Kekes on Evil

Re Kekes quote: "if we do not have answers to these mysteries [Problem of Evil], then we do not know that God exists". This seems to be the assertion of many who take an agnostic or atheist position and use the problem of evil to support their position. In fact, more often I hear students suggesting that "if we do not have answers to the problem of evil, then we know that God does NOT exist." But, I agree with you Matt, to say that not having an "answer" to the problem of evil means that I do not (or perhaps cannot) "know" that God exists doesn't seem to be a defensible philosophical proposition. Religious epistemology aside, is there no room for a modern-day Job in the philosophy of religion? Job never got an "answer" to the problem of evil but chose not to conclude that he could not "know" if God existed or not.

I didn't read the Kekes article, so I'm just shooting from the hip, but I think that whether a theist needs to have an answer to the problem of evil depends on which problem of evil is standing unanswered. If we're talking about a deductive form of the argument, and a theist cannot answer it, then the theist is living in a contradiction. It seems that he/she doesn't know God exists. If we are talking about a strong evidential/inductive/probabilistic form of the problem of evil, I don't see why not having an answer would be tantamount to not knowing that God exists.

Job had direct experience of God. Many people who would say what Kekes said will allow exception for that sort of thing but then say that hardly anyone has even claimed it, and we don't know if anyone has really had it. Yet many believers today claim the same thing, including those who don't think they have any evidence but claim to interact with God. If reliabilism is true, and it really is interaction with God, then it would be knowledge of God.

Hi Matthew Mullins, my name's Andrew Moon, nice to meet you. Here are a few thoughts. (I like to introduce myself to people before I engage w/them in philosophy.)

You say that we can continue to know that God exists even if we have no "answer" to the problem of evil. I agree. But to go a bit further, by "answer", were you referring to a theodicy, where the theist actually has morally sufficient reasons for why the evils exist? Or were you referring to a "defense", where the theist gives reasons for why the seemingly gratuitous evils don't show us that we can't know that God exists? (I THINK I used those terms right, given the evil literature, but it's been awhile.)

I think that a theodicy is unnecessary (as you pointed out) for knowledge of God's existence because we can have knowledge that God exists via arguments or perhaps it is properly basic or based on religious experience. But a defense, I think, is needed for knowledge.

Take a freshman college student who takes philosophy 101 and is presented with the problem of evil. Suppose that he can't think of a good theodicy, but the reality of God in his life is too strong for him to deny it. Could we say he still knows that God exists? Not if he continues to live knowing that there is irrationality in his system of beliefs. But perhaps he does have a defense and that defense is: belief in God is so real that there MUST be something with that evil argument. Then perhaps he does have a defense. (One man's modus ponens is another man's modus tollens.)

Take that same philosophy class where they discuss skeptical arguments that the external world does not exist. After the class is through, he cannot find any justification for why he still believes in the external world. He walks outside and looks at a tree and forms the belief that there is a tree. Can't we say that he knows that there is a tree? Only if the original warrant for belief in the external world was sufficiently strong such that skeptical arguments cannot take away that warrant. And I think that in this case, a sufficient defense would be to say: "look, I have hands, therefore the external world exists and somethings GOT to be wrong with that skeptical argument." I think this is similar for belief in God. (I think this type of example is from Plantinga.)

So in response to Johnny-Dee, (nice to meet you as well), I think that even if one is presented with a deductive argument from evil, if the original warrant for God's existence is sufficiently strong, then the person may continue believing in God and just assume that SOMETHING must be wrong with the argument. When I first heard the "God creating a rock he cannot lift" paradox, I couldn't think of an answer, but I continued to believe in God and his omnipotence, and I think at that time, I even continued to know that God existed. I just assumed that there must be some answer out there somewhere. (That was my defense.)

But now I'm wondering: Have I made belief in God unfalsifiable? I guess we make things like belief in the external world unfalsifiable as well, and if it's like that for the external world, why can't it be the case for God?

I believe Matthew's point was that we someone can have neither a theodicy or a defense and still know that God exists. That was certainly my point.

Charlie—
You're right that Job certainly faced an evidential problem of evil right in the face and yet never cursed God. He wailed, groaned, etc, but he clung to his integrity. Is there a place for folks like Job in philosophy of religion? Well I think that if one has really good reasons for believing in God like Job did, then one would have good grounds to cling to that truth in the face of serious philosophical problems. That said, I think really good reasons are not going to include mentally assenting to the existence of God based on an argument, but something more fundamental.

John—
Given what Kekes says I feel sure that he is talking about the evidential problem of evil. However, as I said I don't think the theist necessarily has to give up their belief in God given the logical or evidential problem of evil. I think there are a number of reasons for why this is so. Two ways one might go are the reliabilism route Jeremy speaks of, or thinking that the arguments for theism on balance outweigh the POE.

Andrew—
I think "defense" in the literature is used to refer to accounts that are at least broadly logically possible that show a way out of the LPE. I think this is different than the way you are using the term. That said I think your point about skepticism analogies, and your last point about the theist responses to apparent difficulties are well taken.

Pierce-
Wait, you don't think neither a theodicy nor a defense is needed to continually know that God exists? (I'm using "defense" how I defined it in my comment; I might be wrong in how it's supposed to be used.) If someone presents the problem of evil to me as a philosophy 101 student (in whatever logical/evidential form) and I just keep believing in God, then doesn't that render me irrational or at least unjustified? I must think up of SOMETHING in response, even a simple G.E. Moore type response. But if I just stubbornly say, "nope! I'm just gonna keep believing in God!" Isn't that unjustified in at least the deontological sense of justification?

If you implant a compass in my brain that always tells me which way north is, and then you spin me around in a circle in an enclosed room and ask me to tell you which way north is, I will invariably point north but have no access to why I think it's north. That strikes me as a clear example of knowledge without evidence. What if you then tell me that you just came in from the street, and you're pretty sure that north is the opposite way, but you're not sure. Now I have evidence that the other direction is north, but it's not great evidence. Then you also find a broken compass and tell me that you're not 100% sure if it works anymore, but it's close. It points south. That's more evidence against my knowledge. In both cases I know that you haven't demonstrated that north is the direction I think is south, but you've given me evidence against my knowledge. I don't think it really makes it not knowledge. What convinces me that north is the other direction is an ability I have to know north in a direct way. If someone has a similar ability to know that God exists through direct interaction with God, then fallible evidence like the problem of evil shouldn't invalidate that knowledge. It's not knowledge based on evidence, so evidence against it doesn't undermine the knowledge.

If you come to me with evidence that my memories are all artificially implanted, and then you tell me my wife doesn't exist and never did, does that make me no longer know that she exists? What if I simply don't believe the evidence and continue to believe my memories? I think it's possible to continue to know that my wife exists even if I haven't given an account of how it is that the evidence might be wrong. All that matters is that it could be wrong. I don't have to show that it could be wrong in order to have knowledge. What I'm denying is that knowledge requires having access to what makes it knowledge. This is standard externalism in epistemology.

I want to make it clear that I'm not denying that there are good defenses against the problem of evil. I just don't think you need to express objections to the problem in terms of defenses in order to have knowledge of God, which comes from genuine interaction with God.

Hi Jeremy. Just letting you know, I'm an externalist with respect to warrant/knowledge and as of now, I'm convinced that something like Plantinga's theory of knowledge is correct. (Somebody just needs to get that mini-environment problem worked out.)

This is a bit of a side note, but your clear case of knowledge isn't so clear to me. In the case with the compass-implant, do you know that the compass was implanted in you? If you don't, then all you have is some sort of oddly produced belief that a certain direction is north that pops out of no where. I would say that this is not knowledge. Consider BonJour's famous Norman case where Norman has clairvoyant powers and suddenly forms the belief that the president is in New York, but Norman doesn't know he has clairvoyant powers. BonJour concludes that this is clearly not knowledge even if Norman has reliable cognitive faculties. This is one of the standard arguments against externalism (See Structure of Empirical Knowledge, 1985. Keith Lehrer has a similar case with Mr. Truetemp in his 1990 Theory of Knowledge book.)

Also as a side note, I have qualms with when you say of belief in God, "It's not knowledge based on evidence, so evidence against it doesn't undermine the knowledge." At least this statement (isolated) as a general principle doesn't work. Take my belief that the wall in front of me is red. It's properly basic and not dependent on evidence (it's at least as basic as belief in God could be); suppose it is also true and is knowledge. But then someone shows me that there is a red light shining on the wall. My properly basic belief is no longer proper and has been overturned by the evidence. We have a standard undercutting defeater. I think that many of our properly basic beliefs (and even those which happen to be knowledge) can be defeated by evidence in this way.

But on the relevant point of your comment (with regard to belief in God), I think we agree, but I want to make some fine-tuning. Admittedly, a person's belief in God, even if it's direct, could potentially be overturned by evidence; this happens all the time. So here's where the fine-tuning comes in. Whether a person's belief in God can be defeated by POE depends on the strength of justification that is given to the belief when the person interacts with God. Suppose God reveals himself to Michael Martin in such a realistic way that his sensus divinitatis goes haywire and Martin can't help but believe in God. All the evidence (including POE) that Martin has marshalled against theism suddenly seems miniscule because a segment of his design plan (the sensus divinitatus) which had hitherto been ill-used is finally properly functioning and the degree of justification for his belief is overwhelming. Then at that time, I think Martin would know that God exists, even if he has all these arguments for the contrary

So my conclusion: the degree of justification that a properly basic belief has is a function of how strong the evidence/defeater must be in order to decrease the justification such that there is no warrant for the belief. How does that sound? (Of course, this stuff normally takes TONS of fine-tuning, and I'm sure, given all the talk about defeaters these days, that I've said a lot wrong, but I'm hoping this is somewhere in the ballpark or closer to where we were.)

Shoot, I just realized that something's wrong with my wall example. I'm not sure if it's really knowledge if there's red light shining on the wall. Anyway, my main point makes sense though.

I think I may just be a good deal more externalist than you, to the point that I don't think defeaters do anywhere near as much as you think they do. I do think you're significantly undermining the externalist move by saying that you need access to how it is that your belief is justified or reliable. That's the very thing the externalist wants to deny.

In the end, I happen to think even the strongest atheist knows that God exists but simply believes a contradictory belief in addition, so I'm not going to think the problem of evil undermines my knowledge that God exists. I'm not going to try to build any case on that, though. I think Plantinga's move can support knowledge of God without saying that.

I think I have a lot to learn about the role of defeaters, but there's more than enough literature about that nowadays to keep me busy, but I'm open. (I guess it means I have some reading to do!)

More specifically then, just a question. Your view that even the strongest atheists deep down inside "know" that God exists seems to me to be crazy.

But rather than debate it and extend this conversation too long, are there any philosophers out there that have defended this that you can reference me to?

There was a paper in Faith and Philosophy within the last five or six years maybe. I can dig around to see if I can find it. Someone told me Plantinga defended this at one point, but I'm not sure. If you want to go to the ancient world, there's always the Apostle Paul in Romans 1, which is where I first saw it.

Good stuff, I take back what I said about your view seeming to be crazy.

"Would not having an answer to the problem of evil mean that we don't know that God exists?"

It might, Matt. The standard position (one assumed in most evidential arguments) is that it is impossible that God permits a single instance of gratuitous evil. Let E be an evil with no apparent justification. Let your priors for God existing be Pr(God/k) = n, where k is all the evidence you have for God's existence and any other relevant information you might have. If you have no defense and you believe that your observation of E is good evidence that there is at least one instance of gratuitious evil, your probability for God existing is going to drop quickly.
But not having a defense for E need not mean that you are sure there is at least one instance of gratuitious evil. You might instead think that the your observation shows that the chances are about even that there is an instance of gratuitious evil. Suppose your priors for God existing are about .8. So, you're a semi-strong believer. What will your posteriors be for God existing given your observation of E? It's not so difficult to get an estimate.
Pr(God/E&k)= .8 x Pr(E/God&k) / Pr(E/k)
If you think that the observation of E given that God exists is low (say, around .2) the posterior prob. of God existing on E&k is going to sink to around .5. You'll be moved to agnosticism. It really depends on how probable you think it is that you'd observe something like E (i.e., an evil that looks like it is gratuitous) on the assumption that God exists. If you think you'd probably see that sort of thing anyway, the posterior probablity of God existing won't sink much.