Why do protestants prefer Paul over John?

Originally posted by googlefudge
Then you are very bad at reading. Because the 'Straw Vulcan' part is at least the 6th fallacy I accuse him of.

If you have got that far and only spotted one [and failed to understand even that] then your comprehension
is so bad this may be utterly pointless.

EDIT: Thread for convenience

http://www.redhotpawn.com/forum/spirituality/william-lane-craig-deconstructed-at-lengh.145003

All that stuff about the "fallacy fallacy" applies to Bill Craig but of course not to you ?

How come the old "Fallacy Fallacy" cannot be applied just as equally to your arguments ?

Originally posted by sonship
You've got a real nerve. Since when have you responded to my requests like this ?

Its not nerve, I am just showing you how ridiculous your debating tactic is. Given that you have refused to give two examples we can now conclude based on your own reasoning earlier in the thread that you are not willing to commit to the arguments in the video you posted. You must be just as non-commital as you claim I am.
QED

Originally posted by sonship
Oh yea.

Well Frank Turek trounces Lawrence Krauss. So there!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TDgciyXq_f8

Richard Carrier discuses the historicity of Jesus (or rather the non-historicity)

YouTube

I win!

Originally posted by sonship
All that stuff about the "fallacy fallacy" applies to Bill Craig but of course not to you ?

How come the old "Fallacy Fallacy" cannot be applied just as equally to your arguments ?

WLC was presenting an argument that he was selling as a 'logical argument' that should convince
the audience that his conclusion [that you cannot have morality without god] is correct.

I pointed out a bunch of logical fallacies in his arguments that show that his argument
should not be convincing and doesn't lead to his conclusion.

I also mentioned the Fallacy Fallacy to make clear that simply by pointing out the fallacies
in his argument I wasn't demonstrating that his conclusion was false, simply that it was
unproven. And that I would move on to making arguments to show that his position was
not just unproven but actually false later.

For the 'fallacy fallacy' to apply to me/my arguments I would have also had to have made a
logically invalid/unsound argument and someone would have had to have used that to try
to claim that my conclusion was false as opposed to merely unproven.

I don't believe that I did make any logical fallacies in my arguments and I don't think anyone made
such a claim.

Which is why the Fallacy Fallacy is not something that applied to my arguments.

If you would like to make the claim that my arguments were/are logically unsound and then claim
that this proves my conclusion/s to be false then I would bring up the Fallacy Fallacy to demonstrate
that YOU are in fact wrong.


Because what you fail to understand is that in this case the Fallacy Fallacy is the shield behind which
WLC is hiding because it means that I/we cannot simply state that his arguments are unsound and
therefore his conclusion is false. It makes me/us have to do the extra work of presenting counter arguments
if we want to demonstrate that the conclusion is false as opposed to merely unproven.


However for the purposes of our current discussion as to whether WLC is convincing and/or a good apologist
for your cause merely pointing out how hopelessly bad and weak his arguments are is amply sufficient.


I am still thus waiting for any substantive rebuttal to any, let alone all, the many flaws I pointed out
in his speech/argument.


EDIT: http://www.redhotpawn.com/forum/spirituality/william-lane-craig-deconstructed-at-lengh.145003
I'm going to keep linking the thread for convenience.

WLC was presenting an argument that he was selling as a 'logical argument' that should convince the audience that his conclusion [that you cannot have morality without god] is correct.

What do you mean by summarizing Craig "you cannot have morality without God"?

Do you mean that you think Craig argues that a person who does not believe in God cannot have morally good behavior ?

Yes or No ?

I ask because I have heard the argument before about " Can We have Morality Without God?" And that is not what Bill Craig argues. He doesn't argue that an atheist cannot have good behavior. If you don't take Craig to mean the above, then perhaps you're aiming at what he does argue.

Originally posted by twhitehead
Richard Carrier discuses the historicity of Jesus (or rather the non-historicity)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_gF0dszx6no

I win!

LOL!

You win the Ostrich Buries Head in the Sand Award.

YouTube

Craig further spanks Carrier on TV program "Faith Under Fire."

Carrier complains that God should have done it Richard Carrier's way.
God should have grandstanded. Craig's reply, referring to Alvin Plantinga's argument with this, I think is more convincing as to why God would not grandstand in the manner Carrier insists any God vindicating a resurrected Son should have done.

Carrier here theories of Jesus raised and left the physical body in the grave and it was latter misunderstood to be a physical resurrection - is a theory requiring more leaps of faith than the NT.

Carrier is mad that the Holy Spirit has overwhelmed to believe - IE. usurp his human will.
"You still have not FORCED me to believe" argument.

This little exchange is shorter.

PS - I don't want to debate if ostriches really do or do not have such a practice.

Originally posted by sonship
LOL!

You win the [b]Ostrich Buries Head in the Sand Award.

No, I win the "I can post more links to YouTube videos RJhinds style whilst not expecting anyone to actually watch them and instead rely on the juicy titles to try and get my message across" game that you were apparently trying to play.

Craig further spanks Carrier on TV program "Faith Under Fire."
See what I mean?

The truth is that Craig has never come up with a reasonable counter argument to Carrier (much less spanked him), but if you spam the thread with enough videos, you wont give anyone a chance to actually discuss that fact.

See what I mean?

-------------------------------

No. I do see what WLC means in that little exchange that well rebuts Carrier's complaint that any resurrection of God's Son should have been done as Richard Carrier dictates it would.

Originally posted by twhitehead
No, I win the "I can post more links to YouTube videos RJhinds style whilst not expecting anyone to actually watch them and instead rely on the juicy titles to try and get my message across" game that you were apparently trying to play.

[b]Craig further spanks Carrier on TV program "Faith Under Fire."
See what I mean?

The truth is that Craig ha ...[text shortened]... spam the thread with enough videos, you wont give anyone a chance to actually discuss that fact.[/b]

Name dropping with "Guilt by Association" IE. "You do as RJHinds does".

"Juicy titles" ... ? As a matter of fact I have found it sometimes necessary to change titles of videos which I thought were too much, to make them more civil.

My last statement about Carrier being "spanked" was a lapse. Anyway, sometimes I recall adjusting a title so as not to sound too offensive. So crash and burn on that criticism

Then we are back to "You won't discuss" charge.
No, I won't or even can't discuss Carrier when I ask you to mention two of arguments from him you find effective, and you don't, but give excuses.

Yea, I don't discuss your excuses. In fact I, at least once, responded in kind.

No played games. I just don't retain in my mind stupid arguments from Dr. Carrier any more time than I need to. I've heard hours of them over the last week.

So, in this last video, what would I "discuss" ?
(Discuss doesn't mean agree with twhitehead ).

Let's go back to this little exchange - YouTube

At 1:44 Carrier begins to talk. He says evidence for a resurrection is like trying to prove that a spaceship crashed on Rosewell. He says we don't have the kind of evidence we would need to confirm that.

First excuse from Carrier - "We don't know who wrote the Gospels for sure".

My response - I think what he should say is that he sincerely hopes that he can obfuscate and obscure the details recorded in the Gospel behind this excuse. "Since I don't know for sure who was sitting down and actually penning down the book called Mark or Luke, I can postpone indefinitely trust in the things written therein."

Mark is traditionally regarded as a record of what the Apostle Peter taught.
Carrier hopes by raising a perpetual question on that, he has grounds to assume liars of one sort or another are spewing out false reports, false recollections, fabrications and generally trying to deceive the readers.

This tells me more about Richard Carrier than the text of Mark.
He's projecting probably.

Second excuse - "We don't know where they wrote them."
You don't know where I wrote this post.
I don't know where the location of the studeo was where Carrier made those remarks.
It doesn't make that much difference to pinpoint the exact physical location something was written.

Third excuse - Don't know when they wrote them or who their sources were.
Scholars would not all agree that we don't know when Mark was written.
I think quite a few scholars know that Matthew and Luke had Mark as a source and some OTHER unknown source.

It is extremely elusive to draw any statistical analysis about this borrowing. Where we expect Mark to have less or more detail, Mark surprises. Backward engineering the Gospels to know exactly who copied who is not easy. It is probably an impossible task to know precisely how these documents came together.

Luke has material that Mark does not have. And so does Matthew have material that neither Luke or Matthew contain.

Carrier may run after these idiosyncrasies as rationales to hold he's being lied to or deceived throughout the Gospels. But I think there is something else going on in his mind for his hard line suspicions.

He says we don't know even if they were reliable. Of course that is a polite what an academic would say that he knows he should be trusted over the Gospel writers who are, not like him, reliable.

Then he goes to say there are alternative explanations of the evidence. Okay. A fertile mind can argue ad infinitum " But, but, I can think of another way this all could have happened." I have heard some of his alternative explanations. They do not impress me.

Now we get into his theory of an alternative explanation. Starting at 2:03.

I'll deal with just the first part - "The disciples originally had visions ...".

I don't think 500 or more people had the same vision at one time (1 Cor. 3:11-15).
A group hallucination involving 500 people, I don't believe.

Okay, that's Paul's letter. How about the disciples had visions ? Well, it is interesting that Matthew says that still some did not believe they were seeing a resurrected Jesus, though some did.

" And the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus directed them. And when they saw Him, they worshipped Him, though some doubted." (Matt. 28:16,17)

They all had a vision at the same time ? And some who saw this group vision doubted ?
No. I think they all saw Jesus and some doubted the miracle.

A previous verse says they saw Jesus raised and grabbed his feet. It is hard to grab the feet of a person you are only seeing in a vision.

"And behold, Jesus met them, saying, Rejoice! And they came to Him and took hold of His feet and worshipped Him.

Then Jesus said to them, Do not be afraid. Go and report to My brothers that they should go into Galilee, and there they will see Me." (Matt. 28:9,10)

A group saw Him. Some held His physical feet.
They apparently heard the same thing.
Richard Carrier's group hallucination theory requires more of a blind leap of faith than the plain report of Matthew. Such a man was victorious over death.

Originally posted by sonship

This was a typo.

To the charge that I can be sloppy, I plead guilty ... sometimes.

I meant to write:

Carrier is mad that the Holy Spirit has [NOT] (edited) overwhelmed him (edited) to believe - IE. usurp his human will. IE. "You still have not FORCED me to believe" argument.

Originally posted by sonship
No. I do see what WLC means in that little exchange that well rebuts Carrier's complaint that any resurrection of God's Son should have been done as Richard Carrier dictates it would.

Yes, but nobody else actually watched the video. So in reality you are relying on the juicy title of the video to try and claim that Craig spanks Carrier. I can do the same if you wish and spam the thread with video after video with juicy titles and claim the contents back up the juicy titles.

Carrier accuses Craig's suggestion that Carrier is not open hearted is an ad hom, merits some reply.

I don't think it has to be considered an ad hom.
An ad hom is a logically weak argument.
But Carrier could just as easily say William Lane Craig is not open hearted.

Face it though. The acceptance of Jesus is not an entirely objective matter.
And there have always been reasons why many prefer this bothering personality be either non-historically existent or dead.

Craig did not have time to respond to this remark.

Put aside the remark. Let's go back to Carrier's theories.

Now, Richard Carrier says he does NOT find plausible that a God of the universe who wants to save all humanity would send his message of salvation only to a few people in secret. And He would or should not do it ONCE only two thousand years ago. Why not just appear to everyone on earth ?

Okay. The point is interesting. However, we see that God appeared grandstand style to the whole nation of Israel on Mt. Sinai in the Exodus from Egypt. God gave the whole assembly of a huge group of people a VISUAL manifestation of the glory of God.

Well, this lasted for some 40 days or more. Interestingly, it did not stop the people from getting restless and doubtful.

1.) They pressured Aaron to make for them a golden calf idol, probably something more like the nations around them.

2.) They persuaded Aaron to take them BACK to the house of slavery - back into Egypt !

3.) They broke practically all of the ten commandments that Moses was about to bring down to them. That is the reason why Moses, in anger dashed the tablets to pieces in disgust and anger.

"Forget IT !! This is simply NOT going to work with these people !! "

It is possible, Dr. Carrier, that the experience was instructive to us. God was after something more inward in a life change upon realizing His reality.

The stadium appearance of Jesus may NOT be what God wanted. Delegation of authority was more in His will. We believe through the changed lives of those who FIRST were eyewitnesses. Even with this scenario God has a hard time.

So Carrier would prefer that God perhaps make the stars spell out "Here I am ... I'm Jesus alive from the dead."

Well, people have not changed from the time of the Exodus. Maybe after less than 40 days, boredom overtake the typical sinner who is eager to get back to business as usual.

Christ did make some dramatic appearances and even to groups. But I don't think God willed to have a stadium like circus show in which men and women only OBJECTIVELY register the information only to have no change in living.

Look at Jesus feeding the 5,000 with a few loaves and a few fish. First He fed the disciples. Then He instructed them to pick up the crumbs and distribute them to feed the multitude. It was a miracle.

Now, Carrier's complaint is something like this. Someone in the crowd is in turn to receive some of those tasty crumbs of fish and bread. He complains -

" Oh no. I don't want YOU DISCIPLES to distribute this food to me. If Jesus wants me to eat, then He has to bring those crumbs of fish and bread Himself. I don't trust you disciples to do it. Maybe you had some food in your pockets. Maybe you slipped that food to me to fake the miracle. "

Some people do not want to accept delegated authority assigned to the apostles of Jesus. Like not wanting to receive any fish and bread except from Jesus Himself, they will not accept the testimony of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John . "Oh no!! Let Jesus write the book and hand it to me personally !"

This analogy is not too perfect. That is because to RECEIVE Jesus in one's heart is to meet Jesus in His form as the Holy Spirit. So it actually IS very subjective and personal.

But as it stands, some of the complaints that a resurrected Son of God should have made Himself manifest in some other fashion amounts to one not wanting to accept delegated authority Jesus dispensed to His close 12 disciples.

I sometimes sympathize with the thought, but I think it can be overcome. You can keep a candle flame burning by passing it on to many many other candles. You can make the flame travel across the country. You can pass the flame down over one hundred years.

I received the testimony of the Gospel. Before me, someone ELSE received it and shared it with me. I share it with someone else who in turn will introduce some OTHER person to the living Lord Jesus.

Each encounter is very personal and unique and subjective yet real.

Originally posted by sonship
Name dropping with "Guilt by Association" IE. "You do as RJHinds does".

No, guilt by similar behaviour. You are doing what he does and he exemplifies the behaviour so he is a good way to point out the type of behaviour I am referring to.
Whenever RJ was challenged on the contents of a video he would just spam the thread with more videos, just as you have done in this thread.

Originally posted by twhitehead
No, guilt by similar behaviour. You are doing what he does and he exemplifies the behaviour so he is a good way to point out the type of behaviour I am referring to.
Whenever RJ was challenged on the contents of a video he would just spam the thread with more videos, just as you have done in this thread.

Any video I put up is with the intention that someone (if not you everytime!) would look at it.

I no where near put up as many YouTubes as RJHinds did who was fond of doing a Thread per YouTube for awhile.

Anyway, rather than waste too much time on process, let's consider another Richard Carrier point.

Well, Richard says there's symbolism in Mark which was misinterpreted to mean that Jesus rose from the dead. What really happened is that the mythology that fed the Christian belief was about someone rising only with a immaterial body while the physical body was left in the tomb.

Now, this kind of thought can argue that only after a considerable period of time was this misunderstanding morphed and propagated in to a risen physical Jesus.

But Paul's First Corinthian letter pre-dates the writing of Mark. What Paul received as ALREADY being taught was the Jesus was buried and raised (not in heaven as Carrier argues, but in an earthly tomb).

At the expense of being accused of "spamming" some of the most conclusive discussion on this pre-Markian narrative in discussed by Dr. Gary Habermas.

There, interested parties can go find the lecture themselves - "The Argument that Changed a Generation of Scholars" or some very similar title, by Gary Habermas.

Anyway, of course Carrier is prepared with reasons. Paul lied - is one of his reasons.
The real autobiographical book on Paul's life from his own words is Second Corinthians. The book shows Paul was either insane or very deceived.

The character of the man does not harmonize with a theory that he is a boldfaced liar. It isn't doing anything for him to LIE except to have extreme suffering at the hands of opposers. That is an opposition which eventually led to his being beheaded, as strong tradition holds happened to him under Nero.

Of course you probably will not take an hour or so to read through the book of Second Corinthians. A big yawn will do better. But for many of us who read Paul's autobiographical testimonial of his apostleship, it sounds like a man who really believes what he is risking his life for and preaching.

And the argument "Well, the 9/11 terrorists also believed what they believed" argument does much to shed light. Some similarities does not mean total similarity.

Paul was not trying to massacre innocent people.
Paul was laboring to cause people to meet the Jesus he met and to become conformed to that Jesus as he himself had been conformed.

Now Carrier has a theory that Mark the Gospel was morphed or understanding of it was morphed from a non-physical rising to a physical one. But the troublesome "cult" could have been squelched by producing the corpse of Jesus. They all knew where the burial place was.

I think Carrier says that they could have been mistaken ( I think ). So you go on with "It could have been this, It could have been that, It could have been this, It could have been that, It could have, could have, could have, could have ... etc. etc."

You end up with throwing out conspiracy theories, none of which you can be accused of actually committing to. Safe to just throw out "It COULD have been, It COULD have been, It COULD have been."

Now I don't claim to have the education Richard Carrier has. Congrats, Carrier on his Phd. But it doesn't intimidate me. He seems to me to have buried himself in all kinds of ancient literature so as to induce people to trust him that he knows HOW fragments were pasted together to arrive at the New Testament.

Since one has not read all these things, one may feel "Who am I to argue with Dr. Carrier." But a little bit of listening to his NT exergesis exposes that he hasn't learned to read the lines there, let alone read between the lines.

Now to Craig's advice. When Carrier refers to some document or other source, Craig advizes people to check that source for themselves. On a wink and a smile you cannot trust the fresh face of Richard Carrier to be accurately explaining always what some other writing which supposedly agrees with his views, really said.

Now, to be fair, I can see how Carrier uses some NT passages to argue for a non-material resurrection. But these passages are about the glorified body of Christ. You see you have to understand that for Jesus to rise from the dead was not simply a matter of someone COMING BACK.

He entered into a glorified new state of indestructibility. Had the Gospel writers wanted to conceal the astounding nature of His new physical body they would have probably not told us of His appearing in a locked room or concealing His identity for a time.

1. He ate fish to prove He was physically there.
2. They grabbed His feet.
3. Or He told on an occasion NOT to touch Him yet.
4. Luke says He showed Himself with many irrefutable proofs over a period of 40 days.
5. He told Thomas to examine His bodily wounds.

The resurrection of Jesus should not be viewed simply are a man COMING BACK from the dead and no more. In His resurrection state He did more than just resume His previous nature. Space does not allow me to elaborate here.

Jewish opponents and Roman opponents could have produced the body of Jesus to stop the spread of the Christian church. They didn't. It was nowhere to be found.

That is nowhere except for His disciples to experience with some new believers, who were wrestling with the whole miracle.

Originally posted by sonship

WLC was presenting an argument that he was selling as a 'logical argument' that should convince the audience that his conclusion [that you cannot have morality without god] is correct.

What do you mean by summarizing Craig "you cannot have morality without God"?

Do you mean that you think Craig argues that a person who does not belie ...[text shortened]... r. If you don't take Craig to mean the above, then perhaps you're aiming at what he does argue.

What do you mean by summarizing Craig "you cannot have morality without God"?

Do you mean that you think Craig argues that a person who does not believe in God cannot have morally good behavior ?

Yes or No ?

No.

Remember I went to the trouble of not just watching his inane talk but transcribing it.
Which took hours.

I heard every single word and understood every sentence he spoke and in detail.

So no, I am not making such an obviously false and elementary mistake as you are suggesting.

He was talking about how one founds morality, on what basis you can create a moral system
and his argument is that you cannot have a sound moral basis without god.