More on the gospels.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

I think it is no more significant than my experience that riding fast motorcycles is fun.

Alas I fear that if they are still discussing your experience with m/cycles in 2000 years time I shall be forced to agree with you.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

I think we are in sitcom territory here: Carry on Crucifixion, perhaps.

Not much, since all we have is a story - perhaps we are still in sitcom territory, so that taking the story seriously isn't required.

Appeal to ridicule

Horse laugh fallacy.

[Gordon]

Appeal to ridicule

Horse laugh fallacy.

You were the chap who raised the subject of sitcoms: I'm just following your analogy a little further than you did (b.t.w. if anything I'm guilty of a 'reductio' - but hey, aren't sitcoms meant to be absurd?).

[jeremyp]

I think there is a difference: the disciples claimed they had witnessed miracles; the Islamic suicide bomber is not claiming an experience that would tell him that his is the true faith.
Still, if you disagree, fine.

That just makes it worse for you. Undeniably, suicide bombers go to their deaths for their faith and now you are claiming they do not need to have had any special experience. So that means the early Christians could have gone to their deaths without having any special experiences too.

[jeremyp]

So you too would disagree with Davey and accept that the most likely response to these reports are to dismiss them? I think many would even in NT times.

When did PD ever say that the most likely response to reports of miracles is not to dismiss them?

Because I have encountered God in Christ and see that the resurrection and ascension are in line and consistent with the God I encountered. I find that my chief influence. The epistles if you like are the minutes and memos of the early church and these events are reported in there.

But that's just you talking. I cannot distinguish between you having some genuine supernatural experience, you having some psychological experience which you believe wrongly is supernatural and you just making stuff up.

The same applies to the epistles. You can't show that they are the result of genuine encounters with god and not the writings of people who just want to convince others to join their religion.

Everything you say is just verbiage to obscure the fact that you have got no evidence.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

But that's just you talking.

Yes and I talked a bit more and you seem to have ignored that.

[jeremyp]

That is because you disagree with it philosophically and cosmologically.

The problem with you is you think adding big words makes you sound more knowledgable, but it's kind of sad and pathetic really. You could have just said "that is because you disagree with it". The rest of your sentence was meaningless bollocks designed to make you look intellectual.

[jeremyp]

Yes and I talked a bit more and you seem to have ignored that.

Yes, because it was meaningless crap about some nonsense called "chronological snobbery".

You haven't addressed the main point of my post which was asking how I could tell if your claimed experience was a real supernatural event, a psychological event that you mistook for supernatural or you making stuff up.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

When did PD ever say that the most likely response to reports of miracles is not to dismiss them?
But that's just you talking. I cannot distinguish between you having some genuine supernatural experience, you having some psychological experience which you believe wrongly is supernatural and you just making stuff up.

The same applies to the epistles. You can't show that they are the result of genuine encounters with god and not the writings of people who just want to convince others to join their religion.

Everything you say is just verbiage to obscure the fact that you have got no evidence.

Well I know others attest to experiences that can be said to be similar involving the same components...while recognising the individuality of the experience.

Other than that you are right and we are back to the trilemma.....am I mad, bad or telling the truth.

But to get back to the rest of why I discount mad or bad in terms of Christianity that is down to the problems scientism and materialism and ignoring the problem of induction and a misplaced desire to eliminate yourself to avoid self examination.

Science, materialism, empiricism are not equipped to examine or are interested in the grounds of religion but somehow quaint atheists still swear on them as the tools of religions downfall.

[jeremyp]

Well I know others attest to experiences that can be said to be similar involving the same components...while recognising the individuality of the experience.

Yes, and they are not all Christians. People of most religions attest to similar experiences.

Other than that you are right and we are back to the trilemma.....am I mad, bad or telling the truth.

If you are going to force me to pick one of those three, I'd go with mad. In actual fact, I think you believe your experience is genuine but I think you are mistaken to attribute it to the existence of a real god.

I'm not responding to anything else in your post because it looks like an attempt to build a straw man.

[Gordon]

Well I know others attest to experiences that can be said to be similar involving the same components...while recognising the individuality of the experience.

Other than that you are right and we are back to the trilemma.....am I mad, bad or telling the truth.

Could it be that you are just wrong?

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Yes, because it was meaningless crap about some nonsense called "chronological snobbery".

Yes the idea that because something is newer it's better or it's been thought through more.
Pinkerian Progress qualifies.

If we insist on reducing humans to what science is able to manage and other people's observations and analysis aren't acceptable because they aren't science then that is pretty week and circular. You start dismissing things of value, import and yes beauty as incorrect where the fact is just that science wasn't up to the job.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Could it be that you are just wrong?

Covered by mad or bad, Gordon.

[Gordon]

Covered by mad or bad, Gordon.

Nope - being wrong is different from being either mad or bad, which is one reason why Lewis' trilemma notion is inadequate.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Nope - being wrong is different from being either mad or bad, which is one reason why Lewis' trilemma notion is inadequate.

I shan't hold my breath until you come up with another.
Ok, have a quadrilemma if you like Mad, Bad, wrong or right. Can't see how that helps you though.

[Gordon]

I shan't hold my breath until you come up with another.
Ok, have a quadrilemma if you like Mad, Bad, wrong or right. Can't see how that helps you though.

It won't: remember I don't have the problem (that would be you).

[Walt Zingmatilder]

It won't: remember I don't have the problem (that would be you).

Not if i'm right.

[Gordon]

Not if i'm right.

True; but sadly there are no good reasons to think you are right, since that would require you to show how you'd excluded the possibility that you could have been honestly wrong in interpreting your experience as being an encounter with something supernatural.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

True; but sadly there are no good reasons to think you are right, .

If it's true that I might be right then you not finding the reasons good isn't really relevant is it?

[Gordon]

If it's true that I might be right then you not finding the reasons good isn't really relevant is it?

It is relevant: and if you, and no matter how convinced you are, can't address the risk that you could be wrong and since the burden of proof is yours, and not mine, that alone is sufficient reason to doubt your account.

Do you accept that you could be wrong?

[Walt Zingmatilder]

It is relevant: and if you, and no matter how convinced you are, can't address the risk that you could be wrong and since the burden of proof is yours, and not mine, that alone is sufficient reason to doubt your account.

Do you accept that you could be wrong?

Not at the moment.

Do I have the sole burden of proof? Why? Are you suggesting that the default position is that there is no God? On what grounds does that demand the status of the default position?

[jeremyp]

Nope - being wrong is different from being either mad or bad, which is one reason why Lewis' trilemma notion is inadequate.

No. Under Vlad's terms, being wrong is either mad if he isn't aware of being wrong or bad if he is aware of being wrong. If you are concerned about calling him mad or bad, don't be. They're his terms. If he doesn't like being called mad or bad, tough on him.

[Gordon]

Not at the moment.

The you are expressing current absolute certainty, which is an untenable position to hold.

Do I have the sole burden of proof? Why?

It is your claim.

Are you suggesting that the default position is that there is no God? On what grounds does that demand the status of the default position?

I'm not suggesting that at all.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

The you are expressing current absolute certainty, which is an untenable position to hold.

It is your claim.

I'm not suggesting that at all.

Then what is the default position here? What is it that gives me sole burden of proof?

[Gordon]

Then what is the default position here? What is it that gives me sole burden of proof?

It is your experience that is driving your claim, so the burden of proof is quite clearly yours.

I don't go down the default route that there is no God myself since I think 'God' is a meaningless and incoherent notion to start with: I would, in effect, be saying that the default is that there is an absence of something that is so meaningless and incoherent that nothing can be said about it that would sufficient enough to come to a view regarding it.

I can, of course, see that a 'the default position is that there is no God' could well be a convenient shorthand that could include the above, but it isn't an approach I make much use of since I think far safer ground is to found in considered arguments offered by some God enthusiasts. My view then is that there is no basis to entertain 'God' as being a serious proposition until such times as someone says something meaningful about it that isn't fallacious or incoherent.