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Post by jamierobertson on Nov 25, 2009 10:16:11 GMT
Y'know, I was going to suggest Shattering The Christ Myth myself, but was a bit concerned you'd be put off by the editor and his position as a prominent Christian apologist. Mind you, I suspect that when it comes to tone and sense of humour, you're kindred spirits  |
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Post by timoneill on Nov 25, 2009 11:14:53 GMT
Y'know, I was going to suggest Shattering The Christ Myth myself, but was a bit concerned you'd be put off by the editor and his position as a prominent Christian apologist. Obviously I disagree with Holding about a great deal, but on this topic most of what he and others say in that book are very sound. Yes, I had noticed the similarity. |
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joel
Bachelor of the Arts
Posts: 70
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Post by joel on Nov 28, 2009 19:23:21 GMT
Jesus Mythers amaze me. One common practice among them is to quickly dismiss the Tacitus reference or the second Josephus reference or a bunch of passages in Paul that blow Doherty's thesis without serious interpretative gymnastics (1 Cor 15, 1 Cor 11 are now interpolations to a lot of mythers) are "disputed." As if there's actually serious academic debate by experts that they're interpolations. But hey, if you say "Tacitus is disputed and can't be used as evidence" that must make it true.
There are people there who think the entire Pauline corpus is a forgery. The latest thing is that Josephus's discussion of John the Baptist is an interpolation by the wicked lying Christians!
But of course, the entire historical academy is controlled by those evil Christians. They won't let anyone question the status quo and have sufficiently brainwashed or frightened the non-Christians there into not examining the evidence objectively!
That said Tim, I don't think your site will do much to convince most of the people at Infidels. They might even label you a closet Christian.
I used to be a young-earth creationist and I have to say that the two movements have a lot in common with each other.
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Post by noons on Nov 28, 2009 19:30:42 GMT
Jesus mythers remind me of Napoleon.
"Never interrupt your enemy while he is making a mistake"
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Post by peterdamian on Apr 19, 2010 12:21:01 GMT
I just found this forum (see my thread in the Christianity section). Most of the opposition to the mythicism seems to take a very binary approach. In reality it's a continuum from biblical fundamentalism on the one side, to complete mythicism on the other. Many of the arguments used by the mythicists are now mainstream view at least in liberal theological circles. E.g. M.D.Goulder en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Goulder , J. Drury, and R.H. Gundry en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gundry , have argued that midrashic activity, particularly on the part of Matthew and Luke, "has created substantial parts of the Gospel tradition in a quite unhistorical way." Goulder has argued that the evangelists were highly creative authors, and that Matthew and Luke had only minimal source material. Gundry was expelled from ETS in 1983 for publishing an account of Matthew that claimed that "the four Evangelists, especially Matthew and Luke, have adapted the deeds and words of Jesus to fit the life and experiences of their readers" and that " in the ‘infancy narratives’ (Matt. 1, 2) and elsewhere Matthew uses a Jewish literary genre called midrash. He has said that "Matthew treats us to history mixed with elements that cannot be called historical in a modern sense." Is the Annunciation history? The annunciation tells the story of a young jewish girl who is visited by an angel from heaven, sent by God to tell her that she will bear the son of God, even while a virgin. Is this history? I think as part of history you have to bring science to bear. If some historical source says that X and if modern science suggests to us that X is impossible, we should use modern science as part of our investigation. E.g. if we accept radio carbon dating, or scientific analysis of documents as part of the inference process about the past, why not also use scientific evidence about sources claiming the existence of miraculous events? If science strongly suggests the story is false, we should look for other reasons that explain the story (for example, that the story was made up for a purpose). |
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Post by perplexedseeker on Apr 19, 2010 17:14:13 GMT
I think that in the context of this thread we were talking about mythicism in the strong sense ie. the idea that Jesus (or Joshua, whichever you prefer to call him) is totally fictional, and was made up by the gospel writers in order to create a religion. That at least some aspects of his life have been mythologised, is something I think that few who are not biblical literalists would deny.
Regarding the scientific falsification of miracles, I assume you're thinking of something along the lines of Hume's argument against miracles based on the regularity of laws of nature. But that's a philosophical argument rather than a scientific observation. Last time I checked it's still an area of considerable debate whether or not science can actually prove anything to be impossible. In particular, science only works on phenomena which can be repeated many times under controlled conditions, and it is hard to see how this could ever be applied to the investigation of miracles, which are by definition singular, out-of-the-ordinary events. This also poses problems for investigations into individuality and personhood, as science can only be reliable if it makes use of the average characteristics of groups, the larger the better...
By the way, in case you're wondering, I'm a philosophical theist and am rather sceptical of reports of miracles. I just don't think science, modern or otherwise, is of much use here (unless of course you happen to be a Logical Positivist, which I am not).
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Post by peterdamian on Apr 19, 2010 18:21:43 GMT
Regarding the scientific falsification of miracles, I assume you're thinking of something along the lines of Hume's argument against miracles based on the regularity of laws of nature. I haven't looked at Hume for some time, but his argument is somewhat more subtle than that. He is saying that in every testimony there is always the possibility, even the probability that it is unreliable. "There is not to be found, in all history, any miracle attested by a sufficient number of men of such unquestioned good sense, education, and learning, as to secure us against all delusion in themselves; of such undoubted integrity as to place them beyond all suspicion of any design; of such credit and reputation in the eyes of mankind etc". We must weigh the possibility or probability of the testimony being untrue, against the possibility of what it attests to. In the case of miracles, it is something that seems remotely improbable or unreasonable, and certainly far more improbable than of the testimony being false or inaccurate. So in the case of the miraculous or supernatural, we should nearly always question the reliability of the source, rather than seek any other explanation. Quite right. But the question is which of two genuinely competing explanations to choose. (1) Is this account of a highly improbable event true? (2) Or was it an invention? Choose the most probable and simplest explanation. Science is of tremendous use in the case of claims about resurrection from the dead, conversations with people who died centuries ago, predictions about the future and so on. It can't disprove these things conclusively. But it suggests they are highly improbable, at least certainly less probable than the possibility that these things were invented in order to gain credence for a group or cult or organisation. |
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Post by James Hannam on Apr 20, 2010 8:50:21 GMT
Hi Peter Damian,
Welcome to the boards. It is nice to have some more sceptical points of view here.
I'm short time so let me deal with a single point (as I think Unklee has dealt with the reputation of the Jesus Myth in academia. I'd only add that as George Wells is a professor of German who has not published peer reviewed material in the field, he only qualifies as an amateur in my opinion. But Carrier and Price are scholars in the field and rare exceptions as mythicists).
But on science, I think you are conflating science as a body of knowledge and method and materialistic philosophy. The NT writers were well aware that resurrections, supernatural healing and virgin births went against the laws of nature. That is why they called them miracles. Science, properly understood, brings nothing to the party on this question. We still think that such occurances would defy the laws of nature and we still think they would have to be supernatural if they did happen.
So science doesn't help us answer any of the questions you suggest that it might. You also suggest that Hume's argument that a miracle will always be less likely that the prosaic explanation holds water. Alas, it is far too subjective to be any help at all. It basically says we should always give our own preconceptions priority over the testamony of others (but only if our preconceptions agree with Hume's). I'm not sure that is helpful.
Best wishes
James
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Post by peterdamian on Apr 20, 2010 9:44:28 GMT
... on science, I think you are conflating science as a body of knowledge and method and materialistic philosophy. The 'science' I had in mind was not any methodological principle but simply the set of background assumptions we are compelled to use in any form of historical investigation. One such assumption is that the entire set of documents that are handed down to us, many or all of which were copied in the 9th century, were not simply made up in the 9th century. We assume that because of the extreme improbability of it being otherwise. Or the assumption (sometimes called the 'embarrassment principle') that a source is more likely to be true when it contains something poentially embarrassing to what the author is arguing for. This rests on psychological assumptions (also on the assumption that the author is not themself conscious of the principle and thus not clever enough to insert such embarrassing material themselves). Why not? I have argued by contrast that it certainly does! If we accept carbon dating of manuscripts, ultra violet to reveal a palimpsest, and other 'scientific' techniques in historical analysis, why not accept the principle that any source which claims the existence of some supernatural event is highly likely to be flawed? Or rather (Hume's principle) that we seek seek a more likely explanation. And thus highly improbable. Thus rendering any more probable explanation as being more likely (by definition). Why not? I have precisely argued that science (i.e. a body of probable assumptions) does help us. I didn't use the word 'prosaic' but 'more probable'. And Hume is in fact not talking about miracles themselves, but about accounts of the miraculous. We have to explain the account, rather than the event it describes. The account is either true, or it is an embellishment or invention. If the truth is less probable than the possibility of its being an embellishment or invention, then choose the latter. Always seek the most probable explanation of why a source is saying what it says. It is not subjective. It is saying: seek the most probable explanation of why a source is saying what it says. That is the most objective method available to us. No it doesn't say that! It is saying: seek the most probable explanation of why a source is saying what it says. Obviously what we regard as probable depends on 'background assumptions'. But such background assumptions are indispensible to any historical investigation or argument, including those made by apologists for miracles. |
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Post by perplexedseeker on Apr 20, 2010 9:55:19 GMT
Oh, I was just naming Hume's argument, not attempting to summarise it. The problem lies in establishing these probabilities in the first place, and it is far from clear that scientific practice in itself can do this. James makes a valid point that our estimates of the probability of an event often say more about our own preconceptions than the actualy probability of an event occurring.
After all it requires only a single valid counterexample to defeat a theory based on hundreds of other observations. In ordinary investigation this works well, as an experiment that results in an improbable claim can be repeated and tested by others. I fail to see how this could possibly be done in the case of miracles, though it could certainly apply to other classes alleged supernatural events, such as healing through witchcraft or finding water through dowsing.
To be sure, if one holds to a naturalistic ontology, then any violation of the laws of nature is ruled out by default as a logical impossibility. That's a defensible position to take, but it shouldn't be confused with what the scientific method itself can establish.
Edit:
Playing devil's advocate, in the case of the life of Jesus, it's also necessary to ask the question cui bono? To be sure, it's easy with hindsight to look at the medieval church's riches and point to that as a motivation for inventing Jesus, but it's hard to see an obvious gain for earlier Christians. If anything, they faced ridicule for the idea that their god had died in a highly shameful manner, which forces us to ask whether, if they had invented Jesus as a fictional character, they would not have come up with something which was more edifying to contemporary tastes?
Again, I'd like to emphasise I'm sceptical of the Resurrection and other miraculous claims about the life of Jesus. But the idea that the disciples and other early Christians, who were best placed to know it was all fictional, were willing to suffer persecution and in some cases die for something they knew to be untrue does not hold much water. (Unless of course one believes that these early Christians were also all fictional).
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Post by peterdamian on Apr 20, 2010 11:42:39 GMT
After all it requires only a single valid counterexample to defeat a theory based on hundreds of other observations. Correct. However we need to emphasise the word 'valid' here. If we have a hundred observations of X, and 1 observation of Y, and if X and Y cannot both be true, which do you choose? Why can't science do this? And as I have pointed out, the entire methodology we use in approaching history depends on the assumptions of such probabilities. Another example: any standard text on evaluation of primary sources say we must establish the 'reliability' of the source. What does 'reliable' mean? Well, it could mean that n times in the past the source said that X, and that X was independently verified. Thus it is *probable* that when the source says that p, we can trust that p, even though in this case p has not been independently verified. You can't do without the 'probable' assumption here. For it is possible that a person who has proved reliable in the past is not reliable in the present instance. Indeed, sometimes it is probable they will not be reliable. This is a method used by confidence tricksters: establish a strong reputation for reliability with the design of eventually saying something unreliable, that will be believed, to their profit or advantage. This is a separate argument. But it also depends on assumptions of probability. In your experience of human nature, you find it improbable that someone would risk death for a belief they thought untrue. But is it impossible? Is it more impossible than the belief itself? And in any case your argument contains a further assumption, that the early martyrs were 'best placed to know whether it was a fiction'. Were they? The essence of any hoax is that very few people - the perpetrators - know it is a hoax. No. The laws of nature are not logically necessary. The argument is all about probability, and the fact that advocates of miracles depend as much on probabilistic assumptions as do the sceptics. |
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Post by James Hannam on Apr 20, 2010 12:55:40 GMT
No it doesn't say that! It is saying: seek the most probable explanation of why a source is saying what it says. Obviously what we regard as probable depends on 'background assumptions'. But such background assumptions are indispensible to any historical investigation or argument, including those made by apologists for miracles. I've got no argument with this of course, but your original argument was about what our background assumptions ought to be (scientific materialism). Now you've jettisoned that point, there is no problem. Of course, the rules of historical methodology do require that I make no judgements about miracle claims. That's not the same as saying they can't have happened, merely that the question is outside the remit of historical enquiry. What we can say is that the NT writers believed miracles had occured and that they had rational reasons for believing this. Jesus's did do things that contemporary observers found inexplicable. Whether they really were miracles is outside the historians purveiw but the rationalist explanations we saw in 19th century accounts are out of court too. Best wishes James |
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Post by perplexedseeker on Apr 20, 2010 12:56:16 GMT
I have no quarrel with the claim that both sides in such arguments use probabilistic reasoning and assumptions. I did not intend to claim otherwise. The point I was trying to make (and for which I apologise if I wasn't sufficiently clear, I was in a hurry when I wrote that) was that the scientific method itself is cannot generate such background assumptions for itself.
If it were to be viewed purely as a passive, value-neutral experimental exercise, all science could achieve would be to pile up data. Such data only become facts when they are fitted into a pre-existing philosophical and theoretical framework, which cannot be established by experiment and has to be imported from outside science. Inevitably, the significance people attach to data from the sciences will be strongly influenced by their pre-existing assumptions, whatever these are. This is as it should be - without a philosophical framework, science would just be mindless collecting. My point (which I am sure you agree with) is that if someone claims "modern science proves X is impossible" our investigation should concentrate on the background thinking that justifies this extrapolation from the data we have available.
But back to the question of miracles, I would have thought it self-evident that even if we lived in a Dungeons-and-Dragons-esque world with hundreds of activist deities, and where miracles happened on a daily basis, science would still be unable to investigate these events, because science depends on constant regularities of nature for its success. If these regularities could be overidden by the genuinely free volition of an agent, it is hard to see how a science that relied on assumptions of continuity could investigate such an intervention, even in principle.
Questions of probability aside for the moment, I'm interested to know where exactly you're coming from here. Do you hold to the view that Jesus never existed at all, or that the miraculous aspects of his life were later additions?
"No. The laws of nature are not logically necessary."
Finally, at the risk of getting side-tracked, my point was not concerned with the logical necessity of laws of nature, whatever these might in reality be (as opposed to the approximations of laws of nature that science offers us), but that under a naturalistic ontology they cannot be suspended by a higher power, because by definition there is none. Naturalism is the thesis that the empirically observable universe is all that exists. Hence under naturalism miraculous events are not just improbable, but impossible.
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Post by unkleE on Apr 20, 2010 13:01:42 GMT
Correct. However we need to emphasise the word 'valid' here. If we have a hundred observations of X, and 1 observation of Y, and if X and Y cannot both be true, which do you choose? Peter, I feel that these three statements are not entirely consistent, that you are applying logic in one place that you are not applying in another. In the statements about miracles, you argue that it is rather improbable that miracles (events contrary to known natural laws) occur, therefore we should always prefer a natural explanation. Whereas in the history statement, you recognise that events contrary to probability do indeed occur, just infrequently. We can see this easily if we consider a newspaper report that our next door neighbour has won the lottery. We know it is quite unlikely for our neighbour to win, and quite likely that newspapers make mistakes, so on Hume's and your logic, we would be justified in concluding that the report was false. But of course, unlikely events sometimes occur, and somebody's neighbour must win. So applying this to miracles, there are many reports of alleged miracles, and christians and sceptics can easily agree that most of them are false. But if there are enough reports, and we accept that there is some probability of a report being true (albeit a small probability), then it is quite possible that one or two reports are true even though most of them are not. That's how probability works. So a fairer statement would be that " mostly we should prefer a natural explanation". Then there is the question of the reason why someone may regard a miracle as being highly improbable. This statement implies the assumption that the laws of nature control everything, i.e. some form of naturalism. But if God exists, then naturalism is false and the natural laws do not fully control everything. So we must ask how did we arrive at the conclusion that God's existence and his interference in nature are improbable? One may argue that when we investigate natural events, we always find natural causes. I think that statement begs the question and is unprovable and unknowable for the vast number of events we experience every minute. But if we look at a subset of events, alleged miraculous healings, we cannot say they have all been investigated and found to have natural causes. They haven't all been investigated, and upon investigation some have been found to be plausible miracles. (e.g. a medical commission looked at 3000 alleged miracles from Lourdes, rejected most for lack of evidence, but found about 60 that couldn't be explained by natural laws.) So in the end, the sceptical view that "breaking" natural laws is impossible is just an assumption, a worldview built around disbelief in God. I think natural theology makes it probable that God exists, so I have no trouble believing a miracle might have occurred, though I would be naturally a little sceptical of any individual claim. So when I consider the New Testament miracles, I have to ask myself what is the likelihood that naturalism is true and must provide the explanation for the Jesus story? Natural theology (IMO) supports the view that God exists. Jesus' life and teachings and its impact on others Jesus make it seem plausible that he brought the power of God to earth. The probabilities of any story being true are therefore much higher for me than they would be for a naturalist. So I think much of the sceptical discussion of miracles is circular - it starts with naturalism, and it is no surprise it concludes that miracles cannot be the preferred explanation. But if natural theology points me to God, I bring a different worldview to the question, and in that worldview, Hume is mistaken. |
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Post by acornuser on Apr 20, 2010 14:43:45 GMT
... on science, I think you are conflating science as a body of knowledge and method and materialistic philosophy. The 'science' I had in mind was not any methodological principle but simply the set of background assumptions we are compelled to use in any form of historical investigation. One such assumption is that the entire set of documents that are handed down to us, many or all of which were copied in the 9th century, were not simply made up in the 9th century. We assume that because of the extreme improbability of it being otherwise. Or the assumption (sometimes called the 'embarrassment principle') that a source is more likely to be true when it contains something poentially embarrassing to what the author is arguing for. This rests on psychological assumptions (also on the assumption that the author is not themself conscious of the principle and thus not clever enough to insert such embarrassing material themselves). Hello there, we are fortunately in a position where we can look at really early documents from within multiple traditions. As far as I can see, the transmission of the NT texts to today looks pretty good for an ancient document; good enough for reliability atmo. I would add that Hume did not make all the running at the time. George Campbell responded to him like so: "Campbell argues that the most important factor in determining the authenticity of testimony is the number of witnesses. Numerous witnesses and no evidence of collusion will supersede all other factors, since the likelihood of testimony outweighs that of Hume's formula for determining the balance of probabilities. According to Campbell, Hume is wrong to claim that testimony is a weakened type of evidence; it is capable of providing absolute certainty even with the most miraculous event." en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Campbell_%28Presbyterian_minister%29best  David |
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