Christian historian Dr. Wallace Marshall and I are debating whether or not enough evidence points to the existence of a god. For background and format, and Dr. Wallace’s opening statement, see entry one. For subsequent entries, see index.

Now we are focusing on a broadly cast Argument from Evil, or as I prefer to call it, Argument from Indifference. And Marshall is here responding to my laying out of that case in my sixth reply.


That the Evidence Points to God (VI)

by Wallace Marshall, Ph.D.

Responding now to Dr. Carrier’s first argument for atheism, I’ll begin by noting the philosophical intemperance of his assertion that there is “no evidence” for God in either cosmology or the “pleasures of experience.” As I pointed out in my opening entry, “evidence” simply means a fact or phenomenon that makes a hypothesis more or less probable than it would be in the absence of that fact or phenomenon. On this definition, it should be clear that there is at least some evidence on both sides of the question. Indeed, this is the case with most if not all significant issues people debate.

One may not find various pieces of evidence compelling, or one may think that the preponderance of evidence, or even the overwhelming weight of evidence, lies on a certain side; but to say that there is no evidence whatsoever on the other side of the question is a narrow-minded and unscholarly position.

Consider that another way of stating Dr. Carrier’s claim would be that the evidence for atheism could not be stronger than it is. But suppose that five years from now physicists were to discover powerful evidence that the cosmos is in fact past-eternal, or that the appearance of fine-tuning in the cosmos was illusory. Such developments would obviously constitute additional pieces of evidence for atheism. But then it follows that the current state of cosmology and cosmogony provides at least some evidence for theism.

As stated in my opening entry, if we found ourselves living on a planet resembling the surface of the moon instead of the striking beauty of the earth, this would obviously count as some evidence for atheism. Similarly, if we lived in a world without beautiful poetry, without great literature, without stunning music like Bach and Beethoven, without the thrill of romantic love and the joy of friendship, without delicious cuisine, fine wine, or the refreshment of a cold, crisp beer—any judicious thinker, any man with common sense, should recognize that this would strengthen the case for atheism and weaken the case for theism. But then the converse applies: that the existence of such things constitutes at least some evidence for theism.

I turn then to Dr. Carrier’s first argument for atheism, which is that the world as we experience it is exactly the kind of place we should expect to find if there were no God. Dr. Carrier lists 10 disagreeable features of the world that he finds to be incompatible with the existence of God:

  1. Natural evils (tsunamis, diseases, etc.) that plague human and animal life.
  2. We do not see frequent divine intervention to oppose or punish human evil.
  3. Most of the universe is inhospitable to life.
  4. Life on earth has developed through a long process of evolution “plagued by random mistakes.”
  5. Human minds are hampered by physical brains instead of being purely spiritual.
  6. People frequently make errors in their reasoning.
  7. Human moral systems have slowly (albeit progressively) developed.
  8. The world’s great religious books have done nothing to further the development of human morality; on the contrary, they have impeded it.
  9. The world’s great religious leaders have endorsed various human evils such as slavery.
  10. All cultures and nations have not always had the same moral, political, medical, scientific and technological knowledge that makes human life more happy and comfortable.

According to Dr. Carrier then, if God existed, there would be no natural evils; or at least, natural evils would not affect human and animal life. God would frequently intervene to stop evildoers in their tracks—say by paralyzing them or knocking them backwards with an invisible force; or, failing this, he would frequently punish them in obvious ways—say by striking them down with lightning or inflicting a disease, or (for lesser crimes) making their hair fall out or their noses grow like Pinocchio’s, or an ugly blemish to temporarily appear on their bodies.

Life would be common all over the universe. Rational agents would exist as Cartesian “ghosts in the machine;” and these agents would all be clear, intelligent thinkers. The world’s great religious leaders would not make mistakes in their moral reasoning.

Finally, God would have equipped mankind from the beginning with a gigantic textbook containing perfect moral principles, application of those principles to a broad variety of specific ethical cases, a delineation of the ideal political system, and whatever medical, technological and scientific knowledge is necessary for the basic comfort and happiness of mankind. Moreover, God would make sure that everyone knew this textbook was divine, and he would ensure that cultural diversity never got in the way of people following this divine textbook.

Such is the ideal world according to Dr. Carrier: the world he would give us if he were God.

In subsequent entries I will have more to say about Carrier-world. I imagine certain readers have already discerned some disagreeable, or at least questionable, aspects of it—certainly from an aesthetic point of view. Its childlike qualities are also notable. Indeed, in certain respects it sounds like the kind of a world a man of science would be extremely dissatisfied with. The demand for spirit-minds is quite humorous coming from an atheist. The claim of #8 is historically false.

With respect to the features of the present world that are disagreeable, Dr. Carrier needs to show why it’s unlikely that God has morally sufficient reasons for permitting these evils to exist. With regard to human suffering this is clearly questionable, for there is more human evil in the world than natural evil, and therefore, what natural evil exists is perfectly compatible with divine justice.

With regard to the rest, how does Dr. Carrier know that God lacks morally sufficient reasons for arranging them as they are? He provides no arguments for showing that say, a divine justice operating in the tit-for-tat manner he desires would in fact make man a better, nobler species.

Other features of Carrier-world are clearly debatable from an aesthetic point of view, for example that life should be common instead of rare, or that the benefits of textbook instruction should override the beauty of gradual development. But again, Dr. Carrier provides no reasons why we should prefer his picture.

Perhaps these omissions are due to his desire to get all his arguments on the table at once, but he certainly owes us more explanation as to why his aesthetic and moral vision of the world is so much to be preferred.

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Such is Dr. Marshall’s response on the Argument from Indifference. 

Continue on to Dr. Carrier’s reply.

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