Rob, you can just go to your Profile/Control Panel, click on Edit Options and select no email notifications. That way you will not receive any emails.
The problem of evil presupposes belief in goodness which is nonsensical in an amoral universe.
The problem of evil does not presuppose belief in goodness and goodness is not nonsensical in an amoral universe, but for the rest I agree with everything you are saying here.
No it doesn’t. “Often unknown” means that many things are unknown, but that, logically, does not preclude “some things” from being known. That doesn’t translate to the simplistic statement of yours that “We don’t know.”
just some rambling thoughts . . .
Evil is whatever the theist thinks it is. As long as the theist thinks evil exists, the PoE works. It does not matter whether I believe evil exist or not because the Problem of Evil is a problem for the internal consistency of the belief in an all-omni-God.
Something is good if it is pleasing to someone and if it does not involve inconvenience for anyone.
My post did not come from any site. It’s just a denial of Tony’s assertion.
How are these definitions helpful in determining what is true?
The opposite from ‘we don’t know’ is ‘we know’. If you know, then please tell us. That may even update the Vatican page, since now it tells exactly: ‘we don’t know’. Vatican page starts with telling us how painful and mysterious this question is. It continues with quotes of saints saying ‘this is all good and it’s God’s will, we don’t ask why’. And concludes with “But the ways of his providence are often unknown to us” , meaning unknown to CCC, and that we should wait to meet God face to face to maybe find out the answer. This may work for you as a believer, but this is an apologetic forum, where answers are expected.
Certainly regarding those “ways of Providence” that are unknown, in principle, or have been determined to be beyond human reason, it would be futile to ask why, but there is no implication in this Vatican document that ALL the ways of Providence are unknown. The entire quest of theology and the sciences in general are concerned, loosely speaking, with the “ways of Providence.” Your claim would cause all of these to come under the heading of “we don’t know.”
Your conclusion would entail that none of the ways of Providence are known to us merely because the ways are “often” unknown.
Certainly this cannot be even an adequate definition because it is a simple matter to imagine things that are good in many respects that are not pleasing to the individual who would benefit from them and have little or nothing to do with convenience.
Your example does not demonstrate how human suffering and anguished are avoided but rather how they become entrebched in the lives of those individuals making the choice.
I said, ‘Does not involve inconvenience for anyone’. I did not say, ’ Does not involve inconvenience for Henry VIIIl’. While it may be so that in the short term Henry’s nutritional habits weren pleasing to him, I doubt they were so in the long run. And I very much doubt that his egomaniacal behaviour would not have caused inconvenience to anyone at all. If, however, both requirements had been met by Henry VIII, then he would have been a “good” king.