Beneficial Laws of Nature
Summary
Without regularity in nature our world would be mere chaos, and we would have no way of predicting the results of any of our actions. Lack of regularity in other aspects of the world might make life itself impossible. Science, as well as everyday life, relies upon there being a great deal of regularity in nature, similar causes tending to produce similar effects.
Theists argue that because this regularity is usually beneficial to us, natural evil is justified since it is just an unfortunate side-effect of the laws of nature continuing to operate in a regular way. The overall beneficial effects of this regularity are supposed to outweigh the detrimental ones.
First, it does not explain why an omnipotent God couldn’t have created laws of nature which would never actually lead to any natural evil. A possible response to this is that even God is bound by the laws of nature; but this suggests that God is not really omnipotent.
Second, it still fails to explain why God does not intervene to perform miracles more often. If god never intervenes, then, as we have seen, a major aspect of most Theists’ belief in God is taken away.
