Debating religion: The evidential problem of good and its implications

I enjoyed the reply and good point: "'Needless suffering' does not have to be if society is educated and people's choices reflect that.

Yes, there is nothing worse than losing an arguement of opinion…

Reducing the discussion to a difference of opinion is pathetic.

There's something in Philosophy called the principle of charity which means that one should read what one has to say in the most charitable way possible in order to most accurately interpret what is being said (because people are generally not really making crazy assertions, are usually intelligent, etc). It is most unreasonable to believe that I believe that atheists losing debates is the worst event imaginable. I was being hyperbolic.

Thank you for proving to me there isn't a God. I wish I could be enlightened to a place outside of this "brainwashed" state, but you too haven't proven your case. It is true that both atheists and theists cannot say with fact that their view is correct, but theists seem to have probability on their side.

Also, I never said what religion I am and I have read the Bible; there's a difference, however, of understanding its content and merely reading its words.

JDG

The writing styles are completely different.

But the IP addresses were the same - & you can't change latitude & longitude.
Now sod off somewhere you're wanted.

"the response to Law’s gambit is found in what has been made Psalm 19:1."

Before you can use bible passages as justification, you have to prove that what the bible says is true and that the way in which you interpret the bible is correct. Especially since the bible you are using as justification contains passages that contradict your argument that God creates only good things - Colossians 1:16 and Isaiah 45:7 for example say that God created *all things, both good and evil.*

"The evil we recognize on earth is derived from the will of man."

3 points.

(1) The will of man managed to corrupt the all-powerful, all-knowing, and all-good Christian God's creation?

(2) If God is omniscient how can man have any sort of free will to change things? If God is omniscient then he knew what would happen when he created things ahead of time and allowed it to happen; thus, he fully intended for and created the evil that is "derived from man".

(3) Again, this assumes both the Bible and the specific way you interpret the bible to be correct and true. How do you know that God is all good and that he created only good things? How do you know that the bible is true? How do you know that God is the Christian God and not the God of another religion or a deist God who created things, *both good and evil*? And how do you know that God exists? Until these questions are addressed, there's no reason for me or anyone else to believe that the God who exists is specifically the Christian God and that he created specifically only good things in the specific way that you believe him to have created things.

"Outside of man we see a wholly good creation."

Satan and demons are evil but they are not human; therefore, outside of man there is not a wholly good creation.

"To posit that a wholly evil god created a waterfall and an ocean and a sunset is pretty ridiculous."

And it's equally ridiculous to posit that a wholly good and all powerful God created and allows for the presence of disease causing bacteria, natural disasters, satan, and birth defects.

Law's argument was NOT that god is an all-evil God. His argument was that the argument for an all-good God is JUST as poor, flawed, and ridiculous as the argument for an all-evil God. His argument was that there's no reason to believe that either an all-good OR an all-evil God exists.

All that is necessary, as it seems to me, to convince any reasonable person that the Bible is simply and purely of human invention -- of barbarian invention -- is to read it. Read it as you would any other book think of it as you would of any other; get the bandage of reverence from your eyes; drive from your heart the phantom of fear; push from the throne of your brain the coiled form of superstition -- then read the Holy Bible, and you will be amazed that you ever, for one moment, supposed a being of infinite wisdom goodness and purity, to be the author of such ignorance and of such atrocity.

Our ancestors not only had their god-factories, but they made devils as well. These devils were generally disgraced and fallen gods. Some had headed unsuccessful revolts; some had been caught sweetly reclining in the shadowy folds of some fleecy cloud, kissing the wife of the god of gods. These devils generally sympathized with man. There is in regard to them a most wonderful fact: In nearly all the theologies mythologies and religions, the devils have been much more humane and merciful than the gods. No devil ever gave one of his generals an order to kill children and to rip open the bodies of pregnant women. Such barbarities were always ordered by the good gods. The pestilences were sent by the most merciful gods The frightful famine, during which the dying child with pallid lips sucked the withered bosom of a dead mother, was sent by the loving gods. No devil was ever charged with such fiendish brutality.

The old, the young, the beautiful and the helpless were remorsely devoured by the shoreless sea. This, the most fearful tragedy that the imagination of ignorant priests ever conceived, was the act, not of a devil, but of a god, so-called, whom men ignorantly worship unto this day. What a stain such an act would leave upon the character of a devil! One of the prophets of one of these gods, having in his power a captured king hewed him in pieces in the sight of all the people. Was ever any imp of any devil guilty of such savagery?

Robert Igersoll - 1892

"In order to defeat the common Christian position it would seem that you must defeat the tenants for which the belief is based upon."

It would seem that in order to defeat the tenants for which the belief is based on, you would first have to prove that those tenants are sound.

"Sure you could create an imaginery universe in which there are supposed “mirrored” results for an all-evil God but that is just it. That universe is an imaginary one."

And you can assume that God exists or that God is all-good without evidence or proof, but those are just baseless assumption.

"While you would most likely claim that Christianity is an imaginery belief to begin with since you are trying to show that there is not a good Creator, much more any Creator, would it not be better to argue for an actual univers?"

The point of Law's argument was not to refute the existence of a God. But to refute the existence of specifically Craig's idea of God.

"It seems that atheists are not burdened with expaining evil because. in some way, it just is because there is no God to relate it to."

This assumes that God is a purely good figure to whom evil can be related to. In the first place what God does or does not want is not necessarily moral or immoral. It is simply something that the God wants.

"Yet, they still have to account for the problem of evil. To make claim that there is evil supposes that it has a nature that needs to be understood as well."

From my understanding of what you've said thus far, your idea of what is evil is whatever God says it is. By the humanist definition, one of many different secular philosophies and viewpoints on morality, evil is any action or lack of action that causes an harm to the life, health, happiness, and/or quality of humans or society. There are many other secular philosophies and views on morality as well.

"While the main thrust of the argument is to show that there is not a good God it does seem silly to argue using an all evil God. What’s the point? Is it just to prove existence or not? How then you resolve the problem?"

As stated above, the primary purpose of Law's argument was to refute Craig's idea of God. Which included the characteristic of "All-good". Thus, for the purposes of Law's argument, refuting the existence of a God was not necessary. All he had to refute was a single key characteristic of Craig's idea of God

"Trying to logically make God disappear will not restore goodness to the world.

And asserting that God is real does not make him real. Nor does anyone logically attempt to "make God disappear". What they do is logically show that specific claims and logical arguments for God are unfounded and illogical.

"it does seem that there is stronger evidence for a theistic position because it accounts for the origin of goodness and the origin of evil giving proper diligence to both God and man respectively."

Please present and point out the evidence. Furthermore, You assert that the origin of goodness and evil comes from God and Man respectively, however if I were to replace the word God with the word Fairies or aliens, then the origin of goodness is still accounted for and the claim is equally as valid.

"I think the argument is misguided since it is to prove that God is not good while the focus should be on why man is so evil for it is man that does evil...Evil is an issue of man, not God. To question a God who is omnipotent and all-powerful is to make claim to a higher reason. I’m sure the entire world is curious to your response to all of life’s questions at that point."

Several points
(1) This assumes the existence of God and that all good comes from God. Both of which are unproven...
(2) How do you know what God thinks is good or evil? Your claiming to be able to correctly understand what the higher reason thinks and wants?
(3) In the Bible, God openly commands murder and rape as well as slavery, sexism, and genocide. Is all of this morally good merely because God says so? Is anything ok as long as long as God condones it?
(4) If you claim that God is good because his nature is good, where does God's nature come from? If God created it himself, then what is good or bad is merely what God whims and can be changed whenever he decides to change his nature. If God did not create his own nature, then the morality in God's nature is inherent in some way and thus God is not truly the author of what is good and what is evil.
(5) Life's questions are worked on and answered as they come along. To think that one should know the answers to all of life's questions immediately on the spot is to claim that someone has absolute knowledge. Claiming absolute knowledge is more a religious characteristic than an atheist characteristic.

I would like to present an oppositional argument against the strategy used by Stephen Law alluding to the impossibility for the existence of the all-good-God that Christianity favors.

I think you missed the boat entirely: THERE'S NOBODY UP THERE.

Hence, I would also argue in favor of the impossibility for an all-evil-god to exist.

Um...what do you call satan then?

However, first, I want to define the concept of evil so that it may clear up the notions that we will be fundamentally addressing.

(It means what you want it to mean, is what you're saying.)

Such definitions will clarify the impossibility for evil to be found as emerging from the intrinsically good God of the Bible.

Oh goody - you're going to bandy about a book that NOBODY here (besides you wankers) accepts as any authority whatsoever. What a refreshing change!
/sarcasm off

Finally, after concluding that total goodness is the very essence of God, I would like to touch on the sources of evil and how the God of the Bible has provided answers to oppose them and defeat them.

Not having them about might just be a good step.

What is evil? Let us first state what it does to be able to define it by its concluding characteristics. Evil “frustrates human goods as goods benefitting the nonhuman world. . . The avoidable suffering of both man and beast is evil.”

Slinging some Groothius, ey?

Natural evil can be defined as the uncontrollable and disastrous behavior of nature causing such things as: tornadoes, earthquakes, tidal waves, hurricanes, etc. Diseases and deformity are also part of this category simply because they do not find their origin in human actions, but rather, they correspond to the aggressive behavior that nature occasionally displays.

Not happy w/simple plagiarism, ey?

What is exactly the problem of evil? Epicurus, the classical thinker, defined it with these words:
“God either wishes to take away evils and he is unable, or he is able and unwilling; or he is neither willing nor able, or he is both willing and able.”

Actually, this is a standard religionist misquote:
"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

Then he tries each possibility which in fact helps one understand with more clarity the essence of the issue under the Christian presupposition of the irrefutable existence of God.

'Irrefutable'? Them's fighting words, bub. Too bad they ain't yours.

1. If god is willing and is unable, he is feeble, which is not in accordance with the character of God.

Yeah, another jackass who doesn't understand his own fairy tales.

2. If he is able and unwilling, he is envious [meaning: evil], which is equally at variance with God.

Hey, your myth declared himself 'a jealous god'. So I call bullshit.

3. If he is neither willing nor able he is both envious [meaning: evil] and feeble, and therefore not God.

He's still not there. Nobody is.

4. If he is both willing and able, which alone is suitable to God, from what source then are evils or why does he not remove them?

Presuppositionalist nonsense.

The fourth premise is the only one that is fully validated in Christianity; it is also the only one that separates God from evil respecting, therefore, the essence of God which is total goodness.

WTF? Are you kidding? That's not an answer. That's a cut-'n-paste apologetic non-answer.

This final and conclusive statement serves to rebuttal the hypothesis exposed by Stephen Law as he alluded to the impossibility for the existence of the all-good-God that Christianity favors.

You (or Goofius) can dance around & repeat yourselves exhaustively, but no point has been proven AT ALL.

And in conclusion, this last premise formulates the right questions concerning both the real sources of evil, and it also formulates the need to understand the reasoning behind the lack of immediate action against evil from God.

Oh please. That was anything but definitive. It was a meaningless tautology.

The following line of reasoning is crucial to understand the Christian position on the matter; positions which I am favoring in my argument.

You mean your NON-argument.

It will serve as the basis from which I will draw the essence of my rebuttal against Stephen Law’s argument.

So...you swipe his garbage w/out attribution, but attribute other shit to him? Nice.

“Atheism is not burdened with attempts to explain evil in relation to God.

That's right, we're not burdened w/anything of the sort.

Evil, for them, just exists in a godless world. The problem of God vanishes for them.

Or gods. Or goddesses. Or any other supernatural folderol.

However, in fact, the “problem does not so vanish for two main reasons: for an atheist to speak of the problem of evil, the atheist must believe that objective evil exists.”

True, but not absolutely.

To justify this claim, this person needs to adequately explain the existence and nature of evil.

It's been explained. No supernatural critters need apply.

In order for objective evil to exist, objective goodness must exist as well, and good must exist in a more fundamental way.

& objective gray areas exist as well. Typical false dichotomies are being posited here.

Evil does not exist in and of itself.

It's specific to the species.

In the words of C. S. Lewis, one can say, then, that “no one does evil simply because he or she takes it to be evil.”

Oh yeah, 'cause nobody here's EVER heard this crap. Oh wait - yes we have.
I'm pretty sure Ramirez reveled in it. So do most psychos.

The badness of an action “consists in pursuing [good things] by the wrong method, or in the wrong way, or too much.

This still DOES NOT prove the supernatural.

”Therefore, even if the person who is doing so may be ‘desperately wicked,’ that “wickedness, when you examine it, turns out to be the pursuit of some good in the wrong way.”

Blah, blah, blah - 'the road to hell is paved w/good intentions.' Yeesh, got any more flowery rhetoric that states the effin' obvious?
Gonna skip to the meat of it:

That original good is found in objective evil which in fact is found only in God.

Who doesn't exist.

“Objective moral goodness, therefore, is best explained by the character of a creator God who made the universe good and gave humans the capacity to recognize the good as such.”

WOW - you don't get out much, do you? Have you taken a purely objective look @ the mess around you? Obviously not.

However, man trying to achieve his selfish purpose often takes the initiative to twist what is originally made good from God and corrupts it.

Setting up your children to fail from the get-go. Yeah, real sound parenting there. (rolls eyes)

The previous definitions bluntly assert that God is the source of goodness, and that he cannot and therefore will not originate evil from himself simply because his essence is goodness, or better, his essence is “objective goodness.”

HAHAHAHA! oh, quit fronting. Book of Job? Noah's Ark? Are you kidding me?

Now, two questions remained to be answer: where are the real sources of evil? ,and how can one understand the reasoning behind the lack of immediate action against evil from God?

It's real easy: NOBODY'S UP THERE.

The Bible clearly states concrete answers for those questions. First, as mentioned before, evil can emanate from humans and nature.

I refuse the authority of your book, which leaves you in a sticky wick.

He had established that the wages or consequences of sin were death.

We die anyways, so that's no help. No solution either.

Therefore, only death could satisfied justice and provide a payment and solution to the stain of sin. This payment and substitutionary atonement was satisfied by Jesus Christ as when he died on the cross.

So, he came down among us, & sacrificed himself to himself to correct a mistake he made?

His death satisfied justice and provided the necessary payment due because of human sin.

Jesus never existed either.

However, His atonement and the forgiveness of sins derived from His wonderful action, can only be enjoyed through faith in Him, His sacrifice and His resurrection.

Horse manure.

Whoever believes in him shall not perish but will have eternal life (accomplished only through the forgiveness of sins).

Yeah yeah, John 3:16. As if nobody's heard that crap before either.

In conclusion, whether you atheist believe or not, Christianity does provide an answer to the problem of evil. In fact, it also provides the reasons and sources of evil; and additionally, it provides a wonderful solution. This solution is found in the person of Jesus Christ.

& it's all a pack of lies. Unprovable, unfalsifiable. Unrepeatable. It's destitute crap, utter sophistry. Your book is wrong on every level: that alone makes all this useless.

It seems that this argument assumes that good and evil are mutually exclusive to morality and in turn reliant to the existence of a god. Explain why moral issues are not able to be defined by society and not religion? The absence of a god will not in turn cause all of civilization to collapse in on itself. Many religions have come and gone that defined right or wrong but within the transitions between them the morality has basically remained. It has changed and progressed with time but that is due to innovations by man, not god, that have affected our perception of the world. Just one example is the advent of ever efficient machines that finally led to the uselessness of slaves to get work done. Far reaching conclusions to try and tie together an ever dwindling argument for an antiquated belief system is at best, laughable. As eloquently this post was it lack perspective on reality. We can focus in on certain substance within arguments but please maintain the scope of what is being discussed.

Ken, all one has to do is actually read the frickin bible to see how evil their god truly is. Problem is most christians are only taught or preached to from what I call the miller lite version, the N.T. I had a born again christian actually tell me that when he is talking to young people or agnostics he tells them to read the gospel of John to show how the word is god. This, he says is all that a christian needs, god is love.

When asked about the O.T. he states that it is only good for a history lesson. This is the mindsight we deal with, refusal by christians to deal with the horrific, bigoted, mysoginist, evil and demented side of their god. They need yahweh to get their jesus, but seem to wash their hands and turn a blind eye to him when it no longer suits their purpose.

This is the position they are forced to take when they let Paul take over the religion and establish his rules. Paul is their religious get out of jail free card. Many of the jews of that time I believe were tired of all the rigid laws, dietary regulations and the simple fact that they believed their god had forsaken them. That tends to happen when you believe in an imaginary skyman. Just read what paul's letters require for salvation. Gone are all the dietary laws, gone are the laws of yahweh and the old testament. Gone also is the belief that yahweh was to restore the israelites to their promised land.

And what do we find in place of all these old rigid dogmas? All one has to do now is believe in jesus and you will be saved and spend your time in heaven. Do you need to do any good works to be saved? No says paul and the christians. Do you have to be accountable for your actions? No says paul and the christians. Believe in jesus and ALL your sins will be forgiven. Take two people and list in one column all the good and positive things a person can do in life such as, being a good person to friends, family and fellow man. A good husband,wife, father or mother; donate and voluteer to charities and try and make the world a better place by being a good and honest citizen. In the second column list all the worst things you can think of that a person can do such as steal, physically abuse, rape and murder people. Now most rational, clear minded and non delusional people would say that column 1 represents the good and moral person and if there were some magical heaven, surely this person would be eligible to go there. By the same token, column 2 represents all that we loathe and abhor in humanity and if such a place as hell existed, certainly this person would go there. Well lo and behold we have the "great" religion of love and mercy known as christianity which says hold up a second, not so fast. Did the person you label as "good" believe in jesus? No? Well then he is banished to hell for eternal damnation. And this person you label as "evil", did he believe in jesus? Actually, yes he did. Well my friend this person will ascend to heaven and live in eternal happiness with our lord and savior.

Now tell me that this is not THE most ridiculous, scurilous, evil and freakin heinous system of justice the world has ever had the displeasure of being subjected to.

That's idiotic. No wait: it's fucking stupid is what it is. Science doesn't have the same problems. Asking someone if they've seen evolution happen is the same moronic crap the creationists use. Evolution is fact: faith is fiction. Nobody teaches we came from a monkey - we share a common ancestor. Darkness is NOT the absence of anything: nothing is the absence of anything. Darkness is the absence of light.
I don't care who had this conversation - both participants were morons.

This story has already been debunked as an urban legend. It's posted on over 600 sites and has classic elements of an urban legend. For example...

(1) In many cases the poster swears this is a true story.

(2) The pages either make no mention of what particular school this took place at, or what the name of the professor is or give different names of the school and professor that conflict with the other posts of this same story.

(3) Many of the minor details change subtly with each retelling. There are also several different endings to the story. In this particular version, the student sits down amidst pandemonium. In some versions the professor rushes out of the room in embarrassment. One version concludes "... The student got an A in the class." Another has the professor go crazy and rush the student, only to die of a stroke.

(4) Every character in the story is a caricature, starkly contrasting "Good, persecuted student" and "Evil professor".

It's an obvious urban legend. An interesting read, but it also falls apart once dissected because...

Science does prove that the professor has a brain, or are you saying that the facts that every human or animal body that has ever been dissected and analyzed has always had a brain, that countless experiments have demonstrated that the brain controls an organism's ability to move and speak and reason, and that an animal with a damaged brain becomes an inanimate mass of carbon aren't proof that the scientists is a living and breathing human being with a brain?

Furthermore, evolution has been tried, proven, and witnessed in laboratories.

The reason these folks spend so much time on the subject is because there is a VAST amount of evidence that contradicts what is stated in all of the "holy" books (the biblical Genesis is especially amusing to me) and they are outnumbered by brainwashed religionists who think that because their holy book says it, it MUST be true. It takes a lot of time to try and present unbiased, outside facts to someone who has been conditioned into believing and not reasoning. I imagine it's frustrating having to present and repeat these facts over and over to a group of people who outnumber you and usually try and and get you to "believe" as well.

And i'm sorry to say that your position -

vehemently arguing against the existence of god = actually believing in god

-is pretty ridiculous.

To me, if the bible is the 100% accurate word of god (which it would have to be), then all it should take is ONE logical fallacy or proven contradictory fact to prove it untrue. Otherwise, it's either false or that god is a deceiver. And there are PLENTY to choose from. Read and research. Or read any of the blogs on this site.

Well I don't have anyone dictating the laws and direction of my country under the assumption that Big Foot or Santa Claus exists. I don't have anyone telling me what kind of person I am, or where I'll end up after death, because I don't believe in Big Foot or Santa Claus. Because I see more things wrong with religion than correct, and see not only my rights as well as others trampled upon because of a christian agenda, I then deem it necessary to disagree and argue my case against the facts surrounding a belief in a higher power.
The predominant religion in the USA is christianity and those who follow it are the ones in power making illogical decisions based on their beliefs. When those decisions infringe on the views of those who believe something different, atheism or another religion, then I take offense.
Your assumptions that just because we voice a concern over god doesn't make us closet christians. If we believed at all, in any way, the logical thing to do would to play along with christianity "just in case." I don't believe in any thought of god or gods because the claims have no substance and cannot be proven in a logical way.
Now your comment that we should inherit the kingdom like a kid, following a belief blindly, without question, has time and time again proved to be dangerous. Not only with religion (especially christianity) but with dictators, kings, and even general politics. Your following a person's "idea" on how things should be and not the consensus of accepted facts. This has led to mass killings and devastating practices.
So to respond to your final comment that fear of theism is a sign that I may actually believe, don't be ridiculous. First off, it is not a fear it is a disagreement and belief that all religions, current and past, are rooted in myth and should be perceived as myth. God is not real therefore does not dictate anything in existence.