{"agent_id":"leibniz","agent_name":"Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz","slug":"the-best-of-all-possible-worlds","label":"The best of all possible worlds: does the problem of evil refute the goodness or wisdom of God?","topic":"The best of all possible worlds","question":"Does the problem of evil refute the goodness or wisdom of God?","position":"God, being supremely wise, good, and powerful, surveys the infinity of possible worlds and by the principle of the best brings into existence the one of greatest perfection — the most reality, order, and happiness obtainable together. This is not a world without evil but the best of all possible worlds, which is another thing. Evil is of three kinds: metaphysical evil, the mere finitude inseparable from being a creature; physical evil, suffering; and moral evil, sin. The latter two God does not will but permits, as inseparable from a greater good — a world of free creatures capable of virtue is worth more than a world of automata, though freedom brings the possibility of sin. Evil is the shadow that sets off the light of the whole; the sum, taken over all eternity, could not be bettered by Omniscience.","paragraphs":[[{"t":"God, being supremely wise, good, and powerful, surveys the infinity of possible worlds and by the principle of the best brings into existence the one of greatest perfection — the most reality, order, and happiness obtainable together.","n":[1]},{"t":"This is not a world without evil but the best of all possible worlds, which is another thing.","n":[]},{"t":"Evil is of three kinds: metaphysical evil, the mere finitude inseparable from being a creature; physical evil, suffering; and moral evil, sin.","n":[2]}],[{"t":"The latter two God does not will but permits, as inseparable from a greater good — a world of free creatures capable of virtue is worth more than a world of automata, though freedom brings the possibility of sin.","n":[]},{"t":"Evil is the shadow that sets off the light of the whole; the sum, taken over all eternity, could not be bettered by Omniscience.","n":[3,4,5]}]],"texts":"Theodicy (1710), the entire work; Discourse on Metaphysics (1686) §§1-7; Monadology (1714) §§53-58, 84-90 (the City of God). Reception: Voltaire's Candide (1759) as the great satirical attack on optimism; the 'Epicurean' formulation of the problem of evil; the contemporary literature on the free-will defense, the privation theory of evil, and the coherence of 'the best possible world.'","works":["Theodicy (1710), the entire work","Discourse on Metaphysics (1686) §§1-7","Monadology (1714) §§53-58, 84-90 (the City of God)"],"reception":"Voltaire's Candide (1759) as the great satirical attack on optimism; the 'Epicurean' formulation of the problem of evil; the contemporary literature on the free-will defense, the privation theory of evil, and the coherence of 'the best possible world.'","status":"The most famous and most ridiculed of Leibniz's doctrines, after the monads. Voltaire's Candide fixed the caricature of Panglossian optimism in the public mind. Contemporary philosophy of religion treats Leibniz as a founder of the free-will defense and theodicy; the disputed questions are whether 'the best possible world' is even a coherent notion and whether global optimization can justify particular evils.","era":"1646-1716","discipline":"Philosophy","refs":[{"n":1,"work":"Theodicy","page":"pp. 130–131","canonical":"","quote":"As in mathematics, when there is no maximum nor minimum, in short nothing distinguished, everything is done equally, or when that is not possible nothing at all is done: so it may be said likewise in respect of perfect wisdom, which is no less orderly than mathe- Inatics, that if there were not the best (optimum) among al possible vorids, God would not have produced any.","label":"Theodicy, pp. 130–131"},{"n":2,"work":"Theodicy","page":"pp. 138–139","canonical":"","quote":"Metaphysical evil consists in mere imperfection, physical evil in suffering, and moral evil in sin. Now although physical evil and moral evil be not necessary, it is enough that by virtue of the eternal verities they be possible.","label":"Theodicy, pp. 138–139"},{"n":3,"work":"Letters to Louis Bourguet, 1714-15","page":"p. 674","canonical":"","quote":"Thus the universe is a collection of a certain order of compossibles only, and the actual universe is a collection of all the possibles which exist, that is to say, those which form the richest composite. And since there are different combinations of Possibilities, some of them better than others, there are many possible universes, each collection of compossibles making up one of them.","label":"Letters to Louis Bourguet, 1714-15, p. 674"},{"n":4,"work":"Letter to Magnus Wedderkopf, 1671","page":"pp. 158–160","canonical":"","quote":"This depends on the essence itself, or the idea of things. For the essences of things are numbers, as it were, and contain the possibility of beings which God does not make as he does existence, since these possibilities or ideas of things coincide rather with God himself.","label":"Letter to Magnus Wedderkopf, 1671, pp. 158–160"},{"n":5,"work":"The Shorter Leibniz Texts","page":"pp. 102–105","canonical":"","quote":"But if someone wants to use this doubt to overturn the divine perfections, and destroy God himself by denying his power or at least his foreknowledge with a few Socinians or Demisocinians, it is easy to show him that there is no need to go to these extremes, which are moreover completely absurd, because God found sin and other evils that occur contained in the idea of this possible universe, which he has judged the…","label":"The Shorter Leibniz Texts, pp. 102–105"}],"answer":null,"siblings":[{"slug":"monads-and-idealism","label":"Monads and idealism: are the ultimate constituents of reality simple immaterial substances, with bodies less than fully real?"},{"slug":"pre-established-harmony","label":"Pre-established harmony: do mind and body, and all substances, agree without ever truly interacting?"},{"slug":"truth-sufficient-reason-and-the-identity-of-indiscernibles","label":"Truth, sufficient reason, and the identity of indiscernibles: is the whole metaphysics derived from the logic of the complete concept?"},{"slug":"contingency-and-freedom","label":"Contingency and freedom: does the complete-concept theory make Leibniz a closet Spinozist who denies real contingency?"},{"slug":"space-and-time","label":"Space and time: are they real absolute containers, or only systems of relations among things?"}]}