Are Pain and Suffering In Fact Good?

[In_Spiration]

Consider Congenital Insensitivity to Pain:

Danger level: High

What is it?

Also called congenital analgia, congenital analgesia and congenital pain insensitivity, it is a rare condition in which a person can’t feel pain.

While at first the inability to feel pain may sound like a gift, the opposite is true. When babies grow, they experiment with their surroundings. When they feel pain, they learn that something is bad for them and stop doing it.

Not these children. Examples for what these babies/kids do to themselves include biting themselves deeply, breaking bones without feeling they did, poking their eyes with their fingers, biting their own tongues.

I believe we too often disassociate pain from its real causes. Simply put, pain is a subjective *affect *of a certain objective state of bodily affairs, namely one that calls for due attention and response. In a man with a properly functioning nervous system, pain is fundamentally the conscious mind’s reception of this useful mental signal, one which serves to favorably orient him toward future survival. Without such signals, the organism is at a great risk of killing itself. However, we frequently only concentrate on the negative aspects, not the positive side (which arguably maximizes its effectiveness).

The same goes for emotional/psychological pain. It’s processed in the same region of the brain, and it has the same adaptive purpose. We feel the pains of depression when we’re socially isolated, for example, and these actually cause us to think more analytically, as well as seek out company. Both results increase our likelihood of surviving. (Another theory claims that major depressive disorder is often due to a hyperactive immune system inducing otherwise beneficial sickness behavior: “The evolved function of [sickness behavior] is to act as an energy-conserving, risk-minimizing, immune-enhancing state appropriate for a body mounting a short-term, all-out attack on an invading micro-organism.”)

My questions are:

1. 
   *]Why do we often think pain and suffering are evil?
   *]What’s the relationship between pain and general evil, and/or between suffering and sin?
   *]What’s the relationship between pain and pleasure, suffering and joy? Is this a necessary, inseparable relation?
   *]If it’s not sufficient proof of injustice to merely highlight the presence of some pain or suffering, then what would one be required to show in order to demonstrate that a given pain is itself wrong or evil?
   *]Why does it seem to be the case that the innocent and holy suffer and feel pain more than the heathen and worldly? Do they really? In strictly their earthly lives, do the most sinful souls in fact suffer less than the most holy?
   *]What is the true nature of evil, and what serves as its clearest indicator (namely that by which we might “know it when we see it”)?

 

[Lancer]

Below are some paragraphs from the Catechism…that give basic answers to your questions…and if you really want to get an incredible depth into the truth of “mysterium iniquitatis,” or “mystery of iniquity”…read Venerable Pope John Paul II’s enycyclical Salvifici Dolores…He “knocks this one out of the park”!!

Pax Christi

[***Salvifici Doloris, “On the Christian Meaning of Human Suffering” ***](http://forums.catholic-questions.org/Salvifici Doloris, “On the Christian Meaning of Human Suffering”)[

**February 11, 1984 **](http://forums.catholic-questions.org/Salvifici Doloris, “On the Christian Meaning of Human Suffering”)
Pope John Paul II examines the meaning of personal suffering, as well as the Christian response to the suffering of others. The Gospel, Pope John Paul stresses, is “the negation of passivity in the face of suffering.” He adds: “The World of human suffering unceasingly calls for, so to speak, another world: the world of human love; and in a certain sense man owes to suffering that unselfish love which stirs in his heart and actions.”
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Catechism of The Catholic Church
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**Providence and the scandal of evil. **

309 If God the Father almighty, the Creator of the ordered and good world, cares for all his creatures, why does evil exist? To this question, as pressing as it is unavoidable and as painful as it is mysterious, no quick answer will suffice. Only Christian faith as a whole constitutes the answer to this question: the goodness of creation, the drama of sin and the patient love of God who comes to meet man by his covenants, the redemptive Incarnation of his Son, his gift of the Spirit, his gathering of the Church, the power of the sacraments and his call to a blessed life to which free creatures are invited to consent in advance, but from which, by a terrible mystery, they can also turn away in advance. There is not a single aspect of the Christian message that is not in part an answer to the question of evil.

310 But why did God not create a world so perfect that no evil could exist in it? With infinite power God could always create something better.174 But with infinite wisdom and goodness God freely willed to create a world “in a state of journeying” towards its ultimate perfection. In God’s plan this process of becoming involves the appearance of certain beings and the disappearance of others, the existence of the more perfect alongside the less perfect, both constructive and destructive forces of nature. With physical good there exists also physical evil as long as creation has not reached perfection.175

311 Angels and men, as intelligent and free creatures, have to journey toward their ultimate destinies by their free choice and preferential love. They can therefore go astray. Indeed, they have sinned. Thus has moral evil, incommensurably more harmful than physical evil, entered the world. God is in no way, directly or indirectly, the cause of moral evil.176 He permits it, however, because he respects the freedom of his creatures and, mysteriously, knows how to derive good from it:
For almighty God. . ., because he is supremely good, would never allow any evil whatsoever to exist in his works if he were not so all-powerful and good as to cause good to emerge from evil itself.177

312 In time we can discover that God in his almighty providence can bring a good from the consequences of an evil, even a moral evil, caused by his creatures: “It was not you”, said Joseph to his brothers, "who sent me here, but God. . . You meant evil against me; but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive."178 From the greatest moral evil ever committed - the rejection and murder of God’s only Son, caused by the sins of all men - God, by his grace that “abounded all the more”,179 brought the greatest of goods: the glorification of Christ and our redemption. But for all that, evil never becomes a good.

313 "We know that in everything God works for good for those who love him."180 The constant witness of the saints confirms this truth:

St. Catherine of Siena said to “those who are scandalized and rebel against what happens to them”: "Everything comes from love, all is ordained for the salvation of man, God does nothing without this goal in mind."181

St. Thomas More, shortly before his martyrdom, consoled his daughter: "Nothing can come but that that God wills. And I make me very sure that whatsoever that be, seem it never so bad in sight, it shall indeed be the best."182

Dame Julian of Norwich: "Here I was taught by the grace of God that I should steadfastly keep me in the faith. . . and that at the same time I should take my stand on and earnestly believe in what our Lord shewed in this time - that ‘all manner [of] thing shall be well.’"183
314We firmly believe that God is master of the world and of its history. But the ways of his providence are often unknown to us. Only at the end, when our partial knowledge ceases, when we see God “face to face”,184 will we fully know the ways by which - even through the dramas of evil and sin - God has guided his creation to that definitive sabbath rest185 for which he created heaven and earth.
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[Spock]

Why do we often think pain and suffering are evil?

I wish you would have qualified this proposition. There are two ways to do it:

1. Why do we often think that ALL pain and suffering are evil?
2. Why do we often think that SOME pain and suffering are evil?

Which one do you mean?

If it is the first one, then the answer is simple: “No one thinks that”. Obviously some pain and suffering can be useful as you correctly pointed out in your opening post.

If it is the second one, the answer is also simple: “Because there is no reason to assume that some random pains and sufferings are beneficial”. The most glaring examples are natural disasters. There are other ones, too. The victims of suicide bombers are a random selection of people, who just happened to be at wrong place at the wrong time. Obviously their demise does not benefit them. Their death spills over onto their families, who suffer both physically and mentally. Who benefits from such an act? The bosses of the terrorists, who sent that poor, dumb, stupid idiot to blow himself up for some “cause”. They benefit, no one else. Do you think that this benefit will justify the pain and suffering of the victims? I don’t think so.

 

[tonyrey]

Why do we often think pain and suffering are evil?

Because we fail to distinguish necessary from unnecessary pain and suffering.

What’s the relationship between pain and pleasure, suffering and joy? Is this a necessary, inseparable relation?

The relationship between joy and suffering is necessary and inseparable because they are the positive and negative aspects of our capacity for spiritual and physical development, creativity, friendship and love.

If it’s not sufficient proof of injustice to merely highlight the presence of some pain or suffering, then what would one be required to show in order to demonstrate that a given pain is itself wrong or evil?

Pain is evil if it is unnecessary. Pain is wrong if it is unnecessary and caused deliberately.

Why does it seem to be the case that the innocent and holy suffer and feel pain more than the heathen and worldly? Do they really? In strictly their earthly lives, do the most sinful souls in fact suffer less than the most holy?

It is impossible to generalise because everyone lives in different circumstances but
people who are kind and compassionate suffer more those who are cruel and callous. Saints are more likely to be martyred than sinners. Those who are unscrupulous are more likely to obtain power and wealth than those who have principles. Jesus suffered and was crucified because He denounced injustice and advocated love.

On the other hand those who believe and trust in God have far greater joy than those who stake everything on the things of this world. The Beatitudes make it clear that love leads to heaven - which begins in this life…

What is the true nature of evil, and what serves as its clearest indicator (namely that by which we might “know it when we see it”)?

When people **deliberately cause ** unnecessary pain, misery and despair we know their intentions and actions are evil.

 

[FightingFat]

The French philosopher, Paul Claudel said that Jesus did not come to explain suffering, nor to take it away, but to unite Himself with it.

Humanity is suffering. We are forged in that fire I think, “mourning and weeping in this vale of tears.”

 

[Timothy17]

The base human condition is that all pain and suffering, being also unwanted, is evil. Human discipline and virtue can temper and alter this, but still, for fallen man, his mortality and finite state seem to often or only hamper his happiness. For the Christian, however, we know that these things are redemptive, thanks to Christ. Pain, for us, is a crying out to God : it is the body or mind begging for its Maker, begging for Love, begging for restoration to that State of Being, called Grace, that we were originally created to be in. Thanks to Christ’s own Sacrifice, we can “offer up” our pains and sufferings and join them with Christ’s own on His Holy Cross. Pain and suffering become spiritual goods if we suffer them for Christ’s sake. We do well when we recognize our pains and sufferings as a yearning for the Ultimate Good, that is, God, and rather than “resist” this yearning, accept it instead as our Cross to bear, and convert it into good by suffering it for the sake of Christ.

Pain and suffering can be spiritual goods in the above sense, but also even human goods if we permit them to temper us and allow them to remind us of our limits and condition as creatures, thus leading us into the virtues of humility and temperance.

The Christian has great joy and liberty in the knowledge that human suffering is not meaningless, but that it can be for our eternal welfare always, and also even, sometimes, for our temporal as well, for we know God chastizes those whom He loves, as a loving father would his beloved child, being for the sake of the child.

I hope this helps

Pax Christi,
Tim

 

[In_Spiration]

My primary aim here is to distinguish between the so-called qualia of pain and suffering, on the one hand, and the objective causes of them, on the other. I am curious as to what our most fundamental criterion for identification of good/evil really is. Do value judgments reduce to subjective observations re: pleasure/pain, or instead to objective judgments re: facts?

I am unable to see how the qualitative character of pain and suffering is in itself bad. Taken strictly as such, without reference to their cause and source, pain and suffering don’t seem evil to me. And yet I’m perfectly aware of the counter-intuitive nature of that idea.

I try to imagine a world in which good deeds are, instead of accompanied by joy, met with the same feeling that torture brings. Obviously there’s something wrong in this picture, but (a) I can’t p(name removed by moderator)oint what would possibly be good or evil about strictly emotional phenomena, that is, without simultaneously thinking of them in relation to objective states, and (b) I’m not sure the conception in my mind even makes any intelligible sense.

I can only manage to understand evil in terms of non-being and non-existence. Pain is bad because it ultimately is some sort of indication of an evil, i.e., it’s a sign of something which somehow might lead to death, demise, decay, sin, etc. And that is the evil. Pain is only evil in the sense that it derives its entire character from a more fundamental evil, in the same way that I’d say pleasure is only good in relation to an objective goodness and not at all “per se”. All evil reduces to varying modes of non-existence, just as all goodness co-extends with the widespread degrees of existence.

It seems as though “unnecessary pain” doesn’t exist. For every pain, do we not presuppose that there’s something objectively wrong behind it? I think we’re still conflating ‘pain’ and ‘harm’. We might then ask, “Why is harm evil?” These inquiries will ultimately have to come down to: To be or not to be?

How do we answer that? Do we have any basis for thinking existence in general is good and non-existence is evil, or is that somehow self-evident? (If it is, I’d hope this is on a firmer basis than just “because that which is conducive to existence feels pleasant.”

Forgive me if I’m rambling. I’m partly hoping someone will “just see” some greater implications surrounding all this (and then share them).

P.S.: Spock, in the future, whenever you deem anything “useful” or “beneficial” (or also, for that matter: “right”, “progressive”, “justified”, “successful”, “important”, etc.), please identify a standard or criterion by which you make such evaluations. Nothing in your posts seems to claim pain/suffering are ever evil as such and not merely signs and effects of evil. Is the demise of unjust terror victims what’s evil, or is it the consequent suffering that’s evil? Would your answer change if no one felt any pain at all from the terrorist act? Also, keep in mind that this thread doesn’t *necessarily *have to be a theistic rationalization for some ulterior motive toward dodging the pesky Problem of Evil. Obviously, that’s relevant; but this is interesting enough for its relation to an epistemology of morality.

 

[Dave_B]

… The most glaring examples are natural disasters. There are other ones, too. The victims of suicide bombers are a random selection of people, who just happened to be at wrong place at the wrong time. …

I see where you are coming from, why does a good God PERMIT death and suffering of innocent people?

This is a very common objection to the existence of God.

I do believe in God. And believe that he is good.

We have free will, and most suffering is self inflicted and is a just consequence for wilful disobedience to God’s law i.e.sin.

But obviously is some cases people suffer for what seems no reason.

There are two answers I can think of.

1. We cant see the bigger picture. Only God can see people’s hearts and intentions, and whether good is coming out of suffering.
2. The universe is created the way it is. God could have made it another way. ie. without free will. without natural disasters. But this is the universe he has chosen to make. We are not capable of understanding the reasons creation is as it is. It just is.

I hope this helps. Peace

 

[Spock]

Spock, in the future, whenever you deem anything “useful” or “beneficial” (or also, for that matter: “right”, “progressive”, “justified”, “successful”, “important”, etc.), please identify a standard or criterion by which you make such evaluations.

Hmmm, in the title of the thread you used the word “good”, and subsequently you gave a good reason, why some pain is beneficial - as an early warning system. So I would assume that we see eye-to-eye using the words, good, useful, beneficial, etc… However, you are right, it is a good idea to define these concepts. Let’s get to it.

1. In a world without life, none of these ideas make sense. Everything just “happens”, events are neither good, nor bad. The waves on the beach gradually smooth a pebble to a nice round shape, but the pebble “does not care”.

Let’s define “life” as the next concept. Life is the attempt to maintain the homeostasis in a changing environment.

1. In a universe with vegetative life (without a nervous system) the concepts of “useful”, or “good” or “beneficial” can be defined. Some event is “good” if it helps life to maintain itself. An event is “bad” if it prohibits life.
2. In a universe with beings which have a nervous system (but no higher brain functions), the definition is almost the same, but there is an extention to it. Some event is “good” if it maintains life or enhances the well-being of the living entity. All the nervous sytems (we know about) have a pleasure and pain center in the brain. All the beings strive to experience pleasure and avoid the pain. It is a simple biological imperative. In this universe the concept of “evil” cannot be defined.
3. Finally, in a universe where there are conscious beings, the previous concepts still apply, but there is a new twist to them. Next to the “is”, these comes the “ought to”, and with the higher brain functions these beings can imagine themselves in someone else’s “skin”.

So here comes the definition of “evil”: it is the conscious and deliberate act to deprive someone else from its life, or decrease its “pleasurable aspect, without a good reason”. In other words, to cause harm, for its own sake. Now, you may agree or disagree with this definition. We shall see how it goes.

Nothing in your posts seems to claim pain/suffering are ever evil as such and not merely signs and effects of evil. Is the demise of unjust terror victims what’s evil, or is it the consequent suffering that’s evil? Would your answer change if no one felt any pain at all from the terrorist act? Also, keep in mind that this thread doesn’t *necessarily *have to be a theistic rationalization for some ulterior motive toward dodging the pesky Problem of Evil. Obviously, that’s relevant; but this is interesting enough for its relation to an epistemology of morality.

Now I am going to place a stink-bomb into the “room”, and light its fuse.

There is no such thing as objective morality.

We call something “morally good”, if we agree with an act. We call something “morally evil”, if we disagree with the act.

Example: “the fact you know about is that someone blew up a bunch of people he considers his enemies and dies in the process”. If you agree with the person, your assessment will be: “he was a self-sacrificing hero”. If you disagree with the person, you will say: “he was a terrorist”. It is all subjective, based upon your views.

Now, let the fireworks commence.

 

[Spock]

But obviously is some cases people suffer for what seems no reason.

There are two answers I can think of.

1. We cant see the bigger picture. Only God can see people’s hearts and intentions, and whether good is coming out of suffering.
2. The universe is created the way it is. God could have made it another way. ie. without free will. without natural disasters. But this is the universe he has chosen to make. We are not capable of understanding the reasons creation is as it is. It just is.

Reply to #1: Read about the fifth officer here.
Reply to #2: Read the first officer on the same page. By the way, God could have created a world with free will and without any disasters.

But, let’s not get into this. There are other threads devoted to the subject, an In Spiration wants us to explore something else.

 

[Dave_B]

… If you agree with the person, your assessment will be: “he was a self-sacrificing hero”. If you disagree with the person, you will say: “he was a terrorist”. It is all subjective, based upon your views.
Now, let the fireworks commence.

Wow, you are setting new ground here You must like to shock.

 

[JDaniel]

Consider affect of a certain objective state of bodily affairs, namely one that calls for due attention and response. In a man with a properly functioning nervous system, pain is fundamentally the conscious mind’s reception of this useful mental signal, one which serves to favorably orient him toward future survival. Without such signals, the organism is at a great risk of killing itself. However, we frequently only concentrate on the negative aspects, not the positive side (which arguably maximizes its effectiveness).

The same goes for emotional/psychological pain. It’s processed in the same region of the brain, and it has the same adaptive purpose. We feel the pains of depression when we’re socially isolated, for example, and these actually cause us to think more analytically, as well as seek out company. Both results increase our likelihood of surviving. (Another theory claims that major depressive disorder is often due to a hyperactive immune system inducing otherwise beneficial sickness behavior: “The evolved function of [sickness behavior] is to act as an energy-conserving, risk-minimizing, immune-enhancing state appropriate for a body mounting a short-term, all-out attack on an invading micro-organism.”)

My questions are:

1. 
   *]Why do we often think pain and suffering are evil?
   *]What’s the relationship between pain and general evil, and/or between suffering and sin?
   *]What’s the relationship between pain and pleasure, suffering and joy? Is this a necessary, inseparable relation?
   *]If it’s not sufficient proof of injustice to merely highlight the presence of some pain or suffering, then what would one be required to show in order to demonstrate that a given pain is itself wrong or evil?
   *]Why does it seem to be the case that the innocent and holy suffer and feel pain more than the heathen and worldly? Do they really? In strictly their earthly lives, do the most sinful souls in fact suffer less than the most holy?
   *]What is the true nature of evil, and what serves as its clearest indicator (namely that by which we might “know it when we see it”)?

1. 
   IS:
   
   Great question: one that I have been asking for a long time herein, but not nearly as eloquently as you did. After much thought, the only answer I could reasonably assert flows from ‘evil’s’ definition. Evil is the absence of ‘good’, or, more precisely, the absence of God. Then I remembered what Christ said: “Whatever thou doest to these the least of my children, thou doest unto me.” (Paraphrased) That is a clear definition of the ‘evil act’.
   
   There are other acts that are not so good, to be sure, but, although they may be heinous, unspeakable, despicable, egregious, bad, horrible, etc., I’m not sure they are necessarily per se ‘evil’. But, an unspeakable act upon a child is absolutely ‘evil’ precisely because it attempts to erase God by the act. But, even that is not sufficient: it is a despicable act against any human that is weaker than his/her assailant(s). So, there certainly are evil acts. I think that the starting place is with that which a person does that is a direct affront to God’s being and His most Loved possessions: children. Then it expands outward in lesser degrees from there.
   
   But, are all the bad things that happen to people, animals, or nature per se ‘evil’, as attributed by many? I don’t think so. Natural events can’t be called ‘evil’ though they may leave behind terrible effects. Nature has no intentionality toward evil. Nature’s intentionality is toward structural self-corrections that, occasionally and incidentally, sometimes involve the collateral damage of things some humans consider important.
   
   God bless,
   jd

 

[tonyrey]

My primary aim here is to distinguish between the so-called qualia of pain and suffering, on the one hand, and the objective causes of them, on the other. I am curious as to what our most fundamental criterion for identification of good/evil really is. Do value judgments reduce to subjective observations re: pleasure/pain, or instead to objective judgments re: facts?

I believe the most fundamental criterion of good is that it is positive because it fulfils the purposes of life: love in particular leads to unity, harmony and joy, whereas evil is negative in deliberately causing unnecessary suffering, death and destruction.

I am unable to see how the qualitative character of pain and suffering is in itself bad. Taken strictly as such, without reference to their cause and source, pain and suffering don’t seem evil to me. And yet I’m perfectly aware of the counter-intuitive nature of that idea.
I try to imagine a world in which good deeds are, instead of accompanied by joy, met with the same feeling that torture brings. Obviously there’s something wrong in this picture, but (a) I can’t p(name removed by moderator)oint what would possibly be good or evil about strictly emotional phenomena, that is, without simultaneously thinking of them in relation to objective states, and (b) I’m not sure the conception in my mind even makes any intelligible sense.

Prolonged, severe pain and suffering are evil because they make it impossible to lead a normal life.

I can only manage to understand evil in terms of non-being and non-existence. Pain is bad because it ultimately is some sort of indication of an evil, i.e., it’s a sign of something which somehow might lead to death, demise, decay, sin, etc. And that is the evil. Pain is only evil in the sense that it derives its entire character from a more fundamental evil, in the same way that I’d say pleasure is only good in relation to an objective goodness and not at all “per se”. All evil reduces to varying modes of non-existence, just as all goodness co-extends with the widespread degrees of existence.

Precisely! Evil is dysteleological…

It seems as though “unnecessary pain” doesn’t exist. For every pain, do we not presuppose that there’s something objectively wrong behind it? I think we’re still conflating ‘pain’ and ‘harm’. We might then ask, “Why is harm evil?” These inquiries will ultimately have to come down to: To be or not to be?

If free will exists then unnecessary pain certainly does exist!

How do we answer that? Do we have any basis for thinking existence in general is good and non-existence is evil, or is that somehow self-evident? (If it is, I’d hope this is on a firmer basis than just “because that which is conducive to existence feels pleasant.”

Existence is immensely valuable because it is a source of **opportunities **for development, creativity, enjoyment and fulfilment.

 

[Spock]

Wow, you are setting new ground here You must like to shock.

Looks like the bomb fizzled… or everyone agrees, which would be really surprising.

 

[Dave_B]

Looks like the bomb fizzled… or everyone agrees, which would be really surprising.

I used to go on a fundamentalist forum where Im sure they would have kicked off. But people here seem more Christian and forgiving. This is one of the reasons I am attracted to the Catholic faith.