Write a dialogue between 2 or 3 people who are discussing the problem of evil.

• One of the characters thinks the problem successfully shows that God does not exist.

• Another character disagrees, and has a specific reason to think that the existence of a 3-O God is compatible with the amount of pain and suffering in the world.

In this assignment, you are going to choose one response and explore it in detail, rather than covering every response to the problem that you can think of. The point is to have a sustained, focused exploration of one response to the problem of evil. If you have a third character, s/he can be anything: an additional character on either side, a neutral facilitator, comic relief, etc. It’s up to you whether you yourself appear as a character.

The dialogue should be 3-4 pages long (double spaced and 12 point font). You should not explain the problem of evil in the dialogue; you should assume that all characters understand it, and jump right in to the discussion. One way to make this seem realistic is to make the characters students in our class; another is to write as though the characters have had an earlier conversation (“Sarah, I was thinking about what you said the other day…”) Of course, if at some point it becomes crucial to clarify some aspect of the argument, do so. You can have a character say, “I think you’re misunderstanding the way that…” or something along those lines.

The best dialogues will contain original material. That is, they will go beyond class, either by offering a response to the problem of evil that was not presented in lecture, or by offering new objections to responses that were presented in lecture. (Or both!) This is not a research paper. I want you thinking long and hard on your own.

Overall, either character can “win,” or the dialogue can end inconclusively. If you do end the dialogue inconclusively, however, be clear about why you’re being inconclusive, and what would help settle the matter. Don’t just say, “oh, well, I guess there’s good arguments on both sides” or “I guess we have to agree to disagree.” Those are total cop-outs.

The point of this assignment is to critically engage with the material, and think hard about what both sides might say. Doing philosophy well requires careful reflection on other people’s positions and arguments, and understanding the point of view of people with whom we disagree. Consequently, it is crucial that your characters be thoughtful, intellectually engaged, and willing to grant good points and alter their positions accordingly. None of your characters can be jerks or idiots. Every character has to be willing to listen to the others, and take their ideas seriously. This means that the character who thinks the problem of evil is convincing must really work to defend it, rather than immediately crumbling when an objection is raised. It also means that the character who thinks it is not convincing must really work to respond to the argument, maybe shift gears in response to what the other character says, and so forth.

Grading note: Fleshing out the characters, setting the scene, and so forth is really just window dressing. I hope you will have fun with this assignment, but you’ll only be graded on the substantive philosophical discussion between the characters. This does not mean that the quality of your writing does not count. As always, your writing should be clear, careful, well-organized, graceful, and free of grammatical errors. It just means that you won’t be downgraded if Hollywood isn’t going to come calling for the screen rights.