The Problem of Evil (XXVII)

[Mister Agenda]

So really you are making the claim that God should not permit suffering as a result of natural disaster and it is illogical that an omnibenevolent God would do so. What "ought not be" "ought not be permitted". I am confused on a particular point: do you think God should prevent all natural "disasters", just those that harm people, or miraculously save people during such an event?

It would be trivially easy for a theodic God to construct a world in which natural disasters didn't happen without sacrificing any benefits. We might not even know they were a possibility, but when the problem of evil came up, people could say, 'hey, it seems like all the suffering there is, is what we do to ourselves and each other'. The very notion that an omnipotent being can't construct a planet that is more hospitable or people who are more durable is laughable. To explain the problem of evil for a theodic God requires a justification for allowing pointless suffering, not quips like it's unreasonable to expect such a being to work miracles or take time out of his busy schedule to save us: miracles and time are supposed to be the hallmarks of a theodic God. You can never be too busy or too preoccupied for anything if you're omniscient and omnipotent.

Probability doesn't enter into it, the difficulty is in reconciling the existence of the God of theodicy with a universe that doesn't seem to be the kind of universe a theodic God would be expected to devise. You either have to cut a leg off the tripod of theodicy (God can be omnipotent, omniscient, or omnibenevolent; pick two), or there has to be a justification for seemingly pointless suffering that omnibenevolence requires, and omnipotence and omniscience can't get around.