Wednesday, December 28, 2005

More on Evil

It is meaningful that I first encountered the problem of evil in a university classroom. I had a disgustingly happy childhood, an affliction that has stunted my development as an artist and as a scholar. It did not occur to me that the world could possibly constitute a case against the goodness of God; how could it? I had experienced mosquitoes, and I had read about famine and war, and I had cried at funerals, but the place I actually lived in was overwhelmingly marked with love and beauty; it was fitting and sensible to praise God for his goodness. I had to be told that the world was catastrophically rotten and twisted. I could not see it for myself; I was happy and that was all that mattered.

The University would not let me linger long in my comfortably limited reality, instead forcing the reality of suffering upon me with a bewildering force. “Where is your God?” they asked. “Where is the redemption of Auschwitz? Where is the justice that is the foundation of his kingdom? If the universe were governed by a God who is love, then love would not be so catastrophically scarce.”

It is easiest to see the problem of evil when it is expressed a technical claim against the existence of God. Specifically, the existence of evil makes the existence of a God who is all-powerful, all-loving and all-knowing logically impossible. If a set of premises embed a contradiction, then they cannot all be true. In this case, he is alleging that there is a contradiction because

a) if God were all-powerful, he could prevent evil if he wanted to
b) if God were all-knowing, he would know about the existence of evil
c) if God were all-loving, he would prevent any evil that he could.
d) Evil exists.

Remember that if there is a contradiction in a set of premises it means that they cannot all be true. Since we know that evil exists (we can see it) we know that the problem lies with a, b, or c. Thus, though God may be very powerful, he is not all-powerful; though he may be very intelligent, his not all-knowing; though he may be very loving, he is not omni-benevolent. If God is all three, then paradoxically, he does not exist. So which of the characteristics listed above are we going to sacrifice?

Philosophically, it doesn’t matter. It makes no difference at all. To human reasoners, and particularly believers, it is nothing matters more.

There is some question in the Bible as to whether God is all-powerful – Satan provides a very powerful opponent to God, and it appears that God allows humans free agency (we are allowed to do what we want, and sometimes we mess that up). As a result, God may be constrained – for the time being (and by his own decision) – to inaction. It is therefore reasonable to conjecture that God wants to fix the problem of evil, but cannot.

The idea that God is constrained may be offensive to some Christians – it was offensive to me when I first encountered it. But we are not approaching this question as Christians. We are approaching it as philosophers. It is an absolutely critical distinction – the standard of proof is different, the methods of discourse are different, what counts as evidence is different. You may have had an experience of God. You may have felt God’s presence; you may “know in your heart” that God loves you. Those feelings do not count to a philosopher. They don’t matter.

As a philosopher, I do not think that we are able to finish the sentence, “God can…” with just anything. For instance, I do not think that we can say, “God can act in a way that is contrary to his character,” or the famous “God can make a stone so big he can’t lift it.” There are some things that God cannot do. Perhaps, for instance, God cannot eliminate evil and allow for human free agency. It is possible that God has a “higher purpose”, some reason that he allows evil to continue.

Of course, we are back into “Why does God…” territory, but it seems less dangerous this time around because we’re talking as philosophers and theologians, not as human beings (strange that there is a distinction, but there is). What I mean is, there is a difference between the God of the philosophers and the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob; we are not talking about a God that is worthy of worship, or present in experience. We are just looking for a God we can give intellectual assent to. This difference is as profound as the difference between acknowledging the existence of women and getting married. The requirements of logic are not terribly rigorous. But logical possibility is not terribly satisfying. As far as I am concerned, it is not even worth discussing.

Wednesday, December 14, 2005

When Things Die (Part Deux - see part one in the archives if you missed it)

We did not see the sign until two days later, when we were walking home from school. She saw it first, breaking stride suddenly, leaving me to walk alone. I didn’t notice immediately that she had stopped, and the realization of my sudden solitude brought with it a wave of anxiety, as if for a moment I was the victim of a prank on a hidden camera show.

“What?” I asked impatiently, looking back at her. She had her hand to her mouth, staring at the side of the plain brown mailbox, dramatically transfixed and obviously shocked beyond words. Everything was shocking to her. Three months earlier, she had overheard me laughing uncontrollably at a story my cousin Darryl was telling me behind the garage. She demanded to be allowed in on the joke. I wasn’t about to tell her that we had been laughing at – suffice it to say that it was the sort of story that is a lot funnier behind the garage than in the sanctuary at church, and featured an unimaginative play on the last name of the High School janitor, Mr. Woodcock. She insisted that we tell her. “What’s so funny? What about Mr. Woodcock?” She knew. She must have known. But she wanted to be invited to share in our private joke. Eventually, Darryl joylessly told her. She was shocked, until her shock melted into outrage. She pursed her lips and squinted judgementally, then turned and wordlessly walked away. Darryl shrugged at me, and smirked, as if to say “what are you gonna do?” but I felt sick at being found out, a nausea that quickly gave way to anger. I shook my head. “Who does she think she is?” I seethed. “Seriously, she begs us to tell her, and then she gets all uptight when we do. She should learn to mind her own business.” Darryl continued to smirk (he was trustworthy with a dirty joke, but less proficient in virtually all other areas of verbal communication), perhaps confused at the intensity of my reaction. “It wasn’t that bad,” I thought to myself. “She should learn how to take a joke.”

I expected that her tender constitution had been wounded by a naughty word scrawled on the side of the mailbox, or some similarly meaningless offence. When I stepped around the mailbox to see what she was pointing at, I felt a sudden rush of recognition. The picture was grainy, a white cat looking back over his shoulder at an unseen owner, and I knew that I had seen that face before, though by the time I saw it, it was much changed. The poster was taped to the side of the mail box, the once black ink from the once bold ‘LOST’ had faded and run like mascara mingled with tears onto the paper, now wavy and yellowed. We must have walked past the mailbox twenty times, but we never saw the poster before, or perhaps we had, but did not bother to remember it. One gets accustomed to seeing the sad little signs seeking lost pets; this one had not meant anything special to me. When I was little, I hated this sort of signs. I remember seeing one in the parking lot at the grocery store with a picture of a little ginger coloured spaniel called Stig. I was terrified on his behalf, imagining myself, unable to speak, wandering down unfamiliar streets, knowing only that I was lost. It was an entirely empty empathy. I did not think to look for Stig. I just moved closer to my parents, remembered that I was not lost, and let their presence calm and comfort me.

“What are we going to do?” she asked breathlessly, filled with an ostentatious concern that would otherwise have annoyed me – she was always certain that the world was waiting on her next decision. She had already decided that this was our responsibility. The possibility that the desiccated remains we had found were unrelated to this sign had apparently not crossed her mind.

“Shh, shh, I’m trying…” I do not know why I needed a moment. I pretended to read the description in the poster, and thought about Stig.

I wonder how scary it is to be a lost dog. I wonder if dogs possess enough awareness to know that they are lost, or if the situation is only really desperate and frightening for their owner. I wonder if it is just arrogance and anthropomorphism that makes us imagine lost dogs wandering pitifully through mall parking lots, listening sorrowfully for the familiar sound of the name they know belongs to them, listening for any kind word at all. I wonder if our pets realize how difficult it is to navigate the large city, or if they imagine that they are always within easy reach of home.

“What are we going to do?” she asked again, her voice still tremulous. I knew what she wanted me to do – that was the point of her repeated inquiries – but she still wanted me to act as if I were making the decision. Her delicate prodding drove me crazy. I knew that we would call the cat’s owner eventually, but I hated that she gave me no choice while still demanding that I be responsible for the decision.

I folded my mouth into a scowl Darryl would have been proud of and shrugged. “Well, I’m going to go home,” I said, turning toward home to emphasize my point. I didn’t look back; I knew that if I did, I would see her writing down the address and phone number in her day planner. I hated that day planner, too. She always handed her homework in on time, and sometimes deigned to remind me a couple of days before things were due. It would take her a few seconds for her to catch up, longer if I walked fast.

I thought about childfind posters. I thought about the picture I had seen of a five-year-old girl that had been kidnapped by her mother. The police had been looking for her for nine years. She probably doesn’t even know she is missing. A computer artist had artificially aged her picture. I would have been interested to find the girl just to see how accurate the artist’s anticipation was. How well can you predict what nine years will do to a little girl’s face? Who knows what she has lived through? Who knows what her face will betray of those years?

She caught up, and walked wordlessly a couple of steps behind me. “Did you write down that number?” I asked. She nodded; but I couldn’t see her. “We should call.”

Tuesday, December 13, 2005

Seinfeld on Evil

Why do we need B.O? What is the function of it? Everything in nature has a reason, has a purpose, except B.O. Doesn’t make any sense – do something good, hard work, exercise, smell very bad. This is the way the human being is designed. You move, you stink. Why can’t our bodies help us? Why can’t sweat smell good? It’d be a different world, wouldn’t it? Instead of putting your laundry in the hamper, you’d put it in a vase. You’d go down to the drugstore and pick up some odourant and perspirant. You’d probably have a dirty sweat sock hanging from the rear-view mirror of your car. And then on a really special night, maybe a little underwear comin’ out of your breast pocket. Just to let her know she’s important. ~ Jerry Seinfeld

Definitions

Anthony’s life was unravelling. He was living a country and western song – his girlfriend had left him, his dog died, and he lost his job. In addition to all of this, Anthony was trying to finish his last semester of University, and although he worked hard to keep up with his studies, it was very difficult, and despite his best efforts, one morning he fell asleep in his philosophy class. After the class ended, the professor gently woke him, and asked if there was anything wrong.

“I’m sorry professor,” Anthony admitted. “I’ve been having a really difficult time these last few weeks…”

The professor nodded understandingly, and Anthony continued. “It’s hard for me to understand what this is all for. Is there any meaning? Is there a purpose?”

The professor thoughtfully rubbed his chin, and then asked, “Define ‘is’…”

It’s an old joke, and it is not very funny (particularly not when compared to that pun about the roller coaster) but it is accurate. Definitions are of critical importance in any philosophical discussion because they allow us a bit of common ground – we understand the questions that the opponent is asking, and we can avoid the difficulties that plagued Abbot and Costello’s famous inquiry into the identity of the first baseman. Seeking definitions can devolve into a stalling tactic: when a debate is not going well, I start asking my opponent to define things. Even if it is merely to avoid the stalling, it is useful to get definitions out of the way early on. When someone shakes their head and bemoans the proliferation of evil, I give a sly grin, try to look a little bit cocky, and say, “Well, of course that depends what you mean by ‘evil.’” It gives me some time to think.

Philosophical definitions try to balance two competing virtues: the ideal definition is general and exceptionless. Metaphorically, writing a philosophical definition is like describing to your ideal mate. If you ask a fourteen year old boy (or an engineer) to describe what he looks for in a girlfriend, they will invariably answer “A girl.” It’s a good answer, but in most cases, it is a little broad. (Ironically, if he likes short girls, his answer could be ‘a little broad’ and still be exact. That’s a joke.) It needs to be more specific. On the other hand, if you ask a philosopher what they are looking for, they will hem and haw, and then answer with excruciating specificity. “Her age cannot exceed 28.4 years, but she cannot be younger than 20.3 years old. She must drive a later model Corrola, enjoy the music of Bach, and vote Conservative federally and Liberal provincially.” That’s a description that gives you a good idea of what he is looking for, but unfortunately, it excludes most of the women that he is likely to meet. That, much more than a crippling lack of social skills, is why most philosophers die alone.

Although we can think of countless examples of evil, and we all know what we are talking about, it remains difficult to find a general and exceptionless definition of evil. A lot of times, we use ‘pain’ as a short of shorthand, asking “Why is there so much pain in the world?” But not all pain is bad. The athlete who disciplines his body might feel pride at his sore muscles, and even enjoy the stiffness that follows a difficult workout (I have no idea, because I have nothing in common with athletes). According to a well-known aphorism, chicks dig scars. Sometimes, things are pleasantly painful: we enjoy jumping into an icy cold lake, and as every person who has ever been a teenaged boy knows, there is something really ineffable and fun about a welt from a ping-pong ball thrown at your bare back. It would seem that pain and evil are not synonomous.

That said, there is pain that is not in any way enjoyable. Some have suggested that pain is the body’s early warning system, a way of alerting the owner of the body that there is a problem. Thus, a burn is God’s way of saying “If you don’t take your hand off the stove, you will damage yourself.” On the face of it, this seems reasonable, but the skeptic will ask, “Why does the burn have to hurt two days later? I already have my hand off of the stove.” A larger question looms: why did God make us out of such fragile stuff and then fill the world with things that burn/cut/damage? Similarly, the suffering of the athlete who endures pain toward a greater end raises difficult questions: why did God not make the world so that we could enjoy the benefits of exercise without the necessity of pain? Noted Philosopher Jerry Seinfeld asks this question in a roundabout way when he asks why exercise makes people smell so bad. “Why can’t our bodies help us? Why can’t sweat smell good?” Why did God make the world this way?

I think that the most honest answer, intellectually and scripturally, is the shoulder shrug. Any question that begins “Why does God…” is going to thwart attempts at an honest answer. “Why does God make puppies/sunsets/cabbages/shit?” Shrug. I simply do not know. Who can know the mind of God? Who can search his purposes? I believe that God has a purpose in these things, but philosophical conjectures about that purpose are sure to come up short, and are often less comforting and satisfying than a long hot bath. This answer is not satisfying to the philosopher or the suffering, but it is, I believe the most honest answer a believer can give.

Even if we fail to come up with a decent definition, no philosopher is going to be able to convince us that there is no evil. Perhaps the construction of a definition ought to return to our shared experiences, and when we consider Auschwitz, Pol Pot and tsunamis it is beyond arguing that this is a world aquainted with evil: irredeemable pain, extreme forms of moral wrong, and grotesque suffering. There is evil. The only question is if its existence impunes (or casts into doubt altogether) the character of God. Over the next week or so, I will approach this question from three perspectives, culminating in my final argument for the goodness of God: A baby dressed as a sunflower peeking impishly over the lip of a terra cotta pot.

Monday, December 12, 2005

Seriously, you guys GOTS to read this.

I went with a friend to ride the roller coaster. Later, someone asked me how it was. I said, "It was up and down."
_________________
I don't even know why I am posting this on my blog; I've already told everyone I know about it, because I thought it was the cleverest thing that I have ever said...

This... is a little weird.

Sadness haunts me, stalks me and finds me in every moment of happiness. But it is not my God. I do not need to bow to it. Success is not my God. I am free to fail. Beauty is not my God. I am free to be ugly. Happiness is not my God. I am free to mourn. Let me mourn genuinely and also rejoice in the good God has blessed me with.

Lord, hear my prayer.

Friday, December 09, 2005

When things die

“What is it?” she asked, too loudly, from behind me, her voice at once hesitant and nagging.

“I don’t know yet,” I admitted. “It’s been dead a long time.”

Though it was dead, it moved, teeming with a life not its own, crawling with maggots and ants. I poked it again with a long straight stick.

“Do you think we should tell someone?” she asked. Her voice was meant to convey concern, but I knew that that she just wanted to gossip, put herself at the centre of the neighbourhood and inform everyone, in the gravest terms, of the mysterious remains in the empty lot.

“We found a dead thing!” I sang, my voice falsetto, my hands fluttering girlishly, exaggerating her volatility. Her face fell at my mockery, and I suspected that I had made a mistake, but I blundered on. “Who are we going to tell anyway?” I asked, incredulous. “ And what are we going to say? That we found a dead raccoon or something? What’s anybody going to care?”

“It might not be a racoon. I thought maybe it was a cat, someone’s cat,” she said, much more quietly. I rolled my eyes in mock disgust.

“It’s not a cat,” I said, with much more certainty than I felt. “Besides, what are we going to do, put up posters? Nobody’s going to recognize... it now.” She sat on her haunches behind me as I pushed the cat, or whatever it was, up with the stick. It was stiff and flat as a board, with gaping leathery holes where its eyes should have been, its teeth bared in a final, horrible grimace.

“I don’t want to look at it anymore,” she said without moving.

“If you don’t want to look,” I said slyly, “you can just leave.” I didn’t look back to see her reaction; I didn’t have to. I knew she’d stay. I moved it again, and watched beetles scuttle into little tunnels in the dirt under the carcass, eager to escape my gaze. Suddenly, I was very bored. There was no great mystery here, nothing meaningful or important to uncover, nothing to solve. It was dead long enough that I could not picture it alive – for all I could see, it had lain in state since the foundations of the earth. “Let’s go,” I said, turning and brushing past her. She skipped along the path behind me as I headed back toward home. I listened to her sing as she skipped. She had a beautiful voice. It oppressed me. When she sang, which was often, I would panic, immediately seek some interruption, some way to stop the music. She was only singing, and it was beautiful, but I wanted it to stop. “Why can’t she just walk normally?” I fumed silently to myself. “Why does she have to skip? Why is she always singing?” I thought of what I could say to cut her off, but I needn’t have worried about it: she changed the subject herself.

“Still,” she said thoughtfully, “It’s sad when things die.”

The Problem of Evil

I was 17 when I gathered all my dreams into an ancient carpetbag with a tricky handle and set out for University. I had endured an idyllic childhood, cosseted in a loving Baptist church as close to me as my own family, but I was excited to see the real world, a world where the best minds of a generation were routinely destroyed by madness. (Or so I had read.) I wasn’t scared, I was ready: ready to have my faith challenged and my stalwart character tempted by the cosmopolitan delights of Lethbridge, Alberta.

I knew almost immediately that I was unprepared. My classes were not difficult, and my marks were good, but my peers and even some of my professors were openly antagonistic toward the faith of our fathers. I remember my logic professor quickly diagramming “Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so” on the blackboard, mockingly asking if it was a valid argument (it isn’t). I had thought that I was part of a respected community; it turned out that we were barely tolerated. I tried my best to defend the faith I loved, as if Jesus would have been ashamed to learn that I was confused and intellectually outclassed. I argued even when I could see no hope, as if it was my duty to the members of the Baptist church to unleash my ignorance at every turn. My efforts at apologetics were only occasionally embarrassing, but it was always an uphill battle, and I learned to wear a confident smirk even when I was sure that I was beaten.

It was no comfort to learn that I was not alone – the Christians I encountered seemed either blithely unaware or transfixed, continually organizing box socials and hayrides. Of course, these were not the only believers on campus, but those who did not remind me of panicked rabbits were just as distressing: wolfish, menacing and intimidating, ostentatiously intellectual, often smoking pipes and always ready to give an answer to anyone foolish enough to spout the calming theology I was familiar with. I had never met Calvinists before, and they impressed me, and always left me with a quiet feeling of dread. I sometimes wondered if I preferred an utterly oblivious, cheerful ignorance to a sour, intellectually respectable faith; I was not anxious to make the choice.

I wish that there were a tidy end to this story, a character introduced in the third act who lived a quiet, penitent, orthodox faith and taught me to respect my mind without sacrificing my heart. There was no such deus ex machina available to me; I will not invent one here. I have struggled, and I continue to struggle, with the intellection that has destroyed the finest souls of my generation. I continue to struggle, but I have made progress. These questions do not cut through me the same way they used to; I have learned to handle my own weapons better and I have learned to accept (and expect) defeat. I have become comfortable, and even rejoice in my own fallibility. I don’t have the answers to the questions that haunt me, but I am called to trust, not to know. It is liberating experience to realize that losing an argument does not mean that I am constrained to doubt or discard my faith – the God that the philosophers are content to prove or disprove is not the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. When I am confused, God does not cease to exist any more than the sky ceases to exist when I close my eyes.

When I first encountered the Problem of Evil, I felt as though my faith was collapsing. My philosophy of religion professor, Dr. Woods, was a considerate, learned and generous scholar. He did not present the problem as a means to enlightening my ignorance, and neither did he dismiss it as an ancient question, long since solved and no longer pertinent. He set the problem before us, and let us contemplate it. It was an example of philosophy as it is meant to be done – thoughtful, respectful, fascinating and (if we are to be honest) incredibly difficult.

As I read Jacob’s recent entries on the Problem of Evil, I realized that I want to go through it too, not as a response (at least not directly) to Jacob’s questions, just as an account of my own experience and thoughts with regard to one of the central philosophical arguments that is put to theists. I feel somewhat guilty, because I know that philosophical posturing does not have wide appeal, and I do not have Dr. Woods's wisdom. I will try to make the discussion accessible and enjoyable; I’m so confident that you will enjoy this that I am willing to offer a ‘money back guarantee.’ (It’s kind of a joke, because you didn’t pay anything to read this, so even if you were dissatisfied, all you would get back is… never mind.) And I’ll try to augment the philosophy stuff with some other stuff, maybe a story or some such, and maybe some jokes, or something, or maybe sports analysis and gossip, for people that don’t really like philosophy. And also, the promised pictures of babies dressed up as potted plants (no, I haven’t forgotten).

“We are talking about God. What wonder is it that you do not understand? If you do understand, then it is not God.” ~ Augustine