Satisfied and Dissatisfied Students

Satisfaction toward school was assessed by means of a 60-item questionnaire and was related to measures of academic success, intellectual ability, social, class, and personal values. For the total sample of 258 high school juniors, there was no significant relation between their evaluation of school experiences and their achievement, as measured by standardized tests and teachers' grades. Teachers rated satisfied students as less impulsive and more responsible than average students. The teachers' ratings also revealed a marked positive bias in favor of girls. Extreme groups on the satisfaction measures were compared and tentative explanations are offered for some of the major differences.     

Aesthetics and the Problem of Evil

Much of Western speculative metaphysics has subscribed to what has been called “explanatory rationalism,” which holds that there is a reason for everything that is and for the way everything is. Theodicies, or metaphysical attempts to solve the problem of evil, have relied on a special application of this principle of explanatory rationalism, namely, the principle of plenitude, which holds that the evil in the world is a necessary ingredient in the world's overall perfection or degree of reality. This essay argues that the principle of plenitude is aesthetically motivated, and that only in art and perhaps in revealed religion can the demands of explanatory rationalism be satisfied.     

Love and the Problem of Evil

The focus of this paper is the virtual certainty that much of what we must prize in loving any human person would not have existed in a world that did not contain much of the evil that has occurred in the history of the actual world. It is argued that the appropriate response to this fact must be some form of ambivalence, but that lovers have reason to prefer an ambivalence that contextualizes regretted evils in the framework of what we welcome in human life.

The Problem of Evil and the Problem of God

Books reviewed: D. Z. Phillips, The Problem of Evil and the Problem of God (London: SCM Press, 2004). xxiii + 280 , price £19.99 pb.
Reviewed by Patrick Sherry, Lancaster University
Religious Studies Department
Lancaster University
Lancaster LA1 4YG     

Recasting Analytic Philosophy on the Problem of Evil

In his recent book, A Frightening Love: Recasting the Problem of Evil, Andrew Gleeson challenges a certain conception of justification assumed in mainstream analytic philosophy and argues that analytic philosophy is ill-suited to deal with the most pressing, existential, form of the problem of evil. In this article I examine some aspects of that challenge.     

Advent's Answer to the Problem of Evil

Traditional Christian answers to the problem of evil may be identified as either theistic or christological. While theistic theodicies enjoy greater philosophical interest, christological theodicies are more practical, remaining embodied in the semiotics of the worshipping church, and are utimately more successful. The Christian church's liturgical practice of Advent – where Christology, soteriology and eschatology come together – is a common and coherent response to the problem of evil. The practice of Advent comprises an eschatological ethics of justice and mercy which embraces their evil side-effects and the tension of present and future justice. Advent thus presents the problem of evil as a constructive part of Christian theology and ethics.     

Epistemic Blame and the New Evil Demon Problem

Philosophical Studies - The New Evil Demon Problem presents a serious challenge to externalist theories of epistemic justification. In recent years, externalists have developed a number of...     

Richard Swinburne,Providence and the Problem of Evil

International Journal for Philosophy of Religion -     

Animals and the Problem of Evil in Recent Theodicies

This essay critically evaluates the theodicies of John Hick, Richard Swinburne and process theism regarding animal suffering and evils. Their positions on animals are found to be flawed and/or inadequate because they cannot explain the mass suffering and unnecessary deaths to animals throughout time. I also offer a positive contribution. That is, God’s putative love for all humans and animals does not entail that he loves every single human and animal. It is very possible that God treats humans and animals similarly in regard to evils. This theory partly explains human tragedies such as the Holocaust and much unnecessary animal and human suffering.