Theodicy and the ‘Above Average Effect’

I have had occasion to think on the ‘problem of evil’ recently as there have been circumstances that are genuinely distressing for me and my family – albeit on a personal rather than global level.

I have thought about protesting in serious complaint (and have done so mildly) about ‘why bad things happen to good people’. 

On reflection though, my overriding thought when people talk about bad things happening to good people: the goodness of the people is rather overstated in this equation.  Yes, the bad things are bad, and the people are not people one ought judge as bad.  But – speaking for myself – my righteousness is rather limited.

One of the classic things you learn at the beginning of a psychology degree is around the ‘Above Average Effect’ (or Illusory Superiority).  If peoples’ self assessments were to be believed on things they or others value, most people would be ‘above average’.
For example, as this article explains

Since psychological studies first began, people have given themselves top marks for most positive traits. While most people do well at assessing others, they are wildly positive about their own abilities…

In studies, most people overestimate their IQ. For instance, in a classic 1977 study, 94 percent of professors rated themselves above average relative to their peers. …

Drivers consistently rate themselves as better than average — even when a test of their hazard perception reveals them to be below par

This is no less true in the moral world.  Forget the fact that on the theological plane: who could meet up the infinite demands of an infinite being?  On a bog standard ethical plane – charity, for instance – we are just not as good as we think ourselves to be.

Bad things are bad – and the problem is a real one - but the problem would be better stated as “Why do bad things happen to average people?”