Perhaps he could try cleaving, if only for a change?

(This is a post I've previously posted in response to the exact same post by the exact same Marvin99). Freethinkaluva, who wrote the stuff Marvin99 is posting all over the internet, has misunderstood quite a bit of what Carrier is saying.

For a more in-depth review of D.M. Murdocks' The Christ Conspiracy with clear documentation that the review has read and understood what Murdock is saying I will direct you to my project - http://somerationalism.blogspot.com . If you look closely at these, you find many of Murdock's sources misunderstood their own sources, many of them cannot point at any solid evidence for wide-ranging claims, many of her twentieth century sources either don't understand their sources or make shit up wholesale (e.g. James Churchward, who claimed to have access to stone tablets from the sunken continent of Mu). A surprising amount of Murdock's claims rely on sources with those or even worse problems. Meanwhile, she is very meticulous about documenting trivial claims - the kind of claims no one would question - and several hundred of the references in The Christ Conspiracy are thus entirely superfluous. The remainder - still about a thousand - are either to sources that genuinely are worthless, or to sources that Murdock misrepresents.

The significance of Carrier's admission that astrotheology is dull in his view is overstated by Freethinkaluva. Modern scholarship is such a huge mass of literature and disciplines that no one can have the time to study every field - ten lifetimes is not enough, fifty lifetimes is not enough either. Carrier focusing on what he feels is more productive scholarly endeavours is fully in his right. Alas, Freethinkaluva is carrying out a "smear campaign" against Carrier, and as usual loves to accuse everyone else of exactly such smear campaigns.

Regarding the age of Bayes's theorem, it is important to realize that in maths, theorems are tested very rigorously in ways that simply is not possible in any other discipline. With regards to probability calculus, they are even tested empirically, both as individual studies and meta-studies. Nevertheless, even then dr. Carrier won't have learned Bayes's theorem from any 19th century sources, but modern text-books by mathematicians that have carefully studied these topics. Carrier is not being hypocritical by applying Bayes' theorem, he is being genuinely scholarly. Murdock's old sources are problematic because in the fields from which she gathers her data, 18th and 19th century scholars often were not particularly good - their methodology was thoroughly flawed. Maths has been significantly more solid for way longer.

Contrast that with the problems I highlight in my blog previously. The distinction is not just one of degree, it's one of science vs. pseudoscience, it's one of genuine search for truth and understanding vs. misleading your audience. Freethinkaluva is quite far from having even the slightest sense of scholarliness, and Murdock's fans should be ashamed of Murdock having FTL as her forum moderator. Even then, Murdock's fans should be ashamed of Murdock's disregard for good scholarly practice.

Are the 'fans' actually much bothered about scholarship?

If they were, would they be likely to be fans?

I don't think its a question of being a fan any longer the following seems almost cult like. In my opinion I do not much believe that was intended but it has all the signs and symptoms. Personally I think they are wasting their energy and time on this because I do not believe that Carrier will ever issue this apology they are asking for. If her (Murdock's) work is that great it should stand on it's own and not have to be propped up by over zealous supporters. Me? I like most of her work but I have not gone to great lengths to check her sources as some have done. Quite frankly I do not think that the Mythicist position will ever gain enough traction to sway the common belief that jesus was real and not a composite of other earlier Gods or Goddesses. I have read where a lot of Atheists are not on board with this theory and that could be the detrimental nail in the coffin.

Her (Murdock's) work almost has the feel of alternate history or is it just me?

Her (Murdock's) work almost has the feel of alternate history or is it just me?

It does remind me of the ancient aliens croowd.

I don't think the Ancient Alien crowd has carried it quite that far cannot say for sure because I have not kept up with that crowd for a while.

Zwaarddijk, I thank you for going through all the trouble that you have, analyzing Acharya S's claims in gory detail.

Most other critics might have found a few elementary mistakes, and stopped there. Sort of like how how most critics of Immanuel Velikovsky's work have handled it. But Carl Sagan was once discussing Worlds in Collision with a distinguished professor of Semitic literatures, and while that professor considered Velikovsky's work nonsensical there, he was impressed by all the astronomy. CS, however had the opposite impression.

lpetrich wrote:Zwaarddijk, I thank you for going through all the trouble that you have, analyzing Acharya S's claims in gory detail.

Most other critics might have found a few elementary mistakes, and stopped there. Sort of like how how most critics of Immanuel Velikovsky's work have handled it. But Carl Sagan was once discussing Worlds in Collision with a distinguished professor of Semitic literatures, and while that professor considered Velikovsky's work nonsensical there, he was impressed by all the astronomy. CS, however had the opposite impression.

The reason I went to all the effort has to do with Murdock's main response to any critic ever - she simply states that they haven't read her works. By clearly documenting that I have done so, and still found them lacking, I hope to explicitly show that this apologetic technique of hers is even worse than transparent bullshit.