or transporter to a different universe, or even to another timeline...

C: an X-Men (animated series) deal... where present/past/future are separate, in that changing the past, begins a new timeline that instead of existing alongside the other, replaces it with a new future, allowing you to go back, change an event and ultimately get erased by your own deed. In the present some guy would pop out of thin air, kill grandma/inventor, and a new timeline would be written, and he would disappear as swiftly as he arrived if the new timeline deemed it so (someone else might invent or mate).

D: It could never be done. If I invented a time machine, I would do like Moebius the Timestreamer and manipulate any and all time travelers. I would keep tabs on everything. I would guide any potential killer and exist outside of time. Of course, that doesn't mean if someone invented it they would do that, just another possibility, unless a condition is that it HAS to happen, in which case, ignore D

[Guest]

Think about these - Back to the Paradoxes

1. Let's say (hypothetically) there is a bullet, which can shoot through any barrier. Let's say there is also an absolutely bullet-proof armour, and nothing gets through it. What will happen, if such bullet hits such armour?

2. Can a man drown in the fountain of eternal life?

3. Your mission is to not accept the mission. Do you accept?

4. This girl goes into the past and kills her Grandmother. Since her Grandmother is dead the girl was never born, if she was never born she never killed her grandmother and she was born.

5. If the temperature this morning is 0 degrees and the Weather Channel says, "it will be twice as cold tomorrow,".... What will the temperature be?

6. Answer truthfully (yes or no) to the following question: Will the next word you say be no?

7. What happens if you are in a car going the speed of light and you turn your headlights on?

8. I conclude with this challenge:

Let the God Almighty create a stone, which he can not pick up (is not capable of lifting)!

my version for #1

in all collisions there are cases.

in this collition we have perfect objects. this example is the start for all the bullets and bullet-proof jackets. so the bullet will penitrate the chest without pass throu it. So both items have done their job properly

[Guest]

#7

if you turn on the light then both car and light will travel with th same speed.So if you are gonna hit a target the target will see the car and the light at the same time. nothing can go faster that the light and if you travel with 299.999,99999999..... km per second and messure the speed of light you will messure 300.000 km/s. Thats what ainstein said about light. All this are writen at the last pages of my schoolbook xD

Edited September 12, 2010 by stavros

[Guest]

as for the grandma and granddaughter i say this:

if the girl kill her granny before granny born her child(girls mama) the girl will desapear

if the girl kill granny but the granny have borned her child then the girl will keep up leaving.

P.S see some movies

[Guest]

1. Let's say (hypothetically) there is a bullet, which can shoot through any barrier. Let's say there is also an absolutely bullet-proof armour, and nothing gets through it. What will happen, if such bullet hits such armour?

There simply cannot be two such objects there existence is a contradiction, it is like saying I am the only member of a very special club, but there is another member

4. This girl goes into the past and kills her Grandmother. Since her Grandmother is dead the girl was never born, if she was never born she never killed her grandmother and she was born.

In my opinion [i have known this paradox for years] she would just eternally flash in and out of existence as each future her killed her grandmother

[Guest]

8. I conclude with this challenge:

Let the God Almighty create a stone, which he can not pick up (is not capable of lifting)!

Can God create a married bachelor? Or a square circle? Can He sin? No. God cannot create things that are conceptually impossible, but that doesn't go against His omnipotence.

[Guest]

for #1 if you shot a bullet that can (hypothetically) go through any barrier at a surface that is completely, utterly bulletproof so that (again, hypothetically)nothing can break through it, the space-time continuum would collapse and a black hole would form and suck everything into it and thus, the ending of the world.

[Guest]

for #1 if you shot a bullet that can (hypothetically) go through any barrier at a surface that is completely, utterly bulletproof so that (again, hypothetically)nothing can break through it, the space-time continuum would collapse and a black hole would form and suck everything into it and thus, the ending of the world.

A black hole would only form if the impact caused enough matter to be compressed into a tiny space, which might actually happen with an armour of that strength and a bullet of that caliber (I think caliber is the right word).

[Guest]

1. Let's say (hypothetically) there is a bullet, which can shoot through any barrier. Let's say there is also an absolutely bullet-proof armour, and nothing gets through it. What will happen, if such bullet hits such armour?

1a. The bullet will find that the armour is not a barrier because the armour will avoid the bullet.

2. Can a man drown in the fountain of eternal life?

2a. Repeatedly - Drown is not the same as die.

3. Your mission is to not accept the mission. Do you accept?

3a. No, problem solved.

4. This girl goes into the past and kills her Grandmother. Since her Grandmother is dead the girl was never born, if she was never born she never killed her grandmother and she was born.

4a. Depends if you consider your existence today dependant on your existence yesterday which obviously you don't: someone sent back in time has no existence the day before when they arrive. Therefore the existence of the girl is independant of the fact that she was born.

4b. You can't creates something from nothing, the total of the universe that the girl arrives in must be the same as it was before she arrived. As you are taking nothing from the universe she has left and adding nothing to the universe she arrives in (talk a bit about girl(a) girl(b) and grandmother(a) for ages and discuss if it's possible to have a copy of an original for a while but have only so much time to spend answering this

4c. The girls mother was born before the girl killed her grandmother, ergo sum...

5. If the temperature this morning is 0 degrees and the Weather Channel says, "it will be twice as cold tomorrow,".... What will the temperature be?

5a. Half as hot as today.

6. Answer truthfully (yes or no) to the following question: Will the next word you say be no?

6a. A proper paradox!

7. What happens if you are in a car going the speed of light and you turn your headlights on?

7a. Others have answered this very well, it depends which observer you are.

8. I conclude with this challenge:

Let the God Almighty create a stone, which he can not pick up (is not capable of lifting)!

8a. Presuming you are speaking of a Judeo-crhistian god, of course. Regardless of the meta-physical laws to which you allude the answer is yes, I seem to remember it took faith to move mountains not a god. A better question might be can a god create something that he can not destroy?

[Guest]

Not a problem. God creates a pebble and then declares "I shall never pick it up". He is capable of lifting it, but can not break his promise. Conditions met.

So you're saying there is something the Omnipotent God cannot do? (He's incapable of breaking a promise)... another contradiction.