William Lane Craig vs Richard Carrier Resurrection plus a note on Craig's sources BEST CHECK

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This debate ( audio | video 1 & 2 | 2:31:26s ) took place in 2009 between Craig and Richard Carrier and was on the resurrection.

4.5 stars. Carrier does better than most against this content-packed resurrection debate and Craig is pretty good too. BEST CHECK

This debate is underrated, IMO. Listen to the debate and you can really hear Craig struggling to stay on the ball throughout it.

Craig's opening for this debate gets into the pretty specific detail on some of the NT scholarship. It seems a lot more academic in nature, actually. I don't know if that was a good thing for his audience if it mattered but judging by the crowd responses it probably didn't. For me it kind of became tedious and out of place. Craig will get technical/specific/dense with his presentations but usually in his rebuttal periods. Because rebuttals are shorter than the opening, he presents this stuff are a much faster pace so it was odd to hear him kind of take his time with specific and recent scholarly insights on the book of Matthew. Finally though, I don't remember him calling on all these specifics in his rebuttals. Usually that would lead me to think that Craig made a miscalculation to preempt something he thought Carrier would argue against but if he did it didn't phase him too much.

Carrier gives a very solid opening. In his post-debate write-up he mentions that he liked it and wouldn't change anything from the script and that's something I would agree with. The only issue is that he definitely was nervous sounding, which is a shame. Another issue is one that Carrier is now quite notorious for and seems pretty unapologetic* about and that's his repeated mentions of how in this book or that book he's authored he goes into detail about certain arguments. In the questions later at least two of the audience members reference this with a bad impression of Carrier's plugging.

Carrier sticks to bringing up more and more parallels as his presentations go on and a few things kind of happen that are related to this tactic. Positively, it is giving a lot of information for the audience to hear and upon a more recent listen to the debate quite a lot of the examples themselves Craig doesn't actually respond to. Craig instead sticks to general criticism of the patterns seen in the parallels and when Craig does talk about specific parallels Carrier does respond to or they're actually not mentioned by Carrier. Negatively, it started to look as if Carrier was spending time he should have allotted to pointing out things he felt Craig didn't address or needed to give a better account for giving more literary examples.

I also feel that Carrier was able to hold his own quite well against Craig's shotgun approach though he didn't address all the things Craig said and made some blunders (stating that Craig used Habermas as a source and not Jacob Kremer and still going with that mistake)** and let a lot of things go unchallenged. However I think he was able to give just as much as he took from Craig. At the very most he came out to a draw, though I am perfectly fine with saying this one went to Craig because while Carriers' case began to sound like longer and longer lists of examples, Craig gave a better impression of synthesizing his case making it more impressive for lack of a better term.

Craig also made one of the better points of criticism I've heard about Carrier's case. At times Carrier sounds like he is speculating a lot of his assertions and some of them, like the one that Craig pointed out, do sound unfalsifiable, at least at first blush. Craig's a good speaker so I'll just quote from an interview of his,

...Because if you say, “Look at these differences between, say, the Iliad and the Gospels,” what they will say is, “Ah, but that is actually evidence for dependence because it shows how Mark changed the Homeric narrative so as to conceal its dependence. So the similarities are taken as evidence of literary dependence, and then the differences are taken also as evidence of literary dependence. So it becomes utterly unfalsifiable and vacuous. Therefore, this is a terrible method of literary interpretation (SAUCE. Emphasis added and lack of closing quotes on the second quote is not my fault and really annoys me).

I don't think this is falsifiable but I can't even think of a nice concise reason to explain why now (partially because I've been up for over 24 hours as of the most recent update of this review) so I wonder if in a debate Carrier would be able to come up with one on the fly. Buuuuuut I think this accusation has been leveled at him before so I dunno.

Why such a high score? Well as I mentioned in previous reviews on Carrier's debates: Carrier makes a more interesting case against the resurrection, the most novel I have heard so far and all of Craig's responses (sans one) to the evidence Carrier presented for the literary aspects of the resurrection story were pretty weak because as mentioned earlier, they were sweeping or not pertaining to the examples given by Carrier.

Missed opportunities: earlier I mentioned that Carrier's opening was almost flawless and what makes it almost a perfect opening is that Carrier mentions the argument that if god wanted us to accept the resurrection she should have given us better evidence for it. Though I agree with this I also agree with Craig that this kind of argument isn't necessarily germane to the debate. Carrier makes the argument for why he disagrees but much later on during the Q&A. I think it would have been better if Carrier mentioned this in his rebuttal in an objection to Craig assuming that God exists during his historical facts argument. If Carrier's assertion doesn't belong in a debate about the historicity of the resurrection then neither does invoking god.

Another missed opportunity related to the audience Q&A. Someone claimed Carrier's describing the gospels as though they were written by highly literate people was absurd because the disciples were fishermen and unlearned. Carrier went on about how there is no proof that any of the disciples were fishermen or unlearned - which sure, whatever, there probably isn't - but probably the more important thing to wax on about is that the gospels were not written by guys named Mark, Luke, John and Matthew something Craig and anyone who looked into the NT more than two minutes would agree to. Poor Richard, it seems like people ask the snarkiest questions of him and he is just too nice of a guy to throwdown with such uninformed questions. Now I think he is just unaware of the underlying cheek of his questioners which actually might be a good thing.

One thing I'll conclude with is the pattern of uncharitable ruthless Craig followed in the debate:

-Craig is infamous for repeatedly calling out his opponent for not responding to his arguments. In his earlier debates he would even do this in his opening speech before his opponent even presented but nowadays he usually waits until his opponent has their first rebuttal but he doesn't let Carrier have this luxury. More annoyingly glaring than in his other debates, he also harps on points that Carrier never disputes as if they were points Carrier failed to respond to or account for, which seems obnoxiously persnickety (I like the word, too!). He keeps doing this about the women witnesses, Carrier explicitly addresses this issue multiple times.

-Craig underhandedly calls Carrier a crank, too. Craig has done this before with other opponents, most notably Ehrman and if you hear Craig resorting to this type of tactic then you know he's getting cornered. But with Carrier it's the most blatant I've heard Craig go, which means something but I'm not sure what.

Technical 
Good AQ and solid VQ.

Reviews

Bill Craig talks about it HERE

Richard Carrier talks about it HERE

DebunkingChristianity discussion HERE

Triblogue's Jason Engwer reviews it HERE

Victor Reppert's site discusses it in this post HERE Now I've heard Carrier called many things, both good and bad, but I've never heard him referred to as "verbose"...I vaguely thought that Reppert was one of the more thoughtful apologists. Either he's changed since 2009 (it's possible) or he seems depressingly uninteresting after seeing this post.

WinteryKnight gives a quick thought HERE but I'm including this because of what he says about the 2004 Carrier-Licona debate. WK said that Carrier "either won or tied" the debate...Well I've said a number of times that if you see someone like WK say a Christian vs [insert someone disagreeing with WK] was a tie then that usually means that the non-Christian won. But either won or tied!?! Jeez WK might as well stop calling yourself a believer after such a concession.



Ben from War on Error reviews the debate HERE and makes me jealous of not having my own picture with WLC.

I'd frame the photo.

A list of mini-reviews of Craig's debates can be found here! 


*I don't mean this in a "get a load of this guy" way, in this more recent debate he mentions that there's a drinking game people play when listening to his debates. Whenever Carrier plugs his books you take a drink.


A Note on Craig's Scholarly Consensus Source

From what I've looking into it would almost seem like Carrier was being generous to Craig in assuming he cited Habermas for such a claim. Because as far as I can tell the citation is pretty old. Craig responds to this criticism, though HERE.

The question points out that the source is from 1977 which is ancient. It also argues that Kremer recently changed his mind based on an interview Kremer had with some student. Craig spends most of his answer talking about how the student mistranslated some German words and confused Kremer's theological views on the resurrection with his historical views. He also says the interview isn't credible.

He then goes on to claim that it appears Kremer hasn't changed his mind and his focus on this issue almost seemed especially drawn out so as to avoid some pretty big problems that still rest in this citation:

1. It's still really freaking old, and Craig even mentions that Kremer has actually died in 2010; and
2. MAYBE you can get away with doing this in print but in a public debate it is beyond cheap to cite a 1977 book written only available in German. ESPECIALLY for one of the claim and especially if a subsequent article has been published on the topic.



Revisions
8-26-2015 Lots of added stuff. Lots of editorial changes too. Lots of lotsa. Didn't change the score on this one however so I guess that shows how this debate ages well.

William Lane Craig vs Shabir Ally - Did Jesus Rise from the Dead? 2009 CHECK

This debate ( audio | video | 2:25.39s ) took place somewhere north of the United States in 2009, between Craig and Muslim Apologist Shabir Ally. They have debated several times, and on several topics, but the topic of this debate was the resurrection.

Debate begins 3:46s in.

3 stars. CHECK

(Source)

I'm afraid of talking too much about Craig's debates on this here blog. And throughout my reviews of his debates I have explained why he's so popular amongst non-theist blogging nerds, but I have recently attempted to defer my reviews of his debates to my big mini review post here.


However, I've decided to do a full debate review on one of Craig's debates with a Muslim apologist, since I haven't done one, and he debates them a lot as well as non-theists.

Craig's Performance
Craig doesn't change too much up. The only difference is that Craig instead, critiques Islam rather than some type of materialism. This meant that Craig emphasized Jesus' crucifixion (which the Q'aran denies) and he also evangelized a little more emphatically.

Ally's Performance
Ally starts off rather weak and muddled but manages to have more forceful rebuttals. This is the first time I heard Craig remark on the number of points raised by his opponent. Usually it's the other way around*. Despite this however, Ally falls flat when trying to counter Craig's arguments against Islam. I think Ally might have done better if he opted to go the irreligious-historian route with his presentation, but it's pretty obvious why he felt obligated to defend Islam and he did have to respond to Craig's repeated referrals to the Q'aran's position on Jesus' crucifixion.

When Ally was defending his own dogma it never sounded all that convincing, unfortunately. It actually made me decide to unpack one of the problems I have with Craig, in fact. For one thing, I wish his opponents would be more forceful in arguing that Craig needs to defend the bible as essentially inerrant with as much self-righeousness and gusto seen in Craig when he complains about Muslims defending the Q'aran. Also, Richard Carrier was extremely on point when he said that Muslim apologetics has a long way to go to reach the sophistication seen in Christian apologetics. However Ally is at least several steps above Rajabali who thank the gods, hasn't debated since 2004.

Anyways, Craig also said this is one of his favorite debates, too. He wrote a song to the tune of Prince Ali from Aladdin about it, after all...

Shabir Ally, wily is he!
Crafty and cagey!
Turns things around,
Quotes Raymond Brown
In support of Islam!

My SO thought it was racist, but I took issue with the "crafty and cagey" part - it would flow better if it was "cagey and crafty" IMO.
 
Technical
The AQ is kind of quiet, same for the video.


A list of mini-reviews of Craig's debates can be found here! 



8-20-2015: Made it a bit more coherent. I think I should listen to this one again and talk more specifically about the arguments.

Shermer & Prothero v Meyer & Sternberg

This debate ( audio | 1h58m21s ) took place in 2009 between Michael Shermer and Donald Prothero versus Stephen Meyer and Richard Sternberg. The debate topic was: Has Evolutionary Theory Adequately Explained the Origins of Life?

DB: 8m53s! The intro is wayyyy too long.

3 stars

APF review: 4/5
Robert Crowther talks about how awesome the cdesign proponentsists were in the debate.
Shermer licks his wounds and is more forceful in print than he is in the debate.

I was waiting to listen to this one for awhile because I know that the evolutionists side did a bad job and I remembered the ID proponents doing a better job. I always find myself saying that I think Stephen Meyer is a solid proponent of ID and I would imagine that I could cite this debate as an example supporting that position. I probably still could, but I wouldn't think it is all that impressive of an endorsement after just hearing the debate.

In fact, the best way to describe this debate is to call it a hornet's nest. The best part was probably Shermer and Prothero's opening and then it just went down hill from there. Damion goes into some detail about their arguments which I suggest you read if you want to know them but don't want to listen.

Basically, the IDers came off as really whiny. They also came off as creepily interested in one another, too. Several times in the debate Meyer would stop everything and talk about how great of a guy Sternberg is and Shermer mentions this...later on, during the Q&A the mod had to ask Meyer to not ask his own questions of his debate partner...it was kind of weird...

There was also a pissing match over what the debate topic was about. Technically, only Shermer's side really addressed it. The debate was on whether or not evolution was able to address the origins of life. All the IDers did was complain that they weren't being taken serial and that whales evolved too fast. They started mentioning the Cambrian explosion but barely did so beyond quibbling and both sides messed this topic up: complaining about how long it actually took and whether it should be considered an explosion or a short fuse. I can picture a layperson in the audience, who is interested in the discussion, begging someone to relate this back to the topic at hand.

Meyer did get some good jabs in on Shermer, maybe this is where I thought Meyer did a good job. Shermer compared Sternberg's argument to the god of the gaps argument in his rebuttal and Meyer was pretty slick in calling out Shermer for using canned responses in his rebuttals. This is a major issue that I have with Shermer in general, he is just too vague of a skeptic, it would be nice if he did some more research and argued more on specifics.

But besides that, the IDers mostly just patted each other on the back, whined that they too, had PhDs and didn't address the arguments their opponents made that were relevant to the debate's topic. They got away with this, though and the audience seemed raring to clap at anything pro-ID, I think they even accidentally clapped for a talking point that wasn't that pro-ID made by Sternberg.

Both Richard Sternberg and Stephen Meyer are the guys who sparked the whole Smithsonian/Peer-Review Controversy, something that was later treated in Expelled. Their back-patting all night in this debate definitely fits in well with the circumstances that are discussed in the Wikipedia article I link to.


A pretty frustrating debate. I would like to hear Massimo Pigliucci debate Meyer, personally. I just remembered that there is a debate between Meyer and Ken Miller out there, but I haven't heard it in awhile, maybe I'll check that one out later...

Tabash v Slick "Does God Exist?" CHECK

This debate ( audio | video | 1h54m46s ) took place in 2009 between Lawyer Eddie Tabash and Apologist Matt Slick. The debate topic was "Does God Exist?" and this isn't the best debate but it certainly was interesting.

3.5 stars. CHECK

The Godless Skeptic review: Tabash won

First I suggest you all read a better written review of the debate here because my reviews aren't nearly as full of content as the ones that I link to (sans the ones to WK which amaze me that someone could write so much summary about a given debate and not follow the arguments presented by anyone he disagrees with).

Matt Slick has some issues. I think he has potential to be a much more formidable apologist but a) he is just wayyy to condescending b) gets too excited about his pet arguments (which aren't that good to begin with) and c) is too whiny. He just comes off as a total douche and though I won't lie, I think he probably is, he probably could still improve his tact.

But I digress, on to the debate: Slick starts out setting up a lot of qualifications in order to ultimately present just one argument (something that is quite obvious, Eddie points out and Slick doesn't deny). Eddie presents his usual stuff, he does ask a lot of questions and says a lot (hence why he came off better against Craig when they debated) but he does make arguments. He argues against divine command theory, divine hiddeness, the argument from design, the argument from fine-tuning and claims of miracles. He further demonstrates how morality based on the bible is demonstrable and subject to varying interpretations that lead to an incoherent worldview.

In the rebuttal period Slick comes out swinging. He flips out on Eddie for not addressing his one argument*, dismisses Eddie's criticisms for the morality of the Christian faith because atheists are morally bankrupt and that the debate is on whether God exists and complains, complains, complains.

Slick keeps mentioning throughout the debate that he's watched Eddie's previous debates, several times, and that he has counted the questions Eddie has asked and that there were just too many. He further suggested that he could answer them all and here is where it gets good: he doesn't. The entire time, Slick relies on complaining that he has debated this stuff for over 30 years, has debated atheists in formal and informal settings and that he totally could answer these questions. If you're so experienced in these addressing these questions then why did you waste yours, Eddie's, the audience's and my time NOT answering them. I mean, Eddie is a lawyer, a part-time judge plus he's active in the atheist community and debates. This is your livelihood, Matt, you make your money defending these superstitious ideas, and like you repeat over and over and over and over in this debate, you've been doing this for a long time.

I'm serious, Slick's whole second rebuttal is complaining about how Eddie asked too many questions and how great of an apologist he is. He addressed one thing: Eddie can't pass judgement on the bible because the atheistic view is morally bankrupt. But what about Hindus? or Buddhists? or Neo-Pagans? If Slick were debating one of them would he deign himself to consider the fact that the bible is an evil and disgusting book? This is a question that I am thinking of asking more seriously, atheists have plenty of moral frameworks they can rely on to pass ethical judgements, too, but can't we just agree with the myriad of others religious views who agree that the bible blows?

Regardless, Slick doesn't even explain why they are morally bankrupt. I mean, I guess he hints at it and because I know the arguments I can put two and two together but seriously, he totally wastes his first rebuttal.

Eddie doesn't. Eddie devastates Slick's opening argument and because Slick was dumb enough to a) only present one argument and b) waste his rebuttal period away complaining about the questions Eddie asked, Eddie has more than enough time to demonstrate how his questions are relevant and need to be answered and explains that he asks them but further answers them himself.

Technical: Good AQ and VQ.

**Matt is good at saying "I'm not saying that X is a Y, but...X is a Y". Several times he said something like that. He said that he wasn't claiming Eddie was trying to deceive, or dupe, anyone but then continued on as if he were saying that anyways.

Ed Turner vs David Robertson & Richard Morgan on Unbelievable in 2009 CHECK

This debate ( audio | 1:20m ) happened on the Christian radio show Unbelievable in 2009. It pits atheist blogger (no longer active) Ed Turner vs Rev David Robertson and recent Christian convert from Islam, Richard Morgan (not the author, sadly).

3.5 Stars: Turner manages to hold his own against three Christian Archetypes: Slimy Apologist, Snarky Convert, and Lovable Moderate in this flustered radio debate. CHECK

APF review: 3.5/5

Holy crap this debate got my blood boiling. I agree with Damion's assessment of Robertson only I think that the term "prick" is too nice. I would call Robertson a douche, actually.

I also agree that Robertson lacks historical perspective in his arguments about how apparently any positive aspect we can identify in today's modern world can be sourced to the greatness that is Christianity. Such an ethnocentric and lazy picture of the world is depressing given that his educational background is in history. The concept of freedom of expression and democracy stem from Christianity? Get real!

This isn't the first bit of ethnocentrism I've listened to on Unbelievable nor is it the first instance of an ignorance on the historical past that I have heard spewed in all these religious-themed debates* on this site. Read your history folks - I mean, two words: ANCIENT GREECE.

Turner certainly holds his own between Robertson, Morgan, and the Host though Robertson did most of the talking. Turner certainly sounded slick repeatedly noting the statements made in Robertson's books and after reading the reviews of The Dawkins Letters I have to give Turner credit for reading anything by that guy. Turner spends a little too much defending the statements of Dawkins when he didn't really have to, however. Dawkins is a great writer/science promoter but I don't particularly find his insights outside of science all that interesting. It seems like Robertson shoulda stopped bringing up Dawkins too considering he kept having to qualify the fact that Dawkins does not endorse a morality based on evolution.

This is a frustrating debate to listen to, I enjoy that kind of stuff though, but if you don't, then skip it.

Technical
As usual, great audio quality, it's Unbelievable OHHHHHH.

*I'll note, I haven't heard Craig in any of his debates make such moronic claims as those made by Robertson. Never mind, Craig does it a lot, actually.

Revisions
8-6-2013 I lowered the score, I have too many high-starred debates. 
8-23-2015 Clear up some things, added more information about the debate itself, ya'know.

Craig v Brown in 2009

This debate ( audio ) took place in 2009 between Craig and Jim Brown on whether or not God exists...I think.

4 stars.

CSA review: bad
APF review: 4.5/5

I don't have too much to say about this one that hasn't been said in the two reviews I linked to above. I pretty much agree with both of them. Brown does come off as kind of ramble-y in his beginning speech and this always just looks a millions times as bad when up against Craig because of his skill. You gotta give Craig something to counter or he has the playing field to himself.

Brown catches up a little and really handles the Q&A (sans the Behe question, which is a total bummer because it is a pretty weak argument that has been addressed in so many different ways ever since Behe first talked about the flagella). But the questions were all kind of naive, for lack of a better word.

Brown is one of the better debaters against Craig but Craig definitely took the debate.

Technical: Low AQ.

A list of mini-reviews of Craig's debates can be found here! 

Shelley Kagan vs William Lane Craig - Ethicis without God 2009 BEST TOP TEN

This debate ( audio | video ) was between philosopher Shelley Kagan and super-apologist William Lane Craig in 2009. The debate topic was about the possibility of ethics without God.

5 stars. Kagan lets Craig get away with very little in this debate about morality without God. BEST TOP TEN
 

Whenever the Apologeticbot-316000 William Lane Craig is brought up by (more thoughtful) atheists, it's usually conceded that Craig definitely lost this debate on morality with philosopher Shelley Kagan. I'm updating all my reviews (2015) and this still seems to be the ONE debate more agree on.

Kagan details his argument so clearly and in such an accessible manner. He starts off by making sure the audience knows that people have been talking about morality without mentioning god for a very long time. Such a thing isn't even atheistic, too, it's just that people have been trying to knock about moral frameworks forever and a lot times they forget to think about how maybe some celestial super-being might play a role.

He also presented just ONE such moral framework that can account for what Christian apologists (not all) usually insist atheistic moral frameworks lack, which is moral objectivity. This framework is Rawl's Theory of Justice, which basically purports that the feature of universal or objective morality is achieved by asking how we would treat one another/interacted morally/ethically with the external world had we been asked such questions before we were marred with our dividing biases.

Craig does his shtick but it doesn’t seem to be as intense as in other debates because the debate topic is so specific. Here is where we get a more focused speech from Craig on only morality. Craig is good at giving out a lot if nice, snack-sized arguments, together forming one larger case for his position. But when he has to flesh out a more specific topic, he ends up coming off less intense (if you need another example, check out his debate with Ray Bradley on Hell).

This issue really weakens Craig's position later: Craig keeps harping on ultimate significance as being really super important to objective morality and this is how he is able to dismiss the non-theistic arguments for being morally upright because 5 billion years from now the earth with turn to ash AND they don't matter if there is no god or heavenly reward.

Craig does say this in many of his other debates but it is dished out with several other arguments that his opponent has to respond to. However, Kagan doesn't need to worry about that here and we also hear Craig repeat this issue over and over again making it easier for Kagan to respond to it. And he does. Really well.

Craig also gets beaten up pretty badly in the cross-examination, Kagan doesn’t let him get away with the slides he can pull through his almost complete mastery of the art of formal debate. Kagan beautifully lays out contractualism and Craig attempts (not necessarily in a nefarious manner) to crap on the framework by asking “what if [I forget] doesn’t wanna sign the contract?” and this gets a laugh out of the audience but it also gave Kagan the chance to reiterate the key parts of contractualism to the audience and Kagan does so and does it perfectly.

One of the best debates out there.

Technical
Good but kind of choppy AQ and good VQ.

Other Reviews
APF review: 4.5/5
CSA review: good?
WK review: Xians always win


A list of mini-reviews of Craig's debates can be found here! 

Post Revision Notes
6-30-2013 I fleshed out the first paragraph introducing the debate a little more.

8-19-2013 I significantly changed the first paragraph. I originally talked about how Kagan didn't need to address Craig's argument from the resurrection, which is true, but it's true because Craig never actually brings it up in this debate. I've listened to a lot of Craig's debates and they all blurred for me. I also edited the technical  section.
8-15-2015 Updated the links and made myself sound less like an idiot...And I described the debate a bit more.

Bart Ehrman vs James White - Did the Bible Misquote Jesus? 2009 BEST

In this debate ( audio | video | transcript ) Misquoting Jesus author Bart Ehrman argued against Calvinist Apologist Dr James White concerning the textual reliability of the New Testament.

4.25 stars: There is a lot detail packed into this epic debate. And though White's rather blatant underlying agenda ultimately left him sounding a bit whiny, he certainly comes off as a polished proponent for theism. BEST


This is a pretty strong debate between the two. I have heard Ehrman before but not White. This is the usual debate on this topic, Ehrman takes a conservative view on the textual reliability and White feels that the "misquotes" brought up by Ehrman are trivial or misused in some fashion. Nothing truly groundbreaking is thrown around between the two, at least as far as I heard. I liked the format of the debate, there was a pretty intense cross examination between the two where I think both debaters got in the points they wanted to hit home well.

Of course I think that Ehrman did better for the content he presents but he also does a good job of distilling the issues he discusses. He and White both got a little heated about things and Ehrman did so about some odd stuff. He didn't like being compared to a Muslim, which sounded weird to me, for lack of a better way of describing my impression. White kept on being kind of condescending about things in the cross-exam which probably agitated Ehrman a little. White would repeatedly say that Ehrman was not understanding what he was arguing and would repeatedly ask Ehrman whether or not he was familiar with other big names in the fields related to the subject of the debate. It sounded like Ehrman was getting more and more annoyed with this.

White did okay, I need to hear him more to develop more of an impression. I think he would agree because I would like to think he wasn't so whiny as he came off. He kept getting upset about Ehrman going on popular talk shows and having his work referred to by atheists and Muslim apologists. Look White, write a book with a controversial sounding title and you might get to go on those talk shows. Write a book that counters a view that has been so engrained in the American mindset ever since the beginning of this country and maybe you'll get on those shows. It sounds pretty lame to complain about non-Christian perspectives getting popularized in the United States, I'm sorry if just repeatedly affirming the validity of an old tome already considered dogma by the population doesn't sound sexy enough to go on Colbert. Maybe you can go to all the churches, universities, other shows and channels devoted to Christianity to make yourself feel better, eh?

Technical 
The audio is good but it has some sort of stutter going through it, maybe Veritas has a better copy. I didn't watch the video, just listened to it.


Other Reviews
CSA: best!


Note on James White's Sale of these debates.  I think they're free now! See!

Post Revision History
7-7-2013 I cleaned up what I said about White's complaints, lowered to score because I think I need to be more critical and noted that on the epic list of debates put together by Luke Muehlhauser this debate is labeled as "best!".