It is a dogma of Christianity that God transcends His creation. If you and others cannot accept this, than all arguments are pointless. Transcendence also means, without ambiguity of arguments, that God cannot be part of a natural chain of causality.
miraculous events are distinct from the transcendence of God; in many cases eyewitnesses attest to a miracle and these are recorded and subject to scrutiny. If you or others cannot accept this, there is little that can be said.
If I understand your point (and I cannot pretend that I have a clear notion of your views), you seem to want some information that a miracle or supernatural event is about to occur, so that you can set up equipment and methods to capture all information on the event, and then perform various tests and propose hypothesis. My view is that you cannot do such a thing, and that places you at a disadvantage in your attempts to prove miracles do not occur.
Too often critics of Christianity fail to distinguish between superstition and miracles - Christianity has tried to remove superstition, with varying success throughout history.
This is a fair example for me to explain how Iām reading Taqās pointāplease correct me if Iām wrong!
Science uses methods, established over time, which regard evidence, testable hypotheses, etc. These methods werenāt established in an effort to exclude supernatural ideas. They became established because they have been proven to reliably assess reality.
If one professes an idea which by its nature makes it immune to such analysis, science isnāt intentionally excluding it. It simply canāt assess it, except perhaps to note that evidence has not been found to support it.
Sure. Thatās the nature of your conception. Science hasnāt disproven it, but itās not deliberately pushing it aside. Furthermore, if your supernatural entities are said to affect our empirical reality, then those effects can be empirically analyzed and information gained through the process.
In a nutshell this is why I donāt like Gouldās ānon-overlapping magisteriaā or similar conceptions. There is only one reality, and we have a variety of intellectual tools available which we can use to understand it.
I find it difficult to see the rational behind the use of methods developed by scientists to examine natural phenomena, applied in areas that by definition, do not meet the criteria for physical examination. Supernatural ideas, as you and others seem to mean (I regard these as superstitions) are surely particular ones that are not, in themselves, natural phenomena. Thus I am unable to follow your reasoning on this.
Many people have discussed an āidea of godā and none have done so in a way that Christian theology talks of God. I think you should appreciate the irony in this - our understanding of God is not a product of an idea, or of a natural event(s) - it would be instructive to realise that the criteria you suggest (if I understand it correctly) fits far better with the Hellenic idea of gods and how they were thought to interact with nature and people.
The transcendence of God has been discussed many centuries before we would think of the scientific method, so it is incorrect to imply that this may be a way to exclude an idea or hypothesis from scientific scrutiny.
I must say that I am unable to comprehend the rest of your comments - perhaps if you bring some specifics regarding transcendence or other theological matters, I may be able to make further comment.
That brings up an old but interesting question: Can supernatural or miraculous events be distinguished from phenomena which are brought about by very advanced technologies? How? Is the natural vs. supernatural distinction always a meaningful one?
Suppose I could use a time machine to visit the first century and could take along anything I wanted. My āsupernaturalā pair of two-way radios would allow me to converse with people while I remained āinvisibleā to them. My magnifying glass could convince people that fire comes from my hands and can burn a pile of leaves. My bottles of antibiotic pills could miraculously heal people. And if I were a trauma physician who could take along a lot of equipment and some skilled assistants, I could āmiraculouslyā heal cleft palates, reattach retinas to restore eyesight, and remove tumors without my patients feeling any pain. And if I took along a portable superconductivity experiment, I could āsupernaturallyā levitate a magnet so that witnesses would compare me to Elisha floating an axe head. Wouldnāt people in the first century consider me a miracle-worker or some kind of sorcerer? (Obviously, this has been a popular trope for fiction writers.)
I often think of the difficulties in distinguishing the supernatural from the natural-but-advanced-technologies when I consider how we would react to witnessing the kinds of miraculous events described in the Bible. Did Jesus always transcend natural law (i.e., the laws of physics) when he performed miracles or did he actually work in concert with those natural laws in ways we still canāt comprehend? I donāt doubt that Jesus had the ability to do the āsupernaturalā. Iām just saying that I canāt say that I know that that was necessary.
So, is a miracle always ātranscending natureā or is it simply beyond the comprehension and explanation of the audience? Personally, Iām still inclined to think in terms of the former but I canāt necessarily prove that that is the only reasonable position.
And that is the problem. The Bible does not speak of either āmiraclesā or āsupernaturalā events. The language of the Bible deals in āsignsā and āwonders,ā which served a specific purpose, namely to identify and authenticate the one who spoke for God. Even the term āsupernaturalā would have had no meaning to a first-century audience. For them, there was the seen and the unseen, the physical and the spiritual.
Supernatural? That is an entirely foreign concept to the Bible.
Ordinarily I would agree with you. After all, the O.T. is practically devoid of any beneficial reference to a general resurrection. Pretty odd considering how much Christianity says it relies upon the O.T. to establish the truth of its main prophet and doctrines.
But I donāt think you can really say the Supernatural is a foreign concept to the Bible - - for āSupernaturalā is the normal sense of the āMiraculousā. Technically speaking, a āsignā doesnāt have to be miraculous. But to the casual observor it is almost always so:
The Ten Plagues of Egypt? While some of them may not have been so impossible or implausible, several of them are completely imbued with a miraculous - - i.e. supernatural - - aspect! In some respects, lining up several natural signs into an indisputable sequence is quite miraculous. Having all the first born die, that is certainly a terrible kind of miraculous! The rod of Moses becoming a snake - - miraculous.
The talking donkey? Miraculous.
The magical hair of Samson? Miraculous, of course.
Maybe I donāt understand, but as written I would completely disagree. My working definition of supernatural is something that, even in principle, will never be explained by science (i.e., parlor tricks donāt count.) The bible is chock full of such events. They can be (and were) observedāand in principle could be measured and recorded (should you happen to be at the location of oneāgood luck with that) but they cannot be explained by existing or future science.
How do we go about determining what will never be determined by future science? I canāt think of any methodology for doing that.
If we were living in 1750, could we determine that future science would figure out how to build radio communication devices but not ever be able to do something stupendous, such as bringing back to life a human who had been dead for days?
In short there are no āBiblical reasonsā to specifically believe that the earth is old. However the supposed Biblical reasons to believe otherwise are based on particular relatively narrow interpretations of Genesis 1. And there are sound hermeneutical reasons for believing that these interpretations are neither necessary, nor the best. In short there is a weak Biblical argument for a young earth. On there other hand there is strong evidence from natural revelation that the universe is very old. To doubt this evidence it is necessary to believe that God specifically created in such a way that natural history deceives us on this point. If God is a trustworthy author of both natural and special revelation, then those two revelations agree, and if they seem not to, then we are interpreting one or the other incorrectly.
In the days of the Galileo controversy there was abundant (but weak) Biblical evidence for geocentricity which caused the pope, and also Luther and Calvin on the protestant side, to soundly condemn those who accepted the Copernican conclusion that the earth orbited the sun. But, even at the time there those theologians who were willing to reevaluate what they thought the Bible said about these things. Eventually nearly everyone accepted the seemingly obvious interpretations of the many verses which seemed to say that the earth does not move while the sun revolves around it, were incorrect. The strong physical evidence from observation of nature eventually corrected the weak Biblical interpretations to the contrary. There was similar debate over whether the Bible said that the earth was flat, with a similar result. Over time there have probably been a number of misunderstandings about the Bible based assumptions made in ignorance other information.
The bottom line was that there was absolutely no āBiblicalā evidence for either a round earth or a heliocentric solar system, though people now do try to find such evidence. The simple fact is the Bible wasnāt given to us to answer these kinds of questions of mechanics. I believe the Bible simply does not tell us how old the earth is or even necessarily the mechanical details of creation.
There is good reason based on the original language and style of the early chapters of Genesis as well as comparisons to similar literature of the time to cause significant doubt that a strictly literal interpretation is what was intended. To interpret a passage as not strictly literal shouldnāt be such a troubling idea when have other literary genres in the Bible which we all interpret figuratively such poetry and apocalypse.
Neither is it a question of whether it is the Bible or nature that is false, as both must be true and compatible. We have to āreadā and interpret them side-by-side, when it comes to the way the physical world is, keeping in mind that the purpose of scientific study is to answer physical questions and Bible in intended to answer theological questions.
Iām not sure Iām following you either. Iāll try to restate a bit, and I hope to understand you better as well.
First, Iād trace this part of the thread back to this post
To me, this seems to be a philosophical and epistemological point, and not a theological one. Iām discussing this point specifically. I posted about it recently here.
A question, do you mean to say that āIt is a dogma of Christianity that God transcends His creation.ā is not a supernatural argument? I donāt think supernatural and superstitious mean the same thing. The first definition I find is ā(of a manifestation or event) attributed to some force beyond scientific understanding or the laws of nature.ā which squares with my understanding.
Many people have discussed an āidea of godā and none have done so in a way that Christian theology talks of God. I think you should appreciate the irony in this - our understanding of God is not a product of an idea, or of a natural event(s).
I think itās enough for my purpose here that itās not a natural event. Hence, itās supernatural, for what itās worth.
The transcendence of God has been discussed many centuries before we would think of the scientific method, so it is incorrect to imply that this may be a way to exclude an idea or hypothesis from scientific scrutiny.
Iām not saying itās a way to do anything. Iām only saying that it isnāt being excluded from scientific consideration by design. Making a quick edit here to add that itās probably a chicken-or-egg type situation.
I must say that I am unable to comprehend the rest of your comments - perhaps if you bring some specifics regarding transcendence or other theological matters, I may be able to make further comment.
I hope that clears things up a bit. Thanks. I donāt know what ātranscendenceā is for a start. I guess thatās not a specific though
We donāt have to. The text makes it clear. Unless you want to suggest that Jesus walking on water is natural, i.e., that it uses advanced technology that we will someday (at least in principle) understand, then, short of denying it happened, the most parsimonious explanation is that was accomplished by a divine intervention into the physical realm that violates the laws of physics. That is, it was supernatural.
If Jesus communicated by audible wireless with Peter, it would, I would argue, still be a supernatural event, or a miracle. This is true even knowing now that we have radio. Unless, again, your argument is that unknown but natural technology (from where?) was employed. Same with raising the dead. If future advancements in medical science allow us to resurrect someone who has been dead for three days, it will not make the biblical resurrections less supernatural, for youād still lack a natural explanation as to how Lazarus was raised. (It goes without saying that this is just my opinion.)
I think this is the crux of our difficulty in communicating. Transcendence when referring to God includes creation from nothing, and a ānon-dependenceā (or a relationship as we understand it) for God regarding the creation (or nature as you would say). Thus if we talk of an event being such that we define a cause-effect within the natural order, and ascribe this to God, we are indulging in theological error, if we say, I have measured that cause and concluded it is god or such language.
This is a very crude way of discussing theology, but it the best I can do within the context of your comments. IF someone says I saw a spirit do such and such, and measured the result, I would describe this as superstition.
IF a doctor has diagnosed an illness and the patient says I prayed for healing, and the doctor reports the illness has disappeared, we would discuss this, and as Christians say that the faith of the person has resulted in an answer to prayer - .we would still rely on the doctor for details - we would not see some measurable aspect that we would than produce as data proving god.
If my comments are clear, you should see that science has not been excluded, nor denied. The explanation of faith is subjective, but the diagnosis of the doctor is physical (or scientific). BUT if you want this scenario to become a scientific methodology, than you will be disappointed, as faith is not part of a scientific apparatus or method.
Thatās not easy for me to understand. But are you saying it means God (for example) is not āsupernaturalā? That may be the crux of what Iām trying to say.
Thus if we talk of an event being such that we define a cause-effect within the natural order, and ascribe this to God, we are indulging in theological error, if we say, I have measured that cause and concluded it is god or such language.
This is a very crude way of discussing theology, but it the best I can do within the context of your comments. IF someone says I saw a spirit do such and such, and measured the result, I would describe this as superstition.
IF a doctor has diagnosed an illness and the patient says I prayed for healing, and the doctor reports the illness has disappeared, we would discuss this, and as Christians say that the faith of the person has resulted in an answer to prayer - .we would still rely on the doctor for details - we would not see some measurable aspect that we would than produce as data proving god.
I see. What I did say above is that it should theoretically be possible to scientifically analyze such supposed effects on reality. Iām not saying that that should be a test which would disprove god.
If my comments are clear, you should see that science has not been excluded, nor denied. The explanation of faith is subjective, but the diagnosis of the doctor is physical (or scientific). BUT if you want this scenario to become a scientific methodology, than you will be disappointed, as faith is not part of a scientific apparatus or method.
I donāt want it to so perhaps we have some agreement at least.
Thatās very similar to the point I am trying to make. Itās not as if there is objective and empirical evidence for the supernatural that scientists are purposefully excluding.
You mention people being healed through faith. Obviously, not all Christians are healed through faith. Without going into the thorniness of the existence of evil and death, we could compare it to someone flipping a coin. The person claims that they can pray to God which allows him to always land on heads. However, 50% of the coin flips still land on tails. The explanation is that God does not answer all prayers, and tails are also part of Godās plan. Obviously, this explanation isnāt scientific. A result consistent with random luck satisfies the null hypothesis in this example. If the supernatural explanation is that Godās actions will be indistinguishable from God not acting at all, then that explanation can not be considered scientific since science requires a null hypothesis.
Perhaps a less controversial example would be the placebo effect. In drug studies, people report getting better at a higher rate than untreated people, even though all they are given is a sugar pill. No one thinks sugar pills are a universal panacea, so what is going on in these studies?
Apart from the evidence for and against a young or old earth, you say some things here that trouble me. You say it is a waste of time to speak to you of physical evidence, since you are unqualified to evaluate or even comprehend it. Yet you are āfully convincedā that there is sound scientific evidence for a young earth. With respect (and I do mean that) how can you be convinced of something in an area that you say is a waste of time to discuss, since you canāt comprehend it? This also makes me wonder if you consider yourself capable of understanding the difficulties of Hebrew translation and how other ancient literature helps us to understand word meanings and literary genre.
Your commitment to the Bible seems to me to be a commitment to particular dogma propounded by certain trusted individuals who you believe can interpret both science and the Bible for you. Since men who are both totally committed to the Bible and also have made its understanding their lifeās work can intelligently disagree with the young earth position, it is hard for me to believe that your commitment is solely to āthe Bibleā rather than to a particular viewpoint about it, that involves questions you donāt understand, or even want to talk about. You seek a simplistic answer to a complex question, when there is none.
With regard to determining what questions science can answer there are a number of approaches.
First, science makes no attempt to answer philosophical and metaphysical questions. Second science is by definition unable to deal with anything that cannot be observed. Even if science discovered a way to reanimate a dead human, it could answer the question of by what power Christ did it by merely speaking a word, or much less having the power to raise himself. There is also the problem of things that the laws of nature alone simply do not allow.
You work on the assumption that nothing can exist beyond nature, and therefore science can potentially answer all questions. But by what methodology can you rule out the supernatural?
