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Arguments of the existence of god
Essay on the arguments against the existence of god
Arguments of the existence of god
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The Problem of Evil The simultaneous presence of evil and God has been an ongoing debate for a long time. Evil is defined as being morally wrong and by definition, God is the supreme; he is morally perfect and has the power to control everything and everyone. He should then be able to prevent evil from existing or get rid of the evil that does exist, but this is not the case. The question that arises, is if there is a God and he is morally perfect, why does God allow for evil in the world if? The problem is that there is no straightforward answer to this question. Or as some philosophers argue, this is only a problem for those who believe in God and that God is morally perfect and omnipotent (J.L Mackie). To believe in God and say that …show more content…
Inwagen argues that along with being omnipotent and morally perfect, God also knows everything. This means that God not knowing about evil in the world is not a question. He is at least aware of some of the evil taking place: “But the argument from evil doesn’t require this strong assumption about God’s knowledge-it requires only that God know enough to be aware of a significant amount of the evil that exists in the world,” (p. 108). However, God takes no action to stop evil from occurring which goes against him being morally perfect. The one solution Inwagen believes can partially justify the existence of evil and God is the free-will defense. The free will defense is plausible if one considers the fact that the good outweighs the evil and that it is intrinsically impossible for God to control what choices humans make. On the other hand, it can be argued that free will defense is not plausible because it’s difficult to say that good outweighs all the evil present as there is no accurate way of measuring this. It is also important to keep in mind that not all evil is caused by human free will (non-moral evil) such as natural disasters. This leads to Inwagen’s main argument that the free will defense explains some evil such as moral evil: “The simplest form of the free-will defense can deal with at best the existence of some evil – as opposed to the vast amount of evil we actually observe – and the evil with which it can deal is only that evil that is caused by the acts of human beings,” (p.
“God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks to us in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: It is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world” (Lewis, 1994, p. 91). Throughout history man has had to struggle with the problem of evil. It is one of the greatest problems of the world. Unquestionably, there is no greater challenge to man’s faith then the existence of evil and a suffering world. The problem can be stated simply: If God is an all-knowing and all-loving God, how can He allow evil? If God is so good, how can He allow such bad things to happen?Why does He allow bad things to happen to good people? These are fundamental questions that many Christians and non-Christians set out to answer.
"Did God decide what goodness is? If so, then "good" is more or less the arbitrary decision of a frightening being to which we cannot relate, and that being could just as easily have made murder and stealing the ultimate moral actions without any contradictions. On the other hand, if God did not decide what goodness is, he cannot truly be omnipo...
In his essay, "The Magnitude, Duration, and Distribution of Evil: a Theodicy," Peter van Inwagen alleges a set of reasons that God may have for allowing evil to exist on earth. Inwagen proposes the following story – throughout which there is an implicit assumption that God is all-good (perfectly benevolent, omnipotent, and omniscient) and deserving of all our love. God created humans in his own likeness and fit for His love. In order to enable humans to return this love, He had to give them the ability to freely choose. That is, Inwagen holds that the ability to love implies free will. By giving humans free will, God was taking a risk. As Inwagen argues, not even an omnipotent being can ensure that "a creature who has a free choice between x and y choose x rather than y" (197)1. (X in Inwagen’s story is ‘to turn its love to God’ and y is ‘to turn its love away from God,’ towards itself or other things.) So it happened that humans did in fact rebel and turn away from God. The first instance of this turning away is referred to as "the Fall." The ruin of the Fall was inherited by all humans to follow and is the source of evil in the world. But God did not leave humans without hope. He has a plan "whose working will one day eventuate in the Atonement (at-one-ment) of His human creatures with Himself," or at least some of His human creatures (198). This plan somehow involves humans realizing the wretchedness of a world without God and turning to God for help.
Throughout the world, most people believe in some type of god or gods, and the majority of them understand God as all-good, all-knowing (omniscient), and all-powerful (omnipotent). However, there is a major objection to the latter belief: the “problem of evil” (P.O.E.) argument. According to this theory, God’s existence is unlikely, if not illogical, because a good, omniscient, and omnipotent being would not allow unnecessary suffering, of which there are enormous amounts.
The problem of evil is a deductive a priori argument who’s goal is to prove the non-existence of God. In addition to Mackie’s three main premises he also introduces some “quasi-logical” rules that give further evidence to his argument. First he presumes that a good thing will eliminate evil to the extent that it can and second, that omnipotence has no limits. From these two “additional premises,” it can be concluded that a completely good and omnipotent being will eliminate all possible evil. After establishing these added premises Mackie continues with his piece to list and negate several theistic responses to the argument.
Shirley Jackson’s short story “ The Possibility of Evil” is about a little old lady named Miss Strangeworth. She thinks she’s in charge of the town and to make sure it’s free from all evil because her grandfather built the first house on Pleasant Street. At first Miss Strangeworth is a nice little old lady, worrying about people and wondering what others are up to. Then in the middle of the story she becomes a little rude to a few of the townspeople. In the end Miss Strangeworth thought she was getting rid of the evil in the town, but in reality she was causing evil in the town by showing her true colors and being extremely mean and cruel to others. Don’t judge a book by it’s cover because people aren’t always what they seem to be.
There is evil. 3. So, God does not exist”. Since there is evil, then that means God does not exist. So there is no loving and powerful God. However, if there is a God then he is not all loving and powerful. Daniel Howard-Snyder states in his article “God, Evil, And Suffering,”: “We would have to say God lacks power and knowledge to such an extent that He can 't prevent evil. And there lies the trouble. For how could God have enough power and knowledge to create and sustain the physical universe if He can 't even prevent evil? How could He be the providential governor of the world if He is unable to do what even we frequently do, namely prevent evil?” (5). This statement argues that God is not all powerful because he is unable to prevent evil in the world. Daniel Howard-Snyder then argues that: “Would a perfectly good being always prevent evil as far as he can? Suppose he had a reason to permit evil, a reason that was compatible with his never doing wrong and his being perfect in love, what I 'll call a justifying reason. For example, suppose that if he prevented evil completely, then we would miss out on a greater good, a good whose goodness was so great that it far surpassed the badness of evil. In that case, he might not prevent evil as far as he can, for he would have a justifying reason to permit it” (5). Even if God had a reason to allow evil, he who is all loving and powerful would want the least amount of people to suffer and feel pain. Since God knows
My claim that we have evil in this world because of our libertarian freedom does not fully answer the notion of “the problem of evil”. Saying we have evil in this world is just like saying we have bad decisions in this world. Bad decisions just like evil do not have a form. Every decision that God makes is a good decision therefore God cannot do evil. Human beings initiated evil. In fact, the first human beings (Adam and Eve) gave ongoing birth to evil because everyone ultimately came from them. So everyone after Adam and Eve is inherently evil. This idea is evident in our lives because every human being has committed evil. The ultimate problem is not how an all-powerful God can exist while evil exist, the ultimate dilemma is how a holy God can accept human beings that are not holy. Stephen T. Davis in “Free Will and Evil” writes, “All the moral evil that exists in the world is due to the choices of free moral agents whom God created” (Davis). Davis argues that free will is the answer to the problem of evil. This is consistent with my view that evil exists because of our libertarian freedom. Unlike Hick, Davis is consistent with my answer for evil and he is also consistent with how evil is solved in regards to heaven and hell. Davis states, “I do believe hell exists, but I do not hold that it is a place where protesting people are led against their will to be tortured vengefully. I believe that the people who will end up separated from God freely choose hell and would be unhappy in God’s presence. Having lived their lives apart from God, they will choose eternally—to go on doing so. So it is not a bad thing that they do not spend eternity in the presence of God. People who will prove to be incorrigibly evil will never come to th...
This concept can be investigated further because now it seems that religious people have a violent God since he stands around while his people are suffering, and there are people who do violent things and are not punished for them by their God. From all of this, it is clear then that religion seems to be violent to a person standing on the outside. Anyone could connect the two points which is why it seems to be valid as an argument against religion. The problem is that Maher holds God accountable for the actions of his followers. God being all powerful can prevent people from doing bad things but then the issue of free will comes up. Often times, people find many things to complain about even when there is no problem. How likely would it be for people not to accuse God for not allowing everyone free will? Taking away free will would portray God as a controlling deity. There is no win-win situation. According to Becker, ideals are not always attainable and this could be seen as true through this lens. The comical thing is that Maher does not bring this issue up. He does not want to give off the impression that maybe God did rightly in allowing people to do bad things. It is comical because he himself does not allow people their free will when he constantly tells them how stupid they are for believing in God. This also presents itself as ironic because I’m sure he would be one
“…And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.” (Matthew 6:9-13) As it says in the Bible, we wish to be led astray from evil. However, evil is a very curious subject. For most intensive purposes, evil can be described as cruel, heinous, and unnecessary punishment. Evil is a relatively accepted concept in the world today, although it is not completely understood. Evil is supposedly all around us, and at all times. It is more often than not associated with a figure we deem Satan. Satan is said to be a fallen angel, at one point God’s favorite. Supposedly Satan tries to spite God by influencing our choices, and therefore our lives. However, this presents a problem: The Problem of Evil. This argues against the existence of God. Can God and evil coexist?
The Possibility of Evil Character Sketch –Miss Adela Strangeworth “The greatest deception men suffer is from their own opinion.” We all have opinions on things that are not an actual reflection of the reality. We have opinions that are different than what is real. Miss Adela Strangeworth is a 71-year-old woman with blue eyes and pretty little dimples. She lives in an ancestral house where her parents and grandparents lived.
Proponents of the argument believe the set of propositions is logically inconsistent, i.e. that at least one proposition must be false. This basic formulation is problematic. It presupposes two important things: First, that God and evil are logically incompatible; and second, that God's omnipotence is unlimited. It is obvious, then, that some additional premises are needed if the argument is to succeed. W.L. Mackie was one of the first philosophers to provide these additional premises.2 He adds the following premises to the set:
If there is truly a God and the maker of this universe did create human beings, then in this perfect world that this perfect God made, I do not just see God’s wholly good but also the bad and ugly. God must not be omnipotent, omniscient, and benevolent then and the definition of God is false and the existence of God
The Free Will Defense is an attempted solution to the problem of moral evil. Human beings are gifted with free will by God as a condition for genuine morality, trust, love, and the like, though it also makes possible the introduction of moral evil into the world. There are various questions that are asked with the question of God. Many ask questions like- why did God give humans the ability of free will knowing that they will abuse it? Is free will a condition for real humanhood? Could God have made us free and unable to sin? These questions that are frequently asked are left unanswered. People believe all different things.
The strongest argument against the existence of God is the existence of evil, and those who oppose His existence on the basis of evil fall into two categories: examining the logical problem of evil, or the evidential problem of evil. The logical problem of evil does not allow for both God and evil to exist simultaneously, and because it is clear we live in a world with much evil, it must be concluded that there is no God. The evidential problem of evil considers it unlikely that both God and evil could exist, citing the fact that evil does exist leads to the conclusion that God probably does not exist. Without any concrete proof, opponents of the logical problem of evil can dismiss it as an unsubstantiated assumption. Theists argue who