Can a machine understand?

In a discussion about the immaterial nature of mind, an atheist asks: "Can an omnipotent God create a computer that has beliefs and knowledge?"

A theist replies:

What he was attempting to do is the moral-and-intellectual equivalent of "arguing" thusly: "Can 'God' create a square circle? No? I thought not. Thus, 'God' is not 'omnipotent'; thus, 'God' does not exist" -- which, as anyone can see, is really shitty "reasoning". But, you know, that's par for the course for 'atheists'.

The Cult of Victor Strikes Again

I hate to pick on Victor Reppert so much, but he seems to be asking for it when he interprets the words of prominent atheists in a way that totally misrepresents their meaning and casts them in the most uncharitable light possible.  Inevitably, his followers, the Cult of Victor, pick up on these misrepresentations and start ranting about how terrible this atheist "gnu" is, and how all decent atheists should publicly disavow him, along with any other "gnu" that is on their list enemies.

Theistic Arguments Series: On the Impossibility of an Actual Infinite

One of the key concepts found in some theological arguments such as the Kalam Cosmological Argument is the assertion that the universe must have had a beginning, which is based on the notion that it is logically impossible for an "actual infinite" to exist.  Theists have made numerous defenses of this assertion.  It appeared in my previous post, where my interlocutor said:

This is a metaphysically untenable position. Why can't there be an eternal succession of people? Well, person one (p1) is going to have to give birth to them-self before they can give birth to p2. How can p1 give birth to them-self if they don't exist. Since contingent p1 can't be accounted for contingent p2...pn are not accounted for, and so the whole chain fails to exist.