The Argument From Evil

[Author's note: this post was originally written and posted, January 2, 2009. Now again the Argument From Evil has been termed a robust philosophical argument - which it is not - and an intellectual proof of the necessity of Atheism - again which it is not. For these reasons, I post this analysis again here, and I will develop a sidebar for false arguments of Atheism.]

Several events have come together to induce me to revisit the infamous “argument from the perspective of evil”, an Atheist argument against the existence of a deity. The basics of the argument go like this (or variations of this): evil exists; a deity could stop it but doesn't; therefore the deity is either evil or doesn't exist; most likely the deity doesn't exist. There are lots of offshoots that discuss omnipotence, omniscience, free will and so forth, but the basics remain pretty much the same.

For Christmas I received a book documenting a debate between two scholars on the existence of a deity.

As I sometimes do, I read the frontispiece of a book and then go to the back to see if an index contains items that interest me. In this particular book the Atheist participant claims up front that his 8 year old son was brilliant enough to develop his own argument from evil; at the back of the book he claims that while Materialism might be a shaky position, the argument from evil is solid and irrefutable.

Simultaneously with receiving the book, the argument from the perspective of evil has arisen on other blogs, with the proponents confident that the argument is absolutely insurmountable and is concrete proof that there is no deity.

The argument from evil seems to be even more persuasive to Atheo-materialists than either the flying spaghetti monster/ orbiting teapot argument or the who-made-God argument. The argument has several aspects to be addressed:

1. Atheists are more moral than God.
2. Atheists are more omniscient than God.
3. Omnibenevolence is a lacking characteristic, yet necessary of a God.
4. Earth as a protected playground, a requirement of a God.

Some questions arise quite naturally from this. First, what are the standards for morality that are being used? Next, what evidence is produced that supports the claims? Are the claims coherent using standard logic? Do the claims in fact prove what they purport to prove?

1.Declaring that God is immoral presents an immediate cognitive dissonance. Since Atheists do not accept any morality as absolute, much less binding, they are certainly stretching credibility by declaring that God is immoral, especially by their standards. Most Atheists admit that there are no absolute moral standards common to all Atheists. So there is no standard by which to judge a deity, other than his own standard.

To claim that Atheists – if they were God - would not allow mass murder is absurd, given the history as recent as the last century which was drenched in Atheist bloodbaths. To claim that Atheists would not allow suffering, rape, torture, etc ad nauseum, is equally absurd. Atheists cannot be more moral than anyone, period. They have no common morality from which to make that claim. And their history belies their claim, in spades. Evidence for Atheist morality is contrary to the assertion made or implied by the argument from evil.

But more to the point, a deity in possession of the roots of morality cannot be faulted for whatever he chooses to do, since his morality is his decision. He cannot be immoral by his standards, since he created the standards for humans, not for himself. For the deity, morality is tautological. The claims made by the argument from evil are not logically coherent.

By the way, this is the exact position taken by Atheists, who feel they are moral. They cannot fail to be moral by their standards, since they invent the standards to suit their own convenience: they are moral by their own definition, not by any absolute standard. This argument for Atheist morality fails even amongst other Atheists whose standards differ, person to person; the morality is relative to the individual, and so is not morality at all. It is just behavior being justified with words conjured in its favor. This position is not coherent.

But back to God. If God commands one thing, then countermands that command for specific situations, is that hypocrisy as Atheists charge? The deity in charge of the roots of morality cannot be a hypocrite. It is a definitional pot hole into which the Atheist’s argument disappears.

As for material proof, are natural disasters, diseases, pain and suffering immoral in and of themselves? These are the material manifestations that are found objectionable by the argument from evil. But these material objects and actions are not evil, they just are. They have no motivations, no evil objectives. Even evil people are not evidence of an evil deity unless they are puppets of that deity; and the puppet theory is transparently false.

The lack of standards, evidence, coherence and material proof contradict the presumed validity of the argument from evil. But there is more.

2. By claiming to know more than a deity about what is Right For Mankind, the Atheist is asserting a superior omniscience to that of the deity in question. Need I say more about such a fallacy? OK, I will say this: Philosophical Materialism is the opposite of omniscience. The act of denying a deity does not add either knowledge or wisdom to an individual. It artificially constricts knowledge to material objects and actions, while denying subjective space experiences.

3. The primary rationalized disconnect in the argument from evil is the concept of omnibenevolence. This position maintains that because I don’t like certain aspects of living in the material world, the deity SHOULD NOT have allowed those aspects to exist. In fact the Atheist, if promoted to the position of the deity, would have eliminated all such discomforts from the world. This includes such things as natural disasters, disease, predators, entropy, aging, death and other unpleasantness. Obviously any deity that would allow such nasty obstacles to complete happiness for each human cannot be any good. Any really good deity would grant every wish and remove all unpleasantness from our experiences: no stubbed toes, no scraped knees, no burnt fingers; only pleasantness would occupy our days. So from this the Atheist concludes that no deity exists, since the world does not conform to the Atheist’s standards and specifications for a deity. No omnibenevolence, no deity.

As any parent knows, omnibenevolence is a sure path to creating a totally selfish, self-centered offspring, one that demands ever more since happiness is so elusive when sought in material things. The inability of the recipient to become happy even when awash in material goods results in resentment of the provider, and ultimately in separation and hatred by the recipient who feels denied of real happiness and blames it on the provider. Omnibenevolence is an evil itself. Demanding omnibenevolence from a “good” deity is irrational.

4. Even in the face of the evil of omnibenevolence, Atheists claim that a moral deity would not allow any consequences for bad decisions. This has been called the “perfectly protected playground”, where the deity cushions all falls and no one ever learns how not to fall in the first place.

The argument from evil ties-in perfectly with humanism, which requires happiness as the ultimate good. Not the happiness of the individual, mind you, but the generalized happiness of the bulk of mankind. In fact, individual happiness is to be sacrificed for that of overall mankind. It is this sacrifice, it is claimed paradoxically, that provides happiness to the individual. Humanism has resulted in the slaughter of hundreds of millions of humans, all for the good of mankind. Humanism is one of the worst evils visited upon this planet; it is directly connected to Atheism, and is justified by the argument from evil.

The argument from evil, is itself, evil. It is illogical, and it is false.