Star formation: good-freagin'-grief!

[Roy]

To compare what we have against YEC with the resurrection, we would need to have in virtually every town and hamlet a piece of Jesus' bone sitting in a glass case showing us He did not rise from the dead.

I thought they only came in boxes of ten?


Roy

[Jorge]

You mean by matters you disagree with. I got it.

**********************************************************************************************

See? That's the dishonesty from you people that I often refer to.

Thanks for providing such a vivid, lucid example.

Jorge

[Jorge]

Here is where I think you jump the rails. We have no positive evidence directly related to this one claim that can disprove it (e.g., a testimony from someone who saw the "resurrected Jesus" take of his disguise and turn out to be Mary Magedelene, for example), but we do have a significant amount of positive evidence about resurrection claims in general. I think it can be safely said that every instance of a claimed resurrection I have encountered where evidence was available - it disproved the event. Since the same is true for every other miraculous claim I've encountered, I feel quite confident in believing the miraculous claims of the bible are likewise unlikely to be true. And the evidence claiming they are true is nowhere near adequate to reverse that judgment.

The same would be true of the YEC claim.

Michel

***********************************************************************************

I'm going to enjoy watching you, an Atheist, argue with O-Mudd, a Christian TE,
what I know all too well. These people (TEs) can't get it through their thick skulls
that theirs is a SELECTIVE belief making it a dishonest position for Christ. [Of
course, I realize that this is not your goal but it will be one of the spinoffs.]

Even Atheists, as spiritually blind as they are, know of this compromise. Let note
be taken that I am in agreement with an Atheist on this point.

Aside from that, Atheists are clueless about the "YEC claim" so they should
remain silent on that subject.

Jorge

[wattsr1]

Aside from that, Atheists are clueless about the "YEC claim" so they should
remain silent on that subject.

Jorge

Is this why you don't wish to argue Biblical meteorology with me Jorge? You are clueless and so choose to remain silent? However, being clueless and remaining silent is not how you behave. So what is your reason?


Regards, Roland

[Carpedm9587]

Hummm, sounds like some pretty good ways to simply reject it outright so let me begin:

1. I somehow doubt that people that spent day and night with Jesus for several years would be fooled by somebody 'wearing his disguise'. Did you somehow think the disciples were stupid or something?

Let me get this right. I'm putting forward an example of evidence that would support my position (e.g., positive testimony that the thing was a fraud), noting that such evidence does NOT exist (which strengthens the Christian claim) and you want to argue about it?

2. Just because X case of a miricle is false, does not make each and every case false. All must be looked at, by their own merits, to see if they have any truth to them.

All things being equal, I would agree with you. When there is inadequate evidence, however, we tend to turn to weaker evidence. Example: police comes upon the scene of an accident and four men with records for armed robbery are standing over the dead body of an armored car driver. They all claim someone else came along and shot the driver and they were merely witnesses. There are no other witnesses. The police officer has sufficient reasonable doubt to warrant an arrest, based on their past behavior and the circumstances.

Same with the Christian claim. We MUST examine all of the available evidence - but when the evidence is inadequate to come to a conclusion, we must also factor in trends, and any other evidence that will help us arrive at "what most probably happened." It may not be possible to know, ultimately, but we do what we can with the evidence at hand.

3. The age of the earth or universe can be answered scientifically because test can be run over and over again to confirm or deny results of previous test. The same can't be done with the resurrection. Scientifically, the resurrection can't be looked at other than to say that dead men don't normally rise from the dead, than again, the disciples and Christians understood this so that would be nothing they were unaware of.

Correct - the scientific method will not help with non-scientific claims unless that methodology can be used to show the event never occurred. I know no way of doing that in the Christian claims, so the scientific method doesn't help me. The historical method is what is left, and the evidence is not, AFAICT, adequate.

In the end, it seems you are simply looking for any excuse to justify your own doubts. There is nothing scientifically impossible about the resurrection because it can't be scientifically tested, so you can't really bring much to the table other than, dead people tend to stay dead.

I bring to the table:

1) There is inadequate historical evidence to substantiate the claims of the biblical authors using the historical method (or to outright refute them).

2) In the absence of supporting evidence for or against those claims, I look to parallel claims (people rising from the dead) made throughout history and find those are either a) also unsubstantiated or b) frauds, hoaxes, or errors.

3) I also note that the people accepting these particular claims will themselves reject any parallel claims in any other context.

This pattern leads me to believe the claims are most probably false.

Michel

[Tiggy]

Aside from that, Atheists are clueless about the "YEC claim" so they should remain silent on that subject.

Jorge

Speaking of 'being clueless and remaining silent' Jorge, when are you going to provide the source data for the 5,700 - 10,000 year age of the universe as you claim?

Your silence confirms those are just more numbers you made up as you go.

- T

[Carpedm9587]

great - and BTW I appreciate the cordial nature of your replies so far.

They will stay that way. I tend to find you get out of a discussion what you put in, most of the time.

Keep in mind the context of the discussion to this point is not the relative merits of the evidence for the resurrection. Jorge specifically is accusing those of us that believe in the resurrection but who do not believe the Earth is young per a very wooden reading of Genesis 1 of being 'selective in terms of which miracles we will believe in and which ones we won't. Arbitrarily selective. He is ignoring the distinction between what science can tell us is possible by natural means, what science can tell us is a possible fit for the extant physical evidence.

OK.

We do have evidence about the ressurection. The evidence against is primarily circumstantial. We do not have any physical evidence that is inconsistent with the event having happened.

We have inadequate evidence, both historical and scientific, for the claims concerning the resurrection. I agree the evidence against is circumstantial and that we do not have any physical evidence against.

Curious. I would wonder what evidence you have for or against any claimed resurrections. (no sarcasm - I'm curious).

Merely that I have never encountered one that has been substantiated, and many have been shown to be hoaxes, frauds, or errors. I have, quite frankly, no instance of adequate evidence "for" a resurrection. Most take the form of verbal accounts but there is insufficient basis for accepting the claims.

But the one we care about at this point is the one associated with Jesus. So just as in assessing the probability of the result of the toss of a fair coin has nothing to do with the results of the previous set of tosses - no matter how many - the fact we've never observed a validated resurrection story does not in fact tell us much about the resurrection claims made of Jesus Christ. Each one must be evaluated independently from the others.

Agreed - unless we have cause to think the coin unbalanced - then it would be fair to say that previous experience is a possible predictor. If you hand me a coin and tell me I have no way of predicting how it will land - I would, in general, agree with you. If, however, you show me the history of the coin and 90% of the time it landed heads, I would be justified in suspecting the coin is not balanced, and it has a 90% chance of being heads.

This is essentially the case with resurrection claims, in the absence of adequate evidence substantiating them - one is justified in looking at the history of similar claims to see if there is a pattern. The pattern is that none has ever been shown to be real - and many (most) have been shown to be frauds, hoaxes, or errors.

Miracles are, in general, unlikely. That is one of the things that makes them miracles. Few of us have seen a bona fide physical miracle we can say absolutely was a miracle. I have experienced a good many things in my life I would call a miracle, but not one of them could I prove was a miracle. To be a Christian requires faith. A person without faith can not become a Christian unless somehow they find a way to have faith, because there is no way to prove true the fundamental claims of the Faith.

But blind faith is an irrational position, IMO. It leads one to accept potentially any claim without regard to the probability (or even possibility) of it being true. To be reasonable, faith must be informed. Then, when all of the evidence available has been amassed and examined, faith is what we use to arrive at our conclusion.

Many would disagree with your assessment. Adequacy here is not merely that which is adequate to validate a scientific claim. Again, Belief in Christ is not something one can quantify, and the reasons for having faith are not all, or perhaps even mostly, things that can be quantified. They are invariably personal and to one extent or another unverifiable. But everyone posting here that believes in Christ will tell you there are reasons that, for them, and when taken together as a whole, are more than adequate to validate the claim.

If you have personal experiences of a supreme being, then I can only say you have access to information I do not have access to. If you have evidence other than what is in the general record (e.g., artifacts, text, etc.), then please present them. If your evidence is what is contained in the NT and a handful of pseudo contemporary historians - I have examined that evidence and found it wanting.

But what we are talking about here is different than this. We have oodles and oodles of physical evidence that directly describes the history of the Earth. Evidence anyone can look at, as many times as is necessary. Tons of indications the world is much older than 10,000 years. So when someone comes along and claims the Bible tells us the world is younger than 10,000 years, then we can know that either the Bible is wrong, or that person's claim about what the Bible says is wrong, because the Earth is much older than 10,000 years. Fortunately, it is fairly easy to scan the Biblical text and see it never, ever tells us how old the Earth is. Those dates are arrived at by making assumptions about how to interpret the text, assumptions about how complete certain genealogies are, and assumptions about certain historical events and their correlations with Biblically described events. Assumptions that are fairly easy to show are flawed.

With this I agree.

To compare what we have against YEC with the resurrection, we would need to have in virtually every town and hamlet a piece of Jesus' bone sitting in a glass case showing us He did not rise from the dead.

Now THAT would be interesting!

I would disagree. I know of no physical evidence that can disprove the claim Jesus Christ rose from the dead. Only evidence that would prove such an event could not have happened on its own as a result of natural causes.

Now it might seem a fantastic claim, and may be too fantastic for you to believe it is true - the evidence for it may not be nearly strong enough to make you think it is a thing worth believing in - but that does not change the fact that there is no physical evidence that can disprove the claim. Indeed the evidence that does exist is consistent with the claim - as long as one does not try to find a way to explain it by natural causes. No one claims this happened by natural causes.

Your point seems muddled here. Are you saying no possible physical evidence, or no existing physical evidence? I would disagree with the former, but I would agree with the latter.

As for "explaining by natural causes," I do believe that, all things being equal, a naturalistic explanation is adequate if it is available. Given the absence of sufficient evidence to substantiate a supernatural claim for the events in question, and the existence of multiple possible naturalistic explanations, I conclude it is more likely the events in question was were supernatural events.

YEC, on the other hand, is disproved every time we observe an object outside our galaxy. Every time we count Antarctic ice core layers, Every time we examine data from the Chicxulub or Chesapeake bay impacts. Not evidence that God could not have make the world in 6 days less than 10,000 years ago, but evidence He did not do that.

With this I agree.

Michel

[Carpedm9587]

We could. We could also take a more direct path and point out that there's no superglue on Fred's turtle.

spoilsport...

If one accepts miracles, then it makes no sense reject claims simply because they require a miracle. But it might make sense to reject claims which require a miracle if those claims would have produced visible effects that cannot be seen.

Claim 1: Leprechauns stole someone's cow 600 years ago. Can't be refuted directly, only by pointing out the non-existence of leprechauns - which won't faze someone who believes in them.

Claim 2: Leprechauns stole the statue of liberty last night. Can be refuted directly by pointing out that Liberty hasn't been stolen.*

Claim 3: Leprechauns stole tha statue of liberty last night and returned this morning before anyone could record its absence. Same as #1, but with added desperation and Last-Thursdayismishness.

The gospel miracles have no specific evidence against them , only general evidence that such things don't happen - which is irrelevant if they were miracles.
The creation and the flood do have specific evidence against them, so the acceptance of miracles doesn't protect them - only a retreat to Omphalosy** can do that.

Roy

*Ok, this is an assumption, I haven't actually checked, and if the statue of liberty did actually vanish overnight I'm going to look a bit silly.
**Om-fallacy?

I would disagree with the emphasized item above. If a claim is made, and other similar claims have a pattern of being shown to be hoaxes, frauds, or errors, then it is reasonable to conclude that - unless there is compelling evidence to believe this is a true exception to that rule - it is most likely another fraud, hoax, or error.

Michel

[Carpedm9587]

***********************************************************************************

I'm going to enjoy watching you, an Atheist, argue with O-Mudd, a Christian TE,
what I know all too well. These people (TEs) can't get it through their thick skulls
that theirs is a SELECTIVE belief making it a dishonest position for Christ. [Of
course, I realize that this is not your goal but it will be one of the spinoffs.]

Even Atheists, as spiritually blind as they are, know of this compromise. Let note
be taken that I am in agreement with an Atheist on this point.

Actually - I generally agree with OX about his arguments with respect to your claims. We disagree only on whether or not the claims about the resurrection are adequately substantiated.

Aside from that, Atheists are clueless about the "YEC claim" so they should
remain silent on that subject.

Jorge

Sorry I can't accommodate you, but you can take comfort in the fact that I don't spend a great deal of time on YEC claims. To hold this position requires ignoring so much obvious scientific evidence that it cannot, IMO, be the position of a rational person. Having a discussion with someone who holds the YEC position, in my experience, is like talking to a conspiracy theorist or a geocentrist: the position cannot be discussed rationally because the person is not being rational - so it's a waste of time.

Michel

[rogue06]

***********************************************************************************

I'm going to enjoy watching you, an Atheist, argue with O-Mudd, a Christian TE,
what I know all too well. These people (TEs) can't get it through their thick skulls
that theirs is a SELECTIVE belief making it a dishonest position for Christ. [Of
course, I realize that this is not your goal but it will be one of the spinoffs.]

Even Atheists, as spiritually blind as they are, know of this compromise. Let note
be taken that I am in agreement with an Atheist on this point.

Aside from that, Atheists are clueless about the "YEC claim" so they should
remain silent on that subject.

Jorge

Then I guess Roy's response to Carp (post #150) will come as a real shocker to you.

[Roy]

If a claim is made, and other similar claims have a pattern of being shown to be hoaxes, frauds, or errors, then it is reasonable to conclude that - unless there is compelling evidence to believe this is a true exception to that rule - it is most likely another fraud, hoax, or error.

Um, I agree with you. But I think you're missing two points of this discussion.

1) The question involves the presence or absence of direct evidence against particular miraculous events; and

2) the debate is taking place under the assumption that miraclulous events are possible.

You're in the position of someone who has interrupted a spirited debate on the relative desirability of Daphne Ann Blake and Jessica Rabbit with the exasperated comment that 'They're cartoon characters, Gildermint!'

On second thoughts, maybe I should pick a different analogy...

Roy

[Carpedm9587]

Um, I agree with you. But I think you're missing two points of this discussion.

1) The question involves the presence or absence of direct evidence against particular miraculous events; and

2) the debate is taking place under the assumption that miraclulous events are possible.

Yeah - I'm realizing I picked up on one part of the discussion, and missed the rest. I would agree there is an enormous body of direct evidence for an old earth and none (that I know of) for the resurrection NOT occurring.

You're in the position of someone who has interrupted a spirited debate on the relative desirability of Daphne Ann Blake and Jessica Rabbit with the exasperated comment that 'They're cartoon characters, Gildermint!'

On second thoughts, maybe I should pick a different analogy...

Roy

No comment....

But I do agree I appear to have wandered into an internal debate on miracles. I'll go away now!

[oxmixmudd]

Hi Carped - altough you've indicated you will withdraw from the discussion, I will offer a 'how I see things' response to some of the points you make here.

They will stay that way. I tend to find you get out of a discussion what you put in, most of the time.

OK.

We have inadequate evidence, both historical and scientific, for the claims concerning the resurrection. I agree the evidence against is circumstantial and that we do not have any physical evidence against.

And this is then where the rubber meets the road in the believer/non-believer debate on an intellectual level. The primary evidence we have comes in the form of the accounts of the Gospel writers, though there is sufficient extra-Biblical evidence to establish that Jesus existed and likely was crucified. For the details then we have to rely on these accounts. Without getting into an extended discussion, I personally believe these accounts accurately relay what the disciples observed. I do not think that, given the information in these accounts and the lives lived by the disciples themselves and other witnesses of the events that a purposed hoax makes much sense as an option. It would have had to have been very elaborately contrived, and I think in the end some or most of them would have recanted to save their own skin. Why would a bunch of Jewish fishermen and common folk spend their lives, and lose their lives - violently - trying to convince those around them the Messiah came not as a king but as a suffering servant to die for the sins of mankind - unless that is what they actually believed?

Another, somewhat odd indication to me there is truth to this story is the lack of traction for the 'rumor' that the disciples stole the body. The story as recorded in the Gospels is that the Jewish leaders tried to bribe the roman guard. As I perceive it, one of the major reasons such a rumor never got traction was that among the potential audience of the rumor - those that witnessed to one extent or the other the events in question - there were too many for whom such a story seemed too 'far fetched' to be a plausible explanation of the disciples claim of a resurrection. That is, even though they may not have bought the idea of a resurrection, they also didn't buy the idea a bunch of hardened Roman soldiers would sleep through a bunch of fishermen trying to get a big stone out of the way and haul off the body.

Merely that I have never encountered one that has been substantiated, and many have been shown to be hoaxes, frauds, or errors. I have, quite frankly, no instance of adequate evidence "for" a resurrection. Most take the form of verbal accounts but there is insufficient basis for accepting the claims.

I guess what I was asking for is where have you heard a story of a resurrection that has been formally investigated and shown to be a hoax? Your premise is that there are other stories of resurrections, that they have been investigated and shown to be hoaxes. I am just curious what they are. Are we talking TV preachers, or stories from the mission field, or other ancient stories? Just trying to put what you are saying in context.

Agreed - unless we have cause to think the coin unbalanced - then it would be fair to say that previous experience is a possible predictor. If you hand me a coin and tell me I have no way of predicting how it will land - I would, in general, agree with you. If, however, you show me the history of the coin and 90% of the time it landed heads, I would be justified in suspecting the coin is not balanced, and it has a 90% chance of being heads.

Ok - this is fair. But I would submit that each claim is its own coin, and thus must still be evaluated on its own merits as an independent entity. I would then add that historically, there are a large number of people convinced of the credibility of the resurrection of Christ - this in and of itself sets it apart from other resurrection stories. One would also think that early on there would have been people able to produce evidence to counter the claims, especially considering the rabid hostility against the Christian faith in its first 3 centuries. Remember that early Christianity was not a political force. There were no armed ambassadors of the faith, no marauding bands with swords demanding allegiance to this new faith, just martyr after martyr after martyr. Yet no one was ever able to substantially refute the claims of the disciples and early believers.

This is essentially the case with resurrection claims, in the absence of adequate evidence substantiating them - one is justified in looking at the history of similar claims to see if there is a pattern. The pattern is that none has ever been shown to be real - and many (most) have been shown to be frauds, hoaxes, or errors.

But as I indicate above, in going to the secondary evidence, one can't discount the history of the church itself. That people can be deceived or that people put on hoaxes is in your favor, but what of the motives of those putting on hoaxes? Do the disciples fit that pattern? What of the circumstances surrounding the events? Is it reasonable to expect a bunch of fishermen and misfits to put on such a hoax, and then die defending it - to commit themselves to lives of poverty and eventual death as their 'reward' for successfully putting forward the hoax?

But blind faith is an irrational position, IMO. It leads one to accept potentially any claim without regard to the probability (or even possibility) of it being true.

I agree with you here. I do not advocate blind faith, and I would never discourage serious examination of the evidence as you have likely done. This is why I am not YEC.

To be reasonable, faith must be informed. Then, when all of the evidence available has been amassed and examined, faith is what we use to arrive at our conclusion.

We also agree here as well. So clearly then I must believe there is some basis for my faith, like the kinds of things I outline above. Also I have reasons for believing the text itself was written at or near the time of the events and not constructed so long after as to not reliably represent what was observed. But clearly there is more, something that pushes me over the edge, and that is my own personal experience - which as you note below - it not something you have access to.

If you have personal experiences of a supreme being, then I can only say you have access to information I do not have access to. If you have evidence other than what is in the general record (e.g., artifacts, text, etc.), then please present them. If your evidence is what is contained in the NT and a handful of pseudo contemporary historians - I have examined that evidence and found it wanting.

We could perhaps continue this if you wish. But your first point, the personal experiences, I would say is a critical piece of this puzzle. I believe that when Jesus says that if we seek God we will find Him He is referring to just this very element. That each of us who comes to faith in Christ at some point on our journey comes face to face with a unique set of circumstances that convinces us God is out there calling us to Himself. As such my story told to you can only help motivate you to start or continue your own journey, it can never substitute for your own journey. And at some point though after I tell you all the physical and personal reasons why I think the story of Christ's resurrecion is true, I depend on the God I serve to step in and bridge that gap for you as He did for me.

With this I agree.



Now THAT would be interesting!

- Fortunately for me, this is not even close to the case!

Your point seems muddled here. Are you saying no possible physical evidence, or no existing physical evidence? I would disagree with the former, but I would agree with the latter.

The latter. There would have been physical evidence at the time to support or refute the claims. But sufficient evidence apparently never materialized so as to refute the claims of the disciples. One possible explanation for this is that there was no such evidence because Christ actually rose from the dead.

As for "explaining by natural causes," I do believe that, all things being equal, a naturalistic explanation is adequate if it is available. Given the absence of sufficient evidence to substantiate a supernatural claim for the events in question, and the existence of multiple possible naturalistic explanations, I conclude it is more likely the events in question was were supernatural events.

I would wander what the possible naturalistic explanations are that you feel are sufficient? I would discount hoax and self-revival as nearly as unlikely as the resurrection itself. What remains?

With this I agree.

Michel

Thanks for a good discussion. As you had said you were 'going away', you need feel no obligation to respond to this post or my questions. I just wanted to show you the respect you earned in the previous posts by at least attempting a fair response to the points you had made.

Jim

[Jet Black]

**********************************************************************

rather than address my intellectual deficiencies, I will sling feeble insults.

Jorge

:nada:

[lilpixieofterror]

**********************************************************************************************

See? That's the dishonesty from you people that I often refer to.

Thanks for providing such a vivid, lucid example.

Jorge

There is no dishonesty going on here, but it seems as though you want to equate not being YEC with not believing the resurrection happened. I doubt many would go with that assumption of yours.