Every which way but true

JC: The fact of the matter is, we humans are often in a position to say what didn't happen without knowing what actually happened.”

SH: Yes, that’s true. But unfortunately for you, you need to go beyond a general truism to show how the Resurrection is such a case.

We can sometimes know that something didn’t happen, without knowing what did happen, if we have independent evidence to the contrary.

And how is that analogous to the Resurrection? Where is your argument?

JC: I may be lying or I may be delusional. You may never be sure. But there is one thing you can know with confidence. I really didn't go up into a space ship yesterday.”

SH: And you can only say that because you think such a scenario is near to being impossible. And where is the parallel argument against the Resurrection?

JC: I know you don't like this illustration because you think it is absurd. And of course it is.”

SH: I don’t feel one way or the other about the illustration. That’s beside the point. The issue is not with the cogency of the illustration, per se, but with the cogency of the analogy.

It could be terrific illustration, on its own terms, but fail to illustrate the point at issue.

JC: But it still illustrates the flaws in your reasoning.”

SH: Unfortunately for you, it does no such thing. You are suggesting an argument from analogy minus the argument.

Is the Resurrection on an epistemic par with alien abductions? If so, where’s the argument? If no, the comparison is fallacious.

JC: You are making general statements about how we know things, such as what I've quoted above. I'm taking that general statement and applying it to an absurd situation and showing that it results in absurd conclusions. So your reasoning is flawed. It is absolutely true that you can in some cases know what didn't happen even if you don't know exactly what did happen. I think that's pretty obvious.

SH: You’re attempting to universalize my comments beyond their immediate context, and then disprove my contention by coming up with some counterexamples.

That’s’ beside the point.

I was quite specifically talking about the contributors to The Empty Tomb. About what they were in a position to know.

They have no independent evidence to support an alternative explanation.

JC: You have no reason to assert this. It's not true. They are recognizing that the miraculous explanation for the facts concerning the resurrection is one of many possible explanations.

SH: Now you’re being disingenuous. They do not regard a miraculous explanation as one possible explanation.

Their position is driven by metaphysical naturalism. They don’t believe for one moment that a miraculous return from the dead was ever in the cards.

Hence, for them, any alternative theory, however otherwise unlikely, is more probable than an impossible explanation.

JC: Your view is a lot like the Roman Catholic claim that Protestants prove themselves false by virtue of the variety of opinions among them.

SH:

1.Another flawed analogy. Notice that Jon likes to change the subject. Instead of actually discussing the evidence for the Resurrection, he fishes around for distracting analogies.

The contributors to the ET don’t disagree because they differ over the interpretation of Scripture. Rather, they deny the accuracy or historicity of the Biblical record, and then disagree because they don’t have any documentary alternative, so all they’re left with is boundless conjecture.

Let’s keep our eye on the ball, Jon.

2.What are the contributors to the Empty Tomb in a position to know? They don’t believe in the Resurrection, but they don’t know it didn’t happen.

They don’t have any direct evidence against the Resurrection. And they don’t have any independent evidence for their alternative theories.

They have alternative theories without alternatives lines of evidence.

3.What they think they have is evidence of metaphysical naturalism. And that, if probative, would indirectly count against the Resurrection.

However, they offer no evidence for metaphysical naturalism. They take it for granted. Given that assumption, they then assume that any other explanation, however otherwise implausible, is more plausible than the sheer impossibility of a Resurrection.

JC: What Catholics don't realize is that they in fact are just one denomination among many. Anybody can put himself on one side of the fence and everyone else on the other and say that everyone else is wrong because they disagree amongst themselves. Suppose I think the body was stolen. I can put all other theories on one side of the fence (swoon, space alien, miraculous explanation) and say that they are all wrong and this proves I'm right. That doesn't work for Catholics or for my theory that the body was stolen.

SH: Except that you’re doing what you fault the Catholics for. You are putting the Resurrection on one side of the fence, and every alternative theory on the other side of the fence, as if they add up to an argument against the Resurrection rather than an argument against each other.

JC: It's a rare supernaturally occuring process. Regardless, it is very rare. Therefore any miraculous claim must start with a presumption against it.

SH: How does the rarity of an event create any presumption against its occurrence?

1.I attended my 10th high school anniversary back in 1988. That’s a very rare event for me. Indeed, it’s a unique and unrepeatable event. I had a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to attend my 10th high school anniversary. I will never have another chance to do so. Other anniversaries, yes. Other But not the 10-year anniversary. Other high schools, but not my high school.

So is there a presumption against my having attended my high school reunion? Must I come up with extraordinary evidence to overcome the crushing presumption that I didn’t go to my high school reunion?

2.You act as if rarity were equivalent to positive evidence against the occurrence of a rare event. These are hardly convertible claims.

3.The underlying issue is one of expectations. What makes a given event frequent or infrequent?

It is the kind of event which, if it happened at all, would happen more often?

Or is it the kind of event which, were it to happen, would be rare or even unique?

4.The Resurrection is supposed to be very specific in its timing and orientation. It serves a particular purpose, at a particular time and place in human history.

It’s a purposeful event, with a strategically targeted position in the history of redemption.

JC: Really? So if a friend of yours claimed to have flown in a space ship and your experience with your friend leads you to conclude that he's neither a liar nor delusional you'd just believe it? You can't conclude that he's been put up to it because a threat that would induce such behavior would be a strange occurrence.

SH: Notice, once again, that Jon is changing the subject. He was originally asking about ESP. Now he reverts to alien abductions.

I have a number of reasons for believing that ufology is false.

I don’t have any comparable reasons for believing that ESP is false. And, indeed, there’s some evidence that ESP is true.

Now, we need to distinguish between evidence for the general phenomenon and evidence for any particular claim.

But for Curry to swap out ESP for alien abductions assumes an equivalence that I deny.

JC: The only point I'm making is that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. That's a pretty obvious point I think.

SH: No, it’s not obvious.

1.To begin with, it depends on how you define “extraordinary.” To judge by your above usage, you define extraordinary as “rare.”

Does it require extraordinary evidence to prove that I have a rare blood type?

2.You’re also confounding cause and effect. The primary question is not, in the first place, whether we have evidence of an “extraordinary” event qua extraordinary, but whether we have evidence of an event qua event which happens to be extraordinary.

The evidence for the event itself, and the evidence for the classification of the event are distinguishable. We don’t need to classify an event as ordinary or extraordinary before we can identify its occurrence. The interpretation of the event is subsequent to the identification of its occurrence.

Maybe a given event has a supernatural cause. But I don’t have to identify the cause before I identify the effect.

3.In what sense is the Resurrection extraordinary? Christ was alive, then he was dead, then he was alive again.

What we have is an extraordinary relation between ordinary events. Does it require extraordinary evidence to establish life and death?

JC: Not at all. You've asserted that it is irrational to suggest contradictory explanations for an extraordinary claim. My illustration shows you to be wrong. I apply your general principle to a specific circumstance and show that the resulting conclusion is absurd. This means your claim is mistaken.

SH:

1.You’re the one who likes to smuggle in these qualifiers like “extraordinary.” I did not frame my objection in those terms.

2.All your illustration shows is that a silly illustration will illustrate a silly claim.

That doesn’t go any distance towards showing that the Resurrection is silly.

JC: That has nothing to do with it. You didn't say "Contradictory explanations don't make sense when the claim violates a shared assumption." You (and Gene) are saying that contradictory explanations never make sense. But they do as I've shown.

SH:

1.That’s because you’re not being forthcoming about your presuppositions, so we have to smoke you out into the open.

I am answering you at your own level. You chose an illustration that you knew most folks would regard as ridiculous.

Needless to say, it’s easy to contend that an explanation which isn’t ridiculous may be preferable to an explanation which is.

But these diversionary comparisons continue to dodge the Resurrection. You haven’t created any presumption against the Resurrection.

2.Moreover, it doesn’t follow that even if the given explanation is absurd, an alternative explanation is any better.

The alternative may escape the charge of absurdity, but that doesn’t make it plausible or probable.

We can dream up multiply alternative explanations for any event. And we can so do without a shred of evidence that any of them is true or likely to be true.

JC: Really, I'm not trying to prove anything about Bayes' Theorem. I raised it, but my purpose is not to get into a debate about the validity of it.

SH: Be sure to file Jon’s disclaimer for future reference.

JC: I'm simply pointing out a simple fact. It makes sense to have multiple mutually exclusive explanations for events that initially seem improbable. And the fact of the matter is, you should initially be skeptical of any miraculous claim.

SH: That is not a “simple fact.” Rather, it’s simply begging the question.

Why should I be initially sceptical about any miraculous claim?

JC: We both should be able to agree thar miraculous events are rare. I think they are so rare that they've never happened. You think they are a little less rare, but still rare nonetheless.

SH: Once again, this turns on how you define “improbable” and what makes a given event improbable. To say that a miracle is unlikely to happen because a miracle is infrequent is a category mistake.

A miracle is not the kind of event that, if it happened at all, would happen all by itself, or happen on a regular basis.

Rather, a miracle would be the result of personal agency. A personal cause, involving purposeful timing and placement, according to the rational discretion of the agent.

Miracles aren’t more or less likely to happen. They are not that kind of event.

The Son of God wasn’t born to the Virgin Mary in Bethlehem rather than Rome because he was more likely to be born in Bethlehem rather than Rome. He wasn’t born in the 1C rather than the 21C because one date was more likely than another.

You need to bone up on your theology of miracles.

JC: Yes, it does. If I went out and defended the swoon theory, and asserted that everyone else was wrong and I'm right, then other plausible alternatives (twin, stolen body, myth, miracle) all tend to reduce the likelihood that I'm right.

SH:

1.In that event, you admit that contradictory theories undermine each other. So how do they count as evidence against any particular position? Why should we believe any of them?

2.At the same time, not all explanations enjoy the same evidentiary value. The Resurrection is the only actual evidence we have for the empty tomb. There is no rival record of event.

3.Or are you leaving yourself an escape route by suggesting that your conclusion only follows if you actually committed yourself to one alternative theory, but as long as your noncommittal, the conclusion fails to obtain?

But unless we have some reason to believe that one or another of the alternatives is true or likely to be true, then how do they count against the Resurrection?

JC: Because that's my goal. If my goal were to prove that the twin theory was false, I would array all of the alternatives (stolen body, myth, miracle) against it. This is why I keep pointing out the fact that the authors of the book The Empty Tomb have as their goal to prove the Christian explanation false. So it makes sense for them to offer multiple alternative esplanations. Do you really not understand this point?

SH: It makes a lot of sense if they’re intellectually desperate and dishonest, in consequence of which they cobble together a congeries of absurd and mutually destructive alternatives to throw at the Resurrection.

JC: Which is why I said that generally multiple different plausible alternatives tends to reduce the likelihood of any other particular alternative. The alternatives you offered are so unlikely that they wouldn't move the result much. But they might move it ever so slightly.

SH: And what makes the alternatives plausible? Plausible in relation to what? Not in relation to each other, for they undermine each other. They can’t be equally plausible if they equally negate each other.

Plausible in relation to the Resurrection? This assumes that the Resurrection is the most implausible explanation, such that any alternative theory is more plausible. But, for that, you need a separate argument.

Plausible in relation to the evidence? But there is no independent evidence for the alternatives.

And if there were such evidence, how could the same evidence be evidence for one alternative as well as a contrary alternative?

How is the same evidence picking out the swoon theory and the stolen body and the wrong tomb, &c.

But if, in fact, the evidence can’t point in opposing directions, then the alternatives are equally implausible for lack of evidentiary support or corroboration. Unbridled speculation is not a form of evidence.