CosmicSkeptic Debate Prep Fails Him In Cosmic Proportions

(For the Audio and Video versions of this article, see below)

In a recent debate betweenJonathan McLatchie and Alex J. O’Connor (Cosmic Skeptic), O’Connor made numerous problematic assertions that I would like to address. While I thought McLatchie handled many of these objections well, because of the short timing of the debate and the structure, he was not able to address many of the root cause problems, nor offer substantive rebuttals to everything O’Connor had said. I will briefly respond to his overall methodological problem, list some problems that I think McLatchie dispatched rather easily, and then focus on one claim as the paradigmatic example of the level of research and quality of evidence that often undergirds the atheistic position, even when they appear erudite, confident and oh so very British.

I am here only going to examine the opening statement and initial rebuttal section of the debate (and even here will only address specific parts of that). I may write a part 2 of this which will handle other issues raised in the debate, such as the hypothetical of if I would obey if I thought God was telling me to shoot up a school. Here I am going to address these few issues from that section.

First, O’Connor’s main methodological problem is not unique to him. It is nearly universally the stock and trade of the online infidel community in the 21^st century thus far, and, ironically, there is nothing really new about the “New Atheists” in this regard. It really is the quite old hat of Logical Positivism wedded to a kind of Philosophical Naturalism and defended (if we can call it that) with an arsenal of hyper-skeptical memes to be Gished out upon an unsuspecting opponent. Anyone even remotely familiar with the tactics of YouTube atheists like O’Conner and kin, this should not be a new summary so I will not bore with details here. The one that I would like to address briefly, because it was more than prominent in the debate strategy employed by O’Connor, is the use hyper-skepticism to avoid presenting reasonable alternatives.

Daniel Dennett once called evolution a “universal acid” – an acid that is so powerful that it could corrode any container that one could try and keep it in. For Dennett, this was an apt illustration for evolution because he thought evolution, when applied to any area of knowledge, would radically alter it. Besides that actually being disanalogous to his own original analogy, there were also major criticisms of the kind of Scientism of Logical Positivism needed to take a theory of biological speciation and diversity (even if a good one), and apply it to even other areas of biology (such as abiogenesis) let alone non-biological and even non-scientific/empirical questions and disciplines. However, the analogy is a good one for something like hyper-skepticism precisely because both would destroy any container that attempts to hold it. Hyper-skepticism is quite rightly compared to the child’s insufferably repeated question, “why.” The child does not yet grasp different levels of explanations and causation; they do not understand when burden has been met for warrant and which does not need to be exceeded; they do not have the awareness of concepts like conceptual justification in which one need not have an explanation for an explanation for it to yet be the most adequate one. Children do not yet know the difference between deduction, induction, and abduction for example.

Atheists will often say things like, “when I was a child I had an imaginary friend, but I left that behind as a child and I do not want a god-sized imaginary friend as an adult.” Well, one can quite easily look at much of what passes for warrant these days for atheists and say, “when I was child a had children’s questions that didn’t understand warrant, and as an adult I don’t want to keep reasoning like a child.” Simply asking “why” or “what is your evidence of that claim… and that claim… and that claim… and that claim… and that claim… and that claim….” ad nauseum, may help the online infidel community reassure themselves that they have the evidence while theists eschew it because it’s “why’s” all the way down, but it’s not actually good epistemic methodology. This is because it is a universal acid which destroys any worldview or conceptual contain which holds it – even the attempt to justify using it. Why should we ask for evidence? Well because we want to have evidenced beliefs. What evidence do you have that we should want to have evidenced beliefs? Well because when we don’t have evidenced beliefs we believe false things. Well do you have evidence that when we have no evidence we believe false things? Yes, here is a case X. Well do you have evidence that case X is a case of something that is false with no evidence? And on and on. That kind of skepticism is totes adorbs when it can be parroted under the guise of the Fly Spaghetti Monster, Invisible Tea Pot, or Maximally Great Law of Nature (all of which reveal a startling lack of understanding on the part of the atheist), but really it’s a methodology that would cut in all directions. The instant that we even ask the atheist trying to wield it to defend even their use of it, even that use is dissolved – and a method that falsifies everything is useful nothing.

So when O’Connor attempts to use this kind of method of “yeah but how do you know that,” or the “well I can think of any absurd counter possibility and no matter how obtuse, it’s clearly evidence that you’re wrong” then all he is doing is showing that very well spoken young British chaps may still have some intellectual growing up to do.

Second, there are problems with how O’Connor not only attempted to reject the Biblical evidence of the resurrection, but also in how he responded the McLatchie’s rejoinders. For example, O’Connor made the claim that the gospels contradict on the number of the women at the tomb. McLatchie showed that in John, while only one woman is expressly mentioned, the pronouns being in the plural showed that there were more than one in mind. O’Connor’s hyper-skepticism here attempts to defend this as a “contradiction” that lends itself as evidence that the Bible is not trustworthy. Why? Because, he says, that even though it’s not technically a “contradiction” anymore, surely the transcendent God of the universe would have made it more clear because it’s the most important event in history. This make several errors.

1.       The number of women at the tomb is not the most important event in history. The resurrection may have been, but that would simply commit the composition fallacy to think that just because the major event was so important, that every detail carries the same importance such that anyone telling it would all tell the exact same details.

2.       We do not tell stories, even true ones, this way. I may tell one person that I went to the store and bought oranges. I may tell another that this weekend I went with my son to the store because we had to get a lot of groceries. I may tell another that my wife and I, after going to the park, took both of our sons to Vons to buy groceries for the week. Does the fact that I did not include the same details, did not include everyone involved or every place or time reference mean that this is evidence that somehow the story is an invention or that they are evidence that I am not a trustworthy narrator? Of course not. That kind of standard would just be asinine and no one outside of a band of merry atheists ever use such a standard.

3.       O’Connor seems to have a view of inspiration that only the most anti-intellectual and hardline literalistic fundamentalist would defend. Nearly every historical statement on inspiration and the authority of the Bible denies a kind of mechanistic dictation of the Bible by God and sees God as using the culture, motifs, literary devices, worldview, backgrounds, customs, etc. of the people to which the original documents were written and of those who composed them. To think that “God would write it differently” just is for O’Connor to say that he would write it differently. However, if all the narratives agreed on every detail, as McLatchie and others have often pointed out, we would then be defending the gospels against an accusation of collusion and deception to “get their story straight.” In fact, these kinds of varied details in eyewitness accounts is precisely the kinds of things that detectives, reporters, and lawyers look for in authentic testimony. When everyone agrees too much on ancillary details, collusion is often the prime suspect.

Third, O’Connor then makes one of the weakest attempts to avoid admitting error that I think I have heard. He had made the original claim that the story of Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead is a contradiction of the story of Lazarus and the rich man where Jesus did not raise him from the dead - the exact structure of his argument was quite garbled to begin with if I ‘m being honest and I have a hard time thinking that he really thought a narrative was in contradiction to a parable in the historical sense. I think likely he was trying to make a Carrier type myth development argument and got lost in the weeds. While McLatchie did an adequate job responding, I think he could have pushed this far more forcefully. He got O’Connor to admit that these were likely not the same person (Lazarus was actually a common name in 1^st century Palestine). However, instead of simply admitting that it wasn’t a contradiction, he admitted that they could be different men but that the contradiction still existed because in one Jesus intended to raise Lazarus and in the other, he didn’t. So there is, he claims, a contradiction of intent. This seems one of the most obtuse things he said in the entire debate. For what contradiction in intent could there be in Jesus intentions to raise, in real life based on his ministry and mission to demonstrate that he is the giver of life, his real friend who really died, and to a person in a parable used to simply illustrate a point about the efficacy of the word of God in warranting trust and righteousness, precisely over miracles like raising someone from the dead? I thought that if I were debating O’Connor that I would have stopped the debate and asked him to go, in that precise moment, to get a cup of tea with me. Surely he would have said no, he was in the middle of something. Well then I could ask if he has ever agreed in a moment to go get a cup of tea with someone. If he had, then wouldn’t that be contradiction of intent by his standards? It’s obviously silly. Different intent in radically different contexts with different people at different times do not make contradictions. Plus, one of the contexts was a parable. I don’t even know what it would mean to say that Jesus intended to raise Lazarus in the parable… it’s a parable. Jesus isn’t in the parable. There is no intent within the parable. It’s a parable…

Finally, O’Connor made a claim about the gospels being “riddled with myth” and his best example of this was to say that the narrative of Cleopas on the road to Emmaus in Luke 24 follows/borrows from the mythic archetype seen in the myth of Romulus and Remus and the vision of Romulus seen by Proculus on the road to Rome. The reason that this argument by O’Connor is so important to note is because it shows the kind of dubious research and pseudo-scholars he is willing to use (clearly without fact checking). This demonstrates that while he employs hyper-Skepticism against the theist, he has zero skepticism for anything or anyone that affirms a position that he desires to be true.

O’Connor’s source for this claim is none other than the unemployed blogger himself, Richard Carrier – the darling of Jesus Mythicists everywhere. Any time an atheist seeks to handle a Biblical text, one will find that they often never go to the academic literature, exegetical commentaries, peer reviewed literature on Biblical languages or backgrounds, etc. but will go to things internet infidel blogs, Reddit, and YouTube, but when they need to rubber stamp a PhD. on something, they will go to people with unrelated academic specialties like Dawkins and Hitchens, or to known fringe kooks like Carrier and Price – who quite literally couldn’t get hired or peer reviewed by any actual institutions of higher learning, so created their own “think tank” to self-publish and “peer review” each other’s writings. And this is who O’Connor turns to, and as such it is not a surprise that he gets carried away by fits of whimsy and the deep imagination of Carrier.

To make this claim, O’Connor (really just parroting Carrier’s earlier debate), says that we can see that this is a mythical borrowing by seeing three facts about both stories:

CLAIM 1: Cleopas means “to tell” and Proculus means “to proclaim” and thus both give functional names to describe their role.

REBUTTAL: For anyone familiar with Koine Greek and Latin, this is laughably false. Cleopas does not mean “to tell.” Not even close actually. Most think that the name is a contraction of the common name, Cleopatros (the male version of the name we often know: Cleopatra). This was a name known at that time and was actually a contraction of two words κλεός + πατρός which would be literaly, “the glory of/to the father.” Cleopas is almost certainly a contraction of Cleopatros. These kinds of names that were original contractions but then themselves become standalone names are called hypocoristic names and are common in the New Testament and broader 1^st century period (they still occur today such as anyone with a last name like “Smith” or even my first name, “Tyler.”) Those who doubt this or who think this is an all to convenient response simply need to look at the other names in the book of Luke that are examples of this common practice. The person ascribed to the book as its author, Loukas (Λουκᾶς), is the shortenedfor of the name(s) Loukanos (Λουκανός) and Loukios (Λούκιος). The same author, writing in the books of acts has others such as Silas (Σίλας), which is a contracted version of Silvanos (Σιλουανός) and, man ythink that possibly Theudas (θευδᾶς) in a contraction for Theodōros (θεόδωρος).

So, we can see that Cleopas does not mean “to tell.” While there are a couple of theories about its etymology not listed here (such as it being a patronym for his city of origin – Clophas), one thing we do know is that it does not mean “to tell.” But what about Proculus? Does it mean “to proclaim?” From what I can tell it does not. In fact we have two ancient sources that tell us the etymology of the word. Plutarch tells us of one the customs on the Romans in how they named their children. He writes,

“Another of the same family was named Celer (the Swift), because of the wonderful quickness with which he provided a show of gladiators on the occasion of his father's funeral. Some even to the present day derive their names from the circumstances of their birth, as for instance a child is named Proculus if his father be abroad when he is born, and Postumus if he be dead. If one of twins survive, he is named Vopiscus. Of names taken from bodily peculiarities they use not only Sulla (the Pimply), Niger (the Swarthy), Rufus (the Red-haired), but even such as Caecus (the Blind), and Claudus (the Lame), wisely endeavouring to accustom men to consider neither blindness nor any other bodily defect to be any disgrace or matter of reproach, but to answer to these names as if they were their own. However, this belongs to a different branch of study.”

Here, Proculus is used of a child conceived and born while the father was away – the Latin literally meaning “as from behind” or something close to that (it could literally be “like the anus”), but likely refers to it either being done while the father’s back is turned (not a pejorative) or something like it being done in secret behind his back while he was away.

Another option given to us by Festus is that the name is a diminiutive of the term Procus which can mean either a suitor (possibly again referring to the illegitimacy of being from a suitor and not the husband who is away), or even a term meaning a prince (think of parents calling their son, “our little prince.”)

Here we find that neither Cleopas nor Proculus means anything like “to tell” or “to proclaim.”

CLAIM 2: Both Cleopas (Emmaus to Jerusalem) and Proculus (Alba Longa to Roma) were traveling in a westerly direction.  

REBUTTAL: Alba Longa was South East of Rome. This would mean Proculus was traveling North West-ish. While we do not know the exact location of Emmaus (we have about 9 candidate location) the various contenders for the location of Emmaus are mostly to the West of Jerusalem – 6 out of 9 are to the west, but if they meant cites like Ram, Chemesh, or Artas then it would have been either North or South. Since the text says that Cleopas and his companion were going toward Emmaus they would also be traveling in a westerly direction, though depending on the location, they could be going Northwest, West, or Southwest for five of the possible locations but not the other three. This means that in this case, maybe they were traveling in the same direction, but maybe not. At best, this claim is dubious, and given the range of possibilities that would be considered “westerly” this would be approximately 1/4^th of travel narratives – hardly a motif making feature of a story.

CLAIM 3: Both trips would have been 14 miles.   

REBUTTAL: This is strange because Carrier (and thus O’Connor) get it wrong on both accounts. The distance from Alba Long to Rome was only about 12 miles. In Luke 24:13 we are told that the distance from Jerusalem to Emmaus was sixty stadia. A stadia was equivalent to about 607 feet/185 meters for us, meaning that the distance from Jerusalem to the location referred to as Emmaus in the text would have been just under 7 miles. This comports with 8 out of 9 of the possibilities that archaeologists give for the site of Emmaus. So not only does Carrier get the distance of both of them wrong, but they are not even the same distance.

In addition, Luke gives the distance, while Plutarch does not. It would be the most obscure kind of myth making motif parallel if the distance had to be 14 miles but not only does a text not even need to mention distance and fit the motif, but another text could mention a different distance and still meet the requirement of the motif. This kind of absurdly misleading parallelism is precisely why no one takes Jesus Mythicists seriously… well… no one except online atheists like O’Connor.

(UNSTATED) CLAIM 4: We can see that Luke was borrowing these mythic details from a motif established by Plutarch’s account of Romulus.

REBUTTAL: This kind of assumption on the part of Mythicists reveals that in their hunt to find vague parallels to prop up, basic chronology is left by the wayside. Even if we grant the critical late dating for the gospel of Luke into the late 70’s, this would be almost certainly at least a decade prior to Plutarch’s writing, but probably more (since he probably wrote it in the 1^st decade of the 2^nd century). While I could argue for a dating of Luke’s gospel into the 50’s, I do not need to present that here since even the late dating is almost certainly pre-Plutarch. So not only is this series of “facts” debunked and does not present a known mythic motif in 1^st century biographical literature, but if there was any borrowing to bolster a story, the causal arrow would be exactly reversed from the direction that Carrier, O’Connor and the other mythicists wish us to accept.

With that, I think I have shown that not only is O’Connor’s epistemic methodology wildly problematic and not actually the rationally responsible method to compare and evaluate competing worldviews or explanations, but also his engagement with Biblical/ancient literature, historiography, and historical facts is done in the irresponsible manner of the Jesus Mythicists. This may fly at places like the University of Northern New Jersey and the Center for Inquiry Institute, but they should not be accepted by any rational, truth seeking individuals.

Argument from Orthodoxy for Soft Determinism

Possible world: a manner/state in which the actual world could have been. The set of propositions that are or would be true in each possible world. Thus W1 will be an expression of the set of all propositions (N) that are true IF W1 was the actual world (N1, N2, N3, N4,… Nx.) 

Let me give a quick argument on why I think that any and all orthodox conception of God as an omnimax being who is the Creator of the actual world will necessarily entail, at minimim, soft determinism. 

God created/actualized (either weakly or strongly) the actual world (W1). In actualizing W1, God has created/actualized all propositions that are true which are labeled, as a set, “W1.” 

Let N666 be some instance of evil that obtains in only W1. God, in creating/actualized W1, has determined that N666 will obtain and cannot fail to obtain. For if N666 failed to obtain, then W1 would no longer be W1 but some other world (W1939) where ~N666 would obtain. If this were the case, God would have intended to create W1 but would have failed to do so when W1939 obtains contrary to his intention. This would result in a God who is not omnipotent. 

In addition, God, in actualizing/creating W1, at the moment of creation (T1), foreknew that N666 would obtain because he was intending to create W1. If ~N666 obtained, then God’s knowledge would be incorrect. Even if ~N666 did not obtain, but had a real metaphysical possibility to obtain, that would mean it would be possible for N666 to not obtain in the actual world. This means that God’s foreknowledge at T1 could possibly be wrong. If God’s foreknowledge could possibly be wrong, then God cannot know that he knows (since it would be precisely the thing that he would not know). This would result in a God who is not omniscient. 

The only consistent way to maintain the orthodox view of God as the omnimax Creator, is to affirm that God has actualized/created W1 and in doing so has determined, unalterably, whatsoever comes to pass as true propositions in the W1 which have no metaphysically meaningful ability to fail to come to pass. As such, God has determined N1 through Nx that are true given his creation/actualizion of W1, as opposed to any other propositions in other possible worlds. This results in, at minimum, soft determinism. 

Therefore, orthodox Christian conceptions of an omnimax being who is Creator of the world logically result in, at minimum, soft determinism.