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Doug
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Debate News

Post by Doug »

DOUG KRUEGER writes:
I finally have the details about the exact location of that resurrection debate I'm doing next week.

Doug Krueger v Phil Fernandes
"Did Jesus Christ Rise from the Dead?"


Location: State University of New York, Oswego, NY.
Venue: Sheldon Hall Ballroom.
Date: April 16, 2010.
Time: 6pm.

Sponsors: The Outpouring Church of Oswego, Christian Campus Ministries, ( A registered Student Association Organization) and the Oswego Evangelical Alliance (a group of local churches from various denominations who work together regularly on various projects).

Darrel Henschell is going as my videographer. If you know anyone in the area, tell them to go to the debate. It's free.
"We could have done something important Max. We could have fought child abuse or Republicans!" --Oona Hart (played by Victoria Foyt), in the 1995 movie "Last Summer in the Hamptons."
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Re: Debate News

Post by Doug »

DOUG writes:
Phil Fernandes took 1 minute or so of our debate, when he asked me a question about whether I still held, as I wrote in my book, that Hume was correct that testimony is never enough to establish a miracle.

I had replied in the debate that I have "softened" on that somewhat because I don't want to dogmatically declare that it would be impossible to ever establish a miracle. So I would not rule out the use of testimony.

Fernandes put that on YouTube as "Douglas Krueger Caught Contradicting Himself."

See here.

Oh, and the video clip YouTube page does not allow comments. Typical!

The comment about the video is interesting. It says that I am open to the possibility of miracles in the debate, but that in my book I agreed with Hume, as if the two positions are contradictory. But this assumes that Hume was not open to the possibility of miracles. I don't read Hume that way; Hume is open to the possibility of miracles, it's just that none have been proven and testimony is not sufficient to show that a miracle has taken place. So I have not contradicted myself. I don't think Hume was saying that miracles can be ruled out a priori. However, fundamentalists like to insist that Hume was indeed saying the latter so they can characterize Hume as close-minded and biased.

Fernandes' video clip will be very useful to me in showing how fundamentalists do not treat their audience with respect. The fundamentalists simply parrot narrow interpretations of Hume both uncharitably--because there are other interpretations of Hume that they refuse to recognize--and dishonestly--because the fundamentalists do not want people to know that there are other interpretations of Hume.

I guess William Lane Craig really liked that clip of me allegedly contradicting myself, as well as the whole debate. William Lane Craig's YouTube channel has a log of videos he has "favorited." He "favorited" the 1-minute video clip. In fact, Craig "favorited" the video of the whole debate.

From David Hume, An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, Section X, "Of Miracles," part II:
"...suppose, all authors, in all languages, agree, that, from the first of January, 1600, there was a total darkness over the whole earth for eight days: suppose that the tradition of this extraordinary event is still strong and lively among the people: that all travellers, who return from foreign countries, bring us accounts of the same tradition, without the least variation or contradiction: it is evident, that our present philosophers, instead of doubting the fact, ought to receive it as certain, and ought to search for the causes whence it might be derived. The decay, corruption, and dissolution of nature, is an event rendered probable by so many analogies, that any phenomenon, which seems to have a tendency towards that catastrophe, comes within the reach of human testimony, if that testimony be very extensive and uniform."
However, Hume was adamant that no such extensive, expert, widespread, and uniform testimony of a miracle could be found in the annals of human history:
"...there is not to be found, in all history, any miracle attested by a sufficient number of men, of such unquestioned goodsense, education, and learning, as to secure us against all delusion in themselves; of such undoubted integrity, as to place them beyond all suspicion of any design to deceive others; of such credit and reputation in the eyes of mankind, as to have a great deal to lose in case of their being detected in any falsehood; and at the same time, attesting facts performed in such a public manner and in so celebrated a part of the world, as to render the detection unavoidable: all which circumstances are requisite to give us a full assurance in the testimony of men." --Ibid.
The latter quotation strongly indicates that Hume was open to the possibility that belief in a miracle could be justified if the testimony was strong enough--based on experts, in sufficient numbers, of "undoubted integrity," etc. etc. So the claim that Hume ruled out the possibility of belief in a miracle seems quite mistaken.

And note that Hume is only talking about believing in a miracle based on testimony. He is not ruling out belief in miracles based on personal observation, and nowhere in his writings does he rule out the possibility of miracles in general. Hume was not as narrow-minded as the fundamentalists try to pretend.
Last edited by Doug on Wed Oct 06, 2010 1:32 am, edited 3 times in total.
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kwlyon
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Re: Debate News

Post by kwlyon »

Typical unethical rhetoric from a creationist. Why is it that the moral minority never can seem to behave themselves? At any rate, Doug, I would love to watch this debate, however the youtube video has horrible audio. Any chance you have a copy that is a little cleaner?

**Never mind...the audio cleans up pretty quickly...
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Re: Debate News

Post by Dardedar »

kwlyon wrote: **Never mind...the audio cleans up pretty quickly...
DAR
Yeah, not sure if that was a dirty tape head or a problem with the upload, but as you note, it's just at the beginning, nothing important lost at all. Maybe we should make a note about that in case people get discouraged from watching. The people running this thing had two big fancy cameras, where is their tape? Why isn't it online?

Someone should ask if Lame Craig, who only debates people with a Ph.D., would consider debating Fernandes. After all, Fernandes claims on his books and on his material that he has a Ph.D., albeit a phony one from a diploma mill. Does that count Craig?

D.
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Re: Debate News

Post by kwlyon »

Darrel wrote:... Lame Craig, who only debates people with a Ph.D.,
I believe they set this criteria for two reasons. First, few people WITH a Ph.d. are willing to waist their time on him and thus he "wins by default". Second, and of equal importance, he wants to mooch off their credibility. Or as Dr. Nicholas Gotelli so eloquently phrased it, "That would look great on your CV...not so good on mine!"
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Re: Debate News

Post by Doug »

kwlyon wrote:
Darrel wrote:... Lame Craig, who only debates people with a Ph.D.,
I believe they set this criteria for two reasons. First, few people WITH a Ph.d. are willing to waist their time on him and thus he "wins by default". Second, and of equal importance, he wants to mooch off their credibility. Or as Dr. Nicholas Gotelli so eloquently phrased it, "That would look great on your CV...not so good on mine!"
DOUG
Of course, Craig doesn't really only debate people with Ph.d.'s. He only says that when he wants to decline to debate me or a few other people. After refusing to debate me 3 times because I don't have a Ph.d., Craig debated Ron Barrier, who has only a high school diploma--no college degrees at all.
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Re: Debate News

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Doug wrote:DOUG writes:
Phil Fernandes took 1 minute or so of our debate, when he asked me a question about whether I still held, as I wrote in my book, that Hume was correct that testimony is never enough to establish a miracle.
My error. Whoever put that 1-minute clip up on YouTube, it was not Phil Fernandes. He just wrote to me and let me know that it wasn't him, and also that he didn't think I had contradicted myself at all.

The ExposedAtheists group that put up the clip does not identify themselves, but I notice that they have one subscriber, William Lane Craig. Funny. This is a very bigoted and uninformed YouTube channel. For example, they put up a debate clip between an atheist and a theist with the "poisoning the well" caveat that the atheist "gives an emotional, arrogant, and bigoted presentation," and that the theist "responds rationally and analytically."

Anyway, the identity of the person responsible is not as important as the fact that their characterization of the clip is skewed. I'm glad it's not Fernandes. Maybe he and I can do another debate sometime.
"We could have done something important Max. We could have fought child abuse or Republicans!" --Oona Hart (played by Victoria Foyt), in the 1995 movie "Last Summer in the Hamptons."
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Re: Debate News

Post by Savonarola »

Doug wrote:The ExposedAtheists group that put up the clip does not identify themselves, but I notice that they have one subscriber, William Lane Craig.
... to whom you'll be sending a new debate challenge upon getting your Ph.D., right?

Last week, I spent some time watching some of Craig's bits on YouTube -- and I mean the ones that were pro-Craig, not ones that try to refute him -- and although he makes me think more than the average schmoe, I was very underwhelmed. The fact that he claims to love the Kalam argument so much but can't defend it without changing the first premise to include "comes from nothing" shows what a dishonest schmuck he is.
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Re: Debate News

Post by Doug »

Savonarola wrote:
Doug wrote:The ExposedAtheists group that put up the clip does not identify themselves, but I notice that they have one subscriber, William Lane Craig.
... to whom you'll be sending a new debate challenge upon getting your Ph.D., right?
DOUG
Yes.

And there is much to be underwhelmed about.
"We could have done something important Max. We could have fought child abuse or Republicans!" --Oona Hart (played by Victoria Foyt), in the 1995 movie "Last Summer in the Hamptons."
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