The "science" of Miracles

A couple of hypothetical questions:

Are all scientists agnostic by definition?

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Can there ever be a science regarding miracles?

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When you went to church, you never found evidence. Will you remain agnostic your entire life or will you declare atheism and stop looking?

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Chance as a real force is a myth. It has no basis in reality and no place in scientific inquiry. For science and philosophy to continue to advance in knowledge, chance must be demythologized once and for all. —RC Sproul
"A lie can travel half way around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes." —Mark Twain "
~"If that's not sufficient for you go soak your head."~Faith
Paul was probably SO soaked in prayer nobody else has ever equaled him.~Faith

When doing science, I think they are. Can all drivers see? It's kind of a prerequisite. How? Agnosticism is not a step on the road to atheism. It's a constant state, like the curiosity of scientists. You can "declare atheism" but you're still really agnostic. A scientist can be temporarily stumped but he/she is still looking for answers. There is no reason for scientists to consider the concept of "inexplicable" at all.

I don't know. Sort of, I guess. Miracles are little more than arguments from ignorance, so science could start with "I don't know" and then try to figure it out. Miracles are also often based on poor observations, so science could easily ferret those out. Atheism and agnosticism are two different things. There are agnostic theists, gnostic atheists, and gnostic Christians. Agnosticism is a statement about what we know. Atheism is a statement about what we believe."Agnostic isn’t just a weaker version of being an atheist. It answers a different question. Atheism is about what you believe. Agnosticism is about what you know."--American AtheistsEdited by Taq, : No reason given.

Agnostics don't exist. You either believe in god(s) or you don't. If you don't know whether you believe in god(s) or not, you don't believe in god(s).Neither atheists nor agnostics nor deists nor theists have knowledge of god(s). If anyone had knowledge of god(s) we'd all have knowledge of god(s). If such knowledge existed it would be published in Nature and peer reviewed to death.All we have is knowledge of what we believe.Agnosticism is an invented cop-out to avoid a social and intellectual problems./off rant.Edited by Tangle, : No reason given.Edited by Tangle, : No reason given.

Responding to a couple of your recent messages...Regarding your Message 492 to me: Of course they keep looking. But for as long as nothing pans out the violations of known natural or scientific laws would remain, for the time being, inexplicable. You're back to your broken record again, reintroducing old arguments as if they hadn't already been addressed. My dear boy, nobody implied that calling it a miracle would bring research to a halt. Giving dark energy a name didn't end research, why would giving inexplicable violations of natural or scientific laws a name end research? Yes, of course. I kinda think you know they'd give it a name and that it wouldn't be "something we're working on." You think the comic implies they put a lot of effort into the miracle step? Hmmm, interesting. In any case, the answer to your original question about the difference between "no explanations are forthcoming" and "insert miracle here" remains the same, that "no explanations are forthcoming" means that no ideas have panned out so far, while "insert miracle here" means just declaring something a miracle.I get the feeling that you view them as synonymous terms. If so then I of course disagree, but it doesn't seem worth arguing about. The sun rising tomorrow hasn't happened yet and therefore according to your statement is unprecedented. Perhaps you meant "every phenomenon" rather than "everything," but that doesn't work either. The history of science is of discovering new phenomena that in some way add to what we know of existing phenomena. That's why we made sure that the suggested scenarios represent phenomena that violate existing phenomena, something unprecedented in the history of science. Agreed. I think we may be using the word "explanation" differently. When you say "explanation" I think you mean an idea or proposal or unproven hypothesis. When I say "explanation" I have in mind something more complete around which, at a minimum, a consensus has begun to form. Relativity is an explanation. Ideas about, for example, why there's more matter than antimatter, don't seem like explanations to me, since they haven't uncovered enough evidence to build a consensus.I don't think this is a case where one of us is right and the other wrong. It just points out the need to agree on a definition. I don't think I've ever said or implied that scientific research ever ends. Science never stops questioning. Naturally investigation is directed into areas that appear to have the most promise for new knowledge, with the result that areas that appear well established tend to receive very little attention, but that seems okay to me. You mean backward. Yes, that was me, but your current arguments must stand on their own merits and not on accusations that I'm not perfect, because I'm sure that's a quality you also do not share. It's been said many times now that the particular term chosen by science for inexplicable phenomena that violate known natural or scientific laws isn't important, yet you're still hung up on the term "miracles". This is a science discussion, not a religious one, and it's already been established that attribution or cause isn't a necessary quality of scientific phenomena. You continue to return to your original arguments as if substantial discussion about them hasn't already taken place, a strong indication that your position is bereft of merit. Mr. Janitor, you're cleaning up the wrong aisle! You chopped off the front part of my sentence that indicated agreement with your "Yup, sometimes". But you also chopped off the part that reminded you we're talking about miracles. So asking the question again, is that what you think about miracles, that absence of evidence *is* evidence of absence? If so, why? I think that if you try to find where I suggested this that you'll come up dry. You still seem to be claiming knowledge you don't have, but let's just say you know your pigs and are correct. The actual point was that you didn't choose an inappropriate analogy, and if pigs actually do wallow in all types of mud, including any new type of mud, that just makes the analogy even worse. Agreed. Hmmm. That sounds unexpected. Is that what you observe your pigs doing in snow up there in the frozen wasteland? But that's beside the point. What's important is the inappropriate nature of the analogy you chose. Hardly relevant. Your analogy is not only inappropriate, but upon further consideration isn't helpful, either. The main point is that science follows where the evidence leads. The unprecedented nature of violations of known natural or scientific laws would lead scientists in new directions.Regarding your Message 495 to Phat: We agree on this. The relevant consensus is the one among the scientists in the new field of study focused on the new phenomena. That most scientists are in other fields doesn't matter. Of course a consensus could form among scientists in this new field.--Percy

Im taking this response here.

It's hard to nail your jello to the wall. If research wouldn't come to a halt, why would scientists take time out to call something a miracle? It seems redundant. Well, where did all of those figures come from? Thin air? The sun rising every day in the past is well-documented. That's why we can comfortably predict that it will rise tomorrow.On the other hand, scientists haven't labelled things as miracles, even when they were temporarily inexplicable. (If you have examples of scientists labelling things as miracles in the past, feel free to cite them.) That's why we can comfortably predict that they won't do it tomorrow. The thread is about miracles and you keep calling them miracles. No it hasn't. It has been established that events that are called miracles are only called miracles in a religious context, not in a scientific context. The attribution to unnatural causes is the only thing that distinguishes a "miracle' from any other event. That isn't going to change just because you don't like it. How so? The analogy is that scientists wallow in all types of questions, including the inexplicable ones. We have no reason to think they would handle a "new" question differently.

There *are* profound philosophical and perhaps unanswerable questions surrounding the boundaries of science. I found a good discussion from a somewhat religious perspective at Miracles and Science: The Long Shadow of David Hume. I'm a little hesitant to introduce any of it into this discussion as you completely ignored my attempt in Message 468 to introduce some of the arguments from Science and Miracles into this discussion, but I'll say just a little anyway.David Hume wrote:

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A miracle is a violation of the laws of nature, and as a firm and unalterable experience has established these laws, the proof against a miracle, from the very nature of the fact, is as entire as any argument from experience can possibly be imagined.

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Hume is arguing that past experience is proof that miracles can't exist. My own reaction is that this violates tentativity, but the essay itself addresses the question from several points of view, including the one that miracles are non-repeatable and a-scientific, a view you might share. I won't invest further time describing the essay as I fear the effort might, as before, draw no response and be wasted, but if your response indicates an interest then maybe there's something we can discuss. Maybe they'd call it a miracle, maybe something else, but surely they'd call it something much shorter than "inexplicable phenomena that violate known natural or scientific laws." It's a comic, not real life. Are you imagining that the comic's author did anything more than make stuff up or copy stuff out of a math book? And concerning the miracle step, which is what I actually asked about, do you really think the comic implies a lot of effort was placed into "Then a miracle occurs"? If so then I still have the same reaction: Hmmm, interesting. Yes, of course, and so I was correct that you actually meant "every phenomena", not "everything". But you're leaving out the violation of known natural or scientific laws, something scientists haven't encountered before. Is the word "unprecedented" really so difficult for you to understand? Yes, of course. As already pointed out many times now, were science to identify evidence of actual miracles they might choose some other term, but such phenomena would still be inexplicable violations of known natural or scientific laws. Um, yes it has. Do you need to be reminded of the two-slit experiment and quantum entanglement and radioactive decay and so forth? Up until now that is true. But what if tomorrow that changed? It has nothing to do with whether I like it and everything to do with you declaring things true that are not so. Because your pigs react to the new type of mud as if nothing about it was different from the old type of mud. An accurate analogy to what's being proposed in this thread would be if pigs were presented something different to wallow in. But it's a new (no quotes) and unprecedented question. Incorporating into science the hypothesis that there can be violations of known natural or scientific laws would require some new thinking.--Percy

Have you recently changed your mind on this?

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when John says that Jesus turned the water into wine we know that isn't true

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Message 718

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How do you know it isn't true?

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Because it's a miracle.

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Message 735

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Regarding John and the miracles specifically, I think I've already explained this. The suspension of natural laws renders it false immediately.

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Message 753

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You think tentativity argues that the probability of anything lies in the range 0 < p <=1. I think some things are impossible

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Message 908Scientists tend to go for 'anomalous'. The precession of the perihelion of Mercury, for example was an anomaly in the 19th Century. It didn't seem to conform to Newtonian laws (ie., the known natural laws of the time).

Hume is just doing what ringo is doing - defining away the argument. Like ringo, he's refusing the what if. It's only when you allow the what if that you can make any form of progress. If you disallow the concept there's nothing more to say.

The Creator of the natural laws could certainly suspend them if He wanted to.

Well that's certainly what believers in that sort of magic believe.The problem is that if this god thing ever did suspend natural laws we'd have evidence if it. But of course he never does so he's not playing or he doesn't exist.The other problem is that believers like you tell us that he suspends natural laws all the time. But strangely there's never any real world evidence of it. I'd say that's conclusive.

Aaa, this has been answered a million times already. There simply is no physical evidence left behind from a one-time miraculous event. Even if there are physical remains there is no way to prove they got there by anything but nonmiraculous means. You may have wine left in the pot that was changed to wine from water but just that fact proves nothing about how it got there. You'd have to have been there when the miracle occurred. Or of course believe those who were and try to tell you about it in the teeth of your refusal to believe, which you won't no matter what they say, as this thread amply demonstrates. The Bible gives plenty of witnesses to miracles but you rationalize them all away. You want "scientific" evidence of something that simply by its nature can't exist. The argument is ridiculously futile. I believe the Bible witnesses, you don't and really, that's all there is to it.So, no, we would NOT have evidence of a miracle if it occurred.I haven't argued that God "suspends natural laws all the time," and I don't know who does. He's pretty sparing with His miracles it seems to me. He rather likes His natural laws and the science based on them. The biblical reasons for the miracles are always to validate the claim that the God of the Bible is the Creator God who made it all and runs it all, and that Jesus is also God. It's to demonstrate divine powers to distinguish the true God from lesser gods. Even miracles claimed today are generally done in parts of the world where the people have never heard the gospel, where they need proof of the divine power of the God they are being told about, since they know of the lesser powers of their local gods who can't do what the Creator God can do. Those who live in a Christianity-saturated culture have all the proof we need in the millions of witnesses and the whole history of Christianity. If you spend all your energy debunking it, that's your loss.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

That's correct, I'm not going to believe anything a believer says without evidence. Your primitive believes have been shown to be wrong time and time again. I would rationalise them away if their was anything rational about them. The bible is only evidence that someone - we don't even know who or even when - wrote down some stories. Nothing else. Anything that happens in the natural world leaves evidence. You've spent fruitless years trying to tell us that with your flood nonsense. Yup, but here you are again being futile. Of course it would, anything that interferes with the natural world must, by definition, leave evidence - for example a faith healer would leave someone who was ill not ill. But they never ever do anything conclusive. Why not? Answer: because they can't.

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Aaa, this has been answered a million times already. There simply is no physical evidence left behind from a one-time miraculous event.

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That would depend on the miracle. There is no reason why we could not have good evidence of a miraculous healing, for instance. All we would need are good medical records before and after confirming that something miraculous had happened.As. I’ve said before prophecy should be a particularly easy case to prove. Instead we have believers declaring verses to be prophecies long after the supposed fulfilment and trying to cover up failures.

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Or of course believe those who were and try to tell you about it in the teeth of your refusal to believe, which you won't no matter what they say, as this thread amply demonstrates

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Miracle stories are common - especially in ancient documents. Demonstrated miracles are not. Only the gullible would trust in stories.

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The argument is ridiculously futile. I believe the Bible witnesses, you don't and really, that's all there is to it.

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But let us note that you are the one clinging to rationalisations. There is no good reason why there cannot be evidence of miracles. While it is harder for examples in the ancient past it is certainly possible. Even if we exclude predictive prophecy it is notable that we can’t track down the Plagues of Egypt, for instance in either history or archaeology.