Has Plantinga “buried” Mackie’s logical argument from evil?

In seeking to undermine Mackie’s logical argument from evil, Plantinga assumes that Mackie’s argument regards it as a necessary truth that a wholly good God would eliminate all evil that he could eliminate. I argue that this is an interpretative mistake, and that Mackie is merely assuming that the t...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Kraal, Anders (Author)
Format: Electronic Article
Language:English
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Published: Springer Science + Business Media B. V 2014
In: International journal for philosophy of religion
Year: 2014, Volume: 75, Issue: 3, Pages: 189-196
Further subjects:B Logical argument from evil
B problem of evil
B Alvin Plantinga
B John Mackie
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Summary:In seeking to undermine Mackie’s logical argument from evil, Plantinga assumes that Mackie’s argument regards it as a necessary truth that a wholly good God would eliminate all evil that he could eliminate. I argue that this is an interpretative mistake, and that Mackie is merely assuming that the theist believes that God’s goodness entails that God would eliminate all evil that he could eliminate. Once the difference between these two assumptions, and the implausibility of Plantinga’s assumption, are brought out, Plantinga’s celebrated critique of Mackie’s argument can be seen to be far less compelling than is often assumed to be the case.
ISSN:1572-8684
Contains:Enthalten in: International journal for philosophy of religion
Persistent identifiers:DOI: 10.1007/s11153-014-9448-3