God Probably Doesn't Exist.

R1. Higher Order Problem of EvilI have objections to both premises, ergo:“P1: There is gratuitous puzzlement.”While there is indeed puzzlement, it doesn’t follow that such a puzzlement is gratuitous (i.e. has no “positive” outcomes), that is something that needs to be proven, not assumed by Pro (and appeals to intuition, and “seeming’s” is insufficient to accomplish this). Simply appealing to a potentially infinite number of puzzlements doesn’t actually increase the likelihood of there existing at least one gratuitous puzzlement, since all such puzzlements are of the same logical structure, and thus can all share a common “redemption” for the perceived gratuity (there doesn’t need to actually be a known answer to the PoE, only good common reason to think the conclusion false). A analogy would be the claim that “there exists a raincloud that is actually Thor’s urine”, it doesn’t matter if there is one possible raincloud, or an infinite number, since all rainclouds have a common mechanism for formation, and hence infinite explanatory power is possible from one source. There existing infinite rainclouds doesn’t actually make it any more plausible that Thor urinated once on this planet.Further, if we assume normative morality, then there is no shortage of methodologies by which such puzzlement would not be gratuitous, for example puzzlements give us an increased sense of wonder of the natural world, and promote logical and critical thought.That is not to say that these are explanations, except that Pro assumes with no evidence, nor any reason that there is a gratuitous puzzlement when we haven’t exhausted the explanation sources of these puzzlements – especially when we discard normative morality and lean on moral scepticism (the notion that we do not have access to knowledge regarding moral truths). Believing that there is a mechanism – even in light of ignorance of what the mechanism, or redemption is sufficient to solve the issue of alleged gratuitous puzzlement without committing oneself to further puzzlements. We do this everyday for a plethora of problems – we do not have perfect knowledge, and it would be a tremendous leap for Pro to assert that these lead to a negative effect even when assuming normative ethics. Pro gives no reason to believe that our everyday notions of morality have anything to do with the contents of moral realism however, thus moral scepticism is default, and needs to be solved first before moral arguments possess cogency.[6]“P2: If God exists (and he is benevolent omniscient, and omnipotent) there is no gratuitous puzzlement”Pro hasn’t actually attempted to justify this premise. Puzzlement is not inherently tied to benevolence, or morality in general – and I will go further to argue that even suffering and pain is not inherently tied to morality. God is the ground of all morality, and thus it is by God’s standard that things are deemed good, evil, right or wrong. This can be affirmed by moral scepticism, where nobody has true moral knowledge, including whether or not morality has anything to do with human’s day-to-day lives. We have no reason to believe this would be the case, and conflating desires, and social behaviours with objective morality is patently absurd and a classical fallacy of equivocation.[6]R2. The Universe’s ExistenceSemanticsPro hasn’t defined “universe” here, but for the sake of argument I will assume that Pro is referring to “everything that exists in a metaphysically possible world”, which seems to be the most natural and consistent with his arguments, given that his argument is not scientific (and hence the scientific definition is inappropriate).OmnibenevolencePlease see my rebuttals to Pro’s first argument, love is not a prerequisite of benevolence. God can actually be morally indifferent (from the standpoint of normative ethics) to humans, for his goodness may well transcend what immediately happens on our planet. Until Pro solves moral scepticism – he cannot soundly make such claims. Why would we expect an all powerful transcendant being’s nature to be understandable to our contingent whims?God is contingentGod’s definition is only contingent if and only if it is being interpreted de re. And if it is being interpreted de dicto, then the many worlds objection applies (see later).[7]De dictoThe definition is de dicto if it is not subject specific, i.e. if “the contingent universe” is refers to the hypothetical contingent universe in the possible world that it exists within. i.e. not in explicit reference to our possible world that we are living and breathing in (although it can refer to such by accident).De reThe definition is de re when the subject is specific, i.e. if “the contingent universe” is specific to this contingent universe in this possible world. It is explicit to the universe that we live in right now, breathing in, and inhabiting in, and refers to nothing else except this.Pro has not been explicit in which definition of God he is arguing against, thus he would need to disprove both to uphold the resolution via. this argument.Furthermore, even if we assume a de re definition, and hence even if God’s definition is contingent, it doesn’t follow that God itself is contingent. It would mean that an act of God was contingent. God’s nature isn’t what he has done, it isn’t anybody’s nature what they have done. For example, take the proposition which I call “Pie”:“The circumference of a circle is a metaphysically necessary truth equal to pi, is one of the most important numbers in mathematics and was was discovered in babylon and computed by humans to 13.3 trillion digits in 2013”Pi being equal to the circumference of any circle is clearly a metaphysically necessary truth, yet the statement as a whole above is clearly not metaphysically necessary to be true. Thus, the statement that “Pie is true” is coherent (at least contingently), while the statement “the circumference of a circle is a metaphysically necessary truth equal to pi” is also necessarily true. By analogy, the same is true of God’s definition (with a necessary nature, and contingent reflationary attributes). Pro would have to argue that “Pie’s” contingency renders the truth of pi’s value contingent and hence incoherent to remain consistent.Many universes objectionIf we assume a de dicto definition of God, then his argument only works if and only if there exists a possible world where there doesn’t exist a universe, or if God has created a specific universe in each and every possible world (such as this specific universe).However, this doesn’t work if there are at least two possible different “universes” – in which case both universes (or more, perhaps infinite) would remain contingent by Leibniz metaphysics, since there is a possible world where that universe doesn’t exist, whilst remaining consistent with God’s de dicto definition that God is the efficient cause of every contingent universe. It would follow that the proposition “a universe exists in every possible world” is true, but it certainly would not follow that each of these hypothetical universes are metaphysically necessary (thus not contingent).Modal Realism“What makes it possible that there could be a cup off the table?... Where is the state of affairs that makes this true?”The truth bearer is that there is a metaphysically coherent state of affairs where the cup never came into contact with the table. If one recalls my original ontological argument, metaphysical incoherence only arises if and only if:1. There is an external contradiction with the contents of the possible world2. There is an internal contradictionIf both of these conditions are correct then the proposition is metaphysically possible. Thus is must beconsidered whether or not it is possible in principle to come up with a hypothetical set of necessary and contingent metaphysical constraints which still allow for the cup to not exist on the table.“On the other hand, we can state the truthmaker is a real cup that’s not on the table, just not in this immediate reality.”This is just false, due to my previous elucidation of metaphysical possibility. Why should we prefer Pro’s elucidation over mine? Pro just assumes with no justification that all other theories are false, including ones not conceived of yet which is a shifting of the burden of proof fallacy. It is not for me to prove his putative truthbearer false but for him to prove his true.Furthermore, Pro conflates “efficient causation” with “necessarily possible”. Just because a logical deduction renders that a proposition must be necessarily possible, doesn’t follow that the proposition lacks an efficient cause within the state of affairs it exists within. It would just follow that every genuinely possible state of affairs there would also exist God which was the efficient cause of that state of affairs.References6. http://plato.stanford.edu...7. http://plato.stanford.edu...