J. L. Mackie (1977) Evil & Omnipotence - SUMMARY
J.L. Mackie's 1977 essay begins by setting out the Problem of Evil & Suffering.
In section A, Mackie outlines the "Adequate Solutions" offered by some religious thinkers. Although he admits that these solutions work up to a point, Mackie describes them as "half-hearted" because, he argues, they don't take the idea of evil seriously enough. In Section B, Mackie deals more harshly with the "Fallacious Solutions" offered by more mainstream religious thinkers. Mackie thinks these solutions all fail because they only appear to be retaining the three main propositions of the problem of evil (God's omnipotence, God's goodness, the reality of evil); he aims to show that they abandon one of these propositions in one way or another. |
Mackie claims that these three propositions cannot all be true:
Mackie adds two more principles which make the three propositions formally (logically) contradictory:
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GOD CAN DO ALL THINGS THAT ARE POSSIBLE - THOMAS AQUINAS