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Replying to POI in post #13]
You can save all these posts, because all that is going on is that we continue to go over the same things. You complain about how much I say which sort of demonstrates one who is convinced there are easy answers, and it is hilarious. This topic has been debated for over 2000 years, and all of the sudden it is all so simple, and you have it all figured out. Of course, this is after you spent decades of your life believing a dead man rose from the dead for no reason at all, and of course this must make you an expert on the subject.
But let's walk through this together. You claim to be agnostic toward Christianity, but I highly doubt that is the position you hold. Rather, if I were a betting man, my bet would be that you believe Christianity to be false. The problem is the fact that you can in no way demonstrate the position you actually hold, and so you are forced to take the agnostic position and complain that you cannot disprove an unfalsifiable claim. However, as I have demonstrated, the unfalsifiable claim argument you attempt to use, was intended to be confined to science, and was never intended to even suggest there would be no facts, evidence, and reasons to believe unfalsifiable claims. Again, the man who came up with this idea, rightly argued that unfalsifiable claims were outside the realm of science, and science should stay in its lane, and allow other fields of study to take care of what they are equipped for.
You complain that the Bible, and Christianity deserve intense "scrutiny" and the fact of the matter is, Christianity and the Bible has endured this intense scrutiny, and it is what is called the historical method. Not the scientific method, because these sorts of things are outside the realm of science which means science cannot help us out, which goes on to mean, one cannot appeal to the unfalsifiable claim argument, and yet you do. However, it is beyond any reasonable doubt at all, that you did not come up with this on your own, but rather you heard it from someone else, and since it sounded good to your ears, you simply repeat it without actually doing the thinking yourself in order to determine that the topic under debate is outside the realm of science, and therefore the unfalsifiable claim argument does not apply.
Okay, does this sound familiar to you in any way? Allow me to help you out. Let's go back and think about a time when you simply listen to what others were telling you, and what these folks were telling you sounded good to the ears, and you simply accepted what sounded good to your ears without the use of the mind, and then you wake up one day and come to understand that you have not use the mind.
I'm just telling you there is no difference! Again, it is a fact that you did not come up with the unfalsifiable claim argument on your own, which means you heard it from another, but the fact of the matter is, it would not take very much research in the least to come to understand that this argument does not apply to the topic at hand, and here you are making the argument, which means (just like when one was a Christian) there is not a whole lot of thinking going on for one's self.
However, when you and I go on to apply the correct method, which is the historical method, you and I come to an agreement that the resurrection stories could not possibly have been made up. Notice what this means. It means it would have been impossible. Now, you know, I know, and everyone who may be reading knows, you would love to be able to use this argument. However, when we use the historical method, you come to understand it is not possible.
Okay, so we reject the resurrection because it would be impossible, and we reject the idea that the resurrection story was made up because that would be impossible. So then, any thinking person would attempt to move on to another scenario which may be possible and think through what all that would have involved. My friend, you do not even have to do the work here, because the scholars have done the work for you, and there is no known scenario which would be possible. The thing is, you have to know this. Because you see, if any of the scholars had come up with this neat and tidy explanation of the facts we can know which would even be possible, we would all be aware of this scenario. It does not exist, and this does not matter to you because you hold out hope, against all hope that there must and has to be a scenario out there that may be possible. This is exactly what you are doing because you have not come up with any scenario which would be a possibility, and yet you have somehow convinced yourself that there must and has to be another explanation. There is no known explanation of the facts we can know which would not include the extreme extraordinary, which means you have to exchange one extraordinary tale for another, or you have to hope against all hope there is an unknown explanation out there.
But let us continue to think about your situation. You have no explanation of the facts we can know, but what you do know is you were convinced a dead man rose from the dead for decades of your life, only to come to realize that you did no thinking on your own because you simply took the word of others and you simply repeated the words of these others. So then, you decide to begin to listen to those on the other side, and what these folks have to say now sounds good to the ears, and you are simply repeating arguments you have heard from others. Moreover, what is even more fascinating is the fact that you have convinced yourself that there is no possibility of error on your part. We know that you are under the impression that there is no possibility of error on your part, because you will not even allow it to be a possibility that those who hold to a different conclusion than you could have possibly used any sort of reason, and you are able to fix your fingers to type out that it has to be the case that those opposed to you must, and have to be guilty of cognitive dissonance which again is your repeating what you have heard from others, because this is not an argument you have come up with on your own.
I am sorry, but I am not seeing a whole lot of difference between the thinking when you were convinced a dead man rose from the dead, as opposed to the thinking now that you came to realize that others were thinking for you. This is why I can say, simply because the mind has changed does not necessitate the thinking has changed. Maybe this does not bother you, but I cannot help but think that it must be sad to know that you cannot demonstrate the position you hold and cannot afford to even consider the idea that anyone at all opposed could have possibly used reason to oppose you.
