The Problem Of Evil

A little long for a blog post, but here is my solution to the Problem of Evil.

This essay shall examine the Problem of Evil, and attempt to suggest how a theist could legitimately maintain their belief in God in the face of the existence of evil. Some philosophers surmise that the Problem of Evil may prove fatal for the traditional theistic concept of an omnipotent, omnipresent, all-loving God, but this may not be the case. Indeed there is a powerful argument which appears to counter the Problem, even if it does raise further questions about God and the nature of reality. This is not to say that an omnipotent, omnipresent and all-loving God could exist, just that the Problem of Evil may not disprove the existence of this type of God.
The Problem of Evil holds that if God is omnipotent, omnipresent and all-loving then:
Premise 1: He should be able to prevent all evil He knows about.
Premise 2: He knows about all evil
Premise 3: He wishes to prevent all evil.
Conclusion 1: Therefore evil should not exist.
Conclusion 2: Evil exists therefore one of the premises must be incorrect.
This argument provides a serious problem for traditional theistic thinking, and some philosophers, such as Mackie, have surmised that it forces the theist to either change one of the definitions of God-e.g. remove the omnipotence-or cling on to the traditional concept, but realise that they do so out of blind faith with no support from logic or reason. Some philosophers have come to the defence of the theistic position, and their arguments might defy the challenge of Mackie.
Authority and freedom appears to be something which most humans desire and cherish: as a child grows into an adult they are given increasing freedoms and responsibility, and most adults would resent their parents interfering in their lives with the same authoritarianism as they did in their child’s infancy. What is true for individual adults appears to be true for humanity as a whole: the race would probably grow to resent a being which micromanages its affairs-indeed this micromanagement may stunt humanities creativity in much the same way as a prisoner in chains who could move very little without the guards consent would be unable to fulfil her creative potential. As it appears to be true that authority is a good in itself, this has a profound impact on the Problem of Evil. Imagine Jones had the ability to give Mary a meal or not give her a meal; the worse that could happen is that Mary would become hungry and so it must be agreed that Jones has little moral authority; forcing Mary to go hungry does not have great enough potential consequences to give Jones the responsibility to have moral authority. However, if he has the ability to either give her a poisoned meal and inherit Mary’s wealth or not to give her a poisoned meal and remain poor, then it must be agreed that he has far more moral authority. Also, it is probably safe to assume that Jones’ moral decision not to give Mary poison even though it would have lead to great material advantage is much more commendable than him giving her a nutritional meal because of the greater moral responsibility bestowed upon him. In this instance it could be concluded that the extra authority given to humanity and the moral responsibility that entails far outweighs the evil within the world.
However, Mackie would counter the claim that God must allow evil in order for more good or moral responsibility to come into existence. While what can be called First Order Evils such as war may lead to a Second Order Good like heroism, these First Order Evils can lead to Second Order Evils such as cowardice just as easily. Surely, it is argued, if God is both all-loving and omnipotent He would be able to engineer a world in which only First Order Evils exist? This would mean that War would always lead to heroism, and means that humanity gains all the benefits of these Second Order Goods without involving the evils of the Second Order. That Second Order Evils exist could be taken to indicate that God is either not all-good, or not omnipotent, in that He cannot create, or does not care to create, a world in which Second Order Evils are eliminated.
This kind of argument does not work in light of Swinburne’s defence. The entire reason for evil to exist in the first place is so that humans can choose wither to perform an evil or good act; if Jones can only choose heroism in a war then there is little point of an all-loving being allowing war to exist in the first place-it is having the ability to choose cowardice which makes the heroism good.
This in itself presents a problem for the theist: surely it is possible for an all-loving, omnipotent being to create a world in which an independent human agent could have been created in such a way that the option of doing evil always exists, but they always resist it? This does seem to indicate that the Problem of Evil may have triumphed over the traditional concept of the theistic God; there are people who, when offered a choice between good and evil will almost always choose good. This does not mean that they’re judgment is less praiseworthy; indeed it is probably the opposite. The case seems to be that a person can exist who almost always chooses good, and could retain their responsibility. As such it seems logical that an omnipotent God could create everyone in a way that they almost always choose good; this would afford humanity its cherished freedoms and responsibility, but much reduce the evil in the world. Most people would agree that it is not the case that everyone, or even the majority, almost always chooses good, therefore it might be possible to conclude that as evil is more prevalent than it needs to be, the Problem of Evil still presents a challenge to the idea of an omnipotent, omnipresent and all-good God: one of the premises, or God Himself must go.
Oddly enough Nietzsche may be able to save the traditional version of God from this claim. When writing about the possibility of a utopian society Nietzsche claimed that if it ever came to pass that perfect society came into being, humanity would cease to exist: humanity requires the trials presented by imperfection in order to create, strive and survive. What is true of the utopia could be said to be true of the perfect world in which agents could, but never did choose evil: without the trials provided by agents choosing evil, then humanity would lose what makes it human, and sink into lethargy.
Those who protect the Problem of Evil could respond, if they wished, that the existence of so-called ‘non-human’ evils prevents this counter from succeeding. Assume that humanity both needs the choice of evil, and requires that many independent agents do choose evil, this still does not explain the suffering caused by that which humanity cannot control: earthquakes, droughts etc. An omnipotent God may be able to create a world in which none of these non-human (what Swinburne terms ‘Natural Evils’) disasters exist. This would dramatically decrease the amount of suffering in the world, but could leave enough human evil as to allow creativity and authority to remain.
This argument is not convincing. To return once more to Nietzsche: ‘Formula of my happiness: a Yes, a No, a straight line, a goal...’ Humanity requires the idea of a goal or an aim as much as they require strife. Without evil there is no real goal-an agent cannot aim to eliminate poverty if it does not exist. Without a goal humanity degenerates in the same way as it would if there was no strife. Swinburne illustrates this well when he alludes to the unemployed in contemporary Britain: without employment prospects, but with no real threat of suffering in the same way that a third world unemployed person would have, the unemployed are in real danger of slipping into lethargy. The example need not be the unemployed: those few individuals who inherit a great deal of wealth so that they are secure, and can buy most material objects, yet despite this these individuals rarely sit with their wealth: they search for a purpose, wither that be in politics or philanthropy. Those that do not find this goal are in danger of leading a lifestyle which does little good to either themselves or to their fellow humans-the news is full of rich youths wasting away in the drug dens of Europe. Even when a human agent has everything, or the potential to have everything which could be desired, that agent will continue to seek out a goal: the goal is the thing for which humanity strives.
The question remains as to why God would allow Natural Evil to persist when it seems possible that humanity could ascertain its goals from moral evil alone. However, it seems that moral human evil simply is not possible without natural evil: not only does humanity seem to learn how to commit evil-learn how to brew poison etc-from observations of nature, it seems that moral evil would not be practically possible without natural evil; the consequence and much of the moral authority would be lost from Jones stealing Mary’s bread if there is not a famine-otherwise the lost bread is an inconvenience. Even in relatively rich countries much of the debate over morals revolves around natural functions: should rich countries give aid to poorer ones, should euthanasia become an acceptable way of ending the suffering of the individual? The list goes on, but these two examples are good illustrations of the argument. The first example links in with the natural and moral evils of the poorer nations: the moral debate around giving aid simply would not exist if natural evils did not make that aid necessary. The euthanasia debate is another example of how natural evil affects the moral compass: without suffering there would be no need to contemplate euthanasia, but natural evils such as disease make euthanasia an option for some people. In this way natural evils allow people to choose between good and bad, and creates a grey area in which humanity can grow as morally responsible agents capable of making their own decisions based on the evidence and their own conscience.
The last doubt created by the Problem of Evil over the traditional theistic God is that the nature of reality presented by Swinburne and others may disprove an omnipotent deity. A God which can do anything should be able to create a world in which it is possible for the creative energy created by evil, and the authority of being able to pick between good and evil exists without having the consequences of evil actions. This could indeed prove fatal for God.
Schlesinger quite rightly claims that we cannot expect an omnipotent God to do the logically impossible: God could remain omnipotent while not breaking logic ‘for we do not know what it is we ask of Him’. Perhaps creating a world in which there is less evil that there is now, but that the human condition remains as if there was the same level of evil as before, is logically impossible. This could quite easily be true, and if it is then God can remain omnipotent, omnipresent and all-loving within the confines of the world humanity finds itself. Indeed it seems to be the case that it is logically impossible to change the levels of suffering without altering humanity. As shown in the above arguments, humanity relies on moral and natural evils so that they can become morally responsible and creative individuals, and to reduce the amount of suffering appears to alter either the creativity or the responsibility. As such for God to reduce the amount of evil in the world, but keep humanity unaltered, human agents would have to believe that suffering remained at the same levels as before-this ensures that the search for a goal remains. Surely if humanity must believe that evil remains unaltered, God would have to create a delusion for humanity, and in this act humanities moral responsibility is altered-a madman cannot have the same level of responsibility as a sane individual, hence the plea of insanity. One of the major points of allowing evil in the first place is to give humanity moral responsibility, and taking this away through delusion would defeat the purpose of evil.
Although the Problem of Evil originally seems to discredit the notion of an omnipotent, omnipresent and all-loving God, on close and careful examination it appears that the Problem simply does not provide a challenge to traditional theistic assumptions. That is not to say that traditional theism is right in ascribing these attributes to God, or that God exists at all, but the Problem of Evil cannot be used as a means to deconstruct these assumptions.



Mackie J. L. Evil and Omnipotence [Book Section] // Reason and Responsibility: Readings in Some Basic Problems of Philosophy / book auth. Feinberg Joel and Shafer-Landau Russ. - Belmont : Thomson Warsworth, 2008. - Vol. 13 .
Nietzsche Friedrich Master and Slave Morality [Book Section] // Reason and Responsibility: Readings in Some Basic Problems of Philosophy / book auth. Feinberg Joel and Shafer-Landau Russ. - Belmont : Thomson Wadsworth, 2005. - Vol. 13.
Nietzsche Friedrich Twilight of the Idols/ The Anti-Christ [Book]. - London : Penguin Books, 1990.
Schlesinger George The Problenm of Evil and the Problem of Suffering [Book Section] // Reason and Responsibility: Readings in Some Basic Problems of Philosophy / book auth. Feinberg Joel and Shafer-Landau Russ. - Belmont : Thomson Wadsworth, 2008. - Vol. 13 Edition.
Swinburne Richard Why God Allows Evil [Book Section] // Reason and Responsibility: Readings in Some Basic Problems of Philosophy / book auth. Feinberg Joel and Shafer-Landau Russ. - Belmont : Thomson Wadsworth, 2008. - Vol. 13.