It would be interesting to extrapolate that statistic between atheists and agnostics. My guess would be that those aware of the definition of atheism/agnosticism and also identify as believing in God would be significantly higher for agnostics than for atheists.

But why do you think it's justifiable to react similarly to these types of "evidence"? We can, at best, draw radically different kinds of conclusions from them. The tools we apply to them are radically different. Why use the same vague term for both reactions?

Just following up to see if you had anything further to say regarding the differences between these "types" of evidence. I'd hate to think you were more interested in wrangling retractions out of me than discussing the issue you were so keen to make sure I didn't misrepresent you on.

Jim,

You can interpret anything as anything. The fact that in both cases you're doing a sort of interpretation doesn't make them really parallel==one act of interpretation can be much more reasonable than the other, based on the available evidence.

I mean, c'mon! When I want to investigate my wife's intentionality, I can ask her questions about what she intended, and she'll tell me! And I can test the connection between her intentions and words by asking her what she intends to do in the future, and then seeing that she does it! The "order of the universe" ...not so much.

Are they equivalent in reliability? Verifiability? Replicability? In persuasive strength? Those are the sorts of thing I want to know.

I get that you don't like it when you think people putting words in your mouth. But things you say have logical consequences, and people are going to infer these consequences and comment about them when relevant to the conversation. It's a pretty normal thing.

There comes a point where you're being obstreperous by repeating "ha, where did I say that?" rather than just explaining what it is you do believe, or why you disagree with the statement. You're the one blocking progress in the dialogue when you do this. I urge you to rise above this impulse.

Brandon,

We have no reason to assume any of these things based on accounts of the Gospels. The gospels were penned decades after the events they purport to describe.

We simply cannot know, with any kind of historical certainty any of what you assert here. On top of this we have very good reasons for doubting.

We cannot know for instance whether, Jesus had an honorable burial (it is extremely unlikely given that he was found guilty of sedition). Pilate was not exactly known for his kid gloves. There is no reason to think he would make an exception in the general practice of crucifixtion (which was to let the bodies be taken by carrion eaters) for unruly Jews, even over Passover. Thus continuing to trot out, the empty tomb, will not make it any more true. What you would need is some independent evidence from outside the Gospels (which tell different stories anyway). This you don't have, and the gospels don't qualify as independent attestations,as they represent a cherry picked sampling of numerous gospels about Jesus that have since been manipulated.

Jesus' alleged post mortum appearances are also problematic in the extreme. Assume the post mortum accounts are more or less true. They say nothing about whether or not the person they think was Jesus was actually Jesus. Indeed, they didn't recognize him for some time. In its oldest form, Mark, (the Gospel on which the other synoptics heavily draw upon as a source), the author doesn't have any post mortum appearances. The oldest, and best manuscripts of Mark, end at 16:8 with two Mary's fled, and never said anything to any man of what they saw, which to be clear wasn't Jesus. The later added verses have all the grace of any ret-con. The Jesus that appears is in a different form. Anyway people have trouble recognizing him during these episodes and seems like it could have wishful thinking or the guy running a scam."Oh I'm Jesus, no really, I know I don't look like Jesus, but trust me." Why is clarity so hard? I mean Herod thought Jesus was John The Baptist raised from the dead. Strange eh? We are also left with the fact that people who really want to see an old friend, a dear loved one, often misapprehend sights and sounds. Such people are only too eager to imagine something crazy has occurred. People used to see Elvis everywhere. I'm certain you haven't lost any sleep over that. And he isn' the only one. http://listverse.com/2009/04/02/top-10-people-rumored-to-be-alive-after-death/

We also cannot know how sudden the disciple's transformation and belief occurred. When one looks at the stats, Christianity grew no faster than the Mormon Church is currently growing. But even if we grant that they did rapidly change their minds, it would not constitute evidence of the truth of what they believed, it would only be evidence that they believed a certain proposition. Belief in X doesn't constitute evidence for X.

Isn't the whole NT an exercise in confirmation bias to the apologist?

But in general, we can gauge the veracity of each of those religious claims based on the available evidence. Some of them—like Mohammed's conversation with Gabriel and Joseph Smith's reception of divine revelation--are purely testimonial and essentially non-falsifiable.

What? You mean in the same way Paul's claims of devine revelation are purely testimonial and non-falsifiable?

There were no eyewitnesses. Therefore, those claims carry far less weight than the historical evidence for Jesus' resurrection that I shared above, which is based on multiple, independent eyewitness testimony.

Brandon, there is no eyewitness account of the Resurrection in the NT. There is only testimonial of a burial in a tomb and sightings of a person called Jesus after the tomb was found empty. But the testimonials are fraught with problems.

There is not a single mention of a tomb, empty or not, in 22 of the 27 books of the NT. Especially in discussion where such a point would add a great deal of credence to the text. Don't you consider that odd.

Jesus' honorable burial, his empty tomb, his post mortum appearances, the disciple's sudden transformation and belief in the Risen Jesus, etc.

We could go into each of those separately. But generally, they do not constute evidence. They are details of a story told some considerable amount of time after the time the tale purports to have occurred.

Please see: The Resurrection of Jesus

Still trotting out that liar Gish Galloper WLC? Wouldn't he be classed as heretical to Catholicism? There is a difference between theology and history. Bart Ehrman tried explaining the details to WLC when debating him, but Ehrman was overwhelmed by the snake oil salesmans showmanship.
The question at the head of the debate was stacked in favour of WLC.

Is There Historical Evidence for the Resurrection of Jesus?

WLC says...

What, after all, is the resurrection hypothesis? It’s the hypothesis that Jesus rose supernaturally from the dead. It is not the hypothesis that Jesus rose naturally from the dead. That Jesus rose naturally from the dead is fantastically improbable. But I see no reason whatsoever to think that it is improbable that God raised Jesus from the dead."

In other words, God-did-it, because God can do anything. Craig asserts this notion as true as a given.

Just like "theory," "evidence" is a word with numerous meanings depending on how it's applied. So if Craig can find one person, from any point in history, who is willing to say "Jesus was resurrected," he's got evidence. Is it good evidence? Duh, of course not. But it's evidence. By the same standard, I could easily lose a debate asking me to prove that there's no historical evidence for Galactic Overlord Xenu. And the Salem Witch Trials provided all kinds of evidence (read: other people's testimony) proving that those women were, in fact, in league with the devil.

http://atheistexperience.blogspot.com.es/2009/02/case-study-william-lane-craig-vs-bart.html

Your idea and my idea of what constitutes evidence differ immensely. Which wouldn't matter so much, but the stakes warrent a bit more substance in my opinion.

It certainly appears to be a case of confirmation bias.