A defense of Christianity helped unlock the secrets of the brain • Hacker News Board

Re: A defense of Christianity helped unlock the secrets of the brain

#31

Post by jabv » Tue, Dec 20, 2016, 4:14 PM UTC

gamegoblin wrote: post #28

jabv wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The fact that Bayes' work, which is more popular and possibly relevant than ever, answers a serious philosophical challenges to claims about the nature of reality (a consequence of any claims of divinity) is a mere historical accident worthy of overlooking? I am reminded of Fulton Sheen's comments on Jesus - a man that claimed to be God is either a liar, a lunatic, or God; to say such a man is a great teacher but not…

Did Fulton Sheen say that first or was it CS Lewis? I say that because I've read about https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lewis's_trilemma which sounds familiar.

I wouldn't be surprised if Sheen picked it up from Lewis, as the former certainly admired the latter!

Re: A defense of Christianity helped unlock the secrets of the brain

#32

Post by dragonwriter » Tue, Dec 20, 2016, 4:21 PM UTC

eneifert wrote: post #22

badkungfu wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I am reminded of Fulton Sheen's comments on Jesus - a man that claimed to be God is either a liar, a lunatic, or God; to say such a man is a great teacher but not God stretches the limit of rationality. That always sounded like an unimaginative argument. Another possibility is that his followers exaggerated his words and deeds after his death.

But his followers were all willing to die because they believed Jesus rose from the dead and they saw it. Seems unreasonable that they would die for something they know is a lie. https://www.wikiwand.com/en/List_of_Christian_martyrs

> But his followers were all willing to die because they believed Jesus rose from the dead and they saw it.

There is very little objective reason to believe that to be the case. There are (themselves mostly unsubstantiated) stories that a number of the inner circle of contemporaries, some of whom are also identified as witnesses of the resurrection, died for the faith, which is both considerably less than "all of his followers", and considerably less established as objective historical fact rather than part of the same system of mythology.

It's certainly a fact that a little later, a lot of people who could not have been witnesses to the resurrection at the time it is held to have happened died for the faith (whether willing or not), but they obviously don't support the argument you are making.

You can't rest a claim that one element of myth is objective fact on the argument that other elements of the same myth -- with no more objective support -- seem more likely if the first element is true.

Re: A defense of Christianity helped unlock the secrets of the brain

#33

Post by badkungfu » Tue, Dec 20, 2016, 4:22 PM UTC

eneifert wrote: post #22

badkungfu wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I am reminded of Fulton Sheen's comments on Jesus - a man that claimed to be God is either a liar, a lunatic, or God; to say such a man is a great teacher but not God stretches the limit of rationality. That always sounded like an unimaginative argument. Another possibility is that his followers exaggerated his words and deeds after his death.

But his followers were all willing to die because they believed Jesus rose from the dead and they saw it. Seems unreasonable that they would die for something they know is a lie. https://www.wikiwand.com/en/List_of_Christian_martyrs

That doesn't list a lot of people who would have known him. Not hard to imagine people being committed to a cause while the lore is still being built.

Re: A defense of Christianity helped unlock the secrets of the brain

#34

Post by koenigdavidmj » Tue, Dec 20, 2016, 4:23 PM UTC

amazingman wrote: post #2

That Templeton Foundation funding, though.

It would help your argument tremendously if you wrote a full sentence, preferably with a verb somewhere.

Re: A defense of Christianity helped unlock the secrets of the brain

#35

Post by sqeaky » Tue, Dec 20, 2016, 4:27 PM UTC

jabv wrote: post #10

zzalpha wrote: post #7

Clickbait title. A great deal of science is rooted in the works of individuals who held a variety of religious beliefs, and in many of those cases, their works were directly motivated by those beliefs. So the fact that Bayes came up with his theorem because of a desire to justify a belief in the resurrection of Christ is, I suppose, somewhat interesting, but not so much so that it needed to be the headline of the sto…

The fact that Bayes' work, which is more popular and possibly relevant than ever, answers a serious philosophical challenges to claims about the nature of reality (a consequence of any claims of divinity) is a mere historical accident worthy of overlooking? I am reminded of Fulton Sheen's comments on Jesus - a man that claimed to be God is either a liar, a lunatic, or God; to say such a man is a great teacher but not…

It seems more likely to me that Bayes work is applicable today because it has practical application and was misapplied to the whole religion thing. Some people are emotionally invested and come up with post-hoc rationalizations and sometimes those post-hoc rationalizations have useful stuff like Bayes theorem.

We don't need to seriously look at discrepancies in history where written records were scant and what does exist clearly claims the impossible. We discount most of these out hand, because they are preposterous, even the ones with much better documentation.

Why cling to this one? We wouldn't be having this conversation if it were a theory Aristotle came up with to defend Zeus or some ancient Indian philosopher in defense of some Hindu god. We have this conversation because in the Western world christianity is given a special level of credibility and defensive taboo that other fairy tales are not privy to. Let's just drop the pretense, we all know better by now or we are religious people.

Re: A defense of Christianity helped unlock the secrets of the brain

#36

Post by pavel_lishin » Tue, Dec 20, 2016, 4:27 PM UTC

simo9000 wrote: post #21

pech0rin wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe you should back up this claim. Just because they are a religious organization does not mean they are fundamentalist.

First line of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Templeton_Foundation . It is just important to understand the possible motivations for the article.

That seems to come from a single French article, in which the only reference to fundamentalism comes from the description of the founder.

It seems that since the core tenets of fundamentalism seem to be biblical literalism and anti-modernity, it doesn't accurately describe the Templeton foundation or its goals.

The founder and his wife did donate something on the order of a million dollars to causes opposing same-sex marriage, which definitely seems like a fundamentalist trait.

Re: A defense of Christianity helped unlock the secrets of the brain

#37

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Dec 20, 2016, 4:43 PM UTC

jabv wrote: post #10

zzalpha wrote: post #7

Clickbait title. A great deal of science is rooted in the works of individuals who held a variety of religious beliefs, and in many of those cases, their works were directly motivated by those beliefs. So the fact that Bayes came up with his theorem because of a desire to justify a belief in the resurrection of Christ is, I suppose, somewhat interesting, but not so much so that it needed to be the headline of the sto…

The fact that Bayes' work, which is more popular and possibly relevant than ever, answers a serious philosophical challenges to claims about the nature of reality (a consequence of any claims of divinity) is a mere historical accident worthy of overlooking? I am reminded of Fulton Sheen's comments on Jesus - a man that claimed to be God is either a liar, a lunatic, or God; to say such a man is a great teacher but not…

[deleted]

Re: A defense of Christianity helped unlock the secrets of the brain

#38

Post by lucozade » Tue, Dec 20, 2016, 4:48 PM UTC

eneifert wrote: post #22

badkungfu wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I am reminded of Fulton Sheen's comments on Jesus - a man that claimed to be God is either a liar, a lunatic, or God; to say such a man is a great teacher but not God stretches the limit of rationality. That always sounded like an unimaginative argument. Another possibility is that his followers exaggerated his words and deeds after his death.

But his followers were all willing to die because they believed Jesus rose from the dead and they saw it. Seems unreasonable that they would die for something they know is a lie. https://www.wikiwand.com/en/List_of_Christian_martyrs

Who said they died because of their belief in the Resurrection?

I think it is highly likely that His followers believed strongly that He was the Messiah and His message had divine provenance.

It's much less clear which parts of, what became, the accepted view they considered worth dying for.

Maybe they believed in the truth of the Resurrection. Maybe they weren't aware of the claims (ok that's unlikely). Maybe they were aware and decided that it was good for the message (much more believable). Maybe they thought that it wasn't that important to the overall mission either way.

I don't know the answer, of course, but it's perfectly plausible that they didn't believe in the Resurrection and still fulfilled their mission. Plenty of people have died for what they believe is right without needing to have a mentor rise from the dead.

Re: A defense of Christianity helped unlock the secrets of the brain

#39

Post by lambdaphagy » Tue, Dec 20, 2016, 4:51 PM UTC

pavel_lishin wrote: post #36

simo9000 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

First line of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Templeton_Foundation . It is just important to understand the possible motivations for the article.

That seems to come from a single French article, in which the only reference to fundamentalism comes from the description of the founder. It seems that since the core tenets of fundamentalism seem to be biblical literalism and anti-modernity, it doesn't accurately describe the Templeton foundation or its goals. The founder and his wife did donate something on the order of a million dollars to causes opposing same-sex…

Is Barack Obama a fundamentalist for having opposed gay marriage in 2008, the same year that the Templetons made their donation?

Re: A defense of Christianity helped unlock the secrets of the brain

#40

Post by jasonkostempski » Tue, Dec 20, 2016, 4:53 PM UTC

jasonkostempski wrote: post #3

"Hume, the probability of people inaccurately claiming that they’d seen Jesus’ resurrection far outweighed the probability that the event had occurred in the first place." Is there any evidence that anyone mentioned in the bible actually ever existed? What is the point of examining the claims of fictional characters about a fictional event?

I can't really accept the reference of already famous names as strong evidence they were part of any event or that the event described actually took place. On a daily basis I see completely made up stories about kings, queens, politicians, actors, actresses, socialites, etc.; and people believing those stories without any evidence; and people retelling those stories, adding their own flair. Often the subject of those stories let the inaccuracies continue or even fabricate it themselves. And that's just people and things that happen today, things that could likely be verified but just aren't because most people don't care to. Over thousands of years and various translations and interpretations, it is nearly impossible that any meaningfully accurate information made it this far, i doubt it even made it to the stone.