suffering and evil

• Evil

  The absence of good
• Free will

  The ability to choose right from wrong/good from bad. The ability to choose between genuine options
• Free will

  • It is what distinguishes humanity from other parts of creation, sometimes referred to as autonomy/self-determination
  • We are not controlled by God/our biology
• For some, free will is God-given
• We know from personal experience that we make choices, and that bad choices have negative consequences
• Even things which are seen as natural disasters could include an element of human choice, for example if you build your house on a volcano you might suffer if it erupts
• For atheists, it doesn't make sense to look for a supernatural explanation for suffering, so we need to take responsibility
• Suffering can be caused by systems rather than individuals, but these still have their origin in human beings misusing their freewill
• Evil

  (non-religious view) It does not exist as a force. It is just a label we use as an explanation for bad things. It is a superstitious belief that has been promoted by religions for their own purposes
• Evil has no explanation, it is just a part of life
• Evil has no ultimate purpose, it is just when things go wrong. It does not exist, instead it is a religious description for the natural forces of evolution
• A good God can't exist

  Because He does nothing to stop evil, even though it would be within his power to do so
• The fact that God does nothing to stop evil

  Suggests He doesn't want to, and this challenges the idea that God is omnibenevolent
• Belief in a Just God makes no sense because life isn't fair. Evil people often flourish while good people suffer
• As Darwin observed, cats playing with mice and the wasps laying their eggs in caterpillars challenges faith because even if the world was created, the cruelty in nature suggested a cruel designer
• God is meant to be omniscient (all-knowing), so he must know about the suffering and evil in the world but it still happens so he's clearly not there
• How could a loving God who has the power to prevent suffering not intervene when terrible things happen like the holocaust? Maybe he's not real
• The idea of God having a plan isn't a good explanation because so much suffering happens to people who don't deserve it, for example the deaths of innocent children
• There is a lot of suffering in the natural world that cannot be explained by free will, for example, natural disasters
• The idea that suffering helps you to develop as a person isn't always the case, sometimes the suffering that people endure is too much for them to cope with and it stops them from fulfilling their potential. There are also cases where because of someone's suffering they become a worse person, not better
• The story of the fall doesn't sound realistic and so for some it isn't a good explanation for suffering. It may also be seen as unfair that human beings all inherit this suffering and evil due to the actions of Adam and Eve when we have not committed the original sin ourselves
• Determinism

  The belief that every action is the inevitable result of the events and actions that occurred previously
• The natural law of cause and effect means that there are things we don't seem to have any choice about
• Causal determinism

  Proposes that there is an unbroken chain of prior occurrences stretching back to the origin of the universe
• Soft determinism/compatibilist

  Acknowledges that all events, including human actions, have causes; but it allows for some free actions when the actions are caused by one's choices rather than external forces
• Free will is an illusion. We are a mixture of biology and our experiences in life, which we may have little control over
• God knows us before we are born, and there is a plan for us which suggests our lives are determined (theological determinism)
• Determinists would say that we have no freewill and instead all of our thoughts and actions are simply the results of what has happened previously and will determine what happens in the future. Therefore, whilst it might appear that humans are responsible for much of the suffering in the world, for example, harming others or climate change in reality we could never have chosen to do things differently. So evil and suffering are just an inevitable part of a chain of cause and effect
• Religious determinists might say that God decides everything that happens. This is often referred to as everything being part of God's plan. Though freewill could also be argued to be part of this plan and as a result the suffering and evil in the world is as a result of how God designed the world and the freewill given to humans