FRDB Archives

Freethought & Rationalism Archive

The archives are read only.


Go Back   FRDB Archives > Archives > Religion (Closed) > Biblical Criticism & History
Welcome, Peter Kirby.
You last visited: Yesterday at 03:12 PM

 
 
Thread Tools Search this Thread
Old 08-03-2007, 09:53 PM   #1
Banned
 
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Bloomington, MN
Posts: 2,209
Default afdave and Prophecy

Quote:
Originally Posted by afdave
Can you please point me to some fulfilled prophecies in the Koran? I can point you to many in the Bible, but I plan to do this in a different thread and take them one at a time.
To save Dave a bit of typing, I thought I'd start that thread for him and head him off at the pass, so to speak.

In my formal debate on the existence of God last fall, I listed seven criteria that a given prophecy must fulfill in order to reasonably call it a genuine instance of fulfilled prophecy:
  1. Is the claimant of genuine fulfilled prophecy (in this case, afdave) properly interpreting the text upon which he is basing his claim?
  2. Do we know that the prophecy was made before the event that allegedly fulfilled it?
  3. Do we know that the prophecy was made far enough in advance of the alleged fulfillment event so as to make educated guesswork impossible?
  4. Did the alleged fulfillment event, in fact, occur?
  5. Is the prophecy specific enough that it could not be fulfilled by a wide variety of events?
  6. Did most or all of the predictions made by this particular prophet come true, rather than just a few of them? (If you make hundreds or thousands of prophecies, it is likely that a few of them will be right; divine powers of prophecy are unnecessary to explain this.)
  7. Can we reasonably rule out that the fulfillment event was staged, or the relevant circumstances manipulated, so as to deliberately fulfill the prophecy?

Whetstone, my opponent in that debate, agreed that these are reasonable tests to give a candidate for fulfilled prophecy.

So the good news for Dave is, he doesn't need to list and discuss many different prophecies -- he only needs to give us one prophecy to convince us that maybe, just maybe, there's something to this Bible thing after all! The catch is, of course, the burden is his to demonstrate that the prophecy he provides passes all seven of the above tests in order to reasonably regard it as a genuine fulfilled prophecy, else we can (and must) assume there's a more likely, naturalistic explanation.

Just one prophecy. That's all Dave needs.

Dave, the floor is yours . . .
Silent Dave is offline  
Old 08-03-2007, 09:59 PM   #2
mung bean
Guest
 
Posts: n/a
Default

While I agree your points are good and you probably have him by the goolies
(and I'd much rather your hands were holding them than mine) do you realise
that you have just given him the perfect excuse to dodge questions in other threads?
 
Old 08-03-2007, 10:04 PM   #3
Banned
 
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Bloomington, MN
Posts: 2,209
Default

Does he NEED an excuse?

And don't worry, I haven't forgotten about the other threads. And I'll make sure Dave doesn't either, believe me. But since the guy has shown himself capable of multitasking, I thought, what the heck. Either way, I've basically made Dave my bitch.
Silent Dave is offline  
Old 08-03-2007, 10:18 PM   #4
mung bean
Guest
 
Posts: n/a
Default

Well that's alright then.
 
Old 08-04-2007, 01:55 AM   #5
cajela
Guest
 
Posts: n/a
Default

I wonder if Dave can admit that Tyre exists. We had one prophecy defender here who refused to admit it exists, despite maps, google earth and photos from the Tyre tourist board...
 
Old 08-04-2007, 02:00 AM   #6
mung bean
Guest
 
Posts: n/a
Default

Funny you should mention that......................
 
Old 08-04-2007, 03:12 AM   #7
BWE
Senior Member
 
Join Date: Jun 2007
Location: Portland, OR
Posts: 624
Default

I think Dave addressed Tyre once before. Something about a bare rock hard set of abs on his favorite male model? I can't remember. Anyone got a link?
BWE is offline  
Old 08-04-2007, 03:58 AM   #8
mung bean
Guest
 
Posts: n/a
Default

BWE, Tyre is mentioned briefly on this page of the RDF Flud Debate Comment Thread but it doesn't say much.

The really good stuff is on the following page.:rolling: :rolling: :rolling: :thumbs:

http://www.richarddawkins.net/forum/...yre&start=2340
 
Old 08-04-2007, 04:39 AM   #9
Regular Member
 
Join Date: May 2007
Location: Madison, WI
Posts: 416
Default

I'd like to move the questions back a step and ask
What the heck IS a prophecy, anyway?
We know what predications are, and they do not count as prophesy, correct?
We know what guesses about the future are, and they do not count as prophecy, correct?
We know what general statements in the future tense are, so which ones get to countas prophecy and which ones do not? And note that we must be able to make this distinction before the candidate is fulfilled or fails to be fulfilled.
What makes a prophecy a prophecy, and how can we tell we have one?

Thanks,
Shirley Knott
shirley knott is offline  
Old 08-04-2007, 06:01 AM   #10
Veteran Member
 
Join Date: Jun 2007
Location: Near Liverpool, UK
Posts: 1,072
Default

Quote:
Originally Posted by mung bean View Post
While I agree your points are good and you probably have him by the goolies
(and I'd much rather your hands were holding them than mine) do you realise
that you have just given him the perfect excuse to dodge questions in other threads?
I wouldn't worry too much.

If he dodges this thread the way he dodges my "where is the flood deposit" thread, you need not worry about this thread being a 'cause' of him dodging questions in other threads. He does that without outside assistance.
Calilasseia is offline  
 

Thread Tools Search this Thread
Search this Thread:

Advanced Search

Forum Jump


All times are GMT -8. The time now is 06:53 AM.

Top

This custom BB emulates vBulletin® Version 3.8.2
Copyright ©2000 - 2015, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.