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07/30/2008 05:51:17 PM · #151
Originally posted by RayEthier:

I am quite aware of the atrocities committed by those you allude to, but one must not overlook the fact that religion has indeed been used as a means to justify wanton acts of agression against a myriad of people.


I'm never really sure why this is a big point. People will use whatever is available to them to cause division and strife if it allows them to remain in or gain power. Religion is no exception. It is also far from the only culprit and if we were to throw out all ideologies which have caused harm in the history of mankind, we'd be left with nothing. Certainly the largest genocides and atrocities of the 20th century are the domain of secular strife. Although Christianity has had its share of dark moments, perhaps the fact that they are mainly in the distant past means we have struggled through our adolescence and have attained at least a certain level of maturity.
07/30/2008 06:02:29 PM · #152
The meta point in the lecture (I listened to all of it) is that any historical writing which depends on manual copying (subject to error) which occurs in a religious/political context (subject to interpretation) will be imperfectly known today. Would it be true of the Koran? Of others? I suppose so.

Does this diminish the ability to inspire? Does it diminish the ability to teach? Does it diminish the ability to antagonize? Possibly not.
07/30/2008 06:04:14 PM · #153
Originally posted by Dr.Confuser:

Does this diminish the ability to inspire? Does it diminish the ability to teach? Does it diminish the ability to antagonize? Possibly not.

Does it diminish the probability that it is the infallible word of some god? Yes.
07/30/2008 06:09:46 PM · #154
Originally posted by Louis:

Originally posted by Dr.Confuser:

Does this diminish the ability to inspire? Does it diminish the ability to teach? Does it diminish the ability to antagonize? Possibly not.

Does it diminish the probability that it is the infallible word of some god? Yes.


Does it diminish the probability that it is the word of some god? No.
07/30/2008 06:19:06 PM · #155
Originally posted by Louis:

Originally posted by Dr.Confuser:

Does this diminish the ability to inspire? Does it diminish the ability to teach? Does it diminish the ability to antagonize? Possibly not.

Does it diminish the probability that it is the infallible word of some god? Yes.


His point generally is that the words themselves are fallible. He is not necessarily saying that the message they convey is fallible.

Let me illustrate. I was once on board a DC10 that was struck by lightning shortly after takeoff. One of the engins exploded. We made an emergency landing. No one was hurt.

Folks on board who told (or wrote) the story afterword would write different words, sentences, paragraphs. Their stories would be from different points of observation. Their individual contexts would compel them to relate various facts with differing degrees of emphasis. Are the stories individually inconsistent? Yes. Are they incorrect? Yes (to some degree), and no (generally). Can you piece together the facts of the lightning strike from differing stories? Certainly. Does it mean the lightning strike did not occur? No.

I am not making a statement about the correctness (or truth if you will,) of the Bible or of the Koran, or any other historically ancient books. Just trying to interpret what I heard him say.
07/30/2008 06:29:21 PM · #156
Originally posted by Sam94720:


Perfect logic. Many people have tried before. The answer you'll get is "It's faith." which means approximately "The rules of logic don't apply here. It's like this because it is like this".


And that's why I lost interest in these threads long ago on other forums and this one too. They're on auto-ignore. ;\ I still like to come and see who the soldiers are on each side battling the never ending battle... Got to keep them flags up boys.
07/30/2008 06:50:41 PM · #157
Originally posted by DrAchoo:

Originally posted by Louis:

Originally posted by Dr.Confuser:

Does this diminish the ability to inspire? Does it diminish the ability to teach? Does it diminish the ability to antagonize? Possibly not.

Does it diminish the probability that it is the infallible word of some god? Yes.


Does it diminish the probability that it is the word of some god? No.

You can equally say, neither does it diminish the probability that it is the word of a magic dragon, or some prankster, or Satan. All equally unlikely. Infinitely more probable is that the bible was imagined and penned by people, and not supernatural beings nobody has ever seen.
07/30/2008 06:58:10 PM · #158
Originally posted by Dr.Confuser:

I am not making a statement about the correctness (or truth if you will,) of the Bible or of the Koran, or any other historically ancient books. Just trying to interpret what I heard him say.

That's precisely what I heard as well. It can certainly teach, inspire, and antagonize, but that doesn't make it a divinely inspired text, nor does its existence prove God's. (Ehrman by the way has lost his faith.)

I like the analogy to the Iliad and Odyssey. They are couched in verifiable historical facts, and archeology has proven that Ilium existed and was razed by war. So the Iliad and Odyssey are apparently representative of some kind of historical fact. But does that mean that all the representative characters are real historical personages, like Achilles, as opposed to amalgams of heroic stock characters? Or that there really is a Zeus, Athena, Aphrodite, etc., that are real gods that get involved in the jealousies and rivalries of human affairs? I would be astonished to find anyone alive today (that isn't Wiccan ;) ) that would say so, or that held those texts to be literally true because there is archeological and historical evidence that upholds some of what they say.
07/30/2008 07:17:04 PM · #159
Originally posted by blindjustice:

plain old missionary style.


Well, for Peat's sake. You gonna bash that too?
07/30/2008 08:12:24 PM · #160
Originally posted by Louis:

You can equally say, neither does it diminish the probability that it is the word of a magic dragon, or some prankster, or Satan. All equally unlikely. Infinitely more probable is that the bible was imagined and penned by people, and not supernatural beings nobody has ever seen.


Nonsense. People have seen them. It says so, right in the bible, silly.
07/30/2008 09:03:05 PM · #161
Originally posted by Louis:

Originally posted by DrAchoo:

Originally posted by Louis:

Originally posted by Dr.Confuser:

Does this diminish the ability to inspire? Does it diminish the ability to teach? Does it diminish the ability to antagonize? Possibly not.

Does it diminish the probability that it is the infallible word of some god? Yes.


Does it diminish the probability that it is the word of some god? No.

You can equally say, neither does it diminish the probability that it is the word of a magic dragon, or some prankster, or Satan. All equally unlikely. Infinitely more probable is that the bible was imagined and penned by people, and not supernatural beings nobody has ever seen.


Which just goes to show the line of argument as some proof against a god is lacking. The only thing your sentence says is if there is human error in the current bible than it is not infallible. It seems sort of self-evident though.
07/30/2008 09:37:11 PM · #162
Originally posted by DrAchoo:

Originally posted by Louis:

Originally posted by DrAchoo:

Originally posted by Louis:

Originally posted by Dr.Confuser:

Does this diminish the ability to inspire? Does it diminish the ability to teach? Does it diminish the ability to antagonize? Possibly not.

Does it diminish the probability that it is the infallible word of some god? Yes.


Does it diminish the probability that it is the word of some god? No.

You can equally say, neither does it diminish the probability that it is the word of a magic dragon, or some prankster, or Satan. All equally unlikely. Infinitely more probable is that the bible was imagined and penned by people, and not supernatural beings nobody has ever seen.


Which just goes to show the line of argument as some proof against a god is lacking. The only thing your sentence says is if there is human error in the current bible than it is not infallible. It seems sort of self-evident though.


Sorry, but the unlikely requires proof.
07/30/2008 10:07:06 PM · #163
Originally posted by DrAchoo:

Which just goes to show the line of argument as some proof against a god is lacking.

This flies in the face of any kind of reasoning. Truly a position of last resort. There is an elephant in my fridge, and there's nothing you can say to me that will disprove that. The pope is a robot. Disprove it. There's a teapot in orbit around the earth, and the evidence against this fact is completely lacking.
07/30/2008 10:19:45 PM · #164
Are any of you non-believers convinced the universe is expanding?
07/30/2008 10:59:32 PM · #165
Originally posted by Louis:

Originally posted by DrAchoo:

Which just goes to show the line of argument as some proof against a god is lacking.

This flies in the face of any kind of reasoning. Truly a position of last resort. There is an elephant in my fridge, and there's nothing you can say to me that will disprove that. The pope is a robot. Disprove it. There's a teapot in orbit around the earth, and the evidence against this fact is completely lacking.


You believed at one time. Can it be so hard to see the other side of the rabbit hole these days?
07/30/2008 11:30:49 PM · #166
Originally posted by DrAchoo:

You believed at one time. Can it be so hard to see the other side of the rabbit hole these days?

At one time most Europeans believed in Zeus or Odin. Can it be so hard to believe in them these days? Nobody has disproven either one.
07/31/2008 12:52:36 AM · #167
To avoid treading where we have tread many, many times already, let's get back to the original topic. I have not seen a significant response to my assertion that one could argue that the combined value of the current "reliability" of the New Testament (read: how similar are the words we have today as compared to the original documents) and the "availability" of the New Testament (read: how many people, as a percentage of the global population, either have a copy or could obtain a copy of the New Testament in an understandable language without too much difficulty) is higher than at any other point in history. In the scheme of this argument, or the argument of the speaker in the video, I think this is significant.

There are two possible discussions to be had. I'd suggest we do not switch back and forth as these threads are apt to do.

Scholarly: The contention of Ehrman is that while the New Testament is one of the most important texts of the Western World it is impossible to know what it really says due to error. I would counter that while some error may have entered into the body of the text, the exponential availability of the text makes our predicament an "embarassment of riches". In other words, we should celebrate that the most important historical text of our civilization is so widely available and is still very faithful to the originals.

Philosophical: Of course the more fun conversation is the implied question Sam is really asking. "What kind of god would fail to keep his main avenue of communication with his creation free of error?" I counter here that one can ask the question "What kind of god would utilize the hand of man to make his main avenue of communication more and more available to mankind as time progresses?" We can quickly dispense with the snide retorts that God should have made his text available to everybody at once. This is not what happened and thus is irrelevant. One side is taking what really happened and is inferring that God either doesn't exist or is inept because error has entered his word while I am contending that the inevitable introduction of errors, the majority of which are insubstantial, has been outweighed by the fact that it is now widely available to most peoples in the world.

People who counter immediately against my philosophical contention are, I'm assuming, simply conceding that my assertion about the reliability and availability is correct. If you don't agree with this, don't go putting the cart before the horse in your argument.

Message edited by author 2008-07-31 02:05:47.
07/31/2008 07:08:06 AM · #168
Originally posted by DrAchoo:

To avoid treading where we have tread many, many times already, let's get back to the original topic. I have not seen a significant response to my assertion that one could argue that the combined value of the current "reliability" of the New Testament (read: how similar are the words we have today as compared to the original documents) and the "availability" of the New Testament (read: how many people, as a percentage of the global population, either have a copy or could obtain a copy of the New Testament in an understandable language without too much difficulty) is higher than at any other point in history. In the scheme of this argument, or the argument of the speaker in the video, I think this is significant.

Why is the number of copies available significant? That's like saying if you say something enough times, it makes it true. As for availability, The Little Prince has been translated into more than 150 languages and sells all over the world. Unfortunately, not all translations are the same and some are even supposed to be downright bad and not true to the story. Am I to believe, since it is so widely available, that it is true? Nevermind the word of God part...
Originally posted by DrAchoo:


There are two possible discussions to be had. I'd suggest we do not switch back and forth as these threads are apt to do.

Scholarly: The contention of Ehrman is that while the New Testament is one of the most important texts of the Western World it is impossible to know what it really says due to error. I would counter that while some error may have entered into the body of the text, the exponential availability of the text makes our predicament an "embarassment of riches". In other words, we should celebrate that the most important historical text of our civilization is so widely available and is still very faithful to the originals.

As I mentioned above, availability has nothing to do with truth or accuracy. I have spent some time working with the original fragments and translations of Heraclitus looking for his influence on various texts in the new testament (there are quite a few). Some translations are better than others but the main problem is that often, the words can't be easily translated as there is no english equivalent for the idea he was trying to get across. The new testament has the same problem; much of it too was written in ancient greek. Then, you translate that into another language, say Chinese, and the work is further diluted due to a problem of language. So, how faithful any of the writings are, to the originals and to each other, is dependent on translation. The further removed from the original, the more problems you will find. But, the number of copies have no bearing on its truth value.
Originally posted by DrAchoo:


Philosophical: Of course the more fun conversation is the implied question Sam is really asking. "What kind of god would fail to keep his main avenue of communication with his creation free of error?" I counter here that one can ask the question "What kind of god would utilize the hand of man to make his main avenue of communication more and more available to mankind as time progresses?" We can quickly dispense with the snide retorts that God should have made his text available to everybody at once. This is not what happened and thus is irrelevant. One side is taking what really happened and is inferring that God either doesn't exist or is inept because error has entered his word while I am contending that the inevitable introduction of errors, the majority of which are insubstantial, has been outweighed by the fact that it is now widely available to most peoples in the world.

People who counter immediately against my philosophical contention are, I'm assuming, simply conceding that my assertion about the reliability and availability is correct. If you don't agree with this, don't go putting the cart before the horse in your argument.

Whether the bible is the word of God or not, it was written and translated by man. Your either/or question/statement above doesn't allow for any other options but I think its too black and white, at least according to my point of view (that God doesn't exist or that he is inept). If God exists and if God 'wrote' the Bible, then man, by virtue of his imperfections, has not heard the word of God correctly. Can't this be another option? It is interesting to see two people read the exact same text and come up with completely different meanings. Both will hold that their opinion of what the text says is correct. But we know they can't both be. If God exists and if God 'wrote' the Bible, maybe he intended it that way.
07/31/2008 08:10:39 AM · #169
Originally posted by DrAchoo:

[...] we should celebrate that the most important historical text of our civilization is so widely available and is still very faithful to the originals.

You keep claiming that the current versions of the Bible are closer to the originals than ever. This is silly for two reasons:

1) We do not know what the originals were.
2) Are you seriously saying that a copy of a copy of a copy of a copy of a copy of a copy of the original is closer to the original than a direct copy of the original?

Did you watch the video? Did you read my previous posts? This issue has already been addressed several times.

I know you will never, ever leave your prison, even if you saw the Flying Spaghetti Monster land outside. But could you please look out the window long enough to watch the whole video before coming back to the discussion? Thanks a lot.
07/31/2008 09:02:10 AM · #170
Originally posted by Sam94720:

Originally posted by DrAchoo:

[...] we should celebrate that the most important historical text of our civilization is so widely available and is still very faithful to the originals.

You keep claiming that the current versions of the Bible are closer to the originals than ever. This is silly for two reasons:

1) We do not know what the originals were.
2) Are you seriously saying that a copy of a copy of a copy of a copy of a copy of a copy of the original is closer to the original than a direct copy of the original?

Did you watch the video? Did you read my previous posts? This issue has already been addressed several times.

I know you will never, ever leave your prison, even if you saw the Flying Spaghetti Monster land outside. But could you please look out the window long enough to watch the whole video before coming back to the discussion? Thanks a lot.


Interesting that you characterise faith as prison. Most of us believe that it is Christ that sets us free, and that to be outside of the will of God is to be in bondage. John 8:31-36
07/31/2008 09:26:05 AM · #171
farfel53, my impression is that most staunch believers have their beliefs because they grew up among beliefers. They have accepted as absolute truth that the Christian god exists and that the Bible is his infallible word. This basic premise is never to be questioned, this is where any discussion starts. And that's why I made the prison analogy earlier (post at 07/28/2008 12:59:29 PM); the prison is this basic set of beliefs that you will never leave.

It is funny that you would argue against this analogy by quoting the Bible, thereby proving my point: you're arguing from inside the prison.
07/31/2008 09:27:51 AM · #172
Originally posted by farfel53:

Most of us believe that it is Christ that sets us free, and that to be outside of the will of God is to be in bondage. John 8:31-36

'Most'? - There are 2.1 billion Christians in the world out of a population of 6.6 billion.
07/31/2008 09:32:47 AM · #173
Originally posted by jhonan:

Originally posted by farfel53:

Most of us believe that it is Christ that sets us free, and that to be outside of the will of God is to be in bondage. John 8:31-36

'Most'? - There are 2.1 billion Christians in the world out of a population of 6.6 billion.


He means "most of us Christians" of course. Surely you can see that?

R.
07/31/2008 09:40:22 AM · #174
Originally posted by Bear_Music:

Originally posted by jhonan:

Originally posted by farfel53:

Most of us believe that it is Christ that sets us free, and that to be outside of the will of God is to be in bondage. John 8:31-36

'Most'? - There are 2.1 billion Christians in the world out of a population of 6.6 billion.


He means "most of us Christians" of course. Surely you can see that?

No. 'Most of us' is pretty ambiguous, in my opinion.
07/31/2008 09:40:31 AM · #175
Originally posted by DrAchoo:

Originally posted by Louis:

Originally posted by DrAchoo:

Which just goes to show the line of argument as some proof against a god is lacking.

This flies in the face of any kind of reasoning. Truly a position of last resort. There is an elephant in my fridge, and there's nothing you can say to me that will disprove that. The pope is a robot. Disprove it. There's a teapot in orbit around the earth, and the evidence against this fact is completely lacking.

You believed at one time. Can it be so hard to see the other side of the rabbit hole these days?

Not hard at all, in fact, I'd say I have something of an advantage here. ;)
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