bacht

I thought ad hominem tactics were always considered irrelevant and immaterial in any debate? If this is Holding's method why would anyone take him seriously?

skepticdude

Humans are naturally drawn to those who express overt confidence, and many continue to be drawn to confidence even if the confident person is proven to be an obvious fake. Many are emotional, and thus don't care if the confidence comes with bad or misused scholarship.

Men that beat women and boss them around, are obvious fakes and not acting the way a real man should. But what kind of guy do you see the hot girls with all the time? If he's not rich or naturally good looking, it's most often the guy that is cocky and confident when in fact his accomplishments are ho-hum. The fact that the confidence is too high for the list of deeds accomplished, doesn't stop the girls from being attracted to it.

We all love to watch tv and listen to the radio, yet every last look and word on those mediums is hyped to express overt confidence, in the hopes of making people willing to buy the product. Big companies wouldn't be spending big money on such advertising if it didn't work. It's nothing but baseless hype, but it sure works to sell shit, eh?

I equate Holding's followers with Benny Hinn's and Jan Crouch's followers: they get far too much glee watching their clown perform, to care whether anything they say or do is the truth.

The only difference is: clowns don't wear as much makeup as Jan Crouch.

Clutch

I know plenty of scholars who are not quick on their feet. Unless you have some reason to believe that scholarly = can answer instantly, this is all unwarranted.

Please do get at least half a clue before telling folks here to shut up; it makes you look like Holding.

Notice that what you quoted from me -- scepticism about the equivalence of scholarliness and being quick on one's feet -- is not "exactly your point". It is precisely opposed to your point. If you can't keep track of your own point, then I fear that even a twit like Holding would tie you in knots in a real-time debate.

And what on earth makes you think that such a debate is remotely worth having? It would prove little about either the credibility of the positions at stake nor the intellects of the people involved.

School classroom tests are not debates, and are not typically thought to be ideal tools for revealing scholarship.

The Bible is a big book. There are many scholarly issues associated with it. Why doubt that anyone could prepare questions that would wrong-foot or stump a genuine expert? No scholars of my acquaintance, and I work with hundreds, are ashamed to say "I don't know" on issues that fall within their expertise; all of them "look it up in a book" on a regular basis. Far from disqualifying them, that's what makes them scholarly. Again, Holding's being a jackass and an ideologue is one thing; but you wouldn't show it by making him say "I don't know" (which no moderately capable rhetorician would be forced to say in any case).

It's hard to imagine why you think this does not apply in general. Can you think of any reason to think that anyone currently impressed with Holding's written bullshit would think critically about his spoken rhetoric?

Aside from being false -- not just any idiot can do this -- this claim is hard to distinguish from the claim that one can get it right by doing research in advance.

Most institutions as a whole do, contingently, though many, many very difficult courses within them do not require any such thing. But the point of such requirements is not plausibly to test scholarship -- which is more obviously established by independent research projects like theses and dissertations.

This is true to some extent, but extremely naive in other respects (about, for example, expertise that consists in knowing how to answer questions, rather than simply having the answers in your head). If you're serious about discussing the varieties and subtleties of scholarship and expertise, we could discuss that. But I'd like to see more evidence of such seriousness before putting any more effort into it.

Clutch

More to the point, why embrace such tactics by making the point of the debate an explicit ad hominem?

Minimalist

Just be happy that his kind don't have the right to burn you at the stake anymore. When they lost that power they lost a lot!

GakuseiDon

I would agree, and I've pointed this out here and on TheologyWeb. Though I'm not sure you are doing skepticism much good, along those same lines. Look, I have no problem if you want to discuss how insulting posts are counter-productive, or riposte is non-biblical, or that oral debates are somehow better than written debates to evaluate scholarly knowledge. All are reasonable topics (though I'd disagree on the last). But my advice is that if someone posts in a way you don't like, far better to just ignore them.

neilgodfrey

I wouldn't try to reason with him. He clearly regards his maverick position as a sign of his superior understanding of what is and what is not allowed or endorsed by the Bible or as a sign of his closer affinity with the mind of God. When others agree with him he can claim support; when they disagree they are fools or blind. There are lots of people like that. I'm more worried about the numbers who appear to support him.

Neil

Petergdi

It's more complicated than that. There were certainly pre-modern theologians who made statements about the bible which appear to be claims of inerrancy.

For instance, see the entry on John Wyclif in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy:
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/wyclif/#5.1

Also, while most of the modern doctrine of biblical inerrency does seem to come from A.A. Hodge and B.B. Warfield of Princeton Theological Seminary, their position did not in any way deny the human origin of the bible. Holding is somewhat fond of quoting the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy which is pretty much in line with, and leans heavily on, the position of Hodge and Warfield.

I personally find the idea a strange one and note that some of the early Fundamentalists (James Orr for example) came out strongly against the doctrine of biblical inerrancy.


I doubt he would. He'd be more likely to point out that Rohrbaugh doesn't appear to understand what the doctrine is. He would actually have a point.

I don't like Holding's abrasive style one bit, but attacking him this way does not make him look worse, if anything it makes his behaviour more understandable. (Still wrongheaded but I understand the normal human tendency to attack when attacked.)

Not that hard to understand really. He thinks it is true, but not vital. There are things I am willing to agrue for because I think they are true, but if it should turn out that I was later persuaded that they were wrong wouldn't really affect my main beliefs very much.

Peter.

Roger Pearse

Is Rohrbaugh aware that you have published his statements?

There are atheists who are quite willing to have a "private" email exchange with someone, with a view to extracting some unguarded comment or piece of private information. Having done so, they then gloatingly publish it all around the web, and other atheists endorse it, without any regard for the fact that it was obtained by means of deception and breach of confidence. I know that JPH has had this done to him.

I suggest that if someone can refute what JPH has to say they do so. Sitting around trying to attack him personally may be effective, or more likely counterproductive.

All the best,

Roger Pearse

squiz

They are by no means alone in this.