Hume concluded that the three points are inconsistent. If God is omnipotent, He is aware of existing evil and suffering, and knows how to put a stop to it. If God is omnibenevolent He will want to put a stop to it. If God is both of these attributes, then evil cannot exist. Since we know evil and suffering is a necessary bi-product of human life, we must acknowledge that evil does exist.
Yet, if we observe that pleasure is good, we should be able to ask is good pleasure. However if an individual gains pleasure through inflicting harm can we conclude that good and pleasure are one and the same thing? In short ethical naturalism is unable to define good, yet continues to claim that ethical language is based on objective truth. Non Cognitive approaches to meta ethics such as emotivism and prescriptivism argue that ethical language is subjective. A. J. Ayer claims that ethical language
Morality does not come directly from God. This is the idea behind the Autonomy thesis. This option says that an act is either immoral or moral based on things apart from the commands of God. Actions are right or wrong in and of themselves regardless of God’s commands. The issues with this option mainly deal with the definition of a theistic God.
The Free Will Defense In this essay I will talk about why the free will defense is a logical and reasonable solution to the problem of evil. I will first define what the problem of evil is, and then I will define and explain why the free will defense works to solve the problem. I will also bring up and support all criticisms against the free will defense. I will continue by responding to those criticisms, and then conclude by summing up my main ideas. The strongest criticism to the free will defense is that God, being an all-powerful being, should be able to create free agents who make only good choices, freely.
Kant’s view uses a categorical imperative, in which ethics is based upon an absolute, objective, deontologcial theory, in which intentions are more important than consequences. Kant believed that an ethics should be based around something entirely good. He decided that the only thing entirely good in the whole universe is ‘good will’. Everybody must decide ethical decisions in a way in which they put themselves last, fulfill their duty, and commit only selfless acts. This may be psychologically impossible, as many believe there is always a selfish reason for any good deed, however Kant only proposed a theory, and
Augustine's views seem to come from the concept of "the love of god." His theory starts by him trying to find a solution, the problem being evil. The problem at hand basically is that if god is so infinite in power then evil just can’t is here; but evil exists, therefore god couldn’t possibly. Augustine argues saying that all things start out as good, not perfect, and are like liable to becoming evil. Evil is simply the lack of good.
Thus, he believes there is no reason why should you live a moral life rather than for one's self. Fidley asks Seltzer one last question, “what motivation for adopting the moral point of view can you possibly offer without a belief in God and immorality?” which leads us to this quote, “When religion tells us that there is nothing more we can say about morality than that we can’t see the reasons for it, but do it if you know what’s good for you, then I do condemn it. We can do better than that. We can become moral grown-ups. And if there were a God, surely he would approve”.
As Dennis McCallum explains in The Problem of Evil, there are more than a few ways to prove or disprove God. The most interesting and well thought out argument is the attack based on the persistence of evil. This attack uses the argument that if God were good and all-powerful he would destroy evil, but since evil still exists, there is no such God. Whether this attack is saying that God is not good or that there is no God at all is unclear, but I see it as saying that there is no God. If there truly were a God who was good, why would he let all the unnecessary pain and suffering happen in the world?
5. Reconciling belief in the existence of God with the existence of evil is a grave problem for the theist. Among the responses to the two versions of the problem of evil include a defense of free will and the plausible reasons God may have for allowing evil to
The first argument, that subjectivism creates infallible moral agents, reads as follows. In subjectivism, to say something is bad is to say one has a bad feeling about it. As one can not be mistaken about their feelings, one can not be mistaken about moral judgements. For those who have encountered someone with very objectionable moral viewpoints however, perhaps violent homophobia or racism, it seems obtuse to suppose such people to be as equally moral as a loving and accepting person. The argument concludes with the claim that, despite the supposed infallibility, people are often mistaken in their moral judgements.