 The idea that evil is defeasible was developed first by Roderick Chisholm (1968). It is an especially useful notion for theodicy, in that when evil is defeated, the usual objections to the presence of evil in the plan of providence are turned aside. If evil were only a means to good, and were simply outweighed by the goods to which it leads, antitheists could legitimately object that God could have created a better world simply by omitting the evil and creating those goods outright, or obtaining them through means that were not evil. By contrast, when evil is defeated it is caught up in a larger state of affairs that constitutes a far greater good, but not by containing components that might have occurred independent of the evil in question, and simply outweigh it. Rather, the evil is addressed within the larger state of affairs in such a way that it becomes integral to the good through which it is defeated. The defeat of evil is, moreover, an especially impressive sort of good. That Beethoven should have overcome the natural evil of his deafness to write the music he did, for example, strikes us as an amazing good — one far greater than what would have been accomplished had Beethoven written the same music (assuming that to have been possible) with good hearing. Similarly, that moral evil is overcome through the process by which sinners are brought into a right relationship with God may be considered a far greater good than would have been accomplished had he made us a community of spiritual lotus eaters, whose relationship to him, if any, was founded on no meaningful decision, but simply upon our never having had the experience that would make anything else possible. Indeed, given the moral vacuity of such an existence, it is not obvious that such creatures would even be fit for divine friendship, much less able to make the decision through which that relationship is brought to pass.