The world of religious is overflowing with examples of “miraculous” (meaning we can’t explain how it happened) religious phenomena: visions, prophetic dreams, sudden healings, efficacious prayers, psychic surgery, efficacious rites or items/talismans. Every day, practitioners of Santeria and Palo throw coconut shells to communicate either with powerful spiritual beings or with one’s ancestors. Many people shuffle and lay out Tarot cards to explain a client’s questions. People make pilgrimages to special places, pray to special items/beings, etc.
With all this going on, is it reasonable to expect that religious phenomena can be or should be able to be scientifically explained?
Can religious phenomena be scientifically explained? No, they can’t, almost by definition. Science requires the actions of the phsyical universe to follow predictable and understandable laws constrained by this universe and to be open to falsification. Religious phenomena, especially those attributable to an omnipotent or near omnipotent supernatural deity fail to meat one or all of those criteria. It’s outside the scope of science.
Can phenomena mis-attributed to religion be scientifically explained? Hell yes. A good stage magician may tell me that the ocoin vanished because of the actions of a God but I don’t have top believe him. I’m free to conduct a scientific investigation and thatinvestigation will discover a cause that follosw predictable and understandable laws constrained by this universe and that is open to falsification.
That’s a very big distinction and you haven’t made it very clear which you wish to discuss. Of course given the overwhelming lack of evidence for the former category it may be a short discussion.
I think it’s all too easy to dismiss the use of the word “miracle” as a God-of-the-gaps situation. Indeed, I’ve frequently seen SDMBers insist that ANY “miracle” that could occur must necessarily have some hitherto unknown scientific explanation. However, I think such an analysis is shallow and dismissive, to say the least.
To use a familiar example, consider the infamous parting of the Red Sea. Let’s suppose that such an event did occur, as described in Genesis. Once could say, “Well, there must be some scientific explanation. We just don’t know what it is yet.” Even if that were true though, it would be extremely odd for such a rare event to occur just as Moses commanded it, and precisely when Moses needed it. (Again, do remember that we are postulating that the Exodus account is fundamentally accurate, for purposes of discussion.)
Therein lies the problem. Even if one could concoct some scientific explanation for this event, it would be hopelessly premature to dismiss the miraculous nature of such an event. Such an approach may sound scholarly and learned, but it would betray a severely shallow analysis.
Scientifically you have to be open to all possibilities, but in the end we’re faced with the same problem you’re always faced with in these situations, which is the burden of proof. Even if I can’t prove something miraculous didn’t happen, that’s far from proving it did. Occam’s Law isn’t proof, but when you have two possible explanations and one involves miracles…
Perhaps, but that’s beside the point. The point I’m addressing is whether we should dismiss the label of “miracles” as a mere appeal to the God of the gaps. I submit that this criticism fails to consider the individual circumstances of the miracles, and implicitly assumes that a mere “scientific” explanation is sufficient to dismiss the event’s miraculous nature.
Is there no room for miracles which both defy scientific explanation, and do not necessarily arise from the action of a deity? Maybe the cold uncaring void suffers from a few quirks in the workings of probability.
First prove that anything has occurred which does not conform to the ordinary laws of physics and then we can worry about how it happens.
WeRSauron, you have asked a bit of a scattershot question and each of the practices you describe has its own explanation. We can address each one individually if you would like (we can discuss various methods of fortune telling for instance) but I promise you, there is no practice or phenomenon you could bring up as an example of the “supernatural” that would not be quickly and efficiently eviscerated by the denizens of this message board. Trust me, we have an answer for EVERYTHING.
But before we start with any of that, it may be helpful to you to know that there has never been a single scientifically validated instance of any authentic “supernatural” or “paranormal” event or phenomenon in all of human history. We can’t prove that natural laws have ever once been violated in the history of the universe.
And it’s not for lack of trying. Scientists have devoted far more attention than is probably deserved to investigating such things as “psychics,” “ghosts.” and the like. They always come up with zeros.
You may have heard of James Randi, a long time illusionist who is also probably the world’s best known skeptic. Randi has a longstanding offer to give a million dollars to anyone who can demonstrate a genuine paranormal ability under labratory conditions. So far no one has even come close and the more well known “psychics” run from Randi like a vampire runs from garlic.
Just to back up The Cynic, the bible was written at a minimum of 80 years after Jesus Christ was crucified. Everyone thought that he would be back in their lifetime so they never devoted it to writing. I mean, after all, they didn’t think anyone would actually need to have a written copy of what happened because their dads told them ‘something that happened to a friend of a friend of a friend of mine’, an argument totally unable to stand up with any proof. The ‘purple monkey dishwasher’ syndrome, Mr. Paul Bunyan, the tall lumberjack.
Well, that is what I think… though I don’t rule out the idea of an architect, it is possible there is reason behind everything (just try and explain why there is ‘something’ instead of ‘nothing’… rather… I believe it may be true.)
I don’t know why anyone would think that the laws of nature have to be broken for some religious issues to be resolved or explained. Perhaps those who worshipped the sun in ancient times thought it was a “miracle” that the sun returned from its journey.
Maybe science will discover the beginnings (or remnants?) of a sense that allows some individuals to intuit information about others, for example. (I’m making no claim about the existence of such a sense; this is just for the sake of an example.) For some people, their intuitive natures are very spiritually and religiously significant.
Knowing that there is a scientific explanation doesn’t have to detract from the “miraculous” feelings of the believer. We still talk about the miracle of birth and we are beginning to hone in on what causes babies.
There are many phenomena which the current scientific paradigm cannot yet explain every single aspect of: black holes, magnetic north, quantum chromodynamics and human consciousness are all examples of things which are mostly explainable but still a long way from a complete explanation.
However, I’d suggest that some of the OP’s examples are of a slightly different nature: They are phenomena which the current, rigorously tested scientific paradigm says cannot happen. They would not merely show up a gap in the paradigm, they would comprise serious, even fatal, violations of the paradigm.
Is there any such phenomenon? People like Susan Blackmore have spent decades seeking any such phenomena in careful, serious (despite her hair) studies, to absolutely no avail.
Science does not state that people cannot dream, or have visions. But whenever someone says that their dream or vision foretold something extremely specific which actually came to pass, the evidence is always sadly lacking: if they wrote the dream or vision down immediately, it is always extremely vague and inconclusive when compared to the supposed real, specific event. Deja vu, on the other hand, is a common neuropsychological phenomenon in which the brain erroneously judges input as incredibly significant or familiar, leading us to conclude “Wow! I must have dreamed this exact thing!”
Good point, but I’m curious…why did you say originally that it was described in Genesis? (Exodus is the correct answer, for anyone like me who’s nitpicking.)
Nonsense. Science and history are full of recorded events that are by no means wierd. Have you ever read about ocean tides or the migration of birds? There’s nothing wierd about these events, and yet they have been amply recorded.
Moreover, your statement (if it were accurate) would actually support my claim. Any spontaneous parting of the Red Sea–or any large body of water–would most certainly be an unusual event. As a result, if such a thing were known to happen, it would most likely have been recorded somewhere. Hence, the lack of any accounts that describe such a spontaneous parting of the sea would actually lend credibility to the notion that the Exodus account was indeed miraculous.
And as I said, even if there were an adequate scientific explanation, the peculiar timing of this event would be sufficient to earn the label of “miraculous.” Such spontaneous partings would be exceedingly rare, by any account. For this event to occur exactly when Moses needed and commanded it – well, only the most hardheaded skeptic would dismiss that as a purely natural occurence.
(Again, I’d like to remind everyone that for the purpose of this particular example, I’m presuming that this particular miracle was indeed genuine. The intention here is to show that the mere existence of a scientific explanation is not enough to discount the miraculous nature of an event.)
When I was a kid, attending Catholic School, I was intrigued by all the “scientific” explanations given fior apparent miracles – even by some of the nuns, who arguably would be predisposed towards a miraculous explanation. “It was the Sea of Reeds, not the Red Sea,” explained one exasperated nun, “They croosed at low tide. The Pharaoh’s chariots got stuck in the mud.” Later I was to hear other people rationalize this miracle on the basuis of high winds, the explosion of Santorini/Thera, and earthquakes. Other miracles were also addressed in this fashion. The Catholic comic book Treasire Chest portrayed parts of the book of Joshua, with the miraculous crossing of the Jordan and the fall of the walls of Jericho as full-fledged miracles, then, later in the same issue discussed natural explanations. Again, this was a Catholic publication, not a wild-eyed bunch of skeptics.
I came to the conclusion early on that it was best, in any case, to look for natural explanations. Far from explanations of this sort being “God in the cracks”, I suspect too many people are too credulous, and will too readily jump at miracles as an explanation. Skepticism is not incompatible with faith, and reasonable people, I think, will want to seek truth (and avoid looking foolish) by examining a situation to see if such a naturalistic explanation might not be apparent.
Skeptical tendencies aren’t confined to Christianity. The Roman travel writer Pausanias always looked for naturalistic explanation of the Graeco-Roman myths, although he lived in a world where they were the accepted norm. He was certainly not alone – there are plenty of writings displaying many degrees of skepticism from the same period.
As for your stubborn scientists of today vs. the religious, consider, instead of your example, the now-hot issue of evolution. Arguments arrayed against evolution generally consist in pointing out apparent errors, contradictions, or gaps in our knowledge (e.g. : “How could wings evolve if a partially-evolved wing is useless for flying?”). In the last case the suggestion is that evolution cannot account for it, and this constitutes evidence for creation. To the scientist, however, it respresents something altogether different – a lack of knowledge, currently, but one that can be filled in. (For the case of wings, I’ve seen several interesting hypotheses in the past few years attempting to answer just that question.)
I want to be clear on this – to the scientist, this saying that the answer is not known is not evasion. It’s not a minor part of his/her job. The seeking out and attempts to answer just such unknown questions and apparent contradictions is what the scientist sees as precisely his or her job. It is their bread and butter, the stuff of daily life. This is the fundamental difference between the two sides in the debates between science and faith, not just in evolution, but in all things, including the parting of the sea in Exodus – the believer in miracles piles up as much evidence as possible to show that the event goes against human understanding, and thus conmstitutes evidence of the supernatural, but the scientist’s response is not acknowledgment of this breaking through of the metaphysical – it is, instead, to say “Great! Here’s something new that can be investigated!”
The two sides aren’t being bull-headed and pointlessly avoiding the obvisious truth of the other side’s point of view. They simply have completely different philosophies about the implications of such apparent paradoxes. And never the twain shall meet.
So saying “just because a possible scientific explanation may exist doesn’t prove that it wasn’t a miracle” won’t wash. The philosophy of one side is predisposed to believe it is a miracle, and will interpret it that way. The philosophy of the other side is prediasposed to look for naturalistic explanations, and will never be satisfied by describing it as literally “miraculous”.
That is true - there can reach a point in any rational attempt to dismiss apparently miraculous phenomena when it’s easier to accept a miracle than the long chain of if-then-maybe coincidences needed to explain something away. And who’s to say dieties don’t perform miracles thru manipulation of natural phenomena anyway?
This makes absolutely no sense. A lack of corroboration just shows that the event was not historical in the first place.
It’s called dramatic fiction. The “timing” was a contrivance of the author. In point of fact, there was no Exodus, no Moses and no parting of anything. It’s a made up story. Made up stories do not require explanations. Discussing natural vs. “miraculous” explanations for the parting of the Red Sea is like trying to figure out the exact formula of Icarus’ wings. It’s the wrong way to read mythology.
Yes it is, actually. There is no need to resort to supernatural explanations for naturally explainable events…especially if you can’t prove an event ever occurred in the first place.
Again, CalMeacham, I think you’re missing the point. Sometimes the timing of an event is what makes it miraculous, regardless of the presence or absence of any scientific explanation. Consider the life of George Mueller, for example. He routinely related stories wherein he would pray for food or money to support his orphanages, and wherein God provided in dramatic ways (e.g. a milk truck breaking down nearby, such that the driver was forced to donate the milk lest it spoil). Indeed, according to Mueller’s accounts, such events happened to him with great regularity.
It is true that some will be predisposed to interpret this as a miracle, and some will insist that there’s a purely naturalistic explanation. That’s beside the point, though. The point is that it’s foolish to insist that a purely scientific explanation is sufficient to dismiss the miraculous nature of such an event.
