The argument from evil (AE) is sound

CritiquesFirst, P1 ignores that omnipotence is poorly understood. At best theologians consider God to be omnipotent just if he can, "actualize any state of affairs that is not described by counterfactuals about the free acts of others and that is broadly logically possible for someone to actualize, [with the same conditionals]" (Philosophical Foundations). Pointless moral evils & theism are compatible with this definition.Second, we're given no reason to think that "God can get what He wants without permitting some particular horror." With such a BoP it would seem that a simplistic view of omnipotence & a sloppy theodicy on God’s purpose for man only hurts Pro's case. God's ultimate & proximate teleos are distinct. The latter may well involve permitted evils due to a binding resolution not to interfere with human freedom unless there's a significant religio-context (petitionary prayer) which serves God's Teleos. Koons contention breaks Pro's argument down to a cas par cas from which Pro attempts to make an argument, this boarders a fallacy of accident. P1 charges that any evil must be necessary for an outbalance of Good. If one thinks hard about it following the implications to their ends, my theodicy readily answers P1.P3 presupposes first that we stand in a good epistemic position to make probability judgements regarding moral ontologies. There's reason to doubt this when compared to an all-knower. Upon surveying the 6 cognitive limitations under which impair such judgments Alston writes, “The judgments required by the inductive argument from evil are of a very special and enormously ambitious type, and our cognitive capacities are not equal to this one. . . . it is in principle impossible for us to be justified in supposing that God does not have sufficient reasons for permitting evil that are unknown to us” (Alston 1991). So prior to Pro arguing that evil counts as evidence against theism, he must first show that we can make such judgements either way since we're attempting to disconfirm an all-knower as partial-knowers. For E1, an all-knower would seem to have morally sufficient reasons to permit infant-death had he known the relevant counterfactuals of what that baby would have grown into (a more painful life with an inability to properly choose, say). If one entertains the idea of infant reincarnation into a properly functioning fetus then this objection wouldn’t be a problem. This idea wouldn't seem apparent yet why think that it would? For E2, the matter of suffering beasts is beyond our cognitive purview since we lack both knowledge of the beast's nature & its teleos for which they exist. We lack knowledge of their teleos because we lack knowledge of their natures. We don’t know anything about their psychological makeup or their wills. Can the claim, “the fawn’s suffering appears unjustified” itself be justified, especially without knowing it’s nature or purpose? Whether its suffering is justified or unjustified is in principle beyond our ken. But in fact a beast lacks higher-order access to its own 1st-order experiences of pains. Glenn Ross & MJ Murray write, “Some non-human creatures have states that have intrinsic phenomenal qualities analogous to those possessed by humans when they are in states of pain. These creatures lack, however, any higher order states of being aware of themselves as being in ﬁrst-order states. They have no access to the fact that they are having a particular feeling, though they are indeed having it.” All creatures with few exceptions lack function in the frontal lobe which enable the higher order awareness of pain. This alone rebuts Pro's 3rd point regarding the history of animal suffering, since “there is simply no victim, no subject for whom it can be said that there is a way it is like for it to be in such a state of pain” (Murray, Ross). For “epistemic consistency,” Pro fallaciously reasons by analogy in comparing a Man-to-God moral epistemology with a Man-to-Man's. The fallacy is unavoidable for Pro since he presupposes that God’s proximate (vs. ultimate) teleos for Man ought to be (what we want now) physical longevity & complete happiness. I'm not appealing to mystery when I doubt WSA's wanting to use our own moral standards. Rather I'm bringing to light his argument from analogy. Such fallacious reasoning forgets that we're partial-knowers. In this light it's perfectly legitimate to claim knowledge of partial truths of God. Pro just asserts pointless evils on a cas par cas citing that the instrinsic probability of theism on these perceived pointless evils alone disconfirm theism. But first probabilities are calculated along with background information. Christianity's background not only affirms intense & seemingly pointless suffering, but also makes it more probable given a fallen world, Calvinism, etc. Second, we've no basis for affirming actual gratuitous evil from its appearance! To say so would simply be the faith of a partially knowing atheist against an all knowing God. How uninteresting.Theodicy*God’s purpose for us is happiness sought on our own terms, & the essence of complete-perfect happiness is necessarily rooted in God’s just Divine Love. Now Jerry Walls argues Plantinga is really a theodicist since he's committed to the reality of libertarianism as God’s actual justification for permitting evil. Plantinga argues he's a defender yet concedes that for all he knows, there may be a justification other than libertarian freedom, he just fails to see a justifying good other than libertarian free will (he's a Calvinist). I claim partial knowledge of Man's Teleos. Now ultimate Teleos & action/non-action flowing from proximate teleos aren't identical. Thus I can affirm both partially knowing God's purpose for man while also not fully comprehending His lack of physical intervention whence percieved gratuitous evils occur. Pro dodges from one answer to another yet my theodicy involves a basis from which many different complex & variegated answers can be made to what seems like pointless suffering. I've even applied it to E1-2 easily enough. Pro's just working from a cas par cas position here.Lastly, any evil is justified if it's outbalanced & first defeated, i.e., if its responded to in a virtuous manner (justice). Moral evils that are committed are distinct from suffered evils. Committed evil is defeated in a life wherein choosing rightly, one seeks to avoid tempting situations but if they succumb then the defeat of evil occurs through repentance (true Love’s way). With suffered evil, choosing rightly seeks not to return wrong for wrong but overcomes evil with good (Rom.12:17, 21). Suffered natural evils are defeated if there’s a virtuous response to both potential & actual victims. Christians believe that part of man’s fall into moral sin included limited cognitive faculties which would entail our partial inability to know when & where natural phenomena occur, though such phenomena result from the conditions needed for life so such evils cannot logically count against theism anyway.SkepticismI never said we can make no judgements whatsoever, but just that such judgements are limited, & so one ought to consult the full scope of evidence. P3’s inference is tenuous since the most important factor in weighing whether the suffering in the world is really gratuitous will be whether God exists. For probabilities are always relative to background knowledge. If one has more compelling grounds for theism, then the appearence of gratuitous evil isn’t a problem (Howard-Snyder).PoE’s Rightful PlacePro charges ST is is unfalsifiable, but so is the claim that gratuitous evil exists. Yet falsifiability is one of many criteria & just because evil & good in the world can merely be existential, it doesn't follow that theism is therefore unfalsifiable. Christianity can be shown to be logically incoherent or the bones of Christ found, etc.