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Arceus' Questionable Nigh-Omniscience

Metafragmentation

Metafragmentation

18
7
Arceus

"Created the very concept of knowledge, in the form of Uxie, from itself."

This seems like weak reasoning to me. Even if Arceus created the concept of intelligence, it might have not done so consciously.

And let's assume it did so consciously. Knowledge is something intentionally constructed by Arceus, down to the last detail. Maybe that would prove that Arceus at the point of knowledge's creation, knew everything that could be known. However, knowledge isn't something solid. With every second knew things are added to the pool of things that could be known.

The first person to write a book might have 'created' the concept of books, but that did not give them knowledge of every book in human history.

"Could inform Lucas/Dawn about Darkrai during its endless sleep, while he/she was in Darkrai's nightmare."

That just seems to prove that it has means of gathering information in its sleep. Definitely not an indicator that it "knows almost everything in existence."

Conclusion

Arceus' page doesn't currently include enough proof of its Nigh-Omniscience. If there is sufficient proof it should be added to the page, otherwise the Nigh-Omniscient rating should be reconsidered.
 
I agree that Arceus' page needs better justifications to support Nigh-Omniscience.
 
With Cal.

Plus Uxie is kinda an extension of Arceus himself. Same with Dialga, who IS time and by extension has knowledge of pretty much everything that goes on the world by itself.

There's 0 reason why Arceus wouldnt be capable of whats listed above if Uxie and Dialga are capable of the same.

EDIT: Also, why are you assuming Arceus didn't make Knowledge consciously? It actively created the Lake Trio, which includes Uxie, who is obviously Knowledge.
 
-Uxie is not only the embodiment of knowledge but also the embodiment of intelligence, it is declared that Uxie's existence was the cause of intelligence bloomed in the living beings.

"When that pokémon was born, inteligence bloomed among us, enriching our lives"

"When Uxie flew, people gained the ability to solve problems. It was the birth of knowledge."
-It is not only declared that Arceus is the creator and origin of all things, but also that he was the one who gave shape to everything that exists in this world.

"Depicted on the Mystri Stage are the Pokémon that shaped this world. The circle in the middle is Arceus, the origin of it all.."

"It is said to have emerged from an egg in a place where there was nothing
, then shaped the world."
"According to the legends of Sinnoh, this Pokémon emerged from an egg and shaped all there is in this world."

-The Original one (Arceus) is the avatar and physical form of the Original Spirit, of which all humans and pokémon are part of his presence.

"When that spirit came to be, there followed awareness about the world.
Within the newborn spirit, time and space were intertwined as one.
People and Pokémo, too, were but the same presence.
As I understand it, people and Pokémon shared the spirit and awareness.
They should have understood and accepted each other then.
Because they shared the same spirit, people and Pokémon intermingled."

"A Pokémon is said to have shaped this world.
Could that Pokémon be the physical form of the original spirit?
Hmm... The spirit came to be, and from it, time and space were born...
That seems to point to Legendary Dialga, the Pokémon of time, and Palkia, the Pokémon of space...
And they lead back to Arceus, the Pokémon that made them arise."

- Arceus is literally declared Omniscient in TCG.
 
If Arceus has all the powers of Uxie, then he is Omniscient. Knowledge as a concept will encompass all knowable things in existence. Anything that has knowledge or can comprise knowledge will merely be participating in the concept of knowledge, with the concept of knowledge being unchanged despite existing within a wider array of facets. Knowledge as a concept itself will not change based on what participates in it, so Arceus should should retain this if he hax Uxie's traits.
 
I agree with the proposition.

To add three things:

-Creating something doesn't mean knowing all information related to it. A reality warper creating a planet doesn't mean that it knows the planets subatomic structure, and certainly not more abstract things like all changes that will happen to it in the future.

To that comes that knowing everything about a concept is a whole lot different than knowing about the real life things based on the concept. A concept is an abstraction, knowing everything about it only means you know about the general nature of the things the concept describes. Knowing about the things themself is an entirely different story.

-Being something / the incarnation of something doesn't imply complete knowledge about it. E.g you are yourself, yet 99.9999999% of all stuff happening in and with your body happen without you having any idea about it.

-On screen showings don't support the notion of omniscience, neither in games nor anime
 
@Kukui Is there any actual proof that either Uxie or Dialga have that kind of knowledge though?

A character who is the embodiment of time but not omniscient isn't unimaginable. Neither is a character that is the origin of knowledge itself, but doesn't actually possess all knowledge.

Knowledge isn't finite. New facts and information are constantly created. Every movement you make, every thought you think creates information that can be known. So just by creating the concept of knowledge, how would you argue Arceus would know this newly added information? It might have created the possibility for knowledge to exist, but how does that prove that it actually knows everything and learns about every new fact and bit of information that is created every moment?

I'm not also not assuming that. I simply acknowledged it as a possibility.

And for the record, I'm not particularly passionate about Arceus not having Nigh-Omniscience, I'm just saying that if it does have it, the Intelligence section on its page is insufficient to explain why.

---

I can't reply to everything right now unfortunately but I am trying to keep up, sorry
 
Problem is, and no offense to DontTalk, but he's wrong, because he's using a false equivalency. There's a difference between creating a planet and creating the concept of knowledge and being the embodiment of it. Every instance DT used involves the usage of knowledge. I.E., you don't have to know a planet's entire structure to create it. It gets into far more abstraction when you get into a concept of an idea.
 
Assaltwaffle said:
If Arceus has all the powers of Uxie, then he is Omniscient. Knowledge as a concept will encompass all knowable things in existence. Anything that has knowledge or can comprise knowledge will merely be participating in the concept of knowledge, with the concept of knowledge being unchanged despite existing within a wider array of facets. Knowledge as a concept itself will not change based on what participates in it, so Arceus should should retain this if he has Uxie's traits.
Click to expand...
^

This. The concept of knowledge is unchanging. Knowledge may be changing, but the concept is still the same. For example, I may be growing, due to being a human, but no matter what, my concept of "Cal" is unwavering.

But to piggyback...

Knowledge isn't finite to humans. Higher dimensional beings, not so much.
 
@Meta

As far as Dialga goes, yes. The anime movie (y'know, the PIS ridden one) alone proves it. Dialga was shown multiple times to know instances/events throughout time in that movie. Ex: Knowing the exact place and time where Damos attacked Arceus, when Arceus lost the jewel of life, Sheena Ash and the others in that time period, etc. And for Uxie, well, Neo covered it.

At this point, its not even embodiment as that only goes for their physical forms. Dialga literally IS time and Uxie literally IS knowledge. If either one can know of everything happening every passing moment, then Arceus most certainly can too. Especially when the presence of all living things in Pokemon is tied together with the Original Spirit, aka Arceus.

And the rest is covered by Cal. Adding to the False Equivalncy stuff,
 
I agree. Creating the concept of knowledge and having Knowledge come from yourself is at least like Cosmic Awareness feat.
 
Also one minor thing to add: Nigh-Omniscience.

Even if the OP is right about this, this at best shuts down Omniscience. Nigh omniscience can be at literally any level as its finite opposed to being truly infinite like actual omniscience.

So even with the benefit of the doubt, Arceus would keep his nigh-omniscience regardless.
 
Okay so what I can gather from this is that there is no consistent idea of what a concept even is on VSB. And what vague ideas have been brought up here vastly differ from what we call concepts in the real world.

What is a concept?

A concept is an abstract mental category that contains objects. It is simply a part of how human cognition works. For example "chair" is a concept that contains the concrete objects we would define as chairs. Chairs can differ in appearance and even function, but we do group them together as chairs because we have a mental category "chair" that we categorize them as.

The concept of "chair" is created through discourse. Meaning that we learn what "chairs" are through language. We were taught what chairs are and are not through the context of our upbringing, which formed our concept of "chair" which we now use to categorize furniture.

However, the VSB idea of what a concept is is obviously very fictionalized. Which is appropriate, I guess, since we're dealing with fiction.

So, What is a concept in fiction?

Well, this question is really unanswerable. Because in a story or game or play or whatever kind of medium, what makes a concept is completely up to the discourse in the book and up to the interpretation of the audience. Meaning that there cannot be a unified idea of what a concept is across different franchises, media, 'verses'.

In one verse a concept could be closer to what we call concepts in real life, in another verse it might be some weird, metaphysical object that somehow gives you power over everything contained in it. And I can write a story in which a 'concept' is completely different from all of these descriptions.

So since what a concept even is changes from verse to verse, I think the real question we have to clear up before we can judge whether creating the concept of knowledge gives you access to the knowledge contained within that concept is:

What is a concept in Pokemon?

So much at least for the "Arceus created the concept of Knowledge so it must possess the knowledge contained within" argument.

I find the argument that both Dialga and Uxie have shown their Nigh-Omniscience in Pokemon media more convincing. If they really have shown enough awareness for a Nigh-Omniscience rating, then they deserve that rating for sure. However, their intelligence sections should actually reflect that. "Possibly Nigh-Omniscient, as the embodiment of time" is not enough, since I can imagine a character that is the embodiment of time but is not Nigh-Omniscient quite easily, the same way I can imagine a being that literally is all knowledge but doesn't actually have access to that knowledge. Imagine a library that contains all the world's knowledge. Is the library itself actually aware of all the things contained within it? Being knowledge itself could give Uxie the knowledge contained in that, but it could just as well make Uxie like that hypothetical library. So it would be preferable if Dialga's and Uxie's intelligence sections actually listed those instances of them showing off their Nigh-Omniscience in the verse.

In the same way it would be preferable if Arceus' intelligence sections listed instances of Arceus showing off its omniscience. Either that, or, as mentioned above, proof that the creation of a concept in Pokemon gives you agency over everything contained within.
 
1.) If they have "possibly" then this simply means they're intelligence needs to be upgraded from that.

2.) That is more false equivalence coming here. The difference between Uxie and a library is not only is the former a sentient abstract while the latter is a non-sentinent man-made creation, but in a library, new things are updated constantly by people around the world who find and obtain said knowledge and with people (lower-dimensionals) already lacking the capacity to contain a set finite amount of knowledge, its obvious that people cannot be aware of everything all at one time each passing moment.

In addition, while its true someone who embodies time itself doesnt neccesarily know whats going on all throughout said time, the same wouldnt hold true for someone who is along the lines of being omnipresent (which Dialga is for being the very time that makes up the verse) and has showcased being aware of events going on in said time, which Dialga has done. Its a case by case basis, not a general one. Because if someone is capable of either thing I just mentioned, you better believe they are aware of whats going on in time.

Finally, no offense of course, but the last part of your reply seems to be somewhat strange to ask. Creating a concept not suddenly allowing you to have agency over it? Dialga and Palkia certainly rule over time and space because they are the concepts of time and space. So the notion of this suddenly being different for Uxie is incredibly Speculative.
 
Assaltwaffle said:
I think the reason we think about concepts the way we do is from Plato's Theory of Forms. This argues against what you propose the hard-and-fast notion of a concept is.
Click to expand...
Which is a big problem. The Theory of Forms is a solution to the problem of universals based on Realism. Concept is another solution of the Universe Problem that denies the existence of universals or that they influence the Physical World. It makes no sense to always equate the term Concept with respect to Form, since the Conceptual Universals are completely contrary to the Theory of Forms.
 
@Executor

If we talk about Concepts as in the aspect of the concept itself being manipulated, I think it is rather natural to make a Platonic connection of the Forms. If the abstract embodiment of "knowledge-ness" is manipulated or created, would that not be a Platonic way of viewing concepts?

Edit: Also I just realize don't this is going to basically be a discussion over what part Pokemon goes to when dealing with he Problem of Universals. Honestly should we default to Platonic Realism, or should we go to Idealism or Nominalism?
 
I personally don't mind the justification for Arceus' nigh-omniscience, but I agree with the OP about the fact that Dialga's need some work.

If it has showings of nigh-omniscience, we should list those, because "possibly nigh-omniscient as the embodiment of time" isn't a justification at all
 
@Assalt Not really, for the vision of "something abstract that exists beyond the physical world and represents the true form of something" is Plato's view of the Universals. No Concepts, Concept is another explanation for what the Universals are (Something less aggressive than Nominalism).

In my view the idea of something that embodies individuals as it is in Pokémon fits more in Aristotelian realism where the Universals are actually the physical junction of all its Particular.

For Pokémon to really work with Platonic Realism he would have to have far more complex things than the franchise showed, or unless I have seen evidence about it.
 
@Executor

I think we shouldn't look specifically at the word "concept" as opposed to "form," but rather which view the franchise follows in regards to the Problem of Universals.

While it would be easy to say "Pokemon used "concept" so Platonic Realism is out," I personally think that many franchises that use the term concept seem to imply the understanding of a Platonic Form.
 
In fact it's not quite a matter of using the word concept, in fact I do not remember Pokémon having used that word other than a description of the Distorted World. For the rest we consider Dialga, Palkia and others as Conceptual beings largely only by their Backstory.

But from what Pokémon showed, without any kind of specification, it is much more likely that they follow an Aristotelian realism where the Universities are the physical manifestation of all Individuals. This fits with them being directly called "Time", "Space", "Knowledge", etc. and also embody what they represent.
 
Also, this may not be the place to bring it up, but im going to say we are much more lienient to other verses when it comes to Nigh/Full Omniscience.

For example, take Zuno from DBS. Zuno is stated by sources (mostly Jaco IIRC) to be omniscient. Thats fine, but problem is, all he is just a normal guy who shown really good intelligence feats. Now im not saying he isnt omniscient, but if we're going to question an abstract being who literally IS knowledge on having omniscience, why does Zuno suddenly get a free pass?

If we can allow something with much less justifications to get an intelligence rating of that caliber, then we can allow this. Or we need to only allow more solid material.
 
Hmm. A fair point. I'm not 100% sold, but the implications of Aristotelian Realism would give them some stupid strong Type 8 immortality. But this view also doesn't seem to work.

Uxie embodies knowledge, and existed before any other being that had knowledge. For Uxie to be Aristotelian, he could not have existed without another being first having knowledge, since Aristotle's concepts exist only so long as what they are representative of exists (circle-ness would cease to be if all circles disappeared).
 
It's kinda derailing the thread regardless.
 
@Dragon Actually I'm not suggesting changes, I just made a response because of what a person said, if I wanted to suggest such big changes I would not do it here (Of course, I said that my Blog was not to suggest any kind of change, was just something complementary to what I was doing about Digimon).

@Assalt In fact, just as Uxie arose, it was the emergence of the knowledge of living beings. So we do not know if Uxie existed before knowledge existed, the same goes for Dialga, Palkia, etc. As soon as they emerged what they represented also came about, it would basically be something like: Palkia came up, so the space came about because Palkia is the space.

But I understand that this is a useless discussion here, I will withdraw from the discussion.
 
No offense, but "it is complicated & more complex" is in no way close to a valid argument against Executor's posts. It is akin to telling us to drop Dimensional Tiering, which we obviously won't.

This is derailing the thread, but I felt like pointing out it isn't an argument at all.
 
Kepekley23 said:
No offense, but "it is complicated & more complex" is in no way close to a valid argument against Executor's posts. It is akin to telling us to drop Dimensional Tiering, which we obviously won't.
Click to expand...
Never once did I argue his point of view. My post was basically telling him to "Not try and get that followed here right now". Never once did I say "your are wrong and this is why"?
 
I was talking about what you said in the end:

"that this may overcomplicate somethings and such be a lot harder for people to follow and accept due to it changing the system immensely."
 
Kepekley23 said:
I was talking about what you said in the end:
"that this may overcomplicate somethings and such be a lot harder for people to follow and accept due to it changing the system immensely."
Click to expand...
Once again, not arguing his points. But this is pointless and derailing.
 
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