In the article by H.J. McCloskey, named “On Being an Atheist”, he attempts to deny the existence of a supreme being, namely God, by offering many criticisms of theism and the beliefs and arguments of theist. In the beginning of his article, he speaks on the arguments as “proofs” and tries to make an objection as to why these arguments cannot be considered concrete in the case for God. These proofs that he speaks of are the Cosmological argument, which argues for a creator, the Teleological argument or the argument from design, which argues that the universe shows signs of intelligent design and divine purpose. However, in response to McCloskey’s claims, there are things that can be said in support of these arguments or proofs. The account
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Correspondingly mentioned in McCloskey’s article “On Being an Atheist” is how a perfect, supreme being would never have created a world full of suffering or a world where it’s creations take part in morally evil acts in which, often times, innocent people are effected. Again, in response to McCloskey’s claims, it can be said that this is simply not true. Evans and Manis make an agreeable statement when they stated, “What is true, perhaps, is that a good being always eliminates evil as far as it can without the loss of a greater good or the allowance of a worse evil.” (Evans & Manis, 2009, p. 160). An omnipotent being does have a limitation, and that is that even it cannot do what not possible logically; theist have generally accepted this limitation. Furthermore, it is possible that a great deal of the natural evils we all experience in this world is necessary in order for second-order goods like moral virtues to be obtained; moral virtues like courage and temperance. Likewise, natural evils are thought of by some theists as consequences of other moral evils. And, even if God created a world devoid of evil, both moral and natural, it is more than likely that any free being that God would create could, and most likely would, misappropriate their freedoms to do some evil. In Philosophy of Religion: Thinking About Faith, by Evans and Manis, it is also mentioned how it is unnecessary to have a theodicy as a rebuttal to the logical form of the problem of evil; it is good enough to know that there are possible reasons why God would allow such evils, and so far, no one has been able to prove that God’s existence and evil contradict each other. The free will argument is also discussed in McCloskey’s article “On Being an Atheist”. He writes about how God could have created a world where men were always predisposed to virtue and were men would always choose to do the right thing. And while God could have created a world like this, he has knowledge
Correspondingly mentioned in McCloskey’s article “On Being an Atheist” is how a perfect, supreme being would never have created a world full of suffering or a world where it’s creations take part in morally evil acts in which, often times, innocent people are effected. Again, in response to McCloskey’s claims, it can be said that this is simply not true. Evans and Manis make an agreeable statement when they stated, “What is true, perhaps, is that a good being always eliminates evil as far as it can without the loss of a greater good or the allowance of a worse evil.” (Evans & Manis, 2009, p. 160). An omnipotent being does have a limitation, and that is that even it cannot do what not possible logically; theist have generally accepted this limitation. Furthermore, it is possible that a great deal of the natural evils we all experience in this world is necessary in order for second-order goods like moral virtues to be obtained; moral virtues like courage and temperance. Likewise, natural evils are thought of by some theists as consequences of other moral evils. And, even if God created a world devoid of evil, both moral and natural, it is more than likely that any free being that God would create could, and most likely would, misappropriate their freedoms to do some evil. In Philosophy of Religion: Thinking About Faith, by Evans and Manis, it is also mentioned how it is unnecessary to have a theodicy as a rebuttal to the logical form of the problem of evil; it is good enough to know that there are possible reasons why God would allow such evils, and so far, no one has been able to prove that God’s existence and evil contradict each other. The free will argument is also discussed in McCloskey’s article “On Being an Atheist”. He writes about how God could have created a world where men were always predisposed to virtue and were men would always choose to do the right thing. And while God could have created a world like this, he has knowledge