The argument that there should be no pain and suffering in the world is vacuous unless it is supported by a detailed description of a feasible world in which there is no pain and suffering. This is an even taller order than less pain and suffering. Most philosophers who have studied the subject agree that there must be some evil in the world.
I guess the Philosophy board is not the right place to ask theodical questions. I’m not asking what most philosophers think. I’m asking why there is natural evil in the world that the Christian God created.
The Problem of Evil is accepted as a topic for a Ph.D. thesis!
Because it is inevitable in an immensely complex physical system where billions of living organisms are pursuing different goals. Development entails competition, success and failure. Natural evil is the price of the richness, variety and beauty of nature. Every advantage has its corresponding disadvantage. The more sensitive we are the more we can enjoy life but also the more we can suffer. (Our capacity for love is a good example. We can be filled with ecstasy or plunged into torment.) In short it is unreasonable to expect to have everything for nothing…
observation and imitation can be programmed too, sensors, processors and the right programming can imitate any behavior. they even have robots that can observe and imitate human facial expressions. therefore imitation and observation cant validate anthropomorphism either as a rational statement.
this is simply the loaded language fallacy, an attempt to influence an audience to accept an argument based on a description of behavior that wouls be commonly accepted as monstrous, evil, bad etc. instead of on the strength of the arguement alone.
yeah, i got one. i think you cant prove that G-d is responsible for any evil in the world and your argument is false. care to defend it?
**Wazzup, redhen?
You’re right, I can’t prove that G-d is responsible for any evil in the world, because I don’t know if such a G-d exists at all.
I’m not asking about the philosophical idea of morals and ethics, I’m asking about theodicy, the justification of evil in a world created by **Theos/**God.
That’s one model. Is it not possible there could be other models the Creator could have used that did not involve pain and suffering (for all organisms)? I can think of one off the top of my head, something along the lines of heaven, or the universe before the creation of man, where only angelic beings inhabited the cosmos. I’m sure there are other such models.
Moral evil as a consequence of sin I can understand, but natural evil is still a mystery.
from your link…
But, given your argument that everything was created by God, then, yes, he is ultimately responsible for it. But, it can also be argued that God uses ALL things to demonstrate his might and glory. The inference in your statement, theodicically (is that a word?) is that this some how makes God out to be evil. No offense,…but I find that logic to be intrinsically Satanic.not to imply that you are a satanist.
i contend that there is no thing such as “natural evil”, storms, earthquakes, volcanoes, etc.
Theodicy is a metaphysical topic in the Philosophy of Religion…,
It is necessary to explain exactly how a theoretical model of a superior universe could be implemented if it is to be considered a genuine possibility. Where there are finite individuals pursuing their own goals how could the element of interference, failure and frustration be eliminated? Without a detailed blueprint it remains a fantasy…
Such a model is devoid of the richness of physicality.
So we are back to God’s answer to Job, simply put “who are you to question me?”
Do not the purely spiritual, angelic beings interact with this physical world? Did not Jacob **wrestle **with an angel? That’s pretty physical.
Like the natural disasters visited upon the Egyptians, just to harden Pharaoh’s heart? The Bible has many examples of God sending natural evils against Israel and individuals as punishment for sin. (Funny how God is anthropomorphized all the time in the Bible, in this case vengeance, yet I’m always accused of the same thing when it comes to animals).
Well, since I doubt the existence of either of these two spiritual beings, that’s really not my problem. That’s the problem of theodicy, which has been around since the beginning of recorded history, and will probably stick around as long as homo sapiens exists.
This question takes this thread off topic. Please start another thread on the question of theodicy.
Not necessarily. I think he has a valid argument. I do not agree with his line of reasoning. But, still, it does have some merit.
i would say that we are not right back to that, we never left that answer. people want to make sense of things based on the information they possess, its a natural tendency of being human. yet that doesnt overcome the irrationality of trying to draw valid conclusions from wildly insufficient information. no matter how badly one may want to, they simply cannot draw valid conclusions on the subject. therefore the POE was always an illusion built on ignorance of the necessary information, and not on a rational position, but an emotional one.
**Well, it is says in the Bible that he made us in his likeness. So anthropomorphizing God is really more like saying that you are turning your father into yourself. But, given the capacity for cruelty which humans exhibit towards animals and each other. I can see your line of reasoning. “If we are cruel, then God must be cruel.” and vice versa. Since we are made in his likeness. The God of the Old testament did demand animal sacrifice as propitiation for sin. This is evidenced through out the entire Old Testament.
