The End of Christianity

The End of Christianity (the long awaited sequel to The Christian Delusion) is now available in bookstores (and I'm assured will soon be available in kindle and other digital formats). Delusion was an awesome book. End is even better. Indeed, I think the two volumes together amount to a decisive refutation of Christianity. A bona fide litmus test. No rational person can read both volumes and not walk away a skeptic. That won't stop the irrational (just see The Infidel Delusion). But at least from here on out we'll be able to call a spade a spade.
 

Sources of the Jesus Tradition

Several months ago the papers of the 2008 Amherst conference finally appeared in print. Sort of. I have a lot of problems with this, and the following is a review of the successes and failures of the new book Sources of the Jesus Tradition: Separating History from Myth (Prometheus Books 2010).

Mark 16:9-20

A good long while ago I completed a contract job to produce a thoroughly researched and argued case against the authenticity of the verses in Mark 16:9-20, which the mainstream consensus has long since rejected as an interpolation but fundamentalists keep trying to rescue. The final product has now finally been published at Errancy Wiki (which years ago also published a concise summary of my case for the historical contradiction regarding the date of Jesus' birth in Matthew and Luke: Luke vs. Matthew on the Year of Christ's Birth).

The new article is: Mark 16:9-20 as Forgery or Fabrication. Like the earlier article, which decisively proves the bible historically errant, this article decisively proves the bible textually errant. It's the most egregious and appalling case of doctoring the text of the New Testament on record. You may have often heard references to scholars having proved that the ending of Mark is an interpolation from manuscript and stylistic evidence. Well, if you are wondering exactly what that evidence is and how well it holds up, especially against any competent attempts to argue the contrary, this new article is for you. It is now the definitive treatment of the ending of Mark, being the most comprehensive summary of the evidence that I know. In fact when combined with the scholarship in its bibliography, it is the most complete treatment you'll ever find.

I discussed this issue of New Testament textual errancy in general (and the ending of Mark in particular) in a recent debate with J.P. Holding, a video of which the producers assure me will eventually become available online. I also plan to blog the case for two other interpolations (in the letters of Paul), which came up in that debate, adding even more material I chose not to present during the debate in order to open up time for other arguments. 
  

Why I Am Not a Christian

A donor who wishes to remain anonymous has commissioned on my behalf a print publication of a slightly updated version of my 2006 essay "Why I Am Not a Christian." All proceeds will go to me. He just wanted it to exist so he could hand it out to door knocking evangelists, and make other handy uses of it in his own atheist evangelism. At the donor's request (and generous payment) I made several minor additions and some changes, to get its content up to date. It is available in print and kindle.

For those unfamiliar with the original, it explains the four reasons I do not accept the Christian religion, describing four facts of the world that, had they been different, I would believe. Those four reasons are God's silence, God's inaction, the lack of evidence, and the way the universe looks exactly like a godless universe would, and not at all like a Christian universe would, even down to its very structure. I address all the "usual" replies to these claims, in ways you might not have heard before, relying on my wide experience in debating and studying these issues all over the world for more than fifteen years.

In this version I am brief, clear, and down to earth, covering the whole topic in under ninety pages of easy-to-read explanation. My donor is right, it does make a perfect book to introduce yourself, or your friends, to why fewer educated people are embracing Christianity than ever before, and is ideal for handing out to door-to-door missionaries. I don't expect everyone will want one (it's content isn't new), but for the above uses it's handy and cheap, and makes for an easy read. I'll be selling copies at all my upcoming venues.

Book Updates

I've been very busy of late, almost underground working furiously away, but I finally found a hiatus to blog some news. I have a hodgepodge of things to mention. Two items today...

-:-

First big news is that Sense and Goodness Without God: A Defense of Metaphysical Naturalism is now available as an eBook. You can buy it in various places, but most obviously on Amazon.com (click for Kindle edition). Not the Impossible Faith has always been available as a PDF download and now is available in other formats, too (click for Lulu edition as a PDF download; and click here for Kindle edition). And The Christian Delusion: Why Faith Fails is also now available in e-format (click for Kindle edition), as is The Empty Tomb: Jesus Beyond The Grave (click for Kindle edition).

-:-

And second is a status update on my book On the Historicity of Jesus Christ. Donors to the project have already received a full report, but for the general public the latest news is that I've solved the problem of cutting material down by seeking publication as two volumes, the first on method and the second on results, though the first volume includes one major section of results. That volume is completed. I am seeking a private peer review from a number of respected scholars, and shopping for a publisher. Meanwhile, I'm hard at work on volume two, some of which donors have already seen, but there's even better stuff to come.

The first volume has the current working title Bayes' Theorem and Historical Method: The Invalidity of Current Historicity Criteria in the Study of Jesus and Their Replacement. The subtitle actually isn't the controversial bit. I discuss all the leading scholarship on those criteria, and all of it comes to the same conclusion I do. The main title will actually be the controversial part, and the bulk of the book is devoted to answering all the arguments against applying Bayes' Theorem to history, while explaining in easy-to-understand terms what that theorem is, how it works, and how we can employ it as historians. Donors and scholars who have been reviewing the work up to this point have given me very valuable criticisms and advice that has made this volume into something I'm quite proud of. It rocks now. I'm confident the second volume will be as good.

The Christian Delusion

Two years in the making, controversial even before its launch, and perhaps the most definitive refutation of Christianity yet in print, The Christian Delusion (Why Faith Fails) is now available at Amazon and your local bookseller. Edited by John Loftus, TCD contains fifteen chapters by nine authors, including numerous experts with doctorates in their respective fields. Myself included.

It's a fantastic book. I loved it as I was reading it even in earlier drafts, and I have been anticipating its publication for a long time. You'll all want a copy, trust me. Buy it and read it. And if you like it, give it a customer review on Amazon, critical or laudatory. We'll need honest Amazon reviews to counter the inevitable Christian tactic of low-starring it and lying about it to dissuade fellow Christians from reading it. I'd rather have valid criticisms in there if any.

Following is a summary of the book, then at the bottom a link to a companion website for the book that actually has new additional articles by me and others (check it out!).

Defining Naturalism II

Yesterday I posted on my recent article in Free Inquiry on Defining Naturalism, in which I also replied to The Teapot Atheist's response to that FI article. TPA then answered back (Richard Carrier on Richard Carrier on Naturalism...I think just using my last name would have been more economical, but that's just my aesthetics talking :-). He's well in earnest. But still wrong. 

Some of my responses to other comments on yesterday's blog are pertinent (if you want to catch up with those, start here). But now I'll just quote and reply to TPA's latest blog...

Defining Naturalism

An article I submitted years ago has finally made it into the pages of Free Inquiry magazine (issue 30.3 of April/May 2010, pp. 50-51), "On Defining Naturalism as a Worldview," part of their ongoing 'It's Only Natural' column. It was sitting in their queue for ages. It essentially just summarizes the most important points of my more extensive blog on the subject, Defining the Supernatural.

It has already provoked one reply at The Teapot Atheist. But had TPA read the blog recommended in my FI article, he would have known I already addressed the concerns he raised. I just didn't have the room to fit all that into two pages of print.

Vids, Letter, Article

First, I still haven't seen The Nature of Existence, but it's supporting website now has extras on it, including a few extended bits I suppose were not included in the final film, some of which include material from Nygard's interview with me (sprinkled in amidst material from other interviews). Use the the film website's People link (or click here), and wait fifty years for the page to load, then find me listed on that page, and under that entry will be a link to "Videos" that include me. Although I've gotten in once or twice, most of the time their server will fail before you even get to the first step of this process. So basically, you have to be lucky to ever see these clips. So, good luck with that.

Second, I wrote a letter to the editor of American Atheist Magazine which they published (in the September issue of 2008, p. 6.), on Pigliucci's  critique of Dawkins in the preceding issue. I agree with Pigliucci except on two points where I defend Dawkins: contrary to Pigliucci, Dawkins is right to criticize the apathetic liberal and moderate wings of Christianity for their failure to stand up to the right, and Pigliucci is wrong to claim the God hypothesis is not a scientific hypothesis that can be be refuted scientifically. I defend both points with facts and arguments in a full-page letter.

Third, the University of La Verne Campus Times published an article about my talk there on my historicity of Jesus work earlier this year, but it's not very good. Their quotations of me are often inaccurate (sometimes egregiously so, yet they didn't call me to fact check them or, evidently, even fact check them against the video I know they have access to), and what I said in the talk is often not correctly described. But if you want to see a completely inaccurate news article about the event for some reason, click here.

The God Who Wasn't There

As many know I was interviewed for the film The God Who Wasn't There, which came out years ago and includes an extended version of my interview in the DVD extras. When I finally got to see the film, I privately circulated (eventually to journalists, academics, colleagues and others) a brief white paper on potential errors in it (only regarding the first third regarding ancient history, as that's my field). I then forgot about it. Several people recently have asked me about the film again, which reminded me I should just publish my brief. It is now available via my website as Critical Notes on the Movie The God Who Wasn't There (2005). Some of the points I make in that document I have since revised in subtle ways (as will be clear in my book On the Historicity of Jesus Christ), but it's adequate enough to stand un-edited from the original.

People have also asked me my opinion of the film. In general, the movie is as much about the supernatural God who isn't there (the Jesus everyone believes is going to come back from outer space and kill us) as the historical man who wasn't there, so it's not exactly a documentary about historicity (that subject only occupies something like a third of the film and is covered entertainingly but briefly). I find the film fun, funny, well-edited, and (for the most part) well-produced. It's definitely a feel good movie for atheists, and it definitely pisses off Christians to no end. I like it.

But it's not PBS edufare. GWWT suffers from the unavoidable problem of all entertaining documentaries: it oversimplifies things. But it's nowhere near as egregiously full of sh*t as Zeitgeist: The Movie, which has been thoroughly debunked as absolute garbage by several knowledgeable commentators (the best critiques are catalogued by Jim Lippard at the end of his own blog post on that awful doco). I wouldn't recommend Zeitgeist at all. But I only wouldn't recommend GWWT as a scholarly introduction to Jesus Myth theory. I still recommend it as awesome entertainment, played out with acceptable license. It takes liberties, but they aren't that excessive (as my white paper explains), and if you want authoritative discussion, you really ought to be reading a book instead.

[Though I grant you, there aren't any such books I'd recommend yet, beyond Doherty's The Jesus Puzzle, which is in its own ways flawed and incomplete--as you might glean from my critical review. Besides what you can read there, what I would say Doherty's book is lacking (and only because it's impossible for a single book to include everything) is coverage of a variety of essential supplementary topics, such as the fiction-myth analysis of the Gospels provided in Randel Helms' Gospel Fictions, which I also highly recommend (even though Helms doesn't argue Jesus didn't exist).]

Not the Impossible Faith

I am still writing On the Historicity of Jesus Christ. But to save space there, I found I often needed to cite an online book I wrote some years ago, which is easier to do when there are page numbers. So I went ahead and produced a Lulu print edition. I just received sales stock today, so I will be selling it at my events in March after all, as I've hinted was possible. Though it is not yet posted for sale at Amazon, it will be in a few months (I'll update this blog when it appears there). I was going to wait for that, but since I'll be selling it at events next month, I decided to blog about it now so my fans are fully in-the-know.

The new book is Not the Impossible Faith: Why Christianity Didn't Need a Miracle to Succeed (2009). This is a special updated edition of Was Christianity Too Improbable to be False? (2006), which I was paid $6000 to research and write as a publicly available response to J.P. Holding's 'flagship' essay "The Impossible Faith: Or, How Not to Start an Ancient Religion," which he also reproduced as a printed book, The Impossible Faith (2007). In it he boasts that 'someone' was paid thousands of dollars to debunk his arguments, but he never names me or tells his readers anything about how to find that rebuttal (or even mentions or responds to anything I said in it). Amazon now allows product plugs in customer reviews, so you know what I'll be doing when Not the Impossible Faith finally appears on Amazon... :-)

Part of my original contract included the guarantee that my initial work would be available to the public for free. So Was Christianity? will remain on the Secular Web, free to all. The print edition, now titled Not the Impossible Faith (to rif on Holding's title), includes various changes, to the point that it certainly supercedes the online version (it's the edition I will cite and reference from now on), but nothing so significant that you "need" to buy the book if you're content with the online text. I didn't want to take any time away from my current project, so I just did the minimum necessary to produce a decent print copy (and there wasn't much room for improvement anyway--as a refutation, it's pretty conclusive).

What's new? Basically, I folded everything in the original Chapter 19 into the other 18 Chapters (where the various items in 19 belonged, each piece in a different place), folded many endnotes into the main text, wrote a new brief introduction (none too kind to Holding), rewrote some sections for clarity, made a slew of minor corrections and additions throughout, and smoothed readability in several places. Apart from all that, the main advantage of the book is that you can now cite it by page number (if you have a copy on hand), and carry it around and loan it around and write notes in the margins and highlight it and bookmark it and whatnot (I made sure it had proper 1" margins this time).

Personally, I just prefer reading physical books--lounging wherever I want, no eye strain, no battery or outlet issues, lighter to carry, easier page turning and flipping around and estimating reading time (I can see how much is left to read in a chapter or the rest of the book), I can stuff a bookmark where I left off, etc. For all these reasons, and especially if you want to start building a Richard Carrier collection on your bookshelf, it'll be worth buying the book. You can also buy a PDF version at Lulu for just $2.50, which will have to serve as a substitute for an index (since you can search that file for keywords, and still get the correct page number and see the text of the new edition, which is often different from the online version), since compiling a print index requires a solid week's work, and that was far too costly for me.

You can buy it now at Lulu (the PDF or the softback), but Amazon will give you free shipping (on the softback), so I recommend waiting for when it's available there (unless you just want the PDF). But the best option is to buy a copy from me in person (at a speaking event any time in the future), where you will get a much reduced price ($20). And of course I'll sign it if you want. Though I'll make more money on sales through Lulu than Amazon, it's already overpriced ($28 through any vendor), so I'm keen to advise fans to save where they can. Lulu passes all costs on to the customer (that means you), which means it cost me nothing to publish (which is why I bothered). Unlike most self-publishing firms, which charge at least a thousand dollars to launch a book, Lulu charges nothing (and you can do all the formatting and editing yourself online, which limits your options, but that's no matter if you don't need any). But it makes up for this in unit price. So in effect, buyers are subsidizing the publication of the print edition.

Though this means my book costs two to three times Holding's (which also just reproduces content already available for free online), mine is four times longer (454 pages to his 112) and (as you all well know) far better researched, argued, and referenced. Thus in terms of actual relative value-for-cost, the price isn't bad. My book actually contains a great deal of useful content and information, and citations of scholarship and sources, far beyond merely being a response to Holding (see the Lulu page for my full book description). It's a useful primer on the socio-intellectual context of the origins and spread of early Christianity. And of course it nails it hard to one of the most annoying apologetic windbags on the web.

Important News

A brief report on four developments of note for all my fans and friends:

1. Blogger now lets me add a widget for Followers (a new feature explained here). I've added it down the right margin, just below the Subject Index. It will show the avatar and link to the profiles of anyone on Blogger who joins my "followers" list (which means people who follow my blog, not my international coven of cultists). Just click "Follow this blog" to join.

2. Since I have now graduated, my Columbia University home page will eventually cease to exist (as will my old CU email address). So I have bought my own domain and set up a permanent official website at www.richardcarrier.info. Some Canadian businessman owns the .com domain even though he isn't doing anything with it (at least not yet), and he never replied to my request to buy it from him (and I have no international coven of cultists to cast dark magicks on him). But no matter. The new .info domain is fine. With a simple redesign, the new site is much updated from my old "Office" pages at CU. So go explore a bit if your keen. If you have any links to any of my personal pages, just replace the old domain www.columbia.edu/~rcc20 in the URL with www.richardcarrier.info, and leave any file names and subdirectories the same.

3. About a year ago I agreed to begin a formal online debate with theology scholar Jake O'Connell this very month. I'm behind in my other work so ordinarily I wouldn't undertake this or any other task, but this was a prior obligation that's been planned for some time (complete with genuine Ph.D.'s as official judges). In any event it should prove interesting. The topic is whether Paul believed Jesus rose from the dead by swapping bodies rather than rising in the same body he was buried in (the thesis of my most detailed chapter in The Empty Tomb). This debate repeats the format of my Carrier-Wanchick Debate (on naturalism vs. theism). Our joint statements are now up, along with our bios and those of the judges. Our opening statements will go up in a couple of weeks, then it will be 2-3 weeks between entries until we're done, then the judges will weigh in. I'll announce this debate on my blog again when the whole thing is completed. But you can take a look now at: On Paul's Theory of Resurrection: The Carrier-O'Connell Debate (2008).

4. My book On the Historicity of Jesus Christ is making exciting progress (I'm very happy with it so far--it will be unlike any book you've read on the subject before), but taking longer than I predicted. I will produce a formal progress report for all donors who asked to receive a pre-publication draft (which they will also get later) and email that before the end of this month, so you can see what I've done so far and what's ahead. This will be for your eyes only, a privilege for donating to the work. But I'll also blog some highlights for everyone around the same time, even if only to share my grief. New Testament studies is in a worse state than I thought, a fact that standard references often whitewash (out of their own desperation, I suspect), and trying to untangle that mess is what's slowed me down.

Ironically, though, I already have too much and not enough--I've accumulated these past months more material than I can use for the book, yet important gaps remain in specific places where further fact-checking is needed, so I have to accumulate yet more, while cutting the fat from the rest. It's that fact-checking, though, that's uncovered some messy skeletons in the closet of New Testament studies, and I'm buried in skeletons enough as it is. But I'll say more in my next report.

Darla the She-Goat

I'm still too busy to blog anything serious this month, so here's something easy. The following appeared in the December 2007 issue of the Atheists United newsletter, Rational Alternative (whose tagline reads: "Defying the idea that ethics come from God since 1982"). I punched this out in my spare time at the special request of the editor (who happens to be kin), as an essay entitled "Ethics Begins with Metaethics (Say What?)." It was scattered over pages 4, 12, and 13. It's obviously written in humor, and barely touches on many issues my book explores in more serious and complete detail. But for now, enjoy...

Dissertation Done

Evidently good news to some, a horror to others, but...

Letters and Radio

It occurred to me recently that many of my fans might not know that I have several significant letters to the editor published in journals, and have appeared on many web radio shows, since none of these are listed anywhere else. So this post is for anyone who wants to obsessively read and hear everything significant of mine, and didn't know about my work in letters and radio.

The Abortion Controversy

A new classroom textbook has just come out called The Abortion Controversy, edited by Lucinda Almond, which includes as a chapter an old paper I wrote years ago, along with other papers from a wide range of perspectives taken from many different sources. The book is intended as a classroom reader wherein all sides of a debate can be explored.

I haven't read the other chapters included in the collection, beyond a good skim, so I can't say whether the book has other merits, but the way my contribution was treated does not inspire confidence. As the Secular Web owns my original essay (and it's already available for free) I didn't ask for a royalty, which is fine. But I carelessly didn't ask to see a galleys before approving publication. Lesson learned. I'll have to be an asshole in the future.

For my part I have nothing good to say about this book and I don't recommend it. As for the rest, the one good thing I can say is that it includes papers one might not readily encounter elsewhere (such as an article defending the murder of doctors who perform abortions), but if these have been treated as mine was, their authors might not recommend this book either.

Video of Michigan Talk

The Freethought Association of Michigan has put a video of the talk I gave to their group on January 24 of 2007 at the Women's City Club in Grand Rapids, Michigan. You can download it by going to the Freethought Association Past Events page dedicated to this event (Richard Carrier on January 24, 2007, "Sense and Goodness Without God") and right-clicking the link there to download the mp4 video (the size of the file is 56 Mb). If you have a problem downloading it, see comments section below.

This is the same talk I had announced on my blog at the end of last year, under Appearing in Michigan. I describe the talk more there, but in brief this was about the secular and scientific foundations of morality, building and expanding on my book. My intro also goes over worldview theory, and why it is essential to developing sound moral thought. I also did about fifteen minutes on the moral aesthetics of cinema at the end of my talk, which was much more entertaining, but since that involved proprietary film clips, all of it was removed from the online video, which skips directly to Q&A, and even then only one or two questions are shown--the video even fades out in the middle of one of my answers! But I'm sure file length was an issue.

I just watched the video myself, and boy do I look like a kid! No one will believe I'm 37 there. Personally, I find that annoying. Can't I look all old and dignified instead? With my luck, when I finally start to look my age I'll probably shrivel up like Kris Kristofferson and scare neighborhood children with a smile like the crackled grimmace of a hellbeast. So I suppose I should count my blessings.

New Articles Online

Fans might want to know about two new articles of mine that have appeared online recently. Although for different reasons they aren't exactly "new," I think it fitting to announce them here, in case anyone has interest.

1. Antony Flew is in the News Again

In late 2004 I wrote about Antony Flew's conversion to Deism (Antony Flew Considers God...Sort Of). This article actually made national news. I continued adding updates to it as events transpired over the subsequent years, now five updates in all. All this includes discussions of my personal correspondence and phone conversations with Flew as well as religious and press coverage and other developments. Most recently Christian apologist Lee Strobel released edited portions of a taped interview of Flew, warranting my latest update to the original article, which you can jump to here: January 2007.

2. "Errancy Wiki" Honors My Work on the Nativity

I generally have no taste for discussing biblical contradictions, since I find the matter so boring. Even more boring than bickering over contradictions in Homer. And that's being generous...as literature, in plain aesthetic terms, Homer is quite superior to the Bible, although that's just my opinion. I also find this task largely pointless, since the only people who actually think the bible is inerrant are also insanely dedicated to denying any evidence to the contrary with any baloney hoohah they can pull out of their ass. So what's the point?

Nevertheless, as a history teacher, people who dick around with history piss me off. Consequently, I have devoted my energies to one biblical error, the only one I have the stomach to bother with (and that only barely...apparently I can endure some dry heaves). Which error is that? The date of the nativity. In my well-known and excruciatingly detailed Secular Web article The Date of the Nativity in Luke (which was originally published in 1999 and reached its 5th edition in 2006), I argue it is beyond reasonable dispute that Luke dates the birth of Jesus to 6 A.D. while Matthew dates the birth of Jesus to 4 B.C. or earlier (perhaps around 6 B.C.). This is an irreconcilable contradiction. I wouldn't give a shit, except that Christian apologists have contrived and spread so many distortions of historical fact in order to "remove" this contradiction that it got my gall up.

Anyway, my work on this has been so extensive--and, apparently, appreciated--that it is now regarded as "legendary" by the editors of the new Errancy Wiki (which is still in development). They hired me to write a summary article, which compresses my original work down to just the conclusions reached in each section, in plainer and easier English. It's still lengthy (because efforts to deny the contradiction have been numerous and convoluted), but it is considerably shorter and easier to read than the original, to which you can still refer for more evidence and detail.

The new article is called Luke vs. Matthew on the Year of Christ's Birth (2006). It is not directly listed at the Secular Web and isn't easily evident even on the Errancy Wiki page for historical errors in Luke or Matthew (and isn't listed at all under contradictions, although the editors might be reserving the latter for purely internal contradictions). But it is prominently listed as a "legends" piece, and fans might like to know it exists, since it is a nice summary of my work on this issue and, I think, a good read. If, that is, you can stomach hearing so much bullshit ennumerated and gainsaid.