Hi Peeps

[downbeatplumb]

That would be the new forrest then?

I too hail from hampshire.

We've previously been in Southampton, but currently in Roundabout Land (Basingstoke). We still make frequent forays into the New Forest for its awesomeness and beer. Whereabouts are you based?

Gosport, so not a million miles from you.

[Ryft]

I have a sneaking suspicion that I am going to really like you. Welcome to the forums, brother Markos.

[Cinjin]

Well I spose I'll give you a shot despite this sentence of yours:

Jesus is much more interesting, as are real atheists with bite (i.e. those who have got beyond the monotonous mantra of "evidence, evidence").

My only thought is this: Wouldn't it be a pathetic world of ours if everybody just gave up on evidence and we all believed any wild claim that came out of some lunatics mouth? To put it another way .... How nice it would be for Muslims if Christians suddenly stopped giving them "evidence" of the divinity of Jesus Christ.

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[Cyberman]

Wouldn't it be a pathetic world of ours if everybody just gave up on evidence and we all believed any wild claim that came out of some lunatics mouth?

Whenever this thing about evidence comes up, I always get a mental picture of a prosecutor in a courtroom, or a scientist presenting his/her research for peer review: "Aw, come on, why do you always ask for evidence all the time? It's so boooooring!"

Protip: this is why people who play that card tend to haemorrhage credibility round here.

[Markos]

Well I spose I'll give you a shot despite this sentence of yours:

Jesus is much more interesting, as are real atheists with bite (i.e. those who have got beyond the monotonous mantra of "evidence, evidence").

My only thought is this: Wouldn't it be a pathetic world of ours if everybody just gave up on evidence and we all believed any wild claim that came out of some lunatics mouth? To put it another way .... How nice it would be for Muslims if Christians suddenly stopped giving them "evidence" of the divinity of Jesus Christ.

You speak as if the only alternative to repeatedly asking for evidence (that is, evidence that is sufficient to meet one's own particular standards for the truth claim in question) is to end all discourse by blindly accepting any old claim for no reason whatsoever. Why? Aren't they equally clumsy and dull ways to seek truth? Aren't the methods we apply in the natural sciences, just to give one example, so much more profound and complicated than merely one party asking another for evidence? Yet many people - not least on this forum, with fundamentalists on both sides - act as if all one needs to do to "win" an argument is to apply that lethal hammer blow "The Scientific Method" (as if such a thing exists).

[The Grand Nudger]

Do you have any evidence for this alternative?