Evidence of miracles.

[Mountainmike]

Remember, I asked you for documents...you had NONE.

Instead you gave me a list of forensics "experts", who it turns out weren't all that credible. Including one who went to prison for fraud, and another who actually worked for a television station at the time.

You do have a tendency to overstate your evidence.

I gave books full of forensic reports , of practising legal forensics experts. Six miracles , Five continents , dozens of forensics labs involved. All of them saying the same.

You found one interview with one, ( who was at a low ebb at the time) which did not discredit his testimony in any way, he has a professional legal forensics chair to this day. How so if he is incompetent? The slides for tixtla were validated by others too.

You only have smoke and mirrors.

I have dozens of forensics reports.
No contest. Discuss the forensics. In your professional opinion was it heart tissue?

I forgot, you don’t have a professional opionion!

In this Lourdes case I have 20 medical professors on my side who sit on the Lourdes medical commission. The cures later reviewed by others one I named.

The only sceptic nonsense about the cure is from a magician sceptic wacko, who was neither qualified nor involved !

Yet you believe the wacko!
No contest. I prefer science thanks.

 

[partinobodycular]

I have dozens of forensics reports.

May I see one?

 

[Irkle Berserkle]

So what you're proposing is that we should find a preponderance of anecdotal evidence... a la Michael Shermer to be somehow convincing?

Should we likewise find the evidence for bigfoot to be convincing, or alien abductions, or the Loch Ness monster, or ghosts?

The sheer number of anecdotal stories doesn't equate to evidence. And should always be taken with a hefty dose of skepticism.

You reveal your lack of familiarity with the actual evidence. The evidence concerning Bigfoot, alien abductions, the Loch Ness monster and ghosts - and I am very familiar with all of it - does not even approach, in terms of volume or level of research, the evidence for other phenomena such as After-Death Communications. (The evidence for ghosts and apparitions is quite compelling.)

"Convincing"? Yes, you should find it convincing that these phenomena unquestionably do occur and demand an explanation. On their face, they point in a pretty obvious non-mundane direction. If you insist on a non-mundane explanation, you should be able to articulate one that will at least withstand ratiional scrutiny and consists of something more than "We may not know what they are, but we know there must be a naturalistic explanation and they certainly aren't After-Death Communications." No, we don't know this.

I'm sorry, but your post reveals that you simply don't know what you're talking about. After 50+ years in this field, I no longer have the patience to humor those who have no depth of knowledge.

 

[partinobodycular]

in terms of volume or level of research, the evidence for other phenomena such as After-Death Communications. (The evidence for ghosts and apparitions is quite compelling.)

I'm sure that a bigfoot proponent would disagree. But what exactly is your standard?

"Compelling" after all is a very subjective term, and doesn't make for much of an objective standard.

Does it simply need to be "mysterious". Does it need to be verifiable? Is eyewitness testimony sufficient? Or maybe it just has to be on the History channel, there's no more credible source than that.

What's your standard for compelling?

 

[partinobodycular]

I no longer have the patience to humor those who have no depth of knowledge.

Ah, so you're only interested in the gullible...got it.

 

[Hans Blaster]

The only sceptic nonsense about the cure is from a magician sceptic wacko, who was neither qualified nor involved !

Yet you believe the wacko!
No contest. I prefer science thanks.

It would seem Mr. Randi gets under your skin.

Many magicians (amateur and professional) have been involved in investigating fraudulent miracles and healings. As I recall it was James Randi and Johnny Carson (himself an amateur) magician that exposed the fraudulent faith healing scam of Peter Popov. (Randi also exposed Uri Geller's "spoonbending" on Carson's show.)

The tools used by magicians to trick audiences and "read minds" are exactly the same ones used by fake healers and psychics.

Another such magician turned debunker was Erich Weiss (aka the Great Houdini).

 

[Mountainmike]

He doesn’t get under my skin. He’s an irrelevance.

When the Lourdes medical commission consists of many medical professors who leave no stone unturned.

Yet the only defence here is a smoke screen from Randi, who wasn’t involved.

I know what gets my vote - science.

So What gets under my skin is that on a so called scientific forum, people believe every sceptic that offers a priori opinion, against a consensus scientific opinion by medics who actually investigated.

if Anyone looked at leurets book ( or more recently theilleur ) who described the process , they would know the lengths they go to to exclude any possibility of fraud. Fraud is the first assumption, not last.

The verdict on the pelvic case would not have been given without X-rays before and after.

Even modern reviews of evidence agree “ inexplicable” . With Cures too fast to be natural process.

So why does anyone mention a man with no medical qualification and sceptical bias at the outset?

It’s the sceptic way.

Study the Lourdes medical commission. See what it is that decides.

Just like not a single comment was made of the tissue sections and forensic conclusions on Eucharistic miracles.
The contest was just sceptic smoke , not scientific fire.

It would seem Mr. Randi gets under your skin.

Many magicians (amateur and professional) have been involved in investigating fraudulent miracles and healings. As I recall it was James Randi and Johnny Carson (himself an amateur) magician that exposed the fraudulent faith healing scam of Peter Popov. (Randi also exposed Uri Geller's "spoonbending" on Carson's show.)

The tools used by magicians to trick audiences and "read minds" are exactly the same ones used by fake healers and psychics.

Another such magician turned debunker was Erich Weiss (aka the Great Houdini).

 

[Hans Blaster]

He doesn’t get under my skin. He’s an irrelevance.

When the Lourdes medical commission consists of many medical professors who leave no stone unturned.

Yet the only defence here is a smoke screen from Randi, who wasn’t involved.

I know what gets my vote - science.

So What gets under my skin is that on a so called scientific forum, people believe every sceptic that offers a priori opinion, against a consensus scientific opinion by medics who actually investigated.

if Anyone looked at leurets book ( or more recently theilleur ) who described the process , they would know the lengths they go to to exclude any possibility of fraud.

The verdict on the pelvic case would not have been given without X-rays before and after.

Even modern reviews of evidence agree “ inexplicable” . With Cures too fast to be natural process.

So why does anyone mention a man with no medical qualification and sceptical bias at the outset?

It’s the sceptic way.

Study the Lourdes medical commission. See what it is that decides.

Just like not a single comment was made of the tissue sections and forensic conclusions on Eucharistic miracles.
The contest was just sceptic smoke , not scientific fire.

How many people claim to be "healed" at Lourdes each year?

How many "verified miracles" of such healing has The Church declared there?

 

[Mountainmike]

How many people claim to be "healed" at Lourdes each year?

How many "verified miracles" of such healing has The Church declared there?

Understand five things.

1/ Most do not subject themselves to the process. Not interested.
2/Of those that do - There are several stages to the process.
A medical enquiry comprising many doctors investigates for years, both before and after.
3/ They present evidence to a committee of professors. Who decide.

The lambertini criteria are almost impossible to pass: the disease must be serious and impossible to cure by human means as well as not be in a stage liable to remission. The cure must be instantaneous, complete, permanent, and must not be preceded by any treatment to which the cure could be attributed.

4/ Eg there are many occasions on which cures occur in which the speed of cure completely negate natural means, but are outlawed by the criteria none the less. Cures have been effected but returned years later, again discounted. Most patients have been treated but unsuccessfully , but a later cure is then cast into doubt.

The process takes up to 20 years to ensure none return!

But that only defines “ inexplicable”

Then
5/ the church decides if it is safe to attribute the cure as a miracle,Many more fall by the wayside, even though medics can’t explain them.

The fact that tens of cures are left is amazing.

Just one is needed.

There can be many more a year.
They are rejected by the criteria.
Read the books by the medical commission.

I think the criteria need a change.
Either incurable,OR too fast to be natural, OR cured but only partially. Or cured but not permanently. Many cancers return even if cured for a decade.
The patients wouldn’t be there if prior medicine had worked!

 

[Hans Blaster]

Understand five things.

1/ Most do not subject themselves to the process. Not interested.
2/Of those that do - There are several stages to the process.
A medical enquiry comprising many doctors investigates for years, both before and after.
3/ They present evidence to a committee of professors. Who decide.

The lambertini criteria are almost impossible to pass: the disease must be serious and impossible to cure by human means as well as not be in a stage liable to remission. The cure must be instantaneous, complete, permanent, and must not be preceded by any treatment to which the cure could be attributed.

4/ Eg there are many occasions on which cures occur in which the speed of cure completely negate natural means, but are outlawed by the criteria none the less. Cures have been effected but returned years later, again discounted. Most patients have been treated but unsuccessfully , but a later cure is then cast into doubt.

The process takes up to 20 years to ensure none return!

But that only defines “ inexplicable”

Then
5/ the church decides if it is safe to attribute the cure as a miracle,Many more fall by the wayside, even though medics can’t explain them.

The fact that tens of cures are left is amazing.

Just one is needed.

There can be many more a year.
They are rejected by the criteria.
Read the books by the medical commission.

I think the criteria need a change.

So what you are saying (without any useful quantification) is that lots of people leave places like Lourdes after taking the "healing waters" with rather mundane perceptions of improvements to their health ("Claire's bad knee didn't act up so badly after she went to Lourdes.") that are so minor and unremarkable that the Church doesn't even bother trying to claim they are "miraculous"? Only those weird remissions and freak medical occurrences that are out of the ordinary get the full "House, S.J." treatment and those last few that can't quite be explained are then "miracles". Seems like a rather convenient "miracles of the unexplicable" situation.

Are these miracles actual suspensions of laws of nature in someone's favor, or are they just unlikely occurrences that you get to attribute to divine favor?

 

[Subduction Zone]

Do you study anything before declare it a fraud?

Your final comments on the shroud proved it. Citing papers you had never read as “ evidence for fraud” by an author whose views you clearly didn’t know, supporting the authenticity of the shroud not debunking it! But any cut and paste will do huh!

In yet another case I’ve told you where to look: books written by medical doctors that head the medical bureau.
The commission of medical professors decides on medical cases, on the basis of that evidence.

Leuret ( modern miraculous cures) describes the tortuous process and doctors involved needed to declare both inexplicable ( by medical commission) and a miracle ( decided by church) in the period described, and all the safe guards that eliminate fraud.

Terre de Guerisons ( in french, theilleur) , head until 2010 brings it to present day.
Sadly many books on such things are not English. ( just like Eucharistic miracle works are in a variety of languages)

The church chooses not to declare many inexplicable cures as a miracle. The church waits for decades before declaration, long after the medical commission has investigated. That’s why there are no more recent cases.

But apriori scepticism is easier. It doesn’t trouble itself with annoyances like evidence.

You lost in your first sentence.

 

[Mountainmike]

What I am saying is read the evidence.

You would know the answer to all your questions if you did.

Study the commission. How it works. The reviews that have since occurred.
then decide.

There are many more cures than meet the strict criteria for declaring a miracle. It’s a one way proposition. Those that don’t make it are not thereby declared explicable. Many are not.

Many cancers recur. An instant inexplicable cure doesn’t make the list if it returns three years later. I think the criteria are too restrictive.

If it was surgery + chemo that achieved the same, you would not argue the cure was real. Except surgery + chemo is not instant.

Sadly those on this forum prefer to listen to a magician who didn’t study it, not the many professors who did. As a scientist I prefer the professors to the magician.

So what you are saying (without any useful quantification) is that lots of people leave places like Lourdes after taking the "healing waters" with rather mundane perceptions of improvements to their health ("Claire's bad knee didn't act up so badly after she went to Lourdes.") that are so minor and unremarkable that the Church doesn't even bother trying to claim they are "miraculous"? Only those weird remissions and freak medical occurrences that are out of the ordinary get the full "House, S.J." treatment and those last few that can't quite be explained are then "miracles". Seems like a rather convenient "miracles of the unexplicable" situation.

Are these miracles actual suspensions of laws of nature in someone's favor, or are they just unlikely occurrences that you get to attribute to divine favor?

 

[Tinker Grey]

Oops. Sorry.

np

 

[Hans Blaster]

What I am saying is read the evidence.

You would know the answer to all your questions if you did.

Study the commission. How it works. The reviews that have since occurred.
then decide.

There are many more cures than meet the strict criteria for declaring a miracle. It’s a one way proposition. Those that don’t make it are not thereby declared explicable. Many are not.

Many cancers recur. An instant inexplicable cure doesn’t make the list if it returns three years later. I think the criteria are too restrictive.

If it was surgery + chemo that achieved the same, you would not argue the cure was real. Except surgery + chemo is not instant.

Sadly those on this forum prefer to listen to a magician who didn’t study it, not the many professors who did. As a scientist I prefer the professors to the magician.

None of these volumes by learned Catholic intellectuals means anything without the answer to this question. So I ask again:

Are these miracles actual suspensions of laws of nature in someone's favor, or are they just unlikely occurrences that you get to attribute to divine favor?

 

[NxNW]

• When such an event happens to you, it is not anecdotal evidence. It is direct experience.

• That's when you should be extra skeptical, because your emotions get in the way.

  [*]When your experiences closely mesh with those of thousands or even millions of other sane and credible people, there gradually accumulates a mountain of evidence that simply can't be ignored.

  
  The plural of anecdote is not data.

One of my favorite tales involves arch-skeptic Michael Shermer, with whom I've communicated. He and his wife experienced an almost classic After-Death Communication from her late grandfather that was very close to some I've experienced. He described it in Scientific American, Anomalous Events That Can Shake One’s Skepticism to the Core - Scientific American.

That's a great story. But it's not evidence of a miracle. I once missed dying a horrible death by a tenth of a second. I was shaken to my core for quite awhile that day, legs trembling, etc. But I've never once suspected that a miracle was involved.

All mysteries are not miracles.

 

[Mountainmike]

That’s good.

Because none of the judgements are made by catholic intellectuals.
The commission is open to all medics and professors.

If the medics say it can’t happen in nature, it’s good enough for me,
Then combined with WHERE it took place , and that it is not recorded elsewhere gives your answer.

You cannot prove God. Until you put him in the model.
Till then all you can do is determine inexplicable ,
and then use context for who or how.

Just read the science.
Then decide, good order.

None of these volumes by learned Catholic intellectuals means anything without the answer to this question. So I ask again:

Are these miracles actual suspensions of laws of nature in someone's favor, or are they just unlikely occurrences that you get to attribute to divine favor?

 

[Hans Blaster]

That’s good.

Because none of the judgements are made by catholic intellectuals. The commission is open to all medics and professors.

If they say it can’t happen in nature, it’s good enough for me,
Then combined with WHERE it took place , and is not recorded elsewhere gives your answer.

So you're saying that these miraculous healings result in the suspension of the physical laws of the Universe?

 

[NxNW]

I have dozens of forensics reports.
No contest. Discuss the forensics. In your professional opinion was it heart tissue?

I forgot, you don’t have a professional opionion!

In this Lourdes case I have 20 medical professors on my side who sit on the Lourdes medical commission.

If you're not on the commission, then using your own logic, you don't have a valid opinion either. But Randi partnered with doctors who specialize in the type of ailment described in your case. They examined the reports from the commission and found inconsistencies and omissions, which he describes in detail at the link I provided earlier.

The only sceptic nonsense about the cure is from a magician sceptic wacko, who was neither qualified nor involved !

This is a lie, as I described above.
And yet you too are neither qualified nor involved, correct?

No contest. I prefer science thanks.

You're not qualified to comment on the science. And as Randi has proven on countless occasions, miracles are faked, and the scientists are easily fooled by con artists.

 

[Mountainmike]

If you're not on the commission, then using your own logic, you don't have a valid opinion either. But Randi examined the reports from the commission and found inconsistencies and omissions, which he describes in detail at the link I provided earlier.



And yet you too are neither qualified nor involved, correct?



You're not qualified to comment on the science. And as Randi has proven on countless occasions, miracles are faked, and the scientists are easily fooled by con artists.

Randi isn’t a medic.
Many medics came to a different conclusion in a tightly controlled investigation.

Tell me. If you get cancer will you go to a qualified medic or an apriori sceptic magician. Tell us which do you trust in oncology?

If you were scientists maybe just one of you would read the books on the process. But no. You prefer magicians!

 

[FrumiousBandersnatch]

The evidence could not be substantiated.

Who said anything about Randi's opinion? Clearly you haven't read his examination of your 'data'.



Link, please.



What do skeptics want to hear? Link? Do you speak for them?



Is anyone claiming it is?

The paper has been found to be poorly documented and riddled with errors and contradictions. Efforts to substantiate the claims were unsuccessful.

Yes, the documentation is poor and some of the reported data does seem contradictory, and it is also odd that such an apparently amazing recovery was given so little medical and media attention.

Spontaneous remission from such bone cancers of that kind is rare, but does happen, and given the throughput of seriously ill patients at Lourdes, it should not be so surprising that such a case was found there. AIUI, the overall rate of remissions, recoveries, and cures of Lourdes visitors is not exceptional.

IME Mike will only double-down when claims supporting his beliefs are questioned. Those producing evidence in support are impeccable, those raising questions are charlatans.