God’s Ethics: A Workaround?

This chapter engages with a recent book by Mark Murphy in which he argues that a correct understanding of the ethics of a perfect being renders arguments from evil for atheism effectively defanged. Murphy contends that God’s baseline attitude toward human persons is indifference and, indeed, that it is consistent with the nature of God for God to allow evils to befall rational and sentient creatures for no reason whatsoever. To the contrary, this chapter argues that God counts as an absolutely perfect being only if by God’s very nature God is such that God cares for the rational and sentient creatures in existence and prevents us from suffering pointlessly. In support of this view, the author delineates two arguments, thus defending the conception of God as essentially perfectly morally good. In light of an appropriate conception of God’s ethics, the argument from evil retains its power.

Hell and Fault

This chapter addresses issues concerning agential freedom, moral fault, and punishment. It argues that David Lewis is right that there is an especially virulent non-standard argument from evil, which can be seen more clearly by an expansion of his argument. What Lewis calls “the neglected argument” is an argument concerning the rationality of belief in an eternal hell on the part of theists. It is an argument for the incoherence of what Lewis calls the orthodox story concerning God and hell. The argument is not on its own an argument for atheism, since it leaves intact a variety of metaphysical positions, including universalist theism and forms of religiosity other than those involving an affirmation of the existence of a being who is essentially omniscient, omnipotent, and perfectly good. It stands, nonetheless, as a powerful argument from evil demanding attention from any perfect being theist who endorses the existence of a non-empty eternal hell.

Divine Intimacy Theodicy

This chapter develops what the author calls a divine intimacy theodicy in response to the problem of evil. It highlights reflections of this theodicy in the thinking of several historical and contemporary philosophers, theologians, and religious practitioners, including some medieval mystics. The central idea is that some occasions of suffering may qualify as religious experiences that serve to promote closeness with God. Despite its value as a strategy a religious person might use for coping with suffering, the author argues that ultimately the divine intimacy view does not succeed in answering the concerns of the non-theist who poses arguments from evil against the existence of God. The chapter closes by discussing prospects for a hybrid theodicy.

God and Suffering

This chapter launches a new investigation of the question of God’s existence, examining it against the reality of human suffering and bringing to the fore contentious presuppositions concerning agency and value at the core of the debate. When we survey the world, we observe an enormous amount of pain, including virtually unspeakable kinds of maltreatment and agony, many instances of which seem patently unfair, unearned, and pointless. This chapter initiates the book’s argument that, in light of these observations, it is reasonable to conclude that God does not exist. The chapter critically examines and extends the work of William Rowe, John Hick, and Alvin Plantinga, taking up apparently pointless instances of suffering and the proposed justifying goods of character-building and free will.

The Value of Free Will

This chapter closely examines the free will theodicy and free will defense as responses to arguments from evil for atheism. It sets out three types of accounts of the nature of free will in the contemporary literature on agency and argues that only one of them is suitable for the free will theodicist’s (and defender’s) use. The chapter then takes up the question of whether or not God’s giving created beings free will, as characterized by that suitable sort of account, would make sense—that is, whether or not it would be worth the price. It argues that it would not, or at least that it is not unreasonable to refrain from believing that free will is worth the costs. If free will is not worth the costs, then it is unsuitable to serve as the central good that is alleged to provide a God-justifying reason for allowing evils in the world.

Skeptical Theism

This chapter critically examines skeptical theism, roughly the point of view that God exists but that God’s reasons for permitting evils are beyond our abilities to discern. Matters addressed include the epistemic import of appearances of pointlessness, the skeptical theses and analogies for the human condition with respect to apparently pointless evils defended by Michael Bergmann, and concerns about skeptical spread. The chapter provides support for the idea that, if there were God-justifying reasons for evils, we would see them, thereby defending a key premise in the argument from pointless evils and the argument from facts about evil.

Conclusion

This chapter summarizes the case that has been made in the book in defense of the argument from pointless evils and the argument from the facts about evil in support of atheism. It highlights important claims about agency and claims about value that have been brought out by close examination of the punishment theodicy, the free will theodicy, the character-building theodicy, the divine intimacy theodicy, and the position of skeptical theism. The chapter also points toward directions for further work on the problem of evil in the philosophy of religion.

Religion on the Cheap

It seems a natural thought that worshipping God and taking part in related communal religious activities does not make sense if one does not believe that God is real. But not all share this thought: some think it is perfectly sensible to engage in traditional communal religious activities centered on God without believing that God—an essentially omnipotent, omniscient, perfectly good agent who creates whatever universe there is—really exists. This chapter argues that certain attempts to make sense of this way of thinking and this way of life, such as those described by Howard Wettstein and Gary Gutting, do not succeed in making sense of them. It further points out that there are real costs associated with not assenting to the claim that the proposition, “God exists,” realistically construed, is true, but suggests that one should be prepared to absorb those costs rather than trying to have it both ways—rather than getting religion (of a particular sort) on the cheap.