I think the reason we characterize the Judeo-Christian God (which I assume you are referring to) as omnibenevolent is on account of references in scripture describing him as good and perfect. For example, in Deuteronomy 34 it is written “His work is perfect, For all His ways are just; A God of faithfulness and without injustice, Righteous and upright is He.” And In Matthew 48 Jesus says “the Father is perfect” during the sermon on the Mount. It would be very problematic if this God was not all-good or perfect. If he were just somewhat good (more good than humans) and all powerful, this does not seem like a God worth trusting or worshiping or petitioning in prayer.

This argument is simple:
If God is omnibenevolent then he will always do the best thing
God doesn’t always do the best thing
God is not omnibenevolent (1,2 MT) — lupac

I’d like to challenge premise one of your argument. I think it is possible that God IS omnibenevolent even if he doesn’t always do the best thing. God can be infinitely good and be capable of infinite goodness in any particular situation, but perhaps to achieve a greater good, in the individual moments he acts in ways that are GOOD but not the BEST.

What are you suggesting when you say, “Why not think of God as all-loving (doing the best possible) instead of omnibenevolent to avoid paradoxes…” I’m not sure how switching the description to all loving mitigates the problem of not doing the best thing. Perhaps we both agree that God does not do the best conceivable thing in particular situations because it isn’t possible for him (maybe his action affects other situations, or to do the absolute best would violate laws of our world that are of greater overall importance)? I think in this case, God is still omnibenevolent, despite not doing the very best thing in every individual situation.

There are certainly examples from scriptures of God acting in ways that don’t seem the “best” to us. These are very difficult sometimes to even understand as good, let alone best. God commands the Israelites to kill every living being during battles. God punishes multiple generations for the sins of one individual. God considers wiping out an entire city before Moses debates him to spare the righteous. These do not seem to be evidence of an omnibenevolent God. Maybe this argument is a little out there…but perhaps these are example of God doing what was good and made sense to a particular people group 3000 years ago, but from our point in history and our interactions with God in the twenty first century we are sure he did not act in the best way. If there is a way to reconcile these ancient stories as evidence of God being good, even if he’s not doing the best conceivable thing, I think such examples do not need to imply a lack of omnibenevolence.

Hi Bitter Crank!

I think you are making a very good point. It certainly seems that the power structure and justice systems impose an order and morality on humanity. In our world today there are clearly widely held values and morals that regarding treatment of others and giving of one’s self that may seem contrary of themes of individualism or even tribe mentality one might expect from survival based morals. However, maybe those moments when “the State” breaks down, the violence and opportunism that ensures is indicative of more primitive instincts.

I think your argument is as follows:
1. If humans’ primary goal is to maintain individual security and opportunism, then morals have evolutionary origins
2. If there is no centralized authority, humans’ primary goal is to maintain individual security and opportunism.
3. If there is no centralized authority, then morals have evolutionary origins (1,2 HS)
4. Humans originally had no centralized authority
5. Humans’s morals originally had evolutionary origins (3,4 MP)

One problem I have with this argument however is Premise one. I don’t think it follows that opportunism is an indicator of evolutionary morals, rather it is an indicator of survival instincts that exist independent of morals. Morals are beliefs about the right way to act in the world. Instincts are concerned with self preservation. We hold our morals because we think they are true, while our instincts exist to preserve the body. I think it becomes very problematic if we are holding our morals for a reason other than truth.
It seems the main argument here is that humans exhibit evolution-driven morals that manifest in society-oriented ways when there is central authority maintaining the society, or they manifest in individual/offspring oriented ways when there is a breakdown of society. Even if these behaviors are exhibited however, I don’t think we can certainly say it is due to evolution. I think morals could exist independent of evolutionary forces, even if they contribute to a stable society, survival, or passing on of genes. In addition, I think our instincts for survival are not the same as our morals. Reactions to a dangerous situation are not the same as thought out choices we make aligned with our values.
In the examples you cited about anarchy breaking out and violence ensuing, this may reveal a weakness in humans; people might abandon or subjugate their values out of fear and desire to survive. I don’t think this in itself is evidence of remnant morality of the past, I think this reveals the impact irrationality and persistence of a will to survive.

Hi Francesco! This is a very interesting topic. I am inclined to think that humans have indirect doxastic voluntarism as well, but that its implications on our responsibility might be better directed towards our belief making processes. If indirect doxastic voluntarism is as you explained it, “the ability to bring about belief by more than just directly willing, but as having the ability for indirect control over one's beliefs in the sense that we have the capacity to pass judgment, doubt, or to choose when and/or what kind of evidence we seek out on the basis of confirming or disconfirming beliefs,” then our skepticism and critical analysis of beliefs is of the greatest importance. It seems that we require sufficient reason to hold are beliefs if we do not just will them into existence (i.e. we justify them to ourselves, regardless of whether they are rational in a broader sense). These justifications can be aimed towards genuine and truth seeking, or towards complacency and avoidance of critical analysis. Perhaps this is what we are ultimately responsible for, because it is what we have control over.

I would like to offer an alternative to an individual being responsible for the beliefs in themselves. Rather, perhaps an individual is held responsible for those processes which lead to the beliefs. In a sense one should be held responsible for their intentions. My argument is as follows:
1. One should only be held responsible for beliefs they have control over.
2. If indirect doxastic voluntarism is true, then humans are primarily in control of their own reasoning and truth seeking processes or their truth seeking processes are in voluntary
3. If humans are in control of their reasoning and truth seeking processes, then they should be held responsible for their reasoning and truth seeking processes
4. Therefore, if doxastic voluntarism is true, then humans should be held responsible for their reasoning and truth-seeking processes (2,3 HS)

@FordFestivaPhilosophy makes a good point about only an individual being limited by beliefs about how to choose a reliable source or obtain information. If one’ pre-existing beliefs about seeking truth not voluntary and they inform the beliefs we do hold as true, this is a problem for indirect doxastic voluntarism. I think in this case we should say that DIRECT doxastic voluntarism is true, because even if one controls beliefs by virtue of “belief making beliefs,” if they are not in control of their reasoning, they are transitively not in control of holding the belief that results from it.
Of course, in a practical sense, people’s intentions are often inaccessible to us, so “holding one responsible” in an Earthly context would be impossible to implement. However, I do think this view could offer some insight into how humans might be held responsible for their beliefs in the eyes of an omniscient God.

Thank you that does help! I think that makes a lot of sense to believe, especially in a practical sense…regardless of where these morals come from or why we believe them some of these very basic widely held ideas certainly seem to promote human flourishing in a way that their counterfactuals do not. In general, ideas like: it is good to avoid needless pain, it is good to continue to live, it is good to have freedom, etc seem natural and self-evident without examination. I think the life-promoting, self-evident nature of these core morals is a good reason to hold them and live by them because we must make choices in life with incomplete information, but I still wonder what the connection is between these “values” and their “correctness”…

The objectivity in the example you gave that you mentioned above seemed to be that the pain was undeniable and it was caused without reason, thus it must be immoral. You are assuming I suppose that this is a necessary fact about the world we live in? Is it that we call actions that promote life “moral” and things that promote death we call “immoral”?

It also has to do with what we value in our lives, and a life free of senseless pain seems to be a something that almost all people value; and this arises out of the kind of biological beings we are (and I'm not thinking necessarily in terms of evolution), i.e., it's the background reality of our biology, what we value, what we feel, how we reason, etc. — Sam26

is it possible for this biological basis to be independent of evolution? Looking at the tenacity of life and how throughout history there is a drive in human beings to survive and create good lives, it makes sense that these life-promoting values be things we know a priori due to the “background reality of our biology.” If the inclination to follow that objective moral truth is innate in human beings, is it distinct from an evolutionary mechanism optimizing survival and reproduction? The question becomes: are actions moral on account of evolutionary advantage or are they moral in themselves and also coincidentally evolutionarily advantageous? The core of my questions here is whether these morals are based on an independent truth value or the product of random variation and natural selection (I sure hope not

I know you said you are not necessarily thinking in the terms of evolution, so if you see another explanation I would love to hear it! (also some of these thoughts come from Richard Joyce’s Evolution of Morality if you want to check it out)

@Sam26 I think this is a very good, simple example that most people would agree is immoral. There seems to be a core morality between most cultures and peoples that condemns senseless suffering like you described in the example of cutting off someone’s arm. I also think it is true that immoral acts cause harm in some form (i.e. there is a reason to say the act is wrong). I believe your argument is as follows:

1. Cutting off someone’s arm with no good reason is objectively immoral independent of religious belief
2. To cause pain without a good reason is objectively immoral
3. Therefore, some objective moral claims exist outside of religious belief.

You seem to be pointing out a nearly universal moral value (that senselessly inflicting pain on another human is bad) which is very important, given its dominance across religious and secular worldviews alike. However, I think the question still remains: where does this notion of morality come from? When you say, “it’s objectively immoral based on the harm alone,” do you mean that there is some independent moral truth that exists which humans have the ability to perceive, connecting the pain to “wrongness”? Or, do you mean that the widely accepted idea that senseless suffering is wrong is a sufficient basis for the term “objectively immoral” because of its popularity?

I would like to challenge premise 2 (and in effect, premise 1 as well) assuming that you are calling it objectively immoral because it is a widely accepted human intuition. Suppose you were to poll people about whether it is immoral to cut off someone’s arm without good reason and it turned out there were a small group of people who did not find such an act problematic. Suppose this group becomes very influential over time or a natural disaster wipes out the people who think otherwise to that the majority of the population does not believe the act is wrong (they don’t have to think it is moral, or engage in causing pain, just that it doesn’t necessitate a moral claim either way). Would this shift in core morality change the claim that it is objectively immoral? To call pointless pain objectively immoral is to say it is universally wrong, independent of personal interpretation.

It does seem very hasty to assume morality is subjective from a secular world view simply because God is not the basis, because, similar to claims about absolute religious truths, the same can be made about the existence of moral facts independent of divine origin. However it seems important to distinguish that claims about “objective morals” be attributed to the existence of such moral truths, independent of popular opinion, otherwise the basis of morality is not in truth value but random chance or evolutionary favorability.

I think your train of thought makes a lot of sense! :) It seems that free will is necessary for true love of God and indeed humans must have an alternative (to choose not-God). I would like to challenge your premise on free choice. You wrote
“Forced love is not love.
So, God cannot force humankind to love him.
Humankind must, therefore, be capable of freely choosing to love God.
To have the capacity of free choice is to possess free will.
Therefore, humankind must possess free will.”

I think it is important to distinguish what this free choice means. Does it mean that an essential aspect of humanity is the ability to choose to love God (regardless of whether they get the chance to do so on Earth), or that all humans do in fact have the ability to choose God on Earth? What I mean by this is that human free will in certain regards by the conditions that one is born into. For example, one might technically have the ability to choose to love God if they were aware that such a choice existed.
There are some people (infants, those living in remote areas, and the severely mentally disabled might be good examples) who do not get the chance to hear the gospel of about the existence of a God before they die. Christian doctrine more specifically requires belief in Jesus as a savior for salvation, and certainly no every human being has knowledge of Jesus during their lifetime. Thus if salvation requires belief and love of God, then these people who are never exposed to God will go to Hell (unless there some chance to choose to love God after death.) I would like to argue that those who are unexposed to information or knowledge about choosing God, in essence do not have a choice.

On account of this, I would also like to clarify what you mean by saying:
“If God is all-loving, then he wants what is best for every person.
What is best for other people is not hell.
Therefore, God does not want people to go to hell.”
If God does not want people to go to Hell and you are arguing that God has granted humans free will to choose to love God (not go to Hell), wouldn’t it be necessary for the choice to be real, rather than theoretical and contingent on one’s specific circumstances at birth?

If indeed the physical word is the only chance to gain salvation, these people are virtually in the same boat as the souls damned under a predestination argument. The mental capacity, origin of birth, or time of death dictated their access to God. Such thing are nearly entirely out of an individual’s control and thus such factors have predetermined their fate. This is similar to the predicament of a predestination argument which results in predetermined souls who go to Hell instead of given the mercy of Heaven, irrespective of their life choices. If this is an analogous argument, the salvation dynamic and existence of Hell are still is incompatible with a maximally good God.

I also tried to formulate this into my own argument on this post: https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/4199/salvation-after-death/p1
I would love to hear your thoughts!

@SophistiCat

I think you make a very good point about the Fine-Tuning Argument being an explanation potentially generated from a preselected argument (i.e. existence of a God). However, I would like to challenge your assertion that “whatever the universe is trying to tell us, it is not that it is fine-tuned for life.” It seems to me that what is truly remarkable about our universe is how the complexity throughout allows life- abundantly and diversely. In searching to explain human existence, purpose, and even explain our own need to search for meaning, we reach a point where the natural world can explain no further…yet we recognize that the natural world seems perfectly balanced to accommodate our existence and is things were slightly different (on a biological, chemical, astrophysical level), human life would be impossible. At this point it seems reasonable to consider whether our physical world exists in the way it does by accident, through random change, or if something outside of our universe orchestrated this world, explaining its seemingly fine-tuned nature and the human desire for a greater meaning in life. Thus, complexity that allows the firing of neurons to construct thoughts about an explanation for existence itself seems very improbable under conditions that very easily could have been otherwise.

Of course, on a basic chemical level, reactions need energetically favorable conditions to occur unless there is an input of energy, trending towards increasing entropy which makes complexity in general impressive as randomness is preferable. Yet life thrives on the principles of thermodynamics. The chemosynthesis of photoautotrophs is powered by maximizing the energetically favorable conditions while still building complexity. I don’t think it follows that:
“Another objection is that life, being a high-level complex structure, is going to be fine-tuned (again, in the sense of being sensitive to variations of low-level parameters) no matter what. In fact, any such complex structure is bound to be fine-tuned”

Part of what makes life so remarkable is not only that it exists complexly, but there is a trend in increasing complexity. Life is not just surviving it is changing and adapting- which sets it apart from being any “high-level complex structure.” The tenacity and development of life should be considered in fine tuning. Looking at the evolutionary process and how life has been facilitated and increased in complexity, the development of flagella is a classic example. The probability that this mechanism would arise, this fundamental piece in cell mobility and eventually multicellularity seems so unlikely but happened with extreme success. Evolution informs us that random genetic mutations lead to diversity which will persist if it does not harm the individual’s reproductive ability…. That conditions would exist such that the intermediate steps in flagellum development would have occurred, leading to a such increased biological complexity seems to be another aspect of what our universe is “fine-tuned” for. If it were fine tuned to any other standard (even just complexity in general), a convincing argument would need to be made for what the fine-tuning is for and again we would again be faced with the problem of explaining life as some big accident with in a universe finely-tuned to a different standard.