Evil is the absence of God

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(these "problems" don't actually address the issue at hand, they straw man it.)
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"What about...<ref>Dun dun dunnn...</ref> EVIL?!"  The eager student explains about darkness being the absence of light, and cold being the absence of heat, and evil being just the absence of God. Of course, [[strawman|the professor]] was dumbstruck. The student's name? Albert Einstein.   
 
"What about...<ref>Dun dun dunnn...</ref> EVIL?!"  The eager student explains about darkness being the absence of light, and cold being the absence of heat, and evil being just the absence of God. Of course, [[strawman|the professor]] was dumbstruck. The student's name? Albert Einstein.   
  
Why is the story very unlikely to be true?  1) The dear Albert, not unlike [[Hitler]] for other uses, is always being dragged into urban legends when a generically smart person is used, even more so when this "smart person" is so often associated with atheists - which can be quite a blow to Christians.  2)  The telling of the tale, the "atheist professor", and the build-up to the grand conclusion has all the leanings of an urban legend. 3) It's still just a really bad argument to boot. [[appeal to authority|Appealing to authority]] is also a bad argument, so using a doubly-bad argument to save a bad argument is just [[wronger than wrong|badder than bad]].  
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Why is the story very unlikely to be true?  1) The dear Albert, not unlike [[Hitler]] for other uses, is always being dragged into urban legends when a generically smart person is used, even more so when this "smart person" is so often associated with atheists - which can be quite a blow to Christians.  2)  The telling of the tale, the "atheist professor", and the build-up to the grand conclusion has all the leanings of an urban legend. 3) It's still just a really bad argument to boot. [[appeal to authority|Appealing to authority]] is also a bad argument, so using a doubly-bad argument to save a bad argument is just [[wronger than wrong|badder than bad]].
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==Criticisms of the argument==
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The argument works quite well, if you ascribe to particular views of the world, primarily Judea-Christian views: those without God do evil, those with God do not.
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The argument fails in every way to prove God exists.  So anyone not believing in this God, or in any god would not be tempted to care about this one view of evil.
  
 
==Footnotes==
 
==Footnotes==

Revision as of 20:24, 22 January 2012

Part of the series on

Logic and rhetoric

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Key articles
General logic
Bad logic

Evil isthe absence of God is a supposedly logical argument that attempts to solve the problem of evil by explaining that "evil" does not exist as a positive, but is simply the lack of God.

The "argument" itself basically follows like this.

Question: Does evil exist?

  1. Darkness is not a thing, in and of itself. Darkness is simply what we call a lack of light.
  2. In the same way, cold does not exist. It is simply an area that lacks heat (energy).
  3. Equally, we can say the same about evil. Evil itself does not exist, it is simply a lack of God.

This argument has been used by Jehovah's Witnesses to explain why the world is falling apart, by Ray Comfort to address the fact that God would not actually be a bad dude - but if you reject him, you cannot do Good, and by other feel-good Christians who want their "all good God", but still look at a world where evil clearly exists.


Einstein

Perhaps the most famous rendition of this argument is in the urban legend that circulates e-mail and social networks which has a young Albert Einstein in rapt debate with his professor.[1]

The professor asks, "Did God make everything?" One eager student happily yells out a yes. The mean atheist teacher, hoping to trick his faithful students into a quandary smirks, says:

"What about...[2] EVIL?!" The eager student explains about darkness being the absence of light, and cold being the absence of heat, and evil being just the absence of God. Of course, the professor was dumbstruck. The student's name? Albert Einstein.

Why is the story very unlikely to be true? 1) The dear Albert, not unlike Hitler for other uses, is always being dragged into urban legends when a generically smart person is used, even more so when this "smart person" is so often associated with atheists - which can be quite a blow to Christians. 2) The telling of the tale, the "atheist professor", and the build-up to the grand conclusion has all the leanings of an urban legend. 3) It's still just a really bad argument to boot. Appealing to authority is also a bad argument, so using a doubly-bad argument to save a bad argument is just badder than bad.

Criticisms of the argument

The argument works quite well, if you ascribe to particular views of the world, primarily Judea-Christian views: those without God do evil, those with God do not. The argument fails in every way to prove God exists. So anyone not believing in this God, or in any god would not be tempted to care about this one view of evil.

Footnotes

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