If God wants to destroy evil...

[Zarathustra]

God created everything that has been, is, and is going to be in existence. He created the Earth and the Heavens. He created the Lake of Fire in which he casts sinners. He created Good, and He created evil. Does not the old adage says "I have created you, and so can I destroy you"?

If God wanted to, couldn't He, in theory, destroy evil with no need for the battle of the apocalypse?

[Bro Dave]

If you just feel it's too hopeless to continue this discussion with me, then I would be sorry to hear that. I am very likely to continue to insist on hearing reasons for beliefs, and I know not everyone is comfortable with that. (But I think this forum is a great place to expand one's comfort zone in that arena!)


spetey

Should I choose not to continue our discussion, it would have nothing at all to do with your “insisting on hearing reasons for beliefs”. It would have to do with my apparent inability to communicate simple concepts, such as I attempted in the last post. My point was, that we humans each tend to believe we are logical, and have “good reasons” for whatever it is we conclude. Those whose views are other than our own, and therefore at least suspect, and more than likely “wrong”. The question I asked, was actually rhetorical in nature; i.e. how can anyone tell when they are being illogical? The tool required to make that evaluation, is logic, so if you are using your own logic to see if you are logical, the outcome is at least suspect.
In your posts, I feel an ingrained superiority toward anyone who believes in God. Well, fine, you have the right to be arrogant if you so choose. However, you have never answered my premise that you have no better basis for your beliefs, than do I. The only apparent difference, is that I claim to experience God, and you do not. So, your conclusion seems to be that I am obviously delusional, and my need to find God has created this illusion. You are again welcome to your conclusions, but your lacking what is a common experience among those find God, hardly disproves those experiences. Your very premise in these discussions, is that there is no God. All reasons supporting your premise are, by necessity, relative, not absolute. So, when you take the tone that you are here to destroy our illogical reasons for believing in God, it is somewhat offensive. I am not offended that you have not experienced God. Why are you so aggravated that I have?

Bro Dave

[spetey]

Hey folks...

Should I choose not to continue our discussion, it would have nothing at all to do with your “insisting on hearing reasons for beliefs”.

I admit, that was an unfair suggestion on my part (that you would only stop this conversation because you're uncomfortable with reasons), and I apologize. Please, then, do give your reasons. I really am interested to hear them.

My point was, that we humans each tend to believe we are logical, and have “good reasons” for whatever it is we conclude.

Sure, I agree--we all like to believe we're right. But sometimes the sad truth is that we're not. People who thought the earth was flat were wrong. And it's happened to us all--we all know it's possible to be wrong in a belief. You and I agree that some beliefs are better than others. Now, I believe there is no God; you believe there is one. One of us must be wrong! Of course, I think you're wrong, and you think I'm wrong. So I suggest, in forums like these, that we try to work it out together. I have given reasons why I don't think there's a God--reasons like the presence of unnecessary evil. I would like to hear your response to this problem. It is not a response to say "well we all think we have good reasons for our views." Sometimes, when we are open to the possibility of being wrong, we need to look at those reasons and find out whether we really do have good reasons. Maybe my reasons for atheism are bad, and I am wrong. If so, this is your opportunity to show me. Similarly, I assume that you are open to the possibility that you are wrong--right?

The question I asked, was actually rhetorical in nature; i.e. how can anyone tell when they are being illogical? The tool required to make that evaluation, is logic, so if you are using your own logic to see if you are logical, the outcome is at least suspect.

I don't think this question should be rhetorical. I think it's a very good question. It's true that we have to use our own thinking in order to evaluate our thinking, and I agree there's something problematically circular about that--kind of like a computer program that checks computer programs for viruses. (The virus-checker itself might have a virus!) But usually, virus checkers work, and do find viruses! Similarly, sometimes we can think about an issue, and discover that one of our beliefs is bad by our own lights. After all, we change our minds sometimes, based on reasons, right? I am suggesting that by your own lights it is contradictory to believe in an all-good, all-powerful God and unnecessary evil. Perhaps I'm wrong--perhaps you don't think these are contradictory. But I would like to hear why.

In your posts, I feel an ingrained superiority toward anyone who believes in God. Well, fine, you have the right to be arrogant if you so choose.

I'm genuinely sorry if I come off arrogant. It's true that I'm very confident in my position, and I guess it shows. I think my position in this matter is well-reasoned, and I often suspect that theist views are not as carefully reasoned. But, arrogant as I might be, I am also open to the idea that I might be wrong. So please show me: what's wrong with my reasons?

However, you have never answered my premise that you have no better basis for your beliefs, than do I.

Here, again, is just one of my reasons for thinking that "there is no God" is a better belief than "there is a God":

1. If God exists, God is all-good and all-powerful.
2. If something all-good and all-powerful exists, there is no unnecessary evil.
3. There is unnecessary evil, such as the drowning of innocent children.
4. Therefore nothing all-good and all-powerful exists (from 2 and 3 by the modus tollens inference rule).
5. Therefore no such God exists (from 1 and 4 by modus tollens again) .

Before we agreed that some beliefs can be better than others--that racism is a bad belief, for example. And I said that I think beliefs are better or worse according to the quality of the reasons for or agasint it. I have yet to hear what you think makes some beliefs better than others, if not reasons like these.

The only apparent difference, is that I claim to experience God, and you do not.

I didn't know you were appealing to personal experience with God. In what form did / does it take? Is it an experience you can share with others, to give them reason to believe? Does God tell you why God permitted the tsunami?

So, your conclusion seems to be that I am obviously delusional, and my need to find God has created this illusion.

I've never accused you of being delusional, Bro Dave. I do think you're mistaken to think God exists. But I would have to hear more about the nature of your personal experience before I could even venture a guess about whether delusion is a better explanation of the phenomena.

You are again welcome to your conclusions, but your lacking what is a common experience among those find God, hardly disproves those experiences.

Quite right. If many people have actual personal experience with God, then that is a reason to believe in God. I find it a bit mysterious why God only shows God's self to some people, and those only in certain geographic distributions, and only to those who have already heard of the Christian God ahead of time. For reasons like these I tend to guess that people interpret experiences as being from a God (about whom they've happened to hear).

Your very premise in these discussions, is that there is no God.

No, that's not my premise; that's my conclusion (5 above). My premises are 1-3 above. It would be begging the question to use that conclusion as a premise. That is one of the kind of mistakes I try to avoid--that's one of the little thinker's virus-checkers I have, so to speak.

All reasons supporting your premise are, by necessity, relative, not absolute.

This phrasing confuses me. What exactly does it mean for a reason to be relative, rather than absolute?

So, when you take the tone that you are here to destroy our illogical reasons for believing in God, it is somewhat offensive. I am not offended that you have not experienced God. Why are you so aggravated that I have?

I am not aggravated that you have this experience as of God. I do think you are mistaken in your beliefs, but that is not the same as aggravation. The premise of this forum is that people post here to try to consider what reasons there are, for or against, the existence of God (and other similar issues). I am merely presenting my reasons against, and asking for a response to those reasons. What is wrong with the argument from the Problem of Evil? If you can find nothing wrong with the argument, why is it okay to continue believing anyway?


spetey

[harvey1]

If you look back and stand by the whole thing as an argument--instead of, say, wild speculation--then we can go over it with a fine-toothed comb together. Do you stand by that argument? Is that your final draft?

I gave my response there to your questions...

[*] You claim that God had to permit the tsunami in order to prevent some worse paradox. What paradox do you have in mind here?

I don't have any particular paradox in mind, however there are a number of possibilities. Yin and yang could be at work in the world, or the uncertainty principle might have teleological implications for human societies, or God could be operating under some least action principles that are necessitated, etc., etc.

How did the tsunami prevent this paradox?

The paradox might not be prevented by the tsunami, rather God not preventing the tsunami would be a way to avoid a paradox (or increasing pain and suffering elsewhere to keep the World free from paradox).

[*] What makes it a "real" paradox (like killing your grandfather) rather than an "unreal" (?) paradox (like "this sentence is false")?

Real paradoxes might screw up the timeline or nullify logical conditions on which the universe is founded (thereby making the underlying logic of the universe nullified, etc.), etc. Whereas, Liar might be limited to human language which the universe does not depend on to be properly instantiated.

[*] Why are real paradoxes a worse evil than unreal ones?

See above. As an example, a real paradox can void out logical underpinnings of the universe...

[*] Why are real paradoxes worse than the drowning of many children?

God has to balance out the pain and suffering of children compared to the necessity for there to be anything at all. It's a moral dilemma, to be sure, but its not just others that are of concern, the children are also of concern since a real paradox could wipe out their afterlife in eternal paradise, and that would be a bigger tragedy then the few short years they might have on earth (really nothing when the finite is compared to the length of the infinite). So, it is very tragic the world is this way, but it is this way and God is working to make sure good comes from all of it.

Why do you assume that God couldn't do it in the tsunami case? Because you have an antecedent belief that God is good, and you rely on this belief--the very thing you're trying to prove?

It's not what I'm trying to prove. What I'm proving is that the atheist reductio argument is not valid. My assumption is the same as your reductio assumption (i.e., God exists), and from that I show that God could have justified reasons for allowing evil that still portray God as all-powerful (in the same sense as I already discussed with you).

Even supposing that omnipotence does not extend to necessities like mathematics (which indeed any theodicist has to suppose, if the claim is that some evil is necessary), in what way would preventing the tsunami lead to "violating a mathematical law"? God could have simply made the crust of the earth more stable, or made the material at the plates' fissures more amenable to smooth interaction, or made the interaction take place in a safe location, or ... I mean, tons of things. How would this violate mathematical law?

There's two aspects here to consider about God's existence. There is the issue of how mathematics is an exemplification of God's existence--brute fact. This brute fact brings about worlds (i.e., worlds are instantiated because they reflect God's glory). The worlds that exist as a result of God's existence also must be in conformance with the brute fact of mathematical law. Those laws allow evil because that's brute fact what they do. However, God's existence dictates those laws by setting boundary conditions on what they can allow, and God's presence also transcends those laws by bringing about good in the world. So, it's not all that simple to change the settings of the physical laws, they are brute fact required (or necessiated) as a reflection of God's glory. It just so happens that this brute fact reality (that reflects God's glory) also brings about a lot of pain and suffering, but not to fear, God's glory is stronger than the evil that exhibits itself in the world and good overcomes evil. God is busy with bringing about good, but does so only in conformance with the brute fact laws (i.e., which are approximations of God's glory and existence). In other words, not only are the brute fact laws ultimately about God's glory, but so are the higher laws which more accurately reflect God's transcendence and immanence in the world. These higher laws are spiritual laws that work their way through creation and ultimately succeed about bringing about good in the world. These higher laws are intelligent and is what Christians might label as the Logos. Got that?

God can surely do the kinds of things I can do, but on a bigger scale. Like maybe if I were strong enough and fast enough and could hold my breath long enough (and could withstand the pressure, and knew the earthquake was coming, and so on), I could have eased tension in the fissure myself with the right tools and materials, without violating any laws of physics. Why couldn't God have done that?

The laws of physics stand in the way of God and the universe much like our posterior parietal cortex which control much of our interaction with the world (of course, this parallel should come as no surprise since this structure is exemplified into nature as an imprint of the eternal to the finite). In the case of God, the world is largely interacting with God's "posterior parietal cortex" which we term the laws of physics. God does not and probably cannot override these laws without severe consequences, namely paradoxial results. Hence, if the laws bring about evil, this evil is allowed only as much as God is able to work around those laws in more subtle interaction. (Btw, I should start every sentence with "I believe that...," however that's tedious.)

Fine, let's agree God can't change math. Still, I would think for God to have at least some normal powers of any kind, God can interfere in the physical world. I mean heck, I can interfere in the physical world by moving something from one place to another. I don't break any mathematical laws when I do that. Surely God has at least those powers, right? You seem to claim that the tsunami was just as necessary as the digits of pi. But I don't see why you think that.

Why wouldn't I think that? What is different about the digits of pi than the things in the universe. Both are aftermaths of God's existence, and it is not God's fault that the act of existing brings certain constraints and brute facts with it. Just like the digits of pi, God's existence brings with it some pretty marvelous aspects with it, but there is still necessity, and that necessity (in the case of pi) is apparently random (although it's not really completely random), and similarly, there's apparent randomness (heavily exemplified as evil) in our world--however it is not completely random--God is active in the world to bring about the divine will as much as it conforms to the constraints or brute facts of the laws (which are just extensions of the fact that God exists).

Why would God have to violate the very laws of mathematics to do something any human could do in a few minutes?

First off, God is not in time, God is outside of time. Humans are in time which means there is no danger that we can causally affect the world in a way that brings about paradox (unless of course Dr. Brown is successful in making the flux capacitor), and therefore humans have full ability to change the world to their liking. God has many, many more constraints due to the fact that God is outside of time. God faces the same paradoxes that humans could possess with time machines, and you can only imagine how difficult it would be for humans to travel in time and not cause a paradox somehow (there's a movie coming out soon based on one of my favorite short stories based on this notion...). In any case, it is possible for God to affect the timeline according to the divine will without causing paradox, unfortunately it is progressive and a whole lot of evil happens along the way. It's all brute fact, unfortunately. Good thing is that God exists, is all-powerful to bring about the divine will, and paradise is the end result of all of this. In the end, God is all in all.

God was able to save them, however that would cause worse results elsewhere, and therefore God allowed evil to happen to prevent even worse results. Of course, you are critical to this, but you are not God. You have no clue as to the challenges of bringing about a happy world and therefore any criticisms are made in complete ignorance (and arrogance and self-righteousness since it is extremely arrogant and self-righteous to assume that our limited perspective is suitable to judge God's actions).

Here you assume God is all-good and therefore God had a reason (which is mysterious to us and self-righteous to ask about). But you see, this is what's in question. You cannot assume what you are trying to prove. The tsunami looks for all the world like an evil thing, a terrible thing to permit to happen.

I'm not assuming what I'm trying to prove. All I need to prove is that your reductio argument is faulty, which I have done.

Look: suppose some human guy knew about the tsunami early, and knew it was going to kill hundreds of thousands, and could have warned them all in time, but he just didn't. If I heard this, I would claim this guy is a moral monster. And first of all, that seems at least on the face of it a reasonable claim, doesn't it? On the face of it, it looks like anyone who permits such a terrible tragedy is not a very good person. Now it's possible, of course, that this guy had great reasons, and that he was really a good guy after all. So someone might try to defend this guy in the face of this outcome, just as you are trying to defend God in the face of apparent evil. But in so doing, it doesn't count to just assume that this guy was a hero, and had his good reasons, and that he was trying to prevent some worse evil by not telling people. I would have to hear a reason to think that he was trying to do good after all.

A more accurate analogy is the time traveller who has come from the future to prevent the worst tragedies in human history. Some do not see those tragedies, they only see the tragedies that she couldn't prevent because it would have caused a paradox. Instead of thanking our time traveller from saving us from the worst of the worst, they sit there in their self-righteous position saying that the time traveller is incompetent or worse (not really from the future, not even intelligent, not even existing). That's unfair and very unappreciative of what that time traveller did and the risks that time traveller has taken by even sending their own child to the past to be cruely treated and called a phoney. The time traveller should be upset, but they want the best for all humanity, even those who spit in her face.

Is this a confession on your part that you are not attempting to give reasons for your view? Reasons are the kind of thing that might convince someone who doesn't already believe.

No. I think you don't buy into good reasons because it is not what you want to believe.

No, it's the other way around. I believe according to reasons, or at least I try to. You have not given me reason to think that God is good. You trust that God permitted the tsunami in order to prevent something worse. But this trust does not stand as a reason for me, and so my belief is not swayed.

Your reductio argument has flopped, and that is the reason why I said that you won't listen to reasons. Even though your argument has not succeeded, you still continue to believe a failed argument. Why? The only thing that makes sense to me is that you want not to be an atheist. You told me before that this wasn't the case, but how can I not think this is the case when your argument flopped and you still believe it?? You would think that if you really wanted there to be a God, that you would immediately rejoice that your argument flopped, but such is not the case. It just doesn't follow that your really would like for there to be a God. I don't want to judge your reasons, and should be more sensitive here, but I'm spending a lot of time and you won't admit that your reductio argument has flopped when you cannot show a real contradiction in a good God and the existence of evil.

I do buy into good reasons, which is why I'm an atheist. I have yet to see reason to think otherwise from you. I see a lot of appeal to trust that God is saving us from the dreaded "real" paradoxes by drowning children, and occasional non sequitur appeal to Tarskian semantics, but nothing I can yet call a reason. Give me an argument with premises and a conclusion.

Spetey, you picked up a reductio argument. In order for a reductio argument to succeed it must prove it without there being any exceptions to it. The onus is not on me to show that paradoxes actually exist that prevent God from stopping a tsunami, rather, all I have to do is show that if there are paradoxes that this would be justified reason for God's inaction with regard to tsunamis. However, I've even gone one extra step, I've given you a whole basis in mathematical laws on why we can regard this as a serious possibility. There might be other possibilities that we cannot even fathom, however the reductio argument only fails if one exception has been shown, and I showed you that one exception.

As for whether I want to be a theist, or am happy as an atheist: again, that has nothing to do with it. But yes, I'm at least as happy now as an atheist as I was as a Christian.

If you are happy, then what should be my motivation here? I'm doing this for you, no one else. In fact, I prefer less people reading my posts.

Again: what reason do you have for supposing that the tsunami was necessary in order to prevent something worse? (And if it is necessary, how come there aren't more tsunamis? Should we be trying to instigate some of our own, to help God out?)

I have pi. What do you have for reductio argument now that an exception has been found?

Gotta go, no time for editing...

[spetey]

Hey folks!

Harvey, I think we need to get clearer on the dialectic here. In summary, this is the problem of evil:

1. If an all-good, all-powerful entity exists, there is no unnecessary evil. (premise)
2. There is a great deal of unnecessary evil, such as the evil that resulted from the recent tsunami. (premise)
3. Therefore, there is no all-good, all-powerful entity. (conclusion)

Now, as I understand your response, you want to attack premise (2) above. That is, you want to say that all evil is necessary, every scrap, and that for example God had to let those hundreds of thousands die miserable deaths in order to prevent some still worse thing. Your claim is thus that this is the best of all possible worlds--it is literally impossible for God to make things better than the world as it is today. This is a traditional approach to the problem of evil, a theodicy. A theodicy attempts to show that God is indeed good ('theo' God, 'dike' virtuous), and has indeed created the best of all worlds for us, despite the apparent existence of mass amounts of unnecessary evil.

Now, on the face of it, the tsunami was a horrible disaster that did not have to happen, and that we would have much preferred didn't happen. In other words, (2) is at least a plausible premise. It seems weird to say that it was (even on-balance) good that the tsunami happened. So you have to defend this claim that the tsunami was good after all, and that therefore God is good. In so doing you try to show (2) is false, which would make my argument unsound.

But when you simply state that God must have been preventing some horrible paradox by permitting (actually, causing) that tsunami, you seem to assume that God has worked things out for the best, so that there is no unnecessary evil. But that is to assume just what it is you need to show. To defeat my second premise, you need to show that all evil is necessary. But when I ask why the tsunami was necessary, it is not enough to say "there was surely some worse thing, a paradox or something, that would have happened if not for the tsunami". Do you see that?

You claim that God had to permit the tsunami in order to prevent some worse paradox. What paradox do you have in mind here?

I don't have any particular paradox in mind ...

This is an excellent example of why your response is suspicious. You don't have a particular paradox in mind, and you can't give any reason to think there's a bad paradox God is preventing, and you can't explain how permitting a tsunami prevents logical paradoxes, and you don't seem too clear on why a "real" paradox is worse than tortured children. You just assume that God prevented some bad paradox with that tsunami. In other words, you assume that the tsunami was a necessary evil. But this is exactly what you are trying to prove in denying my second premise.

So, it seems you have four options in the face of the argument above:

1. argue (not assume) that the evil of the tsunami was necessary, and so help support your argument against premise (2);
2. argue against the other premise of my argument;
3. argue against modus tollens, the inference rule I use to bridge my premises to my conclusion (and so try to show the reasoning invalid, even if the premises are true);
4. accept the argument as sound, and believe the conclusion.

Which do you pick?


spetey

[harvey1]

Hey, Spetey.

Harvey, I think we need to get clearer on the dialectic here. In summary, this is the problem of evil:[*] If an all-good, all-powerful entity exists, there is no unnecessary evil. (premise)

I deny this premise in the exact way it is phrased. There is unnecessary evil over the shortterm (meaning a finite period) because it cannot be prevented without bringing the world into paradox or introducing even worse evil. God did not cause this unnecessary evil, rather it is a brute fact that exists because the Universe is such as it is. God is all-powerful because the divine will is such that good can triumph (eventually).

[*] There is a great deal of unnecessary evil, such as the evil that resulted from the recent tsunami. (premise)

I agree there is unnecessary evil in a finite period, but ultimately (i.e., from the perspective of all eternity) all evil is "necessary," meaning that it could not be prevented--not that it was caused by God's will, it was caused by God's existence. There's two different causal relationships.

[*] Therefore, there is no all-good, all-powerful entity. (conclusion)

The reductio ad adsurdum argument is faulty because there can exist a God that brings good to the world over a period of eternity, but over a finite period God must deal with evil in a manner that is prudent and respectful to the nature of existence which requires paradox avoidance schemes.

Now, as I understand your response, you want to attack premise (2) above. That is, you want to say that all evil is necessary, every scrap, and that for example God had to let those hundreds of thousands die miserable deaths in order to prevent some still worse thing. Your claim is thus that this is the best of all possible worlds--it is literally impossible for God to make things better than the world as it is today.

No, no, no. We don't live in the best of all possible worlds, we live in one of the possible worlds (I have no idea if it is best). If we look at all the possible worlds combined, then those worlds are "best" but that's a little absurd since they are the only ones possible! That is, they are the only ones possible in that no world can exist that doesn't eventually conform to God's will.

Now, on the face of it, the tsunami was a horrible disaster that did not have to happen, and that we would have much preferred didn't happen. In other words, (2) is at least a plausible premise. It seems weird to say that it was (even on-balance) good that the tsunami happened.

It would be weird, and it's not something that I am at all saying. However, it is good that we live in a world where there can be a tsunami killing many children and through God's grace something good comes of it. That is very Good. It brings meaning to all of the pain and suffering that the world must bear with much sorrow.

But when you simply state that God must have been preventing some horrible paradox by permitting (actually, causing) that tsunami

Not causing in the sense that God willed it to happen. The tsunami is indirectly caused because God exists and therefore a world exists, hence God is in that causal chain. But, it is not God's fault that the divine existence is required for there to be anything. It is just brute fact that has to do with the nature of truth (or so I believe).

you seem to assume that God has worked things out for the best, so that there is no unnecessary evil.

I don't have to assume it anymore than you do. I don't even have to believe my own argument. All I have to do as an innocent bystander to this argument is say that your reductio ad adsurdum argument fails in case God is struggling with paradox avoidance. That's all I must do to show that your argument is faulty, and it is what I have done. Instead of giving up your argument, you continue to believe it without reason (funny how you only use that word in a one-way line of communication...).

But that is to assume just what it is you need to show. To defeat my second premise, you need to show that all evil is necessary.

All I have to show to defeat your second premise is show that God's existence can eventually bring about unnecessary evil (over a finite duration), and I have done that by showing that God's will cannot prevent evil over a finite duration because of paradox.

But when I ask why the tsunami was necessary, it is not enough to say "there was surely some worse thing, a paradox or something, that would have happened if not for the tsunami". Do you see that?

It is enough. All I have to show is that God did everything possible without stepping into paradox in trying to reduce evil as much as possible for all the worlds collectively. God cannot single out one specific world and leave the others in worse shape. Doing so is immoral, and an all-good God cannot do that.

You claim that God had to permit the tsunami in order to prevent some worse paradox. What paradox do you have in mind here?

I don't have any particular paradox in mind ...

This is an excellent example of why your response is suspicious. You don't have a particular paradox in mind, and you can't give any reason to think there's a bad paradox God is preventing, and you can't explain how permitting a tsunami prevents logical paradoxes, and you don't seem too clear on why a "real" paradox is worse than tortured children.

It's not suspicious because I don't have to be anything more than an innocent bystander to this argument by just showing how this reductio argument can and does fail. If you want to take one example of how a paradox can bring about evil in line with my argument, that's fine. I think what you will find though, is that this is all just a waste of time. There can exist brute fact reasons as to why God cannot violate a principle of existence without bringing contradiction. It's just a matter of showing how one of those paradox examples can do that, which is pretty straightforward.

You just assume that God prevented some bad paradox with that tsunami. In other words, you assume that the tsunami was a necessary evil. But this is exactly what you are trying to prove in denying my second premise.

I don't assume the tsunami was a necessary evil over a finite period. There is a world with our laws of existence, those laws of existence (e.g., laws of physics) are not perfect at preventing tsunami's, God was not in position to prevent the tsunami and maintain the integrity of laws of existence in a manner that would be morally right to other worlds or in a manner that would prevent an outright paradox directly by violating some more primitive requirement (i.e., the laws of existence).

So, it seems you have four options in the face of the argument above:[*] argue (not assume) that the evil of the tsunami was necessary, and so help support your argument against premise (2);

I don't have to argue that it was ultimately necessary, all I have to show is that if it was ultimately necessary, then your reductio ad adsurdum argument fails. That puts to bed your argument because your argument should be valid for every case we can introduce (of course, there may be other arguments that we cannot know--but that's why the reductio argument is so easy to refute--just come up with one example of where it fails).

[*] argue against the other premise of my argument;

I did that too.

[*] accept the argument as sound, and believe the conclusion.

Your options are to produce a different reductio argument, or to withdraw it. Somehow I think you would prefer not to withdraw your failed argument.

[The Happy Humanist]

Harvey:

There is one possible way in which God could prevent all the evil in the universe, necessary or otherwise, without creating any paradoxes. He could choose not to create the universe in the first place.

I submit that an all-good God, knowing that by creating a universe such as ours, knowing that there would be evil in it that he could not prevent without creating a paradox, would not create such a universe. This would render all paradoxes unnecessary, and therefore all evil unnecessary, and therefore all evil preventable. An infinitely-good God, it would seem to me, would prefer such an option.

Thus, the very existence of the universe would appear to be an argument against the existence of God.

[spetey]

Harvey, I don't know why you make so much of the form of my argument. It could be considered as a reductio in the sense that the first premise involves a conditional, and if one were to assert its antecedent, then one would be committed to denying the second premise. In other words, one cannot consistently hold both premises and hold the antecedent of the conditional. Call it a reductio, call it an argument by modus tollens, who cares? The point is simple: if the premises are true, the conclusion follows deductively. Here, for review, is the argument:

1. If an all-good, all-powerful entity exists, there is no unnecessary evil. (premise)
2. There is a great deal of unnecessary evil, such as the evil that resulted from the recent tsunami. (premise)
3. Therefore, there is no all-good, all-powerful entity. (conclusion)

It is not enough to call this a "faulty reductio". You actually have to give reasons against at least one of the premises (or, a much harder task, deny the conclusion follows validly from the premises). Now, you do try to do this some, so let's take a look at those parts of your response.

If an all-good, all-powerful entity exists, there is no unnecessary evil. (premise)

I deny this premise in the exact way it is phrased. There is unnecessary evil over the shortterm (meaning a finite period) because it cannot be prevented without bringing the world into paradox or introducing even worse evil.

In other words, you are saying the "short term" evil is necessary for making this world as good as possible. This is a standard theodicy: there are bad things in the world, but we need those bad things (because we can't appreciate the good without the bad, or because the bad leads to higher goods like forgiveness, or blah blah--if one of these versions tempts you, let me know). To say that we must have some evil in order to prevent worse evil is to say that original evil is necessary. If we could have neither, presumably God (being all-good) would prefer neither, right? Otherwise, why would God needlessly torture God's subjects? It doesn't seem like a good thing to do, agreed? So the point is supposed to be that even God, who can do everything possible, cannot make less (longrun) evil. See?

There is a great deal of unnecessary evil, such as the evil that resulted from the recent tsunami. (premise)

I agree there is unnecessary evil in a finite period, but ultimately (i.e., from the perspective of all eternity) all evil is "necessary," meaning that it could not be prevented--not that it was caused by God's will, it was caused by God's existence. There's two different causal relationships.

Now this is kind of important. Sometimes you sound like you're saying God could have stopped the tsunami (for example), but only by allowing something much worse. Other times, like here, you seem to say that God couldn't have stopped that tsunami, even if it would have been for the better. That sounds, of course, like you're giving up on God's omnipotence. To give up on God's omnipotence is of course a consistent solution to the Problem of Evil, as I mentioned to MagusYanam here. It's unclear why you would worship a God not capable of simple acts that humans can perform (such as fixing faulty wires), but hey. In this case, you would accept the conclusion of my argument. You would agree that there is no all-good, all-powerful entity, and argue that God could still exist because God is not such an entity.

Therefore, there is no all-good, all-powerful entity. (conclusion)

The reductio ad adsurdum argument is faulty because there can exist a God that brings good to the world over a period of eternity, but over a finite period God must deal with evil in a manner that is prudent and respectful to the nature of existence which requires paradox avoidance schemes.

I argue that the presence of an all-good, all-powerful being is not consistent with the evil in the world. Here you say in effect that my argument is bad because an all-good, all-powerful God is consistent with the evil in the world. But this is not a reason, it's simply contradiction. You remind me of this fun site.

Now, as I understand your response, you want to attack premise (2) above. That is, you want to say that all evil is necessary, every scrap, and that for example God had to let those hundreds of thousands die miserable deaths in order to prevent some still worse thing. Your claim is thus that this is the best of all possible worlds--it is literally impossible for God to make things better than the world as it is today.

No, no, no. We don't live in the best of all possible worlds, we live in one of the possible worlds (I have no idea if it is best).

Now here you contradict your earlier claim, according to which (in the long run, of course) this is the best world there could be, and every scrap of evil is in order to prevent worse evil elsewhere. Here, by contrast, you say this is not the best possible world. In other words, you think this world could be a lot better--it is possible to have a better world (in the long run). That is, any being with all powers could make this world better (over the long run). So in other words, this world is worse than it has to be--there's unnecessary pain and suffering. Now: why would an all-good God subject us to such unnecessary pain and suffering, given that God is powerful enough to prevent it?

However, it is good that we live in a world where there can be a tsunami killing many children and through God's grace something good comes of it. That is very Good. It brings meaning to all of the pain and suffering that the world must bear with much sorrow.

Are you suggesting that the good that came from the tsunami (some people being charitable and such) outweighs its evil? This is the old "second-order good" response to evil. It has classical problems we can rehearse if you stand by this tack.

All I have to do as an innocent bystander to this argument is say that your reductio ad adsurdum argument fails in case God is struggling with paradox avoidance. That's all I must do to show that your argument is faulty, and it is what I have done.

I hope you can see (as above) why I think you have not shown my argument fails. Please pick one of the contradictory positions you take above (is all evil necesssary, or not?), and then argue for the claim. From where I am standing, it is you who are not changing your belief in the face of good reason.

All I have to show to defeat your second premise is show that God's existence can eventually bring about unnecessary evil (over a finite duration), and I have done that by showing that God's will cannot prevent evil over a finite duration because of paradox.

You have not shown that God must allow evil like the tsunami in order to prevent paradox. You have merely claimed it. I need a reason to believe this. Myself I don't see what on earth the existence of a tsunami has to do with time paradoxes.

There can exist brute fact reasons as to why God cannot violate a principle of existence without bringing contradiction. It's just a matter of showing how one of those paradox examples can do that, which is pretty straightforward.

Okay, show it. Show how preventing the tsunami would have led to horrible paradoxes (and then argue how those paradoxes would be worse than the tsunami). So far you just claim it.

God was not in position to prevent the tsunami and maintain the integrity of laws of existence in a manner that would be morally right to other worlds or in a manner that would prevent an outright paradox directly by violating some more primitive requirement (i.e., the laws of existence).

Let's look at this paragraph in a little bit of detail, to see why I do not think it forms the response you hope it does. I hope this might be a worthwhile exercise for you to think more about wild, speculative claims before you post them.

1. why are you so sure that God couldn't have prevented the tsunami without violating "the laws of existence"? (Is it because you assume God is all-good and that therefore any evil that exists is necessary?)
2. what are the "laws of existence"?
3. what does it mean to be "morally right to other worlds"? This is a new phrase you introduce.
4. how would violating these laws not be "morally right to other worlds"?
5. why is not violating the laws of existence a "more primitive" requirement than not violating the laws of existence? (It seems to be exactly the same requirement.)

And so on... Frankly, you seem to write these paragraphs hoping that they will make sense and sound convincing. But I do not think that making up notions like "the laws of existence" and being "morally right to other worlds" is a responsible way to argue. (Do you hope your interlocutor will assume that these phrases make sense since they sound so grand?) If you really have a meaningful argument you wish to make here, please lay it out clearly, using plain English.

I don't have to argue that it was ultimately necessary, all I have to show is that if it was ultimately necessary, then your reductio ad adsurdum argument fails.

No, I happily grant that if my premise 2 is false then my argument is unsound. (A sound argument, by definition, has no false premises.) But of course just showing that "if one of your premises is false, your argument is no good" is not effective. I claim that both premises are true, and that therefore the conclusion is true. How do you respond?

That puts to bed your argument because your argument should be valid for every case we can introduce (of course, there may be other arguments that we cannot know--but that's why the reductio argument is so easy to refute--just come up with one example of where it fails).

Here it sounds like you don't quite understand what a reductio argument is. What would it mean for my argument to be "valid for every case"? It is simply valid--that is, it is impossible for the premises to be true and the conclusion false. Furthermore, I claim it is sound--that is, I claim the premises are true. The premises stand as reason for the conclusion. What reason do you give against them?


spetey

[The Happy Humanist]

And just how did I show my sinful nature lying in my crib? Or do you not accept that the stain of sin exists from birth? And if you don't fully understand it, then how do you (meaning Christians in general) expect us to accept it? If this is some kind of contract that I've been made a party to without my consent, informed or otherwise, I have the right to at least fully understand it. Otherwise, I am perfectly within my rights to reject it.

You're the one who brought it up, not me.

For that matter, I've brought up a lot of things you haven't. Still a valid question.

I have always focused on the sins you knowingly commit. There is not a great deal of teaching in the Bible about it, that's why I don't fully understand it. While I believe it, I'm much more concerned about willful sin.

I might be more inclined to believe in the concept of willful sin, if I could accept the concept of Original Sin. So far, I have not been given a good reason to believe in either one.

You can reject it. You can ask Christ to cleanse you from every sin

This would be like asking my mother to forgive me for stealing the cookies when I have no memory of doing such a thing in the first place.

I could lead an exemplary life, I could feed more hungry than Mother Teresa, I could resist all temptation to do evil.

You haven't and you couldn't. That's what you need to be concerned about.

Neither could Adam and Eve. That's what I'm concerned about. God creates imperfect beings, then punishes them for their imperfections. I call foul.

After all, if your beliefs take sway in our political system, but turn out to be wrong, you will have needlessly caused great harm to millions - homosexuals, abortionists, aborted babies, Terry Schiavo, and anyone else turned away from God by your influence and the influence of others like you.

Not quite the same. If my beliefs were to take hold, none of those people would be deprived of their chance at salvation. All would be allowed to worship as they choose (as long as they don't interfere with others' right not to worship). The lack of state-sponsored prayer in school, or allowing gay marriage, for example, would not affect your relationship with Christ one whit. Oh, did you think I wanted the government to become actively atheistic and officially outlaw religion or something?

Let's not talk slavery. Don't assume I will answer according to popular opinion, but it's not an issue I'm going to debate with you. Humanity has never come to perceive a moral truth God was blind to.

I won't push you on the slavery issue, I can understand where you might be reticent to discuss it, especially if your answers don't accord with popular opinion...but you can't decline the invitation and then claim victory anyway.

We do have consciences, very similar ones, and yet with deep divides over certain issues. It's not hard to see that there must be flaws in each of us, and I turn to the only one Who can set them right.

At least, you hope he can...after all, if your conscience is flawed, your perception of God as the Good Guy may be flawed as well...

The default position is not non-existence - God's existence can be observed in nature if you have the eyes to see it.

Unfortunately he appears to have withheld this special vision from certain of us.

No, He hasn't. The only thing keeping you from seeing is your own unwillingness.

...which, of course, you have determined by looking directly into my heart and my experience, like only God's supposed to be able to do, right? You have no clue how willing and open I am, or have been in the past.

[harvey1]

Hello Spetey,

If an all-good, all-powerful entity exists, there is no unnecessary evil. (premise)

I deny this premise in the exact way it is phrased. There is unnecessary evil over the shortterm (meaning a finite period) because it cannot be prevented without bringing the world into paradox or introducing even worse evil.

In other words, you are saying the "short term" evil is necessary for making this world as good as possible.

Let's get our terms right so there is no future confusion. How about:

• Deterministically necessary: should mean that something is evil as a matter of some deterministic feature that the laws of the Universe (e.g., logic) require.
• Divinely necessary: should mean that something is evil if God allows it to maintain a Greater Good (and we'll leave that open as to what that means).

Likewise,

• Deterministically unnecessary: should mean something is evil that the laws of the universe (including logic, etc.) do not apparently determine it to be so. For example, there are deterministically unnecessary evils that humans can apparently prevent (e.g., crime, war, etc.). Note: there is no deterministically unnecessary evil for God since for God evil is either deterministic or it is not, and God is not fooled by appearances as humans often are. (Btw, this is not to say that free will is deterministic in the sense that individuals lack the power of free choice.)
• Divinely unnecessary should mean that God can prevent the evil and still maintain a Greater Good. In my view, there is no divinely unnecessary evil.

All I have to show to defeat your second premise is show that God's existence can eventually bring about unnecessary evil (over a finite duration), and I have done that by showing that God's will cannot prevent evil over a finite duration because of paradox.

You have not shown that God must allow evil like the tsunami in order to prevent paradox. You have merely claimed it. I need a reason to believe this. Myself I don't see what on earth the existence of a tsunami has to do with time paradoxes.

To defeat your argument, I do not need to show that God must allow evil like the tsunami in order to prevent paradox. All I have to show is that if God must allow evil like the tsunami to somehow prevent paradox (or lessen evil elsewhere), then your argument is defeated. I have showed this by showing that preventing paradox is sufficient reason to allow divinely necessary evil. You have to show that paradox is not sufficient reason to allow divinely necessary evil, and you have wisely stayed away from that argument. But, by staying away from defending your position, you should give up your argument.

This is a standard theodicy: there are bad things in the world, but we need those bad things (because we can't appreciate the good without the bad, or because the bad leads to higher goods like forgiveness, or blah blah--if one of these versions tempts you, let me know). To say that we must have some evil in order to prevent worse evil is to say that original evil is necessary. If we could have neither, presumably God (being all-good) would prefer neither, right? Otherwise, why would God needlessly torture God's subjects? It doesn't seem like a good thing to do, agreed?

Your clause: "To say that we must have some evil in order to prevent worse evil is to say that original evil is necessary" should be reworded as, "To say that we must have some deterministically necessary evil in order to prevent worse deterministically necessary evil is to say the original deterministic evil is divinely necessary evil." If you reword your clause like that, then I agree. God allows original deterministic evil to avoid worse deterministically necessary evil.

So the point is supposed to be that even God, who can do everything possible, cannot make less (longrun) evil. See?

God, who can do everything possible, cannot make less (longrun) deterministically necessary evil.

There is a great deal of unnecessary evil, such as the evil that resulted from the recent tsunami. (premise)

I agree there is unnecessary evil in a finite period, but ultimately (i.e., from the perspective of all eternity) all evil is "necessary," meaning that it could not be prevented--not that it was caused by God's will, it was caused by God's existence. There's two different causal relationships.

Now this is kind of important. Sometimes you sound like you're saying God could have stopped the tsunami (for example), but only by allowing something much worse. Other times, like here, you seem to say that God couldn't have stopped that tsunami, even if it would have been for the better. That sounds, of course, like you're giving up on God's omnipotence. To give up on God's omnipotence is of course a consistent solution to the Problem of Evil, as I mentioned to MagusYanam here. It's unclear why you would worship a God not capable of simple acts that humans can perform (such as fixing faulty wires), but hey.

The tsunami falls under a category of divinely necessary evil, however as a divinely necessary evil it satisfies the minimum amount of evil needed to satisfy the deterministically necessary evil criterion that God must adhere (i.e., this criterion must be satisfied based on the whole Universe and not just our universe). It might be that the tsunami is actually a direct deterministically necessary evil, or it might also be the case that the tsunami is an indirect consequence of some deterministically necessary evil. In my conception, the tsunami is an indirect consequence of deterministically necessary evil, and therefore God has many options as to how the deterministically necessary evil is best met (i.e., as a criterion that is based on the whole Universe).

In this case, you would accept the conclusion of my argument. You would agree that there is no all-good, all-powerful entity, and argue that God could still exist because God is not such an entity.

No, I don't accept your conclusion. We differ what it means to be an all-good, all-powerful entity. All-good means fighting and overcoming evil with as much good as possible, or bringing about an all-good Universe despite evil. All-powerful means having the power to fight and overcome evil over the course of eternity, or having the power to bring about an all-good Universe--nothing can stop God. If you want to construe omnipotence as something that can control deterministically necessary evil, then I would disagree with your terminology.

The reductio ad adsurdum argument is faulty because there can exist a God that brings good to the world over a period of eternity, but over a finite period God must deal with evil in a manner that is prudent and respectful to the nature of existence which requires paradox avoidance schemes.

I argue that the presence of an all-good, all-powerful being is not consistent with the evil in the world. Here you say in effect that my argument is bad because an all-good, all-powerful God is consistent with the evil in the world. But this is not a reason, it's simply contradiction.

No. I have showed that avoiding paradox by trying to overcome deterministically necessary evils is sufficient reason to think your argument is not comprehensive enough to cover that situation. Since you are trying to show proof by contradiction, you have to show contradiction for every presentable case. I have presented a case that you have not been able to show a contradiction. Therefore, you should give a reason that God cannot co-exist with deterministic necessary evil. And, for more than the second time, please give your reason or give up your argument.

We don't live in the best of all possible worlds, we live in one of the possible worlds (I have no idea if it is best).

Now here you contradict your earlier claim, according to which (in the long run, of course) this is the best world there could be, and every scrap of evil is in order to prevent worse evil elsewhere. Here, by contrast, you say this is not the best possible world. In other words, you think this world could be a lot better--it is possible to have a better world (in the long run).

It would better for you to say, "you seem like you contradict yourself here...." Any hoot, I'm not contradicting myself. There is the World that contains all possible worlds, and there is our world that is a member of the World. The deterministically necessary evil affects the World, but over the longterm, our World is the "best world" in that there is not a shred more of evil that is not deterministically necessary. Of course, that's an absurd statement to say our World is the best world since it is the only World. There are no other Worlds than this World, so it "best" by definition.

That is, any being with all powers could make this world better (over the long run). So in other words, this world is worse than it has to be--there's unnecessary pain and suffering. Now: why would an all-good God subject us to such unnecessary pain and suffering, given that God is powerful enough to prevent it?

Any being with all powers could make this world better (over the long run), but this World is no worse than it has to be. There's deterministically unnecessary pain and suffering, but not from God's perspective. There could be divinely unnecessary pain and suffering, but God doesn't allow such to occur.

However, it is good that we live in a world where there can be a tsunami killing many children and through God's grace something good comes of it. That is very Good. It brings meaning to all of the pain and suffering that the world must bear with much sorrow.

Are you suggesting that the good that came from the tsunami (some people being charitable and such) outweighs its evil? This is the old "second-order good" response to evil. It has classical problems we can rehearse if you stand by this tack.

Not exactly. I'm saying the tsunami is a divinely necessary evil that is a consequence of deterministically necessary evil, and if doesn't happen here and now, it will happen somewhere else in the world (or World) as a much worse tragedy (which God would not allow since God seeks to minimize pain and suffering for the World as a whole). If God stops the deterministically necessary evil from exemplifying itself altogether in the World, then that brings a paradoxial result--forbidden by God to allow.

All I have to do as an innocent bystander to this argument is say that your reductio ad adsurdum argument fails in case God is struggling with paradox avoidance. That's all I must do to show that your argument is faulty, and it is what I have done.

I hope you can see (as above) why I think you have not shown my argument fails. Please pick one of the contradictory positions you take above (is all evil necesssary, or not?), and then argue for the claim. From where I am standing, it is you who are not changing your belief in the face of good reason.

I don't see how in the World you can say that. I have shown that paradox is sufficient reason for God to allow divinely necessary evil and still be all-good and all-powerful. On the other hand, you have not given a reason why your proof by contradiction is valid in light of God fighting off paradoxes. Please give your reasons! If you do not believe in giving reasons, then please state defense of "faith" here.

There can exist brute fact reasons as to why God cannot violate a principle of existence without bringing contradiction. It's just a matter of showing how one of those paradox examples can do that, which is pretty straightforward.

Okay, show it. Show how preventing the tsunami would have led to horrible paradoxes (and then argue how those paradoxes would be worse than the tsunami).

I'm going further than I have to go to defeat your argument, since I technically do not need to provide the facts of some unknown science in order to show that facts of some unknown science can reasonably exist. However, it is relatively an easy stipulation, so I don't mind a little side tour of this discussion...

As I said, there are many candidates for principles of existence that would require God to allow deterministically necessary evils. One of my favorites is an extension of the least action principle. For every action in the world, the action that nature follows is the one with least action. If God is deterministically required to keep the least action (let's say that the least action is a basis of causality and God must maintain causality), then in that case, least action would be a principle of existence.

As a principle of existence, God would have to judge whether preventing the tsunami was the least amount of action that divine will can take. If it were not (e.g., allowing the tsunami was least), then God would need to allow the tsunami, or violate a key principle of existence. God can still be all-good and all-powerful just as long as following the principle of least action allows God to "figh(t) and overcom(e) evil with as much good as possible, or brin(g) about an all-good Universe despite evil."

God was not in position to prevent the tsunami and maintain the integrity of laws of existence in a manner that would be morally right to other worlds or in a manner that would prevent an outright paradox directly by violating some more primitive requirement (i.e., the laws of existence).

[*] why are you so sure that God couldn't have prevented the tsunami without violating "the laws of existence"? (Is it because you assume God is all-good and that therefore any evil that exists is necessary?)

Spetey, you miss the central point of your argument. You are saying that an all-good, all-powerful God cannot exist. In making that strong claim, you are put before me two premises, both of them I object to. I don't have to be sure that God couldn't prevent the tsunami without violating any law, all I have to be sure of is that your argument fails if that is true. If you want to state that your argument fails under those circumstances, but such a view is not realistic of God. Then give reasons why you think this view of God is not reasonable.

[*] what are the "laws of existence"?

A law is a rule that must be met in order to maintain the integrity of some structure, and existence is a structure that encompasses the whole World along with any sub-law that can be derived from a law that establishes this structure.

[*] what does it mean to be "morally right to other worlds"? This is a new phrase you introduce.

First, I'll give an example. If in order to increase my income for myself, I go and steal money from someone down the block, then I am not being morally right to other people. Likewise, if God could reduce our pain and suffering while increasing the pain and suffering of others in a manner that is preferring us over them even though we are all equally sensitive to pain and suffering, then it is immoral to do so. Morality is to provide a sense of fairness, and it is often not fair to harm others so that a few can see a benefit.

[*] how would violating these laws not be "morally right to other worlds"?

Some principles of existence might give God more options as to how the criterion of deterministically necessary evil is dished out throughout the World. For example, the Maxwell-Boltzmann distribution law for molecules (i.e., statistical mechanics) states the conditions for an ensembly of molecules, however this law is stated in terms of mean values. It could very well be the case that if God restricts evil here, then a mean value criterion might require the evil that did not occur here to be made up elsewhere. Since many of the laws of physics are statistically-based (e.g., Maxwell-Boltzmann distribution), it cannot be ruled out that deterministic evil is a necessary distribution in the World. Most of the principles that I can think of that could be used to explain paradox can best be described as distributive type principles. Hence, God would need to share the pain to be morally responsible to the World as a whole.

God was not in position to prevent the tsunami and maintain the integrity of laws of existence in a manner that would be morally right to other worlds or in a manner that would prevent an outright paradox directly by violating some more primitive requirement (i.e., the laws of existence).

[*] why is not violating the laws of existence a "more primitive" requirement than not violating the laws of existence? (It seems to be exactly the same requirement.)

I'm not exactly sure what you are asking here, but what I mean by my comment is that a law of existence might directly exemplify itself in the world. For example, if Dr. Brown did invent a time machine and went back to 1955, such a situation could mean a direct violation of a law of existence if causality is such kind of law. That is, God may not allow a violation of causality, so God would not allow Dr. Brown to invent a time machine.

And so on... Frankly, you seem to write these paragraphs hoping that they will make sense and sound convincing. But I do not think that making up notions like "the laws of existence" and being "morally right to other worlds" is a responsible way to argue. (Do you hope your interlocutor will assume that these phrases make sense since they sound so grand?)

No, I write these sentences because if they say exactly what it is that I want to say. I cannot help that reality is not as simple as many people would like it to be. If you want to talk about basketball, then I promise that I'll never mention "laws of existence" or "morally right to other worlds" in those contexts. Is that what you want to discuss, the Pistons and Pacers in a playoff matchup?

If you really have a meaningful argument you wish to make here, please lay it out clearly, using plain English.

Wish I could do that for you, Spetey, but there are no such plain English phrases that I know of. If you have other terms you would like, be my guest to make suggestions.

I don't have to argue that it was ultimately necessary, all I have to show is that if it was ultimately necessary, then your reductio ad adsurdum argument fails.

No, I happily grant that if my premise 2 is false then my argument is unsound. (A sound argument, by definition, has no false premises.) But of course just showing that "if one of your premises is false, your argument is no good" is not effective. I claim that both premises are true, and that therefore the conclusion is true. How do you respond?

Both of your premises are wrong and need to be corrected in light of a God who is avoiding the paradox that may come about by tampering with deterministic evil. You need to address your argument against this possibility and if you cannot, then give reasons as to why an all-powerful, all-good God cannot exist if such a God is fighting off paradoxes.

That puts to bed your argument because your argument should be valid for every case we can introduce (of course, there may be other arguments that we cannot know--but that's why the reductio argument is so easy to refute--just come up with one example of where it fails).

Here it sounds like you don't quite understand what a reductio argument is. What would it mean for my argument to be "valid for every case"? It is simply valid--that is, it is impossible for the premises to be true and the conclusion false. Furthermore, I claim it is sound--that is, I claim the premises are true. The premises stand as reason for the conclusion. What reason do you give against them?

Your reductio argument must be valid for every possible situation where an all-good, all-powerful God is presented. For example, I assume you feel confident that your reductio argument works well for a God concerned about free will, right? So, why doesn't that argument work for a God concerned about paradox? The reason it doesn't work is because it is not valid for every case of an all-good, all-powerful God. Your premises are just wrong.

[The Happy Humanist]

I've been trying to follow this thread without having my brains spill out of my ears, and I think I see where the disconnect is. But first,

Both of your premises are wrong and need to be corrected in light of a God who is avoiding the paradox that may come about by tampering with deterministic evil. You need to address your argument against this possibility and if you cannot, then give reasons as to why an all-powerful, all-good God cannot exist if such a God is fighting off paradoxes.

Harvey, are you stating this "paradox reduction" scheme as an actual belief that is consistent with Christian theology, or are you merely proposing it as "one possibility" as to why God must allow evil, thereby thwarting spetey's Premise 2? If the latter, do you see the rather "ad hoc" nature of it? This is the problem when trying to apply logic to Absolute Entities and Numinous Realms. Anything can be conjured which might be seen as circumventing what would otherwise be airtight syllogisms. The ad hoc nature of it is further amplified by the fact that it introduces heretofore unrevealed "facts" about God which seem to have escaped the authors of the Bible. Suddenly, we learn that God is constrained by paradox. Yes, of course, it makes sense that he would be...which is how the Problem of Evil got its start in the first place, being, as it is, a paradox. Thus you are in the position of resolving one paradox (an omnibenevolent being who allows evil) by proposing another (an omnipotent being who is powerless to resolve paradoxes without allowing evil). Bit of a philosophical game of Twister, isn't it?

Not to speak for spetey, but I would submit that, among the reasons we find this untenable is that it is almost laughably unparsimonious, given the simplicity and elegance of the alternative explanation - "No God. Bad stuff happens because bad stuff happens."

Further, I re-submit my thesis above. A God who is incapable of permitting unnecessary evil, and who wishes to minimize paradoxes that might engender such evil, can kill two birds with one stone: He can choose not to create a universe in which either can occur. In fact, I submit that this would have been his only choice. The existence of the universe thus disproves the existence of the Christian God.