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Author | Topic: The "science" of Miracles | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
New Cat's Eye Inactive Member |
Phat writes: This is why the idea of evidence conflicts with the very definition of a miracle. Not really. Without evidence we wouldn't know a miracle had happened would we? :-) You could. In the context of evidence and knowledge being scientific, you cannot "know" that a miracle happened. Miracles are inexplicable, if you have evidence and knowledge then it's not a miracle.
If a miracle cures an ill person we would expect at least two pieces of evidence; that the person was ill before the event and not ill after. And if you witnessed the event but did not gather any record of the evidence, then you would be aware of the miracle occurring without having any evidence of it. Then you would know the miracle happened and be without evidence.
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New Cat's Eye Inactive Member |
If someone waved a wand and said 'hocus pocus, grow a second penis' and you instantly grew a second penis, you'd be pretty convinced that something miraculous had happened. ie the evidence and knowledge of the miracle is that something inexplicable has happened in the natural world that we can observe. But that would be considered an unexplained natural phenomenon rather than a miracle.
If nothing observable or detectable happened, then we couldn't say a miracle had happened. When can you say a miracle has happened?
And if you witnessed the event but did not gather any record of the evidence, then you would be aware of the miracle occurring without having any evidence of it. Then you would know the miracle happened and be without evidence. Yup. And? And so the answer to your question {Without evidence we wouldn't know a miracle had happened would we?} is that yes we could.
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New Cat's Eye Inactive Member |
New Cat's Eye writes:
The same time as you can say God exists: When you believe it. When can you say a miracle has happened? Technically you could say it even if you didn't believe it. But this is beside the point.
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New Cat's Eye Inactive Member
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Your first attempt is to define miracles away by claiming that a miracle is simply something as yet unexplained. Then you do a 180 and infer that miracles *can* happen and what's more we don't even need any evidence of them. You've misunderstood. You can't scientifically know that a miracle occurred. If you can study it scientifically then its natural and if you can't then you don't know. But, you could witness a miracle and not have any scientific evidence for it.
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New Cat's Eye Inactive Member |
Yes you can. You can observe and test the evidence. If it breaks natural laws it's a miracle. Nope, you could just be wrong about the natural law. And if you can test it, then it's natural.
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New Cat's Eye Inactive Member |
We know with 100% certainty that wine can't and never can be turned into blood by a guy in dress simply talking at it. That would be a miracle by any definition. And we can test it. If that event happened and you tested it then that would mean that you weren't 100% certain that it couldn't happen. And the response should not be to declare a miracle but to evaluate our understanding of what is possible.
A miracle must happen in the natural world. How do you know? They could be happening in other worlds.
Anything that happens in the natural world can be observed. How do you know? There could be things happening that you can't observe.
If it can't be observed, we can't know anything has happened. An unobservable event could cause an observable consequence, then you'd know something happened even though you couldn't observe it.
You have to accept the paradox. If you don't you're just saying that miracles can't happen. What I'm saying is that it could happen and someone could be aware of it even though they don't have scientific evidence. Also, if it can be tested it's not miraculous.
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New Cat's Eye Inactive Member |
I think this point may have already been addressed upthread, but anyway, the context included the ability to observe the miracle, and so I assumed Tangle's meaning was, "A miracle that we can observe must happen in the natural world." That phrasing makes more sense and is agreeable. "Must happen in" is a little strong for my taste but its not worth nitpicking. I know what you mean.
Sure, miracles could be taking place a mile a minute "in other worlds" (I'm assuming you mean other universes), but how would we ever know? Ever? Go there and see But yeah, from here we wouldn't know either way. But we can't just say they must happen here.
I thought this point was already addressed, too. What is the difference between the undetectable and the non-existent? The undetectable can exist while the non-existent cannot.
The vast majority of things that happen take place away from scientific observation. So of course a miracle could happen where no scientific observations are being made. Yeah, I'm not sure why there's disagreement and claims to the contrary.
But if miracles are part of the natural world then unless God is playing games with us it is possible for them to take place where scientific observations are being conducted.
Also, if it can be tested it's not miraculous. Yeah, I think that's the paradox that was mentioned above. I'm not disagreeing with it
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New Cat's Eye Inactive Member |
We know enough about our world to know that what has happened is an impossibility. If it has happened then it wasn't impossible.
Then no one is able to call them mirculous. Scientifically, you can never call anything a miracle; for if you can test and prove it then it is not miraculous and if you cannot then you can't call it anything.
We would witness the miraculous event. The wine is chnged to blood. Who knows what caused it? It's a miracle. Okay, so my disagreement stemmed from this:
quote: There's two ambiguities there: evidence and knowledge. Either they're scientific or they're not. You can't have scientific knowledge of a miracle, because then you're in the realm of a natural phenomenon, so that's out. I'm saying that you could be aware of a miracle and not have any scientific evidence for it. I don't understand why that is disagreeable. In the above, where you witness wine changing to blood, you don't have scientific evidence and knowledge. Yet, you are still calling it a miracle. So there's an instance of you having unscientific knowledge of a miracle without scientific evidence, which goes against what I'm disagreeing with that without evidence you wouldn't know a miracle happened.
Which is supposedly the case for miracles in the bible. But as we have no objective evidence that the events described actually happened, we can't claim a miracle. So we know of these miracles without evidence, but we don't know if they actually happened or not.
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New Cat's Eye Inactive Member |
Removing the ambiguity in my phrasing, what is the difference (to us the observers and experiencers of phenomena) between something that exists but is undetectable, that leaves no imprint on the universe, versus something that doesn't exist? From our point of view there is no difference. But that doesn't mean that there is nothing happening that we cannot detect.
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New Cat's Eye Inactive Member
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There are good scholarly reasons to believe that the Exodus and conquest really DID happen. See, for example, James Hoffmeier. What reasons does that book present? Edited by New Cat's Eye, : typo
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New Cat's Eye Inactive Member |
There's no point going beyond this because you're not accepting the concept of a miracle as it's defined. Uh, I'd say you are the one going against the definition. Miracles are inexplicable and you're saying that we don't know it's a miracle until it is explained. But that makes it not a miracle.
That's fine but to have this discussion at all, you have to allow that miracles are possible and that they defy natural laws. That is part of my position. A miracle is when when you experience something that defies natural laws. There's no requirement for you to have scientific evidence of it. You can't really know that a miracle has occurred - for if you can test it then it is following natural laws not defying them. If you think natural laws are being defied because of the results of your tests, then that means you need to rethink the natural laws.
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New Cat's Eye Inactive Member
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I'm saying exactly the reverse. How on earth can you be confused about that? I'm saying that by definition a miracle is inexplicable. It's the paradox that makes it miraculous. You're also saying that they have to be impossible and also happen, which is contradictory.
So maybe it's me. How can we know that something has defied a natural law without testing that the something has defied a natural law? You can't. And if a natural law is defied then it wasn't a law.
We measure the outcome, we can't measure the mechanism because it's supernatural. Which means you can't test and prove it. And if you could then it isn't miraculous.
You're just saying that miracles are impossible again. I'm saying it is impossible to know it was a miracle. The term "miracle" is a place holder. Look at the definitions - it's things that are "taken to be", or "held to be", or "ascribed to be" supernatural. Never are miracles concluded to be supernatural - that's impossible.
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New Cat's Eye Inactive Member |
No, I would say that is a miracle. It just wouldn't be scientific. And I wouldn't know it. But I'd believe it.
If, otoh, we could repeat it and test it scientifically, then I would conclude that we were studying some kind of natural phenomenon.
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New Cat's Eye Inactive Member |
Sorry to just jump in, but I've been away. And you didn't reply to my last one.
But the question no one likes is what happens when it's proven beyond reasonable doubt that the event just wasn't natural? If you're talking about science then it doesn't come to that conclusion. It's methodological naturalism. The things that are explainable are natural. And the things that aren't are not supernatural. Thus, you cannot scientifically conclude that something is supernatural. Look, from wiki:
quote:
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