By the way, while vainly trawling the internet for any mention of me, I just discovered a video of me debating His Holiness Shivarama Swami at UCL on the existence of God here, if anyone's interested.
On another blog, FideCogitActio, some theists of a "classical" stripe (that's to say, like Brian Davies, Edward Feser) are criticisng the Evil God Challenge (or I suppose, trying to show how it can be met, or sidestepped). The main post includes this: In book I, chapter 39 , Aquinas argues that “there cannot be evil in God” (in Deo non potest esse malum). Atheists like Law must face the fact that, if the words are to retain any sense, “God” simply cannot be “evil”. As my comments in the thread at Feser’s blog aimed to show, despite how much he mocks “the privation theory of evil,” Law himself cannot escape its logic: his entire argument requires that the world ought to appear less evil if it is to be taken as evidence of a good God. Even though he spurns the idea that evil is a privation of good, his account of an evil world is parasitic on a good ideal; this is no surprise, though, since all evil is parasitic on good ( SCG I, 11 ). Based on the conclusions of se...
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I finally managed to find time to listen to the debate between you and his holiness. It was interesting and educational overall yet there a few things that strikes me as extraordinary. First of all it appears to me that you are only one in the entire room who actually sticks to the game-plan and hold the al good, all powerful God-problem in sight whenever you say something. This brings very little points to your opponents. Secondly I fully support you last positive entry on being an atheist. There is so much wonder in the world and there is simply no need for the supernatural or extraordinary etc. Having the need for the extraordinary seems to me to be linked up with irrational fears of say ‘the end’, ‘death of the individual’ or of the ‘me’ if you wish. Yet to conclude that there must exists an all good, all powerful God based on these arbitrary subjective psychological factors or purely on hope is from where I am standing completely and utterly unsound.
All in all Stephen you have my vote.