Do Extraordinary Claims Require Extraordinary Evidence?

[Jesster]

It's interesting how Steve has written me off, not responding to anything where I quote him.

Sorry that I am shoving the truth in your face, but is such a religious belief really the only alternative?

That's his usual M.O.

I countered his terrible arguments my first month here and he hasn't responded to me since. This is what we call willful ignorance.

[SteveII]

But your entire premise of all the NT players being fooled has absolutely no evidence except people were fooled before and since. In the absence of any real evidence of deceit it seems that is just an assumption entirely based on the supernatural content of the accounts. If that is so, you are question begging: the events are not evidence of the supernatural because the supernatural does not exist.

It's the Bayesian probability that you claim to be employing. We KNOW people have been, can be, and will continue to be deceived. We don't know that miracles are possible. Therefore, it will take more to establish that miracles are possible than stories about miracles by people for whom it is a FACT that they may have been deceived. [1]

In my story about putting on my pants and then hovering over my house via telekinesis, did you have trouble telling which component of my story was more likely to be a deception?

The extraordinary evidence that is referred to is the sort of evidence that would make it more likely for a reasonably skeptical person to conclude that I actually did the telekinetic hovering than that I just made up a story where I have powerful psychokinetic gifts. Does telling another story about my ability to fly with no visible means of support constitute more evidence? What about me getting a friend to support my claim?

Or do all those constitute claims, with no evidence yet presented? [2]

1. I understand you point. However, the NT series of events and body of evidence does not indicate in any way that the people were deceived. So how do you justify keeping that as a live explanatory option? I am not saying you have to find the face-value evidence compelling, but this deceit theory requires you assume things, jump to unwarranted conclusions and ignore other things to make it work. 

2. The problem of these simple analogies is that they are never complete enough. In the NT, we have multiple years, involving thousands of people, with hundreds of unique events and, often overlooked, a coherent message that make sense of what we see from beginning to end. I have never seen one of these analogies even try to cover some of this ground. 

BTW, thanks to the respectful dialog. It is refreshing in a sea of...well, the typical AF experience.

[Foxaèr]

 

BTW, thanks to the respectful dialog. It is refreshing in a sea of...well, the typical AF experience.

Please, I was respectful. I did not curse or call you names.

Rather, you just wanted to remain ignorant rather than continue to respond to me.

[Jesster]

 

BTW, thanks to the respectful dialog. It is refreshing in a sea of...well, the typical AF experience.

Please, I was respectful.  I did not curse or call you names.

Rather, you just wanted to remain ignorant rather than continue to respond to me.

And yet he wants us to just accept it when he's not respectful.

[pocaracas]

Late to the party.... again!

Do Extraordinary Claims Require Extraordinary Evidence?

It seems that the word 'extraordinary' is highly subjective based on a person's knowledge or experience. As an extreme example, wouldn't everything be extraordinary to someone who knew nothing? So, what makes a claim extraordinary? Uncommon or rare things happen every day. What is the threshold from crossing from ordinary to extraordinary that triggers this supposed need for a special class of evidence? And what constitutes this special class of extraordinary evidence? Is is a quantity thing or a quality thing?

While we could apply this discussion to a wide variety of claims, my interest  in the question is does it apply to supernatural/NT claims and if so, how?

For the purpose of this discussion, I define a miracle as a supernatural causation of a physical event, happening in time to physical objects. It is not a suspension of the laws of nature--rather inserting a cause from outside nature. 

First point. Of course someone being supernaturally healed or rising from the dead is an improbable claim. However, the improbability of this event could be counter-balanced by examining the evidence and simply asking the question: what is the probability of this evidence being present had a miracle not occurred? As this probability number goes down, the probability of the event having a supernatural cause goes up. Notice that there is no requirement that the evidence be 'extraordinary'.

Another point is that if the atheist equates supernatural with extraordinary claims (citing a lack of evidence), this implies that ordinary claims are ones that have good evidence to support it. To follow that line of thinking through, what is the good evidence for atheism? In fact, since there is zero evidence for atheism, the presence of the NT evidence and the fact that most people in the world intuitively believes in the supernatural, isn't the atheist making the extraordinary claim? If you go with the BS that atheists make no claims, then I would make the more modest point that atheist's 'extraordinary' assessment of NT claims are unfounded.

(my bold)
I haven't read everything... so... feel free to crucify me if this has already been mentioned...

If this applies to other works of fiction, then maybe... maybe.... maybe... it's not a good measure of reality.
There is zero evidence for a-force-ism, so the Jedi are real.
There is zero evidence for a-faer-ism, so faeries exist.
There is zero evidence for a-warp-speed-ism, so Star Trek is an accurate portrayal of the future.
There is zero evidence for a-pokemon-ism, so there are definitely Japanese kids engaging in small pocket monster slavery for the purpose of battling other similar monsters.
There is zero evidence for a-zylon-ism, so the Earth most surely was the 13th colony.

[KevinM1]

Why are we holding what some people believe in as some kind of objective truth again?

People believing in Santa != Santa actually exists.
People believing in anal probing aliens != those anal probing aliens actually exist.
People believing Jesus was a magic man (not in the Heart sense) != Jesus being a magic man.

It doesn't matter that billions of people think so.  It doesn't matter that there are early references to Christianity in other works (works that don't even attempt to judge the truthiness of the sect's claims, but rather simply acknowledge that, yeah, they existed).  It doesn't matter that you illogically think that Jesus is different/special and not beholden to logic.

No freshman philosophy teacher would give that line of reasoning a passing grade.

[shadow]

Kind of. While there might be such a thing as an extraordinary event, there is no such thing as a class of extraordinary evidence. There is no philosophical basis in which to demand more than regular evidence and assessment and so this whole enterprise is nothing more than special pleading/moving the goal post/hyperskepticism (thanks RR!). 

We don't demand more than regular evidence and assessment on a philosophical basis: we demand it because we want to draw good conclusions to make good decisions. If someone's claiming something that is within the laws of physics, is supported by empirical evidence and has no profit motive, I don't need as much convincing to believe them as if they are claiming there is an all powerful being controlling my destiny who wants me to give them my money. You really don't understand why?

I can answer 1 and 2a together by explaining it is a cumulative body of evidence that, when considered as a whole, has been compelling to a significant amount of people.
- Documentary (both actual and inferred)
- The churches, the growth, the persecution, and the occasional mention in surviving secular works.
- The characters, their actions, character, stated goals, meaning of their words, and eventual circumstances
- Jesus' own claims (explicit, implicit, connections to the OT--some of which the disciples may have never known).
- The actual message: how it seems to fit the human condition, resonate with people, and how it does not contradict the OT--which would have required a very sophisticated mind to have navigated that.
- Paul and his writings on application--done before the Gospels were independently written. To have them work so well together is incredible.
- This one can't be stressed enough: the likelihood of alternate theories to explain the facts. I think it is obvious people believed from day one when Jesus was still walking around. I have never heard a alternate theory which could account for most or all of the concrete and circumstantial evidence we have.

I don't understand how any of this is evidence.

3. So my point here is that that your position on the existence of the supernatural is not backed by even ordinary evidence. We can then weigh against the evidence I listed above (and much more) AND the properly basic belief of most of the population of the world (now and in the past) that the supernatural exists. The conclusion is that a demand for extraordinary evidence is unfounded (and a result of special pleading/moving the goal post/hyperskepticism).

About 1000 years ago, germ theory was inconceivable. People also believed in witches, that the earth was flat, that the sun moved around the earth. Was the fact that the majority of the population believed in these entirely false assumptions a testament to their validity? Or is a belief in witches the result of fear, misinformation, and a lack of education? It is entirely false to say that because people believe something it is true. If you can prove something it is true. I have no interest in whether a belief is 'compelling to a significant amount of people'. Islam is compelling to 1.8 billion people: do you believe that as well?

[SteveII]

Late to the party.... again!

Do Extraordinary Claims Require Extraordinary Evidence?

It seems that the word 'extraordinary' is highly subjective based on a person's knowledge or experience. As an extreme example, wouldn't everything be extraordinary to someone who knew nothing? So, what makes a claim extraordinary? Uncommon or rare things happen every day. What is the threshold from crossing from ordinary to extraordinary that triggers this supposed need for a special class of evidence? And what constitutes this special class of extraordinary evidence? Is is a quantity thing or a quality thing?

While we could apply this discussion to a wide variety of claims, my interest  in the question is does it apply to supernatural/NT claims and if so, how?

For the purpose of this discussion, I define a miracle as a supernatural causation of a physical event, happening in time to physical objects. It is not a suspension of the laws of nature--rather inserting a cause from outside nature. 

First point. Of course someone being supernaturally healed or rising from the dead is an improbable claim. However, the improbability of this event could be counter-balanced by examining the evidence and simply asking the question: what is the probability of this evidence being present had a miracle not occurred? As this probability number goes down, the probability of the event having a supernatural cause goes up. Notice that there is no requirement that the evidence be 'extraordinary'.

Another point is that if the atheist equates supernatural with extraordinary claims (citing a lack of evidence), this implies that ordinary claims are ones that have good evidence to support it. To follow that line of thinking through, what is the good evidence for atheism? In fact, since there is zero evidence for atheism, the presence of the NT evidence and the fact that most people in the world intuitively believes in the supernatural, isn't the atheist making the extraordinary claim? If you go with the BS that atheists make no claims, then I would make the more modest point that atheist's 'extraordinary' assessment of NT claims are unfounded.

(my bold)
I haven't read everything... so... feel free to crucify me if this has already been mentioned...

If this applies to other works of fiction, then maybe... maybe.... maybe... it's not a good measure of reality.
There is zero evidence for a-force-ism, so the Jedi are real.
There is zero evidence for a-faer-ism, so faeries exist.
There is zero evidence for a-warp-speed-ism, so Star Trek is an accurate portrayal of the future.
There is zero evidence for a-pokemon-ism, so there are definitely Japanese kids engaging in small pocket monster slavery for the purpose of battling other similar monsters.
There is zero evidence for a-zylon-ism, so the Earth most surely was the 13th colony.

That is nowhere near what that sentence says, implies, or means. I will try again.

1. Supernatural events are extraordinary claims because of difficulty obtaining evidence.
2. Ordinary claims are ones in which good evidence is possible to obtain.
3. There is no evidence for atheism 
4. There is some evidence for God (natural theology, revealed theology, the person of Jesus/events of his life, personal experience, properly basic belief in the supernatural in ~90% or the world's population).
5. If evidence for the existence of God can be obtained and cannot be obtained for his non-existence, then on the question of God's existence, at worst, the atheism is making the extraordinary claim, and at best the distinction of 'extraordinary' becomes meaningless.

[Minimalist]

Anyone want to discuss this part of the OP:

First point. Of course someone being supernaturally healed or rising from the dead is an improbable claim. However, the improbability of this event could be counter-balanced by examining the evidence and simply asking the question: what is the probability of this evidence being present had a miracle not occurred? As this probability number goes down, the probability of the event having a supernatural cause goes up.

Sure, Stevie.  As the probability number goes down the probability of the event ever happening falls off a cliff.

We have no need to believe in your stupid bullshit.  When you can face that personality flaw of yours perhaps then you will understand why you are not taken seriously.

You should have outgrown the need for invisible friends around the age of 5.  You need a shrink.

[Wyrd of Gawd]

Historical evidence also exists that some people believed that Jesus miraculously created a woman from his side and then had sex with her (or, at least tried to), but Steve doubts that claim.

The Apocrypha contains lots of historical evidence that theists ignore.

---

Theists have been cherry picking since the very beginning when they decided what books should and should not be included in the Unholy bible.

The Apocrypha was an integral part of the Bible until 1881.  Then two English guys got bugs up their butts and deleted it.  And just like that, the Protestant Bible popped into existence, just 136 years ago.