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The Problem of Evil, Christians, and Inconsistency
#31
RE: The Problem of Evil, Christians, and Inconsistency
Judges 9:23

Then God sent an evil spirit between Abimelech and the men of Shechem; and the men of Shechem dealt treacherously with Abimelech.

How you gonna spin that one? Hmm.

God creates evil, screws with free will and incites treachery all in one sentence.

For his amusement?
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#32
RE: The Problem of Evil, Christians, and Inconsistency
(September 4, 2014 at 1:53 pm)orangebox21 Wrote: Please defend your knowledge claim that: 'God's will is unable to oversee the abolition of grotesque evil in the world.'
I'm sure you're familiar with the quandary Epicurus (I believe it was) formulated; God may be able to abolish grotesque evil but as he evidently chooses not to, his omnibenevolence loses its essential character. You might hold it out on faith that all forms of evil serve a greater purpose, and are necessary for his grand aims, but then this God also begins to appear much weaker than often proclaimed because if omnipotent, evil would not be any requirement to achieve whatever purpose the deity wills.

Quote:What is meant by 'best-of-all-possible-worlds? Please explain this premise.

Who is making the argument that a world in which our wills are limited would necessitate a less than best-of-all-possible-world?
Pretty classic argument in philosophy/theology, popularized by Leibniz: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Best_of_all...ble_worlds
He who loves God cannot endeavour that God should love him in return - Baruch Spinoza
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#33
RE: The Problem of Evil, Christians, and Inconsistency
(September 5, 2014 at 1:02 pm)Pickup_shonuff Wrote: I'm sure you're familiar with the quandary Epicurus (I believe it was) formulated; God may be able to abolish grotesque evil but as he evidently chooses not to, his omnibenevolence loses its essential character.

So that I can understand your argument, how are you defining omnibenevolence?

The hidden assumption in the above quandary is that having the power to do something necessitates doing it.


Here is a good discussion of the problem of evil as an argument against God.


(September 5, 2014 at 1:02 pm)Pickup_shonuff Wrote: You might hold it out on faith that all forms of evil serve a greater purpose, and are necessary for his grand aims, but then this God also begins to appear much weaker than often proclaimed because if omnipotent, evil would not be any requirement to achieve whatever purpose the deity wills.
You've asserted that evil may both serve a greater purpose and are necessary of for God's grand aims. It is true that I may hold out on faith that evil is not needless, in that it may serve a purpose. I don't know that I agree that evil is necessary. Just because something is 'not needless' does that necessitate that it is necessary?
(September 5, 2014 at 1:02 pm)Pickup_shonuff Wrote:
Quote:What is meant by 'best-of-all-possible-worlds? Please explain this premise.

Who is making the argument that a world in which our wills are limited would necessitate a less than best-of-all-possible-world?
Pretty classic argument in philosophy/theology, popularized by Leibniz: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Best_of_all...ble_worlds
If God chooses to create, freely by His will, does that necessitate that He would create the best-of-all-possible-worlds?

Secondly, let me think aloud a bit.

An eternal world is a better world than a non-eternal world.
The world we live in is not an eternal world.
Therefore the world we live in is not the best-of-all-possible-worlds.

Theologically speaking and to the best of my knowledge I'm not sure the Bible teaches that the created world is the best-of-all-possible-worlds. It says the world was created 'good'. Does good mean best?

If it could be proven beyond doubt that God exists...
and that He is the one spoken of in the Bible...
would you repent of your sins and place your faith in Jesus Christ?



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#34
RE: The Problem of Evil, Christians, and Inconsistency
(September 7, 2014 at 3:23 pm)orangebox21 Wrote: So that I can understand your argument, how are you defining omnibenevolence?
Wholly good, "good" as a term that is not simply honorific and arbitrary, but also has some meaningful relationship to human conceptions of goodness, which typically (at least according to Kant as I get the impression) involves the notions of happiness and virtue.

Quote:The hidden assumption in the above quandary is that having the power to do something necessitates doing it.
That's not a hidden assumption at all; it's part and parcel with the conception of the highest (or whole and complete) goodness, that if you have it within your power to relieve a person's suffering (which in this instance you're at the very least indirectly responsible for causing), and choose not to, for no apparently good (that is, rational, or internally consistent) reason, your quality of character is less than the highest conceivable good.

The free will defense was already shown to be unsatisfactory in the OP, so I don't really get the point of your restatement of it.

Quote:You've asserted that evil may both serve a greater purpose and are necessary of for God's grand aims. It is true that I may hold out on faith that evil is not needless, in that it may serve a purpose. I don't know that I agree that evil is necessary. Just because something is 'not needless' does that necessitate that it is necessary?
If it is not necessary, and it wouldn't be for an omnipotent deity who has no obligation to causal relations, then you're talking about gratuitous, capricious evil, evil that is neither required nor demanded by God to achieve whatever purpose he might will and yet allowed to continue on anyhow.

Quote:If God chooses to create, freely by His will, does that necessitate that He would create the best-of-all-possible-worlds?

Secondly, let me think aloud a bit.

An eternal world is a better world than a non-eternal world.
The world we live in is not an eternal world.
Therefore the world we live in is not the best-of-all-possible-worlds.

Theologically speaking and to the best of my knowledge I'm not sure the Bible teaches that the created world is the best-of-all-possible-worlds. It says the world was created 'good'. Does good mean best?
Yet you would have us 1) find compatiblity between and 2) infer the best-of-all-possible-gods, or the something of which nothing greater can be conceived, with and from a world that resembles nothing of the sort?
He who loves God cannot endeavour that God should love him in return - Baruch Spinoza
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#35
RE: The Problem of Evil, Christians, and Inconsistency
Pickup_shonuff's Original Post Wrote:"But, ah!" the Christian is likely to retort, "in heaven, we choose to be good all the time! Our freedom is not impugned because we have made our choice on earth, since that is the purpose of our free will here, that it allows us to choose God, and that makes heaven an even better possible domain to dwell in! Therefore, no one in heaven will want to do evil!"

Well, if that was offered as a rebuttal, then I would respond, "Why couldn't God have made Earth like that?" After all, if a logical state can exist where people can a.) know for a fact that God exists, b.) have free will, and c.) only choose to do good, then clearly you can have free will without having evil exist! This is about as close to an Achilles' heel for the free will defense as one can find.
Luke: You don't believe in the Force, do you?

Han Solo: Kid, I've flown from one side of this galaxy to the other, and I've seen a lot of strange stuff, but I've never seen *anything* to make me believe that there's one all-powerful Force controlling everything. 'Cause no mystical energy field controls *my* destiny. It's all a lot of simple tricks and nonsense.
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#36
RE: The Problem of Evil, Christians, and Inconsistency
(September 8, 2014 at 1:25 pm)StealthySkeptic Wrote:
Pickup_shonuff's Original Post Wrote:"But, ah!" the Christian is likely to retort, "in heaven, we choose to be good all the time! Our freedom is not impugned because we have made our choice on earth, since that is the purpose of our free will here, that it allows us to choose God, and that makes heaven an even better possible domain to dwell in! Therefore, no one in heaven will want to do evil!"

Well, if that was offered as a rebuttal, then I would respond, "Why couldn't God have made Earth like that?" After all, if a logical state can exist where people can a.) know for a fact that God exists, b.) have free will, and c.) only choose to do good, then clearly you can have free will without having evil exist! This is about as close to an Achilles' heel for the free will defense as one can find.
Exactly. I'm surprised that point isn't made more often. A) and B) taken alone don't pose any of the real difficulties that believers allege they would... as evidenced by numerous examples in their own holy books.
He who loves God cannot endeavour that God should love him in return - Baruch Spinoza
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#37
RE: The Problem of Evil, Christians, and Inconsistency
(September 8, 2014 at 1:25 pm)StealthySkeptic Wrote: ...if a logical state can exist where people can a.) know for a fact that God exists, b.) have free will, and c.) only choose to do good, then clearly you can have free will without having evil exist!
Free will in heaven is not even close to being a problem:

1) Only choosing to do good is an acquired habit not a compulsion.
2) Heaven has various levels (mansions) based on the amount of good someone is receiving at any given time.
3) Someone can exercise free will by choosing between various good actions.
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#38
RE: The Problem of Evil, Christians, and Inconsistency
(September 9, 2014 at 12:48 pm)ChadWooters Wrote: Free will in heaven is not even close to being a problem:

1) Only choosing to do good is an acquired habit not a compulsion.
2) Heaven has various levels (mansions) based on the amount of good someone is receiving at any given time.
3) Someone can exercise free will by choosing between various good actions.

Then why isn't earth that way? Why don't we only choose good actions?
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#39
RE: The Problem of Evil, Christians, and Inconsistency
(September 9, 2014 at 1:11 pm)RobbyPants Wrote: Then why isn't earth that way? Why don't we only choose good actions?
Better question...why don't you choose only good actions?

In all honesty, I don't understand the objection. Being virtuous is a skill, like any other skill, that improves with practice. It's like wanting to be good at anything else, like algebra. Once someone learns algebra do they then choose to be bad at it?
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#40
RE: The Problem of Evil, Christians, and Inconsistency
(September 9, 2014 at 4:41 pm)ChadWooters Wrote:
(September 9, 2014 at 1:11 pm)RobbyPants Wrote: Then why isn't earth that way? Why don't we only choose good actions?
Better question...why don't you choose only good actions?
Go to Amazon.
Buy 'The Selfish Gene' by Dawkins.
Read it.
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