God, Evil, and Hiddenness Midterm; Intro, Probability, and Rowe

Intro to the Problem of Evil

What do many atheists base their criticisms on?

They base their atheism on criticisms of positive arguments. They think they provide no reason.

Intro to the Problem of Evil

“Argument from Evil”

Some atheists believe there are positive arguments against the existence of God.

• One of these is called “Argument from Evil”. Based on the problem of reconciling the pain, suffering, and ugliness we find in the world with the existence of a being that is all-knowing, all-powerful, and all-good. This argument says that we would not expect to find pain, suffering, and ugliness in a world that God created. The reason is because if God existed he would eliminate all bad. This is bc his goodness allegedly leads us to expect him to create and sustain only good things. Evil in world = reason to disbelieve in existence of God.

Intro to the Problem of Evil

The Problem of Mere Subotimality(MSO)

• Issue of whether reality is as good as it could be, and if not, whether this in itself is reason to reject theism.

• Some believe that God would only make the very best creation he could. Among these philosophers, the theists have disagreed with the atheists only over claims about whether the world really is as good as it could possibly be.

• Some philosophers have contended that God would not be forced to create the best of all possible worlds and perhaps would not even be able to.

Intro to the Problem of Evil

PE

PE is the issue of why God would make a world where suffering and other morally bad things occur.

• “The Problem of Evil” is aimed at PE.

• Atheists believe that they can show the existence of evil is reason to reject theism, while theists believe that they cane explain why God would allow such evil.

Intro to the Problem of Evil

Aesthetic Issues

• Issues having to do with beauty rather than moral, rightness, or goodness. They are undoubtedly closely related to moral ones, but not exactly the same.

• Aesthetic parallels to the moral concerns above - is reality as beautiful as it could be?

• Issues raised abt balancing aesthetic considerations with moral ones.

  • It may be that, to make the world more beautiful, God would need to take away from the moral goodness of that world.

Intro to the Problem of Evil

Deductive Arguments from Evil

Also called arguments from the logical problem of evil.

Aim to show that the presence of evil in the world is inconsistent with the existence of an all-good, all-knowing, all-powerful being.

• It shows that this type of being would eliminate evil from the world, and so the presence of evil in the world provides proof that this being doesn’t exist.

• Basic structure for this argument:

  (1) If an all good, all knowing, and all powerful being existed, then there wouldn’t be evil in the world.

  (2) There is evil in the world.

  (3) So by modus tollens: An all good, all knowing, and all powerful being does not exist.

• Argument not popular among atheists bc too easy to defeat. All critic must do is find possible way the world could be set up that is consistent with the evil we observe and where God exists.

Intro to the Problem of Evil

Evidential arguments

• Have become more popular.

• Inductive or adductive in character.

• Aims to show that the hypothesis that God exists is not very likely given the evidence that evil provides us with.

• Much harder to counter bc one cannot merely dream up farfetched scenarios where evil and God coexist. One must instead show that scenarios where evil and God coexist are plausible, not merely possible.

Intro to the Problem of Evil

Theodicy

Attempts to outline ways that the evil we find could coexist with God.

Intro to the Problem of Evil

Strategy of denying attributes of God

• Denying that God isn’t all-good would imply that God knowns about evil and has power to stop it but doesn’t want to.

• Denying that God is all-powerful implies that God knows about evil and wants to stop it, but lacks the power.

• Denying that God is all-knowing implies that God has the power to stop evil and wants to stop it, but is ignorant to it.

• Not popular responses because not so much responses as they are admissions that those arguments are decisive. Don’t represent a further discussion of arguments from evil themselves.

• Another reason why denying attributes is unpopular is that it involves giving up “traditional tri-theisim”. Giving up the central question - changes who God is.

• Used to explain why God isn’t taking away evil. It also doesn’t make sense because a historical interest comes from people with traditional religious commitments - changing the subject of God doesn’t follow this.

Theodicy Strategies

Free Will Defense

“Free Will Defense”: Very valuable thing for creatures to have the power of meaningful free choice. Allowing for free choice requires the creator to give up a certain amount of control over creation and give up control over whether creatures suffer or not. He is going to have to allow for the possibility that some will kill other creatures and cause suffering. To rob them of this opportunity would rob the world of something good.

• God gave humans the ability to do good and bad things. It contributes value to the world in some way, makes the world better. This also allows humans to mess up the world.

• Issue with this defense: can’t explain everything of all pain and suffering in world because of natural evils.

Theodicy Strategies

Knowledge Theodicy

Human free will is very important. In order to use it in right way, humans need to know what consequences will be. Naturally produced pain and suffering gives humans knowledge of consequences from their actions.

Theodicy Strategies

Natural Stability Defense

The things that cause all harm in world; if you were to get rid of them it would actually be worse for world. If you got rid of bacteria, fire, oceans, it would be worse for world.

Theodicy Strategies

Higher Order Goods Theodicy

Pain and suffering is required to allow opportunity for various good things to occur in world that would be impossible without. - to act heroically for example. Variable enough for God to allow pain and suffering.

Theodicy Strategies

Soulmaking

Through pain and suffering we have chance to develop our characters.

Theodicy Strategies

Neo-Cartesian Theodicy

Animals don’t feel pain or it’s so different from human pain that it doesn’t weigh the same.

Skeptical Theism

If God is out there, he is all powerful, all knowing, all good. He is beyond our capability to comprehend. God is so beyond us that we should not expect to understand why God does what God does.

Intro to the Problem of Evil

Moral Evils

As evils that creatures freely inflict on one another.

FWD addressed moral evils, not natural evils.

Intro to the Problem of Evil

Natural Evils

As evils that the environment inflicts on creatures, seemingly without their ability to influence the suffering and destruction caused.

Intro to the Problem of Evil

The Soul-Making Theodicy

Sees natural evil as an indispensable influence on development of human character.

• God could artificially make people with virtuous dispositions and saintly desires, but it is much better if they freely grow toward those characteristics in response to the travails of life.

Intro to the Problem of Evil

Two-Pronged Theodicy

Says that natural evils are required if we are to learn and that our choices have consequences.

Probability

Conditional Probability

P(A & B)/ P(B) = P(A/B)

Probability

Independence

For any two propositions A and B, A and B are independent if and only if P(A/B) = P(A) and P(B/A) = P(B)

• Two propositions are independent of one another when the truth of one has no probabilistic impact on the truth of the other.

Probability

Logical Equivalence

For any two propositions A and B, if (1) when A is true, B is true, and also A is true, then A and B are logically equivalent.

Probability

1. For all propositions q, if q is a tautology, then p(q) = 1.

2. For all propositions q, if q is a contradiction, then p(q) = 0.

3. If two propositions p and q are logically equivalent, then p(p) = p(q).

4. For all propositions p and q, if p(p and q) = 0, then p(p or q) = p(p) + p(q). (special disjunction rule)

   • This states that for any two propositions that can’t be true together, the way to find out probability that either is true is to add up the probabilities that each individually is true.

Probability

P(E)

= probability that one will get evidence one actually observes before one observes it.

Good way to think of p(E) is as a weighted average of p(E/H) and P(E/squiggly line H).

Probability

p(H)

= probability of hypothesis in question, before one gets the evidence being examined.

Probability

p(E/H)

= prob of evidence in question, given that the hypothesis in question is true.

Probability

Propositions

The meaning behind the words.

Probability

Axiom

Red and club example

Starting point; base claims - there are 4

• If q is certain, then p(q) = 1

  • If something is certain, probability = 1 or 100%.

• If q is known with certainty to be false, then p(q) = 0.

• If p and q are logically equivalent, then p(p) = p(q)

• Special Disjunction Rule: If p(p and q) = 0, then p(p v(or) q) = p(p) + p(q)

  • Ex: Deck of cards; P(red v club) = p(red) + p(club) = .5 + .25 = .75

Probability

General Disjunction Rule

Jack and diamond example

P(x v y) = p(x) + p(y) - p(x + y)

• Ex: Deck of cards: p(jack v diamond) = p(jack) + p(diamond) - p(jack + diamond) = 4/52 + 13/52 - 1/52 = 16/52 = 14/13

Probability

General Conjunction

Heart and red example

Even and larger than average rolling a die example

P(x + y) = p(x) x p(y/x)

• P(a/b) = P(a + b)/P(b)

  • Ex: P(heart/red) = p(heart + red)/p(red) = .25/.5 = .5

• Ex: rolling a die; P(even + larger than average #) = P(even) x P(larger than average # + even) = ½ x 2/3 = 2/6 = 1/3

Probability

Special Conjunction

Flyers and Sixers playing, both have 50% chance of winning example

If x + y are independent, this applies. Independent means the outcome of one doesn’t affect the other.

P(x + y) = p(x) x p(y)

• Ex: Flyers and Sixers playing, both have 50% chance of winning; P(Flyers and Sixers) = .5 x .5 = .25

Probability

Bayes’s Theorom

P(H) x P(E/H)/P(E)

P(E/H) x P(H) + P(E/ ^ H) x P(^ H)

P(H) reads prior probability of H, etc.

• Probability of hypothesis I’m considering given the evidence.

Rowe

Questions of article

• Is there a good argument for atheism from evil?

• How can the theists best defend?

• What should the atheists attitude be about the rationality of belief in God?

Rowe

Theist vs athesit

Theist: Someone who believes in existence of an omnipotent, omniscient, eternal, supremely good being who created world.

Atheist: Deny any existence of divine being or divine reality.

Rowe

Narrow theism vs broad theism

Narrow: all- powerful, all knowing, perfectly good God.

Broad: some supernatural being; doesn’t have to have all these characteristics.

• His argument is strictly about narrow theism; about a full blown God.

Rowe

Human and animal suffering

Intense human or animal suffering is an evil even if it sometimes is justified and leads to some good that would be unobtainable without it.

Taking human and animal suffering as clear instance of evil gives an argument for atheism.

Rowe

Human and animal argument for atheism

(1) There exists instances of intense suffering which an omnipotent, omniscient being could have prevented without losing some greater good or permitting evil equally bad or worse.

(2) This being would prevent occurrence of any intense suffering it could, unless it couldn’t without losing some greater good or permitting evil equally bad or worse.

(3) There doesn’t exist an omnipotent, omniscient, wholly good being.

Rowe

Probability with complication

Really complicated = lower probability

Really simple = higher probability

Rowe

His Pro-Atheist Argument

Evidential

Atheism here as denial of full blown God.

Says let’s imagine that God exists. He says if he did, he would go through mental checklist of evils. He wouldn’t want to allow evils.

• Requirement for God to allow an evil ; either

  (1) There is some greater good that can be obtained by God only by allowing this evil.

OR
(2) There is some greater good or an equally bad or worse evil that can be obtained by God only by allowing this evil.

OR

(3) Only preventable by God by allowing equally bad or worse evil.

• God has to have a good reason to allow evil - Ex: fawn in the forest fire.

Rowe

Fawn in the forest fire example

Lightning strikes and there is a fire. Fawn gets trapped. Fawn slowly burns to death in forest fire.

Goes through checklist - if God existed he would use it.

(1) No greater good.

(2) No greater good.

(3) Not satisfied either.

• The fact that these things happen in world is strong probability that God doesn’t exist.

P(E/theism) < 1 P(E/atheism)

Rowe

Theistic Personalities vs. Classical thesists

Theistic Personalities: Think of God as a great big ghost/spirit. Exists like everything else except its very impressive

Classical Theists: Think of God as foundation of being/existence. God is simple; has no parts, just is - has no literal characteristics.

Rowe

What attitude should the atheists have toward the rationality of belief in God? - Different forms of atheism

Unfriendly atheism: Natural form of atheism; Atheism and no theist is rational in believing in God.

Indifferent atheism

Friendly atheism: Rowe’s position; atheism and some theists are rational in believing in God.

• Gives example of how you can believe in one thing but think it’s rational for someone else to believe something.

• Ex:Flight crashes, you survive and waiting to be rescued; news reporting that no survivors have been found; your friends only know what they have been hearing and conclude that you died, a rational conclusion. Not rational for you to believe that because you have better evidence to believe you are still alive - so you draw a different conclusion.

  • You think your evidence base is better than theirs, but that their evidence base leads them to their conclusion; that’s how you can be a friendly atheist.

• Rowe thinks theists are naive, they haven’t experienced the horrible things in world or haven’t had terrible experiences to make them atheists.

Rowe

The Problem of Evil - God itself

All powerful - omnipotent

All knowing - omniscient

Perfectly good

Why would there be evil in the world if God has power to change it, God knows about them, and God wouldn’t want them because he is good? - argument/problem

Rowe

The Problem of Evil - MSO: Mere Suboptimality

Why do things fail to top off the goodness scales?

• Ex: If there is one planet with life that is happy, why wouldn’t God make other planets with life forms living happily?

Rowe

The Problem of Evil - PE: Positive Evil

Things that are actually contributing to suffering.

Rowe

The Problem of Evil - Different ways the world can be bad

Moral Badness

• Contribute harm in intangible ways to the world.

• Pain and suffering is the most obvious example.

Aesthetic Badness

• Have to do with beauty and ugliness.

• Ex: Why are people deformed with illness? Ugly places on earth - landfills. Why does God allow ugly things in the world?

Rowe

Logical Problem of Evil

Also known as the deductive problem of evil.

Raising question of capabilities of God with existence of evil,

(1) If God existed, then there would be no evil in the world.

(2) But there is evil in the world.

(3) Therefore, God does not exist.

Rowe

Evidential Problem of Evil

Existence of evil doesn’t fit in if God existed.

Not trying to prove God doesn’t exist, trying to show that evil in world shows that likelihood of God existing makes probability very low.

Theodicy

Attempt to explain why God would allow pain, evil, and suffering in world - to give account of God’s actions.