I don’t know what “the right one” would mean in this context. Whatever it might mean, if they don’t get to any real god, then I assume the “right one” is included in that paradigm. I fail to see a reason to think there is a “right one”.
I fail to see why you think your experience is categorically different. What about it couldn’t be explained by some version of “my brain is doing weird things”?
“the right one” meaning the true one, assuming that one of them is true. You’re saying those arguments only get you to an abstract first cause, not a personal being with will. But do you think “a necessary, intelligent, personal being exists” and “an abstract first cause exists” are the same claim, or is the personal/intelligent part actually part of what those arguments are trying to establish?
Obviously they are different claims. You can tell be the fact they use different words that have different meanings 
My argument concerns itself with non-abstract gods. I have little interest in abstract gods. They are speculative musings. They are essentially logical exercises.
You started this discussion commenting on my position on miracles, and asking what it would take to convince me of a god outside of miracles, and then shifted to discussions of these abstract entities. I assume you are suggesting that there is some sort of path from abstract apologetic gods to the sorts of gods people actually worship? If that’s where you’re going, can you just make that case please?
If not, then I don’t care about the largely speculative arguments in favour of such an abstract entity. It seems to me that such over-abstracted arguments can arrive at almost any sufficiently vague conclusion one wants, and unless real life (empirical matters) inject themselves into the discussion, such arguments are nothing more than trivial playthings… not the deeply important things that people present gods to be.
I also find such arguments widely disingenuous. People who believe in a personal god for personal reasons present apologetics as a reason to believe, as if it was their reason to believe. I see nothing that suggests to me that such arguments are anything more than post-hoc rationalisations of a less than rational culturally transmitted mythology.
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Obviously they are different claims. You can tell be the fact they use different words that have different meanings
You never can tell - some people may consider them essentially one in the same.
My argument concerns itself with non-abstract gods. I have little interest in abstract gods. They are speculative musings. They are essentially logical exercises.
You started this discussion commenting on my position on miracles, and asking what it would take to convince me of a god outside of miracles, and then shifted to discussions of these abstract entities. I assume you are suggesting that there is some sort of path from abstract apologetic gods to the sorts of gods people actually worship?
Yes, I am “suggesting that there is some sort of path from abstract apologetic gods to the sorts of gods people actually worship”.
If that’s where you’re going, can you just make that case please?
If not, then I don’t care about the largely speculative arguments in favour of such an abstract entity. It seems to me that such over-abstracted arguments can arrive at almost any sufficiently vague concision one wants, and unless real life (empirical matters) inject themselves into the discussion, such arguments are nothing more than trivial playthings… not the deeply important things that people present gods to be.
I also find such arguments widely disingenuous. People who believe in a personal god for personal reasons present apologetics as a reason to believe, as if it was their reason to believe. I see nothing that suggests to me that such arguments are anything more than post-hoc rationalisations of a less than rational culturally transmitted mythology.
Yes. The case is two steps doing two different jobs. Natural theology gets you to “a personal, intelligent, necessary being exists” - not a vague first cause, but a mind. That’s what makes “God did it” an agent-explanation rather than a wizard. The second step is historical and empirical: that being made a specific, checkable claim in a specific place at a specific time. If we set aside the “God did it” explanation entirely and just look at the historical data - empty tomb, early claimed appearances, the transformation of the disciples - do you think that’s remarkable enough to be worth explaining, or does it not clear your threshold?
I don’t think it’s remarkable that such stories exist. Similar stories, alleged to be history, exist in other cultures with other gods. It is entirely consistent with my observation that people create god myths. I find that people who want to believe are more credulous to some of the allegedly historical claims in question than I can see justification for. As far as I can see, we can be decently confident that a man called Jesus existed who led a religious movement and was crucified. Apart from that, we can only say that people told lots of stories about him that are similar to other mythological figures. None of these things that we can be really confident about suggest anything supernatural to me. It all seems pretty par for the course.
What specific parallels are you drawing, and do those other stories have the same evidential profile - multiple independent sources written within decades, by people willing to be killed for the claim, in a culture with no prior tradition of dying-and-rising deities?
I am making a general observation explaining my general attitude toward general historical types of claims, to serve as context for the discussion. I am not making any specific comparisons.
If you want to make a specific case, or talk about specific evidence, I am willing to discuss such things to some degree, although I will express to you some of the ways I am dubious of such discussions.
I once, on the old forum, had a discussion about astrology. I roundly dismissed it as superstitious, and made all of the predictable critiques of it. My interlocutor “explained” that if I wasn’t properly aware of all of the “evidence” in favour of astrology, I couldn’t possibly have a rational and educated view on the matter. I have seen similar arguments about flat earth and parapsychology. I hope we can agree that this argument is specious. One needn’t be an expert in the astrology, parapsychology or geology to rationally reject the positions in question. Agreed? Although you have not done so, I have seen many such arguments occur about the historicity of biblical events. I’m not an expert in such things, and just like astrology, I feel that expending much effort into the subject would just be a waste of time.
Given that context, if you have some evidence about the historicity of the bible that you think justifies me overturning the apparent laws of physics, I am open to hearing it, but am obviously sceptical.
That’s fair, and I genuinely appreciate the willingness.
I once, on the old forum, had a discussion about astrology. I roundly dismissed it as superstitious, and made all of the predictable critiques of it. My interlocutor “explained” that if I wasn’t properly aware of all of the “evidence” in favour of astrology, I couldn’t possibly have a rational and educated view on the matter. I have seen similar arguments about flat earth and parapsychology. I hope we can agree that this argument is specious. One needn’t be an expert in the astrology, parapsychology or geology to rationally reject the positions in question. Agreed? Although you have not done so, I have seen many such arguments occur about the historicity of biblical events. I’m not an expert in such things, and just like astrology, I feel that expending much effort into the subject would just be a waste of time.
I agree with the principle - you don’t need expertise to reject flat earth or astrology because the evidence is one-sided. But the resurrection case is genuinely contested among historians of antiquity, including non-Christian ones. Would you agree that this makes it a different category?
Given that context, if you have some evidence about the historicity of the bible that you think justifies me overturning the apparent laws of physics, I am open to hearing it, but am obviously sceptical.
The framing is “evidence that justifies overturning physics”, but the question I was asking is a step before that. It’s not “does this prove God?” It’s “is the historical data - empty tomb, early claimed appearances, transformation of the disciples - remarkable enough to be worth explaining?”
Not in the way you think it does, I don’t think. More on that in my next response.
I don’t think there is a bar for “worth explaining” as such. Having said that, I certainly don’t feel a driving need to explain what you are referring to, as I see no reason to assume that it requires the supposition of supernatural events (the overturning of physics). In this way it isn’t different to astrology. Both are presenting what appear to me to be very weak and vague evidence and asking me to change my entire view of physics. Some controversy about some historical facts among experts doesn’t rise to the challenge of throwing away what I know about the way the universe works. I don’t need to answer the question of why it might appear to some historians that the tomb was empty to feel exceedingly confident that if it was empty there was a non-supernatural explanation why.
You said,
I don’t think there is a bar for “worth explaining” as such.
but I think that the rest of your response already concedes it. You say you’re “exceedingly confident” that there’s a non-supernatural explanation. Wouldn’t that only makes sense if the data is something that needs explaining? The disagreement isn’t whether it’s worth explaining; it’s what the explanation is. So the real question is: what’s that explanation, or is the confidence itself doing the work?
As with astrology, I don’t need to study all the data to feel exceedingly confident that star positions at one’s birth don’t change personality traits.
As to the historicity of the bible, I don’t need to consider the evidence of an allegedly empty tomb to feel exceedingly confident that people don’t rise from the dead.
These are epistemically the same. If you have some evidence that is so overwhelmingly compelling that what occurred vis-a-vis the tomb couldn’t possibly be explained in a way that is consistent with what we know about the universe, then I’m open to hearing it. If not, it only seems sensible to continue under the assumption that people don’t rise from the dead, and feel perfectly fine with just knowing that whatever the explanation of tomb anomalies are, they sit firmly within the “people stay dead” paradigm. At it’s heart, that’s how Bayesian reasoning works.
Again, you seem to want to make a meta case before actually making your case. Why not just present your evidence and we can evaluate it?
Are your feelings hurt that I’m not arguing against the god you want me to? Seriously, what’s your problem?
Not hurt just disappointed that your description of God ‘most likely not existing’ doesn’t include God described as the Creator of the universe and life. That’s good it suggests you’re okay with that God being the cause of the universe and life.
As with astrology, I don’t need to study all the data to feel exceedingly confident that star positions at one’s birth don’t change personality traits.
As to the historicity of the bible, I don’t need to consider the evidence of an allegedly empty tomb to feel exceedingly confident that people don’t rise from the dead.
Would you apply the same “I don’t need to look at the data” standard to the execution of Socrates? “I feel exceedingly confident Socrates was executed by hemlock without studying the sources” - or is that a different kind of claim from astrology?
These are epistemically the same. If you have some evidence that is so overwhelmingly compelling that what occurred vis-a-vis the tomb couldn’t possibly be explained in a way that is consistent with what we know about the universe, then I’m open to hearing it. If not, it only seems sensible to continue under the assumption that people don’t rise from the dead, and feel perfectly fine with just knowing that whatever the explanation of tomb anomalies are, they sit firmly within the “people stay dead” paradigm. At it’s heart, that’s how Bayesian reasoning works.
What historical claim has ever met the bar of “couldn’t possibly be explained naturally”? If the answer is none, is the bar one you’d actually engage with, or is it one that no evidence could clear?
Again, you seem to want to make a meta case before actually making your case. Why not just present your evidence and we can evaluate it?
I would certainly like to present some evidence and we should get to that in a moment, but I would like to first finish our current line of thought.
My argument doesn’t preclude gods that are creators, it just precludes creative forces/entities that are the subject of purely abstract arguments, divorced from intervention in human life and without knowable wills. I’m dubious about the notion of a creative force/entity, but don’t rule it out. If I granted the conclusion of the “first mover” argument as being completely true, it would have no effect on my belief in a god. A first cause isn’t a god, it’s an abstract philosophical concept.
It’s plausible that Socrates was executed by Hemlock. We know people are sometimes executed, and we know Hemlock is poisonous. If the competing explanation was that he was beamed onto an alien spacecraft, I would feel fine dismissing this claim without further examining the evidence. Do you see what I’m saying here? Prima facie credibility matters.
I’m working really hard not to say “naturally” (and I think failing sometimes), because it has nothing to do with metaphysics. Our observations about locality and sub-atomic particles presented us with evidence that contradicted some pretty fundamental things we thought we knew about the world, and rightly, many people were extremely sceptical about these findings. So we dug further into it until it was really not reasonable to argue that these non-local effects were happening. There is still lots of discussion concerning how to best think about these things, but no one in the know denies that they occur.
Claims that Jesus rose from the dead aren’t unbelievable because they aren’t natural, they are unbelievable because people don’t rise from the dead. It’s not metaphysical, it’s pragmatic. If you can convince me that the “people don’t rise from the dead” paradigm is false, then we can talk about the tomb in a different light. I’d say that would require somewhere in the same neighbourhood of confirming evidence as non-locality.
We can walk and chew gum at the same time. If you have evidence that you think is compelling, present it and perhaps my response to it will make some of the discussion we are having about the meta issue redundant.
I agree prima facie credibility matters - as a starting point that determines how much evidence is needed, not as a reason to stop looking. The alien spacecraft claim and the Socrates/hemlock claim sit at opposite ends of a spectrum. Where does “a specific dead man was found alive by specific people in a specific place” sit on that spectrum? And what would the evidence look like that moves it?
I’m working really hard not to say “naturally”, because it has nothing to do with metaphysics. Our observations about locality and sub-atomic particles presented us with evidence that contradicted some pretty fundamental things we thought we knew about the world, and rightly, many people were extremely sceptical about these findings. So we dug further into it until it was really not reasonable to argue that these non-local effects were happening. There is still lots of discussion concerning how to best think about these things, but no one in the know denies that they occur.
The non-locality analogy is a good one, and I think it’s more useful than you’re giving it credit for. Can you walk me through what actually changed people’s minds about locality? Was it one dramatic result, or was it a pattern of repeated, independently confirmed results over time? And does that tell us anything about what kind of evidence is needed to overturn different types of generalizations?
Claims that Jesus rose from the dead aren’t unbelievable because they aren’t natural, they are unbelievable because people don’t rise from the dead. It’s not metaphysical, it’s pragmatic. If you can convince me that the “people don’t rise from the dead” paradigm is false, then we can talk about the tomb in a different light. I’d say that would require somewhere in the same neighbourhood of confirming evidence as non-locality.
You’ve set the bar at “confirming evidence in the same neighbourhood as non-locality.” If we take that seriously, what would that look like for a single, specific event in a single place at a single time? And if the answer is “it can’t look like that, because non-locality required repeated experimental confirmation,” then is the bar you’re actually willing to engage with the same one you’ve described?
We can walk and chew gum at the same time. If you have evidence that you think is compelling, present it and perhaps my response to it will make some of the discussion we are having about the meta issue redundant.
I see it more as chewing two different pieces of gum at the same time in opposite cheeks. If the option is available to simply chew one piece, and then chew the other one when the first one is done, then chewing them at the same time seems like it would be making things unnecessarily difficult.
Somewhere near the “Socrates was beamed onto an alien spacecraft”.
Again, you would have to convince me that the paradigm that people stay dead was false, which would require an incredible amount of evidence. If your suggestion is that only one man ever didn’t stay dead, and the only evidence we have is 2000 year old historical accounts, I would say you would be hard pressed to convince me.
It was a huge number of iterations of careful and detailed observations that actively sought to prove the non-locality wrong, and failed to do so.
It wouldn’t look like anything. In order for the world to be a sensible place, we must assume that induction is a thing, and repeated patterns tell us something about how the universe works.
Sure. You seem to want to offer some special pleading exception to the claims that Jesus rose from the dead, as if it is not part of the larger category of claim that people rise from the dead. I mean, it’s logically possible that only one person in the history of the world rose from the dead (or even 5 or 10 or however many are part of Christian lore), just as it’s possible that only one person was beamed onto an alien spaceship. That doesn’t move the initial plausibility of the claim. So if you have evidence that would overcome that obvious mountain of implausibility, then let’s hear it.
At this point, I’m actually becoming annoyed and impatient by what’s starting to appear as gamesmanship. Do me a favour, and even if it doesn’t seem ideal to you, just bite the bullet and present your case. Otherwise I feel like this is just wasting my time and attention.
The alien spacecraft claim has no known pattern behind it at all - nothing in our experience of the world makes it even slightly less surprising. “A specific dead man was found alive by specific people in a specific place” is different: people come back from clinical death, the boundary between “alive” and “dead” is not as sharp as it looks, and the claim is anchored to a specific, checkable location and time. So I’d have to push back on placing it near the “Socrates was beamed onto an alien spacecraft”
Again, you would have to convince me that the paradigm that people stay dead was false, which would require an incredible amount of evidence. If your suggestion is that only one man ever didn’t stay dead, and the only evidence we have is 2000 year old historical accounts, I would say you would be hard pressed to convince me.
“2000 year old historical accounts” is doing a lot of dismissive work. We accept a great many specific historical events on the basis of ancient sources - the construction of the pyramids, the reign of specific kings, the existence of specific battles. The age of the source isn’t what settles it; the quality, independence, and corroboration of the source is.
It was a huge number of iterations of careful and detailed observations that actively sought to prove the non-locality wrong, and failed to do so.
What you’re describing is the standard for overturning a theoretical framework based on repeated experimental results. But is that the same standard as the one you’d apply to “did this specific thing happen in this specific place at this specific time”? What’s the evidential standard for, say, “Socrates was executed by hemlock” - was it a huge number of iterations, or was it the quality and independence of a small number of sources?
It wouldn’t look like anything. In order for the world to be a sensible place, we must assume that induction is a thing, and repeated patterns tell us something about how the universe works.
I think you’re right that induction is foundational. But induction tells us what’s probable, not what’s possible. And specific unusual historical events are established all the time on evidence that doesn’t fit a repeated pattern - a specific person survived a specific crash, a specific patient recovered from a specific diagnosis. The evidence for those isn’t “a pattern of repeated confirmations.” It’s the quality of the sources and the absence of a better explanation. Does that apply here, or is this a case where you require a pattern even for a single event?
At this point, I’m actually becoming annoyed and impatient by what’s starting to appear as gamesmanship. Do me a favour, and even if it doesn’t seem ideal to you, just bite the bullet and present your case. Otherwise I feel like this is just wasting my time and attention.
Thank you for your candidness. I am sorry you feel that way, and that is certainly not my intent. Personally, what frustrates me is trying to keep up with several, ever-increasing, simultaneous lines of thought at the exact same time. If you do not wish to continue the discussion further, without expanding into yet another simultaneous line of thought, I will respect your decision.
My claim is that people don’t rise from the dead. It is through this lens that I evaluate any specific claim. In order for me to entertain a claim that requires me to reject the larger rule, I must be convinced that the rule is not really a rule.
If my wife told me that she physically met and spoke to my long dead brother, I would say she hadn’t. This is in spite of the fact that she wouldn’t lie to me about something like this, that there is no reason to think she might be delusional. There would be lots of great reasons to believe she was speaking the truth. However, there would be no reason to believe that dead people come back to life. None of the details about how credible my wife’s claims are changes that, so while I might be at a loss to explain how she might be mistaken, or why she might lie, I would not think she was speaking the truth without cause to believe that the paradigm of “dead people stay dead” is false. Why should biblical historians be more credible than my wife?
If I were the first person to witness an example of non-locality, it would be insane to accept that what I had witnessed was what it appeared to be at face value, regardless of how well calibrated my instruments were, how well controlled my experiment was, and how detailed my data sets were. In the same way, it seems insane to me to suggest someone rose from the dead, no matter how good the history was. But once again, make the case, and we’ll see. Stop dancing around. If you think the evidence is compelling, have the courage of your convictions. It seems like you doubt the strength of your own position.