AronRa
Administrator
I've received a number of tweets from @Aj2Parkes, @Kingdomfocus1, and someone who created a twitter account out of an obsession to hate on the mythicist, D.M. Murdock. They have all challenged me on twitter. They want me to give in-depth explanations and provide evidence for history, theology, and evolutionary science, and they expect me to do all of this in posts of 140 characters or less. Obviously no sensible person would ever even try to have a serious conversation like that. So I'm opening a new thread here. Where their questions can be dealt with appropriately.
@DmMurdockErrors doesn't even know what I'm saying, but still pretends to have shown errors in my logic. Someone asked me whether I discount the gospels as evidence of Jesus. I answered that the contradictory absurdities in the Bible are not evidence that impossible nonsense really occurred in history. The Bible is not a compilation of history but of mythology. I mentioned that even the early church founders dismissed most of the gospel authors as frauds. The Murdock hater then demanded that I reveal which gospels were considered fraudulent and by whom, insisting that they still would have had historical significance. But the gospels I'm referring to are the 16 non-canonical gospels which the early church fathers rejected outright. Once men had decided which fables should be canonized, Bishop Athanasius condemned the use of non-canonical tomes in his Festal letter of 367 CE. Thus, other books would be treated as damnable heresies which must be silenced and put out of sight. So I asked the Murdock hater what historical significance the infancy gospel or the gospel of Thomas could have had. The response was that I wasn't allowed to comment on those, insisting that my answer to their question is somehow a non-sequitor fallacy. It's not my fault if they don't know what I'm talking about, because they can't follow a protracted conversation on twitter. But that doesn't make it a logical fallacy to answer their question correctly.
That person also insists that there is historical confirmation of Jesus, despite the admission that there are doctoral historians who say otherwise. This person thinks Tacitus counts as confirmation of a historical Jesus. Fair enough, lots of people think that, even though its not so. So I was asked whether Tacitus lied or made up a fictional story, as if that were the only explanation here.
Similarly, they told me to send "the link" that proves evolution. I suppose I could send a link to PubMed, which includes tens of thousands of peer reviewed articles proving evolution. But I don't think that's what they're asking for. I told them it wouldn't do me any good to send thousands of links they don't understand. That I would have to explain it.
They also challenged me as to whether I would accept their evidence of God and creation. If they had it, I would be compelled to consider it of course, just like they're compelled to ignore the evidence I'll show them in this thread. The only thing we've discussed so far was whether both sides tell lies. They've already conceded that the religious side lies, but I think they did that thinking that I would make a similar concession. But I told them that I am unaware of any lie told my any scientist promoting evolution, and I'm unaware of any truth told by any believer about religion. Of course they cited Haeckel's drawings as the best example of an evolutionist's lie; every creationist does. But they don't know what they're talking about.
Here is an excerpt from my book where I talk about Haeckel:
@DmMurdockErrors doesn't even know what I'm saying, but still pretends to have shown errors in my logic. Someone asked me whether I discount the gospels as evidence of Jesus. I answered that the contradictory absurdities in the Bible are not evidence that impossible nonsense really occurred in history. The Bible is not a compilation of history but of mythology. I mentioned that even the early church founders dismissed most of the gospel authors as frauds. The Murdock hater then demanded that I reveal which gospels were considered fraudulent and by whom, insisting that they still would have had historical significance. But the gospels I'm referring to are the 16 non-canonical gospels which the early church fathers rejected outright. Once men had decided which fables should be canonized, Bishop Athanasius condemned the use of non-canonical tomes in his Festal letter of 367 CE. Thus, other books would be treated as damnable heresies which must be silenced and put out of sight. So I asked the Murdock hater what historical significance the infancy gospel or the gospel of Thomas could have had. The response was that I wasn't allowed to comment on those, insisting that my answer to their question is somehow a non-sequitor fallacy. It's not my fault if they don't know what I'm talking about, because they can't follow a protracted conversation on twitter. But that doesn't make it a logical fallacy to answer their question correctly.
That person also insists that there is historical confirmation of Jesus, despite the admission that there are doctoral historians who say otherwise. This person thinks Tacitus counts as confirmation of a historical Jesus. Fair enough, lots of people think that, even though its not so. So I was asked whether Tacitus lied or made up a fictional story, as if that were the only explanation here.
Aj2Parkes and Kingdomfocus1 are somehow unaware that the Bible has been proven wrong on every testable claim that it makes. They want me to name which passage of the Bible has been disproved. I said that the myths about the Garden of Eden, the Flood, the Tower of Babel, and the Exodus had all been disproved. But they want me to send them "the link" that shows how the Garden of Eden was disproved. Judging by the volume of threads on this forum and all the thousands of links provided here, there obviously couldn't be just one link on the side of reality. And if there were, it would be outnumbered and highly suspect.Robert M. Price said:
Similarly, they told me to send "the link" that proves evolution. I suppose I could send a link to PubMed, which includes tens of thousands of peer reviewed articles proving evolution. But I don't think that's what they're asking for. I told them it wouldn't do me any good to send thousands of links they don't understand. That I would have to explain it.
They also challenged me as to whether I would accept their evidence of God and creation. If they had it, I would be compelled to consider it of course, just like they're compelled to ignore the evidence I'll show them in this thread. The only thing we've discussed so far was whether both sides tell lies. They've already conceded that the religious side lies, but I think they did that thinking that I would make a similar concession. But I told them that I am unaware of any lie told my any scientist promoting evolution, and I'm unaware of any truth told by any believer about religion. Of course they cited Haeckel's drawings as the best example of an evolutionist's lie; every creationist does. But they don't know what they're talking about.
Here is an excerpt from my book where I talk about Haeckel:
So my first challenge then would be (1) Name one evolutionary scientist who lied in the act of promoting evolution over creationism. (2) Name a professional creationist who did not lie when trying to defend creationism or condemn evolution. As creationism is based entirely on lies, and science is based on critical analysis in peer review, no one has ever answered either question despite many attempts. They don't have to take this challenge. I'd rather they ask sincere questions since I am making a sincere effort to help them understand reality and not be fooled by fables.
