Atheists. What consitutes a miracle

[Azy]

For me the day Britney Spears stops appearing in the papers.

Seriously though it's a tricky one, in the past believed in miracles because of some then unknown mechanism that we have explained since. So weird things might happen but be decidedly normal to us in the future.

 

[ranma1/2]

Medically speaking, there have been many cases of people who appear to be dead, who are not dead. There is a word for this but I forget!

As a result, in ancient times, people thought various dead people have miraculously been brought back to life. They were not. Instead, they only appeared to be dead.
....

i think the term is mostly dead.

http://www.youtube.com/v/6GrYNaaYSjs&hl=en

 

[Pygoscelis]

I love that movie.

 

[barney]

In the words of Albert Einstein, "the miraculous thing about the universe is that there are no miracles".

What you want is a suspension of the natural order and process so that something inexplicable can occur.

Thats why I would need the positive link with my request. If a Teddy just materilayzed from nowhere in front of my eyes, I would be all totally like, "OMGOMG!" and start thinking things like, Insanity, Optical illusion, too much beer, or even Alien technology conducting random soft-toy generation.

If I had asked God for the Teddy and It appeared, even 40 foot away or if the miracle was accompanied by it claiming to be from God. That lends weight to it being so.

 

[wth1257]

Can there be such a thing as a Miracle.
What would constitute one.
How far would you go to explain one before you said "I'm jumping through hoops here, that is supernatural"

I'll start.
Asking God to show me a stuffed teddy as a sign , and twenty minuites later a Stuffed Teddy was thrown out of a pram, fifty yards from me.
I'd take that as 80% proof of a divine act.

Not exactly an atheist but my response would run something like this.

Metaphysically the concept of a miricle, for me, is easy to define, generally it would be seen as a supernatural force somehow interacting with the causally closed world/universe.

The problem is not so much metaphysical, unless you are Hume perhapse:X, as Epistemic. Without a total and complete knoledge of the universe, in total, it is impossable to gadge which seeming intervention of the laws of nature represent a genuin mirical as opposed to an, however unlikely, event in nature.

I beleive Muhammed is said to have been frightened by an eclipse of the moon, to him and many at the time, this would certianly meet their criteria of a miricle, and inexplicable exception to the laws of nature who's only, apparent, explination, is supernatural intervention, now any schoolchild could explain this seemingly inexplicable event. Today were I to, God forbid, be diagnosed with terminal brain cancer, and tomorrow it disappeared many would lable that a miricle, but with our incomplete knoledge of cancer, hum physiology and genetics, and the laws of nature in general we have no was of knowing if it was a mirical, of simply a rare physiological trai I possess.

 

[wth1257]

Thats why I would need the positive link with my request. If a Teddy just materilayzed from nowhere in front of my eyes, I would be all totally like, "OMGOMG!" and start thinking things like, Insanity, Optical illusion, too much beer, or even Alien technology conducting random soft-toy generation.

If I had asked God for the Teddy and It appeared, even 40 foot away or if the miracle was accompanied by it claiming to be from God. That lends weight to it being so.

And yet modern quantum theory suggusts that causality is utterly different from what we previously conceived and that perhapse human conscisiousness can even affect the world, perviosuly anathama in science we see that the universe is infinitly more complex then previously dreamed. Your example would, undoubtedly(almost) be, in Newtonian Mechanics, a miricle, yet not so much now, untill we have a complete accounting of the physical laws of the universe we simply will not know.

 

[IbnAbdulHakim]

I beleive Muhammed is said to have been frightened by an eclipse of the moon.

He also use to feel fear when he use to see grey clouds which usually resemble rain because he recalled a moment (which can be found in the Quran) of similar clouds which bore violent winds of destruction for the nations of Aad and Thamud (two nations of former prophets).




Miracles arent necessary to believe in God. And i honestly believe this with all my heart. It is enough to reflect and ponder, there were believers before the message of Muhammad, there were believers before the message of Isa (jesus) and there were believers before the message of Musa (moses) (peace be upon them all, alaihissalaatu wassalaam). Even without miracles it is possible to conceive an all-mighty being which started it all and watches over it all...



But as for what constitutes a miracle... i would say it is the response to a call which is impossible to answer.

for example healing the sick and blind. Splitting the sea... we can also say... a miracle is something only possible by God.


By this definition (a miracle is only possible by God) we can even say everyday birth are miracles... because life has to start from somewhere....

 

[jd7]

If 2 million years time from now, life is never discovered anywhere but on Earth, would you consider life on Earth a miracle?

JD7

 

[jd7]

An additional thought:

Is there a supernatural or are things attributed to the supernatural natural occurrences that we don’t yet fully understand? The reported sightings of ghosts/spirits would be an example.

JD7

 

[Azy]

Do you think 2 million years would be enough to sufficiently develop the technology for scanning/travelling to the billions of stars in each of the roughly hundreds of billions of galaxies in the universe?

I don't think anyone has a verifiable claim to a ghost sighting unless we're to believe that spirits only visit ghost enthusiasts while they stay in remote, deserted stately homes.

 

[Woodrow]

Perhaps, my reasoning is faulty? I can not perceive anything that is not a miracle.

I am seeing the question as being more of asking "What event would constitute proof of Divine Intervention by a Supreme Diety?"

None would and none is needed.


A person needs only to search for reasons to accept the existance of Allaah(swt), after that all else falls into place.

 

[jd7]

Azy, considering the progress made over the last 1000 years, it seems that 2 million years from now ought to be a long enough time.

Reports of ghost sightings have been many and varied. I am rather surprised that you would dismiss all 100% of them so quickly.

What exactly are you basing that dismissal on?

I am assuming your dismissal is something scientific and that you will explain and defend it (considering the nature of the thread).

JD7

 

[ranma1/2]

If 2 million years time from now, life is never discovered anywhere but on Earth, would you consider life on Earth a miracle?

JD7

no not particularly (wed be lucky to exists that long with out blowing ourselves up or hte plantet.), now if life is discovered elswewhere what would you do?

 

[ranma1/2]

Azy, considering the progress made over the last 1000 years, it seems that 2 million years from now ought to be a long enough time.

Reports of ghost sightings have been many and varied. I am rather surprised that you would dismiss all 100% of them so quickly.

What exactly are you basing that dismissal on?

I am assuming your dismissal is something scientific and that you will explain and defend it (considering the nature of the thread).

JD7

Many and varied is key there. Not to mention not one verified.

 

[Pygoscelis]

If 2 million years time from now, life is never discovered anywhere but on Earth, would you consider life on Earth a miracle?

No. Why would you think it was?

 

[tetsujin]

Perhaps, my reasoning is faulty? I can not perceive anything that is not a miracle.

An example would be lovely.

Please bear in mind my first post on page 2.

I am seeing the question as being more of asking "What event would constitute proof of Divine Intervention by a Supreme Diety?"

None would and none is needed.

Proof? Even if one could grant the existence of miracles, it would be evidence in an argument for the existence of a deity, and then you certainly have all your work cut out for you in determining which deity it is. Whether it be loving, caring, willful, dictatorial or otherwise. You still wouldn't know. But again, that's not even the question.

A person needs only to search for reasons to accept the existance of Allaah(swt), after that all else falls into place.

That is indeed faulty reasoning.

Francis Collins described the appearance of a frozen waterfall as affirmation for his belief in the trinity.

Were I still a Muslim I would laugh at him for association he made to what I have always concluded was a false god. My Jewish friends, and Buddhist friend would likewise be skeptical, or at the very least find affirmation for their own beliefs if they came across the same phenomenon.

Humans are already predisposed to finding patterns and seeking associations were they may not necessarily exist. Preachers do it, imams do it, Zionists do it, free masons and gamblers do it (and only the later seem to be getting psychiatric assistance on occasion), it's an innate compulsion we learn to discard through the application of critical thinking that can only come from discarding all of our "intentions" and predispositions when we examine ourselves and the world.

Stop looking for affirmations of the answers you want to hear and ask yourself, what does the data really say?


All the best wishes,

Faysal

 

[Islam-Sikhism]

I don't believe in miracles either.

I am however quite ready to admit I don't know something or can't explain something. Just because we can not explain something does not mean it was an act of God, much less an act of any specific God we name. It could be aliens, it could be a practical joke, it could be some big consipiracy, or it could simply be a coincidence. As Occam's Razor (sp?) says, the simplest explanation is usually the correct one. God is the most complex explanation of all, so its higly unlikely, and whatever amazing inexplicable thing we observe can probably be explained by something else.

Asalaamu 'alaikum

We would contest the above Dawkinian-esk premise of God being the most complex explanation. Our intention here is not to get into a debate; but only to voice an alternative point to this oft-quoted atheistic argument.

DEFINITION OF COMPLEXITY

Complexity is that property of a model which makes it difficult to formulate its overall behaviour in a given language, even when given reasonably complete information about its atomic components and their inter-relations. [1]​

Alvin Platinga disagrees with Dawkins’ proposition that God as the designer “would have to be enormously complex, and the more complex something is, the less probable it is: ‘However statistically improbable the entity you seek to explain by invoking a designer, the designer himself has got to be at least as improbable. God is the Ultimate Boeing 747.’”:

The basic idea is that anything that knows and can do what God knows and can do would have to be incredibly complex. In particular, anything that can create or design something must be at least as complex as the thing it can design or create. Putting it another way, Dawkins says a designer must contain at least as much information as what it creates or designs, and information is inversely related to probability. Therefore, he thinks, God would have to be monumentally complex, hence astronomically improbable; thus it is almost certain that God does not exist.

First, is God complex? According to much classical theology (Thomas Aquinas, for example) God is simple, and simple in a very strong sense, so that in him there is no distinction of thing and property, actuality and potentiality, essence and existence, and the like… according to classical theology, God is simple, not complex. More remarkable, perhaps, is that according to Dawkins' own definition of complexity, God is not complex. According to his definition (set out in The Blind Watchmaker), something is complex if it has parts that are "arranged in a way that is unlikely to have arisen by chance alone." But of course God is a spirit, not a material object at all, and hence has no parts. A fortiori (as philosophers like to say) God doesn't have parts arranged in ways unlikely to have arisen by chance. Therefore, given the definition of complexity Dawkins himself proposes, God is not complex.

According to classical theism, God is a necessary being; it is not so much as possible that there should be no such person as God; he exists in all possible worlds. But if God is a necessary being, if he exists in all possible worlds, then the probability that he exists, of course, is 1, and the probability that he does not exist is 0. Far from its being improbable that he exists, his existence is maximally probable. So if Dawkins proposes that God's existence is improbable, he owes us an argument for the conclusion that there is no necessary being with the attributes of God—an argument that doesn't just start from the premise that materialism is true. Neither he nor anyone else has provided even a decent argument along these lines; Dawkins doesn't even seem to be aware that he needs an argument of that sort. [2]​

Richard Swinburne argues ‘The Simplicity of Theism’ in chapter 5 of his book The Existence of God:

Theism postulates God as a person with intentions, beliefs, and basic powers, but ones of a very simple kind, so simple that it postulated the simplest kind of person that there could be.
To start with, theism postulates a God who is just one person, not many. To postulate one substance is to make a very simple postulation. He is infinitely powerful, omnipotent. This is a simpler hypothesis than the hypothesis that there is a God who has such-and-such limited power (for example, the power to rearrange matter, but not the power to create it)… A finite limitation cries out for an explanation of why there is just that particular limit, in a way that limitlessness does not. As I noted in Chapter 3, scientists have always preferred hypotheses of infinite velocity to hypotheses of very large finite velocity, when both were equally compatible with the data. And they have always preferred hypotheses that some particle had zero mass to hypotheses that it had some very small mass, when both were equally compatible with the data. There is neatness about zero and infinity that particular finite numbers lack. Yet a person with zero powers would not be a person at all. So in postulating a person with infinite power the theist is postulating a person with the simplest kind of power possible.

A substance who is essentially omnipotent, omniscient and perfectly free is necessarily a terminus of complete explanation. For, if some state of affairs E is explained as brought about by God in virtue of his powers and beliefs and intentions to bring about E, how can the action be further explained?
The hypothesis of theism postulates not merely the simplest starting point of a personal explanation there could be (simpler than many gods or weak gods), but the simplest starting point of explanation for the existence of the universe… A scientific explanation, will have to postulate as a starting point of explanation a substance or substances that caused or still cause the universe and its characteristics. To postulate many or extended such substances (an always existing universe; or an extended volume of matter-energy from which, uncaused by God, all began) is to postulate more entities than theism. The simplest scientific starting point would be an unextended point. This, however, would have to have some finite amount or other of power or liability to exercise it (since what it will create would not be constrained by rational considerations), and so it would not possess the simplicity of infinity. [3] (pg. 97-8; 106)​

As for the Islamic concept of God and in relation to the Trinitarian doctrine, which in our view goes beyond complexity and straight into the realms of the absurd and impossible, it is known that Allaah is understood by way of the language with no difficulties whatsoever. Hence, He is the simplest explanation. We would not have any troubles in accepting the above quoted excerpts from these two Christian philosophers in rebutting the aforementioned Dawkinian argument, although we would have a huge problem with these Christians attempting to justify their explanations with the absurdity that is Trinitarianism.

Wa salaam


http://geocities.com/islam_sikhism/

 

[Abdul Fattah]

Greetings,


You haven't heard of Occam's Razor? Its usefulness has become so apparent to scientists and logicians over the centuries that it is often taken to be a standard maxim in those and other fields of study. It can be misused, but as a helpful principle of thinking it is widely accepted.

See here.

Regarding the original question of the thread, I think Pygoscelis has said pretty much would I would say as an answer.

Peace

I do agree that ockhams razor can be very helpful and useful. However there are situations were ockhams razor is no longer applicable. Especially when dealing with whole world views (like religious vs. atheistic) it's practically impossible to weigh of one view against the other. The person who weighs will undoubtedly be biased by his personal paradigm to asses which explanation is "simplest". For me personal, the explenation: "it's a miracle" is a much simpler explanation as opposed to saying: "it's coincidence"! But I do understand why atheist or agnostics would disagree with me on that.

In general you could say a theist already believes in God and doesn't believe in luck, so explaining an unexpected event as miracles is the explanation that expands his/her paradigm the least. Whereas on the other hand an atheist would generally not believe in God but do believe in luck, so for him/her explaining it as luck is the most simple expansion of the paradigm. In the end it all comes down to personal belief again, and we can only agree to disagree. There is no logical "proof" that favors one p.o.v. over the other.

 

[Pygoscelis]

Asalaamu 'alaikum

We would contest the above Dawkinian-esk premise of God being the most complex explanation.

Fair enough... but your explanation that follows is so wrapped up in semantic gymnastics it is hard to even understand what the authors are trying to convey nevermind debate it. But lets try...

The basic idea is that anything that knows and can do what God knows and can do would have to be incredibly complex. In particular, anything that can create or design something must be at least as complex as the thing it can design or create.

This is already mistating things. This is one argument one could make, but it isn't the only one that leads to the conclusion that God is the most complex (and unlikely and fantastic) explanation for things.

First, is God complex? According to much classical theology (Thomas Aquinas, for example) God is simple, and simple in a very strong sense, so that in him there is no distinction of thing and property, actuality and potentiality, essence and existence, and the like… according to classical theology, God is simple, not complex.

And this doesn't even address the "dawkanian" (whatever that is) position put forward above. It just says "classic theology says the position is wrong, so its wrong".

According to his definition (set out in The Blind Watchmaker), something is complex if it has parts that are "arranged in a way that is unlikely to have arisen by chance alone." But of course God is a spirit, not a material object at all, and hence has no parts. A fortiori (as philosophers like to say) God doesn't have parts arranged in ways unlikely to have arisen by chance. Therefore, given the definition of complexity Dawkins himself proposes, God is not complex.

This is a good example of semantic gymnastics. Interpret away the problem. Define "parts" as physical and then declare god isn't physical therefore god can't have parts and therefore god isn't complex (according to this one particular definition and therefore according to any definition lol).

But if God is a necessary being, if he exists in all possible worlds, then the probability that he exists, of course, is 1, and the probability that he does not exist is 0. Far from its being improbable that he exists

And here again we are defining our way to victory. If we accept that God is a necesary being... then I suppose we have to agree its pretty darn likely God exists. But why would we accept that premise?

So if Dawkins proposes that God's existence is improbable, he owes us an argument for the conclusion that there is no necessary being with the attributes of God

Neither he nor anyone else has provided even a decent argument along these lines;Dawkins doesn't even seem to be aware that he needs an argument of that sort.

Because he doesn't. The assertion was made by the author that God is necessary, not by Dawkins. And it is an irrational assertion. What makes it worse is that "attributes of God" are not defined by the author.

So in postulating a person with infinite power the theist is postulating a person with the simplest kind of power possible.

This is irrational.

A scientific explanation, will have to postulate as a starting point of explanation a substance or substances that caused or still cause the universe and its characteristics. To postulate many or extended such substances (an always existing universe; or an extended volume of matter-energy from which, uncaused by God, all began) is to postulate more entities than theism.

I'm sorry, but saying "god done it with his magic powers" does NOT make it simpler than to actually explain how those magic powers work. It just makes one more ignorant.

What is most amazing about this "refutation" is that it first mistates Dawkins (and tries to equate this one argument by Dawkins as the only one there is), and then it doesn't even address the "Dawkins" position it puts forward. This is not a refutation at all.

 

[Islam-Sikhism]

Hey Pygoscelis,

We don't usually delve into forum dialogues due to the majority facile responses that are posted as so-called responses; but, in this case, we'll make an exception, just this once, by taking your response as a demonstration of what we mean.

From the outset you state:

Fair enough... but your explanation that follows is so wrapped up in semantic gymnastics it is hard to even understand what the authors are trying to convey nevermind debate it. But lets try...

Well, we can do nothing except try.

This is already mistating things. This is one argument one could make, but it isn't the only one that leads to the conclusion that God is the most complex (and unlikely and fantastic) explanation for things.

How can things be mistated when they haven't been said? The authors haven't said this is the only argument; and yet, this is the only argument that needs to be addressed. As for the existence of any other arguments; then these have no bearing on the one being responded to... so what's your point?

First, is God complex? According to much classical theology (Thomas Aquinas, for example) God is simple, and simple in a very strong sense, so that in him there is no distinction of thing and property, actuality and potentiality, essence and existence, and the like… according to classical theology, God is simple, not complex.

And this doesn't even address the "dawkanian" (whatever that is) position put forward above. It just says "classic theology says the position is wrong, so its wrong".

What the authors are pointing to is Dawkin's strawman argument, in that he presupposes God to be more complicated than what He designs based on faulty premises. The argument is of God; what the author has shown is that Dawkin's argument, as with many of his nonsensical arguments related to God, involves a theological concept that is not the classical concept of theology of that religion. Hence, it being a fallacious argument.

According to his definition (set out in The Blind Watchmaker), something is complex if it has parts that are "arranged in a way that is unlikely to have arisen by chance alone." But of course God is a spirit, not a material object at all, and hence has no parts. A fortiori (as philosophers like to say) God doesn't have parts arranged in ways unlikely to have arisen by chance. Therefore, given the definition of complexity Dawkins himself proposes, God is not complex.

This is a good example of semantic gymnastics. Interpret away the problem. Define "parts" as physical and then declare god isn't physical therefore god can't have parts and therefore god isn't complex (according to this one particular definition and therefore according to any definition lol).

Alas, coming from one who it seems doesn't seem to know very much about fallacies and argumentation.
Once more: the asserter of the argument is Dawkins who has concocted his own idea of god and then proceeded to refute it. And it is pretty obvious for the critical minded that the authors aren't speaking for all definitions of God.

But if God is a necessary being, if he exists in all possible worlds, then the probability that he exists, of course, is 1, and the probability that he does not exist is 0. Far from its being improbable that he exists

And here again we are defining our way to victory. If we accept that God is a necesary being... then I suppose we have to agree its pretty darn likely God exists. But why would we accept that premise?

This is the problem we stated above. Pay attention: not defining terms is actually a fallacy known as the freshman fallacy. People lose arguments, and thus debates, due to the failure in defining terms.
Dawkin's warped book The God Delusion has been castigated the world over as being so poor precisely because of the many strawman arguments he brings. Of course, for blind-following atheists, it's a winner.
Moreover, pay attention to the conditional statement 'if' used by the author and you might realise how poor your response is... well that's our hope anyway.

So if Dawkins proposes that God's existence is improbable, he owes us an argument for the conclusion that there is no necessary being with the attributes of God

Neither he nor anyone else has provided even a decent argument along these linesawkins doesn't even seem to be aware that he needs an argument of that sort.

Because he doesn't. The assertion was made by the author that God is necessary, not by Dawkins. And it is an irrational assertion. What makes it worse is that "attributes of God" are not defined by the author.

You haven't shown how it is irrational. Just asserting something for the sake of doesn't prove it now does it?
What the author has done is ask Dawkins to argue his point, which is perfectly valid in argumentation and debate; just as we've asked you to argue why it's irrational (not that you'll be getting a second chance any time soon).

So in postulating a person with infinite power the theist is postulating a person with the simplest kind of power possible.

This is irrational.

*Yawn*

A scientific explanation, will have to postulate as a starting point of explanation a substance or substances that caused or still cause the universe and its characteristics. To postulate many or extended such substances (an always existing universe; or an extended volume of matter-energy from which, uncaused by God, all began) is to postulate more entities than theism.

I'm sorry, but saying "god done it with his magic powers" does NOT make it simpler than to actually explain how those magic powers work. It just makes one more ignorant.

What is most amazing about this "refutation" is that it first mistates Dawkins (and tries to equate this one argument by Dawkins as the only one there is), and then it doesn't even address the "Dawkins" position it puts forward. This is not a refutation at all.

We're sorry too for getting into this debate, if one can call it that.
The explanation put forward by the author is now premised on HIS definition of God, an area in which Dawkins made the big booboo to begin with. Hence, the author is now putting forth a counter argument to Dawkin's assertion, which again is perfectly normal thing to do.
You may disagree with it, but you cannot disagree based on the skewed premises used by Dawkin's for his argument, otherwise you too will end up committing the strawman fallacy.
Of course, the argument is directed at Dawkins. Let's see if he will ever respond by firstly being humble enough to acknowledge his mistake (fat chance from someone so brash, conceted and arrogant), then readdressing his audience.

Anyway, this is our final response since, to be absolutely frank, we have bigger fish to fry and time as they say is a premium.

All the best Pygoscelis

Wa salaam to our brothers and sisters