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Josephus also references Heracles/Hercules in similar terms, and many times more often that the single "Christos" reference. Does that mean Heracles/Hercules is real?

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Josephus was a Romanized Jew and unconverted. That the reference to Jesus in his History names him as the Messiah casts immediate doubt in the minds of most scholars. Josephus was a well known "Messiah-buster", and had no patience for those with messianic claims.*

Ironically, due to his immersion in the Roman culture, the writings of Josephus were rejected by his fellow Jews, and might have been lost had some later Christian scribe not slipped in some editorializing. It is because of these completely unreliable passages that the History survived, and has come to be recognized as one of the best available histories of the Jewish people from the time.

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* Here, the general lack of awareness of what life was like in those days works against most people having a good grasp on what the whole story of Jesus would have meant in context. In the first place, most of the Jewish people in the region had long ago given up any hope of a "messiah" making an appearance. The story had been around too long, and there had been too many claimants. To people in that time and place, there would have been nothing particularly special about one my buy showing up with followers claiming he was the Messiah.

Also, it is important to keep in mind that the popular teachings of the time held that ALL men were "the sons of God". A claim that Jesus was literally so would have cause no particular rise in interest. More of a "Yeah, yeah, me too" response.

As a counter argument, I offer Roswell. The parallel to the Jesus mythos to be found in the tales of that "flying saucer crash" are marked and remarkable. From a small incident briefly blown out of proportion and then forgotten for thirty years, we have a substantial "cult" developing once the information was rediscovered and embellished (and embellished, and embellished, and embellished). And Roswell happened in a time when mass communication was commonplace. The mythology persists even tho there are video recordings of the same people saying at one time "I don't know what you're talking about" and at another, years later, "Yes, I was there and saw everything." Turn that into an ancient game of "telephone" and see what you get!

I'm a fan of Ehrman, but his bristling responses to the notion that Jesus is a fiction bother me. Fine, he thinks a Jewish teacher lived and died 2000 years ago and inspired a "great religion," but he has no cause to label skeptics as cynical and out-of-touch the way he does.

If Paul converted within a year or two of the death of a real Jesus, why does he know so little about the details of life as told in the Gospels?

JB: Josephus was a Romanized Jew and unconverted. That the reference to Jesus in his History names him as the Messiah casts immediate doubt in the minds of most scholars. Josephus was a well known "Messiah-buster", and had no patience for those with messianic claims.* Here, the general lack of awareness of what life was like in those days works against most people having a good grasp on what the whole story of Jesus would have meant in context. In the first place, most of the Jewish people in the region had long ago given up any hope of a "messiah" making an appearance. The story had been around too long, and there had been too many claimants. To people in that time and place, there would have been nothing particularly special about one my buy showing up with followers claiming he was the Messiah.

In all of these cases, we depend on a surprisingly small body of documentary evidence.

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But not NONE AT ALL.