(July 27, 2017 at 1:19 pm)downbeatplumb Wrote: I get presents at Christmas! who leaves it under the tree if not santa?

Your parents, of course.

(July 27, 2017 at 12:56 pm)SteveII Wrote:

(July 27, 2017 at 11:03 am)Khemikal Wrote: It provides ordinary evidence of an ordinary event.  That people tell stories.  It provides no evidence of an extraordinary event, the supernatural - by definition beyond the range of ordinary, as all evidence of the supernatural would inexorably be.

If someone wanted to demonstrate that psychic abilities existed, they would work to show a success rate beyond the ordinary range described by brute force of statistics.  Extraordinary predictive ability.
If someone wanted to demonstrate the healing power of a magical incantation, they would work to show a success rate beyond the ordinary rate of remission.  Extraordinary medical efficacy.
If someone wanted to show that a god walked the earth........................................."there's this book......see......"

There's no point in proponents of the supernatural complaining that the bar has been set too high...they're the ones who set it there by definitively proclaiming something to be extraordinary in the first place.  If they want to argue semantics, fine, but they're only arguing with themselves and their own silly ass claims.

Oh, I get it. Like if someone whats to demonstrate that the supernatural exists, maybe they would hang around for 3 years and perform series of miracles that only had supernatural explanations. How many miracles would that person have to do before a "success rate beyond the ordinary range described by brute force of statistics" was established?

The problem you just so kindly illustrated is that the evidence available to us is the same kind for your psychic and magician/healer illustration. However, through some process that remains unclear, we can set that aside and declare the need for extraordinary evidence. Please explain.

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(July 27, 2017 at 11:04 am)KevinM1 Wrote: It's amazing to me that Steve thinks every single Christian has come to it after rigorous investigation of it.  Most people were born into it, with their entire support system having something to do with it.  Others convert when they're emotionally vulnerable (recovering from addiction, after suffering a loss, etc.).  Still others do it as a form of protest (Muslims converting, people in China converting, etc.).  And there are still people forced into it by the promise of violence (see: the various shit holes in Africa).

So, not only is an appeal to popularity fallacious in and of itself (popularity has never been synonymous with truth), the notion that all, or even most, Christians arrived at their faith after serious investigation into it is equally fallacious, and laughable to boot.

I just don't get why you stubbornly stick with that.  It's not doing you or your arguments any favors.

I only brought up the vast numbers of Christians as it relates to standards of proof. People weigh the evidence differently and have different thresholds for proof. So, no appeal to popularity.

You outline various reasons why people become Christian. I don't disagree. However, you are not addressing the 20, 40, 60 years they may be a Christian and in various stages of their life investigated some of all of the evidence.

Bullshit, the numbers depicted in the bible describing the number of witnesses is by design, not because the events were true. Using numbers in mythology even in polytheism was a way to sell the legend and over conflate the importance of the story. You see the same tactics used in ancient Greek plays, and even in the age Renaissance plays like "The Song Of Roland".

Numbers in antiquity were used by polytheists too, to sell the story. Really no different than today when you go see an action movie, and you see the hero of the movie do the impossible. In reality you know it is a camera trick or computer graphics or a controlled stunt. Numbers in both polytheism and monotheism and even in the entertainment of antiquity were props merely used to sell the story.

And none of your argument in any case, makes magic babies with super powers true, nor would anyone survive the death myth as the bible intends you to believe if you did that to someone in reality.

A movement existed otherwise Christianity would not exist. But that does not mean there was ever a magic man with super powers. The NT in reality reads like the writers slapped a name to a movement after the fact and used numbers to sell the fiction.

(July 27, 2017 at 12:42 pm)SteveII Wrote:

(July 27, 2017 at 10:37 am)paulpablo Wrote: I think the NT provides some level of ordinary evidence.  I'll talk about the sections talking about the life of Jesus just because I don't know about all of the NT and just for the sake of conversation to keep it easier.

Someone wrote a book about it, there may have been some witnesses.  That's about it.

There are many MANY things that can be considered to cast doubt on the claims of the new testament.

The fact that it does contain a type of religious leader who is able to perform supernatural actions in the form of miracles.

This isn't begging the question or circular reasoning.  I'm not saying supernatural things can't happen because they're supernatural.

I'm saying we have no evidence (beyond what I previously mentioned) of them (supernatural events in the NT) happening, we do have evidence of people being deceived into believing supernatural actions/events do happen.

There's the situation of the evidence and witness testimony being so old, combined with the supernatural actions.

If the claim was for example "Mary walked across the stepping stones on this river 2000 years ago" then it can be taken with a shrug.  You could think, ok maybe she did, who cares?  Her footprints are long gone, anyone who saw her is long dead, the children of whoever saw her are long dead and so are the grandchildren of her children.

If the claim is that "Jesus came back from the dead, had a chat with people, turned water into wine and walked on water over 2000 years ago."

We're in the same situation, plus supernatural events.  The witnesses are long dead, the wine has been drank, no photos no film, nothing but what people said and wrote down.

So we have no evidence of people being able to use actual real magic and miracles to walk on water, come back from the dead, turn water into wine.

 Can people be tricked into believing this has happened?   Yes, we have evidence people can deceive other people into believing magic things happened, or just lying about it to begin with

 Do cult followers believe their leaders can do these type of things now? 

 Do cult leaders perform real magic supernatural miracles now, or is it true that there are people who are capable of deceiving other people into believing miracles and magic have been performed?

How reasonable is it that a cult leader 2000 years ago could have had witnesses claiming he did miracles when he actually didn't do them.

How reasonable is it to think that the cult leader 2000 years ago performed real magic miracles on the basis of whatever evidence we have.

I'm giving benefit of the doubt though, I'll be willing to go along with a hypothetical situation in which we know these witnesses were real people and this book was written by followers of Jesus, I know a lot of people doubt he even existed or that his followers did.

Bold mine. This is what your whole post boils down to. 

The events during and following the life of Jesus are some of the most attested to series of events in ALL of ancient history. We know exactly what the first century Christians believed and much of what they did. Even Bart Ehrman thinks the NT is 99% of what it was originally. I don't care if you don't find it compelling. But this constant nonsense (not just you) of "no evidence" is just silly and show a lack of understanding the evidence, or bad reasoning skills, or misunderstanding definitions, or a bias you bring to the subject. 

In case anyone is hazy on the difference, here is an excellent discussion on it at http://pediaa.com/difference-between-evi...and-proof/

I just re read what I wrote and that part was a mistake. I didn't mean no evidence, I actually meant no compelling evidence.

I did actually put at the beginning of that post that there is some evidence, just not compelling.

I said there is ordinary evidence in the form of a book written about the events.  For the sake of simplicity I'll agree that the evidence shows people believed Jesus did miracles.

This isn't no evidence, it's just a lack of compelling evidence due to the fact that people making claims thousands of years ago is a weak foundation to place a belief on.

What casts doubt on the evidence is that we have evidence of people 

a) Being deceptive and lying about supernatural events.
b) Being deceived by other people into thinking a supernatural event happened.

We have cult leaders alive now who have followers who would say their leaders can perform miracles.  We have evidence that these types of people have existed through history.

It isn't just a lack of compelling evidence, it's evidence that a much more simple conclusion can be drawn and is possible.

In any area where reason and evidence are important the evidence put forth in the style of the NT couldn't stand.

It's ancient witness testimony of supernatural events.

This doesn't mean the miracles and supernatural events in the NT are definitely impossible it just means that practically speaking it's much more sound and logical to conclude that the supernatural events didn't happen.

It's certainly very reasonable to say that there's always more evidence backing up a non supernatural version of events rather than a supernatural.

The definition of supernatural is of something that isn't practically possible within the laws of nature and we try and reasonably conclude what is and isn't possible via evidence.

Therefore it's pretty much something that has already been concluded due to be practically impossible to happen based on the lack of evidence that it can happen and/or evidence we do have that it couldn't happen.

Steve will still single out one line from your wall of text to claim "you're ignorant of religion".

(July 27, 2017 at 1:39 pm)paulpablo Wrote: [quote pid='1592525' dateline='1501173746']
I said there is ordinary evidence in the form of a book written about the events.  For the sake of simplicity I'll agree that the evidence shows people believed Jesus did miracles.

Historical evidence also exists that some people believed that Jesus miraculously created a woman from his side and then had sex with her (or, at least tried to), but Steve doubts that claim.

(July 27, 2017 at 1:54 pm)Jehanne Wrote: Historical evidence also exists that some people believed that Jesus miraculously created a woman from his side and then had sex with her (or, at least tried to), but Steve doubts that claim.

The Apocrypha contains lots of historical evidence that theists ignore.

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Theists have been cherry picking since the very beginning when they decided what books should and should not be included in the Unholy bible.

(July 27, 2017 at 12:56 pm)SteveII Wrote: Oh, I get it. Like if someone whats to demonstrate that the supernatural exists, maybe they would hang around for 3 years and perform series of miracles that only had supernatural explanations. How many miracles would that person have to do before a "success rate beyond the ordinary range described by brute force of statistics" was established?

Exactly.  Someone should do that, if they want to demonstrate that the supernatural exists.  Get to it, or call your boy up on the godphone and have him get to it.  Either way.   Just a wild ass guess..the number would have to be precisely -one-. That;s all it would take. One paltry fucking miracle.....and yet, because you can;t even muster that, you point to fairy tales. The same nonsense plays itself out in psi research, wherein the claimant...upon failing the test, claims that he could totally do it yesterday.

Quote:The problem you just so kindly illustrated is that the evidence available to us is the same kind for your psychic and magician/healer illustration. However, through some process that remains unclear, we can set that aside and declare the need for extraordinary evidence. Please explain.

You mean, your stories?  Obviously, it's not the same.  You have ordinary stories, and you wish for that to be evidence of an extraordinary events.  You don't accept that ordinary evidence in the case of anyone else's extraordinary claims..so I don't see why you yammer on about it - it can only expose the weakness of your position.  You believe.  You do not need evidence to believe.  The stories are not evidence of their contents accuracy.  You have faith that they are accurate, but faith is all it is and all it needs to be.  

Why is that so difficult for you?

(July 27, 2017 at 2:12 pm)Khemikal Wrote:

(July 27, 2017 at 12:56 pm)SteveII Wrote: Oh, I get it. Like if someone whats to demonstrate that the supernatural exists, maybe they would hang around for 3 years and perform series of miracles that only had supernatural explanations. How many miracles would that person have to do before a "success rate beyond the ordinary range described by brute force of statistics" was established?

Exactly.  Someone should do that, if they want to demonstrate that the supernatural exists.  Get to it, or call your boy up on the godphone and have him get to it.  Either way.   

I invited God for pizza and pop, but he was a no-show.

Yeah, the almighty turned into a hermit some point between skipping around the ANE bare-assed and the invention of a camera.  Go figure.

(July 27, 2017 at 12:42 pm)SteveII Wrote: The events during and following the life of Jesus are some of the most attested to series of events in ALL of ancient history. We know exactly what the first century Christians believed and much of what they did. Even Bart Ehrman thinks the NT is 99% of what it was originally. I don't care if you don't find it compelling.
But this constant nonsense (not just you) of "no evidence" is just silly and show a lack of understanding the evidence, or bad reasoning skills, or misunderstanding definitions, or a bias you bring to the subject. 

Blatant bullshit.  Know what someone believed and what actually happened are two different things (well, for most people).

You have no evidence that doesn't have other reasonable explanations for it.  And that last sentence shows just how much your brain is damaged by your beliefs.