The Problem Of Evil - Philosophy Flashcards
Natural Evil
Evil that results from the workings of the natural world e.g Natural disasters and disease
God designed and created the natural world, making Him seem responsible for the evil and suffering that occurs in nature
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This is a problem for God’s existence because God could have designed a world without natural evil
Moral evil
Evil caused by human action, such as murder or rape
There are infamous examples throughout history of evil actions on a mass scale, such as the holocaust
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This is a problem for God’s existence because why doesn’t God intervene to prevent these things
The Logical Problem of Evil - Epicurus
This is an apriori argument that evil and the God of classical theism cannot exist together
Epicurus was an Ancient Greek philosopher and was the first to formulate this problem
1) Is God willing but not able to prevent evil? Then he isn’t omnipotent
2) Is God is able to prevent evil but not willing? Then he isn’t omnibenevolent
3) If God is both able and willing, then why is there evil?
4) If God is neither able or willing then why call him God?
Logical Problem of Evil - Inconsistent Triad (Mackie)
All three Omni qualities cannot exist with evil also existing and so God doesn’t exist
P1. An omnipotent God has the power to eliminate evil.
P2. An omnibenevolent God has the motivation to eliminate evil.
P3. Nothing can exist if there is a being with the power and motivation to eliminate it.
C1. Evil, omnipotence and omnibenevolence thus form an inconsistent triad such that God (as classically defined) and evil cannot possibly co-exist.
SOMETIMES DEVELOPED TO BE APOSTERIORI
P4. Evil exists because we experience it in the world
C2. Therefore God does not exist
Evidential Problem of Evil - Hume
Aposteriori - doesn’t try to claim that evil logically disproves God but rather sees it as evidence against His existence
Aposteriori suffering that Hume points out:
1 – Animal suffering. Why shouldn’t nature be created such that animals feel less pain, or indeed no pain at all?
2 – Creatures have limited abilities to ensure their survival and happiness
3 – Why does nature have extremes which make survival and happiness more difficult? Natural evil
4 – Why doesn’t God intervene to prevent individual natural disasters?
Hume says it’s possible that a perfect God allows evil, but there reasons ‘are unknown to us’ - he argues that whatever speculations theologians like Augustine and Irenaeus might invent about God’s reasons for allowing evil, we have no evidence that He has such reasons
Summary of Evidential Problem of Evil
P1. We are only justified in believing what the evidence suggests (empiricism).
P2. We only have evidence of imperfection (a world with both good and evil).
C1. We are only justified in believing that imperfection exists.
C2. So, belief in a perfectly good being is not justified.
A defender of God against this argument must not show only a logically possible reason for God’s allowance of evil, but they must show there is good evidence for thinking that it’s not merely possible but actually true
Original Sin (Augustine)
The first sin that Adam and Eve committed resulted in a corruption in humanity, spread through the loins of Adam (as we were all ‘seminally present in the loins of Adam’)
Thus, all humanity is corrupted forever
How does Augustine see Evil
Not a property itself, but rather a ‘privation of good’ - as humans fell away from God (The Fall), we fell away from his goodness, resulting in what we mistakenly call ‘evil’
Evil has no ‘positive existence’, similar to darkness, where it is an absence of a thing rather than a thing by itself
Free Will Defence - Plantinga
Intended to respond to Mackie:
He argues that it is possible for God and evil to coexist because evil is the result of free will
Moral evil results from human actions and Plantinga says it’s logically possible for natural evil to result from:
1) The free will of Demons and Satan
2) The free will of Adam and Eve justifying God in allowing natural evil into the world as punishment
Plantinga claims that free will gives life and the universe value, and so we must accept that our universe is better for having value (free will) despite the downsides (evil)
Summary of the Free Will Defence
P1. Evil is the result of the misuse of free will.
P2. God cannot remove evil without removing free will (that would be logically impossible).
P3. Life would be valueless without free will, so it is better to have free will despite the evil its misuse can lead to.
C1. It is therefore better for evil to exist than not to.
C2. An omnibenevolent and omnipotent God therefore would allow evil.
So, a perfect God would allow evil
Strength of Augustine’s theodicy against the Logical Problem of Evil
It does seem logically possible that God allows evil because it is either sin (moral) or punishment for sin (natural) or the work of satanice energies (natural)
Also, Augustine doesn’t argue we are responsible for Adam and Eve’s actions but rather that a factual consequence of Adam’s sin was that all future humanity became infected with original sin and thus deserve punishment
we deserve punishment for being sinful beings
Weakness of Augustine’s theodicy
Pelagian Controversy -
Followers of Pelagius objected that Adam’s crime is not a personal crime of his descendants - thus it remains incompatible with omnibenevolence to suggest we deserve punishment
Example:
It’s difficult to maintain that a child deserves cancer (natural evil as a punishment) because it has original sin. Augustine would have to say it is God’s justice for that child to get cancer and God is still omnibenevolent despite allowing it - seems logically inconsistent
Evaluation defending Augustine’s theodicy
It may seem unfair, but Augustine puts it down to the ‘secret yet just judgement of God’, indicating the epistemic distance but declaring that we should have faith that justice is served
Augustine points to Psalm 25:10: ‘All the paths of the Lord are mercy and truth’ and concludes: ‘Neither can his grace be unjust, nor his justice cruel’
Furthermore, children suffering from natural evil could be as a result of the work of demons
Evaluation criticising Augustine’s theodicy
The case of innocent children suffering natural evil destroys Augustine’s argument - he can maintain that adults deserve natural evil; he still thinks giving in to original sin (i.e concupiscence) is a choice
However he cannot argue this about small children, too young to choose to sin - there is no logically coherent way to claim that small children deserve to suffer
A strength of Augustine’s original sin from empirical evidence
G.K. Chesterton made the point that you can see evidence for original sin ‘in the street’.
R. Niebuhr said original sin was the one ‘empirically verifiable’ Christian doctrine
When Augustine was 16, he and his friends stole some pears. What Augustine found remarkable was that upon reflection, he realised he did not steal them because he was hungry (threw them away) - he concluded he did it just for the pleasure of sinning