Religious Background

[TheBeardedDude]

You've still completely missed the point of my comparison of alien abduction with Christianity's claims. Each are a series of fantastical claims without evidence that are contra to everything we know about our world. Believing in them would require a lot of what we know to be wrong. Things for which we have evidence. It isn't special pleading. Special pleading would be rejecting the similarities I've listed for the reasons you've already posted (to be clear, it's special pleading you engage in when trying to reject one set of claims, alien abductions, but not another, the Bible's claims). [II]

If someone tells me that they have a dog, I'd probably believe them. It requires no suspension of the way the world works to believe someone I know has a dog.

If someone tells me that they have a pink unicorn in their garage but it only appears to select people, I'm going to need to see some evidence before I'll believe any part of it. That's where the similarity is between Christianity and other fantastical claims (alien abduction, magic, out of body experiences, ghost haunting, etc). [III]

There are documents that predate Paul, and none of them tell any of the stories written in the gospels. At best you have a couple of people who wrote about a guy named Yeshua who lived in the Middle East at the time. That observation doesn't corroborate any of the stories attributed to him. [IV]

And I'm not rejecting it simply because it's hearsay, I'm rejecting it because it is hearsay that is without corroborating evidence AND because believing the stories are true requires a belief in magic. If I ever see evidence magic is real or even possible, I'll reconsider. [V]

And no, this isn't a circular argument. The straw man you've attempted to construct is.

Since you've mischaracterized much of what I've said thus far, let me break it down more simply:
1) literal interpretation of the Bible (new and old testaments) is not possible because we know things in the Bible could not have literally happened (no evidence of a flood or special creation or a man-god or angels or talking animals, etc)
2) individual interpretations without an objective standard to compare to are unreliable. Making anyone's interpretation as valid as any other and interpretations can be literal polar opposites. If these are interpretations about a universal truth, then it is nonsensical that they'd arrive at polar opposite conclusions when using the same means
3) given that one could make the same observations about other myths, it appears that the Christian religion is as much a myth as the Greek and Roman mythologies


Cheers
TheBeardedDude

I appreciate the discussion. Thanks!

I. Your comparison continues to be ineffective on two levels.  The first is the 'no evidence' nonsense. Comparing what one person reports is very different than what thousands upon thousands saw over three years. The second, an alien abduction is not claiming anything but naturalistic events--all thing under the purview of science. The NT is claiming supernatural events. Science cannot in any way comment on whether miracles can or do happen so therefore believing them does not require anything science tells us 'to be wrong' (at all). 

II. It is your claim of 'no evidence' that is special pleading. You accept every other historical account as evidenced but exclude this one. There are no similarities between the claim of alien abduction and the most attested to series of events in ancient history: the life of Jesus, so no special pleading on my part.

III. And so you should. Good thing we have all the evidence of the churches, letters, and gospels outlining what thousands of people believed immediately following the life and death of Jesus. It may be that that is not enough evidence for you, but that is a personal decision and not an objective one. 

IV. How in the world would you know any of that? How do you account for the churches all across the Roman empire that existed before Paul stared writing? Your belief is fringe at best (and that is quite generous).

V. You throw the phrase 'corroborating evidence' in there to make you position sound reasonable, but, what does that even mean? Multiple accounts? Other writings illustrating that people believed the events really happened? The existence of churches shortly after in disparate locations that believed the events really happened?  Your comment is clearly circular reasoning: The NT can't be evidence of miracles (magic as you call it) because you have never seen evidence of miracles, and your claim there is no 'corroborating evidence' is just putting window dressing on a bad argument. 

Perhaps the problem is in definitions.

• Evidence refers to pieces of information or facts that help us establish the truth of something. Proof is a conclusion about the truth of something after analyzing the evidence. Evidence is suggestive of a conclusion. Proof is concrete and conclusive.
  
• The churches spread throughout the empire within 15 years of Jesus' death, the 27 different authenticated writings discussing Jesus and his teachings, and ancillary works and references throughout the first century is certainly evidence that Jesus did what the people claim he did and said the things they claim he said.
  
• Proof can have different thresholds. Anywhere from more likely than not (preponderance of the evidence), to beyond a reasonable doubt, to absolute. These are all arrived at by considering evidence. So, to say that my list is not evidence is simply wrong. What you mean is that in your opinion, it is not proof. That's fine--that is the threshold you chose.
  

1. It would be foolish and wrong to read everything 'literal'. That word actually means to determine meaning without critical thought, source, context, style, or any other number of inputs that go into the writing of anything. Genesis was never intended to be a science book. It was intended to teach the truths that needed to be understood to the Jewish people for whom it was written in the time it was written. Whatever truths we can glean from it today must be understood in that context. 

Regarding the recording of miracles anywhere in the Bible, there is no logical basis on which you can rest your conclusion that miracles didn't, couldn't, or don't still happen. If someone (ancient or modern) describes an obvious miracle, you can either believe of not believe. You cannot use logic or science to determine the truth of the matter. 

2. The alternative of taking things 'literal' is definitely not 'individual interpretation'. Hermeneutics and the complete exegesis of passages is quite thorough and certainly can put a stop to "Making anyone's interpretation as valid as any other and interpretations". 
 

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hermeneutics
  
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exegesis
  

Exegesis includes a wide range of critical disciplines: textual criticism is the investigation into the history and origins of the text, but exegesis may include the study of the historical and cultural backgrounds for the author, the text, and the original audience. Other analyses include classification of the type of literary genres present in the text and analysis of grammatical and syntactical features in the text itself.

I would say that more than 95% of the teachings of the NT are not ambiguous at all. So, to rephrase your objection, maybe 5% of the doctrines of the NT are open for interpretation. These are not 'individual interpretations', but different ways of taking a passage or a group of passages and how they fit into an overall systematic theology. In other words, they are well thought out and have an entire structure to consider. Your objection seem to be another straw man. 

3. Your premises are faulty so any conclusion you draw from them is invalid.

I) special pleading

II) I don't automatically accept any and all other "historical" accounts. Straw man

III) appeal to consensus. A lot of people believing something only tells me that they believe it. It says literally nothing about the validity or accuracy of their beliefs

IV) Paul founded the Christian church. So how does one explain the existence of multiple sects of a religious cult running around the Middle East? Pretty easy, they believed the tales/legends/myths being presented to them

V) magic doesn't exist. Sorry to break that to you

*evidence refers to a piece of information that logically connects to a conclusion. There is no evidence of supernature or supernatural processes

**and the churches of Scientology, Islam, Mormonism, etc, all spread within either the lifetime of their messiah or shortly after their death. Once again, all this tells us is that people believed it. Not that what they believed is true. If the spread of an idea is more likely to be true the closer the spread is to the lifetime of the messiah, then Christianity would lose to those previously mentioned. You going to convert to Scientology based on your logic here?

1) miracles aren't really, sorry. Magic still doesn't exist, sorry. And when it comes to a god spreading their message via stories that require interpretation (with no direction this is the case nor any guidance as to how to correctly interpret them as evidenced by the conflicting interpretations out there), that's a rather stupid way for a perfect being to spread their message. It makes much more sense that ignorant humans wrote a series of myths because that's what humans had been doing and continued to do.

2) theological bs doesn't convince me of anything other than the ability for people to argue and debate over fictional stories. You can see literally the same thing on any given message-board for any other fictional universe (lord of the rings, Harry Potter, etc). Once again, a god divining information to primitive humans and expecting them to write a message that would apply to humanity 2,000 years later, requires some special pleading (something you constantly accuse me of but appear to engage in regularly). Why would a god choose these ignorant humans for spreading its message via stories that some take literal, and others don't? (and those that don't will have multiple conflicting interpretations)

I don't care about the "teachings" of the NT. I care about the context of these stories and the accuracy and validity of the whole story. I can get meaningful life lessons from Harry Potter but that doesn't mean I think Harry Potter was real.

3) you're straw men of my arguments are tiring and boring. You should refrain from so many logical errors




Cheers
TheBeardedDude

---

You've still completely missed the point of my comparison of alien abduction with Christianity's claims. Each are a series of fantastical claims without evidence that are contra to everything we know about our world. Believing in them would require a lot of what we know to be wrong. Things for which we have evidence. It isn't special pleading. Special pleading would be rejecting the similarities I've listed for the reasons you've already posted (to be clear, it's special pleading you engage in when trying to reject one set of claims, alien abductions, but not another, the Bible's claims). [II]

If someone tells me that they have a dog, I'd probably believe them. It requires no suspension of the way the world works to believe someone I know has a dog.

If someone tells me that they have a pink unicorn in their garage but it only appears to select people, I'm going to need to see some evidence before I'll believe any part of it. That's where the similarity is between Christianity and other fantastical claims (alien abduction, magic, out of body experiences, ghost haunting, etc). [III]

There are documents that predate Paul, and none of them tell any of the stories written in the gospels. At best you have a couple of people who wrote about a guy named Yeshua who lived in the Middle East at the time. That observation doesn't corroborate any of the stories attributed to him. [IV]

And I'm not rejecting it simply because it's hearsay, I'm rejecting it because it is hearsay that is without corroborating evidence AND because believing the stories are true requires a belief in magic. If I ever see evidence magic is real or even possible, I'll reconsider. [V]

And no, this isn't a circular argument. The straw man you've attempted to construct is.

Since you've mischaracterized much of what I've said thus far, let me break it down more simply:
1) literal interpretation of the Bible (new and old testaments) is not possible because we know things in the Bible could not have literally happened (no evidence of a flood or special creation or a man-god or angels or talking animals, etc)
2) individual interpretations without an objective standard to compare to are unreliable. Making anyone's interpretation as valid as any other and interpretations can be literal polar opposites. If these are interpretations about a universal truth, then it is nonsensical that they'd arrive at polar opposite conclusions when using the same means
3) given that one could make the same observations about other myths, it appears that the Christian religion is as much a myth as the Greek and Roman mythologies


Cheers
TheBeardedDude

I appreciate the discussion. Thanks!

I. Your comparison continues to be ineffective on two levels.  The first is the 'no evidence' nonsense. Comparing what one person reports is very different than what thousands upon thousands saw over three years. The second, an alien abduction is not claiming anything but naturalistic events--all thing under the purview of science. The NT is claiming supernatural events. Science cannot in any way comment on whether miracles can or do happen so therefore believing them does not require anything science tells us 'to be wrong' (at all). 

II. It is your claim of 'no evidence' that is special pleading. You accept every other historical account as evidenced but exclude this one. There are no similarities between the claim of alien abduction and the most attested to series of events in ancient history: the life of Jesus, so no special pleading on my part.

III. And so you should. Good thing we have all the evidence of the churches, letters, and gospels outlining what thousands of people believed immediately following the life and death of Jesus. It may be that that is not enough evidence for you, but that is a personal decision and not an objective one. 

IV. How in the world would you know any of that? How do you account for the churches all across the Roman empire that existed before Paul stared writing? Your belief is fringe at best (and that is quite generous).

V. You throw the phrase 'corroborating evidence' in there to make you position sound reasonable, but, what does that even mean? Multiple accounts? Other writings illustrating that people believed the events really happened? The existence of churches shortly after in disparate locations that believed the events really happened?  Your comment is clearly circular reasoning: The NT can't be evidence of miracles (magic as you call it) because you have never seen evidence of miracles, and your claim there is no 'corroborating evidence' is just putting window dressing on a bad argument. 

Perhaps the problem is in definitions.

• Evidence refers to pieces of information or facts that help us establish the truth of something. Proof is a conclusion about the truth of something after analyzing the evidence. Evidence is suggestive of a conclusion. Proof is concrete and conclusive.
  
• The churches spread throughout the empire within 15 years of Jesus' death, the 27 different authenticated writings discussing Jesus and his teachings, and ancillary works and references throughout the first century is certainly evidence that Jesus did what the people claim he did and said the things they claim he said.
  
• Proof can have different thresholds. Anywhere from more likely than not (preponderance of the evidence), to beyond a reasonable doubt, to absolute. These are all arrived at by considering evidence. So, to say that my list is not evidence is simply wrong. What you mean is that in your opinion, it is not proof. That's fine--that is the threshold you chose.
  

1. It would be foolish and wrong to read everything 'literal'. That word actually means to determine meaning without critical thought, source, context, style, or any other number of inputs that go into the writing of anything. Genesis was never intended to be a science book. It was intended to teach the truths that needed to be understood to the Jewish people for whom it was written in the time it was written. Whatever truths we can glean from it today must be understood in that context. 

Regarding the recording of miracles anywhere in the Bible, there is no logical basis on which you can rest your conclusion that miracles didn't, couldn't, or don't still happen. If someone (ancient or modern) describes an obvious miracle, you can either believe of not believe. You cannot use logic or science to determine the truth of the matter. 

2. The alternative of taking things 'literal' is definitely not 'individual interpretation'. Hermeneutics and the complete exegesis of passages is quite thorough and certainly can put a stop to "Making anyone's interpretation as valid as any other and interpretations". 
 

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hermeneutics
  
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exegesis
  

Exegesis includes a wide range of critical disciplines: textual criticism is the investigation into the history and origins of the text, but exegesis may include the study of the historical and cultural backgrounds for the author, the text, and the original audience. Other analyses include classification of the type of literary genres present in the text and analysis of grammatical and syntactical features in the text itself.

I would say that more than 95% of the teachings of the NT are not ambiguous at all. So, to rephrase your objection, maybe 5% of the doctrines of the NT are open for interpretation. These are not 'individual interpretations', but different ways of taking a passage or a group of passages and how they fit into an overall systematic theology. In other words, they are well thought out and have an entire structure to consider. Your objection seem to be another straw man. 

3. Your premises are faulty so any conclusion you draw from them is invalid.

You need to understand my principle position on rejecting religious arguments: I don't see any evidence that demonstrates a god is a possible thing to exist. So appealing to theological or religious arguments to explain what you believe and why, is irrelevant to me. I don't care because I don't believe the basis for your belief system has ever been established as possible.

So if you want any of your theological special pleading arguments to be accepted (or even considered), I need to see that a god is a possible thing to exist. Given the characters, attributes, and stories attributed to your god, we can reasonably say 2 things: 1) this god is supposed to be able to interact upon the universe (it is supposedly the thing that created it) and 2) this god is supposed to be able to interact within the universe (answer prayers, communicate to humans, etc)

Both of these mean that direct evidence should exist so as to demonstrate that this god is possible. When it comes to 1, we've no evidence that the universe requires a cause and no evidence that if a cause does exist that it would be a sentient or conscious entity. And even assuming a conscious/sentient entity were the first cause, this argument does not provide a logical connection to show that this god (or gods) is the Christian one.

When it comes to 2, we've never observed magic or miracles and confirmed them to be such. At best we have weird events/circumstances that we don't have a sufficient explanation for. Extrapolating from these scenarios to call them "miracles" or "magic" is an argument from ignorance.


And then once you add on top of this all of the issues with how the Bible came to be, it makes it all the more obvious that it's a human construct. Early versions of the OT texts even make reference to more than one god within them! (The "thou shalt have no other gods before me" is a great example of how the ancient Jews who formed the foundational cult of the Abrahamic religions believed in a polytheistic religion).


When it comes down to it, I don't have any reason to give any default credibility to the Bible or any of its stories. I need evidence to demonstrate that it's core claim (god exists) is valid and then evidence of its lesser claims (miracles) in order to determine they are possible. So when you find some evidence of your god, I'll be all ears.


Cheers
TheBeardedDude