More Responses To DD & Co.
Posted in Blogosphere, Thinking Critically on | 6 minutes | 4 Comments →
As stated earlier today, I'm now responding to DD and company here to thwart DD's perceptions of my personality and hopefully force a return to the issues. Remember, what better way to disable your accuser than to steal his bullets, right? Refusing to comment there should swiftly undermine DD's whining about me being an "infiltrator", "troll", "heckler", "loser", etc. I can't fairly be called any of that if I cease all rapport on DD's blog, and once his bullets have been stolen and his emotions return to a steady equilibrium, once he's exhausted and done contradicting himself by addressing his perception of my personality, I'm hoping DD will return to the issues.
I encourage anyone and especially TWIM's Power Commenters to butt in here. I'm especially wondering who agrees with me that DD's clarion calls for vigilance on addressing issues vs. personalities and not feeding trolls seems contradictory juxtapozed against The Heckler's Defense which is effectively tantamount to armchair psychoanalysis in a troll trough. I'm also especially wondering who feels the Bible's claim that humans cannot see God the Father and live effectively challenges DD's claims that God should be right here, right now, in person.
Eneasz,
If he said “GH is Christianity” then we’d never get past that first statement, since 2000 years of experience shows us that it is impossible to get a single coherent definition of Christianity.
While I have more faith in our powers of reason, yours is a moot point. We don't need a single, coherent definition of Christianity. We only need to be sure that all tenets of DD's GH reflect foundational Christian claims, even if they are meant only to be baseline. For example, how would you say DD's GH's claim that God should be right here, right now, in person parses against the Bible's claim that no human may see God (the Father) and live?
It may be a bit of a trap, but how else can you get believers to consider the evidence on its own terms?
"A bit of a trap" seems like a generous understatement to me, and I submit the best way to get believers to consider the evidence on its own terms is to address that which the evidence is purported to address on its own terms. This is where DD fails, as myself and others have maintained since weeks 1 and 2 of this discussion.
ThatOtherGuy,
What he’s doing with this is saying that while the GH is not the entirety of christianity, it IS the core that unites all the sects.
And what myself, Jayman, Facilis, MS Quixote and others have been saying since weeks 1 and 2 is that the GH is emphatically NOT the core that unites all the sects.
..you cannot reject the GH without rejecting christianity.
That would be true if the GH accurately represented a subset of baseline Christian claims common to all faiths. Problem is, it fails badly in that regard.
..you’ve been lashing out at everyone here for weeks..
Sorry. I can't take that seriously from a befuddled smart-mouth like you who freely took the initiative in lashing out at me after demonstrating erroneous claims you made about Mormonism and Joseph Smith.
DD,
[cl] wants me to say either that the Gospel Hypothesis is Christianity, so he can spring the trap he’s got ready for that one, or to say that it is not Christianity, so he can spring the other trap he has prepared.
What's so unreasonable about asking for a straight answer? Not for Christ's sake, your series is titled Evidence Against Christianity. Therefore, your GH must accurately reflect Christianity, else the MH cannot disprove Christianity. This is so simple and clear and pristine I'm completely baffled at objections to the contrary.
Does proving that nobody's ever watched a monkey become a man disprove evolution? Why not? The same logic applies here: that a human can observe a monkey become a man is not a foundational claim of evolution, thus it cannot disprove evolution.
Ahem. Can you or anyone please help me get my head around the following transaction:
Some of the commenters seem to have slightly misunderstood the Gospel Hypothesis. I am not claiming that the Gospel Hypothesis is Christianity (we’ll get to the relationship between Christianity and the Gospel Hypothesis later on). (DD, bold mine)
Notice that nowhere did I ever say that the Gospel Hypothesis is not Christianity. (DD, bold mine)
Do you live in some hitherto undisclosed world where one can both "not claim the GH is Christianity" and "not claim the GH is not Christianity" at the same time? How dost that work, o ye of little faith but superior intelligence and demeanor?
cl has taken a simple statement that does not say what he claims it does, and distorted it into something that suits his ad hominem agenda, so that he can try and derail us from discussing the issues and embroil us in an personal squabble. And he rants and rants on it, because it focuses on personal accusations rather than on the issues (with which he is ill-prepared to deal).
Excuse me, Dr. Duncan, but what personal accusations do you claim I prefer? Wasn't The Heckler's Defense devoted entirely to personalities as opposed to issues? Answer honestly now.
That’s why we’re comparing the two hypotheses against the real-world evidence rather than against some individual’s personal interpretation of the Bible.
DD, are you flat-out blind? The GH is a personal interpretation of the Bible, cherry-picked so you can win the argument! How is it possible to craft an hypothesis that falsifies Christianity that doesn't rely on interpretation of the Bible?
cl’s post above technically violates the anti-trolling standards for the comments on this blog,
To hell with standards of hypocrisy!
He may vent his personal animosity towards me, but such does not provide the unbeliever with any rational basis for rejecting atheism and turning to Christianity.
I don't have personal animosity towards you, but slothful induction is always frustrating, especially with your insulting, contradictory posts and your sycophants taking their stabs. And you can weasel-y vent your personal animosity towards me by proxy all day long, too, but such does not provide justification for your so-called Evidence Against Christianity.
However, you've made a great case for Evidence Against DDanity, but why should anyone care?
John Morales
says...Well, I’m not a “Power Commenter”, yet I am a member of the set of “anyone”.
I am encouraged.
It doesn’t claim that. If I may quote the GH:
“… mankind has an almighty, all-wise, objectively real Creator God Who loves us enough to become one of us and to die for us so that He could enjoy an intimate, personal relationship with each and every one of us for all eternity, as is His desire. We won’t all necessarily benefit from that desire, some say, but that is what He allegedly wants.”
Where does it mention the Bible? Nowhere.
cl
says...John Morales,
Sorry, but I disagree. DD claims such is a logical prediction cast by the GH, verbatim.
Yes, are we starting to see the problem? DD wants to say his exercise “constitutes a reasonable basis for rejecting the truth-claims of Christianity” and “evidence against the Christian God,” yet also refuses to state clearly whether he contends all the tenets of his GH are accurately identified as foundational Christian claims as delineated by reasoned, non-dogmatic, non-denominational parsing of the Bible. The prediction that God should be right here, right now, in person, on the evening news and on magazine covers is not a foundational Christian claim, nor does it flow logically from the full subset of foundational Christian claims as delineated thusly.
Is there anything you would suggest that might help get this point across if it’s not becoming clear yet?
John Morales
says...Yes, I understand you claim to disagree. However, what the GH claims is what it says, no more and no less.
What may be inferred, however, what is entailed, under a reasonable interpretation, is much as DD says.
No matter how much you repeat it, the claim itself and the inferences to be drawn therefrom are different things.
Maybe so, maybe not. I’m not now (and haven’t been since childhood) a Christian, nor do I know what your specific version of the foundational Christian claim is.
However, it is not a foundational claim of the GH, either.
I quote it again:
“… mankind has an almighty, all-wise, objectively real Creator God Who loves us enough to become one of us and to die for us so that He could enjoy an intimate, personal relationship with each and every one of us for all eternity, as is His desire. We won’t all necessarily benefit from that desire, some say, but that is what He allegedly wants.”
Given the well over 30,000 sects of Christianity, I would need to know your specific understanding of what the “full subset of foundational Christian claims” is before I could meaningfully respond. Should you care to summarise such, I can then determine whether such a claim does or does not likely “flow logically” therefrom.
(BTW, I take it by “full subset of” you mean the ‘set of’, in this case, since no foundational claims can be outside the subset of foundational claims (definitionally). It is odd phrasing.)
Well, so far as I can see, the GH (not Christianity, mind you, but the GH) does in fact imply that an almighty God who loves us would reveal itself to us; this is obvious by simple empathy – were I to love someone, and were that someone to require my presence to avoid pain and suffering, and were I to have the ability to present myself to that person, I would. Hence, so would the God of the GH.
I get your point, but not its basis. So… what are the foundational Christian claims, as you understand them?
cl
says...Yes, “full subset of” was odd phrasing, and you interpreted the odd phrasing correctly.
This leaves the door wide open to “no true Scotsman” and “Courtier’s Reply” charges. By no means is that the argument I’d like to hide behind, and honestly, I’d like to remove the words Christian and Christianity from this discussion. I think DD’s correct in his idea to go as far back to the source as possible. Christianity samples from the Bible. That’s why I think we need a reasonable Bible Hypothesis that purports to evaluate the Bible on its own merits, and that’s what I’ve been partially working on behind the scenes here. The GH merely samples partially from the Bible. Since that is the case, the MH challenges an incomplete competitor – if DD’s GH is in fact proffered as an accurate representation of the God of the Bible (he won’t say).
I’ve been trying to strain the “right here, right now God” (RHRNG) prediction from the GH, as I think that’s what’s hanging you and I up over the past 24 hours. I understand the difference between the bare-bones structure (GH) and what DD inferred from that structure (RHRNG): the GH actually is composed of foundational Bible claims. The problem – again – is that DD only includes the foundational Bible claims he needs to superficially win his case. He omits other foundational Bible claims that directly challenge his inferences of a RHRNG. I don’t think that’s reasonable.
Correct. I agree 100%. Problem is, the “proto-god” of DD’s GH is only half the story if we’re discussing the God of the Bible – but DD won’t say whether his GH is meant to accurately reflect the God of the Bible or not – so it seems we’re at an impasse until he clears this up.
Let’s see how my previous remarks help, then I’ll be glad to return to this question, because it’s a question that needs to be fully answered in order for me to make my case – although – I’m going to answer it in biblical (not Christian) terms.