The Problem of Evil fails

Thank you for the interesting points. It should make for interesting discussion.CulpabilityDirect: As far as direct causation goes, because you chose to argue for God instead of Ra, Vishnu or even simply a generic, omniscient, omnipotent and omnipresent figure, you are bound by the documents that define the characteristics of God. Therefore, I needn't believe in The Bible to appreciate the argument presented on his behalf:1. God will do x (smite people) in the instance y (irreverent acts) occurs.2. The instance y has occurred.3. Therefore, God has done x.The Bible clearly states that God has already done x for the instances of y committed. It also makes clear that God will do x if other instances of y should be committed. We can therefore assume direct harm has already occurred and will continue to occur to people for exercising the gift he gave to them. Moreover, you cannot make the argument that you've never seen him do it because, again, you are bound by the documentation in which God is elucidated simply by the nature of your original argument.Indirect:I don't entirely embrace your definition of causation. I will, however, allow for the point that you make in which x requires an event in order for causation to be asserted. The creation of anything, however, is an event. Your very argument made explicit that God created free will and therefore, based on the laws of logic and physics, God is a cause of the harm that ensues from said creation.That answer may not satisfy you because society does not accept these definitions for determining responsibility. x can be the cause of y and yet not be responsible. This is true in your example of the person who invented factories and subsequent deaths. In society, we generally use legal principles to determine responsibility. These are based on knowledge and intent in addition to causation (both cognitive assessments comprise the legal term mens rea).Oliver Wendell Holmes famously said, "even a dog knows the difference between being kicked and stumbled over." Nearly all legal systems that have ever existed in civilized society have been based upon this premise. There are crimes punishable purely based on causation; these are generally always punished less severely than crimes with both causation and reasonable knowledge of foreseeable consequences. In turn, these are punished less strictly than crimes possessing causation, knowledge and intent.My argument is that, as stated above, God was the cause of suffering and pain (based on the definition of causation you gave; I believe on this point we can agree). The question upon which we disagree is whether God is responsible, to which I would argue that he is. Here's why:Being omnipotent, omniscient and omnipresent, God knows beyond all comprehension that his creation will cause harm and suffering. he knows of each and every instance of future suffering. Therefore, he is at present, guilty only of a second degree crime with causation and knowledge since it seems his intentions were "noble" (in the very same way we would punish an honor killing as a second degree murder rather than a first degree murder). We can already infer he is responsible, but the situation for God looks even more grim when, considering that if his intent was noble, and yet he knew his actions would cause more harm than good, what then does this tell us? This, however, is for another debate.Therefore, we can conclude that yes, God is responsible. We can cite the inventor of Oxycodon as a cause for its usage. Responsibility, however, is not given to him because at the time of invention, could not be required to reasonably assume that it would be anything more than a revolutionary painkiller used to treat patients at the discretion of doctors. We do, however, attach culpability to those who create this drug for sale to street dealers because they know beyond reasonable doubt that it will cause harm to those procuring it (we know this because that's the business model!).Disproportion of Free WillI appreciate your attempt to refute my argument and I appreciate that you bring up an interesting point down the line which I am quite excited to address. That being said, however, I don't think you full grasp the argument in its entirety so I will try to outline it more concisely and then perhaps, it will become more clear why your examples given do not fit.In order for it to be truly valuable, you claim God gave us unrestricted free will. If an entity has no restrictions, it is considered infinite. This implies that our free will is infinite in its inception. Now, I'm certain even you can agree that you cannot increase something that is infinite; all you can do is restrict it so as to make it finite. Therefore, if God wanted us to truly have unrestricted free will, he (omnipotent and omniscient as he is) would have implemented it in a way conducive to this. Unfortunately, however, he did not. The free will of others takes away from our own free will in varying proportions.Imagine, for a moment, a scale. on one side of the scale is absolute nothingness; no restriction of any kind. This side is our own willpower as given to us by God. On the other side of the scale, let us assume that we have grains of sand. Each grain of sand is minuscule and won't do much to tip the scale. These grains are the effects that the willpower of others has on us.Let us take your example of the thief who steals from the billionaire. In this instance, let's assume it is so minute as to cause only a grain of sand to be placed on the scale. His action has still revoked a minuscule amount of free will from the billionaire. In this scenario, the billionaire wanted to relax and do nothing but have a sandwich this afternoon (which is why he bought the bread). Now, that option is no longer available to him. He will have to instead, choose one of the other trillion or more options available to him. It doesn't seem like a problem on the surface, except these little grains of sand (or minor impositions on free will) begin to add up until the scale is overburdened and free will is highly restricted.This brings me to the interesting point you made about assistance granting more free will. This certainly can be true! A person who wishes to play soccer but cannot afford to do so is burdened with the many clumps of sand the soccer organization has placed upon him (their will to have the players fund the soccer league) has hindered his free will to play soccer. A kind person may come along and lift several clumps of sand by paying for his admission. In doing so, however, they have lifted some sand (perhaps I can give you this point, there is indeed less sand now than before). This is because he now no longer has the option of discovering a way to earn the money required to play. No matter how many grains of sand you unburden, you will always inadvertently add more because that's simply the nature of energy. Some will always be lost forever in any chemical reaction, no matter how minuscule. This is just as true with free will.ConclusionBased on this argument, it follows that there will always be an imbalance in favour of a continually restricted free will. You argue that God's motives to create free will were proportionally positive despite the responsibility that he must accept for pain and suffering. I would argue that he create a paradigm that leads to a Darwinian battle for free will, leading to gross improportionality, unfairness and dare I say, evil 9consult my definition above and incorporate the sand-scale analogy to see how this so). Therefore, the problem of evil still stands.