An argument from evil against the existence of God based on sports injuries would not, I think, be found very persuasive. Why not?
I take it that this is because of the retort: “The athletes freely undertook these risks.”
This free undertaking is not the whole of the explanation of why sports injuries are less troubling as examples of the problem of evil. Another part is the idea that there are significant goods at stake in sports, and real danger is a constitutive component of some of these goods. But that the risk is freely accepted is surely a major part of our lack of worry. We are much more worried about evils that befall those who did not freely undertake the relevant risks.
Note also that as a rule we do not—though there are notable exceptions—blame the athletes for freely undertaking the risks of sports injuries. We feel that, generally speaking, they are within their rights to undertake these risks for these potential benefits.
But if God exists, he is closer to us than we are to ourselves. He cares for our good more than we care for ourselves. And he has more rights over us than we have over ourselves. If this is correct, then just as we have the right (limited as it is) to accept certain serious risks, God has an even greater right to impose risks on us.
The observation that God would have more rights over us than do over ourselves by no means solves the problem of evil. But it helps.
14 comments:
"Might makes right" is not a very good theodicy, Alex.
It is a defense against the problem of evil, not a theodicy.
I don't think God's rights over us come from his omnipotence. I think they come from the fact that all the features that give us dignity are participations in God.
Philotheological
Than it's not a very good defense.
Alex
If we are not simply robots controlled by God then it does not follow that God has more rights over us than we have over ourselves. In fact, is we are significantly free, He has no rights over us at all.
I think the thesis that God has more rights over us than we have over ourselves is a part of the traditional concept of God, which makes God, in addition to being supremely good, supremely powerful and supremely knowledgeable, be supremely authoritative. Thus, an argument that God wouldn't have such rights over us would, I think, be a direct argument against the existence of God as conceived of in classical theism.
I say this while aware that my good friend Mark Murphy has argued against the authoritativeness of God ( https://smile.amazon.com/Authority-Cornell-Studies-Philosophy-Religion/dp/0801440300 ).
Alex
Of course it is an argument against thé existence of God as conceived of in Classical Theism, although I am not sure a lack of authoritativenes is necessarily incompatible With CT.
I haven't read Mark Murphy's argument, though.
@Alex You say that "I think they come from the fact that all the features that give us dignity are participations in God."
Do you mean that all features are sustained by God, or that they participate in God in that they are like parts taken from God or just copies of God?
Wesley:
Something in between being sustained by God and being parts taken from God. :-)
I don't know what exactly participation is, but I think it is really important.
Alex
I am very curious to hear how parts can be taken from a simple being that has no parts.
I didn't say that parts are taken from God. I said it's something in between two options. And I added a smiley.
IMHO, Thomism relies a bit too much on all kinds of 'in betweens'😄
Chesterton, I think, talks of how the Catholic truth tends to lie between two opposed heresies.
Alex
Your in between has elements of both options and that's is problematic because it would entail that there is at least some truths in 'parts taken from God. But per divine simplicity that can not je true in any way.
I think that if you had said 'in between Being sustained by God and being some sort of copy of God', this would be more compatible with divine simplicity.
@Alex So participation doesn't mean things are just copies or reflections of God, though they do reflect Him in a sense? Interesting. But more importantly, how would you address the following concern:
The idea that created beings are all just purely reflections of different aspects of God seems a bit sad or even bad, as it seems to remove the possibility of uniqueness from created essences. Imagine seeing your family members after the Resurrection and going "Oh look, another reminder of God!" Of course, you'll also respect them as living human persons, but all of their attributes will just be reminders of God, which seems to cheapen the value of things as it means they don't have anything unique in their nature's content that isn't a reflection of God.
How would you respond? Some Thomists I've asked said that, actually, it's a trivial truth that the intelligible content behind divine ideas contain aspects that are reflections of God, but also aspects which aren't because they are finite beings with their own nature.
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