(August 9, 2020 at 5:31 pm)John 6IX Breezy Wrote: Evidence by it's very nature requires interpretation. In other words, evidence is theory-dependant. Data only becomes evidence when you look at it through a particular lens.
You mean like when scientists proved through radiometric dating that shroud of Turin is a fake made 630 years ago, but Christians insist that it's the scientists who are wrong because (as they claim): Masonic lodges interfered with the testing; radiometric testing doesn't work anyway; Jesus was full of radiation when he resurrected so it interfered with radioactive carbon, etc.
Because yeah, that's closed minded. Christians are the one trying to falsify the evidence with their wishful thinking, while scientists just provided the evidence with no "particular lens" on scientists side.
teachings of the Bible are so muddled and self-contradictory that it was possible for Christians to happily burn heretics alive for five long centuries. It was even possible for the most venerated patriarchs of the Church, like St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas, to conclude that heretics should be tortured (Augustine) or killed outright (Aquinas). Martin Luther and John Calvin advocated the wholesale murder of heretics, apostates, Jews, and witches. - Sam Harris, "Letter To A Christian Nation"
