My $0.02 worth about a subtopic:
When trying to guesstimate the probability that there was an historic Jesus, one must work with a priori probabilities.
To take but one example, consider the reaction Jesus gets when he visits his home town: “A prophet is not without honour, save in his own country, and in his own house.” Were such accounts fictions added for some didactic purpose? Or are they simply a true chronicle? What are the chances a fiction writer would invent such a story? What are the chances that such incidents would have occurred in a real life? There are several incidents in the Gospel that have a “ring of truth” simply because they have no clear purpose for a fiction writer.
Why did Jesus, if fictional, say “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” on Calvary? For that matter, why invent a fictional Jesus in the first place when there were real “messiahs” to choose from, e.g. John the Baptist?
What are the chances that a 1st-century Galilean could turn water into wine and walk on water? Low, I’d think. What are the chances a zealot(?) could be charismatic enough to heal, teach, hypnotise, and inspire? Even inspire Gospel writers to make up fantasies about him? Not low at all, I think.
See? It’s all about guessing probabilities. Now the huge net of probabilities is too complex and the probabilities too uncertain to dream of actually applying Bayes’ Theorem arithmetically. (And anyway I reach the opposite conclusion as Carrier.) But having a feel for a priori probabilities is essential.
Once or twice on this and another message board, I myself have avoided a tedious paragraph about “comparing the chances of hypothetical priors and causal chains” with a terse phrase mentioning “Bayes Theorem.” And thereby caused confusion… :smack:
I’ve not read Carrier’s book; if he tries to develop actual numbers to plug into Bayes Theorem he’s probably being silly. But contemplating a priori probabilities, however fuzzy, is the correct way to approach many questions. If someone introduces Bayes’ Theorem to make this point, I have no problem with them.