Evidential Arguments from Evil and the "Seeability" of Compensating Goods

Abstract

William Rowe has offered one of the most simple and convincing evidential arguments from evil by arguing that the existence of gratuitous evil in our world serves as strong evidence against the claim that God exists. Stephen J. Wykstra attempts defeat this evidential argument from evil by denying the plausibility of Rowe's claim that there are gratuitous evils in the world. Wykstra sets up an epistemological test that he refers as CORNEA, and he proceeds demonstrate that Rowe's inference his existential claim is unjustified in light of our particular epistemic situation. Specifically, this inference is unjustified because compensating goods that would be connected to any given evil lack what Wykstra calls 'seeability.' Without seeability, it is illicit infer the nonexistence of an object simply from the fact that we cannot detect it, and thus Rowe is denied justification for his first premise. Wysktra's principle defense of the non-seeability of compensating goods rests on an analogy comparing children and parents humans and God. 1 will show that Wykstra's conclusion regarding the seeability of compensating goods is unjustified given this analogy. Without justification for the claim that some compensating goods lack seeability, Wykstra's defeater crumbles. First I need reconstruct Wykstra's criticism in order demonstrate the crucial role of seeability in his defeater, and then I will criticize his application of the parent analogy. Rowe's original evidential argument from evil begins with the existential claim that gratuitous evil exists, then notes that if God exists then there will not be any gratuitous evil, and concludes via modus tollens that God does not exist. Wykstra converts Rowe's existential claim concerning gratuitous evils into the logically-equivalent claim regarding the existence of compensating goods for some evils. 3 In other words, Wykstra demands that Rowe defend the claim that there are no compensating goods for some evils. Rowe ' s