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?

[Philbert]

The fallacy in the rest of your argument is that you argue for the historical accuracy of the text only when it suites you while ignoring the text when it is against you. It's disingenuous.

Regrettably, many or most members seem hopelessly confused about the difference between reason and ideology. It doesn't appear much can be done about this.

[Goose]

I think this is the only relevant point to be made here. Debating about whether Ceasar's assassination is backed up by more or less evidence is beside the point.

No it isn't beside the point. It is a way to objectively establish the strength of the historical evidence for the resurrection. You continually side step the argument. That alone speaks volumes.

Would you, Goose, be ready to switch your religion if you encountered historical testimonies of a bunch of miracles performed by someone else?

Irrelevant. The topic for debate in this thread is evidence for my belief in the supernatural. It's not why I'm a Christian instead of a Muslim. Do try to stay on topic.

[no evidence no belief]

Goose, I don't know if I'm gonna be able to get across to you, but I will try.

If you could manage to pull yourself away from the incessant juvenile arguments by ridicule for even one post it would certainly be easier to take you seriously. I won't hold my breath though.

We disagree on the strength of the evidence FOR the resurrection.

And here you conceded the debate question as you’ve framed it in your OP. Your OP states:

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

Because you concede there IS evidence for the resurrection you concede the point and I need not admit I have no evidence. Everything else beyond this is a rabbit trail.

But, for the sake of interest and to be a good sport I’ll bite on the rest.

------

But let's agree to disagree on that for now, and assume you're right, and lets say that there is strong historical evidence for the resurrection.

Our other disagreement, which I want to address here, is best spelled out in our exchange here:


The fact that we know scientifically with a very very very very very high level of certainty that decomposing brain-dead bodies DO NOT come back to life, isn't just a claim in favor of something, it's also a claim AGAINST something.

The overwhelmingly strongly established scientific fact that bodies don't raise from the dead is evidence against the claim that bodies raise from the dead.

It's utterly laughable to say that when trying to determine if a claim is true or not, you should only examine evidence in FAVOR of it, but completely ignore evidence AGAINST IT just because this evidence against it also happens to be evidence in favor of an alternate explanation. What on earth are you talking about?

What on earth are YOU talking about? Would you like a blow torch for that enormous strawman? Where I have said, “that when trying to determine if a claim is true or not, you should only examine evidence in FAVOR of it, but completely ignore evidence AGAINST IT…�? No where I have said or argued we only look at the evidence in favour of a position while ignoring the evidence against. I was responding to your implication that evidence for a position is rendered invalid on the basis there is evidence against the position.

Yes, evidence for a claim is rendered invalid by stronger evidence for a different claim that is mutually exclusive with the first claim.

The claim "I saw a flying pig" is rendered invalid by the mutually exclusive claim, supported by much stronger evidence that "pigs can't fly".

Here’s what I wrote to refresh your memory, “What you’ve listed here doesn’t make the evidence itself invalid. What you have listed here would be evidence in favour of the case against a particular claim.�

Correct. Extremely strong evidence in favor of a claim that is mutually exclusive with your claim, renders the much weaker evidence for your claim moot, irrelevant and invalid.

Now, what this essentially boils down to is whether or not the Christian is standing on strong enough historical evidence to justify the belief that our observation that usually dead people stay dead did not hold in the case of Jesus. Of course, I believe the Christian is standing on solid enough historical evidence – you no doubt disagree as you’ve stated. But you offer no real argument as to why the historical evidence itself is weak.

I can get into why the historical evidence is very weak, but I don't have to. Let's assume for the sake of argument that the historical evidence is not weak. It is countered by MUCH MUCH MUCH stronger physical, chemical, biological, medical evidence. Thus it is moot, irrelevant, invalid.

You could have a mountain of circumstantial evidence that I committed a crime, but if there is empirical evidence that I was in a different country when the crime was committed, then the circumstantial evidence that I committed a crime becomes INVALID.

The situation is so simple.
A book written by iron age simpletons says that zombies and talking donkeys are real. The same science that allows us to perform heart transplant, create nuclear bombs and land on Mars, tells us zombies and talking donkeys are not real.

Either the iron simpletons who thought the earth was flat were wrong, or the entire body of scientific knowledge that allows us to perform heart transplants, build nuclear bombs and land on Mars is wrong.

Google Zack Dunlap – he was declared brain dead.

Oh my God, this changes everything!

It is scientifically possible for people who were brain dead to come back to life. It isn't a supernatural event! It's just a very very rare event! It happens. Zack Dunpal was brain dead but he came back to life!

Thank you so much for clearing that up. When Jesus and Zack Dunlap returned to life after being brain dead it was NOT a miracle. It was just a very rare event. It does NOT constitute evidence for the supernatural.

Thanks for bringing this to my attention, buddy. I will be sure to use the Zack Dunpal argument whenever anybody tries to make the absurd claim that Jesus's resurrection is evidence of the supernatural.

It is NOT, and you proved it! THANK YOU!

[Philbert]

A book written by iron age simpletons....

The fantasy here just goes on and on and on, the evidence ignored, ignored, ignored.

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.

FACT: Posters in this thread have not been able to offer any evidence at all of having persuaded even a single person to their point of view.

At the very least this proves beyond all doubt that the iron age simpletons exceeded the writing ability and understanding of human nature of posters here (yours truly included) by an immeasurably wide margin.

Truly, truly, truly, most of the adamant atheist posters here and elsewhere are simply intellectual frauds, there's just no more accurate way to say it.

They chant evidence, evidence, evidence all day long until the very first moment they encounter inconvenient evidence, upon which they completely lose interest in evidence.

That's called ideology.

It has nothing to do with reason.

[10CC]

A book written by iron age simpletons....

The fantasy here just goes on and on and on, the evidence ignored, ignored, ignored.

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.

FACT: Posters in this thread have not been able to offer any evidence at all of having persuaded even a single person to their point of view.

At the very least this proves beyond all doubt that the iron age simpletons exceeded the writing ability and understanding of human nature of posters here (yours truly included) by an immeasurably wide margin.

Truly, truly, truly, most of the adamant atheist posters here and elsewhere are simply intellectual frauds, there's just no more accurate way to say it.

They chant evidence, evidence, evidence all day long until the very first moment they encounter inconvenient evidence, upon which they completely lose interest in evidence.

That's called ideology.

It has nothing to do with reason.

"scuse me, I must have missed this EVIDENCE you claim, or is it this stone age drivel in a bronze age book?

[Danmark]

I think this is the only relevant point to be made here. Debating about whether Ceasar's assassination is backed up by more or less evidence is beside the point.

No it isn't beside the point. It is a way to objectively establish the strength of the historical evidence for the resurrection. You continually side step the argument. That alone speaks volumes.

Would you, Goose, be ready to switch your religion if you encountered historical testimonies of a bunch of miracles performed by someone else?

Irrelevant. The topic for debate in this thread is evidence for my belief in the supernatural. It's not why I'm a Christian instead of a Muslim. Do try to stay on topic.

No, that is not the topic for debate. The topic for debate is evidence for anyone's belief in the supernatural. [See post #1] Therefore the question Would you, Goose, be ready to switch your religion if you encountered historical testimonies of a bunch of miracles performed by someone else? is perfectly relevant. Your 'evidence' for your belief in the supernatural is apparently based on what someone wrote about what someone else reported. Why is that hearsay report more credible than other hearsay evidence about miracles from other traditions?

[instantc]

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

I'm not sure whether the book has ever convinced anyone. People convince people into believing that the book is correct, often by threats of violence, hell and so forth. Don't give the book too much credit.

[Artie]

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

Has this book persuaded you that the Earth is flat?

[Philbert]

I'm not sure whether the book has ever convinced anyone. People convince people into believing that the book is correct, often by threats of violence, hell and so forth. Don't give the book too much credit.

This is what I mean about blatantly ignoring inconvenient evidence. Thank you for sharing an example to illustrate my point.

If posters, whether they be theist or atheist, are going to blatantly ignore inconvenient evidence, there is really no meaningful purpose for this thread, which is now on pointless page one hundred and twenty something.

[Philbert]

"scuse me, I must have missed this EVIDENCE you claim, or is it this stone age drivel in a bronze age book?

Thank you for clogging the forum with long quotes followed by tiny cutesy sarcastic blurbs.

I'm hoping to learn from you how this amazing style of contribution is done. How am I doing here, am I getting the hang of it?

Oops, sorry, my post is longer than the quote. Darn it! This is harder than I realized!