Gage Hines

Heath Allen

Essay 2

Philosophies of life 025

5 November 2014

Does God Exist? by Thomas Nagel

Why God Allows Evil by Richard Swinburne

Nagels essay starts off by listing and explaining two dialectical arguments, one is known

as the cosmological argument and the other is called the ontological argument. The cosmological

argument states that every event must have a cause, as far down the line as it goes, meaning

infinite causes for infinite events. The ontological argument is more complicated and can be

explained in many ways; one of the most common is that God is a perfect being, and since we

have an idea of God being a perfect being, God must exist. The cosmological argument is a lot

stronger than the ontological argument, because if we do not know what a perfect being is then

how can we know it exists? Nagel then goes on to talk about an argument by the name of the

argument of design; this argument states according to Nagel that only a mathematician could

have devised the patterns of order we have discovered in nature.

Nagel also talks about another argument that goes along the lines of being in the

presence of god so there for he exists. The argument has a couple of strong points, especially at

the end when it says and similarly, an overwhelming feeling of being in the presence of the

Divine is evidence enough for admitting the genuineness of such feeling; it is no evidence for the
claim that a supreme being with a substantial existence independent of the experience is the

cause of the experience. This means that just because you feel as if you are in the presence of

god and just because you feel so good doesnt mean that god himself put you in that situation,

this pissed off a lot of people but I believe it is the strongest point of Nagels essay.

Nagel then goes on to talk about the atheistic criticism of the theism thesis with two main

points. The first says that there is no real thing as evil, and either evil is an illusion or just

something we use to describe the absence of good. It also says that evil isnt really real and that

it is only the negative side of the almighty. Lastly it says that evil is just an appearance, just

because something bad happens doesnt mean that it was done by evil or that evil is present. It

simply means that something bad happens and because nothing bad happens with God then we

have to place a label on it, and that label is evil.

Swinburnes article talks about why God allows evil, because most believe that an

omnipotent God could have prevented evil, so why would he allow it? The first evil that

Swinburne talks about is called Moral evil; he says that moral evil is how you use the free will

that god gives you. Certain things might not be illegal, such as cheating on your wife, but it is

morally wrong and so the thought and action of cheating could fall under being morally evil. He

also says that moral evil is the consequence of what happens when you are given too much free

will, and that a bad action cannot be done without some reason. The second evil that Swinburne

describes is called natural evil; natural evil is more complicated again than that of moral evil

because it can be described in two different ways. The first way is the operation of natural laws

producing evil gives humans knowledge on how to bring about such evils. Take for instance

catching a disease, it is a natural occurrence.

 The second way that natural evil operates to give humans freedom is it makes you have

the ability to choose in certain situations. Say you are shot in the chest hundreds of miles away

from the nearest hospital. Natural evil comes into play here because you have two choices, you

can either suffer the pain and die a slow death, or you can have someone end it quickly for you

and just take the easy way out. He also says that god has th right to make all evils occur to some

extent, saying that it would be crazy to multiply evils or take away opportunity.

Out of the two essays I think the first one by Nagel was better in all aspects. The second

essay was a lot harder to follow and a lot harder to understand. Nagel did a really good job of

explaining his ways in an easy to read format and he had a lot stronger arguments and I felt like

he was able to support his essay a lot better. I think that I liked Nagels better because it just made

more sense, I dont think that Swinburne did a very god job of supporting his arguments.

Nagels article was a lot more fun to red, and more enjoyable. I think that the topic of God

existing interested me a lot more than why god allows evil. The bible says that the devil is who

produces evil, and h is responsible for evil and temptation. I think that a good point to think

about would be why god would allow the devil to exist as another almighty being. If gods is so

much more overpowering than everything else then why did he let the devil be created? I think

that is something that did spark my interest from Swinburnes article.