I did read his “Did Jesus exist” book, and have just finished Lataster’s summary of it and it seems he does accept many of the main points of mythicism (more I think, than he did when he wrote it, perhaps a little intellectual honesty forced it’s way in).

While I doubt Price will be able to get him to actual compare the two hypotheses, it would be nice if he can get him to admit that there is not really anything that comprehensively rules out the mythical/celestial Jesus. And also, if he can get Ehrman to accept that going from “the Gospels are largely fictions written to push a theological viewpoint and there is no reliable way of identifying any historical material in them” to “Jesus existed and the people who knew him would have recorded some stories that eventually found their way into the gospels in some form, therefore we know he existed” (paraphrasing, but IMO, that was basically his argument) is not sound.

Please advise and prep Price going into his debate with Ehrman.

Yes. A 3-to-1 historicity-supporting item of evidence would bring the a fortiori probability of historicity to even money, and raise the a jud. to 1 in 4,000, and those would be the margins of error either side.

A single 1000-to-1 historicity-supporting item of evidence would bring the a jud. to 1 in 12 chance of historicity, but the a fort. to 1/3 x 1000/1 = 1000/3 = 333 to 1 in favor of historicity. So it would warrant provisionally believing Jesus existed, with just some doubts remaining. But two such items of evidence would bring even the a jud. to 1/12k x 1k/1 x 1k/1 = 1,000,000/12,000 = 83 to 1 in favor of historicity. That’s the a jud. even. And that’s a really high certitude for ancient history. Mythicism would be dead in the water.

Thanks Richard!

Even with your a fortiori posterior probability of historicity as only 33%, that means any new piece of evidence would have to be 3 times more likely on H than not H to even bring the probabilities to even money. With your ad judicantiori posterior of 1 in 12,000 that means any new evidence of historicity would have to be damn convincing, right?

Rich

I do. And I’ve been aware of it. But it’s for applications far more advanced than I have need for. So, it just goes in the “cool” column for now.

I’d debate him formally if he asked, or anyone arranged it.

(And that last post is amusing. McGrath doesn’t realize that he needs to test the alternative hypothesis: that I’m right. Then, my critics will have to have made egregious mistakes, or been dishonest, as there is no other way to “rebut” what is true. In fact, the fact that rebutters consistently get what I say wrong or even lie about it—McGrath himself having lied several times—and I am able to prove this with evidence, not merely assert it—and notice McGrath’s post records the assertions but deletes and never even mentions all the evidence I presented for them—is evidence in favor of my being correct. I’m still waiting for an honest rebuttal to what I’ve actually argued. So far, all I hear is crickets.)

Bass is a presuppositionalist, and those debates are always maddening.

He won’t be able to use a presuppositional argument in our debate.

As to how he will conduct himself then, remains to be seen. I’ll charitably assume the best.

As to the first question:

Yes. If it were 100% to 10%, then such a letter would increase the probability of history ten times.

Though I would expect such a find to be really hard to explain on mythicism. So the ratio is more likely to be 100, or even 1000 or more, to one.

As to the second question:

The simplest procedure would be to use the posterior probabilities I generated in OHJ as the prior probability in a new run of the equation, with the new Pilate letter as new evidence, and just update the prior, by running it through that equation.

But I also think what you mean to be asking is what happens if we start with a combined P(e|h) of .1 and P(e|~h) of .5 (which is not what I find in OHJ, so we are already imagining some sort of radical change in the evidence even besides the new Pilate letter), and then add the new letter, whose P(e|h) is 1. I can’t answer that question without knowing the P(e|~h) for that same item of evidence. So I will assume you mean it to be as proposed in the first question: .1.

Then, if we start from my a fortiori prior probability of 0.33, which in the odds form equals 1/2, the 0.1/0.5 scenario updates that prior by 1/5, giving us 1/10, or an a fortiori posterior probability of historicity of one chance in ten (a much more destructive result to historicity than I reached). This then becomes the updated prior probability. Adding the new Pilate letter then does this:

P(h|e) = 1/10 x 10/1 = 10/10, or a straight up 50/50 chance Jesus existed.

Though I think such a letter would, as I noted, be at least a 100/1 or even a 1000/1 game changer, so either:

P(h|e) = 1/10 x 100/1 = 100/10 = 10/1, for a total reversal (now a one in ten chance Jesus didn’t exist)

Or:

P(h|e) = 1/10 x 1000/1 = 1000/10 = 100/1, for a hundred to one odds against mythicism.

Any of those results would kill mythicism. The last, all but decisively.