Super Swamper Boggers

comparison: the two weights and two measures of believers

Common Sense About the website Atheism , Luke Muehlhauser notes how believers use two weights and two measures in assessing the claims incredible.

The idea is a quote from Richard Carrier , taken from the chapter "Why the Resurrection is Unbelievable" ("Because the resurrection is not believable") of the book The Christian Delusion :

Fifty years after the end of the Persian Wars in 479 BC, Herodotus of Halicarnassus asked numerous eyewitnesses and their children about things that happened in those years, and wrote a book about it. Although monsters are often a critical and skeptical mind, sometimes stating the name of his sources and even questioning the reliability in the face of suspicious or conflicting stories between them, nevertheless shows beyond doubt that the temple of Delphi defended himself magically animated weapons, lightning and rock walls that collapsed, and that the sacred olive tree of Athens, although burned by the Persians, it grew a new branch along the arm in one day, that a miraculous flood swept away an entire Persian contingent after it was desecrating an image of Poseidon, a horse gave birth to a rabbit, and that an entire city was witness to the resurrection of the mass of cooked fish!

Carrier continues

believe that these things happen? Why not? ... For example, say that these things do not happen because really nothing like it does now, and certainly never in your presence. The cooked fish are not raised. Bunnies do not sprout from the horses. The temples do not defend themselves with weapons or miraculous weather flying ... These things you know from your experience staff, as well as that of countless others, especially after centuries of scientific research. But you also know that people think of ... People exaggerate, tell amazing stories, creating myths and legends, uplifting, and they are wrong in many ways ... as we all know, the false stories are common. But miracles, of course, no.

So what is more likely? What miracles like this happen really, as you and those you trust, including any scientist or investigator in the last centuries, have missed all of them randomly? Or that these stories are just incredible? I believe the answer is the latter. And I suspect you will agree with me.

It is a rule that we follow all. Your dubbi diventano ancora più forti quando non potete interrogare i testimoni; quando non sapete neppure chi sono; quando non avete la loro testimonianza diretta ma quella di qualcun altro; quando esiste uno scopo nella narrazione, qualcosa che il narratore sta cercando di farvi credere; quando i testimoni o gli autori sono un po' strani o eccessivamente zelanti. E così via. Tutti la pensiamo così, e a ragione.

Per queste ragioni, e per altre, consideriamo correttamente [i miracoli descritti da Erodoto] delle storie divertenti che non sono vere.

Credo che Carrier abbia ragione su questo punto: di fronte a storie fantastiche e lontane dalle nostre esperienze siamo molto diffidenti, e quando non sappiamo da dove vengono or how can we trust the witnesses, we are even more suspicious. After all it is for this reason that few really believe that Priesley Elvis is still alive, or that there is the monster of Loch Ness, or that people will be abducted by UFOs, despite so many people express the truth of these facts.

The majority of people live using very high standards of skepticism and doubt in the face of allegations extremely unusual. Yet many people suspend their disbelief in the face of claims of religion.

Luke, for example, compare the stories of Herodotus a Gospel passage in particular :

And when Jesus had cried again with loud voice, gave up the ghost. And behold, the veil of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom, the earth shook, the rocks crashed, the tombs were opened and many bodies of saints which slept, rose again, and went out of the tombs after his resurrection, they entered the holy city and appeared unto many. ( Matthew, 27:50-53, edition CEI)

According to the Evangelist, on the death of Jesus there was an earthquake and "many bodies of saints resurrected and entered the city," appeared to many '. Yet nobody but the evangelist, seems to have become aware of these significant events, both natural (earthquake) that supernatural (The resurrection of the dead and their appearances). We do not know who he really is the author of this piece, but we know that was not a direct witness to the incident and that has a tendency to include stories unlikely, often for a specific purpose, to convince us of the truth of certain ideas.

But many people, otherwise very skeptical of claims like those of Herodotus, they believe. Why?

The article is a plagiarism of inspired by 'Resurrection Why is Unbelievable (Part 1) , "Luke Muehlhauser.