The Atheist's Problem of Evil

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Music written and generously provided by Paul Jernberg. Find out more about his work as a composer here: http://pauljernberg.com

For whatever difficulties arise for the Christian in accounting of the Problem of Evil, I think there is an even larger difficulty for a materialist atheist. Because materialism is the belief that the physical properties of the universe are all that exist. There is no invisible, transcendent dimension of reality – only what can be observed physically.

But if you hold this view, and you want to arrive at some rational explanation for the kinds of evil I discuss in the video, you have to account for those events by appealing to exclusively material causes.

But as soon as you do make an explanation like that, if one is available, notice what you’ve forfeited. What you cannot say after having observed such phenomena is, “That was evil or that was wrong.”

Because as soon as you admit that, what you’re saying is, “Something that happened, and is therefore real and part of reality, should not have happened.” In effect, you’re saying, “I disapprove of those events which are part of the fabric of reality and, therefore, I disapprove of reality.”

To say that is to insist that reality and the events that constitute it should have been another way. Something else should have happened; specifically, that guy shouldn’t have brutally murdered an innocent life. And he shouldn’t have gloated about it afterwards as if he did something enviable with complete indifference to goodwill or the lives that he has now traumatized.
But if all there is is material reality, how can you lay claim to knowledge of an alternate reality, which doesn’t exist, and which you believe should exist – some invisible better world that you would have approved of?

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