Johnny Skeptic

Consider the following regarding the recent William Lane Craig, Richard Carrier debate:

http://www.stjoenews.net/news/2009/m...se-dead/?local

Following Dr. Craig's same line of reasoning, if four ancient sources claimed that a pig spouted wings and flew over Jerusalem, the claim would be credible because four independent sources made the claim. How is a pig sprouting wings and flying any more unusual than a person rising from the dead?

show_no_mercy

Well... three men make a tiger...

GakuseiDon

Out of interest, if four independent sources did make that claim, what are the most probable reasons why four independent sources did so, IYO?

aa5874

This is like asking for the probable reasons why four or more independent sources claimed they saw Martians.

One probable answer is that they lied indepndently. I think there are probably millions of persons who could indepently make false statements.

Sheshbazzar

How many sources independently claim to have been abducted by UFO beings?

Once an urban legend takes hold, it is never difficult to find thousands who are willing to swear on a stack of Bibles, that they either saw it, or that they personally experienced it. This is what makes it so easy for wacko religious claims to fly.

ChristMyth

What I want to know is where he gets multiple sources. Is he counting each gospel as one source or the synoptics as just one source with John and Paul as separate sources?

Does anybody know?

GakuseiDon

So, what is the reason for the many independently attested claims of alien abductions? Do we know? Is there a consensus position on the best possible explanation?

Note that I'm not pushing for one solution over another, but asking something more basic: is it possible to evaluate independently attested claims for the fantastic?

GakuseiDon

From memory, he says there are five: the gospels and Paul. He gives reasons for why they should be regarded as multiple sources.

jon-eli

I know that in Bart Ehrman's reconstructions of the historical Jesus, he uses the four gospels as if they are independent sources; there's barely anything he won't claim is historical if all four of them say the same thing. He calls it the rule of "multiple attestation." I'd say that Craig is making the same argument.

aa5874

But, in that case, it would have been multiple-attested that Jesus was born of a virgin, without sexual union, transfigured, resurrected and ascended if it is claimed the four gospels are independent sources.

I find HJers to have all totally flawed and bogus arguments for historicity of Jesus.