The Resurrection of Jesus Christ is historically probable

It would appear that rational scientific evidence is not getting me anywhere at all in this debate. I feel rather disappointed because the reasoning I used has been given no consideration whatsoever. I felt the need to repeat it a lot because it was being ignored. If my evidence was acknowledged, then I would have been happy to move on to analysing your historical accounts. Evidence is evidence and indeed science is stronger evidence than ancient writing because we can actually measure it. Someone commented that the universe in infinite. Well, I am certainly knowledgeable in science enough to know that that is certainly not so. The universe is finite (and it is expanding) and mathematics cannot be inconsistent, which I am tired of repeating. So if you must insist on still doubting it, please go and do some research. What I shall do now is to present alternatives explanations to rationalise why the resurrection is believed to be to be true, in contrast with common sense. First of all, the reappearance of religious figures post-death is very common throughout religion, suggesting it is a psychological human phenomenon and historically common; it is not specific to Christianity. If you read through the scriptures, you will find that Paul has nothing to say of the empty tomb (and his account was the earliest) and the other gospel accounts have more and more far-fetched accounts as they go on, which could suggest that this has been contrived. However unlikely it may be, it is more likely than the alternative. Also, the accounts of Jesus' reappearance are mostly unspecific; he appears as a figure but his appearance doesn't have any significant effect. The visions of Jesus were limited to a group of disciples, who would surely have been in a traumatic state of mind at the time (perhaps something like PTSD), as their saviour, who they believed was the embodiment of gods, had been killed. They would have felt very emotional. This is speculation of course, but I think it is quite reasonable to suppose they felt this way; there is no reason to think they would have been feeling any other way. It is common for people who are suffering from PTSD to experience hallucinations, as many soldiers who have been in traumatic situations have noted. Indeed, what the scriptures tell us of Mary suggest that she had a mental illness (demon-possession); it would not be a surprise if she saw a hallucination. All of these things, however, are consequences of the resurrection; we are interesting in the actual resurrection, whether it happened. There is no evidence (in any sense) that the actual resurrection occurred. The best you can do is infer the resurrection from the historical accounts of its consequences. There is no account from Jesus saying how he felt to be alive again, what had happened whilst he was dead (we have to infer this as well) or how he could have predicted this event. In fact, there is little evidence that Jesus even claimed to be divine. We can't rely on the Bible, as the books that are in it were chosen because of their content. There are non-canonical gospels that have accounts that contrast with the four canonical ones. Why should we assume that the four canonical gospels are more likely to be true than any of the others? The collection of books in the Bible was contrived, so they appeared to confirm the beliefs of Christians. There is little non-Biblical evidence that Jesus claimed to be divine. It is quite possible that the consequences of the resurrection that my opponent has mentioned, did indeed happen without the resurrection occurring. The resurrection is not necessarily a pre-requisite. They could have been mistaken about the resurrection; the consequences could be based on hallucination etc. The resurrection doesn't have to have occurred for the rest of the accounts to be accurate. So, you may be able to justify the claim that these accounts are true (to some extent) but you still haven't shown evidence that the actual resurrection occurred. Saying the resurrection did occur is indeed a useful way of explaining the events depicted in the ancient texts, but it that is far from showing that it did actually happen. The point I have been trying to make, that has been consistently overlooked, is that the resurrection cannot have happened, because it is impossible. Everyone that has argued against my evidence has done so very badly. It is almost like they are being obtuse. No-one has presented any scientific reason why science could be violated. Not a single one of the explanations that have been offered in the comment section has come anywhere close to doing so. This may be because these people are not very scientifically well educated, but I suppose that people who believe in the resurrection for religious reasons, will find any reason they can to try and defend it, which although quite natural, is perniciously irrational. No historically certain fact has ever been shown to contradict science, so why would you be so certain that this one does, given the evidence you have. As I said at the start of this debate, extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence to justify them. If a resurrection was claimed today, we would not be inclined to believe it, because of common sense. These things do not happen; we are not familiar with them. We would need a lot of evidence to convince us. If the evidence presented was of the same standard as that offered for Jesus' resurrection, then I highly doubt that any of us would be convinced. I think a better explanation as to why people believe in the resurrection is their religious faith. If someone has spent their entire life believing something, and living their life in accordance with it, then I'm sure it would be difficult to dismiss it on the grounds of reason. It would, however, be more honest for them admit that they do not believe in the resurrection because of the evidence available, but because of their faith. Perhaps this argument is too embarrassingly weak to offer any dignity, but at least it would be more honest. Science is very useful in providing evidence, because its theories are open to being disproven. There are many tests that can be done on a scientific theory to test it. If the theory explains a lot, makes new predictions and cannot be shown to be wrong in any case, then it is a very good theory. Evolution is an example of this. The laws of physics are the same; they are open to be disproven. It has not once been demonstrated that they are not consistent, they explain a lot and they make predictions about the universe (which have all been shown to be true), so if it is suggested that they are not consistent, then we should be inclined to doubt that claim. When the claim is backed up by some 2000 year old writing, from which the claim can only be inferred, then the case against the laws of physics is very weak. You simply do not have enough evidence to justify this extraordinary claim. My opponent says that science cannot comment on history. What science can do is tell us what cannot have happened. It tells us that the world is not flat and ergo any account of this must be wrong. We can be sure that the world is not held up by 2 tortoises called Esmeralda and Keith. Whatever evidence these events claim to have, science demonstrably has more. We know that the world did not begin in a cosmic egg and we know, through honest scientific enquiry, that the resurrection of Jesus cannot have happened. It not reasonable to suppose this, and it is not intellectual honesty.