The Problem Of Evil Is Sound

He mentions a few theodicies, but they seem to fall short of the desired goal as theodicies generally do. As leading Christian philosopher Alvin Plantinga notes: "And here I must say that most attempts to explain why God permits evil - theodicies, as we may call them - strike me as tepid, shallow, and ultimately frivolous. Does evil provide us with an opportunity for spiritual growth, so this world can be seen as a vale of soul making? Perhaps some evils can be seen this way; but much leads to not growth but to apparent spiritual disaster. It is suggested that the existence of evil provides the opportunity for such goods as the display of mercy, sympathy, self-sacrifice in the service of others. .. Again, no doubt some evil can be seen this way. .. But much evil seems to elicit cruelty rather than sacrificial love. And neither of these suggestions, I think, takes with sufficient seriousness the sheer hideousness of some of the evils we see. " - Alvin Plantinga [1] ---Independence--- First off, my argument is about gratuitous suffering (not necessarily all suffering), so my opponent seems to miss the mark right off the bat. Either way, my opponent states that if God were to end all suffering then we would become less independent and we wouldn't work together to look for a way to help ourselves which is good. Without cancer, for example, we wouldn't work to find a cure and would depend on God for healing. However, it's not clear how us being more independent justifies the horror that all the people who go through cancer have to experience. Imagine I had a needle filled with HIV and injected your child with the virus, also imagine that I had the cure, and also suppose I told you that I did this so you could figure out the cure for yourself so you wouldn't depend on me. That is utter madness. Similarly, it would be evil for God to create a world where people necessarily get cancer, hold back his divine healing; all so we could find the cure ourselves while our loved ones suffer in pain and agony. If this wasn't true, then we should be happy when one of our loved ones get cancer because it would give us a chance to find a cure; but of course we should not be happy when our loved ones get cancer. Philosopher Quentin Smith makes a similar point: "[I]t is a self-evidently false moral principle that the evil of an incurable disease is outweighed by the good of the opportunity to prevent future occurrences of the disease. The falsity of this principle needs little reflection to become manifest. Consider that if this principle were true, we would rejoice with each new disease because it would give us the opportunity to prevent future instances of that disease. We would currently be celebrating the AIDS epidemic, because the thousands or millions who have died and will die agonizing deaths from this disease would give us the 'outweighing good' of the opportunity to prevent future instances of AIDS. But this is of course morally absurd. The evil of the actual instances of AIDS far outweighs whatever goodness belongs to the opportunity to prevent possible instances of it. " - Quentin Smith [2] Since independency from God so we can can help others ourselves pertaining to disease is implausible and counter-intuitive as an outweighing good; this theodicy seems to fail. Also, let's say independency increases the worlds goodness level by X amount, and requires Y amount evil. Since God is omnipotent he could increase the worlds goodness by X amount in another way not involving said independency or requiring Y amount of evil (as God can do anything logically possible). This means that Y amount of evil would still be gratuitous as God's omnipotence entails he could instantiate X amount of goodness without Y amount of evil as there is nothing incoherent about such a thing. This refutation works against any posited justification for apparent gratuitous suffering or evil my opponent could even possibly bring to the table. This is why theodicies fail; Nicholas Tattersall makes a point that somewhat resembles mine: "Why is producing a sound theodicy such a difficult task? The problem essentially comes down to the fact that things are so easy for the critic. When finding faults for attempted explanations of evil, all logical possibilities are open. .. Refutations of theodicies can often work by simply noting other possibilities open to God for achieving goals which do not involve intense suffering. " - Nicholas Tattersall [3] --Rape Intervention-- My opponent says that God would want us to intervene with regards to rape in order for us to help each other. However, if helping people is so good under Theism, then why doesn't God stop rape when nobody else can? Imagine a man captures a child and nobody sees, and drags a child to an abandoned barn miles and miles away from any other human. In this situation, there is no possibility of anybody intervening in the rape except God himself but God never intervenes. I'm sure many situations like this have happened over the course of human history. If God is is all-good then he is the standard of goodness meaning good is merely God-Likeness. So if God is the type of person who never stop rapes even when he can and just watches with inaction, and everything God does is good, then it follows that never stopping rape even when you can and just watching with inaction is good if God exists. However, never stopping rape even when you can and just watching with inaction is not good. Therefore, it follows that God does not exist. ---Must Moral Realism Be True If God Exists? --- Omnibenevolence is an objective property of God properly defined classically. It is inherent to his very nature and is not subject to change based on any opinion. Therefore, if God exists, Moral Realism is necessarily true. ---The Holocaust--- My opponent implies that the allowance of the Holocaust was good so we can learn to prevent future instances of genocide. However, this assumes that allowing genocide is bad. This contradicts Theism, because if allowing genocide is bad then God wouldn't have allowed the holocaust (as God only does what is good). Therefore, if what my opponent is saying is true, then Theism is false. One could say that only us preventing genocide entails the greater good, but God can't prevent the genocide without forgoing a greater good. Not only is this extremely ad hoc but it puts God's omnipotence in question. I'm sure if God wanted to he could intervene and prevent all genocide and find a way to make the intervention causally necessary for an even greater good than the good that would be entailed by the causally necessary evil that would have been prevented had he stopped said genocide. ---Can Morality Exist Without Suffering? --- If God exists, then he is morally good solely due to his nature and by definition; no suffering required. Therefore, if my opponent is right that morally requires suffering; God does not exist. Either way good does not require the amount of suffering we see in the world. Love is good, and I can love someone even if no Intense suffering existed. Generosity is good, and I can give even if people did not get raped and murdered. So this response may only work with regards to some goods, perhaps, not all. Also, remember, even one instance of gratuitous suffering disconfirms God's existence, so this line of reasoning from my opponent is not convincing. ---Conclusion--- The Problem of Evil withstands all of my opponent's objections; the resolution is still affirmed. ---Sources-- [1] Alvin Plantinga, "Self Profile" in Alvin Plantinga ed. James E. Tomberlin and Peter van Inwagen (Dordrecht, Holland: D. Reidal Publishing Company, 1985), p. 35. [2] RELIGIOUS STUDIES in 1992 (Volume 28, pp. 347-350) [3] . https://infidels.org...