RE: Evidence for atheist claims
May 7, 2016 at 2:45 am
(This post was last modified: May 7, 2016 at 2:48 am by robvalue.)
I'd like to raise another point regarding trying to compare anecdotes used in court, and anecdotes of a supernatural nature.
This is a hopelessly flawed comparison. There is a very clear limit regarding what would ever be accepted as "evidence" in any sane courtroom. That limit is that it must involve things we already know about and understand. It cannot contain ghosts, gods, sentient fireballs or angels.
We know that the above type of evidence, even with that limit applied, is very unreliable. It is only ever (properly) used as supporting evidence for a decision in court.
But now consider an anecdote that involves something we don't yet understand well, like an angel say. We're faced with even more problems:
1) We are relying on them telling the truth.
2) We are relying on them accurately recalling what happened.
3) We are relying on them accurately identifying and categorizing phenomena previously unknown to science.
This third part alone makes the whole thing a total joke. Absolutely no one has the authority or credibility to do this, in my estimation. At the very best, we have an unexplained/unknown phenomenon being described. The fact that many different anecdotes happen to use the same word/vague description of things like angels does not make it credible. It just means we have lots of people getting well above their station in terms of what they can accurately identify, and are referencing popular mythology.
This is a hopelessly flawed comparison. There is a very clear limit regarding what would ever be accepted as "evidence" in any sane courtroom. That limit is that it must involve things we already know about and understand. It cannot contain ghosts, gods, sentient fireballs or angels.
We know that the above type of evidence, even with that limit applied, is very unreliable. It is only ever (properly) used as supporting evidence for a decision in court.
But now consider an anecdote that involves something we don't yet understand well, like an angel say. We're faced with even more problems:
1) We are relying on them telling the truth.
2) We are relying on them accurately recalling what happened.
3) We are relying on them accurately identifying and categorizing phenomena previously unknown to science.
This third part alone makes the whole thing a total joke. Absolutely no one has the authority or credibility to do this, in my estimation. At the very best, we have an unexplained/unknown phenomenon being described. The fact that many different anecdotes happen to use the same word/vague description of things like angels does not make it credible. It just means we have lots of people getting well above their station in terms of what they can accurately identify, and are referencing popular mythology.
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Index of useful threads and discussions
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Quickstart guide to the forum