“The Problem of Evil” in atheism and in Islam

[Esquilax]

Here the use of Tu Quoque is a twisting of a logical fact. I am not very fond of fallacy games. If you have contradictory ideas then better you expose them rather hiding behind fancy terms.

It's simple: you said that the problem of evil was a self refuting argument, because atheism has no rational basis for making it. But atheism isn't the only position from whence that argument can come and, regardless, "I don't have an answer to the problem but neither do you," cannot be classified as a rebuttal. "Tu coque" literally means "you too," and the point of it is that simply pointing out that somebody else also has a problem with a given argument doesn't suddenly mean that you don't.

An atheist before Darwin could have said, following Hume: "I have no explanation for complex biological design. All I know is that God isn't a good explanation, so we must wait and hope that somebody comes up with a better one." I can't help feeling that such a position, though logically sound, would have left one feeling pretty unsatisfied, and that although atheism might have been logically tenable before Darwin, DARWIN MADE IT POSSIBLE TO BE AN INTELLECTUALLY FULFILLED ATHEIST.
The Blind Watchmaker (1986), page 6

“I BECAME INCREASINGLY AWARE THAT DARWINIAN EVOLUTION WAS A POWERFULLY AVAILABLE ALTERNATIVE TO MY CREATOR GOD as an explanation of the beauty and apparent design of life. ... It wasn’t long then before I became strongly and militantly atheistic.”
Richard Dawkins speaks during the National Atheist Organization's 'Reason Rally' in 2012 in Washington DC.

This is completely irrelevant to what you quoted.

Dawkins is one of the most ardent defender of the Theory of Evolution. On top of that he is a well know scientist.

Once a journalist asked him,

“Can you give an example of a genetic mutation or an evolutionary process which can be seen to increase the information in the genome?”

That question caused a total blackout in Dawkins’ mind, he was unspeakable for about 30 seconds of the recorded time, and he was forced to request the operator to stop recording. After a while, he came up with a mumbo jumbo that signified nothing.

You are most welcome if you wish to answer the same question.

Wouldn't happen to have a link to this claim you've made, would you?

As to the question, it won't take me thirty seconds to come up with an answer, because I can do it instantly: Nylonase. Here we have a strain of bacteria that was unable to digest nylon, which makes sense because nylon only came into existence in 1935. Over time, under laboratory conditions, the bacteria evolved the capability to digest nylon; this is an entirely new ability for them, something that did not exist in prior generations, and did in successive ones. It is, by all definitions, an increase of information.

Maybe also look up "Italian Wall Lizards," as when a population of them was introduced to a remote island and returned to later, the descendants had evolved entirely new structures in their digestive tract to deal with the differing food source there; if the evolution of whole new organ structures isn't an increase in information, I don't know what is.

Mutation is the changing of the structure of a gene, resulting in a variant form, which may be transmitted to subsequent generations, caused by the alteration of single base units in DNA, or the deletion, insertion, or rearrangement of larger sections of genes or chromosomes.

In essence, mutation causes individual genes to be changed according to some PROBABILISTIC rule and can take many forms. For chromosomes that are binary strings, mutation occurs simply by CHANGING THE GENE AT RANDOMLY CHOSEN POSITIONS.

If you have doubt in my words then you are free to consult any specialist in the field.

The initial mutations are random, but they exist in an environment, as part of a whole organism. Those mutations that survive and persist will have done so as a result of being capable of surviving both of those factors, which in a sense guide the mutations down a path that allows the organism to live. The mutations you actually observe in animals, the ones you know about, are not random because of this.

Wow! That is something new. Perhaps, then you also know the PROCESSES of The Natural Selection! I hope you would not refuse to share with us your valuable information on the mechanics of Natural Selection.

Just keep in mind what ONE GREAT PROFESSIONAL is saying:

“Natural selection, the blind, unconscious, automatic process which Darwin discovered, and which we now know is the explanation for the existence and apparently purposeful form of all life has no purpose in mind. It has no mind and no mind’s eye. It does not plan for the future. It has no vison, no foresight, and no sight at all.”
Page 5
The Blind Watchmaker
Richard Dawkins.

Dawkins is right; natural selection is not conscious. But it does still provide a framework in which evolution must occur. It's a guide in the sense that the sea currents are a guide; the ocean isn't conscious, but you still aren't randomly tossed about in the waves, as there are currents that take you along defined paths, even if those paths weren't specially carved by an intelligence.

I totally agree with you here. However, the structure of mind evolved because of the information stored in the genes so what is consciousness if it is not a function of physical mind.

Are you asserting that functions of physical objects can never become complex enough to transcend simplistic physical programming? Do you have any evidence for that assertion?

To make the PoE a rational argument God is required to be a rational basis for objective good and evil.

Without God, which transcends human subjectivity, these terms are relative as there is no conceptual anchor. So the terms evil and good make no sense or are just ephemeral without God. Therefore, in order to make objective sense, existence of God is the necessity.

Reality also transcends human subjectivity; why are you excluding reality as a conceptual anchor?

Alvin Plantinga had given a moral argument that goes like this:

1. If God did not exist, then objective moral values would not exist
2. Evil exists
3. Therefore objective moral values exists (from premise 2)
4. Therefore, God exists

Page 7
God, Freedom and Evil
William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company. 1977

Was premise 2 ever demonstrated? Or premise 1, for that matter? I don't see much need to respond to an argument for which the two premises are mere assertions, made without justification.

Here you are trying to compare unconscious and mechanical functionality of Natural Selection with the Consciousness and Free Will of God and man.

No, I'm not. I'm trying to say that if I'm trying to argue against a position someone else holds, my argument needs to take into account the things that other person actually believes, to show why those beliefs are wrong. There'd be no point in formulating an argument that begins by presuming the position I'm trying to prove is true.

If “morality, constructed not from secret god knowledge” then the alternate you are left with is the Natural Selection. However, Natural Selection is not producing people by means of some conscious act. How comes insentient Natural Selection is creating sentient beings? Whether human consciousness is not the product of Natural Selection or Natural Selection is a conscious being. Natural Selection cannot be conscious and unconscious at the same time. Absurd!

Why start with a false dichotomy like that? Just because you demand that there's only one alternative other than god, doesn't mean that's automatically true.