Problem of Evil

The suffering of the world is said to count against a God who is all-powerful, all-knowing, and perfectly good.

Tagged: Arguments against God Problem of Evil

The argument begins from a plain fact: the world contains terrible suffering, including suffering that seems to serve no purpose and falls on the innocent. If God were all-powerful, God could prevent such suffering; if God were all-knowing, God would know of it; and if God were perfectly good, God would want to prevent it. The existence of so much suffering therefore appears to conflict with the existence of such a God.

In its logical form the argument claims outright contradiction; in its evidential form it claims only that suffering makes God's existence improbable, especially when the distribution of suffering seems random and the suffering of children and animals is considered.

The Argument in Form

If God exists, God is all-powerful, all-knowing, and perfectly good.
A being with those attributes would prevent any suffering it could prevent without losing a greater good.
There is suffering that no greater good appears to require, and some suffering that appears gratuitous.

Conclusion: Therefore, either such a God does not exist, or the theist owes an account of why the suffering is permitted.

Proponents and History

Epicurus first posed the dilemma in antiquity, asking why a willing and able God permits evil. J. L. Mackie gave it a modern logical form in 1955, arguing that the existence of evil is inconsistent with a God who is omnipotent, omniscient, and omnibenevolent. William Rowe later recast it as an evidential argument: particular cases of intense suffering appear pointless, and the sheer scale of suffering makes theism less probable. Later writers refined both versions, while theists answered with defenses and theodicies that remain central to the debate.

Standard Responses

Alvin Plantinga's free will defense answers the logical problem by arguing that a world containing creatures who are significantly free is more valuable than one without freedom, and that God cannot both give creatures freedom and guarantee that they never choose wrongly. John Hick's soul-making theodicy answers the evidential problem by proposing that suffering can form character, deepen compassion, and make a world of moral growth possible. Skeptical theism adds a caution: finite minds may be unable to see the goods that justify particular sufferings, so the appearance of pointlessness does not establish actual pointlessness.

References

The Problem of Evil (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy) Free / open access
Logical Problem of Evil (Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy) Free / open access
Evidential Problem of Evil (Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy) Free / open access

Related Across the Site

Argument from Non-Belief Argument — The sheer scale of unbelief in the world is said to fit naturalism better than theism.
Cosmological Disproof Argument — Modern cosmology is said to remove the need for a first cause of the universe.
Divine Hiddenness Argument — If God were perfectly loving, reasonable people would not remain without belief; yet many do.
Foreknowledge and Free Will Argument — If God already knows infallibly what each person will do, the future seems fixed and human freedom seems lost.
Omnipotence Paradox / Coherence of Theism Argument — The stone paradox asks whether a God who can do anything can make a stone too heavy for God to lift.
Omnipotence and Omniscience Incoherence Argument — The divine attributes themselves are said to conflict, so that no being could hold them all together.
Ontological Disproof Argument — The ontological argument is said to fail because existence is not a property that can be built into a definition.
Teleological Disproof Argument — Evolution and natural explanations of fine-tuning are said to remove the need for a designer.

Related Arguments

Divine Hiddenness — If God were perfectly loving, reasonable people would not remain without belief; yet many do.
Argument from Non-Belief — The sheer scale of unbelief in the world is said to fit naturalism better than theism.
Moral Argument — Objective moral values and duties exist, and they are best explained by a moral lawgiver.