Peter Boghossian on The problem of evil
Boghossian uses the problem of evil to demonstrate that theodicies are post hoc rationalizations, not honest engagements with evidence.
Boghossian's treatment of the problem of evil is distinctive because he focuses less on the philosophical puzzle and more on the epistemological behaviour of believers confronted with it. When presented with gratuitous suffering — childhood cancer, natural disasters, animal agony — believers do not adjust their confidence in God's existence. Instead, they generate explanations after the fact: free will, soul-making, mysterious purposes. Boghossian identifies this as textbook unfalsifiable reasoning.
He asks a pointed question: what amount of suffering would cause you to doubt God's existence? If the answer is 'nothing,' then the problem of evil is not being engaged honestly. The believer has decided in advance that God exists regardless of the evidence, and theodicies are merely tools for maintaining that conclusion. This is faith, not reasoning, and Boghossian regards it as the epistemological vice he has dedicated his career to addressing.
Boghossian also notes the moral dimension of the problem. Telling a parent whose child has died of cancer that 'God has a plan' is not just philosophically dubious — it is ethically irresponsible. It asks the grieving person to suppress their justified moral outrage in service of an unfalsifiable hypothesis. Boghossian sees this as one of the concrete harms of faith-based thinking.
“If nothing could change your mind about God — not the suffering of children, not the silence of heaven — then your belief is not based on evidence. It is based on something you are unwilling to question.”