Could God do better?

[Paul of Tarsus]

The philosopher Gottfried Leibniz argued that this is "the best of all possible worlds" to free God from blame for the world's troubles. In other words, this world, warts and all, is the best God could have done. I'm left wondering, though, why this world is the best possible. It seems likely to me that the world would be better off without cancer, for example, and therefore it's really not the best possible world. Wouldn't the world actually be better without cancer, and if it would be better without cancer, then why is God failing to do the best he presumably could do? If the world is the best possible world, then how does the presence of cancer make it better than a world without cancer?

[Aetixintro]

[Replying to Paul of Tarsus in post #10]

I'm not sure God has the power to create the total World without evil, without the Devil! That's the issue. You forget to attribute the evil to the Devil.

God is all-good and God has created humanity for the aim of goodness. The question is: do we perform the best of all possible sentient Worlds? Are we less evil or marked by evil compared to all possible Worlds of intelligent life? I don't know. This World holds a lot of evil, that's clear! However, I do not hold God accountable for any evil! Remember that those who do evil must pay the price for it!

All the best!

[JehovahsWitness]

I'd rather trust somebody who is currently demonstrating goodness by disallowing cancer to harm people.

I'm rather trust someone who does what is for the long term good for everyone concerned. If doing something in the immediate caused more harm than good, I'd rather someone that did what is right, just and beneficial in the long term.

There, we just voiced personal preferences, that was fun!

If God can't handle that now, then it seems foolish to believe that he'll ever do it.

That's one way to speculate.

[JoeyKnothead]

From Post 11

I'm not sure God has the power to create the total World without evil, without the Devil! That's the issue. You forget to attribute the evil to the Devil.

So, God created the devil, who created evil?

That's gotta be an accessory to the crime charge right there.

God is all-good and God has created humanity for the aim of goodness.

I challenge you to show you speak truth in this matter.

I've also challenged such here.

The question is: do we perform the best of all possible sentient Worlds? Are we less evil or marked by evil compared to all possible Worlds of intelligent life? I don't know. This World holds a lot of evil, that's clear! However, I do not hold God accountable for any evil! Remember that those who do evil must pay the price for it!

As commonly understood, 'evil' is a thought or action that God gets upset about.

If this is your definition, I challenge to show you speak truth on this.

[Paul of Tarsus]

A decent answer is that this world is a testing ground and it needs horrible things in order to test people properly.

A testing ground for what? Eventual nonexistence. How much practice does one need for that?

Yes, you qualify. You've achieved what all living beings eventually achieve. Nothingness. Here's your brass ring.

While I agree that an afterlife is improbable, I don't think I can go so far as to say I know there is no life after death. That said, some scientists like Sean Carroll claim that if what we know about science is correct, then life after death is impossible. Even if there is a life after death, it doesn't make sense that an all-knowing God would need to test us to see what kind of eternal fate we deserve. He would already know where we will end up, and in that case, it seems odd that he would create people he knows will end up in hell.

[1213]

... Wouldn't the world actually be better without cancer, and if it would be better without cancer, then why is God failing to do the best he presumably could do?...

I believe the world is like this, because people wanted it so, they wanted to reject God and learn to know evil. I think this world is very good for learning to know what evil means.

[Paul of Tarsus]

[Replying to JehovahsWitness in post #13]

Here's a partial outline of basic Christian/Jehovah's Witness theology:

1. God created the world.
2. God cannot do evil or create anything that is bad.
3. We know God created life because living cells are astoundingly complex and when formed do amazing things. Evolution as a theory of life is simply inadequate to explain the cell's structure and function.

To accept these theological points fully and to apply them consistently, we must conclude that the world we live in is the best possible because a perfectly good God created it. The perfect goodness of God's creation includes cancer. To cure cancer would make the world a worse place. Although it may be difficult to see the benefits and goodness of cancer, we must accept cancer as a good thing to maintain belief in God. Only he can explain the astounding complexity of cancer cells and their amazing ability to cause pain, sickness, and death.

[tam]

Peace to you,

The philosopher Gottfried Leibniz argued that this is "the best of all possible worlds" to free God from blame for the world's troubles. In other words, this world, warts and all, is the best God could have done. I'm left wondering, though, why this world is the best possible. It seems likely to me that the world would be better off without cancer, for example, and therefore it's really not the best possible world. Wouldn't the world actually be better without cancer, and if it would be better without cancer, then why is God failing to do the best he presumably could do? If the world is the best possible world, then how does the presence of cancer make it better than a world without cancer?

This is not the "best" of all possible worlds (if by "best" you mean a world without cancer, and be extension, any other ailment that causes suffering and death). I would suggest to you and others that this world could be much worse without God interfering and preventing certain things from becoming worse (or from happening before their proper time). Regardless, this is the world with conditions that man has made for himself. God certainly did not force man to pollute the air, the protective layer around the earth, the oceans, the land, the food, etc.

The world without cancer or any other ailment that causes suffering or death (because death causes suffering as well) is the world promised to come. Such as is described below:

“Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man, and He will dwell with them. They will be His people, and God Himself will be with them as their God. 4‘ He will wipe away every tear from their eyes,’ and there will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the former things have passed away.” 5And the One seated on the throne said, “Behold, I make all things new.” Rev 21:4


That would be a 'new earth'. Not that this world is destroyed, but rather that this one is healed (both the planet and the life on the planet). Mankind, too, would have to be changed; healed (the leaves of the Tree of Life are for the healing of the nations).

That is the promise.


Peace again to you,
your servant and a slave of Christ,
tammy

[Athetotheist]

The philosopher Gottfried Leibniz argued that this is "the best of all possible worlds" to free God from blame for the world's troubles. In other words, this world, warts and all, is the best God could have done. I'm left wondering, though, why this world is the best possible.

A decent answer is that this world is a testing ground and it needs horrible things in order to test people properly. Cancer is horrible because we make it horrible. We fight and we struggle and we do anything and everything to preserve our lives, even kill ourselves to death with heavy metals and radiation. If we're really not dead and disappeared upon death, we just brought all that on ourselves for probably little or no reason.

Then your answers to the questions I posted in the OP is that yes, the world would be better without cancer, and therefore God could have created a better, cancer-free world. God has failed to make the world better because we humans, part of what he created, messed it all up. God's plan went awry because we fouled up his plan--which to me is a strange consequence considering that God is perfect and all-mighty.

I see some other obvious problems with this viewpoint of yours. I don't see how we puny little people could cause trouble for God. And as far as cancer is concerned, many of us do indeed act in ways that can cause us to get cancer, but many cancer victims did nothing at all to bring on the disease. Regardless of our habits, though, none of us created cancer. If God created the world, then he created cancer.

My response is that God cannot create a world better than this one because he is limited, or he didn't make human welfare his top priority. As Woody Allen quipped:

If it turns out that there is a God...the worst that you can say about him is that basically he's an underachiever.

I was literally just about to use that Woody Allen quote here.

So I'll just post the other thing I was going to contribute:

[JehovahsWitness]

[Replying to JehovahsWitness in post #13]

Here's a partial outline of basic Christian/Jehovah's Witness theology:

... the world we live in is the best possible because a perfectly good God created it.

Do you really think you know enough about Jehovah's Witness theology to present it back to one of Jehovah's Witness without being corrected?

In the Bible the word “world” (Greek, koʹsmos) often designates unrighteous human society, which “is lying in the power of the wicked one.” (1 John 5:19) - The Watchtower Novembre, 1st 1997 p.8

EPHESIANS 6:12 - Holman Christian Standard Bible

For our battle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the world powers of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavens.

To learn more please go to other posts related to...

SATAN , THE WORLD and ...HUMAN SUFFERING

[JehovahsWitness]

[Replying to JehovahsWitness in post #13]

Here's a partial outline of basic Christian/Jehovah's Witness theology:


The perfect goodness of God's creation includes cancer. To cure cancer would make the world a worse place. Although it may be difficult to see the benefits and goodness of cancer, we must accept cancer as a good thing to maintain belief in God. Only he can explain the astounding complexity of cancer cells and their amazing ability to cause pain, sickness, and death.

This in no way represents Jehovah's Witness theology. As one of Jehovahs Witnesses I am obviously more qualified to tell you what we believe than you are and I hereby challenge you to find anything in our literature or on our official Website (which outlines our official beliefs) to prove your post above true. You are, le course, free to imagine anything you like (I cannot debate your imagination) but on a debate forum you will be challenged to back up your CLAIMS with proof.

If, on the otherhand you are simply presenting what you believe to be true about JWs theology, that's fine - as I'm sure you know that simply believing something to be true doesn't make it so.




JEHOVAH'S WITNESS