It seems that there may be some meta problems with your view. If indirect doxastic voluntarism is true, then, as you define it, we have the “ability to pass judgement, doubt, or choose when and/or what kind of evidence we seek out on the basis of confirming or disconfirming beliefs”. What concerns me, is that even under this schema, one is still restricted by beliefs that they do not have control over, even in your own view. That is to say, how does one come to the beliefs about how we should pass judgement on beliefs, what evidence is worth seeking out, when is there enough counter evidence that I should consider seeking more evidence? Even questions like what sources are reliable seems to be based upon prior beliefs.

Thus, it would seem, even if our will plays some role in our belief forming, if our will is shaped based of of pre-existing beliefs, which are formed entirely involuntarily, and not through this indirect doxastic voluntarism, if we were to look at the causal chain of why you believe what you believe, it would all be rooted in forces outside of your own control. If the nature in which you will about the criterion above is shaped through no kind of voluntarism, it would still seem you are not morally culpable for your beliefs. It could very well be the case that you could not have the correct will in regards to how to go about acquiring beliefs, because you involuntarily formed the wrong beliefs about how that process should be approached.

It would seem that premise one (1) is wrong then. It is very much possible that indirect doxastic voluntarism is true, and yet one could still not have control over their beliefs. I do, of course, as is implicit in your argument, assume that if one lacks control of their beliefs, they are not responsible for them. I also assume that one cannot willfully change their beliefs, as you have said.

1. If one’s meta beliefs about belief forming are involuntary, one cannot be held responsible for their beliefs about belief forming.
2. If one cannot be held responsible for their beliefs about belief forming, then one cannot be held responsible for the beliefs which result from those beliefs beliefs about belief forming, i.e. the beliefs formed because of indirect doxastic voluntarism.
3. One’s meta beliefs about belief forming are involuntary.
4. Therefore, one cannot be held responsible for their beliefs, even those which result from indirect doxastic voluntarism.

If the only cases in which we can be held responsible for our beliefs are in the instances involving indirect doxastic voluntarism, then, it seems, three (3) is true, as those meta beliefs cannot be formed as a result of indirect doxastic voluntarism.

Your defense for premise 1 ( It is possible that beings of limited cognitive ability (like humans), do not fully comprehend even the simplest concepts in comparison to beings of infinite knowledge such as God) seems to be rooted in some lack of the extent of our knowledge. Doesn’t it seem, that there must be some certain simples necessary for cognitive ability. You say that you accept that numbers do, in fact, exist, but how do you know this? If, as you say we are unable to know even the simplest concepts, then how are we supposed to know anything more complex? Your argument is more of a reason to doubt all knowledge, as, if we cannot even understand these cognitive simples, such as numbers, and logical truths, how then can we know anything at all? It would seem, your argument would seek to unfound any knowledge claim.

Also, there seems to be an implicit premise, which I am not sure one should accept: if there are limits in one’s cognitive abilities, one must accept that it is possible that all knowledge is impossible. Well sure, I suppose it is possible, but I would question the probability of such a sentiment. For instance, I would claim that numbers exist. It seems that there are these concepts which so accurately predict phenomena in the real world, that their existence is highly improbable. Fictions would almost certainly not be a certain and predictable as mathematics would indicate numbers are. However, despite the probability that numbers do in fact exist, your same argument would argue that it is possible that it is entirely fictional, and that we understand nothing. Because we have limited cognitive ability, is possible that we are wrong about absolutely everything, even, as you say, the simplest concepts. Should we begin to doubt the simplest concepts then? Surely not, for then how would we ever think we could construct meaningful thoughts and beliefs?

Thus, I believe, your premise one (1) is a much broader claim that at first it seems, and when taken to its logical extremes, results in some absurd, or at least improbably claims, that I’m not sure you meant to endorse.

You are indeed going after premise 1, which states “In many sad events, we can’t see what good features outweigh the bad features.”

Your counter to this seems to be “In many sad events, there are no bad features. The things we perceive as bad, are all part of God’s justice.”

You seem to be saying that the nature of our world is a natural consequence of our sin, because it is only just that sinned beings live in such a world filled with suffering. There is no greater good, because the suffering itself is just. This results in some conflicting beliefs. You have stated that in this system, gratuitous evil can exist. But this is not the case. On your schema, all suffering is just, and is therefore not gratuitous, but perfectly reflecting our sin.

This is hard to defend, as it seems that God could have made a world filled with sin and free will, but not as naturally bad. Why do hurricanes and childhood cancer exist? Well, God wills for them to suffer. This kind of natural suffering seems entirely unrelated to the suffering created by say, someone sinning and murdering somebody else. So it would seem that God, in this situation, has created beings he knew would sin, and then, on top of them being sinned and therefore separated from him, he puts them in a world which has a multitude of things ready to kill them, in seemingly terrible ways, because he is just.

This creates a variety of problems. If all of this suffering is just, then what moral qualms should you have about inflicting suffering on other people? If you were to torture somebody else, that suffering would all be part of the grand justice of God’s vision. Why was the holocaust bad? Well it wasn’t, it was just. If it is good to be just, and it is just to suffer, then it is good to suffer. It seems that you run into some pretty serious problems when adopting your counter to premise 1.

You say God doesn’t view these events as good, but you say that it is just that they happen. Does God not think justice is good?

I could also contend that this is only a problem if we understand the universe as something created. The Big Bang implies a beginning, not a creation. And to put on my (very inadequate) speculative astrophysicist hat, perhaps the Big Bang is not even a beginning, but simply the start of a form that we recognize. We do not know what came before. — Brillig

I think a beginning implies creation. If anything comes into existence, it seems like it should be explainable in some way. For instance a tree is created by a certain combination of factors, and, as with most things, seeing that something exists. It would seem that anything which has a beginning, at least in the observable world, is created in some sense. So it seem rational, if we see a beginning to the universe, to wonder what kind of conditions led to that beginning. I think you agree with this, but you seem to think that it is equally reasonable to claim that there were random preconditions which caused the big bang and that there was a Divine creator which caused the big bang. The problem with this is part of the neatness of a creator is, at least with most conceptions, is he possesses the quality of aseity, or he explains himself. Any other pre-conditions, the argument suggests, would lead you into an infinite regress until you reach something which is self-explained.

Also in your response to Ben, you seem to think that when we accept some kind of creator, we welcome a whole new host of problems which does not come with an atheistic explanation, such as what kind of being is this “God”. This only seems tangentially related, as the point of the fine tuning argument is not to arrive at any particular conception of God, but rather that some sort of being we could conceivably call “God” exist. The only attributes one can imply based on this argument are God’s aseity and eternity. Also, it would seem that that however many complications come with some version of God, it would be less complicated than another explanation. Again, because, if we take an a se being to be the cause of the big bang, we don’t have to explain his existence, whereas it would seem that any other cause would require a more complicated explanation. In other words, it doesn’t seem that we are, as you put it, “trading one mystery for several”, but rather we are solving potentially infinite mysteries with one.

1. If hell exists, there would be Biblical evidence for its existence, or it exists only conceptually in the minds of human beings due to misinterpreting the Bible.
2. Things that only exist conceptually in the minds of human beings do not actually exist.
3. There is no Biblical evidence for the existence of hell.
4. Therefore, hell does not actually exist. — Francesco di Piertro

In response to premise 1:

First, I would rephrase this to be “Either hell exist only in the mind or there is biblical evidence for its existence.”

Second, what you seem to consider Biblical evidence is the Bible directly mentioning hell, but this does not seem to be equivalent to evidence. There are a fair number of doctrines that I think are supported by scripture that aren’t necessarily mentioned directly. E.g. the doctrine of the trinity. The word trinity appears nowhere in the Bible, but are we to say it does not exist? Almost certainly not. So, I am not entirely sure what criteria you use to conclude what is considered evidence or not. This is also assuming that your first premise is really only true for issues of Christian doctrine, for surely things exist that are not evidenced in the Bible. But let us take more common parts of Christian doctrine that have little or no evidence in the Bible. God’s omnipresence. By your implied premise one, one could hardly believe in the omnipresence of God. I could only find one reference to it in the Psalm 139, which is hardly more evidence that we have for Hell.

This, I believe your argument, if true, may have some problematic consequences for other Christian doctrine.

In response to premise 2:

I think you should clarify what you mean by exist. Things that exist only in the mind certainly exist in some respect as you used the term “exist” to describe them. I think you maybe should say “do not actually exist in reality”.

Overall Response:

My main issue is with premise one. I’m fairly certain that the conditional you present isn’t true, and if it is, I think you would have to forsake some mainstream Christian doctrine including the Trinity and God’s Omnipresence. Or you could revise what you mean by evidence.

Now I think that if you want to take an annihilation view on Hell, that is certainly reasonable. Simply looking at John 3:16, the antithesis of Salvation seems to be perishing, which sounds really close to annihilation. Or in Matthew 7, when Jesus says that he will say to those who deny him, “I never knew you”. Thus, I think there is a reasonable argument to be made that the traditional conception of Hell does not exist, but I do not think that your argument is sufficient to reach that conclusion.