Why the whole Adam and Eve Fall story makes no sense

[robvalue]

Question for all theists:

If you're presented with a random story, how do you go about determining whether or not it might be a real story? How would you teach a child to tell the difference?

OK, as the theists aren't biting, let me have a crack at this, Rob.

1. You give me the random story.
2. I check if it's in my book of made up bollox. If it's not, I say it's not true.

I ignore the fact that this method was not available to the people who compiled my book of made up bollox in the first place. Those people might have rejected your story as untrue, but they could not have used the criteria of "it's not in the Bibo/Kerrang/Bhang-a-gran-Rita/whatever." They used a bunch of criteria I don't know about, but I don't want to think about that*.

I also ignore the fact that the story might be in someone else's book of made up bollox. Because it is my book of made up bollox that is the only one that is right.

Do I get a prize for "most convincing answer so far"?

*When the Codex Sinaiticus - including the oldest extant complete copy of the new testament - was transcribed, the clergy required over ten thousand corrections to it. How did they know what to correct it to?
http://codexsinaiticus.org/en/codex/significance.aspx

That is definitely the most convincing answer so far! You win a book of bollocks

Do religious people actually teach their children how to tell reality from fantasy? Seriously. Do they? How do they then tell their kid that their book is "just different"? Stop asking questions you little fucker! That's how learning happens! Is that what you want, you little bitch?

My answer would be, "Did my mum tell me this story was true?"

It's quite telling that even between Christians who believe the bible is somehow magically true, they can't agree on what is literal and what is fictional within the same book. They talk to God, and even he doesn't know.

Other possible criteria:

"Do I get a warm fuzzy feeling while reading the story?"

"Did the author know the name of some towns near where he lived?"

"Can a random atheist prove the story didn't happen?"

Maybe as a scientific test we should pick stories from other works of fiction and from the bible, mix them up, and then see if a Christian (who isn't very familiar with the bible, ie. most of them) can pick out the fictional ones from the "true" ones.