Originally posted by SwissGambit
A maximum differentiation would be so not-subtle that we might have trouble seeing it. To use your wall analogy, maybe the 'spot' is so big that spans your field of view, and the other color of the wall is outside your field of view.
The theist would say that God exists, and he brought us into existence using his power. So, for a time, there was just , but never the idea that something is fluctuating between existence and non-existence.
I see where you are now, and what I acknowledge is a solid big theistic thought.
[The analogy is being stretched, and I would use the word 'differentiation' in an edge and form defining manner, but the point is made. One could ask as the wall and patch (still undifferentialable) expand beyond ones conceptual limit, how does one then know it is even a wall? Differentiation of solidities is required.]
However, the thought you express represents to me a significant stage I passed on my theistic path. I began asking where "God" stops? What is inside of "him" and what is outside of "him". Can indeed anything be outside of "God"? If we use time bound terminology as evident in one of your statements I would from a previous theistic viewpoint have difficulty as seeing God as different "before"" and "after" any point of time. My theistic concept then involved a "God" that was time itself, infinite and unlimited.
Also a self-existent Being is argued in Buddhism to require that such be totally and irrevocably independent otherwise it is dependent and thus not self-existent unto itself alone. It cannot be said to 'not exist' for there is phenomenon relatively. and equally it was clear, to me anyway' that the argument of the need for utter independence to define an 'existent' was irrefutable. Thus for me then I could not say 'God' existed in a manner totally cut off from any interaction or dependence on an 'other', namely life and us. I hung around a form of Pantheism then, for a while.
Is not 'God' absolute?, I asked myself. Or is 'God'' both absolute and relative?
The path further cleared for me as I encountered the conundrums of quantum findings, which seem to concur with the manifestation of particles of neither existing nor not-existing. I am of the impression that apparent superluminal behaviour of co-relative particles has been shown many times now and is acknowledged, but interpretations differ as to what it means. Some still say after a century or more, there is more to be found and finally something solid unto itself will appear. I am not at all convinced of that, as much of our expanding technology is growing around such phenomenon as tunneling and quantum entanglement. And it fits beautifully with Buddhist insight and logic.
This is also applied to our own concept of a 'self', wherein such is seen as an emergent dependent phenomenon of the many streams physical and mental that we have, referred to as 'skhandas" in Buddhism. This accords btw with a modern and dominant psychological understanding of the formation of personality.
Theoretically and conceptually, if not physically, how do we measure 'maximal'' in cosmological terms? Does the Universe have an edge? Where does time and spacial distance arise apart from mental perception?
Hopefully you can see something of where I am coming from, even if you disagree, and why I question the use of the phrase 'maximally great being'. If not, I will aquiesce as I do not see I can of my own ability go further in explanation of my and the Buddhist viewpoint (and I think poorly expressed by me).
That is too but a way stop.
Finally the Bull must also disappear.
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ten_Bulls]