what specific prophesy are they referring to?  i doubt they even know.

Did you know that a lot of prophecies came true within the Legend of Zelda? The story said that a hero would come to deliver the Hylians from the tyranny of Ganondorf, the king of evil, and restore the triforce to the light realm. And if you knew the story, you would know that Link really did that. Therefore, Zelda is real and probably hott.

Well, at least real.

Ask the person for a specific example. I can guarantee the kind of response you'll get is some ambiguous metaphorical shitpile that has been twisted to fit some modern circumstance. It's the same thinking used by people who actively believe in the accuracy of horoscopes. Don't let them baffle you with bullshit.

I can't remember the prophecy exactly, but I know one of the "prophecies" that is often cited is, I think, from David, and it's something about a statue divided into sections, with each section made out of some different kind of metal, and one by one the sections are destroyed, and through some impressive hoop jumping, the prophecy bullshitters will point out they stand for all the great empires and the only one still standing is either America or the EU or the yet-to-be-seen "new world order" blah blah.

Biblical prophecies have come true as much as Nostradamus prophecied the events of 9/11. (read: they haven't).

Ouch. There's one that hasn't been heard 10,000 times before. This isn't true at all. Faith is necessarily the believe in something without evidence. This is obvious since, if there were any evidence, no faith would need to be called upon!

Faith is baseless by definition, while science is the opposite: nothing is accepted that does not have some sort of basis. In science, if you have no basis, you can't say X is true! Similarly in science, if you have no basis, you can't say X is false!

It's a completely ludicrous assertion. And other than the fact that the argument is wrong, it's also hilarious, since it's basically saying: "Look! You're just as irrational as I am!"

I'm not even sure what that means.

You wouldn't even know such a thing as science existed without human knowledge, so there's no way that can be entirely true. Did your faith tell you about science?

When was the last time faith made a discovery? Faith is NOT a type of knowledge nor is it a source of knowledge, nor is it a mode of thinking. It is purely and simply the lack of thinking. It's the refusal to lift any brain cells. It's a convenient decision-maker that spares you any mental exercise, like flipping coin.

Is god real? Well... let me just flip my faith coin... heads I win, tails atheists lose...

*flip*

Thanks, faith!

You don't have to be such a smartass about it. I'm just an asshole. =]

Hi Kike,

Welcome to the forums.  Others are probably correct when they say that any arguments to submit to this person are probably going to be irgnored by them regardless of how good the arguments are.  That said, these things are normally of more benefit to the silent observers anyway.

When I last had somebody throw a prophecy at me (in this case Ezekiel and the prediction of the fall of Tyre) I came up with what I thought were pretty reasonable conditions for the assessment of prophecy:

1)  The prophecy must be made BEFORE the events it prophecises!  For prophecies about a previous event or fact (i.e. intricate details of a past event), the propheciser must not be able to possibly know about the event or fact they are prophecising about through normal means.  The reasons for this should be self-evident.

2)  It must have a date or time limit attached to it.  For a mere human making a prophecy I would probably be a bit more lenient on the accuracy level of the dating, but for a human channelling an omnipotent, omniscient propheciser, I think it is reasonable to expect a higher level of accuracy.  The reason for requiring a date is twofold.  It saves time in debating "Is this event what he meant?  Is that event what he meant?".  More importantly, it provides a key component of falsifiability.  Prophecies with dates that have come and gone can be obviously written off as false.  Prophecies with no date have too easy a "get out of jail free" card, and this makes them pretty weak in my opinion.  Prophecies with future dates at least give us something to look forward to, though I suppose that if the prophet wants his distant-future prophecy to be remembered, he had better make some good predictions during his lifetime!

3)  It must not be fulfilled by people who could have heard of the prophecy.  It would be preferrable if people, who naturally have an interest in the prophecies, had nothing to do with it.  An example would be "On the 3rd of June 2008 a pig will fly, under its own power, around the world visiting every major house of parliament and will be seen by millions."  I prophecise that you will read the next condition in this list of requirements.

4)  Ambiguity, vagueness, repetition, theatrics and poetry demonstrate a different purpose for a "prophecy", such as a Nostradamus style all-purpose prophecy, or intimidation purposes, or allegory.

5)  It must be correct!

I also seem to recall that Richard Carrier brought up some good conditions in this discussion with Nadir Ahmed http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-097g5pdPpA

The conditions being exegesis, ambiguity, borrowing, triviality and error.

That's probably the most important thing to remember, Kike: if the argument is rock solid and rational, it might be ignored. You should prepare yourself for that eventuality.

With that said, my reply to Captain Ass Weasel follows.

Oh mah gahd, sriusly?

I can't even think of books that were make 1000 to 3000 years ago.

...

No, wait: how about Plato? Or Sallust? Both had a pretty clear idea of how republics would run forever and ever, and it turns out they were right. Wow, that's pretty impressive. What did the bible come up with, something vague perhaps? Hold on, there were a couple of Greeks who predicted the motion of the stars - that's pretty impressive. Holy shit, there are lots of prophesies that came true!

Proof of what, you fucking ass weasel? Insulin? Penicillin? Scientists save your weasel ass every day, you ungrateful little shit. You have teeth in your shoe-size IQ head because a scientist figured out that topical application of fluouride preserves teeth!

It speaks volumes about our modern tolerance for ridiculous idiots that this guy isn't barred from hospitals. "Sorry, you're too stupid and ungrateful to participate in a health care system. Have you tried homeopathic medicine, you moron? It's just the thing for your broken arm."

Sometimes I encounter the slippery slop, but I don't find that it can wrecked anything.

Everytime I see this typo I imagine a pig slipping in some slop. There's an e at the end people.

Or is this some new theist argument? Like the swine that were possesed by demons..opening yourself to satan is a slippery slop.Look at the pigs?

Yeah, that guys can talked a good england.  Perhaps it isn't his first language though, so who knowed.

 Funny that you ask about the kike thing...My first name is Enrique and the nick name for that would be Kike or Quique (both of them pronounced Kee-keh).

 So no,not trying to insult anybody.