James Sterba uses the Pauline Principle to argue that the occurrence of significant, horrendous evils is logically incompatible with the existence of a good God. The Pauline Principle states that (as a rule) one must never do evil so that good may come from it, and according to Sterba, this principle implies that God may not permit significant evils even if that permission would be necessary to secure other, greater goods. By contrast, I argue that the occurrence of significant (...) evils is logically compatible with the existence of a good God because victims of significant evils may themselves reasonably consent to their suffering. In particular, I argue that they may be able to accept their suffering if it turns out that there was no way for God to secure relevant greater goods (or prevent other, greater evils) except by way of allowing their suffering, and God also provides them with other compensating, heavenly comforts. After using this consent-based argument to address Sterba’s logical problem from evil, I briefly consider how this argument may also help address a related evidential problem from evil, which suggests that while it is possible that victims of significant evils would consent to their suffering, it is unlikely that they would do so. While I do not provide a definitive solution to this evidential problem of evil, I highlight one important example of a trade-off that God may need to make that would—along with the provision of compensating, heavenly comforts—potentially persuade victims of significant evils to consent to their suffering. Specifically, I argue that there may be a necessary trade-off that God needs to make between permitting significant evils (on the one hand) and protecting a certain, morally significant form of free will (on the other hand). (shrink)

The Problem of Evil: New Philosophical Directions brings together a diversity of philosophical views, methods, and approaches to the much-discussed topic of evil and its bearing on religious belief. Through both general and specific examinations of the problem of evil, this book proposes new directions for philosophical thought.

The Problem of Evil, the idea that inexplicable human and non-human suffering is inconsistent with the existence of a benevolent, omniscient and omnipotent God, stands as one of the greatest challenges to classical theism. Many philosophers and theologians have offered theodicies, defense of God, in an attempt to blunt the force this problem. Others, however, believing that those theodicies have been effective have abandoned the classical definition of God and have embraced more liberal theologies, including deism, pantheism, (...) process theology, and alterity theism. Theists of this sort argue that their theologies are immune from the POE. This is so because the POE derives its force from the supposed attributes of God. If God is not omnipotent, omniscient, and omnibenevolent, the problem disappears. So rather than seek to resolve the POE, theists who hold one or the other of these non-classical positions seek to walk around it altogether. The problem simply dissolves, it is claimed, when these alternative theologies are embraced. This article critiques the most prominent liberal responses to the POE and demonstrates how they fail. (shrink)

The problem of evil and theodicy is one of the most important subjects in the field of Philosophy of Religion. The problem of evil is basically understood as the problem of incompatibility of the existence of God with evil. While the problem of evil is used to justify atheistic claims, theodicy has been developed to strengthen theistic claims. Mawlânâ D̲j̲alāl al-Dīn Rūmī (1207-1273), who is the important sufi thinker of Turkish-Islamic culture, is (...) generally known for his mystical and literary works. Although Mawlânâ 's philosophical views have not been studied sufficiently, it is seen that he presents his important ideas in the philosophical field, especially in the philosophy of religion, in a non-systematic and hidden way in his works. In this study, the problem of evil has been studied in the case of Mawlânâ, within the scope of the evil’s types and the problem of evil’s types in the literature. In addition, it has been examined whether Mawlânâ discussed the evil as a philosophical problem and contributed to the solution of the problem of evil. Then, one of the theodicy used by Mawlânâ, which is related to contrasts, has been called the theodicy of contrasts and has been explained and systematized. It is known that theodicy related to theme of contrast was developed before Mawlânâ. As a result, Although it cannot be said that Mevlânâ made an original contribution to the problem of evil with his theodicy of contrasts in terms of content, it can be said that he approached originally to this problem in terms of his metaphorical manner and expression style. (shrink)

In its original form, Nozick’s experience machine serves as a potent counterexample to a simplistic form of hedonism. The pleasurable life offered by the experience machine, its seems safe to say, lacks the requisite depth that many of us find necessary to lead a genuinely worthwhile life. Among other things, the experience machine offers no opportunities to establish meaningful relationships, or to engage in long-term artistic, intellectual, or political projects that survive one’s death. This intuitive objection finds some support in (...) recent research regarding the psychological effects of phenomena such as video games or social media use. After a brief discussion of these problems, I will consider a variation of the experience machine in which many of these deficits are remedied. In particular, I’ll explore the consequences of a creating a virtual world populated with strongly intelligent AIs with whom users could interact, and that could be engineered to survive the user’s death. The presence of these agents would allow for the cultivation of morally significant relationships, and the world’s long-term persistence would help ground possibilities for a meaningful, purposeful life in a way that Nozick’s original experience machine could not. While the creation of such a world is obviously beyond the scope of current technology, it represents a natural extension of the existing virtual worlds provided by current video games, and it provides a plausible “ideal case” toward which future virtual worlds will move. While this improved experience machine would seem to represent progress over Nozick’s original, I will argue that it raises a number of new problems stemming from the fact that that the world was created to provide a maximally satisfying and meaningful life for the intended user. This, in turn, raises problems analogous in some ways to the problem(s) of evil faced by theists. In particular, I will suggest that it is precisely those features that would make a world most attractive to potential users—the fact that the AIs are genuinely moral agents whose well-being the user can significantly impact—that render its creation morally problematic, since they require that the AIs inhabiting the world be subject to unnecessary suffering. I will survey the main lines of response to the traditional problem of evil, and will argue that they are irrelevant to this modified case. I will close by considering by consider what constraints on the future creation of virtual worlds, if any, might serve to allay the concerns identified in the previous discussion. I will argue that, insofar as the creation of such worlds would allow us to meet morally valuable purposes that could not be easily met otherwise, we would be unwise to prohibit it altogether. However, if our processes of creation are to be justified, they must take account of the interests of the moral agents that would come to exist as the result of our world creation. (shrink)

The formulations of the argument for atheism from evil are quite formal in nature. One “solution” to the problem of evil would be to deny that evil exists. But Clive Staples Lewis, a philosopher, would have none of this. He believed that pain is intrinsically evil, and it is its evilness that ultimately gives rise to the problem of evil. Lewis' thoughts about pain and God's reason is the subject of this chapter. The (...) chapter also discusses Lewis's treatment of the problem of evil. Lewis held that the justification for allowing human beings to experience pain is ultimately connected to the good of perfect happiness, where the enjoyment of it can be had only if persons have the freedom to choose how they will become happy, to choose to die or not to die to self. Thus, Lewis articulated his theodicy in terms of the actual individual and his or her happiness. (shrink)

The Holocaust is one of the most intractable and challenging tragedies of moral evil to understand, assuming the existence of an omnipotent, omniscient and all-loving God, and it has important implications for all theists. This paper critically examines the problem of evil in the philosophical theologies of two prominent Jewish philosophers: Emil Fackenheim and Richard Rubenstein. The article defends their view that the six million deaths are existentially meaningless because no justifiable reason exists why God permitted this. (...) Thus, a Jewish theodicy is not possible for them. Fackenheim attempts to salvage traditional Judaism, and urges Jews not to lose their faith, lest Hitler be given a posthumous victory. Rubenstein rejects Fackenheim’s position and encourages Jews to accept the death of God and his mystical radical theology, and still continue traditional religious practices. I question both these responses, and hold that it is more plausible that God is not perfectly loving. (shrink)

Here I consider the two most venerated arguments about the existence of God: the Ontological Argument and the Argument from Evil. The Ontological Argument purports to show that God’s nature guarantees that God exists. The Argument from Evil purports to show that God’s nature, combined with some plausible facts about the way the world is, guarantees (or is very compelling grounds for thinking) that God does not exist. Obviously, both arguments cannot be sound. But I argue here that (...) they are both unsound for the very same reason. (shrink)

The problem of evil is very old in philosophy (if God is omnipotent and benevolent, why does he allow evil in the world?), but it has not been sufficiently discussed in the context of sports. This article discusses how athletes and fans in sports relate to it. In sports, there are moral evils, such as cheating, trash talking and unjust retaliation. Theists have traditionally appealed to free will as a way to respond to the challenge of moral (...) evil, but this appeal is not without problems. In sports, there are also natural evils, such as injuries and the unfair distribution of natural talents. Theists also have traditional ways of responding to that, but again, it is not clear that these answers are fully satisfactory. (shrink)

The problem of evil is the problem of reconciling the existence of a perfect God with the existence of horrible things in the world. Many take this problem as a convincing reason to be an atheist. But others think that the problem can be solved. One prominent solution is called ‘sceptical theism’. A sceptical theist is someone who believes in God but thinks that the problem of evil is not a real problem (...) since humans are unable to see whether the horrible things in our world are truly pointless or else serve some greater purpose. (shrink)

I argue that the creation and freely chosen salvation and everlasting bliss of even just one person is a greater good than any finite amount of evil and suffering. Since it is extremely likely (if not certain) that, out of all possible individuals that could exist, some (or at least one) would only be freely saved through the contemplation and experience of evil and suffering, then God would be justified in creating a world with evil and suffering (...) to allow for the salvation of such individuals, so long as no one else freely lost their salvation who otherwise would not have lost it because of the evil and suffering. Thus, the problem of evil dissipates, as a world with evil and suffering, even seemingly gratuitous evil and suffering, would be entirely expected given theism. (shrink)

One paradigmatic argument from evil against theism claims that, (1) if God exists, then there is no gratuitous evil. But (2) there is gratuitous evil, so (3) God does not exist. I consider three deontological strategies for resisting this argument. Each strategy restructures existing theodicies which deny (2) so that they instead deny (1). The first two strategies are problematic on their own, but their primary weaknesses vanish when they are combined to form the third strategy, resulting (...) in a promising new approach to the problem of evil. (shrink)

The primary aim of this paper is to highlight, at least in short, how the resources of experimental philosophy could be fruitfully applied to the evidential problem of evil. To do this, we will consider two of the most influential and archetypal formulations of the problem: William L. Rowe’s article, “The Problem of Evil and Some Varieties of Atheism” (1979). and Paul Draper’s article, “Pain and Pleasure: An Evidential Problem for Theists” (1989). We will (...) consider the relevance of experimental philosophy to Rowe’s 1979 argument in §1 and to Draper’s 1989 argument in §2. But in addition to exploring how the resources of experimental philosophy might apply to the problem of evil, it is also worth exploring what broader empirical factors might contribute to people having the intuitions that have—from someone’s affective state to someone’s need for closure. In §3, we want to very briefly elucidate a few areas where the psychology of philosophy might be productively explored in future empirical research. (shrink)

The problem of evil can be captured by the following four statements which taken together are inconsistent: 1) God made the world 2) God is a perfect being 3) A perfect being would not create a world containing evil 4) The world contains evil Traditional attempts to grapple with this problem typically center on rejecting (3). Thus Descartes, following Augustine, rejects (3), arguing that evil is the result of man’s exercise of his free will. (...) However, given Descartes plausible claim that God could have created man in such a way that through exercising his free will man comes to only virtuous actions, it is not clear how the problem is solved. Descartes also repeats the Augustinian orthodoxy that though the world contains evil it does not contain it as a positive existence; evil has no real being but is simply the reflection of the inherent lack of full-being in merely finite individuals. Again, that this is a solution is open to serious doubt. (shrink)

The problem of evil is one of the most discussed topics in the philosophy of religion. For some time, however, there has been a need for a collection of readings that adequately represents recent and ongoing writing on the topic. This volume fills that need, offering the most up-to-date collection of recent scholarship on the problem of evil. The distinguished contributors include J.L. Mackie, Nelson Pike, Roderick M. Chisholm, Terence Penelhum, Alvin Plantinga, William L. Rowe, Stephen (...) J. Wykstra, John Hick, and Diogenes Allen. Including an introductory essay and a selected bibliography, this comprehensive and completely up-to-date collection is an invaluable guide to current scholarship in this highly debated area of the philosophy of religion. Oxford Readings in Philosophy aims to bring together important recent writings in major areas of philosophical inquiry, selected from a variety of sources, mostly periodicals, which may not be conveniently available. (shrink)

Wang Yangming believes that human nature is entirely good. A question naturally arises: where is evil from? It has been argued that Wang’s idealism gives rise to the problem of evil. I first argue...

The central theses of Oduwole are: first, that Olodumare cannot be exonerated from the philosophical problem of evil for He possesses similar attributes to the theistic God in Judeo-Christian tradition; and second, that the Yoruba hold a strong dialectical principle of Ire and Ibi in their daily world encounters. This paper challenges these positions as inaccurate representations of the Yoruba African understanding of the nature of evil. It exposes the conceptual errors that fraught Oduwole’s paper and provides (...) further rigorous analytical expositions of the nature of evil in Yoruba-African philosophical thought. (shrink)

The existence of evil and suffering in our world seems to pose a serious challenge to belief in the existence of a perfect God. If God were all-knowing, it seems that God would know about all of the horrible things that happen in our world. If God were all-powerful, God would be able to do something about all of the evil and suffering. Furthermore, if God were morally perfect, then surely God would want to do something about it. (...) And yet we find that our world is filled with countless instances of evil and suffering. These facts about evil and suffering seem to conflict with the orthodox theist claim that there exists a perfectly good God. The challenged posed by this apparent conflict has come to be known as the problem of evil. (shrink)

Whether evil provides evidence against the existence of God, and to what degree, depends on how things seem to the subject—i.e., on one’s perspective. I explain three ways in which adopting an atheistic perspective can increase support for atheism via considerations of evil. The first is by intensifying the common sense problem of evil by making evil seem gratuitous or intrinsically wrong to allow. The second is by diminishing the apparent fit between theism and our (...) observations of evil. The third is by lowering the initial plausibility of theism. I call this “the perspectival problem of evil” and argue that skeptical theism does not fully address it. (shrink)

The vast amount of suffering in the world is often held as a particularly powerful reason to deny that God exists. Now, one of the world's most distinguished philosophers of religion presents his own position on the problem of evil. Highly accessible and sensitively argued, Peter van Inwagen's book argues that such reasoning does not hold: his conclusion is not that God exists, but that suffering cannot be shown to prove that He does not.

While evil has always fascinated philosophers, it is only in modern times that the existence of evil has been seen as a serious challenge to belief in the existence of a powerful and benevolent God. In order to demonstrate this, the following chapter traces the historical emergence of what philosophers today call “the problem of evil” through an analysis of the writings of Plato, Epicurus, Sextus Empiricus, Augustine, Aquinas, Calvin, Descartes, Bayle, and Hume.

Chapter 1 addresses some preliminary issues that it is important to think about in formulating arguments from evil. Chapter 2 is then concerned with the question of how an incompatibility argument from evil is best formulated, and with possible responses to such arguments. Chapter 3 then focuses on skeptical theism, and on the work that skeptical theists need to do if they are to defend their claim of having defeated incompatibility versions of the argument from evil. Finally, (...) Chapter 4 discusses evidential arguments from evil, and four different kinds of evidential argument are set out and critically examined. (shrink)

The inductive argument from evil to the non-existence of God contains the premise that, probably, there is gratuitous evil. Some skeptical theists object: one's justification for the premise that, probably, there is gratuitous evil involves an inference from the proposition that we don't see a good reason for some evil to the proposition that it appears that there is no good reason for that evil, and they use a principle, "CORNEA," to block that inference. The (...) common sense problem of evil threatens the CORNEA move, because the common sense problem of evil does not involve any inference to justify the belief that there is gratuitous evil. In this paper, I argue that the common sense problem of evil doesn't avoid CORNEA. CORNEA, or a reformulated version of it, can still prevent one from having justification for the belief that there is gratuitous evil. (shrink)

The most forceful philosophical objections to belief in God arise from the existence of evil. Bad things happen in the world and it is not clear how this is compatible with the existence of an all-powerful and perfectly loving being. Unsurprisingly then, philosophers have formulated powerful arguments for atheism based on the existence of apparently unjustified suffering. These arguments give expression to what we call the problem of evil. This volume is an engaging introduction to the philosophical (...) problem of evil. Daniel Speak provides a clear overview of the main lines of reasoning in this debate and argues for the defensibility of theistic belief in the face of evil. He fleshes out the distinction between theodicy and defense and guides the reader through the logical, evidential, and hiddenness versions of the problem."--Publisher's description. (shrink)

This book is an intercultural exploration of the full scope of evil. The problems of evil have beset humanity throughout the ages and continue to trouble us. The studies here examine evil in Asian thought, in Western theory, in the cosmic order, in human psychology, and in social practice. Insights are added to the philosophical discussions from religion, culture, history, law, technology, and literature.

The problem of evil: formulation and historical solutions -- Analysis of the theories of evil of Ibn Sînâ's predecessors -- Ibn Sînâ's analysis of metaphysical evil -- Ibn Sînâ's notion of moral evil -- Ibn Sînâ's solution for the problem of evil and the problem of destiny.

This article focuses on questions about evil which are both theological and doxastic, and more specifically alethic – i.e., questions about whether what we know about evil can be used to establish the falsity or probable falsity of the belief or proposition that God exists. Such a focus is natural for agnostics. More generally, it is natural for anyone who is engaged in genuine inquiry about whether or not God exists. A specific concept of God is employed – (...) it is assumed that to assert that God exists, or that ‘theism’ is true, is to assert that there exists a supernatural person who created the natural world and who is perfect in power, perfect in knowledge, and perfect in moral goodness. This is obviously a narrow sense of the words ‘God’ and ‘theism’, but it is common in the philosophical literature. The article also uses a common strategy to investigate alethic problems of evil: it constructs and evaluates a variety of ‘arguments from evil’ for the conclusion that God does not exist or that His existence is improbable. (shrink)

A prominent Christian apologist suggests it is inconsistent for an atheist to have a favourable attitude towards procreating while maintaining that a loving God would not place vulnerable beings in such a harmful world. I put this analogy to the test with a series of thought experiments, revealing crucial disanalogies between God and procreators that absolve the atheist from the charge of inconsistency and draw the reader's attention to the central issues on the problem of evil as debated (...) by contemporary philosophers. (shrink)

In this chapter, the problem of evil is understood in a narrow, intellectual sense: as the problem of how a theist can best reply to various arguments for the non-existence of God that are based on the fact that the world contains evil. Two such arguments are examined. One proceeds from a general fact about the world: that it contains a vast amount of truly horrendous evil. The other proceeds from a particular horrible event. It (...) is argued that each of these arguments is a “failure” in this sense: ideally rational agnostics, having reflected on the argument, could, without any offense against reason, remain agnostics. (shrink)

Even philosophers of religion working on the problem of non-human animal suffering have ignored the suffering of creatures like insects. Sensible as this seems, it’s mistaken. I am not sure whether creatures like these can suffer, but it is plausible, on both commonsensical and scientific and philosophical grounds, that many of them can. If they do, their suffering makes the problem of evil much worse: their vast numbers mean the amount of evil in the world will (...) almost certainly be increased by many, many orders of magnitude, the fact that disproportionately many of them live lives which are nasty, brutish, and short means that the proportion of good to evil in the world will be drastically worsened, and their relative lack of cognitive sophistication means that many theodicies, including many specifically designed to address animal suffering, would apply to their suffering only with much greater difficulty, if at all. Philosophers of religion should therefore more seriously investigate whether these beings can suffer and what, if anything, could justify God in allowing as much. (shrink)

Editorial for issue 29 of Scandinavian Jewish Studies, 'The Problem of Evil and Images of Humanity'.

The argument that(1) God exists, and is omniscient, omnipotent, and perfectly goodand(2) Evil existsare logically incompatible, can be construed aporetically (as generating a puzzle and posing the constructive challenge of finding a solution that displays their compatibility) or atheologically (as a positive proof of the non-existence of God). I note that analytic philosophers of religion over the last thirty years or so have focused on the atheological deployment of the argument from evil, and have met its onslaughts from (...) the posture of defense. I take Nelson Pike (in his article “Hume on Evil”) and Alvin Plantinga (in The Nature of Necessity, “Self-Profile,” and other pieces) as paradigm defenders, analyse their approaches, and try to make explicit parameters and assumptions within which these defenses have been conducted. In particular, both writers seem to attempt a reply within the parameters of a religion-neutral value theory and on the assumption that God has obligations to do one thing rather than another in creation-both of which conspire to defend God as a producer of global goods and shift attention off the more pressing question of His agent-centered goodness. I then argue that value-theory pluralism explodes the myth of shared values, and so complicates the structure of fair-minded debate about the problem of evil as to significantly limit the utility of defense. I invite Christian philosophers to approach the problem aporetically, and to exhibit the compossibility of (1) and (2) by formulating their own beliefs about how God is solving the problem of evil using the valuables within a Christian value theory to defeat evils. After sketching a strategy for doing this, I answer the objection that my recommendation conflates Christian philosophy and theology, and try to show how it affords a continuity between the so-called philosophical and existential problems of evil. (shrink)

Sceptical theists undermine the argument from evil by claiming that our ability to distinguish between justified and unjustified evil is weak enough that we must take seriously the possibility that all evil is justified. However, I argue that this claim leads to a dilemma: either our judgements regarding unjustified evil are reliable enough that the problem of evil remains a problem, or our judgements regarding unjustified evil are so unreliable that it would (...) be misguided to use them in our decision-making. The first horn undermines theism, while the second undermines our moral decision-making. Thus, sceptical theism is problematic. (shrink)

The Evidential Problem of Evil The evidential problem of evil is the problem of determining whether and, if so, to what extent the existence of evil (or certain instances, kinds, quantities, or distributions of evil) constitutes evidence against the existence of God, that is to say, a being perfect in power, knowledge and goodness. Evidential […].

"This book is D.Z. Phillips' systematic attempt to discuss the problem of evil. He argues that the problem is inextricably linked to our conception of God. In an effort to distinguish between logical and existential problems of evil, that inheritance offers us distorted accounts of God's omnipotence and will. In his interlude, Phillips argues that, as a result, God is ridiculed out of existence, and found unfit to plead before the bar of decency. However, Phillips elucidates (...) a neglected tradition in which we reach a different understanding of God's presence amidst suffering, and addresses the ultimate question of how God can be said to be with those who are crushed by life's afflictions." "An ideal text for students of philosophy, religious studies and theology, but also for anyone who reflects seriously on the danger of adding to human evils by the way in which we write and think about them."--Jacket. (shrink)

In this chapter probability and confirmation theory are used to investigate the problem of evil, concentrating on whether a theist should consider our ignorance of a good reason for God to permit evil to support a non-religious alternative over a typical theist's beliefs. It is argued that according to Likelihoodism, our ignorance of a good reason does not favor a competing hypothesis over the religious view that there is an incomprehensible good reason for God to permit (...) class='Hi'>evil. Bayesian accounts of comparative confirmation, which are alternatives to Likelihoodism, have the same result. Furthermore, according to both Likelihoodism and Bayesian accounts of contrastive confirmation, our ignorance of a good reason for God to permit evil may actually support typical religious beliefs over the alternative hypotheses. (shrink)

The vast amount of suffering in the world is often held as a particularly powerful reason to deny that God exists. Now, one of the world's most distinguished philosophers of religion presents his own position on the problem of evil. Highly accessible and sensitively argued, Peter van Inwagen's book argues that such reasoning does not hold: his conclusion is not that God exists, but that suffering cannot be shown to prove that He does not.

If the problem of evil is one of justifying how a perfect God could create evil, then there is no problem of evil in early Chinese thought, but my claim in this paper is that the problem of evil is one manifestation of a deeper problem, which is the conflict between the world and human values and desires. This deeper problem appears in early Chinese thought in ways analogous to the (...) class='Hi'>problem of evil in theistic traditions. Daoists respond to this problem with a call to harmonize with heaven by overcoming conventional values and desires. Mencius, a Confucian, offers a more complex response, in which it is natural to cultivate virtue and certain desires even though nature itself is indifferent to them. My paper focuses on this Confucian response. (shrink)

The problem of evil is a metaphysical problem bound up with the conditions of human existence. The radical evil of fascism and communism, according to Józef Tischner, opens up the possibility that we live in the time of a modern Manichaeism, understood as having two faces: nihilism and pessimism. The possibility of thinking of such a modem form of Manichaeism necessarily calls for a new inquiry into the question of evil. For Tischner, evil, like (...) good, is not an object, but something in which man participates, and for this reason it cannot be objectified and defined. One can only ask how it appears. (shrink)

Of all the issues in the philosophy of religion, the problem of evil arguably commands more attention that any other. This text, which is broad in scope, is organized in a way that clearly exhibits the main structure of the overall problem as it has been treated in Western theistic traditions generally and the Christian tradition specifically.

Many Buddhists tend to think that the world is overall, a good state of affairs, and that life is worth living. However, Yujin Nagasawa points out that there is a mismatch between the positive value one puts on the world and the Buddhist's metaphysics. Buddhism endorses the impermanence thesis which roughly states that all things exist only momentarily. And it's the impermanent nature of reality that leads to significant suffering in the world. If impermanence is a fundamental feature to reality, (...) and, if suffering is primarily linked to the impermanent nature of reality, how can one consistently give an optimistic assessment of the value of the world? In this paper, I come to the aid of the Buddhist and point to how she might develop her own response to this problem. (shrink)

This is a reference guide to contemporary work on the problem of evil with Oxford Bibliographies Online.

This paper considers briefly the approach to the problem of evil by Alvin Plantinga, Richard Swinburne, and John Hick and argues that none of these approaches is entirely satisfactory. The paper then develops a different strategy for dealing with the problem of evil by expounding and taking seriously three Christian claims relevant to the problem: Adam fell; natural evil entered the world as a result of Adam's fall; and after death human beings go either (...) to heaven or hell. Properly interpreted, these claims form the basis for a consistent and coherent Christian solution to the problem of evil. (shrink)

I begin by distinguishing four different versions of the argument from evil that start from four different moral premises that in various ways link the existence of God to the absence of suffering. The version of the argument from evil that I defend starts from the premise that if God exists, he would not allow excessive, unnecessary suffering. The argument continues by denying the consequent of this conditional to conclude that God does not exist. I defend the argument (...) against Skeptical Theists who say we are in no position to judge that there is excessive, unnecessary suffering by arguing that this defense has absurd consequences. It allows Young Earthers to construct a parallel argument that concludes that we are in no position to judge that God did not create the earth recently. In the last section I consider whether theists can turn the argument from evil on its head by arguing that God exists. I first criticize Alvin Plantinga’s theory of warrant that one might try to use to argue for God’s existence. I then criticize Richard Swinburne’s Bayesian argument to the same conclusion. I conclude that my version of the argument from evil is a strong argument against the existence of God and that several important responses to it do not defeat it. (shrink)

The existence of evil is often held to pose philosophical problems only for theists. I argue that the existence of evil gives rise to a philosophical problem which confronts theist and atheist alike. The problem is constituted by the following claims: (1) Successful human beings (i.e., those meeting their basic prudential interests) are committed to a good-enough world; (2) the actual world is not a good-enough world (i.e., sufficient evil exists). It follows that human beings (...) must either (3a) maintain a state of epistemic ignorance regarding the nature of the actual world or (3b) abandon their basic prudential interests. Theists resolve this problem by rejecting (2), only to confront the problem of evil as it is traditionally understood. Successful atheists also reject (2), but without adequate grounds for doing so. (shrink)

Contrary to what many philosophers believe, Calvinism neither makes the problem of evil worse nor is it obviously refuted by the presence of evil and suffering in our world. Or so most of the authors in this book claim. While Calvinism has enjoyed a resurgence in recent years amongst theologians and laypersons, many philosophers have yet to follow suit. The reason seems fairly clear: Calvinism, many think, cannot handle the problem of evil with the same (...) kind of plausibility as other more popular views of the nature of God and the nature of God's relationship with His creation. This book seeks to challenge that untested assumption. With clarity and rigor, this collection of essays seeks to fill a significant hole in the literature on the problem of evil. (shrink)

Abstract – “Evil, Problem of” The New Encyclopedia of Unbelief The idea that at least some of the evil present in the world constitutes a problem for belief in the existence of God is both an ancient idea going back at least to job – and presumably beyond – and the very natural one. Whether evil is, however, a decisive objection to the existence of God has remained unclear, as various formulations of the argument from (...) evil that initially seemed plausible have proven problematic. This entry is concerned, accordingly, with how the argument from evil should be formulated, and with the various ways in which theists can respond to the argument. My discussion falls into the following sections: (1) Different ways of formulating an argument for evil. (2) Types of responses to the argument from evil: Refutations, Defenses, and Theodicies (3) Total Refutations. (4) Defenses. (5) Theodicies. (6) Inductive logic and the evidential argument from evil. (shrink)

For decades, the problem of evil has occupied a centre stage in the Western philosophical discourse of the existence of God. The problem centres on the unlikelihood to reconcile the existence of an absolute and morally perfect God with the evidence of evil in the universe. This is the evidential problem of evil that has been a source of dispute among theists, atheists, agnostics, and sceptics. There seems to be no end to this dispute, (...) making the problem of evil a perennial one in Western Philosophy of Religion. In this essay, I will contribute to this discourse from an African perspective. This essay, therefore, explores the evidential problem of evil within the African philosophy of religion. I argue that it is unlikely for the evidential problem of evil to be a problem in African philosophy of religion. I invoke an Ejima-based argument to support this claim. I conceptualize the Igbo word Ejima to metaphysically mean the inevitable coexistence of two opposite variables as complements to argue that God could be both good and evil within the African Traditional Religion, which explains why good and evil exist in the universe. (shrink)

The aim of this book is to ascertain how ancient Greek and Latin authors, both pagan and Christian, formulated and answered what is now called the problem of evil. The survey ranges chronologically from the classical and Hellenistic eras, through the Roman era, to the end of the pagan world. Six of the twelve chapters are devoted to Christianity (including Manichaeism), as one thesis of the book is that the problem of evil takes an acute form (...) only for Christians, since no other philosophy of antiquity posits a personal God exercising providence over individuals without having to overcome countervailing forces. None the less it will also be shown that Greek philosophies, Platonism in particular, come close to the Christian formulation. Being conscious of the affinity between Greek thought and their own, early Christians respond to the problem of evil in the same way as the philosophers, by questioning the existence of evil rather than of the divine. (shrink)