To my mind, a lot of puzzling aspects of theism go away if you assume atheism is true. As Richard Dawkins put it in his book, "River Out of Eden":
“The total amount of suffering per year in the natural world is beyond all decent contemplation. During the minute that it takes me to compose this sentence, thousands of animals are being eaten alive, many others are running for their lives, whimpering with fear, others are slowly being devoured from within by rasping parasites, thousands of all kinds are dying of starvation, thirst, and disease. It must be so. If there ever is a time of plenty, this very fact will automatically lead to an increase in the population until the natural state of starvation and misery is restored. In a universe of electrons and selfish genes, blind physical forces and genetic replication, some people are going to get hurt, other people are going to get lucky, and you won’t find any rhyme or reason in it, nor any justice. The universe that we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but pitiless indifference.”
I still find myself not being convinced by the idea that the evils of the world are a tragic but necessary consequence of the world being structured to bring about some soul-building goods. The suffering that occurs in nature is so extreme, all-pervasive, and overwhelming that it seems to outweigh any soul-building benefit that its existence might be a consequence of. It just seems like no good can be good enough to justify that much evil, even if the evil is a necessary side effect of bringing about the good. In that case it seems like we can confidently say that it's not worth it and that the world as currently constituted would be better not to exist, and sans converting the universe into hedonium to outweigh the natural suffering of the world, that conscious existence is a net negative. If we can say that the current world would be better for its inhabitants not to be, I think we can confidently refuse theism on the grounds that even for some soul-building good, a good God simply would not create such a world.
“[N]ecessary consequence of the world being structured to bring about some soul-building goods”
Besides the evil that a theist has to account for, I am also wondering why god would need to create “soul-building goods” in the fist place. “Let me create some souls and subject some of these souls to evil and suffering on the basis it all nets out”.
A further point is the asymmetry of pain and positive experiences as David Benatar makes this distinction:
If a scientist wanted to breed monkeys on the basis some would have soul-building and some would just have extreme suffering, we would call the whole experiment unethical. You can’t just “net out” the suffering of beings with the soul building of some.
I still take issue with, “If [god] places us in tons of worlds, probably some will be like [this one].” What makes that claim substantively different from a classic theodicy which says “If god places us in a world where we have tons of experiences, probably some will involve evil”?
The latter claim isn’t taken seriously until justified with “god’s plan/evil builds character/etc.” so, similarly, you can’t wiggle out simply on the probability of evil words existing. You seem to accept this, and then give lots of reasons for why evil worlds might have to exist on theism, but they’re the same reasons that everyone always gives for why evil experiences exist on theism!!
I take issue with the holocaust example along similar lines: the classic theodicy says ‘the holocaust happened because it made for more good in the world’, your theodicy says ‘(a world exists where) the holocaust happened because it made for more good in (all the worlds)’. Why should I be any more convinced by you? Why should I find your version less reprehensible?
It is the core part of your argument. If suffering isn't necessary for goodness (doesn't have to be the tragic side-effects of other things that deliver great goods), then God would not have reasons to put us in worlds like ours (with suffering). Therefore, the whole premise crumbles.
1) A perfect being would not allow horrible evils for which there is no justification. (obvious truth)
2) Horrible evils happen without justification. (obvious fact)
3) A perfect being doesn't exist.
This argument stands undefeated and is the simplest way to prove with certainty that a perfect being obviously doesn't exist. Anyone who rejects P1 is as morally confused as someone who rejects that 1+1=2 is mathematically confused. Anyone who rejects P2 is as empirically confused as someone who rejects that 1+1=2 is mathematically confused.
Except 2) cannot be proved. We can know that human beings do evil w/o justification, but we can't know that the arrangement of this world that makes that possible isn't the best of all arrangements. Especially if there will be an eternity after this when injustices will be repaid and those who suffered unjustly be rewarded.
I agree that soul building and virtue building is the weakest link. When you write -
"I think that the soul-building element is one of the least persuasive elements of the theodicy. Still, I have a few main comments about Alex’s criticism. First, it might be that as free creatures, God can’t just make us with any old character. What we do is up to us, and if God made us constantly disposed to do the right thing, then that would eliminate the good of us doing the right thing even when it’s psychologically difficult. It would be like genetically engineering your child so that they never even consider doing the wrong thing. Perhaps then, given our freedom, experiences like those we have on Earth are needed for the best kind of long term character—one that freely chooses the good without compulsion.
Second, lots of kinds of virtue require us being in positions of hardship. We could not be brave without something to fear. We could not suffer for others without suffering. To exercise forgiveness, there must actually be something to forgive.
Third, it might be that forming desirable character traits freely—rather than having them directly implanted by God—is itself an intrinsic good. Coming to care about others freely—through seeing their suffering—might be more valuable than having God directly make you compassionate. Some virtues are best if formed freely through experiences rather than directly implanted."
All of this is super implausible if you consider that people with psychopathy or extreme anti-social personality disorder are simply unable to feel empathy or compassion for other beings and as a result they are unable to become virtuous genuinely. And vast amounts of animals who go through pain are also unable to build virtues.
This is why rather than virtue building, I just recommend either a kind of victory-pleasure or great story theodicy (Josh Rasmussen likes this) or video game theodicy is better. They are all just that - it would feel wonderful to win after going through a hard challenge. The feeling of great satisfaction after going through hardship might be so good that it would make the suffering of each individual creature in this world worth it. Each sentient being gets optimized level of pain to ultimately maximize pleasure.
I think, the fact that you believe in free will makes your case less persuasive in my view. Because remember that God never needs to go through all this suffering for his own virtue, soul building, etc. etc. etc. God never ever does evil. Every theist believes that God knows what God is doing. God never commits a mistake. God's nature is perfect. Every action God does is for the good. And it is simply instinctual for God to do good effortlessly.
Repeat this - 'God has libertarian free will (according to you) but God can never do evil, that is, God can never do otherwise.'
Keep repeating until you know how nonsense or incoherent this belief in libertarian free will is.
There a lot of things I generally don't consider like growing a second neck. Now where's my freedom? My freedom is radically constrained by this titanium like strength of being embedded in a body.
Your rebuttal to the October 1st argument misses the point that you have knowledge that today is October 1st, so if there is a single specific day that loops infinitely it cannot be anything other than October 1st. So you're weighing the probability that the current day loops infinitely (unknown, but small) against the probability in an infinite sequence of days that today would be October 1st (infinitesimal). Unknown but small > infinitesimal.
That's what I'm saying your anthropic arguments for God are. Juxtaposing the infinite improbability of the current moment next to an arbitrary probability you allow yourself to assign to what amounts to a thought experiment. The same argument supports us living in an infinite regress of simulations. The only difference is your priors. You may reckon God sounds like a reasonable idea, and you might reckon that today looping infinitely sounds pretty bunk, but that on its own isn't the basis for a probabilistic argument.
> As for the substantive remark—it’s true that the theory that everyday is October 1, 2024 on loop makes it likelier that today would be October 1, 2024. But what the view makes up for in explanation, it loses in priors! The odds that every day would be October 1, 2024 = the odds that everyday would be some specific day times the odds that if everyday is some day, it would be October 1 2024.
If you are certain that one day is repeated in a loop but don't know which, then your calculation of priors for which exact day is repeated is correct.
But when you consider which of two scenarios is a priori likelier: 1. same experience is repeated in a loop and 2. there is a diverse array of different experiences, - then the prior probability of 1. and 2. is calculated based on their complexity: how long of a program we need to implement these scenarios in code. And here scenario 1 is clearly more favorable.
The same principle but in different words: theories have to restrict anticipations. When a theory predicts multiple outcomes - it gets complexity penalty. And if a theory can "explain" any outcome - then its explanatory power is zero. And that's what your theodicy seem to be.
> If we were all being grotesquely tortured all the time, then probably it would be reasonable to believe in some kind of evil God. There’s some large amount of evil at which point the thing that best explains it is an evil God—but a mere 80 years of bad stuff that’s 0% of total possible badness spread across 0% of our life isn’t that!
How much bad stuff should happen? Suppose that you are constantly tortured by literal demons for thousands and thousands of years. Why the logic of your theodicy not apply to this situation? Surely thousands years of constant torture is very bad, but maybe it's just one of our infinite lifetimes and it really helps with soul-binding and free will and all the other rationalizations. Why would your theodicy restrict this outcome?
Everywhere I look I see people running organizations. Naturally my bayesian prior would be to go with there's some person running the universe. Paley would approve. But actually I don't. It seems an obvious error of composition. Along with the Kalam arguments similar mistake. Not to mention the unwarranted apotheosization of a ridgid cause and effect. Demonstrate the necessity of that first.
The problem of evil exists because God is a libertarian capitalist using the suffering in parallel worlds as fuel for his axiarchic pollution factory. Many such cases
I miss hedonist BB. This theodicy is p much “whatever purported actions of God incompatible with standard normative theorizing (of the kind you endorsed not so long ago no less!) actually involve an intrinsic good.”
How exactly do we access these other worlds? And what's the meaningful distinction between this and the multiverse theory?
Also, how does being an LGBTQ+ person in an extremely LGBTQ+ phobic country, or even a pedophile in a country that bans child sex dolls/robots, actually encourage character-building?
All adversity forces a person to exercise strength, sometimes strength they weren't aware of possessing. Thus one becomes stronger. And exercising one's strength becomes a sort of battle joy.
And being a despised minority can force you to require more from yourself. People can disrespect you as they choose. Your job is to make sure that you are worthy of respect, whatever others may think.
Regards pedophilia, if you are prevented from acting on this in any capacity, even using a robot, you are actually profiting by not doing it.
My own view on simulated acts is that it’s very hard to argue why exactly simulated acts that involve 2+ consenting adults are acceptable but not simulated acts that involve one person and a doll or a robot.
Having sex with Shauna Rae is legal for pedophiles if she consents, for instance:
But having sex with a doll or a robot who looks and acts like Shauna Rae (or another adult with a similar condition to Shauna’s) would be completely unacceptable. Why exactly?
Similarly, doing rape fantasy roleplaying with a consenting adult partner is considered perfectly acceptable, even when you yourself play the role of the rapist and actually enjoy it, but programming a non-sentient robot to resist one’s sexual advances and then raping them is considered unacceptable. Why exactly?
BTW, I suspect that your own views on the acceptability of child sex dolls/robots would be vastly different if you yourself had such inclinations, and to such an extent that having sex with other adults would not be a viable long-term substitute for this.
I don’t see how exactly pedophiles profit from not having any sex life at all, even one that involves a doll/robot. They might get a moral boost in the eyes of others but their quality of life would very likely severely suffer from this, thus more than compensating for this moral boost.
To my mind, a lot of puzzling aspects of theism go away if you assume atheism is true. As Richard Dawkins put it in his book, "River Out of Eden":
“The total amount of suffering per year in the natural world is beyond all decent contemplation. During the minute that it takes me to compose this sentence, thousands of animals are being eaten alive, many others are running for their lives, whimpering with fear, others are slowly being devoured from within by rasping parasites, thousands of all kinds are dying of starvation, thirst, and disease. It must be so. If there ever is a time of plenty, this very fact will automatically lead to an increase in the population until the natural state of starvation and misery is restored. In a universe of electrons and selfish genes, blind physical forces and genetic replication, some people are going to get hurt, other people are going to get lucky, and you won’t find any rhyme or reason in it, nor any justice. The universe that we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but pitiless indifference.”
I still find myself not being convinced by the idea that the evils of the world are a tragic but necessary consequence of the world being structured to bring about some soul-building goods. The suffering that occurs in nature is so extreme, all-pervasive, and overwhelming that it seems to outweigh any soul-building benefit that its existence might be a consequence of. It just seems like no good can be good enough to justify that much evil, even if the evil is a necessary side effect of bringing about the good. In that case it seems like we can confidently say that it's not worth it and that the world as currently constituted would be better not to exist, and sans converting the universe into hedonium to outweigh the natural suffering of the world, that conscious existence is a net negative. If we can say that the current world would be better for its inhabitants not to be, I think we can confidently refuse theism on the grounds that even for some soul-building good, a good God simply would not create such a world.
“[N]ecessary consequence of the world being structured to bring about some soul-building goods”
Besides the evil that a theist has to account for, I am also wondering why god would need to create “soul-building goods” in the fist place. “Let me create some souls and subject some of these souls to evil and suffering on the basis it all nets out”.
A further point is the asymmetry of pain and positive experiences as David Benatar makes this distinction:
If a scientist wanted to breed monkeys on the basis some would have soul-building and some would just have extreme suffering, we would call the whole experiment unethical. You can’t just “net out” the suffering of beings with the soul building of some.
I still take issue with, “If [god] places us in tons of worlds, probably some will be like [this one].” What makes that claim substantively different from a classic theodicy which says “If god places us in a world where we have tons of experiences, probably some will involve evil”?
The latter claim isn’t taken seriously until justified with “god’s plan/evil builds character/etc.” so, similarly, you can’t wiggle out simply on the probability of evil words existing. You seem to accept this, and then give lots of reasons for why evil worlds might have to exist on theism, but they’re the same reasons that everyone always gives for why evil experiences exist on theism!!
I take issue with the holocaust example along similar lines: the classic theodicy says ‘the holocaust happened because it made for more good in the world’, your theodicy says ‘(a world exists where) the holocaust happened because it made for more good in (all the worlds)’. Why should I be any more convinced by you? Why should I find your version less reprehensible?
> Okay but that wasn’t my argument!
It is the core part of your argument. If suffering isn't necessary for goodness (doesn't have to be the tragic side-effects of other things that deliver great goods), then God would not have reasons to put us in worlds like ours (with suffering). Therefore, the whole premise crumbles.
1) A perfect being would not allow horrible evils for which there is no justification. (obvious truth)
2) Horrible evils happen without justification. (obvious fact)
3) A perfect being doesn't exist.
This argument stands undefeated and is the simplest way to prove with certainty that a perfect being obviously doesn't exist. Anyone who rejects P1 is as morally confused as someone who rejects that 1+1=2 is mathematically confused. Anyone who rejects P2 is as empirically confused as someone who rejects that 1+1=2 is mathematically confused.
Except 2) cannot be proved. We can know that human beings do evil w/o justification, but we can't know that the arrangement of this world that makes that possible isn't the best of all arrangements. Especially if there will be an eternity after this when injustices will be repaid and those who suffered unjustly be rewarded.
What is the justification for the fact that the holocaust had approximately 12 millions victims instead of 11,5 millions ?
I agree that soul building and virtue building is the weakest link. When you write -
"I think that the soul-building element is one of the least persuasive elements of the theodicy. Still, I have a few main comments about Alex’s criticism. First, it might be that as free creatures, God can’t just make us with any old character. What we do is up to us, and if God made us constantly disposed to do the right thing, then that would eliminate the good of us doing the right thing even when it’s psychologically difficult. It would be like genetically engineering your child so that they never even consider doing the wrong thing. Perhaps then, given our freedom, experiences like those we have on Earth are needed for the best kind of long term character—one that freely chooses the good without compulsion.
Second, lots of kinds of virtue require us being in positions of hardship. We could not be brave without something to fear. We could not suffer for others without suffering. To exercise forgiveness, there must actually be something to forgive.
Third, it might be that forming desirable character traits freely—rather than having them directly implanted by God—is itself an intrinsic good. Coming to care about others freely—through seeing their suffering—might be more valuable than having God directly make you compassionate. Some virtues are best if formed freely through experiences rather than directly implanted."
All of this is super implausible if you consider that people with psychopathy or extreme anti-social personality disorder are simply unable to feel empathy or compassion for other beings and as a result they are unable to become virtuous genuinely. And vast amounts of animals who go through pain are also unable to build virtues.
This is why rather than virtue building, I just recommend either a kind of victory-pleasure or great story theodicy (Josh Rasmussen likes this) or video game theodicy is better. They are all just that - it would feel wonderful to win after going through a hard challenge. The feeling of great satisfaction after going through hardship might be so good that it would make the suffering of each individual creature in this world worth it. Each sentient being gets optimized level of pain to ultimately maximize pleasure.
I think, the fact that you believe in free will makes your case less persuasive in my view. Because remember that God never needs to go through all this suffering for his own virtue, soul building, etc. etc. etc. God never ever does evil. Every theist believes that God knows what God is doing. God never commits a mistake. God's nature is perfect. Every action God does is for the good. And it is simply instinctual for God to do good effortlessly.
Repeat this - 'God has libertarian free will (according to you) but God can never do evil, that is, God can never do otherwise.'
Keep repeating until you know how nonsense or incoherent this belief in libertarian free will is.
If you are a compatibilist, then you shouldn't be - https://youtu.be/3d0ycm6dbMI
There a lot of things I generally don't consider like growing a second neck. Now where's my freedom? My freedom is radically constrained by this titanium like strength of being embedded in a body.
Your rebuttal to the October 1st argument misses the point that you have knowledge that today is October 1st, so if there is a single specific day that loops infinitely it cannot be anything other than October 1st. So you're weighing the probability that the current day loops infinitely (unknown, but small) against the probability in an infinite sequence of days that today would be October 1st (infinitesimal). Unknown but small > infinitesimal.
That's what I'm saying your anthropic arguments for God are. Juxtaposing the infinite improbability of the current moment next to an arbitrary probability you allow yourself to assign to what amounts to a thought experiment. The same argument supports us living in an infinite regress of simulations. The only difference is your priors. You may reckon God sounds like a reasonable idea, and you might reckon that today looping infinitely sounds pretty bunk, but that on its own isn't the basis for a probabilistic argument.
> As for the substantive remark—it’s true that the theory that everyday is October 1, 2024 on loop makes it likelier that today would be October 1, 2024. But what the view makes up for in explanation, it loses in priors! The odds that every day would be October 1, 2024 = the odds that everyday would be some specific day times the odds that if everyday is some day, it would be October 1 2024.
If you are certain that one day is repeated in a loop but don't know which, then your calculation of priors for which exact day is repeated is correct.
But when you consider which of two scenarios is a priori likelier: 1. same experience is repeated in a loop and 2. there is a diverse array of different experiences, - then the prior probability of 1. and 2. is calculated based on their complexity: how long of a program we need to implement these scenarios in code. And here scenario 1 is clearly more favorable.
The same principle but in different words: theories have to restrict anticipations. When a theory predicts multiple outcomes - it gets complexity penalty. And if a theory can "explain" any outcome - then its explanatory power is zero. And that's what your theodicy seem to be.
> If we were all being grotesquely tortured all the time, then probably it would be reasonable to believe in some kind of evil God. There’s some large amount of evil at which point the thing that best explains it is an evil God—but a mere 80 years of bad stuff that’s 0% of total possible badness spread across 0% of our life isn’t that!
How much bad stuff should happen? Suppose that you are constantly tortured by literal demons for thousands and thousands of years. Why the logic of your theodicy not apply to this situation? Surely thousands years of constant torture is very bad, but maybe it's just one of our infinite lifetimes and it really helps with soul-binding and free will and all the other rationalizations. Why would your theodicy restrict this outcome?
Everywhere I look I see people running organizations. Naturally my bayesian prior would be to go with there's some person running the universe. Paley would approve. But actually I don't. It seems an obvious error of composition. Along with the Kalam arguments similar mistake. Not to mention the unwarranted apotheosization of a ridgid cause and effect. Demonstrate the necessity of that first.
The problem of evil exists because God is a libertarian capitalist using the suffering in parallel worlds as fuel for his axiarchic pollution factory. Many such cases
I miss hedonist BB. This theodicy is p much “whatever purported actions of God incompatible with standard normative theorizing (of the kind you endorsed not so long ago no less!) actually involve an intrinsic good.”
How exactly do we access these other worlds? And what's the meaningful distinction between this and the multiverse theory?
Also, how does being an LGBTQ+ person in an extremely LGBTQ+ phobic country, or even a pedophile in a country that bans child sex dolls/robots, actually encourage character-building?
All adversity forces a person to exercise strength, sometimes strength they weren't aware of possessing. Thus one becomes stronger. And exercising one's strength becomes a sort of battle joy.
And being a despised minority can force you to require more from yourself. People can disrespect you as they choose. Your job is to make sure that you are worthy of respect, whatever others may think.
Regards pedophilia, if you are prevented from acting on this in any capacity, even using a robot, you are actually profiting by not doing it.
My own view on simulated acts is that it’s very hard to argue why exactly simulated acts that involve 2+ consenting adults are acceptable but not simulated acts that involve one person and a doll or a robot.
Having sex with Shauna Rae is legal for pedophiles if she consents, for instance:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kgqZiGH5Jps
But having sex with a doll or a robot who looks and acts like Shauna Rae (or another adult with a similar condition to Shauna’s) would be completely unacceptable. Why exactly?
Similarly, doing rape fantasy roleplaying with a consenting adult partner is considered perfectly acceptable, even when you yourself play the role of the rapist and actually enjoy it, but programming a non-sentient robot to resist one’s sexual advances and then raping them is considered unacceptable. Why exactly?
BTW, I suspect that your own views on the acceptability of child sex dolls/robots would be vastly different if you yourself had such inclinations, and to such an extent that having sex with other adults would not be a viable long-term substitute for this.
I don’t see how exactly pedophiles profit from not having any sex life at all, even one that involves a doll/robot. They might get a moral boost in the eyes of others but their quality of life would very likely severely suffer from this, thus more than compensating for this moral boost.
Last sentence was a joke!