Problem Of Evil

Jesse Harris Prof. Haney PHI 2010 September 28, 2006 Word Count: 934

Critique of the Problem of Evil When I examined the logical problem of evil and its theodicies or attempted solutions to the problem, I found that the theodicies did not logically solve the problem of evil. The problem of evil is the problem of reconciling the existence of evil or suffering in the world with the existence of an omniscient, omnipotent, omnibenevolent God or Gods. The problem of evil is a deductive argument which means if the premises are true then the conclusion is also true. The premises of the problem of evil are as follows; 1) God is omnibenevolent and therefore God does everything in his power to prevent any evil. 2) God is omnipotent and omniscient and therefore would know of any evil and is able to prevent it. 3) Therefore God must prevent all evil. 4) There is evil in the world. 5) Therefore God does not exist. From this arises Epicurus’ questions; ‘Is he willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is impotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Whence then is evil?’ By definition God is neither impotent, malevolent or evil. Therefore the mere definition of God contradicts reality.

To me it seems obvious that the definition of God as omnibenevolent, omniscient and omnipotent is inconsistent with the fact that evil exists. If he was both all good and all powerful surely evil wouldn’t exist. The theodicies try to solve this logical problem by either saying evil doesn’t really exist or that evil exists but there also exists an alternate omni malevolent deity called the devil. This second so called solution may be easily dismissed since God could not be omnipotent if an opposite rival deity existed. I also don’t like this argument since it undermines human responsibility. The other theodicies say that evil doesn’t exist because suffering is not pointless or that those who suffer are not innocent. The last statement implies original sin; that we are already guilty before we are even born and therefore we deserve punishment. Not only is this ‘solution’ pure speculation but to me it seems ludicrous to say that one is guilty before committing a crime or that a baby that suffers or dies deserves God’s punishment. The remaining theodicies attempt to explain away evil by saying it’s not pointless. Like the other theodicies, they are also built on speculation and they all violate Occam’s Razor which is expressed in Latin as the lex parsimoniae (law of succinctness). Occam's razor states that the explanation of any phenomenon should make as few assumptions as possible, eliminating, or "shaving off," those that make no difference in the observable predictions of the explanatory hypothesis or theory. In short, when given two equally valid explanations for a phenomenon, one should embrace the less complicated formulation. The least complicated formulation is obviously evil exists but God doesn’t. The theodicies which argue that suffering is

not pointless speculate about God’s ‘Big Plan’, that evil is necessary for ‘character building’, that human ignorance is so great that we cannot know if evil exists, that we need evil in order to ‘contrast’ it with good, and finally that free will is a test to see if we will choose good. None of these really solve the problem of evil. If God is omnipotent and omniscient he would already know if we would choose good especially if he created us. To me, the ‘contrast’ argument sounds a lot like the ‘character building’ argument as well as the ‘test’ argument. These imply that there is a point to having evil so that we may choose good. However, often there is no choice involved when something evil happens, like the distruction caused by a natural disaster or when people die but there is no one else around to witness it. Some times good things come out of something evil but that doesn’t mean that the original event is no longer evil, just that the effects were not entirely evil. The argument that humans are to ignorant to understand evil and yet are able to understand God is equally preposterous. Both of these concepts may be understood by humans since we invented them. The definition of evil is pointless suffering of the innocent. This is easy to see when we observe the world around us. However, the existence of an entiy that is omnipotent, omniscient and omnibenevolent is not objectively observable and also logically violates Occam’s Razor. Not only that but, as shown, it is incompatible with the existence of evil which is observed. In The Problem of Evil written by David Hume, Cleanthes responds to the theodicies: ‘These arbitrary suppositions can never be admitted, contrary to matter of fact, visible and uncontroverted. Whence can any cause be known but from its known effects? Whence can any hypothesis be proved but from apparent

phenomena? To establish one hypothesis upon another, is building entirely in the air; and the utmost we ever attain, by these conjectures and fictions, is to ascertain the bare possibilities of our opinion; but never can we, upon such term, establish its reality.’ In conclusion, the theodicies and the concept of God as we define it are all speculation built ‘entirely in the air’. The concept of evil, on the other hand, is easily observed in the world around us. By definition, since evil and God cannot both exist, the logical problem of evil shows that only one of the concepts is objectively real; the one that is observable.