Home » Academics » Nerds' Corner

Christianity, Evil and the Argument from Moral Knowledge

The Argument from Moral Knowledge

In my last article, we considered the following scenario:

You and I are sitting in your dorm room, and we learn that someone in your hall (call him "Smith") intends to copy the NIU and Virginia Tech shootings. As far as we know, all we have to do to stop Smith is make an anonymous call to campus police. Thinking carefully about it, we can see countless reasons to make this call, and we can't see a single reason not to. It seems perfectly clear that calling the cops is exactly what we should do.

But this scenario, we saw, turned out to be trouble for belief in God. People claim that evils like the NIU and Virginia Tech shootings are conclusive evidence for the nonexistence of God. We saw, however, that avoiding this claim requires espousing a position called "skeptical theism,"¹ and we saw that skeptical theism opens the door to the following argument:

(1) For all we know, God is planning on actualizing some greater good by allowing Smith to copy the NIU and Virginia Tech shootings.

(2) Our not interfering with God's plans is always morally permissible.

Therefore,

(3) For all we know, our not interfering with Smith's copying the NIU and Virginia Tech shootings would be morally permissible.²

This argument appears valid. If (1) and (2) are true, then (3) must be true too. But (3) seems obviously false. We have a strong moral obligation to stop Smith from copying the NIU and VT shootings, and we know that we do. But if (3) is false, then we have to reject (1) or (2), and this seems like a problem.

Rejecting (2) amounts to claiming that we're sometimes morally obligated to interfere with God's plans, and rejecting (1) forces us to reject skeptical theism, since skeptical theism follows from (1).³ It seems obviously false, however, that we're sometimes morally obligated to interfere with God's plans, so rejecting (2) looks like a bad option. Rejecting skeptical theism leaves us without any answer to the Evidential Argument from Evil, so rejecting (1) looks like a bad option too. So it looks like those of us who believe in God have no good option, in which case theism is in serious trouble.

Because this argument banks on an assumption about our moral knowledge — namely, that we know we should interfere with Smith's copying the NIU and Virginia Tech shootings — let's call this argument "the Argument from Moral Knowledge."

Getting Straight on "Interference"

Fortunately, the Argument from Moral Knowledge trades on equivocation. To see how, we need to get clear on the notion of "interference."

For the sake of focusing our attention, let's suppose that the Virginia Tech shootings didn't take God by surprise — let's suppose He knew they were coming, and let's suppose He chose not to stop them because He planned on actualizing some greater good through them.⁴ In other words, let's suppose that the VT shootings were part of God's plans.

Moreover, let's suppose that someone (we'll call her "Jen") discovered what Cho was going to do, and let's suppose that, after making this discovery, she gathered a considerable amount of evidence, called the cops and convincingly presented this evidence to them more than a week before the massacre. Finally, let's suppose that, after hearing her case, the cops assured Jen that they would take full action to stop Cho, and let's suppose that, for one reason or another, they simply failed to do so.

Of course, very few of these suppositions are true. There was no phone call tipping off the police, or anything like that. But supposing they are true, the question I want us to focus on is this: By making the phone call to the campus police and warning them about Cho's plans, did Jen interfere with Cho and the VT massacre, or not?

Well, she certainly tried to. But strictly speaking, to interfere with someone's plans is to hinder or prevent that person from doing whatever it is that he or she plans to do. So, strictly speaking, if you're planning on doing something and my actions don't so much as slow you down, then I haven't interfered with your plans. By compiling all of her evidence and calling the cops, Jen didn't so much as slow Cho down. So, strictly speaking, Jen did not interfere with Cho and the VT massacre.

But here's the thing: Jen's response to Cho's plans was clearly morally permissible. Jen unambiguously did the right thing. In fact, if anything, she deserves praise for her response to the situation. So, in spite of the fact that Jen didn't interfere with Cho's plans, her response looks very good, morally speaking.

So, What's the Problem with (3)?

But if Jen's response looks pretty good, morally speaking — and this in spite of the fact that she failed to interfere with Cho's plans — then it's no longer clear why we should have any problem with (3). We initially thought (3) was obviously false. But now this is anything but clear.

Think about the situation we are imagining ourselves in. We have discovered that Smith is planning on copying the NIU and VT shootings, and we have determined that calling the cops is the right thing to do.

Are we in any position to know, however, that cops will succeed in stopping Smith? Are we even in a position to know that they will slow him down, or make things any more difficult for him? What if the cops don't take us seriously and, for the sake of getting us off their backs, pretend that they are making plans to stop the attack? What if Smith is being intentionally misleading about the day and time he plans to attack, so that, if the cops are warned, they will be too late anyway?

Since we succeed in interfering with Smith's plans only if we actually stop or hinder him from copying the VT and NIU shootings, and since we are in no position to know that our calling the cops will have this result, we are in no position to know that, by calling the cops, we will be interfering with Smith's plans. But clearly, so long as we do call the cops, we can't be blamed for whatever the cops do with our information. At that point, the situation will be out of our hands.

It follows that, so long as we call the cops and earnestly give them all of the information we have, we will not be morally blameworthy for whatever happens next. But if the cops neither hinder nor stop Smith, then we will have failed to interfere with Smith's plans. So, if the cops neither hinder nor stop Smith, then we will not be morally blameworthy for having failed to interfere with Smith's plans. Since there is no way for us to know if the cops will succeed in stopping or hindering Smith, it follows that, for all we know, we won't be morally blameworthy for not interfering with Smith's plans.

But this means (3) is true. And when we ask why we initially thought (3) was false, we can see that we originally thought not interfering would be equivalent to our doing nothing at all. If (3) is true, however, then the Argument from Moral Knowledge constitutes no problem at all for belief in God.

The Argument from Moral Knowledge Repaired

Unfortunately, things aren't quite this simple. Regardless of whether the cops stop or hinder Smith, you and I will be morally blameworthy if we don't at least call the cops. At the very least, we have to try to interfere with Smith's plans. So, it looks like the Argument from Moral Knowledge can be easily repaired as follows:

(1) For all we know, God is planning on actualizing some greater good by allowing Smith to copy the NIU and Virginia Tech shootings.

(2*) Our not trying interfering with God's plans is always morally permissible.

Therefore,

(3*) For all we know, our not trying to interfere with Smith's copying the NIU and Virginia Tech shootings would be morally permissible.

C O F F E E  S H O P

---

How would you approach this moral dilemma?

Join the discussion!

Unlike (3), (3*) seems obviously false. But (1) and (2*) seem true, and they entail (3*). So, it looks like we still have a problem. Rejecting (2*) amounts to the claim that it's sometimes OK to try to interfere with God's plans, and rejecting (1) leaves us with no response to the Evidential Argument from Evil. Both options look pretty bad. So, once again, it looks like those of us who believe in God have some explaining to do.

I will have to address this version of the Argument from Moral Knowledge in my next article.