Wiploc

Why don't you just say that he doesn't want to. Admit it. It will feel good.

Your position, I'm guessing ---and why do you have us still guessing? --- is this:

1. God isn't truly omnipotent. There are some things he just can't do. For instance, he can't give us patience and also eliminate suffering. Even if god can do miracles, this is a miracle that he can't do.

2. God isn't truly omnibenevolent. (This is going to depend, of course, on how you define omnibenevolent, but if you define it as wanting to prevent suffering as your top priority (a strong desire which not second to any other desire) then god isn't omnibenevolent.) God wants to give us something which is more important than a lack of suffering, and which is incompatible with a lack of suffering (like patience maybe). It is because god has the divine wisdom to see that this something else is more important, is "better," than lack of suffering, that he does not make the lack of suffering his top priority.

3. Therefore, even though god is not perfectly good in the sense that his top priority is preventing pain, he is still perfectly "good" in some other "better" sense which we would agree with if we had god's wisdom and understanding.

4. Therefore the PoE as Charlie (crc) has rendered it is logically impeccable, but it doesn't even begin to show that the god who really exists isn't even better, in some important sense, than the god which the PoE proves (absolutely proves, yes!) doesn't exist.

And, incidentally,
5. If another Christian asks me why I think there are things god can't do, or why I think there are some things "better" than not suffering, I'm gonna use the PoE to absolutely prove it to him.
crc

NonContradiction

Yes, that is exactly what I am saying. You can roll your eyes all you want.

Modus Ponens:

1) If P then Q
2) P
3) Therefore, Q

1) If patience exists, then pain and suffering exists.

2) Patience exists.

3) Therefore, pain and suffering exists.

Modus Tollens:

1) If P then Q
2) ~Q
3) Therefore, ~P

1) If patience exists, then pain and suffering exists.

2) Pain and suffering don't exist.

3) Therefore, patience doesn't exist.

It should be very clear to all, by now, that any denial of pain and suffering implies a denial of patience. Since God wanted us to learn patience, He had no choice but to create some pain and suffering.

Wiploc

Your syllogism is valid.

I'm not inclined to argue with your first premise in the real world. But there isn't any reason to think it would still be true if there were a miracle-throwing god around. He could, for instance, make waiting even more fun than getting what you are waiting for.
crc

wizwoz

Are you intending that Patience is simply : the ability to tolerate condone or allow pain/suffering until it may hopefully come to a conclusion?.
If so, Not so, I think.. Patience does not NEED to include suffering. It can just as well be a quality of good-natured tolerance of a delay in something. One could simply enjoy the anticipation awaiting an action. Like the countdown to a vacation, eager to set off but made Patient by enjoying the contemplation of a holiday beginning. Patience can be and is experienced without - as well as with - pain and or suffering. It is I am sure, quite possible to imagine God arranging for a state of content waiting ONLY and I would still know what the "virtue of patience is". It would amount to not being intolerent of my wait. In this same context I can invisage him having arranged for a method of content learning and understanding of evil pain and suffering, without the need for innocents to endure any of it. For instance he could have left these as concepts, filmakers/bookwriters could portray it, no one need suffer it!

NonContradiction

Here is the problem with what you are saying:

You are confusing physically impossible with logically impossible. I can imagine God creating a world where a cow could jump over the moon. However, I cannot imagine God creating a world where a cow could move forwards and backwards simultaneously. A cow moving forwards logically implies that it's not moving backwards.

Similarly, I cannot imagine God creating a world where patience existed and pain and suffering didn't also exist. It's a logical impossibility. The existence of patience logically implies the existence of some pain and suffering.

7thangel

Now you are sounding foolish. In essence you are requiring that for God to be omnipotent is for Him to do all things possible. And if my fellow Christians would tell you that you will go to Hell, you will say that God "SHOULD NOT" do such things!!! But we will argue, from your line of reasoning, that if God is omnipotent, He can send you to Hell, else He is not omnipotent.

If you want God to do things outside of logic, it will be illogical for you to judge according to logic. Because demanding God outside of logic, in any sense, you demand that God is allowed to do anything. Including the will "to be," or "not to be." So, by not realizing the real consequences of your argument, you ended up insisting a demand which you even have no grasp if it be reality.

NonContradiction

See my post to Philosoft.

Philosoft

I can imagine an instance of patience that does not entail pain or suffering. Inconvenience, as included in your definition, is arguably morally neutral.

Dr. Retard

Assume that patience necessitates pain and suffering. So what?

First, a lot of evil has nothing to do with building patience. The evil that kills you, for instance.

Second, some evil that is related to patience-building is so wretchedly evil, that things would be better if the evil and the patience-building were both nonexistent. For example, the patience learnt by someone being eaten by ants, as he waits to die.

Wiploc

Suaup, here's some comments on style and diction. I hope they don't sound harsh. You asked for feedback of this type, and I hope this is useful to you.

“non resolvable problems” is vague hand-waving. Don’t leave us wondering whether Smith just couldn’t figure something out. Be concrete; say there is a logical contradiction.


“The sum of good” seems to me a strange and uncommunicative phrase, but maybe it was appropriate because it was used in your course? In order for that to be true, it would have had to had an actual concrete meaning in the course. If it was just a vagueness, there is no reason to invite it into your paper.

“Unless they are part of a greater plan,” doesn’t convey much. Why would inflicting planned pain be better than inflicting pain on impulse?

Your definition of amoral evil seems an aimless bit of wandering. If you don’t use the definition, you don’t need to include it. Don’t cock that gun if you aren’t going to fire it. If you raise the issue that suffering isn’t god’s fault because man brings it down on himself, then you have reason to distinguish those evils that man doesn’t cause.

It might be a good exercise to imagine yourself as Hemmingway, hitting the keys hard, making short little punchy sentences. See how long you can go on like that:

“George H. Smith says you can’t have natural evil if you have an all-loving god. Not if he’s also all-knowing and all-powerful, you can’t. If god does evil, he has to be evil. But some say that’s not true. They say god had a choice of evils. He chose the lesser evil, giving us suffering rather than something worse.”

Another exercise is to take the side you don’t believe. Be fair to it. Try to make it win. This is a great way to clarify your thoughts so you know exactly where to stick the knife when you go back to writing what you do believe.

“Qualifying God as immoral,” doesn’t have an obvious meaning. It’s not clear that there is a difference between re-evaluating the Christian understanding of god and negating the traditional Christian view of god. Say what you mean. “If natural evil proves that an existing god must be evil, then the Christians are wrong about god being good. Either that, or they are wrong about him existing at all.” If that’s not what you mean, then say something else, but say it clearly.

Critics respond by arguing that the universe is the best of all possible worlds created by God.


Put a period after “worlds.” Otherwise you introduce questions like, “could the world be better if it weren’t made by god?”

How about this: “Critics respond by saying god made the best world he could. Not even god can do absolutely anything. Making a better world than this one is one of the things he can’t do. And, since this evil-including world is the best world he could make, he isn’t evil for making it. God, then, is like a dentist, who gives pain only to prevent greater pain. If dentists aren't evil, neither is god.”

crc