Shinobi

The standard attempt at refuting the PoE rests on the assumption that when evil is witness by us, such as the killing of 6 million Jews in Nazi Germany, it’s not really evil because it serves a greater good (planned by God) that we are unable to comprehend. But if this were true then that would mean that we could commit no evil. I can form a gang to eliminate Christians and go on a murder spree and it’s not evil, because that is part of a plan for greater good than puny human minds cant understand.

It also brings about another problem, if this is rejected by a theist then it must be asked what the criteria is for saying that a particular “evil” is part of a greater good or if it is just plain evil that isn’t part of a greater plan.

Is this the standard theist rejection of the PoE? It seems it based on what I have read here on the PoE threads.

Do people see my point as valid?

Jinto

A reasonably stated argument. I think I'll go kill some Christians now: after all, GAWD will prevent me from killing anyone unless it's part of his greater plan.

Predicted theist rebuttal: "well, the greater purpose served is our free will. Whose free will are you protecting?"

Lobstrosity

My rebuttal rebuttal (which would be my re-rebuttal, which cancels to simply give my buttal):
God can have his cake and eat it, too (he is God, after all). Could he not give us free will but simply make murder physically impossible? You could go around shooting anyone you want, but it simply would have no effect. He impedes our freedoms by making it impossible to go faster than the speed of light, so it's not like there isn't precedent for this kind of thing. If no one claims that restrictions on our maximal velocity is an impingment of our free will, then why would restrictions on the harm we can cause others be an impingment of our free will?

Consider yourself buttaled, you silly fictional theist.

Jinto

<theist>I'm not fictional, because I have faith in my own existence.</theist>

rainbow walking

Hi Shinobi,
Welcome to the forums, (if such welcome hasn’t already been extended), and allow me to engage your arguments. PoE happens to be one of my favorite subjects at the moment so I appreciate the opportunity to engage lively discussion of its merits. You happen to have brought up one of PoE’s strongest points and one that has plagued my own thinking processes for months, so I especially appreciate the chance to explore PoE from this perspective. What I shall do is dust off my old theist cap, don it for the duration of this discussion, and attack your position as though I were a true believer, (which I’m not), and hopefully, before I’m finished, demonstrate the utter futility of PoE against an internally consistent epistemology. So, sit back, grab a cup of your favorite beverage, relax and enjoy the journey…but don’t put away your drawing board just yet:^D

Shinobi: The standard attempt at refuting the PoE rests on the assumption that when evil is witnessed by us, such as the killing of 6 million Jews in Nazi Germany, it’s not really evil because it serves a greater good (planned by God) that we are unable to comprehend.

rw: I’m not sure a theist would say that evil is not really evil, although that may be inferred from the rest of their argument, but they certainly are spot on with the observation that some proportional good does come of virtually every evil eventually. (IMV though, that’s a rather dangerous idea to propagate because it could be viewed by some nut case as a justification to do something harmful, as you’ve rightly noted.)
Let me begin by conceding your point that this thing about evil is part of God’s plan, but allow me to diffuse that concession somewhat by reminding you that without evil the concept of good would be nullified, so if good is a preferred value then some degree of potential evil is inescapable. In fact, if you invoke God’s omni-benevolence to cancel out evil you cancel out, thereby, his omni-benevolence, since good, whether we describe it in relation to ALL, (as in omni), or some degree less than all, requires a backdrop of evil, to be a meaningful concept. But that’s really just an aside that I felt you should be aware of. The real meat of my argument against PoE has not yet been seasoned and placed on the grill.

Since you brought up God’s plan let’s run with it. In my rebuttal I shall introduce the premises of freewill and best of all possible worlds. I’m sure you’ve probably encountered these arguments before but probably not in any coherent articulation. (Oh the arrogance)

Now, back to God’s plan. If you’ve spent any time at all discussing the relevance of an existent God, you’ve likely encountered this freewill argument from the theist so I’m going to assume you understand the basics of it and just touch upon the high ground here in order to facilitate brevity and get to my main points. Creating a being with freewill is not God’s plan IN IT’S ENTIRETY but an integral aspect of it. Additionally, creating a being with a preference for choosing the good, as opposed to evil, is also not God’s plan IN IT’S ENTIRETY, but an integral part of it. So let’s recap briefly by the numbers:

1. Good and evil are a PART of God’s plan

2. Beings with freewill are a PART of God’s plan

3. Beings with a preference for choosing the good are a PART of God’s plan.

Now here’s where I introduce the premise of “Best Of All Possible Worlds”. Invoking this premise seems, at first glance, like a sure victory for PoE. If this state of affairs is the BOAPW’s then this God can’t possible be omnipotent or omni-benevolent, right?
Not necessarily…here’s why.

This current state of affairs, resplendent with all the evil and suffering that I’ve conceded to be a part of God’s plan, is not the best of all possible worlds.

What it is, however, is the Best Of All Possible Paths To The Best Of All Possible Worlds.

While this is sinking in let me carry on a bit longer. PoE only obtains because its proponent, (in this case that would be you), has made a judgment call based on this CURRENT state of affairs. However, if this current state of affairs is not the finished product then PoE has been invoked prematurely.

It’s equivalent to hiring a contractor to build you a house and then visiting the jobsite at about the time he’s completed the foundation. Then, from examining the foundation, criticizing the contractor’s labors as though this foundation were all he was giving you for your money. See what I mean? Here you stand looking around at the mess that accumulated while he was setting the foundation and criticizing his labors as though he were finished.

In other words, God is still busy in the creative process of building the best of all possible worlds by proxy, (that would be via us). But I can already anticipate your objection that if this is the best of all possible paths it hardly rescue’s God from the challenge of PoE, since an omnipotent being should be able to devise a better building program that doesn’t require evil and suffering, right?
Again, not necessarily. God’s building program doesn’t REQUIRE that evil and suffering become a reality, only that it be available as a choice. Big difference. If evil and suffering are realized along the way it’s because man has made the wrong choices.
Of course, this is only apropos to moral evil and the suffering it incurs and says nothing about those phenomena that cause natural suffering like floods and earthquakes. But since you haven’t introduced that aspect of the argument I’ll leave it for a later trouncing…uh…er…discussion.

Now, this wouldn’t be complete unless I cover your specific example of the Jews. The first thing of note is that the Jews are a CHOSEN specific part of God’s plan, as opposed to the Gentiles who are the benefactors of the Jew’s chosen status. A good analogy would be to consider the Jews as God’s favorite hammer. If God has a plan he must have a way to communicate it without turning humanity into a mass of willess blathering idiots bleating for God to fix everything and do everything. (sound atheistically familiar?)

Let me tell you being a Jew is not an enviable calling. But, here’s the kicker. The FACT of the Jews existence as a newly reformed nation and a series of 3000 year old predictions in their recorded history book, (the OT), is irrefutable EVIDENCE…PROOF…that this being exists. The predictions declare that the Jews will be scattered, persecuted, murdered down to a tenth of their population and then returned to their homeland…BY THE GENTILES. Curious prediction but accurate to a tee. Now I realize us atheists will always find a way around most of these so called evidential arguments but this one is too succinct to gloss over. It isn’t subjective personal testimony but verifiable facts of our reality. It represents God’s way of proving he exists without violating man’s freedom of choice to accept or reject it as such. And, let me qualify all of this by assuring you that the evil and suffering the Jews endured was not God’s choice because all of these predictions were CONTINGENT on the Jews choices. They weren’t uttered as though written in stone but were spoken as warnings that the Jews failed to heed. Their hard heartedness brought about their suffering and God’s omni-benevolence turned it into a blessing and brought about their liberation and restoration as a nation.

So what exactly is this God’s plan? What will this best of all possible worlds be like once we’ve journeyed this best of all possible paths to its realization?

Frankly, I don’t know. Now, mind you, that’s not the same as saying it’s unknowable. I’m only saying it isn’t yet completely comprehensible. And before you jump on that and say, “Aha, that proves your worldview is invalid”, let me remind you that were I to ask you why this universe exists instead of nothing, you would be forced to concede that you also don’t know and I would be justified in pointing at this admission and saying, “Aha, that proves your worldview is invalid as well”. So let’s just work with what we’ve got, admit we both have a long way to go, and move on…yes?




Shinobi: It also brings about another problem, if this is rejected by a theist then it must be asked what the criteria is for saying that a particular “evil” is part of a greater good or if it is just plain evil that isn’t part of a greater plan.

rw: No particular evil can be designated as a part of God’s plan, only evil as a concept and a choice. If any particular evil is actualized it is a result of man’s choice. And, let’s not forget that any evil that is actualized is eventually met with a proportional amount of good, maybe even greater good.

In closing I submit that PoE, without some modification, cannot obtain against an internally consistent epistemology. It bears a burden that it fails to address at all, that being the unsupported assumption that an omnimax being could bring about a state of affairs sans evil and suffering and remain omnimax. No evil, no concept of good. No concept of good, no omnibenevolence. An amoral being can do nothing, thus no omnipotence or power of any kind. If PoE negates the very attributes upon which it builds its case…well, no PoE. If the only way PoE can obtain is to have such a being bring about a state of affairs that cancels out such a being in the process then PoE doesn’t demonstrate that such a being doesn’t exist, in fact, it demonstrates the converse, that the current state of affairs necessitates the existence of just such a being. Hardly what I’d call a convincing argument.

diana

Huh?

d

rainbow walking

quote:
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Originally posted by rainbow walking
An amoral being can do nothing, thus no omnipotence or power of any kind.
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Diana: Huh?

rw: All sentient beings base their actions on some type of normative value system, even if it's nothing more than self preservation. No normative values, no motivation to act.

Marz Blak

This statement, combined with its application to a hypothetical amoral being, implies that any value judgment must have an ethical component.

I am not sure I believe this is true. Where is the ethical consideration in preferring chocolate over vanilla?

Or am I misreading your assertion?

rainbow walking

Hi Marz,

You said: This statement, combined with its application to a hypothetical amoral being, implies that any value judgment must have an ethical component.

I am not sure I believe this is true. Where is the ethical consideration in preferring chocolate over vanilla?

In response to this: rw: All sentient beings base their actions on some type of normative value system, even if it's nothing more than self preservation. No normative values, no motivation to act.


To which I respond: The ethical consideration in the preferance is implied and can be stated thusly:

Pleasing myself is a good thing and since chocolate pleases me more than vanilla, I prefer chocolate.

Clearly, in a state of affairs sans evil and suffering, no reference for pleasure would exist either.

NonContradiction

It's my belief that we need to eliminate the word "evil" in the PoE since we are not really talking about evil, anyway, but rather pain and suffering. Good and evil are metaphysical constructs that have no basis in the natural world we live in. On the other hand, the pains and pleasures of this life, which we do EXPERIENCE, do have a concrete reference.

Now, having said the above, I think that it would be absurd to claim that 6 million Jews, assuming that this number is correct, didn't suffer in Nazi Germany.

I think that you are demonstrating that an absurdity in a premise leads to an absurd conclusion.



If people would stop equivocating on the word "evil", then perhaps we could reach a common understanding. Our question then becomes, is God immoral for not preventing gratuitous pain and suffering, instead of, is God evil for not preventing evil? The latter commits the fallacy of equivocation, IMO.

I don't think so.

I don't, but I don't speak for everybody else.