I have written before of the impossibility of proving G-d's existence. And I still agree that, short of first hand experience, there is no proof logically sufficient to prove His existence. In addition, as I argued in "Atheism's Circular Reasoning", G-d does not admit to experimental repetition as we are dealing with a volitional being who does not respond in a mechanistic way. Thus, even if we were to accept first hand experience, or testimony of such experiences, we would have a problem conducting formal experiments, as we could not reliably repeat those experiments. As with psychology*, or social sciences, religion does not admit to laboratory proof.

Readers are probably also aware from my posts "The Teleological Argument" and "Planning For Imperfection" that I do also accept that there is proof which is suggestive, if not probative. There is some evidence, some facts of the way the world operates, which suggest, though certainly do not prove, a benevolent entity.

What makes me mention this is my realization that government itself, by its very nature, is one such proof. After all, so long as government respects individual rights, enforces law consistently, and adopts an impersonal, "rule of law" policy, the nation will prosper. However, when the government adopts policies of intervention, enforces law inconsistently, or introduces human foibles into the law, it will begin to introduce the seeds of its own destruction. In short, the universe is constructed in such a way that evil will inevitably destroy itself, while the good will eventually prosper**.

Of course, many will disagree with me, but the evidence is there.

Let us look at arbitrary law. While some may argue that arbitrary enforcement by a benevolent individual is not evil, I would argue otherwise. True, a benevolent dictator may benefit his people in the short run, but he will not rule forever. As I discussed in my post "The Wrong People", his successor may not be so benevolent. And, honestly, even during the reign of the benevolent tyrant, he still is not being quite as "good" as some think. After all, he is basically substituting his own judgment for his subjects, which seems a bit arrogant of him. And that sort of pride seems to me inconsistent with the idea of "good". In addition, while he may be apparently helping his people, as I argued in ""Empathy" Threatens not "Justice" but Predictability", he is in reality causing harm, as his inconsistent enforcement leads his people to despair of long range plans, causing a drop in investment a gradual decay of the economy. In other words, a dictator who does not rule consistently will end up destroying his nation.  And, in time, this sort of despotism will result in the collapse of his nation.

Similarly, a nation which robs its citizens, which does not respect their rights, will also set the stage for collapse. Despite the claims of many, the Nazis are not a counter argument to this, their economy, while superficially strong, was living on borrowed time, consuming the capital built up over decades. By the time of the war, the Nazis were disassembling factories in captured lands and employing slave labor extensively, and still had trouble supplying even the basic war materials. Nor was it a matter of the scale of the war, as Britain, with a much smaller population, and the US, with a nearly nonexistent pre-war military and no armament industry, had no such troubles (though I would note the USSR was heavily dependent on US and British aid, despite later myths about Russian victories). Interventionist economies simply cannot survive indefinitely, and that inevitable collapse helps lead to either external conquest and liberation, internal revolt, or simple decay and the chance to replace the bad state with something better.

Of course many will argue that my proof is not convincing, as I rely on an idiosyncratic definition of "good", assuming that small government, individual freedoms and lack of government are inherently good. On the other hand, I have no problems with that. Assuming G-d wants us to respect the rights of others, to support ourselves productively, and so on seems unobjectionable. Even if one assumes that G-d's plan includes charity and helping others, I would argue doing so privately is much more morally praiseworthy than being forced to do so through government coercion. Is it good to support the poor by paying taxes if you do so only because failing to do so means going to jail? No, I think without individual liberty, any action loses moral significance. So I have no problem defining a good state as one which respects individual rights, life and property, and which leaves its subjects free to pursue their own goals.

And having so defined good, I am still impressed that governments which follow this course are inherently stronger, more stable, and longer lived than states which follow alternate courses. I know it does not prove anything, but I still see a divine hand in the fact that respect for freedom is the only course consonant with a long lasting, stable state. And in the fact that bad government sows the seeds of its own destruction. I think it quite telling that misdeeds bring about their own punishment. Not always, not on any schedule, but eventually. That, to me, is yet another sign of a benevolent creator.

Having said all that, there are many questions that remain, many objections even sincere people ask about G-d. After all, if I find so much proof of benevolence, isn't there just as much proof of malevolence? After all, why allow disease? Why allow death? Not just allow death, but make it inevitable? Why allow beings to feed one upon the other? Even if you do not care about the suffering of animals, the fact that there are predators still leads to humans being consumed, so why so order the universe? And, finally, why allow volitional evil?

I obviously do not have the answers to all of these. Though I have thought about some of them, and many have been answered by minds much better than mine.

For example, evil. There are two replies which I have found convincing. The first, quite simply, argues that our human perspective often sees evil, where there is really a greater good. Often what we see as evil is really good when seen from another perspective. Or, perhaps, the evil we see is the precursor of a greater good. Admittedly that is something of a cop out, but it is also true that we often fail to see the whole picture. Just as I argue that many economic policies are accepted because men don't take in all the consequences (for example "When Help Hurts"), is it not possible we find things evil because we fail to take in the whole?

The other argument, even more persuasive to me, regards human evil. If man is given free will, then he must be free to commit the most evil acts. If he cannot be evil, then there is no merit in being good. In fact, without the choice to be evil, one cannot be good. Despite the beliefs of those who would forcibly perfect man, good deeds without choice are not good. When you ahve but one option, it has no moral significance. So, the ability to commit evil is, of necessity, tied to the ability to be good.

I could answer the rest, but I have gone on at great enough length, and I am afraid that presenting these arguments at such short length make them sound overly simplistic. And my whole point here was to present nothing more than my observations about the self-defeating nature of evil. So I will postpone talking about nature, about death, and so on until a later post. After all, this is supposed to be a political blog. Or mostly so.

So I will leave it at that.

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* I know there is a belief that psychology can be tested experimentally, but I find that a dubious assertion. The lab environment itself tends to twist responses, as well as the awareness that an experiment is being conducted (the same forces also skew polls). However, even when the subject does not know it is an experiment, any claim of mechanistic stimulus-response requires that we completely ignore the volitional elements of human behavior. I know strict Skinnerian types do this, but I do not. Man can respond in unpredictable ways, and that means any experimental psychology is, at best, an approximation, a very loose generalization, of human behavior. To take one example, in a given experiment, a human will always withdraw his hand from fire. The proof is conclusive. However, not only will many gladly enter fire to rescue a loved one or a beloved possession, but firemen do it without that motivation every day, as do some masochists, mystics of certain traditions, sideshow performers, and others. So, despite experimental evidence, behavior tends to vary more than those experiments suggest. But,t hen again, this is hardly my first dispute with psychology and psychiatry, just read my post "Mental Illness" and "Finding What You are Looking For".

** Listing all of my essays on these topics would take forever. So allow me to recommend two: "The Nature of Evil" and "The Endless Cycle of Intervention". As I said, I have argued this point in almost every essay I have written, but these two seem to be good examples of the way bad decisions harm those making them, and how bad logic proceeds to its logical conclusion. The second point is also made in "Inescapable Logic" and "Inescapable Logic II". Actually, even more recently, these points are also made, if not explicitly in "Modern Marius and Sulla".

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POSTSCRIPT

The following posts include all my writing on supposedly scientific atheism, proofs of G-d, and similar matters:

An Off-Topic Post
"Silly Rules"
Knowing Our Limits
Guess It Is Time
A Question
A Reply to Scientific Atheists
Some Thoughts On Arguments For Intelligent Design
Winning Over Moderates
Thoughts on Islam and the Current Conflict
The Teleological Argument
Some Thoughts on Predestination
Science and Religion
A Lot of Wasted Effort
A Brief Aside About "Faith Communities"
One More on Religion
Bad Theses
Silly, Silly Argument
A Silly Mistake
"Wasting Time"
Fighting the Good Fight?
Standard of Proof
A Question About the Origins of Religion
Materialist Arrogance
Quote of the Day
Misunderstanding Legislation
Atheism's Circular Reasoning

As you can see, my though has evolved slightly, as I came to realize how heavily the atheists stacked the deck against empirical evidence, while admitting empirical evidence for mundane events under much less stringent requirements.

POSTSCRIPT II

Some may argue that my post "When Help Hurts" argues against my conclusion. After all, that post shows how good intentions often result in bad results. However, that misses the point I made in "The Citizen Dichotomy" and "Smaller Government , Fair Weather Friends and Special Cases". Yes, people who enact, for example, debt forgiveness in bankruptcy laws, think they mean well, but they are also guilty of arrogance in dismissing the decisions of their fellow man and substituting their own judgment. So, while they mean well, the sin of arrogance is more significance. Unless one approaches governing with humility and a respect for the citizens and their right to decide, then the rest of one's intentions do not matter.