Marcus Borg: From mystical experiences to religious pluralism to a politically correct Jesus

Marcus Borg is a leading New Testament scholar, member of the so-called Jesus Seminar (a group of scholars that I've criticized here), and author of several works about the life and teachings of Jesus.

As I've discussed in other posts, the Jesus Seminar's main prupose is to make Christianity palatable to a secular and anti-Christian audience. This seems to be weird, since if Christianity is true, then anti-Christianity has to be false and secularism too. (In the same way that if near-death experiences are true afterlife experiences, materialism is false. You cannot have them both).

The popularity of the Jesus Seminar ideas (and the ideas of other people like Dan Brown) is caused by the widespread hostility towards Christianity in USA and other western countries. This is why many these books (like Brown's the Da Vinci Code) become best-sellers, even when they're defending false ideas (ideas which even atheist scholars specialized in the field reject as false and ridiculous).

In the case of the Jesus Seminar, they attract not only atheist readers, but all the readers who (for whatever reasons) are hostile to traditional Christianity, including mystics, spiritualists, pantheists and specially religious pluralists. (Note that this claim is a pure factual asseertion: I'm not claiming here that the hostility to Christianity is justified or unjustified, or that Christianity is true or false; these are another matters. I'm simply claiming that people hostile towards Christianity tends to be attracted and sympathetic to the Jesus Seminar's work on Jesus, and this claim can be easily corroborated. The reason is that the want to have a new vision of Jesus more palatable to their anti-Christian tastes and preconceived ideas).

It's important to understand that many members of the Jesus Seminar, including Borg, are religious pluralists, i.e. they believe that no religion or spiritual way is "the only way", but that all or many religious are valid and true. As consequence, they try to undermine the view of Jesus and Christianity as the "only way", and in order to do it, they have to create a new portrait of Jesus.

In the case of Marcus Borg, his religious pluralism is grounded largely in his 0wn personal mystical experiences. In this interview, Borg says "Yes, I did have a number of mystical experiences in my early 30s that made all the difference in my life. Suddenly, through these experiences, my life changed from having this notion of God as a hypothetical concept to experiencing the reality of God. This transformed my understanding of God.

Karl Rahner, the great Catholic theologian, said that the future of Christianity will be mystical or it will not be at all. What I understood him to be saying is that in a world of religious pluralism, a religion that simply operates as a kind of hypothetical construct will cease to have any enduring power. The question becomes: Why should I take Christianity seriously if there is no experiential validation of its foundational claims? How can I take Christianity seriously if we cannot experience God as real and known to us in various ways? For Christians, the decisive way God is known is through Jesus. Jesus gives us a sense of the character and passion of God."

As Borg's concede, his own personal, mystical experiences, were the cause of his change of view about God. Influenced by Rahner, Borg realized that in a religious pluralist world, religion has to be experienced by each practitioner, not simply thought in hypothetical terms. Borg asks why should he take Christianity seriously if there is not experiential validation of its claims?

Borg's question reveals an obviously flawed assumption and reasoning. For example, why should I take NDEs seriously if I haven't had any experiential, personal validation in my life of the claims of NDErs? The answer is that a bunch of people have had NDEs, and serious scientists consider them worthy of study, and this is important to the survival question. The fact that I myself lack such experiences is not reason to think that the people who DO have them are wrong, or that study them is a waste of time.

Do I need to have "past-lives memories" myself in order to take the evidence for and against resurrection seriously?

In the same way, if you have never observed an UFO or being abducteed, does it mean that you cannot take ufology seriously? Obviously no. There are many reports of abductions and other lines of evidence suggesting that something interesting is happening in ufological studies, and it has nothing to do with your own personal, subjective experiences.

Likewise, the fact that I myself lack any inmediate experience of Christianity's (or any other religion, for that matter) fundamental claims is not reason to think these claims are false or cannot be taken seriously. For example, if Jesus' resurrection is historical, then I have reason to think Jesus' teachings seriously and be open to Christianity's fundamental claims. It has nothing to do with my own subjectives personal experiences.

By the way, Borg assumes that his own view of God as a "hypotethical concept" is the view of Christians in general. This is simply false. Many Christians say that they "feel Jesus Christ in their hearts" and things like that (If these feelings are veridical or not is not my point now). They feel their life changed by God. So, they not have the cold, purely intellectual view of God that Borg had before his mystical experiences.

But Borg's flawed reasoning is beside the point in this moment. My interest is to show the connection bewteen Borg's personal (mystical) experiences and his religious pluralism and how it affects Borg's view on Jesus.

Once Borg's view about God is changed by his mystical experiences, it is not surprising that he interprets Jesus' life and teachings in that new (pluralistic) light. In fact, as Borg explicitly says, such new light about Jesus "undermines a widespread Christian belief that Jesus is unique, which is commonly linked to the notion that Christianity is exclusively true and that ‘Jesus is the only way." ( Meeting Jesus Again for the First Time, p. 37)

Note Borg's insistence in undermining Christian exclusivism, and making Jesus look as nothing fundamentally special or unique (among other spiritual teachers of other religious). This insistence is caused by Borg's uncritical acceptation of religious pluralism which, in turn, was caused by his own mystical experiences.

This approach to Jesus' life and teachings have the following consequences:

-It begs the question against the possibility that the traditional exclusivistic view of Jesus be correct. This is a question that has to be settled by the evidence, not by our personal prejudices or ideologies (in favor or against such a view).

-It makes antecedently very improibable, almost impossible, the historicity of Jesus' resurrection, since the latter is not the kind of phenomenon that you would expect in a Jesus who is not essentially or fundamentally different than other spiritual teachers. This is why Borg and other members of the Jesus Seminar reject in advance the historicity of Jesus' resurrection.

-It forces in advance a certain pluralistic reconstruction of the historical Jesus, in which the evidence is interpreted in terms of pluralism alone. The inmediate consequence of this is a very poor and seriously undermined image of Jesus (specially of one who is putatuvely resurrected).

In my interview with Robert Perry, Robert quoted the following Borg's words (which are telling of Borg's pluralism and his watered down view of Jesus): "Rather strikingly, the most certain thing we know about Jesus according to the current scholarly consensus is that he was a teller of stories and a speaker of great one-liners whose purpose was the transformation of perception. At the center of his message was an invitation to see differently"

Note that if we accept Borg's words at face value, then Jesus' status is not essentially different than any other spiritual teacher of mankind. If Jesus was merely a "teller of stories" and a speaker of "great one liners" with the purpose of "changing people's perception", then what the hell is the fundamental spiritual difference between Jesus and other teachers like Silver Birch, Buddha, Hermes Trimegistro, Sai Baba, Paramahansa Yogananda, Osho or popular writers like Louise Hay, Wyne Dyer, Deepak Chopra, Neale Donald Walsch or Eckhart Tolle? Is not the main, basic, essential and often explicit purpose of all of these people to "change people's perceptions" through a bunch of stories, examples, analogies, anecdotes, arguments, metaphors, maxims, aphorisms and great one liners?

Note by the way that in Borg's poor and watered down view of Jesus, the historicity of the resurrection (if it occurred) is absolutely unexplanaible in the context of Jesus' life and teachings. Jesus' resurrection becomes a miracle without a proper context rooted in Jesus' unique nature and teachings. The unique phenomenon of the resurrection comes from the left hand, without any connection with anything special in Jesus, since nothing special or unique or spiritually exclusive exists in him as a plausible explanation of the unique event of the resurrection.

Borg's strongly undermined, poor and watered down image of Jesus makes no room for the resurrection of Jesus and make it extraordinarily unlikely given religious pluralism. Therefore, if the evidence favors Jesus' resurrection, both religious pluralism as Borg's reconstruction of the historical Jesus, is largely refuted and is probably false.

I suggest my readers to explore critically the evidence for and against Jesus' resurrection, and draw their own conclusions about the implications of this matter.

Atheist philosopher Stephen Law's skeptical argument against Jesus' existence and agnostic historian Bart Ehrman's reply

In his blog, atheist philosopher Stephen Law, poses a formal argument to be skeptical of Jesus's existence (this argument is a fine example of how the "extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence" skeptical principle can be used to doubt whatever claim you don't want to believe. In the case of Jesus' existence, virtually no professional historian or scholar doubts of his existence on the grounds of an argument like Law's... I'll give as an example the best-selling author and influential critic of Christianity, the agnostic historian and New Testament scholar Bart Ehrman's reply to the denialism of Jesus' existence).

You have to keep in mind that Law is a philosopher, not a professional historian. So, in order to evaluate some of Law's premises in his argument, you will have to compare Law's knowledge of ancient history with the knowledge of history of contemporary professional historians.

Law's argument is this:

1. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. In the absence of extraordinary evidence there's excellent reason to be skeptical about the claims.

2. There is not extraordinary evidence for any of the divine/miraculous stuff in the NT documents.

3. Therefore (from 1 and 2), there's excellent reason to be skeptical about those extraordinary claims.

4. Where testimony/documents combine both mundane and extraordinary claims, and there's excellent reason to be skeptical about the extraordinary claims, then there's pretty good reason to be skeptical even about the mundane claims, at least until we possess some pretty good independent evidence of their truth.

5. The NT docs combine extraordinary and mundane claims about Jesus.

6. There's no pretty good independent evidence for even the mundane claims about Jesus (such as that he existed)

7. Therefore (from 3, 4, 5, and 6), there's pretty good reason to be skeptical about whether Jesus existed.

Let's to comment briefly on some of the premises of this argument:

Regarding premise 1 (Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. In the absence of extraordinary evidence there's excellent reason to be skeptical about the claims.), we can reply, quoting this author: "Skeptics, both of the genuine and the pseudo variety, have elevated this double standard to a principle of science: extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence! But this principle does not hold up to logical scrutiny, because a claim is only ordinary or extraordinary in relation to a theory. For the sake of making this point, let us assume a scenario in a hypothetical new science in which there are two pieces of evidence to be discovered, A and B, each equally credible, each one suggesting an obvious, but incorrect explanation (call them (1) and (2)). (1) and (2) are mutually incompatible, and a third, highly non obvious explanation (3) that accounts for both A and B is actually correct.

As chance would have it, one of the two pieces of evidence A,B will be discovered first. Let A be that piece of evidence, and further suppose that the scientists working in that hypothetical field all subscribe to the principle of the double standard. After the discovery of A, they will adopt explanation (1) as the accepted theory of their field. At a later time, when B is discovered, it will be dismissed because it contradicts (1), and because A and B are equally credible, but A is ordinary relative to (1) and B is extraordinary.

The end result is that our hypothetical science has failed to self-correct. The incorrect explanation (1) has been accepted, and the correct explanation (3) was never found, because B was rejected. I therefore submit that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence is not suitable as a guiding principle for sound scientific research. All evidence, whether it supports accepted theories or not, should be given the same level of critical scrutiny. "

Ordinary or extraordinary are relational properties of claims relative to a theory or a body of knowledge. In the case of New Testament documents referring to Jesus, they contain extraordinary claims relative to the naturalistic, atheistic worldview, but not relative to a theistic worldview in which God, whenever he wanted and for purposes which only he fully knows, could intervene selectively in certain events (and a theistic worldview was essential in Jesus' teachings and hence is part of the religious context to understand Jesus' putative miracles).

If you assume a body of knowledge or theory or worldview which excludes a given X phenomenon, then whatever claim for the existence of X is intrinsically and by definition considered extraordinary. For example, if you assume atheistic materialism, then phenomena like miracles, survival of consciousness or paranormal phenomena are antecedently improbable (in fact, impossible). This is why a materialist like Richard Wiseman concede the evidence for remote viewing but remains skeptical of its existence appealing to is putative "extraordinary" nature: "I think that they meet the usual standards for a normal claim, but are not convincing enough for an extraordinary claim."

Hence, it is not the intrinsic qualitity of the evidence, but the putative extraordinary nature of the claim (considered in the context of a assumed materialistic worldview) which precludes Wiseman's belief in the evidence.

In case of Law, since his naturalism precludes the miraculous as "normal" phenomena, whatever claim of supernatural events is, by definition, extraordinary, and give us a reason to be skeptical of such claims.

Premise 6 is simply false. An example of a mundane claim related to Jesus is his death by crucifixion. It was a common method of execution employed by Romans and more importantly, this fact is attested in independent non-Christian sources of the same period. For example, historian Josephus comments "When Pilate, upon hearing him accused by men of highest standing amongst us, had condemmed him to be crucified" (Antiquities, 18.64).

As consequence of this independent evidence (plus other credible Christian and non-Christian sources), virtually all historians and scholars agree that Jesus died by crucifixion (which implies Jesus' existence). This is why, even a revisionist and radical skeptical and atheist scholar like John Dominic Crossan of the Jesus Seminar has conceded "That he [Jesus] was crucified is as sure as anything historical can ever be" (Jesus: A Revolutionary Biography, p. 145).

Again, Law is not a professional historian and probably this is the reason why he claims a premise like the number 6, a premise which any major (atheist) professional historian and New Testament scholar would consider simply ignorant, incompetent, agenda-driven and ridiculous. (The only "scholars" who assert this are an extremely tiny minority of atheist fanatics, like for example online atheist apologist Richard Carrier, or Jesus Seminar "scholar" Robert Price, who have not much weight or influence in the academic community with their idiosyncratic ideas. These individuals have as their main purpose in life to destroy Christianity and the best way to do it, they believe, is to deny Jesus' existence).

Finally, in response to people skeptical of Jesus' existence, agnostic scholar and historian Bart Ehrman comments:

Bart Ehrman vs. Craig Evans debate: "Does the New Testament present a reliable portrait of the Historical Jesus?"

Edward Feser lecture: Natural Theology must be based in the philosophy of nature, not natural science

Edward Feser is Associate Professor of Philosophy at Pasadena City College in Pasadena, California. He has been a Visiting Assistant Professor at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles and a Visiting Scholar at the Social Philosophy and Policy Center at Bowling Green State University in Bowling Green, Ohio. He holds a Ph.D. in philosophy from the University of California at Santa Barbara, an M.A. in religion from the Claremont Graduate School, and a B.A. in philosophy and religious studies from the California State University at Fullerton.

William Lane Craig and Peter Williams vs Andrew Copson and Arif Ahmed - Cambridge Union Society God Debate, Oct 2011

In the facebook page of the Cambridge Union Society, you can read the voting results of the above debate: "On the Motion - "This House Believes God is Not a Delusion": Ayes 243, Abstentions 129, Noes 229: The motion passes by 14 votes." in favor of Craig/Williams vs atheists Copson and Ahmed.

It's interesting and even astonishing that in a so prestigious scholarly debating society like the Cambridge Union (not precisely a friend of Christianity), Christian philosophers William Lane Craig and Peter Williams have beaten atheists Andrew Copson and Arif Ahmed.

In my opinion, the format of the debate wasn't ideal for a serious scholarly discussion. Formal philosophical arguments need to be examined carefully, slowly and in depth, without ditstractive cavils and uninformed objections from "the public" (who tend to be ignorant of the most sophisticated arguments for and against a given thesis). Moreover, in a debate (in which both sides present philosophical argumentation) the need for a careful reflection and objective evaluation of the arguments in their strongest formulations is even more needed.

In any case, even in these less than perfect conditions, the atheist debaters lost in their own "home".

This is further evidence of the extreme intellectual weakness of the atheist case.

A french psychic makes predictions for 2012 -- From 30 years ago (Subtitles in English)

I have no idea who that guy is, and I don't trust in that video (it seems to be fake, indeed). In any case, I let the video here for your consideration because it has caused some interest on the internet.

Regarding the "end of the world" in 2012, I don't think it is going to happen. I think Mayan prophecies have been largely misrepresented, but this is a complex topic.

Regarding an "encounter with aliens" in 2012, after my study of ufology, I think there is evidence (not conclusive, but more or less good and interesting) to think some beings outside the Earth have been in touch with us for a long time. This could include beings from other planets, or from other dimensions (in both cases, they could be considered "aliens").

I don't discard that a "open, public contact" will happen some day, but I see no reason to think it will happen in 2012.

The two faces of Bart Ehrman: The scholar vs the debater. An analogy with skeptics Richard Wiseman and Ray Hyman

Studying carefully and critically the literature pro and against the case for Jesus' resurrection, I've identified a consistent pattern of dishonesty, sophistry and double standard in some skeptical scholars which is very similar to the one typical of paranormal skeptics like Richard Wiseman and Ray Hyman. Like in the case of parapsychology, this pattern tends to support the thesis that skeptics don't have good arguments against the position that they attack (psi, in case of paranormal skeptics; or Jesus' resurrection, in case of New Testament skeptical scholars). So, they're forced to use sophistry in order to support their case.

I'm going to give irrefutable evidence for this contention, using as an example the leading and influential agnostic New Testament scholar and historian Bart Erhman.

Bart Ehrman: the scholar:

Remember that the 4 main historical facts used commonly as evidence for Jesus's resurrection are 1)The burial of Jesus by Joseph of Arimathea; 2)the empty tomb; 3)Jesus' post mortem apparences and 4)The origin of the Christian belief. (Actually, there are at least 12 historical facts that could be quoted as part of the historical evidence for Jesus' resurrection, but just the 4 mentioned above sufficy to make a reasonable minimal case for it).

In his early scholarly works, Ehrman was skeptical of some of these facts. However, in his most recent academic works, he accepted that the historical evidence for these 4 facts is historically good and reliable.

Let's see the references:

1-Regarding the burial by Joseph of Arimathea and the empty tomb, Ehrman wrote: "the earliest accounts we have are unanimous in saying that Jesus was in fact buried by this fellow, Joseph of Arimathea, so it's relatively reliable that that's what happened. We also have solid traditions to indicate that women found this tomb empty three days later" (From Jesus to Constantine: Lecture 4, the teaching company, 2003).

Please, read the above paragraph very carefully, twice if necessary, because it is essential and crucial to my arguments below.

2-Regarding Jesus' post-mortem appearences, Ehrman wrote "we can say with some confidence that some of his disciples claimed to have seen Jesus alive" (Jesus: Apocalyptic Prophet of the New Millenium, 1999, p. 200)

3-Regarding the origin of the Christian belief in Jesus' resurrection, Ehrman wrote "For it is a historical fact that some of Jesus' followers came to believe that he had been raised from the dead soon after his execution" (Jesus: Apocalyptic Prophet of the New Millenium, 1999, 231)

Like most New Testament scholars, Ehrman agrees with the historicity of the 4 main facts mentioned as evidence for Jesus' Resurrection. Ehrman's disagreement is methodological: Historians don't have access to miracles or supernatural events; hence, an historian cannot accept Jesus' resurrection as an historical fact (even if it ocurred).

By the way, the above references reveal the wholly ignorant, strongly prejudiced and misguided comments by Alex Tsakiris about the debate between Ehrman and Craig. In Tsakiris' podcast in which he interviewed Chris Carter, Alex commented that "In fact, if you go on YouTube as I have, you can hear some of these debates where these very convincing, well-spoken scholars and historians like William Lane Craig who is one of the guys who is a Christian Apologist who does this a lot. In the background here I’m playing a little bit of a clip from his debate with Bart Ehrman, who is a biblical scholar who has come to the conclusion that some of these claims in the Bible and the most important claims in the Bible don’t really hold up historically... You see, in my mind if you listen to the debate between Bart Ehrman and William Lane Craig, Bart Ehrman mops the floor with him. If you can really be objective and stack up the facts point by point on who really has the strongest argument, there’s really no contest. But if you’re a committed Christian and you really want to believe the Gospel story exactly the way that it’s written, you’ll find plenty of solace in William Lane Craig’s arguments."

Tsakiris' comments reveal the hostility, ignorance, ill-informed criticism and anti-Christian bigotry that I've discussed in my previous posts. As a matter of fact, the debate between Craig and Ehrman was about the historicity Jesus' resurrection, and in Ehrman's published works (as I've demostrated above) HE ACCEPTS ALL THE FACTS MENTIONED BY CRAIG AS EVIDENCE FOR JESUS' RESURRECTION! (So the debate wasn't mainly about the relevant "historical facts", but about the best explanation of these facts).

Hence, to which "facts" of the Bible that only Christians like Craig believe in, is Tsakiris referring to? To the 4 facts mentioned above? Obviously not, because these facts are agreed by most New Testament scholars, including Ehrman himself as I've demostrated above.

To Jesus's resurrection? Well, Ehrman himself doesn't deny it, he only denies the historian's competence to claim that it occured. So, Ehrman's argument is purely a methodological one.

And by the way, Ehrman's argument is based on Hume's argument against miracles (an argument which is used also by contemporary skeptics like Wiseman against paranormal and afterlife claims), but which most philosophers (including Chris Carter) consider fallacious and invalid. In fact, I must suppose that Tsaskiris reject Hume's argument too, otherwise he would have to reject a priori the evidence for parapsychology and the afterlife and wouldn't be sympathetic to these matters. (And note that Hume's argument applies both to miracles and paranormal claims too, even if the latter are not miraculous. Hume's argument, if sound, would apply to the latter too and this is why skeptics like Randi, Shermer or Wiseman use it, in the form of "extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence")

If Tsakiris rejects Hume's argument against miracles in order to reject skeptical objections against the paranormal and the afterlife, then he cannot buy into Erhman's argument either. So which is the motive of Tsakiris' sympathies to Ehrman's case? Exactly in which part of his debate with Criag was Ehrman sweeping the floor with him?

If Tsakiris were cognizant of the technical literature about Jesus' resurrection, he would know that Ehrman was misleading the audience in his debate with Craig, because Ehrman was affecting a skeptical position which himself rejects as false and historially unjustified. He was falsely being skeptic of historical facts that in his own published work he has accepted as "historical facts" which can be reliably accepted with some confidence based on the historical evidence alone.

That Erhman mopped the floor with Craig? Well, regarding the 4 facts mentioned by Craig, it is impossible, since Erhman accepts all of them in his own published works. Regarding Jesus' resurrection? Impossible, since Craig met Ehrman's Humean challenge using the work of agnostic philosopher of science John Erman, who proved (using Bayes' theorem of probability) that Hume's argument is demostrably fallacious (in fact, John Erman's book is entitled "Hume's Abject Failure"). Bart Ehrman hadn't any answer to Craig's technical argument against Hume.

So, clearly Taskiris watched the debate with his anti-Christian wishful thinking glasses, not with the objective, rational and academically responsible classes of the best scholarly literature on Jesus' Resurrection (including Ehrman's) and the best works of philosophy regarding Hume's argument, Bayes' theorem and probability theory.

This kind of anti-intellectualism, prejudice and arrogant ignorance (masked with the language of science, "facts" and objectivity) is common in some paranormal circles, and it is one of the reasons why most philosophers, scientists and scholars in general, even open minded ones (like the authors of the book The Quantum Enigma) don't like to be associated with these groups.

I've been increasingly dissapointed with this lack of intellectual rigour, ignorance and prejudiced bigotry which exist in some paranormal circles.

Bart Ehrman: The Debater

People unfamiliar with Erhman's own academic works, like Tsakiris, will be taken in by Ehrman's claims in his debate with Craig. In this debate and fully unable to reply consistently to Craig's arguments, Ehrman was forced to deny his own claims (published in his academic works) in order to contradict Craig¡s case.

For example, we see above that Ehrman considered that Jesus' burial by Joseph of Arimathea is relatively reliable because it appears unanimously in the earliest historical sources (This is the reason why most New Testament scholars, including atheists, accept this as a historical fact).

However, for debating purposes and in order to contradict Craig and undermine his case, Ehrman said in his debate with Craig "We don’t know if Jesus was buried by Joseph of Arimathea."

Note Ehrman's affected and purely speculative skepticism, which is totally contrary to the claims that he has made in his own published academic works regarding Jesus' burial. Ehrman the scholar is different than Ehrman the debater.

Regarding the empty tomb, remember that Erhman has published that "We also have solid traditions to indicate that women found this tomb empty three days later"

But these "solid traditions" that have convinced the scholar Ehrman and most scholars of the historicity of the empty tomb is, for debating purposes, "forgotten" by Ehrman the "debater", who said (in his debate with Craig): "We don’t know if his tomb was empty three days later."

Regarding Jesus' post-mortem appearences, remember that Ehrman the scholar has written in his scholarly works that "we can say with some confidence that some of his disciples claimed to have seen Jesus alive" and "For it is a historical fact that some of Jesus' followers came to believe that he had been raised from the dead soon after his execution"

However, Ehrman the debater has a different opinion about this historical fact: "We don’t know if he was physically seen by his followers afterwards."

You can see how Ehrman the scholar/historian is different than the Erhman the debater. In the context of a debate, Ehrman is prepared to lie and misrepresent the evidence, even openly contradicting and publicly destroying his own published academic works, just in order to win the argument in front of an audience which, like Tsakiris, is solidly ignorant of the evidence and of Ehrman's own academic works explicitly supporting the evidence.

Analogy with Richard Wiseman and Ray Hyman:

Skeptics of the paranormal make use of the same tactics than Ehrman.

For example, Wiseman one day can say that "I agree that by the standards of any other area of science that remote viewing is proven" (link here) and the next day to appear in TV saying that there is not good scientific evidence for remote viewing.

Ray Hyman can say one day that the evidence for the SAIC experiments are well-designed and the investigators have taken pains to eliminate the known weaknesses in previous parapsychological research.

And the next day he can publish an article on the Skeptical Inquirer saying that no good evidence for remote viewing exists.

This kind of duplicity, dishonesty and sophistry suggests that the case for skepticism regarding these matters is very weak, and this is why the skeptics in question make use of such a tactics.

If pushed against a corner (like Erhman was in his debate with Craig), I'm sure that skeptics like Wiseman and Hyman would contradict his own published statements too, if it is strategially useful to debating purposes or to convince a given ignorant audience that the evidence for psi is not good.

They will prefer to look inconsistent instead of being wrong regarding his cherished skeptical beliefs.

Death and the path of the Apprentice by Jorge Carvajal Posada

Jorge Carvajal Posada is a Colombian physician, medical doctor and spiritual teacher. He's the creator of "Sintergetic Medicine" (Medicina Sintergetica, in the original Spanish language) which is a fusion of all known medical therapies (conventional, alternative, complementary, energetic, etc.) and consciousness studies.

For years, and from good reliable sources known by me, I've heard stories of Carvajal's amazing success in diseases considered as "incurable". He has an astonishing erudition of both conventional medicine and alternative therapies.

Unfortunately, his books and lectures are not available in English. However, in the following videos, you can watch a Carvajal's lecture on "death" and how this is relevant to "life". The video has subtitles in English. Enjoy:

5 basic conclusions about my psychological experiment on pseudo-skepticism as a trait of the human mind

In a previous post, I mentioned one experiment that I did to test the hypothesis that "Human beings tend to be pseudoskeptics regarding conclusions or ideas they disagree with"

I used as an example the historical evidence for Jesus' resurrection (which in my opinion, and for my complete astonishment, is reasonably good).

Here are some of the conclusions of my experiment:

1-Pseudoskepticism is a property of the human mind. It has to do with the functioning of the human mind when it is confronted with data, evidence, facts or arguments which are incompatible with previous strong beliefs.

In the case of my experiment, most of the readers who commented to me were people strongly hostile towards Christianity, and hence Jesus'resurrection is not even a possible alternative worthy of consideration, whatever the evidence for it is. This is why they used commonly known pseudoskeptical tactics (red herrings, falsehoods, sheer speculations, ill-informed criticisms, double standards, straw men and unproven assumptions) in order to explain (or explain away) the evidence for Jesus' resurrection.

I was astonished to find intelligent people appealing, for example, to the evils caused by Christianity as a serious or relevant objection to Jesus' resurrection (an argument that is obviusly ridiculous and that they wouldn't take seriously if it were used to attack their own positions sympathetic to spiritualism or parapsychology).

This red herring shows that their hostilite to Christianity is largely emotional, not rational. You don't determine the truth or falsehood of a given worldview or position on the grounds of the behaviour of some of its radical followers. You determine it on the grounds of the evidence alone.

2-Pseudoskepticism is essentially a psychological method to protect a given set of basic beliefs from falsification or refutation, not a method to find the truth.

This is a motive of serious motive of concern for me, because I consider pseudoskepticism a major obstacle to find the truth and to being rational.

3-Pseudoskepticism includes a self-protecting method: The person behaving as a pseudoskeptic DOESN'T and CANNOT realize that his attitude is irrational. On the contrary, he considers his position perfectly rational and valid, even "obvious". Moreover, he'll consider that people who disagree with him are irrational, stupid and ignorant, because they're not able to see the same that the pseudoskeptic can see as obvious.

Again, this is a motive of concern because it implies that the possibility of self-correction (essential to any truth seeker) regarding strong basic beliefs is excluded in advanced or undermined.

For example, you'll remember materialist philosopher J.J.Smart arguing that "Someone who has naturalistic preconceptions will always in fact find some naturalistic explanation more plausible than a supernatural one... Suppose that I woke up in the night and saw the stars arranged in shapes that spelt out the Apostle's Creed. I would know that astronomically it is impossible that stars should have changed their position. I don't know what I would think. Perhaps I would think that I was dreaming or that I had gone mad. What if everyone else seemed to me to be telling me that the same had happened? Then I might not only think that I had gone mad-- I would probably go mad" (J.J.C. Smart in his contribution to the book Atheism and Theism, pp.50-51. Emphasis in blue added)"

Note that for Smart, God's existence won't be accepted regardless of the evidence. Not even publicly confirmed objective evidence will produce a change of opinion in him regarding the falsehood of naturalism. Confronted with irrefutable evidence for supernaturalism which he cannot deny, he'll choose to believe that he has gone mad.

For my astonishment, some of the anti-Christian people who wrote to me has a similar position: They confessed that they won't accept Jesus' Resurrection, or its relevance as evidence for Christianity, regardless of the evidence. For people like them, Christianity is false a priori.

Note that in both cases it is not the evidence, but the pseudoskeptic's strong beliefs, which determine the conclusions that he'll have. In fact, these strong beliefs even will determine what kind of data will count as evidence (and what data won't count as evidence). Again, it is not the evidence, but the pseudoskeptic's own belief system, which determines his reading of the evidence.

Actually, his negative emotions and past experiences (probably negative ones) will determine largely his wordlview.

In my case, when I examine whatever topic, I don't know in advance where the evidence is going to lead me (precisely by this reason is that I'm researching the topic in question). And I'm emotionally and intellectually prepared, if the evidence leads me to it, to accept a conclusion, belief, idea or theory that I find strongly repugnant or impalatable.

For example, I find repugnant the idea of reincarnation, but if the evidence for it is good (as I think it is, even thought not conclusive), then let it be. If the evidence leads to Jesus' resurrection (as I think it does), let it be. If the evidence leads to Islam, led it be, if the evidence leads to atheism, let it be and so on.

You have to detach your emotions, dislikes and tastes from the sober, always cold, rational evaluation of the evidence.

I think this is the proper mindset of a truth seeker.

4-Just for the record: I've also experienced pseudoskepticism in myself and have used the same peudoskeptical strategies to refute a matter which I disagree with. So I'm familiar to it in first-person. I've also used the same unproven speculations and purely imaginative scenarios ("it could be that...", "perhaps it is..." and so forth) in order to avoid a conclusion that I don't like.

Precisely for this reason, I'm almost obssesed with the psychology behind pseudoskepticism and what method could be used to counter it, because pseudoskepticism is a major obstacle to the truth.

Currently, I can see when I'm begining to use these pseudoskeptical methods and inmediatly try to stop them. I say to myself that I'm trying to find the truth, not to protect my beliefs and compare the structure of my objections with the ones used by pseudoskeptics in order to see if I'm using the same tactics.

5-Paranormal pseudoskepticism (of people like Shermer, Hyman, etc.) is a natural corollary of the strong belief in metaphysical naturalism and atheistic materialism. This is a species of pseudoskepticism, not qualitatively different than any other form of pseudoskepticism (it is only different in its contents, not in its overall methods of debunking).

The methods of pseudoskepticism are pretty the same, regardless of the topic discussed.

This is why the best method to attack paranormal pseudoskepticism is to attack metaphysical naturalism and atheistic naturalism (an insight that most parapsychologists have not realized and this explains the parapsychologist's naive and largely non-efficacious attempt to reply to the skeptic using scientific evidence and arguments alone. The latter is necessary, but not sufficient, because what is at stake is not only the evidence, but how this will be read in the light of worldview considerations. This is why Chris Carter's book Parapsychjology and the skeptics is an original contribution to the field, because it is one of the few books which addresses these worldview considerations).

Stephen Braude on the evidence for the afterlife or survival of consciousness

More on reincarnation and spiritualism and experimental testing

In the previous post, I proposed an experiment that could settle the question about reincarnation. However, I think my argument needs some qualifications.

I was assuming a purely scientific approach to the question, not a religious or philosophical one. In this sense, I assumed that the best scientific evidence for reincarnation comes from the empirical studies with children who remember past lives.

Based upon these assumptions, my argument was that, as with any scientific hypothesis, you test it by their consequences. In the case of reincarnation, the reincarnation hypothesis predicts that the same soul was transfered from a dead body to another body. Hence, providing evidence that the soul of "reincarnated cases" is not reincarnated at all (but only apparently so), is evidence that the hypothesis of reincarnation is false in those cases.

In other words, if reincarnation is true, then the same soul of the dead person is now IN the body of the child who remembers past lives. Therefore, his soul is NOT in the afterlife anymore (the implication is that if the soul is found there, then reincarnation regarding that soul cannot get off the ground).

In other words, if reliable mediums could discover that, in these cases, the spirit or soul of the dead person is STILL in the afterlife (and hence NOT in another body in earth), then it refutes the hypothesis of reincarnation on thoses cases.

I think the logic of this argument is correct and impeccable.

Now, it could be argued that at most the experiment shows that in cases of children with past lives experiences the hypothesis of reincarnation doesn't apply, but it doesn't refute the hypothesis of reincarnation in general.

However, the above objection implies actually a major scientific concession against the reincarnation hypothesis, because:

1-The best scientific evidence of reincarnation is the evidence of children with past life memories or birthmarks suggesting a past life wound or cause. Therefore, if the best evidence for reincarnation is actually not evidence for it, then a fortiori the weak evidence for it won't do the job either.

2-Reports and communications from some mediums supportive of reincarnation conflict with reports from mediums who don't support it, or even are hostile to it. And from conflicting reports alone you cannot draw any solid conclusions about the existence or not of reincarnation. In this case, the most reasonable conclusion based on such a conflicting reports is agnosticism.

However, agnosticism about reincarnation based upon spiritualism plus positive evidence that the so-called "best reincarnation cases" are not reincarnation cases at all, push the balance strongly in favor of the non-existence of reincarnation.

3-Reports from people who have had hypnotic regression and have discoveried memories of past lives is a kind of evidence weaker than cases of children who remember past lives, because in general it is purely subjetive and not confirmed by objective evidence (e.g. autopsies, etc.). But even if these reports could be confirmed by objective evidence, point 1 could apply to it too (and experiments as the one proposed by me could be used to test the reincarnation hypothesis in those cases of hypnotic regression too).

This is why I thnk the experiment that I proposed, if produces the result discussed here, would provide excellent evidence against the existence of reincarnation.

Obviously, reincarnation would still be a logical possibility, but empirical science is not interested in purely logical possibilities (which only exist in a skeptic's imagination, who tries to resist a conclusion that he doesn't like through the use of pure speculations and unproven assumptions); science is interested in logical possibilities actually supported by empirical evidence.

As has argued philosopher of science and survivalist Neal Grossman "So there is a big difference between a hypothesis that is merely logically possible (that is, a hypothesis that is not self-contradictory) and a hypothesis that is really possible (that is, a hypothesis for which there are empirical reasons to believe might be true). Of course, any real possibility must also be a logical possibility, but the converse is not true. The fact that a given hypothesis is logically possible, that is, is not self-contradictory, is not a reason to believe that it is a real possibility, that is, that it might be true. Science is concerned with real possibilities only, not with mere logical possibilities"

Grossman's point is a basic principle in the philosophy of science. Science doesn't need to refute all the possible alternative explanations for a given set of data (in fact, the number of such an alternatives is potentially infinite). Science is interested only in the hypotheses which, given our background knowledge, the current evidence available and a few of heuristic principles, are really possible (i.e. likely to be true).

This is why the defender of reincarnation can't appeal to speculations about "group souls" and other purely logical possibilities to which we have not evidence at all (or just extremely weak evidence). Only if he can provide evidence of the existence of "group souls" PLUS evidence that it could account for reincarnation cases, then it would be a living possibility which has to be considered and evaluated.

In conclusion, my experiment is just a modest proposal for evaluating reincarnation empirically. I'm sure my experiment needs to be qualified and perfected in the details, in oder to make it useful in an actual experiment design with mediums and cases suggestive of reincarnation.

Solving the tension between spiritualism and reincarnation: An experimental proposal

The comments of some of my readers about my post on the tension existing between spirtualism and reincarnation, has motivated me to think about a possible way to solve this debate on empirical grounds.

I'd suggest the following: To try a series of controlled experiments in which reliable mediums try to communicate with the spirits of the dead who, apparently, are reincarnated in children with past life memories.

Let's to expand this proposal:

1-We need contemporary "reliable" mediums like John Edward, Suzane Northrup or David Thompson (I mention these just because they're widely known and for illustrative purposes alone. You can think in other currently practizing mediums).

2-The mediums need to have access to the best current documented cases of children with past life memories (specially of cases in which the death of the person whose soul is supposedly reincarnated now is recent and well documented).

3-And several, properly double blind controlled experiments with the mediums need to be carried out (for reasons of experimental design, obviously the mediums cannot know in advanced that the identity of the dead person whom they are trying to contact seem to correspond with the past memories which the children are remembering now).

Possible results and conclusions:

1)If the reincarnation hypothesis is true, then we'd expect that the mediums CANNOT contact in the afterlife with the same person who died (and is believed to be reincarnated now). The reason is that such a person is not in the afterlife anymore. This would provide strong evidence that chidlren who remember such memories are actually reincarnated.

2)On the contrary, if mediums DO contact with the same person who died (and is now supposedly reincarnated), then the reincarnation hypotesis is false. In fact, I'd consider this evidence as a knock-down argument against reincarnation.

If this second result is the case, whatever strong evidence is gathered in cases of children who remember past lives cannot be considered as evidence for reincarnation anymore, and has to be explained in terms of, for example, paranormal access to fragments of memories of a dead person (or by any other hypothesis not related with reincarnation).

Possible objections of a defender of reincarnation:

Confronted with the scenario 2, the defender of reincarnation will have to attack mediumship itself. He'll have to argue that mediumship in general, or the mediums of the experiments in particular, weren't reliable, and hence their communications cannot be believed.

Unless he can provide good evidence for this conclusion, I think the defender of reincarnation would be trapped against a corner. This would reveal that his commitment to reincarnation is not rational but pure wishful thinking.

Another defense by the defender of reincarnation would be appealing to the hypothesis of "group souls" mentioned by Michael Tynn in my interview with him, and defended by some spiritual teachers like Silver Birch according to which "there are what you call ‘group souls,’ a single unity with facets which have spiritual relationships that incarnate at different times, at different places, for the purpose of equipping the larger soul for its work."

Obviously, this is a purely speculative possibility, and the defender of reincarnation which takes this idyosincratic view has the burden of proof that such a "group souls" exist and that this provide the explanation for reincarnation cases.

In any case, the experiment with mediums mentioned above could include specific questions about the existence of such a "group souls" and whether they can explain the cases suggestive of reincarnation. The communications received will have to be considered in order to evaluate the plausibility of the "new position" of the defender of reincarnation.

I think this kind of experiments, if carried out competently and replicated, would provide an almost definitive answer regarding reincarnation.

Spiritualism and reincarnation: Bad bed fellows?

Studying the afterlife literature, specially the evidence from spiritualism, one gets the impression that there is a kind of tension between the portrait of an afterlife given by spiritualism and reincarnation. More specifically, the tension is between the spiritualistic information according to which reincarnation doesn't occur and the evidence for reincarnation.

For example, in my interview with one of the world's leading experts in the scientific evidence for an afterlife, Michael Roll, when I asked him about reincarnation, he answered: "Never come across reincarnation in my studies. Never heard a medium say, "Sorry, you can't make contact with him/her as they have gone back to Earth." See the book The Case Against Reincarnation by James Webster on my website. The aim is to let people all over the world know that we all survive the death of our physical bodies and that we are responsible and liable for what we do on Earth. We must not go off on any tangents, keep out of the psychic jungle at all costs."

Michael suggested James Webster's book against reincarnation, a whom I interviewed too. James' view is strong "No amount of research will prove reincarnation as the theory is false to begin with"

One afterlife spirit who communicated through John Sloan (who was in my opinion, a true medium), the famous direct voice medium who was researched by Arthur Findlay, when asked about if we reincarnate, replied "Now it is a question that I find difficult in answering. I have known no one who has. I passed over many years ago, and I have round about me those who lived thousands of years ago on Earth. That's all I can say because my knowledge does not permit me to say more." (On the edge of the etheric, p. 61)

Note that we have here 3 pieces of evidence, coming from different spiritualistic sources (including an afterlife sources) which suggests that reincarnation doesn't happen:

1-A world leading expert in afterlife studies, Michael Roll, who has never found evidence for reincarnation in his studies.

2-An spirit in the afterlife who claims not knowing anybody who has reincarnated (but without denying explicitly the possibility of reincarnation)

3-Another spiritualist researcher, James Webster, who claims the hypothesis of reincarnation is false.

This seems to support the thesis that reincarnation doesn't exist, or at least that solid evidence for it is weak or non-existent.

Evidence for reincarnation

However, it is hard to dismiss the evidence for reincarnation gathered by researchers like Ian Stevenson, Jim Tucker, Titus Rivas and others.

But this evidence doesn't come from spiritualism (or from afterlife sources), but mainly from empirical cases of children who have had putative past-life experiences, which in principle leave open the possibility that past-life experiences are gotten through paranormal means not related to reincarnation as such (a hypothesis defended by some researchers).

In any case, the point is that the evidence from spiritualism seems to be more or less in tension with the evidence from reincarnation.

I mentioned spiritualistic researchers who are skeptical of reincarnation. However, not all of them are. For example, Michael Tynn, when I asked about reincarnation, replied "I have come to the conclusion that reincarnation exists, but it doesn’t play out the way most people who believe in it think it does. I believe that the non-local aspects of time put it beyond human comprehension. I accept Silver Birch’s communication about reincarnation that “… there are what you call ‘group souls,’ a single unity with facets which have spiritual relationships that incarnate at different times, at different places, for the purpose of equipping the larger soul for its work.” I don’t really understand that, but I accept that there are celestial matters that are beyond human understanding and language."

Note that Tynn accepts reincarnation, but in a very qualified way (the inclusion of "group souls" which is a single unity with many facets), a position that many survivalists will reject or find unpersuasive.

Guy Lyon Playfair, another afterlife research, is skeptical of reincarnation. When I asked him about the matter, he replied "The word reincarnation implies the permanent return of a whole personality, and I don't think the evidence generally supports that, although there are cases where it does seem possible, when there are birthmarks and behaviour patterns as well as memories. I'm thinking of people like Jenny Cockell, Om Sety and most recently James Leininger in which identifiable people do seem to have returned to earth, but such cases are very rare. On the whole, though, I think that what people call reincarnation is more like temporary transfer of fragments of memory, etc."

Neal Grossman, on the other hand, strongly supports the idea of reincarnation "All mediumship communications of which I am aware and that discuss the concept of reincarnation, are strongly supportive of that concept. (e.g. The Seth Material). The evidence collected by Stevenson, Tucker, and others, is impeccable and conclusive. Some mediums can even get information about past lives. (I don’t know the type of mediums you have experienced, but I am aware that a few are Christian based, and they interpret everything in such a way as to be consistent with their prior religious beliefs)."

However, the mediums that I had in mind when I asked the question to professor Grossman have nothing to do with Christianity. In fact, they're mediums like John Sloan and others mediums investigated by atheists like Michael Roll, who precisely support a skeptical position regarding reincarnation. For example, in his recent interview in Skeptiko, medium August Goforth comments "I have a huge library of books written by mediums and spiritualists that go back almost a couple hundred years. I noticed not a single one mentioned reincarnation."

On the other hand, if we have to question the source of the information on the grounds of religious beliefs, we could argue against the source of the evidence for reincarnation in the way that James Webster has argued: "Also many of the children Stevenson researched were from Eastern countries who practiced religions and belief systems (e.g. Hinduism and Buddhism) soaked with reincarnation, past lives and karma."

We could say the same of mediums who have read or are sympathetic to belief systems and religions which support the idea of reincarnation, and hence such a beliefs colours the putative afterlife communications from mediums which support reincarnation.

So, the bias cuts both ways.

But this is besides the point. My point is that we find here the tension that I mentioned before. On one side we found long time afterlife researchers who have found no evidence at all from the spiritualistic communications regarding reincarnation. On the other hand, we find scholars like professor Grossman who consider that the evidence for it is "conclusive" and that some mediums get informations about past lives.

Or researchers are reading different spiritualistic literature, or they're leaving their own biases to strongly influence their conclusions.

My own opinion is that the evidence for reincarnation from people like Stevenson is good but not conclusive. More research and theoretical analysis need to be done.

However, I don't have clear how the evidence from spiritualism, overall, tend to support or refute the idea of reincarnation. I suspect that, overall, spiritualism tends to support a skeptical position regarding reincarnation, even thought some spiritualistic communications support the idea too.

A social and psychological experiment by Jime Sayaka on how the mind works

(This is not me)

Before I begin this post, I'd like to thank the many e-mails that I've received since my lastest post on Jesus. Sorry if I haven't replied to all of them, I don't enjoy of so much time as I'd desire. (I haven't replied to many other mails which arrived to me several weeks or even months ago, for the same reason, so sorry again).

In this post, I'll comment on the preliminary results of an informal psychological experiment which I've performed in my blog (with the help of some of my readers). Obviously, I didn't informed any of my readers of this experiment, because they were the subjects of it.

The purpose of this very informal experiment was to test the hypothesis "Human beings tend to be pseudoskeptical of theories, ideas or conclusions that they disagree with".

So (if my hypothesis is true) pseudoskepticism in general is a consequence of how the human mind works (pseudoskepticism of the paranormal is just a species of this).

My motivation to perform this experiment is my almost obsessive interest in discovering the nature of human disagreement and, specially, understanding the psychology of hard-core atheists and pseudoskeptics. In order to avoid bias against mterialistic pseudoskeptics, I performed an experiment with paranormalists, survivalists, spiritualists and mystics who read my blog.

An adventage of addressing so many topics in my blog and interviewing a number of different people, is that you can discover how human psychology works from a wider perspective. In fact, my motivation for addressing so many topics is precisely to learn to understand a given situation from a broad range of possible perspectives (not limited to my own's perspective alone).

However, this particular investigative methodology (which I use intentionally) runs contrary to how the mind works.

The mind seems to be designed to explay away phenomena or evidence that it finds unpalatable or incoherent with other beliefs, desires and expectations. It sees as natural and "obvious" ideas that fit previous beliefs, and as silly, ridiculous or implausible ideas that runs contrary to one's prejudices.

Evidence for this is the use of unproven assumptions which are added to the actual evidence in order to avoid certain conclusions, and make the evidence fits the person's previous beliefs about how the world works.

Before of commenting on my experiment, I'd like to point out a preliminary point:

As most of my readers are sympathetic to the paranormal and the afterlife, I'll mention just one example from pseudoskepticism in order to show how the human mind works. This example has the adventage that most of my readers will agree with me here:

-Regarding the SAIC experiments on remote viewing, Ray Hyman conceded that "The SAIC experiments are well-designed and the investigators have taken pains to eliminate the known weaknesses in previous parapsychological research. In addition, I cannot provide suitable candidates for what flaws, if any, might be present."

So far, so good. Which is the correct scientific conclusion from an experiment like that? That the results support the psi hypothesis. It is the correct conclusion given the specific evidence of the case. Any unbiased person will accept that evidence (at least provisionally) and the conclusion.

However, in order to protect his skeptical position, Hyman is forced to ADD to the current specific data an unproven assumption based on a sheer possibility: "Just the same, it is impossible in principle to say that any particular experiment or experimental series is completely free from possible flaws. An experimenter cannot control for every possibility--especially for potential flaws that have not yet been discovered"

Note that Hyman 's argument is literally true, but (applied as an objection to the specific SAIC experiments) it is flawed because it is a SHEER SPECULATION. It's a pure generality which is not proved in the speicific case. No actual and specific evidence is provided to support the idea that, in the specific case, a "potential flaw" exists.

Now, the readers sympathetic to parapsychology will agree with me that Hyman is using a dishonest trick and double standard in order to avoid the acceptation of the evidence for psi.

However, materialists and skeptics will consider Hyman's position "pretty reasonable" because after all (so they will argue) parapsychology and psychic research has a long and known history of incompetence performing experiments, frauds, delusions and deceptions (as has been conceded, for example, by George Hansen in this article). So, presuming a potential flaw not discovered yet is reasonable.

Now (you'll ask) why people sympathetic to parapsychology tend to agree that Hyman is wrong, and "skeptics" tend to agree that he's right? Try to reflect hard on this please.

The answer is that the belief "Hyman is wrong" fits the paranormalist's strong belief that remote vieweing exists. Hence, he's prone to accept conclusions that support his previous beliefs. On the contrary, for the skeptic, that "Hyman is wrong" is likely to be false, because Hyman's anti-psi position supports the skeptic's strong belief that remote viewing doesn't exist. Hence, the skeptic is prone to accept conclusions against the existence of the paranormal.

The asture reader will discover a lot of how the human mind works examining the above simple example carefully.

What most readers won't consider is that exactly the same applies to all the human beings (including themselves).

Let's to analyze again Hyman's mistake: it consists in using a unproven assumption to explain away the force of the evidence for psi. He's not denying the evidence as such, rather he's adding a unproven assumption (a potential undiscoveried flaw) in order to avoid the psi-favourable conclusion. Note that Hyman's assumption is not false in general; but it hasn't been proven in the specific case. Regarding the specific case, it is sheer speculation. It doesn't constitute specific evidence IN the particular case.

I agree with the paranormalists (and against the pseudoskeptic) that Hyman is wrong.

THE EXPERIMENT:

In order to test my hypothesis and fully cognizant that most of my readers are sympthatetic to spiritualism, mystics, New Age and parapsychology, and that most of them are strongly anti-Christians, I decided to use the evidence for Jesus' Resurrection (which I've been studying a lot since some time ago) in my experiment.

As consequence, I've written a series of posts sympathetic to the possibility (even probability) of Jesus' Resurrection and its putative divine origin in order to discover the common reaction of my anti-Christian readers. (By the way, everything that I've written about Jesus represent my true opinion and views about him, so I haven't been lying in my conclusions and I stand to them).

What I discovered was that, in general, they commit the same miskates and tend to use the same or very similar tactics than the pseudoskeptics, in order to avoid conclusions that they don't like (specially a conclusion favourable to Christianity).

In particular:

1-Ignorance of the literature and of the relevant evidence and scholarly arguments:

Many of my readers admitted openly that they have not studied the best literature about this matter. However (like seen in pseudoskeptics) they feel competent to judge (and dismiss) a complex scholarly topic appealing only to their personal opinions, tastes, beliefs and prejudices.

You have realized how many popular and online pseudoskeptics don't even know the best evidence for psi, and repeat confidently the same falsehoods and stereotypes (like "all the psi experiments are flawed", "there is no replication of psi experiments", "The only positive evidence for psi came from parapsychologists who are strong psi believers", "No skeptic has ever found positive evidence for psi" and so forth).

Exactly the same kind of demostrably false and ill-informed arguments that I've found in some of my readers ("The empty tomb is only believed by Christian scholars", "Liberal scholars are interested in facts and evidence alone, not in ideology", "Christian scholars just believe by faith and are not interested in facts" and so forth).

Any unbiased study of the literature would expose the falsehood of these ideas.

2-Red herrings and irrelevances:

In the case of parapsychology, you will remember that many online pseudoskeptics argue "If psychics were real, then they would be millionarie using psi powers to win the lotery". Or "If psi exists, then why no one of them has won the Randi's challenge?" and so forth. The implication is that psi doesn't exist.

Any rational person, even a skeptic, would see that the above are not serious objections to the existence of psi.

In the case of some of my readers, I received similar red herrings and irrelevances. For example "Christianity has done a lot of evil, look at the Inquisition" or "If Jesus' resurrection is real, then where is he now?" or "The trinity is absurd, thinking about 3 persons in a same being is incoherent".

Obviously, all of this is irrelevant regarding the historical factuality or non-factuality of Jesus' Resurrection. You don't need to know "where is he now" in order to conclude, if the evidence is good, that the resurrection probably happened. Likewise, the evils caused by some Christians in the history is not a reason to think that Jesus' resurrection didn't ocurred.

And the coherence or incoherence of the trinity cannot prevent us to study the evidence and, eventually, if it is good, to conclude in favour of Jesus' resurrection (By the way, regardless of whether the doctrine of Trinity is true or false, I don't think it is incoherent when properly formulated. Read this post by Christian philosopher Edward Feser about it).

3-Straw men, caricatures and unsympathetic formulation of the position being criticized:

You're familiar with pseudoskeptics misrepresenting the position being defended by the psi or survival proponent. Remember the pseudoskeptic's misrepresentation of the "filter hypothesis" to explain the mind-body connection, which the pseudoskeptic subtly misrepresents as a one-way connection (from the soul to the brain), when the survivalist constantly stresses that his position is a two-way (soul affecting the brain, like in the placebo effect; and brain affecting the soul, like neurological diseases or brain intoxications).

In the case of the hypothesis of Jesus' resurrection, the argument is misrepresented (grotesquely in my opinion) as a defense of the Bible, or as apology of the Church's beliefs, or creationism regarding biology. I was astonished to see some of my readers arguing like that.

They reveal a astonishing unability to understand even the most basic arguments (a trait which I thought, apparently wrongly, was exclusive of hard-core atheistic pseudoskeptics).

4-Falsehoods:

You'll recall the cases of pseudoskeptics arguing that "No skeptic has ever gotten positive evidence for psi", "psi hasn't be replicated" . Any person familiar with the literature would know that these claims are false.

In the case of Jesus, a few of my readers argued that Jesus probably didn't exist. Others say that perhaps Jesus existed but that the evidence for his existence was very weak, almost non-existent.

Any person who has studied something of history knows that these claims are false.

5-Egregious double standards:

Skeptics complain that most parapsychologists are believers in psi and survival researchers are believers in the afterlife, implying that they're biased. Therefore (skeptics will argue), that "most" parapsychologists and survivalists accept the evidence for psi and afterlife is not surprising.

For example, Martin Gardner wrote: "How can the public know that for fifty years skeptical psychologists have been trying their best to replicate classic psi experiments, and with notable unsuccess? It is this fact more than any other that has led to parapsychology's perpetual stagnation. Positive evidence keeps coming from a tiny group of enthusiasts, while negative evidence keeps coming from a much larger group of skeptics." (The whys of a philosophical scrivener)

The implication is that "enthusiasts" (i.e psi researchers) get positive results because they're biased for the psi hypothesis.

Or skeptic of survival Keith Augustine regarding NDE researchers: "Many near-death researchers interpret NDEs as evidence for survival of bodily death. Because many people would like to know that there is an afterlife rather than simply take the notion on faith, the study of NDEs tends to attract researchers who already believe that they provide evidence for survival. NDEs are a natural lure to survivalists, since they offer the prospect of bolstering belief in survival and of offering hints about what exactly is going to happen to us when we die." (Near-Death Experiences with Hallucinatory Features, in the Journal of NDE studies, p.28-29)

The implication is that NDE researchers, in general, tend to be biased towards the survivalist hypothesis of NDE, and this is why many of them think that "something interesting" (for survival) can be found in NDEs. (And as Keith argues in other paper: "that those (NDE) researchers willing to devote substantial amounts of time and energy to conduct large-scale studies of NDEs tend to be predisposed to dismiss psychophysiological explanations of them."(Psychophysiological and Cultural Correlates Undermining a Survivalist Interpretation of Near-Death Experiences’’ Defended, Journal of NDE studies, p.170)

Now, survivalists will reject Gardner and Keith's suggestions as misleading and irrelevant. The survivalist will say that the fact that most psi researchers or NDEs researchers are sympathetic with the psi and survival hypotheses is not reason to consider them unreliable scholars. I agree with the survivalist here.

However, when it comes to New Testament scholarship and the discussion about Jesus' resurrection, the same anti-Christian survivalists will appeal to an argument similar to Keith and Gardner, namely, that "only the Christian scholars accept the evidence for Jesus' Resurrection" (implying that this conclusion is caused by the bias or prejudices of Christians).

In other words, the survivalist doesn't consider that the possible bias (mentioned by Keith and Gardner) are a problem for the field of parapsychology and NDE studies (because the survivalist agrees in advanced with psi and survival-favorable conclusions) but he will consider this bias a very serious problem (which casts doubts on the scholar's objectivity) when discussing a topic to which he disagrees with (e.g. Jesus' Resurrection).

6-Unproven assumptions and Hymanian sheer speculations:

For example, essential to the evidence for Jesus' resurrection is the historical evidence of an empty tomb. This is part of what need to be explained by any correct hypothesis regarding the events around Jesus' putative resurrection.

Confronted with this fact (accepted by most New Testament scholars), my anti-Christian readers' responses were more or less like these:

-It's an invention, a legend, a myth, not something real.

As expected, they cannot support this speculation with any concrete historical evidence which overturns the evidence for the empty tomb historicity. It's sheer speculation and wishful thinking.

-"Perhaps" the body of Jesus was stolen or dissapeared by other reasons. After all, this is not impossible.

As expected, not specific historical evidence was provided to support this "stolen body" hypothesis of Jesus' body, just a mere speculative possibility has been posed. Again, think in Hyman's "possibility" of potential flaws regarding the SAIC experiment, even thought he couldn't find any...

Note that, for the unbiased reader, these unproven speculations reveal the critic's emotional need to explain the known evidence in terms of a hypothesis different than the resurrection, because he doesn't believe in the latter (like Hyman doesn't believe in remote viewing). The critic's beliefs push him into purely speculative scenarios in order to explain the evidence in a way which is compatible with their beliefs and block a conclusion which they disagree with (i.e. Jesus' Resurrection).

Another interesting sheer speculation (which is particularly unlikely) was this:

-Jesus could have come to life again like in cases of NDEs and this would explain both his empty tomb and why the disciples saw him after his "dead".

Note that this speculation is unlikely if we taken into account the fact that the Romans were professional and experienced killers using the brutal method of the crucifixion. The evidence shows that Jesus was brutally tortured in his whole to death, not simply dead clinically due to some infarction or accident.

Moreover, in contrast with NDEers who came to life again and then died again (as the late Pam Reynolds), there is not evidence that Jesus died again (which is consistent with the hypothesis that the resurrection body is the same body transformed to make it fit for inmortality).

The latter fact (the non-existence of evidence for Jesus' second death) cannot be explained by the hypothesis that Jesus' first death was purely clinical and that he came to life again like in cases of NDEs.

That such a implausible hypothesis like that be posed as a living alternative reveals the critic's strong hostility towards the resurrection hypothesis.

Regarding my claim that, if Jesus resurrected, it was plausibly caused by God (as most scholars agree and how is plausible given the religiously charged context in which Jesus lived and the content of his theistic teachings), I received these speculations:

-Jesus "could" be a yogui with amazing paranormal powers.

Again, there is not good historical evidence at all that Jesus was a yogui. It is sheer speculation. Moreover, there is not evidence that yoguis can produce a resurrection body fitted to inmortality using their putative powers.

It's sheer speculation which is added to the known evidence in order to block and exclude in advanced the hypothesis that God raised Jesus from the dead.

-Jesus was an expert in unknown meditation methods which enabled him to do that.

Again, there is not persuasive historical evidence that Jesus was an expert in meditation methods, nor that such methods, if exist and are mastered, would enable the practitioner to create a resurrection body fitted to inmortality.

In fact, meditation methods which are available in most Eastern practiques and philosophies are part of a system in which the human being has several bodies (the etheric body, the astral body, and so forth) and in no one of them (as far I know) posed that the same physical body will be resurrected after death. But even if one of these text posed something like that, there is not evidence that Jesus was an expert in that specific method, or that that method actually produces such a result.

Speculation is added to speculation to speculation to speculation in order to block a conclusion favourable to God as the cause of the (putatuve) resurrection of Jesus.

-Jesus was a practitioner and advanced student of Buddhism and it "could" explain his resurrection.

Again, there is not solid historical evidence that Jesus was a practitioner of it. Sheer speculation and unproven assumption. Moreover, Buddhism is in general atheistic and hence incompatible with the historically evidenced fact that Jesus's teachings were explicitly theistic, i.e. about God's kingdom.

The motivation behind these speculations is to avoid the conclusion that God raised Jesus from the dead. Now (you can ask) why some people try to avoid this conclusion with unproven assumptions and speculations? Why do they are not even open to this possibility, even if they (claim) to believe in God? After all, if God exists, he could create a resurrection body. Is not God supposed to be omnipotent and more spiritually powerful than any other creature?

I can understand that atheists and pantheists don't consider this as a living possibility, because for them God doesn't exist, and hence cannot raise Jesus (or anybody, for that matter). But that self-proclaimed "theists" try to avoid this possibility, appealing to wholly unproven assumptions and speculations + speculations + speculations?

I discoveried that the motivation for avoiding this theistic explanation of Jesus' Resurrection is either atheism or religious pluralism. Most of my readers seem to be sympathetic to both. New Agers, mystics and some "spiritual seekers" seem to agree with one of them too. They don't believe that there is "one way" which is exclusively the truth regarding spirituality. They think a lot of methods (meditation, chi kung, yoga, Easter practiques of all kinds, etc.) are part of the same "way" to God (or to "pure consciousness", or similar). Or they simply think that "God" doesn't exist, so the hypothesis in question cannot get off the ground.

Note that I'm not saying that atheism or religious pluralism are false. I'm simply pointing out how these beliefs determine the use of pseudoskeptical tactics when confronted with evidence which doesn't seem to support these beliefs. This is my main argument.

In future posts, I'll discuss in more details the conclusions that I've gotten with my experiment.