Thursday, March 5, 2020

my miracle-challenge to Zachary Cawley

Zachary Cawley describes himself thus:

Joined Jun 26, 2016 Description
Zachary Cawley, here! I am a Christian apologist that also delves into anarcho-capitalism (the anarchist variant of Libertariansim). I aim for accuracy, which means the diseased fundammentalism espoused by a great many atheists and fellow Christians is out of the question!  
If you like what I create, you can support me by donating crypto! If this is a good enough success, A MakerSupport and (maybe) a Patreon will be justifiable! Ask me for the BTC, ETC, ETH BTCP, LTC addresses! YOu can help me obtain TUBES for Bittube by registering on the Airtime/Bittube plugin with this referring link: https://bittubeapp.com?ref#!undefined
See here

Concerning the issue of whether miracles can happen, Cawley went to James Patrick Holding's YouTube channel and defiantly joined in Holding's mockery of the skeptical view, by saying

Seems like Jesus could have also filled them in later. Gospel of John has several encounters between Jesus and his disciples after the Resurrection with plenty of opportunity for conversation and teaching.
tektontvtektontv2 weeks ago"But that assoomes mirakles happin durrrrrr...."
9Zachary CawleyZachary Cawley2 weeks ago@tektontv Oh! But, James! Simply saying miracles are improbable makes it so! Dun'cha know!? Lol

See here.

So I did what I do best, and challenged this individual to put his money where his mouth is, by sending the following message to his "discussion" forum at his own YouTube Account.  My message was:
I noticed the following comment you posted over at tektontv:
Zachary Cawley2 weeks ago
@tektontv Oh! But, James! Simply saying miracles are improbable makes it so! Dun'cha know!? Lol------------------
I'm an atheist, and I'm willing to discuss with you my defense that the skeptical view of miracles is more reasonable and academically justifiable than the Christian view 
You can contact me at my blog by responding to articles I've already posted challenging Craig Keener and others, see https://turchisrong.blogspot.com/2017/12/my-questions-to-dr-craig-keener.html
https://turchisrong.blogspot.com/2019/06/craig-keener-failing-again-to-take.html
https://turchisrong.blogspot.com/2019/11/the-faces-of-miracles-serialized-ebook.html
https://turchisrong.blogspot.com/2017/07/demolishing-triablogue-part-4-steve.html 
Or you can respond to me by email.  barryjoneswhat@gmail.com 
Here is the screenshot:



I've preserved the challenge like that since there is a chance it will be quietly deleted, as quiet deletions are usually what happen to my challenges.  See here for the original post.

So I guess only time will tell:  Did Mr. Cawley mock the naturalistic view because he has sufficient education about the philosophy of miracles to actually back up with robust argument his obvious belief that miracle-skeptics are unreasonable? 

Or was there a reason the bible warned people to watch out for "Christians" whose zeal exceeded their knowledge?  If converted Christians could maintain stupidity despite their zeal back in the 1st century (Acts 18:26), then apparently, being zealous to the point of talking all bold, does NOT place the skeptic under an intellectual obligation to either believe the  message or admit their own stupidity. 

Something more than high-strung polemics must be engaged before there can be any game in play for the skeptic to "lose".

Yes, I'm pretty sure Christian apologists will take this challenge as a sign that I just run away from arguments and cry whenever it looks like somebody might challenge me.

YEAH.

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