Abstract
Respondents to the argument from evil who follow Michael Bergmann’s development of skeptical theism hold that our failure to determine God’s reasons for permitting evil does not disconfirm theism (i.e. render theism less probable on the evidence of evil than it would be if merely evaluated against our background knowledge) at all. They claim that such a thesis follows from the very plausible claim that (ST) we have no good reason to think our access to the realm of value is representative of the full realm of value. There are two interpretations of ST’s strength, the stronger of which leads skeptical theists into moral skepticism and the weaker of which fails to rebut the argument from evil. As I demonstrate, skeptical theists avoid the charge of moral skepticism while also successfully rebutting the argument from evil only by embracing an equivocation between these two interpretations of ST. Thus, as I argue, skeptical theists are caught in a troubling dilemma: they must choose between moral skepticism and failure to adequately respond to the argument from evil.
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Notes
The locus classicus for the moral skepticism—sometimes called the moral paralysis—(Almeida and Oppy 2003). Since then, this criticism of skeptical theism has resurfaced in several places. See Anderson (2012), Maitzen (2013). For recent defenses of skeptical theism against the moral skepticism objection, see Bergmann (2012), Howard-Snyder (2014), and Rea (2013).
Dougherty (2012, p. 18).
Howard-Snyder emphasizes that theism is not entailed by skeptical theism. I agree with him on this, but since Bergmann is my primary target, I follow his characterization of the view. For a discussion of where Bergmann and Howard-Snyder’s views diverge, see (Howard-Snyder 2014).
The informed reader will notice that I, following Rea, have combined Bergmann’s ST1, ST2 & ST3 into a single thesis. I do this simply for convenience.
Bergmann (2012, pp. 11–12).
An anonymous reviewer suggested the possibility that perhaps Bethany should intervene because, for instance, she is a dog-lover and not because she has engaged in any conscious deliberative activity as a cognitive reason for intervening. In other words, perhaps the distinction between moral deliberation (i.e. in Bethany’s case) and speculative deliberation (i.e. in the case of the argument from evil) would allow for moral action when deliberation concerning the evidence of evil might nevertheless be prohibited. I’m not optimistic about the prospects of such a response. However, even if it were permissible, calling a moral action ‘rational’ in this sense would still allow us to call it ‘irrational’ in whatever sense the inference in the evidential argument from evil is irrational by the skeptical theist’s lights.
See Rowe (1988).
I don’t mean anything particularly technical by ‘evidence’ here. Thus, I do not intend to separate propositional evidence from something akin to Plantinga’s “grounds”. See Plantinga (2009).
As does, for instance, (Van Inwagen 2006).
Here it is again as a refresher: we have no good reason for thinking that the goods, evils and entailment relations between them of which we are aware are representative of the goods, evils, and entailment relations between them there are.
One might respond in other ways: (i) following (Dougherty 2008), one might suggest that in the case of the evidential argument from evil, some sort of phenomenal conservatism principle is sufficient for inferring Q from P, (ii) perhaps there are other logical forms of the argument from evil to which one might turn, or (iii) one might simply point out—see (Draper 2014)—that while our inability to think of theodicies to justify evils may not disconfirm the existence of God, nevertheless the existence of those evils may still disconfirm God’s existence.
See Wykstra (2012) for an argument along these lines.
See Kvanvig (2014, pp. 125–127) for similar thoughts applied to the question of the existence epistemic obligations.
Bergmann (2009, p. 392). The italics are my own.
Dougherty (2014) calls a version of this (modified to apply only in the context of evidential arguments from evil) the ‘No Weight Thesis’, and he attributes it to Bergmann.
Not to mention the fact that someone will need to determine how confident they are about the truth of ST in the first place, whether or not it is interpreted in the strong or the weak manner.
Perhaps someone doubts my assumption that Bergmann thinks that evil does not disconfirm the existence of God at all. Consider then the following enlightening passage from Bergmann (2012, pp. 23–24), (italics are mine):
Sometimes, when we are exposed to a vivid portrayal of some actual instance of horrific suffering E, we are tempted to think that a perfectly loving God wouldn’t permit E. I think it is a mistake to think that we can see that this is true or even likely…Given ST1-ST4, these epistemic possibilities are things we have no good reason to think are even unlikely if God exists.
Bergmann (2009, p. 392).
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Rutledge, J. Skeptical theism, moral skepticism, and epistemic propriety. Int J Philos Relig 81, 263–272 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11153-016-9567-0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11153-016-9567-0