If an islamic martyr today can be convinced that he gets x virgins in paradise (something your evident christianity would claim is untrue) in a world full of science as well as the true faith (from your point of view), why can’t some writer 1800 years ago be convinced that what he writes is the true word of god?
It’s possible that someone can be convinced that what they are writing is from God (which a few people have done). The difference that I see with other religious texts and the Bible is that the Bible does not shy away from naming real people, dates, and places. If I were to fabricate a lie I will steer away from mentioning identifiable people, places, and dates in fear of emboldening my audience to call out my BS. The more specific I am the easier it becomes to discredit my claims.
Look, ancient people were just as skeptical as people are today. They also had a BS meter like we do today. The people back then would not have easily believed that God wiped out Sodom and Gomorrah or that 2 million people walked out of Egypt. They would not have easily accepted such claims if there was not truth to it, the same way people today would not easily accept a claim that Israel’s modern enemies got wiped out by a miraculous fire from heaven unless there was some level of truth to it. Ancient man had the same advanced faculty to reason and question claims like we do today. To think otherwise is an act of historical chauvinism.
Ancient people were just as skeptical with the key difference of having virtually no information, relative to what we do today. If I hear about something happening in Africa, I can go to the internet, or go to any of a dozen news sources to try and find out how true what I heard was. If someone 2000 years ago in europe heard about something happening in africa, they would have none of these options. People made things up, misinterpreted things heard from other languages and cultures, and just plain didn’t understand all sorts of things. Consider Herodotus, to all accounts a man who intended to write true stories of different countries and events, and yet whose accounts are littered with what we now know to be untruths and misrepresentations. We know that there were apocryphal gospels that never made it into today’s bible, so at some point historically things were selected by people in power, presumably because they furthered their agenda. You’re trying to argue that it’s implausible that the bible is one giant lie, and I agree, but it’s very likely to be a hundred different lies or distortions from a hundred different eras piled on top of each other. If everyone believes some simple claim, then then next censorship or invention is not the giant lie you make it out to be.
Why do you (and the author of the grandparent) think ancient people were just as skeptical as us? I’m not even sure that different cultures today are equally skeptical.
Perhaps if you do the radiator experiment where you have turned the metal plate round, you will find that in different cultures (or even situations) people will be more or less likely to be skeptical of the situation in front of them.
I’m agnostic as to whether or not they were, but I was granting the claim for the purposes of the debate. Whether or not your base level of “skepticism” is the same, the amount of knowledge you have influences what you are skeptical of. Ie, a child may be innately as skeptical as an adult, but has less information.
If an islamic martyr today can be convinced that he gets x virgins in paradise (something your evident christianity would claim is untrue) in a world full of science as well as the true faith (from your point of view), why can’t some writer 1800 years ago be convinced that what he writes is the true word of god?
It’s possible that someone can be convinced that what they are writing is from God (which a few people have done). The difference that I see with other religious texts and the Bible is that the Bible does not shy away from naming real people, dates, and places. If I were to fabricate a lie I will steer away from mentioning identifiable people, places, and dates in fear of emboldening my audience to call out my BS. The more specific I am the easier it becomes to discredit my claims.
Look, ancient people were just as skeptical as people are today. They also had a BS meter like we do today. The people back then would not have easily believed that God wiped out Sodom and Gomorrah or that 2 million people walked out of Egypt. They would not have easily accepted such claims if there was not truth to it, the same way people today would not easily accept a claim that Israel’s modern enemies got wiped out by a miraculous fire from heaven unless there was some level of truth to it. Ancient man had the same advanced faculty to reason and question claims like we do today. To think otherwise is an act of historical chauvinism.
Sure. And people had crazy apocalyptic cults and mass hysteria just like we do today.
What’s your point?
Ancient people were just as skeptical with the key difference of having virtually no information, relative to what we do today. If I hear about something happening in Africa, I can go to the internet, or go to any of a dozen news sources to try and find out how true what I heard was. If someone 2000 years ago in europe heard about something happening in africa, they would have none of these options. People made things up, misinterpreted things heard from other languages and cultures, and just plain didn’t understand all sorts of things. Consider Herodotus, to all accounts a man who intended to write true stories of different countries and events, and yet whose accounts are littered with what we now know to be untruths and misrepresentations. We know that there were apocryphal gospels that never made it into today’s bible, so at some point historically things were selected by people in power, presumably because they furthered their agenda. You’re trying to argue that it’s implausible that the bible is one giant lie, and I agree, but it’s very likely to be a hundred different lies or distortions from a hundred different eras piled on top of each other. If everyone believes some simple claim, then then next censorship or invention is not the giant lie you make it out to be.
Why do you (and the author of the grandparent) think ancient people were just as skeptical as us? I’m not even sure that different cultures today are equally skeptical.
Perhaps if you do the radiator experiment where you have turned the metal plate round, you will find that in different cultures (or even situations) people will be more or less likely to be skeptical of the situation in front of them.
I’m agnostic as to whether or not they were, but I was granting the claim for the purposes of the debate. Whether or not your base level of “skepticism” is the same, the amount of knowledge you have influences what you are skeptical of. Ie, a child may be innately as skeptical as an adult, but has less information.
I agree. Perhaps I should have put this as a reply to the grandparent instead?