The Ethical Problem of Evil

[Code-Monkey]

your trying to apply logic to GOD and trying to figure GOD out which is impossible cause even in a lifetime you wont know everything about GOD even if you took 100 years and were the holiest of men you would still fail in knowing everything about GOD and why things happen and its pretty simple why GOD gave us free will cause love given freely is much more treasured than love forced and GOD wants us to love him and worship him for always but he wants us to choose that on our own and yes HE knows everything and HE knows our potential to do great things but its up to us to choose that way or follow the other road

Just one comment. It is a very valid thing to try to apply logic to God. God in essence must be purely logical. Logic must be a part of his nature, otherwise we have the nonsensical idea that someone made logic up later on down the line. Someone arbitrarily decided that 2+2=4 when they could have made it 2+3=4 one day and changed it the next. However, it would be a bit foolish to suspect that we could learn everything God knows. There's no real reason to suspect our human brains could even remember the names of all the people in the city we... just a fraction of the information of in the universe and we simply aren't capable of coming close to knowing everything. But, we should still strive to learn as much about God as possible as well as everything else around us.

 

[Code-Monkey]

Well, perfect knowledge is a necessary but not sufficient condition for this discussion. If god were just omnipotent, but was not all knowing, I believe you could still argue freewill exists.

So it's not just knowledge, but perfect knowledge?

What if God doesn't have perfect knowledge (ie, he can't know anything about our past), but he does know our future? Would that also destroy free will in your mind?

What makes the knowledge perfect? Lets first take the idea of imperfect knowledge. Lets say God somehow has full imperfect knowledge. That sounds sort of silly. But lets say God has an opinion about everything possible, however his opinions are all wrong. That's what I'm considering to be "full imperfect knowledge". God has no doubts about everything, but in fact he is wrong on everything. Lets take an event about tomorrow for example. God fully believes that Bob will eat pizza tomorrow for lunch. And what do you know, Bob eats a taco instead. If this happens, then we can say that God's knowledge of the event is incorrect. However, if Bob does eat a pizza tomorrow for lunch, then God's knowledge becomes correct. In short, it seems to be not somehow just having knowledge itself that makes it correct, but the knowledge is only correct if it corresponds with reality.

Knowledge can be correct or incorrect.
Knowledge is only correct if it corresponds with reality.
If God has knowledge of an event, his knowlege can only correct if that event corresponds with reality.
If God has knowledge of an event in the future, his knowledge will only be correct if the event actually happens.

There really is no argument against free will. Omniscience doesn't change the possibility of free will. Omnipotence doesn't change the possibility -- in fact omnipotence almost logically gaurantees free will and the ability to create other creatures that have free will.

For this brief argument, I'll assume:

"Free will" basically means being the root cause of one's own actions.
And a "free creature" is something that has free will.

P1. Either it's possible or impossible for a creature to have free will.
P2. If it's not possible for a creature/thing to have free will, then there must be an infinite regression of cause/effect and it's impossible to have a beginning.
P3. If it is possible for at for a creature to have free will and that creature is the first or uncaused creature, then there can be a beginning.
P4. There was a beginning.
P5. If at least 1 creature has free will, then it is possible for a creature to have free will. (blantatly obvious, huh! )
C1. Therefore, the first uncaused creature necessarily has free will.
C2. It is possible for a creature to have free will.


The only arguable premise here that I see is premise #4. You can either suggest there is a beginning or there is not a beginning or you can say there isn't enough information. However, the big bang points to at least a beginning for the universe. The philosophical problem with an infinite regression of cause/effect point to a beginning. But if you don't buy into either of those ideas, we can still apply occam's razor and say that it's much simpler & sufficient to suggest a beginning than an infinite extra causes and effects.

But regardless, you're left with either asserting a personal opinion that there is no beginning or you're left with simply asserting that not even a God could have free will.

P1. Either it's possible or not possible for a free creature to create other free creatures.
P2. If it's not possible to create creatures that are free, then God cannot create people with free will.
P3. If it's possible to create creatures that are free, then God could create humans that have free will.
P4. An omnipotent God can do all things that are possible.
P5. It's possible to create free creatures.
P6. God is omnipotent.
C. Therefore, God can creature people with free will.

Hmm... I could have probably reworded those arguments a bit better, but I'm pretty whiped out today.

The thing that strikes me is I keep hearing folks say that not that their simply asserting their personal opinion that there can be no such thing as free will, but they state that it's a logical impossibility. And yet no one was offered a sound logical argument to show that it's impossible.

 

[freelight]

Greetings all,

Great thread. It would appear that with free will....came the inevitability of evil being possible. This was the risk of giving souls free will...if such included the possibility of evil. (this could be possible with free will just existing without a presumed Creator-God). So this risk was apparently worth it from the Creators view...evidently. (or even if free will is just a property innate within sentient beings of any consciousness or intelligence).

If God gave man true free will knowing the possibilities/consequences....He would maintain a responsibility only of that which He could be truly responsible for...and the rest would lie in mans own hand according the laws of his own free will and the personal consequences of his actions. God could not be blamed for causing what is committed against His Will amid the laws of karma (sowing and reaping) that operate in the worlds of time and space among mortals.(also all things are unfolding by their own innate nature at any given time...every seed producing after its own kind - this appears as natural law). God may be grieved by the tragedy of evil but cannot be mocked for it....nor can He be blamed by granting free will liberties to sentient beings by allowing the possibility of evil. Still....all is governed/maintained by the laws of God within divine Providence of which nothing that exists can be outside.

At this point I see God as knowing all potentials and actuals existing at any point in time....having complete/perfect knowledge of the past and present...while the future is more or less open to any number of possible outcomes determined by free will contingencies and the spontaneous generation of potentials becoming actuals in that space-dimension where chaos translates into creation (potentialities be-coming actualities). {I see in this vaccum or dark-space the element of uncertainty existing where eventuations takes place due to the variabilities influencing how things unfold as present states eventuate/potentialize into actualities. This of course is seeing from a more time-conditioned view...with God acting/being immanently within sequentuality(time). [ God is existing within and without time]. This being similar to Open View(OV) sentiments....it would seem to annul Gods absolute omniscience in some particulars...particularly an exhaustive knowledge of the future. But perhaps this aspect of the equation is better to be continued in the 'Unorthodox theology' section - a good thread there on Open Theism.

Evil at this point or in this relative, mortal, finite world appears to exist so we have to deal with it. We presume that at some point we will one day have a nature that does not allow evil. Could such a state exist and is our hope for this tenable/reasonable/logical? Of course at that point where our free will is wholly governed, inspired and ruled from within a dimension of being that has no potentiality or capability for evil...then we could presume that evil will no longer exist...at least not in the dimensions that it once did in our previous incarnation/state/nature/constitution/spiritual, moral development, etc.


God is knowing all that is knowable. God knows all potentials and actuals that exist at any given time. Therefore God is omniscient of all that is knowable. Becaues evil exists and was/is potentially possible and even likely given the propensities innate within human nature capable of evil....it was/is surely known wholly to God - the totality of evil and its immensity, its end is known wholly to God. A souls free will can still be free to act/choose within the Light of Gods omniscience.....especially if one takes the position that Gods knowledge of the future is not exhaustive because of free will contingencies. The future is 'open' in this view - it is not finally or absolutely pre-determined or unalterable.



paul

 

[Job_s_First_Son]

Omniscience assumes correct knowledge, I would think.

God made a pizza loving Bob.

God makes a pizza loving Bob (omnipotent). God knows Bob will eat pizza (omniscient). Bob eats pizza (no freewill).

=> God Omnipotent & Omniscient but no free will.

God makes a taco loving Bob (omnipotent). God knows Bob will eat pizza (omniscient). Bob eats a taco (Bob has freewill but God not omniscient).

=> God Omnipotent but not Omniscient and Bob has freewill.

God makes a taco loving Bob (omnipotent). God knows Bob will eat pizza (omiscient). Bob eats a pizza (Bob demonstrates free will but God not omnipotent).

=> God not omnipotent but is omniscient and Bob has freewill.

God makes a freewill Bob (omnipotent). God knows Bob will eat pizza before during and after Bob's creation (omniscient). Bob eats pizza (Bob has freewill)

=> God omnipotent/omniscient and Bob has freewill, but not logical (creating a random variable knowing the outcome with certainty).

God is omnipotent in his creating a human who has freewill even though he knew what he was going to do before God even created him. By the way, if Bob eats pizza he goes to hell.

 

[Misty Minister]

The logical problem of evil states that the existence of evil is in contradiction with the existence of a God which dislikes evil (Omnibenevolent), knows about it (Omniscient), and can correct it (Omnipotent). This thread has nothing to do with that. I will warn you here that this is a fairly long post (which I wrote at 4:30 AM, so it probably rambles on, with the occasional typo or brainfart mixed in; if you notify me about something, I will correct it), so you can skip the history and go to the last argument if you wish.

My argument begins with the deterministic approach to answering the other problem of evil, which was

P1. An omniscient God knows everything.
P2. A perfect God doesn't change, without losing perfection.
C: Therefore, for an omniscient and perfect God not to change, that God must know everything, and cannot learn new things in the future, it must already know those things. (Thus, everything which will happen in the future is already known by God, even seemingly random events, because if God didn't know their outcomes, his knowledge would change and he either could not have been perfect before, or is not perfect now. Does this argue against free will? You decide. This early on, just try and follow the arguments.).

Which led to the contradiction with Christianity:

P1. There is no free will, if God is omniscient and perfect.
P2. The concept of sin requires free will.
C: There is no sin, if God is omniscient and perfect. (Uh-oh).

Determinism stepped in to save the day. It restored God's omniscience by arguing against premise 1 in the previous argument. It said:

P1. Everything is caused by laws of nature (which includes brain events, like wants, preferences, and choices).
P2. Causes force their effects.
P3. If an effect is forced is forced, it's not free.
C: No acts are free.

Okay, so there is no free will. Now what? Well, the concept of sin is gone, but on the bright side God is omniscient and perfect again. Sin though... that's pretty essential. Along came soft determinism, which retained the premise of determinism, but redefined free will:

P1. Everything is caused by laws of nature (which includes brain events, like wants, preferences, and choices).
P2. Free means voluntary.
P3. An act is free if I want to do it, and nothing prevents me.

Okay, so it's determinism, but free will is back, and in a form which gets by both issues. Now God can know everything because everything is still determined, and you can still be free. It works. This philosophical view is also called compatibilism, and it's not hard to wonder why. Now we can get to my counter-argument.

P1. Everything is caused by laws of nature (which includes brain events, like wants, preferences, and choices).
P2. God created the initial causes of nature, and the laws of nature.
C: God makes you choose to sin, want to sin, and gives you the ability to sin (for sinners).

Oh dear. With so-called compatibilism, God is making people sin and then punishing them for it. This is like placing a gun in a guy's hand, putting his finger on the trigger, aiming it at someone, pressing his finger into the trigger, and then charging the guy with murder. He had nothing to do with it, no sane person could possibly blame him for something so immensely out of his control, much less hold the real culprit without any blame. This isn't compatible at all, it makes God out to be a monster, certainly not omnibenevolent.

I doubt many Christians will argue the second premise, that God is the creator, so it had to have been the first one. Not everything is caused by laws of nature. In other words, now we have uncaused causes. We are now back to where we started. God has lost his omniscience, because uncaused causes are truly random. There are no governing laws behind them to make them anything other than random, but it's possible that somehow they enable free will, through their unintuitive weirdness, so sin is back, maybe.

Have we reached the end of possible positions here? You decide.

Applying Human standards, motives, ideal, and morals to a nonhuman entity does not look like it will be too successful. Man imputes these attributes to the concept man calls God. Does God impute these attributes to itself? What is reality when we now understand that light is just wrinkles from the fifth dimention?

 

[Code-Monkey]

Omniscience assumes correct knowledge, I would think.

Super. So we can also agree that the knowledge is only correct if it matches reality. So the reality logically proceeds the knowledge being correct.

God makes a freewill Bob (omnipotent). God knows Bob will eat pizza before during and after Bob's creation (omniscient). Bob eats pizza (Bob has freewill)

=> God omnipotent/omniscient and Bob has freewill, but not logical (creating a random variable knowing the outcome with certainty).

God is omnipotent in his creating a human who has freewill even though he knew what he was going to do before God even created him. By the way, if Bob eats pizza he goes to hell.

So you really don't have an argument against free will, you're just asserting that it's illogical on the basis that it "creates a random variable knowing the outcome with certainty".

You can't simply say something is illogical without demonstrating why. Again, time is simply a property of the universe and God is not within it. It's no more relevant of an issue that the location of Bob when he eats the pizza. The knowledge only becomes correct if the reality is true.

God can still be logically omniscient, omnipotent and free will can still exist. And experience certainly shows us that free will does exist. It's the default view.

You ought to either formulate a logical argument against free will or try to attack the one in favor of free will I gave.

 

[Job_s_First_Son]

The last scenario is illogical because God cannot create a random variable (freewill must a least be a collection of choices) that is certain. It's the God making a square circle thing. Thats why Omniscience AND Omnipotence poses a logical problem for freewill (which is what the discussion was kind of about).

Any instance (x) of a random variable X must have a probability of 0<x<1.
x has a probablity of 1.
X is a random variable. (not logical)

God creates Bob who can choose a myriad of paths.
There is only one path Bob WILL follow (the one chosen by God and which God could change it if he wanted to).
Bob has freewill. (not logical).

God's creation of freewill must present some choice unforseen by God (impossible) otherwise its the freewill of a lab rat in a straight hallway. I have nothing against people saying a God exists and there is freewill. You can say all you want about God and freewill (and that's totally fine, if I were a theist I'd got the Annointed712 route, much more "intellectually honest"), but either God is not both Ominscient & Omnipotent or it is illogical.

 

[GreenDragon]

Any instance (x) of a random variable X must have a probability of 0>x>1.
x has a probablity of 1.
X is a random variable. (not logical)

This argument hinges on the fact that it is not logical to know a "random" variable with certainty before it happens. It is perfectly logical to know it with certainty after it happens. For God, there is no "before" or "after"; He doesn't experience time like humans do.

 

[Job_s_First_Son]

Omniscience would indicate knowledge before during and after, I think?

In these discussions I try to stay away from the minute characteristics of God or how God works (God out side of time, God inside and outside of time, God before time, etc.) Unknowable and although really really fun to discuss, not useful. The grand characteristics are the ones to discuss and test against logic (whosever logic that may be): Omnipotence, Omnisicence, Omnibenevolence, etc.

 

[elman]

Omniscience assumes correct knowledge, I would think.

God made a pizza loving Bob.

God makes a pizza loving Bob (omnipotent). God knows Bob will eat pizza (omniscient). Bob eats pizza (no freewill).

=> God Omnipotent & Omniscient but no free will.

God makes a taco loving Bob (omnipotent). God knows Bob will eat pizza (omniscient). Bob eats a taco (Bob has freewill but God not omniscient).

=> God Omnipotent but not Omniscient and Bob has freewill.

God makes a taco loving Bob (omnipotent). God knows Bob will eat pizza (omiscient). Bob eats a pizza (Bob demonstrates free will but God not omnipotent).

=> God not omnipotent but is omniscient and Bob has freewill.

God makes a freewill Bob (omnipotent). God knows Bob will eat pizza before during and after Bob's creation (omniscient). Bob eats pizza (Bob has freewill)

=> God omnipotent/omniscient and Bob has freewill, but not logical (creating a random variable knowing the outcome with certainty).

God is omnipotent in his creating a human who has freewill even though he knew what he was going to do before God even created him. By the way, if Bob eats pizza he goes to hell.

Bob can love pizza and chose to go on a diet and not eat it. Free will.