Theistic god logically disproved - Problem of Evil FINISHED

[3Sum]

First, I'll list some definitions and the argument in a logical form. Then I'll move onto more casual argumentation and defense of the argument.

LOGICAL FORM

god – highly intelligent omnipotent, omniscient, omnibenevolent being which created the universe.

I'll mostly refer to it as a „OOO god“(3 omnis) or "god" if I forget the OOO part, point is whenever I speak of god this is the definition of god I'm using

Evil – Everything which intentionally, unnecessarily hurts some being. I'll divide them into 2 categories

1) Evils in nature. Natural disasters and diseases. I have never even heard of a good argument against natural evils and most believers would either stop arguing with me or completely ignore my points about them.

2) Evils occuring as a result of human nature. This is usually considered explained away by "free will". But is it? No. Not even closely.

Omnibenevolent – the attribute of not unnecessarily harming others, preventing harm if possible and working to bring peace, harmony and happines unto others. A being which either creates evil and/or lets evil be without removing it is not omnibenevolent
Omniscient – knows everything
Omnipotent – all powerful

Although I myself find most of these ideas like omnixxxx ridiculous I'm trying to convince theists so I'll use their definitions and terms. Most of them just say something like „well, god can't make a logical contradiction but he can do everything logically possible“ so I'm sticking to that kind of reasoning.

There are 2 variations of the problem of evil I thought of and put in a logical form. One would be perfectly enough to disprove the OOO god if sound but I put up two in case one gets refuted . First one deals with the logical impossibility of an OOO god that creates evil even though he's capable of not creating it, second one deals with the fact that god is absent (almost though as if he didn't exist ) and does nothing to remove evils, which is contradictory to OOO traits attributed to him.

Argument against creation of evil:

P1: An OOO god wants to create our world without evil, knows how to do it and is capable of doing it.
P2: Therefore, if an OOO god existed there would be no evil in our world.
P3: There is evil in our world.
C: An OOO god doesn't exist.

Argument against god's lack of reaction to evil:

P1: An OOO god knows about evil, wants to remove evil from existence and is capable of it.
P2: Therefore, if an OOO god existed he would remove evil from existence (evil would not exist)
P3: Evil exists.
C: An OOO god doesn't exist.


PROBLEM OF EVIL DEFENSE

Here I'll elaborate a little bit more on the arguments.

Argument against creation of evil - A god is omnipotent, therefore he is capable of creating a world without evil. He is omnibenevolent, therefore he wishes to create a world with maximal goodness. And he is omniscient(which is a little redundant considering he already has omnipotence) so he knows how to realize his plans. Evil and good are reversely proportionate -> The less evil there is in the world the more good there is in the world. If there is no evil in the world then there is a maximal amount of goodness in the world. Therefore, a god would strive to creating a world with maximal goodness and no evil.

Just consider this and tell me which god is the better one:

a)god X creates a world A which is maximal in goodness. No living being ever suffers and everybody and everything lives in perfect harmony without ever hurting each other. Like an utopia we humans(or at least I) strive towards so much. God doesn't require of us to be irrational and have faith(belief without evidence) and instead interacts with humans daily, helps them and provides divine guidance to our race. Now, THAT sounds like a good god.

b)god Y creates a world B full of suffering. Now I'm talking about our world, earth. Billions and billions of living beings suffered, enduring agonizing pain and dying in various brutal ways. Thousands of people die of hunger and horrible diseases, people are getting shot, raped and beaten to death every day. And what about carnivores? Seriously, an organism (supposedly) designed purely for BRUTALLY KILLING others? If predator doesn't catchy it's prey, the predator dies of starvation. If predator catches its prey, the prey dies an agonizing and frightening death. Not to mention how much I could write about all the various nasty diseases. Ever heard of smallpox and black plague? What kind of a SICK, SADISTIC designer would design something like that? And what about natural disasters? Tornados, earthquakes, volcano eruptions, floods, tsunamis etc. Such phenomenons wouldn't happen in a perfectly designed earth, now would it? That means that god either: 1) Couldn't have made it better(not omnipotent and omniscient), 2) Didn't want to make it better(not omnibenevolent) and 3) Maybe, just MAYBE... god doesn't exist .

I think I'm justified in saying that god X is better than god Y, am I not?

Argument against god's lack of reaction to evil
- First thing I'm probably going to hear here is "FREE WILL BLAH BLAH WE CAN CHOOSE BETWEEN GOOD AND EVIL BLAH BLAH". So I'll address it immediately with my

Refutation of free will

Free will as a concept is flawed

I have a problem with the classical concept of free will, as it doesn't make much sense. First of all, why the "free" part? Our will is obviously not free from everything. It's bound by natural laws, our own mind and even the laws of the state in which we live in.

I can't really DO what I WANT, I don't even have the free will to CONTROL what I WANT. Example for the former: I can't survive without nutrition. Example for the latter: I'm a male and I can't want to have sex with another man since I'm not biologically determined to be homosexual.

We humans are simply acting according to our DNA, brain and chemical reactions in it. Who (supposedly) designed our brain and the way that natural laws act upon substances for chemical reactions to occur? God. So, god is ultimately responsible for whatever we do since he supposedly designed EVERYTHING, including US HUMANS. And since he is omniscient and omnipotent he could have designed us any way he wanted and he knows what the repercussions will be of any particular type of design and knows what we will do and want before us. That already invades my free will for privacy.

I also have a will to summon dragons and fly over the world with them, ridding the world of evils. But I don't have the free will to do that, do I now? Now, why would god give some people the freedom to do evil and not give me the freedom to do good? Calling it "free will" just because we're free in certain aspects of our lives is idiotic, it's like calling an inmate in a 3x3 meters room free just because he can choose what to do in the room. Extremely shallow and pathetic.

Free will, evil and morality

A good god wouldn't create beings wanting to do evil. Besides, god supposedly already made a lot of limitations already(as I listed above) so I don't see why wouldn't he make a POSITIVE limitation and remove some of the NEGATIVE ones. Removing evil from mankind would be a POSITIVE limitation. Even us humans are moral and rational enough to determine that absolute freedom is negative for the society and that we need limitations(LAWS) and that an individual is free as long as he doesn't hurt others(do evil). Not only is wanting to do evil unnecessary in being a moral agent and a free person, it's UNWANTED since us moral humans DON'T WANT others to want to do harm and evil, even at the expense of their freedom (prisons). So why doesn't god realize that and remove evil from mankind? Why didn't god make us FREE FROM EVIL? God could have given us the ability to make choices but between good choices, not good and bad choices.

I'll try to illustrate another point with the following question:

If you see a pedophile trying to rape a child would you: A) Stop him from hurting the child or B) Say: "Oh well, it's your free will to rape that child and I can't interfere with other people's free will, so go ahead".

I assume that you would do A. So why does god do B? What kind of a sadistic, perverse, psychopath monster creates a psychopath and then lets it rape a child, CARING MORE ABOUT THE PEDOPHILE'S FREE WILL THAN THE VICTIM'S?

Heaven and hell, concerning free will. If you don't believe in heaven, this argument doesn't apply to you

So, a presumably good god creates evil beings in a world full of evil and lets them do evil to innocent, good beings. He thinks that somehow a world WITH evil as a result of free will is BETTER than a world without. Or does he? What's the point of heaven and hell then?

Do we have free will in heaven and hell? The answer for hell is an obvious NO. Setting aside the ridiculous concept of hell, an infinite punishment by torture for a finite sin which ultimately won't benefit anybody since the victim will be tortured forever AGAINST HIS FREE WILL in god's personal torture chamber I'll mostly focus on heaven.

Assuming that in heaven nobody ever does anything evil, do we have free will in heaven? Pick: A) No - We lose our free will in heaven or B) Yes, free will can be had without ever doing evil.

Also, if there is a heaven what's the point of this life? In comparison to heaven this life seems pointless. There's no reason to live in an imperfect world full of evil and suffering if you can live in a perfect world full of goodness. So why wouldn't everybody just suicide and go to heaven? Though if heaven really existed, "suicide" and "death" as concepts completely lose their meaning and negative connotations and "dying" is actually a positive thing cause it's a transcendence to a higher, better reality. And since god is supposedly good I'm sure he wouldn't mind us avoiding unnecessary suffering. So why don't we massively commit suicides?

Simply, because we know that this life is the only one we have and that heaven doesn't exist and that's a proven scientific fact (psychology, brain biology anyone?). About as certain as gravity. Most people know that on a subconscious level anyway, and that's why they don't commit suicide and are still afraid of death and mourn their loved ones when they die.

[Immanuel Can]

Omnibenevolent – the attribute of not unnecessarily harming others, preventing harm if possible and working to bring peace, harmony and happines unto others. A being which either creates evil and/or lets evil be without removing it is not omnibenevolent

There is but the first in a serious of factual and logical missteps, I'm afraid.

The traditional triadic claim about God is "Omniscient, Omnipotent and Omnipresent." You've substituted the third of these for a contrivance of your own, "Omnibenevolence," then defined it as a sort of "short-term pleasantness," essentially, and then condemned the view you've created for failing to meet your own contrived definition.

But you don't really describe benevolence at all. Benevolence can be long-term, not short-term. It can take into account present apparent 'harms' with an ultimate good in view. It can weigh off relative goods and harms, and arrive at a right balance, and so on. For example, a "benevolent" parent can withhold money from a child now, with a view to funding university later; or he can allow a child to fall down and skin his knees because that's the way the child learns to ride a bike; or he can choose to allow a child to undergo a painful surgery in order to correct a spinal defect, etc.

Benevolence can only be judged by it's ultimate result. Unfortunately for your argument, you are not in possession of any grounds for such a judgment. So you are simply jumping to a condemning conclusion that you cannot actually justify.

The rest...well, since you fell down on the very first premise, the rest pretty much tumbles as a result. You'll need to rework the whole thing. But before you do, you'll have to solve the "benevolence-defining" problem you've now set to yourself.

[QMan]

Just wondering, but this is really a very extensive research project you have created for yourself here and I would probably not try to dig into (non-existent) encyclopedic type of knowledge over here but research it on- line first. That way you could also buttress your arguments if you needed to.

Then I would give a short overall scope and then introduce one or two arguments at a time trying to come to a consensus on them. This would be real progress because as I observe, even partial consensus is never reached here so that there are never definite conclusions.

I am afraid, this will otherwise just get very messy like a lot of the stuff here.

[3Sum]

The traditional triadic claim about God is "Omniscient, Omnipotent and Omnipresent." You've substituted the third of these for a contrivance of your own, "Omnibenevolence,"

TBH though I find listing omnipresent redundant seeing how we have omnipotence and omniscience already. Besides, I even find listing omnipotence and omniscience separately redundant since omniscience means one would know the way to achieve omnipotence and omnipotence means god can do anything and even achieve omniscience if he so desires.

All these omniblahblahs are ridiculous when looked at closely.

Omnibenevolence my own? Not even closely. It's what most theists I know use to describe god.

then defined it as a sort of "short-term pleasantness," essentially, and then condemned the view you've created for failing to meet your own contrived definition.

When did I say anything about "short-term pleasantness"? Please don't put up strawmans.

But you don't really describe benevolence at all. Benevolence can be long-term, not short-term. It can take into account present apparent 'harms' with an ultimate good in view. It can weigh off relative goods and harms, and arrive at a right balance, and so on. For example, a "benevolent" parent can withhold money from a child now, with a view to funding university later; or he can allow a child to fall down and skin his knees because that's the way the child learns to ride a bike; or he can choose to allow a child to undergo a painful surgery in order to correct a spinal defect, etc.

Although I see your point, you're thinking about god as a limited, incapable human. Us humans only do harm to others when it is necessary in order to do greater good. There is no harm that is necessarily done by an omnipotent, omniscient, omnibenevolent god.

However, if humans, like god, had no restrictions and if a doctor f.e. COULD conduct a surgery without harming the patient then he WOULD be obliged to do so.

My argument relies on definitions, true, but what argument doesn't? Even though there are some extremely morally complex issues like abortion on which I don't even have a definite opinion yet, every sane human being should agree that causing ANY unnecessary (which doesn't result in a greater good) harm is wrong, or, if you prefer, EVIL.

God creating a process for which he knew (omniscience) will result in the suffering and deaths of billions when he could have done otherwise (omnipotence) is morally inexcusable. And god's lack of action to at least try to nullify the evils resulting in his process is also despicable.

[Immanuel Can]

God creating a process for which he knew (omniscience) will result in the suffering and deaths of billions when he could have done otherwise (omnipotence) is morally inexcusable. And god's lack of action to at least try to nullify the evils resulting in his process is also despicable.

You're angry about something...I get that. I'm not sure what it is, and I won't pry. I don't think it's about the "billions," though. If it were, you'd probably be inclined to less-charged language.

Your problem remains your concept of "benevolence." You seem to suppose that nothing you do not personally happen to understand at the moment is capable of a rational explanation or of moral justification. Yet there's no reason to think that's so. My example of human situations is a fair analogy, because all I use it for is to show the principle that benevolence itself has the qualities of being long-term, admitting proximal pains, etc. And as you admit, that's pretty clearly true.

Omnipotence doesn't really change the equation in this regard. Human or divine, the principle sticks. Even an omnipotent being could justifiably prefer long-term good to short term, allow for proximal pains, etc. In fact, if He didn't, he would be *less* capable (perhaps because *less* knowledgeable of outcomes) than the human doctor, who after all *can* do such things.

Interestingly, you also suppose that physical "death" is the worst thing that could ever happen to a human being: but what if it's not? What if there are other things our there that are worse? I certainly think there are. And if there are worse things, then we might ask how we can pass judgment upon God for having allowed a lesser evil to take place in order to prevent a greater one, or even to produce a very great ultimate good.

if humans, like god, had no restrictions and if a doctor f.e. COULD conduct a surgery without harming the patient then he WOULD be obliged to do so.

Ah, but who would "oblige" Him? Being the source of moral authority in the universe, who shall call Him to account? And since, as Nietzsche so clearly pointed out, within Materialism there is no standard of good and evil, how shall we even identify that "evil" has been done? By the fact that we happen not to like whatever it is? Is that much of a condemnation? From whence, then, your concept of "evil"?

Now to the intersection of "Omnibenevolence" and Omnipotence. As a matter of fact, there are some things that God cannot do. This is why "omnipotence" must be properly explicated. Biblically speaking, God cannot lie, cannot fail, cannot break His promises, and cannot sin. He has "omnipotence" in respect to every outcome coherent with the character of a righteous and loving God, it is true. But He does not have "omnipotence" if by that word we wish to include such things as lying, failing, etc.

Something God cannot do as well is self-defeat. He cannot prevent Himself from doing what He wishes to do. This is why the old "God-and-the-rock" chesnut is a waste of time: as worded, it's self-defeating. As C.S. Lewis once put it, "Nonsense is nonsense, even when we're talking about God." God does not do nonsense.

Your "omnibenevolence" definition is also self-defeating. It assumes "benevolence" means "preventing all perceived harms." But this cuts out long-term benevolence, or omniscient benevolence, or benevolence that extends beyond the human horizon. In other words, it really poses a curtailed, personal definition of "benevolence" against the more full-blooded understanding of "benevolence."

God cannot fail to be "benevolent," even if that "benevolence" requires the allowing of things which seem to you to be "evils" to exist for a time, possibly in view of greater good or prevention of greater evils. But we will not know if and how genuine "benevolence" has been done until the Final Judgment Day.

[3Sum]

It's really fun to see lengths at which the theists will go to defend their delusion.

Look at yourself. Look at what you're saying. Look at how much you've redefined your definition of good, we can't even call it good anymore.

You kill an innocent man? Rape a child? Do any evil? No problem, just say that it is for long-time good and that just because the judge and the jury don't understand it at the moment doesn't mean that there is no rational and moral justification.

I already said that if doctors did discover a way to alleviate open wounds without making the patient suffer, they would be obliged to do so. An all good being wouldn't prefer harming somebody AND doing good to just doing good.

Besides, the kind of evils I'm mostly addressing are natural disasters, diseases, murders, rape, poverty, famine etc. What good comes out of a Tsunami killing thousands of people? Or smallpox killing millions, making them die agonizing deaths? Or a woman being raped? Or a child dying of hunger?

Please. Your definition of good = my definition of evil. What's worse, that's MASKING the evil under the word good, which is deceit.


Get back to me when you set your morals straight. Also, physical death? You mean just death, right? Cause, newsflash: Death is the end of our human existence. Please educate yourself on psychology and brain biology.

[Immanuel Can]

You kill an innocent man? Rape a child? Do any evil? No problem, just say that it is for long-time good and that just because the judge and the jury don't understand it at the moment doesn't mean that there is no rational and moral justification.

Of course I said no such thing. Reductio ad Absurdum...a fallacy, of course.

I was speaking generally, of "harm" considered en masse, and defined by your own terms, "non-benevolence," if you will. You were, up to this point, keeping things in generalities yourself, so you can hardly fault me for that. All I suggested is that "harm," considered as a general collective, is not necessarily rationally incompatible with a benevolent Creator.

So now you want to know about *specific* evils? Well, that requires much more detailed parsing. And while you've still not given a stitch in justification of your use of a term that can have no meaning in your worldview, I will overlook that for a minute and propose that we consider all of the cases above clear examples of "evil." We can borrow a more traditional worldview to justify the thing temporarily, on the understanding you are free to revert to your own later.

You seem rather animated and personal about this issue. I'm not here to "score points" so I'm going to step aside and allow someone else to speak. It will, at the very least, save us both a lot of typing.

http://rf.convio.net/site/R?i=qivafUib0n2K_9BF5V22rw

[3Sum]

Of course I said no such thing. Reductio ad Absurdum...a fallacy, of course.

Seems to me like you should read what Reductio ad Absurdum is again. Cause I didn't commit a fallacy.

I was simply applying abstract moral reasoning to more concrete examples to show you how immoral you sound. Considering that you seemed appalled I think I achieved my goal.

Except that with the god example it's much worse... since he started a process for which he knew will result in the agony and suffering of BILLIONS of organisms, not ONE as in my example. But I guess you're too delusional to even consider objectively what I'm saying and will just write anything off and argue against anything just because it's contrary to your religious beliefs and what bothers me personally - that you are willing to give up your moral compass in favor of a false, illogical idea.

Although if you point me to WLC's ReasonableFaith website I'm afraid you're already brainwashed...

[Felasco]

Please prove that the human logic you are using to conduct your analysis is binding on the area you appear to be making claims about, all of reality, and any gods contained within.

As a start, you might define "all of reality". What is it's size, shape, dimensions, boundaries etc? Just some basic facts to get us started.

[bobevenson]

As expressed in the book of Revelation and "The Ouzo Prophecy," there is an eternal struggle between good and evil that is symbolically represented by the Ouzo Cross; it is a struggle between what God hath put in our hearts to fulfill his will and the false prophets of our institutions.

[HexHammer]

People today confuse the bible stuff with modern concepts of "good and evil", neither of past leaders had "perfect modern concepts of moral and ethics", but had quite abominable methods to keep their reign.
Imo our demands of God has gone too far and we demand too much.

[3Sum]

Please prove that the human logic you are using to conduct your analysis is binding on the area you appear to be making claims about, all of reality, and any gods contained within.

As a start, you might define "all of reality". What is it's size, shape, dimensions, boundaries etc? Just some basic facts to get us started.

"all of reality"? I'm talking about the reality we explored so far. It falls under the definition of an omniscient and omnipotent god to be able to be anywhere and know any evil and how to prevent it. That means that he must know about the evils on the earth and how to prevent them, and moreover he is the one who supposedly created them.

I do not know all reality. But god supposedly does. All reality includes our reality.

So WHAT are you exactly saying? That god doesn't know about evil in our world? That he can't prevent it? That he doesn't want to prevent it? Or maybe that evil in our reality is actually good in his reality?

HexHammer I've seen your Mercedes thread and that seems like a huge strawman argument of my original problem of evil. Are you seriously comparing not giving a Mercedes to somebody with designing babies in such a way that they die, deformed and in terrible pains just couple of months after birth? And what about letting all the millions of people die of smallpox and black plague? Please. I think that you'd say that even us humans would have a moral obligation to stop such evils if we could. A being that has infinitely more power and knowledge to stop those evils and is supposedly infinitely better than all of us is bound to stop those evils.

And for god, stopping such evils is much easier than for humans and he is supposedly also much better (omnibenevolent, no human can be called that), he could remove all evils in less than a second and with no effort at all, right? Hell, why even design such diseases in the first place?

[Greylorn Ell]

3Sum,

You have proven that the "God" created by Augustine and Aquinas, with the help of Hermes Trismegistus and generations of confused religionists does not exist. So, rest on that laurel for awhile. Eventually it'll make your butt itchy, meaning that it's time to get up, put the thinking cap back on and go back to work.

So you've proven that an entity that logically cannot exist, cannot exist. What about an entity that might be able to handle the job of universe-creation, and whose properties are logically limited?

Have you disproved the existence of a creator in general? How about this version, still a few ticks away from general popularity?

God thinks and therefore does not know everything (not omniscient).

God is not omnipotent. He did not create the universe from nothing, but rather from energy, making use of the only small force at his disposal-- the ability to freely violate the second law of thermodynamics.

God is neither singular nor male, but since "it" feels inappropriate, the male (or on special occasions) the female pronoun works for me. Given that lots of "gods" were involved in engineering the creation process, there is room for both sexes, interpreted with respect to engineering styles since immaterial creators are unlikely to possess genitalia. (I'd propose that wolverines and hummingbirds were created by engineers with differing perspectives and styles, but you would likely "sex" these styles differently than I do.)

So, out of curiosity, where might such possibilities take you?