[angiosperm]

Thank you for that. The huff and bluster I encountered was in Ehrman's video appearances. I would never have guessed that he had actual arguments he just preferred never to mention in his presentations. I will see now if he has any.

Carrier has been very abrasive in the past, but not as I have seen lately. He might be said to have mellowed with age.

There is only one concrete fact of history here that is of any consequence: did Romans knowingly execute the instigator of the one cult that survived? I agree that we might never know. We need not trouble ourselves over Mary, Gadarene swine, or zombie dinner parties.

The charred scrolls in Herculaneum are deeply exciting for far more substantive reasons. We might find there was, or wasn't, a Jesus, and forget to care because of the important revelations.

[freedomben]

> The huff and bluster I encountered was in Ehrman's video appearances. I would never have guessed that he had actual arguments he just preferred never to mention in his presentations.

Haha, yeah that's fair. IMHO he's a great public speaker and I enjoy watching him, but he has been really bad at laying out his arguments against Carrier in videos. I think partly because he is a super classy (and incredibly nice) guy who hates personal insults and such, and a lot of interviewers try to juice the beef (because let's face it, it's entertaining :-) ). I think he's also just deeply uncomfortable with the whole topic because of past friction and tends to try to avoid diving into it.

> Carrier has been very abrasive in the past, but not as I have seen lately. He might be said to have mellowed with age.

That would be great! IMHO Carrier is one of the most interesting atheists nowadays, and he's very much inline stylistically with the new atheist movement from the 00s (which I kind of like actually), but I don't know if it's cultural change or what but that approach really turns a lot of lay people off now, leaving just people like us. I'd love to see his appeal broaden, and I'm excited to see the next generation of thought leaders (and partially afraid that there may not be any).

Regardless, thanks for the discussion! I've found your comments very interesting

[angiosperm]

Likewise!

Much more interesting, ultimately, than any of the actual arguments is the modern method of evaluating them. It's not foolproof (fools are clever!) but it offers a chance of results that amount to more than just one more opinion. Makes me think of the Enlightenment dream that one day all disputes could be resolved by "come, let us calculate": http://scihi.org/universal-academic-gottfried-wilhelm-leibni...

Atheism is growing by leaps and bounds, even in the US, I'm guessing in large part because evangelicals here have so enthusiastically embraced out-and-out grifters and con-men. I doubt promotion can claim much credit.