tw1tch

Bizarre.

You could lift a stone ONLY IF no one was standing nearby...because you could drop it on that persons toe. So cooperation would not be an option (because evil may occur).

You could talk ONLY IF it was about noone in particular...because you could utter a lie or slander that person. So no media would exist.

Ad infintum.

I am more inclined to think the world we have makes much more sense than the strange machination you propose.



Ah...we wouldn't be robots...and we couldn't do anything bad.
This broaches on the 'freedomless freedom' absurdity.


I here you saying 'freedom to do evil'. To me this is 'freedom'
God removing our 'freedom to do evil' is God removing our 'freedom'. Robots.

In fact there would not. There would be just as much. We would still have people asking the question "Why is there so much suffering in the world? Couldn't God make a world we're we couldn't cause each other pain just by staring at each other? Why couldn't He make it harder?"

There would be a Bizzaro Thomas Metcalf with proofs that if a loving God existed He would have made it much more difficult to cause each other harm.



Correction. God knows all paths you could choose to take. Which one you take depends on you.


How is it irrelevant? Because I don't agree you have adequately presented the issue at hand?
I disagree with your implicit assumption that 'free will => evil'.


Satan Oscillate My Metallic Sonatas

Dr Rick

It was god that purportedly made "nature's natural woes." An omnipotent god could have made nature and all of the cosmos follow a different set of rules; one's that do not require conflict and change and in which there is "gain without pain." If he couldn't, then he is not omnipotent.

That response doesn't address the objection.

An omniscient god wouldn't be mystified, and an omnipotent one would have an infinite number of options to choose from. Whatever an omnipotent and omnisicient god purportely wants for us he could impart unless perhaps there was a logical contradiction in doing so.

The arguments are asking why, if a god exists, he didn't do all within god's power

That assumes gods exist.

Non sequitur; what's being argued here is, if they exist, why did gods allow evil?

What's being questioned is why god, if he exists, didn't do what he wanted to do without allowing evil and suffering?


We already have tremendous restrictions on our choices. In our state of existence, we can't do many things do to the constraints imposed by our bodies and the laws of physics. Why did god not choose to restrict our choices for evil?

Rick

GunnerJ

If what you say is true (PROTIP: It's not) then we are already robots, living in freedomless freedom: we lack the ability to violate physical law, although we may will to do so.

Zadok001

Meh? That's not the claim. The claim is that you couldn't DROP the stone, and that you couldn't SLANDER the person. This idea doesn't necessitate that we prevent the stone from being lifted. After all, lifting a stone is not an evil act - Dropping it on someone's head is.

This is therefore a strawman argument. If you wish to respond in a predictable manner, you could say "But you'd need to prevent A to prevent B!" This assumes God is not omnipotent. God is capable of creating physical laws. God could therefore create a physical law preventing B from occurring independant of A. If you want to concede that God could NOT create that law, you allow that God is not omnipotent, and concede the argument by default. (The PoE does not attempt to argue against the existance of a God which does not have the quality of omnipotence.)


That's absurd in the extreme. 'Freedom to do Evil' is a subset of the many elements that make up 'Freedom.' Among the other elements: "Freedom to eat beef,' 'Freedom to do jumping jacks,' and 'Freedom to think about carrots.' Taking away our freedom to think about carrots LIMITS our freedom, but does not remove it.

If you wish to argue the point, you could claim that removing ANY element of our freedom negates the entirety. Unfortunately for you, that includes my freedom to walk through walls. We are denied this basic freedom, yet we still have 'freedom' as a general clause. Hence, removing the freedom to do evil, while it puts a limitation on our overall freedom, does not eliminate freedom altogether.

Another strawman.

That's what makes this argument so much fun! Realistically, it boils down to requiring God to eliminate ALL freedom to do evil, as well as natural evil! In other words, eliminate evil altogether. Sure enough, that's exactly the claim that the PoE makes to begin with: An omnimax deity, by definition, must not allow evil to exist. Evil exists, hence an omnimax deity does not.

(Note that this STILL doesn't imply 'robots,' as you obsessive-compulsively put it. See my deconstruction of your other strawmen.)




Implication: God doesn't know what I'm going to do. He knows what I _MAY_ do, but he cannot specifically know my next course of action until it has occurred. This is a limitation on his knowledge; i.e., he does not KNOW my exact future course. Since my exact future course is SOMETHING, this means God does not know EVERYTHING. Omniscient deities, by definition, know EVERYTHING. Hence, your God is not omniscient. Result? The PoE no longer disputes your claim, as you no longer say an omnimax deity exists.

You are aware that this statement destroys your argument single-handedly, correct? Free will != Evil. Hence, free will can exist without evil. Therefore, an omnimax deity could have created a world in which free will exists but evil does not (indeed, would be required, upon creating a world, to imbue it with such qualities). Such a world does not exist. Hence, the omnimax deity in question does not exist.

Try again please. To misquote a famous line: "Once more with rationality."

GunnerJ

Unfortunately (?) this would reduce the content of SOMMS' already skimpy posts to his signature.

rainbow walking

Well, let’s set the record strait on this particular argument before we go any further. Suffering caused by nature as an argument against FW is a red herring, straw man, and non sequitur all rolled into one. This has nothing to do with freewill in any way, shape or form and should be argued on its own merits as a separate issue. Frankly, I just don’t see how basing an argument on what a prospective god could have or should have done is valid. It presumes too many variables that are unknown or unknowable about a lot of things. The presumptions are based on contradictory and confusing attributes that are defined in our imaginations without an appeal to empirical support to verify the presumption. What evidence do you have that this god “could have” done things any differently and still ended up with moral agency?
Let’s start with knowledge. Man must be free to explore all options in the acquisition of truth. Any restriction to this freedom hinders his ability to learn and increase his knowledge base. Scientists exercise their freewill in determining the layout of experiments. In the second place, my rebuttal was based on the bizarre assertion that god could institute a natural law to restrict moral agency. How would you describe such a law? Maybe he could enact a natural law that makes a man’s penis shrivel up and fall off if he looks at any woman other than his wife? That would surely win the approval of women all over the world. But it wouldn’t do much for the species in general, as it would only be a matter of years before the entire race was unable to procreate or would go blind.


[quote]

rw: I’m mystified as to what natural law could be enacted to determine human behavior in relationships with family?



TM: God has the power. [/b]

And you know this…how? An unsupported assertion does not a valid argument make.
So you want this god to do…what? Make it so that anyone who touches a baby with ill intentions will…what, poof out of existence? Why stop there? Hell, why not have god make it so no one can do anything remotely immoral…or better yet, just have this god make it so we all can have as much of everything we could ever want, whenever we want it. Or why not just have god step down and let…you be in charge. Then we could all just live happily ever after in the land of Oz…yes?
Oh really? That’s what the atheist would say? Funny, that’s not what you are saying. You’ve spent countless hours putting together these seven arguments that say anything but that…and you are an atheist I take it? So if god doesn’t exist why are you blaming him for everything that does exist?

?

Uh…not from where I’m standing. You argument, in order to qualify as a valid argument, requires some substantiation to bolster its sagging premises. As it stands now it’s just a wild declaration that things are mucked up and if there really is a god he ought to do something about it since it’s all his fault anyway. Maybe he’s waiting on you to tell him something definitive to do? I know I’d appreciate some clarification on just how much of my freedom you’re willing to sacrifice to repair all these vague evils you attribute to a gods lackadaisical efforts.

Oh, I’m sorry, is there a range of good choices that he’s restricted us from? Could you enlighten me as to what they are?
Yes, I’ve noticed your arguments are big on what god should do and woefully short on details. We already have laws that restrict many choices. Of course this doesn’t deter people from choosing those behaviors anyway. So how do you propose this god should deter humans from making these choices without actually manipulating their thoughts in some way…unless, you are actually suggesting god manipulate our thoughts? Are you sure that’s such a good idea? Boy I’m glad you’re not in charge.
Well why not? I mean if we’re going to appeal to magic for solutions why not just go for broke? Or maybe you’d prefer god poof a dis-proportionate number of moral people into existence to compensate for the truly depraved ones? And for his next big act, ladies and gentlemen, god is going to make the next generation totally dependent on him for their every whim.
Riiight…and this is inferred from that magic voodoo formula you incorporate in your imagination every time you here the word “omnipotent”. I get it.
I see. So you’ve got to race ahead of an event and fix the outcome before you return and predict it. Is that how the weatherman predicts the weather? So if he says it’s going to snow tomorrow it’s because he made it so it would? Gosh I never knew that.
Oh, I’m sorry Thomas, I wasn’t aware that the FWD was based on freewill requiring evil. I thought it was just an argument for how an omni=benevolent god and evil could co-exist. So evil has to exist before freewill can? Hmmm…now there’s a different take on an old story. In other words one couldn’t possibly have to choose between chocolate or vanilla ice cream, it has to be ice cream or snake venom for the choice to have been freely made. Well, I’ll have to hand it to you Thomas, you sure gave me cause to pause.

Zadok001

Remember your topic. We're discussing the Free Will DEFENSE, an argument presented to counter the Argument From The Problem Of Evil. The PoE doesn't care what KIND of evil is being discussed, whether it be the free will of man or the whims of nature. Hence, if the evil continues to exist outside of human free will, such as in natural disasters, the FWD is insufficient to block the PoE. THAT'S the argument, merely that the FWD doesn't do what it wants to do, even if it DID work - It doesn't block the PoE.

Our 'evidence' is that moral agency exists in the absence of, say, bolts of lightning striking five-year-olds. Care to contest that position? How?

So why make the law like that? Create a natural law that disallows a man from feeling desire towards anyone who isn't his wife. Remember, this law doesn't have to be oriented by cause and consequence. Which is to say: It doesn't have to prevent the cause, and it doesn't have to cause a consequence. It merely has to prevent the evil. Hence, the 'drop a rock on someone's toes' issue - Rocks are prevented from being dropped on people's toes.

It's a simple rule, easy to imagine. Claims that it can't work this way surrender the issue by admitting God isn't omnipotent.

Again, you're misstating the rule. It doesn't require someone to 'poof.' It requires them not to do evil. 'Going further' is not necessary. Remember, at no point does the PoE imply God should have created more GOOD. It requires that God is required to have created LESS evil, based on the omnimax properties imbued in him. Get it yet? The rules are NOT consequential, or causal. They simply prevent the evil from occurring.

Misinterpretation. It doesn't matter that God has limited our range of good free choices (he has: I can't feed everyone on Earth through willpower alone), it's that he's given us free will to do evil. If the existance of free will merely requires a range of choices, as you claim, then eliminating our free will to do evil doesn't curtail free will as a whole. You said "Freewill necessitates only that humans enjoy a range of choices." That's a concession of the argument, as it means God can eliminate our evil acts while leaving our free will intact. We would enjoy a range of choices; specifically, we would enjoy a range of GOOD choices.

Sure, manipulating thoughts works. It doesn't even require direct manipulation, merely the placement of a mental barrier that prevents us from willing evil. But that's not actually needed. A set of physical laws that prevent evil from occuring works just fine - i.e., a dropped rock never hits feet, it floats away and drops in the ocean. Again, these laws are VERY easy to envision.

Non sequitor. What does dependancy have to do with the proportion of moral people on Earth? Nothing at all! If everyone on earth was moral, as a matter of fact, I bet there'd be a fair deal fewer things for us to wish God would have prevented. Hence the basis of the whole damn PoE.


Omnipotent: Can do ANYTHING. If you care to say that God CAN'T do anything, then God has ceased to be omnipotent. The PoE no longer has an argument with you, as you no longer declare an omnimax God. Note that a lot of Christians would take issue with you claiming God isn't omnipotent.

The FWD is that evil exists because it is necessary to free will. It that was NOT the case, then an omnimax deity would have created a world in which free will existed but evil did not. That's a simple fact. The ENTIRE free will defense hinges on the idea that to have free will, one must allow evil. Hence, evil is a detector for free will. If evil doesn't exist, then free will does not exist. (Argue that point, and the argument is conceded, since an omnimax deity would be required to have no evil in a created universe.) Hence, since evil is absent in Heaven, so is free will.

ReasonableDoubt

I concur with Zadok001- the FWD rests upon the assumption that human freedom (libertarian freedom) is the most important value to God such that any other state of affairs is not possible.

Rainbow Walker, I think you've missed the point that I and others have made regarding heaven. IF there is no free will in heaven, and heaven is the ultimate perfection, then it cannot be that libertarianism is the most important value. B/c if it was, there would necessarily be libertarianism and hence evil in heaven. Since that is presumably NOT the theist's case, then we can conclude that to God, libertarianism is not the most important ultimate value, and so the FWD fails.

A simple thought: I presume you, like myself and most of the others on this Board, have never committed a crime, or, at least have never committed a violent crime. I presume you'd say I have freedom of choice, b/c God made me that way. So why couldn't he have made everyone like me and all the rest of the law -abiding citizens, who freely choose to do good most of the time? Granted, there'd still be evil, but no murder, rape, and all the horrific evil that exists now.

rainbow walking

Remember your topic. We're discussing the Free Will DEFENSE, an argument presented to counter the Argument From The Problem Of Evil. The PoE doesn't care what KIND of evil is being discussed, whether it be the free will of man or the whims of nature.

If the PoE is sufficiently argued it needn’t resort to this tactic. It’s not even remotely reasonable or logical to attempt to stretch the FWD over this particular example of suffering. It is also a bit disingenuous to call a natural catastrophe evil. Nature is indifferent, so the suffering incurred cannot accurately be classified as evil therefore the PoE has no jurisprudence over this aspect of human suffering. Remember the title of your argument is Problem of Evil, not Problem of Suffering. However, in all fairness, I have no problem with isolating this aspect of suffering and presenting arguments to defend an omni-benevolent god along these lines as well.

Hence, if the evil continues to exist outside of human free will, such as in natural disasters, the FWD is insufficient to block the PoE. THAT'S the argument, merely that the FWD doesn't do what it wants to do, even if it DID work - It doesn't block the PoE.

As I said above, you have yet to substantiate that nature is intentionally malevolent and thus evil. Until you do it is actually the PoE that suffers from its application to this area of human suffering. Now, before you argue that all human suffering is evil, you would have to explain how this would apply to childbirth, surgery, and grief from the loss of a loved one, since this would mean that people are evil for giving birth, having physical maladies repaired or grieving over their dead.




Our 'evidence' is that moral agency exists in the absence of, say, bolts of lightning striking five-year-olds. Care to contest that position?
Not at all. Have any evidence to support your claim that an omni-benevolent god would care to establish moral agency in this fashion?

How?
By trial and error. Care to explain why human history shows a penchant for goodness? Or how our genetics or environment led us to conclude that slavery was evil?



So why make the law like that? Create a natural law that disallows a man from feeling desire towards anyone who isn't his wife.

And she came to be his wife…how?
Remember, this law doesn't have to be oriented by cause and consequence. Which is to say: It doesn't have to prevent the cause, and it doesn't have to cause a consequence. It merely has to prevent the evil.

Uh, excuse me but have you ever heard of cause and effect? You think the absence of something has no consequences? Try expelling all the air from your lungs for two minutes and I wager you’ll change that tune.
Hence, the 'drop a rock on someone's toes' issue - Rocks are prevented from being dropped on people's toes.
Uh..o’kay, and what becomes of entropy when all this extra energy is displaced to perform these mighty feets, (if you’ll pardon the pun)?

It's a simple rule, easy to imagine.
Lot’s of things are easy to imagine but apparently that doesn’t include all the not-so-obvious residual consequences of changing even the least of nature’s standards. Start with the rock from toes example and see if you can think of any possible consequences other than people with healthy feet. Then consider that one possible consequence and what would have to be altered to allow for that and the consequence that would follow. If you’re imaginative enough I bet, before you’re finished we’ll end up with another entire universe that doesn’t even remotely resemble this one.
Claims that it can't work this way surrender the issue by admitting God isn't omnipotent.
Such claims tend to ignore the fact that the way it works now is such a tightly woven fabric that maybe only an omnipotent god could have arranged it to be so. The primary reason I counter with such blatantly ridiculous examples when encountering these arguments of what god could or should do, is simply because the moment you begin to alter nature to get at man’s freewill you find yourself encountering far more consequences than you could possibly anticipate, so why not skip all the bullshit and just poof another universe into play?



Again, you're misstating the rule. It doesn't require someone to 'poof.' It requires them not to do evil.

Uh…excuse me, but aren’t we neglecting just a wee bit something here? Like how you are going to instantiate this amazing new result without doing something…something that will inevitably lead to doing other things ad nauseum?
'Going further' is not necessary.

Uh…huh…and you know this…how?
Remember, at no point does the PoE imply God should have created more GOOD.

Say what?! Let me see if I’m getting this. Diminishing evil is not good? Such that the more evil you diminish the better it gets?
It requires that God is required to have created LESS evil, based on the omnimax properties imbued in him.

I must be missing something here. Which one of this god’s omnimax attributes created evil? I always thought evil was the result of “commission”. When did it become an actual creation?
Get it yet? The rules are NOT consequential, or causal. They simply prevent the evil from occurring.
Oh I’m getting it yet…loud and clear. This god should prevent evil without any consequences, (which means it doesn’t affect a damn thing, the world stays essentially the same) and without recourse to any causal agency. So if you want this to happen without any causative factors to be involved…who the hells gonna do it? You want god to do something without actually doing anything that would make any consequential difference anyway. Well, why the hell didn’t you say so…hell, I can do that for you! Poof, it’s done and I win the argument. I like those rules.



Misinterpretation. It doesn't matter that God has limited our range of good free choices (he has: I can't feed everyone on Earth through willpower alone)

Well, have you tried?
, it's that he's given us free will to do evil.

Or good, but from what you say above, you choose to do nothing because…well, you just can’t.
If the existance of free will merely requires a range of choices, as you claim, then eliminating our free will to do evil doesn't curtail free will as a whole.

Yeah right. It just creates a great big gaping “whole” in our realm of choices. According to you this will have no effect on our freewill. Tamper with our range of choices and you can box up the free aspect of your will and ship it to Saddam Hussein. The only way to eliminate this range of choices is to remove them from our knowledge. Now you’ve restricted our ability to learn and progress as a species and here we are right back in that same conundrum of cause and effect. Science is no longer free to explore the universe because some of the discoveries might lead to knowledge that could lead to an evil choice and, yet again, we’re left with a brand new universe out of holey cloth. Like I said, why not skip all the bullshit.

You said "Freewill necessitates only that humans enjoy a range of choices." That's a concession of the argument, as it means God can eliminate our evil acts while leaving our free will intact.

I suppose that depends on your definition of free. The further you restrict man from that range the closer you drive him to slaughter.

We would enjoy a range of choices; specifically, we would enjoy a range of GOOD choices.

We already do…and what’s cool about it is we enjoy the apprehension of an ever greater range of choices because we’re free to learn the range of all choices. Take away our capacity to learn and we will destroy ourselves. How good is that?



Sure, manipulating thoughts works. It doesn't even require direct manipulation, merely the placement of a mental barrier that prevents us from willing evil.

Yeah…like Pavlov’s dogs. We can be trained to do anything, even live like zombies.
But that's not actually needed. A set of physical laws that prevent evil from occuring works just fine - i.e., a dropped rock never hits feet, it floats away and drops in the ocean. Again, these laws are VERY easy to envision.
Yeah, I bet they are. Fortunately for all of us we’re not dependent on such a short-sighted vision.



Non sequitor. What does dependancy have to do with the proportion of moral people on Earth?

Seeing how I’ve already devastated this line of reasoning I hope that any future replies will not appeal to these bankrupt claims again. They utterly fail to take into account the effects, both short and long range, this would have on man’s ability to progress, to grow, eventually leading to full dependency and total depravity. This, in any possible world, is not a good thing. Man absolutely must have access to all choices or he ceases to be man. Having access doesn’t necessitate actuation and that is what makes him a moral being. Forcing him to do good, if that were even possible, does not make him good…just a simpleton.
Nothing at all! If everyone on earth was moral, as a matter of fact, I bet there'd be a fair deal fewer things for us to wish God would have prevented. Hence the basis of the whole damn PoE.
And far fewer people around to appreciate the drama. If that is the basis of PoE, it remains unresponsive to man qua man.



Omnipotent: Can do ANYTHING. If you care to say that God CAN'T do anything, then God has ceased to be omnipotent.

So, who gives a shit. We’re not arguing for attributes here anyway. O’kay this god can’t do EVERYTHING. Now how you propose he enacts all these nutty natural laws and mind altering parlor tricks? Seems to me yous the one standing on the slippery slope with that defense.

The PoE no longer has an argument with you, as you no longer declare an omnimax God.

hahahaha…The PoE never has graduated to an argument in the first place but if you want to take away all gods toys I don’t care. You just slitting the throat of your own arguments recourse to what this god could have and should have done. Without an omnimax god to taunt, you stuck with the world you stuck with.
Note that a lot of Christians would take issue with you claiming God isn't omnipotent.

Hey, tell ‘em to get in line. I got a lot of issues.



The FWD is that evil exists because it is necessary to free will. It that was NOT the case, then an omnimax deity would have created a world in which free will existed but evil did not.



Evil exists because people have recourse to choices that lead to acts deemed evil. It doesn’t necessitate they make those choices.

That's a simple fact.


Not so simple actually. But I digress…

The ENTIRE free will defense hinges on the idea that to have free will, one must allow evil. Hence, evil is a detector for free will.



No more so than good is. But I digress…

If evil doesn't exist, then free will does not exist.



Whoops…that’s not a valid disclaimer. The operative word here is ACCESS. Got it? People must have access to all choices for their will to be free. It isn’t NECESSARY that they make choices that incur evil. They can make choices that incur good all their lives and their freewill never wavers. The two are not interchangeable nor is evil NECESSARY to the existence of freewill. Only ACCESS to evil is NECESSARY. Because evil exists it serves as proof that people have ACCESS to all choices and explains itself in that ACCESS. If no evil were ever instantiated that would not be the end of freewill as long as people still had ACCESS to it. Tamper with ACCESS and freewill is history.

(Argue that point, and the argument is conceded, since an omnimax deity would be required to have no evil in a created universe.) Hence, since evil is absent in Heaven, so is free will.

And both conclusions are false because the foundational premises are not true. Sorry, regroup and try again. But I like your style of argumentation. You are very knowledgable, intelligent and a worthy opponent. I look forward to hearing from you soon.

rw

rainbow walking

I concur with Zadok001- the FWD rests upon the assumption that human freedom (libertarian freedom) is the most important value to God such that any other state of affairs is not possible.

Hi ReasonableDoubt,
I would have to gently disagree based on my very limited understanding of the biblical rendition of this god’s purpose for creating man. Near as I can tell, all good people (created in his image fulfilled) appears to be his most important goal. Freewill appears to be just one of his tools for the achievement of this goal.

Rainbow Walker, I think you've missed the point that I and others have made regarding heaven. IF there is no free will in heaven, and heaven is the ultimate perfection, then it cannot be that libertarianism is the most important value.


Again, I think you are basing this conclusion on false premises about freewill. Evil needn’t be instantiated to preserve an autonomous will, just ACCESS to evil as a choice. It’s like having a million dollars in the bank. The man with ACCESS to a million dollars has far more options than the man who is penniless. But the man with the bucks doesn’t have to spend a single dime to prove he is rich.

B/c if it was, there would necessarily be libertarianism and hence evil in heaven. Since that is presumably NOT the theist's case, then we can conclude that to God, libertarianism is not the most important ultimate value, and so the FWD fails.

Well, here too I think it is you who miss the point. While I can’t attest for the arguments of every theist, I can say that a correct FWD isn’t based on freewill being god’s most important value. Man’s goodness is and freewill just happens to be his tool of choice in achieving it. I hope you can see the difference.

A simple thought: I presume you, like myself and most of the others on this Board, have never committed a crime, or, at least have never committed a violent crime. I presume you'd say I have freedom of choice, b/c God made me that way. So why couldn't he have made everyone like me and all the rest of the law -abiding citizens, who freely choose to do good most of the time? Granted, there'd still be evil, but no murder, rape, and all the horrific evil that exists now.

Again, I fear you’ve created a straw man in this analogy simply because there’s no reason to allow your premise that god had anything directly to do with the way you are. I’m proud of you for being the way you are. It speaks highly of you, your parents, teachers, and many other factors too numerous to attempt to articulate. Remember, you guys are the ones arguing that god could have and should have done things differently. You can’t around and now claim that you are the way you are because god directly intervened on your behalf to ensure you’d be of such quality of character not to commit a violent crime…no more than you can blame god for those who can’t match your pristine accomplishments.