A fun little exercise and a new perspective at Gettysburg

[achilles12604]

http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... 3&start=40

This thread was started because I suddenly had an idea. I know from a Christian point of view what it is like to try and prove something which to me, make perfect sense and fits in with the facts, but others deny much and sometimes all of what is put forth simply because it is the Christians viewpoint.

So I have devised a devious scheme. Time to switch and see if the non-theists can defend a position which we all know to be true. I (and any other theist who wants to join) can play the atheist/skeptic and the non-theists have to be the apologists for the validity of the event.


ready . . . here is the topic to be proven:

Prove to me that Lincoln actually gave the Gettysburg address.



I'll get you all started.

I see no reason to believe that the GA was ever given. Even if some speech was given by someone near Gettysburg, I am sure it wasn't the speech that history records. My reasons for this follow:

1) There were many of bloody battles during the civil war. Gettysburg wasn't the beginning nor the end of the war. In fact there really wasn't any reason at all for this particular battle to deserve a speech.

2) I find it unlikely that Lincoln would have presented a speech totally unrehearsed and unplanned. Once again there was no reason for this to happen.

3) The North needed to rally its troops after the battle to take advantage of the their first major victory. The idea of such an inspiring speech would have made a great platform for recruiting and inspiring their soldiers.

4) Other than NORTHERN people, who would have been biased in favor of the ideas put forth in this address, there are no witness accounts for this speech.

5) The supposed copies we have of "drafts" of the speech differ in several places and have major inconsistencies.
http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/gadd/gadrft.html

6) The drafts we have come from different sources both of whom were very pro-north in their ideology and these two drafts do not match with one another, suggesting that there was never an original or correct coy to begin with. After all how hard is it to simply copy from one paper to another?

7) These two drafts and the only two which were written anytime near the event in question and modern scholars aren't even sure if one of them was written before or after this supposed speech was given.

8) There isn't very much evidence that Lincoln was ever at Gettysburg. There are no photos of him there. The only photo which supposedly has ever been found of him there was unidentified until 1952, is very vague and doesn't contain anything in it which can positively identify a location or even a time.

9) Lincoln was all the way in Washington just a couple hours after this speech was supposedly given so combining this fact with the fact that there is not physical evidence he was ever at Gettysburg, I see no reason to conclude that he ever was at Gettysburg, much less that he stopped to give a speech at a battlefield with no significance at the time.

10) The details of the speech are not agreed upon. If Lincoln did write it, and if he was alive to write out other copies later on, shouldn't all this be clear?

http://spider.georgetowncollege.edu/hta ... /page6.htm

11) Why would Lincoln be at this site for hours and only give a speech with barely 230 words total? Shouldn't a president be given the majority of the time to speak? Why would his speech be cut so short given the amount of time he was supposedly there? This inconsistency is illogical and can not be reconciled with the facts.


Based on the fact that there are extreamly limited and fairly untrustworthy copies of this supposed speech until well after it was already circulated by northern conspirators and that the motive for the North to concoct such a scheme is easy to see, I submit that President Lincoln never actually gave this speech in Gettysburg at the time he was supposedly doing so.

It was obviously a giant media propaganda by Northern war hawks and politicians.

[Goat]

Is that it then . . . No one thinks they can defend a ligitament historical event?

Or is that the skeptics are so used to just being able to "doubt away" ligitament arguements, that they fear being on the defensive side of the ball?


24 hours. A few dozen views but no more replies. Can anyone prove that Lincoln did in fact give this speech just as history records?

I could, fairly easily.

However, I consider your arguement to be totally irrelavent. You already were given the various methods one would figure that out, and you arbitrarily rejected them already.

So, why bother?

By all means go through my points and show where my logic fails. Also keep in mind the usual arguements used against apologists. You might see a few similarities.

We did. You ignored the points. See post 2 and post 6.

You also have to argue against the various different newspaper reports, of eyewitnesses to the speech , (who claim they were direct eyewitnesses), and the various diaries of people who claim to have heard it. You also have to agrue against Abraham Lincoln's personal diary.

[achilles12604]

Is that it then . . . No one thinks they can defend a ligitament historical event?

Or is that the skeptics are so used to just being able to "doubt away" ligitament arguements, that they fear being on the defensive side of the ball?


24 hours. A few dozen views but no more replies. Can anyone prove that Lincoln did in fact give this speech just as history records?

I could, fairly easily.

However, I consider your arguement to be totally irrelavent. You already were given the various methods one would figure that out, and you arbitrarily rejected them already.

So, why bother?

By all means go through my points and show where my logic fails. Also keep in mind the usual arguements used against apologists. You might see a few similarities.

We did. You ignored the points. See post 2 and post 6.

You also have to argue against the various different newspaper reports, of eyewitnesses to the speech , (who claim they were direct eyewitnesses), and the various diaries of people who claim to have heard it. You also have to agrue against Abraham Lincoln's personal diary.

I addressed every point in posts 2 and 6. So far those individuals have not gotten back to my replies. Unlike some others on this site I don't simply ignore a point made by the other side. Either I address it or conceed it. But since you made the claim, what point from 2 or 6 didn't I address right afterwards? You make many bold statements like this (and numbers 5) Can you back it up with quotes or evidence?

As for your second paragraph, yes I hav argued about those things in much the same fashion as the skeptics of christianity do with our evidence. So far the result has been the same which should tell you something.

Do you have an excerpt from Abrahams diary or is this another point of evidence without any support at all? I'll gladly address it if you have a source and a quote.

[Goat]

Is that it then . . . No one thinks they can defend a ligitament historical event?

Or is that the skeptics are so used to just being able to "doubt away" ligitament arguements, that they fear being on the defensive side of the ball?


24 hours. A few dozen views but no more replies. Can anyone prove that Lincoln did in fact give this speech just as history records?

I could, fairly easily.

However, I consider your arguement to be totally irrelavent. You already were given the various methods one would figure that out, and you arbitrarily rejected them already.

So, why bother?

By all means go through my points and show where my logic fails. Also keep in mind the usual arguements used against apologists. You might see a few similarities.

We did. You ignored the points. See post 2 and post 6.

You also have to argue against the various different newspaper reports, of eyewitnesses to the speech , (who claim they were direct eyewitnesses), and the various diaries of people who claim to have heard it. You also have to agrue against Abraham Lincoln's personal diary.

I addressed every point in posts 2 and 6. So far those individuals have not gotten back to my replies. Unlike some others on this site I don't simply ignore a point made by the other side. Either I address it or conceed it. But since you made the claim, what point from 2 or 6 didn't I address right afterwards? You make many bold statements like this (and numbers 5) Can you back it up with quotes or evidence?

As for your second paragraph, yes I hav argued about those things in much the same fashion as the skeptics of christianity do with our evidence. So far the result has been the same which should tell you something.

Do you have an excerpt from Abrahams diary or is this another point of evidence without any support at all? I'll gladly address it if you have a source and a quote.

Pardon, I was mistaken. It was a different diary entry.

Benjamin French, who helped plan the dedication, wrote in his diary, "Anyone who saw & heard as I did, the hurricane of applause that met his every movement at Gettysburg would know that he lived in every heart. It was no cold, faint, shadow of a kind reception -- it was a tumultuous outpouring of exultation, from true and loving hearts, at the sight of a man whom everyone knew to be honest and true and sincere in every act of his life, and every pulsation of his heart. It was the spontaneous outburst of heartfelt confidence in their own President."

http://showcase.netins.net/web/creative ... ysburg.htm

We also have the letter that Edward Everett sent Lincoln complimenting him on his speech. Note: it isn't a copy, it is the original docuement.

http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/treasures/trt032.html

[achilles12604]

Is that it then . . . No one thinks they can defend a ligitament historical event?

Or is that the skeptics are so used to just being able to "doubt away" ligitament arguements, that they fear being on the defensive side of the ball?


24 hours. A few dozen views but no more replies. Can anyone prove that Lincoln did in fact give this speech just as history records?

I could, fairly easily.

However, I consider your arguement to be totally irrelavent. You already were given the various methods one would figure that out, and you arbitrarily rejected them already.

So, why bother?

By all means go through my points and show where my logic fails. Also keep in mind the usual arguements used against apologists. You might see a few similarities.

We did. You ignored the points. See post 2 and post 6.

You also have to argue against the various different newspaper reports, of eyewitnesses to the speech , (who claim they were direct eyewitnesses), and the various diaries of people who claim to have heard it. You also have to agrue against Abraham Lincoln's personal diary.

I addressed every point in posts 2 and 6. So far those individuals have not gotten back to my replies. Unlike some others on this site I don't simply ignore a point made by the other side. Either I address it or conceed it. But since you made the claim, what point from 2 or 6 didn't I address right afterwards? You make many bold statements like this (and numbers 5) Can you back it up with quotes or evidence?

As for your second paragraph, yes I hav argued about those things in much the same fashion as the skeptics of christianity do with our evidence. So far the result has been the same which should tell you something.

Do you have an excerpt from Abrahams diary or is this another point of evidence without any support at all? I'll gladly address it if you have a source and a quote.

Pardon, I was mistaken. It was a different diary entry.

Benjamin French, who helped plan the dedication, wrote in his diary, "Anyone who saw & heard as I did, the hurricane of applause that met his every movement at Gettysburg would know that he lived in every heart. It was no cold, faint, shadow of a kind reception -- it was a tumultuous outpouring of exultation, from true and loving hearts, at the sight of a man whom everyone knew to be honest and true and sincere in every act of his life, and every pulsation of his heart. It was the spontaneous outburst of heartfelt confidence in their own President."

http://showcase.netins.net/web/creative ... ysburg.htm

We also have the letter that Edward Everett sent Lincoln complimenting him on his speech. Note: it isn't a copy, it is the original docuement.

http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/treasures/trt032.html

You would have been better if you had only presented one of these sources. They contradict one another. . .

"Anyone who saw & heard as I did, the hurricane of applause that met his every movement at Gettysburg would know that he lived in every heart.

Unfortunately, Lincoln had heard only the polite applause commonly awarded men of his station, whatever the occasion, which stands in marked contrast to the crescendo of praise that sounded across the nation after the American people had time to read and reflect on the Address.

It seems that even the eyewitnesses can't agree on the details can they? Which one do we trust?

Oh by the way . . . just a quick note. The letter you cite here is not the original as you suggested

We also have the letter that Edward Everett sent Lincoln complimenting him on his speech. Note: it isn't a copy, it is the original docuement.

it is not even a paper copy from the time period. It is a holographic representation of this supposed letter. Sorry to burst this bubble.

A Gracious Compliment, American Treasures of the Library of Congress: Includes a holograph of Everett's famous letter to Lincoln after hearing the Gettysburg Address in November of 1863.-MJM

http://library.marist.edu/diglib/englis ... edward.htm

This site's link lead straight you the site you cited. (that was a mouthful)


Your first point of evidence is arbrtrary. Monuments can be established any where any time for any reason. The fact that a monument is there is simply fallout from the resulting impact that this conspiracy put forth. The conspirators wished to stir the peoples emotions and win opinions over to their much needed war hawing. A memorial years later isn't evidence of an event. It is evidence of a response to something. That something could very easily have been a conspiracy leaked to the media. Remember that although the press was supposedly there, they lack even one picture of the event in their papers.


So what you initally presented as a diary entry and the original letter turned out to be heresay from years later and a holographic representation of something we arn't ever sure existed in the first place. Like James Ossuary, some things which are to good to be true usually are forged.

Really good try though.

[MrWhy]

Proof of the specifics of any historical event is next to impossible. The weight of evidence is what we have to base judgement on. Evidence is support for the truth of a proposition, and includes anything that makes a proposition more likely and contrary propositions less likely. Some evidence can be listed for almost anything, but a reasonable person will withhold conclusions until a high level of supporting evidence is established. The quality of evidence has to do with the credibility of the facts and the theories. In this case the evidence for his speech is adequate.

There are a couple of points that need to be made.
1. This is an irrelevant debate unless you are an avid history buff. A proof of true or false would affect few of us living today.

2. One reason to accept the evidence that the event occurred as claimed is: No miracles, or other supernatural events are claimed. Nothing out of the ordinary is proposed.

[juliod]

Based on the fact that there are extreamly limited and fairly untrustworthy copies of this supposed speech until well after it was already circulated by northern conspirators and that the motive for the North to concoct such a scheme is easy to see, I submit that President Lincoln never actually gave this speech in Gettysburg at the time he was supposedly doing so.

Yes, in the terms you have laid out, your argument is potentially valid. It's just that in detail the judgement of the historical community is that Lincoln did deliver such a speech.

However, your meta-argument, that if it is possible that the Gettysburg Address was a fake then it is possible that Jesus was real, is not valid. Neither will it make an impression on we atheists. Those who are skeptical of religious claims are equally sensitive to the reality of historical fictions.

No well-thinking rationalist should need to be reminded that our views of history (in particular what we are taught in school) are likely to be heavily flawed. It is the theists who constantly reject this lesson.

DanZ

[Goat]

So what you initally presented as a diary entry and the original letter turned out to be heresay from years later and a holographic representation of something we arn't ever sure existed in the first place. Like James Ossuary, some things which are to good to be true usually are forged.

Really good try though.

You are misunderstanding (perhaps for the purpose of your mental exercise), evaluating the reliablity of evidence.

Points to consider:

1) What is the history of the evidence, and how was it found? In the case of the letters, they were part of Lincoln's personal effects, and were given to the library of congress by Lincoln's heirs. In the case of the Ossuary of James, it was owned by a private collector, and there was no context which it could be examined. It appeared out of no where.

2) Is the evidence able to be examined and tested by objective observers. In the case of both, yes, they could (and that is how the fraud was discovered). In the case of, let's say, the chariot wheels of Ron Wyatt, no objective person was allowed to look at the evidence. In the case of King Tutt's Mummy, it was discovered intact, and removed in a
manner where there were objective observers, and all the evidence could be independantly examined.

3) When it comes to alexander the great, we have independant contemporary observers that recorded events. We have physical evidence that events that are attriubuted to him actually happened. Also,
none of the events recorded were beyond the realm of mundane physical laws.

[achilles12604]

Proof of the specifics of any historical event is next to impossible. The weight of evidence is what we have to base judgement on. Evidence is support for the truth of a proposition, and includes anything that makes a proposition more likely and contrary propositions less likely. Some evidence can be listed for almost anything, but a reasonable person will withhold conclusions until a high level of supporting evidence is established. The quality of evidence has to do with the credibility of the facts and the theories. In this case the evidence for his speech is adequate.

There are a couple of points that need to be made.
1. This is an irrelevant debate unless you are an avid history buff. A proof of true or false would affect few of us living today.

2. One reason to accept the evidence that the event occurred as claimed is: No miracles, or other supernatural events are claimed. Nothing out of the ordinary is proposed.

The point of this exercise was to show that when approached with a predisposition, valid historical events can be attacked and shown to never have happened.

Your last sentence is exactly what I am talking about.

2. One reason to accept the evidence that the event occurred as claimed is: No miracles, or other supernatural events are claimed. Nothing out of the ordinary is proposed

This sentence shows your prejudice against the possibility of God. If God were even allowed the possibility of existing as an option before being thrown out, then unbiased review of the evidence could be done. But since non-theists do not even allow the possibility of God to enter your equations, your logic follows the same line of reasoning that my exercise with Gettysburg did. I threw out Lincoln giving the address as a possibility and was able to construct another solution to the evidence that existed. This is EXACTLY what non-theists do on a regular basis with the litterature, histories, archeology and traditions the apologists present.

Thank you for outlining my point.

[Goat]

So what you initally presented as a diary entry and the original letter turned out to be heresay from years later and a holographic representation of something we arn't ever sure existed in the first place. Like James Ossuary, some things which are to good to be true usually are forged.

Really good try though.

You are misunderstanding (perhaps for the purpose of your mental exercise), evaluating the reliablity of evidence.

Points to consider:

1) What is the history of the evidence, and how was it found? In the case of the letters, they were part of Lincoln's personal effects, and were given to the library of congress by Lincoln's heirs. In the case of the Ossuary of James, it was owned by a private collector, and there was no context which it could be examined. It appeared out of no where.

2) Is the evidence able to be examined and tested by objective observers. In the case of both, yes, they could (and that is how the fraud was discovered). In the case of, let's say, the chariot wheels of Ron Wyatt, no objective person was allowed to look at the evidence. In the case of King Tutt's Mummy, it was discovered intact, and removed in a
manner where there were objective observers, and all the evidence could be independantly examined.

3) When it comes to alexander the great, we have independant contemporary observers that recorded events. We have physical evidence that events that are attriubuted to him actually happened. Also,
none of the events recorded were beyond the realm of mundane physical laws.

There also is a difference because in the Gettysburg address, we hve a number of first hand accounts, written within months if not days of the origianal event.

In the case of the Gospels, we have nothing that describes the event from less that 35 (or more) years away, written by people who had theological axes to grind. In addition, the further in time away from the supposed event, the more detailed the account was (something you would expect in the development of a myth).

[achilles12604]

So what you initally presented as a diary entry and the original letter turned out to be heresay from years later and a holographic representation of something we arn't ever sure existed in the first place. Like James Ossuary, some things which are to good to be true usually are forged.

Really good try though.

You are misunderstanding (perhaps for the purpose of your mental exercise), evaluating the reliablity of evidence.

Points to consider:

1) What is the history of the evidence, and how was it found? In the case of the letters, they were part of Lincoln's personal effects, and were given to the library of congress by Lincoln's heirs. In the case of the Ossuary of James, it was owned by a private collector, and there was no context which it could be examined. It appeared out of no where.

2) Is the evidence able to be examined and tested by objective observers. In the case of both, yes, they could (and that is how the fraud was discovered). In the case of, let's say, the chariot wheels of Ron Wyatt, no objective person was allowed to look at the evidence. In the case of King Tutt's Mummy, it was discovered intact, and removed in a
manner where there were objective observers, and all the evidence could be independantly examined.

3) When it comes to alexander the great, we have independant contemporary observers that recorded events. We have physical evidence that events that are attriubuted to him actually happened. Also,
none of the events recorded were beyond the realm of mundane physical laws.

There also is a difference because in the Gettysburg address, we hve a number of first hand accounts, written within months if not days of the origianal event.

In the case of the Gospels, we have nothing that describes the event from less that 35 (or more) years away, written by people who had theological axes to grind. In addition, the further in time away from the supposed event, the more detailed the account was (something you would expect in the development of a myth).

We are also 2000 years removed from those events. The culture was totally different (oral vs written) and the papyrus used to write on (along with bark and other materials) were much more likely to dissolve and be lost over 2000 years than the modern paper and preservation we have now. That is why I was not comparing the two events. They have nothing in common all the way down to the technology or culture of the people. I simply wante to test the idea of useing your non-theist friend's arguements against a well known historical fac and see if they could defend it. I was not comparing these events outright. I notice you and juliod had to go back to your stomping ground which was off the topic. Lets focus here on what this thread is about.

Besides as I pointed out comparing these documents is like apples and oranges. Really, I should not have been able to raise even a small issue considering the advancements in technology, the written culture of today and the fact this event occured only 120ish years ago. The fact that I was able to raise the exact same complaints that non-theists raise about events 2000 years ago actually surprised me. 2000 years ago they didn't have preservation technology, paper, . . . for crying out loud the vast majority of the people of the entire world were illiterate!

Don't muddle the main discussion. I was talking about Gettysburg. You and Juliod go my point but this particular thread isn't about Jesus or the gospels so lets try and focus here rather than going back over the same old ground.

I think since two non-theists admitted that the way I drew the evidence made it possible for the Gettysburg address to have not been given the way history describes, I have made my point. I am not debating the validity of the Gospels here, so lets let that strawman go for the moment ok?