Disproving Odin - An Experiment in arguing with a theist with Theist logic

[Cecelia]

You miss the entire point. With God creating mankind, we have all four types of causes present: material, formal, efficient, and final cause. See? Metaphysically sound. 

With Odin's parents, you have...what...a material cause? Fire and Ice...allegorically. Do I really need to point out that you will not be able to keep this comparison up?

And yet with Mankind, we see that human beings actually evolved over thousands of years.  Keep in mind that the bible is supposed to be the word of God himself.  Which means that he should know how humans actually came about, but instead decided to tell a fairy tale about two people in a magic garden with a talking snake and a fruit people weren't supposed to eat. 

Meanwhile, we don't have the story from Odin himself.  The Legends of How Odin was formed isn't something that mankind needs to know.  Merely it's an allegorical story meant to symbolize how Odin is both fire and ice, he is heat and cold.  The story is not meant to be taken literally.  Odin could surely have told us how he came about, but he has chosen not to because it's not important.  If the Allfather wants us to know how he was created, he will tell us.

[The Grand Nudger]

Well, if we get to consider Odin's stories to be as literal as steve must imagine magic book's stories to be, whats the problem?

[Angrboda]

That's irrelevant.  What matters is whether the author of Genesis intended it to be taken literally.  It's consistent with both the time period and the genre that he did.  Against that are incredibly weak textual arguments that it was intended as allegory.  The fact that some body of people treat it as allegory is more an artifact of people realizing that holding to a literal interpretation of Genesis puts them in the position of defending things like the flood, which they realize they can't reasonably defend.  It's a tactical retreat, unrelated to the facts of history which are that originally, it was accepted as literal.  You're always going on about how the authors of the gospels "would have known eye witnesses," implying that their proximity to the events is a testament to their historical validity, yet when it comes to Genesis, you implicitly argue against that standard; you seem to have a double standard here.

The first three chapters of Genesis are linguistically different from the rest of Genesis both in style and come from a different time in history (use of older language). So, who was the author? Certainly not the same as the rest of the book.

The context was that there were other creation accounts from other civilization (including the recent 400 years the Jews spent in Egypt) and it is likely that the Jews were passing this one down long before Genesis was written to teach their children the distinctions from other religions: that the world is a created entity (no endowed with its own spirituality) and done so by the monotheistic God they worshiped. The actual Hebrew is poetic and highly structured--which is easier to recite and teach from generation to generation (oral tradition) and clearly not meant to be a science text (since very few science text are written in poetic form).

So, was it 6 days, 6 periods, 6 billion years? Who knows. As long as you believe that God is responsible for the creation of the cosmos and humans are in the image of God, there are a variety of ways you can assemble a systematic theology and still be internally consistent.

None of this actually answers the objection. Your speculations about what was 'likely', or what it 'clearly' is are just speculation. Like a typical fundamentalist, you like to poison the well by the inclusion of unjustified adjectives. Regardless, there is a clear history of people originally taking Genesis as literal, which isn't answered by anything you've said.

[Huggy Bear]

Therefore it is my position that the Norse god Odin is derived from previously held concepts and can reasonably be dismissed as being real.

The Christian god Yahweh is also derived from previously held concepts.  So can he too be reasonably dismissed as being real.  If so, then I concede defeat (to you at least).  If, however, you still hold that God exists then I still maintain that Odin is real.  After all I can simply argue that the similarities from other religions are based in part truth, and part the work of the trickster god and shapeshifter Loki. 

This discussion isn't about Yahweh, now is it? In the other thread I clearly stated that I would provide evidence for God if someone provided evidence against and well see who had the most for and against... no one took me up on it.

So far you've only made claims, you've put forth no evidence, so technically there really isn't anything for me to refute... I on the other hand said I would provide corroborative evidence for God, can you at least provide that?

[Astreja]

So how is your evidence different from the Norse evidence? There are some old stories but no directly-observable deity. Potato, potahto.

[chimp3]

I think we must include Altjira of the original Australians and Wakan Tanka of the Lakota both of which had no influence by Mesopotamia, Babylon, the Greeks, or the Norse. Because the Norse, Lakota, and Australians also had trickster deities perhaps the origins of Christian and Norse mythology dates farther back than Mesopotamia. We have to go back at least 65,000 years taking into account the Australians.

[Huggy Bear]

So how is your evidence different from the Norse evidence? There are some old stories but no directly-observable deity. Potato, potahto.

How about a photograph thoroughly vetted scientifically, along with eye witness testimony, and audio recordings of the same event?

That would be 3 pieces of corroborative evidence.

Can anyone provide the same for Odin? If not then it isn't exactly "potato, potaho" is it?

[Cecelia]

This discussion isn't about Yahweh, now is it? In the other thread I clearly stated that I would provide evidence for God if someone provided evidence against and well see who had the most for and against... no one took me up on it.

So far you've only made claims, you've put forth no evidence, so technically there really isn't anything for me to refute... I on the other hand said I would provide corroborative evidence for God, can you at least provide that?

I expect logical consistency.  If I see none, I see no reason to concede the debate. 

All Christians ever do is also make claims.  They never provide evidence or proof.  I'm only holding myself to the same standards you hold yourselves.

[Huggy Bear]

This discussion isn't about Yahweh, now is it? In the other thread I clearly stated that I would provide evidence for God if someone provided evidence against and well see who had the most for and against... no one took me up on it.

So far you've only made claims, you've put forth no evidence, so technically there really isn't anything for me to refute... I on the other hand said I would provide corroborative evidence for God, can you at least provide that?

I expect logical consistency.  If I see none, I see no reason to concede the debate. 

All Christians ever do is also make claims.  They never provide evidence or proof.  I'm only holding myself to the same standards you hold yourselves.

No, I clearly stated I would provide evidence for God and you stated you'd provide evidence for Odin, so where's the evidence?

[haig]

So how is your evidence different from the Norse evidence?  There are some old stories but no directly-observable deity.  Potato, potahto.

How about a photograph thoroughly vetted scientifically, along with eye witness testimony, and audio recordings of the same event?

That would be 3 pieces of corroborative evidence.

Can anyone provide the same for Odin? If not then it isn't exactly "potato, potaho" is it?

So you have a scientifically vetted photo of god? hahahahahahaha