The confutation of atheism-3

“My point was your rejection of certain miracle claims in ancient literature, and had nothing to do with how closely the details of the Christian virgin-birth story parallel other divine-birth stories.”

I have neither affirmed nor denied the miracle claims in ancient literature. That is only a question I could answer on a case-by-case basis. There is no uniform answer to such a vacuous question.

“In spite of this irrelevancy, you also commit the no-true-scottsman fallacy, by trying to get rid of the similarities via the citation of different details. By your logic, if two trucks have different sets of tires, are colored differently, one is stick, the other automatic, one is 4x4, the other not, and one has tinted windows, while the other doesn't, then they must not be the same make and model. ridiculous. We learn from your mistake then that the general similarities require explanation if we allege that both items are originate from entirely different points, and that citation of differences in various details does NOT ‘outweigh’ the similarities.”

The problem is not with superficial differences in detail. The problem is with the differing and diverse background conditions. If you are going to indulge in comparative mythology, and if you are trying to establish a relation of literary dependence, then the fact that literary allusions ground the accounts of the virgin birth in OT motifs should tell you that those accounts are literarily dependent on the OT rather than Greco-Roman mythology. If there are any genealogical parallels, that’s where to look. Your extraneous illustration of two trucks is irrelevant to responsible literary analysis.

Citing Justin Martyr does nothing to change the fact that the life of Christ is modeled on various OT paradigms.

The NT is a Jewish book. You need to read the NT through Jewish eyes. Justin was a Gentile, not a Jew. He assumes a Greco-Roman point of reference because that represents his intellectual background. To confound his intellectual background with the background of the NT writers is a pretty serious blunder.

Justin is doing the best he can with the intellectual resources at his disposal, but he reflects the limitations of his cultural conditioning. Second Temple Judaism is the proper point of reference.

For some good online material concerning comparative mythology, cf.

http://www.frontline-apologetics.com/mystery_religions_early_christianity.htm

http://www.leaderu.com/everystudent/easter/articles/yama.htm
“What's wrong with making sure that my eyes haven't decieved me, except that such a test makes it harder on miracle-workers to dazzle me?”

Nothing wrong with that except that your dogmatic commitment to methodological naturalism precludes you from ever accepting a supernatural cause, as when you say, just a few lines below, that “even if you were to come up with a modern-day miracle report that I couldn't explain away naturalistically, that STILL doesn't suddenly mean that miracles are true or possible.”

For you, it isn’t a question of the quality or quantity of evidence.

“I guess you only offer unsupported assertions because you said that in a form that Jason E said was primarily for the benefit of Christians.”

The fact that Jesus is not a dead man amoldering in the grave, but is a living, risen Savior, is asserted or assumed throughout the NT. That’s multiple-attestation.

“Perhaps that benefits the believers to talk like that, but all you are doing for me is reminding me that you forgot how I prioritize the uniformity of the physical laws over eyewitness testimony.”

Without eyewitness testimony you have no evidence for the uniformity of physical laws. And, unfortunately for you, that same database includes testimony to the miraculous.

“That's exactly right. If 6,000 people swore on a stack of bibles that they saw someone walking on water, I would rest upon the confirmed physical laws to laugh in their faces.”

Which bears out my point that, for you, it isn’t a question of the quality or quantity of evidence.

“Am I wrong for using uniformity of physical laws to discount thousands of eyewitnesses to a single event which they further interpret as a miracle? Why? Isn't eyewitness testimony more prone to false reporting and prone to complex problems such as group-think and cognitive dissonance, than is, say, the unanimous consent of the scientific community that earth's gravity affects all material objects? WHo among the two groups, has more probability of being wrong?”

All you’ve done is to arbitrarily privilege one set of observers over another. Scientists are just as subject to groupthink and cognitive dissonance as anyone else.

In addition, many scientists also believe in miracles.

“Should we also look through history to see how many times the scientific method has resulted in incorrect results and how many times people misinterpreted some event as a miracle?”

This question is too vague to be answerable—a favorite tactic of yours.

“No historian on earth automatically believes everything he sees written in an ancient religious propaganda, outside the bible.”

And just as many scientists believe in miracles, so do many historians.

Now you’re resorting to a straw man argument. This isn’t a choice between universal scepticism and universal credulity.

“Therefore, you either need to argue that the bible deserves to be trusted far more so than other similar religious docuents…”

Yes, it does deserve to be trusted for more since there are many reasons for believing the Bible that do not carry over to other religious documents.

“Or you need to admit that you are cornered when asked to produce a single example of extra-biblical religious propaganda which you trust to tell the facts only, no embellishments or errors. You dance around my request that you name this extra-biblical source you trust like the bible, because the fact is that you dismiss the full facticity of ALL non-biblical ancient religious propaganda, which then makes your acceptance of the bible look like a child's game of playing favorites, also known special pleading.”

I don’t produce a single example because the burden of proof is not on me to produce a single example. I’m not trying to prove “extra-biblical religious propaganda,” and the veracity of the Bible is independent of that question.

All you’ve done is to pose a trick question. I am not privy to what you have in mind by “extra-biblical religious propaganda.” The onus is not on me to divine what examples you may have in mind.

If you want a specific answer, pose a specific question.

“That will stand against you until the day you decide to actually provide evidence that people should trust the bible more than the non-biblical ancient religious literature which you summarily reject from the "report-the-facts-only" category.

Again, what evidence do you use to support your premise that the New Testament, for example, is completely historically trustworthy, while you deny this high trust to every other non-biblical ancient religious document? Can you answer that directly by actually giving said evidence? I'm betting you can't. Prove me wrong.”

Once again you’ve rigged the question by assuming that the case for the veracity of Scripture can only be made in comparison and contrast to the case for “extra-biblical religious propaganda,” whatever that means.

These are two logically distinct and separable questions.

In addition, there’s a difference between proof and persuasion. Persuasion is person-variable. There’s no uniform answer to what different men will find persuasive since different men are impressed by different types of evidence.

Some men are more empirical, others more philosophical, still others more existential. There are many possible reasons for believing in the Bible.

Existential readers are impressed by its psychological realism, by the way in which the men and women depicted in Scripture act just like you’d expect real men and women to act in real life situations.

They are also impressed by the way in which they can find themselves in Scripture, by the “shock of recognition” as it offers an uncannily accurate diagnosis of their own condition. As they identify with the spiritual experience of David or Paul.

Likewise, they are impressed by the work of grace in the lives of the saints, who model their lives on Scripture.

Empirical readers are more impressed by patterns of prophetic and typological fulfillment as seemingly divergent OT motifs suddenly converge in the NT on the person and work of Christ.

They are also impressed by the way in which Bible history coincides in time and place with extra-Biblical history, as borne out by Biblical archeology and the like.

Or, to take a couple of detailed examples, the synoptic problem affords us an independent check on how Matthew and Luke react one of their sources (assuming Markan priority). We can see for ourselves how extremely conscientious and conservative they are in the minor changes they make to Mark.

Or, for another example, Andreas Köstenberger has an excursus on “Johannine Asides” in his Encountering John (Baker 2003), 250-52.

Now, if John were just making up scenes and speeches as he went along, he would not include these parenthetical comments. Rather, he would incorporate the interpretation directly into the narrative.

These editorial asides only make sense if the composition of the Fourth Gospel is a two-stage process in which he first records what was actually said and done, as he saw it and heard it, and then glosses the record for the benefit of readers who weren’t there and wouldn’t be privy to the explanatory context.

Philosophical readers are more impressed by the explanatory power of Scripture in its philosophy of history.

“But you haven't demonstrated how my belief that the causal system is closed, is any less warranted by the evidence, than is your automatic rejection of talking crayons from the causal system.”

That’s a short question with a long answer--which would involve us in the theistic proofs, a la the alethic, ontological, cosmological, teleological, axiological, and transcendental arguments, &c.

“Ok, so Christians can define the uniformity of the past in a way that they wish, and thus may choose to admit to believing in ‘uniformity’, without necessarily telling the hearers that their sort is quite different from atheist uniformity. Big Deal! How does that threaten the atheist version in the least?”

It means that your version ceases to be the standard of reference.

“Yes, that's because any such idea as ‘outside the universe’ sounds like utter nonsense to me. Don't you mean "everything that exists" when you say "universe"? If so, then logically there CAN't be anything outside the realm of existing things to enter that box. But if not, where is your proof that ‘universe’ doesn't refer to all existing things? What then.....will you tell me you believe that certain things exist outside the realm of all existing things? Please justify your seemingly arbitrary limitation upon a word that is supposed to refer to ALL because it starts with ‘UNI’. I've got space, matter, time and energy, and it's the universe. If you got something more than these things, please give your evidence of it.”

The “universe” denotes the physical universe. That doesn’t encompass the whole of reality by a long shot. The universe concretely exemplifies abstract universals, properties, propositions, numbers, possible worlds, consciousness, qualia, minds, souls, spirits, &c.

That’s another reason you can’t reduce the universe as a closed system.

There’s an extensive body of literature on this various aspects of this subject, such as: R. Adams, “God, Possibility, & Kant,” Faith and Philosophy 17/4 (October 2000), 425-440; Davis, B. The Metaphysics of Theism & Modality (Peter Lang 2001; B. Hale, Abstract Objects (Oxford 1987); J. Katz, Realistic Rationalism (MIT Press, 1998);
B. Leftow, Divine Ideas (Cornell, forthcoming); A. Plantinga, The Nature of Necessity (Oxford 1974); G. Welty, An Examination of Theistic Conceptual Realism as an Alternative to Theistic Activism (MPhil thesis, Oxford 2000 [http://www.ccir.ed.ac.uk/~jad/welty/]); Theistic Conceptual Realism: The Case For Identifying Abstract Objects With Divine Ideas (DPhil diss., Oxford, forthcoming); C. Wright, Frege’s Conception of Numbers as Objects (Aberdeen 1983).
http://www.georgetown.edu/faculty/ap85/papers/PhilThesis.html

As well as: J. Byl, The Divine Challenge (Banner of Truth 2004); R. Chisholm, “Mind,” H. Burkhardt & B. Smith, eds. Handbook of Metaphysics & Ontology (Philosophia Verlag 1991), 2:553-557; J. Cooper, Body, Soul, & Life Everlasting (Regent 1995); J. Eccles, How the Self Controls Its Brain (Springer-Verlag Telos 1994); J. Foster, The Immaterial Self (Routledge 1996); H. Lewis, The Elusive Mind (Allen & Uwin 1969); R. Paterson, Philosophy and the Belief in a Life After Death (Macmillan 1995); R. Penrose, The Road to Reality (Knopf 2004); J. Schwartz & S. Begley, The Mind & the Brain (Regan 2003); J. Smythies, The Wall of Plato’s Cave (Avebury 1994); J. Smythies & J. Beloff, The Case for Dualism (U. of Virginia 1989); C. Taliaferro, Consciousness & the Mind of God (Cambridge 1994); P. Unger, All the Power in the World (Oxford 2005); http://www.nd.edu/%7Eafreddos/papers/soul.htm

“First, what is your advice to people who ask you whether they should believe a miracle report from a personal family situation reported by somebody else to them over the internet?”

I am simply playing by your own rules. A little below this you said: “our own life experience also tells us what is more likely true and what is more likely false. Whether it's always right or not is irrelevant to my point that past testimony from those who went before us is NOT the only source of information we have on the subject of uniformity of natural law. “

As well as: “I depend primarily on my own personal experience of life to decide whether some report of an event is more probably true or more likely false.”

So if personal experience can supply evidence that miracles don’t happen, then personal experience can also supply evidence that miracles do happen. Or do you take exception when I borrow a page from your own playbook?

If so, there’s also an extensive body of literature documenting the occurrence of events which defy the laws of physics, such as: D. Bartholomew, Uncertain Belief (Clarendon 1996); F. Goodman, How About Demons (Indiana University Press 1988); G. Habermas & J. Moreland, Beyond Death (Crossway Books 1998); K. Koch, Christian Counseling & Occultism (Kregel 1972); H. Montefiore, The Paranormal: A Bishop Investigates (Upfront 2002); J. Montgomery, Demon Possession (Bethany 1976); Principalities & Powers (Dimension Books 1975); J. Richards, But Deliver Us From Evil (Seabury 1974); M. Saborn, Light & Death (Zondervan 1998); R. Sheldrake, Seven Experiments That Could Change the World (Riverhead Books 1995); M. Unger, The Haunting of Bishop Pike (Tyndale 1971).
http://www.equip.org/free/DD282-1.htm
http://www.equip.org/free/DD282-2.htm
http://www.sheldrake.org/

As well as: G. Bennett, Alas, Poor Ghost! Traditions of Belief in Story & Discourse (Utah State University Press 1999); S. Braude, Immortal Remains (Rowman & Littlefield 2003); G. Doore, ed. What Survives? (Jeremy Tracher 1990); A. Jaffé, Apparitions (Spring Publications 1979); R. Kastenbaum, ed., Between Life & Death (Springer 1979); D. Klass et al. eds., Continuing Bonds (Taylor & Grancis 1996); L. LaGrand, After Death Communication (Llewellyn 1997); B. Schoenberg et al. eds., Bereavement (Columbia 1975); http://www.beyondreligion.com.