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Guest Post: Tim McGrew defends “The Argument from Miracles: A Cumulative Case for the Resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth”

May 9th, 2011 by Madeleine

Tim McGrewA little while back we published a post linking to some talks by Tim McGrew on Undesigned Coincidences in the Gospels. For some bizarre reason this post of ours prompted fellow kiwi blogger Deane Galbraith to write a post on the Bulletin for the Study of Religion, linking to our post, on the separate topic of Tim and his wife Lydia McGrew’s article “The Argument from Miracles: A Cumulative Case for the Resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth” which was published in the The Blackwell Companion to Natural Theology.

Here is a snippet of Galbraith’s post from the beginning:

There are quite a few academic and quasi-academic studies in which statistical analysis seems to be employed as a substitute for thinking. It is, perhaps, fairly understandable why some people are tempted by the allure of numbers. Those mysteriously complex formulae, mindnumblingly boring statistics and obscure mathematical notations lend a magical aura of scientific objectivity and plausibility to even the most patently absurd claims.

What gets me talking about this at this moment is my dumbfounded reading last night of an article published by Timothy McGrew and Lydia McGrew, entitled“The Argument from Miracles: A Cumulative Case for the Resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth” (2009). In this article, the McGrews utilize Bayesian probability in order to argue to the “scientific” conclusion that the probability of the resurrection of Jesus is a “staggering” 100,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,
000,000,000,000,000 to 1.

Are you staggered? overwhelmed? swooning? Were you previously skeptical about the Christian claim that Jesus was resurrected, but now you’re feeling pretty silly? Perhaps not.

The post goes on in the same vein to accuse the McGrews of trying to trick people into belief in the resurrection. It is littered with terms like “flimsy basis”, “populist apologetics”, “fanciful” and “deeply and unavoidably farcical” and is illustrated complete with a giant white-robed Caucasian Jesus wistfully looking heavenward as he steps out of the tomb. It finishes with Galbraith laying out his understanding of their mathematical reasoning, the tone at this point is dripping with lashings of smug, self-congratulation at how easily he, PhD student from Otago whose research area is giants in the Old Testament narrative, had dispatched two of the top philosophers of religion working in this field, both specialists in probability theory.

Not being qualified remotely in Bayesian probability theory myself, and therefore not wanting to presume anything beyond assessing the tone as exceedingly arrogant, I passed on Galbraith’s criticisms to the McGrews on Facebook. Well it turns out that Galbraith isn’t the only non-qualified liberal/atheist to take a punt at their reasoning on this piece. Tim McGrew explains that straw men have been popping up all over.

Straw Men Burning: Misinterpretations of our Article on the Resurrection

One of the hazards of writing technical philosophy is the risk that someone who lacks the appropriate expertise will attempt to critique it. In the case of the article on the resurrection that Lydia and I wrote for The Blackwell Companion to Natural Theology, this has already happened. It is hard enough to correct misimpressions of this sort on a relatively neutral topic; when the subject rouses passions of the sort that, as Hume reminds us, religious disputes are apt to generate, then the difficulties are redoubled.

But one thing that we did not anticipate is that people who are completely clueless would undertake to explain the article to the rest of the world, in the process completely garbling the central claim and shedding absolutely no light on any of the surrounding issues. Since this particular exhibition of aggressive incompetence is now being uncritically rebroadcast by people who are unable or unwilling actually to read the article, it is worth making a few salient points:

1. Nowhere in the article do we give, estimate, or suggest “odds on the resurrection.” Near the outset we explicitly disclaim any attempt to do so, writing:

Even as we focus on the resurrection of Jesus, our aim is limited. To show that the probability of R given all evidence relevant to it is high would require us to examine other evidence bearing on the existence of God, since such other evidence – both positive and negative – is indirectly relevant to the occurrence of the resurrection. Examining every piece of data relevant to R more directly – including, for example, the many issues in textual scholarship and archeology which we shall discuss only briefly – would require many volumes. Our intent, rather, is to examine a small set of salient public facts that strongly support R. The historical facts in question are, we believe, those most pertinent to the argument. Our aim is to show that this evidence, taken cumulatively, provides a strong argument of the sort Richard Swinburne calls “C-inductive” – that is, whether or not P(R) is greater than some specified value such as .5 or .9 given allevidence, this evidence itself heavily favors R over ~R.

The ratio of 10^44 to 1 is a likelihood ratio, not odds. People who do not understand the difference between these two ratios should not attempt to discuss the mathematical parts of the article.

2. We are very explicit about our assumptions. In the online version of the article, on p. 39, we make it plain that our calculation

is predicated on the assumption that in matters other than the explicit claims of miracles, the gospels and the book of Acts are generally reliable – that they may be trusted as much as any ordinary document of secular history with respect to the secularly describable facts they affirm. And where they do recount miraculous events, such as Jesus’ post-resurrection appearances, we assume that they are authentic – that is, that they tell us what the disciples claimed. This calculation tells us little about the evidence for the resurrection if those assumptions are false. We have provided reasons to accept them, but of course there is much more to be said on the issue.

3. We are quite aware that the assumption of independence is critical, and we discuss this matter extensively on pp. 40-46. It is wearying to see commentators who have not bothered actually to read the article confidently proclaiming that we have overlooked the possibility of dependence.

Readers are of course free to disagree with our actual conclusions. It would be cheering, however, if they would first take the trouble to understand what those conclusions are.

Tags:   · · · · · · 50 Comments

50 responses so far ↓

  • There is a trend in biblioblogging in particular to skim works that you already know you will disagree with only to find two or three points to which you can (usually out of context and misunderstandly) make fun. I think it’s clear that Deane didn’t actually read the article, but assessing the argument of the article was probably never his intention.

  • I know this isn’t the point of your article, but it seems to me, Christians shouldn’t be arguing probability for the resurrection. If you accept the presuppositions that god exists and Jesus was god incarnate, then the odds he was resurrected would be 1:1. No need for math…

    But if McGrew wants to argue the likelihood that the gospels and acts accurately reflect real events, rather than presupposing it, that would be really interesting.

  • actually if the odds are 1:1 that means a fifty percent chance… but anyway…

  • M, I’m sure you get the point though.

  • Yes – I was just pointing out what “odds” means… and I agree with you. I find these probability arguments bizarre. They are treating the direct intervention of the creator of the universe to fulfill a timeless eternal plan as though it is just like any other event – like flicking a coin or a horse race. Either it is true or not…

  • Ryan I have not read Tim’s particular article, but from what I have heard from Tim, I think Deane’s question begging accusation fails.

    You beg the question when you assume the conclusion in the premises. In this case the conclusion is that Christ rose from the dead, or that its probable he did.

    What evidentialist philosophers usually argue is that the gospels can be taken as historical sources and as sources certain parts of them are reliable accounts of what happens. One then argues from those parts that certain facts are the case.

    This is no different to asking wether Alexander the Great did X as stated in some text. We look at the historical sources we have of Alexander, take from these what we believe to be reliable accounts of his life and then see if the claim is probable on this evidence. Thats not circular at all.

    I agree with you that the probabilities here depend on the background beliefs one brings to the text. I don’t think Tim would disagree with this. The issue however is whether one can argue for the resurrection without assuming these background beliefs, on the basis of certain claims that an agnostic interlocutor might reasonably accept if you can then you can provide those interlocutors reasons for embracing Christianity.

  • Ryan,

    You write:

    “Christians shouldn’t be arguing probability for the resurrection. ”

    I’d respectfully disagree. I am a full-throttle evidentialist, both in epistemology and in apologetics.

  • I think Timothy should stick to his banana argument to be honest – it is more scientifically sound.

  • But seriously. You (Matt) say that Timothy is an expert in probability theory.., without me cyber stalking him could you just outline what his qualifications in this area are? Also – has this idea been assessed by any mathematics/statistics departments? What do you think an expert on Bayesian probability theory would make of this… has it been peer reviewed by any experts in mathematics/probability?

  • m,

    I don’t’ really get this.

    I find these probability arguments bizarre… It’s either true or it’s not

    The proposition “Jesus was raised from the dead” is certainly either true or false, but the degree to which we believe any claim should always be a probability shouldn’t it?

    If you start with no prior knowledge about the age of the earth and someone says “I added up all the begetting in the bible and got 6000” you might decide the proposition “the earth is 6000 years old” is quite likely to be true. Of course, when you learn about geology (and perhaps a little about the bible) you’ll update that particular probability, but I don’t think you’d ever say it wasn’t possible.I don’t see why the resurrection should be any different?

    I skimmed the article earlier, and the basic approach seems to make sense. It’s the same framework that Bayesian model comparison from stats – ignoring the prior probability and instead focusing on how the ‘data’ fits two models that might explain it (so, it’s not actually dealing with probability directly)

    Of course, I think the assumptions in the paper are kind of ludicrous, and the arguments for maintaining them less than convincing.

    (I’m just a humble biologist and not an expert in probability, though, bizarrely enough, writing about Reverend Bayes is the closest I’ve come to being famous 😉

  • Max,

    Yes Tim has done peer reviewed work in probability theory and confirmation theory, he also has done peer reviewed work in the epistemology of miracles where he uses probability theory.

    Here are just some examples.

    British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 54 (2003): 553-67.

    ABSTRACT

    Recent work on inference to the best explanation has come to an impasse regarding the proper way to coordinate the theoretical virtues in explanatory inference with probabilistic confirmation theory, and in particular with aspects of Bayes’s Theorem. I argue that the theoretical virtues are best conceived heuristically and that such a conception gives us the resources to explicate the virtues in terms of ceteris paribus theorems. Contrary to some Bayesians, this is not equivalent to identifying the virtues with likelihoods or priors per se; the virtues may be more accessible epistemically than likelihoods or priors. I then prove a ceteris paribus theorem regarding theoretical consilience, use it to correct a recent application of Reichenbach’s common cause principle, and apply it to a test case of scientific reasoning.

    Also, Tim is the author of the peer reviewed Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy’s article on Miracles. Which looks at how one applies probability theory to miracle claims. You can read about the peer review process for the Stanford here. http://plato.stanford.edu/info.html.

    of “Direct Inference and the Problem of Induction” The Monist84 (2001). which looks at probability and confirmation theory.

    “Foundationalism, Probability, and Mutual Support” With Erkenntnis 68 (2008): 55-77.

    “Probabilities and the Fine Tuning Argument: A Sceptical View.” With Lydia McGrew and Eric Vestrup. Mind 110 (2001): 1027-37.

    “Foundationalism, Transitivity and Confirmation.” . Journal of Philosophical Research 25 (2000): 47-66.

    “Evidence,” in Sven Bernecker and Duncan Pritchard, eds., The Routledge Companion to Epistemology, 2011, pp. 58-67.

    “Two Cheers for Bayes’s Theorem.” Analysis 55 (1995).

    But I guess Deane Galbraith says other wise so….

  • I think Timothy should stick to his banana argument to be honest – it is more scientifically sound.

    I look forward to your and Deane’s article on the epistemology and probability of miracles in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.

    The editors obviously are total idiots, as are the editors of Analysis, the monist, British journal for philosophy of science, and so on allowing this obviously banana pseudo stuff to get published.

  • “I find these probability arguments bizarre… It’s either true or it’s not”

    Let me put it another way. The probability that Jesus rose from the dead and ascended to heaven and sit at the right hand of the Father if Christianity is true is 100% – and if Christianity is false is 0%.

    One believes it or not believes it to the same degree that they assent to the claims of Christianity as a whole.

    I don’t think it is comparable to your “age of the earth example” because it is not an event which goes along with the usual laws of nature. If Jesus rose from the dead then an event which has a zero probability of happening happened. It could only happen due to divine intervention. So a debate about the probability of this zero probability event is meaningless.

    “focusing on how the ‘data’ fits two models that might explain it ”

    The problem is I could make up any sort of whacky theory and pick out prior probability numbers and do exactly the same thing to show how likely my crackpot theory is. The author has decided what the conclusion is and has picked a model and prior probabilities to make sure the result he wants comes up. This is so embarrassingly obvious that it is painful.

  • Just for you Matt, because I know you like pretentious Latin expressions: What a Non sequitur!

  • Yes yes – I am well aware of the embarrassing use of probability in the field of philosophy and theology… this list strengthens my opinion of this. But has this article been examined by a real statistician/mathematician?

  • there are no priors in that analysis

  • I see, so, apparently the whole field of probability theory in epistemology is bunk. None of the specialists in that field understand the issues. I Got it.

    The lengths people will go to to maintian the “evangelicals are thick” stero-type is always amusing.

    I

  • No Max, the claim is not a non sequitur, the suggestion you (and Deane) made was not that ,Tim was mistaken, it was that his understanding of probability lacked any rational merit at all, was pusedo scholarship and in your words the equivalent of the “banana” argument. That would mean that every editor and reviewer of multiple philosophical journals, including the Stanford, was incompetent.

  • My God! I just went to the excruciating effort of reading the article in full… and it is embarrassing! I am sorry Timothy but are you serious???

    Constantly he is dismissing other theories by assigning them arbitrary probabilities – then using these in calculations.

    I could do the same thing with respect to UFO abductees claims. Make a strong claim that “naturalistic (non Alien) explanations of these events can be given a probability of 0.0001 for each of the 50,000 Abductee claimants and come up with some outrageous livelihood ratio… and thus conclude… what? I guess one could do the same thing for Lochness monster sightings (I assign a probability of a given individual making up a lochness encounter to be 0.0001 as very few people wish to be ridiculed. And to argue that ALL of the lochness monster viewers suffered from a delusion is so unlikely – what is the chance that all of them suffered from a mental illness?) Now you may think i am being stupid here.. but these are the sorts of argument Timothy uses in his article over and over again!

  • Lets look at the argument itself Matt rather than arguing by pulling up lists of articles and saying an argument must be good because such and such wrote it. A topic for next friday maybe?

  • My question was – what do you think a real mathematician would make of this sort of argument. I am well aware that philosophers do odd things with probability all the time. How about you send this off to a few statistics departments and see what the experts on probability in those departments make of it. I don’t think it would get a favorable response to be honest.

  • Lets look at the argument itself Matt rather than arguing by pulling up lists of articles and saying an argument must be good because such and such wrote it. A topic for next friday maybe?

    Max, you seem to misunderstand me here. I was not saying Tim’s argument was sound because it was peer reviewed, that would be fallacious. I make no claim on whether the argument is successful or not.

    What I was arguing, is that the fact that Tim’s work in probability theory and confirmation theory and so on has passed peer review numerous times, mean’s it’s implausible to dismiss his argument on the grounds that he clearly is an ignoramus about probability theory so his thinking is on par with the “banana” argument.

    I think there is a big difference between saying X’s argument is unsound and “X is a total fool who knows nothing about the subject his argument is so obviously flawed that anyone who knows any thing about the subject will reject it”.

    I suspect you know the difference. Unsound articles survive peer review all the time people don’t reject articles for review simply because they disagree with them. Articles which fail to meet any competent standard in a subject typically do not meet peer review.

  • “… it’s implausible to dismiss his argument on the grounds that he clearly is an ignoramus about probability theory so his thinking is on par with the “banana” argument.”

    It is plausible if his argument is crap – and not plausible if his argument is not crap. You are still committing the same fallacy – if a slightly more subtle version of it.

    “…articles which fail to meet any competent standard in a subject typically do not meet peer review.”

    Yes but again you have missed my point. I contend that this would not pass peer review by real mathematicians. That is the point, Yes theologians accept this nonsense… and philosophers too.. but my question is whether it would pass peer review by real mathematicians.

  • Max

    I think again we are having a communication problem. I am not saying that one can’t dismiss an argument as crap if you examine it and it is in fact crap.

    If that was all Deane was doing, I would not have a problem. If Deane examined the argument, accurately represented it, offered critique of the premises and or argument form, that would be perfectly legitimate critique. No matter where it was published.

    But that’s not what I see Deane doing, what I see him doing is a very different thing. He was suggesting that no person informed about the subject could even consider that a competent piece of scholarship. That Tim is some kind of pseudo-academic with little or no understanding of the subject.

    This is a different claim one is a claim about an argument another is a claim about a persons credentials and about how other credentialed people will act. The truth conditions of these claims are quite different. If a person contends that no one informed about the subject can consider X a competent piece of scholarship. The existence of several different people who are informed about the subject who consider it worthy of publication refutes this claim. Similarly the claim that a person is a pseudo academic who knows nothing about a subject is refuted if the person is a qualified academic in a particular field, has studied a subject in that produced numerous pieces research in that subject that have on multiple occasions been accepted for publication, in the top journals in that field, and is invited by the top people in the field to contribute to writings on that subject to the major anthologies, texts in the field and so on.

    The claim that Tim is a pseudo academic whose work on probability and confirmation theory is such that no one informed on that subject could see as competent. Is I think simply refuted by the facts. By any non circular definition Tim is a qualified academic and his work is considered competent by people who work in confirmation and probability theory.These are simply facts. If Deane wants to respond he is welcome to address Tim’s actual argument, but academic character assassination is not such a response.

  • I feel very odd being on Matt’s side of an arguement but…

    M,

    Why would you need a mathematician to review this piece? i agree that the way that get their likelihoods is a bit of a joke – but that’s obvious to anyone that reads it. It’s not a matter probability theory, and there’s nothing wrong with the maths, it’s just the garbage that gets put into the formulae that wrong.

    As to your point that the resurrection is true under Christianity and impossible under anything else. Isn’t that the point? If that’s the case, then the probability you place on the resurrection having happened is equal to you belief that Christianity is true. It there really was convincing historical evidence that Jesus was raised from the dead it would be case for Christianity.

  • Max,

    If you have an actual argument to put forward, as opposed to a load of snarky invective, by all means do. If you can find any formula in the paper that is incorrect, or even a typo, we’d be most interested to know.

    As for disagreement regarding particular Bayes factors, interested readers might want to see for themselves what we say about this matter on pp. 30 and 40.

    For the record, yes, a professional mathematician (Eric Vestrup, author of The Theory of Measures and Integration (Wiley, 2003)) read through the whole paper before it was submitted for publication.

  • Matt:

    You seem to be talking to Deane not me… although he had not commented on here…

    David:

    To an extent I agree with you. The mathematics is fine and the problem is the old computer science saying: “Trash in; trash out.” However part of the job of a statistician is to make sure that trash is not going in in the first place!

    “It there really was convincing historical evidence that Jesus was raised from the dead it would be case for Christianity.”

    I think my point is that unless you already have the theism framework, then evidence of the resurrection will not be evidence for theism. I could rewrite Tim’s entire paper with an “Alien hallucination ray” as the reason that people saw what they saw and get this amazing result that it is far more likely that the Alien hypothesis is true than other alternative hypothesis – including the theism one. Once you have Alien hallucination rays as part of your world view the evidence for them from this story will be vast! You could do this with a “Jesus-the-creature-from-the-center-of-the-earth-who-could-emulate-death” theory as well – or any other weird thing you can think up!

    Tim:

    the points I made were legitimate criticisms of your shonky methodology. Answer them or not (*shrug*). As I said to David the maths is all sound.. but as David says: trash in -> trash out. And this seems to be the best summary of your paper.

  • And Tim – I am not sure I said any formula were wrong… I said your assignment of arbitrary numbers was shonky – as I illustrated in my Lochness example.

  • Max here is what you originally said

    But seriously. You (Matt) say that Timothy is an expert in probability theory.., without me cyber stalking him could you just outline what his qualifications in this area are? Also – has this idea been assessed by any mathematics/statistics departments? What do you think an expert on Bayesian probability theory would make of this… has it been peer reviewed by any experts in mathematics/probability?

    Here you insinuated that Tim was not knowledgeable on probability theory and any one who was an expert on Bayesian probability theory would recognise this.

  • “Here you insinuated that Tim was not knowledgeable on probability theory and any one who was an expert on Bayesian probability theory would recognise this.”

    Yes they would recognize that he is misusing the discipline. Ie. the “trash in” part. I still think this is the case – so what?

  • Max,

    Thanks for acknowledging that the mathematics is, from a formal perspective, unobjectionable. That’s progress, given that you walked in trying to cast aspersions on our competence with probability theory.

    Why you think that statisticians should have a special ability to assess the plausibility of certain historical and philosophical claims is still a mystery. Perhaps your stats training was all among the frequentists. If that is where your objections are coming from, then you should at least acknowledge that you are simply ranging yourself on one side of a battle over the nature of probability and the scope of probabilistic reasoning that goes far beyond this particular issue.

    I note for the record that, so far, you haven’t actually provided an argument against any particular claim in the paper. Your Loch Ness example does not constitute such an argument, any more than it would be an argument against the resurrection to say that other people have believed firmly in other religions. One cannot argue by proxy on an issue like this.

  • “Thanks for acknowledging that the mathematics is, from a formal perspective, unobjectionable. That’s progress, given that you walked in trying to cast aspersions on our competence with probability theory.”

    Not what I meant at all. I said you were misusing the methods. Which I still maintain. Part of understanding probability and statistical methods is knowing when it is appropriate to use certain tools and when it is not. This is the art rather than science part of the discipline.

    “Why you think that statisticians should have a special ability to assess the plausibility of certain historical and philosophical claims is still a mystery.”

    Not sure i ever said that… but they would see through what you are doing here pretty quick.

    “Perhaps your stats training was all among the frequentists…..”

    Nothing to do with the matter. Good use of jargon though…

    “Loch Ness example does not constitute such an argument, any more than it would be an argument against the resurrection to say that other people have believed firmly in other religions….”

    My point was that I – or anyone else – could construct an argument identical to your one by choosing out of a hat low probabilities for such and such an event. My alien ray example would for example come up with the same result as your paper… especially if I decided to pull out of a hat that the probability of seeing these events given Theism was true was very low – say one in a million? Where would i get this figure from? Well basically I would make it up to make sure the numbers came out the way I wanted (as you did) – but I could come up with a justification if pressed. From a Jewish perspective say – which sees the idea of an incarnational God as impossible – a very very low probability of the Jesus resurrection happening – and the reports of the disciples being reliable given Theism is true could be assigned. But the probability of the recorded events given that there were aliens with mind altering rays whizzing around in flying saucers is very high….

    Basically this means that you can dercde before hand whatever whacky theory you want.. pick numbers to make sure you get this result – them come up with justifications for these numbers… in other words.. argue entirely backwards. Which is not how a reputable statistician… Bayesian or otherwise 😉 would go about their work.

    I mean lets be honest here. You did not start of with no idea what the result was going to be and then honestly assign numbers not knowing where they were leading! Please! This is the most transparent bit of pseudo science I have seen in a long time. You are not fooling anyone.

  • I am half tempted to replicate your paper arguing in favor of the alien mind ray… but it would be a lot of effort for little gain. I think people get the point.

  • Max,

    You write:

    “My point was that I – or anyone else – could construct an argument identical to your one by choosing out of a hat low probabilities for such and such an event.”

    The numbers were not “chosen out of a hat.” You are free to disagree with them, but we provided some considerations in favor of each one. If you don’t think the considerations substantiate the numbers, we can discuss that.

    “Where would i get this figure from? Well basically I would make it up to make sure the numbers came out the way I wanted (as you did)”

    Do you have an argument to back up this insult, or is it *just* an insult?

    ” – but I could come up with a justification if pressed. From a Jewish perspective say – which sees the idea of an incarnational God as impossible – a very very low probability of the Jesus resurrection happening – and the reports of the disciples being reliable given Theism is true could be assigned. But the probability of the recorded events given that there were aliens with mind altering rays whizzing around in flying saucers is very high….”

    Why should one think that? Supposing for the sake of argument that there were aliens with mind-altering rays, why would we expect them to do that rather than doing something more useful — like teaching you good manners, for example?

    “I mean lets be honest here. You did not start of with no idea what the result was going to be and then honestly assign numbers not knowing where they were leading!”

    My motives, be they ever so disreputable, are irrelevant to the argument. That aside, of course I undertook the project persuaded that there is a strong case to be made in favor of the conclusion; otherwise, I would not have accepted the invitation to write it. I did not, however, pick a target number in advance and then work toward it by selecting Bayes factors for their contribution to that goal.

    If you would like to discuss the matter like a grown man, avoiding this sort of gratuitous slander would be a good first step.

    “Please! This is the most transparent bit of pseudo science I have seen in a long time. You are not fooling anyone.”

    Max, I appreciate the fact that you feel strongly about this issue. But you are substituting insult for argument. If you cannot learn to speak civilly to those with whom you disagree, you should not expect to be taken seriously — and you should certainly not expect to be taken for a Christian.

  • “Why should one think that? Supposing for the sake of argument that there were aliens with mind-altering rays, why would we expect them to do that rather than doing something more useful — like teaching you good manners, for example?”

    Its my made up cosmology. My imaginary entities will be as I define them to be and likely to to what i define them to be likely to to – just like your ones Tim. This question is a non-starter and if you did not immediately see it applied equally to your theory I don’t know where to start with you. Lets not be personal though huh? I mean why didn’t your God do something useful like giving you a decent haircut?

    I did not, however, pick a target number in advance and then work toward it by selecting Bayes factors for their contribution to that goal.

    “If you would like to discuss the matter like a grown man, avoiding this sort of gratuitous slander would be a good first step.”

    Its not slander – it is my honest assessment of the process you used.

    “Max, I appreciate the fact that you feel strongly about this issue. But you are substituting insult for argument.”

    Not at all – I have pointed out that using the methodology you use I could come up with a similar argument to support any rubbish I felt like making up. This makes your conclusion entirely worthless. This is not slander – it is not personal – it is in fact a knockdown argument against your paper. Now if you want to ignore this and not address the real issue and instead try to teach me about morals and politeness feel free to do so – maybe that is your real calling?

    “…and you should certainly not expect to be taken for a Christian.”

    Here we go! Bring it brother! I love it when the “you are not a real Christian” arguments get rolled out. Is this the equivalent of shut up or face excommunication for evangelicals? Rhetorical question – no need to reply – but its a little silly. It LOOKS like you can’t face the fact that i have exposed your article as bunk and so your only response is to declare me a heretic! And since the argument has been reduced to that I will leave it at that.

  • (and for the record Timmy boy – you are the one who started with the personal insults first.. so don’t try that one on.

  • “Its my made up cosmology. My imaginary entities will be as I define them to be and likely to to what i define them to be likely to to …”

    Well, then, we have a pretty significant disanalogy between your procedure and ours, since we actually made assessments that are plausible in light of what we know of human nature, whereas by your own admission your *only* way of picking numbers is to pack the probabilities into the alien hypothesis.

    “– just like your ones Tim.”

    You keep asserting this. Either provide evidence for your claim or retract it.

    “This question is a non-starter and if you did not immediately see it applied equally to your theory I don’t know where to start with you.”

    Then clearly, you don’t know where to start.

    “Lets not be personal though huh? I mean why didn’t your God do something useful like giving you a decent haircut?”

    Has it really not occurred to you that when you described our work as “embarrassing,” “arbitrary,” “stupid,” “crap,” “trash,” and “pseudo science,” you have invited comment on your lack of manners? And yet an aspersion on my personal appearance is the cleverest thing you can find to say in defense of your running your mouth.

    I wrote:

    “I did not, however, pick a target number in advance and then work toward it by selecting Bayes factors for their contribution to that goal.

    “If you would like to discuss the matter like a grown man, avoiding this sort of gratuitous slander would be a good first step.”

    To which you respond:

    “Its not slander – it is my honest assessment of the process you used.”

    Pardon me: how are you supposed to have divined the process? Telepathy?

    I wrote:

    “Max, I appreciate the fact that you feel strongly about this issue. But you are substituting insult for argument.”

    To which you respond:
    “Not at all – I have pointed out that using the methodology you use I could come up with a similar argument to support any rubbish I felt like making up. This makes your conclusion entirely worthless.”

    You have, in fact, *not* done this; you have only *claimed* that you could do it, and your only gesture toward actually doing it involves your packing your hypothesis by giving your aliens specific purposes and intentions rather than your appealing, as we do, to well-known aspects of human behavior.

    But even if you *had* done it, and even if you were right and our conclusion really *were* worthless, it would not follow that we had picked a number in advance and then selected Bayes factors that would lead to that goal. That is the slander. Put up – reveal to us your telepathic powers – or retract the claim.

    “This is not slander – it is not personal – it is in fact a knockdown argument against your paper.”

    It is nothing of the sort. And if you were even half as bright as you clearly think you are, you should know better.

    “It LOOKS like you can’t face the fact that i have exposed your article as bunk and so your only response is to declare me a heretic!”

    On the contrary: you walked in and used a pile of pejorative epithets from the get-go. Now you are trying to hide behind your transparently bad attempt at a reductio by parallel argument without having pointed to even one actual claim in our paper against which you have an argument.

    I don’t think you’re a heretic. For all I know, your theology is impeccable. I think you’re rude – astonishingly, childishly, embarrassingly rude.

    As this is a matter entirely within your control, it is a very serious character flaw. It also makes it very unpleasant for anyone to try have a discussion with you.

  • “Well, then, we have a pretty significant disanalogy between your procedure and ours, since we actually made assessments that are plausible in light of what we know of human nature,”

    Missing the point again Tim. We both use the same assessments of human nature. We both have some odd explanation for how the observations the humans had came about.

    “You keep asserting this. Either provide evidence for your claim or retract it.”

    I don’t need to provide evidence for it. All I need to do is demonstrate that the same result you have come up with could be created for 1000 other scenarios. Now your result is just one out of 1000 or 10,000 competing theories each of which, using the same methodology, is much more likely that all of the others.

    “Then clearly, you don’t know where to start.”

    Clever quip.. but does not really an answer now is it?

    “Has it really not occurred to you that when you described our work as “embarrassing,” “arbitrary,” “stupid,” “crap,” “trash,” and “pseudo science,” you have invited comment on your lack of manners?”

    These are an assessment of your work. Not of you as an individual. I don’t know you. I have no need to insult you. I certainly would not question your faith as a Christian based on the paper or your comments on this post.

    “And yet an aspersion on my personal appearance is the cleverest thing you can find to say in defense of your running your mouth.”

    No Tim. This was a parody of the sort of things you were saying about me. I was trying to point out to you that you were diverting the conversation from one about the paper into a personal attack on me. Now maybe I was just a little too subtle. You have a nice haircut Tim.

    “Its not slander – it is my honest assessment of the process you used.”

    See above.

    “That is the slander. Put up – reveal to us your telepathic powers – or retract the claim.”

    No. This is my assessment of the methodology. It is not “slander”. It is not accusing you of any crime – not attacking you as a person. I disagree with your paper and methodology – throwing legal terms around will not bully me into changing my mind any more than calling me a heretic will. Sorry. I think you are wrong. I think it is a bad paper. Don’t worry about it – I am not even an academic in your field. Don’t take it so personally. Get over it

    ” I think you’re rude – astonishingly, childishly, embarrassingly rude.”

    Pot – Kettle. But to be honest I am not interested in your personal attributes as much as you are in mine – but in the content of your paper. Let the personal stuff go OK?

    “As this is a matter entirely within your control, it is a very serious character flaw. It also makes it very unpleasant for anyone to try have a discussion with you.”

    Get over it.

  • Max,

    You write:

    “(and for the record Timmy boy – you are the one who started with the personal insults first.. so don’t try that one on.”

    Lest anyone be tempted to take Max’s word for it, here is the timeline, easily verified by looking above:

    “banana argument” — Max, May 10, 2011 at 3:11 pm

    “crackpot theory” — Max, May 10, 2011 at 5:59 pm

    “embarrassing” — Max, May 10, 2011 at 6:02 pm and May 10, 2011 at 6:43 pm

    “arbitrary” — Max, May 10, 2011 at 6:43 pm

    “crap” — Max, May 11, 2011 a5 1:36 am

    “If you have an actual argument to put forward, as opposed to a load of snarky invective, by all means do.” — Tim, first reply to Max, May 11, 2011 at 11:49 am

  • “I don’t need to provide evidence for it.”

    Well, then, there’s not much to discuss, is there?

  • Yes Timmy. YOUR insulting nature finally goaded me into snapping back a couple of insults myself. I should not have let you do this. But perhaps look at yourself before attacking a stranger next time. Anyway – I have said all that needs to be said.

  • And by the by Tim. All of those comments were about your theory – not your person. So quoting them out of context is dishonest as well as pointless. Get over it. I am not interested in your personal opinion of me really. One last thing I will say though is that deciding that a stranger is not a Christian because of an intellectual dispute – or even a personal one (which is the way you seem to have seen it) is never justified in my view. I would not say this about you. Why? I don’t know anything about you. Please in future keep this in mind. Cheers.

  • Does “M” have an actual argument against the Article in question?

    So far i can’t see one.

  • I have said all I am going to say: Read above. If you disagree with my argument that is fine. I won’t take it personally 😉

  • “I have said all I am going to say: Read above. If you disagree with my argument that is fine. I won’t take it personally”

    I hope you won’t take it personally if I agree with those who can’t seem to find a single argument in any of your posts.

  • OK – Eric. That is fine. I realize that your dispute is with what I have written and not a personal attack on me. I am capable of seeing this subtle distinction. I think you have missed the point – but that is fine. You *may* even still be a Christian despite this 😉

  • @ Tim:

    “My motives, be they ever so disreputable, are irrelevant to the argument. That aside, of course I undertook the project persuaded that there is a strong case to be made in favor of the conclusion; otherwise, I would not have accepted the invitation to write it. I did not, however, pick a target number in advance and then work toward it by selecting Bayes factors for their contribution to that goal. ”

    I found that statement to be quite disturbing. Alot of your critics are looking at the former and will need quite some persuading that the latter did not happen.

  • @Paul

    How does Tim prove your negative about what he as actually trying to say?

  • Dumb spelling mistake I left out a “w”

    “was actually etc”

  • @ Ben Yachov

    “How does Tim prove your negative about what he as actually trying to say?”

    That’s a very good question and I’m not sure that there is a clear answer.

    What might help would be if Tim, specifically, published a paper that used the same methodologies to arrive at a similar conclusion for a non-Christian faith position. This would add some credence to any claim of a lack of bias. Otherwise the elephant in the room will be the accusation that Tim and Lynda were highly unlikely (perhaps to the same level of improbability) to arrive at any other result.

    To quote Mandy Rice-Davies “Well, he would, wouldn’t he.”

    Tim needs to show that that assumption is unwarranted.