I don't think it was a decision. I think it's implied by the meaning of the words. You can't feel sorry for someone who never has bad things happen to them. If you agree that sympathy is a greater good than 'just being generally benign' then suffering is a necessary thing in order to get that good.
Yeah, it's independent of God. He can't draw square-circles either.

Hi, by the way.

BTW Isn't it the christian belief that God gave humankind the Garden of Eden that was free of suffering, and humans were the ones to mess it up? So God wouldn't be to blame.

In a more modern real life example, Oprah Winfrey (not that she is God) gave deprived African girls a few beautiful school in which they are getting an education that they never could get otherwise. Some of the girls ended up being physically and sexually abused there. They appealed to Oprah and she provided better security. So did Oprah do a bad thing in providing the school? Who was responsible for the suffering there?

A human somewhere just killed someone so we should all be punished. Its only just.

You know what they say about one bad apple spoiling the bunch.

The argument is about whether God has the abilities and traits attributed to him by many theists. Your analogy breaks down precisely because Oprah isn't God. Now, let's say Oprah is God; she would have known that the schools security is not good enough and that some of these kids would get abused. Since she knew this would happen, and could have prevented it by providing adequate security in the first place, can you still label Her maximally good and all-powerful?

Take out the bad one and save the good ones?

Oh yeah, you've said it once or twice before.

Good to see you're still posting, I was worried after the forum split.

BTW I'm don't claim to be an expert on theology. I just find it interesting to ponder some classic issues from time to time. The point of that pop culture analogy was suffering shouldn't remove the possibility that a powerful entity has overall goodness, deserves respect, and warrants further interaction. Overall Oprah did good for the girls even though some were hurt. Oprah could do much more, like give each one million dollars, but she didn't. The girls shouldn't be upset with her for not doing more and I doubt they are. Further interaction with Oprah would likely be beneficial to them. So possibly the same sort of situation could exist between humans and the Christian God.

Can we call the Christian God maximally good? Depends what that means.
If it means that God can only create pleasant worlds or that he must immediately end any suffering, then the answer seems clearly to be no.

Isaiah 45:7
I form the light and create darkness,
I bring prosperity and create disaster;
I, the LORD, do all these things.

From what I have read, when Christians say God is maximally good or omni-benevolent or loving, it could have different meanings. It could mean that God has the infinite capacity to do good, but it doesn't mean he must automatically bestow it. It might also mean that any further interactions with humankind from some point in time would be for good only. It could also mean humans have been given the power to overcome all suffering in time.
happy holiday

You and me both.
I basically agree with this.

It could mean those things, however I get the impression that’s not what the vast majorities of theists believe. If God has these traits and abilities usually ascribed to him by theists and yet still allows/causes suffering then maybe it’s for the greater good? But why are the lessons we learn in the few brief decades we spend on Earth so integral to an eternity in heaven? If babies can get into heaven then perhaps it’s not even necessary to experience life on Earth – and so why the necessary suffering?

I’m sure theists have reasons, but you begin postulating and rationalizing concepts that are so foreign and so far removed from anything you can reliably know. The problem of Evil is a pretty huge barrier for me when considering the possibility of the Christian God existing. However, it completely vanishes when I consider a world without the Christian God. Presumably religion affords you a more coherent worldview, which is why you’re religious. I’m interested in why you smart theists subscribe to a worldview which offers an understanding of subjective feelings (I don’t mean to suggest this is all you gain from your religion) at the cost of significant difficulty in explaining other things. Is it broadly because you’d rather have an explanation for your revelations and difficulty explaining the presence of evil than the other way around?

There are really two arguments here: the Problem of Evil (PoE) and the Argument from Evil (AfE). The PoE, where it's claimed the belief that (a) there is an all-good God is incompatible with the belief that (b) there is evil in the world, is more a problem for the theist. In the sense you're using it, however, the atheist is trying to show that the theist is being irrational by holding incompatible beliefs (a) and (b). The PoE isn't that strong of an argument, though, because the theist can just claim that (c) evil is non-substantial or that (d) there's more good in the world than evil and the good cancels-out/negates the evil leaving only the good. The atheist may not accept (c) or (d) but since they're not necessarily false, if the theist believes either one, he avoids the ad hominem attack, i.e. the theist does not hold incompatible beliefs.

With the Argument from Evil, it's a little more difficult for the atheist than you're suggesting, IMO. To be accepted as a counter-argument to their own beliefs, the more serious theists will require the (AfE) to be formalized with premises something like:

P.1. God necessarily actualizes all good all the time.
P.2. Evil has objective and substantial existence.
[Therefore, God does not exist.]

(With the above, P.1. might be taken as an escape hatch for the theist or what you termed, "a significant difficulty in explaining other things," but there are some sound arguments like how the infinite good could possibly manifest in finite existence without an orderly process of growth, i.e. going from less good to greater good, ad infinitum.)

But supposing P.1. is accepted, the argument still has to be constructed in such a way that if evil denies God's existence, then the lack of evil affirms God's existence for the AfE argument to hold. In other words, the atheist has to affirm as true a premise whereby the conclusion either God exists or God does not exist logically follows, i.e. if 'E' then God does not exist OR if 'non-E' then God does exist. If the atheist can't construct the argument in such a way, then it's still possible that God exists and that God is good, so all he's really doing is poking at the theist position, not really arguing against it.

What do you mean?

The world is not God's purpose. God is the world's purpose.

As C. S. Lewis once put it, If you think of God creating the world like a painter paints a painting, then it was never God's intention to create the perfect painting. It was God's intention to create a painting where the figures in the painting would one day step out of it, into a greater life, eternal life.

I’m not so much saying they’re incompatible, although I would reject C and D as absurd. It’s about which explanation (God or no God) is more likely.

My quick explanation of evil/suffering: Nature is uncaring and for a variety of reasons some humans are ****s. I think that explains suffering considerably better than any explanation from a Christian viewpoint. You’ve given some reasons theists can give but they require further explanation by drafting in additional unknowns and possibilities. On the other hand, if you assume God doesn’t exist then nature being uncaring is a given.

Can anyone argue that I, as an atheist, have a more difficult sell than a Christian to explain suffering in the world? Fair enough if after looking at the whole picture you’ve come to the conclusion that the Christian God is more likely than no God, but suffering and evil are considerably better explained by a lack of a caring God then the presence of one.
I disagree that if I don't completely disprove ones viewpoint, I'm not really arguing against it. There are many things which can be very persuasive but lack an actual proof. My intention is not to suggest that the Christian God cannot exist, or to provide any logical framework where the conclusion is ‘therefore God does not exist’. My point is if you have 2 competing theories (no God vs Christian God) to explain the world, which ‘fits the evidence’ better? Certain aspects, like evil and suffering, are considerably easier to explain with one of these (no God). Other aspects, like an explanation for your revelation, are easier to explain with the latter theory (Christian God exists).

I’m having trouble articulating myself... but I feel that an explanation for someone’s very real suffering should take precedence over an explanation for your revelation. I suppose you could say your revelation is just as real as their suffering but it’s difficult for me to accept. Perhaps it’s because my underlying opinion is that a naturalistic process will eventually fully explain your revelation, whereas I don’t think religion will ever be able to adequately explain evil and suffering. Is that where we differ?

I'd go as far as saying that nature being uncaring more easily explains suffering in the world, but I don't think it's a considerably better explanation. My reasoning for saying so is because while natural explanations are great for explaining the relations of things in existence, they lack the ability to explain why there are things in existence to begin with.

You, or a naturalist, may believe that someday we'll have said naturalist explanation but it's a non sequitur in terms of what understanding natural laws are potentially capable of explaining. Natural laws deal exclusively with secondary causation, they don't tell us why things exist or even why the laws exist, and just because they're good at explaining secondary causation that can't be logically taken to imply that they can or are capable of explaining primary causation.

Where you and I differ on this is that you take the evidence in existence as primary whereas I take the evidence of existence as primary. From there we'll form our respective worldviews and I'll be left with the task of explaining things in existence, like suffering, and you'll be left with the task of explaining why anything exists at all.


Based on what I said above, obviously, the theist and naturalist have chosen differently as to which question to answer first and which to leave open, based, I assume, on what question seems most important to each. So, I'm not charging you with disproving God to maintain your worldview, but if you want the theist to abandon his, then yeah, you do have to prove that God doesn't exist. I don't see this issue as a right or wrong thing, more like tit-for-tat. Naturalists aren't abandoning their worldview just because they can't explain everything, so why should the theists abandon their worldview because they don't have all the answers?

All I can say to your point is that I believe we can't completely divorce ourselves from the human experience, nor can we escape the logical consequences of the worldviews we hold. Like a great many theists, I believe our conception of what we're talking about when we talk about God is woefully inadequate in terms of explanatory power. Unlike those believers who know with a certainty that their conception of God is the right one, I don't relate. Like I said, I don't think the explanations are entirely adequate and further I don't think the arguments are all that compelling. So, I'm perfectly fine with allowing the concept of God to evolve in a dynamic sort of way.

With that said, however, I do draw a line somewhere and the nearest I can express where, is the difference between the animate and the inanimate in regard to the primary cause of existence. The former I relate to God and the latter to naturalism. They're two diametrically opposed worldviews, from which when relating one's human experience one can't escape the logical consequences and conclusions. Personally, when I try to relate what I feel in regard to my own existence with existence in toto, what I feel is a deep sense of gratitude. I feel grateful for my existence, and hence, I need an animate thing to be grateful towards. I can't be grateful towards inanimate things like matter or gravity. In contrast, if I were to hold a naturalistic worldview, the logical consequence is that I can't feel gratitude towards inanimate things and hence in terms of what I could feel in regard to my own existence as it relates to existence in toto, I could only feel lucky. But, like I said, I feel grateful, not lucky, and while a naturalist may wish to accuse me of anthropomorphism, from my perspective, all he's doing is explaining away my human experience, not explaining it.

Cheers Duffe, Seems like a fair assessment - I don't really have too much to add.