Atheists say a little more? A person, who may or may not identify as atheist, may say more. I’ve said all sorts of things. I think you should dial that statement back because, really, by claiming “atheists say a little more that that” is to say that everyone who identifies as atheist has more in common that a lack of belief in god/s. Perhaps you could say “some atheists”.
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Then what dogma of mine are you challenging?
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Straw man, I never said otherwise, nor did I need it explained? This also doesn’t address my post or your claim for witnesses?
As I have explained several times, we are not just discussing historical claims, we are talking about supernatural claims, so this is a false equivalence, and there are no witnesses, only claims.
Irrelevant, as I have explained countless times now no one is making supernatural claims about Spartacus, so again this is a false equivalence fallacy.
What has this to do with your erroneous claim for witnesses? Here:
Forget Spartacus as it is an irrelevant red herring, and address the rest of my objections to your claims.
HERE:
HERE:
HERE:
HERE:
HERE:
HERE:
HERE:
Perhaps I should have said “Evidence for all written claims about people’s lives in antiquity has only been an appearance in literature”.
We have nothing more than two rather scant sources that lend support to the claim “Spartacus was real and challenged Roman rule”.
So when you said “Evidence for that claim has only been an appearance in a story book” that is true of much of ancient history, not just biblical literature.
What single source is that then? Jesus is attested to in Tacitus, Josephus, Mara bar Sarapion, Suetonius, the Babylonian Talmud and more are all sources for the historicity of Jesus. Bear in mind we have one first hand source for Spartacus and a second source is a quote taken from another long lost primary source.
Consider too:
I never said I was challenging you specifically. Atheism is dogmatic and intolerant and dogma should be challenged.
The very claim “I’ve never seen evidence for God” is often dogmatic because its a self reinforcing belief. The atheist making that claim can never not be an atheist because they will always reject all evidence presented to them. They will do that because they have no idea what would serve as evidence.
If a person has no formal process for categorizing evidence as for or not-for God then they are being disingenuous when they demand evidence.
I think you mean some atheists, not atheism, how can the lack of belief in a deity be itself dogmatic, we are all born atheists after all. When you made the original claim I did ask you for some example of atheist dogma? Only when ever this form of whataboutism is offered in religious apologetics, I have found only straw men offered.
That’s a subjective opinion, it has not been my experience of most of the atheists I have encountered, and of course you have failed to offer any objective evidence, and your arguments have used known logical fallacies almost relentlessly, though I understand that you don’t want to acknowledge this of course.
That’s a bizarre assertion, as i said when you made this claim before, who one earth start with belief, then afterward gains an understanding of what the evidence is? That’s just risible…
Like all the apologists before you, you have had a free rein for many months and have failed to offer anything beyond subjective assertions and irrational arguments. Yet unsurprisingly it’s all our fault as usual.
What is yours, maybe we can learn something.
Thank you for the shifting of the goalposts.
Now, rather than address this absurdity, you wish to argue the historicity of Jesus. I am not a mythicist, despite the scant evidence. You will have to take up your widely rejected “sources” with someone who cares enough to educate you on the difference between historicity and historical fact.
When you stated “Christ has appeared”, you stated it the context of evidence for god.
Whether or not there was a character named jesus, does not in any stretch of even your imagination, lend credence to the Christ myth, despite your convoluted interpretations.
Please please please, stop with the Spartacus nonsense. As far as I am aware, Spartacus did not possess magical powers.
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A good point, that I have made previously as well. I have as yet received no cogent response to this of any kind, yet here we see the red herring of an historical character being introduced in his apologetics again.
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Well, I think you may need to consult your sources again. The original 'followers of the way", a sect or sects of jews who worshipped at the synagogue alongside other jews did not (see my archived piece on the Ebionites)
a) accept a physical resurrection,
b) did not believe that their messiah (jesus) was divine until his death when he was “adopted by their god. The resurrection was purely 'spiritual”, as also preached by Paul. This suggests that the graeco-Roman legends of physical resurrection were fringe beliefs of the non jews and added to the “Mark” text after (at the earliest) about 60CE and elaborated on by the other anonymous authors after 70CE, and “John” texts after 90CE.
The 'witnesses" of which you speak, were either : undead, anonymous, or participants in the charade observed and reported by yet another 3rd party (plagiarised and contradictory as they are) some decades afterwards.
Please tell me where and how that convinces you?
Both the concepts of a divine son of god, born of virgin were added a couple of generations after the alleged life of the Jesus figure were added
As to your outside sources not one is contemporary, even the Catholic Church recognise the passages attributed to Suetonius were blatant later forgeries. Mar Bar Sarpion does not mention “jesus” or the Christ by name but some 45 years after the alleged life of the jesus figure refers to a"wise King" and the destruction of the Temple in 70CE, in punishment for a jewish rebellion against Rome. " “What advantage did the Athenians obtain by putting Socrates to death? Famine and plague came upon them as judgment for their crime. What advantage did the people of Samos for burning Pythagoras? In one moment their country was covered with sand. What advantage did the Jews gain from executing their wise king? It was just after that their kingdom was abolished. God rightly avenged these men: the Athenians died of hunger; the Samians were overwhelmed by the sea; the Jews, ruined and driven from their land, live in complete dispersion. But Socrates did not die for good; he lived on in the statue of Hera. Nor did the wise king die for good; he lived on in the teaching which he had given.” – British Museum, Syriac Manuscript, Additional 14,658
1> Tacitus, writing some 40 - 60 years after the events refers only to the beliefs of the jewish christians in Rome blamed for the Great Fire in 60CE.
“Consequently, to get rid of the report, Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace. Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilatus, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judæa, the first source of the evil, but even in Rome, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their centre and become popular. Accordingly, an arrest was first made of all who pleaded guilty; then, upon their information, an immense multitude was convicted, not so much of the crime of firing the city, as of hatred against mankind.”
In Latin: ergo abolendo rumori Nero subdidit reos et quaesitissimis poenis adfecit, quos per flagitia invisos vulgus Chrestianos appellabat. auctor nominis eius Christus Tibero imperitante per procuratorem Pontium Pilatum supplicio adfectus erat; repressaque in praesens exitiabilis superstitio rursum erumpebat, non modo per Iudaeam, originem eius mali, sed per urbem etiam, quo cuncta undique atrocia aut pudenda confluunt celebranturque. igitur primum correpti qui fatebantur, deinde indicio eorum multitudo ingens haud proinde in crimine incendii quam odio humani generis convicti sunt. [Wiki]
The most anyone can get out of this rather inaccurate passage (Pilate was Prefect not Procurator and there was not an 'immense multitude" of christians anywhere much less in Rome in 60CE) Is that a Jewish Cult of Chrestus was in Rome in about 64CE according to reports some 30 - 50 years later.
Not very convincing evidence for a Jesus, even for a rabid theist now is it?
2> Josephus makes only one direct reference to “jesus” and that is a late 3rd century interpolation, aka fraud. Neither is it contemporary. The other reference is to James at the Jerusalem Temple. Scholars are still debating which Jesus is referred to, also the phrase brother ‘in’ christ or brother ‘of christ’ Again Josephus was writing many years after the events. Not contemporary.
3> Pliny was writing in 112 CE…hardly contemporary and was writing about the legal status of christians and how to tax them as a cult of Jewry, he didn’t mention a physical Jesus or christ.
4>Lucian: You are joking aren’t you? I quote: “Lucian’s statement was written near 170 CE (about 140 years after the crucifixion), and Lucian himself was born in 125 CE (about 95 years after the crucifixion). It seems rather unlikely that Lucian was an eyewitness.”
5> Babylonian Talmud a 3rd century CE (at the earliest) document that parodies the gospel stories and christianity in general. Not contemporary to the early 1st century and contradicts most of the gospel narratives.
Once again I state there are NO contemporary references to a jesus as described in the gospels.
In conclusion the best that we can say is, as I have stated many times: “ There is no contemporary evidence for a magical, divine, Jesus figure as described in the gospels. None.”
That some people may take this as a starting point to mythicise the Jesus figure is understandable, others may deny the existence. Absence of evidence can, indeed, be ‘evidence of absence.’ However I prefer the Scottish verdict in Law ”Not Proven”.
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Hey Sherlock - There is absolutely no connection at all between the universe and something with non-natural agency. There is no evidence of any non-natural agency that is existent. Before (BEFORE) you can tout God as a possibility, you must (MUST) demonstrate such a possibility exists. YOU HAVE NOT DONE THAT. You do not get to simply assert a god into existence. There is no connection between the concept of ‘self’ and a God. Before (BEFORE) you can assert such a connection, you must demonstrate a God thing actually exists and is a possibility. YOU HAVE NOT DONE THAT. Finally, Before you can assert that our form of consciousness is evidence for the existence of your god belief, you must clearly define what it is you are calling god, demonstrate that it actually exists, and then show a clear connection between it and consciousness. YOU HAVE NOT DONE THAT! You have no justification for any of your inane bullshit. NONE. You have a blind, ignorant assertion, ‘God done it.’ And nothing more. All your pages and pages of blathering obfuscation, false equivocations, and intentional dishonesty have not moved you one iota closer to the conclusion, ‘Therefore God Exists.’
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My remarks about historicity were in response to what you said:
I pointed out there wasn’t a “single source” there are 30+. As for the “absurdity” that’s taken out of context, here’s that context:
That entire paragraph was part of a summary of my own theological beliefs, if you don’t want to hear things that you refuse to accept then do not ask an atheist for their theological views, of course they’ll seem absurd to you, you’re an atheist.
They are not widely rejected Skriten, but you’ll have to take this up with someone who cares enough to educate you. It is the “myth” interpretation that is widely rejected, that’s why it’s called “fringe”.
It is something I regard as true, and I as answering questions you had asked about my own beliefs.
That’s odd, I thought you said “I am not a mythicist” yet now you say “lend credence to the Christ myth” - which is it, a myth or not?
Nor did Jesus.
Well clearly you equate a possible character named Jesus with the mythical Christ. Since there is scant (I am being magnanimously generous here) evidence for Jesus ( yes I have been educated ) and zero evidence for the supernatural nonsense called Christ, I will decline from believing this fairy tale.
Of course it is your prerogative to interpret reality as you see fit.
I am fine with you believing as you “choose” although I don’t think belief actually works that way.
Presenting lame so-called sources is not ok. Many of us here have been down this road with others and are really tired of having to wade through the
ordure. But, feel free to employ your own special interpretations since you clearly have developed an affinity for such.
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Complete and utter bollocks.
NOT treating the unsupported assertions of a pre-scientific mythology uncritically as fact, is the very ANTITHESIS of “dogma”.
Also, pointing out the absurdity inherent in treating unsupported mythological assertions uncritically as fact, isn’t “intolerant”, despite mythology fanboy misrepresentation thereof in this vein.
But I’ve been seeing bilge of this sort from mythology fanboys for 14 years.
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Atheism is just the lack or absence of belief in a deity or deities, I think you mean to say some atheists can be dogmatic and intolerant.
Dogmatic
adjective
- inclined to lay down principles as undeniably true.
Care to give an example that doesn’t involve yet another straw man fallacy? If challenging the irrational and dogmatic assertions of religions and the religious is intolerant, then yes so be it, that gets a big so what? No one is threatening violence, or telling you what you must belief, or how you are to act, you came here to us remember, are we obliged to be tolerant when your spiel is dishonest and irrational, I think not.
Myth
noun
- a traditional story, especially one concerning the early history of a people or explaining a natural or social phenomenon, and typically involving supernatural beings or events.
What part of that definition does not apply to the second hearsay of the gospels?
Magic
noun
- the power of apparently influencing events by using mysterious or supernatural forces.
Try again…or explain in detail with evidence how Jesus purportedly performed miracles.
Don’t see any response to this at all, I did ask how about the literally thousands of deities you don’t believe are real, and of course unlike most atheists you are actually making a positive claim they don’t exist that must be inherent on any monotheistic belief.
For the record rational reasoning seems a good start, it has exposed every single argument you have made for a deity as irrational after all, what “evidence” you alluded to is either wholly subjective opinions, or second hearsay from archaic myths. If one were to lower the bar fro credulity that far what would one not believe? The Legends of Hercules, Theogony: Clash of the Titans, Τhe Three Sisters of Fate, Prometheus and the Theft of Fire, Pandora’s Box, indeed mythology abounds in all ancient human cultures, explain your "formal process for categorizing evidence as for or not-for " these mythologies?
No answer, so bumpity bump…
No answer, so bumpity bump.
No answer so bumpity bump.
No response at all, so bumpity bump…
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That was my question. As for @Sherlock, I know of no Atheist Dogma. None. Some atheists have come onto this site and dogmatically asserted that there is no god. In all honesty, they get the same reaction from the site members that you have gotten. They get called on their superfluous bullshit, inane assertions, and the fact that they are professing to know that which they can not possibly know. Like you, they come on the site spouting complete nonsense, failing to identify terms, refusing to clarify concepts, obfuscating positions and making assertions and assumptions without evidence. Just check out previous posts. These "Dogmatic Atheists’ as you call them, are held to the same standards that you are being held to. And they are called on their bullshit just as you have been called on yours.
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I’m pretty sure one can, but one need not. Since a miracle is defined as “an extraordinary and welcome event that is not explicable by natural or scientific laws and is therefore attributed to a divine agency.”
It is therefore the very definition of an argumentum ad ignorantiam fallacy.
“Argument from ignorance (from Latin: argumentum ad ignorantiam), also known as appeal to ignorance (in which ignorance represents a lack of contrary evidence"), is a fallacy in informal logic.”
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Well likewise, one cannot reject my account of monkeys flying out of my ass last weekend as untrue since the rejection is based on the belief that such an event cannot or did not occur…
.
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Edit (there may have been a couple of lizards as well)
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You really need to keep Cog out of there.