Sean Stevenson

Philosophy 110
Extra Credit Paper

On J.L. Mackie’s Evil and Omnipotence

The famous philosophical issue of evil existing within the theistic universe has

puzzled many in the areas of free will, moral absolutes, and comparative relativity.

Mackie, in Evil and Omnipotence tries to make a complete case as to why he sees a belief

in an omnipotent God as irrational. Mackie points out that the usual cases that are made

by theists are those that don’t truly do away with the problem of evil. Mackie also goes

further by pointing out that there are many fallacious viewpoints which try to push the

theist argument further. However, Mackie believes that these fallacies deny claims while

making claims for the inherent omnipotence of God. Mackie makes plain and simple the

issues of omnipotence known, showing that, while it is possible that a solution exists that

reconciles God, free will, and good and evil, that many theistic claims do not truly escape

the problem that consistently rears its ugly head: “How can an all-powerful God allow

evil to exist in a universe that He/She/It controls?”

Firstly, Mackie takes the theistic arguments and splits them into solutions that are

adequate to solving the solution of evil – those which would go by reason of limiting

God’s omnipotence or denying God’s omnipotence all together. Mackie then rigorously

attacks the fallacious solutions to evil – those which seem to deny the omnipotence of

God, while in other arguments actually argue for the omnipotence which was denied

before.
 Within Mackie’s look of the adequate solutions to the problem of evil in a theistic

universe, he sums up what makes the adequate superior to the fallacious solutions and

assumptions. A large error within the argument of the theist would be the simplicity in

which ascribing omnipotence (and other “great-making factors) to God creates a dubious

argument, subject to paradox, faulty logic, as well as a weakened postulation left to be

reevaluated. The problem is, according to Mackie, that these solutions “are only almost

adopted” (Abel, p. 80). That is to say that these solutions probably are similar to those

who deny omnipotence, and yet may strengthen its argument for omnipotence in other

ways. These arguments may be quite similar to the fallacious solutions if they do not

truly redefine omnipotence or deny or limit the powers of God in some consistent

manner.

So Mackie then believes that the best solution would be to deny the omnipotence

of God, or at least suggest that God’s powers are limited. What I tend to notice about a

large portion of the article takes issue with what omnipotence actually is. What are these

great-making capabilities of God, and do they have limits? Theists will not have an issue

with evil if they find that God is not all-powerful, based upon what has been properly

defined as omnipotence, and that this definition works within their own philosophies,

including the limitations of omnipotence, if there are any. Theists will then find the issue

of evil prominent if they continue to assert God’s omnipotence, as shown in the fallacious

solutions.
 According to the fallacious solutions section of Mackie’s article are the arguments

used to refute the main claims of evil that fall in line with omnipotence. Here, Mackie

attacks four specific claims that he finds fallacious: “good cannot exist without evil” (p.

81), evil is used to justify good, the universe is better off with a small amount of evil

compared to none, and finally, that “evil is due to human free will” (p 85). What evil and

good are necessarily opposites or complimentary values? Can they be said to be

equivalent? These are part of Mackie’s questions about the claims. I’ll assume here that

Mackie used these specific claims to show the faulty reasoning and structure of the

omnipotence in relation to good and evil in a theistic universe.

With the first three arguments, Mackie uses an ordered system of good and evil,

from simple pain and pleasure up to that of benevolence and cruelty. In explaining his

refutation to the third claim, Mackie states that the differing degrees of morality (first,

second causes good and evil) can be said to fall into an infinite regress, in which the next

level of good is contradicted by that level’s evil equivalent. Simply by revealing the

ambiguity of definition of good and evil on a moral scale, Mackie shows how an

ambivalent definition of “omnipotence” can be an unrelenting torment of evil continuing

to rear its ugly head.

The last of the four claims, the one dealing with human free will causing evil is a

very damaging one to the theists’ claims of God having omnipotence. Mackie brings up

the possibility of humans possessing free will, while at the same time, freely choosing

actions that are good. If such an existence is possible, then why would there be a God
that would create the possibility that human beings can freely choose evil over good,

thereby existing as beings God truly cannot control? What Mackie calls the “paradox of

omnipotence” (p. 86) takes the issue of evil to an area almost impossible to refute. The

paradox states that if God is omnipotent, it can be questioned whether God has the ability

to hinder His/Her/Its powers. If this is possible, then it means that God is not truly

omnipotent. On the other hand, if God is not omnipotent, then we have asserted that God

is not omnipotent at all.

Mackie surely takes an ardent stance on theistic philosophies on the problems of

evil, in which he questions God’s omnipotence. Mackie highly points to the issues that

arise when talking about the nature of evil, including omnipotence: what good and evil

actually are, and throwing human free will into the equation. If any theist asserts that he

can reconcile his/her philosophies with that of Mackie’s, they better be sure that they

deny God’s omnipotence, or either redefine omnipotence in a way that will be non-

contradictory and consistent with a position that would place God in a universe where the

existence of evil is justified.