The Debate Hall Social Thread

[Sucumbio]

...are you familiar with Christian theology?

Fully aware, I am Catholic after all, and obviously I understand the Christian mythology and "why" Jesus refused to provide any real proof he was the son of God.

In short, for you to claim that his refusal to perform a miracle in front of Herod/Pilate makes all his miracles automatically hearsay is cherry picking the Bible to fit your own conclusion.

Not at all. It's just the same events interpreted the opposite way. Christians believe he did it for a holier purpose, non-believers see it as proof he was a charlatan. There's none much to read into it. If I suddenly find myself being followed by 10000+ people all calling me the son of God, and I end up on trial for it, and refuse to prove my case, how would history judge me?

A fraud.

 

[Dre89]

Theology can make anything sound true if you already accept the theology.

To the neutral however, it's far more rational to believe that he was a fraud than refusing for a holier purpose.

 

[Nicholas1024]

An alternate interpretation? Fine, that's fair enough. But you can't use it as evidence when there's a simple explanation for it (and in fact, such behavior would be required for Jesus to fulfill the prophecies concerning his death).

Also, to address the example Succumbio gave, if you had already extensively proved your case elsewhere, then history would likely judge you quite differently than you're suggesting.

 

[Dre89]

The 'simple explanation' comes from theology, which is exactly the problem because you can't assume theology is true at this stage.

 

[Nicholas1024]

The 'simple explanation' comes from theology, which is exactly the problem because you can't assume theology is true at this stage.

It's not an assumption. I'm pointing out that my position has an explanation for that behavior, and therefore Succumbio can't use Jesus's refusal as proof that Jesus never did miracles.

 

[#HBC | Acrostic]

Nich how were you converted to Christianity.

 

[RDK]

Oh hey guys check out all this debate in here

 

[Budget Player Cadet_]

An alternate interpretation? Fine, that's fair enough. But you can't use it as evidence when there's a simple explanation for it (and in fact, such behavior would be required for Jesus to fulfill the prophecies concerning his death).

But "God did it" is not a simple explanation.

Oh hey guys check out all this debate in here

Hey RDK, long time no see.

 

[Dre89]

Oh hey guys check out all this debate in here

He returns from the dead.

Looks like you wanted us to know that you were back but couldn't think of anything to say.

It's cool bro.

 

[Sucumbio]

The 'simple explanation' comes from theology, which is exactly the problem because you can't assume theology is true at this stage.

Absolutely correct. History though it does benefit from perspective - "history is written by the victors" (sic) - is based more or less on facts. Dates. Times. Occurrences. Jesus' failure to make a case for himself, historically speaking, shows us why it is up to Christians to believe that it must have been intentional.

And to be clear, I'm not exactly making a "case" so to speak. I'm just pointing out the irony inherent to the discussion. Jesus' own contemporaries were unable to document a miracle, because there were no witnesses who weren't also already a part of his congregation.

If we were to try to find out if Adolfo Constanzo or Marshall Applewhite or shoot, even someone more "respected" like say, Joseph Smith, founder of the Latter Day Saints movement (Mormons), had any REAL supernatural powers like, raising the dead for instance... what would a skeptic need to do? Convert to their religion? Obviously not! I mean sure, that's one way to do it, but how objective is that? How true is it? No... instead they would want to read quantifiable, falsifiable documents written by neutral 3rd party observers... or themselves witness an actual occurrence if they were contemporary.

Can we do this with Jesus? Well no.. he's been dead over 2000 years. So... the only other option is to look for documented evidence as written by a neutral 3rd party. Ah, but there isn't any such thing, the only thing one -can- read, is the Bible, which is none other than the religion's own spokesperson.

That's the point I was making. It is literally impossible to prove the holiness of Jesus without buying into the holiness of Jesus outright, and that's just something no skeptic will be willing to do.

 

[jaswa]

And to be clear, I'm not exactly making a "case" so to speak. I'm just pointing out the irony inherent to the discussion. Jesus' own contemporaries were unable to document a miracle, because there were no witnesses who weren't also already a part of his congregation.

Can we do this with Jesus? Well no.. he's been dead over 2000 years. So... the only other option is to look for documented evidence as written by a neutral 3rd party. Ah, but there isn't any such thing, the only thing one -can- read, is the Bible, which is none other than the religion's own spokesperson.

orly?

Now there was about this time Jesus, a wise man, if it be lawful to call him a man; for he was a doer of wonderful works, a teacher of such men as receive the truth with pleasure. He drew over to him both many of the Jews and many of the Gentiles. He was [the] Christ. And when Pilate, at the suggestion of the principal men amongst us, had condemned him to the cross, those that loved him at the first did not forsake him; for he appeared to them alive again the third day; as the divine prophets had foretold these and ten thousand other wonderful things concerning him. And the tribe of Christians, so named from him, are not extinct at this day.

From a Jew.

Consequently, to get rid of the report, Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace. Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilatus, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judæa, the first source of the evil, but even in Rome, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their centre and become popular. Accordingly, an arrest was first made of all who pleaded guilty; then, upon their information, an immense multitude was convicted, not so much of the crime of firing the city, as of hatred against mankind

Neutral Roman.

 

[Claire Diviner]

One thing that seems to bother me is that the bible is but one form of scripture from one religion. There are tons of other religions with texts and scriptures that preaches their word, including Buddhism, Islam, Hinduism, just to name but a few. Who is to say Christianity is the right religion among all others? What if one of the other many religions happen to be true? What if none of them are true? The problem is that at this current stage, it's impossible to prove through scientific means if one religion is right over another, or if they're all just beliefs created to explain the unexplainable.

 

[GwJ]

There's already so much wrong with the mere concept of the religions we have today. When it comes to god concepts, I think deism is really the only one you can actually defend and get anywhere.

 

[Claire Diviner]

Unfortunately, in most cases, religion is always brought up as an argument for defending the existence of any possible deity.

 

[Sucumbio]

>.> Jaswa, what do those quotes prove? Neither Josephus nor Tacitus spoke of Jesus' miracles in detail. Vague allusions to "10,000 other wonderful things" doesn't exactly say "changed water to wine." Besides, there are only three total references from the historian Josephus regarding Christ, and though the first two are indeed considered fact (the stoning of James, and the imprisonment and execution of John the Baptist) his third reference is considered only partially accurate (obviously indicating the mention of his resurrection as no doubt suspect. Tacitus' writings on the other hand still hold scholars on the edge of agreement to whether it was merely hearsay or if at all worthwhile. If it IS at all worth anything, it establishes 3 things: "...that there was a sizable number of Christians in Rome at the time, that it was possible to distinguish between Christians and Jews in Rome and that at the time pagans made a connection between Christianity in Rome and its origin in Judea."

Still nothing about miracles.

I hate to say it, but you'll be hard pressed to find someone who had no vested interest in Christianity documenting proof of Christ's miracles. Besides, if there WAS such proof, do you really think the whole world would still be warring over which God has a bigger ****?

 

[Aesir]

Wasn't tacticus shown to be a fabrication?

 

[GwJ]

Who's Tacitus? I've heard of Josephus, but Tacitus is new to me.

 

[#HBC | Dark Horse]

A roman senator. Part of his book "Annals" talks about Christ's crucifixion.

 

[GwJ]

What information does he touch on exactly?

 

[Sucumbio]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tacitus_on_Christ

 

[#HBC | Mac]

so when do we call this forum officially dead?

 

[Claire Diviner]

We could use more life here. My only regret is not having joined sooner, when the Debate Hall was more alive.

 

[GoldShadow]

There's plenty of life here, I don't know what you guys are talking about.

 

[Claire Diviner]

Well, yeah, there is life... just not as much as I thought there would be, unless I'm somehow never around whenever activity is at its peak.

 

[GwJ]

I don't think this is the kind of place that requires constant activity. If there's something to debate about, someone makes a thread. If not, oh well.

 

[Nicholas1024]

There is life, it's merely in hibernation. But yeah, there wouldn't be a point in opening yet another God debate, on all the major related topics I've reached a standoff with our resident atheists. As that's the main topic that I tend to actually debate, I just haven't visited this place much lately.

 

[Claire Diviner]

Come to think of it, my taste in debates tend to lean towards laws and moral issues. I can do religion too, as I have before, but considering the amount of religious debates this place has had in the past, it's akin to beating a dead horse with another dead horse's dead horse at this point.

 

[Budget Player Cadet_]

Maybe I'll make a thread about taxation and flat tax...

 

[#HBC | Mac]

Go for it, it's topical enough

 

[Sucumbio]

srsly tho? I've been gone for like, weeks it seems and there's been no new discussions in the DH. >< Ah well I have nothing to talk about myself I shouldn't gripe.

 

[GoldShadow]

I think activity waxes and wanes, and we're in the middle of a slump right now...

 

[rvkevin]

Ok, I have a question to settle. I am talking to someone that is saying that infinities are counter-intuitive so I want to find what other peoples opinions are on it. Some people may disagree and wish to debate it.

Specifically, do you think that all infinities are 'created' equal, or do you think that certain infinities are bigger than other infinities? Suppose that some infinite sets could be bigger than other infinite sets, would you find this counter-intuitive?

If you have trouble think about infinities, think of a set of numbers such as A=[1,2,3,4,...] or B=[2,3,4,5,...] Are these two sets the same size?

 

[Holder of the Heel]

Common sense tells me that they are the same size. I don't know much about infinities, other than its simply never-ending, and is simply an idea. So I really see little point, from this limited perspective, discussing it, and cannot see how we can really look at something so "imponderable" in an actual, practical mathematical sense.


As for topics, I've currently been burned out on what to philosophize about, though I'll be enrolling into college again and may through the coming months and years likely have more to talk about. Perhaps even law ethics, which would interest me greatly. It saddens me that we are in a debate drought, hoping that changes. Even when school picks up and I'm studying all the time, would still at the very least like to drop in here and have some healthy discussions.

 

[GwJ]

Infinities cannot be larger than other infinities. They can be escalating at different rates, however.

You could say that an infinity increasing at a rate of x^10 is larger than one increasing at only x^3, but neither is larger, because neither is a value.

 

[rvkevin]

Holder,

Thanks for answering. Would it change your mind if I told you that you could subtract B from A to reach a finite set? For subtraction, you simply remove the values that they have in common from the first set. So, in the example before, A-B=[1] and if we introduce C= [3,4,5,6,...], then A-C=[1,2].

Also, in regards to law ethics, what did you have in mind?

Jumpman,

What if the infinities cover different ranges and one infinity is a subset of the other one as it occurs in the examples I have given? Wouldn't you then say that the one that covers the entire range of the other and then some is larger?

 

[Dre89]

Rv your problem is you're not distonguishing between potential and actual infinities.

As GW pointed out, potential infinites can exist and differ in their growth rates, but actual infinites cannot exist.

If we suppose a causal chain has infinite growth potential, at any point in time the number of causes is finite. There's no point where it goes from a finite number to infinity.

 

[rvkevin]

Dre,

Are you saying that the term 'infinities' specifically refers to actual infinity and that the set A = [1,2,3,4,...] is not an infinite set because its not an actual infinity? If not, I'm not sure how your comment is at all relevant to anything said so far.

I'm not talking about what is physically possible or what we would observe if we tried to emulate them; I'm operating only on a conceptual basis at this point.

If we suppose a causal chain has infinite growth potential, at any point in time the number of causes is finite. There's no point where it goes from a finite number to infinity.

The series is infinite, as in, the series has no set stopping point, it merely goes on forever. Pointing out that you haven't reached infinite elements doesn't negate the behavior of the process. Its not like infinity is a number where the series stops. The entire point is that it doesn't.

 

[Dre89]

Well most people who say infinites are counter-intuitive are referring to actual infinites.

If your friend is saying that potential infinites are counter-intuitive then I think he's wrong.

 

[rvkevin]

Well most people who say infinites are counter-intuitive are referring to actual infinites.

If your friend is saying that potential infinites are counter-intuitive then I think he's wrong.

It was specifically about the cardinality of sets and whether it is counter-intuitive that different infinite sets can be of different sizes. It was sparked by the comment that WLC makes in defending the KCA by saying that when you subtract infinities from each or something like that, you get a contradiction. I explained subtraction and addition of infinite sets and was like "it's not that hard" and they said, although in agreement, that it was counter-intuitive.

 

[GwJ]

Jumpman,

What if the infinities cover different ranges and one infinity is a subset of the other one as it occurs in the examples I have given? Wouldn't you then say that the one that covers the entire range of the other and then some is larger?

You mean like comparing the values of x^10 with Pi in that Pi's decimals continue for an infinite amount of time? That would be different then. The first is an infinite function. The latter is an infinite amount of decimals.

Also, if you're saying something like "If you were to stop the two functions at a certain value and one of them was larger, would that make it a larger infinite function", the answer is no.