Proving The Resurrection By the Minimal Facts Approach

[robvalue]

Memo totally nailed it, I was going to write the same thing myself but found he'd already done it

I doubt any Christian believes in Christianity because of rationalisations like these. They are attempts to make an irrational belief look rational with pseudo-logic and pseudo-science. And because they don't believe them for these reasons, it makes no difference how many times we rip them to shreds.

I came with a way of paraphrasing all this: they are strawmanning themselves. They are putting forward the position that these arguments are sufficient to base belief on, knowing that it isn't true. Then when they get torn down, the real reasons stay nice and intact because they haven't been put on display.

You're also dead right Nemo, this "technique" just assumes the conclusion must be true, and that there must be a way of logically drawing a line between it and reality. So any argument that does so must be valid. That is the essence of the problem.

I don't say so to boast, but to prove a point: I was totally unindoctrainated as a child. Not raised "atheist", just not any beliefs forced on me at all. I was 5 years old when I was first presented with people trying to convince me of this crap. My critical thinking was developed enough even then to understand this is nonsense. Randy couldn't have convinced me even then. He would have been faced with a child asking him why an adult believes in fairy stories.

If I'd have been indoctrinated, I probably would have believed all these stories. At least until I got older. I hope I would still have found my way out.