Part 3: On Gangadean's "Real" Solution to the Problem of Evil.

Last time, I applied some pressure on Gangadean's notion of 'good' and 'evil'. Gangadean claims that good for a thing is in accordance with the nature of that thing and evil is what is contrary to the thing's nature. He further claims that human nature consists in using reason to the fullest and I discussed how there are problems facing this view as well. In neither case has Gangadean done anything like provide a proof or shown that these claims are clear to reason.

Starting on pg 112 of Philosophical Foundation, Gangadean says his definition of 'good' and 'evil' as it relates to the problem of evil can be illustrated in the parable of the prodigal son. I won't include it here and assume my readers are familiar with it, or at least are able to find it easily (see Luke 15:11). Now it's very important to note what it is he is up to and what he isn't doing. What does it mean to "illustrate a definition" and its relation to the problem of evil? Well, at most what Gangadean is doing is assuming his framing of the problem of evil and his definitions, and seeing how it accords with the parable. Importantly, this isn't anything like giving a proof of concept. And remember he hasn't actually defended his definitions or his framing of the problem of evil. Earlier he claimed that his definition of 'good' was known a priori, but curiously failed to give any rational justification for that claim. And I raised issues at this very juncture last time. So the parable is an illustration of the definitions and his way of thinking about the problem of evil, but not anything like proof or independent support that Gangadean's analysis is correct.

Now my fear at this point is, at least for Christians, who already have a commitment to the bible as divinely inspired (and thus consisting of only truths) that they will not be careful in properly restricting the extent of Gangadean's move here. If you already think the parable of the prodigal son is special revelation, or God's word, then you may be inclined to think that any theory of 'good' and 'evil' and way of framing the problem of evil that accords well with parts of scripture, like the parable of the prodigal son, is going to be correct. But that's no good for Gangadean's worldview. Remember, he thinks the problem of evil is a problem against the very coherence of Theism. Thus, to presuppose the bible is divinely inspired  in the current context is question-begging, because to presuppose that there is a divinely inspired text is to presuppose that God exists in the first place. You can't respond to the problem of evil, by helping yourself to any claim that assumes that God exists.

So the illustration given by the prodigal son parable shouldn't be taken as anything like proof of concept for his way of thinking of the problem of evil nor his definitions of 'good' and 'evil'. Nothing we draw from the parable can be taken as a premise in giving an answer to the problem of evil (i.e., a theodicy). All you we should do is conclude is that there's a passage in this book, which purports to be the word of God, which on a particular reading, accords with Gangadean's theory. But Gangadean isn't very careful here. It seems to me that he actually does exactly what I suggested he shouldn't (in terms of rationality) do. He follows his quote of the parable with the following.

How does this illustrate the problem of evil? Why is there evil? The younger son was in a state of unbelief with regard to his father's teaching. Day and night, for all his life, his father, by word and deed, lived out the way of life before his sons. Yet the younger son did not see or hear or understand what was clearly laid out before him...His unbelief was inexcusable and therefore evil. Evil as unbelief serves to obscure the clear revelation to the person in unbelief. The condition of unbelief is allowed to work itself out in the prodigal's life. As a result, the revelation of justice (his way came to naught in the pig-sty) and of love (his father forgives and receives him back) are deepened. If he had second thoughts about possible dangers and hardships of his way the first night away from home he could have reconsidered and returned with his fortune intact. He could have returned all to his father, simply acknowledging gratefulness to know that he had the freedom to leave if he wanted. In that case there would be no deepened revelation of justice and mercy. Evil as unbelief serves therefore to deepen the revelation of justice and mercy (112).  

For the time being, let's ignore that Gangadean is taking for granted his own interpretation of scripture as if it's the only proper one. But that's a weighty assumption and something he needs to independently support (at least insofar as he's after certainty/clarity). Now Gangadean presents the problem of evil as a question about why there is evil and seems to think that the parable (i.e., the bible) has got the answer. Recall, Gangadean is intent on answering the logical problem of evil and faults other theodicies (and thus carves a place for himself at the table) for failing to answer it. The logical problem of evil is a demand for an account of how God's perfect goodness and omnipotence can be logically compatible with the presence of evil in the world. Gangadean's strategy at this point is to try and give an account of a rationally justifiable reason that God would permit evil despite his great power and perfect goodness. In this regard, it's similar to theodicies which he has just criticized. The soul-making theodicy (that God permits evils to build in us virtues) and the free-will defense (God permits evil so that we can be free to perform morally significant actions) both try to give different reasons why God might permit evil. On Ganagdean's theory, in very general terms, God permits moral evil to deepen revelation about himself (his justice and mercy) to his human creatures. Importantly moral evil for Gangadean is fundamentally intellectual--not using reason to the fullest and thus not knowing basic things (i.e., unbelief). But we also have to keep in the background of our minds Gangadean's commitment to clarity. He thinks you must have certainty in order to know basic things. And so while other theodicies aimed at addressing the logical problem of evil merely try to show a possible answer to "why does God permit evil?" it's far from clear that this would be sufficient for Gangadean. At least insofar as Gangadean claims to know that God exists, he's got to know with certainty that his theodicy is correct. A tall order which he fails to achieve.

Importantly, all of the mentioned theodicies face of two significant and interrelated questions which we might use as a way of testing the strength of the theodicies. First, the legitimacy of the theodicies will depend on whether the reason that God permits evils is sufficient to justify him doing so. This gets to the question of whether it's worth it. Is it worth all the evil and suffering, that humans build virtues (i.e., the soul-making theodicy)? Is it worth all the suffering and depravity in the world, that some people get to exercise significant freedoms (i.e,. the free-will theodicy)? Secondly, is the necessity condition or as I'll call it, the "is it necessary?" question. Whether these theodicies are any good will depend on whether it's necessary (and in what sense) for God to permit evil and suffering to achieve whatever end is suggested by the theodicies as being worth all the evil. Is all the suffering and evil necessary for the exercise of free will? Is it necessary for building in us virtues? Or could God have achieved it some other way?

Gangadean seems somewhat aware of these two conditions. He addresses the "is it worth it?" question with respect to his own theodicy. Is revelation of God ultimately worth it when you consider all of the evil and suffering in the world? And he faults the free-will theodicies on failing to sufficiently address the "is it necessary?" question. For instance, he suggests that actual evil is not  necessary for humans to exercise their free-will and thus it's possible that humans with freedom only do what is good. He further considers whether moral evil is necessary for revelation of God? Could God have achieved it some other way?

And in fact, Gangadean's theodicy fails on both of these fronts. I've already spoken some about these in my early posts concerning the problem of evil, but I'll try to further develop those ideas.


IS IT WORTH IT? 

The "is it worth it?" question is a tricky one in a way that Gangadean doesn't seem to appreciate. The worth of some state of affairs seems to depend on values and also the relative subjects to whom the states are worth it. If I ask you whether an expensive meal was worth it, you will (roughly) consider what amount of good the meal brought to you (maybe pleasure + nutritional benefits) and consider the amount of bad that was brought about by the hit your wallet or purse. We're assuming here then that you've got some notion of good or bad in mind in virtue of which you calculate the worth of something else. Roughly, if enough good results from some state of affairs Y and there isn't an overriding amount of bad that results, then we might say that Y is worth it.

Secondly, we standardly ask whether something is worth it relative to a subject i.e., the person or being that is incurring at least some cost and at least some of the benefit. Just as I can ask whether it was worth it to you, that you paid a lot of money for a meal you enjoyed, I can ask whether it was worth it to me that you paid a lot for that meal which you enjoyed. In many cases the question won't make sense depending on the subject of interest. As my example shows, insofar as I didn't incur any costs or any benefits, it's strange to ask of me whether it was worth it that you paid a lot of money for a meal you alone enjoyed. And I'm not sure if there's a question that isn't relative to any subject whatsoever like "is it worth is simpliciter?" We've got to get clearer on all of this if we are going to make much headway in answering the question about whether all of the suffering and evil in the world is worth the revelation of God. The trouble is, the revelation of God's justice and mercy is relative to some subjects while the cost of such revelation is shared by all of creation. Both moral and natural evil are ubiquitous and according to Gangadean while moral evil is "permitted" to give some people a deeper revelation of God, it also leads to God instituting natural evil (suffering) as a "call-back" to repentance from sin. As a result, all people sin and every creature under the sun suffers and dies, but only a select few reap the benefits, if you will. Only Christians will enjoy the revelation. To add insult to injury, the evil that nonbelievers experience isn't limited to this plane. According to Gangadean, they will continue in spiritual death/moral evil, in ever increasing degrees, forevermore.

So when we ask whether "deepening revelation" is worth all of the evil in the world we've got to get clearer on who the relevant subject is. Worth it to whom? Is it worth it to Christians who by God's grace make it out, that all of creation is steeped in evils? I don't know how to begin addressing that question. That involves at least addressing the first question about values. How do we weigh the evils against the goods? By what system or calculus? I haven't a clue, but Gangadean had better have an impeccable answer here. The very peculiar part about Gangadean's theodicy, is that he merely glosses over these complications. He admits that his theodicy assumes that the revelation is worth it, but he doesn't address the "worth it to whom?" question. Instead he seems to presuppose that the only subjects we should be interested in when we address the "is it worth it?" question are Christians who reap the benefits of the revelation at the cost of grave evil experienced by all. This is not only entirely arbitrary, but also very hard to swallow. In a sense, the unbelievers who will suffer not only in this life but forevermore are casualties of God revealing himself. Combine this view with Gangadean's strong commitment to calvinism/predestination, and you've got a devil of a doctrine.

Why does God permit moral evil? Answer: well, because he desires to make himself known but only to some of the people he created i.e., his people which he determined before the creation of the world. But what about unbelievers? Weren't they chosen to fail to believe from the beginning? What of their suffering on earth and of the moral evil to come forevermore? Answer: well, it's worth it to the believers that they themselves experience limited suffering and evil and further that non-believers experience suffering in this life and evil forevermore. I find it incredible that anybody should be able to stomach this kind of teaching. I don't think Gangadeanians are sociopaths and so I think there are some biases which are keeping them from seeing such views clearly. For instance, in my encounters with Gangadeanians, I got the sense that they viewed me as an enemy and that I sort of have whatever evil results from my "unbelief" (as they would call it) is something I deserve. They speak of people like me and people that the consider "unbelievers" as "filling up their cup of wrath". And I think they fail to draw out the implications of their views about predestination, soft determinism, and the problem of evil. And I suspect that if more of them saw things a bit more clearly, they would find such teachings appalling. The trouble is, Gangadean has a way of using his "a priori definitions" to confuse his people out of appreciating such problems.

On his view, God creates humans and determines that people will sin and sin a lot. That the world would be filled with moral evil--indeed God determines this so that it can be no other way. The result is that people sin and reap the benefits of such sin; the world is steeped in unbelief, and evil. Sure natural evil serves as a call to repentance, but one must be regenerated in order to heed the call and it's only those that God chooses to grant with grace that do so. For only these people does natural evil serves as a "call-back" from moral evil. In turn, they get to enjoy the great revelation of God's justice and mercy. Not because they did anything deserving. No, God chose them. He chose to have mercy on a (relatively) select group. As for the rest, they will live in just the ways that God has determined them to live. If only they would seek or want to know God, they could. But God has determined that they never seek nor want to know God, so in effect, they never will in fact, unless there is contingency in God's will, it's impossible for them to do so.  In a sense, they no more deserve their sad state than the regenerated deserve the grace bestowed upon them. These nonbelievers suffer (along with all of creation) and will live in spiritual death forevermore so that only the believers enjoy the benefits of a deepened revelation. It's hard to see how this is anything of a solution to the problem of evil. How is this exemplary of a perfectly-good, (and I would add, perfectly just and merciful) God? I just don't see it. I can't make sense of how this is the "greatest conceivable being." It seems to me that in presenting his "answer" to the problem of evil, Gangadean has inadvertently presented himself with another iteration of the problem.

Interestingly, Gangadean merely provides us with anecdotes from the bible (Job and Paul), to say that suffering is worth the revelation. But the important point is that he can't appeal to these as authoritative accounts because again that would be to presuppose that the bible is divine revelation and thus to presuppose God exists in a context where that is the very thing in question. Furthermore, I think these examples encourage one to ignore the point I am bringing up about evil and suffering in the lives of the nonbelievers. The way that Gangadean presents it, the question is something like, "is the suffering and evil in Job's life, worth the revelation that Job gets?" What I'm suggesting is that this is far too narrow. We ought to include the following unless Ganagdean can give us some principled reason to exclude it.  Is the revelation that Job and other Christians get or will have received, worth all the suffering that not only they have and will experience, but also all of the suffering that nonbelievers experience and the everlasting and ever-increasing evil that they will experience? Would Gangadean give another "a presumptive unqualified 'yes' " to this? More importantly, can he give an actual reason that we should agree with him or even what he thinks Paul or Job would say?

IS IT NECESSARY?

As I said, there's the "is it worth it?" question as well as the "is it necessary?" question in evaluating theodicies. So is it necessary for God (according to Gangadean) that there be so much evil in the world in order to deepen his revelation to the believers? After all, if God could achieve his ends another way, a way that involves less moral evil or even natural evil, then he would have. Gangadean confidently answers in the affirmative. But he's got no business doing so. He claims, but fails to argue for the idea that moral evil must be removed gradually rather than abruptly (113). And he claims that unbelief (moral evil) must be permitted to come about in every combination. He further asserts, "Some things cannot be known except by experience-- such as hunger or pain, both physical and spiritual. A book version of human history, or a movie version, cannot supply this experience and is incomprehensible without it" (ibid). I've italicized each of the modals because they are very important.

I can't begin to tell you why Gangadean feels qualified and in a good enough epistemic position to claim these without some serious hedging. They are merely speculative, but you get no indication of that from his book. How does one know that moral evil must be removed gradually rather than abruptly in order for the revelation to be deepened. Note 'must' is a modal akin to 'necessarily' just as 'can/cannot' is akin to 'possible/impossible'. The question then is whether it's logically or metaphysically impossible for God to deepen the revelation while removing it abruptly? And he must be saying that it is logically/metaphysically impossible, but how does he know so much about evil and its removal as well as its relation to the revelation of God? And how could he possibly know that physical and spiritual pain can't (i.e., that it's impossible) be known sans first-hand experience (the sharp reader will wonder if this commits Gangadean to the claim that there are some things God can't know)? Remember, we're talking within the context of trying to answer the problem of evil and so he can't appeal to scripture as any authority in supporting these claims on pain of begging the question. So it's utterly a mystery how he could know with anything resembling certainty that these very strong modal claims of his are true. He certainly owes us an explanation.

Now for the most part I've been conflating moral and natural evil because when it comes to calculating the worth of revelation in relation to the cost of moral evil, we really should include the costs of natural evil as well. This is because without moral evil, there would be no natural evil according to Gangadean. So God creates the world in a way such that people will only know about his justice and mercy if there is much moral evil in the world and this leads him to institute natural evil. He must have known this "ahead of time" of course. So it's natural to conflate them in calculating for the worth of God's revelation. But prying them apart we can also ask about the necessity of natural evil in relation to calling people back to repentance from moral evil. This is something I don't see Gangadean addressing. But it's weird that he doesn't. If it's possible for God to achieve repentance from the subset of humans that he regenerates, without making animals suffer or without the prevalence of the millions of diseases that afflict us, or without small children literally starving to death, then arguably he must as a result of his perfect-benevolence. Now recall, from last time that there are different kinds of necessity just as there are different kinds of possibility. Importantly, when we ask whether natural evil is necessary to make humans repent, we should care about logical or broadly metaphysical necessity rather than merely nomological or causal necessity. This is because God is not bound by the laws of nature or any causal regularities. He's only limited with respect to making logical or metaphysical truths false (he can't make it so that 1+1=3). And it's far from clear that it is logically or metaphysically necessary that God must use natural evil to call those he has regenerated from their sin. Gangadean had better give an argument to the contrary, or else his theodicy fails in just the ways he claims that other theodicies fail i.e., there's no obvious metaphysically necessary connection between natural evil (and to the extent we have it in this world) and people repenting from moral evil.

So I contend that Gangdean's theodicy fails on two fronts. It fails in ways that he thinks other theodicies fail. Gangadean's God is anything but perfectly-good and all-powerful insofar as he must or chooses to deepen his revelation to some of his creation at the cost of determining that the rest of his creation will suffer both in this life and forevermore. Presented in these terms, it's far from clear that evil is worth the revelation. It's certainly not worth if we consider the well-being or good of those that are perishing. That's really uncomfortable to say the least. Secondly, it simply isn't clear that moral evil is necessary for the revelation, nor is natural evil necessary for repentance.

I'll close with one more related thought concerning the "is it worth it?" question. Gangadeanians say that humans have intrinsic dignity in virtue of their rationality. This is what makes murder (even murder of the unborn) wrong and I take it is also partially why they think utilitarianism gets it wrong. But it turns out that on their view, God treats such persons (the unregenerate) as mere means to achieve his ends (his revelation). Moreover, it's weird to think that such persons are being dealt with by God as essentially rational beings. He has darkened their minds so that apart from his act of regeneration, they can't see what is clear.  How does this amount to treating them as rational beings? Or as beings with inherent dignity? The unbelievers will live, suffer both physically and spiritually, and die before being raised again for everlasting spiritual death. What makes it worth it? Well, that others will enjoy God's revelation. That sounds a lot like utility maximization gone wrong. The big moral here is that as Gangadean sees things, God calls us to act towards humans in ways that He himself is not willing.

Part 2: On Gangadean's "Real" Solution to the Problem of Evil.

Continuing the discussion from last time concerning Gangadean's "real solution" to the problem of evil, let's consider what he says. Gangadean begins with some assumptions about the nature of good and evil as well as the nature or essence of humans (to use reason to the fullest). But they are merely assumptions.

Starting on page 111 of his book, he states

as an a priori, good for a being is according to the nature of that being and evil is what is contrary to the nature of that being."

It's very easy to forget Gangadean's standards for knowing or rationally believing something and this is what I think many Gangadeanians fail to keep in mind when assessing his claims. They often fault alternative views along these unreasonably high standards (e.g., if evolution isn't deductively proven, then it shouldn't be believed or can't be known), while they assess Gangadean's teachings on much more laxed terms (e.g., they claim to know that humans but not animals are minded but do so via abduction--which is a form of induction a.k.a-- inference to the best explanation). The inconsistency is glaring to me. But now notice that applying Gangadean's high standard to his claims just rehearsed entails that to know something like "good for a being is according to the nature of that being" is to rule out the very possibility that it's not true. It's literally got to be impossible for the claim to be false! But has he proven this? No, I think he's simply stated something that his followers somehow "feel" is right. It's sort of common sensical. I mean he doesn't ever give any arguments to that end and even if he were to give arguments, I suspect they wouldn't be deductive proofs with indubitable premises.

And what does he mean it's an a priori? Philosophers sometimes distinguish between a priori (a part from experience) and a posteriori (via experience). These have to do with how things are known or justified. It turns out that it's a rather tenuous distinction and not without real controversy. To say that something is known prior to or apart from experience, isn't to tell you very precisely how you know that thing. 'From experience' and 'apart from experience' are very general categories. So we've got to get into the specifics of how a thing like the claim about goodness might be known and again in accordance with Gangadeanian epistemic standards.

One way that a thing can be known apart from experience, is if it's a matter of conceptual truth. Some statements are trivially true, because they are true by definition. That all bachelors are unmarried is a paradigm example. All that is required for a person to know that such a proposition is true is that they understand the terms 'bachelor',  'unmarried', 'male', the copula 'is/are' and of course the quantifier 'all'. Philosophers sometimes refer to such propositions as analytic truths (i.e., true by definition).  The idea is that it doesn't take any experience to verify the truth of such a claim at least once you've got the meaning of the terms right--but this last bit is where problems arise. Anyway the general idea seems to be that you didn't have to go out into the world and learn about every bachelor to know that they are all unmarried in order to legitimately affirm the proposition that all bachelors are unmarried. But things are not so clear cut.

Gangadeanians are often unaware that the whole idea of something being true by definition is a matter of controversy. In the first place, Quine pointed out that the very meaning of 'analytic' is not clear. We can try elucidating it by using other words, but then we get into this potential circularity. Suppose by analytic we mean synonymous, but now what does synonymous mean? If you say 'analytic', you've just given a circular account. If you give other words like 'true by definition' to account for synonymy, then we need only ask what the meaning of 'true by definition' is and so on. We seem to face a regress or circularity concerning meaning. So Gangadean following his requirement of clarity should be able to explain where the buck stops and how we can be certain of even the very meaning of 'analytic' or 'true by definition'.  Now I'm not a full out skeptic about there being such things as conceptual a priori truths, but neither am I certain that there are such things (I think there's just a presumption in favor of the idea that is ultimately defeasible). The reason for my hesitation is that it's a difficult matter figuring out exactly what counts as being true by definition and also what counts as being known/justified apart from experience (even if we have a sufficient enough grasp of what these expressions mean). We've got what we take to be paradigm examples of each, but it isn't as if we've got a complete list of analytic truths vs. non-analytic (or synthetic) ones. So when we encounter a claim that purports to be true analytically, or true by definition, it isn't clear exactly which criteria we are to use to make such an evaluation. For instance, ask yourself, what counts as being part of the very meaning of 'dog', 'house', 'chair', 'solar system', 'unicorn', 'phlogiston', 'species', etc. If you're reflective, you'll start to wonder how you begin to determine what is part of the very meaning and what isn't. And Gangadean, insofar as he depends on the notion of conceptual/analytic truths to reach certainty, had better be in a position to give us a theory here. The same goes for things known a priori vs. a posteriori. 

As I've mentioned, insofar as the proposition that all bachelors are unmarried is solely verified as true on the basis of one's understanding or grasp of the meaning of its component terms, if we want Gangadeanian certainty through and through, we've got to be certain that our grasp of the meanings are right in the first place. And how do we get to be sure of a thing like that? I've written before on how we have good reason to believe that getting to the "right" meaning of a word is an a posteriori, and fallible process. The meanings of words in a given language are a matter of convention. If you want to say that people misuse or misunderstand the meaning of a word like 'bachelor' you've got to have some standard or basis in virtue of which you distinguish between the right and wrong meaning and you've got to think critically about the legitimacy of this standard. And I simply can't imagine that there is anything but a fallible, empirical process of the sorts of research they do in linguistics that we can rely on. Now Gangadean sometimes acts as if he's got privileged access to an infallible dictionary of words in the English language or as if whatever he thinks a word means is automatically just what the word means, but neither of these is plausible and more importantly he's got to argue for them.

Instead, I contend that you've got to see how people actually use words and make your best guess at the definition based on such behaviors. This is why I say it's a fallible process and also a posteriori (requires experience). Insofar as determining that 'all bachelors are unmarried' requires knowing what each component expression means in a given language, and that the latter is an empirical process, the idea that the statement is known to be true entirely apart from experience (or a priori) becomes tenuous to say the least. Traditionally philosophers have avoided this issue by proposing that for a statement to be analytically true just means that once you've got a sufficient grasp of the meaning of it's component parts, you can know that the entire statement is true entirely apart from experience. But I have no idea why this is an acceptable way of cutting things up conceptually. Why shouldn't the experience involved in determining the meanings of the component terms in the first place, call into question whether the process of verifying the truth of the statement count against the a priori status?

Anyway let's relate all of this to Gangadean's original claim about the nature of goodness. According to Gangadean it's known, apart from experience, that the following are true.

'X is Good for A' = 'X is in accordance with A's nature.'
'X is evil/bad for A' = 'X is contrary to A's nature.' 

As we've explored, one way that statements like these might be known a priori (apart from experience) is that they are true by definition. But this whole business of statements being true by definition is again not without difficulties in particular as it concerns Gangadean's claims of certainty/clarity. Learning what the meaning of a word is, requires experience (and is ultimately fallible). And as I've noted above, it's not clear why this experience is not germane when it comes to evaluating whether a statement that is composed of such words (and their meanings) is known from experience (a posteriori) or apart from it (a priori). If knowing that a statement is true by definition requires knowing what the component terms of the statement mean, and the latter requires experience, then there's a real sense in which knowledge of the truth of the statement is a posteriori. For Gangadean to claim that 'good' means something like 'in accordance with the nature of the thing' he's got to know with certainty that he's not mistaken about the meaning of each of the component words. But if the only way he can verify the meanings of his words is via empirical investigation, that is, to see how the members of the language community actually use the words, then this seriously calls into question whether Gangadean could know apart from experience and more importantly it calls into question whether it can be known with certainty, that "good for X is in accordance with X's nature." Again he must be presupposing that the way he and people he is familiar with use the word in just the manner that supports this analysis. But that isn't to prove that he (and his) are correct in doing so. The payoff is that Gangadean has much more work to do in order to settle his premise that it's an a priori, that good for a thing is in accordance with its nature.

Now let's turn to Gangadean's proposal about the nature of humans. He writes,

Man, by the very intellectual nature of the problem of evil, is a rational being. What then is good for man as a rational being? Good for man as a rational being would be the use of his reason to the fullest. Since reason is used to grasp the nature of things, good for man as a rational being would be to understand the nature of things. Since thinking by nature is presuppositional, that is, we think of what is less basic in light of what is more basic, the good would be to grasp, first of all, the nature of basic things in light of which all else is understood. Since the nature of things created reveals the nature of the Creator, good for man is the knowledge of God...Evil is the failure to know God (111). 

That the nature of "man" is rationality is something that Gangadean seems to think he's proven. But that's far from obvious. It certainly doesn't follow from the problem of evil. How does the fact that there's an intellectual puzzle for the Theist, tell us what human nature consists of? Is it somehow logically impossible that rationality is not what makes for the essence or nature of humans? According to Gangadean's epistemic standards, that's just what he needs to show.

At this point we run into annoying questions about how we could come to know the nature of humans. Is it again something that can be known via conceptual analysis and thus a priori? We've already discussed how the distinctions are anything but neat and tidy. I actually think Gangadean holds believes it's a matter of conceptual truth that man is in essence, rational, but I'm far from sure. I say this largely in part because he's strongly inclined towards an methodological Aristotelianism. And if you read Aristotle you see that he does a bunch of arguments which depend on his take on the meanings of words (and it almost never occurs to him that he might actually be mistaken about the meanings of words!). This pattern is consistent with Gangadean's way of arguing. And it's on shaky ground. Again, why isn't Gangadean keen on answering the skeptic at this point? The skeptic is going to press Gangadean on how he can be sure that his understanding or grasp of 'human' and 'rationality' is the correct one. So Gangadean has much work to do in this area. Alternatively we might think figuring out what the nature of a human consists in is going to be an empirical process. We discovered that water molecules consists of hydrogen and oxygen, via experience even though it seems that h20 is the very essence of water. But taking such an empirical route to the question poses serious worries for Gangadean again because of his impossible standards of clarity. Empirical investigations are fallible---they are inductive and depend on our fallible perceptual faculties. So it's hard to see how Gangadean could come to know with certainty that humans are rational beings on the basis of empirical investigation. What is more, he just hasn't provided any of this empirical data! So I actually think Gangadean is stuck in a dilemma here. Conceptual analysis threatens parochialism and semantic chauvinism, and empirical investigation is at best inductive. Neither way provides clarity.

Furthermore, it turns out that it's actually the "potential or capacity" to be rational that makes up human nature for Gangadean. I say this because when you bring up the counterexample of brain damaged humans, or fetuses, individuals that Gangadean accepts as members of the set of all humans who presumably aren't (actually) using their reason, he will revise his position to say that it's merely the potential to use reason that makes for a human. But when you press him on what exactly counts as "having a capacity or potential" to be rational, there's no ready response.

Potentials and capacities have to do with non-actualities. They are modal terms/concepts. When we say that X has merely the potential to reason we mean that by changing certain facts about our reality (i.e., consider counterfactuals), X would in fact use reason.  If Bill has merely got the potential to get a job, then that means that Bill doesn't have the job, but with a few changes to the world, he will have the job. But which changes (and how dramatic of changes) should we care about? Capacities come in many forms and the problem for Gangadean will be to specify where to draw the line in a principled manner. Suppose you've got a rock, an ape, a brain damaged person, a neanderthal and a fetus. Plausibly none of these actually are using reason in the Gangadeanian sense. But Gangadean will want to say of some, but not all of these that they have the capacity/potential to use reason. And the problem is that what counts as a potential or capacity seems highly context sensitive and interest relative.

In some sense, I've got the potential to fly (sans any aircraft). Again we've got a state of affairs (me flying) which is not actual. But given sufficient changes to reality, I would fly. For instance, it's possible that God could make me have wings and paired with certain other background conditions (like my having the desire to fly), I would fly.  It's not actual of course. I haven't got wings. But with some changes to reality, I would fly. So when we pay attention to certain counterfactual situations (where we imagine changing a certain set of facts about our reality), it's true that I have the potential or capacity to fly.

But when we evaluate the very same statement (that I have the potential/capacity to fly) against a different set of counterfactual considerations (we focus on imaging different changes to our reality) the same statement is false. If say God were to have changed my hair and eye color from what it is now, then that's a change from reality. But those changes wouldn't make it sufficient for me to fly. So when we merely focus on these counterfactual conditions, the statement 'I have the potential/capacity to fly' is false.  The point is, whenever we're dealing with a statement like, 'X has the potential to be rational' we're dealing with a way the world might have been (nomological, or perhaps metaphysical modality) or might turn out to be (epistemic modality). We imagine certain changes to reality and wonder whether X uses reason, given those changes. But which changes should we focus on? That's the big question. Take a brain damaged person that is currently (and in actuality) not using reason. Do they have the potential to be rational? Well, it depends on which changes we consider in our evaluation of that statement. Changing the person's hair style from what it actually is or removing their limbs, or having the nurses read to him poetry are not going to bring it about that such a person starts to use reason. So they don't have a potential with respect to such changes. On the other hand, considered in light of some radical changes to certain physical laws, or technological advancements, and the like will make it so that the person uses reason. The question for Ganagdean then is what principled account he has of determining just which counterfactual details we should care about when we evaluate whether someone/thing has the potential to reason or not. If we're very liberal and inclusive of the changes we allow, then rocks have the capacity to reason and so should gain membership to the set of all humans. If we're too conservative, then brain-damaged persons and fetus haven't got the potential or capacity to reason and so don't count as humans. The trick for Gangadean is to navigate between the two in a principled manner which isn't question begging or ad hoc.

At this point the Gangadeanian might be tempted to respond that rocks and apes don't have the capacity to reason at all because the sorts of changes to reality that would need to be made for rocks or apes to actually use reason, would make them no longer rocks or apes respectively. Presumably, the same is not true of say a fetus. But this is no good. We need only inquire into why our imagined Gangadeanian insists on excluding fetuses from this worry. A fetus that actually uses reason (in the Gangadeanian sense) is not going to be a fetus unless we radically change the laws of nature, our taxonomies, or make the fetus develop in such a way that it is no longer a fetus. Thus we still have no principled way of figuring out which sets of counterfactual conditions we should care about in assessing whether X (be it a rock, an ape, a neanderthal, a fetus, or a brain damaged person) has got the potential to reason or not. Most philosophers will say that which sets of facts we pay attention to is not determined by any fixed standard, but rather that the conversational context in which a statement like "X has got the potential to be rational" will determine which counterfactual conditions we ought to pay attention to in evaluating whether or not the statement is true. And conversational contexts are sensitive to the goals, and interests of the the speakers and hearers. But I hardly think this sort of relativity is going to be amenable to team-Gangadean.

Another more general epistemological worry looms for the Gangadeanian at this point. The work of evaluating the truth of statements involving 'potential' and 'capacity' depends importantly on what we can conceive of and what we can imagine. We've got to think in terms of possible worlds or ways reality might be different and hope that we've got reliable judgments. Philosopher take this as a general presumption--it's an unproven assumption that just seem acceptable in some sense to rely on. But given Gangadean's epistemological standards, he can't rest his case on such presumptions--they are uncritically held presuppositions and so he had better be in a place to prove them.

The payoff is that we shouldn't grant Gangadean his claim that 'good for a thing is according to its nature' or that 'evil for a thing is contrary to its nature'. We also shouldn't grant Gangadean that the nature or essence of humans is to use reason or even the weaker claim that human nature consists of having the potential/capacity to use reason. But he's going to need these premises to develop his theodicy and so until he's settled these issue, his theodicy is a no-go. Next time, for the sake of discussion, I'll grant him these very premises and show problems for this theodicy nonetheless.

Part 1: On Gangadean's "Real" Solution to the Problem of Evil

Gangadeanians run the Ratio Christi Tempe, Arizona. I don't know much about this national organization, but it seems pretty mainstream evangelical which makes me wonder to what extent they are aware of Gangadean's teachings, the problems and harms his church has caused on Christians and non-Christians alike in Arizona and beyond, though thankfully their impact has been fairly negligible in the grand scheme of things.

Apparently, they are discussing the problem of evil lately as featured on their facebook page (linked above). The latest event is entitled, "The Problem of Evil - A Real Solution" (try to look past the obnoxious title). I've noticed that web traffic to my blog has picked up a lot in recent days and in particular, my posts regarding Gangadean's theodicy. Perhaps one phenomena has something to do with the other. 

I've written about some very specific problems I see with Gangadean's "real solution" to the problem of evil (here and here), but have so far only scratched the surface. So I wanted to say a few things for those who may have encountered Gangadean's "Ironic Solution" to the problem of evil. Perhaps even those that have attended the recent Ratio Christi meeting. 

First, some ground clearing:

Gangadean and his people tend to focus solely on the logical problem of evil. There are at least two problems, the logical and the evidential one. The former is the stronger of the two. It threatens to make theism internally inconsistent. Gangadean usually presents it via the work of David Hume in his Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion. In more recent times, and perhaps more precisely stated, we find a formulation of the problem by the philosopher J.L Mackie in his article, "Evil and Omnipotence." Mackie doesn't distinguish between moral and natural evil, but it is standardly accepted that there are two (though it's hard to prove such a thing---something Gangadean and company really ought to do insofar as they make appeals to the distinction). However, the distinction is not crucial for Mackie's argument since he can use the generic term 'evil' to include both types. Briefly, here's the logical problem of evil: God according to standard conceptions of the Abrahamic traditions is perfectly good and all powerful. Hence, the very presence of evil is logically incompatible with these of his attributes. *But clearly there is evil in the world*, which entails that God simply does not exist on pain of logical contradiction.

The premise surrounded by '*' is one that is taken for granted between the two parties. It's not provable in the strong sense since it's an empirical claim infused with a value judgment. It's supposed to be patently obvious that there is much suffering, misery, pain and the like in the world and that these are bad things. For the logical problem of evil to be a problem though, I would add that such instances can't just be evils per se, but the sorts of evils that are logically incompatible with whatever goodness is traditionally ascribed to God in theistic formulations. Things get a bit tricky here. Some suggest then that the sort of evils that cause problems for theism (as in the logical problem) must be something like gratuitous evils. If so, it's a bit less obvious that there are gratuitous evils in the world. I mean, it certainly seems that way to me when I hear about some of the horrendous evils in the world, but it's not something I'm sure about. Skeptical theists (I'll talk about this view a bit later) apply pressure on these very considerations. When the wielder of the logical problem of evil assumes as one of her premises that there are a great many instances of evil in the world, they presuppose that these very evils are the sorts of evils that are logically incompatible with God's perfect goodness and power. That's far from obvious and sometimes even feels a bit question begging against the theist. Gangadean ignores all of this. I don't know if it's due to ignorance or because he's got an axe to grind. I add the latter clause because he thinks he's got the "real solution" to the problem of evil and dismisses other purported solutions before offering his. If other solutions fare at least as well as his "solution" or perhaps even better, then he's sort of out of a job in this respect. 

One thing to note is that Gangadean seems to be working from an outdated playbook in certain respects. Even Mackie's paper, written in the 50's, though much more recent than Hume's, is fairly dated. The general consensus is (among both theists and non-theists working in this area) that the logical problem of evil is not really a problem. It was far too ambitious. Showing that something like Theism is utterly incoherent, that is, to show that there's a logical contradiction between evil and God's attributes proved to be too much for anybody. It has thus given way to what is call the evidential problem of evil, which is a weaker problem. The weaker formulation basically states that while the presence of evil doesn't disprove God's existence, it provides at least some evidence that God doesn't exist. But Gangadean often ignores this and so he thinks that the logical problem is really a problem. It's a rather odd response.  I mean, even atheist philosophers like the powerhouse David Lewis (see his exceptional paper, "Evil for Freedom's sake") admit that the logical problem is dismantled by the work of Plantinga. Now Lewis thinks there are problems that remain for the theist, but it's not one of logical incoherence i.e., he doesn't think there's actually a logical problem of evil. The same is said of the late, William Rowe---another atheist who was arguably one of the most influential persons working in philosophy of religion in recent times. He presented us the Evidential Problem of Evil (in the 70's) because he recognized the logical problem was no real problem at all. So why does Gangadean insist that the logical problem of evil is something that the theist must address? Your guess is as good as mine. I suppose he just misunderstands the issues and is anxious to contribute something he thinks is significant to the debate. He very briefly considers some possible solutions, and then suggests they are insufficient (but certainly hasn't proven that). One of these he calls the "free will solution"--and by this he really means a family of views. He doesn't, in print, consider in any depth what is widely accepted as the most rigorously presented defense of this sort, called the Free Will Defense by Alvin Plantinga (1979). And I think Gangadean is far too quick in dismissing all free will solutions, in part because he fails to track the subtler terms of the debate which I'm learning is a common occurrence --he's just not that careful a scholar in my opinion. The same is true of his quick dismissals of what is called skeptical theism which I want to focus some on. 

Plantinga's free will defense is tricky. It involves evaluating counterfactual statements, which invariably involves possible-worlds semantics (a formal model of the truth conditions of statements involving modal terms).  Maybe I'll spend a few posts on it someday, but for the moment I want to simply state that Gangadean's dismissal of all free will solutions had better engage with Plantinga's paper, which is widely received as the best and most sophisticated account (at least if he wants to be charitable).

What I want to focus on today is the other family of views that he hastily dismisses. In his book, Gangadean writes, 

A response to this [failures to account for the problem evil] is to appeal to mystery. The answer is beyond human ken, utterly. There is not a contradiction here, it is said, only a paradox, wrapped in mystery. For all we know, there is a good reason God allows evil and just so much evil...but he has not chosen to make it known to us. Another solution, more promising than an appeal to unknown, is along the lines of Hume's suggestion that for all we know there may be an easy solution. (110).  

Skeptical theists contend that our understanding of the possible goods and evils there are is quite limited. Importantly, they are not saying that we can't know anything about what is good or evil. On the contrary, the idea is that we have a limited grasp of such things. We aren't in a position to, with much confidence think that the goods and evils we know of are representative of all the possible good and evil states of affairs that there are. The skeptical theist doesn't take these premises to be very controversial and partially motivate them by considering the many moral puzzles that arise in the realm of ethics where it's often not obvious what the right thing to do is. They also add that our epistemic position with respect to the sorts of entailment relations between the possible goods and evils there are is also limited. That is, when we reason about what evils must be required for certain goods to obtain (or even which goods could be attained without any evils), our reasoning though not entirely useless is limited. Applied to the problem of evil, in particular the logical problem of evil, this raises the issue that the wielder of the problem is over-reaching. They simply aren't in a position to fairly assess whether the sorts of evils there are in the world are logically incompatible with an all-good God owning to the fact that our knowledge of all the possible goods and evils and their logical relationships is limited. Indeed skeptical theism is usually a stronger argument which was intended to object against the weaker, Evidential Problem of Evil. But for our purposes it's enough that it does even less, namely, that it raises sufficient doubts against the logical problem of evil. [Note as a historical fact, skeptical theism isn't usually presented against the logical problem because again most people take the logical problem to be sufficiently answered already].

Curiously, Gangadean never engages with this kind of solution in his manuscript. He merely dismisses it as an appeal to unknown (whatever that is). Beyond Gangadean and his kin, I've never heard anyone say that someone is making an appeal to unknown and I've been around philosophers a lot. So I don't even know what that amounts to or why it's a bad thing in the current context. More importantly though, this is where he's has obviously let the terms of the debate slip. As we've noted, the logical problem of evil is a very ambitious argument. It contends that it's logically or perhaps metaphysically impossible for both God to exist (as all good and all powerful) and for there to be evil in the world. Logical incompatibilities are like the existence of something that is red all over and also not-red all over (at the same time and in the same respect). But what the skeptical theist is pointing out is that the logical problem of evil presupposes that we are in a sufficiently good place epistemically to judge (among other things) all the possible goods that could legitimize God for permitting the evils in our world. What they would say to the challenger is that they ought to make more modest claims like, "it appears to us that there are evils which are incompatible with God's existence because we can't, try as we may, come up with justifying reasons for why God would permit evils." And from such a qualified statement, it simply doesn't follow that therefore, God cannot possibly exist. If we have at least some reason to suspect we aren't in such a great epistemic vantage point, then we've got reason to back off of the logical formulation of the problem. The question that arises at this point is why we need to look any further to Gangadean to save the day? The logical problem is an overstatement and skeptical theism is but one way to show this. So we don't even need to look at Gangadean's "real solution." Furthermore, insofar as skeptical theism is incompatible with Gangadean's "real solution", he will need to show that the former is not even possibly true. That's based on his impossible standards of knowledge and clarity. To know that his theodicy is correct, he's got to show that any and all mutually exclusive alternative theories can't possible be true or that his solution can't possibly be false. So keep this in mind as we continue our discussion of his "ironic/real solution to the problem of evil".