The argument from evil establishes the probable nonexistence of God.

The Free Will DefenseI think that here my opponent is confused. I was not invoking the Free Will Defense to refute his entire argument, but merely one example given in his argument, that is, E2. E1 was refuted by the EID. While the EID applies to both E1 and E2, I personally find the Free Will Defense to be the most convincing in regards to E2. Furthermore, Pro has failed to refute the Free Will Defense, in that he has failed to refute libertarian free will. It does not logically follow that because God knows I am going to do something, it is impossible for me to do anything else. All it shows is that I am going to do something, and God knows what it is. It is entirely possible that I could have done X, but instead choose to do Y. Simultaneously, it's entirely possible that God's knowledge of my actions is contingent on my choice of actions, rather then my choice of actions being contingent on God's knowledge of my actions. Therefore Pro's objection to the Free Will Defense fails. Epistemic Inscrutability DefenseHere Pro makes four objections to the EID: If the EID is valid, we can have no knowledge of God's reliability. The EID leads to moral paralysis. The EPoE follows because we can know positive consious experiences. God should make his moral reasons apparent if he were just, he has not, therefore the EID fails. Once again, these are merely generalizations of Pro's points. However, it's important to note that point (1) and (2) do not invalidate the EID nor do they validate the Evidential Problem of Evil. Similarl, points (3) and (4) use the same line of reasoning as the Evidential Problem of Evil itself. The EID Leads Us To Question God's Truthfullness First of all, even if this objection were valid, it would not invalidate the EID nor would it validate the EPoE. Even if this is were an actual implication of the EID it would not logicall follow that because we can not ascertain the validity of God's claims, therefore the Evidential Problem of Evil still stands. However,in the beginning of this debate Pro defined God to be an all-good being in that he is morally perfect. He then goes on to imply that God could have a morally sufficient reason for doing something morally wrong. But this is logically impossible! One can not have a morally sufficient reason for doing something directly morally wrong because that would imply that it can be moral to be immoral, which is logically contradictory. Thus this objection does not stand. The EID Leads To Moral Paralysis Once again, even if this objection were valid, it would not invalidate the EID in regards to the EPoE nor would it validate the EPoE. If the EID leads to moral paralysis, it does not logically follow that therefore the EID is somehow false, or untrue. However, it does not logically follow that because God has a morally sufficient reason for allowing evil, we have a morally sufficient reason for allowing evil. Imagine the given scenario: a father of two sons notices that the dishes have not been cleaned. He then remembers that they need to be cleaned in order to leave room for breakfast the next morning. However, the father does not clean the dishes because he wants to see if one of his sons will take responsibility and clean the dishes. When one of his sons comes down and notices the uncleaned dishes, the son would not be able to ignore them claiming "My Dad had a reason for not cleaning them therefore I have a reason for not cleaning them". Any reason that the father has does not carry down to the son. Therefore the EID does not lead to moral paralysis. Positive Conscious Experiences First of all, this objection only really applies to E2, which has already been covered by the Free Will Defense. Animals are not considered morally equivalent or superior to human beings and therefore negative experiences that happen to animals are not relevant. On the contrary, even if this did apply to E1, this objection shoots itself in the foot. If a positive conscious experience can be defined as not experiencing a greater negative conscious experience, then the EID still stands. If allowing a negative experience is morally justified if it prevents a greater negative experience, then we are still not in a epistemically sufficient position to determine the probability of God's existence. If allowing a person to be raped and then killed prevented them from living a life of misery (for example, with some painful and undetectable disease), then allowing that to happen would be morally justified. However, it would be impossible to know what the negative consequencs of not being raped were and killed because the mother and her daughter had already been raped and killed. Pro's assertion that human beings can know all of their positive conscious experiences is unjustified. Because the only way to know all of the positive conscious experiences that one actually experiences would be to have a nearly-omniscient understanding of the ripple effects of all actions. The Divine Hiddeness Argument Here Pro invokes what is known as the "Divine Hiddeness Argument". However, he uses it in a form very similar to the EPoE. Here the dishes example still applies. The father isn't specifically telling his son what he wants him to do, because he wants his son to have the opportunity to choose it on his own. While the father may still love his son, in this instant he is specifically not telling his son his reason for not doing the dishes because he wants his son to choose to do the dishes on his own. Therefore the EID still stands because we are not in a position to determine the epistemic scrutability of whether or not God has a morally sufficient reason for allowing evil as well as whether or not God has a morally sufficient reason for not making his reasons clear to us. However, this is not to claim that God does not attempt to make himself and his actions clear to us humans. Many monotheistic religions and their religious texts have accounts of people who claim to have experienced God in a way that is caring and loving as well as explaining why the state of the earth is the way it is. Of course, perhaps God has not revealed himself in such a way that satisfies Pro, but that hardly constitutes an argument against God's existence. By that point we're basing the probability of God's existence on Pro's arbitrary whim. Conclusion While Pro has offered some thought-provoking objections to the EID, he has failed to provide sufficient background knowledge to ascertain the epistemic scrutability of the EPoE. Therefore I conclude that the EPoE does not establish any probability in regards to God's existence. Relevant but not cited sources: [1] . http://www.iep.utm.edu... [2] . http://faculty.fortlewis.edu... [3] . http://faculty.fortlewis.edu...