Which hypothesis would Occam's Razor favor?

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Elijah John
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Which hypothesis would Occam's Razor favor?

Post #1

Post by Elijah John »

From the Wikipedia description of Occam's Razor:
the problem-solving principle that essentially states that simpler solutions are more likely to be correct than complex ones
In light of this principle, which of the following scenarios is most likely true?

a)That Jesus existed as a real, flesh and blood human being, but was mythologized after his death.

b)That Jesus is really God the Son, second person of a Divine Trinity.

c) That Jesus never existed at all, and is a literary and theological invention.
My theological positions:

-God created us in His image, not the other way around.
-The Bible is redeemed by it's good parts.
-Pure monotheism, simple repentance.
-YHVH is LORD
-The real Jesus is not God, the real YHVH is not a monster.
-Eternal life is a gift from the Living God.
-Keep the Commandments, keep your salvation.
-I have accepted YHVH as my Heavenly Father, LORD and Savior.

I am inspired by Jesus to worship none but YHVH, and to serve only Him.

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Mithrae
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Post #21

Post by Mithrae »

Elijah John wrote: Isn't the "Jesus-myth*" theory an unnecessary complexity, in effect, a conspiracy theory?
Jubal wrote: Pardon ?
What on earth do you think a conspiracy theory is ?
A few years ago on my politics/climate change forum I realized that the contrarian view often involves numerous conspiracy theories, in the truest sense of the term. I came up with a set of fairly clear criteria based on some well-known conspiracy theories, along with the question of what makes conspiracy theories so problematic:
  • Conspiracy theories, in the '9/11 sceptic' or 'chemtrails' sense, have a few fairly obvious general characteristics:

    1 > That the public in general is in some way deceived
    2 > They necessarily require that large numbers of people who should be expected to reveal the truth to the public are instead colluding, or inexplicably and inexcusably ignorant of the truth
    3 > The motives attributed behind the deception are vague, obscure, implausible or (at best) in conflict with more obvious and powerful motivators
    4 > And above all, they make up for serious lack of evidence and any contrary evidence by appealing to collusion and cover-up
While the opposite argument could also be made for some theories regarding Jesus, I would say that based on those criteria the Jesus-myth theory as advanced by Richard Carrier for example is not a conspiracy theory: He suggests that Paul preached a heavenly rather than earthly life and death of Jesus and that, being a relatively common kind of thing at the time, there was no intention of deception or it being taken for an earthly life... but the later author of Mark mistook or adapted it as such, the subsequent gospels simply followed Mark's lead and the sect of Christianity which eventually became the orthodox accepted those gospels.

That would require little or no intent to deceive except by Mark (and perhaps, to a much lesser extent, by the other gospel authors in their embellishment of the story), no large numbers who should be expected to reveal the truth, and not much in the way of implausible motives either. The only criteria which it even approaches is the fourth, in his tortured reinterpretations and ad hoc appeals to interpolation regarding Paul (required to make the 'heavenly Jesus' fit instead of the human Jesus Paul clearly meant), but even that is just poor interpretation/reasoning rather than an appeal to collusion or cover-up.

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Post #22

Post by Jubal »

Mithrae wrote: A few years ago on my politics/climate change forum I realized that the contrarian view often involves numerous conspiracy theories, in the truest sense of the term. I came up with a set of fairly clear criteria based on some well-known conspiracy theories, along with the question of what makes conspiracy theories so problematic:
  • Conspiracy theories, in the '9/11 sceptic' or 'chemtrails' sense, have a few fairly obvious general characteristics:

    1 > That the public in general is in some way deceived
    2 > They necessarily require that large numbers of people who should be expected to reveal the truth to the public are instead colluding, or inexplicably and inexcusably ignorant of the truth
    3 > The motives attributed behind the deception are vague, obscure, implausible or (at best) in conflict with more obvious and powerful motivators
    4 > And above all, they make up for serious lack of evidence and any contrary evidence by appealing to collusion and cover-up
So your definition has nothing to do with any 'conspiracy' - which is an agreement to commit a crime.

Your definition matches belief in Jesus :

"1 > That the public in general is in some way deceived"

The public were deceived about Jesus being a historical person (not a deliberate hoax, but people who really believed (wrongly) convinced them a myth was real.)

"2 > They necessarily require that large numbers of people who should be expected to reveal the truth to the public are instead colluding, or inexplicably
and inexcusably ignorant of the truth"

Paul admitted he lied to convince people, most of the NT books are forgeries, much of the Christian story is impossible magic.

"3 > The motives attributed behind the deception are vague, obscure, implausible or (at best) in conflict with more obvious and powerful motivators"

Paul's motives are confused, the motives of all the forgey writers are unknown.

"4 > And above all, they make up for serious lack of evidence and any contrary evidence by appealing to collusion and cover-up"

Christians make up for the serious lack of evidence for Jesus by abusing sceptics as conspiracy theorists.


Belief in Jesus matches your definition of a conspiracy theory.


Jubal
Last edited by Jubal on Fri Jan 11, 2019 11:54 am, edited 1 time in total.

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Post #23

Post by Jubal »

Mithrae wrote: Conspiracy theories, in the '9/11 sceptic' or 'chemtrails' sense, have a few fairly obvious general characteristics:

1 > That the public in general is in some way deceived
2 > They necessarily require that large numbers of people who should be expected to reveal the truth to the public are instead colluding, or inexplicably and inexcusably ignorant of the truth
3 > The motives attributed behind the deception are vague, obscure, implausible or (at best) in conflict with more obvious and powerful motivators
4 > And above all, they make up for serious lack of evidence and any contrary evidence by appealing to collusion and cover-up
[/list]
But your definition does NOT match the Jesus myth theory -

"1 > That the public in general is in some way deceived"

Only IF you are a believer - were the public deceive that Moses was real ? Wsa that a conspiracy theory to convince people Moses existed ?

"2 > They necessarily require that large numbers of people who should be expected to reveal the truth to the public are instead colluding, or inexplicably and inexcusably ignorant of the truth"

The Jesus myth doesn't require thatr at all - just people who BELIEVED (wrongly.)

Is belief in Adam and Eve a conspiracy theory ?
Of course not.

"3 > The motives attributed behind the deception are vague, obscure, implausible or (at best) in conflict with more obvious and powerful motivators"

There was no deception about the Jesus myth.
Just people who BELIEVED (wrongly).
What were the vague, obscure, implausible motives and DECEPTION behind Moses being believed historical ?
Please explain the motives and the deception behind the conspiracy theory that Adam and Eve were historical.

"4 > And above all, they make up for serious lack of evidence and any contrary evidence by appealing to collusion and cover-up"

The Jesus myth theory has nothing to do with collusion or cover-up.
Any more than the Moses myth theory does.
Mithrae wrote: I would say that based on those criteria the Jesus-myth theory as advanced by Richard Carrier for example is not a conspiracy theory.
Yes.
Most people use the term 'conspiracy theory' to mean :
"stuff I violently disagree with".

Early Christians abused each other's sects by accusing them of eating babies. Now believers abuse their critics as 'conspiracy theorists'.

Jubal

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Post #24

Post by Mithrae »

Jubal wrote:
Mithrae wrote: A few years ago on my politics/climate change forum I realized that the contrarian view often involves numerous conspiracy theories, in the truest sense of the term. I came up with a set of fairly clear criteria based on some well-known conspiracy theories, along with the question of what makes conspiracy theories so problematic:
  • Conspiracy theories, in the '9/11 sceptic' or 'chemtrails' sense, have a few fairly obvious general characteristics:

    1 > That the public in general is in some way deceived
    2 > They necessarily require that large numbers of people who should be expected to reveal the truth to the public are instead colluding, or inexplicably and inexcusably ignorant of the truth
    3 > The motives attributed behind the deception are vague, obscure, implausible or (at best) in conflict with more obvious and powerful motivators
    4 > And above all, they make up for serious lack of evidence and any contrary evidence by appealing to collusion and cover-up
So your definition has nothing to do with any 'conspiracy' - which is an agreement to commit a crime.

Your definition matches belief in Jesus :

"1 > That the public in general is in some way deceived"

The public were deceived about Jesus being a historical person (not a deliberate hoax, but people who really believed (wrongly) convinced them a myth was real.)
That's one opinion, for sure. But you may want to double-check your definition of conspiracy; Google tells me it's "a secret plan by a group to do something unlawful or harmful."
Jubal wrote:"2 > They necessarily require that large numbers of people who should be expected to reveal the truth to the public are instead colluding, or inexplicably
and inexcusably ignorant of the truth"

Paul admitted he lied to convince people, most of the NT books are forgeries, much of the Christian story is impossible magic.
You seem to have been misinformed. Paul never said he lied to convince people; in fact in Romans 3 he expresses precisely the opposite sentiment quite strongly. Scholars are unanimous that 7 Pauline epistles are authentic (Romans, 1 & 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Philippians, 1 Thessalonians and Philemon) and there's no reason whatsoever to doubt that someone called John wrote the Revelation on Patmos, while 9 other New Testament works are anonymous (gospels, Acts, Hebrews and 1-3 John). So even if every single other work were pseudonymous - which is highly improbable - it would be well under half of NT. To my knowledge the only books which are almost certainly 'forgeries' are the pastorals and 2 Peter; in fact there's ongoing debate over even those, which says something about the uncertainty surrounding any pronouncement on the more other, more credible ones!
Jubal wrote: "3 > The motives attributed behind the deception are vague, obscure, implausible or (at best) in conflict with more obvious and powerful motivators"

Paul's motives are confused, the motives of all the forgey writers are unknown.

"4 > And above all, they make up for serious lack of evidence and any contrary evidence by appealing to collusion and cover-up"

Christians make up for the serious lack of evidence for Jesus by abusing sceptics as conspiracy theorists.


Belief in Jesus matches your definition of a conspiracy theory.
I don't think you've understood what I wrote or what I meant.

shnarkle
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Re: Which hypothesis would Occam's Razor favor?

Post #25

Post by shnarkle »

[Replying to post 1 by Elijah John]

D. None of the above.

Jesus was probably an illiterate Jew who began to manifest God's will when he realized that the only thing standing in the way of the messianic kingdom coming into existence was for people to see Christ in, with, and through themselves and each other. This only required repentance of the delusion that they were separate from God. To believe that one has a separate independent existence from God is idiotic, and the solution is self sacrifice which is what all four gospels point to. People believe this delusion of the self, and this is what allows us to not only commit sin, but to justify it.

When reality dawns upon one's awareness, the ego is abolished. Paul explains this when he points out that his identity is in Christ, or that it isn't him, but "Christ in me".

When there is no longer this separation, the new creation can then claim, right along with Christ that they are one with the father.

This is confirmed in the church as they identify themselves as "the way". There is only the way, and the reason it is so narrow is because it leads straight to those flaming swords guarding Paradise which instantly slice one's identity into nothing.

There is no one on the narrow path, there is only the path itself. Anyone who disagrees doesn't understand that they can't be the abstract construction or idea that they identify with. Identities don't actually exist as anything other than ideas.

It's so simple, no one ever bothers to point it out.

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Re: Which hypothesis would Occam's Razor favor?

Post #26

Post by shnarkle »

[Replying to post 1 by Elijah John]

D. None of the above.

Jesus was probably an illiterate Jew who began to manifest God's will when he realized that the only thing standing in the way of the messianic kingdom coming into existence was for people to see Christ in, with, and through themselves and each other. This only required repentance of the delusion that they were separate from God. To believe that one has a separate independent existence from God is idiotic, and the solution is self sacrifice which is what all four gospels point to. People believe this delusion of the self, and this is what allows us to not only commit sin, but to justify it.

When reality dawns upon one's awareness, the ego is abolished. Paul explains this when he points out that his identity is in Christ, or that it isn't him, but "Christ in me".

When there is no longer this separation, the new creation can then claim, right along with Christ that they are one with the father.

This is confirmed in the church as they identify themselves as "the way". There is only the way, and the reason it is so narrow is because it leads straight to those flaming swords guarding Paradise which instantly slice one's identity into nothing.

There is no one on the narrow path, there is only the path itself. Anyone who disagrees doesn't understand that they can't be the abstract construction or idea that they identify with. Identities don't actually exist as anything other than ideas.

It's so simple, no one ever bothers to point it out.

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