The Problem of Evil

[fantome profane]

Well, that is EXACTY what atheist are baling God for in the Problem of Evil are they not?

No, that is what I am trying to tell you. The problem of evil is not about blaming "God". It is about a logical contradiction.

And as, and having just asked this, what is it that causes bad things?

Why do men rape women?

Why do men murder men?

Because they choose to.

And since EVERY rebuttal to the Problem of Evil for literal millennia has pointed out the consequences of Free will, and the real cause of evil is man choosing to do wrong, then we are left with ...

atheists not wanting to concede a point?

What causes this evil?

And as God's Plan of Salvation both grants us free will and promises us suffering ... how exactly is your conclusion that man causes these things a rebuttal?

Right, you MUST blame God rather than man instead, even as you acknowledge that man causes these things ... which is exactly what God tells us. And has for millennia.

Please explain it rather than reject it because it clashes with your faith.

Yes, men commit evil. And more to the point men allow evil to occur.

If I see a man abusing and killing a child, that man is evil. If I stand by and watch, having the ability to stop it, and not stopping it, I am evil. So if a man kills an innocent you can conclude either that I was unable to stop it, or I was unwilling to stop it.

So if an innocent child is murdered you can logically deduce that I cannot be omnipotent, and loving. Or else that innocent child would not have been murdered.

The free will response is nonsense. If I have the power to stop a murder or rape or child abuse I will do so. We employ police just for the purpose of doing this. We don't care about the free-will of murderers to murder. If we protected the free will of murderers to commit murder that would be evil. We don't do that. We do everything in our power to interfere with the free-will of murderers to kill. That is good.

If "God" is protecting the free will of a murderer, and not protecting the victim, that "God" is evil. The point isn't to blame "God". The point is that if you believe in an "all good God" then this is a logical contradiction.

(If you believe as Cynthia does that "God" is good and evil, this is not a logical contradiction)

 

[CynthiaCypher]

If there was no suffering there would be no evil.

That's not they way some of us see it. We believe that without suffering there would be no good, no agency and no achievement or growth.

 

[fantome profane]

That's not they way some of us see it. We believe that without suffering there would be no good, no agency and no achievement or growth.

That is fair enough. But

But right now, somewhere in the world a child is being born. That child is sick, in terrible agony, and before you have time to reply to this post, that child will have died. No achievement, no growth, no learning. Just pain. This happens. This happens every day.

You can't deny the existence of evil, you can't ignore it, and you can't justify it, and you can't rationalize it away.

 

[technomage]

You can't deny the existence of evil, you can't ignore it, and you can't justify it, and you can't rationalize it away.

No, you can't ... as long as you keep using your simplistic, black-and-white understanding of the word "evil."

C'mon, Fantome ... even as an agnostic, I can see that the Problem of Evil is _far_ more complex, and requires far more nuance, than you're giving it credit for. You can accuse others of not seeing the problems ... why can you not see that the "problems" you're citing come mainly from the oversimplification that you're using?

 

[cottage]

If there was no suffering there would be slavery.

If there was no suffering there would be nothing to push us outside our comfort zone.

If there were no suffering there would be neither good nor evil.

Not so. God could have created a possible world with no evil and suffering, i.e. goodness at a basic level and where the inhabitants coexist harmoniously but aspire to raise their consciousness and achieve higher levels of goodness in the relationship with their neighbours.

The problem of evil is little more than an illogical attempt to apply logical standard to an illogical premise.

Then please provide me with an argument to demonstrate that so I can give you my response?

God has shared with us his Plan of Salvation. A plan in which ALL but those who choose to know him and reject him anyway, the sole unpardonable sin, will return to him.

Does that strike you as evil because you will endure suffering for a small bit of time against eternity?

Yes, it does! There is no such thing as ‘a small bit of suffering’ given as some kind of mitigation. What is done cannot be undone. Even God cannot delete history or make the past non-existent. God’s copy book is blotted for eternity. The contradiction stands.

Its like saying the pain of a vaccination is 'evil'.

Really?

And with no God, you still have the problem of evil do you not? Why do bad things happen?

Why do some men rape women?

Why do some men murder other men?

Because they choose to.

And that seems to be in line with consequences of granting free will doesn't it?

Why is it that atheists blame God for these things, even as they accept the reality of the situation?

It’s rather absurd to say atheists ‘blame God’, when by the very definition of that appellation we hold the view that no such being exists. And free will doesn’t imply evil and suffering as a choice (more on which in a moment).

It cannot be the case that God must create a world with suffering. And as wecan conceive of the world not existing, since there is nothing contradictory in the notion, we can confidently make the assertion that the world need not exist. So it must follow that if our world need not exist, then the same applies to the suffering that is contained in our world. Now, we might want to argue that this particular world, as it is, cannot exist without suffering. But that would just be question begging, and making a special plea for this world and the suffering it contains. If ‘God exists’ is true then suffering exists because it is his will, and not because of any logical necessity. Therefore the argument finds that there is no compassionate God; either that or he it is impotent in this respect.

In the matter of God creating a world without suffering there are several points to be made, logical and practical. If God was under no logical compunction to create the world (or us) it certainly can’t be said that he had to create a world containing evil, for there is no logical absurdity in conceiving a world without evil. The typical response to this is: ‘There would be no point in God creating a world of automatons’ (or 'slaves' according to you), who always did exactly as programmed, and so he created a world of free agents with the power to make choices. There are two things wrong with that. It assumes that evil must be available as a possible choice - an exquisite example of begging the question, since evil exists only because it is God’s will, and self-evidently if he didn’t will it then it wouldn’t exist! The other point is that we can make all sorts of choices without having to inflict pain and suffering on our fellow men, and nor do we need evil as a perverse form of adversity test. We can conceive of a world devoid of evil, where the inhabitants co-exist in a harmonious way. And doesn’t that fit the notion of heaven, as believed or envisioned by many theists?

 

[fantome profane]

No, you can't ... as long as you keep using your simplistic, black-and-white understanding of the word "evil."

C'mon, Fantome ... even as an agnostic, I can see that the Problem of Evil is _far_ more complex, and requires far more nuance, than you're giving it credit for. You can accuse others of not seeing the problems ... why can you not see that the "problems" you're citing come mainly from the oversimplification that you're using?

I see that. I am not claiming that all evil is unjustifiable. I do agree with Cynthia that suffering can lead to growth, advancement. But that is not the entire picture. I am willing to consider the entire nuanced meaning, as long as we do consider the entire meaning.

I am not suggesting that a loving "God" would or should solve all of our problems. But nor am I willing to ignore truly tragic and pointless suffering.

Not so. God could have created a possible world with no evil and suffering, i.e. goodness at a basic level and where the inhabitants coexist harmoniously but aspire to raise their consciousness and achieve higher levels of goodness in the relationship with their neighbours.

This is absolutely not the argument I am making.

 

[cottage]

That's not they way some of us see it. We believe that without suffering there would be no good, no agency and no achievement or growth.

This is another argument that is sometimes given to justify evil and suffering, and it is one that makes a peculiar circuit returning the problem to the place it started. It is saying evil and suffering is necessary to overcome evil and suffering. Now that might arguably be necessary in our contingent world where a murderer is put to death for his crime, which can be said to be good in the sense that no more people will be murdered by that particular individual. But even in that case is it really a greater good?

And it seems to me to be morally reprehensible to have one person suffer so that another can come to their aid and thus be seen as good person, when that person’s goodness is artificially dependent on the former person’s suffering. It is simply wrong to say this is the best possible world that God could have created. There is no reason to believe that God could not have created a possible world where the inhabitants were all good and where evil never existed; for it would still be possible for the inhabitants to aspire to and achieve a greater good. By simply living one’s life doing no harm to others it can be considered good, but to go the extra distance helping, assisting, or befriending others must surely rate as a greater good. To conclude, it seems evident that a world that contains suffering must be the very worst of all possible worlds. And at this point we may hear from theists that say God gave free will to humans, who are the source of their own misfortunes.

 

[idav]

This is another argument that is sometimes given to justify evil and suffering, and it is one that makes a peculiar circuit returning the problem to the place it started. It is saying evil and suffering is necessary to overcome evil and suffering. Now that might arguably be necessary in our contingent world where a murderer is put to death for his crime, which can be said to be good in the sense that no more people will be murdered by that particular individual. But even in that case is it really a greater good?

And it seems to me to be morally reprehensible to have one person suffer so that another can come to their aid and thus be seen as good person, when that person’s goodness is artificially dependent on the former person’s suffering. It is simply wrong to say this is the best possible world that God could have created. There is no reason to believe that God could not have created a possible world where the inhabitants were all good and where evil never existed; for it would still be possible for the inhabitants to aspire to and achieve a greater good. By simply living one’s life doing no harm to others it can be considered good, but to go the extra distance helping, assisting, or befriending others must surely rate as a greater good. To conclude, it seems evident that a world that contains suffering must be the very worst of all possible worlds. And at this point we may hear from theists that say God gave free will to humans, who are the source of their own misfortunes.

Destruction is the way of creation. Without the duality there would be no change, no ebb and flow, there would be no point.

 

[cottage]

That's not they way some of us see it. We believe that without suffering there would be no good, no agency and no achievement or growth.

Continuation...

There are several arguments made in favour of evil as a positive concept. One is that the existence of evil and suffering allows us to develop and grow. Another apologetic is the Parent/Child analogy, where suffering serves as an admonishment or warning, allowing us to learn to avoid harmful situations. There is also the argument that suffering is good in relative terms, and another that makes the case that it is better for evil to exist as a choice rather than for humans to be mere automatons (the free will defence). And there is another offering, sometimes referred to as the Ying and Yang argument. This very common (but hugely mistaken, in my view) understanding is that that there can be no good without evil, and therefore (so the argument goes) evil is therefore good. (I have a separate response to this one) All of these positions can be met with the objectionthat they make evil a condition of the argument. And that means God caused evil and suffering to exist unnecessarily. To which it cannot be replied that causing evil is necessary, unless we also want to accept that God is powerless in that respect, which of course is self-evidently absurd if God is omnipotent.

 

[Ouroboros]

Lot of people of the more atheistic persuasion are somehow convinced that this is somehow actually an argument against the existence of God. As if presenting evidence that evil exists in the world is proof that God does not exist. But to tell you the truth, this argument is weak and shallow.

It's not really an argument against God per se, but against a good God that can do and wants to fix the evil.

If God wants to get rid of evil, and he can do it, then why isn't he? If the explanation that he doesn't want to, then the first part of the sentence is wrong. If he can't, then the second part is wrong. So the argument actually can accept an evil God or impotent God, just not benevolent and omnipotent simultaneous.

The presence and existence of evil is not a problem for many theistic traditions out there, including some forms of Judaism, Islam, Christianity (especially the more mystical and Gnostic strains) and Hinduism amongst others.

The argument isn't about the problem of evil but God's willingness and ability in relation to evil.

Yes people, these religion have dealt with the problem of evil in various ways that offer satisfying answers to the practitioners of those religions. Some of us even except the presence of evil and God's responsibility for evil. But some of you continued to persist in this argument as if it is your trump card.

If God is responsible, then isn't God unwilling to deal with it... at least for right now?

Perhaps we can agree that if God is willing to deal with evil, but at a later date, it's the same as to say that he's not willing to deal with it right now?

So ok. Let's have at it, you want to argue the problem of evil, then let us do so. But be aware it is no real argument against God but rather an argument against certain sectarian beliefs of various religious systems and nothing more than that.

Agree. It's not an argument against all and every kind of God-image we can think of, but only an argument against a specific kind of idea of God.

 

[gree0232]

No, that is what I am trying to tell you. The problem of evil is not about blaming "God". It is about a logical contradiction.
Yes, men commit evil. And more to the point men allow evil to occur.

well, as I explained earlier, omnipotence is not a logical premise is it? If something be definition can do anything, which nuclides violating logic, why would we seek to confine yo to logic knowing that it CAN violate logic ... because its omnipotent?

That very premise is illogical.

Its a bit like trying to qualify infinity to an accurate decimal point. It just isn't join to happen is it?

So what exactly are we proving here? And why is this proof so near and dear to atheists when its very premise is illogical?

If I see a man abusing and killing a child, that man is evil. If I stand by and watch, having the ability to stop it, and not stopping it, I am evil. So if a man kills an innocent you can conclude either that I was unable to stop it, or I was unwilling to stop it.

You do not have the ability to stop all rape kiddo. You are not God.

And I say that as someone who has tried. I have burst through the doors of rape/torture rooms ... I have stooped some of this evil, but evil men will do evil things. They will look for where you are not. They will attempt to stay ahead of you as long as they can.

You can do good. You can stop some. You alone cannot stop it all. No matter how many guns you own. No matter who violent or determined you are. Man has been grated free will, and some choose to exercise for evil.

That you resist that pull? Congrats, you ar just like me despite your differing faith choice.

So if an innocent child is murdered you can logically deduce that I cannot be omnipotent, and loving. Or else that innocent child would not have been murdered.

If an innocent child murdered it is because a man chose to do so, and God believes that allowing us freedom is more important than you or I. The very same reason Soldiers sacrifice themselves on a battlefield that you may not need too.

Are Soldiers evil? If defending freedom at the price of your own life evil?

The free will response is nonsense. If I have the power to stop a murder or rape or child abuse I will do so. We employ police just for the purpose of doing this. We don't care about the free-will of murderers to murder. If we protected the free will of murderers to commit murder that would be evil. We don't do that. We do everything in our power to interfere with the free-will of murderers to kill. That is good.

The free will response is reality.

Why not actually examine reality rather than claim your honor is the same as every one else's? It simply is not true is it?

Do you honestly think that NO MAN, when seeing an isolated woman and opportunity will take advantage of the situation to rape?

You would not? Neither would I.

Some will.

And that is the reality of free will.

You reject it because you believe that your honor alone will stop it. That is patently false. And three dozen rape victims I have met plainly testify to the absurdity of your position.

Evil still happens.

If "God" is protecting the free will of a murderer, and not protecting the victim, that "God" is evil. The point isn't to blame "God". The point is that if you believe in an "all good God" then this is a logical contradiction.

(If you believe as Cynthia does that "God" is good and evil, this is not a logical contradiction)

Do we put innocent people it jail she the available evidence condemns them?

And who are you judge?

Who are you to tell 99% of humanity that that must not be granted free will because 1% will abuse it? Do you think the rights of the 99% don't matter?

You would enslave the majority because a tiny minority is evil.

And enslavement? The denial of free will because you think YOU should be the determiner of everyone else? Well, that is exactly what Papa Stalin felt, and we see what he did with his superior insights.

You still have the problem of evil to deal with. And all your self effacing nonsense doesn't change the fact that some men are not honorable and will do things that they should not.

And that some do this? Should eliminate the choices of others why?

One of the primary virtues of true morality is selflessness. And what I see with atheists attempting to install THEIR values for all others is the opposite. Do you serve the others in this argument? Or yourself?

 

[CynthiaCypher]

This is another argument that is sometimes given to justify evil and suffering, and it is one that makes a peculiar circuit returning the problem to the place it started. It is saying evil and suffering is necessary to overcome evil and suffering. Now that might arguably be necessary in our contingent world where a murderer is put to death for his crime, which can be said to be good in the sense that no more people will be murdered by that particular individual. But even in that case is it really a greater good?

And it seems to me to be morally reprehensible to have one person suffer so that another can come to their aid and thus be seen as good person, when that person’s goodness is artificially dependent on the former person’s suffering. It is simply wrong to say this is the best possible world that God could have created. There is no reason to believe that God could not have created a possible world where the inhabitants were all good and where evil never existed; for it would still be possible for the inhabitants to aspire to and achieve a greater good. By simply living one’s life doing no harm to others it can be considered good, but to go the extra distance helping, assisting, or befriending others must surely rate as a greater good. To conclude, it seems evident that a world that contains suffering must be the very worst of all possible worlds. And at this point we may hear from theists that say God gave free will to humans, who are the source of their own misfortunes.

Once you have a world without pain and suffering, a world without evil, what other greater good could be achieved? There is nothing left. Everything is fixed, you're every need is now catered to you from above. You have nothing left to aspire to anymore, you have nothing to overcome.

What you want is The Brave New World, well I do not want to live in The Brave New World.

Like John Savage said: “But I don't want comfort. I want God, I want poetry, I want real danger, I want freedom, I want goodness. I want sin.”

 

[fantome profane]

well, as I explained earlier, omnipotence is not a logical premise is it? If something be definition can do anything, which nuclides violating logic, why would we seek to confine yo to logic knowing that it CAN violate logic ... because its omnipotent?

That very premise is illogical.

Its a bit like trying to qualify infinity to an accurate decimal point. It just isn't join to happen is it?

So what exactly are we proving here? And why is this proof so near and dear to atheists when its very premise is illogical?

That is fine, if you conclude that "God" cannot be omnipotent, then that matches the conclusion of the argument of evil. I don't care if you got there some other way the conclusion is the same.

You do not have the ability to stop all rape kiddo. You are not God.

Right, that is exactly the point. There is no human being in existence that has the ability to stop all rapes and is willing to do so. We know this because rape is a reality. And apparently there is no "God" in existence that has the ability to stop all rapes and is willing to do so.

Who are you to tell 99% of humanity that that must not be granted free will because 1% will abuse it? Do you think the rights of the 99% don't matter?

You would enslave the majority because a tiny minority is evil.

And you are taking an absurd absolute position here. I am not suggesting that free-will should be denied to everyone to prevent a rapist from raping. I am suggesting that if some entity had the power to do so it should interfere with the free-will of that rapist. There is no need to deny free will to the 99%, only to that 1%, and even perhaps only 1% of the time. If we put one person in prison for committing rape that does not mean that we must imprison the rest of humanity along with them. That is just absurd.

The free will argument is nonsense. When a woman or a child is being raped their free will is being violate along with their body. You can't tell me that "God" values free-will absolutely and at the same time allows people to have their free-will forcefully taken from them. In that situation someone's free will is going to be denied. If there is no one to stop the rapist he is going to deny free will to the victim. If someone is there to stop him the rapist is going to have their free will denied. There is no option there where free will is not denied.

 

[gree0232]

That is fine, if you conclude that "God" cannot be omnipotent, then that matches the conclusion of the argument of evil. I don't care if you got there some other way the conclusion is the same.

You've just fundamentally changed your standards. If God is omnipotent, then limiting him with logic doesn't work because he can violate logic.

How that then becomes relevant to me somehow claiming God is not omnipotent?

That would indeed be a stretch, if not an outright straw man.

Right, that is exactly the point. There is no human being in existence that has the ability to stop all rapes and is willing to do so. We know this because rape is a reality. And apparently there is no "God" in existence that has the ability to stop all rapes and is willing to do so.

Why once again would God take away free will rom 99% of humanity because 1% are bad?

As all men are equal, our free will is equal.

What you advocate is slavery, the inability of anyone to choose so that NO ONE can choose evil. And that ... is evil

And you are taking an absurd absolute position here. I am not suggesting that free-will should be denied to everyone to prevent a rapist from raping. I am suggesting that if some entity had the power to do so it should interfere with the free-will of that rapist. There is no need to deny free will to the 99%, only to that 1%, and even perhaps only 1% of the time. If we put one person in prison for committing rape that does not mean that we must imprison the rest of humanity along with them. That is just absurd.

That is exactly what you are claiming. That God SHOUD do the very premix ethat you now, a literal sentence later, find absurd.

Why should God so this?

Wjhy should God grant free will ... and yet not allow choice? Which is a bit of logical paradox for you isn't it?

Your faith screams otherwise ... what does your intellect say?

The free will argument is nonsense. When a woman or a child is being raped their free will is being violate along with their body. You can't tell me that "God" values free-will absolutely and at the same time allows people to have their free-will forcefully taken from them. In that situation someone's free will is going to be denied. If there is no one to stop the rapist he is going to deny free will to the victim. If someone is there to stop him the rapist is going to have their free will denied. There is no option there where free will is not denied.

She is indeed.

Now why does her free will trump yours or mine?

You cannot grant free will without allowing some people to choose evil. You claim it is otherwise, but what you advocate is slavery.

And the emotive tossing of absurdities notwithstanding ... slavery is not right.

Somehow you think this exploration affirms your faith ... yet evil still happens and you still have to deal with it. Go figure.

Please though, continue blaming God for this while denying that is the case.

Why again do men rape women? Because they choose to ... and you would deny them that choice. You would enslave all rather than risk someone being evil.

and this is better? Perhaps I should just call it absurd? Which it is.

Once again, evil is out there because man chooses it. Men are allowed to disagree with you. And unless you want to live in a state with greater control than North Korea, there isn't a lot you can do about it.

Some choose evil.

That is not God's fault.

Its man's fault.

 

[technomage]

But nor am I willing to ignore truly tragic and pointless suffering.

That's part of the problem. I'm going to ignore "tragic," because all suffering is tragic. Let's look at "pointless."

What happens if that "pointless suffering" actually serves a larger purpose?

Even when I was a theist, I had a problem with that possibility ... but I finally had to realize, my argument was an argument against the consequences. Regardless of how horrible it looks from our perspective, if we're going to posit a God exists, and we're going to posit said God as omniscient, then we cannot ignore the possibility that the God we hypothesize about would know more than we know.

It's an unsatisfying counter-argument ... but it does, successfully, counter the Argument from Evil.

 

[LuisDantas]

Really? Fascinating.

Please show me this test to prove my God false and me a brazen idiot.

Baiting me? How cute.

Abraham's God is supposed to be all-powerful yet fair. Existence isn't fair. Ergo, Abraham's God does not exist.

There is also the matter of how flawed and, in fact, immoral he is (according to various passages of the Old Testament anyway). In that sense, the Bible is self-contradictory.

And you pay no price for belief in God kiddo,

I do indeed pay no price, because I do not take it.

Plenty of people do however pay too high a price, by giving up on part of their moral and rational discernment in order to keep believing.

It doesn't always happen, but it does happen, and it is quite a shame.

As for the later, please review the posts. Suffering must be or we are slaves.

If you say so. Makes no sense to me.

You seem to be basing that odd statement on the concept of free will. But free will makes no sense, either. It is just a trick of discourse to distract people from realizing that the Abrahamic God is nonsensical. The two concepts somewhat offset each other, because they are absurd and unrealistic in opposite ways.

 

[gree0232]

Baiting me? How cute.

Abraham's God is supposed to be all-powerful yet fair. Existence isn't fair. Ergo, Abraham's God does not exist.

There is also the matter of how flawed and, in fact, immoral he is (according to various passages of the Old Testament anyway). In that sense, the Bible is self-contradictory.




I do indeed pay no price, because I do not take it.

Plenty of people do however pay too high a price, by giving up on part of their moral and rational discernment in order to keep believing.

It doesn't always happen, but it does happen, and it is quite a shame.




If you say so. Makes no sense to me.

You seem to be basing that odd statement on the concept of free will. But free will makes no sense, either. It is just a trick of discourse to distract people from realizing that the Abrahamic God is nonsensical. The two concepts somewhat offset each other, because they are absurd and unrealistic in opposite ways.

Oh look .. no proof that there is no God.

Whew, and here I thought, after decades of debating atheists that one would FINALLY present proof of their claim.

Silly me for being alarmed.

Glad that being called out makes you a victim of flame bait rather than evidence though. Atheists ... rational victims sans the proof they claim, you guys sure have it worse than Somalis.

Feel free to do more than insult me based on my beliefs that you cannot prove atheist. Your pride is your faith and all you have by way of proof. Hardly convincing to anyone by yourself ... but then, that's rather the point isn't it?

What is nonsensical is to disparage someone, a perfect stranger bases solely on a faith choice, with neither the balls nor the evidence to back it up.

Wait ... apologies, YOU are the victim ... my mistake.

 

[fantome profane]

You've just fundamentally changed your standards. If God is omnipotent, then limiting him with logic doesn't work because he can violate logic.

How that then becomes relevant to me somehow claiming God is not omnipotent?

That would indeed be a stretch, if not an outright straw man.





Why once again would God take away free will rom 99% of humanity because 1% are bad?

As all men are equal, our free will is equal.

What you advocate is slavery, the inability of anyone to choose so that NO ONE can choose evil. And that ... is evil



That is exactly what you are claiming. That God SHOUD do the very premix ethat you now, a literal sentence later, find absurd.

Why should God so this?

Wjhy should God grant free will ... and yet not allow choice? Which is a bit of logical paradox for you isn't it?

Your faith screams otherwise ... what does your intellect say?



She is indeed.

Now why does her free will trump yours or mine?

You cannot grant free will without allowing some people to choose evil. You claim it is otherwise, but what you advocate is slavery.

And the emotive tossing of absurdities notwithstanding ... slavery is not right.

Somehow you think this exploration affirms your faith ... yet evil still happens and you still have to deal with it. Go figure.

Please though, continue blaming God for this while denying that is the case.

Why again do men rape women? Because they choose to ... and you would deny them that choice. You would enslave all rather than risk someone being evil.

and this is better? Perhaps I should just call it absurd? Which it is.

Once again, evil is out there because man chooses it. Men are allowed to disagree with you. And unless you want to live in a state with greater control than North Korea, there isn't a lot you can do about it.

Some choose evil.

That is not God's fault.

Its man's fault.

Ok sonny, I am going to try this one more time. There is no logical reason why free will must be absolute. No reason why it must be absolutely allowed or absolutely denied. Your insistence that it must be all or nothing is absurd, and obviously not true. Everyday we deny free will to people. That does not mean that we deny free will to everybody.

You said in a previous post that you "have burst through the doors of rape/torture rooms". Did you respect the freewill of those rapist and torturers? Or did you try to deny those people freewill. I am sure you used your judgement to conclude in that case in that situation the right thing to do would be to deny freewill to the rapists, and try to protect the freewill of their victims. You made that judgement, and you didn't proceed from there to try to deny the freewill of all humanity. You didn't conclude that since you denied freewill to a small percentage you had to deny freewill to all.

There is no reason why freewill must be an all or nothing proposition. And in reality it obviously is not a all or nothing proposition.

 

[gree0232]

Ok sonny, I am going to try this one more time. There is no logical reason why free will must be absolute. No reason why it must be absolutely allowed or absolutely denied. Your insistence that it must be all or nothing is absurd, and obviously not true. Everyday we deny free will to people. That does not mean that we deny free will to everybody.

You said in a previous post that you "have burst through the doors of rape/torture rooms". Did you respect the freewill of those rapist and torturers? Or did you try to deny those people freewill. I am sure you used your judgement to conclude in that case in that situation the right thing to do would be to deny freewill to the rapists, and try to protect the freewill of their victims. You made that judgement, and you didn't proceed from there to try to deny the freewill of all humanity. You didn't conclude that since you denied freewill to a small percentage you had to deny freewill to all.

There is no reason why freewill must be an all or nothing proposition. And in reality it obviously is not a all or nothing proposition.

Then simply answer the question: who gets free will and who doesn't?

And having granted those you deign to have free will? And they exercise it by choosing evil and raping someone?

What then?

It really is all or nothing. This absurd premise that you can grant free will and the ability to make decisions but ONLY to this that you know will not make bad choices ... which means they aren't granted free will at all ...

Its your logical absurdity to deal with.

You figure out how to grant people free will and yet preclude them from making bad choices - while still having the ability to make choices.

Slavery.

By all means ... explain this logically. How do you grant free will while denying it?

Oddly, the problem of evil is supposed to be a logical paradox for us. yet here we are wondering at your own logical paradox.

 

[CynthiaCypher]

Then simply answer the question: who gets free will and who doesn't?

And having granted those you deign to have free will? And they exercise it by choosing evil and raping someone?

What then?

It really is all or nothing. This absurd premise that you can grant free will and the ability to make decisions but ONLY to this that you know will not make bad choices ... which means they aren't granted free will at all ...

Its your logical absurdity to deal with.

You figure out how to grant people free will and yet preclude them from making bad choices - while still having the ability to make choices.

Slavery.

By all means ... explain this logically. How do you grant free will while denying it?

Oddly, the problem of evil is supposed to be a logical paradox for us. yet here we are wondering at your own logical paradox.

And also free will is a property of the whole species not of the individual, individuals have free will because it is a property of the human species. If you strip free will away then the individual isn't human anymore.

Asking God to take free will away from the rapist is like asking God to turn the rapist into a frog.