MIRACLES FROM THE BOOK THE GOD DEBATE BY LENNOX

Re: The God Debate: A New Look at History's Oldest Argument

 

This Christian book by obfuscator Professor Lennox claims that Hume stated miracles don't happen for they are contradicted by natural law. That is a Christian lie. It is dishonest how Lennox never mentions how Hume said simply that as it is more likely for dead man to stay dead you cannot believe in a resurrection unless the evidence is very strong. Hume is not saying a dead man cannot rise but is talking about how likely it is. 

 

Anyway supposing the book is spot on that Hume defined miracles as impossible for it is impossible for nature to change. It argues that Hume confused uniformity with absolute uniformity.

 

What we are not told is that uniformity could still be enough to make miracles unbelievable. You don't need to presuppose absolute uniformity if you want to show miracles are too much to believe in.

 

And if nature is not absolutely uniform then you cannot know if a claimed miracle was a fluke of nature or really a miracle.

 

Hume presumably argued that a miracle must be a pure once-off to be a miracle. Because Hume reportedly says that a miracle by definition is unprecedented, we cannot believe a miracle even if it really happens because it is so improbable.

 

Lennox is trying to make Hume look daft. Hume never said that. For Hume a brick floating in mid-air once every year is still to be suspected as a trick for bricks PROBABLY should not do that. 

 

The book then repeats Lennox's allegation that Hume is merely inventing a definition of miracles that rules out the possibility of believing in miracles. Hume is accused of assuming that miracles are unbelievable and of being guilty of assuming what he wants to prove.

 

But Lennox does not really believe Hume is doing wrong. Does Lennox want to accuse those who say that miraculous trolls are improbable of bias? Life is not worth living if we are going to consider everybody to be irrational because there are many miracles they will not consider to be possible.

 

Also, Lennox is accusing Hume of saying nature is absolutely uniform so miracles cannot happen. But even if Hume did, his argument was not about miracles being impossible but about them being improbable. Hume did spell out when it is sensible to believe in miracles. It is not true that he reasoned that miracles don't happen therefore they don't happen.

 

It is not fair to accuse Hume of defining miracles as unbelievable and that he is guilty of assuming that they are unbelievable when that is the very thing that needs proving. Hume only said that because of the problem of human error and bias and lying it is not that simple. It is reasonable to hold that somebody who reportedly takes a ride in an alien spaceship is mistaken or lying. It is mistaken to believe them. Also, people do lie when they must know everybody knows they are doing it. Imagine how the tendency to lie could be stronger when the person tells a supernatural lie for that cannot be found out. You cannot prove that the person who claims visions of Jesus is lying. The supernatural cannot be disproved.

 

Later in the book, Lennox's distinction between miracle and supernatural is made. Lennox says that creation of all things from nothing is supernatural but not miraculous. Ghosts and possession by demons are supernatural but not miraculous. Lennox says that the miraculous will always be supernatural but he insists that not all that is supernatural is miraculous.

 

Lennox then by his definition cannot prove that the resurrection of Jesus was miraculous. Perhaps the people who met him after his death had supernatural experiences? His argument seems to be that though the supernatural makes all things, it is only when the supernatural is trying to give a religious message from God that it can be called a miracle. But what about the fact that the best miracle tales give no such message? They portray themselves as just happening!!

 

If ghosts and demonic possession are not miracles they can simulate miracles. Lennox does not and will not tell us that!!

 

The book says that Hume believed that if a miracle is unprecedented in one generation it needs to be performed in the next generation so that it can be unprecedented to it too.

 

Hume said none of that and it contradicts Lennox's allegation that for Hume a miracle is a total once-off. If a miracle gives you a great spiritual message then why is the miracle so important? Why can't the message be bigger than the miracle meaning you don't need a repeat of the miracle in every generation?

 

Hume said miracles may happen but if they do they are not believable for they are so strange and rare and can be believed if the evidence is good enough but it sadly never is. We follow this rule not just in miracles but in all strange things. For example, if an old man looked 20 we would keep the same rule. We would not believe he is really old even if he has papers. There is nothing wrong with any of that. Lennox and Co are lying about what Hume believed. They see nothing wrong with his view and so they have to make a laughing stock of it.

 

The Bible should give an argument like Hume's and refute it. It doesn't. This ruins its credibility and its miracle tales. The argument is fundamental.

 

Lennox should be dismissed from his job for no scientist who lies that much can be trusted.