Less than half of Irish people consider themselves religious

philologos

amadain17 wrote: »

I'm just citing my sources. When I give you videos for the inaccuracy of the New Testament you refused to watch them When I give you sources for the errors and immorality in the bible you refuse to look at it. The site (Skeptics Annotated Bible) goes through every book of the new testament and old. The information is too much for me to type. From our previous discussion you never answered why nobody during Jesus's lifetime wrote any of his deeds down. You have answers for nothing. You avoid questions you don't like. You clearly know all of these problems and you choose to ignore them. I called you dishonest twice and you said that this was rude and disrespectful. Well I don't respect you. You are a deceitful liar and a dishonest con-man. This thread is about the Irish losing their religion. Most of the atheists here were indoctrinated and dispelled the ridiculous at a later age. We are now having children. My children were not baptised and will not be indoctrinated. This is the same for my friends' children. The next generation will have a better foundation. Its very important for children to learn skepticism and of the logical fallacies so that they can defend themselves against huxters like you. Now go an shout on a street corner you waste of space

1. I was pointing out that perhaps quoting the Skeptics Annotated Bible without considering anything that Christians might have to say mightn't be the best approach. "The information is too much for me to type" - you mean what people selectively misquote without consideration of context? That's what I've found when I've spent some time reading through it before.

2. I've explained quite a few misconceptions that have been raised. I don't honestly believe that God is immoral, and I have countered many of the claims that you've already made.

3. I've systematically went through many of your posts which were sceptical of the authenticity of the New Testament, I even presented to you a number of Biblical scholars who on the basis of the clear manuscript evidence conclude that at least 99.6% of it is the same as when it was first written. I've also shown you that on the same criteria that we investigate the authenticity of Aristotle, Plato, or other ancient texts, the New Testament comes way way way ahead.

4. I never saw the post where you asked me why did nobody write anything while Jesus was still alive, naturally I've had quite a bit to respond to. That's no excuse for being rude. If you think that I've missed a post, what you should do is link me to it, send a PM and ask me to look at it. Naturally, I've other things to do such as work. Yes, you called me dishonest twice, and I said it was rude and disrespectful primarily because I've spent quite a lot of my time and energy trying to respond to your posts as best as I can. I think most reasonable people would call that rude at best.

5. What questions have I avoided? - I think what you mean by avoided is that I haven't been sat at my computer 24 / 7 waiting for them. If you have a question that you think I've missed, PM me and I'll try my very best to get around to as much as possible.

6. The video? - I explained to you very well that I'm not going to spend 1hr 30mins of my time watching videos to respond to one post. I also told you that if you knew Bart Ehrman's argument sufficiently that you should be able to paraphrase it and present your argument to me. A number of atheists actually agreed with me on this issue. I also showed you some other scholars who have disagreed with Bart Ehrman's conclusions in Misquoting Jesus. I've asked you to show me other passages other than the 40 verses that Bruce Metzger in his research has regarded to be doubtful. You've failed to do this. How is that unreasonable or unfair?

7. I don't care if you respect me honestly. It is mere etiquette that one presents an argument with respect, and one communicates ones point clearly so that the other can respond. I suspect that you're not interested in what I have to say anyway. If that's the case, why are you posting? Go do something that you think could be more fruitful?

8. Liar and a conman? Would you like to present a lie that I've given in your response. Honestly, I don't care if you call me a liar or a conman. The fact that you call me that is laughable though. What do I have to gain from presenting the Gospel, and defending it on boards.ie? Incredibly little. The reality is the only reason I post is that I hope many hear the Gospel and are saved.

9. I agree, it is important for children to learn scepticism. Indeed people should be taught scepticism in general, and should have a good introduction to philosophy. I've mentioned on this thread already, by nature I'm quite a sceptical person. Indeed, my scepticism extends to the claims of new-atheism and its proponents both in more formal and informal forms. I've thought through my beliefs, and I've shown you what I've thought about from Scripture, and how I disagree with your position. Even if you disagree with me, I think there are very few people who could argue seriously that I've not done my homework on the Gospel.

10. I don't care whether or not you baptise your children. I'm not a proponent of infant baptism, I believe that when people become saved and know Jesus as their Lord, that's when they should be baptised. People should think about the Gospel before making an important decision that they are going to follow Jesus for the rest of their lives. I was baptised as an infant, but I didn't truly believe in Jesus until about 5 years ago.

11. This article is about Irish people losing their religion - Agreed. I'm Irish, and I'm an example of someone who found Christ. I saw questionable claims about Christianity being posted on this thread, and I think it's my freedom as a member of this forum to contribute a response to those claims, many of which were unfounded. There were quite a few genuine questions, and I like getting my teeth into a good discussion on God. I come here because I want to share the hope that is within me with gentleness and respect (1 Peter 3:15 - 16).

12. Whatever you call me, a huxter, a fraudster, a conartist (despite having absolutely nothing to gain), I'm not going to do the same to you. I hope the very best for you, even if you hate the Biblical Gospel. I hope that you will actually some day come and listen to what Jesus has to say to you. If at any point you change your mind, or are curious about these issues please feel free to PM me at any time.

Much much thanks for your time,
philologos

Nodin

philologos wrote: »

......



That video is built upon a logical fallacy. I've discussed that many many times in my time on boards.ie.

1. It assumes that because I have never seen God healing amputees, that it never happens.
....

...Whoah there Tonto. Theres no verified record of any amputee being healed. Thats rather different.

crazy cabbage

Posted this in another tread months back and think it has some value so i will repost.

For me all religions are just different pages of the same book. I have read bits of the bibal and the koran and was interested in buddism for a while. while i dont believe the dali lama is a walking god, he seem to be a stand up guy who has only ever preached peace. Other pages of this 'book' include spirtuality and being a member of the universe and athism and pritty much anything.

If being a member of a religion makes you a better person or you think you have something to learn from it then no one has the right to convince you otherwise. I learned alot from reading about some buddist beliefs. Some of the catholic storys make execlent fabels that one can learn from (sheperd who called wolf and what-have-ya). I do not follow any religion but i wouldn't consider myself an athist either. Whatever religion one chooses to follow is great. Let them be. For all you know that religion could have had a very positive impact on there livies. I myself am considering going to one of them monesteries for a month when i am older (dont care what religion it is really becouse i will be ignoring most god talk). Think the experience with the strict code of conduct and constant medatation would be bennifical to me.

what i dont think is fair however is the hold that the catholic religion has over people in ireland. People are baptised without question often so it will be easier for them to get into school. People then get married within the church. burried by the church. Chatolism is ingrande within us and i think that needs to change.
Nothing against chatolism. i just think people would think more of it if they turned to it in there own time, if they so wish

my 2 cents

hiram

philologos wrote: »

amadain17 wrote: »

I'm just citing my sources. When I give you videos for the inaccuracy of the New Testament you refused to watch them When I give you sources for the errors and immorality in the bible you refuse to look at it. The site (Skeptics Annotated Bible) goes through every book of the new testament and old. The information is too much for me to type. From our previous discussion you never answered why nobody during Jesus's lifetime wrote any of his deeds down. You have answers for nothing. You avoid questions you don't like. You clearly know all of these problems and you choose to ignore them. I called you dishonest twice and you said that this was rude and disrespectful. Well I don't respect you. You are a deceitful liar and a dishonest con-man. This thread is about the Irish losing their religion. Most of the atheists here were indoctrinated and dispelled the ridiculous at a later age. We are now having children. My children were not baptised and will not be indoctrinated. This is the same for my friends' children. The next generation will have a better foundation. Its very important for children to learn skepticism and of the logical fallacies so that they can defend themselves against huxters like you. Now go an shout on a street corner you waste of space

1. I was pointing out that perhaps quoting the Skeptics Annotated Bible without considering anything that Christians might have to say mightn't be the best approach. "The information is too much for me to type" - you mean what people selectively misquote without consideration of context? That's what I've found when I've spent some time reading through it before.

2. I've explained quite a few misconceptions that have been raised. I don't honestly believe that God is immoral, and I have countered many of the claims that you've already made.

3. I've systematically went through many of your posts which were sceptical of the authenticity of the New Testament, I even presented to you a number of Biblical scholars who on the basis of the clear manuscript evidence conclude that at least 99.6% of it is the same as when it was first written. I've also shown you that on the same criteria that we investigate the authenticity of Aristotle, Plato, or other ancient texts, the New Testament comes way way way ahead.

4. I never saw the post where you asked me why did nobody write anything while Jesus was still alive, naturally I've had quite a bit to respond to. That's no excuse for being rude. If you think that I've missed a post, what you should do is link me to it, send a PM and ask me to look at it. Naturally, I've other things to do such as work. Yes, you called me dishonest twice, and I said it was rude and disrespectful primarily because I've spent quite a lot of my time and energy trying to respond to your posts as best as I can. I think most reasonable people would call that rude at best.

5. What questions have I avoided? - I think what you mean by avoided is that I haven't been sat at my computer 24 / 7 waiting for them. If you have a question that you think I've missed, PM me and I'll try my very best to get around to as much as possible.

6. The video? - I explained to you very well that I'm not going to spend 1hr 30mins of my time watching videos to respond to one post. I also told you that if you knew Bart Ehrman's argument sufficiently that you should be able to paraphrase it and present your argument to me. A number of atheists actually agreed with me on this issue. I also showed you some other scholars who have disagreed with Bart Ehrman's conclusions in Misquoting Jesus. I've asked you to show me other passages other than the 40 verses that Bruce Metzger in his research has regarded to be doubtful. You've failed to do this. How is that unreasonable or unfair?

7. I don't care if you respect me honestly. It is mere etiquette that one presents an argument with respect, and one communicates ones point clearly so that the other can respond. I suspect that you're not interested in what I have to say anyway. If that's the case, why are you posting? Go do something that you think could be more fruitful?

8. Liar and a conman? Would you like to present a lie that I've given in your response. Honestly, I don't care if you call me a liar or a conman. The fact that you call me that is laughable though. What do I have to gain from presenting the Gospel, and defending it on boards.ie? Incredibly little. The reality is the only reason I post is that I hope many hear the Gospel and are saved.

9. I agree, it is important for children to learn scepticism. Indeed people should be taught scepticism in general, and should have a good introduction to philosophy. I've mentioned on this thread already, by nature I'm quite a sceptical person. Indeed, my scepticism extends to the claims of new-atheism and its proponents both in more formal and informal forms. I've thought through my beliefs, and I've shown you what I've thought about from Scripture, and how I disagree with your position. Even if you disagree with me, I think there are very few people who could argue seriously that I've not done my homework on the Gospel.

10. I don't care whether or not you baptise your children. I'm not a proponent of infant baptism, I believe that when people become saved and know Jesus as their Lord, that's when they should be baptised. People should think about the Gospel before making an important decision that they are going to follow Jesus for the rest of their lives. I was baptised as an infant, but I didn't truly believe in Jesus until about 5 years ago.

11. This article is about Irish people losing their religion - Agreed. I'm Irish, and I'm an example of someone who found Christ. I saw questionable claims about Christianity being posted on this thread, and I think it's my freedom as a member of this forum to contribute a response to those claims, many of which were unfounded. There were quite a few genuine questions, and I like getting my teeth into a good discussion on God. I come here because I want to share the hope that is within me with gentleness and respect (1 Peter 3:15 - 16).

12. Whatever you call me, a huxter, a fraudster, a conartist (despite having absolutely nothing to gain), I'm not going to do the same to you. I hope the very best for you, even if you hate the Biblical Gospel. I hope that you will actually some day come and listen to what Jesus has to say to you. If at any point you change your mind, or are curious about these issues please feel free to PM me at any time.

Much much thanks for your time,
philologos

Actually, I respect you Philo, moreso for you eloquent discourse etc. But....I really do think you need to close that Laptop, or close down that PC, rub those eyes, open a window and go for a long walk, or a drive, or meet some people, or make love, or hit someone, go skinny dipping, watch porn, fly to Italy for a weekend just for pizza, see a band, join a band.....because, what if, and only if. You are wrong and this is it....you will have wasted all those thousands of posts arguing with people on a forum which is to most people a bizarre form of simple entertainment and they really don't give a crap. Go Philo, go.....before its too late.

philologos

hiram wrote: »

Actually, I respect you Philo, moreso for you eloquent discourse etc. But....I really do think you need to close that Laptop, or close down that PC, rub those eyes, open a window and go for a long walk, or a drive, or meet some people, or make love, or hit someone, go skinny dipping, watch porn, fly to Italy for a weekend just for pizza, see a band, join a band.....because, what if, and only if. You are wrong and this is it....you will have wasted all those thousands of posts arguing with people on a forum which is to most people a bizarre form of simple entertainment and they really don't give a crap. Go Philo, go.....before its too late.

Part of me says though, that if I have an opportunity, I should share a bit of the Gospel with others around me. I aim to do this with people I meet in real non-boards.ie life as well.

If I'm wrong, I've wasted my time. If I am right, I've spent time introducing people to the Lord Jesus, the only one who can truly save.

Don't worry, I still get around to doing many things

Mardy Bum

philologos wrote: »

Part of me says though, that if I have an opportunity, I should share a bit of the Gospel with others around me. I aim to do this with people I meet in real non-boards.ie life as well.

If I'm wrong, I've wasted my time. If I am right, I've spent time introducing people to the Lord Jesus, the only one who can truly save.

Don't worry, I still get around to doing many things

So you are a hostage to the gospel and Jesus?

philologos

Mardy Bum wrote: »

So you are a hostage to the gospel and Jesus?

Jesus is honestly the most important thing in my life hands down. I want to live for Him in everything I say and do. Many times I fail and on many occasions I do a crappy job of it, but with God's grace I get up and try again.

When I go to work, I want to glorify Him in everything I say and do. When I am with friends, and family, I want to live as He would want me to live. In every single thing that I do, I want to live as Jesus would have me live.

Why? Because I'm immeasurably thankful, for His grace and His mercy to me a sinner. The Gospel changed my life forever, and I'm not ashamed to say that He's Lord.

With that I'm going to leave it for today. Might get round to some more tomorrow night.

NotForResale

philologos wrote: »

If I'm wrong, I've wasted my time. If I am right, I've spent time introducing people to the Lord Jesus, the only one who can truly save.

Unless one of the other religions is right.

amadain17

Whatever you call me, a huxter, a fraudster, a conartist (despite having absolutely nothing to gain), I'm not going to do the same to you. I hope the very best for you, even if you hate the Biblical Gospel. I hope that you will actually some day come and listen to what Jesus has to say to you. If at any point you change your mind, or are curious about these issues please feel free to PM me at any time.

Much much thanks for your time,
philologos

Actually Philologos I want to apologise. I WAS rude to you (sleepless nights with the kids but that no excuse) and for that I am sorry. I originally came in to the conversation on the back of your statement that the bible was unchanged. I disagreed with that from what research I had done. Even the historicity of Jesus is under dispute.

However none of this matters because if this is your goal with atheists:

The reality is the only reason I post is that I hope many hear the Gospel and are saved.

Then you need to prove god exists. An atheist is simply a person who does not believe in the existence of any gods. There are some people, I admit, who believe that god exists and are angry with him/her/it but they are not atheists.

The historicity of the bible or the validity of a man who 2000 years ago apparently thought he was god have no bearing on the question. These things build on the foundation that god exists.

If you want to 'convert atheists' simply prove god exists.

For the immorality shown in the bible simple goes to show that was man-made and man-inspired. Morality changes over the ages and we have different moral values now.

Most people on this forum were brought up in religion and became atheists after looking into their beliefs and questioning them honestly. Science has shown us natural causes for that which we once thought supernatural. The honest enquiry that science pursues has a far better foundation than the speculative conjecture of the Biblical texts.

There is no advantage in replacing an 'I don't know' with a 'god did it'. 'I don't know' is honest and marks something for future investigation. 'God did it' is lazy and says 'I'm not going to look any further and questioning how He did it is disrespectful'. In short its a lazy way out. We have brains and 'God did it' is the route of not using our brains.

If you got past proving god exists then you would only be at deism. The next thing is to prove that god cares about what is mentioned in whatever holy book you personally subscribe to (there are so many and have been so many throughout the ages). This is the point of holy war. Everybody has an interpretation of what god thinks and is like and, funnily enough, their opinions on that matter always seem to correspond to their own personal utopia. Even people within the same sect have differing visions of their own personal utopia based on the different experiences of their own lives and this even changes throughout their lives due to the culmination of further experiences (your personal idea of heaven is someone else's vision of hell).

I feel you have a job ahead of you but you would make headway here taking us from atheist to deist. For that reason I ask you what evidence you have for the existence of god (any god to start off with)?

Again sorry for the earlier rudeness. I hope this can be the start of a civilised debate on the topic.

A

nozzferrahhtoo

amadain17 wrote: »

If you want to 'convert atheists' simply prove god exists.

Unfortunately every time we ask him to do this he turns to lies and evasion. Despite having a massive post count he starts claiming that he has not the time to make such posts and will "get around to it" which he never has and I think never will.

The one time he tried with me he listed the reasons he thinks Christianity is true and real and I debunked them all. At that point he ran off crying, started to pretend to have me on ignore.... forgot and replied to me a few times in another thread and sent me PMs.... then started to pretend to have me on ignore again.

Though I am not the only one to notice his cut and run tactics, and he changed his nick from Jakkass to Philologos to try and shake off some of his reputation in this regard, his standard tactic is to evangelise a thread, then run when it gets hot, lay low for a day or two, then pop up and evangelise another thread with all the same points that were systematically and thoroughly debunked in the previous thread.

amadain17

The one time he tried with me he listed the reasons he thinks Christianity is true and real and I debunked them all.

I checked that link out. What a wonderful debunking. Thank you for sharing that.

A

paddyandy

O.P. That will change before the year is out i'm sure to certain .

Dyr

paddyandy wrote: »

O.P. That will change before the year is out i'm sure to certain .

Yeah as nature takes its course with our coffin dodging seniors that percentage of unbelievers will go up

hiram

amadain17 wrote: »

Whatever you call me, a huxter, a fraudster, a conartist (despite having absolutely nothing to gain), I'm not going to do the same to you. I hope the very best for you, even if you hate the Biblical Gospel. I hope that you will actually some day come and listen to what Jesus has to say to you. If at any point you change your mind, or are curious about these issues please feel free to PM me at any time.

Much much thanks for your time,
philologos

Actually Philologos I want to apologise. I WAS rude to you (sleepless nights with the kids but that no excuse) and for that I am sorry. I originally came in to the conversation on the back of your statement that the bible was unchanged. I disagreed with that from what research I had done. Even the historicity of Jesus is under dispute.

However none of this matters because if this is your goal with atheists:

The reality is the only reason I post is that I hope many hear the Gospel and are saved.

Then you need to prove god exists. An atheist is simply a person who does not believe in the existence of any gods. There are some people, I admit, who believe that god exists and are angry with him/her/it but they are not atheists.

The historicity of the bible or the validity of a man who 2000 years ago apparently thought he was god have no bearing on the question. These things build on the foundation that god exists.

If you want to 'convert atheists' simply prove god exists.

For the immorality shown in the bible simple goes to show that was man-made and man-inspired. Morality changes over the ages and we have different moral values now.

Most people on this forum were brought up in religion and became atheists after looking into their beliefs and questioning them honestly. Science has shown us natural causes for that which we once thought supernatural. The honest enquiry that science pursues has a far better foundation than the speculative conjecture of the Biblical texts.

There is no advantage in replacing an 'I don't know' with a 'god did it'. 'I don't know' is honest and marks something for future investigation. 'God did it' is lazy and says 'I'm not going to look any further and questioning how He did it is disrespectful'. In short its a lazy way out. We have brains and 'God did it' is the route of not using our brains.

If you got past proving god exists then you would only be at deism. The next thing is to prove that god cares about what is mentioned in whatever holy book you personally subscribe to (there are so many and have been so many throughout the ages). This is the point of holy war. Everybody has an interpretation of what god thinks and is like and, funnily enough, their opinions on that matter always seem to correspond to their own personal utopia. Even people within the same sect have differing visions of their own personal utopia based on the different experiences of their own lives and this even changes throughout their lives due to the culmination of further experiences (your personal idea of heaven is someone else's vision of hell).

I feel you have a job ahead of you but you would make headway here taking us from atheist to deist. For that reason I ask you what evidence you have for the existence of god (any god to start off with)?

Again sorry for the earlier rudeness. I hope this can he the start of a civilised debate on the topic.

A

One of the best posts I have read in a while. Most excellent.

amadain17

One of the best posts I have read in a while. Most excellent.

I'm chuffed. Thanks

A

Scanlas The 2nd

Possibly my favourite boards post ever, he tears to shreads the tiresome nonsense we're so used to hearing from philologos.


Quote: philologos
I've linked to some reasons I gave a few years ago and I will refine these in time.


Let us look at those reasons shall we?

Quote: philologos
1) Messianic prophesy


I am aware of no such thing. I am aware of people retrospectively cherry picking vague lyrical text from the bible and making suggestion that they fit past events. However I am aware people also do that with Nostradamus. If you have lyrical text that is vague enough you will always fit it to events, especially if you have enough events from which to draw from.

If you want to pick say one of the "prophesy" at a time however and adumbrate your reasoning as to how it was prophesy and why you think it was fulfilled, in such a way as to show it was not merely the connection of vague text to vague events then I am happy to work through them one at a time with you.

A challenge of course is to establish that you did not fall into one of the two big pitfalls people fall into while doing this which are:

1) The prophesy was not self fulfilling. After all if a text days "The messiah will ride into town on a donkey" then anyone who wants to pretend to be the messiah will of course make a point of riding into town on a donkey.

2) The text of part 2 was not written specifically to make it appear it fulfills part 1. There is a reason after all that people are not wowed by the fact that the prophesy made in book 1 of Lord of the Rings was later fulfilled in books 5 and 6.

Quote: philologos
2) Christian history does not make sense without a Resurrection event


I can think of many ways in which it would make sense. Not just one but many. For instance the people involved could have been deluded. The people involved could have been DOING the deluding. The people involved may have dispersed but history re-written to suggest they saw things they never claimed to, such as the walking dead. It is amazing for example that the line in the bible which tells us that the graves all opened and the dead walked the earth seems to have... despite it being an incredible event.... made very little ripple in the texts of the time at all.

Quote: philologos
If you cannot explain to me conclusively how all 11 disciples went through to the lengths that they did in a reasonable manner, then this will always give credence to something extraordinary having happened to bring these men to those lengths.


You ask however to explain why 11 disciples went through what they did if there was no ressurrection. I find that easy to explain. We have fanatics today who do monumentally unusual things for things the rest of us clearly see are erroneous or a lie. That people can get fanatical and delusional is hardly a surprise or something that needs to be explained.

That a man claiming to be a god would a) attract and b) even seek out such people is also hardly a surprise.

Also you want an explanation for a mere 11 people. Childs play. Explain to me the massive and CURRENT dedication to Sathya Sai Baba. He even claims to be born of a virgin. His followers can be just as dedicated and just as fanatical as your mere group of 11. He had a birthday and a million people showed up.

You act like finding 11 fanatics that believe your guff is some kind of miracle that requires explaining. To me it is common as muck. Go look at the "Ten Commandments of God" sect. They believed strongly enough, and were fanatical enough, to go into a hut with their family and burn the place down around them in a suicidal expression of their certainty.

And you want a mere 11 unhinged, fanatically dedicated people explained? You are engaged in comedy here.

Quote: philologos
3) Creation without a higher power does not make sense.


What has SENSE got to do with anything?

Many things do not make sense. Go to a pub next time and ask everyone there how tall they thing a news paper would be if they folded it 100 times. The highest answer I EVER got was "As high as this pub". Do the maths however and you find the actual answer is so tall that light itself would take 1000s of years to travel it's length.

The universe, compared to our ability to comprehend it, is MASSIVELY Complicated. Even the simplest things like folding a page 100 times does not make sense to us. The rigours of things like mathematics makes sense of it however.

That a simple idea makes more "sense" to your, or our, simple mind tells us nothing about whether there is a god or not. It tells us EVERYTHING about how simplistic our minds are... and how difficult it is for us to comprehend even the most established truths.

All you say when you say it makes sense, is that simple ideas make sense to YOU. This is not, I repeat NOT evidence that such a creator entity actually exists anywhere other than in your mind.

Quote: philologos
The probability of the world coming into existence


You have fallen for the "2 decks of cards" trick I am afraid. Probability has nothing to do with it because the number of worlds in our universe balances the probability of our one having come about.

Secondly the probability assumes that our world is the only kind that could support "life" at all. This is something we do not know to be true. In fact we know it NOT to be true in some ways because we have found life on our own planet in places we previously thought impossible, such as life working on a silicon basis and life working in the complete abscence of sunlight, but getting its energy from chemosynthesis instead.

The 2 decks trick is this. Get 2 decks of cards. Deal one out randomly. Now pretend that the result is "special" and try and get it again. The possibility of you having got THAT arrangement of 52 cards is so remote that you could keep trying with the 2nd deck for the rest of your life... and your off spring for the rest of their lives for many generations... likely will not get the same arrangement.

In fact work it out. The average calculator breaks down before the probability of even getting the 15th card correct. That is how big the probability is.

This is the danger of "retrospective probabilities" and of thinking "What are the chances it should have happened this way" without recognising a) the number of chances it did have TO work out that way and b) the number of other ways it could also have worked out.

Quote: philologos
4) Spiritual experiences


Anecdote is not evidence. How, for example, is the spiritual experience of someone who thinks there is a god any different, or more credible, than that of someone who thinks they were abducted by aliens or that they are Napolean reincarnated.

How do you even verify that the anecdote is not made up, let alone applicable?

In essence as evidence for something you have no evidence for.... you are presenting other things you ALSO have no evidence for. 0 + 0 = 0 I am afraid.

Quote: philologos
5) Historical sources for the existence of Jesus of Nazareth


Irrelevant. You were asked for evidence that god exists. Not that a man called Jesus existed. I am not sure what the evidence for Jesus existing is, but I do not doubt it is very likely. Even if a person with such a name was real, this says nothing about whether a god exists. In fact there are many people in Spain right now that exist and are called Jesus.

Quote: philologos
6) Archaeology, Geology and History backing up the Bible. 7) Authenticity of the Bible


These two are essentially that same. This is the one that makes me laugh the most, the hardest and the longest when I hear it. Most Fiction is set against real world events, places and people. This is just how fiction works!

2000 years from now for example there will be Archaeology, Geology and History backing up the Bourne Identity. The reason for this is that although the Bourne Identity is fiction, the cities in it, the political occurrences within it, the politicians named there in, the companies by which Jason Bourne traveled from place to place, the products he ate and drank…. They were all real and existed.

Fiction is almost always set against reality, so you will ALWAYS find Archaeology, Geology and History backing up the contents. This is, again, how fiction works.

So showing that a number of places, events and people in the bible are real in NO WAY suggests that the entire story is real and that there fore god exists or Jesus had magical powers.

So really your 7 reasons are not just lacking, but POWERFULLY lacking.

paddyandy

The Popular versions of anything never have amounted to much but there is stuff on the web........we'll have a different attitude before this year is out .We live in interesting times i have no doubt .......grab yer torch an pitch fork ....

philologos

First off Scanlas the 2nd. I found your post interesting in so far as the arguments go. I have responded to many of those arguments before, particularly the one about the Resurrection. I don't believe by any means that all of these reasons have been debunked.

Before I start, I need to make the following clear. I have no interest in responding to ad-hominem attacks on this forum or any other. These are entirely vacuous, and a waste of time for all parties (irrespective of whether or not they are true or false). I like any poster acknowledge that they are prone to make mistakes, past, present, and no doubt future. I recognise that many atheists have sincere disagreements with Christianity. I have no doubt about that, and I have no interest to belittle such concerns. I will be responding to this post with the respect and gentleness that is deserving of it as I am called to as a follower of Christ (1 Peter 3:15-16). Moreover, if others give the same respect, I'm far more likely to respond provided I have the time. If I find that a number of different posts are hitting on the same point, I won't respond to them all individually. Also to point out, if you think that my post is so disagreeable that you have no desire to respond to it, that's entirely understandable and feel free to bow out at any juncture. That's my policy, and I hope only for good and fruitful discussion, and that's the only type of discussion I'm interested in.

It is important to also explicitly mention that the 2009 post was not intended to be absolute proof of God. Indeed there is no absolute proof. I do claim that these reasons amongst others offer indicatory evidence - namely they point to God's existence being more likely than not. The more indicatory evidence we have for the Gospel, the more confident I can be about its claims being true. If any are confused as to the distinction between evidence and absolute proof - here's an example from a previous post I made on this forum.

Scanlas The 2nd wrote:

I am aware of no such thing. I am aware of people retrospectively cherry picking vague lyrical text from the bible and making suggestion that they fit past events. However I am aware people also do that with Nostradamus. If you have lyrical text that is vague enough you will always fit it to events, especially if you have enough events from which to draw from.
If you want to pick say one of the "prophesy" at a time however and adumbrate your reasoning as to how it was prophesy and why you think it was fulfilled, in such a way as to show it was not merely the connection of vague text to vague events then I am happy to work through them one at a time with you.

Not being aware of such a thing is not quite the same thing as it not existing. There are over 300 Biblical prophesies from the Old Testament canon (600 years before Jesus) that fulfil Jesus' death and resurrection. I have no doubt that in a few isolated cases that people could have fudged the text in order to introduce such things. Given the vast scale and number, and the limited amount of time that the Gospel was codified in (see "Why trust the Bible?" and my argument from Paul's letter to the Galatians) - there is good reason to doubt the probability of this. You claim that there is a "vague" and "lyrical" text, but the problem is when we have clear prophesies telling us about the Messiah and what He was intended to do, and when we have about 300 cases of this happening in the New Testament, given the circumstances, I think it becomes a lot more difficult to fob off, particularly when we are dealing with clear prophesies about His life, His death, His birth, His disciples and so on. I would challenge you even alone to read Isaiah 53, Psalm 22 and Mark 15 and just count the similarities between what was prophesied 600 years before Jesus death and it's fulfilment in the Mark account. So yes, I find that convincing as a pointer that indicates that God's promises were probably fulfilled in Jesus.

Bringing up the Lord of the Rings is a poor argument considering that the New Testament is not written as fiction, and nowhere is there any evidence for presuming it to be such.

Scanlas The 2nd wrote:

I can think of many ways in which it would make sense. Not just one but many. For instance the people involved could have been deluded. The people involved could have been DOING the deluding. The people involved may have dispersed but history re-written to suggest they saw things they never claimed to, such as the walking dead. It is amazing for example that the line in the bible which tells us that the graves all opened and the dead walked the earth seems to have... despite it being an incredible event.... made very little ripple in the texts of the time at all.

You've ignored the actual point that was made in the post in question. As many other posters did at the time. I'll get on to why I find posting about Sai Baba and others unsatisfactory in a minute. Here's the guts of the argument that I made back in 2009:

2) Christian history does not make sense without a Resurrection event:
Let's go through this bit by bit:
a. You have been with a charismatic preacher for 3 years in Israel,
b. You have seen this man endure trials of all sorts, and you have come to know His personal character during this time.
c. You see this man die.
x. -
d. You and the others who were with you at the time, spread the teachings of this individuals thousands of miles throughout the Gentile world, preaching that we can become a new Creation in Christ Jesus if we are baptized and confess that Jesus is Lord (2 Corinthians 5).
e. These men are zealous for the spiritual truths that this man taught throughout His worldly existence, even until the point of death, by stoning (James the Righteous - see Josephus' Jewish Antiquities), Thomas who is believed to have been gored with a spear in India, Peter said to be crucified upside down, James Son of Zebedee who was said to have been put to death by Herod in the book of Acts.
Now, what on earth can explain the difference between d and e. How on earth if you have seen your best friend, if you have seen this man who has testified to such truths while alive, could they possibly have endured to spread it as zealously as they did and until the point of death? It does not make sense unless something extraordinary happened inbetween both of these events. I'm not saying that this necessarily has to be the Resurrection, but it certainly gives credence to it.

If you cannot explain to me conclusively how all 11 disciples went through to the lengths that they did in a reasonable manner, then this will always give credence to something extraordinary having happened to bring these men to those lengths.

Then taking into account that in the accounts the mention of women running to the tomb would have been seen as laughable in Jewish society at the time, a lack of an attempt to cover this up would indicate that it was indeed the honest and frank truth of the situation.
There are more and more textual implications like these in the Gospels themselves.

My challenge was to see if there are any reasonable alternatives to the Resurrection that hold up. My point was to see if others can provide an alternative explanation for x. Pointing to Sai Baba, or anyone else doesn't satisfy that question, and I think people know that too.

If you're going to claim that the people who are involved were doing the deluding, we need a good reason as to why they would do that. One that can't be really found in the case of Sai Baba. Arguments about Sai Baba and others are irrelevant to the discussion because they are not focused on the specific case of the Resurrection. I had responded to others on boards.ie with this plenty of times. The specific case of the Resurrection isn't comparable with these situations precisely because it is different, it involves a claim about someone rising from the dead. We also have history of the early church where we have the Apostles claiming that Jesus Christ has risen from the dead and we (as Christians) have received eternal life in His name. If these people were deluded, we'd have to accept that they made up Scripture. However there are arguments against that insofar as the New Testament accounts themselves encourage skepticism and scrutiny, indeed they don't even present the Apostles as cult leaders, rather they present the Apostles as sinners, and they encourage people to seek out eyewitnesses (see "Why trust the Bible" in my signature). That bears the other question, if the Gospel was so widely dispersed in Asia Minor in the first century why didn't anyone seek them out? Why didn't anyone reasonably and justifiably refute the Gospel? It seems they had as much difficulty then as many do now. There are flaws in the argument of saying that the writers of Scripture intentionally went out to delude people.

The argument that they themselves were deluded would need to be substantiated. You'll need to provide a bit more meat before we can go into that conclusion. Although, I reckon it would take an extreme situation to bring someone to go out in the world proclaiming the Gospel in a place where there was almost certain death for proclaiming Christianity in the Roman Empire. Practically all of the Apostles were martyred. The question comes back to the point - why die for a lie? There are flaws in the argument from textual authenticity, because the New Testament itself encourages skepticism, and curiosity in its pages. It doesn't present the Apostles as cult leaders without fault, and it even presents embarrassing details about the Apostles (see my signature "Why trust the Bible?" links).

I'm more than happy to discuss alternative incidents that could have happened in the case of X, but we need to have a lot more details if we are.

Scanlas The 2nd wrote:

What has SENSE got to do with anything?
Many things do not make sense. Go to a pub next time and ask everyone there how tall they thing a news paper would be if they folded it 100 times. The highest answer I EVER got was "As high as this pub". Do the maths however and you find the actual answer is so tall that light itself would take 1000s of years to travel it's length.
The universe, compared to our ability to comprehend it, is MASSIVELY Complicated. Even the simplest things like folding a page 100 times does not make sense to us. The rigours of things like mathematics makes sense of it however.
That a simple idea makes more "sense" to your, or our, simple mind tells us nothing about whether there is a god or not. It tells us EVERYTHING about how simplistic our minds are... and how difficult it is for us to comprehend even the most established truths.
All you say when you say it makes sense, is that simple ideas make sense to YOU. This is not, I repeat NOT evidence that such a creator entity actually exists anywhere other than in your mind.

I don't know about you, but when I'm forming my beliefs, I need to be able to ensure that they make good logical sense before I hold to them. Isn't that not a reasonable position in terms of deciding what to believe?
Your claims about the scale of the universe aren't relevant to the argument. Christians are in full agreement that the universe is vast. Indeed the Bible even points out to the fact that God is mindful of us even when Creation is so vast (Psalm 8 and Psalm 19 for a start). Christians aren't in disagreement that the earth is vast. In fact Christians largely don't disagree with natural science. I suspect the reason you brought this up is because of the notion that atheists like to correlate atheism with science. This is not a good correlation at all - if only for the reason that firstly, atheists can believe in pseudoscience, and secondly Christians can regard science with high esteem (Hence why there are Christians in science). Your point about the scale of the universe has little or nothing to do with whether or not the earth was created by God. Indeed, the question could be justifiably asked as to how such a huge and a complex universe could have emerged without a Creator.

That's where the improbability comes in. If you look back to what I said at the start, this post was originally about indicatory evidence, what indicates that the existence of God is more likely than not. If the universe in its current state having merely emerged without any cause or reason is highly improbable, then it is entirely reasonable to consider what is more probable, in this case Creation. That's before we get into the whole argument of whether or not it is reasonable to assume that the universe must have had a cause as is the case in the cosmological argument for God's existence.
So yes, it is more reasonable from my perspective to look to what is more probable and indeed to consider why it is more probable. The idea that it is ridiculous to believe that there is an established and an intelligent cause to the universe seems bizarre to me. Why is it ridiculous to believe that there is a Creator? That's what I'd be interested in hearing from atheists.

Scanlas The 2nd wrote:

Irrelevant. You were asked for evidence that god exists. Not that a man called Jesus existed. I am not sure what the evidence for Jesus existing is, but I do not doubt it is very likely. Even if a person with such a name was real, this says nothing about whether a god exists. In fact there are many people in Spain right now that exist and are called Jesus.

You do realise that many atheists object to the existence of Jesus don't you? - Indeed, the reason why historical evidence for the existence of Jesus is compelling is because external historical evidence points to Jesus existing within a short time of his life, and indeed other texts which comprise the New Testament which are largely contemporary to this writing also speak of Jesus. This is a good reason to think that it is at least in some way quite probable that the New Testament was writing about the same person as the external historical works especially when the external historical works affirm some of what is in the Gospel.

Scanlas The 2nd wrote:

These two are essentially that same. This is the one that makes me laugh the most, the hardest and the longest when I hear it. Most Fiction is set against real world events, places and people. This is just how fiction works!
2000 years from now for example there will be Archaeology, Geology and History backing up the Bourne Identity. The reason for this is that although the Bourne Identity is fiction, the cities in it, the political occurrences within it, the politicians named there in, the companies by which Jason Bourne traveled from place to place, the products he ate and drank…. They were all real and existed.
Fiction is almost always set against reality, so you will ALWAYS find Archaeology, Geology and History backing up the contents. This is, again, how fiction works.
So showing that a number of places, events and people in the bible are real in NO WAY suggests that the entire story is real and that there fore god exists or Jesus had magical powers.
So really your 7 reasons are not just lacking, but POWERFULLY lacking.

Firstly, it is entirely reasonable to hold that the Bible being completely accurate in respect to historical events, and archaeology, not to mention the afforementioned reasons that I have given makes it likely that the Bible is speaking the truth. Logically, if I can find many many cases of the Bible very clearly telling the truth about historical events, occurrences, and other reasons to affirm its authenticity (again see the "Why trust the Bible?" link in my signature) then it becomes more likely that the Bible is telling the truth in respect to other things. That's a reasonable assumption. The more indicatory evidence we find of something being true, the more probable it becomes that it is the case.

That's hardly illogical.

Your claims that the Bible is "fiction" don't hold up. The Bible was never written as fiction. I've pointed you to my signature and the reasons I've given for this not being the case on another thread.

You claim that my reasons are lacking and "powerfully" lacking, but there are clear responses to these objections no matter how much people claim that these are flawed. There is still a discussion to be had, and I'm interested in having it with you. I might take some time to respond to your posts but I am interested in doing so.

Reason 4 was to point out that my Christian experience and that of others has led me more towards Christ and that is my primary reason why I trust in Jesus. Indicatory pointers are useful but actually coming to seek out Biblical truth for onesself supersedes this from my perspective. I understand that this won't be convincing for those who have not done this or refuse to do this.

Sarky

You haven't bothered watching those videos though, have you?

philologos

Sarky wrote: »

You haven't bothered watching those videos though, have you?

No I've not watched 90 minutes of video just to respond to a post. I have linked to other scholars who disagree with Ehrman's conclusions. You wouldn't if I linked you that much content from a Christian source. I'm more than happy to discuss any claim that any poster can argue for themselves or quote on this thread.

That's just fair.

amadain17

This is for anyone who wants to watch on the historicity of the gospels and their questionable authorship. I don't expect philologos to watch but others on this thread might find it interesting. Matt Dillahunty is a former evangical christian who studied to become a preacher and when he was looking into the bible to find ways to counter the arguments people had against it he discovered the arguments to have more weight that the bible had substance. In a wonderful twist, this former evangical christian is now the president of the Atheist Community of Austin and host of the Atheist Experience - and all because he examined the bible critically. Oooohhh the irony

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VhLUF1leMF0

amadain17

Here's another one from James Randi showing how archaeology shows biblical errors:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZxEJHO8KIXY&feature=related

no birthplace for jesus. Thats the start of the new testament. Now for the rest ...

amadain17

Here is a great series on the historical accuracy of the Bible:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DVJWql-xGTY&feature=plcp

eye-opening stuff.

nozzferrahhtoo

philologos wrote: »

First off Scanlas the 2nd. I found your post interesting in so far as the arguments go. I have responded to many of those arguments before

No. You did not. He is just copy and pasting a post from me which you did not respond to but instead ran away from. Pretended to have me on ignore. Forgot you were pretending and replied to some of my posts and even PMed me. Then started to pretend to have me on ignore again.

philologos wrote: »

That's my policy

No. It is not. Your "policy" is to enter a thread. Evangelise. Wait till the replies get to hard to reply to. Run away. Lay low awhile. Then find another thread to evangelise in with all the same points that were debunked in the previous thread you ran from.

All coupled with the occasional user name change to shake off the people who know your "policy" on sight and pretending to have people on ignore who you do not so you do not have to acknowledge the posters who are best at debunking your crap.

philologos wrote: »

Not being aware of such a thing is not quite the same thing as it not existing.

Nor did I claim it was. However the fact when I asked for one and you ran away and did not give one suggests you are as unaware of one as I am and you are simply making stuff up when you claim such things exist. You think you can claim they exist so as to support your main claims.... and simply hope no one asks uncomfortable questions about them.

philologos wrote: »

There are over 300 Biblical prophesies from the Old Testament canon (600 years before Jesus) that fulfil Jesus' death and resurrection. I have no doubt that in a few isolated cases that people could have fudged the text in order to introduce such things.

And the prophecies in the early books of Lord of the Rings are fulfilled in the later ones. That is how writing fiction works. Internal narrative etc. There is no miracle here. There are 1000s of works of fiction where this is true. You just pick one of them and act like it is magic because.... well just because.

Plus remember if someone at the time was going to claim to be the messiah then of course they are going to learn the prophecies and fulfil them. If a prophecy reads "And he shall ride into town on a donkey" then any charlatan worth his salt is going to ride into town on a donkey. Only people like you are fooled by it.

philologos wrote: »

If you're going to claim that the people who are involved were doing the deluding, we need a good reason as to why they would do that.

This is even worse than your USUAL bull. Reason? Theres loads of them. Humans delude other humans all the time for power, profit, women, status and more.

philologos wrote: »

The specific case of the Resurrection isn't comparable with these situations precisely because it is different

So all a story needs to be true is not actually evidence.... but something original in it? Seriously dude? No wonder you believe and espouse such comical egregious nonsense if that is the extent of your criteria for truth.

On this line of "reasoning" (and I direct that term at YOU with tongue firmly in cheek) I could make up any nonsense tomorrow and have you believe in it... so long as I put some original spin on it.

And what makes it even more comical is that it is not even that original. There were plenty of ressurection myths about at the time. The only way you can call this fairy tale "different" is to ignore all the similar tales from the time. But I guess we have learned that ignoring inconvenient facts is your forte and has been for some time.

philologos wrote: »

I don't know about you, but when I'm forming my beliefs, I need to be able to ensure that they make good logical sense before I hold to them.

That is clearly an outright lie given you have no logical arguments or evidence for your god claims. In the past the sum total of your argument for god is that it "makes sense to me". That is it. Nothing more. So you have "ensured" nothing as you here falsely claim.

philologos wrote: »

You do realise that many atheists object to the existence of Jesus don't you?

Then take it up with them. If you want to reply to what I have written do so. If you want to argue positions I do not hold then leave me out of it.

philologos wrote: »

Firstly, it is entirely reasonable to hold that the Bible being completely accurate

No it is not reasonable. You just declare it and have not once substantiated it except to point out that SOME historical and archaeological accuracies exist. But we already knew that. That does not prove the book true and accurate any more than the historical and archaeological accuracies in the Bourne Identity prove that story true.

In essence you have decided up front the Bible is True and Accurate and then self validated that nonsense claim by cherry picking the bits you can prove accurate and then extrapolating from that handful of thing a claim that the entire thing must be wholly true and accurate.

And you call this "reasonable". For shame. It is as unreasonable as it is dishonest.

Sarky

Just in case you're ignoring nozzferrahhtoo again, I'll summarise: You have yet to do any of the things your last post claims you do. He points to old posts where you have repeatedly failed to do so.

You should probably go back to his old posts and get around to responding. I'm not sure how much more jebus talk the servers will take.