MKJ
Contributor
No one in their right mind seriously thinks that.
Some people seriously do, whether they are in their right mind i won't speculate. But that was the assertion of the individual my original comment was directed at - that God could do what he wanted, including planting false evidence or making things look older than they actually are.
The Catholics have some interesting rules about that, you can't conclude a miracle until all the naturalistic explanations are exhausted. Exorcisms for example are pretty rare, except maybe in Africa, for that reason. The whole problem with approaching a miracle with science because you would have to assume a miracle is a possibility. Given the epistemology it seems unlikely.
It isn't impossible for a scientist to concede that a miracle is possible, it would just limit what could be said about it.
I get what your saying though, you could show up charlatans or maybe clear up misconceptions using empirical methodologies.
Yes - you could place some limits around what had supposedly happened. And of course one could build a circumstantial case, and those can be quite strong depending on the circumstances.
I think it's important to understand that God rested from the work of creation, at least the creation of the natural world. Now God has since created Israel and makes us new creatures in Christ, I doubt you'll get something isolated that you can test in a lab for that. According to most theologians the last day of creation, the Sabbath rest, continues at least until the return of Christ.
Still, prophets challenged God to do things only God can do. I really don't know what kind of manifestation would be suitable for empirical testing but I think such a thing is highly unlikely.
You aren't going to be able to test for anything that is metaphysical in nature, in any case.
We think of miracles as supernatural but for God is the most natural thing in the world.
Sure - the natural world depends on the supernatural. Even a miracle could be achieved by totally natural means - to some extent the designation of something as a miracle has more to do with how we understand it than how it actually came to be.
C.S. Lewis once talked with JRR Tolken about myths and JRR Tolken said he wrote myths and the Bible is a myth, the only difference being that the Bible is true. I think what he was saying is that it's mythic in it's scope but never the less happened.
I am very much in line with both Lewis' and Tolkien's views on both science and mythology. I would put them a bit differently though than I think you are understanding them. I would say that the myths in it are reflective of the reality they seek to describe. In some cases they are meant to have happened - say, the book of Acts. Those historical events are derived from the mythic or metaphysical or spiritual truths that underlie them.
In other cases the myths are meant to describe spiritual realities, but not historical events, or only partially so.
A human poet will try and create myths from reality, but they are imperfect because they don't see the whole picture and because of failure of craft. God doesn't suffer from those problems. Unlike human poets, God's poetry can't tell lies, as Plato accuses the pagan poets of doing.
Remember that Lewis says "I have therefore no difficulty in accepting, say, the view of those scholars who tell us that the account of creation in Genesis is derived from earlier Semitic stories which were pagan and mythical. He like Tolkien was a scholar of mythology, and they understood it in that sense.
I'm big on evidential apologetics, positive evidence for the Scriptures is one of my favorite studies. The single most important proof for the miracles of the Scriptures is the living witness attached to it, the Hebrew and Christian communities respectively.
Miracles are meant I think always to be understood in that sense - otherwise we would be gnostics.
There was this woman at a church I attended for a while, the doctors all said she should abort because a defect was going to deform her horribly. When she was born her only issues were a cleft pallet and web toes. The doctor, as the story goes, when she was born started saying 'She's perfect!'. The church prayed for that baby all the time, was that a miracle. I don't know but God does wonderful things, I don't need a scientist to prove that to me empirically.
medically this turn of events doesn't actually surprise me at all.
They inhabit the savannahs of Africa, not a place you would find fossils very much. The extent of the fossil evidence for Chimpanzee ancestors is three maybe four teeth found in the Rift Valley, that's it. The reason I asked the question is because I believe Chimpanzee fossils are being passed off as human ancestors, the Taung Child for instance. It's small, even for a Chimpanzee child and it looks a lot more like a Chimpanzee the a human. Lucy is another one and there are a few others, I think the way fossils out of Africa are handled is far less then objective, every time an ape fossil is dug up it's automatically celebrated as one of our ancestors.
Just something to think about.
Grace and peace,
Mark[/quote]
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