The Problem of Evil and It's Personal Implications
In Philosophy of Religion we have discussed the Problem of Evil for a few class period, examining it as evidence against God or it's harmony with the existence of a God.
Thus far the most compelling argument for how God can be all-good and yet still allow evil into the World is the idea of free will as a cause for evil.
To briefly summarize this argument I will use an example my teacher gave me: would you rathe have a rock as a pet, who cannot move or sin, or a horse that can or will run away as a pet. The answer seems to be the horse, despite it's ability to sin, appears to be inherently more valuable because it has the free will to act, unlike the immobile rock. This is how humankind is, free to sin and yet more valuable due to said ability. Thus God allows us to have free will, knowing evil will happen as a result, because we are more valuable creatures for such a trait.
This checks out for me, and makes logical sense. However, in the moments of personal tragedy and evil, I cannot help but question why God couldn't make the simple exception to spare me from the pain. Perhaps the same would be true for a child whose mother was murdered in front of them, only to enter into an abusive foster home and a life of endless tortures, etc. Logically, I can see why evil exists and why free will is so valuable, but to the extent of gratuitous evil, one that is generous and without purpose, why would God, in His infinite power, make an exception and spare the sufferer. Surely this would not collapse the entire system of free will?
Lastly, when going through personal evils, why does logicality not translate into peace and acceptance of any given evil?
Thus far the most compelling argument for how God can be all-good and yet still allow evil into the World is the idea of free will as a cause for evil.
To briefly summarize this argument I will use an example my teacher gave me: would you rathe have a rock as a pet, who cannot move or sin, or a horse that can or will run away as a pet. The answer seems to be the horse, despite it's ability to sin, appears to be inherently more valuable because it has the free will to act, unlike the immobile rock. This is how humankind is, free to sin and yet more valuable due to said ability. Thus God allows us to have free will, knowing evil will happen as a result, because we are more valuable creatures for such a trait.
This checks out for me, and makes logical sense. However, in the moments of personal tragedy and evil, I cannot help but question why God couldn't make the simple exception to spare me from the pain. Perhaps the same would be true for a child whose mother was murdered in front of them, only to enter into an abusive foster home and a life of endless tortures, etc. Logically, I can see why evil exists and why free will is so valuable, but to the extent of gratuitous evil, one that is generous and without purpose, why would God, in His infinite power, make an exception and spare the sufferer. Surely this would not collapse the entire system of free will?
Lastly, when going through personal evils, why does logicality not translate into peace and acceptance of any given evil?
Comments (44)
I didn't know that horses could sin. That just doesn't make sense to me within the (I assume) Christian framework you're employing.
Quoting Ciceronianus the White
:pray: :sweat:
Problem of evil is answered by christians in four ways:
1- mans evil is caused by his freedom not by god
2- natures evil is necessary for creation or part of gods higher plan
3- god helps stop evil sometimes if you pray.
4- god gives justice in the afterlife
evil doesnt really refute the existence of a personal god. i never use that argument, i have much better refutations of theism
If God is omnipotent, then it must be possible for God to create a world that has free will, and no evil, no?
Quoting Tzeentch
It's sufficient for the evil to exist in our own minds. Whether or not the evil is illusory, the suffering it causes is real.
:up:
creation is not omnipotent. it is finite and limited, and therefore may not be perfectible for that reason. material creation creates a bottleneck upon omnipotence.
Quoting Echarmion
if god changed your thoughts then he would violate your freedom. you have to take responsibility for it yourself and learn and grow a person. which is part of gods plan for you.
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im not promoting theism im just saying your points are flawed
That's contradictory. If you argue that some things just cannot be done, you have to drop the "omni" in "omnipotent".
Quoting OmniscientNihilist
God doesn't need to change my thoughts. God just needs to set up the world so that my thoughts cannot cause harm. God can make a plan that works without anyone suffering.
there is a difference between real omnipotence and magic
if you use magical thinking then god can do anything even make a square circle
if you use real omnipotence then he cant make a square circle because its illogical
even an omnipotent being would still be limited by the factors of the creation he setup, he cannot contradict his own creation. otherwise it just pure magic, which is just nonsense magical thinking
any creation, no matter which it is, will have limitations of some kinds somewhere. it can never attain the fake perfection of the idealist.
what your asking may be nothing more then words in your mind that are impossible in real existence. like a square circle, its just two words put together, it cannot exist outside of words.
also your wanting creation to be like heaven. creation is deliberately not heaven. (in the christian story)
god himself is said to be all-good. not things outside him, like you or creation etc... god himself will not directly do evil to you ever, or that would contradict his nature.
So the first problem here is that "logical" is a property of propositions, not of things. Logic doesn't tell reality how to behave.
The second problem is that you haven't established why it is illogical to have a world with free will but without evil.
Quoting OmniscientNihilist
Everything that includes omnipotent gods is nonsense magical thinking. That's actually the reason the problem of evil is so intractable.
Anyways if the setup is too limiting, just create a different setup.
Quoting OmniscientNihilist
How do you know that?
Quoting OmniscientNihilist
You have this backwards. If your words don't describe reality, your words are wrong, not the other way around.
gods plan is the bigger picture, it does not include every single little detail, it does not include every little choice you make down here on this tiny planet. and therefore they can be compatible in that way.
or it does include every possibility and accounts for it within the plan. so some variation is allowed and accounted for.
The idea of free will and God’s will are contradictory. If the universe is God’s will, God’s plan, we do not have free will. If we do have free will, the universe is not God’s plan, not God’s will. How can we be evil if God has a plan for us? Etc.
The forum seems to have eaten your answer to me, and your answer to Nosferatu is now actually in front of his post.
Ask your professor his personal views on omnipotence. And ask him if in history there were other theologians & philosophers who struggled with the concept of evil viz Omni-x3.
For example, theist/philosopher's St Thomas and Epicurus struggled with that very same reconciliation (of evil/omnipotence). Accordingly, modern-day Process Theology provides for a more plausible explaination.
As a Christian Existentialist, I certainly recommend you continue to ask questions and explore all information available to you in researching the topic. However, keep in mind that no one has a complete explaination relative to understanding God's nature.
As other's have suggested here, you don't have to believe in Omnipotence to be a Christian.
Omnipotent G/g (OG/g): For Shits & Giggles as if I didn't exist or give a fuck, Let's Not create the best of all possible worlds. :fire: :eyes:
From this, I recognize a response for the evidential argument from evil also discussed in class, which is to what extent God owes us anything. Also, the idea that if God where to stop a gratuitous evil, does a positive good ultimately stem from that, or does evil still occur. God could prevent that one gratuitous evil, but that does not mean that another evil slightly lesser or nearly equivalent would occur. Even if it where to occur, perhaps God had slightly more of a reason to allow the gratuitous evil, then to not allow it at all. From there, God could always prevent another evil from being slightly less evil, but then where would it end?
I believe your argument follows as :
1. God is the greatest possible being.
2. If one is capable they should ensure that gratuitous evils do not exist.
3. God is capable thus he should end gratuitous evils.
My argument : against premise 2
1. God allows gratuitous evils.
2. Gratuitous evils should be stopped if they emit a positive good.
3. There is no evidence that stopping a gratuitous evil emits a positive good.
4. God should not stop gratuitous evils (2,3).
That doesn't help the people who are suffering.
Quoting LizNH
Stopping a gratuitous evil "emits" a good by definition.
Understanding the nature of something is the first step in overcoming it. If people do not wish to understand, that is their choice.
The only plausible argument is that he made Evil for some unseen benefit - to us or God. The argument for the ‘pet’ is a little silly as far as I can see because it basically says ‘life is dull without evil’. So God was bored and sadistic by creating Evil.
If I was to argue for a ‘logical’ answer I’d go for Evil being a necessary contrast needed to feel Good. I still don’t see how that would excuse a child dying in agony of bone cancer though. If God preferred the Good why torture innocent children? Washing his hands of us is either due to his own short coming as a ruler of humanity or something done out of some twisted sadistic amusement.
Or maybe God isn’t the creator and ruler of everything. Maybe God did create humanity and the universe but sadly God was naive/arrogant in assuming Evil was Good for us. Of course anyone could simply say ‘have faith’ and be done with it. Fair enough. Personally I don’t buy into it but I certainly cannot see how anyone can logically say Evil is good AND God is all powerful - if so then God is necessarily Evil (knowingly creating and torturing lesser beings).
Oh, so what are the other steps towards overcoming, say, loosing your family in an earthquake?
Since one cannot change past events, the only rational mental end state is acceptance, which coincidentally is also commonly seen as the last stage of grief. The faster we can accept past events, the faster the grief they inflict can be overcome. However, in situations like these our emotional responses often interfere with the process of acceptance. The loss of a loved one can come as a great mental shock. Why?
Because of one's attachment and one's perception of loss.
Attachment to material things, including people and indeed one's own life, is the source of most if not all of man's suffering. Since all that is material is fleeting, loss of these things is unavoidable, and attachment to these things is irrational. By attaching ourselves to things which one will unavoidably lose, one is setting themselves up to suffer. Sadly, we live in a world in which a deeply materialistic worldview is almost universally perpetuated.
Furthermore, when one loses a loved one many will, consciously or unconsciously, make the assumption that they will never see them again. This assumption, whatever the basis may be, is irrational, since no one knows what happens after a person dies. Making the assumption that death is the end, regardless of how well-informed one thinks it is, is a choice, and once again one has created their own suffering.
Take a child's toy and it may cry, for it was attached to the toy. It therefore suffers.
Skip forward one hour and look at the child. It is no longer crying. Why? The past hasn't changed and its toy was still taken. The child has moved on and is thinking about something else. It no longer suffers.
Not necessarily. Some methods of ‘stopping evil’ contribute greatly to suffering. War, for instance, does not ‘emit a good’.
One could argue that war contributes to evil instead of stopping it. Fighting suffering with suffering does not stop suffering, fighting fear with fear does not stop fear, ..., love does. Good spreads as evil shrinks and vice versa.
That’s the one thing I disagree with in Buddhism. While I agree with the idea that attachment to desire leads to suffering, how can there be love without attachment to life? If some powerful force wants to cause suffering and destroy all life, are we supposed to watch it happen and be content that we are not suffering because we are not attached to anything? And then beauty and love and happiness will be gone, is it worth it to give up all that just to avoid suffering?
And then, isn’t it that the root cause of suffering is not attachment to desire, but loss itself, separation? Becoming detached is a way to cope with loss, but what if loss is not a fatality but something caused by an evil that really exists beyond one’s mind? Then seeing loss as an unavoidable fact of existence would be blinding ourselves to this evil and be left with two options: suffer, or be detached from love and from life.
To the question of how to deal with destructive forces, I would tend towards a "turn the other cheek" approach. The assumption is that all men are Good in essence, but are corrupted by their material existence. By giving the right example one may cause them to see the error of their ways. An "eye for an eye" or "fight fire with fire" approach are fundamentally flawed as solutions, though.
However, understanding attachment and the cause of suffering doesn't mean one may never act to preserve something, like in the act of self-defense. One would simply have to accept the suffering that may come along with such an act.
Lastly, I would disagree that loss or separation is the root cause of suffering, since without attachment there is no sense of loss or separation.
But that still means the grief exists. It's real. We wouldn't talk about "overcoming" a mere fiction. So in the context of this thread, the question is why is there grief in the first place? Why aren't people born perfect Buddhists?
Quoting Tzeentch
From the perspective of an omniscient and omnipotent God, there are no natural events. Every event, and every consequence of every event, is intentional.
That's begging the question though. If war contributes greatly to suffering, is it "stopping evil"?
:chin: Arbitrary, yeah, but not necessarily deliberate ... (of course, "from a certain point of view" :smirk: ).
We could debate the exact debarkation between intentional negligence and deliberate harm here, but for the purposes of theodicy, the distinction is moot.
What the story about the child is supposed to illustrate is that grief and suffering are illusory in nature. When one stops thinking about them, they stop to exist.
Quoting Echarmion
Who says they aren't?
Quoting Echarmion
Terms like "omniscient", "omnibenevolent", "omnipotent", they are paradoxical in nature and make little sense to me. Though, I don't believe a "creator" necessarily needs to be any of those three things.
But the story doesn't illustrate that. The feelings the child has are real. So are the memories of the event.
Quoting Tzeentch
I think the world would look very different if they were.
Quoting Tzeentch
I do agree with that. All three "omnis" are incoherent. Nevertheless, that's the Christian doctrine the "problem of evil addresses".
No - and yet ‘stopping evil’ is so often presented as a reason to go to war, or to hate, isolate, exclude, ignore, or otherwise act in a way that may cause suffering - isn’t it? The point is, we assume that because our intention is to ‘stop evil’, that we are doing something ‘good’ by definition. It’s usually only after the fact that we acknowledge it wasn’t good, after all.
:wink: :up:
(Consistent with reality ravaged by gratuitous, pointless suffering, the JCI g/G is either a sadist or a fiction, no?)
5 - there is no evil from God's point of view
This might just be my free will allowing me to disagree with god, but if I were god I would rather have the rock. As a god, one that I assume has a plan, I would rather put that plan into action in a way that is likely to succeed and not backfire. Adding unpredictable elements to my grand scheme would only add the unknown, eliminating a perceived advantage of being a god (to be all knowing). The only way I would prefer a horse over a rock is if the horse's free will was required for part of the plan.
If my plan requires that part of it may be evil, and I allow that willingly, am I good or evil?
Yes I agree that one can love without attachment, however what I ultimately meant is that if we aren’t attached to love and to life, destructive forces could destroy life and love, and then ultimately there wouldn’t be love anymore.
I agree that the approaches “an eye for an eye” and “fight fire with fire” are fundamentally flawed, but the approach “turn the other cheek” is only valid if as you say the assumption that all men are Good in essence is true, or to put it in another way if Good is necessarily more powerful than destructive forces, or if turning the other cheek necessarily leads destructive forces to eventually stop being destructive. But is that really true?
Rather I would say there are plenty of examples of people who have turned the other cheek and who were simply destroyed, and then we say that these people were too weak for this world. Turning the other cheek is not enough to stop destructive forces, Good needs to be strong as well, not wanting to hurt but not always turning the other cheek, Good needs to stand its ground and say no to destructive forces, in order for Good to spread.
And so to me the “being detached” and the “turning the other cheek” approaches miss an important part of the picture. Loving while being detached so as to never suffer makes love vulnerable to destructive forces. Loving while turning the other cheek also makes love vulnerable to destructive forces. In fact I would say in both cases one attempts to be detached from suffering, while not working on protecting love. Love doesn’t just need to be given, it also needs to be protected in order to not be destroyed.
And then while being completely detached allows to avoid suffering, that doesn’t imply that attachment is the root cause of suffering, because if there were no destructive forces then one wouldn’t need to be detached in order to avoid suffering. Rather, these destructive forces are the root cause of suffering, because if they weren’t there then there would be no loss or separation. Destructive forces aren’t only found within men, they are also found in Nature, but there are also forces in Nature that work to protect life. What if then the struggle between Good and destructive forces that plays out among men and among life also plays out in Nature? What if Nature is not moved by eternal Laws but by Wills that are in constant struggle, with one Will attempting to protect and spread life and another opposite Will attempting to destroy life? Cannot we make sense of everything by seeing things that way?