Let's cut to the chase. Do you have any evidence?

[no evidence no belief]

I feel like we've been beating around the bush for... 6000 years!

Can you please either provide some evidence for your supernatural beliefs, or admit that you have no evidence?

If you believe there once was a talking donkey (Numbers 22) could you please provide evidence?

If you believe there once was a zombie invasion in Jerusalem (Mat 27) could you please provide evidence?

If you believe in the flying horse (Islam) could you please provide evidence?

Walking on water, virgin births, radioactive spiders who give you superpowers, turning water into wine, turning iron into gold, demons, goblins, ghosts, hobbits, elves, angels, unicorns and Santa.

Can you PLEASE provide evidence?

[Nickman]

Goose wrote:
"Is this how evidence is treated in a trial? Let’s use your example of you allegedly committing a crime. What you are wanting is for the evidence you are guilty to be invalidated on the soul grounds you believe you have stronger evidence for your innocence. That’s not how a trial works."

Yes it is. It's called an ALIBI.

oooh er... an alibi is a plea that you weren't at the scene of a crime. From the Latin for 'elsewhere'.

Correct.

If you can successfully demonstrate that you were not at the scene of a crime, then any circumstantial evidence that you may have committed the crime is no longer relevant.

If alibis are rock solid.

Similarly, if you can successfully demonstrate donkeys can't talk and zombies can't raise from the dead, then any circumstantial evidence that donkeys can talk and zombies can raise from the dead is no longer relevant.

How do we demonstrate that? We cannot do so, hence Christians use this as their unfalsifiable argument. If a donkey stubs his foot in the woods, does he say f**k? Who knows? We cannot prove that they cannot talk. Although highly improbably, speaking absolutely is the downfall of evey argument. This applies to Atheists and Christians alike.

[Clownboat]

[Replying to post 1332 by Clownboat]

I agree with instanc here. Philbert is not even a Christian, so why would he claim that it is evidence for the supernatural?

I don't know, but we have only heard from Instantc until now. Philbert, would need to clear this up, I fear that yourself and instantc are unqualified to answer for Philbert if he really meant "evidence" when he claimed to have "evidence".

4th time?:

The evidence.....

FACT: The iron age simpletons wrote....

What do you guys think he meant when he typed "evidence"? Apparently something other than evidence?

[Clownboat]

re Philbert, I think his challenge to atheists is to face up to the fact that billions of people have been persuaded to believe the bible is true but we atheists on DCR have very few if any conversions to our viewpoint to boast about.

Can you explain to me how that would be relevant to this discussion about evidence if that is really what he was saying?

Am I right about that much, Philly? I don't want to go on if I'm on the wrong tack.

If that was his point when he typed "evidence". I am sorry I wasted my time even responding to such a worthless and irrelevant statement.

OP: - Let's cut to the chase. Do you have any evidence?
Philbert, Instantc and Keith: Oh ya, well atheists cannot show that they convert anyone on the DCR forum.

My mind is boggled.

[instantc]

OP: - Let's cut to the chase. Do you have any evidence?
Philbert, Instantc and Keith: Oh ya, well atheists cannot show that they convert anyone on the DCR forum.

My mind is boggled.

I'm by no means endorsing that argument, I don't even understand why anyone would bring it up in any context.

[help3434]

[Replying to post 1340 by Clownboat]

Evidence for what? In post 1304 he said that he is not claiming that it is evidence that the Bible is true. I am not sure what he is arguing for honestly.

[Clownboat]

OP: - Let's cut to the chase. Do you have any evidence?
Philbert, Instantc and Keith: Oh ya, well atheists cannot show that they convert anyone on the DCR forum.

My mind is boggled.

I'm by no means endorsing that argument, I don't even understand why anyone would bring it up in any context.

Great! Finally we can be off the "atheist conversion" horse I hope.

What do you think he meant when he typed:

The evidence.....

FACT: The iron age simpletons wrote a book which has persuaded billions of people over thousands of years in every corner of the world.

Please be mindful of the part I put in bold.

[scourge99]

The very notion that testimony can EVER outweigh a worldview based on a lifetime of evidence and experience to the contrary is ABSURD.

It's not absurd if the evidence is strong enough. In the case of the resurrection I believe the historical evidence is strong enough and I've provided a framework to establish the strength of that evidence.

You keep deceitfully saying there is strong "evidence" when in fact all you mean is that there is testimony.

There is no historical evidence for the resurrection or miracles of Jesus except for written testimony.

Your "evidence" is nothing more than testimony about things that conflict with a lifetime of evidence and experience to the contrary.

But you offer no argument for why the historical evidence itself is not strong enough to justify my belief that Jesus rose from the dead.

Yes i have. The historical "evidence" is nothing more than unverifiable testimony.

Unverifiable testimony isn't heavy enough outweigh a lifetime of experiences and observations to the contrary. If you accept it, you are gullible or irrational.

You are merely pooh-poohing the evidence because it is testimony which conflicts with your personal world view.

When the testimony makes unverifiable claims about things which conflict with a lifetime of experiences and observations about how the world works, yes, i and any other rational person will "pooh-pooh" the testimony. And so should you, unless people flying into the sky or magically rising from the dead are things that are compatible with your observations and experiences in this world.

I don't understand how anyone could believe something that contradicts their personal experiences about the world because of testimony unless they are gullible or irrational.

At least I’ve provided an argument to establish why I believe the evidence is strong to justify my belief Jesus rose from the dead. An argument you haven’t even touched, I’ll add. On the other hand you merely present your personal incredulity as evidence the Christian belief in the resurrection is irrational.

What argument? All you've done is repeat yourself that you think testimony about supernatural and magical claims are really convincing to you if they were written down in an ancient text. That's not an argument.

Then you try to argue that Caesars assassination is believable because of ancient texts therefore jesus magic is also believable. Yet you seem incapable of even acknowledging that there is nothing supernatural about Caesars assassination and there is with Jesus magic. And that makes the comparison between the two very problematic.

That you cannot even acknowledge that difference tells me you are likely incapable of honest debate.

No, you haven't. Danmark has questioned your consistency on this matter and you've shown that you are a hypocrite.

Yes I have given my case for why I believe the evidence is strong enough to justify my belief. I gave you a link to the post where I did and you ignored it. Danmark’s question is irrelevant and I’ve explained why it is. I suspect you guys are harping on this Red Herring of essentially asking why I'm not a Muslim to avoid my argument for why I believe the evidence for the resurrection is strong. I certainly seems that way with Danmark anyway.

Its not a red-herring. You claim that testimony is compelling evidence. Yet when presented with testimony for non-Christian supernatural claims, you make all sorts of excuses and complaints to exclude them. So you are actually committing the fallacy of special pleading when it comes to Christian testimony.

Or you make some vague and sweeping statement that no other testimony is as strong as Christians, but completely fail to EXPLAIN EXACTLY WHAT makes Christian testimony about supernatural claims more believable and all others not believable.

Danmark asked whether you would trust the testimony of other holy books, belief systems, or religions and you refused to answer directly.

False. In my first post to nenb I acknowledged the possibility that Muhammad may have had a supernatural experience. Now, if you’d like to make an argument that the historical evidence for that event is as strong as the resurrection, I’ll listen.

So you ADMIT that testimony alone is NOT strong enough to believe supernatural/magical claims. Great. What about a testimony regarding supernatural/magical makes it weak or strong enough to believe it or reject it and WHY?

Its clear to me and everyone else reading your responses that you are irrationally biased towards Christian testimony of supernatural claims and not any other. Yet you claim that testimony is strong evidence regardless of the religion or holy book. That inconsistency makes you a hypocrite, or perhaps worse, a liar.

Since I’ve given my argument for why I believe the resurrection is supported by strong historical evidence (an argument you haven’t even touched), I’ve granted the possibility of supernatural claims outside Christianity and since you’ve merely asserted I’m a hypocrite or perhaps a liar without sufficient justification I’ll kindly ask you to withdraw your accusation.

I've explained exactly why you are a hypocrite or are inconsistent. Here it is again:

You claim that testimony is strong evidence regardless of the religion or holy book. But you only accept Christian testimony of supernatural claims and not any other testimony of supernatural claims.

Your response is that you've somewhere at sometime given an argument about why you believe Christian testimony is believable and others aren't. But that's not an explanation or argument. That's merely an assertion that you have an argument.


So i will only retract my accusation when you actually present a rational argument that clearly explains why only Christian testimony should be accepted for supernatural claims and why all others should be rejected. But i will not retract simply because you claim to have an argument that you claim to have presented somewhere, sometime ago.

Incorrect and inaccurate . I am biased. I am biased against testimony that contradicts my lifetime of experiences and observations of the real world.

Now who’s being irrational? To reject testimony (or any form of evidence for that matter)

Nowhere did i say i reject any form of evidence that contradicts my lifetime of experiences and observations about the world.

I only said i reject TESTIMONY when it comes in conflict with my experiences.

Do you understand the difference or are you intentionally misrepresenting my position? Do you think your god will appreciate such dishonest debate tactics? Or is all fair when arguing for Jesus?

a priori on the soul grounds it conflicts with your experiences and observations is irrational since our experiences and observations are finite and do not represent the entirety of all possible experiences and observations. How can such an approach claim to be open minded?

Because testimony is weak evidence. That's why. Testimony can never overcome a lifetime of experiences and observations to the contrary.

Perhaps you are so gullible and credulous to believe pigs fly because your mother, brother, wife , pastor, or ancient book tells you they saw one. But i won't. I will believe it when there is something more than TESTIMONY to support it.

I’d rather take the approach of evaluating the strength of the evidence (regardless of the form of that evidence) for a claim on its own merits rather than simply discarding it a priori because I don’t like what it may be suggesting.

Once again you dishonestly accuse me of rejecting all forms of evidence when i have only rejected TESTIMONY that conflicts with a lifetime of personal experiences and observations to the contrary.

That's twice now you've ignorantly, perhaps intentionally misrepresented what I've said. Will you acknowledge your misrepresentation or is such misrepresentations an acceptable debate strategy when its in defense of Christianity?

But unlike you, i am not a hypocrite who selectively accepts testimony from their preferred religion but rejects testimony from other sources. Instead, I reject all testimony, across the board, when it conflicts with my experiences and understanding of the world.

And as such your approach is irrational.

How so?

In the case of the resurrection I believe the historical evidence is strong enough. Would you like to examine my argument for why I believe that is the case or are you going to continue to dance around it like everyone else seems to be doing?

What evidence is there for the resurrection besides testimony? Do you have the bones of jesus? A video? Can we reproduce resurrections? Can people fly into the sky unassisted?

All you have is testimony. And you won't concede that point. That's why you constantly relabel testimony as "evidence" and "historical evidence" and "strong evidence". Its to cover up the fact that you've got NOTHING except unverifiable testimony about extraordinary events.

And that constant relabeling you do DEMONSTRATES just how weak your argument is and the deceitful debate tactics you are willing to engage in to support those beliefs.

[instantc]

What do you think he meant when he typed:

The evidence.....

FACT: The iron age simpletons wrote a book which has persuaded billions of people over thousands of years in every corner of the world.

Please be mindful of the part I put in bold.

I thought he meant that the evidence shows that the iron age simpletons have persuaded a lot of people.

[Goose]

I accept that reindeer exist. I accept that reindeer can be formed into a team and used to pull a sleigh. I am frankly NOT however compelled to accept a story of a team of flying reindeer pulling a sleigh through the sky. Given what can be observed concerning the nature of reindeer, and the nature of flight, there is nothing disingenuous about rejecting the story of a team of flying reindeer outright for cause. The story of the flying reanimated corpse of Jesus is very comparable to the story of the team of flying reindeer in terms of reason, logic, and observable fact. Both stories are unrealistic to the point of foolishness and we have every reason to reject them outright for cause. As such both stories should necessarily require a good deal more evidence then "that's what I heard," or "that's what so-and-so said," for rational adults to even begin to give the story credibility. This is where unrealistically low levels of skepticism and unnecessarily high levels of gullibility come into play. The ability to be able to differentiate between what is realistically plausible and what is clearly make believe is one of the hallmarks of growing to competent adulthood after all. And we're not simple superstitious shepherds any longer. Could the story of the traveling teacher who ran afoul of the authorities and ended up being crucified be true? It may or may not be true, but there certainly is nothing which would obviously mitigate against the story had it ended right there. And perhaps there actually is a white bearded old man who lives in the far north country and favors red clothing. But stories of a corpse which came back to life and flew away are no more believable then stories of flying reindeer. Taking such a view is hardly disingenuous.

I’m not arguing your rejection of the resurrection is disingenuous. Frankly, I don’t really care if you reject it. I’m saying your argument against the resurrection is disingenuous because it tacitly assumes the text is accurate in what it reports at Matthew 27:64 and that this was “in fact exactly what occurred.� But you then assume the text must be inaccurate where it works against you and claims that is not what occurred
.
Further, I disagree with your assessment that both the resurrection and flying reindeer are equally unrealistic. Here’s why. Firstly, with resurrections we have documented medical cases – the Lazarus Syndrome - which show a resurrection (however short from time of death to resurrection they may be) is at least plausible. Of course the Lazarus Syndrome is far off from establishing Jesus’ resurrection, if we assume the text is accurate in that Jesus was dead for three days, mind you. But it is enough to, at the very least, nudge us off the premise that dead people always stay dead thus establishing a baseline of plausibility for a resurrection. Now, compare this to flying reindeer. Do we have similar evidence which might establish a baseline that at the very least it is plausible for a reindeer to, say, even levitate off the ground for even a few seconds thereby at least nudging us off the premise that reindeer always stay grounded? I don’t think we do.

Secondly, I’m not aware of any sane adult who holds to flying reindeer let alone any historian who does whereas we have sane professional historians who do hold to the bodily resurrection of Jesus. That itself is not evidence that Jesus did rise from the dead of course but it is at the very least good reason to think flying reindeer and the resurrection of Jesus are not on equal footing in terms of plausibility.

For these two reasons, at least, to argue as you have done �[t]he story of the flying reanimated corpse of Jesus is very comparable to the story of the team of flying reindeer in terms of reason, logic, and observable fact� is quite clearly fallacious.

Here is the factual nature of your "compelling evidence." According to the time frame established by the Gospels, Jesus was executed circa 27-30 AD. For the next quarter of a century not a single reference is made either to the execution of Jesus, or to his purported resurrection from the dead. No glorious accounts of the miraculously risen Christ. Whole hoards of dead people came up out of their graves and wandered the streets of Jerusalem at the time of Jesus' resurrection, according to Matthew 27:52-53. And yet no one mentions any of this at the time. There is no indication of alarm, consternation, fear or joy occurring among the population of Palestine at all. In fact the very people in the best position to have known what occurred first hand, uniformly rejected the story as a hoax perpetrated by the followers of Jesus. The greatest event in the history of humankind, according to Christians, provoked not the slightest mention or notice from anyone for a quarter of a century after it was supposed to have occurred. Only silence.

Circa 55 AD Paul of Tarsus wrote his first letter to the Christian church in Corinth. In this letter Paul talks about the resurrection of Jesus from the dead. This letter, 1Corinthians, represents the FIRST EVER historical mention of the story of the resurrection of Jesus. In his letter Paul asserts that on one particular occasion more than five hundred of Jesus' followers communed, walked and talked with the risen Jesus. This reference is typically used by Christians to establish the factual truth of the risen Jesus. Surely hundreds of eyewitness cannot be dismissed. The problem here of course is that we don't actually have hundreds of eyewitness accounts. We have one account, that of Paul who was not personally present for the event he claims occurred. Paul was not himself a witness to the life and ministry of Jesus, to his death, or to any resurrection after his death. Paul never met the living Jesus. Paul converted to Christianity some years after the execution of Jesus, and was by his own account a man "born of due time." Paul also mentions by name, Cephas, James, and the apostles, as being witness to the risen Jesus. This is consistent with the first chapters of Acts, which indicates that as many as 120 followers of Jesus gathered in Jerusalem some six weeks after the execution with the intention of spreading the story of the risen Jesus. Who witnessed the risen Jesus? His followers, and only his followers, according to his followers. And what happened to the risen man? He flew away, up into the clouds. According to his followers, and only his followers. So from the very beginning the "risen" man was not provided as proof of the claim. Only the silent witness of the empty tomb. What did the chief priests and Pharisees tell Pilate that they expected the disciples intended to do? They felt a plot was afoot to move the body and to then proclaim that Jesus had risen from the dead. Which is exactly what occurred.

Okay let’s look at your reasoning for why you apparently think the evidence for the resurrection is weak and run the evidence for the assassination through that methodology as a control. If your methodology also makes the evidence for the assassination seem weak then I’m still justified in holding that the evidence for the resurrection is strong since it will be no worse than the evidence for the assassination and the evidence for the assassination is generally considered quite strong. In other words, if your methodology renders the assassination evidence also weak your methodology must be flawed since the historical evidence for the assassination is considered quite strong by historians.

Your first criterion seems to be the time proximity of the text to the event. You argue the first mention of the resurrection comes from Paul in his first letter to the Corinthians about 20 years after. I could argue here that some scholars, yes even some critics, argue 1 Corinthians 15:3-5 is a creedal passage dating back to within only a few years of Jesus’ death. But for the sake of argument let’s say the dating of Paul’s letters represent the first mention. How does this compare to the assassination then? Well, the first mention apparently comes from Cicero’s speeches and letters within a few years which would make it earlier than the resurrection. But the trouble here is Cicero never actually says “Caesar was assassinated.� He alludes to a murder but his references are quite cryptic and if we did not have the later writers such Nicolaus and Plutarch through which to interpret Cicero we wouldn’t really have any idea what or who Cicero was referring to. The first full account of the assassination is about 60 years later by Nicolaus as compared to the Gospels which are all well inside that mark with the possible of exception of John.

Your second criterion seems to be lack of abundant mentions considering the nature of the event and number of possible witnesses. But the same argument could made against the evidence for the assassination. Caesar’s assassination was arguably one of the most infamous events in ancient history allegedly involving as many as eighty senators taking place in front of the senate which may have had as many as 900 at the time of Caesar. Yet, despite the nature of this event, the high rank of the person who was murdered and the large number of potential witnesses there is but a few cryptic peeps from Cicero (who wasn’t a witness) and not one single eyewitness account of the event has come down to us. Nicolaus is the first to give a full account almost 60 years later. He was not a witness either and he never met Caesar. “Surely hundreds of witnesses cannot be dismissed� – where have I heard that before?

Your third criterion seems to be that only Jesus’ followers witnessed the resurrection. We’ll set aside for the moment that strictly speaking this isn’t true as Paul was not a follower, but rather an enemy, at the time he reports to have had his experience with the risen Jesus. Not to mention, only Romans apparently witnessed the assassination so I don’t see how this is a problem for the evidence for the resurrection. I suspect you are fundamentally driving at the criterion of bias here? If you are I concede the writers for the resurrection were biased. But so were the writers who recorded the assassination. So the criterion of bias is moot.

So we in the 21st century are faced with reaching a rational conclusion. Which is the more likely, that an empty grave is probably the result of actions taken by the living, or that the empty grave is more likely the result of actions taken by the corpse? And the answer is overwhelmingly obvious. As long as the followers of Jesus are the obvious and logical suspects, with the means, motive and opportunity to have moved the body and spread the false rumor of the risen Jesus, then the possibility that the corpse of Jesus actually returned to life and flew away has no more probability for being true then stories of a team of flying reindeer are likely to be true.

Firstly, nothing you’ve stated here undermines the strength of the evidence for the resurrection itself. So it isn’t really relevant to my argument. Secondly, your explanation doesn’t account for why the disciples believed Jesus had appeared to them nor does it account for Paul’s conversion experience thus it lacks scope as compared to the hypothesis Jesus rose from the dead. You need separate ad hoc hypotheses to account for these facts. Thirdly, your explanation lacks explanatory power as a group of disillusioned cowardly men who just witnessed their leader die a horrible death would hardly be in a state to organize the theft of the body and then run around lying about it in the face of persecution and threat of possible death.

[help3434]

[Replying to post 1347 by Goose]

People who come back from the dead in real life were only mostly dead. Jesus in the Bible was all dead.