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The whole conservation of energy thing doesn't imply an afterlife. If you die, the energy from your brain doesn't stay "brain energy". It gets used elsewhere. For all you know, your "brain energy" might end up coming out of a dog's rear end years later.
No, it's just not how science works. Science works in the NATURAL, not the SUPERNATURAL.
Beats me. I know as much about metaphysics as I do about the Street Fighter metagame, which isn't very much.
It doesn't imply an afterlife, but it's not out of the realm of impossibility. Frankly, I sometimes think that maybe the energy of George Washington's mind may have at one point powered my light bulb at the flick of a switch, just to be transferred elsewhere upon being shut off.
I get that. What I'm getting at is how one day, science could come to a point where it transcends past the natural and into the realm of the supernatural. The key term being "could".
There is a problem with this. Sure, it makes sense that if something happens that cannot be explained naturally, it could be supernatural. Okay, so how do we determine it's not natural? How do you know if you've exhausted all of the feasible explanations?
I would invite him to contact the James Randi foundation and have someone who is a little more well-learned in testing to figure out ways to make sure what's happening isn't a trick. He would also win a million dollars, so that's a plus.
If I, personally, could not think of a natural explanation for the power based on my current knowledge, I would not assume it's supernatural. I don't know enough to judge that sort of thing.
The problem is that theoretically, it's impossible to determine whether or not every feasible natural explanation has been exhausted, only because there are always new things to be discovered and understood. When those are exhausted, there will have been more things to work with to try to explain things. Will it result in something that can prove/debunk supernatural occurrences eventually? Maybe, maybe not. But it's highly doubtful they'll run out of feasible ways to try and find the answer to the supernatual.
If it wasn't a trick of some kind, or some future tech aiding in such levitation, if he is indeed using his own abilities, then I wouldn't classify that as supernatual. It would instead seem like something in his genetics allow him to achieve such a feat, in which case, it would be natural to him alone. Can it be studied? Possibly. Do we have the technology and knowledge to understand it at this time? Who can say? Is it superhuman? Most definitely. But it wouldn't be supernatural in that sense, if it's something he can accomplish with his own genetic gift.[/QUOTE]
Yeah, I'm pretty sure the PG and Debate Hall has had more than enough of those kinds of debates.
1. Levitate liquid bodies of specified compositions.
Please don't confuse Jesus the man with Jesus the myth. I'm sure there was a guy 2000 years ago who thought he was divine and had some truly radical ideas of the time. No credible source outside the bible verifies these miracles.
Is this based on the same evidence as in your previous thread? If so, I'm completely uninterested in an argument that tries to use the gospels as evidence, and offers as corroborating evidence sources which have been almost entirely discredited.
...And this is why I do not believe in the supernatural. Good luck ruling out every feasible natural explanation in any situation. By default, actions which directly contradict the known laws of nature are the least feasible solutions to any given problem.
Case in point: how could you determine that this was a supernatural power? Saying "we don't know of a natural explanation" is nice, but because the action itself is effective within the natural world, the most reasonable solution is not "god did it", but rather "we don't know how he can do it". I'd assume some sort of futuristic technology or bizarre biological mutation before I assumed "it's because of something supernatural", because that last answer is nothing more than a dead end with 0 explanatory power.
Yeah, that argument for God is what I'm interested in; I'm referring to a post like two pages back.
...But if it happened, then clearly, it is not impossible. And here we come to the paradox of a miracle: something which by definition is impossible has to happen. That doesn't work. It makes every other explanation that fits with what we know about natural law, no matter how bizarre or unlikely, a more reasonable starting point. Of course, this ignores the fact that the actual evidence for anything one could even count as miraculous is piss-poor.
Of course not! A miracle, being quite possibly the least likely event possible in the universe, requires absolutely extraordinary evidence! Hell, I'd go so far as to say that testimony is altogether an absolutely terrible medium to record evidence for something so fantastic. There is no amount of historical documents that could convince me that the earth was once flat, and there is no amount of historical documents that could convince me that a man rose from the dead.
Much like the Martyrs of other extremist brainwashed cults? Yes, these people martyring themselves doesn't make a lot of sense. You know what else doesn't make a lot of sense? This guy. Or rather, the girls he has raised into his family. Just sayin'. That a few people were brainwashed by an influential leader far enough to turn themselves into martyrs for their "god" is, on the grand scheme of things, not that unlikely. It certainly doesn't trump "a man walked on water and brought his friend back to life" on the unlikeliness scale.
We throw them out because they were written and edited by people with an extreme vested interest in the legitimacy of incredible claims, contain things which are absolutely ludicrous in their own right, contradict each other, show a clear agenda (Matthew, IIRC, was written so as to fulfill as many of the old testament prophecies as possible), and are corroborated in claims which are absolutely unbelievable by almost no contemporary sources, and certainly no contemporary sources that are beyond reproach.
Your sources suck.
Not just possible, extremely likely. Like, as in "this was church doctrine for a while".
You're asking me to believe that a man rose from the dead after 3 days. That this same man previously brought his friend back to life and walked on water during a storm.
Wow, as far as unfair comparisons go, this one kinda takes the cake. I'm not asking you for non-christian evidence. I'm asking you to not use the document you're trying to establish as legitimate as proof. Not to mention that we aren't arguing for evolution based on century-old religious texts, but rather fossil and genetic evidence that each and every person can go look at right now if they want.
It's a comparison that Nicholas has brought up in the past when I noted that his collaborating sources suck. That there's little to no actual evidence of Alexander the Great's life until a few hundred years after he died.
But if a miracle DOES happen, it can't be classified as a miracle then.Miracles aren't impossible because the laws of universe are contingent, they could have been otherwise, so they can technicall be defied.
Nic- I'll make the thread soon. I'll try get Jaswa back too.
Wait nicholas has said that? "little to no actual evidence that Alexander the great lived?"
BPC, just what sort of personal vendetta do you have against the very idea of God anyway?
Actually, I've heard claims of miracles performed by other Christians, but I haven't actually investigated to see which (if any) would hold up. For instance, Ray Comfort has claimed to have seen demonic possession (and driven them out), but somehow I doubt you'd take that as evidence.
*sigh*. How many times have I answered the insanity complaint? Let's go over the reasons why this comparison is stupid one more time.
Let's deal with these one at a time.
Considering the amount of religions going on in the Roman empire, where such claims were fairly common... no, I don't think it would. By all accounts it wasn't until Christianity grew into more than a local phenomenon that the Roman government actually cared at all.
Ladies and gentlemen, here on display we have BPC's amazing debating skills! I'm sure all of you wish you could craft an argument as eloquent as this, something so completely impossible for the other side to answer that they just shake their head and move on. (Yes, I'm just a little annoyed by this point.)
Right. Someone please explain to me why there isn't massive variation in these collaborating sources, (as you'd hardly expect 30 different corrupt copyists to modify the same document in exactly the same way), and why the false gospels that were dismissed as lies (like the Gospel of Thomas), or the Jewish Talmud (calling Jesus demon possessed, and such) managed to survive.
Yep. You could raise this objection against almost any religion, really. I would like to point out that many of science's claims have initially sounded just as implausible before being verified.
Basically you're claiming there since there's no natural way for someone to rise from the dead, therefore it's impossible. Or in other words, that nothing should be evidence of a miracle. (We also have scientific evidence that the world was round 1000 years ago, you can't prove via science that Jesus didn't exist.)
Um... what? You've outright said that you won't take anything as evidence on the grounds of miracles being impossible. I could give you a time machine to watch the events for yourself, and you'd still come up with some way to deny it.
Way to take me out of context, BPC. The comparison was made into response to accusations that "legend distorted the gospels over the 30 year gap between the events and when they were written." My point is that several hundred year gaps are the norm in ancient history, and that that standard of proof would require tossing out most of what we know about ancient times.
Hey, how about you actually attack the point instead of insinuating that I have a personal vendetta against a ludicrous idea? If I was here for adhoms, I'd go back to The Escapist. Their forums aren't dead.
Seriously though, what's wrong with this logic? When looking for an explanation for a given phenomenon, "some supernatural being breaking the laws of nature" should be the last place we go to look. I've heard tons of claims. What I have not seen is any evidence or substantiation. Faith healing that fails, demon possession that have been explained through other means, and claims of miraculous events without even the slightest shred of evidence... Again, we have this simple problem that, in an age where a large number of the people in the first world have a video camera built into a device that they always have on their body, there is no evidence of anything even resembling a miracle. At least, no evidence that holds up to the slightest bit of scrutiny.
You know what? It's still both more realistic and more feasible than "A person existed who walked on water, turned water into wine, brought a person back to life, and rose from the dead". I don't understand why this is so hard for you to grasp. I reject the idea that the disciples were telling the truth, and I think there's a lot more to consider in here then you are bringing up.
I'm not talking about the immediate time after the death of Jesus. I'm talking about a few hundred years later. You know, back when they voted on the contents of the new testament? Not to mention explicitly left out the gospels written that presented Jesus as less than the son of god?
Do you disagree that it is absolutely ludicrous for a person to come back to life after being dead for an extended period of time? Calling it a "miracle" doesn't weaken the fact that what you are bringing up is less at home in a work of historical fiction and more at home in Aesop's Fables. The fact of the matter is, the new testament describes events which are absolutely preposterous, and were this any other historical text, regardless of the circumstances of its creations, it would be dismissed out of hand due to the absolutely ludicrous nature of the claims therein.
Your non-gospel sources are crap. That's the short version.
What, you want me to link to Iron Chariots or Wikipedia as well? I figured I'd save myself the time, because from what I remember from your thread on the subject, all of your contemporary sources are bad, and have been taken to task as often as NephilimFree has.
I retract this claim; I don't have the evidence to back it up the way I thought I did. My own sources are little shakier on that than I thought. However, I don't regret saying it, as...
Do I even have to respond to this? Is there anyone here who doesn't see how stupid this comparison is? Like, for starters, that we could easily reconstruct a few steps back into the tree of life with genetics alone? Or that there is massive corroborative evidence across fields as diverse as paleontology, virology, and geology? Or that evolution doesn't violate any part of our understanding of the laws of nature?
Class, would anyone like to point out the crucial part of this sentence? ^_^
Funny, because this changes quite a few variables. Things like:
Yep. You've got two different things mixed up here. This whole argument is almost entirely based on your assertion of the historicity of the bible – I'm saying "no ****ing way, that **** is ludicrous!". Whether or not other evidence of miracles would work is another question entirely, but I will refer you back to posts by Jumpman or Dre. – if a miracle happens, it's no longer classifiable as a miracle.
Addressed this above. This comparison is so unfair, it makes a cage match between Mike Tyson and Ike Broflovski seem like even odds.
I <3 you so much. ^_^
No, that's an impossible event. An impossible event would be something existing and not existing at the same time, because it defies a necessary law of logic.
Even going by that, anything miracle-status that would happen would be more likely a natural event that is not yet understood rather than a supernatural one. Seeing as miracles defy the laws of nature, we cannot set a standard on the properties of miracles, so we can't base miracles of any sort of criteria and thus make miracles a redundant concept.
I dunno what's so hard about the concepts I'm bringing up. It's really nothing more than an extension of "extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence". Or, in this case, "the claim that a guy rose from the dead after 3 days is sure as hell gonna need better ****ing evidence than the anecdotal claims of a 2000-year-old book". Believing that kind of crap scouts you as a gullible fool in almost any other context.
