By "theodicy" I mean a theory intended to reconcile the fact that there is evil with the existence of God, the argument from evil being one of the most powerful arguments against the existence of God.
Consider this theodicy:
P1: It is psychologically impossible for any logically possible living being to understand the value of any possible world and feel appropriate gratitude for the existence of that world unless that world is tainted by severe and pervasive evil.It would follow from this that if [P2] the best possible world entails the possibility for living beings to understand the value of that world and to feel appropriate gratitude for it, then [C:] the best possible world must be tainted by severe and pervasive evil. As I have suggested in previous posts, the aforementioned understanding and gratitude is the point of meditation and prayer, and gratitude is a cardinal virtue. But, possibly, this gratitude cannot be achieved by any logically possible living being unless that living being must cope with severe and pervasive evil. In other words, no one, not even God, could design a living being which would have the psychological capacity to achieve it in a world of little or no evil. Whether or not the premises (P1 and P2) of this theodicy are true, the argument appears to be valid. Are the premises true?
