When did I agree that your incorrect assertions don’t change your argument? Quote me. They have to change your argument by the fact they are wrong.
An argument is not just a conclusion. It is a basis that lead to a collection of assertions, presenting some conclusion. If the basis is wrong, the argument is meaningless. If the assertions are wrong, the argument is also meaningless. The conclusion being right doesn’t make the argument any more useful. Your basis of ‘the bible was written in Latin’ was wrong, so you changed it to ‘the bible wasn’t originally written in English.’ You posit that this makes it unreliable to know what it is truly saying, but this is ridiculous.
Another basis you make that is completely wrong is that all English bibles come from a single source, from the Roman Catholic Church. Not only is this incorrect for all English bibles, but it’s not even correct for all English Roman Catholic Bibles! Most of the sources and manuscripts of the bible are not even related to the Catholic Church or the See of Rome pre-schism. Only one version of the bible, the Douay–Rheims version, was directly translated from the Vulgate. All the others were translations of other, completely independent sources. You can get literal, peer-reviewed, high-quality editions of the major sources with extensive notes, and see all the ‘subtle yet deeply reaching’ differences for yourself. Tell me how many you find. All of the OT sources state that the universe was created in six days, by the way.
There are churches that have existed since Antiquity that have continually used the Byzantine Majority Text in its original form liturgically. These churches are in communion with churches that use English bibles liturgically, and bibles of other languages. These churches take communion very seriously. If the Greek bishops had a problem with the English translations, it would be known. Indeed, many bishops did have a problem with the current translations using the Masoretic text instead of LXX, not for dogmatic reasons, but because the Masoretic is a Jewish source, made after LXX, so they made a bible with an English LXX OT and an NKJV NT (based on the Textus Receptus, a version of the Majority Text). The LXX had already been available in a literal English translation for over a hundred years prior to this.
From a historiographic perspective, the sheer volume of textual evidence of the bible outclasses every other written work in existence. Philologists usually only have one manuscript, probably not even complete, to work with. The bible has thousands, most in vernacular languages that have direct lineage to languages spoken today. The more textual evidence you have, the more evidence you have to construct the correct result. If one copy has an error, two others don’t, so it becomes possible to find and proofread errors in the manuscripts. The idea that the true meaning of the bible cannot be known because of translation or transcription errors is beyond ridiculous. We have independent sources of the same set of works. Of the sources, we have several manuscripts to correct errors. The sources were written by different religious bodies with different theologies and motivations, and yet there are few differences between them. (Ironically, the biggest difference is between LXX and the Masoretic Text, both written by Jews, but separated by a couple centuries.) The historical context of the NT is well-known, due to the high-quality sources of Roman times. In addition, there are several writings (mostly by saints) that give context and commentary on the NT since nearly the day the books were written. The historical context of the OT is far less understood. The ‘meaning’ of the OT is thus split into three camps: Christian interpretation is ironically the oldest, since we can trace the tradition to Greek church practices and sources (including the NT itself); post-Christ Jewish interpretation began as a counterpoint to Christianity, in some ways unreliable as the new Jewish scholars were attempting to differentiate themselves from Christianity, but that is a matter of opinion; and modern interpretation that attempts to reconstruct the original meaning as known to the ancient Jews and Hebrews, based mostly on conjecture and the existence of imaginary sources (yes, I do have a disdain for certain ‘schools’ in this field). Indeed, the Dead Sea Scrolls pointed out to us that the LXX is probably the more correct version of the ‘original’ OT.
An argument is not just a conclusion. It is a basis that lead to a collection of assertions, presenting some conclusion. If the basis is wrong, the argument is meaningless
You are disregarding something called "triviality".
If someone believes the sky is blue because of aliens inventing color with mind control waves, are the wrong about the fact that the sky is indeed blue?
the predictive power of the statement "The bible is a human creation written by humans and was not originally in English" is not increased by knowing the exact minutiae of the translations and versions.
The conclusion being right doesn’t make the argument any more useful.
Being right is useful in and of itself.
Things occur, such as reality supporting your position even if you can't articulate exactly why. To claim an inability to articulate a position is tantamount to an incorrect position is fallacious.
How can you seriously know so much about the bible and still have missed its most central messages?
I actually didn’t read the thread. I skimmed through it because it didn’t interest me, but I happened to see that you said the bible was originally written in Latin, so I felt compelled to correct you.
You said unequivocally that an unfalsifiable would have to be proven false in order for something falsifiable to be proven true.
I never said that. And in the quote I literally state, ‘You don’t need to disprove ... any unfalsifiable premise’. Where do I state ‘an unfalsifiable statement would have to be proven false’? The only language I use in the context of predicating on something being unfalsifiable is ‘assume’ which does not mean ‘prove‘ at all. You are grossly misrepresenting my words to try to show that I am making a logical error, but I never said what you are directly accusing me of stating.
Neither of those quotes are me agreeing that your errors don’t affect your argument. In fact the whole reason I pointed out your errors is to demonstrate that you have insufficient knowledge to form an argument through hermeneutics.
If someone states that the sky is blue because it reflects the ocean, I will point out their error and tell them they are ignorant to physics because they, in fact, are.
I’m not sure how you define ‘predictive power’ in this context, but the knowledge of the textual evidence of the bible gives us a wealth of information applicable to a variety of disciplines. You sound like a positivist. You only value things that can be empirically and materially proven. Positivism is considered outdated for a reason. I would love if I could solve problems wholly empirically and materially, but it’s not possible. I am a postpositivist and holist because they are some of the most pragmatic and useful approaches to solving problems in existence today.
To claim an inability to articulate a position is tantamount to an incorrect position is fallacious.
I’m not claiming that. I’m claiming that if you have the correct answer, but you don’t have a valid argument for it, then you don’t have any argument to base your conclusion on. You are relying on either misinformation or emotion, or more likely some combination. Consider these three scenarios:
The sky is blue because I see it -> unfalsifiable, therefore unscientific
The sky is blue because it reflects water -> attempts to be scientific but is wrong
The sky is blue because of Rayleigh scattering -> correct, scientific explanation
You continually keep trying to appeal to some sort of moral indication that my actions are wrong. Well, here is my moral framework: it is my purpose in life to learn things, and to use that knowledge to correct others.
Neither of those quotes are me agreeing that your errors don’t affect your argument.
Your claim is contrary to fact.
You have directly agreed my premise and the outcome is unchanged as result of the errors.
This is what trivial means.
but you don’t have a valid argument for it,
An argument that is only trivially wrong is a valid argument.
This is what trivial means.
The sky is blue because I see it -> unfalsifiable, therefore unscientific
The sky is blue because it reflects water -> attempts to be scientific but is wrong
The sky is blue because of Rayleigh scattering -> correct, scientific explanation
You keep bringing up this straw man.
If we were to parlance my argument into your sky example,
The sky is blue because of scattering
i.e. The bible is not literally the divine word because of translation
its trivial to say "scattering is an insufficient poor explanation, you mean Rayleigh scattering"
You continually keep trying to appeal to some sort of moral indication that my actions are wrong.
No, I keep appealing to the idea that its oddly hypocritical to be such a devout researcher of the bible but to have ignored the message contained within in favor of quibbling about trivial details.
The bible is not literally the divine word because of translation
This is wrong. To call something ‘divine word’ is unfalsifiable. Your argument has no logical basis.
Regardless, I have shown that there is no evidence that the bible has suffered from translation error, and that there is sufficient textual evidence to reasonably believe it has been both preserved and translated correctly.
Translation is not scattering in this case. It is reflection, i.e. a completely wrong explanation with no basis in reality.
When did I agree that your incorrect assertions don’t change your argument? Quote me. They have to change your argument by the fact they are wrong.
An argument is not just a conclusion. It is a basis that lead to a collection of assertions, presenting some conclusion. If the basis is wrong, the argument is meaningless. If the assertions are wrong, the argument is also meaningless. The conclusion being right doesn’t make the argument any more useful. Your basis of ‘the bible was written in Latin’ was wrong, so you changed it to ‘the bible wasn’t originally written in English.’ You posit that this makes it unreliable to know what it is truly saying, but this is ridiculous.
Another basis you make that is completely wrong is that all English bibles come from a single source, from the Roman Catholic Church. Not only is this incorrect for all English bibles, but it’s not even correct for all English Roman Catholic Bibles! Most of the sources and manuscripts of the bible are not even related to the Catholic Church or the See of Rome pre-schism. Only one version of the bible, the Douay–Rheims version, was directly translated from the Vulgate. All the others were translations of other, completely independent sources. You can get literal, peer-reviewed, high-quality editions of the major sources with extensive notes, and see all the ‘subtle yet deeply reaching’ differences for yourself. Tell me how many you find. All of the OT sources state that the universe was created in six days, by the way.
There are churches that have existed since Antiquity that have continually used the Byzantine Majority Text in its original form liturgically. These churches are in communion with churches that use English bibles liturgically, and bibles of other languages. These churches take communion very seriously. If the Greek bishops had a problem with the English translations, it would be known. Indeed, many bishops did have a problem with the current translations using the Masoretic text instead of LXX, not for dogmatic reasons, but because the Masoretic is a Jewish source, made after LXX, so they made a bible with an English LXX OT and an NKJV NT (based on the Textus Receptus, a version of the Majority Text). The LXX had already been available in a literal English translation for over a hundred years prior to this.
From a historiographic perspective, the sheer volume of textual evidence of the bible outclasses every other written work in existence. Philologists usually only have one manuscript, probably not even complete, to work with. The bible has thousands, most in vernacular languages that have direct lineage to languages spoken today. The more textual evidence you have, the more evidence you have to construct the correct result. If one copy has an error, two others don’t, so it becomes possible to find and proofread errors in the manuscripts. The idea that the true meaning of the bible cannot be known because of translation or transcription errors is beyond ridiculous. We have independent sources of the same set of works. Of the sources, we have several manuscripts to correct errors. The sources were written by different religious bodies with different theologies and motivations, and yet there are few differences between them. (Ironically, the biggest difference is between LXX and the Masoretic Text, both written by Jews, but separated by a couple centuries.) The historical context of the NT is well-known, due to the high-quality sources of Roman times. In addition, there are several writings (mostly by saints) that give context and commentary on the NT since nearly the day the books were written. The historical context of the OT is far less understood. The ‘meaning’ of the OT is thus split into three camps: Christian interpretation is ironically the oldest, since we can trace the tradition to Greek church practices and sources (including the NT itself); post-Christ Jewish interpretation began as a counterpoint to Christianity, in some ways unreliable as the new Jewish scholars were attempting to differentiate themselves from Christianity, but that is a matter of opinion; and modern interpretation that attempts to reconstruct the original meaning as known to the ancient Jews and Hebrews, based mostly on conjecture and the existence of imaginary sources (yes, I do have a disdain for certain ‘schools’ in this field). Indeed, the Dead Sea Scrolls pointed out to us that the LXX is probably the more correct version of the ‘original’ OT.
You are disregarding something called "triviality".
If someone believes the sky is blue because of aliens inventing color with mind control waves, are the wrong about the fact that the sky is indeed blue?
the predictive power of the statement "The bible is a human creation written by humans and was not originally in English" is not increased by knowing the exact minutiae of the translations and versions.
Being right is useful in and of itself.
Things occur, such as reality supporting your position even if you can't articulate exactly why. To claim an inability to articulate a position is tantamount to an incorrect position is fallacious.
How can you seriously know so much about the bible and still have missed its most central messages?
I actually didn’t read the thread. I skimmed through it because it didn’t interest me, but I happened to see that you said the bible was originally written in Latin, so I felt compelled to correct you.
I know lol.
It's been pretty obvious from your replies.
I never said that. And in the quote I literally state, ‘You don’t need to disprove ... any unfalsifiable premise’. Where do I state ‘an unfalsifiable statement would have to be proven false’? The only language I use in the context of predicating on something being unfalsifiable is ‘assume’ which does not mean ‘prove‘ at all. You are grossly misrepresenting my words to try to show that I am making a logical error, but I never said what you are directly accusing me of stating.
Facts are facts. It’s not like there’s any context I missed that makes your ‘original church Latin’ remark any less stupid.
Neither of those quotes are me agreeing that your errors don’t affect your argument. In fact the whole reason I pointed out your errors is to demonstrate that you have insufficient knowledge to form an argument through hermeneutics.
If someone states that the sky is blue because it reflects the ocean, I will point out their error and tell them they are ignorant to physics because they, in fact, are.
I’m not sure how you define ‘predictive power’ in this context, but the knowledge of the textual evidence of the bible gives us a wealth of information applicable to a variety of disciplines. You sound like a positivist. You only value things that can be empirically and materially proven. Positivism is considered outdated for a reason. I would love if I could solve problems wholly empirically and materially, but it’s not possible. I am a postpositivist and holist because they are some of the most pragmatic and useful approaches to solving problems in existence today.
I’m not claiming that. I’m claiming that if you have the correct answer, but you don’t have a valid argument for it, then you don’t have any argument to base your conclusion on. You are relying on either misinformation or emotion, or more likely some combination. Consider these three scenarios:
The sky is blue because I see it -> unfalsifiable, therefore unscientific
The sky is blue because it reflects water -> attempts to be scientific but is wrong
The sky is blue because of Rayleigh scattering -> correct, scientific explanation
You continually keep trying to appeal to some sort of moral indication that my actions are wrong. Well, here is my moral framework: it is my purpose in life to learn things, and to use that knowledge to correct others.
Your claim is contrary to fact.
You have directly agreed my premise and the outcome is unchanged as result of the errors.
This is what trivial means.
An argument that is only trivially wrong is a valid argument.
This is what trivial means.
You keep bringing up this straw man.
If we were to parlance my argument into your sky example,
i.e. The bible is not literally the divine word because of translation
its trivial to say "scattering is an insufficient poor explanation, you mean Rayleigh scattering"
No, I keep appealing to the idea that its oddly hypocritical to be such a devout researcher of the bible but to have ignored the message contained within in favor of quibbling about trivial details.
This is wrong. To call something ‘divine word’ is unfalsifiable. Your argument has no logical basis.
Regardless, I have shown that there is no evidence that the bible has suffered from translation error, and that there is sufficient textual evidence to reasonably believe it has been both preserved and translated correctly.
Translation is not scattering in this case. It is reflection, i.e. a completely wrong explanation with no basis in reality.