Killing, letting die and ensuring death
(Note: I am talking of here of intentional ensuring. We also sometimes speak of some action unintentionally ensuring a result. In that case, "ensuring" just means something like "causally necessitating".)
Rachels thinks that this case shows that the distinction between killing and letting die is bogus. Jones is morally on par with Smith.
Rachels is probably right. But the reason for this isn't that there is no morally salient distinction between killing and letting die. It is, rather, that there is no morally salient distinction between killing and ensuring death. What Jones does is ensure death.
This distinction is also germane to theodicy. Arminians exonerate God for the problem of evil because, according to them, God merely allows evil to happen, unlike Calvinism, according to which (or so they say) God causes evil to happen.
But one of the problems with their argument is that, even according to Arminian theology, God does more than merely allowing evil to happen. Rather, by creating a world with foreseeable evil, God ensures evil. Indeed, God intentionally insures that evil outcome. (This applies equally to foreknowledge and middle knowledge.)
And, to extend the argument of Pruss, there’s no morally salient distinction between causing evil and ensuring evil–or “casually necessitating” evil (analogous to killing and ensuring death).
I don't see that God ensures evil by creating a world with foreseeable evil. To ensure evil, God would have to intend that the evil occur, at least as a means to a good. And the Arminian should deny that.
ReplyDeletei) If God creates a world with foreseeable evil, then the resultant evil is the inevitable consequence of his creative fiat. How can his action not ensure evil, given the foreseeable result of his action?
ReplyDeleteii) How does an agent have to intend a result to ensure the result? Not doubt intending a result can render the intended outcome more likely or even certain, but it's possible to unintentionally ensure a given outcome.
I don't think that's true in God's case, but as a general principle, your claim appears to be false.
iii) Again, how is intending evil as a means to a good relevant to whether or not the outcome is certain?
You seem to be adding a number of ad hoc qualifications to the concept of ensuring an event.
iv) Why should an Arminian deny that God intends evil as a means to a good? To begin with, surely God intends the consequences of his actions. And if his actions have evil consequences, surely that's offset by a compensatory good.