"God has morally sufficient reasons for permitting evil"

[LostLocke]

I'm not talking about a god stopping human beings from doing evil things, I think that has been pretty much done and dusted, even if it's still questionable. I'm talking about natural suffering/evil, which is why I talked about malaria for example. The existence of just one unnecessary case of suffering logically contradicts any modern ideas of an all powerful deity, and I think malaria is the perfect example. Is it that hard for a god to make a world without these blatant issues? From what I can see, we're living in a universe which looks exactly how it should be if there were no god.

Don't things like malaria, cancer, and other diseases and natural causes of suffering just come the umbrella apology of "The Fall"?

I've heard often times that these are just the result of original sin, and the whole world being corrupted by it. Even though, it's hard to picture why other animals, plants, and even inanimate minerals would become corrupted by something that only involved two humans and a fallen angel.

But either way, these were things that never needed to be explained in the first place, since technically god didn't create them to start with.

[Zazzy]

Is suffering inherently evil?

It depends on the suffering. If I suffer to finish my dissertation, or to run a 5 minute mile, those are good things that I have chosen. Nobody should deprive me of those things. It's also not too terrible to suffer from a head cold or a broken arm. My parents will die, and I will suffer from that, but we all have to die. I have to die someday of something- these are the range of normal experiences.

If I suffer because a psycho kidnaps me and ties me up in his basement for 10 years and rapes me every day, it would be inexcusable not to intervene if you could.

There are many things that humans can and should take care of themselves- for instance, world hunger and millions of babies dying of treatable disease. But those are things we have only recently had the technology, and occasionally the will, to fix ourselves. For thousands of years, millions of people have lived short, brutal, agonizing lives because we didn't yet have the technology or the will to prevent that.

Just a note from God a few thousand years ago like- "Folks, mosquitoes carry malaria!," would have helped prevent boatloads of suffering for millenia. Or better yet, he could have NOT CREATED Plasmodium in the first place.

Suffering exists because shit happens. It's not evil in and of itself, unless you bring a god into the equation who could have made a world without Plasmodium. God is the psycho who ties you up in his basement.

[EgoRaptor]

One of the most popular apologist arguments seems to be that god created you, therefore he owns you & your life. This, to me, is a huge double standard. Are apologetics types not generally against abortion? Well in an abortion the mother not only had a part in the conception of the child, but the child also depends on the mother for survival. Man does not depend on god, so how you apply this standard to god but not to pregnant mothers? However, if we do apply this apologetics argument to parents, then they have the right to kill their children, as they created them & raised them. Oh, wait a second... the Bible does say it is okay for for parents to kill their children if they are snarky (something modern apologists seem to want us to forget).

[GodsRevolt]

So it is not the suffering that is evil, but the creation of suffering?

But what about people that bring suffering into their own lives for a greater good? Artists that suffer for their art. MLK suffered to get a message out. Immigrants suffer to bring a better life to themselves and their families. This is a kind of righteous suffering, isn't it? because it is justified?

So, if someone allowed you to suffer knowing that you would come out the other side a better person, would that justified? or evil? As a parent, I did this thing called "tummy time" with my babies when they were first born. You lay the child on the ground and the child gets a chance to work out muscles that will later help him/her to sit-up on their own and swallow. It is not the most pleasant time for the child and they mostly ended in crying out.

The baby would mostly likely be fine without "tummy time", i mean, I could have avoided the crying out if I had skipped it for my little ones, but they were able to start doing other things earlier because of it.

Humans are more that beings of reason. We have emotions and imaginations and desires, and they don't always go together. Sometimes our reason muscles are so strong we say no to emotional values "I'll never love again." Sometimes our desires get the best of us and we ignore our reason. And imagination is a flight all its own. Suffering, though not always a reasonable aspect of life, taps into our other strengths, reminds us that there is more to human life than what makes it a reasonable pursuit.

I'm sure you've heard, "nothing worth doing was ever easy." It would be reusable to live a life that was as easy as possible, doing enough to get by, but this is a flabby life. I don't know about you, but every funeral I have even been to, no matter how hard, always made me stronger. I always came out of the other side of my grieving with a different understanding. I could have ignored that grief, just accepted that people die, eh, just what happens, it only makes sense that Fred died, it was his time. But there is nothing gained in that. No muscle worked.

It is easy to criticize pain in the world when you do not see the end to it. If the only thing that exercise got you was tired then no one would do it.

Now, you'll call me an insensitive ass hole because I am basically saying that the little boy in Africa starving of food is justified suffering. But you misunderstand me. Because that little boy in his suffering triggers my emotions and makes me desire to help him. And my imagination figures out how to do it. The world of strict reason says, "Sucks to be you, but I cannot afford to leave my cushion right now." or maybe "Here's a few bucks, hope it helps."

Religion calls us to go further. To sacrifice and suffer for the little boy, with the little boy, because it taps in to the aspects of human nature that act outside of reason.

[Neo-Scholastic]

Pain is a given; suffering is optional.

[Simon Moon]

So, WITH God, suffering is evil.

What is it without God?

When there is an alleged deity that has the power to stop it, but doesn't.

Tsunamis are a perfect example. Either your god has the ability to prevent them, but doesn't. Which seems pretty evil to me.

Or he does not have the ability to stop them. Which makes him impotent.

Of he has a 'special plan', which is just apologists way of making excuses for his inaction.

Or he doesn't exist.

When there is not god, suffering is just an uncaring universe going about its business.

[Ryantology]

But what about people that bring suffering into their own lives for a greater good? Artists that suffer for their art.

Are they suffering as a conscious choice of their own? That doesn't meet the criteria for evil.

MLK suffered to get a message out.Immigrants suffer to bring a better life to themselves and their families. This is a kind of righteous suffering, isn't it? because it is justified?

The perpetrators of the suffering, be it a racist society which discriminates on the basis of skin color, or a xenophobic and plutocratic society which exploits and discriminates against immigrants, which is evil.

So, if someone allowed you to suffer knowing that you would come out the other side a better person, would that justified? or evil? As a parent, I did this thing called "tummy time" with my babies when they were first born. You lay the child on the ground and the child gets a chance to work out muscles that will later help him/her to sit-up on their own and swallow. It is not the most pleasant time for the child and they mostly ended in crying out.

The baby would mostly likely be fine without "tummy time", i mean, I could have avoided the crying out if I had skipped it for my little ones, but they were able to start doing other things earlier because of it.

I think it's kind of reaching for an example when it's like this. Would you put your child through that if it wasn't necessary and/or had no benefit?

Now, you'll call me an insensitive ass hole because I am basically saying that the little boy in Africa starving of food is justified suffering. But you misunderstand me. Because that little boy in his suffering triggers my emotions and makes me desire to help him. And my imagination figures out how to do it. The world of strict reason says, "Sucks to be you, but I cannot afford to leave my cushion right now." or maybe "Here's a few bucks, hope it helps."

I'm sure it is a great relief to that child and his parents that his suffering and premature death helped in the character development of some relatively wealthy and privileged person half a world away.

Religion calls us to go further. To sacrifice and suffer for the little boy, with the little boy, because it taps in to the aspects of human nature that act outside of reason.

Religion glorifies a god who could have made the point, and achieved the same ends, without requiring the suffering and death of a child. That suffering and death is only a part of the equation because God designed it that way, and because God could have designed things any way he wanted, that means he did it that way on purpose.

If a human being attempted to improve the moral fiber of other people by intentionally starving a child to death, we'd call them a criminal. Why does God get a pass?

[Faith No More]

Religion calls us to go further. To sacrifice and suffer for the little boy, with the little boy, because it taps in to the aspects of human nature that act outside of reason.

So, essentially, that little boy's suffering is for your, and his, benefit. I wonder if you would feel that way if the positions were reversed?

Regardless, the religion that calls you to go further is also the religion that worships a god that supposedly set up the system in the first place. Could god not have created a way for us to grow as human beings both spiritually and intellectually without having suffering involved? The problem with the "growth from suffering" argument is that it fails to take into account that god is omnipotent and responsible for everything. So, if you want to use the argument that we grow from suffering, you have to acknowledge that god is the one that made it that way and that he could have made that same growth attainable without the pain brought on by suffering. Ultimately, you have to accept that suffering exists for the sake of suffering.

[Freedom of thought]

So, WITH God, suffering is evil.

What is it without God?

Implying that something can only be good or evil if a god exists. Why would adding a supernatural realm change anything? How would a god creating the universe, as opposed to the universe occurring naturally, make certain actions wrong? It's a non sequitur.

Even if I accept what you said, this doesn't address anything. Even if I cannot comment on what is right and wrong (which I can), I can still comment on suffering. And this problem is about suffering. I've already given an example of unnecessary suffering, so this god is ultimately logically incoherent, since a perfect and good omnipotent being would not have any unnecessary suffering in the world. You must either a) Prove malaria for example, does not cause unnecessary suffering. b) Reconcile this unnecessary suffering. The best way to do this is to removing a trait from god: Omniscience or omnipotence. But if you do this 'god' we were talking about is no longer a god.

[feeling]

The only moral justification for allowing evil to happen is that bigger evil will happen if small evil will not be allowed. However God was the one who created evil. And he is omnipotent therefore can prevent evil altogether at any moment. Then what justification he has for any kind of evil? None.