tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8716347331682132223.post3032519307693081041..comments2023-10-20T02:08:39.524-07:00Comments on Atheism: Proving The Negative: The Implications of the Historical Jesus QuestionMatt McCormickhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17071078570021986664noreply@blogger.comBlogger20125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8716347331682132223.post-4537240240951691432010-05-14T07:37:22.608-07:002010-05-14T07:37:22.608-07:00I briefly flirted with fideism not too long before...I briefly flirted with fideism not too long before my deconversion. Wittgenstein and historical arguments played a significant role in that process. It was Wittgenstein (and majoring in math) that made me realize that belief/axiomatic systems can be in opposition yet internally consistent. And that was how I realized that to be rational in my belief I needed to see how it looked from the outside(this was long before Loftus coined his "outsider test for faith). And so I did, and the historical and textual analysis (and majoring in religious studies)did my childhood belief system in.<br /><br />So it isn't true that Christians proposing the historial approach aren't completely intellectually honest. It's just that the ones that are completely honest about it usually end up agnostic and then atheists.svenjaminhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09843201972958214387noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8716347331682132223.post-79899611867561104582010-05-02T17:25:07.450-07:002010-05-02T17:25:07.450-07:00This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.DMhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11389651479904502758noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8716347331682132223.post-7370415194775329962010-05-02T16:04:12.038-07:002010-05-02T16:04:12.038-07:00This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.DMhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11389651479904502758noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8716347331682132223.post-61922610251067056552010-05-01T14:24:07.798-07:002010-05-01T14:24:07.798-07:00This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.DMhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11389651479904502758noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8716347331682132223.post-51432616163536921442010-04-30T11:59:39.029-07:002010-04-30T11:59:39.029-07:00Richard Carrier who you cite is a good example of ...<i>Richard Carrier who you cite is a good example of this. He was defeated by William Lane Craig in their debate, even by his own admission. And yet what happened? Did he alter his views?</i><br /><br />Superior debating skills are not the same thing as superior arguments.Reginald Selkirkhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09295966091652856726noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8716347331682132223.post-7093932524584091102010-04-30T03:04:15.060-07:002010-04-30T03:04:15.060-07:00Of course this all goes the other way too. An athe...Of course this all goes the other way too. An atheist engaging in this debate has to be at least open to the evidence, when in fact many do not appear to be.<br /><br />Richard Carrier who you cite is a good example of this. He was defeated by William Lane Craig in their debate, even by his own admission. And yet what happened? Did he alter his views?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8716347331682132223.post-87449104504175839192010-04-26T06:46:43.022-07:002010-04-26T06:46:43.022-07:00You lump the historical existence of a person name...You lump the historical existence of a person named Jesus and the question of the historicity of his resurrection together in this argument, but the consequences of these two claims are not entirely equivalent.<br /><br />The question of the existence of a person named Jesus will hurt the theist case if answered in the negative, but will not hurt the atheist if answered in the affirmative, since the this is a quite ordinary answer to a quite ordinary question, and does not go far at all in supporting the miraculous and supernatural claims attached to that person, for reason which are addressed in your argument.<br /><br />Or, as I like to put it: was there a real lumberjack named Paul Bunyan? Does it matter?Reginald Selkirkhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09295966091652856726noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8716347331682132223.post-8369822386229419262010-04-25T05:31:49.842-07:002010-04-25T05:31:49.842-07:00Matt,
There is an excellent article entitled, The...Matt,<br /><br />There is an excellent article entitled, <a href="http://new.exchristian.net/2010/04/jesus-nobody-ever-knew.html" rel="nofollow">The Jesus Nobody Knew</a>, which you might find relevant to this discussion.Ken Pulliamhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12161943466797514854noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8716347331682132223.post-10453470451282205182010-04-25T05:04:21.034-07:002010-04-25T05:04:21.034-07:00This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.Unknownhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17700271084635840759noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8716347331682132223.post-32920454509879980112010-04-24T14:13:16.600-07:002010-04-24T14:13:16.600-07:00Ken--
I believe some (Avalos for one) have called ...Ken--<br />I believe some (Avalos for one) have called Craig on this.<br /><br />But anyway, even though he does say the awful thing, does he really mean it? To me, he seems quite sincerely (however mistakenly) to believe that he does have a solid case built on the application of normal historical standards. <br /><br />We know his apologetic well--it's in his Reasonable Christianity book, many of his occasional pieces, every debate. And that apologetic case does NOT rest on the notion "you should believe because when I was seventeen (or whatever) the Holy Spirit transformed my life." It rests on what purports to be solid, informed, logical reasons of a kind that could weigh on the objective reader or listener. <br /><br />So yes, rhetorically, he's on record saying (maybe for theological as well as autobiographical reasons) "what's decisive isn't what I'm about to say." But then he goes on to say a great deal that, were it valid, should sway us--and sways him.Jameshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02594317489026507409noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8716347331682132223.post-13538700786108522962010-04-24T14:03:05.372-07:002010-04-24T14:03:05.372-07:00Two virtues of non-evidentiary religious belief:
1...Two virtues of non-evidentiary religious belief:<br />1. Its firmness--how infirm a foundation history provides. It seems religion requires something less shaky than the kind of evidence provided by most of ancient history. Maybe pieces of ancient history could provide a secure foundation--imagine a (weird) religion founded on the proposition that Julius Caesar was assassinated (maybe also specifically be Brutus, Cassius, etc.) on the Ides of March. As historical facts go, this seems a pretty secure one. Surely it rates as high as Sanders’ highest rated certainties about Jesus.<br /> But if one moves from Rome and imperial affairs to the provincial back water that is first-century Palestine, and to the the gospel/Pauline record (with a little Josephus and Tacitus and such thrown in), it would seem one is driven to rely on a kind of empirical evidence that entails some considerable uncertainty. And considerable uncertainty must undermine--remove the foundational character of--a set of beliefs one takes to be indispensable for salvation and to point toward guideposts that determine the direction of one’s life. <br /> In other words, Wittgenstein was onto something when he noted that religious believers in fact do not believe in a way that at all resembles the way professional historians believe. This isn’t just accurate sociology, it’s also good philosophy/theology. Religious conviction is of a type that empirical investigation cannot subserve. <br /><br />2. There’s a good thing about Plantinga and Tillich. When you do history well, and conclude that by the application of ordinary historical standards, the case for the historicity of the Resurrection is weak, they may hear you and not come up with bogus counter-arguments. (Though I’m not sure but that Plantinga might not--but at least he’d see the strength of your evidentiary case.) That is, Craig and Habermas and even Wright, though he knows better, feel compelled, because they are evidentialists, to do bad history--to become special pleaders for orthodox Christianity, to traduce normal standards of historical inquiry. But since their faith doesn’t rest on normal historical inquiry, but elsewhere (granted, maybe only in some other epistemic swampland), they aren’t forced to misapply, distort, ignore, standards of historical inquiry. <br /><br />So from the standpoint of a religion one can believe in--seriously believe, build one’s life around, stand on and move out from--the flimsy evidence of the evangelists and Paul (and maybe much of the rest of the evidence historians have to make do with) serves the believer only ill. <br /><br />And the non-evidentialist need not be but a faux historian, can be a true believer.Jameshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02594317489026507409noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8716347331682132223.post-70253061957389099802010-04-24T11:28:44.266-07:002010-04-24T11:28:44.266-07:00Matt,
Good post. One person you left out is Willi...Matt,<br /><br />Good post. One person you left out is William Craig who says he <b>knows</b> Christianity is true because of the "inner witness of the Spirit." Although he makes a pretense of being interested in the historical evidence, he is on record as saying that even if the evidence was against the resurrection, he would still believe it was true because of the inner witness. Why no one calls him on this in a debate is a mystery to me.Ken Pulliamhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12161943466797514854noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8716347331682132223.post-83515084383498158642010-04-24T06:42:49.889-07:002010-04-24T06:42:49.889-07:00This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.DMhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11389651479904502758noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8716347331682132223.post-47387627679340144312010-04-24T06:41:40.685-07:002010-04-24T06:41:40.685-07:00This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.DMhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11389651479904502758noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8716347331682132223.post-39752898234277310642010-04-24T03:49:17.122-07:002010-04-24T03:49:17.122-07:00This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.DMhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11389651479904502758noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8716347331682132223.post-34127319490112136962010-04-23T21:59:21.020-07:002010-04-23T21:59:21.020-07:00Thanks AIG, I'll read that. Looks interesting...Thanks AIG, I'll read that. Looks interesting. A thought: one mistake that many people in this discussion have been making is to treat the question as a historical matter. The history of the Jesus story is important of course, but even more important are all the things we now know about the way human judgment works, psychology, confabulation, hallucination, and so on. The epistemology and the psychology are more important in the case of the history of over wrought religious zealots. <br />MMMatt McCormickhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17071078570021986664noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8716347331682132223.post-5509623121134072242010-04-23T21:53:28.080-07:002010-04-23T21:53:28.080-07:00Hey Matt,
Have you seen Richard Carrier's lat...Hey Matt,<br /><br />Have you seen Richard Carrier's latest article on his website?<br /><br />http://www.richardcarrier.info/axioms.pdf<br /><br />Pretty good stuff if you ask me.AIGBustedhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03232781356086767207noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8716347331682132223.post-46716486875067669182010-04-23T21:18:48.247-07:002010-04-23T21:18:48.247-07:00Thanks Matthew. Those terms seem pretentious, I k...Thanks Matthew. Those terms seem pretentious, I know. All I mean is that there are a bunch of strange existential, post-modern, and post-natural theology views out there. See Wittgenstein, Kierkegaard, Tillich, and recent Plantinga. <br /><br />If someone takes this "God destroys or creates evidence as he wants" line, then we're just done. They need to be dumped back into the hopper and recycled. <br /><br />MMMatt McCormickhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17071078570021986664noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8716347331682132223.post-56656728619848705972010-04-23T19:00:09.337-07:002010-04-23T19:00:09.337-07:00Just when I think I understand what you're wri...Just when I think I understand what you're writing, you go and throw out those big words:<br /><br />"There are Wittgensteinian, Fideistic, Kierkegaardian, Tillich-ian, and Plantinga style approaches among many others"<br /><br />My ego remains firmly in check. ;)<br /><br />I think the easiest thing for the believer to fall back on is the idea that a god could create or destroy evidence as he sees fit to maintain the "faith" aspect of the religion. I know it's ridiculously circular, but in their place that would be my first reaction.<br /><br />But then I'd have to ask, is faith a fundamental aspect of religion, or a by-product of the lack of evidence/reason? They seem like similar ideas, but if it is the former, it will be neigh on impossible to convince someone to even look at evidence. They will say not only is there no evidence, but there isn't supposed to be any. Any evidenciary argument, they think, will be null and void.<br /><br />If it is the latter, the more reason-based religious person should (I hope) readily except the idea and possibly be able to fundamentally change their mind on how they view religious ideas.<br /><br />Now I'll go look up those big words.<br />MHMatthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07068629169998511865noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8716347331682132223.post-47446792362990646252010-04-23T18:16:54.311-07:002010-04-23T18:16:54.311-07:00This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.DMhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11389651479904502758noreply@blogger.com