Evidence of miracles.

[AV1611VET]

You can repeat yourself all you want, and all you'll do is show that you do have a problem with skepticism as soon as someone tries to bring science into it. Again: if you want to use science to prove something, then expect it to be treated with science, that means people will be skeptical about it.



So, in other words, you're lying about the claim that science 'plutos miracles into magic'.

Have a nice day.

Don't let me spoil it.

 

[Hans Blaster]

Scams? yet you have no evidence other than belief that the pathologists were scammed!

You are still using a sceptic trope based on false philosophy,

Scam seems the most likely general conclusion.

The most likely conclusion is that someone substituted the human (?) tissues. All of these investigations occur (from what I can tell) *after* the altered host is "discovered". There is no "reproducibility" in any of this from what I have seen.

“ experience of consciousness away from body may be there in anecdotes , but it cannot happen in theory, so the experiences must be false”
You have got the horse and cart back to front.

Well this is something entirely different! I have no idea where you got the quote and it wasn't from me. I hope you're not trying to manufacture a quote for me. I have recently written about non-corporeal "spirits" not being physical, but nothing about any kind of out of body experience.

The axiomatic model that includes “ forces” is a manmade model of repeatable observations not the universe. You have no idea what is actually there.

Even that man made model, accepts that most of the matter and energy doesn’t interact ( that’s the meaning of dark) So you cannot know what is present , even observing you, provided it doesn’t interact with the things you observe.

Now a third topic (all unrelated). This post is a mess.

It is also drastically wrong. The "dark" materials certainly interact, but so far as we know only gravitationally. (Low cross-section interactions of dark matter with detectors are of course being pursued, but nothing so far.)

And from philosophy: In your own model your senses evolve only as needed for survival advantage. You don’t need to sense what does not interact with things needed for survival. In short you are blind to the extent of reality.

You are still trapped in a prison of not knowing the limitations of science seemingly.

Now a fourth topic. I'm not sure what evolution of senses have to do with anything. Are you implying some sort of "unevolved" senses?

Have you ever considered trying to keep your posts short, succinct, and limited to one topic? (It would help.)

 

[Mountainmike]

I replied to two statements.
Scam.
You have no basis to conclude it, other than apriori world view.

Otherwise I replied to this:
[Disembodied] Souls are physically impossible.

Evidence of experience disagrees.
You are treating the physical model as though it were reality (not abstract,) then assuming the universe is constrained to that model, Cart . Horse.

Study my response in that context.
You are jumping all over the place!

Scam seems the most likely general conclusion.

The most likely conclusion is that someone substituted the human (?) tissues. All of these investigations occur (from what I can tell) *after* the altered host is "discovered". There is no "reproducibility" in any of this from what I have seen.



Well this is something entirely different! I have no idea where you got the quote and it wasn't from me. I hope you're not trying to manufacture a quote for me. I have recently written about non-corporeal "spirits" not being physical, but nothing about any kind of out of body experience.



Now a third topic (all unrelated). This post is a mess.

It is also drastically wrong. The "dark" materials certainly interact, but so far as we know only gravitationally. (Low cross-section interactions of dark matter with detectors are of course being pursued, but nothing so far.)



Now a fourth topic. I'm not sure what evolution of senses have to do with anything. Are you implying some sort of "unevolved" senses?

Have you ever considered trying to keep your posts short, succinct, and limited to one topic? (It would help.)

 

[Hans Blaster]

General reply follows:

I replied to two statements.
Scam.
You have no basis to conclude it, other than apriori world view.

Otherwise I replied to this:
[Disembodied] Souls are physically impossible.

Evidence of experience disagrees.
You are treating the physical model as though it were reality (not abstract,) then assuming the universe is constrained to that model, Cart . Horse.

Study my response in that context.
You are jumping all over the place!

1. As I said before - scam seems the most likely conclusion based on the pattern of evidence available and a presumption (not assumption) of naturalism. If you want to convince outsiders of your claim (or they of their claim) you'll need some evidence that requires that the presumption be abandoned.

2. The comment about spirits was from a completely different post which you not only did not post, but crafted a new "quote" for "me". If you want to address that comment, reply to that post rather than mingling it in with some sort of omnibus response.

 

[Hans Blaster]

As to the question if the "eucharistic miracles" are "scams" or likely to be such I have a few questions.

I replied to two statements.
Scam.
You have no basis to conclude it, other than apriori world view.

First: What branches of Christianity are the sources of these claims?

From my recollection all of your examples seem to come from Catholic churches. (This is not surprising given your affiliation.) Are there other branches of Christianity that make similar claims about the bread (and wine?) of communion? If so, are those churches also of the belief that the bread and wine "become the body and blood of Christ"?

If such reports occur only in Catholic (and similar) churches, the there are some possible conclusions [perhaps you could come up with some intermediate alternatives, but I leave these main two possibilities]:

1. The Catholic eucharistic doctrine is correct and supported by divine action, or

2. that certain Catholics have strong doctrinal motivations to manufacture evidence that the flesh of Jesus is present in the communion wafers.

[There are many Catholics (and ex-Catholics) that would find alternative 2 more likely as after hundreds or even thousands of times receiving Communion, the wafer has never had a flesh-like flavor or texture. Instead, it had the flavor of dissolvable packing peanuts and the texture of a styrofoam egg carton.]

Second. Where, geographically, do these incidents take place?

From what I recall of skimming your posts, a lot of these cases arise in Latin America or other overwhelmingly Catholic countries. In such places the pathologists and scientists where most of their colleagues are either Catholic, were raised Catholic, or have been deeply exposed to Catholic culture. In such places no one bats an eye if all (or nearly all) of the experts are Catholic, because most of the appropriate experts in those places *are* Catholic. These all make it easier for the experts to succumb to motivated thinking.

Places, like the US, where Protestants are more numerous do not have that assumption and "all Catholic" expert teams stick out. If the number of these "eucharistic" miracles is much lower in places like the US than the proportion of Catholics would suggest, perhaps this should be telling us something about the nature of these claims.

Third. There have been some claims (and counter claims) about the chain of custody or provenance of the physical evidence.

In one case I recall that the spare consecrated hosts had been locked in the tabernacle. From my recollection, their was a key, but it never left the lock at our church. Even if the keys was removed we are not talking about sophisticated locking mechanisms and churches are rarely tightly secured. This opens the possibility of a clandestine substitution.

Another possibility is substitution by the "discovering" priest. Priests have been known to lie in service of their church and its doctrines. (One prominent priest admitted to a much more significant lie recently.)

There are also the possibilities of multi-person conspiracies to manufacture a miracle. These are all reasonable alternative to divine, supernatural intervention.

Fourth. Most of these incidents seem to be one-off cases.

While there are ways to investigate sets of independent events that can't be specifically predicted careful pre-event scrutiny would be preferred. If there are any locations where these events have taken place repeatedly have they been carefully monitored? (For example security cameras on the tabernacle and verification of non-flesh status before locking.)

The broad patterns of the reported incident show evidence of motivated reasoning by the discovers and investigators and the potential for fraud to take advantage of that reasoning. This is why fraud (aided and abetted by motivated reasoning) appears to be the most likely cause. And frankly, given these patterns the details of most individual cases are distractions.

 

[Mountainmike]

You have run through the list of sceptic tropes. Yet none of them account for the evidence.


A simple fact. Since there is no known mechanism to fake them, so the chain of custody ( which was actually demonstrable ) doesn’t solve the problem of their existence anyway.

I will have to say it again slowly.
It. was. Not. Substitution. Of . Human. Tissue.
Because.
Human . Tissue. Does. Not . Behave . Like . This. Ever.
Got it?


If you want to call it a scam. Explain how it was done. The pathologists would love to know, because they can’t figure it. Only you who has never seen it ( and who probably knows little about pathology ) thinks it can. That is a “ bold” place to be!

Since in some cases it was the pathologist that did the sampling also did the testing , there is no issue on custody either.

The teams are independent.
No common person.
A number of those involved were not religious anyway.

We have several instances of confirmed
- Traumatised cardiac tissue, ( Cochabamba epithelial) - even Lawrence later agreed Buenos airies was cardiac, the cardiac specialists said it straight away.
- Blood pushing out of bread not in. See the electron micrograph.
- progressive change not instant. So not substitution.
- All tests for human blood flesh pass, group AB.
- But no nuclear DNA profile.
- Abnormal elongated white cells. Which shouldn’t be there.
- Mitichondrial DNA with Middle East haplogroup (all 3cases tested for it, showed it) with 3 cases that’s a 1 in 64 billion coincidence.
Einstein said coincidence is “ gods way of staying anonymous”
- But showing heteroplasmy, so the mitochondrial dna is not the same, which is typical of cardiac trauma. It also means it was not the same sample. Check it out.


That can’t be faked, so can’t be subsituted. Got it?
No pathologist or cardiac specialist knows how, so how can you say it?

There was no common person between eg legnica and eg Cochabamba or Buenos airies.

Since nobody knows how to fake it, how was it faked several times?
Use science to answer please , not scepticism.

How was lanciano done 500 years before the earliest cardiac surgery or systematic anatomical investigation?

If you want to declare a scam, at least come up with a CREDIBLE way it was done. I mean use science not sceptic fabrication.
Not thow enough of a sceptic smoke screen and hope it drowns the facts.

The usual trope “ it was a Catholic that created a pious fraud” is nonsense And until you LOOk at the evidence , that’s the last conversation I will have on it with you.

The only truthful thing you said is it WAS the Catholic view of Eucharist.

As to the question if the "eucharistic miracles" are "scams" or likely to be such I have a few questions.



First: What branches of Christianity are the sources of these claims?

From my recollection all of your examples seem to come from Catholic churches. (This is not surprising given your affiliation.) Are there other branches of Christianity that make similar claims about the bread (and wine?) of communion? If so, are those churches also of the belief that the bread and wine "become the body and blood of Christ"?

If such reports occur only in Catholic (and similar) churches, the there are some possible conclusions [perhaps you could come up with some intermediate alternatives, but I leave these main two possibilities]:

1. The Catholic eucharistic doctrine is correct and supported by divine action, or

2. that certain Catholics have strong doctrinal motivations to manufacture evidence that the flesh of Jesus is present in the communion wafers.

[There are many Catholics (and ex-Catholics) that would find alternative 2 more likely as after hundreds or even thousands of times receiving Communion, the wafer has never had a flesh-like flavor or texture. Instead, it had the flavor of dissolvable packing peanuts and the texture of a styrofoam egg carton.]

Second. Where, geographically, do these incidents take place?

From what I recall of skimming your posts, a lot of these cases arise in Latin America or other overwhelmingly Catholic countries. In such places the pathologists and scientists where most of their colleagues are either Catholic, were raised Catholic, or have been deeply exposed to Catholic culture. In such places no one bats an eye if all (or nearly all) of the experts are Catholic, because most of the appropriate experts in those places *are* Catholic. These all make it easier for the experts to succumb to motivated thinking.

Places, like the US, where Protestants are more numerous do not have that assumption and "all Catholic" expert teams stick out. If the number of these "eucharistic" miracles is much lower in places like the US than the proportion of Catholics would suggest, perhaps this should be telling us something about the nature of these claims.

Third. There have been some claims (and counter claims) about the chain of custody or provenance of the physical evidence.

In one case I recall that the spare consecrated hosts had been locked in the tabernacle. From my recollection, their was a key, but it never left the lock at our church. Even if the keys was removed we are not talking about sophisticated locking mechanisms and churches are rarely tightly secured. This opens the possibility of a clandestine substitution.

Another possibility is substitution by the "discovering" priest. Priests have been known to lie in service of their church and its doctrines. (One prominent priest admitted to a much more significant lie recently.)

There are also the possibilities of multi-person conspiracies to manufacture a miracle. These are all reasonable alternative to divine, supernatural intervention.

Fourth. Most of these incidents seem to be one-off cases.

While there are ways to investigate sets of independent events that can't be specifically predicted careful pre-event scrutiny would be preferred. If there are any locations where these events have taken place repeatedly have they been carefully monitored? (For example security cameras on the tabernacle and verification of non-flesh status before locking.)

The broad patterns of the reported incident show evidence of motivated reasoning by the discovers and investigators and the potential for fraud to take advantage of that reasoning. This is why fraud (aided and abetted by motivated reasoning) appears to be the most likely cause. And frankly, given these patterns the details of most individual cases are distractions.

 

[Hans Blaster]

You have run through the list of sceptic tropes. Yet none of them account for the evidence.

Those aren't tropes, those are questions. Long before the details of specific cases are relevant, we must talk about the overall pattern.

[MEGA SNIP]

The usual trope “ it was a Catholic that created a pious fraud” is nonsense And until you LOOk at the evidence , that’s the last conversation I will have on it with you.

It is a reasonable conclusion to a non-Catholic.

The only truthful thing you said is it WAS the Catholic view of Eucharist.

Of course. [The word you were looking for was "accurate". You can disagree with my conclusions or questions, but none of my statements were lies.] The Church has standards of indoctrination.

 

[partinobodycular]

And until you LOOk at the evidence , that’s the last conversation I will have on it with you.

You keep faulting people for not looking at the evidence, yet you haven't actually presented us with any. None. Zilch. Nada.

This in itself is enough to discredit your claims. We don't need to look any further because you've already done a totally sufficient job of discrediting the evidence simply by your inability to produce it.

 

[SelfSim]

If you want to call it a scam. Explain how it was done.

I personally couldn't care less about constructing yet another fantasy.
How about you try explaining how this 'evidence' was collected, in order to attract more serious attention?

If you want to declare a scam, at least come up with a CREDIBLE way it was done. I mean use science not sceptic fabrication.

Science is defined by its process, ie: the 'how'.
That's what makes any evidence collected in the first place 'CREDIBLE'.

 

[Mountainmike]

That’s why the evidence for host to heart IS CREDIBLE
It used scientific processes.

But there’s the thing.
All the QUALIFIED. pathologists who EXAMINED the evidence and used a battery of SCIENTIFIC tests are convinced that it is beyond science to explain. They don’t think it’s a fantasy.

Only the armchair sceptics of CF who know NOTHING about it, REFUSE to research it, have never even SEEN the evidence let alone tested the samples are convinced it’s a scam. So they make a BELIEF satement that it is a scam.

I prefer the SCIENCE and evidence thanks. Not apriori sceptic assumptions based on beliefs.
So I’m with the pathologists on it!

I personally couldn't care less about constructing yet another fantasy.
How about you try explaining how this 'evidence' was collected, in order to attract more serious attention?
Science is defined by its process, ie: the 'how'.
That's what makes any evidence collected in the first place 'CREDIBLE'.

 

[NxNW]

I prefer the SCIENCE and evidence thanks.

You haven't seen the science or the evidence.

 

[partinobodycular]

You haven't seen the science or the evidence.

And apparently neither has anyone else, except for the chosen group of "professionals" who are all convinced that the phenomena is miraculous. At least according to Mountainmike. Not a dissenter in the bunch. But then again we'll never know because it seems as though we're just supposed to take Mike's word for it.

And yes, I refuse to research it any further until Mike gives me some credible evidence to warrant such an expenditure of my time.

So there you go Mike, just give me something that'll justify me looking any further into your claims.

 

[Mountainmike]

Do none of you do critical thinking?

I dont need to see it in person.
I am not the one disputing the conclusion of world class pathologists. You are!

(And quoting magicians who dispute the finding of 300 eminenently qualified professors and doctors in your case. The magician wins in your thinking only because he agrees with you, it is called confirmation bias..)

You are the ones disputing the science when you have not seen any of it and even if you did, you do not have the background to comment. Cardiologists / pathologists like Zugibe (buenos airies) and Engel (legnica) have written HUNDREDS of publications on the pathology of the heart.
You have written 0.

So Excuse me , if I believe Zugibe and Engel.
I like scientific evidence , not sceptic apriori "Belief"

This is a waste of time.
If one of you wants to discuss why 3 of these phenomena spread across the western world independently had a mitochondrial haplogroup for the middle east showing heteroplasmy, different in each case. (but no nuclear DNA profile) Lets talk science.

Otherwise you all lost. Not a single cogent scientific argument or even a scientific statement between you..

You haven't seen the science or the evidence.

 

[SelfSim]

That’s why the evidence for host to heart IS CREDIBLE
It used scientific processes.

Yes .. that is your belief .. but that won't necessarily work for everyone else.

But there’s the thing.
All the QUALIFIED. pathologists who EXAMINED the evidence and used a battery of SCIENTIFIC tests are convinced that it is beyond science to explain. They don’t think it’s a fantasy.

This shows me their lack of understanding of the scientific process. Science doesn't prove things unreachable by that process. (Regardless of the 'shouted' (upper case) words).
I couldn't give a toss what their profession is. Pathology tests are never absolutely conclusive. Have you ever heard of error bars?

Only the armchair sceptics of CF who know NOTHING about it, REFUSE to research it, have never even SEEN the evidence let alone tested the samples are convinced it’s a scam. So they make a BELIEF satement that it is a scam.

You see, those so-called 'sceptics of CFs' are looking for something that will convince them. All they see is shouted words .. and nothing else because that's all you've done for pages and pages of this thread.

I prefer the SCIENCE and evidence thanks. Not apriori sceptic assumptions based on beliefs.

Can you demonstrate your test for diagnosing what a belief is, then?

So I’m with the pathologists on it!

.. and they're just people .. same as you and me .. (yawn) .. and you are just demonstrating that you're a believer and a follower of others' words.

 

[partinobodycular]

I dont need to see it in person.

I don't either, but I would hope that some independent expert has. It's not a problem that I myself haven't had a chance to examine the evidence, but if no one has, then that's a problem. Personally I wouldn't know the first thing about questioning your experts' opinions, but I do want to see the opinion of someone who can question them. Without that second, third, or fourth opinion the expert's claims lack a degree of credibility. And in the case of the miraculous, credibility is crucial. The greater the number of skeptical eyes corroborating the evidence the better. Notice...I specifically said skeptical eyes.

I am not the one disputing the conclusion of world class pathologists. You are!

You're darn right I am, and I'm quite sure that there are a great number of highly qualified people who are just as skeptical as I am, but like me they haven't seen anything but claims, and so are unconvinced. Do you think that every expert in pathology will agree with your expert's opinion, especially without having had the opportunity to examine the evidence for themselves? And if they won't accept it out of hand, then why should I?

So Excuse me , if I believe Zugibe and Engel.
I like scientific evidence , not sceptic apriori "Belief"

I like scientific evidence too, but unlike you I'm not willing to accept extraordinary claims without a similarly extraordinary level of evidentiary scrutiny. Skepticism is crucial to sound judgment. Once you lose that, which you seem to have done, your judgment understandably becomes suspect.

I realize that I've given you a high hurdle to clear, but in the case of miracles the height is warranted.

 

[FrumiousBandersnatch]

Do none of you do critical thinking?

Scepticism is a key component of critical thinking.

 

[Mountainmike]

Scepticism is a key component of critical thinking.

I am a sceptic. I question it all. That’s what it means.

However.

For a group of people who saw none of the samples, who have no pathology training to dismiss the opinion of many world class pathologists who in this case are cardiac specialists( and who amply qualify as court expert witnesses ) to state those pathologists got it wrong, simply because they don’t like the conclusion ,

That is imposing a priori belief.
It’s not scepticism.

Question the evidence by all means.
One test positive for human tissue but no nuclear DNA is interesting not conclusive.

But the same result for four phenomena in several places by double figures of independent laboratories is conclusive. Few forensic samples are subject to so many tests.

When combined with the three instances where mitichondrial human DNA tests were positive, with same ( Middle East) haplogroup but different heteroplasmy so prpof they are different samples.
That’s beyond reasonable doubt, it is human tissue, with no nuclear code.

When combined with four independent instances of in vitro leucocytes indicating recent life. That too is beyond reasonable doubt - it happened. It is traumatised cardiac tissue. The question is why not whether.

I’ve looked up papers on mitochondrial heteroplasmy after cardiac trauma.
Have the ones who dismissed it?

 

[FrumiousBandersnatch]

I am a sceptic. I question it all. That’s what it means.

However.

For a group of people who saw none of the samples, who have no pathology training to dismiss the opinion of many world class pathologists who in this case are cardiac specialists( and who amply qualify as court expert witnesses ) to state those pathologists got it wrong, simply because they don’t like the conclusion ,

that is imposing a priori belief.

It’s not scepticism.

Question the evidence by all means.

I’ve looked up papers on mitochondrial heteroplasmy after cardiac trauma. Have they?

Probably not - I doubt they think it's relevant - have you asked them?

 

[Mountainmike]

Probably not - I doubt they think it's relevant - have you asked them?

Sceptic logic. Me.
I’ve looked at it all, and so decided it is ( or is not) fraud (, or inconclusive ) because (.. insert reasons) . ( a statement from science)
Logical Horse. Cart.

This forum Illogic
I’ve decided it’s fraud so I don’t need to look at it because ( ..insert usual tropes, However inapplicable ) ( a statement from belief)
Illogical Cart. Horse.

 

[FrumiousBandersnatch]

Sceptic logic.
I’ve looked at it all, and so decided it is ( or is not) fraud because (.. insert reasons) . ( a statement from science)
Horse. Cart.

This forum Illogic
I’ve decided it’s fraud so I don’t need to look at it because ( ..insert tropes) ( a statement from belief)
Cart. Horse.

Er... OK, whatever