"Yep, and that's why belief in God isn't a scientific belief, and subjecting it to scientific tests/procedures is naff. Sorry, that's rude. It's a category error."

That is not the issue. Believers broadcast their message to the heathen world and pass on their beliefs to their children as truth. It is not unreasonable under these circumstances to be sceptical and ask what their evidence is, and it is equally not unreasonable to put what they call their evidence (and they do use the word) under scrutiny. They have no right to immunity from awkward questions, considering what they do.

"How does one verify independence of sources? One way is to show that they disagree on some details -- if they agree on everything it's probable that one is copying the other. And the gospels do disagree on a lot of fiddly details (Matthew has 2 animals on Palm Sunday, for instance, where Luke has 1). Of course the response to this will be that this just proves that they're not accurate and so can be dismissed! We can't win."

Well, not all the conflicts are fiddly, but we'll leave that aside for now. Good point about disagreement on detail pointing to authenticity - I like that. But it does go to show that the gospels, and all the rest, should not be taken as, er, gospel. What's more, it would be foolish to overlook the tendentious nature of many of these texts. Mostly, they're hardly neutral, are they?