I don't know about the credit thing. We clearly have been organizing our thoughts differently, as shown by our difficulties in engaging with each other. At this point, based on his gracious willingness to give me feedback on my attempt to express his thought process, I think I understand his thinking behind the original comment. And if he's not interested in pursuing it further, that's fine with me. It's too bad that we don't have a culture where people feel free to throw even a crazy sounding idea out there, let everybody have a go at it, and learn what we can fro the process. And I wouldn't characterize Stem's idea as crazy -- ideally, an interesting exercise in evaluating analogies.honorentheos wrote: ↑Sat Jan 01, 2022 10:56 pmRes, I think you are giving Stem too much credit. He isn't organizing his thoughts in the same way you are. I believe his concern with the pizza analogy is assuming evidence that Jesus might be a pizza is an absurdity on its face, not as a logic problem. It didn't occur to him that the problem you recognized and corrected in your description was the problem. He's just sure no one believes Jesus is a pizza, so it's stupid to argue he's more likely to be a pizza than a pepperoni pizza. When he says we're all in alignment about it being equally improbable if the probabilities of Jesus being both the set and subset are zero, he's not doing so based on an understanding of the logic but because no one actually argues for Jesus being a pizza so of course both statements have a probability of zero. It's surficial aligned but there's an entire level of discussion separating them that makes it difficult to bring into focus.
I did like his shift away from Carrier to the more general issue. I really don't know what to think about Carrier. I just don't have the chops to evaluate his arguments. I'd have to become Kishkumen, and I think that ship sailed long ago. I wonder more about something like the way Urban Legends originate. Is the Hook Handed man urban legend based on a real man with a hand for a hook? Did the equivalent of urban legends exist at the time of Jesus? I dunno. I suppose I'd still need to become Kish.