Our world is the best of all possible worlds

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Parent debateThis argument is used in the debate Does God exist?.
Keywords: God, Evil, Suffering[ edit ].

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QuotationsQuotes

“God's wisdom, not content with embracing all possibilities, penetrates them, compares them, weighs them against each other, to estimate their degrees of perfection or imperfection, strength and weakness, good and evil : it even goes beyond finite combinations, making an infinite number of infinite ones, i.e. an infinite number of possible continuations of the Universe, each of which contains an infinite number of creatures; and by this means divine wisdom distributes all the possible ones it had already considered separately, into as many universal systems, which it compares with each other again: and the result of all these comparisons and reflections is the choice of the best of all these possible systems, which wisdom makes to fully satisfy goodness; which is precisely the plan of the present Universe. And all these operations of the divine understanding, although they have an order and priority of nature between them, are always carried out together, without there being any priority of time between them.”

Leibniz, Theodicy essay, 1710.

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Arguments forJustifications

Arguments againstObjections

  • Argument againstIt's impossible to verify that our world is the best it can be
  • Argument againstTo think that our world is the best of all possible worlds is to accept everything.
  • Argument againstIt's easy to imagine a better world in some respects

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