What about that miracle when during the earthquake everyone got out of a building before it collapsed, but a single piece of metal came flying out of the destruction and happen to hit one of the escapees right between the eyes, killing him instantly? That’s just as much a miracle as the thing you mentioned.
Okay, if rational arguments don’t work, what does?
I for one can hardly blame believers today if they are to only read about such things supposedly happening, when evidently people weren’t buying into it then. If the skepticism and doubt was still strong in that day when the alleged miracles were happening right in front of them, and supposedly during their time, it helps explain why faith is so necessary and why so many believers today struggle with this as they then did if you’re correct. They should, IMO.
When I’ve asked believers before what was the purpose of miracles, other than this brief little sample on this thread, nearly all replied it was to gain converts. I think a few, like you, also said it was to show Jesus was who he said he was, and he wasn’t just whistling Dixie like the other false prophets. But since most of modern scholarship shows the miracle stories were added later, it does appear Jesus is yet another false prophet made up by others later on. If these miracle stories happened, why didn’t any of Paul’s letters which were written well before the Gospels not mention a single miracle performed by Jesus? Nor does he even address a single parable or teaching the best I recall. Is this being too rational again?
Jesus is supposed to have said: “I tell you the truth, if you have faith and do not doubt, not only can you do what was done to the fig tree, but also you can say to this mountain, ‘Go, throw yourself into the sea,’ and it will be done. If you believe, you will receive whatever you ask for in prayer.” Matthew 21-21-22 (NI) What does “truth” and “faith” mean in this context of these scriptures listed in the NT of what a believer would be able to do with it? Was this just hyperbole, and not to be taken literally?
He is also alleged to have said: “Again I say to you, if two of you agree on earth about anything they ask, it will be done for them by my Father in heaven.”
In the book of James it reads:“ And the prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well; the Lord will raise him up. If he has sinned, he will be forgiven. Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective.”
In Mark, “All things are possible to him who believeth.” Also in Mark, “And these signs shall follow them that believe; In my name shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues; They shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover.” In Luke, “For with God nothing shall be impossible.”
The word “faith” is used in the King James Bibles hundreds of times, nearly all being in the NT, and gives many an idea what was trying to be conveyed. You can find such things sprinkled throughout the NT. Shall we strike all of it as hyperbole or something else? Since you’re speaking of someone that has some degree of faith, how does it work to you then?
Why will no one address the amputee question? Sure, there are loads of “miracles” regarding all kinds of internal diseases. Why are no amputees ever given the “miracle” of regrowth? Not even once?
Because there is no good answer for it. Believers will assume there is reason only God knows, non-believers will see it as proof that God can’t exist (at least the one presented by modern Christianity).
Someone said something about faith acting as a placebo for people - Jesus is quoted in the Bible (and non-canonical sources) as saying “your faith has made you well” or “your faith will make you well.” He never said “I have healed you or God has healed you.” Could it be that having enough faith in something will allow mind to overcome matter? Maybe no one has had enough faith to regrow a limb?
I’m not really looking to argue this point, just kind shooting from the hip.
Again, look at the context of the work. Paul was writing to communities of believers, but were struggling to become established. They had already heard the stories of miracles.
In a speech the night before he died, Martin Luther King said “I’ve been to the mountain top…(God has) allowed me to go up to the mountain…I’ve seen the promised land…Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord.”
Should we call King a liar, or should we take him at his word that he literally was transported to the top of a mountain where he actually viewed some physical manifestation of a promised land? Or, do we understand that King was trying to express abstractions – hope, vision, conviction – in words that his audience would understand?
Since it means that much to you, Luke 22:50-51. When Jesus was arrested, one of his disciples drew a sword and “struck the slave of the high priest and cut off his right ear. But Jesus said, ‘No more of this!’ And he touched his ear and healed him.” There’s an amputation miracle.
Yeah, if you believe the bible. Even so, that’s ONE instance.
Yeah, because that’s what you asked for.
But there’s also the reattachment attributed to St. Anthony of Padua, the 1949 healing of Giovanni Savino, and the story of St. John Damascene.
So what? It’s worth noting that Christians don’t venerate Anthony or John because of those miracles – they rate only a minor mention in their biographies.
So now that I’ve provided four stories of reattachment, I’ve proven to everyone’s satisfaction that miracles exist and there must be a God. Of course not. If I could give you a dozen examples, you’d probably not be satisfied with any of them. (I’ll settle for a mere retraction of the assertion that “no amputees ever get healed.”) Which goes to my earlier comment, it’s futile to try to justify faith with rational arguments, and it’s even more futile to justify miracles. Just look at this thread.
**ITR **cites Rita Klaus and hotflungwok argues that her healing wasn’t instantaneous, that she only got better over time.
I cite the Coptic apparition of Mary and** razncain ** says the photographic evidence isn’t convincing.
Perciful believes spontaneous remissions are miracles. gonzomax is convinced they’re simply the result of a probability that given X number of cancers, some of them will spontaneously remit. On the other hand, gonzomax feels a real miracle would be if all cancers spontaneously remitted. At that point, someone else would argue that only proves that cancer turned out to be a disease with a natural cycle of remission.
Voyager called miracles “parlor tricks.” I think of them as events which can’t be explained – at least not yet. Does anyone, either atheist or faithful, think the existence of God hangs on unexplained events?
I do think it’s quite clever for those that assembled the Bible to put them out of order of when they were thought to be written, to give that appearance that Paul doesn’t have to cover any of the miracles, since it gives the impression that he must have known about them. But there isn’t scintilla of evidence in any of his writings that he had a clue.
Nobody should interpret King as actually having been transported to the mountain, and had seen the glory of the coming of the Lord. Besides, he’s reciting parts of the Battle Hymn here word for word.
King was a very inspirational speaker, and even I am moved by his speeches, and the way he carried his voice through inflections and cadence, he could give a speech like so few could, and was very motivational on how he inspired others to his cause, believer and unbeliever alike.
But by answering with King, when I gave you those examples of faith described in the NT, is that how you want to really answer what “faith” is all about? If you hadn’t wrote in other parts, I would think you seem to be suggesting that maybe the miracle stories are told shouldn’t be taken literally, but should be used as King used them. But later you retort back that Jesus healed a man who has his ear cut off, and now give us this:
Oh, pah-leese, you haven’t proven anything about reattachment by reciting the same wore out stories in the past about such things supposedly occurring. Set something up that we can mark our calendars by with time and place, and many will be present. Not that most of us are expecting a miracle, but most like a good show. It won’t happen though, because most adults don’t like making a damn fool of themselves, so believers will just have to rely on another’s word that it happened like they claim it did.
I stated more than just that as to why it isn’t convincing. These lights are supposed to have happened over a period of six nights, I believe it was, in which it also reported doves glowing, and these lights were supposedly captured on many videophones and also thousands of eyewitnesses or said to have seen it.
C’mon now, your link had a picture with a glare of which could easily be somebody shining a spotlight on it. Let’s see the all of the pictures and the evidence, and hey, if this is a yearly occurrence, mark me down for it too. You’d think if this happened as they claim, this would be all over the internet, and we’d have thousand of pics, as well as live video. Where is it? Seriously, are you that easy to convince, and this is what constitutes good evidence to you?
C’mon razncain, I haven’t said I’m convinced of anything – all I’ve claimed is that I believe that sometimes things happen that can’t be explained.
You asked for an account of a contemporary miracle. I gave you one. It doesn’t convince you. No skin off my nose.
Hazle claimed there are no miracles of people having limbs restored. I gave her four (actually, three and an eye.)
You quote passages from the Bible and ask if they’re supposed to be taken literally. In a rhetorical flourish, I quote a passage from Martin Luther King and ask you if it’s supposed to be taken literally. You don’t like that style of discussion, so let me restate my question more directly. Does the use of figures of speech serve to explain abstract concepts, or does it prove the speaker is a blowhard? Specifically, if all those quotes from the Bible you cited are nothing more than rhetorical flourishes, does it follow that the Bible is complete bullshit and there is no God, no Jesus and by extension, no historic kingdom of Israel?
In your first post, you sounded wistful that there weren’t any good old fashioned miracles like we read about in the Old Testament. Now you’re asking God not just for a miracle, but to announce the time and place it will happen. Is that a miracle or one of **Voyager’s **parlor tricks?
Don’t get me wrong. I enjoy a good, well-reasoned, polite theological discussion as much as anyone. And if Jesus could have a skeptic in his group of followers, then why shouldn’t I welcome a discussion with them. But at some point we have to agree that we aren’t going to resolve the issue until we die and face God – or until we die and don’t face God.
Then go find me a man of faith that is convinced. With the second part of this, I suppose if you read about someone reporting it as a miracle, then it somehow gets put into the unexplainable category. There is no good reason to think it’s anything other than man having a propensity for bending the facts especially when they claim to do something that our understanding of science shows would be a complete violation of conservation laws, or some other well known established scientific fact. People got away with such stories thousands of years ago, today, it’s a bit better known about how certain things work, and none of them point to supernatural explanations. While Hume himself never claims that miracles don’t exist, he did say that there should be extraordinary proof before one accepts them. Thus far, you’ve brought us stuff that you’re not even convinced of, but want us to take a look at it.
Sort of. Let me refresh your memory of what you specifically asked of me initially up in the thread:
To which I replied:
Anyway, here’s how you replied to that:
The miracle of Lanciano was supposed to have happened in the 700’s. And even giving this Coptic apparition of Mary, you actually said of it and the other, that you’re not claiming these were actual miracles, but only that they are still unexplained to you. Nothing to explain for the reasons I gave above.
Much of the biblical stories is bullshit, the miracle stories it’s certainly safe to say is complete 100% total bullshit. Most know that disease isn’t caused by demons. Most know laying upon the hands and a few magical words isn’t going to cure anybody of jack shit. Most know one can’t walk on water and violate gravity because one wishes to do so. Most know you can’t feed a few thousand on a few loaves of bread or few pieces of fish. Most know one can’t turn water into wine, etc, etc. Why is that so hard to fathom? The believers evidently don’t know though, and probably, they would prefer not to know.
See above of what I mean by present and previous posts as well. Since you’re not even convinced of the very thing you’re asking us to consider, this is hardly “faith” of anything.
The problem is resolved for many that supernatural miracles don’t occur, and what kind of extraordinary evidence would need to be presented if one wanted to make a real case for it. Hume explained it well. With you the verdict seems to still be out.
Do you have any evidence that Peter actually believed that any of these things occurred?
Okay, here’s someone who seems convinced. If you want to hear directly from a true believer, drop her an e-mail. I’m sure she’ll be happy to share her testimony with you.
http://healingsandmiracles.org/
And if it turns out that someone was bending the facts (i.e., making stuff up) then it isn’t unexplained, it’s bullshit.
I agree, extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof, which is why I lean toward “unexplained” rather than “miraculous.” Even so, why are you upset about the stuff I offered? Were you aware of all of them before you opened the thread, meaning I wasted your time? Are you angry because you looked at each one with the tiniest bit of hope that I had something that might convince you, and I let you down?
Sounds to me like you’re pretty well convinced that there’s no such thing as a miracle. Spontaneous healings? Sometimes diseases just go away. Mysterious lights? Simple tricks. Loaves and fishes, water into wine, and all the rest? Exaggerations or outright lies from first century PR people. Have I missed anything?
My personal belief is that there’s a continuum of human experience that ranges from complete ignorance to complete knowledge, and that we’re progressing along that line. However, like the mathematical paradox of bisecting a line, we can only get closer and never bridge the gap to complete knowledge. In other words, there will always be something out there we don’t understand and can’t find a law of science to explain. If science can’t explain it, there must be another cause that’s beyond our capability to understand, another force in the universe that functions independently. And what would happen if we ever did understand everything completely? For that, I suggest you set aside Hume and read Teilhard de Chardin.
What is that you think science can’t explain?
Those basic, heavy philosophical questions so often enjoyed by college freshmen late at night.
If the universe started with a Big Bang, what caused the Big Bang?
Why do humans appear to be not just an evolutionary advancement over great apes, but a quantum leap in terms of communication, socialization, creativity, etc.? How did it happen? For that matter, what’s the point of art?
What causes us to be altruistic?
Varro discussed microorganisms centuries before there was a way to detect them. On the other hand, Archimedes was hardly the first person to see water displacement, nor was Newton the first to observe that things fall down. What causes one person to see what millions of others overlook?
Science is very good for “how” but often unsatisfactory for “why.”
These are not questions that science can’t answer. Science can actually answer all of them pretty well, or offer good guesses. There’s certainly nothing so vexing about them that we must hypothesize magic.
Testimonials are on the lower end of evidence. Not exactly the gold standard of truth. They are great for selling all kinds of worthless junk, which is why we have so many info-commercials and are so popular with the general public. It’s no wonder churches and religious people use them on selling their wares as well.
I’ll skip on linking onto her if she only wants to talk as a believer who is convinced. I can get that by flipping the channels and watching televangelists. Unless she believes her faith has given her some special gift and she would be willing and open for a small demonstration, and she’s accessible, I’d reconsider. She doesn’t even have to move mountains, I’d settle for a paper clip being suspended in mid-air if everything is all on the up and up. Such is the confidence I have in gravity working the way I think it will.
So we agree that extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof, but where we differ is you put it in the unexplained, but I would put it in the bullshit department.
I wasn’t familiar with the two links you gave me of the Miracle at Lanciano and the lights and glowing doves in Egypt. Not upset, nor am surprised that you can’t recognize it for the bullshit it is, when you feel like it belongs in the unexplained category. But I was specifically looking for someone that had faith in the miracles actually occurring, not one that was agnostic about it all. I don’t have the tiniest hope of finding such a miracle, and none of you have let me down; all of you went and got the weak kinds of evidence I expected those that believed would get, or in your case, went and got what you would consider unexplained.
If the lights happened according to how they presented it, and these occurrences were happening night after night after night, did it occur to you why didn’t some mainstream news source ever bother to pick up on the story? Something like CNN, MSNBC,CBS, ABC, PBS etc? Hundreds of news organizations from all over the world would have been on it, don’t you think if such a thing was actually some supernatural miracle? If such news organizations arrived, do you think the lights and glowing doves would have appeared? If the reports came back as positive from these organizations, it would require further investigation.
One fundamental concept in science is that if some kind of phenomenon occurs once, if conditions are the same, they will occur again. Replication is important for the best kinds of evidence. Ideally, one can test in a controlled environment. But it can also occur in the field with such things as the lights in Egypt if they occur on a somewhat predictable time table, as your link claimed they did then.
When it comes to claimants themselves that have been tested for such supernatural or paranormal abilities, thousands have been tested for such things, and none have ever panned out. Some are just honestly deceived. Some are downright charlatans. Often magicians have been brought in when some scientists didn’t know what to look for, because they weren’t looking for deceit. Something magicians specialize in. I’m sure you’ve been on Straight Dope enough to know of some of these organizations.
Physicists come in two different camps on investigating miracle claims. With their knowledge of even just the fundamental laws of physics, laws of permission and denial, verification and falsification, interactions and such stuff which they can apply to all sorts of claims of miracle phenomena, they never have to leave their work to realize it is bullshit, and also they think it is a huge waste of time and resources. The other camp of physicists are equally skeptically, but are willing to take the time to investigate such claims. These people are not hard to find. What is hard to find is a claimant that can actually do, what they initially claim they can do, or finding some miracle that is supposedly going to occur, like the lights in Egypt. If the physicists showed up the last time this supposedly happened, and they got to investigate it, along with the major news organizations reporting on it, the miracles would have never been reported like in your link. You can think the evidence should remain as unexplainable and still plausible. I’m willing to be shown that I’m wrong, but I’m also willing to go all in, and claim bullshit on anyone and everything that claims some supernatural phenomenon has occurred.
What do you want from the members of this board? Did you expect posters to come in with their personal experiences? Did you expect a cite that met your burden of proof, that you couldn’t have found yourself with a Google search? Are you disappointed that the discussion hasn’t been more scintillating?
Razncain there are two basic problems with your expectation of proof. One is that you seem to feel it can’t be legitimate if independent third parties aren’t there right away to record and verify it. Suppose I call the editor of the Cairo Times and say, “There’s a hell of a light show here in Asyut. It’s a miracle!” And the editor says, “I’m not sending a reporter 350 km to cover a light show. Send me a photo.” That means it’s all bullshit, right?
Then you want the miracle held up to scientific scrutiny, especially predictability and replication. It’s a* miracle*. It doesn’t arrive on schedule, nor does it return because you’ve set up testing equipment. Every occurence is a one-off, sui generis phenomenon.
You say you’re open to being proven wrong, but until you are proven wrong each and every incidence of a “miracle” is bullshit. By “bullshit” do you mean deliberately fraudulent, a con job? Do you include a jump to conclusions by unsophisticated people who fall back on superstition because they don’t know how to verify something scientifically? I think calling a folktale “bullshit” is a little harsh.
If I think something is unexplained, that doesn’t mean I think “OOOOOOH! Mystery.” It may mean there’s a simple explanation that was overlooked, a complicated explanation that needs to be developed, or a fraud that needs to be exposed.
Dio, if science offers “good guesses” then there’s an element of uncertainty, isn’t there? Is there nothing between science and “magic”?
If science can offer a plausible, non-magical explanation for something, then it rules out magic as a necessary hypothesis. Nothing has ever been shown in the universe for which cannot be plausibly explained without resort to magic. It isn’t necessary to prove a non-magical hypothesis is the correct one, only that it’s a possible one. Any possible non-magical explanation automatically rules out any need to hypothesize magic.
Eyewitness testimony means nothing, by the way. Nothing is ever accepted as scientific evidence on someone’s mere say so, no matter who says it, or how many.
Take the Fatima nonsense, for instance. Clearly, unequivocally and irrefutably, the sun did not move. We know this for a fact. The tides did not shift. There was no seismic or tektonic activy. No kind of celestial or astronomic activuty was detectable to scientific instruments or observers. No one else in the world noticed the sun moving outside of one crowd of credulous, religious fanatics in Portugal. The sun didn’t move, period, full stop, end of paragraph.
The eyewitness testimony of these people, is therefore worthless. We know for a fact that they didn’t see what they said they saw. Their accounts aren’t even consistent. Different people described seing different things. Some said they didn’t see anything at all.
Most likely, they saw a sundog or something and got all hysterical about it, started babbling and the power of suggestion did the rest. People started imagining shit they didn’t really see, exaggerating illusions of movement or color, reinforcing each other’s suggestions, etc. Afterwards, they began to edit their memories (a common phenomenon) to make it a better and better story. More than a few were probably flat out lying. None of it adds up to evdience of anything. The empirical, testable evidence tells us that the sun did not move, no matter how many superstitious peasants think they saw otherwise.
I think my thread title and what I covered in the OP was quite clear of what this thread was going to be about. I didn’t expect anything but from what I got. I am trying to still understand the mind of the Bible-believer, in particular, adults, who still claim they have faith, if they think it is the same kind of faith as I described in the OP. Maybe it is you who is disappointed, and feel like we haven’t given your links the credence you think they deserve.
You’ve said you agree that the extraordinary claims require the extraordinary proof. This story doesn’t demonstrate it. And sorry, photos are good, but not great, and often they can be doctored, but there are many ways to finding that out and certainly worth a look ( see Camera Clues by Joe Nickell).
If the lights happened for six nights in a row, there wouldn’t have been no need to get in a rush. Your spiritual link, which you got to admit, doesn’t have that PBS Frontline type of investigating reporting written all over it. Neither did your other link.
That is still asking for too much, isn’t it? Shall I lower my standards a bit more in hope of a miracle maybe getting through then? Let’s stick with testimonials, good story telling, and hearing of such miracles well into the past and or thousands of miles away. Let’s also ignore the most basic fundamentals of physics, and flush that all down the toilet too, pretending the world actually works much differently, and let’s start giving these people a little bit more credibility. And maybe, just maybe, miracles will start appearing all over the place.
As I’ve stated before, I prefer replication, because it’s the best kind of evidence, when, e.g., people who claim to have special supernatural gifts are tested, it will leave no shadow of doubt, that the first experiment wasn’t botched, either through people not quite being qualified to do the tests, or some other trickery could have been going on by the claimant. For many groups that have done this testing though, the claimant never even gets past the preliminary rounds. But if replication is asking for too much, I’d settle for one if it was the right one, and the proper protocol was set up for it which I’ve explained before as one such example I would accept. I could give many more. People that have such a gift, I would think, would be all too happy to share the great news with the world. I know I would be if I was legitimate.
I believe you used the term bullshit first when responding to me in the form of a question if you think that is what I thought of it, so I followed up on it. If you didn’t want the term used, perhaps you should have used another.
Many people are operating a fraudulent scheme or con game: Benny Hinn, Sylvia Brown, Van Praage, John Edwards, the miracles at Lourdes, etc…
There are also people who have this uncanny ability to be able to deceive themselves and are probably just honest people. Randi learned this about the water dowsers (ideomotor effect), who in his opinion, feels like they honestly believe they have the ability they claim, even though they fail miserably under proper protocol each and every time, and can’t even get past the preliminary rounds.
As far as calling folklore bullshit, I believe again this is your term. I can accept tall tales, mythology, urban legends, supernatural romance, etc, as interesting stories, and are also great in film, books, etc, and take them for just what they are, as described, and not as literally stories of events that actually occurred. However, if one makes more of it than that, and wants to take it to a new level like some men of faith might do such as; picking up deadly snakes, drinking poisons, feeling like they can walk on water, etc; then, calling it bullshit is not harsh, it’s a reality check.