I think there’s a certain political spin to “Jesus isn’t even real!” that - taken to it’s logical conclusion - leads us to believe virtually nobody existed prior to that advent of photography.
It’s sort of the skeptic’s answer to Pascal’s Wager. Don’t believe in anything, because there’s no material cost either way.
lol no. Photographs can easily be faked, especially with modern technology. Defer to those who have applied the scientific method, who have done solid research, and even do those things yourself to cross-reference; you should really know scientific literacy by now.
“Guy who does actual literal magic” is never real. “Guy who alone violently killed numerous women in London 1888-1891” (AKA Jack the Ripper), as a counterexample, is plausible but (as far as I know) has yet to be proven or disproven by historical evidence or other scientific means as to if it was one killer or multiple killers. “Guy whom historians generally agree did XYZ and had such and such characteristics based on their study of historical evidence and use of the scientific method” is virtually guaranteed to be real within a level of approximation (as in, even if we don’t know John Doe’s middle name was Jack, John Jack Doe still existed but only slightly different from how we know him).
taken to it’s logical conclusion - leads us to believe virtually nobody existed prior to that advent of photography.
That has the logical weight of Last Thursdayism or The Truman Show Delusion. Like technically it’s possible, but there are way more assumptions being made about what it obscured than there are assumptions being made about what is observed.
“Guy who does actual literal magic” is never real.
Sure. But a person doesn’t cease to exist because they’ve been canonized by the Vatican, either. The post-mortem mythology built up around a person isn’t evidence of their absence. The leap from “Jesus didn’t literally bring a guy three-days-dead back to the land of the living” to “No popular rabbi evangelizing a reformist vision of the Jewish faith existed in Jerusalem two thousand years ago” is enormous.
Hell, even the character Spiderman has its roots in the daredevils of the 1930s, 40s, and 50s, famous for free climbing across New York real estate. To hold up a copy of the latest Tom Holland movie and say “This is absurd! He’s literally doing wizard magic! Nobody has ever dressed as a spider and climbed up the side of a building!” Like, obviously false.
That has the logical weight of Last Thursdayism or The Truman Show Delusion.
An even more extreme take, sure. But when you’re dealing with historical events that are thousands of years old, its a game you kinda-sorta have to play. Otherwise, you don’t know where Greek History ends and Mythology begins.
I think there’s a certain political spin to “Jesus isn’t even real!” that - taken to it’s logical conclusion - leads us to believe virtually nobody existed prior to that advent of photography.
It’s sort of the skeptic’s answer to Pascal’s Wager. Don’t believe in anything, because there’s no material cost either way.
lol no. Photographs can easily be faked, especially with modern technology. Defer to those who have applied the scientific method, who have done solid research, and even do those things yourself to cross-reference; you should really know scientific literacy by now.
“Guy who does actual literal magic” is never real. “Guy who alone violently killed numerous women in London 1888-1891” (AKA Jack the Ripper), as a counterexample, is plausible but (as far as I know) has yet to be proven or disproven by historical evidence or other scientific means as to if it was one killer or multiple killers. “Guy whom historians generally agree did XYZ and had such and such characteristics based on their study of historical evidence and use of the scientific method” is virtually guaranteed to be real within a level of approximation (as in, even if we don’t know John Doe’s middle name was Jack, John Jack Doe still existed but only slightly different from how we know him).
That has the logical weight of Last Thursdayism or The Truman Show Delusion. Like technically it’s possible, but there are way more assumptions being made about what it obscured than there are assumptions being made about what is observed.
Sure. But a person doesn’t cease to exist because they’ve been canonized by the Vatican, either. The post-mortem mythology built up around a person isn’t evidence of their absence. The leap from “Jesus didn’t literally bring a guy three-days-dead back to the land of the living” to “No popular rabbi evangelizing a reformist vision of the Jewish faith existed in Jerusalem two thousand years ago” is enormous.
Hell, even the character Spiderman has its roots in the daredevils of the 1930s, 40s, and 50s, famous for free climbing across New York real estate. To hold up a copy of the latest Tom Holland movie and say “This is absurd! He’s literally doing wizard magic! Nobody has ever dressed as a spider and climbed up the side of a building!” Like, obviously false.
An even more extreme take, sure. But when you’re dealing with historical events that are thousands of years old, its a game you kinda-sorta have to play. Otherwise, you don’t know where Greek History ends and Mythology begins.