Why the Omni-God Probably Doesn’t Exist

Abstract

Abstract In the previous chapters we have argued for cosmic purpose, the view that goal-directedness plays a fundamental role in determining what happens in the universe. A familiar way of accounting for cosmic purpose is via the postulation of the Omni-God: an all-knowing, all-powerful, perfectly good creator of the universe. This chapter argues against the existence of the Omni-God, on the grounds that it would be immoral for a being who could do anything to create a universe with so much suffering in it and, hence, if our universe was created by an all-powerful designer, that designer is not perfectly good. We explore and reject the attempts of Richard Swinburne to explain why God might allow suffering, and the argument that the Omni-God is needed to explain why the universe exists. The ‘Digging Deeper’ section responds to skeptical theists, who concede that we can’t think of anything that could justify an Omni-God allowing suffering but nonetheless argue that this gives us no reason to doubt that there is such a justification available to God, if not us. Finally, it is suggested that the argument of the chapter is a middle way between the logical problem of evil and the evidential version of the problem of evil, at least as the latter is standardly understood.