“Horrendous evil” and existence of god in works by M. M. Adams

In this paper, the author reconstructs and analyses M. M. Adams’ pragmatic argument for the existence of God, which is based on the existence of horrendous evils. Adams insists that atheists and agnostics cannot coherently believe that their lives have meanings, realizing that the world is filled with horrors. The author considers the central notions of the argument: horrendous evil, purpose-driven optimism and realism. In analyzing the deductive formulation of the argument, the author provides a missing component in Adams’ argumentation, which he calls the experience of awareness of evils. Further, the author suggests a new formulation of the argument, which is compelling for those, who are optimistic and realistic about the world, who has an experience of awareness of evils and who believes that personality is important and his/her life has subjective and objective sense. Keywords: horrendous evil, the problem of evil, realism, optimism, the existence of God, the meaning of life.