Free Republic
Browse · Search
General/Chat
Topics · Post Article

To: GunRunner

That’s not “my standard”.

If you are a member of a jury in a trial, you hear the evidence of the case, including witness testimony.

You then, taking all the evidence into account, decide which side in the case will win.

Sometimes a witness will tell seemingly fantastical tales which actually wind up being true in the final analysis.

If you told the average person hundreds of years ago that we would have heavier-than-air machines today that could fly across this country in less than six hours, most would think you were a lunatic.

Any good scientist will not dismiss things out of hand, but will simply say “I don’t know”.

My favorite supernatural event from the Bible is the “pillar of fire” from Exodus. May sound off-the-charts crazy, but there actually are fire tornados.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rULehi-U5hI

Of course, many times witness testimony will sound very convincing and seem to make perfect sense, and yet turn out to be lies.

The truth is all that matters in the end; the rest is meaningless nonsense.


513 posted on 05/31/2014 6:34:14 PM PDT by PieterCasparzen (We have to fix things ourselves)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 510 | View Replies ]


To: PieterCasparzen
Actually, scientists dismiss things out of hand all of the time, especially those things which go against the known nature of the universe without any sort of reproducible or observable evidence. If I told a biologist that I saw a leprechaun, it wouldn't be considered evidence any more than an astrophysicist reading the "evidence" that the sun stood still in the sky so Joshua could finish his battle.

I'm not questioning that eyewitness testimony is often considered evidence, but rarely are court decisions made solely on eyewitness testimony, and it is very often unreliable and contradictory. I'm also not aware of any court decision based on testimony from anonymous authors who lived thousands of years ago, nor am I aware of any court decision in the modern era that found a supernatural claim to be true. Abigail Williams' testimony about being hexed was considered evidence at the time, but luckily we're not as credulous as they were in Salem or in the Iron Age.

Fire tornadoes are interesting in that they exist, as do burning bushes and red tides. But this type of faux open mindedness doesn't lend itself to how we make determinations about the nature of the universe today. There is some evidence that stands up to scrutiny, some that doesn't, and some that isn't really evidence at all and can be dismissed out of hand.

I would still love to see evidence of Matthew 27:52, but this never gets mentioned or defended by theists despite claims of Biblical historical and archaeological "accuracy", and for good reason.

515 posted on 05/31/2014 7:52:32 PM PDT by GunRunner
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 513 | View Replies ]

Free Republic
Browse · Search
General/Chat
Topics · Post Article


FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson