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Title: Are Christian Apologists Guilty of the Spider-Man Fallacy? Post by: ER on September 20, 2020, 03:48:53 PM Interesting.
Error 404 (Not Found)!!1 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kjrA_a4VB4I#) Title: Re: Are Christian Apologists Guilty of the Spider-Man Fallacy? Post by: Jim H on September 21, 2020, 01:07:20 PM Some interesting info and sources in that. I'll say one thing though - I absolutely have seen a lot of evangelicals and apologists do the exact version of what he characterizes in the intro as merely a strawman argument. That is, use physical archaeological evidence as direct proof of the supernatural aspects of the bible. I mean, not trying to phrase it as an overall confirmation of the potential reliability of the biblical narrative, that makes some sense, as this video describes. Rather, they'll fairly directly state things along the lines of, "Look, Pontius Pilate existed based on this carving, therefore Jesus resurrected three days after his crucifixion".
A LOT of Christians also state an even more absurd similar argument, in different words, "The bible exists, therefore God and Jesus exists as depicted in it". Even further than that, evangelicals will argue (not in these exact words), "God and Jesus exist, therefore God and Jesus exists". This is something I have personally seen in online and in-person interactions with apologists and evangelicals. Yeah, not everyone does that, not even most (certainly not the more well educated and well spoken apologists), but to handwave out of existence the logical fallacies you see routinely on places like christianforums.com day in and day out bugged me a bit I guess. Yes, the Spider-Man fallacy is used unfairly against people who didn't make it at times, but to say Christians never make it is at least as bad. Title: Re: Are Christian Apologists Guilty of the Spider-Man Fallacy? Post by: ER on September 21, 2020, 03:11:52 PM I try to judge arguments on a per-case basis and I'm sure you're right that there are many instances of fallacious reasoning out there.
This link was sent to me by a friend I consider one of the most intelligent evangelical Christians I have ever known, and when he sends me something I will always give it a read or a listen based on my respect for his judgment. Mostly I don't go seeking apologetics out on my own very often but I am glad when he sends them to me because I've learned a lot that way. PS Spiderman exists. |