The Problem of Evil (Oxford Readings in Philosophy)

by Marilyn McCord Adams; Robert Merrihew Adams

Publisher:

Oxford University Press

, 1990

Overview

The problem of evil is one of the most discussed topics in the philosophy of religion. For some time, however, there has been a need for a collection of readings that adequately represents recent and ongoing writing on the topic. This volume fills that need, offering the most up-to-date collection of recent scholarship on the problem of evil. The distinguished contributors include J.L. Mackie, Nelson Pike, Roderick M. Chisholm, Terence Penelhum, Alvin Plantinga, William L. Rowe, Stephen J. Wykstra, John Hick, and Diogenes Allen. Including an introductory essay and a selected bibliography, this comprehensive and completely up-to-date collection is an invaluable guide to current scholarship in this highly debated area of the philosophy of religion.

Oxford Readings in Philosophy aims to bring together important recent writings in major areas of philosophical inquiry, selected from a variety of sources, mostly periodicals, which may not be conveniently available.

Contents

Top Highlights

“Good states of affairs and bad states of affairs, then, have this feature in common: they have neutral negations, negations that are neither good nor bad.” (Page 56)

“Consequentialists are committed to the view that one ought always to do what will have the best results on the whole; and they must presumably conclude that any being who could create the BPW would have a morally sufficient reason to do so, despite any evils that would be actualized thereby.” (Page 9)

“The best procedure for the theist to follow in rejecting premise (1) is the indirect procedure. This procedure I shall call ‘the G. E. Moore shift’, so-called in honor of the twentieth century philosopher, G. E. Moore, who used it to great effect in dealing with the arguments of the skeptics.” (Page 133)

“According to incompatibilist theories of free action, on the other hand, a free action must not only have been done because an agent whose faculties were operating normally chose or preferred to do it; the agent’s choice or preference must also not have been causally determined (though it may certainly have been influenced) by other events or states of affairs.” (Page 12)

“According to compatibilists, an action is free, whether or not it was causally determined, provided only that it was done by an agent whose faculties were operating normally, and was done because the agent chose or preferred to do it.” (Page 12)

Product Details

• Title: The Problem of Evil
• Authors: Marilyn McCord Adams, Robert Merrihew Adams
• Series: Oxford Readings in Philosophy
• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Print Publication Date: 1990
• Logos Release Date: 2020
• Language: English
• Resources: 1
• Format: Digital › Logos Reader Edition
• Subjects: Good and evil; Theodicy
• ISBNs: 9780198248668, 0198248660
• Resource ID: LLS:WS_68A6DB80B23E492F9F903DDAB4A3741B
• Resource Type: Monograph
• Metadata Last Updated: 2022-09-30T04:12:09Z