"Victory" in Debates

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At 01:09 PM 10/17/97 -0500, Douglas R. Larson wrote:

>WALTER

>> As for these men preaching to the choir, I would have to disagree.  The 

>> following debates all went in favor of the christian theist:

>> 

>> Bahnsen vs. Stein (Stein got killed and he's supposed to be a big dog!)

>> Craig vs. Zindler (Zindler got killed too!  This debate was a joke!)

>> Moreland vs. Nielsen (Even Nielsen admitted losing the debate)

>> Montgomery vs. Naland (Naland was seriously confused)

>> Habermas vs. Flew (7-2 in favor of Habermas)

>


TILL
I've had a lot of debates, Walt, but I have never had one yet that I didn't
lose if the opinions of Christians who attended them are to be believed.
Yet in my opinion, I have never had one that I lost.  I personally believe
that I shellacked Norman Geisler and Michael Horner in the resurrection
debates, yet the audiences expressed the belief that they had defeated me.
It isn't surprising, of course, that the audiences on both occasions were
predominantly Christian.  I debated a Church-of-Christ preacher in Portland,
TX, who was supposed to affirm that Yahweh exists.  Although the debate was
eight hours long in four sessions, he never once made an argument for the
existence of Yahweh.  He spent all of his time arguing that the evidence of
design in the human body proves that it was created.  When pressed to
explain how that design in the human body, even if true, would prove the
existence of the god Yahweh, he ignored the issue.  Yet after the debate was
over, his moderator said from the same pulpit that he had never seen such a
resounding "victory for the truth."  The year before, I had debated this
same moderator, who was also declared the victor by the overwhelming
partisan audience, yet neither this moderator nor the other preacher who was
supposed to affirm the existence of Yahweh will agree to debate me again.

My point, Walt, is that victory in debates depends on the predispositions of
those who declare victory.  I simply let the records of my debates speak for
themselves.
You addressed this posting to Douglas Larson, who mentioned Herman Otten in
a posting earlier today.  In November 1991, I began a written debate in
Otten's paper *Christian News,* and my opponent was William Bischoff, a
Lutheran preacher in Bridgeton, Missouri.  Bischoff quit after three
exchanges, and Otten got a fellow by the name of Charles Provan to continue
the debate.  After a few exchanges between Provan and me, Otten stopped the
debate and refused to publish a manuscript that I sent in response to
Provan's latest.  Yet who do you suppose won this debate?  My opponents did.
Just ask Otten and the readers of his papers, who are mainly fundamentalist
Lutherans.  They'll tell you that I lost.

While you are at your conference, ask some of these men that you obviously
venerate if they will agree to affirm this proposition in public debate:
"Resolved: the Hebrew god Yahweh exists."  Let me know what answer you get.



Farrell Till
Skepticism, Inc.
jftill@midwest.net

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