In days gone by many atheists thought the existence of evil in the world disproved theism. Largely due to the work of philosopher Alvin Plantinga, however, most professional philosophers now concede that the presence of evil in the world does not disprove the existence of God (unfortunately, lay atheists failed to get the memo). As atheist and J.L. Mackie came to admit, “Since this defense is formally [i.e., logically] possible, and its principle involves no real abandonment of our ordinary view of the opposition between good and evil, we can concede that the problem of evil does not, after all, show that the central doctrines of theism are logically inconsistent with one another.”
No longer able to use the mere existence of evil as evidence against God’s existence, atheists began to argue that the amount of evil in the world makes the existence of God unlikely. “Why,” they ask, “is there so much evil in the world?” James Corman and Keith Lehrer are representative of this modified argument:
If you were all-good, all-knowing, and all-powerful, and you were going to create a universe in which there were sentient beings — beings who are happy and sad; enjoy pleasure; feel pain; express love, anger, pity, hatred — what kind of world would you create? Being all-powerful, you would have the ability to create any world that it is logically possible for you to create, and being all-knowing you would know how to create any of these logically possible worlds. Which one would you choose? Obviously you would choose the best of all the possible worlds because you would be all-good and would want to do what is best in everything you do. You would, then, create the best of all the possible worlds, that is, that world containing the least amount of evil possible. And because one of the most obvious kinds of evil is suffering, hardship, and pain, you would create a world in which the sentient beings suffered the least. Try to imagine what such a world would be like. Would it be like the one which actually does exist, this world we live in? Would you create a world such as this one if you had the power and knowhow to create any logically possible world? If your answer is “no,” as it seems it must be, then you should begin to understand why the evil of suffering and pain in this world is such a problem for anyone who thinks God created this world. This does not seem to be the kind of world God would create, and certainly not the kind of world he would sustain. Given this world, then, it seems we should conclude that it is improbable that it was created or sustained by anything we would call God. Thus, given this particular world, it seems we should conclude that it is improbable that God – who if he exists, created this world – exists. Consequently, the belief that God does not exist, rather than the belief that he exists, would seem to be justified by the evidence we find in this world.[1]
The claim that God’s existence is improbable given the amount of evil in the world is a much more modest and tenable argument, but it too is problematic. In his debate with Clancy Martin, J.P. Moreland made the point that asking why there is so much evil in the world is an iterative question; i.e. it can be asked over and over again, without any answer being sufficient.[2] If there was only half the amount of evil in the world, the question could still be asked, “Why is there so much evil in the world?” Indeed, if the amount of evil was cut in half again, the question could still be asked ad infinitum. It quickly becomes apparent that the real issue is not the amount of evil, but the presence of evil in the world altogether. Ultimately, then, the argument against God based on the amount of evil in the world is just a restatement of the general problem of evil.
To make this point clear to an interlocutor you might ask, “Would you cease complaining about evil if the amount of evil was reduced in half? What about if it was reduced by 72%? How much evil in the world would you say is acceptable?”
There is an even deeper problem that often goes unnoticed: How does one even go about quantifying evil? As Plantinga notes in God, Freedom, and Evil, evil is not the kind of thing that can be quantified. It wouldn’t make any sense to say “that act contained 35 turps of evil.” This is not to say it’s impossible for there to be a world in which fewer evil acts/events occurred. There could be, but that point is irrelevant. God could have created a world containing no evil by creating a world without any free creatures at all. The relevant question, however, is whether He could have created a world containing free creatures that not only contains less evil, but the same amount of proportional good. As Plantinga notes, it’s not at all obvious that this was possible. It could be that our world contains the most amount of good and the least amount of evil possible for free creatures. This is a logically coherent explanation to why this world contains the amount of evil it does. Admittedly, such a proposition cannot be proven, but neither can it be disproven. As William Lane Craig notes, our epistemic finitude prohibits us from being able to properly evaluate such grand cost-benefit calculations. God, however, is not limited in this way. So long as it is logically possible that the amount of evil in the world is necessary to obtain a maximal amount of goodness, the argument against God’s existence based on the amount of evil in the world fails.
[1]James W. Cornman, Keith Lehrer, and George S. Pappas, Philosophical Problems and Arguments: An Introduction, 3d edition, 1982; available from http://www.ditext.com/cornman/corn5.html; Internet; accessed 06 October 2009.
[2]J.P. Moreland, debating philosopher Clancy Martin on the question, “Does the Christian God Exist?” December 1, 2005 at St. Joseph, MO.
In days gone by many atheists thought the existence of evil in the world disproved theism. Largely due to the work of philosopher Alvin Plantinga, however, most professional philosophers now concede that the presence of evil in the world does not disprove the existence of God (unfortunately, lay atheists failed to get the memo). As atheist and J.L. Mackie came to admit, “Since this defense is formally [i.e., logically] possible, and its principle involves no real abandonment of our ordinary view of the opposition between good and evil, we can concede that the problem of evil does not, after all, show that the central doctrines of theism are logically inconsistent with one another.”
No longer able to use the mere existence of evil as evidence against God’s existence, atheists began to argue that the amount of evil in the world makes the existence of God unlikely. “Why,” they ask, “is there so much evil in the world?” James Corman and Keith Lehrer are representative of this modified argument:
If you were all-good, all-knowing, and all-powerful, and you were going to create a universe in which there were sentient beings — beings who are happy and sad; enjoy pleasure; feel pain; express love, anger, pity, hatred — what kind of world would you create? Being all-powerful, you would have the ability to create any world that it is logically possible for you to create, and being all-knowing you would know how to create any of these logically possible worlds. Which one would you choose? Obviously you would choose the best of all the possible worlds because you would be all-good and would want to do what is best in everything you do. You would, then, create the best of all the possible worlds, that is, that world containing the least amount of evil possible. And because one of the most obvious kinds of evil is suffering, hardship, and pain, you would create a world in which the sentient beings suffered the least. Try to imagine what such a world would be like. Would it be like the one which actually does exist, this world we live in? Would you create a world such as this one if you had the power and knowhow to create any logically possible world? If your answer is “no,” as it seems it must be, then you should begin to understand why the evil of suffering and pain in this world is such a problem for anyone who thinks God created this world. This does not seem to be the kind of world God would create, and certainly not the kind of world he would sustain. Given this world, then, it seems we should conclude that it is improbable that it was created or sustained by anything we would call God. Thus, given this particular world, it seems we should conclude that it is improbable that God – who if he exists, created this world – exists. Consequently, the belief that God does not exist, rather than the belief that he exists, would seem to be justified by the evidence we find in this world.[1]
The claim that God’s existence is improbable given the amount of evil in the world is a much more modest and tenable argument, but it too is problematic. In his debate with Clancy Martin, J.P. Moreland made the point that asking why there is so much evil in the world is an iterative question; i.e. it can be asked over and over again, without any answer being sufficient.[2] If there was only half the amount of evil in the world, the question could still be asked, “Why is there so much evil in the world?” Indeed, if the amount of evil was cut in half again, the question could still be asked ad infinitum. It quickly becomes apparent that the real issue is not the amount of evil, but the presence of evil in the world altogether. Ultimately, then, the argument against God based on the amount of evil in the world is just a restatement of the general problem of evil.
To make this point clear to an interlocutor you might ask, “Would you cease complaining about evil if the amount of evil was reduced in half? What about if it was reduced by 72%? How much evil in the world would you say is acceptable?”
There is an even deeper problem that often goes unnoticed: How does one even go about quantifying evil? As Plantinga notes in God, Freedom, and Evil, evil is not the kind of thing that can be quantified. It wouldn’t make any sense to say “that act contained 35 turps of evil.” This is not to say it’s impossible for there to be a world in which fewer evil acts/events occurred. There could be, but that point is irrelevant. God could have created a world containing no evil by creating a world without any free creatures at all. The relevant question, however, is whether He could have created a world containing free creatures that not only contains less evil, but the same amount of proportional good. As Plantinga notes, it’s not at all obvious that this was possible. It could be that our world contains the most amount of good and the least amount of evil possible for free creatures. This is a logically coherent explanation to why this world contains the amount of evil it does. Admittedly, such a proposition cannot be proven, but neither can it be disproven. As William Lane Craig notes, our epistemic finitude prohibits us from being able to properly evaluate such grand cost-benefit calculations. God, however, is not limited in this way. So long as it is logically possible that the amount of evil in the world is necessary to obtain a maximal amount of goodness, the argument against God’s existence based on the amount of evil in the world fails.
[1]James W. Cornman, Keith Lehrer, and George S. Pappas, Philosophical Problems and Arguments: An Introduction, 3d edition, 1982; available from http://www.ditext.com/cornman/corn5.html; Internet; accessed 06 October 2009.
[2]J.P. Moreland, debating philosopher Clancy Martin on the question, “Does the Christian God Exist?” December 1, 2005 at St. Joseph, MO.
Thinking to Believe 
March 17, 2010 at 10:36 am
Your point at the end is especially important, in my opinion. I have had atheists challenge me to provide the “moral calculus” by which good outweighs evil in the actual world and then claim victory when I acknowledge that I cannot do so. However, they refuse to accept the reciprocal argument, which points out that THEY cannot provide the “moral calculus” by which good DOES NOT outweigh evil in the actual world, either.
The bottom line is that ONLY an omniscient being is aware of ALL of the relevant factors that determine whether the actual world is the “best” of all possible worlds. Basically, theists trust God’s infallible judgment on this, since He sees the whole picture; atheists insist on substituting their own fallible judgment and relying on woefully incomplete information.
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March 17, 2010 at 12:22 pm
“Basically, theists trust God’s infallible judgment on this, since He sees the whole picture; atheists insist on substituting their own fallible judgment and relying on woefully incomplete information.” Well said.
Neither the atheist nor the theist can properly perform a moral calculus. We don’t even have the categories to do so, unless of course, evil comes with a label disclosing the number of turps it contains!
Jason
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March 18, 2010 at 2:56 am
Isn’t it a generally agreed upon rule of argumentation that if one starts out with a false/inaccurate premise (whether on purpose or ignorantly) then the conclusion is guaranteed to be false/inaccurate?
I’ve seen so many atheists revert to the same “if God is so good, if God is love, if God is truly benevolent, etc”, it makes me wonder if they realize that such a premise, at the outset of their argument, is, in my estimation, a false one, at least from a Biblical perspective.
For example, Romans 11:22 reads:
Behold therefore the goodness and severity of God…
When an atheist sets out to argue the non-existence of God based on evil in the world, they seem to limit God, as if to say that God, while He is supposed to be good and loving, is not supposed to also be severe and just, and somehow unable to meet out divine punishment as He deems fit. When such occurs, a much more Hebraic, and less Western enlightment version of God would serve to help construct the proper premise upon which to base the argument. (At this juncture, Isaiah 45:7 and Job 2:10 come to mind. These verses are parts of the cornerstone of Hebraic/Judaic thought, and in my opinion, should be considered when attempting to determine if God does or does not exist based upon the existence of evil in the world.)
So, to me, the god that atheists create when forming their arguments is a non-existent god in the first place. All too often the god they create has no sense of justice, doesn’t recompense evil, doesn’t have a moral standard of righteousness, and cannot feel (or isn’t supposed to feel) outrage at sin, even to the point of hatred and/or separation of His person from our own, or that somehow He cannot step into His own creation, so to speak, in order to bring about catastrophic destruction according to His own will, even if such actions are contrary to our will or our biased sense of morality. It goes back to the question, “can the clay say to the potter, why have you formed me thus”?
It’s almost a utopian-esque, albeit fake god, instead of a realistic, practical God.
Further, when considering pain and suffering, not all pain is evil. Pain, in terms of the physical, is a protector of the body, to let one know something is not right, something is out of order, or in danger. Who would relish going through life not being able to feel the pain of a sunburn as a warning to seek shelter, broken glass on barefeet, a toothache which allows them to know they need to go to the dentist, etc. Sometimes pain is the only sympton that lets us know we need help. How much more spiritual, emotional pain?
Unless, they are upset that God didn’t create us totally invulnerable???
Regarding suffering, how people suffer, and for what, is often a choice and in certain circumstances, there is a reward at the end.
So, simply saying pain and suffering = evil is inaccurate, in my opinion, insomuch that pain and suffering need a more refined definition so as to place the argument in its proper context.
If I sacrifice and suffer through life at a personal cost so that my child can have a better life and a more hopeful future, even to the detriment of my own, how is that universally evil? Haven’t I counted the costs, and deemed it good?
Granted, I assume that when crafting these arguments, the average atheist doesn’t mean this kind of pain and suffering; however, when envisioning a sugar-coated, barney the dinosaur type of god who isn’t sovereign enough in his own morality to also be severe and capable of hatred or separation, it tends to seem that any pain and and suffering, no matter how noble and necessary, is disdained.
(And this doesn’t even factor in human free will and just barely hints at the notion of holiness, the center of God’s ontology.)
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March 18, 2010 at 10:03 am
“So, to me, the god that atheists create when forming their arguments is a non-existent god in the first place.”
Exactly right. The God whose existence is refuted by the typical argument from evil is one who is omniscient, omnipotent, and morally obligated to prevent any and all suffering. Does anyone actually believe in such a God?
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March 18, 2010 at 12:01 pm
Aaron,
You seem to be confusing the atheist’s argument. They don’t argue that God cannot mete out justice, but that an all-loving, all-good, all-powerful God would not create a world in which evil was possible. The atheist’s argument is as follows:
P1 If an all-powerful God exists He could prevent evil
P2 If an all-good and all-loving God exists He would want to prevent evil
P3 Evil exists
_______________________________________________________________
Therefore God does not exist
Insofar as the atheist considers God to be omnipotent and omnibenevolent, they are accurately representing God. I think you are dealing with a separate issue: those who think that God’s omnibenevolence logically excludes His ability to judge. You are right to point out that it doesn’t, but the atheist’s argument against God from evil isn’t claiming it does.
The evil, pain, and suffering most atheists have in mind is not things like tootheaches, but the pain and evil caused by moral evils such as murder, rape, and theft. You acknowledged this, which makes me wonder why you chose to focus on personal pain rather than the evil and suffering atheists have in mind.
Jason
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March 18, 2010 at 6:50 pm
Here is a good onine lecture from Peter Kreef about the problem of pain from the standpoint of C.S. Lewis.
http://www.peterkreeft.com/audio/15_cslewis-problem-of-pain.htm
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March 18, 2010 at 8:18 pm
Hi, Jason and all,
“They don’t argue that God cannot mete out justice…”
I would argue that they do, to some degree or another, implicitely or otherwise, which I will reason out below.
“…but that an all-loving, all-good, all-powerful God would not create a world in which evil was possible.”
This is the part of the argument I was trying to address in my first response.
“P1 If an all-powerful God exists He could prevent evil”
While it’s a tempting premise, and superficially seems right, I’m not convinced that it’s accurate. First, it presumes that God doesn’t have the freedom of will to limit His own omnipotence for whatever purposes He decides are necessary. Second, going with that idea, that it presumes that God doesn’t subjugate His own omnipotence to that of the human free will, which, it appears He does.
“P2 If an all-good and all-loving God exists He would want to prevent evil”
And this was the premise I was really trying to address and show is false/inaccurate.
As you mentioned, this premise implicitly restricts God to a set of parameters to which He is not, in reality, restricted. Is God all good? Yes. But, is God all-severe? Yes, as well. The Greek for ‘severe’ from Romans 11:22 means sharp, or rough and comes from the idea of a precipice, or the edge of a cliff. So, to those who fell, God cut them off, not in an act of all-goodness, but in an act of all-severity. Not out of all-love, but rather, out of all-wrath, if you will. Granted we could argue the greater good of severity, etc, and that might be a worthy discussion, but I hope the point is made.
Regarding the all-love component of God’s nature, yes, God is love, but oftentimes His definition of love is not ours, and again, it seems to restrict God to a certain set of parameters, as if to say God, who has to be all-love, cannot therefore hate. But He does hate, as shown in the Bible. So, to me, the second premise is incomplete or unbalanced. So, can God while being “all-love” and “omni-benevolent” still hate and, at times, be malevolent? I say that the Bible says yes. And if yes, then, like I’m trying to point out, the argument is flawed because the premises were flawed to begin with.
“P3 Evil exists”
Conceded. But the blame cannot automatically be placed at God’s feet. Yes, God could dissolve every bullett, gun, sword, bomb, etc. And if He did, humans would use rocks and fists to kill each other. So then, should God dissolve all of humanity in order to prevent man from inflicting pain and suffering upon man? Well, it does seem like, in a time of His own choosing, God will do just that, so…
“Therefore God does not exist”
Hence, why the conclusion is false/inaccurate, because the premises upon which it is based are false/inaccurate. (Hopefully I’ve shown that sufficiently to make such a statement.)
Regarding the meeting out of justice. If God should call a nation to Himself and send them into another land to kill every man, woman, and child by th edge of the sword, the “moral” atheist would cry foul, and hence, this is why so many people have a dislike for the Bible, especially the Old Testament, because God did exactly that when He sent Israel into Canaan after the exodus and the forty years of wandering in the wilderness.
Undoubtedly, this caused pain and suffering among the Canaanites and all those that dwelt in the land. But was it evil according to the atheist’s definition of the word as used in this particular argument? To say yes is to impugne God and indict Him for an evil act. To say no is to invalidate the argument all together.
Or, if God should send the angel of the Lord to smite a king dead, is it evil, or an act of divine justice? If the atheist says evil, then the atheist doesn’t really see it as justice, and doesn’t want to countenance the fact that God reserves the right unto Himself to pour His vengeance out upon whomsoever He will, as it is written, “there is no good, no not one”. Therefore, God can judge any sinner and remove them from earthly existence, should He so choose, being sovereign and omnipotent over His creation. But if the atheist says no, it was not an evil act but an act of divine justice performed out of God’s moral nature to hate sin, then again, their argument is invalidated.
The fact that He does these things at His discretion and not ours, and that He also does not do so, again at His own discretion speaks more to His omnipotence to be free to choose and enact His own desire, rather than showing that He isn’t powerful enough to either create a universe free from evil, or to eradicate evil from the universe whenver it appears in whatever form.
With all that said, maybe I am coming from a different angle, or confusing the issue (I hope not to be doing so). I am trying to get to the heart of the issue, a priori, if you will, to cut off the argument before it even begins, showing that the premises, being false, will lead one to a false conclusion.
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March 18, 2010 at 8:36 pm
“The evil, pain, and suffering most atheists have in mind is not things like tootheaches, but the pain and evil caused by moral evils such as murder, rape, and theft.”
I do grant this most readily.
“…makes me wonder why you chose to focus on personal pain rather than the evil and suffering atheists have in mind.”
I did so only as a “chink in the armor” of the argument, and as a basis to, from here, move on to bigger, more important kinds of pain and suffering.
The next level might be, for example, natural disasters, hurricanes, tsunamis, earthquakes, etc.
The world has had its share of these in the last ten years, and really, throughout it’s existence. They cause unimagineable pain, suffering, anguish, loss of lives, etc. Enough to be called evil, one might suppose.
And yet, God is omnipotent, but doesn’t keep the earth from experiencing these events. Why not? From the Biblical narrative we know that some natural disasters are actually caused by God, or at least allowed to happen by Him for a purpose beyong our understanding. Jeremiah 25 talks about a whirlwind (i.e. hurricane) that will go from one end of the earth to another, killing untold scores of people, so much so that the dead will lie in the streets unburied. Hurricane Katrina comes to mind. Whether this “whirlwind” is literal or metaphorical, the Bible still states that God is the one bringing it to pass.
We could recall God opening the earth and swallowing Korah, etc.
The point being that we really don’t know if the pain and suffering caused by these incidents are a result of God pouring out His cup of indignation or not. While we think and hope not, the Book of Revelation is quite clear that, if not now, then, in th end, it will be God doing so. So, is this evil? It’s pain, it’s suffering, but is it evil? I refer again to Isaiah 45:7. Amos 3:6 does so as well. I realize the atheist isn’t going to respect an argument from Scripture, but it still stands and is something to be considered.
So, if God is powerful enough to stop such events, why does He not? It’s an age old question, but it doesn’t mean He doesn’t exist.
Regarding murder, rape, theft, etc. I submit that God, in order to prevent all such acts, would have to dissolve all of humanity, or, prior to the creation of the human race, have decided to create being with no free will.
Even renowned atheist Jean-Paul Sartre recognized that we are condemned to be free.
The atheist’s argument against the existence of God because of evil in the world never does justice to the reality of human free will. This goes back to what I was saying regarding God subjugating His omnipotence to our free will.
I could raise my hand against my brother, as Cain did to Abel, and God could break my hand or cut it off before the blow ever falls. If He were to do that, then I’d find a way to hit my brother with the other hand, ad infinitum until God destroyed me in order to prevent the evil I was trying to accomplish.
This is the crux of the issue: freedom to do evil in face of an all-loving, omnipotent, omni-benevolent God who doesn’t desire that we should do evil and yet does not infringe upon our right to do so.
If the atheist would couch the argument in those terms, then I would respect the premises and be willing to consider their conclusions. Until then, I just see falsity and inaccuracy in every claim against the existence of God based on evil in the world.
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March 18, 2010 at 8:38 pm
By the by, a good book that directly and indirectly addresses these concerns is The Sons of Oil by David Huston.
His conclusions about suffering might surprise, or infuriate, but they do have a logic to them.
I recommend the book for other reasons, but some of its contents are salient to this discussion.
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March 18, 2010 at 10:20 pm
Sorry, I left the following unfinished:
“To say yes is to impugne God and indict Him for an evil act…”
“…which would render the claim on God being omni-benevolent meaningless and without power, thus nullifying at least one of, if not more than one of the premises of the initial argument.”
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March 19, 2010 at 10:02 am
Aaron,
Don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying some atheists won’t argue that divine judgment is incompatible with a loving God. Some do (as do some Christians!). My point is simply that when the atheist argues that “God cannot exist because there is too much evil in the world,” they are not talking about any supposed incompatibility between divine love and divine justice/judgment. They are talking about human evils like rape, genocide, murder, torture, etc., as well as natural evils like disease and death resulting from natural phenomenon like hurricanes. They are arguing that if God is all-loving, He would want to prevent these evils from happening, and that if He was all powerful, He could do so. Since evil exists, they conclude that God does not exist.
I think your observations are accurate insofar as they go; I just think they are more applicable to the objection that “God cannot be all-good if He judges anyone,” rather than the objection that “God cannot exist because there is too much evil in the world.”
Jason
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March 19, 2010 at 4:04 pm
Fair enough. 🙂
I might only add that perhaps there is a fine line between what an atheist might call the “too much evil in the world” and what might also be called God’s judgment (e.g. was the purging of Canaan by the Israeliltes genocide or divine justice against a people who had committed great and horrific abominations in the eyes of God so much so that the land “vomited them out”? Was Herod’s death by worms an act of sovereign justice performed by God or a petty assasination ordered by a god that didn’t appreciate someone besides himself being worshipped?)
PS. A caveat: I do not believe God calls us to murder, rape, etc. nor do I believe that the words “genocide” and “petty assasination…” apply to the above scenarios. Only saying that certain Biblical activities ordered by God for His people to do, especially and perhaps specifically in the OT might be considered evil by the atheist, when the Scriptures and their believers, both Jew and Christian, might consider them justice.
Make sense?
Peace to all.
Thanks for the discussion. 🙂
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March 19, 2010 at 4:15 pm
Aaron,
Yes, I understand what you are saying. There are many atheists today arguing that God is a perpetrator of evil in the very instances you describe. But that is a separate matter from the argument against the existence of God from evil. This argument actually assumes that God is all-good, and argues that because He is all good He would not want evil to exist in the world.
Jason
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March 19, 2010 at 11:59 pm
At the risk of wading into beating a dead horse territory, I do understand that the contents of the argument are exactly as you say, namely “…that God is all-good, and…that because He is all good He would not want evil to exist in the world”. That’s pretty solid in my mind.
What I’m trying to do (and maybe failing) is say that, because of the restrictive, unbalanced nature of the premises, the assumptions being made about God are inaccurate, not so much because God is not all-good, but that because God is not only all-good or omni-benevolent, but that because He is also all-severe, and therefore exists ontologically beyond the restrictions so placed upon Him according to the premises given, and that He can act malevolently toward His creation (not out of want, but out of will, as influenced by His holiness, based on our actions toward Him and each other), that there really isn’t any way in which the argument can come to an accurate conclusion based on the premises, especially since the argument doesn’t even attempt to address the introduction of evil in the world through human action, let alone the fact that there is more to God than simply all-goodness. Instead of assumptions, the premises are more like presumptions. The atheist presumes that God is all-good and nothing else. He presumes that God is omnipotent and unable or unwilling to place limits on His omnipotence in order to create free will moral, sentient beings, etc.
I would argue that God was able to and did create a universe free from all evil but that He was not omnipotent to stop evil from entering into such a universe since He sovereignly chose to create free moral agents who had and have a will separate from His, capable of acting in any irrational, un-predetermined way, up to and including committing evil acts.
Had God chosen to create subjugated sentient beings who always and only performed His will, then yes, God’s omnipotence would clearly allow for a universe entirely free from evil; and by the way, why is it that atheists refuse to acknowledge this when forming their arguments for the so-called non-existence of God unless they also deny the freedom of will inherent in all of humanity?
Maybe I’m not approaching this from a purely logical stand point, and I’m obviously biased toward what I believe to be the truth of the situation, however, I offer this suggestion:
If we put the argument into a purely logical form, like say an a = b, and b = c, therfore a = c form, and remove the terms God, all-good, evil, etc. (not saying this argument fits that form, just giving an example) then would the conclusion still be the same if the proper form was used and could we even agree (theists and atheists both) that the arrangement of the form was accurate in that a really did equal b, not to mention whether or not a is even a, or if it’s not actually a but say x?
Someone better versed in logical forms can take a crack at that if they want to, since that’s never been my strong suit.
Peace
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March 20, 2010 at 8:13 pm
Here is one way to frame the typical argument from evil as a valid logical deduction.
P1. If a being is all-good, then that being has the desire to eliminate all evil.
P2. If a being is omnipotent, then that being has the power to eliminate all evil.
P3. If a being is omniscient, then that being has the knowledge to eliminate all evil.
P4. If a being has the desire, power, and knowledge to eliminate all evil, then that being would eliminate all evil.
P5. Evil exists; i.e., no being has eliminated all evil.
C1. From P4&P5: No being has the desire, power, and knowledge to eliminate all evil.
C2. From C1: (P1 is false) or (P2 is false) or (P3 is false).
In other words, a being who is all-good, omnipotent, and omniscient – what we commonly call God – does not exist. My response is basically to argue that we should reject P1; being all-good DOES NOT entail the desire to eliminate ALL evil. The burden of proof is on the atheist to show that it does.
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March 20, 2010 at 8:18 pm
Sorry, I messed up the formal logic at the end there. I was playing around with the terms and lost track. I need to replace the last conclusion.
C2. From P1-P3 and C1: No being has the desire, power, and knowledge to eliminate all evil.
The final paragraph is still okay.
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March 22, 2010 at 4:20 pm
Aletheist,
I agree. The premises of the argument are flawed. So long as God has a morally sufficient purpose for evil, the conclusion does not follow.
Besides, even if all the premises were true, it doesn’t necessary follow that no God(s) exist(s). It would only follow that if there is a God who exists, He is not omnibenevolent and/or omnipotent.
Jason
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July 1, 2010 at 4:13 pm
[…] Why is there so much evil in the world?: Jason Dulle observes that the problem of evil is not the amount of evil in the world (Asking “why is there so much evil in the world” is an iterative question), but its mere presence. […]
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December 30, 2018 at 5:29 pm
[…] Why is there so much evil in the world? […]
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