Best of all possible worlds and atheism

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@AG

You state

Your point was that "a person who presents both arguments has contradicted themselves", and on that issue, this seems squarely wrong, for instance, one can present the logical argument, and then say "even if this logical argument does not work for reason X, there is an evidential argument as well" and then this person can present the evidential argument.

Response

You can transition from a logical problem of evil to an evidential one. However they do not reach the same conclusion. If you did transition, you would need to change the conclusion you wanted to reach. In your case, the advice was to transition to a probabilistic argument.

Your statement

To me, there is no contradiction, and rather, my point is that they are of different spheres, as the logical problem of evil tries to show that evil and God are incompatible, and the evidential tries to show that a level of evil and God are incompatible using different assumptions

Response

I think this is where you are confused. The evidential argument from evil tends to have a caveat on it of 'most likely'. Take this section of the one on the Stanford University Website:

"Therefore it is likely that:

If there is an omnipotent and omniscient being, then there are specific cases of such a being's intentionally allowing animals to die agonizing deaths in forest fires, and children to undergo lingering suffering and eventual death due to cancer, that have wrongmaking properties such that there are no rightmaking characteristics — including ones that we are not aware of — that both apply to the cases in question, and that are also sufficiently serious to counterbalance the relevant wrongmaking characteristics.

An action is morally wrong, all things considered, if it has a wrongmaking characteristic that is not counterbalanced by any rightmaking characteristics."

If you wanted to transition to this you would need to insert the caveat (you can find them all through this argument). That is what makes it the evidential argument from evil. It admits to logical compatibility. So if you do not transition to a probabilistic argument and remain attempting to prove logical incompatibility (like the fourth premiss does with it's world IS NOT, as opposed to MOST LIKELY not) the use of the evidential argument refutes what the premiss is claiming.

91 sounds like he's getting tired.

So, to redefine and objectify the issue, we move the debate from the subjective IS to the objective BEST. Best of all possible worlds. How? And for whom?

This is the question you should debate. This is the only question that has an answer in this. The original premise, notwithstanding. Although, as I think I can prove to people's not believing me, this has to be the best of all possible worlds. God notwithstanding, also.

How?

Well, if God did create the world, which I believe He did, then this is the best of all possible worlds for the simple fact that through living in this world, a person, no matter who they are, finds themselves able to live an enabling life whether they find or reject God, in this case, the premise for life on this planet. This is the best of all possible worlds for the believer, inasmuch as he or she can see and feel and find God in most anything they do. This is also the best of all possible worlds for the unbeliever, as he or she can find themselves unbelieving in a world created and designed by a supreme authority. Contradiction? No. What good is being a supreme authority if people, your own creations, cannot question you, debate you, find a meaning for you in and of themselves? Doesn't sound like much of a life, does it? And, as this forum, which I have read from time to time will attest, the certainty that we as a species are created in God's image, lends itself to this mentality. How much more fun is it to debate someone on the relevancy of your position than to have people mindlessly agreeing with you? Exactly. Infinitely.

To that end, this must therefore also be the best possible world if there is no creator, and the world was simply either an accident that physics will never account for, or that the universe, and therefore the Earth, is pre-existing. How? For the fact I mentioned in defence of there being a creator. Without the ability from external factors, to live an enabling life, what have you got? Nothing. Or totalitarian Communism. A place in which no dissent exists, in which debate does not happen, in which philosophy is subjectified to the point of destruction and dismissal as a social force, where the only pre-existing quality in life is not life itself, but rather the absence of meaning in life.

With this being a world in which life flourishes, where both good and bad things happen daily, routinely in some people's lives, the ability to define yourself by what YOU do rather than by what someone tells you is best for you, is sacred. And should never come under myopic attack and dissent in this fashion. As you may or may not know, it was Kant who first proposed that nothingness was all there was, and that as a tool that was nothing, it was for the individual, who didn't exist, to live for the only thing that did exist, the collective. Now, you don't need to be a believer, neither do you need to be conservative, to reject this premise as baseless. Which it plainly is. If I don't exist, how is there a collective mass of me's to serve? Kant cloaked himself in Kierkegaard. Kierkegaard held that we as a people are real and that the only way to make the world around us, which was also real, real to us, is to manipulate and influence the world directly. This he said was a stressful situation for a single person in which to find him or herself. To be responsible for their every action was hard work. Which is why God had to exist as the crutch we all lean on when life becomes difficult.

Why would He create a world with suffering and with difficulty at every turn? So people could actualise their lives through interaction with that world, with the stress of everyday living that Kierkegaard hated so much and that Kant ignored.

Such is where the schism in philosophical thought began and was later legitimised by people spouting ignorant ramblings about nothing existing.

Existence, therefore, became a question of IS. A subjective question that philosophy, no matter its allusions to the contrary, cannot reconcile.

Philosophy can only deal in absolutes, in objective values. Depending on your point of view, you might disagree with me, but the most enlightened philosophers, Kierkegaard, Plantinga, Craig, Rand, Nietschke, all deal in one absolute. Objective reality. They do so in different, markedly different, manners, but they continue to do so because of the objectiveness they hold as the highest ideal of their philosophies. Such is why you have Craig, one of the world's foremost Christian apologetics, agreeing with the basic principles of the woman who made atheism attractive to Americans, Ayn Rand.

If a theist and an atheist can live in philosophical harmony under the single auspice of objective reason, value, morality and truth, then surely this, therefore, must be the best of all possible worlds?

Given that they both conclude that God does not exist, and that is often the relevant conclusion, there is no practical difference.


In practice, this might not make a difference. For instance, if one proves from background assumptions that the existence of an unjustified evil is absurdly high, then there is no practical difference. I'll illustrate with this iteration of my earlier argument:
The probability of a given evil being justified is held at 99.9%.
X = ln(.00000001)/(ln.(999))
X = 18412 evils necessary to make the claim "evil evil is justified" stand at .000001% likelihood.
.000001% likelihood is 0% for all practical intents and purposes.
This means that the claim "most likely" isn't necessary if there is no practical difference between the number given and 0%. And in many classes that use math and math classes, this level of variation, a variation of .000001%, is just considered on the level of a rounding error, or even just something to be rounded down. Last time I took calculus, only 2-3 decimal places were necessary, and this is more than that easily.


This is where I disagree. The evidential argument just doesn't admit to incompatibility. Not admitting to incompatibility is different than admitting to compatibility, while in practice, the results are not going to be different. If one does not admit to incompatibility, one will treat things as if they are compatible for purpose of illustration. If one admits to compatibility, one will treat things as if they are compatible, period.

So, I think you are confused. Evidential arguments aren't going to actually take a stand on this issue, they will instead reason treating the theistic claim of compatibility seriously, and showing how it does not seem to empirically work. Think of an evidential argument as a reductio ad absurdum, while the logical argument argues for contradiction.

@AG

You seem confused about the problems of evil. The evidential problem of evil does not conclude at an established incompatibility. The logical problem from evil is also referred to as the Incompatiblity formulation.

There is a whole section on the differences between the two arguments on the Stanford University Online Encyclopedia of Philosophy

Your discussion about the absurd probability of God having a reason is just not found in the literature. Draper's argument, considered one of the most aggressive formulations (of the evidential argument from evil) not get anywhere near the sort of numbers you are presupposing to be true.

Taken from the same

'If a premise such as (1) (incompatibility) cannot, at least at present, be established deductively, then the only possibility, it would seem, is to offer some sort of inductive argument in support of the relevant premise. But if this is right, then it is surely best to get that crucial inductive step out into the open, and thus to formulate the argument from evil not as a deductive argument for the very strong claim that it is logically impossible for both God and evil to exist, (or for God and certain types, or instances, of evil to exist), but as an evidential (inductive/probabilistic) argument for the more modest claim that there are evils that actually exist in the world that make it unlikely that God exists.'

There is only one philosopher I know of who tried to do what you are doing now (namely meshing the two together). That was Row, his argument is near universally considered to have failed to meet 'the total evidence requirement', he didn't refute himself the way you did, but he did end up presenting a total assumption as being true (he begged the question). So as a general rule, the distinction between the two is well established.

Last edited by 91 on 11 Feb 2011, 8:34 pm, edited 1 time in total.

91, you're still wrong. You already acknowledged the logical argument to be valid (that is, conclusions follow necessarily from the premises). Using evidence to establish a specific premise is not actually the same thing as switching to an evidential argument. I really am sorry that you don't seem capable of understanding that, but the plain simple truth is that you are dead wrong, and have been for 11 pages. Your objections are insane.

91, politely, you're missing the point.

Orwell, ironically enough, is in league with Snowbell, AG, the man who discredited the foundation for his argument in the initial. By allowing the argument to grow increasingly technical, you are legitimising their deligitimising of the original premise that was, if I recall correctly, that given a set of initial conditions, this is both the best of all possible worlds for the believer and the unbeliever. By deligitimising the second premise, and ignoring the first in the launch of his polemic, AG is arguing not his premise, but his interpretation of the outcome of ignoring his premise.

Objectify the premise to BEST and what do you get?

Post-Modernist thought be damned. And yes, this is Post-Modernist thought. Anyone who asserts they are post-anything is seriously misguided in my small corner of the universe. Such as post-natural scientists arguing that it is okay to abandon science when it comes to Climate Change for the nobility of their efforts offsets the abandonment of scrutiny, critical thought, and scientific principle. The same principle applies here. If AG won't see the error of his argument, change the methodology. Make him argue a positive, objective argument in support of his contention rather than in opposition to what he says you're saying when you have yet to utter a word, his having begun this thread.

Argue the substance. Ignore the technical rhetoric. Save everyone some cramping in their hands. How many times can you argue the same point before it becomes tiresome?

91, I am being really conservative in formulating my argument. Philosopher Keith Parsons, for instance, comes up with a number for the number of instances of suffering that we could hold need to be explained: "there have been a trillion (1012) instances of undeserved, unwanted suffering (seems a reasonable number). The theist must hold that God has a morally sufficient reason for permitting every single one of those trillion instances of suffering, that is, not one can be gratuitous." Now, his number is a fiction, but it is a reasonable fiction by his estimate. And, well, frankly, just in order to show the probability to be extremely low with the assumption of 99.9%, I only needed 18412 evils. For a trillion evils, the probability would have to be absurdly highly in order to claim that the evidential argument does not come to the anti-theistic conclusion.

What Paul Draper does, or does not do is irrelevant, as I've made my reasoning clear. It's just mathematics. Frankly, given that Keith Parsons, in claiming that there are a trillion instances of undeserved and unwanted suffering is basically drawing pretty close to the kind of argument I am making.

In any case 91, I don't see the real issue. I can buttress a conclusion with two different methodologies with two different set of assumptions under the idea that one set of assumptions is weaker than the other. That being said, I am not actually making much comment on the logical problem of evil. I only supported my original argument, and my initial assessment was just one of plausibility.

Really, I don't see how this question makes the situation better. This world is not utility maximizing. It is not preference maximizing. It does not maximize knowledge of God. It is inferior to heaven, and if heaven doesn't require earth to be logically possible, then this world by having earth and not just heaven(or even a similar analogue, as there might be qualities about heaven not found on earth that are problematic, but not necessary for the superior state of heaven), is inferior. It has a large set of evils, many of which do seem unnecessary. Etc.


So, are you saying that heaven is really a terrible idea? Because if so, then you've destroyed standard theism. However, if you say it isn't, then you have to go back on your earlier claim, as it makes no sense for God to reward people with an inferior state of affairs.

Even further, this does not prove optimality. You've shown that a good quality exists, not that this good quality is at its peak and cannot be improved upon. So, even if there is an infinite improvement between two qualitative states of affairs, this does not mean that this qualititative state of affairs is at its quantitative peak, or even that there isn't a logically superior, better qualitative state of affairs. (That being said, I don't take debating partners to be "the greatest good" so find this all irrelevant)

Finally, your premise that every person is able to live an enabling life is false. People die all of the time in terrible conditions. People suffer from insanity often. People suffer from intellectually debilitating conditions often. As such, this premise seems false.

To that end, this must therefore also be the best possible world if there is no creator, and the world was simply either an accident that physics will never account for, or that the universe, and therefore the Earth, is pre-existing. How? For the fact I mentioned in defence of there being a creator. Without the ability from external factors, to live an enabling life, what have you got? Nothing. Or totalitarian Communism. A place in which no dissent exists, in which debate does not happen, in which philosophy is subjectified to the point of destruction and dismissal as a social force, where the only pre-existing quality in life is not life itself, but rather the absence of meaning in life.


Umm.... that's really not Kant's point at all. Kantian moral thought stresses individual moral autonomy as a very important element of moral psychology. Even further, Kantian thought stresses treatment of other individuals as ends rather than means, but if individuals do not exist but only a collective, then this basic statement of Kantian thought(even a textbook statement of Kantian thought) is senseless, which means that your point seems a misstatement.

I am not sure that Kierkegaard argued that God was a crutch. Kierkegaard clearly held that each individual, alone, was responsible for all actions they took, and that in the face of eternity, there is nowhere they could hide from their individual responsibility.

That being said... I think that Nietzschean moral thought is most correct. We are defined by our inherent natures more than anything else. This kind of stands against a lot of theistic thought, as theism often does rely on notions of moral autonomy to a high extent.


The problem is that this actualization is not shown as logically necessary. In fact, a person can become more who they are through great experiences as well, so why not only great experiences?


Rand isn't an enlightened philosopher. She is barely a philosopher. That being said, Nietzsche and Kierkegaard clearly have a very very very strong focus on subjectivism, and Kierkegaard actually was explicitly arguing against a notion of only focusing on absolutes and objective values in much of his writings. Kierkegaard was anti-Hegel, and Hegel was ALL ABOUT the absolute and the objective, and so Kierkegaard focused on the opposite. So, your points on those two seem very clearly false. I mean, Nietzsche actually has made statements that one's philosophical commitments are just a product of how they feel, so.... that kind of falls into deep question.


No, there are many possible worlds where that could exist. That does not show that this particular one is the best. You've mistaken showing good qualities with showing that these qualities cannot be improved upon.

The problem is that I didn't and never have accepted that. I can take premises under "as-if" circumstances, and this totally fits into my view of things. For instance, let's say that given my view of the argument, there is a 70% that the logical is true, and a 30% that it is false. If there is a 30% that it is false, then by that 30%, I can invoke the evidential argument, which might also be 70%, and this could get me to 91% certainty on the overall affair. Nothing invalid about looking at it this way.


You'll have to be clear. I have generally and genuinely argued that this is not the best of all possible worlds. I have only compared this to the premise that God exists, seeing other premises as self-evident.


I have argued positively in favor of my contention that this is not the best possible world. I have made several arguments, and the whole issue is just that one of these arguments was probabilistic. That being said, I don't think you likely know what the hell you are talking about, but at the same time, I also do promote some notions of post-modern thinking. In fact, I am probably one of the strongest proponents of taking some postmodernism seriously on PPR. Frankly, methodological shifts are easy for me, and at times I do sometimes feel that pluralist methodology in some fields makes sense.


The technicalities and substance aren't necessarily separate.

I ask again, Best for what? And for whom?

In the known universe, that which we can see through a telescope, whether visual or radio, there is no other planet where this discussion is taking place. Therefore, since all known quantities are taken into immediate consideration, there is no disputing that this must be the best possible world for this discussion to take place, therefore this is the best of all possible worlds.

As to enablability, if that's a word, you say that no everyone can live an enabling life. That's true. Despots, however, do not become despots, without an enabling framework. This is the best of all possible worlds for despotism. Do you deny that? So, for the simple fact that the world is real, which means that Ayn Rand is a credited philosopher as she dealt with reality above all else, and the fact that not everyone lives an enabling life is actually proof positive of the contention that no matter your indoctrination or inculcation, the world is real and therefore everyone has an equal shot at making their lives as they so choose.

Deal with reality. Look to Egypt. A perfect example of how self-actualisation takes on a broader social form. A form free of direction, manipulation and external agendas, in which the Egyptians said no more and now there is no more. This is the world in which Mubarek can lead, where the Muslim Brotherhood can exist alongside Coptic Christians in an harmonious society, and in which it matters not at all that a whole family is tortured to death, but for the ability of the torture to happen.

I repeat myself, which I hate, Best for whom? And for what?

Reality is real. Rand is therefore credited above anyone who has ever said otherwise. Hers is the only philosophy based fundamentally on the fact that your life is your own and what you make of it is up to you.

This is the best world for Objectivism because it exists. As it is also the best world for Socialism, Communism, Facism, Post-Modernism, Utopianism, Environmentalism, Feminism, Liberalism, Atheism, Darwinism, Creationism, and any other ism I can think to list. All of these things, often in blatant opposition to one another exist. So, how can this be anything other than the best of all possible worlds, when all possible worlds exist within this one?

Well? Answer the substance and bring your argument out of the classroom and the realms of probability and relate your remarks to the real world.

It seems like you're missing the point here. If you believe this world is the best because it's the only one that exists, that would be quite valid to use as an argument from a secular point of view.

From a Christian point of view, however, it's quite ridiculous. If God is supposedly good, then any sin (which is opposite of good) that he allows in this world means that he could have created a better world with no sin in it. A world with no evil in it is better than one with evil in it.

MCalavera, with respect, the point of sin, believe it or not, is to juxtapose against good. It's been said since the beginning of time, that it is sin that shows good to be what it is. Without evil, what do you have? You don't have uniform good. You have nothing.

It's the same argument that anyone can rudimentarily mount against Post-anything thinking. In the Post-Modern world, especially, there is no causality. Which is why in the modern world people view taxing profits more vigorously as simply a tax on profits. It won't effect jobs. However, in the real world, if you inhibit a company's ability to make a profit worthy of its being in business initially, it will cease trading. Which will mean no jobs. So, why the profit tax? Increasing profits will increase your initial tax take anyway.

The same is true of good and evil. If you accept that a world must be sin free in order to be the best, it cannot therefore be the best for sin. In which case, the world you create is not the best of all worlds. It is not the best for sin, inasmuch as it doesn't exist.

So. I ask again, the obviously unanswerable question. Best for whom? And for what?

You might want and desire a world without evil, without rape, child abuse and neglect and war and intolerance and religious violence and the broader exploitation of women and whatever else you consider a sin. I agree with you. But the fact is, it is the fact of these things in the first place that dictates that this must be the best of ALL possible worlds, because, as I said before, in this world, all things exist.

Can you think of a more disparate world than this one? Just because you might desire something different doesn't make it better. It only makes it more limited. And as has been said, a limit on choice doesn't preclude choice or preclude free will. People freely commit sin against other people. I will never know why. Neither will I ever sanction their actions as moral. But in the morally pure world, it is morality that doesn't exist. It is, morally speaking, immoral to limit a world to what you would have it.

Did the USSR and Nazi Germany teach you nothing?

As, I wonder, will you concede that this was the best of possible worlds for Nazism and Communism? Just because they died, doesn't mean that this is the worst possible world for them. Without this world, they never would have existed.

Am I making sense yet? And will no one attempt to answer my question? Best for whom? And for what?

Democracy beats Totalitarianism. Of that, most but the most despotic will agree. In order to contextualise Democracy, however, you have to have its compliments. Such as Totalitarianism. So, I ask you, how is a sin-free world the best of ALL possible worlds, when it is without sin that you can never recognise good for the valid social force that it is?

Or do I have to ask my question again?

To the atheist it MIGHT - I say might - be acceptable to say best = best for humanity. Except there is all that talk about the high probability in even the part of the universe we can look at of other observers, AND we do not have to take it that "Best" must be determined by one observer, one race of observers, the set of all observers past or present.

To the theist, however, BEST must surely be defined in terms of the aesthetic of the divine entity or entities. I do not see how theist and atheist can agree on a single "best":

Now, if you happen to place credence in the Pentateuch, as many do, we have the datum that "God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good."

We note God does not say, "It will have to do", nor, "Well, this is the best I can do", nor "Fantastisch! The best of all possible Space - Time contrinua." With characteristic modesty, he figures it is "very good".

Not really relevant. We can propose a large list of potential standards, and this world will fail those standards when compared to other conceived worlds. I already pointed this out.


Not actually relevant, as the idea of "possible worlds" really isn't talking about planets, so much as realities. That is to say that a "possible world" is really talking about entire universes with different facts about them.


No, even then I don't think that is the case. Further though, despotism, by most moral reasoning is not a good thing.

That being said, Rand isn't considered a credited philosopher. It is not as if reading Ayn Rand will kill the brain of the intelligent person who tries, but... Rand is generally just a person who tried to ignore much of the history of philosophy, and then make-up her own perspective on it.

Finally.... "equal shot", is still not shown. There is strong evidence against an equal shot.


You have no knowledge of philosophy, do you? Reality being real is a definition. Even further, the existential movement is based fundamentally on the idea that your life is your own and what you make of it is up to you.


Because they don't all exist within this one? Because there are facts that could be true world that are not true, and thus another logically possible world could have those facts be true.


There is no substance here because your grasp of what is going on is rather weak. "Possible worlds" refers to the idea of other possible realities with other facts that are not in agreement with the existing facts. So, a world where JFK never got shot is possible. A world where the moon was a meter larger in radius is possible. So on and so forth, but these are OBVIOUSLY not the current world.

I don't know what the best world for a good God would be (as I'm not omniscient), BUT I do know that any world with no sin is better to the good God than this world.

Biblically speaking, sin didn't start to exist to show how good God (and his creation apart from sin) is. According to Genesis, when God was done creating the world, he said that it was very good. That was before sin appeared in the world.

Biblically speaking, sin is there simply because of man's freedom to choose to sin, nothing more.

A world corrupted with sin cannot be the best world for a supposedly good God. Simple.

So to answer your question:

God could've easily created a better world for himself (and for his creation) if his purpose of creating is for him to be glorified and have pleasure out of it.

The existence of sin doesn't help his purpose at all.

@AG Wrote:

PJW wrote:
I ask again, Best for what? And for whom?

Not really relevant. We can propose a large list of potential standards, and this world will fail those standards when compared to other conceived worlds. I already pointed this out.

PJW says:

How is it irrelevant to ask what you mean by best? If this is not the best of all possible worlds, you need to define best. Not best to me. Not best to 91. Not best to your average feminist. But best to you. Is there a definition for best? Probably not. But then, that is what makes this the best of all possible worlds.


AG again:

Quote:
In the known universe, that which we can see through a telescope, whether visual or radio, there is no other planet where this discussion is taking place. Therefore, since all known quantities are taken into immediate consideration, there is no disputing that this must be the best possible world for this discussion to take place, therefore this is the best of all possible worlds.

Not actually relevant, as the idea of "possible worlds" really isn't talking about planets, so much as realities. That is to say that a "possible world" is really talking about entire universes with different facts about them.

PJW again:

Not true. There is only one universe. This one. This one is the only one in which we exist. As such, it therefore holds that since this is the only world with life, with sentient creatures having higher order debates, that this is the best world.

I mean, seriously. I can imagine a lot of different worlds. But does that make them real? And, furthermore and most importantly, does that make them best? Even to me, they might not be the best. They might be the best to you. But that doesn't make the world I dream the best to other people. Someone will always lose. Which means, again, that loss, the ability to discern loss and feel loss and understand loss and rebuild from loss, is lost in a world where loss doesn't exist. Which means, by limiting loss, you are limiting the world, people's ability to grow and flourish even through adversity, and is therefore not the best of all possible worlds.

I ask again. Best for what? And for whom?

Does it completely escape you that it could be possible that God wants people to come to Him or reject Him as they so choose? It makes sense to me. I mean, I prefer people to like me for who I am. Not for who I would like them to perceive me to be. How about you?