There is a writer at Examiner.com who is also a member of the AtheistForums.org web site, Jacqueline Lavache (Eilonnwy), who frequently draws attention to the articles she writes as the Boston Atheism Examiner. (Since the web site compensates its writers in a fashion similar to that of Helium and Associated Content, I certainly do not begrudge her frequent solicitations.) There is a particular article she wrote about three months ago that she has made some references to in recent conversations, so I decided to give it a look and review what she had to say. The article is entitled “Standards of Evidence: Why the Bible is not proof of God.” Click on the link and give it a read, helping her earn a buck, and then switch back to here for my review.

I was really disappointed by the stark difference between the promise of the title and the content of the article. I went in expecting to find out “why the Bible is not proof of God” but the only thing the article delivered was the assertion, viz. the article tells us that the Bible is not proof of God but never presents a compelling argument for why it is not. In the nine paragraphs that constitute her piece, she invests only two toward her central thesis, which can be found at the very end. (I went and discounted two ‘paragraphs’ because they are not really paragraphs: one is just a single question, while another is a post-script that misquotes Christopher Hitchens—a quote whose origins can be found in an opinion editorial he wrote on ‘miracles’ for Free Inquiry magazine in 2004.)

In the first paragraph she describes her view of the skeptical thinker, and in the next five paragraphs she elaborates upon the standards of evidence that she erroneously attributes to skeptical thinkers. And I say “erroneously” because what she is describing resembles more closely the standards of evidence held by those who subscribe to methodological naturalism, and by no means do all skeptical thinkers subscribe to that epistemology! And then the following paragraph describes her view of atheism.

At last, in the eighth paragraph she finally confronts her central thesis of why the Bible is not proof of God, which amounts to her self-stultifying assertion that something written in a book can be summarily dismissed on the basis that it cannot provide “substantial corroborative evidence” or meet the standards of empirical evidence she had described. Although we may, at least in principle, be able to verify the locations in which certain of the Bible’s historical accounts took place, she writes, we cannot verify anything else in the story, such as miraculous events, because it seems there were no security cameras capturing the events (see her paragraph on Brad Pitt and the Ghost for examples of what she would deem as acceptable evidence for increasingly extraordinary claims).

As I said, it is a self-stultifying assertion; i.e., it cripples itself. For if she truly holds that standard, then she must also insist that her readers likewise dismiss her own article! Do we find such a caveat anywhere in her piece? Strangely, no. In fact, one might suspect that she is not even aware of her paralogism. Consider: If that which is written in a book can be summarily dismissed for its failure to provide substantial corroborative evidence, then how much more qualified for dismissal is an internet article, published on a web site that is just out of its first year, written by an author who practically no one knows, that contains material lacking so much as the pretence of independent verifiability, while professing extraordinary claims about the standards of evidence deemed acceptable to skeptical thinkers which turns out to be demonstrably false! Would she propose that her readers dismiss her entire article? I suspect not. Ergo, conundrum.

It is perhaps the ninth and final paragraph that reveals most succinctly and accurately why she thinks the Bible is not proof of God: because it is a book of mythology, she claims, which is probably to be understood in the sense of fiction (excluding, of course, certain locations and peoples who she is prepared to admit into history). Given the vast scope and depth of scholarly work invested in examining the biblical literature, the robust archaeological enterprise that has verified so much of its content, the long history of critics having their objections refuted (e.g., Pontius Pilate was once said to be fictional, as were the Hittites, etc.), her statement qualifies as an extraordinary claim. “The Bible,” she writes, “is a book of mythology.” It is appropriate, then, for us to search her article for the substantial corroborative evidence that supports her extraordinary claim, since she did reveal to us her higher standard of evidence. The Bible is a book of mythology, a claim that is evidenced by—

—well, nothing. All she provides her readers is her bold assertion, and a slight misquote from Christopher Hitchens to close off the article. Consonant with the higher standard of evidence she proclaims, she provided her readers how much independently verifiable evidence for her extraordinary claim? Precisely zero. She did not even bother pretending that substantial corroborative evidence exists for her claim. Worse yet, at least one of her claims was demonstrably false. So her claim does not work, impaling itself on a self-stultification; it is predicated on at least one falsehood, a generalization about skeptical thinkers that is incorrect and paints an unfair picture of them; and it is not supported by anything that so much as resembles evidence, a deeply profound irony given the high standards she proclaimed. Perhaps there is more truth to her statement than meets the eye, when she said that this higher standard of evidence is applied to claims made by the religious, which emits a strong odour of the Special Pleading fallacy.

I shall tell you one thing a skeptical thinker is: someone who thinks that reasoning by jargon and paralogistic propaganda is no substitute for rational argumentation.

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