Bill Pratt | January 13, 2013
Post Author: Bill Pratt The empiricist David Hume believed so. According to Hume, who is possibly the most famous skeptic in the history of modern philosophy, only ideas that are based on direct sense experience or are true by definition are meaningful. Hume famously said the following: If we take in our hand any volume — [...]
Bill Pratt | December 17, 2012
Post Author: Bill Pratt Recently I was listening to the Unbelievable podcast and heard something telling from atheist James Croft. As he was discussing the historical, eyewitness evidence of Jesus’s resurrection with Christian Chris Sinkinson, he said the following (this is a paraphrase of what he said): The amount of eyewitness testimony of the death and [...]
Bill Pratt | January 16, 2012
Post Author: Bill Pratt Let’s briefly cover some historical background. The Roman emperor Vespasian ruled from A.D. 69 -79; his reign ended with his death. Writing about Vespasian some 25 years later, the Roman historian Tacitus reported a famous incident where Vespasian is said to have miraculously healed two men – one blind and one lame. This miracle [...]
Bill Pratt | December 22, 2011
Post Author: Bill Pratt Very few skeptics with whom I’ve interacted have actually investigated the historical evidence for the resurrection of Jesus Christ (there are some exceptions, but they are few in number). The typical response is to dismiss all miracle accounts as either impossible or so improbable as to not be worth researching – [...]
Bill Pratt | November 23, 2011
Post Author: Bill Pratt Thomas, the disciple of Jesus, is famous for the following statement: ”Unless I see the nail marks in his hands and put my finger where the nails were, and put my hand into his side, I will not believe it.” There have always been people like Thomas who demand that they directly experience [...]
Bill Pratt | October 3, 2011
Post Author: Bill Pratt During the Renaissance and Enlightenment, philosophers continuously changed their views on how science and religion should interact. Philosopher William Lawhead describes the continuum chronologically in his textbook The Voyage of Discovery. Initially, most scientists and philosophers “saw religion and science as co-equal partners in the search for truth.” Lawhead continues: “Gradually [...]
