Michael Almeida's explanation of the unanswered version of the Logical Problem of Evil in Free Will Defense

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

1 PhD candidate in Kalam at the University of Tehran

2 Professor / Faculty of Jurisprudence and Philosophy, Department of Imami Kalam and Western Philosophy, Farabi Campus, University of Tehran

3 Professor / Tarbiat Modares University; Tehran

4 Kalam Department of the Research Institute of Iranian Wisdom and Philosophy, Tehran, Iran

Abstract

The most famous and plausible philosophical defense against the logical problem of evil is Alvin Plantinga’s free will defense. One of the critics of this defense, Michael Almeida, argues that although free will defense has provided a appropriate answer to many versions of the logical problem of evil, there have been versions by John Mackey that can be called the logical problem of evil redux. Almeida, who is a theist and incompatiblist like Plantinga, in his critique, specifically focuses on one of the most controversial preliminaries of this defense, the assumption of universal transworld depravity, which Plantinga claims it is presumably an essential feature of all agents among the creatures. According to Almeida, this assumption is impossible because absolute divine foreknowledge, based on a view close to Molinism, allows God to actualize a morally perfect world, without inconsistency with human free will. According to Almeida, the cornerstone of the logical problem of evil is a thesis called traditional Anselmianism, which can be modified by moderate Anselmianism and then we can answer this problem and defend the existence of God.

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Philosophy of Religion

Articles in Press, Accepted Manuscript
Available Online from 14 March 2022

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