Dialogue on Good, Evil, and the Existence of God (Hackett Philosophical Dialogues series) by John Perry. Read online, or download in secure PDF or secure ePub format John Perry-author of the acclaimed Dialogue on Personal Identity and Immortality (Hackett Publishing Co., 1978)-revisits Gretchen Weirob in this lively and absorbing dialogue on. If there is evil in the world that suggests there’s some way to detect good and evil and some ultimate reason for why this is good and that’s evil. Question: Bill, you think that evil and good require some kind of moral principle, and that moral principle requires the existence of God.
Or perhaps there is, but he is ignorant, or weak, or mean' (p.4) She thinks God must not care her because God lets her suffered. She provides a main argument to support her position which is 'the existence of suffering is inconsistent with the existence of the all-perfect God.' (p.17) She thinks there is evil but without God. Miller wants to convince Weirob to believe the possibility of God exists. His argument is that this world is the creation of an all-perfect Being, even if we admit that there is suffering in it. He claims that the existence of suffering is consistent with the existence of the all-perfect God. Their arguments are opposed to each other. So Miller has to convince Weirob that Christian God he believe in--- all perfect, omnipotent, omniscient, and benevolent -- could possibly exist, even given as unimportant a bit of suffering as her flu. Miller first raises some examples to proof his argument is possible but doesn't have to explain to Weirob what plan God has in mind. The example is about a painting can have ugly parts but been more beautiful or deep because of them or a dull chapter in an interesting novel. But Weirob does not think her suffering with her flu compares with those examples at all. She claims that she is not a picture of a sniveling, dripping, suffering human but a sniveling dripping, suffering human. This convinces us to think that Weirob wants Miller to give her a more detail of example which is related to her.
The Argument from Evil (against the existence of God)
1. God is all-powerful
2. God is all good
3. Evil exists.
Some claim that if God is all good and all powerful, it is a contradiction to believe that she exists because of the fact that there is an immense amount of evil in the world.
Let’s Examine each proposition individually:
Proposition 1 - God is all powerful. Some philosophers like John Mill and William James have made the claim that God is all good, but not all-powerful or all-knowing. They do this in order to let God off the hook (so to speak) so that there is no logical contradiction in their beliefs. These philosophers have argued that God can’t do whatever he pleases and he doesn’t know the future. They believe that if God knew the future, we would not have freedom because God’s knowledge would predetermine everything to be as it is.
Discussion Question: If God knew what was going to happen in the future would this predetermine those events? Is there any alternative?
The alternative: Just because God knows what is going to happen doesn’t mean that he has to intervene or make it happen. IF God is outside of time looking in, he probably can act, but he could also let human free will play out in the world maybe only stepping in at certain points to determine certain events. In addition, this conception of God reduces God’s power and place in the world so much that one might feel that he or she ought to worship the evil power that appears to be controlling the world. If God is very powerful rather than all powerful, shouldn’t he be able to stop things like the Holocaust and the genocides in Rwanda and East Timor. If he can’t do anything about things like that, then we better watch out because he must not be that powerful at all. As a side note, when someone claims that God is omnipotent, he or she is claiming that God can do anything that is logically possible. He can’t will that he never exist or create a rock that he can’t lift.
Proposition 2 - God is perfectly Good. God cannot be a being that can do evil, because then he would not deserve praise. It is God’s goodness (agreed upon by Muslims, Christians, Jews, and Hindus) that makes him worthy of praise and not just fear and worship.
Proposition 3: Evil Exists
Christians believe that evil exists, unlike many Buddhists who believe evil is an illusion. Evil is in opposition to good, and it is real and painful to humans. It is something to be overcome. There are two types of evil Moral evil and natural evil. Moral evil is that which occurs because of human choices while natural evil is that which occurs to humans through nature (hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes, fires, etc).
This last proposition is the most troubling and causes the problems for the other two.
Discussion Question:
Imagine that you are coming from the library and crossing that little bridge that goes over the river. As your crossing you see a living baby coming towards you on the stream? Would it be evil to do nothing about it?
Johnson uses the example of a house on fire with a baby inside. He asks us if we could possibly consider good the person who had the power to stop it but didn’t? If God is all powerful then he would have the power to stop such a situation, yet we know of many such situations occurring all the time.
Possible reasons why God does nothing:
1. Baby will go to heaven. It is ok that the baby died and God let her because the baby will now be in a better place and that means God was helping the baby.
Johnson’s response – “It was either necessary for the baby to suffer or it was not. If it was not, then it was wrong to allow it. The child’s ascent to heaven does not change this fact. If it was necessary, the fact that the baby will go to heaven does not explain why it was necessary, and we are still left without an excuse for God’s inaction.” (115a)
Arguing for long term benefit for moral reasons is not a good code of morality because people can do all sorts of horrible things which they think will provide some long term benefit. Think of a person who justifies blowing up a building with people in it for some higher moral code. Johnson uses the example of a person on trial who argues that he is innocent and that his action actually is moral, but that the proof that it was a moral act will only come in the long run.
2. The free will defense. Man has been given free will so if a person commits an evil act it is of their own fault. God cannot intervene because he has given some power to humans.
Johnson’s response: “Consider a bystander who had nothing to do with starting the fire but who refused to help even though eh could have saved the child with no harm to himself. Could such a bystander be called good?”(116b)
3. It is for our own good to face adversity without help, if God did everything for us we would become dependent on her and would learn nothing for ourselves.
Johnson’s response: We have all kinds of help and one of the specialities of man is using tools to help us with our problems. Is it really that we shouldn’t use these tools or isn’t more likely that this great big ‘solve everything’ tool we call God does not exist. “Should we then abolish modern medical care or do away with efficient fire departments? Are we not dependent on their help? Is it not the case that their presence transforms us into soft, dependent creatures?”(116b)
Also, if learning how to make decisions on our own and to handle crisis and situations of moral urgency requires burning babies and suffering then God is condoning and endorsing such activities. “It follows that God approves of these disasters as a means to encourage the creation of moral urgency.”(116b) Not only that, but if there is a situation where there is not enough moral urgency and not enough disaster and suffering in order to make us strong moral agents then God has to create that evil. “God would be justified in setting a few fires of his own.”(116b) This is not the type of being we think of when we think of God.
The Evolutionary theory of Evil: Evolutionary theory claims that pain (or what we regard as pain) makes the world evolve. Evil is merely our label for the process of adaptation that allows us to continue to evolve and mark out our respective territories in the world. We are able to experience pain even more than other organisms because we have developed consciousness that allows us to feel the emotional pains of life that other animals cannot feel. Evolution is a bloody and grotesque process that selects out the weaker who are maladapted. Humans have overcome nature in many instances (we keep people alive who would normally die in a more natural setting), but the evil we experience is merely the reality of the process of evolution and the pain that inherently resides in it. If you wanted to place God in this theory it would be in the role of a silent force who uses pain and suffering as a guiding tool. This certainly does not fit the classical definition of God.
4. Evil is a necessary byproduct of the laws of nature. If God were to go around and change the laws of nature everytime a baby was in trouble there would be chaos and we would not know up from down
Johnson’s response: “The death of child caused by an electrical fire could have been prevented by a miracle and no one would ever have known. Only a minor alteration in electrical equipment would have been necessary.”(118a) Or the holocaust could have been simply avoided by giving Hitler a heart attack or some thing that killed him that would not look miraculous in any way. God did not intervene here even though undetectable miracles could have prevented the evil.
5. Evil Exists as a necessary contrast to Good, without evil we would not appreciate good, nor would we understand it unless we have something to compare it to.
Johnson’s response: There are degrees of evil and of good and we would still be able to appreciate the high degrees of good in contrast to the lower degrees. And we certaintly do not need such horrible evil things so frequently in order to properly appreciate good.
6. Ok Fine, but at least I have my faith and that is not able to be challenged.
Johnson’s response: “Now in order to have confidence in a friend one must know him well enough to justify faith in his goodness. We cannot have justifiable faith in the supreme goodness of strangers. Moreover, such confidence must come not just from a speaking acquaintance. The friend may continually assure us with his words that he is good but if he does not act like a good person, we would have no reason to trust him.” (118b-119a)
There are a lot of babies dying without intervention, and for Johnson, this is a lot of examples that God is not a trustworthy being.
Johnson concludes that believing in a God when such situations are present is difficult and if there is a God it is more likely that she is a mix between good and evil rather than just all good. “Such a God if not dead, is the next thing to it. And a person who believes in such a ghost of a God is practically an atheist. To call such a thing a god would be to strain the meaning of the word.”(118b)
The argument from evil therefore defeats tradition definitions of God.
1. God is all-powerful
2. God is all good
3. Evil exists.
Some claim that if God is all good and all powerful, it is a contradiction to believe that she exists because of the fact that there is an immense amount of evil in the world.
Let’s Examine each proposition individually:
Proposition 1 - God is all powerful. Some philosophers like John Mill and William James have made the claim that God is all good, but not all-powerful or all-knowing. They do this in order to let God off the hook (so to speak) so that there is no logical contradiction in their beliefs. These philosophers have argued that God can’t do whatever he pleases and he doesn’t know the future. They believe that if God knew the future, we would not have freedom because God’s knowledge would predetermine everything to be as it is.
Discussion Question: If God knew what was going to happen in the future would this predetermine those events? Is there any alternative?
The alternative: Just because God knows what is going to happen doesn’t mean that he has to intervene or make it happen. IF God is outside of time looking in, he probably can act, but he could also let human free will play out in the world maybe only stepping in at certain points to determine certain events. In addition, this conception of God reduces God’s power and place in the world so much that one might feel that he or she ought to worship the evil power that appears to be controlling the world. If God is very powerful rather than all powerful, shouldn’t he be able to stop things like the Holocaust and the genocides in Rwanda and East Timor. If he can’t do anything about things like that, then we better watch out because he must not be that powerful at all. As a side note, when someone claims that God is omnipotent, he or she is claiming that God can do anything that is logically possible. He can’t will that he never exist or create a rock that he can’t lift.
Proposition 2 - God is perfectly Good. God cannot be a being that can do evil, because then he would not deserve praise. It is God’s goodness (agreed upon by Muslims, Christians, Jews, and Hindus) that makes him worthy of praise and not just fear and worship.
Proposition 3: Evil Exists
Christians believe that evil exists, unlike many Buddhists who believe evil is an illusion. Evil is in opposition to good, and it is real and painful to humans. It is something to be overcome. There are two types of evil Moral evil and natural evil. Moral evil is that which occurs because of human choices while natural evil is that which occurs to humans through nature (hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes, fires, etc).
This last proposition is the most troubling and causes the problems for the other two.
Discussion Question:
Imagine that you are coming from the library and crossing that little bridge that goes over the river. As your crossing you see a living baby coming towards you on the stream? Would it be evil to do nothing about it?
Johnson uses the example of a house on fire with a baby inside. He asks us if we could possibly consider good the person who had the power to stop it but didn’t? If God is all powerful then he would have the power to stop such a situation, yet we know of many such situations occurring all the time.
Possible reasons why God does nothing:
1. Baby will go to heaven. It is ok that the baby died and God let her because the baby will now be in a better place and that means God was helping the baby.
Johnson’s response – “It was either necessary for the baby to suffer or it was not. If it was not, then it was wrong to allow it. The child’s ascent to heaven does not change this fact. If it was necessary, the fact that the baby will go to heaven does not explain why it was necessary, and we are still left without an excuse for God’s inaction.” (115a)
Arguing for long term benefit for moral reasons is not a good code of morality because people can do all sorts of horrible things which they think will provide some long term benefit. Think of a person who justifies blowing up a building with people in it for some higher moral code. Johnson uses the example of a person on trial who argues that he is innocent and that his action actually is moral, but that the proof that it was a moral act will only come in the long run.
2. The free will defense. Man has been given free will so if a person commits an evil act it is of their own fault. God cannot intervene because he has given some power to humans.
Johnson’s response: “Consider a bystander who had nothing to do with starting the fire but who refused to help even though eh could have saved the child with no harm to himself. Could such a bystander be called good?”(116b)
3. It is for our own good to face adversity without help, if God did everything for us we would become dependent on her and would learn nothing for ourselves.
Johnson’s response: We have all kinds of help and one of the specialities of man is using tools to help us with our problems. Is it really that we shouldn’t use these tools or isn’t more likely that this great big ‘solve everything’ tool we call God does not exist. “Should we then abolish modern medical care or do away with efficient fire departments? Are we not dependent on their help? Is it not the case that their presence transforms us into soft, dependent creatures?”(116b)
Also, if learning how to make decisions on our own and to handle crisis and situations of moral urgency requires burning babies and suffering then God is condoning and endorsing such activities. “It follows that God approves of these disasters as a means to encourage the creation of moral urgency.”(116b) Not only that, but if there is a situation where there is not enough moral urgency and not enough disaster and suffering in order to make us strong moral agents then God has to create that evil. “God would be justified in setting a few fires of his own.”(116b) This is not the type of being we think of when we think of God.
The Evolutionary theory of Evil: Evolutionary theory claims that pain (or what we regard as pain) makes the world evolve. Evil is merely our label for the process of adaptation that allows us to continue to evolve and mark out our respective territories in the world. We are able to experience pain even more than other organisms because we have developed consciousness that allows us to feel the emotional pains of life that other animals cannot feel. Evolution is a bloody and grotesque process that selects out the weaker who are maladapted. Humans have overcome nature in many instances (we keep people alive who would normally die in a more natural setting), but the evil we experience is merely the reality of the process of evolution and the pain that inherently resides in it. If you wanted to place God in this theory it would be in the role of a silent force who uses pain and suffering as a guiding tool. This certainly does not fit the classical definition of God.
4. Evil is a necessary byproduct of the laws of nature. If God were to go around and change the laws of nature everytime a baby was in trouble there would be chaos and we would not know up from down
Johnson’s response: “The death of child caused by an electrical fire could have been prevented by a miracle and no one would ever have known. Only a minor alteration in electrical equipment would have been necessary.”(118a) Or the holocaust could have been simply avoided by giving Hitler a heart attack or some thing that killed him that would not look miraculous in any way. God did not intervene here even though undetectable miracles could have prevented the evil.
5. Evil Exists as a necessary contrast to Good, without evil we would not appreciate good, nor would we understand it unless we have something to compare it to.
Johnson’s response: There are degrees of evil and of good and we would still be able to appreciate the high degrees of good in contrast to the lower degrees. And we certaintly do not need such horrible evil things so frequently in order to properly appreciate good.
6. Ok Fine, but at least I have my faith and that is not able to be challenged.
Johnson’s response: “Now in order to have confidence in a friend one must know him well enough to justify faith in his goodness. We cannot have justifiable faith in the supreme goodness of strangers. Moreover, such confidence must come not just from a speaking acquaintance. The friend may continually assure us with his words that he is good but if he does not act like a good person, we would have no reason to trust him.” (118b-119a)
There are a lot of babies dying without intervention, and for Johnson, this is a lot of examples that God is not a trustworthy being.
Johnson concludes that believing in a God when such situations are present is difficult and if there is a God it is more likely that she is a mix between good and evil rather than just all good. “Such a God if not dead, is the next thing to it. And a person who believes in such a ghost of a God is practically an atheist. To call such a thing a god would be to strain the meaning of the word.”(118b)
The argument from evil therefore defeats tradition definitions of God.