We can see from cases like the (false) believers at Lourdes and others that humans are really, really unreliable when they report miracles. Furthermore, the early Christians would have been highly disposed to believe supernatural claims about Jesus, they were ignorant of a wide range of psychological facts about humans and their religiousness, and the Jesus story has been filtered through a long process with the goal of promoting belief. I argue that these layers of doubt undermine the output--the resurrection story we now have. And we should not believe it.

1. Miracles and Probability from Lourdes to Lazarus Debate 2: Matt McCormick and Russell DiSilvestro

3. Suppose, charitably, that half experienced something they took to be supernatural.

4. 66 miracles have been declared to be real by the official investigating body of the Catholic church.

5. Provisional Miracle testimony reliability= .0000165

6. That is, humans are really, really bad at reporting miracles. They have hundreds of thousands or even millions of false reports for every real one (or worse.)

9. First century Christians would have been much more disposed to believe a wide range of supernatural claims, including a lot of false ones that you wouldn’t accept.

10. That is, their error rate with regard to supernatural claims would be high: they would conclude that miracles were more common than they really are, for example.

11. If there were supernatural ideas circulating about that were false or unfounded, this person would be more likely to believe them and repeat them.

13. So my ignorance about it should diminish the confidence you have about one of those claims being true, all other things being equal.

14. That’s why you shouldn’t believe me when I insist that the Detroit Lions will win the Superbowl.

16. Gallup Polls have consistently found similar results. (http://www.gallup.com/poll/109108/Belief-God-Far-Lower-Western-US.aspx)

18. Almost all of the information that you take for granted, the technology, and the methods for acquiring information were unavailable to them.

19. A tiny fraction of the population would have been literate.

20. Their mathematical abilities would have been worse than today’s average 3rd grader.

21. They did not know that the Earth moves, or what the Sun was.

22. They did not know what electricity, hydrogen are.

23. They did not know what caused disease, or pregnancy, or death.

25. Worries about the Repeaters: Organic Memory- humans revise, edit, fabricate memories, and then conceal the changes to themselves. Confirmation Bias- the tendency to note events that favor a favored belief while neglecting counter evidence. Source Amnesia- we recall claims, but forget the sources or whether they are true.

26. Author Problems The Mark Bottle Neck- Matthew and Luke copied from Mark. Possibly independent lines of information dwindle 2 or 3. Inconsistent/contradictory stories- one angel, two angels, Jesus, no Jesus, empty, Mary by herself, with others, tells disciples, doesn’t tell disciples, runs away, stays. . . Mark’s New Ending- Mark ends at 16:8 in oldest versions. 16:9-20 (Resurrected Jesus returns) is added 100-150 years later.

27. Copier Problems Ideological and Evangelical revisions, harmonizations-we know of thousands of additions, subtractions, and edits driven by ideological convictions, and the goal of “correcting” the various works to get them to align. How many more have we not detected? Copy errors-the Carpenter Problem- there is a single mention of Jesus being a carpenter in the Gospels, suppose that had said “tax collector,” or “magician”? Counter evidence problem-To be justified, we need to know that alternative explanations were investigated. No such evidence would have survived through centuries of filtering and copying, even if it was there. We can’t take materials that have been carefully groomed for centuries for the specific purpose of propagating the resurrection story, and then when we fail to find evidence in them that something else happened, proclaim the resurrection to be validated.

28. Canonization Problems Thousands of early Christian documents, many of them with very different accounts of Jesus and Christian doctrine were deliberately sifted and culled to create a single, unified (sort of) narrative. To look back and marvel at the coherence or unity of the Bible, or to cite them as evidence in favor of the resurrection story commits the Texas Sharpshooter Fallacy—the Jesus Sharpshooters. Counter Evidence Problem-if there was information that would have disproven R, it would not have survive the centuries of deliberate culling.

29. An Amplification of Doubts Oldest surv. copies Gospels written Canon created R? Salem Witch Trial Problem Jesus Sharpshooter Problem Counter Evidence Problem Canonizers Ideological Revisions Copy Errors Counter Evidence Problem Harmonizations Copiers Authors Mark Bottle Neck Contradictions There are too many doubts between me and the alleged event for me to conclude that it happened. Organic Memory Confirmation Bias Source Amnesia SBT Repeaters 1. Lourdes Prob. 2. Bereavement Hallucinations Asch Effect SBT Gorilla Problem Alleged eyewitnesses

30. Conclusion The historical evidence is too poor for me to conclude reasonably that the resurrection of Jesus happened.