The argument against "evil", theists please come to the defense.

[Mystic]

Virtues aren't necessary, but perhaps they are a worthy goal, and are a greater good? Specially given at the end of it, will be peace forever.

I wrote my response btw given to what some Theists said in another thread on another forum. I didn't have this answer before hand.

---

I'm going to make a thread on other forums about the issue of why God has the right to kill innocents, but not humans. I don't have the answer as of now.

[Epimethean]

The issue of why a hypothetical deity would of necessity be purely good is a good one to raise, and it points up our need for the irreality of utopias. A far more believable skydaddy would have some mean in him, like a bit of spiked nectar, and enjoy cavorting with the ladies.

Hey, Zeus ...

[genkaus]

The argument is not stating all suffering is incompatible with a benevolent creator. It's stating some of suffering is unnecessary and doesn't bring about a greater good. Example, multiple personalities.

I don't believe "since sufferring exists, then benevolent creator does not", that's too general. Neither do I believe the argument "There is too much sufferring..." because that is too subjective.

What I'm stating is that it seems, that some suffering is unnecessary for the system to bring about a greater good (character building) and doesn't do so.

I think think this is a stronger version of the argument, and classical theodicy doesn't address it.

That doesn't tell me how you determine unnecessary suffering or the greater good.

[Oldandeasilyconfused]

Because they haven't truly accepted Jesus as their personal saviour?

Umm,OK. What about children who are too young to accept Jesus, or the millions who have never heard of Jesus?

I'd better not start on the fatuous arrogance of Christian exclusivity.

[Mystic]

I thought a new premise is that along with character building, is that there is want of variation of experiences in character building, and this is why you have different things that achieve similar goodness, but can be achieved by something else.

This can be for to have a more enriching sentient life experience. Gazillion years from now, the different experiences, will be legacies to remember, and the more diversity there is, the more enriching the experience. I say sentient life, because I'm inclined to believe there is sentient life like ours due to God's grace, and if not in this universe, then certainly in other universes. This belief is in likelihood, it's not belief in a sure manner, but I'm inclined towards this and see it very likely.

Diversity in experiences is cool, everyone with opportunity to have their unique story. Different "evils" to bring different character building.

---

The problem so far with the Theodicy I am presenting is the issue of seemingly special pleading to God with no reason given why. I will try to get a response from theists on other forums about this issue.

[Ryantology]

We could have been made so that we innately have all the character we need. An all-powerful being doesn't need to be that amazingly circumspect in influencing human behavior when he is supposed to have no limit to his abilities.

For an all-powerful creator, any suffering of any kind is avoidable and the fact of its existence indicates either sloppiness or malevolence on the part of God. Of course, the latter seems to be the case as he damned Adam and Eve and all descendant mankind with hardship and pain in response to what seems to be a jackass temptation on God's part to see what the humans will do if he draws attention to it and prohibits their access to it.

The true Problem of Evil for the religions of Yahweh is how one can read the God of the Old Testament and not see a being of psychotic jealousy and murderous spite, in other words the modern classical interpretation of evil.

[Mystic]

We could have been made so that we innately have all the character we need.

Perhaps (and seemingly to me), this is impossible. We can be created as saints/angel like, but we couldn't have gone through the struggle, and earned value from struggle, and built character in this sense.

I don't think the value that comes out of free-will, and character building, can come out by being automatically given this characteristic.

We can see for example, in Islam, Angels are hardly given that much value, and it's said the human is of much better value if he is righteous. Angels are like robots, don't struggle against the choice of evil, while humans do. We have to struggle against our greed to be charitable, we have to learn to forgive those whom do wrong to us while spite is the natural feelings.

I think giving the value of character building is impossible. It must be earned and striven for.

[Ryantology]

Perhaps (and seemingly to me), this is impossible. We can be created as saints/angel like, but we couldn't have gone through the struggle, and earned value from struggle, and built character in this sense.

I don't think the value that comes out of free-will, and character building, can come out by being automatically given this characteristic.

Then, this betrays God's inadequacy. If he were better at his job, he could invent a universe where character building is unnecessary for a person to be mentally well-adjusted. He would not allow it that people randomly suffer far more for no deserving reason.

For the general concept of God, nothing should be impossible. If he wants things to be any kind of way, he only need will it to be, as he is said to have created the universe. God neglected to prevent the existence of suffering, and if he is all-knowing, then he did it on purpose.

[Mystic]

Then, this betrays God's inadequacy. If he were better at his job, he could invent a universe where character building is unnecessary for a person to be mentally well-adjusted. He would not allow it that people randomly suffer far more for no deserving reason.

This seems rather circular. I'm stating it's possible character building is a worthy goal in itself, not for the sake of being well-adjusted, but as a goal, and that suffering in relationship to endless peace and non-sufferring, is a worthy sacrifice for any thing that adds to the human experience of character building. It can be argued some evils are redundant, in that other evils achieve that good anyways, but I argued that there can be benevolent want of diversing human character building character for legacy in the future, enriching human experience as a whole, everyone with their cool story to tell (if they built their character honourably). In fact, I extended this to sentient life in general. It gives more options to free-will and character building.

[fr0d0]

If diseases are for a greater in good for humanity, we should not want to cure them.
We should want to cure them.
Therefore diseases are not for a greater good for humanity.

Did we answer this one yet? (apologies I can't be bothered to read all of this thread)

Humanity serves it's own ends. This question fails to address religion as religion covers more than humanity. The greater good =/= the greater good for humanity.