Wednesday, June 28, 2006

From Thomas Talbott's "C. S. Lewis and the Problem of Evil"

Perhaps Beversluis thinks that God could have improved things immeasurably by eliminating cancer from the world. But how could anyone (who is not omniscient) possibly know that or even have reason to think it true. Try this thought experiment. Try to imagine what our world (with exactly the same persons in it) might have been in the absence of cancer. Our experiment won’t be at all technically accurate, of course, and may even be incoherent, but it may also be pedagogically useful. To begin with, then we must delete from the world (in our imagination) all the pain and suffering caused by this terrible disease as well as all the psychological torment experienced by both cancer victims and those who love such victims; then we must delete all the good—such as the courageous endurance of pain—for which the cancer is a necessary condition; then we must delete all the free choices—and all the consequences of such free choices—that either would not have been made at all or would have been made differently if our world had been devoid of cancer. As one can see, things quickly get complicated. If God exists and there is an afterlife, some of the choices may be choices that result in eternal joy and happiness for some persons. But that is just the beginning of our experiment…Trying to figure out what a world of free persons would be like in the absence of cancer is not like calculating where the planets would be if they had been in certain specified positions last year…Once one begins to think through such complexities as these—which we have barely touched upon—the anti-theistic argument from evil begins to look less and less plausible.


Talbott, T.B. (1987) “C.S. Lewis and the Problem of Evil,” Christian Scholars’ Review, 17(1): 36-51

10 comments:

Steven Carr said...

'Perhaps Beversluis thinks that God could have improved things immeasurably by eliminating cancer from the world. But how could anyone (who is not omniscient) possibly know that or even have reason to think it true.'

We have eliminated smallpox from the world.

Well, somebody has to play God, don't they?

Anonymous said...

I can't believe this Mr. Talbott is serious. Following his line of reasoning, we should forbid the practice of medicine and the dispensing of pain relieving medications. Think of all the courageous actions we are depriving people of by curing their ailments!
t.

Anonymous said...

He's saying that suffering could be a way of molding character into us and make us stronger people.

From my book: "Supposedly, then, we need a certain amount of suffering to mold our character. How much suffering do we need? Where was that suffering in the Garden of Eden? If God’s punishments are good for us, then maybe there was a proper ratio of suffering in the world just after God expelled them from the garden? But with the rise of modern science that ratio has been changed, hasn’t it? Maybe then, we should be upset then that someone found a vaccine for Tuberculosis, or Polio? Should we mourn the day someone discovered penicillin? Because with each new medical advance, that ratio changes.

And wouldn’t a Christian be the first one to say we should alleviate human suffering wherever we can? He’d say we have an ethical obligation to lessen human suffering, wouldn’t he? Then why doesn’t God do this? But if we do, then on the one hand, aren’t we also reducing the total good created by the creator, since suffering molds our character? Since we have been fairly effective in alleviating human suffering through medicine, maybe we’re doing wrong after all? Maybe because of our successes we have contributed to the narcissism in our world today? Maybe our real duty would be to increase human suffering, since it molds character? However, if, on the other hand, certain kinds of human suffering can be alleviated by modern medicine without making it worse off for us as a whole, then those very evils we eliminated were not necessary in the first place. Can the Christian really have it both ways? [This is a point that H.L. McCloskey, makes in “God and Evil,” in Readings in the Philosophy of Religion, ed., Baruch A. Brody (Prentice-Hall, 1974), pp. 168-186].

If suffering can remind us of what’s important in life, like prayer, and turning to God, then God has done a poor job of this. If God’s purpose in bringing upon us so much suffering is to cause us to throw ourselves upon his feet, then it hasn’t worked. Disasters and the resultant human suffering from them have sent more believers away from God than closer to him. The pain and the question of human suffering account for more defections from Christianity than probably any other cause.

Anonymous said...

You make many good points, John.
I think the christian concept of a god who is all-powerful, all-good and works within human history results in the problem of evil. Perhaps that is one advantage polytheism has over monotheism, evil is easier to account for under it. Of course, neither hold a match to the theory of evolution. Under it the philosophical problem of evil simply vanishes. All one needs worry about then is the practical problem of how to reduce evil.
t.

Mike Darus said...

You asked the question, "He’d say we have an ethical obligation to lessen human suffering, wouldn’t he? Then why doesn’t God do this?"
I don't believe there is any single Theodicy that is sufficient to explain great evils. So I also believe that giving a single answer to your question is a mistake. However, there is a simple and profound answer: God does not eliminate evil because he gave that job to us. To me it sounds like a stupid plan. We do this job in spits and sputters but we don't do it nearly as well as God would. But it also seems ingenious. We gain our greatest sense of accomplishment and sense of fulfillment when we do something in this world to assuage the suffering of another being. This is not only a good thing, it is the best thing we have going.

Steven Carr said...

Mike D. writes 'We gain our greatest sense of accomplishment and sense of fulfillment when we do something in this world to assuage the suffering of another being. '

God, of course, is already fully accomplished and fulfilled. His moral character is perfect already, so he has no need to perfect it by helping suffering people.

Anonymous said...

Mike said: God does not eliminate evil because he gave that job to us.

Well then, it's time God took this job back for himself.

What if you hired someone who failed to do the job right, and the job was brain surgery? Would you let him continue to kill people because of ineptitude, or fire him and do the job yourself?

In either case, if someone dies, it would be YOUR fault, because you did not hire the right people to do the job. If God gave the job to Christians, and they fail, then God is still blamed for giving the job to Christians.

There is no reasonable escape from my criticisms. You will either have to abandon your faith in a good omnipotent God, or admit that your faith is not a reasonable faith. Your choice, but in either case you're wrong.

[For some reason lately, I seem to be on the offensive...maybe it's because I was ignored in two e-mails I sent to the owner of this Blog. I don't like to be ignored. Try to ignore me now.]

Victor Reppert said...

I hope the fact that I didn't respond to a couple of your e-mails has not affected the tone in which you conduct discussions here; I sometimes put an e-mail aside because I am not sure what to say in response, and sometimes I never get back to it. I am afraid I am not up to C. S. Lewis's well-known standard from responding to mail. But do not take that personally.

Anonymous said...

Talbott has a more detailed version of this in his book "The Inescapable Love of God" (1999) that I recommend reading

>> I can't believe this Mr. Talbott is serious. Following his line of reasoning, we should forbid the practice of medicine and the dispensing of pain relieving medications. Think of all the courageous actions we are depriving people of by curing their ailments! <<

But the act of curing, finding cures, agonizing over medical research for the sake of those suffering, etc, are examples of compassion that we wouldn't see apart from suffering. Talbott's not saying that we shouldn't cure or treat illness, but rather the act of curing or treating is a demonstration of love made possible by illness.

Talbott argued that a sense of separation from God might be necessary for us to become "perfected saints", just as suffering may be necessary for a fully-developed sense of self-awareness, which is another potential argument against the anti-theistic argument from suffering.

The position of Christian Universalism adds more weight to the position (since, in that model, everyone will eventually be in perpetual bliss)

-- Pat Casanova

Winston said...

It's even worse than that, Tim.

If Talbott really, truly believes that inflicting and allowing suffering is justified because of a "greater good", then he should torture every sentient being as much as possible. He should also encourage everyone else to do the same to maximise the "opportunities for compassion" to manifest themselves.