Denying it over and over again doesn’t make it not true.
The point here is that the “legal” diversion was a response to your demand, not because it was the real objection to the behaviour.
Beliefs are not entitled to respect; persons who hold those beliefs are. I respect Catholics, not Catholicism.
People have the right to practice their beliefs without interference or harrassment. Stealing stuff from a religious ceremony to mock them is harrassment.
It is both a breach of the respect to which those people are entitled, and a breach of their moral right to be left in peace.
That’s an easy one - the trolls who mock other folks by desecrating their religious ceremonies are jerks, and the assholes who post death threats or physically assault others are, also, jerks.
Just as Fred Phelps is a jerk for picketing gay servicemen’s funerals, and those who make death threats against him are also jerks.
Getting death threats for acting like an asshole doesn’t magically make you not an asshole.
I agree that this is difficult task, and not one that is immediately obvious to me. Of course obviously anything that I would state as “must being observed” are actually being observed, because I think it likely that God exists.
If I were to start formulating an argument along these lines I would consider the character of God, and how that would necessarily impact creation. So one possible option is that God values human free will and wants people to make meaningful choices. Part of humans having the ability for meaningful choices is that theyt are able to understand how the world around them effectively works. Therefore, if God exists the world that he created must be effectively understandable. And this is in fact the case. The laws of could be far more chaotic then they are, or indeed there may be no static laws of nature at all. If this were the case then I would take that as a reason to think that it is more likely that God does not exist.
I give that only as an example of what I mean. I am not convinced that is a good argument, but it is a type of argument that I am talking about.
I understand your questions about the nature of the universe, but to me the concept of God does not answer them- how did God do it? How was God created? If the universe had to have a “cause”, then why does God not need a “cause”?
No naturalistic explanation? This one’s easy- people lied. People made errors in reporting. People made stuff up. People used tricks and deception. People faked deaths. To me, all of these are WAAAY more likely than “God did it”. Just like, to me, it’s much more likely that the story of Noah (or Job, or Jonah in the whale) is NOT literally true, than that it is. Jonah is much more likely to have made up the story of being in a whale than to have actually survived inside a whale.
Your conclusion about me is false. I have read extensively on major religions, attended religious schools, and talked to many knowledgeable believers. I’m sure I have a lot to learn, but none have any stories that are LESS believeable than the resurrection of Jesus, Noah’s Ark, Jonah in the Whale, miraculous healing, etc.
For an event that happened 1 week ago, cops and prosecutors will tell you that eyewitness testimony is rarely 100% accurate. For an event 20 years ago, few law enforcement professionals would fully trust even a handful of eyewitness accounts. For an event 2000 years ago? Come on. Sure, I might believe that a big historical event, like the Fall of Rome, occurred (based on multiple sources). But an event that, at the time, only affected or was witnessed by a handful of people? Not even close to qualify as good “evidence”. Based on multiple (and non-biblical) sources, I think it’s likely that a man named Jesus (or the local language equivalent) lived about 2000 years ago, and was involved in some sort of religious movement. But that’s all that I think there’s good evidence of in relation to him.
Magic teapots is a contradiction in terms. “Teapots” are, by defninition non-magical items. If the item gains magical properties it ceases to be a teapot. Since then the existence of “magical teapots” involves a contradiction, then they cannot exist. Simple.
However, even if they do exist, so what? Do they impact my life in the slightest way? If not then why should I even care if they exist or not? Why is it so important to you that you must be able to affirm that magical teapots do not exist?
This is just framing your argument to fit facts that are already known. For example- “My concept of God loves blue and would want the oceans to be blue. Therefore, because the oceans are blue, my God exists”. It’s not at all convincing.
To put it in logic terms: if A, then B, does not mean that if B, then A.
For example, if “My God, who loves blue, were to exist” (A), then “the oceans would be blue” (B), does not mean that the fact that “the oceans are blue” (B) indicates that “My God, who loves blue, exists” (A).
So your example, that (paraphrasing) the fact that “humans have free will and the ability to understand the world around them” (B) does not imply that “God, who values free will, exists” (A).
It isn’t supposed to explain anything. It’s not a hypothesis. It’s not a theory. It’s not a belief. It’s just an absence of belief in gods.
You know that the argument from design is a non-starter, don’t you? It only regresses the question back to the deigner, making the answer more complex than the question. Furthermore, you haven’t demonstrated that the universe shows evdience of design. you’re just declaring it by fiat.
[quote]
Note that I am not talking about objects such as animals or produced through evolution, but that actual underlying laws themselves.[/quiote]
What about them? What’s “designed” about them?
Oh, Christ, the fine tuning argument? Have you ever read Douglas Adams’ puddle analogy?
[quote]
In terms of why I believe in Jesus specifically, I believe that Jesus physically rising from the dead is the best explaination of the apostles, the gospels, and the early church.
[/quote
What does it exp[lain, exactly. and what makes magic a better explanation than non-magic?
No, they don’t, actually. They aren’t even intended as histories. That’s not their genre. Not that the standards of classical historians were al that great anyway.
There is no need to hypothesize naturalistic explanations for something we have no primary claims of ever having happened in the first place. The empty tomb story doesn’t appear in Christian literature until at least 40 years after the crucifixion, and that author is neither a primary nor a secondary witness, so the story doesn’t require “explanation.” You first have to prove there actually ever was an empty tomb (there probably wasn’t).
Interesting since you have not been able to cite any supporting evdience at all for Christianity.
What does “historical type argument” mean? You mean thgat it claims to be based on historical events? Like Islam? Like Latter DaySaints? Like Hare Krishnas?
I have. I’ve actually spent considerable time on it. I have a BA in Religion. All religious metaphysical claims have exactly the same evidence.
These kinds of arguments from personal experience are not unique to Christianity. Every religion has them. Even the ancient classical religions had them. People had experiences of Apollo and Zeus. People in India still have experiences of Hindu deities. What makes your experience more “real” than theirs?
Anyone who threatens Phelps is also a dangerous person yes, do you disagree? He is only exercising his rights and should be free to do that without fear for his safety. No doubt he is an odious little turd mind you.
So what are the odds? Please show your work. Then, if you could be so kind, can you show me your work in getting 50/50 for the existence of a god? Thanks.
You’re an “atheist” with regards to Zeus. You’re an atheist for Thor. And Vishnu. And Horus. We have all that in common. In fact, you’re an “atheist” for every deity but the Christian one.
So we’re pretty similar. I’m just an atheist about one more God than you. If you’re curious about why I don’t believe in your God, just look at the same reasons you don’t believe in Anansi the Trickster.
Of course I agree. Phelps has every right to act the jerk. People who issue death threats are wrong to do so.
I’m merely pointing out that Phelps is not performing some sort of valuable service by acting like an odious turd. The fact that he gets death threats isn’t evidence that his gay-funeral-picketing “services” are really exposing how gays - the target of his attacks - are ‘really’ Bad People.
Similarly, the fact that the Myers posts an offensive blog which demonstrates he’s an ass and a troll isn’t performing some sort of useful service by exposing Catholics as Bad People, because he gets death threats.
Of course I don’t believe in that teapot, that would be silly. Personally, I find it insulting that you would think I believed a simple teapot orbitted the sun
The Teapot is, naturally, made of cerametaltic.
This is a substance not found on earth, and we can only begin to imagine what its properties are.
Do you make no distiction between Catholics on the one hand and white supremacists/Louis Farrakhan on the other?
No, not to the same degree. Jerks and trolls are not as bad as those who issue death threats.
Point here is that getting death treats does not make jerks and trolls into something admirable, or really have anything to do with their jerishness or trollitude; since time immemorial - at least, since nursery school - two wrongs do not transform into a right.
Says who? THIS teapot is magical. Sorry. Prove there isn’t a magic teapot on the other side of the sun. Prove there isn’t a Kokopeli. Prove there aren’t any half-elves. We can do this all day. There is exactly as much evidence for Wotan, for unicorns and for hobgoblins as there is for the Christian God.
You know what religion actually has good evidence? Cargo cults. They at least have a genuine basis for their beliefs that gods will bring them gifts from the sky.
Simply put, God has always existed. I think for anything at all to exist something must exist eternally. Given the properties of the universe, namely the second law of thermodynamics and the big bang, I think it extremely unlikely that the universe has always existed. Therefore there must be something else that exists for all eternity that brings the universe into existence.
First off, there is a confusion in terms of probabilities of explainations that goes back to David Hume. Basically Hume considered that all that mattered in considering competing hypothesis was the inherent likelyhood of the hypothesis itself. So he considered that miracles were always impossible because they are always the least likely thing to happen.
The problem is that inherent likliness is only part of the picture. You also have to consider how much of the surrounding events. And for many hypothesis, the explaination of the facts outweighs the inherent unlikeliness of the hypothesis.
So for instance say you are playing poker, and you get delt 5 cards. According to Hume you are never justified in believing that you have a royal straight flush, even if that is what you see, because that is the unlikeliest of all hands. However, if you pick up your cards and see that you do indeed have a royal straight flush you are indeed justifed in believing that you were delt that hand. It may be incredibly unlikely, but the explaination as to why you see those 5 cards in front of you outweighs the inherent improbability of being dealt that hand.
So in considering the resurrection, you have to consider not just the likelihood of each hypothesis, but also what each hypothesis explains. In this case the resurrection is the best explaination because it explains all of the facts in ways that naturalistic explainations don’t. I don’t doubt that it is extremely unlikely for someone to be raised from the dead. I get that. However I believe in the resurrection because I think no other naturalistic explaination really covers all of the data.
What is your criteria for how likely a belief is? Is it just all miraculous stories have the same improbability value, or is it more nuanced than that?
First off, I think you are selling ancient history short. In terms of the distance between the events and the earliest writings of the event the resurrection is one of the best attested facts in all ancient history. Scholars of other historical events routinely use sources that were written several hundred years after the events. That is standard practice. If you say that the gospels are unreliable historically because of the time between then event and writing, then we would have to throw nearly every historical literary source out.
Secondly I don’t think the comparison between modern prosecutorial evidence and the gospels is a good one. There are a number of studies that demonstrate that ancient pre-literate cultures were actually very good at remembering facts and recalling them. Much better than people today.
Also it has to be considered that the apostles saw the death and resurrection of Jesus as one of the central events in their life. Of course they would put a lot of effort into remembering it. In contrast eyewitnesses in trials are often called on to testify on details that are mostly irrelevant to them and which they have expended no effort in trying to memorise.
A much better comparison would be if you asked older people today about some of the central points of their lives that happened 40 years ago. Ask elderly people about their weddings, or the birth of their children or other such things and they will probably give a very accurate account of what those events were like for them. They remember because it is important to the to remember, as it would be for the gospel writers.
I’m going to an extreme to make a point. If you agree that all believers are not automatically entitled to respect, then that angle becomes meaningless.
Your charactization of “trolling” is not really applicable in either case. Do you really think the kid who brought a wafer back to his seat to show it to a friend before he ate was “trolling?” Do you think he committed a hate crime?
I also don’t see how Myers could troll anybody who didn’t want to be trolled. Was anybody forced to read his blog. Any offense taken from Myers blog was purely voluntary and recreational.
Just for the sake of argument, though, could you explain who is actually harmed by having their beliefs disrespected or mocked? How are they harmed? What are the “jerks and trolls” actually doing to anybody?
It doesn’t matter what the odds are. So long as it is more likely that it doesn’t exist I am justified in believing that it doesn’t. What argument would you advance to suggest that my assigning a probability of less than 50% is in error?
I can think of many naturalistic explanations that cover all the data. Let’s assume this is the data- people say they saw Jesus get crucified. They say they saw him get put in the tomb. They say they saw the big rock rolled to cover the tomb. Three days later, people say they saw that the rock had moved, and the body was gone. And some of the apostles say that they saw Jesus.
Here’s a totally naturalistic explanation that fits ALL the data- Jesus really did get crucified. He really did get put in that tomb. The big rock really did cover the tomb. But in the next three days, at some point, probably at night, someone else moved the rock and stole the body. Why? I don’t know- maybe they wanted to play a trick on the apostles. And then some of the apostles had dreams or hallucinations about Jesus, and thought they had really seen him.
To me, that totally naturalistic explanation is much more likely than the explanation that he was resurrected. And it’s just one of many possible explanations- at any point in the story, people could be making stuff up, or being deceived by trickery, etc.
Yes, all “miraculous” stories have the same improbability value. But there’s a little more to it- if someone says they saw someone fly up in the air, I don’t immediately discount it. I might start looking for wires or a trapeeze. But I would immediately discount any explanation invoking the supernatural- largely, because there’s no point- anything supernatural, by its very definition, does not have to fit “naturalistic” evidence. So there’s no point in looking for “evidence” that God summoned my example of the flying man up to heaven, because even if it were the explanation, there would be no evidence.
