Evidential Problem of Evil
William Rowe's formulation of the problem of evil arguing not that evil is logically incompatible with God's existence but that the quantity and distribution of suffering provides strong empirical evidence against theism. Horrendous evils seem pointless and incompatible with an omnipotent, omnibenevolent God even if logical contradiction is avoided.
Real World
The 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami killed over 225,000 people, including thousands of children with no moral agency. Rowe would cite this as gratuitous suffering — suffering with no plausible soul-making or free-will justification.
Exam Focus
Distinguish the evidential from the logical problem of evil explicitly; conflating them is one of the most penalised errors in AQA mark schemes.
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