God is love
Love is blind
Ray Charles is blind
Ray Charles is God
That's manifestly not logical, and not using logic. I don't know what the person you quoted's actual point is, but I just thought I'd point out that (
yet again!) your logic-bashing ends up being a "birdjaguar shows off how he doesn't have the slightest clue what he's talking about" show.
If you think Childress is equivocating, explain exactly how. On what term is he equivocating? Which premises of his argument use different definitions of the equivocal term, and why is it that under either consistent disambiguation his argument is either invalid or has at least one false premise?
I'd also like to point out that were it someone else accusing you of equivocating (which is essentially an argument that they are making a
semantic error) you would promptly dismiss them on the grounds that they are "playing language games" and "obfuscating language".
Of course, its not clear whether there is any point whatsoever in debating you on anything, because you proudly renounce reason as if doing so indicates some wink-smiley-inducing profundity into your worldview. It doesn't, of course, it just insulates you from criticism so at the end you can believe precisely whatever you feel like believing. There is a sort of tension with you, though. Someone who really renounced logic and reason wouldn't feel the need to try to argue reasonably like you sometimes do. I suspect that the answer is that youd' like for your worldview to be grounded in rationality, so you ape philosophical discourse whenever you get the chance to argue with people who don't know any better. Of course, when you argue with people who do know better, you can retreat to the tried-and-true tactic of accusing them of playing language games, then renouncing "logic and reason", then throwing in a wink-smiley for good measure!
Personally, I don't find that there is a satisfying answer to the problem of evil. Most involve either changing the definition of God, or just throwing up a dressed-up version of the copout "God works in mysterious ways!
". Harping on the meaning of the term "evil" won't help anything either, and really just amounts to reading too much into the title of a philosophical problem.
Here's my view of things:
Either God is Anselmian in nature (i.e. the greatest possible being) or he's the God of the scripture.
If he's the Anselmian God, then his permitting evil is inconsistent with his nature, so he can't exist.
If he's the God of the scripture, then he's a pretty lousy individual. One might even say a moral monster.
So on either major conception of God, the problem of evil exists.
Now, God's being a moral monster doesn't entail that he doesn't exist, but it does give one serious pause! Besides, most people like some sort of Anselmian God anyways.
Any attempted refutation of the idea that a non-Anselmian God is a moral monster rests on a series of just-so stories about evil that are intellectually dubious and wouldn't pass muster in any sort of serious debate (e.g. God allowed some 4 year old girl to burn to death in her room because she might have grown up to be worse than Hitler or because it was necessary to give someone free will or some such other patent nonsense).
Then things quickly degenerate into dime store skeptical posturings, etc..
Maybe I can't argue someone out of the position that the problem of evil is not easily solvable, but this is for the same reason you can't argue someone out of determined full-blown skepticism. That doesn't make their view right/rational/etc.
