Hostname: page-component-6bf8c574d5-rwnhh Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-03-01T15:58:50.016Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

THE PROBLEM OF EVIL AND THE PROCREATION ANALOGY

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 December 2021

John McClellan
Get access

Abstract

A prominent Christian apologist suggests it is inconsistent for an atheist to have a favourable attitude towards procreating while maintaining that a loving God would not place vulnerable beings in such a harmful world. I put this analogy to the test with a series of thought experiments, revealing crucial disanalogies between God and procreators that absolve the atheist from the charge of inconsistency and draw the reader's attention to the central issues on the problem of evil as debated by contemporary philosophers.

Type
Research Article
Information
Think , Volume 21 , Issue 60 , Spring 2022 , pp. 109 - 121
Check for updates
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Institute of Philosophy, 2021

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Harrison, G., and Tanner, J. (2011) ‘Better not to Have Children’, Think 10.27: 113–21.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McClellan, J. (2016) ‘Not Skeptical Theism, but Trusting Theism’, Southwest Philosophy Review 32.1: 233–44.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Vitale, V., and Zacharias, R. (2014) Why Suffering (New York: Faith Words).Google Scholar