Naturalism, An Intermission
February 21st, 2007 by 
drunkentune
Sometimes I try to tell stories in a roundabout fashion in attempts to explain what I mean. This is one of them.
I. Falling and Faith
I don’t live a life of faith… other than in a pedestrian fashion. It’s a common form of faith we practice every day that relies on experience. Today, it is commonly known as induction: I drop a tennis ball and it falls down, I drop a bowling ball, and it falls down again, I continue to drop different kinds of items every day in every environment and every circumstance, and they still fall down, but I cannot be certain beyond a doubt that the next time I drop a ball, it will fall down, and not up. That time may just be the one time that things go up.
I’d still bet a billion dollars that the tennis ball would fall, though.
Still, it rests that logically, induction is not a reliable way of gaining knowledge.
II. Communication
In my mind’s eye I see a shape. Its three sides are of equal length, and the angle between each point of intersection is equal as well. The part you must think of is that if a line bisects one angle, where it hits the opposite line, it both bisects the opposite line and forms two right angles. Really, I am describing a metaphor for thinking about this shape, but you understand.
Do you see this equilateral triangle as well? How do I know that you understand this? People say ‘Have a nice day,’ when they really don’t give a fuck. If we were speaking in a coffee shop, you might at this point nod your head to look like you understand what I’m saying, or while on this website, leave a response that looks like you understand, but that doesn’t mean that you understand.
Let’s move on.
While my mind’s eye I see this triangle, my body’s eye does not. This image is an approximation of the triangle I described:
This is not the triangle. If you took a ruler and measured the lengths of each side, they won’t add up to the same length. If you draw an angle bisector on this shape, it won’t form two 90-degree angles. Those aren’t even lines. Lines are a series of points one after the other, and points have no height, width, or breadth. But when you see the picture, it all makes sense, doesn’t it?
III. Truth
Anamnesis is the ancient Greek conviction that when one sees the truth, it all falls into place. The truth just sounds right. It’s an early form of ‘the truth is manifest’. We can see the truth for what it is, and we accept it.
When speaking with religious people, there is a general attitude that I have felt, that the truth is manifest before us. They point to texts or to nature and proclaim that all the evidence is there. I just need to accept it. The truth just sounds right, it just falls into place.
Setting aside the mentally ill, there has been a long history of the manifestation of truth, culminating in the Enlightenment. They believed that we can be confident that while we are different, we can agree on certain things because we have only to see in our mind’s eye to understand. I didn’t tell you the answers to why an angle bisector forms two right angles – I only had to show you. However, at times, we have seen the truth differently. We saw that the Earth was flat, in the center of the universe, on the magnitude of mere thousands of years old. We saw all sorts of things that we thought were true, but were not.
In response one gives a Euclidian proof. One reasons out why an angle bisector of an equilateral triangle produces two ninety-degree angles at the intersection with the opposite line of the triangle; one proves. There is a reason for this: don’t we want to be on guard? Don’t we want to be confident that what we follow is true? There are many more things plausible than there are reasonable. Mere plausibility isn’t enough. An angle bisector is more than mere plausibility.
IV. Language
When speaking with others, we use public language. Did you ever have a special blanket as a child? It might have been called ‘Red’ or ‘Blue’ or ‘Blankie’. Mine was called gubbie. When you use private language in a public place (like gubbie, for example), people don’t understand what you say. It’s like you are surrounded by idiots. They don’t understand that gubbie is just a three-foot-square grey blanket that I hold for comfort!
There was a moment in your childhood when you spilled milk. Your mother likely said, ‘Why did you do that?’ Now, isn’t that silly? Of course you didn’t spill your milk on purpose. Your mother is an idiot. They don’t understand our private language. They don’t understand our private thoughts.
There must be a way to communicate – a universal language. We must rely on reason and logic. That is the universal language.
V. The Truth is Manifest?
Philosophy is not idle. In ancient Greece, each man was allowed in principle to give their view. During a discussion on central planning, one would only need to stand up, state one’s name, and say what you believe. This left behind the long history of the traditional society where there was practice and not reason. Today, it gets disheartening with such resistance. Practice is not the way to truth. It’s not, ‘Well, live with the Union.’ We don’t give up. Reason will take us to a different, better world. The punch line is…
We were wrong.
It isn’t going to work. The wrong is manifest, not the truth. We can falsify statements, but there can always be that one example that invalidates our theory. Unlike in mathematics and logic, there is no way to prove. So comes the key point: science doesn’t kick in when offering a hypothesis, but critiquing it. Science does not prove that it is correct, only that tentatively it has not been proven wrong.
VI. Back to Faith
The key meaning of faith is not that of the pedestrian. Instead, faith is not because of experience, but despite of experience. Real faith is not that the tennis ball will continue to fall tomorrow or the feather two million years hence, but that the ball will not fall, but float. Faith is to drop a tennis ball one day at the Tower of Pisa and it falls to the ground, and be sure beyond any doubt that tomorrow if I dropped another tennis ball under the same conditions it would float. Faith takes you beyond reason.
I cannot argue with someone that relies on this style of faith, because those that follow faith don’t rest their beliefs on reason. Either one’s foundation is either reason or faith.
V. Reason
I am interested in the reasonable limits of reason, what is rational and what borders rational. In closing, there are several questions that I frequently ask myself that may be helpful to others:
1. What do I think?
This is mere speculation. It could be right, it might be wrong.
2. What do I know?
This reminds me of things I am confident about, namely base statements and tentative claims: I am a white male living on planet Earth; I love my girlfriend; gravity is always in effect.
3. What can I prove?
This is logical analysis.
So, as the bumpersticker I saw this morning says, ‘Don’t believe everything you think.’
Posted in epistemology, naturalism, philosophical issues | 
February 21st, 2007 at 10:43 pm
I use a similar process.
Why do I think or believe this?
and -
How do I know this?
February 22nd, 2007 at 2:18 am
Well, drunkentune, now you’ve got me in a quandry. I’m married to a Protestant, and I’ve been one for a quarter of a century of my adult life, and now look what you are doing!
No, I’m not about to become an atheist. No, that Taoism isn’t it either. It’s those well organized Roman Catholics!
Can we use the methodology you ascribe to naturalism to learn anything about the supernatural? One of the problems is trying to find a group of religious people who experience regular supernatural events that can be and actually are, studied by the methods of science. And here’s what I’ve come up with:
1. http://www.lourdes-france.org/index.php?goto_centre=ru&contexte=en&id=1342&id_rubrique=1342
2. http://olrl.org/stories/lourdes.shtml
3. http://www.catholic.org/featured/sheen.php?ID=1202
4. http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1282/is_n15_v45/ai_13284503
5. http://www.ichrusa.com/saintsalive/bernad.htm
Note that there is a group of medical specialists who carefully examine the medical findings before and after the healings, use medical literature to review the cases, and only refer on those that pass by 2/3 vote as medically inexplicable. Thousands are rejected due to possible medical cures or spontaneous remissions. I find it amusing that the one atheist woman tried to fake them out (in Buckley’s report) and really made an ass of herself! I also think the WW I British soldier who had been severely crippled for years, outran his attendents for several hundred yards just after his cure was pretty humorous to picture in my mind. The atheist doctor who went there after his pious wife died in order to try to refute it made a French Friar of himself (sorry, bad pun). Emil Zola made a French Liar of himself, and the brilliant but flawed Alexis Carrel couldn’t find the courage to admit the truth publicly while he was alive. I’ve searched the web for a decent atheist response to Lourdes, and they are all superficial and dismissive. Not very worthy of honest inquiry on their part. I find it amusing that God chose a 14 year old simple peasant girl in avante guard secular France to bring on a challenge to the forces unleashed by an over-reaction against religion, started by a bunch of proudly intellectual men. I think God really has a sense of humor.
February 22nd, 2007 at 10:50 am
Here is another link to the Lourdes, France information:
http://www.answers.com/topic/our-lady-of-lourdes
February 22nd, 2007 at 7:49 pm
Ed,
Richard Dawkins has a piece on this in The Root of All Evil?. (4:41-7:43)
If a cure was statistically any different than, say, drinking tap water, I’d reconsider. You’re counting the hits and turning your back on the misses.
February 22nd, 2007 at 8:05 pm
Dawkins provided no substantive argument against the findings of the medical and religious authorities in Lourdes, because there is no argument. To argue against a public, open, highly witnessed and documented series of “naturally inexplicable” events such as found at Lourdes is impossible without resorting to the tactics of bozos like the young earth creationists, who dismiss the findings of scientists as part of a great “atheistic conspiracy against religion”. That can’t work against Lourdes, because the Catholics wisely permit physicians with no religion or other religions onto their panels. As a physician myself, I’ll tell you the case reports described are quite inexplicable from a medical perspective. And, I’ll point out that misses are unimportant. Even one hit that shows a supernatural event defeats the a priori premise of naturalism. 67+ hits and the overall context is a compelling story for the believers. Those people could have had no hope for the kind of complete restoration that some of them experienced by drinking tap water for a billion, no a quadrillion, years. People who are paralyzed and don’t walk for years don’t do a sprint within a day of any treatment, period. It is against the valid observation of natural phenomena within the science of medicine. That is why in some of the reports, the physicians break out in a sweat and turn pale, unable to believe their eyes. So, I say Dawkins is grandstanding, he has no argument in France.
February 22nd, 2007 at 8:47 pm
I can only think of questions:
(1) If the water is holy and works for one man, why doesn’t it work for another? Furthermore, if the water is holy and works for 66 people, why doesn’t it work for millions of others?
(2) If I drink the water and get a disease from the holy water, does this count against the holiness of the water? If I have a terminal disease and drink the water, then die, is the water to blame for my death? If I am perfectly healthy and drink some of the water and get sick and die, did the water directly cause my death?
(3) Is the water not holy to some? Or is only some of the water holy? What makes this water cure people? Is there a chemical piece to the water that cures people, and if that’s so, doesn’t that make the water natural, not supernatural? If it isn’t chemical, how does it act upon the person? Does it work on only the most faithful? Must you believe that the water will cure you to make it work? Why don’t people have impossible things happen to them after drinking the water, such as spontanious regenaration, or ESP?
(4) Does God choose who will be cured? Couldn’t God just cure them, without having the cured drink spring water? Where does God intervene in drinking water? Couldn’t any water work just as well, so that all impossibly curable diseases were cured?
(5) Is it the Christian god doing this supernatural work? Remember: ‘…even though the supernatural could logically exist, there are innumerable possibilities to the supernatural forces we can imagine, and have yet to imagine. The supernatural can be anything not natural, be it Lovecraft’s Cthulhu, the Mayan Itzamna, or the Christian God. That means, in a rephrased quotation, that if god exists, anything is permissible.’
(6) If it is currently unexplained by naturalist methodology, is it then caused by the supernatural? And if you believe this, I hasten to remind you that for a long time many things we consider to be natural were once thought to be supernatural in origin, such as lightning, earthquakes, typhoons, the sun and moon rising and setting, etc.
February 22nd, 2007 at 9:49 pm
Drunkentune, we’re in this together, I’m with you buddy. I have different questions, though:
1. What does transubstantiation mean?
2. Who is the Pope now?
3. Can I have a calendar to keep track of all those Saints’ Days?
4. How do you pronounce “immaculate conception”?
5. How do you play BINGO?
February 22nd, 2007 at 9:55 pm
I know 5 right off the bat: Loudly, so the old ladies can hear you.
February 22nd, 2007 at 10:16 pm
My father always said the game was actually, “Aw, shit!”, because more people say that than “BINGO”. He left the Roman Catholic church at age 16, and was an atheist after that. When I converted to Protestant Christianity, he was disdainful, but wondered, “If you’re going to become religious, why not become a Catholic?” The name of the Roman Catholic church in my hometown, where my RC buddies worshipped, was St. Bendadette. I never heard her story or about Lourdes until this week.
February 22nd, 2007 at 10:25 pm
Hah! Thanks for the joke, Ed.
February 22nd, 2007 at 11:55 pm
I’ve been doing some calculations in light of the new data I’ve discovered from the information in Lourdes. I now would revise Unwin’s Baynesian of the miracles factor to 20. I also revise my estimate of the probability that Christianity is correct from 99% to over 99.9%.
February 23rd, 2007 at 3:28 am
You can’t be serious? You have no way to test the veracity of supernatural claims and you are giving christianity a high score?
February 23rd, 2007 at 8:03 am
A virgin birth; living after being dead: untestable and irrefutable/unfalsifiable. What other experience tells us of a virgin birth and a resurrection besides other myths?
February 23rd, 2007 at 8:53 am
Did you read the reports of the Lourdes sites I referred to? If you say there is no way to test the veracity of supernatural claims, then what is the Lourdes Medical Board doing? That is the method of science: make a hypothesis, get a group of people trained in their field, look at the before/after experimentation findings, provide for open examination by non-biased peers to prevent fraud, and draw conclusions about your hypothesis. That is exactly what they’ve been doing. If you say that their process is not believable, then you should tear up your birth certificate. It describes the findings of a physician about an event you can’t remember, that was witnessed by other people who could have attested to the event (but why should you trust them?); THAT is no different in method than Lourdes, and it is less reliable because only one physician signed it (and he was probably drunk and dropped you on your head). And remember, Simon Greenleaf showed that the evidence from the New Testament would be considered credible in a court of law. I’m afraid that we are seeing your personal biases rather than a reasoned examination of the evidence I presented to the forum on Lourdes. I mean, this is tough on me, too, I have to learn about 5 more sacraments, and 2 was hard enough.
February 23rd, 2007 at 9:13 am
Ok, I will give my opinion about Lourdes. I am sure you are all shocked that such a shrinking violet like myself has a personal opinion.
There are always people who, even though there is a rational explanation, or even perhaps many rational explanations on offer concerning extraordinary claims, will prefer to choose the irrational explanation.
I basically call those people supernaturalists. Sometimes they are called religious, and sometimes they are also called a variety of other things.
For the sake of common courtesy, I will call them people who wish to believe the improbable, despite all reasoned argument to the contrary.
February 23rd, 2007 at 9:54 am
Thanks, beep, that added a lot to my consideration of the Lourdes evidence, very scientific that your personal opinion refutes 100 years of a scientific inquiry. Maybe you should do your own test at Lourdes: set up some tricorders, get your phasers ready, send out a 1 THz tachyon pulse, and stun the first cloned Borg you see. Then, give him to GWB and Cheney so they can render him to be tortured to tell you why his species first wants to make us all Catholic before they assimilate us.
February 23rd, 2007 at 10:02 am
Ed,
If Lourdes were a scientific paper, it wouldn’t get past the peer review stage. 66 out of one million is nothing. That is 6.6 x 10-5, or 0.000066% - statistically insignificant. If 100% of drinkers – no, 50% of drinkers – no, 25% - no, if just 10% of drinkers of this water were miraculously cured, I would change my mind. It’s just as likely under the law of truly large numbers for 66 out of a million to exhibit currently unexplainable medical miracles anywhere. 66 out of a million says nothing about a virgin birth, or a resurrection, or anything else in the New Testament. 66 out of a million is counting the hits and disregarding the misses. If we did a control study of, say, the New York water supply and one million drinkers of New York’s finest water, I know that we will find the same percentage of each group winning the lottery, seeing a UFO, seeing Kevin Bacon, and at least 66 people in both groups who have unexplained recoveries of diseases. This is what Richard Dawkins was talking about. There’s no need to even spend time on Lourdes because I know that statistically, at least 66 healthy men and women have died after drinking that water (probably far more have been sick afterwards), and hundreds of thousands of sick men and women never got better after drinking that water. There is no correlation to drinking the water and getting better, but there very well is a direct causal link between drinking bacteria-laden water and getting sick - or drinking said water and not preventing 450 old men and women from getting a disease. There is no way to falsify the claim of supernatural water, since close to a million participants in the study are disregarded, but every case of a reported miracle is far more likely to be due to regression, politics, tourism or currently unexplained natural phenomena than magic water.
February 23rd, 2007 at 11:05 am
You’ve got the wrong null hypothesis. You are using, “The water at Lourdes does not have healing properties.” They seem to be using, “The claims of inexplicable cures of severe medical conditions at Lourdes are false.” They only evaluate those who claim to have a miraculous cure, not those who visit the site or drink the water. True, there are many more claims found to meet their null hypothesis than meet it, but that is due to the rigorous methodology and documentation, the fact that skeptical people can go in and try to make false claim, and so on. The point is, their null hypothesis, if proven false on even one event would represent a signal of something likely supernatural. Not very different than the methodology of the SETI program, which is trying to find evidence of a signal from amongst a lot of noise. I think there are more questions as to why one of the longest running scientific inquiries (that is a very long ongoing study, over 100 years!) is not more widely known. I think it has to do with France’s shell-shock against the misuse of Roman Catholicism under the Bourbons and before for oppression, the reluctance of Protestant-dominated Britain and the US to consider Catholic-based claims, the historical animosity of Germany against all things French, and the reluctance of the Catholic Church itself to create an emphasis on scientific inquiry and “private revelation” over their primary objective, traditional faith.
February 23rd, 2007 at 11:07 am
Sorry, I forgot the word “not” in my sentence describing that only a few (67) people did NOT meet their null hypothesis.
February 23rd, 2007 at 2:17 pm
I point you to comment#6, (6):
‘If it is currently unexplained by naturalist methodology, is it then caused by the supernatural? And if you believe this, I hasten to remind you that for a long time many things we consider to be natural were once thought to be supernatural in origin, such as lightning, earthquakes, typhoons, the sun and moon rising and setting, etc.’
February 23rd, 2007 at 3:00 pm
If the SETI program picks up 67 broadcasts of “Mr. Spock’s Interstellar Logic Moment” from the vicinity of Epsilon Cygnus over the next 150 years, then yes, of course, it is possible that there are no Vulcans and that this is due to a hunk of quartzite being rubbed by a hunk of gypsum. The person who would hold to such a belief, to me, is as biased against the concept of extraterrestrial intelligence as the young earth creationist who demands absolute proof of the theory of evolution, or refuses to accept it. Lourdes does not represent absolute proof, and I have not said that, I’ve only increased my Baynesian assessment by a considerable factor because now I’ve been shown credible scientific evidence that supports my theory that Christianity is correct. And, that is why I’ve stated that my personal confidence level has increased from 99% to over 99.9%. My personal confidence level in evolution remains over 99.99%, and is still somewhat greater than that for Christianity, if that is any consolation to you.
I will point out that Lourdes is not the only report of miracles in the history of the Christian faith, but its documentation using scientific method is the strongest. Those Catholics had some guts back in those days to subject that to such testing. Imagine if not a single inexplicable cure was ever found under such scrutiny: Dawkins would be doing more than grandstanding.
February 23rd, 2007 at 8:01 pm
RE: “If the SETI program picks up 67 broadcasts of “Mr. Spock’s Interstellar Logic Moment†from the vicinity of Epsilon Cygnus over the next 150 years, then yes, of course, it is possible that there are no Vulcans and that this is due to a hunk of quartzite being rubbed by a hunk of gypsum.”
The problem with this analogy, is that you are assuming that this is the case. It isn’t the case. If, however, you had faith in the existence of Mr Spock and his interstellar boradcasts, you would be convinced that Mr Spock’s broadcasts, though they be silent, have a positive effect on your well-being.
And there is no evidence to suggest that a cure was effected by either Mr Spock, or any supernatural entity.
There are people who may have attributed cures to Mr Spock but what is it they are claiming they have been cured of?
And what medical evidence is there to show that they had a genuine illness or complaint before drinking the water?
What medical evidence is there to show that they no longer have the complaint?
What medical evidence is there to show a correlation between the drinking water and the claimed cure? (Correlation doesn’t equal causation)
Did they manage to grow back a leg? And if not, why not?
February 23rd, 2007 at 8:02 pm
I think that many people are in love with the idea of magic, and even if it has a more socially acceptable name like religion, it is still a love of the idea of magic.
February 23rd, 2007 at 9:24 pm
Beep, I don’t think you’ve read the links to the information from Lourdes on post 2 and 3. If you had, you would have found that when a cure takes place, there is an extensive gathering of information from prior medical examinations and treatments. A complete examination of the person is done after the cure (many were the same day). Then, any treatments the person was on are considered, the medical literature on the illness(es) the person suffered from are consulted, and the group of investigators does not vote until all of them are satisfied that the database is complete. This is very common in scientific research, and is a standard procedure. When they feel there is any possibility of a natural explanation, even if it is doubtful, they find the null hypothesis true, and that case is excluded. If the medical board can find no natural explanation for the cure, then the null hypothesis is false, and that would be one of the 67 cases. If there is insufficient documentation of the condition beforehand, the case is not considered. So, that is exactly my point, 67 signals that something inexplicable from a natural phenomenon have occurred at Lourdes. Many more people have claimed cures, and probably believe that God effected the cure or at least assisted it, but those people are not counted if there is insufficient documentation or a natural explanation. Fewer inexplicable cures are forthcoming in recent years due to the fact that doctors no longer give up. They don’t have to, they now have treatments that at least theoretically can give hope for palliation or some partial therapy for almost any condition. Fifty and more years ago, that was not the case. So, now we will be ascertaining fewer signals, because the committee will have to consider whether even a tentatively applied novel therapy was the natural cause of the cure. I hope you have a science background, because if you were a English Lit major, I’ve surely lost you.
I will tell you, the case descriptions in the database of the 67 are people that from my knowledge of medicine were mostly in grave and life-threatening conditions. These were not simply hangnails and tummy aches, yet the resultant cures described show a tremendous return to health. The case of the British soldier from WW I is utterly miraculous: no person could by any natural phenomenon outrun any fit person(s) for several hundred yards on a gravel road the day they regain the use of their legs for the first time in years. Add to that his epilepsy disappearing, his 1 inch borehole in the skull closing, his complete wasted/limp/paralyzed right arm recovering to the point he could throw 200 pounds of coal. And he is not the only one.
Another thing, no one attributes the healing to the water. It is attributed to God by the faithful.
My analogy of SETI/Spock is appropriate. Your post about it seems confused. I am pointing out the methodology used in science to try to pick a signal out of noise, exactly the problem they faced as they designed the study at Lourdes. When a signal is found by such a study, Lourdes or SETI, it is always conceivable that someone will not accept the falsification of the null hypothesis due to the small amount of error found in any scientific study. I think SETI would be thrilled to get 67 clear signals over 150 years, and only the most thickheaded would still doubt the existence of extraterrestrial intelligence if they did.
February 24th, 2007 at 4:32 am
RE ed:
I know someone who regularly took children to Lourdes to have them healed, when he was a catholic. He would wheel those children off to Lourdes to be cured of their cerebral palsy or childhood diabetes. Some who could only be on hospital beds. He looks back on those days with a degree of shame and disgust.
80,000 sick pigrims go to Lourdes each year and have been doing so for over 100 years. This doesn’t include all the other people who go as a sign of faith. just the sick ones.
That’s 800,000 people at least and the catholic church has “confirmed” 66 cures. This leaves us with an impressive cure rate of 0.00825%. The chances for this type of cure rate are probably higher if you don’t go to Lourdes and don’t share the germs and viruses of thousands of sick people all huddled into a confined space.
There wouldn’t be enough antibacterial spray produced in Australia for me to consider that this was a sensible option.
Richard Dawkins at Lourdes
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v3p51MBKMLk
RE: “When a signal is found by such a study, Lourdes or SETI, it is always conceivable that someone will not accept the falsification of the null hypothesis due to the small amount of error found in any scientific study.”
There is a signal from Lourdes alright, but it isn’t a supernatural one. It signals the exploitation of thousands of desperate people every year for whom the hope of “a miracle” is all they have left. And, as is human nature, the wolves are there to nip at the gullible and trusting sheep.
(Sorry I can’t put that anymore politely, but Lourdes is, in my opinion, a scam of the most despicable kind.)
It sells hope to the hopeless and the majority who buy, come away with nothing but empty promises and shattered dreams. And probably with a lower opinion of themselves than when they first went there. As, if sickness is evidence of sin, then continued sickness is evidence that you are not worth saving.
They are the willing sheep who go to get fleeced.
February 24th, 2007 at 4:37 am
Oooops - make it 8 million who have gone seeking a cure for illness. (I had a brain fart- quick, send me off to Lourdes.)
The cure rate is now 0.00082%
February 24th, 2007 at 4:41 am
People have actually been going to Lourdes for about 150 years in hope of a cure. I based my calculations on just 100 years.
February 24th, 2007 at 8:18 am
Just another thought. Does anyone know the % of people out of 8 million who have died since visiting Lourdes in hope of a cure?
Methinks that % wwould far outweigh the 0.00082% of people whom the catholic church claim have received a “miraculous cure.”
Let me think, if correlation equals causation, they were sick, they went to Lourdes, they drank the water, and they died.
Must have been something in the water.
February 24th, 2007 at 10:29 am
Of all the people who ever visited Lourdes, all have died or will die, 100%. Now you’ve convinvced me. You are totally missing the significance of the Lourdes Medical Bureau http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lourdes_Medical_Bureau . SETI is the same idea. The reason SETI invovled so many people’s idle computers is that their hope for a signal was even lower than at Lourdes. I’m sorry that your friend seemed to have an expectation of a physical cure for his kids at Lourdes. He might as well have played the lottery. BUT, there are lottery winners. Really. True, lots of people lose money at lotteries. Your rants about the low rate of physical cures misses the point entirely. The point is that a long-term scientific approach, using valid current scientific methods that are employed for medical studies, SETI, and a variety of other experiments, was used at Lourdes. It tests the hypothesis that miraculous cures have/have not taken place. It has a strict definition of a case ascertation. It has an open panel, not only Catholic physicians, so it protects against the kind of thing that can occur like Piltdown Man. I think there are some valid criticisms that could be raised on the scientific validity of the Lourdes Medical Bureau’s findings, but you are not raising them. Maybe you should find a friend who has studied and remembered their science from university, preferably at a masters or doctorate level. They could help you understand better the scientific strengths and weaknesses of the Lourdes data.
February 24th, 2007 at 10:46 am
By the way, Drunkentune already referred to the Dawkin’s Grandstanding piece against Lourdes. Shame even more on him. He is a scientist. He could have mentioned some valid criticisms of the Lourdes Medical Bureau and mentioned some of its strengths in a balanced way, but….noooooooo, he not only grandstands like a used car saleman (or televangelist), he provides no link to any information that could provide such an analysis. I’ve yet to find anything other than a superficial and dismissive internet link regarding Lourdes from a skeptic’s perspective. The links from the official site, and from believers’ ones range from informative and cautious, to credulous and gloating, but they provide lots of data and analysis. Actually, from a fundie site there is a conclusion that the Lourdes events (while supernatural) must be from the devil! Many fundies absolutely despise Catholic beliefs.
The irrationally skeptic seems to lose track of careful analysis of scientific data when the implication is not in Dawkin’s or her favor.
February 24th, 2007 at 11:27 am
I am saying this slowly and clearly: there is no difference between the percentage of ‘cures’ defined by the Lourdes Medical Bureau drinking magic water and drinking New York’s water. None. Nada. Zip. Zero.
All I am asking for is more: 10% or above of the faithful that visit have an immediate or impossible cure to an ailment defined by the Lourdes Medical Bureau. Or 1% - one in one hundred. Or 0.1% - one in one thousand. Or 0.01% - one in ten thousand. Or 0.001% - one in one hundred thousand. Something - anything that does not statistically match up with the chance of a medical miracle while drinking non-magic water!
I chose 66 out of one million, and got a statistical probability of an unexplained medical miracle of 0.000066% (Comment#6); beepbeep got 0.00082% (Comment#28) (It’s actually 2.75 x 10-6, beepbeep. I think you dropped a couple of decimal places there). Both are statistically insignificant. It means nothing. That is ‘careful analysis of scientific data’. It is not irrational to dismiss a holy shrine with its magic water when if you go down the street and drink from the gutter you have exactly the same chance of a medical miracle! It is nowhere within a 95% deviation of error. It is not one bit different than the millions drinking tap water.
Now on Dawkins: all Dawkins does is ask people questions, and they talk. Then he notes, in his words, the ‘hard facts.’ The man he interviews says that thousands have experienced all sorts of benefits:
Father Liam Griffin: There are actually 66 declared miracles. There are about 2,000 unexplained cures here. But we would say there have been millions who have been healed in different ways.
Dawkins: Healed in some medical way –
Griffin: Healed in a spiritual way of people who have come to terms with a particular situation. People who have rediscovered god in their lives again. People who have received a new grace in the Lord.
Dawkins: So you tend to get 80,000 per year .
Griffin: But 80,000 sick pilgrims every year.
Dawkins: And that’s been going on for more than a century… so 80,000 per year, and only 66 have been cured. So just you see, the way I’m thinking… So the hard fact is that over the years with their millions of pilgrims there have been 66 supposed miracles. Statically it adds up to no evidence at all.
Dawkins doesn’t have to offer any more criticism of Lourdes. It’s just a silly shrine in France that sells t-shirts and bottled water.
February 24th, 2007 at 11:48 am
I repeat, both you and beep are missing the point. If SETI finds 3 valid intelligent signals in the next 20 years out of 10 to the 20th power tested, the percentage will be way lower than Lourdes. In that situation, the data would be EQUALLY valid. The denominator does NOT matter in this kind of study. When Dawkins says “66 supposed miracles”, that is dismissive and superficial and does not address the scientific basis of the Lourdes Medical Bureau. Neither you or beep seem to get this. Maybe you should consult with a friend who can explain the science to you. You have no basis in claiming that medically unexplanable cures occur spontaneously for the kinds of diseases that those who were cured at Lourdes at the same rate as those outside Lourdes in the past 150 years. The only way to determine that would be to do an exhaustive search for medical journal reports and try to estimate the number of people who suffered from similar illnesses in the population. Neither your numerator nor denominator would be reliable, and you’d have only maybe one or two doctors attesting to the cure in their case report. The point of the Lourdes Medical Bureau is not numerators or denominators, it is a post hoc analysis of signals, carefully done and documented. The signals they report on represent a highly impressive case series of natually inexplicable cures occurring in the context of a religious site which started after a 14 year old peasant girl experienced religiously themed visions of a lady. It represents a scientifically derived challenge to naturalism, so please try to understand the science behind it, instead of obsessing on a silly interview between a grandstanding Dawkins and a priest.
February 24th, 2007 at 2:07 pm
Let me offer another example based on SETI. Hypothecially, say the signal is the number pi. If we get 67 signals over the next 150 years that are “3.14″, that might not be very impressive, the number of significant digits being small (it would likely be in base 2, not 10). However, it very well might be interpreted as a valid signal, especially if it derived from the same sector of space. If the signals were 3.1415926… to 50 significant digits, that would be even more impressive. What I’m trying to point out is that the quality of the signals at Lourdes are very high, the kinds of illnesses and disabilities cured in the cases are like the pi to 50 significant digits, very impressive quality signals. The Lourdes medical board dismisses the “3.14″ signals as part of its process. But they could still be signals. For you and beep, it seems you’ll want the aliens to transmit ALL of pi (impossible, it is an infinite series).
February 24th, 2007 at 3:37 pm
Ed,
Instead of dissolving into a shouting match (which I fear we are close approaching), I’ll show you my line of thinking: a scientific study, for instance:
Hypothesis: The water at Lourdes is different than water elsewhere, and this water cures people of incurable diseases. Essentially, the water has supernatural properties.
What we predict: (1) When drinking water from Lourdes, events occur that are currently unexplained by natural phenomena; however, alone, this does not show evidence of our hypothesis. Currently unexplained cures of incurable diseases occur in other parts of the world. Therefore, (2) At Lourdes, these medically unexplained miracles occur significantly more often than at other locations. What we consider ’significantly’ to be is at a magnitude of at least 10 fold from the likelihood of having a medically unexplained miracle without drinking water from Lourdes. Furthermore, (3) if this water is supernatural, it should be indiscriminate and broad in who it cures - there should be a large percentage of drinkers of the water that experience significant benefits that cannot currently be explained by natural phenomena, on, say at least 0.1%, maybe 10% of the population of drinkers of Lourdes water, and hopefully 100%.
Observations: Currently 66 unexplained cases of unexplained cures to incurable diseases are recorded; however, close to several million people have visited the site and have not had currently unexplained cases of unexplained cures to incurable diseases.
Conclusion: While (1) is true, (2) and (3) does not hold up under scrutiny. There is no statistical evidence for either (2) or (3). In fact, the statistical evidence directly contradicts what we should see if the water at Lourdes routinely cured diseases. Our hypothesis is then null. The water of Lourdes is not different than water elsewhere, and this water does not cure people of incurable diseases. There is no evidence of a causal relationship between drinking water at Lourdes and medical miracles.
SETI is not Lourdes; Lourdes is not SETI. It is a false analogy. A true analogy would be searching for a higher percentage of medical miracles at isolated locations across the globe, such as in the Amazon, the Midwest aquifer, England’s ponds and streams, and Lourdes, just as SETI searches for signals that could be from another lifeform in the background radiation. Lourdes simply does not have more medically unexplained miracles occuring.
SETI isn’t saying that the entire universe is sending out radiowaves that are trying to communicate a message - only that out of the known universe, there may be other intelligent life trying to send a message. So in this case, if we find a pattern, we stick with it. With Lourdes, we’re not looking for a single message of, say, 66 out of a million people exibiting a medical miracle. We’re looking to see if the water is magic.
Now is the water magic? No.
February 24th, 2007 at 4:22 pm
Drunkentune,
I’m not upset at all, I’m not about to shout, I’m merely trying to communicate. Really. I hope I’m not being rude, I’m really trying my best to inject light humor and yet point out my thoughts.
My point (and the Catholics say the same thing) is that the water is not significant for healing. The point is looking to see if there are naturally inexplicable events in the context of Lourdes.
The signal they are measuring is the delta (change) from pre-event overall health status to post-event health status. Then, using their criteria, the experts evaluate each claim for whether there is any natural medical explanation for the delta. In the case of people who have been paralyzed or blind for years, and are walking briskly or seeing well the next day, it is pretty easy to see why they are able to find cases. Neither of us knows the rate of such events in other places, no one does, but that is not relevant to their study or a discussion of its results. You are absolutely correct that such information would be useful, as you’ve described in (2) and (3). It might show that miracles happen outside Lourdes (to folks like me).
What is relevant to their study is that their process included a comprehensive examination of the medical literature and a panel of medical experts to advise as to whether similar events were known elsewhere. For example, you will see that part of their criteria was exclusion of cases of renal cell carcinoma. That is because there is a medical literature describing sponateous remissions for inexplicable reasons for that condition. Many of their cases were complications of tuberculosis, the leading cause of death 100 years ago, and a disease that every doctor of that time was extremely well versed in. It is not likely that the Lourdes Medical Board would have misjudged the inexplicable nature of events related to TB cures when they had a vast knowledge of the disease. It is also not likely that the medical community of France outside Lourdes would have let them get away with such bad calls. Now, I could be wrong, I mean I’m not French, and have only the limited information I’ve learned this week. But if there are strong scientific arguments against the Lourdes Medical Board’s findings, I have not found them. And Dawkins did not mention them or refer to them, instead choosing to include that silly interview that doesn’t help us.
I will also point out that the first part of your observation statement is significant in assessing the question: “Is there any scientifically derived data which casts doubt upon philosphical naturalism?” The answer is yes, only one study, but its correlational results are impressive based on contemporary medical knowledge. The remainder of your observation is not relevant to that question.
February 24th, 2007 at 4:35 pm
Ed,
Until we jointly answer my question (from Comment#6) ‘If it is currently unexplained by naturalist methodology, is it then caused by the supernatural?’ I don’t think we can proceed. Yes, I agree: I don’t know why these 66 cases occurred. Neither do you, or anyone else. But that is far from evidence that this was a supernatural act. All I know for certain is that we know very little about the universe, and to reject a natural explanation for a supernatural one is just too farfetched.
I should remind you:
February 24th, 2007 at 5:36 pm
See, we never shouted. However, it is a demonstration of our a priori assumptions that you see the possibility of a supernatural finding as farfetched, and many Catholics and folks like me do not. There could be a natural explanation for the cures from Lourdes, but what it may be is inconceivable to me. But I can give you a supernatural explanation without any problem from the pages of the New Testament, or even some of the Old Testament, but of course, that wouldn’t make any sense to your worldview. And we are both left with the conclusion: you cannot absolutely prove or disprove God with naturalistic methodology, only believe in him or not. And, such a conclusion must be based upon the best evaluation you can make, with knowledge of your a priori assumptions and prejudices, a fair and honest appraisal of the information you’ve receieved, and realizing that any knowledge or conclusions are subject to future revision.
February 24th, 2007 at 6:25 pm
Ed
RE: “Of all the people who ever visited Lourdes, all have died or will die, 100%. Now you’ve convinvced me. You are totally missing the significance of the Lourdes Medical Bureau”
Oh, we know that all people will die, but did they die from drinking the water?
February 24th, 2007 at 6:27 pm
ED:
RE: “The point is that a long-term scientific approach, using valid current scientific methods that are employed for medical studies, SETI, and a variety of other experiments, was used at Lourdes.”
How does SETI test for the existence of the supernatural?
February 24th, 2007 at 6:30 pm
ED
RE: ” If SETI finds 3 valid intelligent signals in the next 20 years out of 10 to the 20th power tested, the percentage will be way lower than Lourdes.”
The point is that SETI hasn’t.
February 24th, 2007 at 6:38 pm
On the question of a priori. My a prioro is that I don’t know, which is why people like me are not going to be satisfied with someone’s a priori which is “I do know and the reason is god.”
People whose apriori is “god exists” are only ever providing evidence for something they claim to know exists in the first place. What is the point of that?
I might change my a priori to ” at any moment it is possible that at any moment everything could morph into a bowl of petunias” and as that is my a priori, I will then go on to prove that the 2 headed invisible gila monster from Beutelguese was a bowl of petunias in a past life.
February 24th, 2007 at 6:46 pm
Hi,Beep,
I’m sorry if my analogy to SETI has thrown you off. All analogies are approximations. It is beyond the scope of a blog to explain the design of scientific research into “signals” whose origin is remote in time or space.
Try to think of what SETI hopes to accomplish: detection of any signal out of the vast noise in the electomagnetic spectrum from remote parts of space. If such a signal shows evidence of intelligent design, that would be a significant finding. It does not absolutely prove the existence of an intelligent source, but it strongly supports such a conclusion.
With the Lourdes Medical Bureau, the signals evaluated were the claims of pilgrims there as to supernatural (trancendent) cures. The methods of science cannot directly test for the supernatural, so instead the evaluations were done on the signals to determine if there was little chance of a natural medical cure. Those cases without a reasonable medical explanation were regarded as signals. Like in SETI, they strongly suggest, but do not prove, a supernatural event. At least that is so to the believers. And that is what allows the bishop to have the scientific consultation to pronounce them miracles or not. Note that they are careful to not have the scientists pronounce them miracles, which science cannot do (alone). I think that is the best I can do here. If you are still unclear, consult a scientist or physician friend of yours.
February 24th, 2007 at 7:02 pm
I see, god of the gaps. We do not have enough scientific information to be able to say why they were cured, so therefore god. Never satisfactory to me, but obviously to believers.
Same methodology has been employed throughout the centuries. We do’t know why this person survived the black death, therefore god.
Or according to my a priori, we don’t know why some people survived drinking the water at lourdes, therefore at any moment, they may morph into a bowl of petunias.
February 24th, 2007 at 7:09 pm
RE: “Like in SETI, they strongly suggest, but do not prove, a supernatural event.”
They strongly suggest that we don’t know why those people may have been “cured”.
Or, according to my a priori, they strongly suggest that at any moment they could morph into a bowl of petunias.
February 24th, 2007 at 7:11 pm
Thinly veiled appeal to ignorance?
February 24th, 2007 at 7:16 pm
The argument from ignorance, also known as argumentum ad ignorantiam (”appeal to ignorance” [1]) or argument by lack of imagination, is a logical fallacy in which it is claimed that a premise is true only because it has not been proven false, or that a premise is false only because it has not been proven true.
February 24th, 2007 at 7:22 pm
Yes, beep, but at Lourdes, for the first time, you have gaps that modern scientific method suggests, that are big enough for a Mack truck to drive through, as the saying goes.
February 24th, 2007 at 7:42 pm
RE ed:
The gaps in human knowledge are always filled with the “a priori” that is the methodology.
February 24th, 2007 at 8:43 pm
Lourdes can help both the naturalist and the supernaturalist solve a dilemma:
The reports of the healings in the Bible of people who are blind, paralyzed, and ill with various diseases are similar in type to the inexplicable cures at Lourdes, which have scientific validation. Therefore, it becomes more tenable for the naturalist to say that “the cures of the Bible could have been observed and described accurately, but are the result of a strange natural medical phenomenon that may cluster around religious activity”. I guess it would still be a hypothesis that is not yet proven, but could result in less resort to conspiracy theories. Those just make believers upset. And, perhaps naturalists could do research on whether exposure to religious activity has an influence on health. Oh, I forgot, they already have. Regular worship attenders live longer:
http://www.jabfm.org/cgi/content/full/19/4/429
http://www.jabfm.org/cgi/content/full/19/2/103?maxtoshow=&HITS=10&hits=10&RESULTFORMAT=&fulltext=hall&searchid=1&FIRSTINDEX=0&volume=19&issue=2&resourcetype=HWCIT
It should be obvious how Lourdes helps a supernaturalist be more convinced of the veracity of the biblical healings: now she has some scientific data to show such events can occur.
February 24th, 2007 at 11:56 pm
beep,
I’ll let you respond to Ed for a bit. Work’s been rough today, and I need some rest.
Ed,
There was a piece on NPR recently on how the studies on religous worship and attendence were either flawed or merely corollary. You can listen for free or check out his book: Blind Faith: The Unholy Alliance of Religion and Medicine, by Richard Sloan.
I am VERY tired. Goodnight.
February 25th, 2007 at 1:30 am
RE: “The reports of the healings in the Bible of people who are blind, paralyzed, and ill with various diseases are similar in type to the inexplicable cures at Lourdes, which have scientific validation.”
They are not scientifically validated as supernatural miracles. What science may have said, is that they have no explanation. No explanation, or lack of knowledge has never been considered as evidence of a god unless you have a predilection to believe in gods in the first place.
You are still committing the logical fallacy of the argument from ignorance.
Your argument from ignorance is - We don’t know, therefore god.
In other words, the methodology that you use to test the veracity of supernatural claims is - Human beings have a lack of knowledge about something, therefore insert “a priori” here in an attempt to explain what happened and in an attempt to validate the “a priori.”
Remember when I asked this? How do you test the veracity of supernatural claims?
Well, you have answered it for me.
Supernaturalists have no consistent methodology with which to test the veracity of supernatural claims. Therefore, they are in the position where they either have to accept all supernatural claims as being true, or they choose to accept specific supernatural claims based on their individual predilections.
You accept specific supernatural claims as being true based on your own individual predilections.
February 25th, 2007 at 1:34 am
People who don’t go to Lourdes and drink the water, live longer too.
February 25th, 2007 at 9:29 am
Actually, the Catholics have set up the program at Lourdes to test the veracity of supernatural claims, so you could say that is the standard methodology. I suppose you could say it is not a consistent one. I am not involved in the process or oversight of it at Lourdes, so maybe you are right about that. It certainly is one of the valid scientific criticisms of the Lourdes project, though it may not be a strong criticism, see http://www.catholicculture.org/docs/doc_view.cfm?recnum=2866 . You may want to investigate this further, you could profit by it, see http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/08/29/1093717837898.html . Perhaps you call my way of reasoning “argument from ignorance”, but I’m glad I’ve discovered the research from Lourdes. I’m glad they did the research at Lourdes, aren’t you? Any new scientific knowledge is great to learn, isn’t it? Now we’re all less ignorant.
February 25th, 2007 at 11:35 am
Ed,
I’ve learned that if I want a cure for a disease, I shouldn’t drink spring water, but see a doctor. By the way, have you read the book ‘Spook,’ by Mary Roach?
February 25th, 2007 at 12:15 pm
Disclaimer: I have an economic interest in encouraging people to get the best and most medical care possible for any disease. I am a physician.
I saw nothing in the information from the Lourdes site that discouraged people from getting the best medical care they can. No church I’ve been associated with discourages such activity either, nor would I. There are a few loonies out there that get unbalanced and weird and never seek medical care, the Christian Science religion by Mary Baker Eddy being one of the most famous. Actually, I was once involved in a situation where a child would have died if he had not gotten a transfusion, and his parents would not consent because they were Jehovah Witnesses. The JW’s take a Mosaic law about not eating blood and apply it to transfusions. The parents actually seemed relieved that we had the child protective services take temporary guardianship, so their son could live while they preserved their legalistic religious obligation.
I’d love to have more time to read books like “Spook”, but now I’m immersed in Taoism, you know. And my next project is learning the Roman Catholic Catechism and the Rosary.
February 25th, 2007 at 12:55 pm
‘Spook: Science Tackles the Afterlife’ is a book that I think would be right up your alley. After you’re done with your projects, I suggest checking it out. It’s a short read that you can pick up for about fifteen dollars at your local bookstore.
And I have this thing against JW’s and Christian Scientists. The Witnesses keep coming to my door and I live nearby a Church of Christ, Scientist, so I get plenty of junk mail. That is, not counting living a few blocks away from a Catholic bookstore and four churches.
I swear, someone has got to take the ‘Scientist’ out of Christian Scientists: it’s false advertising. A friend of mine was raised as one, and he has a deep hatred towards the church.
February 25th, 2007 at 1:05 pm
I’d like them to take the word “Christian” out as well, and actually I drove past one the other day that was called “Church of Religious Science”. I’m not sure if it is part of the original group, or some offshoot. They did start a fairly good newspaper, the Christian Science Monitor, but I haven’t seen much of anything else they did that was worthwhile. The JW’s always seem to me to be like fundies in heretics clothing, to misuse the analogy.
February 25th, 2007 at 6:43 pm
Ed,
A methodology of, we don’t know, therefore god - is, as I said, only filling the “I don’t know part” with the “a priori”. Your a priori is god, but not only that, it is a specific god.
Begging the question in logic, also known as circular reasoning, is an informal fallacy found in many attempts at logical arguments. An argument which begs the question is one in which a PREMISE PRESUPPOSES THE CONCLUSION in some way. Such an argument is valid in the sense in which logicians use that term, yet provides NO REASON AT ALL TO BELIEVE ITS CONCLUSION.
Example:
1.Premise: - god exists as the “a priori”
2. Lourdes process: - We can’t explain HOW this happened. Therefore it must be the “a priori”.
4. Conclusion - god exists as the “a priori”
This is an example of circular reasoning which is part of the fallacy of “begging the question.”
Circular reasoning is not a valid methodology.
February 25th, 2007 at 6:54 pm
Beep,
I think that you ought to refer as many people as you can think of to the Lourdes information we’ve been discussing. Make sure they read about the cures and the scientific investigations into possible natural explanations. Then, please explain about the circular reasoning involved as you’ve just done. I think that will be a great plan for you to show more and more people that religion is really just plain foolishness. Kind of like your own missionary work, if you will.
February 25th, 2007 at 7:03 pm
Just another quick exmaple of this.
1.Premise - Black people are thieves.
(My premise is only used in order to provide an example of the above fallacy (of begging the question, specifically circular reasoning.)
2.My house is broken into and some expensive technological items are stolen.
3.The police fingerprint the house, run the information through a finger-print data base and tell me that they have no leads as to who broke into my house and stole the equipment.
4.I then decide that because they haven’t DISPROVEN that it was a black person who did it, that a black person is the thief.
5.I consider this evidence that a black person committed the crime because they have not DISPROVEN that he didn’t.
6.Premise matches conclusion and another “happy racist” goes away convinced of the criminality of black people.
February 25th, 2007 at 7:16 pm
RE: ” I think that will be a great plan for you to show more and more people that religion is really just plain foolishness. Kind of like your own missionary work, if you will.”
I am way too lazy for any sort of missionary work. It seems to also involve “drinking water” in places which may be unhygienic. So, I will give that one a pass.
However, I support everyone’s right to dance naked around the clothes-line,, smeared with peanut butter, on every blue moon, as they chant to the peanut butter entity. I will even offer to take photographs of their experience for them.
Just as long as they recognize that it isn’t logical to do so, and that I also have the right to consider them batshit insane.
(Lots of bats in Australia, which explains the popularity of the term.)
February 25th, 2007 at 8:01 pm
Premise: Silence in the woods means a evil spirit is about to curse me.
1. I venture from the encampment of my tribe to gather firewood.
2. The songs of the birds in the woods fall silent.
3. My eyes or ears hear no sign of a carnivore.
4. Logically, I can conclude that the silence is a false signal. After all, we both know that evil spirits don’t curse people in the woods.
5. 99 times out of 100 I’m safe.
6. The 100th time, I’m cat food.
We are not Vulcans. We are humans. We may think we can define the proper way of thinking for ourselves and others. We can read books by smart people who think they can. But, we are the result of our evolution. Circular reasoning is sometimes adaptive, and sometimes not adaptive.
February 25th, 2007 at 8:18 pm
Circular reasoning is not a logical methodology in order to test the veracity of supernatural claims.
February 25th, 2007 at 8:19 pm
Or, you may NEVER be cat food.
February 25th, 2007 at 8:23 pm
That you might never be cat food is not evidence that your premise was correct.
February 25th, 2007 at 9:23 pm
Circular reasoning is a fantastic method for propogating ideas, true or false, that have adaptive advantage.
Perhaps the reason the Almighty decided to demonstrate His miraculous, faith-honoring, yet mysterious ways at Lourdes was not to give new truth. Perhaps it was to allow circular reasoning to help propogate revealed truth.
February 25th, 2007 at 9:56 pm
Great - circular reasoning is now the methodology used to test the veracity of claims. But that is all presuppositionalists do anyway.
My circular reasoning.
Presupposition: existential angst exists.
Argument: Help help, I am going to die.
Enter theist presupposition: God will allow you to live forever if you kiss his ass a lot and in the right places.
Conclusion same as presupposition : Existential angst exists.
February 25th, 2007 at 10:04 pm
I might tease that last thought out and use it as a blog post.
Something like - presuppositionalism is just circular reasoning.
(No names of course, I never take the word of other people in vain.)
February 25th, 2007 at 11:39 pm
Beep, here is a short read by a fellow who had visited Lourdes, and he makes some interesting observations and a pretty comprehensive analysis of skeptics’ reactions to the place, I think in section IV…
http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/18729
The Catholic Church has a method for testing claims of the miraculous cures, but you’ll certainly point out it demonstrates some circular reasoning from your perspective, since obviously they begin with their faith tradition:
http://www.lourdes-magazine.com/article.php3?id_article=229&lang=en
I’m signing off after this, I’m feeling viral and may be out of commission for a while. At least, until I can crawl to my bottle of Lourdes holy water… just kidding.
February 26th, 2007 at 9:04 am
RE ed
I know the Catholic Church has a methodology for testing miraculous cures. But it is a flawed methodology.
It goes like this -
1.Not this
2.Not that
3.Therefore god did it.
And now for the parable version.
“A dragon believer says that there is an invisible dragon living in his garage. Because the dragon believer has faith that the invisible dragon exists in the garage and because no one can prove that it doesn’t, he/she takes this as EVIDENCE that the invisible dragon EXISTS.”
Now for the Lourdes version.
“A theist who wears a fish hat says that there is magic water at a place called Lourdes. Because the theist who wears the fish hat has faith that the water is magical and because no one can prove that it isn’t, he decides that this is EVIDENCE that the water is magical.”
February 26th, 2007 at 9:09 am
Now for the scientific version.
1.not this
2.not that
3.Therefore I don’t know.
February 26th, 2007 at 11:18 am
I think the reader of the blog may want to refer to the Lourdes information directly, rather than rely on the overly condensed version by beep.
One thing evident to the naturalist observers at Lourdes was that medically inexplicable events of remarkable healing were taking place. Now, think about it, any religion would likely latch on to any such event as proof of its veracity. There is an argument (poorly made) by the skeptics above, that the rate of the events at Lourdes was low. It was a low percentage, but large enough so that if you were to look around the world today, you’d expect to find dozens if not hundreds of similar events each year. Some of them would be in Muslim lands, Hindu, Buddhist, Shinto, Tao, Jewish, whatever. Surely over all the centuries, there would accumulate a vast literature of what the skeptic would call “inexplicable cures” but those various religious people would call “miracles”. I’ve been looking on the web, and I’m finding very, very few reports of healing miracles from any other religion than Christianity. Doesn’t that seem odd?
February 26th, 2007 at 12:36 pm
No.
February 26th, 2007 at 12:56 pm
I’ve been reading up on the internet, and all the reports of miracle healing I can find are all from the Q-Ray® bracelet, Consegrity®, EMDR, thought field therapy (TFT), homeopathy, aromatherapy, Gerson therapy, chi manipulation, acupuncture, aura therapy, Ayurvedic medicine, reflexology, crystal power, joy touch, shark cartilage as a cure for cancer, Rolfing®, urine therapy, iridology, psychic surgery, the EM-Power Disc, and the Quadro QRS 250G.
Isn’t it odd that alternative medicine is an estimated $15 billion a year business?
I’ve been looking on the web as well, and wherever I look, I see reports of Jesus in a tortilla (1978), a vine-covered tree (West Virginia, 1982), rust stains on an oil tank (Ohio, 1986), a forkful of spaghetti illustrated on a billboard (Georgia, 1991), as well as portraits of the Virgin Mary on the stains on the bathroom floor of a Texas auto parts store (1990), and the grime on a window in an Italian village (1987). Don’t you think that’s odd? Doesn’t that mean something?
February 26th, 2007 at 1:17 pm
I almost forgot: ‘miracles’ happen all over. Someone with a skeptical attitude looks at the evidence and calls them on it.
February 26th, 2007 at 2:08 pm
The article from James Randi is pretty superficial. Scant documentation? Spontaneous remissions? No organic illness? That is exactly the kind of claimed miracle the Lourdes Medical Bureau excludes. I think Randi needs to demonstrate that the methodology is poor, rather than just make some claim. Without his evidence as to poor methodology, would you be prone to just accept Randi’s word?
The reader of the blog needs to investigate the claims of miracles at Lourdes from the primary sources, not some superficial atheist apologist.
Some of the inexplicable medical cures are not merely cures from an illness, but represent restoration of function to the body that is also medically inexplicable. People who have been paralyzed, unable to move their legs for months or years, don’t just get up and walk briskly or run after any curative therapy. That is why we have rehabilition hospitals. Remember the process used by the Lourdes Medical Bureau is not private and anecdotal, it is public and scientific. Show me a public and scientific repudiation of their findings or methods, not some dismissive or superficial article by an apologist who fails to present evidence.
February 26th, 2007 at 4:40 pm
Ed,
(1) The water at Lourdes is not magical, yes? Otherwise, we’d expect a vast majority of drinkers to be cured of their diseases. Thus, the 66 cases have no relation to drinking the water of Lourdes. Therefore, these are merely 66 unexplained medical miracles.
(2) The methodology for classifying them as medical miracles can be correct, but that still isn’t evidence for a supernatural dimension and inhabitants thereof - and certainly isn’t evidence for a certain supernatural entity. It is only proof that we do not currently know how specific recoveries occurred. It is jumping the gun to say that it is the result of a specific supernatural entity.
(3) Furthermore, the medical miracles could have all occurred, but that still isn’t evidence for a supernatural dimension and inhabitants thereof - and certainly isn’t evidence for a certain supernatural entity. It is only proof that we do not currently know how specific recoveries occurred. It is jumping the gun to say that it is the result of a specific supernatural entity.
(4) For instance, someone with a debilitating disease preventing them from walking can run the length of a stage - but this isn’t evidence for the supernatural; ‘[A] woman with cancer of the spine had discarded her brace and followed Ms. Kuhlman’s enthusiastic command to run across the stage. The following day her backbone collapsed, and four months later she died. ‘ [source]
Where is the evidence that these 66 cases are due to the supernatural? How would we go about this? What is the methodology we would use?
February 26th, 2007 at 4:42 pm
The supernatural continues to live in the gaps of human knowledge. Metaphorically speaking.
I don’t believe the claims made by the Catholic Church and Lourdes. The supposed cures are nothing but clever marketing in order to keep fleecing the sheep.
It’s despicable.
February 26th, 2007 at 5:09 pm
RE lourdes
There’s been a robbery in the local church. Four youth were apprehended in the vicinty. After intensive investigations there was no evidence to suggest that the youth committed the crime.
Therefore god did it.
February 26th, 2007 at 5:20 pm
I decided, on a lark, to try out Google Scholar, an excellent source of reliable publications. I typed in ‘lourdes+miracles‘, and saw that the fourth link was to a paper in the Cellular and Molecular Life Sciences (CMLS). I needed a password to read the entire paper, but it wasn’t a dead end. If you look closely, an exerpt from the page is found at Google Scholar, reading ‘… A painstaking investigation of Lourdes miracles by an Officer of the Society for Psychic Research, DJ West, who is also a medical doctor, found no evidence for …‘
I then took it upon me to look for this ‘DJ West‘, searcing again. This time, I came up with little. I felt that this was a dead end, but I searched for a few more minutes until I uncovered this site after searching under Google for ‘West+”Eleven Lourdes Miracles”‘:
Lourdes has seen fewer and fewer miracles in recent years. Now, one answer is that the water’s magic has waned. Another is that the scientific rigor has advanced.