Atheist Debates - The Problem of Evil
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- Опубліковано 9 вер 2024
- Part of the Atheist Debates Patreon project: / atheistdebates
While the Problem of Evil has been a long-standing favorite argument against many different god models, I don't find it particularly compelling and am very particular about when and how I use it.
In this video, I'll talk about why that's the case...and it's all preparation for an argument that I personally view as a much more effective and powerful argument.
I feel like I need to watch all of your Atheist Debates videos multiple times to remember all of your brilliant thoughts and points.
I take Christian claims about problem of evil and suffering and respond to them by changing general "evil" into particular sort of evil, for example "child rape". So, when someone says "evil and suffering exist so that we could appreciate good times", I translate that to "child rape exists so that children can appreciate times when they are not raped". "Evil exists because God respects free Will"="child rape exists because God respects free will of the rapist". "Evil exist so that we could be tested and closer to God"="Child rape exists so that children could be tested and closer to God".
I've never found the "free will" defense to be at all compelling. First, I'm skeptical that free will even exists in the first place, but that aside, much suffering in the world is the result of natural phenomena that have nothing to do with human choices, and on top of that, the Bible has numerous instances of God interfering in the making of a choice, such as with Pharaoh, which makes the raising of free will as an objection to the Biblical god's non-interference in matters of suffering rather moot.
+xerxestireirondada
The "free will" response is typically, at least from well-educated philosophers of religion, only employed in response to the "logical problem of evil" (the existence of an all-good god logically contradicts the existence of evil/suffering). Because the sum total of all evil is comprised, supposedly, of both moral and natural evil, then if "free will" necessitates any degree of moral evil it means that the existence of an all-good God is at least internally logically consistent.
The "free will theodicy", and this I think is the point you were getting at, can do very little work as a response to problems of natural evil or suffering, especially when carefully stated so as to exclude moral evil or causal relationships. i.e. "The evidentiary problem of gratuitous suffering", such as an animal suffering excruciatingly for long periods of time prior to death due to some natural disaster that is unknown and uncaused by human beings. The response to this sort of problem of evil will usually be some form of skeptical theism (which is what Matt is talking about, i.e. "how is one supposed to know that there isn't some greater good in play that we just can't see?")
Most of the things humans do, they do because of wired-in urges. Frequently they entirely lack the willpower to fight those urges (scratching chicken pox blisters is a mild example). There are also things we don't do because of a lack of such urges (breaking our fingers off for example).
So, he's already demonstrated that he's willing to wire us to do and _not_ do certain things. How interesting that he couldn't wire us all to have no urge to harm others.
Also, there's zero need for the extreme pain & suffering that currently exists on this planet (with or without humans present). If his grand plan somehow requires this extreme pain & suffering, it's already not grand at all.
+jessesipprell Well exactly, you don't. In the same way that feeling pain in working out, can lead to a greater good later on.
But more importantly, how do you even define Evil or good and bad, without an objective standard? You can't unless you posit some kind of objective morality/goodness which at the very minimum gives you pantheism (teleological universe).
ElectricQualia I can objectively determine what is good and bad for human beings via evidence and reason. A cosmic dictator does not resolve anything with regards to what is actually good or bad. You presuppose God is the good figure in your view. Exactly how did you determine that to begin with?
xerxestireirondada "I can objectively determine what is good and bad for human beings via evidence and reason."
If you can bridge the Is-Ought dichotomy , get ready to get your Nobel prize.
Often, a child intuitively understands that what an abusive adult is doing is wrong.
+RLSteve I saw a snip of an interview with a daughter of Warren Jeffs. She knew
intuitively the sexual relationship he was forcing on her wasn't right,
but as a child, she was naive to believe Jeffs was perfect. Growing up
she tried to rationalize the two competing views until she gained adult
reasoning skills... I think this is analogous to a Christian converting
out of the religion.
www.cnn.com/2015/09/29/us/warren-jeffs-children-allegations/
That's because all humans (with possible exception to some born with mental illnesses such as psychopathy) are born with the ability to empathize and empathy is primarily what humans use to determine/recognize what is innately wrong. In fact empathy is at the core of the very concept of innately wrong.
Unfortunately the ability to empathize can easily be damaged (or virtually destroyed) by improper upbringing and most of the human race is currently in a chain of such upbringing.
More often than not, children who are raised by (or heavily influenced by) people who have have had their ability to empathize damaged will themselves have a damaged ability to empathize as adults, and will therefore have trouble determining/recognizing what is innately wrong.
When/where exactly the chain started, I don't know.
My guess is that it was started by one or more psychopaths assuming positions of power in one or more communities in the distant past.
I knew my mother was evil when she took me to the hospital so a stranger could stab me with a syringe, they called it vax or something.
God is not a man.
@@tis8411 Nothing is "innately" morally wrong. We decide what is morally right and wrong, but we may be informed by intuitions. However, sometimes our intuitions can be wrong, and so we must use reason to make corrections.
I think the problem of evil can become more compelling when you bring in the concept of heaven, i.e. a proposed state-of-affairs that by definition is not only better than the current state-of-affairs, but the perfect state-of-affairs: No suffering, and people with free will who never make the wrong choices. This current world could therefore never be the best possible world, because another world allegedly exists (has existed forever for a timeless being in an eternal now) that has no suffering.
+wimsweden This is what I was thinking too. If heaven exists, then this raises a problem for the free will argument. Obviously a world can exist that is better than this one and still retains free will, unless the apologist is suggesting that we don't have free will in heaven, in which case, the argument is still undermined by the consideration that free will becomes meaningless when we end up spending an eternity without it anyway.
+Derpalon You're quite right about the problem of Heaven. Seemingly, there can't be free will in Heaven, if there is no evil there. There is also the problem of Hell. How can we be said to have free will to choose to be with God if the alternative is eternal torment?
+Simeon Denk That argument assumes free will is desired in heaven though. Heaven is, after all, perfection.
It'd be like saying if there was no water in heaven you'd go thirsty, assuming thirst is ever felt.
***** in terms of a finite world (like Heaven), is "perfection" something that can actually be reached or something that is served as a limit?
***** If free will isn't desired in heaven, then why would it be desired on Earth? If free will isn't important, God could have made us all perfect in the first place, and started us out in heaven.
When I was still catholic, this was something I really struggled with but essentially ignored. That was my only answer.
The idea that I'm being punished for the sins of my father has never felt just to me. I don't care what Adam did, I'm my own person.
I never answered the problem of evil but I always recognized it as a big problem for my belief. It didn't make me an atheist outright but it was one of many papercuts that killed it eventually.
In casual debates, the problem of evil is very useful because it creates cognitive dissonance.
So how do you explain evil? And yes you are your own person.
Yes, if God did exist, he would never punish the descendants of Adam and Eve for the sins of Adam and Eve. That violates the principle of individual accountability.
Theists claiming that atheists "deny" god, because we are "mad at god", is like saying that we are denying that Darth Vader is real, because we are mad at Darth Vader.
They are both fictional villains, that's all.
Ironically, by labeling G-d a villian, you have proved the theory true, that you are in Fact Mad at G-d.
UA-cam Greats you can hate fictional characters, it doesn’t mean you believe they exist.
Exactly - u can hate the idea and / or concept of a notion whether it’s real or not. Just hate the thought of something.
@@youtubegreats7138 You can hate fictional villain without admitting he is real.
That's a rather naive outlook. Unfortunately, unlike Darth Vader, belief in religions has wrecked much havoc on earth. That idea is not a fantasy but a reality.
What you failed to mention is that the Warriors blew a 3-1 lead in the NBA finals
lmao
But who's the defending champs now bro? 😁
Matt, I'm brazilian and I'm a huge fan of yours and the Atheist Experience. I watch videos of yours and the AE every single night religiously (lol). You're an absolutely brilliant person and I wish I had at least half of your quick wit and intellect.
If vicarious redemption through Jesus is an immoral concept (which I think it is) then surely vicarious punishment for original sin is an immoral concept as well. My favorite response to the free will defense is the logical problem of natural evil and suffering. Natural evil and suffering is not the result of moral agents exercising their free will. It's the result of nature such as hurricanes, earthquakes, disease etc. The existence of that sort of evil and the existence of an omnipotent, omnibenevolent god I think is a contradiction.
Also, I think the "parents know best" analogy is flawed. A parent might take a child to get a vaccine for instance. The shot to the arm hurts but the good that comes from the vaccine outweighs the momentary discomfort. However, parents aren't omnipotent. If they had the choice to give them the same benefit without causing the child pain (which an omnipotent being would be able to do) then it would be evil to give them the shot.
+MrTweej Plantinga's response to natural evil is to suggest the existence of demons (equipped with freewill, of course) who freely choose to cause natural disasters with their superhuman powers. Yes, it really is that stupid.
+Andrew Cooper I know. It's actually technically a little more complicated. He doesn't actually have to maintain that demons or whatever cause earthquakes. Just that it's logically possible. I use this to segue in to the evidential problem of natural evil. This version doesn't claim that God and evil are a logical contradiction but it does make God as likely as demons causing natural disasters. That's a pretty conclusive argument in my opinion.
+Andrew Cooper
Well in that case since God is more powerful than demons, I don't see why God couldn't just annihilate them out of existence, it would surely benefit the earth if they are responsible for natural disasters. Any response to this?
+MrTweej Fair point, the demon argument is intended only as a defense against the logical problem, not as a straightforward theodicy. Plantinga's actual theodicy is, as you're probably aware, much different than his defense and, by my lights, just as ridiculous.
+MrTweej My favourite response to free will defence is the heaven. In heaven there is not supposed to be evil and there is supposed to be free will.
Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent.
Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent.
Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil?
Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?
- Epicurus, philosopher (c. 341-270 BCE)
"if God shows or proves his existence to you then your free will is abolished"
The above argument is countered by one simple fact:
Lucifer knew God existed, and yet he had the free will to disobey him; so wouldn't it be fair to assume that if the Christian God proved his existence inside all of us be it through showing himself through the sky or somehow magically instilled his existence inside of us, we would still have free will? It only seems reasonable to me that this is the case.
If so, why doesn't he? if he did, he would surely turn most criminals into moral, ethical, productive citizens, turn most atheists into theists etc... You know why he doesn't show himself? There are two options, either he doesn't exist, or he likes to play games and we are his NPCs.
+Philipos6 Also, what is so special about God's existence that is has more impact on my will than the infinite Universe?
+Philipos6 "That's different, he's Satan!", said a friend of mine lol
+Jan King Maybe ask your friend a why Adam and Eve were able to chose to sin even though they never witnessed suffering or the results of evil before their "sin".
do we even have free will? (if god exists) (god said, he made us with free will, so eve used her free will, tempted adam with the apple, they both ''sinned'' and lucifer also excersied his free will in that instance which god had given him, to lie to eve, and the consequences of eating of gods tree, was death (it does seem he's a bit of a narcissist to me, like, ohh dont touch or eat my food, if you do, i will hit you! but you can eat all this other stuff, just not this one food, wtf? (ohh you stole my food= you deserve to die!) and he dosent even explain why he essentially felt, ohh they shoudlnt eat of it/my tree, the only thing i can think of is he just wanted this one tree for himself? but for what? to eat of, look at? its not explained.) and the death punishement, to any rational senibel, good person, would say that thats just evil. god essentially made death happen, (just because he could i guess, i dunno, its litteraly like, ohh i made this toy, (humans) but now i will destroy it/kill them/make them die wtf. stuff dosent make any sense, other than god being a sadist or something.) but then he indirectly kills another guy, (jesus) to fix his original problem he made, to make things ''fair'' again, and somehow, if you are a christian you will see jesus or get to heaven again, so then they follow what he says up there, but if he makes the rules, they dont have free will, they think they do, but if they follow what he says, they dont, and are controlled. (adam and eve (and lucifer) used their free will HE GAVE THEM, but god made them die because of it (and lucifer apparently will die,/get another chance? to be able to co-exist along god in heaven again, some christians believe, what ive heard anyway, im no expert) to me that makes this god they speak of evil, at least under curtain cirumstances aka, if they didnt eat of it they wouldnt have died, (if they did what he said, he essentially woudlnt kill them, but if they didnt do what he said, didnt follow his rules they would die, he's nice to them sometimes, (eternal life) but he's voilent other times, (annihelation/death/destruction) thats like a abusive releationship, litteraly. he's like well everyone should be with me, and you cant leave me, (do what you want as free as possible i guess? ofc dont kill, steal rape, etc, we can figure that out) if you do you're in trouble. ua-cam.com/video/xaV1_M2j200/v-deo.html) but he's still evil in my book yeah. and if he is real as they claim, (it is like a animal! and even if lets say he's real and has ''his plan'' why did he make animals the way he made them. it seems cruel to me, and it is!) i think every atheist, maybe even many christians would have some questions for him, unless you litteraly cant think or be rational at all.)
If a truthful God does exist, it would defend the atheistic position over the theistic position. - Kyle Eaton
The atheistic position is not atheistic but anti-theistic; you think God would be bad if real, and therefore he must be fictional. Because you've been taught that God is the wrong kind of "goid", i.e. the champion or embodiment of "goodness" on the moral plane, and since goodness doesn't exactly prevail on the moral plane, you are hostile to this "God" making statements like "even if he were real I wouldn't worship him".
Meanwhile, God portrays himself as transcending the moral plane, being responsible for and utilizing both good and evil for a trans-moral Purpose (which benefits only his loyalists), and while generally beneficent (the sun shines on both Jack the Ripper and Florence Nightingale), he is only selectively and conditionally loving ("Jacob have I loved , Esau have I hated").
In other words, He's the opposite of the usual portrayal by religious apologists, and a far cry from the living embodiment of goodness who just loves EVERYBODY unconditionally. But unlike that fictional being, He is compatible with observable reality. Just ask Job.
ohh wtf haha,🤣 i havent heard that one before lol
@@Nunya_Bidness_53 God is defined as being perfectly moral.
@@whittfamily1 NOT BY GOD OR BIBLICAL THEOLOGY. By theistic apologists who make the mistakes of Job's friends (whom God directly accused of blasphemy) and /or metge the characteristics of the Platonic demiurge with the Scriptural YHVH..
God is:
✓ omnipotent
✓ omniscient
❌ wholly good/omnibenevolent
... and even omnipotence and omniscience are commonly misdefined.
God is an absolute Monarch and alaw unto Himself; the rules are for thee, not for He. Moral categories only apply to the created order, not to the Creator, who is wholly other than His creation. God does what he wants, without accountbility. That's why when a mere human being acts as if he can do what he wants without accountbility, the response is:"Hey, jackass, who do you think you are--God?!" Atheism is in effect asking God the same question as if it applied to Him.
Go watch Bob Ross paint his shitty landscapes on PBS. What's his motto?
"In our world, we don't 'make mistakes' we have happy accidents' ." Why? Because when he f---s up his painting, he's not accountable to anybody; he's the creator, he stands outside the canvas; whatever he puts there, goes there *because he put it there*. If the "happy little bush" could talk and didn't like being put by the creek instead of by the tree, too bad, he's got the brush, and the paint thinner if it gets too ornery.
It's the same with God; He doesn't do a thing because it's right, a thing is right *because he does it* . There's no standard of "rightness" independent of or external to Himself to which he "must" conform "or else"; if so He wouldn't BE "God".
I can already hear you bleat: "Waaah! That's just
'might makes right' !" EXACTLY. NOW you get it. The very word "God" *means* might or strength. Might i.e.God makes *everything* . So we are bacy to the absolute sovereignty of God. NOT his absolute goodness.
@@Nunya_Bidness_53 NB3: NOT BY GOD OR BIBLICAL THEOLOGY.
GW3: God doesn’t exist and the theologians are mistaken.
NB3: By theistic apologists who make the mistakes of Job's friends (whom God directly accused of blasphemy) and /or metge the characteristics of the Platonic demiurge with the Scriptural YHVH..
GW3: God doesn’t exist. The book of Job is a farce. It depicts God as an immoral character who would make bets with Satan at Job’s expense. This is pure nonsense. If he did exist, God would be perfectly moral, not a jerk as depicted in the book of Job.
NB3: God is: ✓ omnipotent ✓ omniscient wholly good/omnibenevolent ... and even omnipotence and omniscience are commonly misdefined.
GW3: Those are traits which God would have, if he existed, but he doesn’t. If he existed, the world would be much different from the way it is.
NB3: God is an absolute Monarch and alaw unto Himself; the rules are for thee, not for He.
GW3: I strongly disagree. If God did exist, he would devise a universal moral code which would apply to all persons, including himself. God would not be a hypocrite. No person is above the moral law.
NB3: Moral categories only apply to the created order, not to the Creator, who is wholly other than His creation. God does what he wants, without accountbility.
GW3: I strongly disagree for the reasons I gave above. You do not understand the concept of “God.” He would be perfectly moral, if he did exist.
NB3: That's why when a mere human being acts as if he can do what he wants without accountbility, the response is:"Hey, jackass, who do you think you are--God?!"
GW3: Nobody is God. God doesn’t exist, and this has been proven. However, whenever two or more persons live in proximity and interact, they will devise a moral code. If God did exist and created other persons, he too would devise a moral code, and it would apply to everyone, including himself. Nobody is above the moral law.
NB3: Atheism is in effect asking God the same question as if it applied to Him.
GW3: God doesn’t exist and can’t be asked any question. Atheism is the absence of belief in any gods.
NB3: Go watch Bob Ross paint his shitty landscapes on PBS. What's his motto? "In our world, we don't 'make mistakes' we have happy accidents' ." Why? Because when he f---s up his painting, he's not accountable to anybody; he's the creator, he stands outside the canvas; whatever he puts there, goes there *because he put it there*. If the "happy little bush" could talk and didn't like being put by the creek instead of by the tree, too bad, he's got the brush, and the paint thinner if it gets too ornery.
GW3: Your analogy is very poor. A painting is not analogous to a moral code.
NB3: It's the same with God; He doesn't do a thing because it's right, a thing is right because he does it .
GW3: I strongly disagree. If God did exist, he would devise the moral law just before creating other persons and then he would implement it. He would choose to obey it himself and expect all other persons to obey it. Just as Donald Trump is not above the law, God would not be above the universal moral code. For example, God would always comply with the moral rule “A person X should never rape another person Y.”
NB3: There's no standard of "rightness" independent of or external to Himself to which he "must" conform "or else"; if so He wouldn't BE "God".
GW3: I strongly disagree. If God did exist (he doesn’t), then he would create or devise the standard of rightness to be independent or external to himself, and then he would conform to it. He would choose to do this. God would not be a hypocrite. He would not tell others to obey the moral law and then not obey it himself.
NB3: I can already hear you bleat: "Waaah! That's just 'might makes right' !" EXACTLY. NOW you get it.
GW3: I bleat something different: “Omnipotence is a separate trait from moral perfection. God would use his great power in service of the moral law which he created, if he existed.”
NB3: The very word "God" means might or strength.
GW3: No, you are simply mistaken about this. “The English word god comes from the Old English god, which itself is derived from the Proto-Germanic *guđán....Depending on which possibility is preferred, the pre-Christian meaning of the Germanic term [guđán] may either have been (in the "pouring" case) "libation" or "that which is libated upon, idol" - or, as Watkins[1] opines in the light of Greek χυτη γαια "poured earth" meaning "tumulus", "the Germanic form may have referred in the first instance to the spirit immanent in a burial mound" - or (in the "invoke" case) "invocation, prayer" (compare the meanings of Sanskrit brahman) or "that which is invoked".”
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/God_(word)
NB3: Might i.e.God makes everything.
GW3: The standard definition of “God” includes “who created the cosmos...” The moral law is included in the cosmos. The cosmos would consist of everything not God.
NB3: So we are bacy to the absolute sovereignty of God. NOT his absolute goodness.
GW3: God would be both sovereign (unique, independent, eternal) and also perfectly moral, if he did exist. As I said, “God: is defined as “the hypothetical supernatural, unique, independent, eternal, invulnerable, everywhere-present, all-knowing, perfectly rational, all-powerful, perfectly moral person or intelligent agent who created the cosmos, sometimes intervenes in our world, and assigns human persons to different desirable or undesirable conditions after they die.”
Thanks for your videos. After the oft lengthy, fruitless conversations I seem to allow myself to get into with people who appear to choose prejudice and irrational arguments over evidence and reason, it's refreshing to hear the dulcid tones of Dillahunty FM, providing a calming reassurance that, one day, things might be ok... :-)
My favourite response to the free will response is: whatever lessons we're learning by using our free will to do evil things, why doesn't God just divinely grant all of us that knowledge and thereby achieve the same effect without people suffering?
And my favourite response to the best-possible-world apologetic is that we _already have_ created a better world than the one we started off in, and we are continuing to improve upon it as we speak.
I've heard a response to this argument; "because granting us that knowledge would negate free will", of course this implies god has no free will, by which time it's usually crickets.
@@drrickmarshall1191 How would it negate free will? That's just a non-sequitur.
@@Adamantium9001 I agree, but then again the people who respond like this aren't interested in rational or logic.
@@drrickmarshall1191 New knowledge or information does not negate free will (if it even exists). If some people had the knowledge that smoking cigarettes was harmful to your health, would their free will to smoke or not be cancelled? Hell no. Even with the knowledge, they could choose to smoke or not. Same thing would apply to knowledge of God's existence, if he did exist, which he doesn't.
@@whittfamily1 Exactly, either conclusion one comes to is detrimental to the concept of an loving deity. I could buy an indifferent or evil deity... But no one wants to peddle that nowadays.
I can't believe I've never thought to ask the question at 15:45. Matt this is why I enjoy listening to everything you put out. You take such an intelligently critical look at these things, but at the same time you're not so wrapped up in the most intelligent parts of the argument that miss the simplest of ideas. and you always have a way to describe your ideas so that they are simple enough to come to the right conclusion, and yet they still sound brilliant. You constantly made me think more than I ever have before and I, as well as many others, are very thankful for what you do
I admire Matt a great deal, but still he should become a fan of the argument from evil and suffering against the existence of God. It is a slam dunk argument.
If god is omnipotent and omniscient, it's logically impossible for his creations to have free will, so there goes that apologetic.
I've heard theists argue that even if there was no naturally occurring anguish or suffering (illnesses, natural disasters, etc...) there would still be people doing evil things because they have the choice. And it's because of gods love for us that he allows us to have freewill. Commonly they say it's justified because the ability of choice makes us happy. You have the choice to choose between right(gods will) and wrong(your own will or Satan's). But isn't deriving any happiness from doing anything other than gods will sinful? Isn't that happiness you feel when choosing for yourself in fact undeserved and frowned upon by god? It's a case in which there is no win-win. If you are happy that you did something wrong(according to the bibles axiom of _morality_) then you are indeed a sinner aren't you? What is there to be gained from sinning? Is there anything you can say that is good for you or anyone else as a result of your sins? Can you justify somebody not doing the will of the lord? Even if somebody were going to be saved as a direct result of sinning could you 100% justifiably tell them to move forward with their sin and not feel morally questionable and it not be a sin to encourage them to do so even knowing the result? Besides that being that they wouldn't have to be saved if they didn't have the ability to sin in the first case correct? Sin(choosing anything other than gods will) is only detrimental to yourself and others correct? So in this instance, since you gain nothing from it and that choice ultimately is more like the ability to choose to fall on a sword, then it isn't good after all? It only serves to harm, it's a disease with no silver lining. Therefore it would be to everyone's best interest to have that sin(choosing anything other than gods will) gone isn't it? If you disagree could you give me a benefit of sinning?
If God did exist and he loved us, then he would trim our free will and, for example, not allow men the free will to rape women.
Here's another question I heard from a guy called Alex O'Connor:
What if God was actually evil and he simply allowed good things to happen?
Matt is our modern day Socrates
+Johny Blade I particularly appreciate how calm he. He speaks his views quietly, calmly, and thoroughly. It's not a shouting match with him.
American Atheist nah
@@jimmuncy5636 have you ever seen atheist experience...?
@@jimmuncy5636 If you wish to see Matt shout, watch some of his call-in shows.
None of the arguments for evil in this world would make sense unless we come to the realization that we are dealing with an unconscious god. A conscious god would know the difference between good and evil.
Ulises Folh unconscious God?
A few points:
* Adam & Eve did not *cause* evil and suffering, because they didn't have the capabilities to do that. Only God could do that (if the story is to be believed), and since Adam & Eve couldn't exactly hold God hostage, God therefore *chose* to make them suffer as a consequence of their actions. I'm not arguing that they shouldn't have consequences. I'm saying that God was the one that chose the severity of those consequences. Adam & Eve are not to blame for that aspect.
* I agree that the free will argument only works if God doesn't intervene. That basically destroys any argument for prayer. Although I've heard some christians argue that prayer is beneficial for us, even if God doesn't act on it.
* If we're already in the best possible world, what is the afterlife supposed to be like?
You are correct that God chose to punish Adam and Eve. But if he did exist, he would not have chosen to punish them so severely and he would not have chosen to punish their descendants. Those are immoral acts.
Hey, that's one of my favorite spots at McKinney Falls! I always thought that it would make a great backdrop for a video.
I'm not able to watch this video yet because I'm at work but from the description I suspect I'm going to disagree with you quite a bit. I think some versions of the problem of evil are excellent arguments...
As you will find out. it all depends on the definition of the God.
If suffering's such a blessing, why don't we just inflict as much of it as possible?
Apologists always talk about a mysterious "greater good." They never mention what that is, though. Strange. An all-knowing, all-powerful god could just tell them what this "greater good" is.
In the world that God originally created, was suffering possible then? If no, then Adam and Eve had free will in world without suffering, so free will is possible without suffering. If yes, then world God originally created was no better than this, if suffering is possible.
When I was a theist, the problem of evil as presented by Epicurus didn't convince me that gods don't exist. I simply concluded that my gods could not be all powerful.
It did turn me away from Christianity.
Very interesting video as usual Matt. But as a videographer you should cut between a close up and medium shot rather than two close ups.
When I'm talking to a believer and the issue of evil in the world comes up, I simply ask them to imagine and describe a world without a God. Invariably, they will say something to the effect that a world without God would be impossible. But I press them, hypothetically, what would they imagine a world without God to be like. They usually end up describing the very world we live in now. So I then ask them, if a world without a God would look just like our world, which you purport has a God, how do you tell the difference?
+babybluesnowden I agree that a world without religion would be, and would have been, amazing, but... He's not saying a world without religion. He's asking about a world without a god as a way of getting them to think. Since this IS a world without god, of course there will be religion. Man will still invent gods to fill in the gaps. For there not to be religion then early man would have to have been a LOT less curious about stuff like "where does lightning come from?" or "where did my loved one just go?" Without that same sense of curiosity and wanting to know things, we may not have spread across the planet and so may have been killed off a long time ago.
As for getting to a world without religion, I see that on the horizon, if we can avoid destroying civilization long enough to get there.
TruthSeeker In my opinion they go hand in hand, without any God(s), would there be any religions, per se? Maybe there would as people tend to gravitate in the direction of collective worship, belief, faith, etc... The church would most certainly disband without a God to invoke their doctrines and dogmatic ideals. You are correct, we do live in a world without the all mighty creator. Much to the dismay of realists, most of the world clings to faith as if it were somehow believable. The discovery of extant life in the cosmos will surely crush the concept that we are somehow special, relevant in nature. The universe doesn't know we exist, and doesn't care what we think. "We are a way for the universe to know itself." -- Carl Sagan
babybluesnowden Maybe you're trying to say that if the CONCEPT of god never existed you'd have no religion. Like the isolated tribes that have no concept of gods. Sure. That's fine. And, yes, the whole dark ages could have been avoided and we'd be 1000 years farther along technologically. But when you say "without any god(s)", it sounds literal.
I'm agreeing that you have to first invent a god and then you can have religion.
As for extant life, you know they will just say, "look how powerful god is, he put life everywhere" or some other way to include the new facts...like they always do. Is that too pessimistic or just realistic of me?
P.S. Favorite scientist since I was a child... Carl Sagan
P.P.S. As for life on Mars, I think we already discovered it but NASA dismissed it because, of the three experiments on Viking, only once came back positive... but it was the most sensitive. The inventor thinks it did and this article seems to point in that direction too: news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2012/04/120413-nasa-viking-program-mars-life-space-science/
This is quite possibly the best of all possible worlds.
A world without God is not possible as there would be no foundation even for Being. Foundations require order, order presupposes intention and intention requires a will, so God is required for there to "be" anything. A world without God is not possible or intelligible for us beings who have order in-built in us and we are order-seeking creatures.
Christians hold God to be the moral standard of all that is good. Thus, anything that is good must be reflected in God's nature. The freewill defense holds that freedom is good, and further, that free beings have the ability to choose to do evil. If God can choose to do evil, then he is not the moral standard. If God cannot choose to do evil, then he is not free and freedom is not good.
In short, the freewill defense is incompatible with Christian doctrine. They cannot be held simultaneously.
+Andrew Cooper
That largely depends on what you mean by "free will".
Physically, I have the "freedom" to axe murder my mother. However, not only is that not something I want to do, it's also not something I can imagine ever _actually_ doing; it's not in my character. If it were indeed true that I could never cognitively bring myself to perform such an action, would it mean that my freedom of self-determination was actually constrained? How does that compare with potential acts of will that are more obviously constrained, irrespective of desire, such as choosing to breath unaided underwater (continuously) or choosing to construct a perpetual motion machine?
What we mean by freewill is, as always, murky and ill-defined. However, for the purpose of my argument, a theist only needs to affirm the following two points about freewill, both of which should be uncontroversial to anyone using the freewill defense:
1. Having freewill is in some sense better than not having freewill.
2. Freewill entails the potential to make wrong or evil choices.
Without these two premises, the defense is dead in the water. If God is intrinsically good, however, then two mutually exclusive conclusions follow:
3. God has freewill, because he would be less good if he did not.
4. God does not have freewill, because he has no potential to make wrong or evil choices.
You raise some interesting issues though. Our free choices are indeed quite limited, whether by physics or by our own conscience, neither of which are within our power to change. I think this points to another big problem with the freewill defense, namely that we don't have the type of freewill it entails.
God cannot do evil because evil is meaningless and purposeless. He is the only One that can give meaning and purpose (life) to anything, whereas Satan is the giver of death to all things meaningful and purposeful. Man has a choice to live purposefully (human) or purposelessly (inhuman/demonic).
Numbers 23:19
“God is not a man, that he should lie; neither the son of man, that he should repent: hath he said, and shall he not do it? or hath he spoken, and shall he not make it good?”
King James Version (KJV)
1 Samuel 15:29
“And also the Strength of Israel will not lie nor repent: for he is not a man, that he should repent.”
King James Version (KJV)
@@user-zf2bk5rk8r If evil is meaningless and purposeless, then YHWH has no reason or meaning to allow it, yet he still does. Problem of evil upholds.
@@jessesipprell This would pose an even more grim view of a deity, if it's not in ones character to commit acts of evil, but they can still retain their free will, why could a deity not create us all with a character or nature not cohesive to performing evil acts?
I think Dostoyevsky made a valid point in Karamazov that I like to employ when talking about the Problem of Evil - to paraphrase, the idea that there is no good in the world that could possibly balance out the evil of some particular evil acts. Is "compassion" worth "suffering"? Is "courage" worth "terror"? Would you, as Dostoyevsky asks, consent to make a world in which even one little child suffers to death crying out to his God for protection that never comes?
Could the "best of all possible worlds" be one that doesn't exist at all? Moreover, when we consider the types of evils that are visited upon humanity, why include the ones that, say, humans make against one another? Keep the tsunamis and earthquakes to inspire fear and pain, and let humanity be good, compassionate beings that don't harm one another? I'm not sure that would be better/worse, but it's an option that God certainly could have created.
I'm interested by the way you chose to format the free will argument - as a compatibilist, isn't your view of "free will" different from Plantinga's, and wouldn't that be a compelling argument to make in response to someone who raises it?
Great points here, Matt! Thanks for the video.
I agree, personally I don't ever use the problem of evil as I find it's a far to visceral topic and it allows crazy apologetics to get involved. Facts are easier to fight with.
You’re right about the introduction of crazy apologetics.
So many crazy add hawk rationalizations come out of that.
“Well, maybe god did it like this for an actual good reason?”
My response is, “But, you don’t know that! You are assuming all of that. The Bible doesn’t say anything about that, so you can’t speak where the Bible doesn’t”
I disagree. The argument from significant harm is the strongest of all arguments against the existence of God. When you think about it carefully, it is actually an argument from morality. If God were perfectly moral, as he is alleged to be, then because he would be all powerful, as he is alleged to be, then he would prevent all the significant harms in our world, such as the Covid pandemic, the Holocaust, bone cancer in children, slavery, etc.
@@whittfamily1 agree that as a believer who's doubting my faith as a Christian for some time, this is also my biggest problem.
I mean, if God exists, then he really meant for this timeline to exist. He set up a sequence of events that he knows the outcome already and despite all the suffering that will occur, he's like "Yeah, sounds good". If Christians are ok with serving this kind of deity, then count me out.
This is why the Book of Job is disturbing for me. God says he hates sin so much and yet he's using Satan, his greateat enemy and originator of sin, as a tool just to prove he is right about Job. Or that Job is a sucker for him. We're all play things for him. For his glory. And the worst thing is, you can't do anything about it. All you can do is be like Job; to be afraid for all eternity cause if you against him, you're getting a lot of hurt.
@@IOverlord One Christian position which seems to be a heresy but is becoming more popular is that if he exists, God is AMORAL! Not moral or immoral, but amoral. This means that he has no code of ethics or morality. He doesn't give a damn about the interactions of persons, including his interactions. Yes, if this god did exist, he is not worthy of our worship.
In the Book of Job, God is described as an immoral person. Nobody should worship a god like that.
Personally, I respond to the theodicy of God having a morally sufficient reason for allowing evil by asking why he didn’t have a morally sufficient reason to destroy Hitler when he was a baby?
If God understands good and evil so much more than us that we can't judge what's good or evil, doesn't that create a bit of a problem? The concepts "good" and "evil" become meaningless.
All those apologetics severely limit the capabilities of god, so they just lead to the last paragraph of Epicurus: "they, why call it god?" From now on, we should refer to "god" as "that more powerful than us, but still pretty limited dude/chick".
Yes, it's surprising how much apologists are willing to limit supposed power of God, just to make a point in debate.
In the world that God originally created, was suffering possible then? If no, then Adam and Eve had free will in world without suffering, so free will is possible without suffering. If yes, then world God originally created was no better than this, if suffering is possible.
I would argue that if God is rational, then he would understand that humans would be justified in questioning why he allows suffering to exist.
If God creates us with the desire to experience positive emotion, then he would understand the confusion and frustration people will feel from living in a world that can cause us to feel negative emotion.
I believe that if God wants people to trust him, if God wants people to follow him, then if there is a moral justification for allowing suffering, he should clearly explain it to everyone.
Any leader worth following, would be sensitive to the emotions of the people they want to lead, and would explain their reasons for doing what they are doing.
If the response is that God cannot interact with the world, then this means that either The Bible is incorrect, or God has lost some of his power.
If God has lost his power to interact with the world, then how could we be sure that his views have remained the same over the years, for example what if God has realised that there is nothing immoral about homosexuality, but simply doesn't have the power to tell us.
How could anyone be sure that God still has the desire to send people to Heaven?
I think you first points are the best objections to the answer to the problem of evil, this being: "Oh, evil exists because of our free will and you are responsible for that. Also, regarding excessive suffering, God has reasons to stay hidden."
Why would he not want us to know those reasons? What good can it possible serve to not give us a foundation to believe? Good answer!
If there was some sort of magical end point that god was trying to achieve, why not just create it, and give the perfect people in his perfect creation fake memories and avoid having to create a hell.
+bakslashr Because "free will" or some other dodge.
+The Kris
Dodge indeed considering that he proceeded to lay down insane laws (mostly laws that sound suspiciously like laws ignorant ancient desert people would make up) and then threaten extreme pain & suffering in hell if those laws aren't followed (as well as more immediate consequences in the form of stoning & such).
He's clearly already willing to infringe on free will to quite an extent via extreme ultimatums.
He could virtually eliminate pain & suffering on the planet while infringing to an even lesser extent.
Note to self:
Stop trying to apply reason when talking about the bibles and the biblical god.
Because of Order.
Evolution is a natural and inexorable law, and so even spirits need to evolve to reach their peak of perfection. If they were created perfect then it would be unfair because there is no merit on it. Even so, if they were forcefully created perfect then with the sensibility and intelligence that spirits have they will know themselves to not be free, and so they would suffer even in their perfection, or rather for them to be perfect it requires them to be free and to be free requires the possibility to go against the natural God-given order. If there is fake memories then there is not a chance of them being perfect. This also presupposes that the only way to use free will is in good vs evil when it's not, and it also presupposes a hell.
@@natanaellizama6559 That's a great argument for why a god isn't perfect or doesn't have free will.
Can't have your cake and eat it too.
@@drrickmarshall1191 No, because God is not a traditional person. God was not created so the laws of the created don't apply to Gof
The problem with this argument is that the whole premise is subjective. The good an evil are both subjective concepts with objective application. You can’t win the subjective argument against religion. The strength of atheism is based on the empirical and objective argument, once you open the door for a subjective debate they will always find a subjective counterargument and that could go into a rabbit hole.
Two counter-arguments I have used in the past for some of the apologists' points you've raised:
"You are as but a child before God, His understanding far exceeds yours."
- The whole point of having children and teaching them about the world is that they grow up: you expect them to one day be adults themselves, and to have to navigate the world without your help. So either a) we will some day 'grow up' and become as God, which most religions deny is ever possible, or b) God intends to keep us in this child-like state forever... in which case why bother teaching us?
"The suffering is necessary, either because of Adam's sin, or to teach you some important lesson."
- Ignoring the whole inequity of 'punishing the child for the father's sins' (which let's face it the Judeo-Christian God is *all* about), this is a very humano-centric view. What possible line of reasoning could explain the ichneumon wasp? What valuable lesson could humanity learn from the suffering of a parasitised caterpillar? What possible sin could the caterpillar's forefathers have committed to deserve it?
I think you came close to one possible logically-consistent explanation for the Fall: paraphrasing, "We need original sin, so that we will need salvation". God wants to sweep into our lives as a loving saviour, to remove our suffering, so that we will be properly grateful to Him... how can he do that if we're not suffering?
I love this! I love, that's it. I love debating good evil. I love that you do or don't believe in whatever. I love that we have free will!
I'm strapped in, theodicy, this one's a doozy
You AGAIN!
TestMeatDollSteak haha, hello mate! :)
Do you two know each other? lol
I still can't understand how an omni-benevolent god, trying to not only have a personal relationship with us and with a need to provide salvation, could possibly do that without remaining hidden. The notion that he knows better is not sufficient when he stays hidden. Or 'produced' a bible riddled with contradictions, factual mistakes, and inaccuracies. Not only does this tie in with the video about Divine Hiddenness, but that hiddenness does nothing to dispel that this god knows better.
+ffairlane57 That's what most folks claim. I think only a minority of christians don't believe that. Are you telling me you've never heard such a thing?
"Evil comes from the abuse of free will." - C.S Lewis
+Reoce Jacobs
That's a cop out, because there's no such thing as free will in christian theology. Lewis was an exceptionally poor apologist and a horrible logician.
+TheZooCrew --- As shocked as I am, TZC is correct; there is no such thing as "free will" throughout Christian theology. C.S. Lewis was no intellectual slouch; but I would not personally recommend him to counter the new atheism.
+TheZooCrew If God doesn't exist, then free will is just an illusion.
Reoce Jacobs
I don't see how god has anything to do with free will. If you believe in a christian god, then there's no way you can also believe we have free will, because not only did this god create everything knowing exactly what would happen in the future, but the bible is full of god specifically robbing people of their free will, like the pharaoh opposing Moses.
Also note that this is an appeal to consequences fallacy. "X makes me sad, therefore X is false" is a laughable, invalid, unsound argument.
+Louis Unger The story of the tree of knowledge in Genesis confirms that we have always had a choice. Free will is nothing more than the ability to choose. But with choice comes responsibility and consequences. God would be unjust to condemn us without first giving us a choice. At the same time, God's sovereignty doesn't allow him to just pardon us when we blatantly disobey his commands. The bad news is that all disobedience must be punished. The good news [gospel] is that someone has agreed to take that punishment for us.
I applaud your intelligent, fair, calm and even handed approach to the dissemination of Atheism. Sadly though, reason and faith are at direct odds with each other, so few with "faith" will be swayed toward sense, but hopefully, for those who haven't been infected by religion of any persuasion, your message will slowly help to sway humanity in the direction of a more honest, ethical and moral approach to the way we live our lives and ultimately, develop as a human race. We're all human beings that have similar wants and needs in a general sense and we need to treat each other accordingly. Thanks Matt.
The problem with the fall, and that's an excuse why animals must kill each other to eat. If God designed all animals in one creation event, why did he design such efficient killing machines, such as sharks or crocs, lions with hook claws, etc., if we were intended to all eat fruits?
+Mike Alstatt
Furthermore, if we and animals only experience death because of the original sin, then how soon would the world be over-populated with animals and humans ?
".....if this is the best possible world, god can't intervene anymore." Your comments from 13:12 to 18:47 are SO good.....keep playing it so I can wrap my head around it. Thank You Matt!
But the premise is false! This isn't the best possible world. Just without slavery this would be a better world and so it can't be the best possible.
If G*d is omnipresent how can evil manifest at all? How does it exist at all? If it's not G*d what is it? Something separate from G*d? Then he is not omnipresent.
Looking forward to the next one Matt.
I think the most impactful question for me as a theist struggling to know which view is right is why would God even make a timeline where sin would exist if he hated it so much. It's like he created a series of dominos that he know's the first one will someday fall and will create a series of catastrophic events. And who's there to make it all go away? God himself. Like Matt says, he sacrificed himself to himself to fix the problem he set up himself, or something like that.
It's like the bottom line of it all is his worship. Of course, his creation doesn't have a choice but for them but to do so. Now, if that's what you think holy, perfect, and infallible is, then that's up to you.
A lot of theists will say that I'm just putting the blame to God and not on myself and humanity. Sure, you can blame people for doing bad things but be sure to blame God for the terrivle things he's done and will do just to force and/or manipulate his creation to worship him.
Thank you, Matt, for this series. While I like to do my own investigations, and come to my own conclusions, your arguments tend to mirror my thoughts in most instances. I'm trying to get better at articulating my arguments, and your videos are truly helpful in that respect. So, thanks again, and I'm glad your recovery seems to be going well. Good thing you went to doctors to fix your heart, instead of praying!
Cheers
If you die in unbelief, you will regret it for an everlasting infinity.
I found this discussion to be particularly compelling because it focused particualarly upon your goal, Matt, of influencing and/or converting believers. I find "The Problem of Evil" to be the most completely logical argument against the existence of an all-powerful, all-knowing, moral, and perfect God. You are not interested, though, necessarily, in the logical consistency of the argument. You are instead interested only, or most exclusively, in the arguments persuasive effectiveness when addressed to a particular community. You are not so interested in what argument most compelling convinces an atheist to value his/her position. You are more exclusively only interested in what argument would convince a believer to change his/her belief position.
Problematically, a willingness to see the "Problem of Evil" as less effective than other arguments fails to see how the argument participates in what "belief" means. The problem of evil addresses that part of belief which is rooted in morality, while other arguments may address aspects of belief which are rooted in the scientific. Personally I am less concerned with believers who use religion to provide answers to scientific questions, than I am with believers who seek to use God as a reason to impose prejudiced moral authority in social/cultural and legal contexts. I dismiss young earth creations as unintelligent quacks and either ignore them, or laugh at them. On the other hand I find the hegemonic influence of the Christian church in the social/cultural/legal world to be terrifying.
I see the belief in God to be far more troubling from a moral perspective, than from a scientific one. Therefore, I hind the "Problem of Evil" as an argument against the existence of a Christian God to contain substantial importance, even if it may be less well received by members of Christian/apologist communities.
Another good one, Matt
If God had to make the universe in a certain way then that means there are laws of nature that God is bound by, meaning there is a power greater than God. Either God makes the rules or he doesn't, so either way, the problem of evil disproves the existence of an Abrahamic god.
I can't accept free will as a response to the problem of evil. To suppose that god allows murder and misery in this world because he will not tamper with ones free will is something that (if I really tried to)I can accept. But how can this same god that cares so much about our will allow rape and slavery to exist. How can He just sit by as someone steals the will of their victim. This to me is simply inconsistent.
We live a finite life born in sin our fleshy minds and bodies cannot fathom with the idea of eternity because eternity in paradise with our lord and savior will make up for any of the wrong doings in the world as well as the eternal punishment it is God’s will and it will be done he is all good so no sin will be allowed to enter into his kingdom
See, I'm going to have to disagree with you on this one Matt. Why? Because the problem of evil and suffering was the one reason why I never truly believed in the Christian God. I, too, was raised Southern Baptist, by an ordained Southern Baptist minister. As a child, I even tagged along with him to some of his classes at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth. Hell, we lived in the Seminary housing for 7 years, I've always loved learning so I asked to go. Anyway, back to my point. My childhood was not an easy one, as I have always suffered from various and sometimes even life threatening illnesses. I would watch other children, my younger sisters included, and see how they didn't suffer in the same ways I did. They would be outside playing and having a normal childhood, while I watched them from my bedroom window. I asked this same question many times as a child, not so generally but applying more to my own suffering as children will do. Of course, the only answers my parents and elders provided were so unsatisfactory that it made any true belief in such a deity utterly impossible. Perhaps it's not the best argument for all people, in any situation, but it can be the most powerful argument for those like myself, or their relatives and friends. It's the argument that I have used most successfully in my encounters with people of faith, primarily because it does appeal to their emotions. It's hard for them to look me in the eye and tell me that for some reason I deserved to suffer as a child, and continue to suffer, even though they know I'm a good person. Not to say that it always works, but they at least walk away feeling less sure of their position. So while I see where you are coming from, I will respectfully disagree. Though I shall take your suggestions and apply them. Thanks for all you do. Believe me, it's good to know that I'm not the only on who escaped the Southern Baptists. lol
I completely agree, Sherridan. The problem of evil is a very large problem for Christianity to me.
Actually, it is the best argument for all people! It is so powerful because everyone has either experienced significant harm themselves or they have a family member or friend who has experienced it. It is a slam dunk argument which has not and cannot be defeated.
--Yes, my English is not that good--
I believe that the problem of evil is a good argument against free will. What we do is a product of what we are and what we are is a product of our biology (DNA, whatever more) and our environment (every TV show you watch, every book you read, every friend you have and so on).
So whats that free will? If god wanted us to be good why he just didnt made us good? Why are we naturally selfish, jealous and sometimes just bad? Love, empathy, anger, hate, even things like rape are all innate in the human being and everything in your life can make you do the wrong decisions. So, if you are all powerful, all knowing and all good why would you let it happen, would you even punish or grant people for their behavior?
Thanks for sharing. As a believer, the problem of excessive evil haunts me. Of course, I know that God will bring judgement on the Earth at the end of times, but when a child is being raped, people are tortured and exterminated, and millions of people die of hunger even today, I just wonder if God could prevent certain things from happening, ie. the narco guy about to torture someone is hit by a car or something similar, Hitler gets shot before he exterminates more people, or there is some rain after droughts and years of war.
God is NOT Omnibenevolent, He may be Omnipotent. But He's NOT Omnibenevolent since He ALLOWS so much EVIL and Suffering.
How's that book going Matt? I look forward too it.
+Dylan Ost i am atheist and only 7 years old i want book too
Awesome Video Matt. Thanks for all the work you do.
I have to say I took issue to one thing you said, and I could be mistaken, so if someone wants to correct me, please do.
"God is so good that he allows to hurt ourselves"
"John/Jane's mom is so good that she allows him/her to cut him/herself"
When a parent allows their son/daughter to harm themselves and has a way to prevent it but doesn't, they are not a very good "parent." In either account...
That seems to be a pretty strait forward thing to explain to someone...
beautiful background Matt.
I liked your talk but I would have thought you would have concentrated on the creation of evil. As you have stated, God has been perceived as a omniscient, omnipotent and wholly good entity. If as most religious people presuppose that He predates evil, how has evil come into being?
Christian theology has attempted to explain this with the story of the creation of Lucifer who tried to steal God's crown. If God, a wholly good omnipotent being created Lucifer, where did Lucifer get the option of evil? It had to exist for him to choose it.
Likewise for Adam, evil already had to have been present for him to choose the option. If we look at it in an almost mathematical way - an omnipotent, eternal and wholly good God cannot be capable of creating the option of evil.
Free will is simply a distraction to this problem. The question Atheist should be asking in these debates is - "Who created the option of evil?" If the answer is God, then God cannot be wholly good. If the answer is someone else, then God cannot be perceived as the sole creator and therefore not omnipotent in nature.
this all is a non-issue in roman catholicism, because evil is not viewed as polar opposite of good. It's more of a light vs. darkness thing, where darkness in not opposite of light, it's just absence of light. Whether an action (a dynamic effect) is considered good/evil depends on its net benefit on goodness in the world. Since this world is finite it also means there can only be a finite amount of goodness in it. There is also no reason whatsoever for God to pick any specific amount of goodness, since any finite amount would literally be equally infinitely smaller than goodness of his own. In which case it makes perfect sense to pick world where there is just enough goodness to not be rare, yet not so much that it's no longer valuable.
This theory is not only immune to most if not all problems of evil, it is also much more consistent with human experience. Humans are largely insensitive to how well off they actually are - they are sensitive to how their well-being changes (hence the "first world problems" irony).
Just because you say it is a non-issue doesn't necessarily make it so. Everything in the bible, reads as a Good vs Evil narrative. The two forces are depicted as polar opposites in which conflict arises. Revelations makes absolutely no sense because Evil is not regarded as an absence of good. An absence of good entails a certain passivity of which evil is certainly not by nature.
Secondly, the original wholesome God would not be able to create a matrix that contains evil even if it is defined as an absence of good. the contents of the creation is intricately entwined to the nature of its creator (being perfect).
By the way if you say that God "picked" this world, the onus of original sin would fall on God's shoulders at least partially because as you have suggested, God was an active force in deciding if the world would have elements of "absence of good".
Believe it or not some scenes from the movie Predators were shot exactly where he is.
If having a free Will enables us humans to do evil, then god, who also has a free will, is also capable of doing evil things. What other ability does god posess that prevents him from doing evil things? Let’s ignore for a moment that the bible is brimming with examples of god doing things that would be considered evil if done by humans, I don’t believe that the bible is the word of god anyway. And why couldn’t he give us humans this ability? If he can’t, he is not all-powerful, If he can but doesn’t want to, he is not all-good. If he created us, he deliberately built flaws into our design that make us imperfect. A creator, especially an alledged perfect one, is responsible for any and all misbehaviour of his creations. As an atheïst though, i don’t believe in any god. But i do believe that we have some amount of free Will, which i define as the ability to analyze our behaviour, and imagine the consequences our actions our inactions may have. This ability is however not always working as well as we’d like, and often overruled by our emotions and instincts. Still, most people can reasonably be held responsable for their actions, right or wrong. Because there is no god.
The excessive "evil" in the world can be explained by the fact that we don't know God's plan. What if people aren't the goal. What if the creature that God is after needs to evolve from the current beings and the only way that will happen is if we strengthen ourselves, and grow our experiences, in the way we are doing. Just as the early hominids might have wondered about all the excess cruelty that occurred, before they had to endure the ice age, and were able to survive to become "us" because of that earlier suffering. That is the same process we are going through right now. What kills us, makes the rest stronger.
Skip Bellon interesting view! We like to believe we are highly valued but I wonder if we are just stepping stones too.
Then God is not good from our perspective.
The problem is quite obvious with this viewpoint. All your theory leads to is just more endless suffering, because God or self needs to constantly evolve. Does this really justify all of this evil? People who use the "higher self" mantra also use similar logic -- since our individuality is an illusion, our suffering and injustices somehow do not matter anymore, despite the fact we still experience them anyways.
God can't achieve his intended goal without the suffering of countless people? Then he's not omnipotent, problem of evil upholds.
thank you for what you do Matt
I think on a human, mortal,finite,common sense level your logic is valid. On an Eternal level,not SO much
But there is no good evidence for an eternal life for anyone. Also, no significant harm on Earth is still better than significant harm on Earth followed by compensation in heaven, all other things being equal.
There is one big problem in people's defense of God's evil. Particularly the argument that it is not evil to burn your hand for touching something hot, so you will know better and not touch it again. That doesn't work - why can't God make it NEVER hurt when touching something hot, so that the "lesson" is never necessary? The same logic can be applied to other situations where God's seems to condone evil.
Imagine the ancient Epicurus, Matt Dillahunty and me all arriving at the same analysis and conclusion. So who else thought the same? :)
What about the animal suffering route how come you don't use that ?
Here's basically how the problem of evil goes and how to properly dismantle it:
Atheist: If an omnipotent and omnibenevolent God exists, how come there is evil/suffering?
Abrahamic Theist: God gave us free will, and we misused it causing sin and evil to enter the world.
Atheist: Putting aside the fact that an abundance of suffering isn't man-made (e.g. natural disasters and diseases) God, who is also omniscient, knew in advance of creating humans that they would misuse their free will. Was God not powerful enough to create only those beings who he knew would only freely choose the good? Moreover, you believe in a place called "heaven" wherein its occupants are free from suffering and never choose evil. So, clearly this is possible for God.
Abrahamic Theist: We just can't understand the mysterious purpose of God.
Atheist: That's a copout answer. The bottom line is that even if we say that evil was chosen by humans, we're still left with the fact that humans were chosen by an omni-God. Hence, God is ultimately responsible.
*Me:* God did not create the beings who in turn chose evil. What am I saying? That someone else created them? No, of course not. I am saying that all souls are spiritual and spirit is eternal. Hence, the beings who fell into suffering were not chosen to exist by God, and therefore God is not ultimately responsible for them choosing evil. God simply supplied the fallen souls with their desire for a world that necessitated the apparent absence of a God to protect you from suffering. You are now free to try and be your own gods, to try and control and enjoy all that you survey, to try and lord it over the material nature. Suffering might be blatantly human-caused or it might come as other forces, but it is all due to one entities capacity to infringe upon another, knowingly or unknowingly, in order to try and be lords of all they survey.
Moreover, if it were solely up to God--that is, if God had no further input--then not a single thing would ever be created. Creation, nay, the mere desire for creation, is inferior to a being such as God, who necessarily has complete and eternal self-fulfillment. Ergo, the entire debate around the existence of evil in the world reduces down to the question:
WHY MIGHT A BEING SUCH AS GOD CREATE ANYTHING AT ALL?
Since we know by deduction through the given characteristics of God that creation constitutes a completely inferior notion for him, the above explanation for how to dismantle the problem of evil becomes that much clearer. Creation is, ipso facto, evil. You can't get around it. It has nothing to do with how good or how powerful God is because it does not and can not reflect the nature of God, as explained above. Someone retorts in question form, "So are you saying that God isn't powerful enough to create a non-evil world?" Answer: No, but he simply wouldn't create anything at all if the desire was purely to reflect his own good nature. The fact that God is creating something means that someone else desired it. Creation reflects the imperfect desires of the fallible entities that drew up its blueprints.
+Austen Green
Care to actually prove any of that blather?
TheZooCrew The point of theodicy is to offer a coherent model that allows for God to exist alongside a world wherein there is evil or suffering. The problem of evil is essentially a reductio argument. Ergo, my only job is to dismantle the idea that these premises lead to a contradiction.
Austen Green
Depends on the god.
The god you describe does not resemble any god that any believer I've ever encountered believes in.
Your "job" doesn't matter. It's utterly irrelevant.
TheZooCrew The God in contention is defined in the argument. What I am proposing matches that definition.
Austen Green
That's a non sequitur.
*The fact that God is creating something means that someone else desired it. Creation reflects the imperfect desires of the fallible entities that drew up its blueprints*
Oh, so you can just make up "other entities?" This is the most bullshit of panaceas.
Most of your definitions are made up on the spot. But that's the point of theodicy...making shit up to delude yourself into thinking you've accomplished something.
Hey Matt. What do you think about this argument against believing in God - God is the obe and only figure thatcould have made abetter world but also chose not to. If he is all powerful he could even break the laws of logic to do so but in his omniscience and therefore knowledge of a world with even the slightest less amount of suffering he chose this world. As you said, we can easily imagine a world with less suffering and we can suppose that God has that same ability.
His goal in the physical world is not get rid of all evil, because He'd then have to get rid of human kind in the process. Who should He be rid of?
For instance, there are bad people who do bad things, but at another time they repent and are changed. So, what we determine who should be rid of, and who shouldn't be is not in our ability to know.
Hmm, I don't know. Thinking that God could be equivalent to parents and then arguing that the worst possible scenarios (in our " child-like" perception) are what children would perceive of us when we in fact were doing the best for them is naive. There are plenty of children who actually suffer the worst possible scenarios growing up with fucked up parents, and I doubt their response is just like when regular children complain they didn't get to eat ice cream instead of their balanced meal.
I think this response to the problem of evil is rather weak, instead of as compelling as you make it out to be. Children may not understand exactly why parents do what they do, but their suffering from hunger, pain, moral and physical (sexual) abuse, abandonment, negligence, and so forth, is objectively worse than their suffering from everything else normal parents do. It seems obvious that we shouldn't assume every child is just as traumatized by their parents decisions as those who were actually abused or neglected.
So the question to this response should be: are we truly in the position of immature children failing to grasp their parents good will, or are we actually suffering absolute neglect? Can we differentiate between those two?
So grateful for your body of work!
The Christian arguments for why evil exists rests upon the absurd notion that decedents can, in any way, be responsible for the "sins" or wrongdoings of their ancestors. This is a barbaric thought process.
In the world that God originally created, was suffering possible then? If no, then Adam and Eve had free will in world without suffering, so free will is possible without suffering. If yes, then world God originally created was no better than this, if suffering is possible.
Why did god give free will to humans if it knew it can lead to suffering? Yeah, if there's a god, it can't be omnibenevolent. It's nonsense.
In the world that God originally created, was suffering possible then? If no, then Adam and Eve had free will in world without suffering, so free will is possible without suffering. If yes, then world God originally created was no better than this, if suffering is possible.
We should be asking is there a reason why Matt Dillahunty is not a God, based on the evidence in this video
If they believe in the Christian/Jewish books, you can make an argument that in order to consider a god remotely good, they could not be responsible for drowning a planet or some of the other atrocities found in the Bible.
What about arguments that go into the fact that without suffering, you couldn’t be as steadfast or experience joy
What is the general response when you point out the fact that it was God who made us to be such limited creatures that we can't understand the problem of evil?
What about kids and babies that die so young they didn't even get to "enjoy" free will? I think the problem of evil still stands as one of the best atheist arguments. I just watched this clip where William Lane Craig is asked why God doesn't stop the suffering and early death of children in Africa, and the best he could come up with was that Christ suffered on the cross. Like that even helped those poor kids at all! I shit you not. And he's a top notch theologian. He didn't even mention "free will".
Agreed. Also a good argument - in the world that God originally created, was suffering possible then? If no, then Adam and Eve had free will in world without suffering, so free will is possible without suffering. If yes, then world God originally created was no better than this, if suffering is possible.
The very notion that evil exists as a sort of material thing is contingent upon the existence of a life force (deity) of ultimate value. Without such a force, life would be meaningless and therefore worthless. When we view life as something of value, we suggest meaning. If no god and no afterlife exist, what purpose would life/creation serve? If life is then worthless, what significance could good/evil possess?
Whitney Vroman, meaning for life is pretty easy to come by. There are plenty of people who find meaning for life in taking care of their dog every day. Others find meaning in raising children, helping the poor, donating blood, learning, science, etc., etc. There are probably as many different answers about the meaning of life as there are people in the world.
Even though God is behind creation, that doesn't mean that God is behind everything that happens within creation.
Since certain creations, such as ourselves, have been given free will and are capable of being creators in our own right; including creating suffering for ourselves and others.
This particular misunderstanding, that God is causing our suffering and perhaps punishing us, is one of the most dangerous misunderstanding promoted by religious teachers; for how can we become free from suffering if we don't understand what's causing it?
As long as we believe that lie, we will blame God or others, or our circumstances for our suffering and not see that we are responsible for our suffering.
Our mistaken thinking, and the negative emotions and negative actions that flow from our thoughts causes our suffering.
Depending on what we choose to believe, and how we choose to respond to life; we create more Love in the world or the opposite.
When we choose to express the opposite of Love or cause harm, it is not God that is at fault.
God gifted us with the freedom to choose and to create, and we eventually learn from our choices to be better creators; to create happiness instead of suffering, and it is suffering that teaches us this; suffering points us away from what is anti-life, anti-Love.
Our own personal suffering is the so-called "punishment" we receive when we make choices that are not aligned with Love; that is the only "punishment," if we will, meted out by God.
We are designed to suffer whenever we miss the mark, which is the meaning of sin; the mark, the target or goal, is Love. We suffer whenever we fall out of alignment with Love.
Suffering and joy are part of the guidance system we've been given; the homing device, which when followed, will bring us back home to Love.
Suffering tells us that we are believing a lie or taking a wrong direction; while joy tells us the opposite.
If we don't want to suffer, then we must stop believing and doing what causes us and others suffering; and start believing and doing what brings peace, Love and joy.
I think my formulation of the Problem of Evil is probably a bad one, but the way I put it is this: a god should be defined as a being worthy of worship, since that quality is what separates a god from a sufficiently powerful agent who is not defined as a god. As humans, we have evaluated that beings worthy of worship must have great character. (e.g. our heroes, be they fictional, such as the protagonists of movies, superheroes in comic books, ect... or real, such as sports figures) We see that we do not find heroes who have lapses of character to be worthy of worship, even if these lapses aren't necessarily evil.
The easiest example I can come up with is Spider-Man. Spider-Man often finds the responsibility of being a superhero too much to bear and quits. While he is inactive, he's not really doing anything evil, but he is not worthy of worship. It may be possible that if he didn't take these breaks, where he abandons his duty, he would become burnt out, unfocused, and might do a worse job as a superhero, and so given the long view of history it may serve the greatest good for him to quit from time to time. However, that doesn't stop him from being unworthy of worship while abstaining from being Spider-Man.
So even in the case where God has taken the long view of history to justify relatively short term atrocities by creating the greatest possible good, he still is not worthy of worship while doing that. By being unworthy of worship, he no longer qualifies as a god.
It's obviously not like, an airtight syllogism, but my core point is that even if there is a reason for the bad things that happen, it can still be a reason to deny worthiness for worship, which is the purpose of the problem of evil in the first place. Thus it's not precisely a positive argument for the lack of an existence of a god, but a meta-evaluation of how we evaluate these ideas.
God, in the standard definition, is worthy of worship, respect, and adulation. Being perfectly moral is part of the definition. If God did exist, he would not "justify relatively short term atrocities," but would prevent them. If he existed, he would be worthy of worship, but sadly, he doesn't exist. For God, there would not be a morally justified reason to allow the atrocities, and if there were, he would tell us that reason, which has never occurred. An airtight slam-dunk syllogism can be and has been constructed.
a lion eats a gazelle although dramatic could be viewed as evil. evil is necessary in the path of nature which is ongoing it may as well be necessary as we branch out into the universe or land on another planet and start a new .disease led to medicine and arguably is responsible for drive in humans and need for intelligence along with hunger
what if some of our more destructive behaviors, such as torture, are toxic to god? He'd likely either remove himself: thus compromising any omni-presence, OR if he can't do that, become corrupt himself undermining his power or benevolence?
The problem of evil presupposes that the world would be better without evil and suffering. The onus is on the atheist to prove this before the argument can hold water. You even grant that some evil is necessary. That opens the door in which you have to prove which evils are necessary and which aren't.
You also have to prove that evil is something in and of itself instead of simply being the lack of good. Christians believe that creation was a good act. Before creation there was nothing, and nothing was neither good or evil. So destruction (a return to nothingness) is not the opposite of good. It's simply a reduction in good to zero.
The problem of evil argument has so many presuppositions that need to be ironed out before it can be used properly.
In the world that God originally created, was suffering possible then? If no, then Adam and Eve had free will in world without suffering, so free will is possible without suffering. If yes, then world God originally created was no better than this, if suffering is possible.
Nice job Matt!..Keep up the good work..I always look forward to your new videos
I find the problem of evil ends up with a debate about free will every time. The best format of the problem of evil argument therefore ends up being a combination; Starting with omnipotence and omniscience as well as omnibenevolence.
The free will objection doesn't work! First, we don't even know if we have free will. Secondly, if God did exist, he would limit our free will to prevent evil acts. For example, he could and would disallow men the free will to rape women. And lastly, natural disasters and illnesses do not entail free will.
Dear Matt,
As you said, the problems of this argument is that the theist can say you don’t know god’s plan, hence how would you know how the evil you see fit in the grand plan. Well, there is an exception to that. We have a front seat view of Allah’s plan as described in the Quran. Allah has lifted the curtain on the unseen world and showed us an example of how he thinks first hand.
In Surah Al-Khaf 18:60-82. Allah describes a journey that Moses takes with a guy named Al-Khidr (altafsir.com). Allah gave Al-Khidr the gift of foresight. The Ayat describe three interactions where on the surface Al-Khidr seem to have carried evil acts. The first he damages a boat for some people who offered Moses and Al-Khidr a ride. The second incident Al-Khidr kills a prepubescent child. According to one narration from an authentic hadith by ripping his head from his body (... yes I know). The third incident by building a wall without getting paid for it. Moses acted as a stooge throughout this entire affair barely objecting to these acts. Finally Allah, through Al-Khidr tells the reasons behind these heinous acts to teach Moses not to ask questions and just follow orders. What a pernicious lesson taught to me and all the indoctrinated generations of Muslims.
The thing that turned my stomach is that killing of the child. When Allah allowed al Khidr to tell Moses why he did it. Because the Child would have grown to be an Atheist. His believing parents would have left the faith due to their love for their son.
So in Islam if I hear that arguments that Allah has a plan and you as a puny human can’t understand how the evil fit in that plan, I can refer to this story. Allah showed us his unseen plan. It is as evil as all the un-hidden evil that we see day to day.
1. He Violated that child’s free will.
2. He killed a child before reaching the age of reason.
3. He punished a crime before it was committed.
And what is the crime?! Atheism; not believing in a god without a good evidence. So if you question and you end up a non-believer you will be punished in the most cruel punishment. But if you are following and believing without evidence you’ll be rewarded with prophet-hood.
I think the problem of Evil in Islam should be used carefully but I think we should be armed with this knowledge when talking to Muslims.
Thank you for all your do, Matt O’Akbar :-)
So you think it is a good thing to kill a child?
I agree that this isn't an argument against God or even Christianity so I don't use it unless the conversation goes that way. That being said, I think if you can get someone to reevaluate their view on God, it can be a step toward realizing there isn't one (at least that was the case for me). The most common rebuttal I hear is the free will argument, but I think there are good ways to deal with it. First, you can point out all the times in the Bible where free will was violated. Second, you can point out that if being able to do evil is a necessary part of free will, it means that there will be no free will in heaven, or there will be evil in it. It may not convince a believer, but it might give them something to think about. John Loftus has a couple of good chapters on this in his book "Why I Became an Atheist" that I recommend if you want to read a through examination of the topic.
+Rick Nards Edited. Did I miss any other commas?
+Jacob Zentichko
It's a good argument against "christianity being true is a good thing" or just "religion X being true is a good thing."
+TheZooCrew I think it's a strong argument against a god's (as defined in the argument) existence. Strictly because the counter arguments are almost always post hoc rationalizations. Similar to me being trailed at court and stating "the world was created 10 mins after I supposedly committed the crime" . Now we must discuss weather the purposed post hoc rationalization is true. And the freewill excuse is easy to refute if you just spend a little time thinking about it.
Personally I think its easiest just not to shift the burden of proof onto yourself though.
Are there any counters to William Lane Craig's "God has morally sufficient reasons" for allowing evil? I find this to be a copout excuse but are there any philosophers who have addressed this?
+Pumpkins
It is indeed a cop-out. It's not an argument...it's an attempt to stifle discussion. It's a "shut up and stop asking questions, you idiot" response. There's no need for any "philosophers" to address this.
When it comes to gods, I find philosophers to be utterly irrelevant. If something exists and affects our reality, then it is scientists who will be learning about it and studying it.
I can't think of any Philosophers who've addressed this because it's such a glaringly obvious and profoundly ignorant excuse.
To confront it I usually refer to the following;
If it's a necessity that god requires a bizzare moral Rube Goldberg machine of suffering to achieve a intended result, then it's no omnipotent.
Simple.
And theists try to disect the initial paragraph in this video, which they haven't learned cannot be done. There are literally zero holes in it.
There aren’t any holes in it unless you recognize most of the evil created by the world is directly caused by man. Of course, how and where do you get the idea that there is evil in the world? Define evil and the basis for your definition of evil.
What do you think of David Smalley using this argument so much on his show?
The fall of Adam was decreed before creation.
Why does shit happen ?
Matt, did u look at the holocaust and deny the existence of God from that?
This argument boils down to an appeal to emotion. It's compelling, but not logical. If you ask why god allows excessive "evil," then you've set yourself up for the smack down ("For reasons that are sufficient to God.") The fact is, we can't even demonstrate a coherent definition of "excessive evil," because we know there are perfectly adequate evolutionary and cosmological explanations for every bit of evil that we experience. So arguing the The Problem of Evil requires a certain amount of disingenuousness in that you MUST suppose that a God exists in order to make the argument.
I always figured that if reality requires evil in order to have good, then the god is operating under a rule and is not omnipotent. If he's all loving and all powerful, he can create a world where you don't have nor require suffering and evil in order to have goodness and joy etc.
Most theists would claim that God created the rules of the universe, thus implying he created the rule that evil is required to have good, and all other rules of logic, which would make him neutral, not good.
Whats the cool archaeology behind you in this vid Matt? It looks organic.
Back, again at same start point - God won't act. God won't reveal.