The Problem of Evil

The Problem of Evil Phil 297, 1/12/06 The Problem of Evil: A (purportedly) inconsistent triad: 1) God is omnipotent. 2) God is omnibenevolent. 3) Evil exists. No clear inconsistency yet, though. A genuinely inconsistent set of claims: 1) God is omnipotent. 2) God is omnibenevolent. 3) Evil exists. 4) An omnibenevolent thing eliminates evil as far as it can. 5) An omnipotent thing can do anything. The problem of evil ?arises for us? if we find ourselves accepting, or strongly inclined to accept, all of 1-5. Question: What is the problem of evil, exactly, according to Mackie? And what would a solution to it amount to? Mackie?s ?Fallacious Solutions?: ?Good cannot exist without Evil? Which of 1-5 is being denied? Mackie says (5): Can?t do anything - only anything that?s logically possible. And, the response says, it?s not logically possible to have good without evil. So we replace (5) with (5*) An omnipotent thing can do anything that?s logically possible. Question: Is the following set of sentences inconsistent? If not, how do we fix it to make an inconsistent set? 1) God is omnipotent. 2) God is omnibenevolent. 3) Evil exists. 4) An omnibenevolent thing eliminates evil as far as it can. 5*) An omnipotent thing can do anything that?s logically possible. Another question: What?s going on in the last paragraph of this section? How should we reconstruct Mackie?s argument there? (Mackie says (4) is being denied, too ? what he says about this is puzzling.) ?Evil is necessary as a means to good? Which of 1-5 is being denied? Mackie says (5) again, but in a less plausible way. God would need to be bound by causal laws, not just logical necessity ? we?d need to replace (5) with something like, (5**) An omnipotent thing can do anything that?s compatible with the actual causal laws. Mackie thinks that theists shouldn?t be happy with such a weak sort of ?omnipotence?. ?The universe is better with some evil in it than it could be if there were no evil? Mackie?s criticism: Whaddaya mean, ?evil?, and whaddaya mean, ?better?? ? If what you mean by ?evil? is something the existence of which makes the world worse, then the response looks incoherent. ? If what you mean by ?evil? is something else, then it looks like you need to distinguish between two kinds of goods and evils. The lower-order evils, like garden-variety pain and suffering, aren?t necessarily opposed to the higher-order goods (Mackie proposes sympathy, heroism, etc. as candidate 2 nd -order goods). So we can say that while evil 1 is opposed to good 1 , it?s not opposed to good 2 . ? So which of 1-5 is being denied? Mackie doesn?t really say, but it looks like the advocate of this kind of response is pleading ambiguity on (3) and (4). According to this response, then, the following two sets of claims are genuinely inconsistent: 1) God is omnipotent. 2) God is omnibenevolent. 3 1 ) Evil 1 exists. 4 1 ) An omnibenevolent thing eliminates evil 1 as far as it can. 5) An omnipotent thing can do anything. 1) God is omnipotent. 2) God is omnibenevolent. 3 2 ) Evil 2 exists. 4 2 ) An omnibenevolent thing eliminates evil 2 as far as it can. 5) An omnipotent thing can do anything. But all a good theist needs to be committed to is: 1) God is omnipotent. 2) God is omnibenevolent. 3 1 ) Evil 1 exists. 4 2 ) An omnibenevolent thing eliminates evil 2 as far as it can. 5) An omnipotent thing can do anything. Mackie?s main complaint, then, is that denying (3 2 ) isn?t in the cards. Evil 2 ? stuff like spite, maliciousness, etc. ? clearly exists. Question: Is Mackie right about this? In particular, is he right about how we ought to understand what good 2 and evil 2 are? ?Evil is due to human free will? Which of 1-5 being denied? Either (3), or (5), or both. Mackie?s complaints: ? Not clear that evil really is a logical consequence of freedom. If it is, then it looks like freedom?s got to be randomness. If it?s not, then we need too strong of a restriction on omnipotence. ? Also seems to require appealing to one of the previous solutions, about evil being necessary for good, in order to justify God?s granting of, and non-interference with, human freedom. Andrew Egan Phil 297