Sunday, July 13, 2008

Debate: Ehrman vs Craig

Bart Ehrman hands William Lane Craig his ass in this debate on the resurrection.

Craig refuses to admit that there are errors in the bible and then refuses to answer any questions in relation to the fact.

Things to watch out for:

He tries to poison the well by stating Ehrman's position incorrectly.

He appeals heavily to other authorities and fails to realize that Ehrman is a very important authority on the subject matter.

He tries to compare Hume's argument against miracles to Ehrman and then proceeds to attack Hume while failing to address Ehrman's argument.

He fails to admit that he has no basis for critically evaluating the manuscripts since he has a an a-priori bias that they are true.

He fails to answer whether or not the later accounts are less reliable since he accepts that the earliest accounts are generally more reliable.

*Update*

Craigs bogus stats unraveled here

6 comments:

Atheist943 said...

Craig won. That's why this debate was posted on a Christian apologist's YouTube channel.

youtube.com/Christianjr4

I really would like to thank you for posting the william lane craig vs bart ehrman debate.

i'm going to buy this, but i was really glad to be able to watch it before doing so.

bart ehrman was one contributing factor that made me doubt my faith a while back, it was really cool to see the unfolding of barts blunder, and ehrman's egregious error.

i had heard from one source that bart ehrman didn't even want this transcript to get out. i'm glad i'll be able to own this on dvd.

God bless.

Rich Rodriguez said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Rich Rodriguez said...

The presence of the debate on a Christian website says nothing about the outcome of the debate. By that reasoning Ehrman's victory is backed up by the fact that it is on my site.

You should really give it a close listening, Craig made himself look silly to those who can weave through his circumlocutions.

I will have to respectfully disagree with your opinion on who won this debate.

Anonymous said...

Craig impresses people with his great public speaking skills. But once you actually listen to his words carefully (or better yet, see it in print), you quickly find he's not really saying much. His book Reasonable Faith is a a case in point.

Anonymous said...

michael

What debate where you listening too? Craig had his ass handed to him.

Anonymous said...

"Craig won. That's why this debate was posted on a Christian apologist's YouTube channel."

It's funny I hear Christians say this a lot. I too, think Craig outdebates every single one of his opponents, (With the exception of Shabir Ally). But his arguments are all easy to refute in reflection. Like the Bayesian analysis trick he pulled on Ehrmann. Craig deliberately withheld the values for the statistical probabilities of each argument. Craig knew that those probabilities could be refuted, so he didn't offer them into the debate. But the probability cannot be separated from the metaphysics of the statistician. Craig knew this. He admits as much in the Q&A when he says he thinks the probability is irrefutable.

But I guess we all see what we want in these debates. Christians don't see the contradictions of Craig's argument, just the rhetorical skill he exudes.