Nailed: Ten Christian Myths that show Jesus never existed

[The Norseman]

I can be fully aware of how the historical method works without being a professional historian.

I'm fully aware of Carrier's interests, and if he can persuade the field to change the method, then the field will change the method.
Until then, his standing is an opinion strongly made from mostly reasonable arguments, but stands against a rather large issue of being somewhat impractical.

You may not agree with that, but as I have pointed out, should we flip to the method which Carrier outlines, we would have far less history to learn and massive amounts of missing accounts.

The way the method currently works is that we read something, let's say by Josephus, where a given event is accounted for.
We see no where else such an event is accounted for.
So what do we do?
Well, historians currently slot the event into the historical record as historically evident weakly, and if the account appears to be exaggerated (let's say a King claims to have wiped out an entire army without a single soldier lost and claims to have taken five hundred thousand soldiers with him to the battle), the event is noted as seeming exaggerated and the minimalist account is held tentatively as existent for the time being; given the example, such an event would be listed as that this King of a given empire or country had a possible skirmish or battle with another King of a given empire or country, and perhaps won (if Egyptian, then the winning is worth noting with doubt, as they have a record of lying about their wins and losses; if it is the Romans, then it is granted likely that they did win since they tended to not lie in their records about wins or losses, but would simply omit events entirely in which they lost unless that event gave context to some political uprising later).
The references to the location and political consequences would be logged and when maps are drawn to describe the boundaries of the relative empires and territories, the boundary for the empire or country who won would be drawn out to the region referenced in the battle.

These references would remain as existent in the historical record, noted as tentative, until further evidence (material) came along to nudge the position either for or against what was outlined from the first entry known to us in modern times.


If we were to flip this around, to the Carrier style method (of which you favor), then the entire account would not be accounted for nor notated as written down, nor covered in collegiate courses on that particular section of history.

As a result, huge massive amount of human history would become absent by flipping the method to inherently holding the negative until proving the positive (like empirical sciences do).

While I honestly do enjoy your posts, it looks as if you do not understand Carrier and what his stance is on the materials we have for and against "an historical Jesus."

I'm currently into the third chapter of Proving History, and I'm still finding it difficult to wrap my brain around Baye's Theorem which is the defining method with which he assigns very little probability of an historic Jesus. He does not begin with the null hypothesis which I have done In earlier posts.

I'm not stopping my attempt to finish the book because I don't understand it; I'm hoping it'll become clearer as I go.

 

[The Norseman]

Thanks for your take on those methodologies, David Mo.
They seem like overt special pleading to me, but I'm an amateur, not professional historian.

I'm also frustrated by the academic pay-walls which severely limit my access to the directions of the academic mainstream.
Bloggers are entertaining and often very well-informed, yes, but it's not the same.
On the other hand, Brainache has posted up some excellent lectures from Yale that are worth viewing or reading the transcripts. If you haven't followed the links, they're well worth the time.

This one thread is getting close to two thousand posts. Would you be so kind as to help me find these lectures of which you speak? Many thanks, pakeha!

 

[Craig B]

He has also apparently decided that the letters of James and Jude are "Forgeries" too.

They are in this sense, that they weren't written by the people whose names they bear. But that doesn't mean they were falsified in the late second or early fourth century by a gang of forgers as part of a phoney package we now call NT.

 

[Stone]

Okay, excellent. I'll do my part and check my online resources for papers (both peer-reviewed and not) and post it here. I think we can both continue to ask others for these kind of responses in lieu of nothing but bible quotes.

Personally, I'm _only_ interested in peer-reviewed articles. Expanding beyond that is like culling the atoms on Planet Earth. The web is swimming in them, and it's the easiest thing to do to throw around any number of "thoughtful" pieces at ignorant readers, calculated solely to keep up a drumbeat for "You see, you see" for one extremist point of view. On RatSkep, Proudfootz does that all the time, and it's infuriating, possibly deliberately so. Oh, you're perfectly free to filibuster us with the a-historicist point of view, of course. No one can stop you, nor should they. But it's a sneaky game all the same. If you're just proposing this as a sneaky way to spread around the (numerous) wacko pieces against historicity, count me out. Once burned, twice shy. But if you find pieces like that which are actually peer-reviewed(!), I'd be very surprised but definitely interested.

Peer-reviewed pieces only, please.

Thank you,

Stone

 

[pakeha]

This one thread is getting close to two thousand posts. Would you be so kind as to help me find these lectures of which you speak? Many thanks, pakeha!

No worries, The Norseman.
It's about learning, after all!

You can watch a few videos while you wait if you like:
http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=historical+Jesus&sm=12

The first one is pretty good and covers much of the basics:

The Historical Jesus

This one is also interesting:

John P. Meier: Jesus the Jew - But What Sort of Jew?

 

[The Norseman]

Personally, I'm _only_ interested in peer-reviewed articles. Expanding beyond that is like culling the atoms on Planet Earth. The web is swimming in them, and it's the easiest thing to do to throw around any number of "thoughtful" pieces at ignorant readers, calculated solely to keep up a drumbeat for "You see, you see" for one extremist point of view. On RatSkep, Proudfootz does that all the time, and it's infuriating, possibly deliberately so. Oh, you're perfectly free to filibuster us with the a-historicist point of view, of course. No one can stop you, nor should they. But it's a sneaky game all the same. If you're just proposing this as a sneaky way to spread around the (numerous) wacko pieces against historicity, count me out. Once burned, twice shy. But if you find pieces like that which are actually peer-reviewed(!), I'd be very surprised but definitely interested.

Peer-reviewed pieces only, please.

Thank you,

Stone

I understand your concern. I do definitely share the same thoughts.

 

[The Norseman]

No worries, The Norseman.
It's about learning, after all!

Many thanks!

 

[Belz...]

Who said that the biblical writing was “a uniform mass of conscious lies and fabrications composed for the purpose of deception”? I did not say that. Those words come for you!

No, it pretty much comes from your buddy Dejudge.

 

[Belz...]

They are in this sense, that they weren't written by the people whose names they bear. But that doesn't mean they were falsified in the late second or early fourth century by a gang of forgers as part of a phoney package we now call NT.

If it was, these guys did a piss-poor job of it.

 

[IanS]

As noted above I don't think much of the consensus argument with regard to an HJ, but I think it is fair to say that there is an almost unanimous consensus that an HJ is plausible. Even people that view an HJ as unlikely (for instance Richard Carrier) don't argue that an HJ is implausible, in fact Carrier even speculates about the probability that an HJ existed.

The implausibility argument that has dominated a great many of the posts in this thread is not supported by any published books or papers that I am aware of. I am somewhat familiar with the Jesusneverexisted site and I have never noticed an argument there that it is impossible that an HJ existed. The bulk of the arguments on that site deal with the unreliability of the evidence for an HJ.

There has been no evidence put forth to support the implausibility argument in this thread. The fact that documentation about an individual contains implausible details, unsubstantiated details, incorrect details and contradictory details doesn't rule out the possibility that the individual existed. This is so obvious that it shouldn't have needed to be said at all, but it has been posted tens of times at least in this thread and it will doubtless be ignored again by the individual arguing that an HJ is implausible.

As a practical matter, the existence of the HJ is not a falsifiable proposition based on evidence available today. In order to determine that an HJ didn't exist one would need to understand the origin of Christianity well enough that one could rule out the possibility that the creators of Christianity did not include true facts about the life of a first century Palestinian individual that they venerated in their religious writings. The information about the origin of Christianity is so sketchy that it appears to be close to impossible that the real nature of the origin of Christianity will ever be known. It is not known today who created Christianity, when Christianity originated, even where Christianity originated is not solidly known. How out of this morass of non-knowledge one can make absolute determinations is a mystery to me.

I don't think we can ever falsify the existence of a non-existent thing, can we? Eg, I think that was the point of Russell's "Teapot" analogy, wasn’t it? Ie, you cannot literally show something to be false, or prove it's non-existence, if it does not exist at all.

But what you can do, and what certainly has been done in abundance in these threads about a HJ, is to show that there is no genuine credible evidence in the biblical writing for the human existence of Jesus.

That's true because, as I have explained ad nauseum, the biblical writing is completely discredited as reliable evidence for numerous reasons, not least of which is that not one of the biblical writers ever met or knew Jesus at all, and none of them could produce a single person who did confirm knowing Jesus. Plus of course, all of them continuously claimed Jesus in terms of physically impossible acts. Writing like that is simply not credible as reliable evidence.

On top of which we do of course know perfectly well why almost every religious movement ever known, has always made entirely false claims of witnessing all manner of miraculous figures. In all cases these beliefs, particular from very ancient times such as the biblical period, arise from even more ancient traditional religious superstitions which were believed at the time largely because of educational ignorance in a pre-scientific age where none of those people had any better explanation of the world except to think that Gods were real and were certainly responsible for everything.

But that's most definitely ancient religious superstition. It is not remotely "evidence" that the superstitious beliefs in a divine messiah of God were ever true.

Does that mean Jesus could never have existed? No. But it’s a very good objective and rational set of reasons to cast great doubt on it.

 

[Brainache]

I don't think we can ever falsify the existence of a non-existent thing, can we? Eg, I think that was the point of Russell's "Teapot" analogy, wasn’t it? Ie, you cannot literally show something to be false, or prove it's non-existence, if it does not exist at all.

But what you can do, and what certainly has been done in abundance in these threads about a HJ, is to show that there is no genuine credible evidence in the biblical writing for the human existence of Jesus.

That's true because, as I have explained ad nauseum, the biblical writing is completely discredited as reliable evidence for numerous reasons, not least of which is that not one of the biblical writers ever met or knew Jesus at all, and none of them could produce a single person who did confirm knowing Jesus. Plus of course, all of them continuously claimed Jesus in terms of physically impossible acts. Writing like that is simply not credible as reliable evidence.

On top of which we do of course know perfectly well why almost every religious movement ever known, has always made entirely false claims of witnessing all manner of miraculous figures. In all cases these beliefs, particular from very ancient times such as the biblical period, arise from even more ancient traditional religious superstitions which were believed at the time largely because of educational ignorance in a pre-scientific age where none of those people had any better explanation of the world except to think that Gods were real and were certainly responsible for everything.

But that's most definitely ancient religious superstition. It is not remotely "evidence" that the superstitious beliefs of divine messiah of God were ever true.

That is not a “proof” that Jesus was mythical. But the point was that we cannot have any such “proof” of a non-existent figure anyway. But what it certainly is, is good reason to doubt the claimed existence, where no genuine credible evidence can ever be produced, and where on the contrary the relatively recent realisation from science is that overwhelming evidence shows that the biblical claims of Jesus were physically impossible, and where we know very well that abundant verifiable evidence clearly shows how & why such ancient religions have always created fictional figures of miraculous repute.

Does that mean Jesus could never have existed? No. But it’s a very good objective and rational set of reasons to cast great doubt on it.

Do you actually find these silly arguments convincing?

 

[Craig B]

Who said that the biblical writing was “a uniform mass of conscious lies and fabrications composed for the purpose of deception”? I did not say that. Those words come for you!

What I have said all through all of these threads is that the bible cannot be a credible source of evidence for Jesus ...

No and I didn't attribute them to you. But the argument in your post was tending in that direction. And other mythicists in these threads do seem to be of that opinion. An analysis of the gospels can indeed yield credible, though not conclusive, evidence for Jesus. This has been discussed, including the criteria by which it is discerned.

 

[davefoc]

No and I didn't attribute them to you. But the argument in your post was tending in that direction. And other mythicists in these threads do seem to be of that opinion. An analysis of the gospels can indeed yield credible, though not conclusive, evidence for Jesus. This has been discussed, including the criteria by which it is discerned.

I wish it had been the focus of this thread. I have noticed the background discussion of elements of the Gospels that suggest that they might contain real historical details, but I, perhaps due to my preconceived notions, haven't really understood where this was going. For me, the Gospels read like fiction and that coupled with the other issues associated with Gospel reliability makes me think there just isn't anything there that substantively moves the case for an HJ forward.

There are intriguing connections between the Gospels and first century Palestine and it seems like they may have really been influenced by a first century Palestinian sect who had a prominent member named the Aramaic equivalent of Jesus. But it also looks to me like they are so separated from first century Palestine that it is hard to see what could be used to separate history from fiction in them except external corroboration for which there is none that isn't disputed and reasonably so in my view.

ETA: I think the explanation for the intriguing connections between the Gospels and first century Palestine is that the people that wrote the Gospels were already actively involved in a Jewish like religion. They don't seem to have been Jews by culture or language, but they had a very deep knowledge of the Septuagint. This group may have been influenced by Hellenized Jewish groups they interacted with or perhaps some of them were Hellenized Jews. I think probably not because of the anti-Semitic elements of the NT and the fact that Christianity diverged so quickly from Judaism that there is no clear cut evidence available for an intermediate group. Assuming this is roughly correct, it suggests to me that it is very plausible that the HJ was either created out of whole cloth or from elements of a real person or persons that are so remote from the HJ of the NT that it would be hard to say that an HJ existed.

ETA2: One significant question is whether there was an HJ that counts, meaning was there an HJ whose ideas and actions influenced Christianity. I think it is very unlikely that there was an HJ that counts. The most plausible connection to a real HJ in the NT is the writings of Paul and not much of the ideas of Paul's HJ made it into his writings. If we don't know what the ideas of the HJ were from Paul it seems much less likely that we could figure out what they were from the rest of the NT.

 

[Belz...]

But what you can do, and what certainly has been done in abundance in these threads about a HJ, is to show that there is no genuine credible evidence in the biblical writing for the human existence of Jesus.

Genuine credible awesome evidence, you mean.

 

[JaysonR]

While I honestly do enjoy your posts, it looks as if you do not understand Carrier and what his stance is on the materials we have for and against "an historical Jesus."

I'm currently into the third chapter of Proving History, and I'm still finding it difficult to wrap my brain around Baye's Theorem which is the defining method with which he assigns very little probability of an historic Jesus. He does not begin with the null hypothesis which I have done In earlier posts.

I'm not stopping my attempt to finish the book because I don't understand it; I'm hoping it'll become clearer as I go.

Applying Bayes' Theorem is starting from a negative.
Starting from a negative isn't using a null hypothesis; using a null hypothesis is to run a test forced to be false as a result for comparison of the actual test against for verification that the result of the actual test is significant to the positive in deviation worth noting - beats the null hypothesis.

Starting from a negative is to take the position that something isn't until it is proven true.
Applying the probability of Bayes is doing just this, and it is really a bad idea to apply to History.

It sounds great, I know, but it really is worse than helpful if adopted as a standard.
Most folks don't know how History is conducted, nor what the historical method is or how it works; let alone why.

History is not a hard science (except for Archaeology, which would be an appropriate field to apply Bayes Theorem).
Applying Bayes Theorem, firstly, would make History worse because it would give false confidence and convert History into a pseudoscience as History is not a science and should never attempt to be such.

Secondly, application of Bayes is impractical for History because, for example, if I found a piece of inscription in Egypt from ancient times, Bayes' Theorem would quite loudly produce a probability that what I am holding is filled with lies.
Does that mean that what I am holding is an account that never took place?
No.

It would only mean the probability is that it contains a lie since so many inscriptions in Egypt are filled with outright lies.

I didn't need Bayes' Theorem to figure that out, though, and it doesn't help me accomplish figuring out if what I'm holding is a true account or not.
Why not?

Because to functionally use Bayes' Theorem, I need to have all of the information regarding the proposition available to run the probability.
If I leave out a piece of information, or enter the information in with the wrong premise, then the probability comes out entirely wrong.

And here is the point of my concern here: most of History is entirely vacant to us.

Take Jesus, for example.
Many times people say, "What's the likelihood that someone would make an embarrassing story like this of a fictional character they wanted to use as their champion hero?"

One of the problems with this proposition is assuming that the story is embarrassing, or that seemingly mundane content within are not symbolic.
This is an issue of not knowing the cultural tendencies and values, anthropology.

What appears to be one thing in History can be entirely another.

Furthermore, running Bayes Theorem on Jesus assumes we have all of the information there is to have on Jesus.

However, if I ran that Theorem in 1930, then again in 1960, then again in 1990, and then again in 2020, I will result with an entirely different result for each run as we have repeatedly found more material related to the Jesus cults over time and we full well know that we have not made our way through half of the texts from the early centuries from early and diverse Christian movements.

History is never "done", so applying a probability statistic with hopelessly incomplete information is erroneous before we even begin.

All it would do is fill up conventions with Historians arguing over who did their math better than the other, or who ran their probability with the wrong information or premises, or left out a given piece of information.

Furthermore, as I've mentioned before, running History this way would (to the student's delight) make History a far thinner account as the largest chunks of History would be ripped out and tossed into the gutter as "discounted" and non-applicable to entry into the human timeline.

Based on what?
Based on probability; probability ran without all of the information.

Ancient History doesn't work on probability in the sense of actuality.
It runs on relative association of behavioral tendency (humanities), and usually only finds proof from Archaeology.

For example, Troy was attested, and behavioral tendency first favored earnestness, then favored fiction or error, and it was only Archaeology that rested the case as proven.

Applying Bayes' Theorem would not have altered those events gainfully.
Without supporting Archaeology, Troy would have been claimed probable or improbable based on the theorem, and that decision would have been made in error (regardless of which probability it produces) as it would have done so without all of the information, since more information about Troy was still sitting in the ground unknown to all.

For this reason, History inherits a positive (mostly) and requests a negative be proven.
Tossing a probability at Jesus is not proof of a negative; it's a probability.
That probability doesn't help conclude anything, however, because we don't have all of the information available yet - we may never have all of the information.

Some times, the straight answer, in regards to proof, is...we don't know.
As much as people hate that answer, that is the most honest answer, regarding proof, for most of ancient History.

I don't think there's anything wrong with the historical method as it is, aside from that most people don't understand what the historical method is and think that any documentary with historians on it means the contents discussed are proven true.

The one good thing that I see in Carrier, is that at least the general public is learning what the historical method is.
The problem I see, however, is that many are learning what it is from the position of expecting History to be air tight like science, or logically applicable to systems such as court law.

None of this would be a huge shock if general History classes in basic schooling were more thorough in discussing what History is and how it is formed.

Heck, folks could learn a basic understanding of this in an hour or two watching Crash Course World History by John Green on youtube.

When looking at History, everyone needs to remember that we cannot ever fully know the reality of ancient times; we can only simulate it to our best ability imagining (as in, to conceive of) how people behaved and by dating clay pots.

Don't have a clay pot for us to date you with?
Then we can only inherit your story and imagine the behavior within it and parse out what is akin to social behaviors of your people and what does not fit to what we know of your people...what we know.

That's History; that's it.

 

[dejudge]

Applying Bayes' Theorem is starting from a negative.
Starting from a negative isn't using a null hypothesis; using a null hypothesis is to run a test forced to be false as a result for comparison of the actual test against for verification that the result of the actual test is significant to the positive in deviation worth noting - beats the null hypothesis.

Starting from a negative is to take the position that something isn't until it is proven true.
Applying the probability of Bayes is doing just this, and it is really a bad idea to apply to History.

Are you a mathematician? Are you an historian? Have you any idea how to apply Bayes Theorem?

Bayes Theorem does not ever, ever, ever start from a negative. It starts WITH DATA.

You claim you don't care whether or not Jesus existed but seem to always argue against those who consider that Jesus was a figure of mythology.

You really seem to care about the existence of Jesus or else you would not be posting here.

History is not a hard science (except for Archaeology, which would be an appropriate field to apply Bayes Theorem).
Applying Bayes Theorem, firstly, would make History worse because it would give false confidence and convert History into a pseudoscience as History is not a science and should never attempt to be such.

Your claim shows that you do not understand Bayes Theorem and how it is applied.

Secondly, application of Bayes is impractical for History because, for example, if I found a piece of inscription in Egypt from ancient times, Bayes' Theorem would quite loudly produce a probability that what I am holding is filled with lies.

WHAT A LOAD OF NONSENSE. Why are you doing this? Please, stop your propaganda.

Bayes Theorem requires DATA like any other Probability theorem.

It is just amazing how you can invent the outcome of Bayes Theorem without applying any data.

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/bayes-theorem/

1. Conditional Probabilities and Bayes' Theorem

The probability of a hypothesis H conditional on a given body of data E is the ratio of the unconditional probability of the conjunction of the hypothesis with the data to the unconditional probability of the data alone.


(1.1) Definition.
The probability of H conditional on E is defined as PE(H) = P(H & E)/P(E), provided that both terms of this ratio exist and P(E) > 0.[1]

 

[Brainache]

Applying Bayes' Theorem is starting from a negative.
Starting from a negative isn't using a null hypothesis; using a null hypothesis is to run a test forced to be false as a result for comparison of the actual test against for verification that the result of the actual test is significant to the positive in deviation worth noting - beats the null hypothesis.

Starting from a negative is to take the position that something isn't until it is proven true.
Applying the probability of Bayes is doing just this, and it is really a bad idea to apply to History.

It sounds great, I know, but it really is worse than helpful if adopted as a standard.
Most folks don't know how History is conducted, nor what the historical method is or how it works; let alone why.

History is not a hard science (except for Archaeology, which would be an appropriate field to apply Bayes Theorem).
Applying Bayes Theorem, firstly, would make History worse because it would give false confidence and convert History into a pseudoscience as History is not a science and should never attempt to be such.

Secondly, application of Bayes is impractical for History because, for example, if I found a piece of inscription in Egypt from ancient times, Bayes' Theorem would quite loudly produce a probability that what I am holding is filled with lies.
Does that mean that what I am holding is an account that never took place?
No.

It would only mean the probability is that it contains a lie since so many inscriptions in Egypt are filled with outright lies.

I didn't need Bayes' Theorem to figure that out, though, and it doesn't help me accomplish figuring out if what I'm holding is a true account or not.
Why not?

Because to functionally use Bayes' Theorem, I need to have all of the information regarding the proposition available to run the probability.
If I leave out a piece of information, or enter the information in with the wrong premise, then the probability comes out entirely wrong.

And here is the point of my concern here: most of History is entirely vacant to us.

Take Jesus, for example.
Many times people say, "What's the likelihood that someone would make an embarrassing story like this of a fictional character they wanted to use as their champion hero?"

One of the problems with this proposition is assuming that the story is embarrassing, or that seemingly mundane content within are not symbolic.
This is an issue of not knowing the cultural tendencies and values, anthropology.

What appears to be one thing in History can be entirely another.

Furthermore, running Bayes Theorem on Jesus assumes we have all of the information there is to have on Jesus.

However, if I ran that Theorem in 1930, then again in 1960, then again in 1990, and then again in 2020, I will result with an entirely different result for each run as we have repeatedly found more material related to the Jesus cults over time and we full well know that we have not made our way through half of the texts from the early centuries from early and diverse Christian movements.

History is never "done", so applying a probability statistic with hopelessly incomplete information is erroneous before we even begin.

All it would do is fill up conventions with Historians arguing over who did their math better than the other, or who ran their probability with the wrong information or premises, or left out a given piece of information.

Furthermore, as I've mentioned before, running History this way would (to the student's delight) make History a far thinner account as the largest chunks of History would be ripped out and tossed into the gutter as "discounted" and non-applicable to entry into the human timeline.

Based on what?
Based on probability; probability ran without all of the information.

Ancient History doesn't work on probability in the sense of actuality.
It runs on relative association of behavioral tendency (humanities), and usually only finds proof from Archaeology.

For example, Troy was attested, and behavioral tendency first favored earnestness, then favored fiction or error, and it was only Archaeology that rested the case as proven.

Applying Bayes' Theorem would not have altered those events gainfully.
Without supporting Archaeology, Troy would have been claimed probable or improbable based on the theorem, and that decision would have been made in error (regardless of which probability it produces) as it would have done so without all of the information, since more information about Troy was still sitting in the ground unknown to all.

For this reason, History inherits a positive (mostly) and requests a negative be proven.
Tossing a probability at Jesus is not proof of a negative; it's a probability.
That probability doesn't help conclude anything, however, because we don't have all of the information available yet - we may never have all of the information.

Some times, the straight answer, in regards to proof, is...we don't know.
As much as people hate that answer, that is the most honest answer, regarding proof, for most of ancient History.

I don't think there's anything wrong with the historical method as it is, aside from that most people don't understand what the historical method is and think that any documentary with historians on it means the contents discussed are proven true.

The one good thing that I see in Carrier, is that at least the general public is learning what the historical method is.
The problem I see, however, is that many are learning what it is from the position of expecting History to be air tight like science, or logically applicable to systems such as court law.

None of this would be a huge shock if general History classes in basic schooling were more thorough in discussing what History is and how it is formed.

Heck, folks could learn a basic understanding of this in an hour or two watching Crash Course World History by John Green on youtube.

When looking at History, everyone needs to remember that we cannot ever fully know the reality of ancient times; we can only simulate it to our best ability imagining (as in, to conceive of) how people behaved and by dating clay pots.

Don't have a clay pot for us to date you with?
Then we can only inherit your story and imagine the behavior within it and parse out what is akin to social behaviors of your people and what does not fit to what we know of your people...what we know.

That's History; that's it.

So, basically you are saying that Richard Carrier thinks he knows it all. No surprises there...

 

[Brainache]

Are you a mathematician? Are you an historian? Have you any idea how to apply Bayes Theorem?

Bayes Theorem does not ever, ever, ever start from a negative. It starts WITH DATA.

You claim you don't care whether or not Jesus existed but seem to always argue against those who consider that Jesus was a figure of mythology.

You really seem to care about the existence of Jesus or else you would not be posting here.





Your claim shows that you do not understand Bayes Theorem and how it is applied.



WHAT A LOAD OF NONSENSE. Why are you doing this? Please, stop your propaganda.

Bayes Theorem requires DATA like any other Probability theorem.

It is just amazing how you can invent the outcome of Bayes Theorem without applying any data.

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/bayes-theorem/

This is a stupid argument.

You are very good at making these types of arguments.

 

[dejudge]

This is a stupid argument.

You are very good at making these types of arguments.

Oh, Oh!!! Here you go again. Now you are claiming that Bayes Theorem is a stupid argument.

Don't you even realize that Bayes Theorem was not developed by me or Richard Carrier?

Your posts are coming across as completely anti-intellectual. You seem to have no regard for any theory or evidence which can show that Jesus was a figure of mythology.

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/bayes-theorem/

Bayes' Theorem is a simple mathematical formula used for calculating conditional probabilities.

It figures prominently in subjectivist or Bayesian approaches to epistemology, statistics, and inductive logic.

Subjectivists, who maintain that rational belief is governed by the laws of probability, lean heavily on conditional probabilities in their theories of evidence and their models of empirical learning.

Bayes' Theorem is central to these enterprises both because it simplifies the calculation of conditional probabilities and because it clarifies significant features of subjectivist position......

 

[Brainache]

Oh, Oh!!! Here you go again. Now you are claiming that Bayes Theorem is a stupid argument.

Don't you even realize that Bayes Theorem was not developed by me or Richard Carrier?

Your posts are coming across as completely anti-intellectual. You seem to have no regard for any theory or evidence which can show that Jesus was a figure of mythology.

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/bayes-theorem/

I know what Bayes Theorem is. I never said you or Richard Carrier invented it. Where did you get that idiotic idea?

It is not useful in the study of History. Unless you already know all of the facts of a given event, in which case it is even more useless because: why would you need it, if you already have all the facts?