Today I read Ebon Musings’ very excellent All Possible Worlds. It’s an essay explaining the argument from evil, which is an arguyment I typically pooh-pooh. Normally, the person proposing the argument is not resting on good logic. They have religious-like faith in the solidity of their assumptions, and they fail to see how any possible refutation could even come close to undermining their argument. Trying to explain that the assertion that “a morally perfect god would not allow evil” is too simplistic to be a given is often an exercise in watching water flow off a duck’s back. Too often, the person making the argument is clearly substituting their own sense of idealized morality and expecting that God would unquestioningly abide by it. Which is silly.
In contrast, Ebon Musings carefully considers a truckload of strong and weak positions against the argument from evil, and he rejects them carefully. I don’t necessarily think that in the end the whole thing proves the existence or nonexistence of God, but it is hard to argue with the author’s very reasonable conclusion that the evidence seems to be strongly in atheism’s favor.
Incidentally, this is one of the features that I like best about Ebon Musing’s work. He (she? I don’t really know, so look how I make sexist assumptions!) isn’t arrogant, and he doesn’t claim that his reasoning proves more than it actually does. He fully acknowledges the possibility of being wrong.
Anyway, my brother (Racticas) read the article and said that he felt it neglected some possible explanations. Chiefly, what if there is indeed an omnipotent and omniscient God, but he is a mean son of a bitch. What if God is evil and capricious, and the exact opposite of “morally perfect?” Ebon Musings suggests that such a God should be opposed, not worshipped. But what if such opposition is completely impotent. This evil god is omnipotent and -scient, after all, so you have nothing to gain and everything to lose.
The conclusion seems to be that in such a case, it would be best to simply grovwl and serve evil god in the hope that he will not kill you horribly and damn you. Of course, there’s no reason to expect that evil god would deal with you justly; in fact, there’s every reson to expect that evil god will be definitively unjust. It would be like working for a super-villain. You never know when he’s going to capriciously kill his own minions.
And how would you know that evil god doesn’t like a good fight, or favor those mortals with the cajones to oppose him? You don’t; that’s the problem! You know nothing! You have no reliable standard on which to base your actions in regard to god, since you have no reason to imagine that im- or amoral god won;t be capricious and arbitrary.
Thus you’re left functionally in the same position as the atheist. Since there’s no basis on which to decide how to serve or placate god, you may as well simply ignore him. This might seal your doom, but it might not. You have no idea, really.
In discussing this with my brother, I said “you know, if there’s no god, or a totally unreliable god, you may as well do whatever suits you best in regards to god. If you want to be an atheist, whatever. If you want to worship your stuffed animals or something, whatever.”
Sailing to Byzantium 
I have and I will pray for you that you may find the path to the Living Son of God who came to earth as a man, who took our sins on Him, died on the cross and risen from the dead to give us freedom. Even if you do not believe, it’s ok because I believe and I will ask Jesus to listen to you.
Hi Kullervo,
I’m a he, by the way. You can call me Adam, since that’s my name. 🙂
It’s quite true that the argument from evil tells us nothing about the possibility of an indifferent god, or a malevolent god. Strictly speaking, there might even be a loving and benevolent god who nevertheless lacks the power to alleviate evil and suffering to any meaningful degree – maybe something like the old Zoroastrian system, where there are equally powerful good and evil gods who work to thwart each other.
The argument from evil doesn’t touch any of these other conceptions of God. Of course, that isn’t what the vast majority of the world’s religious people believe. Most of the world’s believers are members of faiths that depict God as both all-loving and all-powerful, and it’s against these that my essay retains its full force. If the term “benevolence” when applied to God means anything like what it does when applied to a human, I’d assert that a benevolent and omnipotent being cannot possibly exist in light of the staggering amounts of purposeless suffering that exist in the natural world. On the other hand, there might just possibly be a god whose notions of right and wrong are so wholly incomprehensible and different from ours that this argument doesn’t apply. But as you put it so well, what grounds would you have for worshipping a god? How could we ever understand the will or desires of such a being? Any decision to worship God must be based on the belief that you have at least some understanding of what God wants from us.
The idea of a truly evil and truly omnipotent god is a very scary one, and it would put us in a horrible dilemma if such a being existed. It’s very fortunate for us that there’s no evidence of that at all! I can’t begin to imagine what I would do in such a situation, whether to oppose that being knowing my effort was doomed to end in failure. But in addition to your point, I’d add this consideration: even assuming this evil god wasn’t going to capriciously slaughter his own followers, what would happen if you came to worship him? Would you want to get into his version of Heaven, knowing that a vast number of good people were condemned to some horrible fate? Could you spend eternity kneeling at that god’s feet and praising him despite that knowledge? This isn’t an attack. I myself sincerely don’t know what I would do in a situation like that. I’m glad I don’t have any reason to expect I’ll ever actually have to make a choice like that.
I suspect what I’m going to say is too obvious to need pointing out, but just in case:
All of this argumentation can be taken as evidence against a single, omnipotent and omniscient God; but atheism is not the only alternative. In polytheism, no gods are, or claim to be, omnipotent, omniscient, or even perfectly moral all the time. Some gods are even “evil”, or at least frequently immoral by human standards.
No, it’s not too obvious to need to be pointed out. You’re exactly right; all the argument from evil addresses is an omnipotent, omniscient, omnibenevolent god. Any other kind of god survives the argument more or less unscathed. I’ve already posted about the morality premise, and I’m working on some other “ways out” for an even newer post.
The nice thing is that Ebonmuse is so careful to not present his arguments as an “ironclad stomping-down” of theism, but as a defense of his rational decision to be an atheist. There are, of course, a lot of something-theisms that he does not address, as his foil tradition is almost exclusively the monotheistic religions of the West: Christianity, Islam, and Judaism, in their mainstream forms.
John Michael Greer’s book “A World Full of Gods: an inquiry into ploytheism” addresses several of the most significant traditional arguments for and against “religion” and how they either don’t apply to or are answered by polytheism. Highly recommended.
Ebon Musings suggests that such a God should be opposed, not worshipped. But what if such opposition is completely impotent.
Irrelevant – if one believed this God to be evil and immoral, the proper course is obviously to oppose it anyway. Cf the Stoics.