I have also a bridge to sell near brooklyn. Me and DP have a partnership, so we will sell it with 50% off

(November 24, 2014 at 6:38 pm)Rhythm Wrote: Doesn't matter what "most historians believe".

Not to mention biblical studies is perhaps the only scholarly field dominated by believers and those with a previous commitment to a tradition of either Christian or Jewish persuasion; if not obvious and flat out conflict of interest, there's often a strong bias.

(November 24, 2014 at 7:07 pm)His_Majesty Wrote: Plus, Richard Carrier already got his ass handed to him in a debate by a more polished William Lane Craig on the same subject [...]

That reminds me -- weren't we supposed to have a debate on the alleged evidence you have demonstrating that your god actually exists?

Do you really mean to tell me you dodged out of that, preferring this instead?

I'm left to assume that your "evidence" for your god is even shakier than your evidence that Christ actually existed.

I seriously would like to debate you on the topic of whether or not the Gospels are based on a true story. You can even have the advantage of seeing my arguments in a previous debate on this topic.

Just to be clear, the issue is not a non-falsifiable claim that "some guy named Yeshua who was a religious leader" existed. Rather, the issue is whether or not we can take the Gospels seriously as a detailed biography of his life or even offers us an idea of what his life was like and what his teachings were.

I'm a "Jesus Mooter", not a myther. My question is, "What, if anything, can we actually know about him?" My contention is that the Gospels are mythology or, at best, legends no more reliable than the folklore of Washington's Cherry Tree or the "Elvis sighting" stories that appeared in tabloids in the decades after his death.

Since the Gospels are all the detailed information we have, the issue of Jesus' existence is moot.

The criteria of the debate will even allow that the accounts of miracles and the supernatural be ignored, perhaps as fanciful ad hocs to the original tale, much like the Cherry Tree story with Washington or the songs sung about Davy Crockett killing bears when he was only three. Getting rid of the supernatural would gut the Gospel account of the life of Jesus, since 90% of it either is about his miracles or relies upon them, but we'll let that go.

However, the debate criteria will specifically not allow the defender of the faith to weasel out of defending the Bible. There will not be any vague, undefined escape hatches like "well, the Bible's not totally accurate." I promise not to bring up petty contradictions like the color of Jesus' robe and stick to glaring, irreconcilable contradictions like "in what decade was Jesus born?"

If you wish to debate that the Gospels are reliable eye-witness accounts that offer a dependable biographical account of Jesus' life and ministry, consider yourself challenged.

(November 25, 2014 at 11:34 am)DeistPaladin Wrote: A bit of US trivia for you: George Washington was NOT the first president of the US.

That title went to John Hancock, who was the president during the Articles of Confederation, prior to when our Constitution was written.

This is a part of our history that our textbooks gloss over. I didn't learn about it until college. In retrospect, I don't know why I didn't question the gap between the end of the Revolutionary War in 1783 to the signing of the Constitution in 1787.

The truth is that our founders' first attempt at creating a government was a dismal failure. We were barely united at all, unable to pay our war debts or maintain order between the states. At one point, two states nearly went to war with one another. John Hancock was little more than a figurehead. We were so uneasy about a new monarchy that we went too far to the other extreme, creating a government that couldn't maintain order at all.

I'm fond of the "child of Britain" analogy to describe our country as I find the metaphor descriptive when you look at our founding as a nation. Using that anthropomorphous metaphor, we can describe our war of independence as an adolescent rebellion (we were the hell-raising, wild, rebellious one while our northern sibling Canada was the "good child", or at least the mellow stoner who lived in the parent's basement, moving out of the house only gradually). After storming out of the house, we tried to reinvent the wheel. Then after failing, we asked ourselves "how does mom do it". We copied the British government as it existed at the time making a few changes (most notably spinning out the judiciary into its own branch.

Whenever I explain our seemingly Byzantine government system to British people, I tell them it's based on the government they had at the time. The old struggles between monarch and parliament are now reflected in our struggles between president and congress.

The apple doesn't fall far from the tree. Even the hell-raising rebellious child winds up becoming like their parents.

So as much as we like to gloss over our founding fathers' disastrous first attempt at a government and how, under questionable legal conditions, they hit the "do over" button in 1787, it's still part of our history. John Hancock was technically our first president.

The question is, how do you know who was the first President?? Regardless of what answer you give, you are relying on what you were told from someone else.

(November 25, 2014 at 11:34 am)DeistPaladin Wrote: As for Jesus, I've already had this debate but if you want to offer a rematch because you think you can do better, feel free.

Rematch?

Think you can play by the rules and actually engage in your opponents assertions this time?

(November 25, 2014 at 9:33 am)Stimbo Wrote: Indeed; and not simply out of hand either. We've submitted genuine, pragmatic reasons for dismissing what's been presented and explained precisely why it's not compelling. And to what result? The objections have been rejected out of hand...

Right, and the vast majority of historians today, some of whom aren't Christians believe that they have genuine, pragmatic reasons for accepting what's been presented and some have even explained precisely why it is compelling.

But you haven't been demonstrating that; merely asserting it. I and others here have been leadiing you by the hand, step by step, through the reasons why your evidence isn't actually evidence for what you're claiming it is. Clearly it's not all that compelling, or there'd be more historians who would accept it. I'm not a historian, but I am a reasonable man. I'll accept a good reason. I'll accept a bad reason. I'll accept any damn reason at all, only at least meet me halfway and give me something to get my teeth into.

(November 24, 2014 at 8:23 pm)Cthulhu Dreaming Wrote: You wouldn't know an ad hominem if it bit you on the ass.

You're stupid, because you compare the existence of a person for whom no contemporary source exists, versus on where a great many contemporary sources do.

You are the one that is stupid, because you are making my point despite being to stupid to realize that to be the case.

You said "verse on where a agreat many contemporary sources do"...so how do yo know that they are contemporary sources...ohhh, wait, right back to believing what you were told, right?

Like I said, made my point for me.

(November 24, 2014 at 8:23 pm)Cthulhu Dreaming Wrote: So, yes, it would appear that you really are that stupid. Which, incidentally, is not an ad hominem - it's an inescapable conclusion one reaches when reading your arguments.

You believe that there are contemporary sources for George Washington's presidency based soley on what you were told. You were not there...you only go by what someone else told you, and you don't even know if that person was there

Stupid.

(November 24, 2014 at 8:23 pm)Cthulhu Dreaming Wrote: As I have better things to do at the moment, I'll leave the arguments to my counterparts here, and resume the regularly scheduled mocking you so richly deserve.

Your counterparts can't handle me either. I began this thread so I can purposely intellectually spank every single person on here that has something to say....and I am doing a damn good job of it

(November 25, 2014 at 1:51 pm)FatAndFaithless Wrote: Think you can play by the rules and actually engage in your opponents assertions this time?

Probably not.

Just look at the Matt Dillahunty vs Ray Comfort "debate".