[moderator’s note: Nonlin.org produced this at about the same time as his “Miracles” post. I delayed this, so that they could be discussed one at a time. I’m now publishing this one.]
[a note to nonlin – if all of your post is one block, it is hard to add a “more” break. Maybe a short introductory sentence as a first block would make that easier]
- “Problem of evil” is supposed to disprove God because,
• a) A God that is all powerful would be able to prevent evil.
• b) A God that is all knowing would know that evil happens.
• c) A God that is all loving wouldn’t want evil to happen and would take needed action to stop it.
• d) Evil happens.
• e) Since evil happens, these statements are contradictory.
• f) An all powerful, all knowing and all loving god cannot exist while evil continues.
Although short, this argument fails repeatedly:
• c) A God that is all loving wouldn’t want evil to happen, but would not necessarily take needed action to stop it due to other, higher reasons.
• d) Evil happens only in a theist universe. The true materialist would not believe in evil, hence this whole argument proposed by him/her would be meaningless and self defeating.
• e) There is no contradiction given the c. and d. counterarguments.
• f) Because there is no contradiction per e. counterargument, f. does not follow.
• g) And f. would not follow even if a. to e. were true, because the conclusion may miss some unspecified additional evidence, such as the fact that the human brain is not good enough to judge God, rendering this and many other such arguments false throughout. - How would we know ‘the good’ without ‘the evil’? We wouldn’t! Therefore Evil is inescapable as experiences are continuously normalized to include good and bad. There’s always a ‘too cold/too hot’, ‘too loud/too quiet’, ‘too much/too little death (who wished historical tyrants lived longer?)’, and so on. Whatever the range, there’s always an extreme good/bad. Cut the range in half and, what was moderate before, becomes extreme. Therefore, God tolerates the [necessary] evil to a certain extent and for a good reason, also as part of the free will deal He offered mankind. For those that say “there’s no need for this much evil”, the question is: “ok, then how much evil should there be?” In addition, the Book of Job clearly explains that it is not up to the lowly humans to second guess God. Those that did not understand this (Nazis, Communists, Eugenists, and many more) have tried to do better than God. But their dreams of evil-free societies invariably turn into nightmares full of evil.
- Evil should mean nothing to the materialist because of the determinism belief (despite the clearest experimental evidence that determinism is dead). And this is the REAL Problem of Evil. A problem only materialists should face since, according to any coherent materialist, not only were Stalin, Mao, Hitler not evil, but they also had no choice due to determinism. Yet mankind insists on calling those individuals evil and with good reasons. Seeing this dilemma, some argue for word substitution – suffering to evil – not noticing that the argument would thus go from bad to ridiculous. After all, God let Adam and Eve know ‘suffering’ will happen after the Original Sin transgression, and most people accept “no pain no gain”, hence suffering for a good reward. Others claim evil makes sense in “humanist morality”, clearly forgetting that, as determinists, they shouldn’t have the free will to do anything morally or immorally, just as stones and animals do not abide by any moral standards. Hume got this one thing right: you can’t derive ‘ought’ from ‘is’, therefore good and evil are incompatible with materialism.
- Is the concept of Evil just a human “evolutionary” adaptation? That doesn’t work because ‘ought’ was derived from ‘is’. The “original ought-is sin” is when materialists imagine the first RNA randomly happening and then, hocus-pocus, “evolution” with its ‘oughts’ takes over. The second is when we see no evil in the lion eating the gazelle alive, or the wasp turning the cockroach into a zombie food supply, the weasel killing all the chickens, peer violence, or even cannibalism, and infanticide. Yet we see evil in the human behaving like these (although infanticide against the unborn is OK – go figure). We do not need the concept of evil to avoid harm. But, aside from the mentally impaired, psychopaths, and a few hypothetical primitive cultures that supposedly do not know evil, all modern humans including the materialists know and oppose evil. Even communists are for “social justice” and fascists for the improvement of society, eugenists for the betterment of mankind and abortionists for “choice”. Not one of these stands for evil despite killing and persecution of the innocent. All these go to great length to hide, and minimize their evil deeds and often argue that – in fact – their opponents are the evil ones. “Sure, you have to break a few eggs to make omelet, right”? “But that’s not evil” is their argument.
Perhaps because our notion of evil involves the intent to do harm unnecessarily. I’m not sure polar bears can have that intent – although I know there are animals that kill more than they can eat or store.
What I don’t understand is how any of this has anything to do with atheism. Personally, I don’t think I would ever do gratuitous harm to anyone, but then again, I sometimes don’t eat all the food I buy before some of it spoils. Perhaps I could be said to be killing animals or plants for no good reason in those cases.
Just hypothetically, if your imaginary atheist SHOULD arrest and prosecute polar bears, just to meet your concept of consistent, what good do you suppose it would do? Would you say that would be a case of good men doing something?
keiths:
Bruce:
Or that it’s unlikely given the evidence. I’m sure you’ve heard the former referred to as “the logical problem of evil”, while the latter is known as “the evidential problem of evil”.
It invalidates the logical argument from evil, but not the evidential argument.
keiths:
Bruce:
Even that argument fails the symmetry test. One could claim instead that God is perfectly evil, and that the acts that flow from his nature are thereby always evil. Any acts that appear to be good are misconstruals on our part, or cases where God permits good in service of a greater evil.
Flint,
Well, first off, if your only definition of evil was intent rather than prevention, then you probably would have to excuse the concept of God that most people have.
Secondly, there are animals that intend to do harm. So should we kill them because they are evil. But let’s be honest here, you know full well that no one really ascribes evil to the struggles that go on in the animal world. They don’t say some animals are virtuous and others evil. They just do whatever their nature does, and no one really wants to kill all sharks because they are not friendly. No, what people really think is that only humans have the capacity for evil because they know better. And how do they know better?
That’s a question worth considering. Do you have an answer?
Well no, because the concept of God begins with the creation of man, including you. So unless you think that it was evil for God to create life for you, that doesn’t really work.
I see keiths picked up on it as well. It’s quite straightforward: If God was omnipotent He could have created us with the knowledge of good and evil, dispensing with the need for us to actually experience evil. So if your argument were correct, God is either not omnipotent or not omnibenevolent.
Bad argument. If I were you, I’d go with the free will thing.
It matches my experience. Perhaps you need more atheist friends?
This is the problem. Because your belief in the supernatural, free will and independent creation follow from your religious views, you assume that all atheists must hold opposite positions. But atheism is not merely a negative cast of your worldview.
Exactly. God is himself supposed to be a person with free will, yet morally perfect. It is not in his nature to do evil. And God is supposed to be omnipotent. So God could have simply created being with free will that are morally perfect, who never do evil acts. God could also have created a world where unnecessary suffering did not occur. Where sentient creatures getting caught in forest fires with no means of escape, did not suffer needlessly.
It’s that binary thinking again! Good vs evil!!!
PS and just to reiterate that both “good” and “evil” are completely subjective cultural concepts, meaningless unless qualified.
he did, haven’t you noticed?
Instead you mean he could have created you with the knowledge of something that doesn’t exist?
And he could also create you with the knowledge of good, without good existing too? Because it is impossible for good to exist, without something that isn’t good. Even God can’t create a paradox. He can’t make something not there that is there, or not big that is big. Or not blue that is blue. And even if you could somehow imagine he could, would there be a point?
Just making things out of indestructible rubber, that can never choose good, can never be righteous, can never be charitable, or heroic? Just little pleasure center orbs of goo? And how many of these please orbs would be sufficient, one, or infinity?
No, I think you are completely wrong there Alan. Not intentionally harming others is pretty universally understood as the key to avoiding evil. Furthermore, its strictly a human understanding.
Despite Rummys pleadings to the contrary , you can’t make a case that animals know that harming others is wrong. You can’t claim that any other being has remorse. Some animals may not have the desire to harm others, but that is quite different from having the capacity for remorse. For guilt.
So when Cornell says, why didn’t God teach us right and wrong. Well, he did.
So how about it, are you willing to ascribe evil to a pitbull that mauls a person. Is that animal evil?
Sure. Some things make sense, well, because they make sense. Doesn’t make them absolute.
For example, I think the treatment of Jews, Gypsies, patients in mental hospials, gays etc by the Nazi regime was abhorrent and I doubt there are many who could argue convincingly to the contrary or in mitigation. But when Truman decided to use atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki resulting in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Japaneses civilians, was that evil? I struggle to make a binary judgement on that.
Huge subject but again it is easy to dip into binary thinking. Humans are different but not exceptional. Studies on primates are very persuasive that strong emotions are at play in their society. The chimp, Frodo, made famous by Jane Goodall’s long-term studies might qualify for the attribute “evil”. I’d certainly suggest he was a psychopath.
Not convinced. I think there has been both evolutionary and cultural design at work in the development of human societies.
You’re asking the wrong person because I don’t think “evil” (adjective) describes a coherent category of things. But no, pitbulls aren’t inherently evil. It’s not their fault. Their natures have been shaped by selective breeding and poor, non-existant or deliberately aggression-inducing training.
Alan Fox,
What do you think would have happened to Jane Goodall if she would have taken out a machete and sliced Frodo’s head off, because she considered him a psychopath? Would there be a single person in the world who would call her a hero?
Sounds like, in your view, God must embody both good and not good.
As I recall, she defended observation without interference. I don’t know whether Jane Goodall considered Frodo a psychopath or not. That was my assessment. One example of Frodo’s behaviour is that he snatched the baby off the back of an African researcher at Gombe and ate it.
ETA not quite as I remembered the incident.
Rukia Sadiki and any other people who lived around Frodo around might feel that way.
Right.
And here is what they said:
They let him live.
In other words, evil is subjective
Frodo met his end rather messily in a fight with other males.
Certainly, describing an act or an entity as evil is no guide as to what to do about it.
In fact, I’d be interested to hear what others might have decided, were they in a position to decide whether to kill Frodo (humanely – we’re not savages) or leave him alone.
I find it very hard to resist the choice to have put him down.
Interesting bit of language isn’t it?
Perhaps a poor choice of words, on reflection. It was inspired by a joke card hanging in our bathroom.
Warning: If I spot even one “whipcream orgasm”, I am out of here.
Negative, see keiths’ response upthread: that is the consequence of us exercising our free will. It is ALL OUR FAULT!
You are contradicting yourself; you just claimed He did create us with that knowledge. In addition, if knowledge of evil cannot possibly be attained without experiencing it yourself, then God cannot be both omniscient and omnibenevolent.
Now, I really don’t wish to push this argument any further. I just mentioned what I thought was unconvincing at Nonlin’s request. I’ll just suggest you abandon this particular argument, ’cause it’s not very good.
What pleading to the contrary? Quote it.
I don’t think all animals can understand at an abstract conceptual level that “harming others” is considered “morally wrong”. Some humans can be raised to understand that (thought here are clearly examples of some that can’t), and perhaps in some limited way some other intelligent animals can be trained or raised to. But if they can’t, I don’t think that makes them inherently evil. They are capable of actions I would consider examples of unnecessary and natural evils.
If someone is struck by lightning and dies, I don’t think the lightning is evil in some personal sense. But I do think the fact that someone died and this will possibly hurt others who cared for that person, is an example of a natural evil. Others are made to suffer, and I think that’s bad, not good. There doesn’t have to be someone there responsible for carrying out the act, who understands it, for it to be an example of something evil.
If you’re not comfortable calling that evil, you can use whatever other word you desire. But if I knew that lightning was going to strike, and had the means and opportunity to prevent it with little to no risk to myself, and yet I did nothing at all, then I think my inaction would be an example of an evil act.
And innumerable similar situations happen every year, and have for all of the history of life, and God does nothing. Knows it’s going to happen, knows what kind of suffering it’s going to result in, is fully capable of preventing it, and yet does nothing. If God’s inaction is supposed to constitute moral perfection, I have to question the definition of morality of the person who insists on that. Perhaps there just isn’t a God at all.
phoodoo’s discussions of theodicy just get better and better.
I, too, will be departing at the first sign of a whipped cream orgasm.
In the meanwhile, this claim of human exceptionalism
is hilarious.
I thought all this stuff has been explained in “The Good Place.”
You want to forget the knowledge of good and evil?
God put that “ought” in your instincts.
Things have changed a bit since Adam and Eve (and as consequences). Nowadays, 3-month-old babies tell the good guys from the bad ones.
How so?
Why do you? Because you’re God’s creation and an incoherent atheist.
The Trolley Problem is a false dilemma once framed correctly.
http://nonlin.org/the-trolley-problem/
First, a clear moral law of all mankind is “do not kill your human fellow being”. By willingly directing the trolley one way or the other, this law is violated. And if you do, you will rightfully rot in prison for killing the innocent. It is not our duty or competence to decide between lives by killing someone.
Done. Read again the essay.
Did you even read once? “In addition, the Book of Job clearly explains that it is not up to the lowly humans to second guess God. Those that did not understand this (Nazis, Communists, Eugenists, and many more) have tried to do better than God. But their dreams of evil-free societies invariably turn into nightmares full of evil.”
Really, how?
Sounds like divine command theory
Inquisition , religious pogroms , The Crusades.
You think the Nazis dreamed of an evil free society?
What? You missed this reply:
“And He did. He also gave us Free Will and some chose to do evil which they know and hide (see 4.). And we recognize that as evil.”
Explain how YOU are a coherent atheist and yet not materialist /determinist (you are already evolutionist). Don’t talk about others.
Really? You’re confusing good/evil with dress codes.
They were “do gooders” trying “to second guess God”?!?
Read! Not “evil free”. They sure “tried to do better than God” for Germany.
You have mis-stated the trolley problem.The dilemma is between action and inaction. Why am I not surprised.
Interesting bit of language isn’t it?
So you know of examples of animals committing evil acts. Have you done anything to call attention to these acts? Have you tried to have these animals punished?
If you haven’t I guess that makes you evil. You know, sort of like the way you claim a God that lets a girl break up with a guy and make him sad, evil. Why doesn’t that God prevent heartbreaks? Why doesn’t Rummy kill evil animals?
Rummy works in mysterious ways.
So how do you get from “you have that instinct” to “you ought to follow it”?
What about people who feel instinctive needs to kill, or rape, or otherwise abuse and mistreat others, ought they also follow their instincts?
Thank you for your irrelevant opinions here but you missed the point of me bringing up the Trolley problem: I could not care any less about what you think the correct way to deal with the problem is, I brought it up to point out that people demonstrably have different “instincts”, different “knowledge of good and evil”, and will vehemently disagree as they feel differently about what the “right thing to do” is. And I don’t happen to agree with your take on the trolley problem, so thank you for proving my point.
Yeah and it didn’t provide any answer to the specific issue I brought up, which was the problem of unnecessary suffering of sentient beings.
Thanks but that doesn’t actually explain anything. Even if God created me and I was being incoherent(neither of which is true, but for the sake of argument), it still doesn’t logically follow that I ought to do what it says in any holy books.
You’re not understanding the is-ought problem mate. No matter what you think about how I came into existence, or how wrong or incomprehensible you find my statements, it does not logically follow from any of those statements that I ought to do what it says in the Bible, or Torah, or Qu’ran.
The conclusion simply doesn’t follow. Non-sequitur.
Do you genuinely not get it, or are you still just pretending not to get it because you’d rather troll and act stupid out of a lack of any sensible response to the points I bring up?
We some times kill animals that attack people. Not to “punish” them (it’s not being done to make the animal regret or understand what it did, or to satisfy some sort of desire for vengeance), but because we want to prevent those animals from doing further harm.
Even so, you are still confusing the act and it’s consequences, with the a judgement of the character of the animal itself. Since the animal doesn’t understand the moral implications of what it is doing, I am not holding it morally responsible in a sense where I think it should be punished out of some need of revenge. Or made to regret what it did, unless I think the animal is actually capable of understanding that it did something wrong and could be trained to refrain from doing it. And to feel shame and regret if they do.
But the act the animal does in a situation, leads to a state of affairs I would consider a kind of evil. What the animal does leads to suffering, and I think suffering is a bad thing. That suffering is a kind of evil.
Are you capable of understanding the distinction between [the act and it’s consequences], and [the responsibilities of the perpetrator of the act]?
To me these are not the same thing. I don’t restrict the word “evil” to refer only to things for which someone can be held responsible. I consider suffering that could have been avoided, even if it was not done knowingly out of malice, a kind of evil.
I don’t know, why doesn’t he? Could God not have created a world in which everyone who falls in love, freely enters into a lasting relationship? Hmm, I think he could. He’s supposed to be omnipotent after all.
I continue to be amazed that of all people, theists just seem incapable of understanding the implications of omnipotence. With God all things are possible, we are told. Except, according to theists, most things. They’re not possible after all.
With God, mundane things are possible, and not much else.
Also I’m not sure I want to recommend that phoodoo gets a dog. On the one hand I think it could teach him something about the intelligence and emotional lives of non-human animals. On the other hand, the callousness with which he speaks about the suffering of animals makes me think he shouldn’t be allowed to keep them.
Why not punish them, they are evil?
Jock seems to claim sometimes they do understand the moral implications.
So, if one animal attacks another animal, and you saw this, would you attempt to kill the animal doing the attacking, since it is evil? Have you done any lobbying for “evil animal” justice? Doesn’t that make you as guilty as the evil God you fabricate, who won’t make us without free will, and instead make us a pleasure center orb?
Corneel,
How many pleasure center orbs must God create, in order to be considered a benevolent God in your opinion? Is one enough?
Maybe God has tried this experiment before. Maybe he made a world in which nothing bad can happen to you. And every being in that world just sat and watched porn 24 hours a day. They were all super fat, but they didn’t care, because in that world you can’t die from clogged arteries. Nobody went outside in that world, because there were no roads, and no place to go anyway, because no one felt like building a road. Food just appeared magically at the push of a button. It was broccoli flavored gummy bears covered in strawberry syrup. Nobody cared, because there was no such thing as tasting bad. You could have kids, but most people just threw them outside, with the gummy bear button.
Everything was super dirty, but no one minded. There was a special type of porn that was particularly popular called dirt porn. It was just images of dirt. That was very popular. You could get birthday cakes in that world, made from the broccoli gummy bears, but no one knew their birthdays because no one made a calendar, because they didn’t care about time. Someone was going to write a book about that world, so other worlds such as this could know about it, but no one knew how to write, so they said nevermind.
God decided to try a different world this time.
A lot of people called God evil for not making that world again. God said, well, I guess you can’t please everyone.
Oh look! It’s the whipped cream orgasms again.
No, silly, I merely made fun of your claim that non-humans cannot feel remorse. It’s still hilarious, and still a different thing altogether.
Also, a Theist probably shouldn’t ascribe to atheists the silly idea of holding animals morally accountable for their actions…what is this, ecclesiastical law in sixteenth century France?
(Just saw this on Drunk History!)
Yep, nothing shows you are concerned about people’s health like The Black Death.
Poor God, people are saying mean things. Maybe time for another Flood.
Maybe not judge all theists by such a small sample.
Just the opposite , they were putting words in God’s Mouth. It turned out the same ,a lot of collateral damage doing God’s Work.
Sorry , “But their dreams of evil-free societies”
The Nazis ,not fans of Evolution , who do you think they though made them the Master Race if not a blue eyed God?
They were fulfilling His Will, why else would He have given them their superiority if not to be superior?
There are plenty of Gods out there, you an always find one to suit your purposes.
The essential problem with omnipotence was posed long ago: Can God make a rock so heavy He can’t lift it? This question (and plenty of variations of it) illustrates that omnipotence is self-contradictory. So only mundane things are possible because “supernatural” things involve inherent internal contradictions — mutually exclusive conditions that must be true simultaneously. We can generalize as, Can God make rules so absolute He can’t break them?
Were you going to provide some evidence that non-humans feels remorse, or were you going to just show a photo of a dog and claim that is evidence? Sort, of like your cancer studies? Oh, maybe Sheldrakes dogs weren’t just showing ESP, they were also displaying guilt?
Why would a materialist be against this? Evil is evil right? Why do we have different laws for animals and people?
In fact, from a materialists perspective, protecting animals from any sort of abuse doesn’t make any sense. Why should we care if animals experience pain? The only way it makes sense is if you feel we are all part of God’s world which has meaning. Otherwise, why should you care about a rats feelings? More inherit morality?