I may have indirectly touched on it in the past and I never consciously avoided the subject. I guess I always just assumed that it was too obvious to be worth mentioning. I speak of the main reason why I am virtually certain that none of these superstitious beliefs (prayer works, Jesus was resurrected, the burning bush, and hundreds of other similar "miracles") are anything but complete hogwash.

That reason is my belief that none of these things EVER actually happen whether they are related to religion or not. (It is not necessary for me to find a perfect definition for "these things" for people to get what I am saying.)

On the other hand, if one of these things has EVER happened, even once, I would almost completely reverse course. The resurrection of Jesus would go from a trillion to one to perhaps fifty to one. Take away my assumption that miracles don't ever happen, and you take away my assumption that religions are completely ridiculous.

Of course, religious people are going to argue that even if there are never any religion related miracles occurring, that doesn't prove that there can't be religious ones. I don't feel like arguing with them.

But there are some people on the other side who also disagree with me, and they are just dumb. In other words, I think there are those who have contempt for the supernatural beliefs of religion EVEN THOUGH they don't reject the possibility of some supernatural events occurring. Uh uh. The non-existence of supernatural events (if they truly don't exist) completely swamps every other possible reason for non-belief in supernatural believing religions. (eg things like "the problem of evil" or stuff like that). It's not the sexiest reason for atheism but it is by far the best.

Do you think you'd actually believe you saw a miracle if you experienced one? Or would you more likely chalk it up to momentary psychosis?

I'm thinking of the burning bush specifically. If you felt a presence and then saw something that unambiguous, would you look back at it with any degree of certainty? (Barring some corroborating evidence like a photo ldo.)

I'm assuming you'd reevaluate everything, like you said. I'm just uncertain you'd completely reverse course with your religious worldview on the front end.

Fwiw , I believe humans are far more advance in science today as they were 2000 years ago .
I think before claiming they saw a miracle , confirming religion view of the world with an all mighty power at its Center , modern educated man would think first as a probable UFO or some kind of aliens action before advocating a direct divine intervention from god , imho .

You rationalists get stuck because you turn your ‘no’ into a ‘maybe not’.

If the status quo is a ‘no’, then truth requires that we stand on that no. If we desire to get unstuck, then we are not allowed to listen to the measured, rational voice that says, “Saying no to the status quo is potentially dangerous, so let’s change the no to a ‘maybe not’ and do a full investigation of the supernatural/religious before we commit to the no.”

The consequence of this is the rationalist stays stuck. The ‘maybe not’ will eventually end up as a ‘yes’ and return to the status quo 100% of the time.

actually rationalist knows that one evidence or one event to find truth isnt enough.

yes ! the world isnt binary as u wish it would be .
rational people need convincing because they think its possible they are wrong , mistake happens , etc.
u should investigate how the scientific method works .

Regarding miracles, the Son of Man realizes that humanity is incapable of bringing forth the Kingdom on its own, so he accepts that he needs God to do this miracle. This will not happen if he doesn’t believe in the possibility of miracles or God.

First, he needs to be honest with himself about whether or not he believes and the degree of his belief or disbelief. This requires constant self-auditing.

If he lacks faith, then he will look for opportunities to grow his belief. When he has an experience of awe or wonder, then he will capitalize on it by growing his belief. When he experiences something extraordinary, then he will capitalize on that.

He grows his belief with the care and attention of a gardener tending his garden.

From your post it’s not the lack in faith in god the problem it’s the lack of faith in man ….

Remember, prayers do not work to accomplish something .

I have faith in my fellow man. I have faith that they value truth the same as I do.

Prayer has value in multiple ways. If the living Son prays, then I pray because I want what he has. That alone is enough.

What u want he has u do not ?

Ps: that is the problem u believe in one truth while many gods and other religion have many truths has valid as to yours because all of it is only base on faith and how strong u want it to be true , not actually what it is true ….

Sadly u don’t see that contradiction .
Hopefully someday u will .

Reality checks are the corrector for everyone - religious or not. Since I know that and you don’t, that might be an indicator of which one of us is closer to reality.

Truth is a hierarchy. At the top is one, but there are countless lower truths.

Ok
Well glad u are in the « corrector « one .
Because u said so .

We all have to discern who we should listen to and who we should filter out. The vast majority think they do this well when they really suck at it.

The wise person is willing to take the position that they suck at it even when they are better at it than everyone else. This allows them to both transcend their categories and to also find value within the mundane.

The judge has to be constantly undermined by the child. One in each hand.

The most fascinating about religion books or it’s adept for me is to be able to read long paragraph in a language I understand and still didn’t understand a thing of what being said .
I guess being as obscure , opaque and using metaphors is the best way to say something that can mean anything without contradicting itself and so be never proven wrong shrug .

As long people are happy I guess it’s fine .

Just a few days ago NFL player Damar Hamlin was resurrected from the dead. Up to about 1904, most people would have been considered this so impossible, so unnatural, that it had to be a miracle. I would think many people would still consider it a miracle. So,David, you can start start believing now.

Except that it was well understood and scientifically based medical treatments that saved Hamlin’s life, not miraculous divine intervention. Something else to consider (and that the religious people are very careful to not bring up), suppose we do think that God saved Hamlin. In that case why can we not equally well say that God also caused Hamlinn in to be in a situation where his life was endangered? Obviously football players tackle other football players all the time. It has happened literally tens of thousands of times over the years. Yet in only one case was the tackler’s life in danger. Why do we give God a free pass for stopping Hamlin’s heart and then give Him credit for starting it back up again?

God created and started everyone's heart.

And God will someday stop everyone's heart. Some sooner rather than later.

Nobody can be sure their next heartbeat won't be their last.

There is one ultimate question we would all be wise to ask ourselves: "Where will I spend eternity?"

The simple closed chest compression procedure that is now used to resuscitate dying people was discovered in 1891 by Dr. Friedrich Maass who happened to try it out on a few patients. Still it was not understood nor widely adopted until decades later. That discovery would be considered the miracle. Whose to say it was not gifted to us from a higher power?

That still does not address the question of why it was necessary to use it on an otherwise healthy person like Damar Hamlin. We credit the great, wonderful and powerful almighty deity with providing miracles like allowing us to restart his heart, but we give that same deity a free pass regarding causing Damar Hamlin to be in that position in the first place. We say it was a freak accident or who knows why his heart stopped. Sounds an awful lot like the type of unexplained phenomena that believers are all too eager to credit God for when it is a positive event. Why should God not get the blame when itÂ’s a negative one?

This purported God is all loving and all powerful, but somehow he seems to let an awful lot of bad crap happen to people who do not seem to deserve having bad crap happen to them. Believers explain this away by saying God does not interfere with free will, but this only explains bad crap perpetrated evil humans against their fellow human, not things like natural disasters, diseases, etc. It’s all part of his plan; that is another load of crap I hear. Ok, how is it part of God’s plan to have a baby born with a congenital condition that only allows him to live for a few days, during which time he is suffering and struggling to breathe? How is childbb him old cancer causing kids to die before they reach high school “part of the plan”? What kind of sick plan is it that calls for that kind of suffering? We praise God when a kid with cancer goes into remission, but why could God not have prevented that cancer in the first place?

While IÂ’m ranting, the whole free will argument is crap too. Why should an evil doerÂ’s free will trump the right of the innocent victim to not suffer? Even if God cannot (contradicting omnipotence) or will not interfere with free will, he still could prevent the evil anyway. Why canÂ’t a person who molested a child be struck by lightning before he has a chance to do so? God is omniscient and omnipotent, so while WWi was occurring He would have known what evil awaited humanity just a few decades after the war. Why could God not have caused an artillery shell to explode near and kill a certain corporal in the Austrian army, or even have said corporal contract the Spanish Influenza that was pandemic in the aftermath of the war and die from it?

So no, I will not give God credit for saving someone from a situation that God himself caused. If you care to believe in such a deity and that makes you feel good, then fine. It makes me feel far better to think that all these things that happen are just random crap that we cannot really do anything about, and that there really is no supreme deity out there causing all of our suffering.

This is covered in the book of Job. The one who holds God responsible and condemns God (Job) is elevated over the others who defend God as blameless.

What would the point of our creation then ?
Regardless of what with do and discover successful ourself always stem from god anyway right ?

So in a sense we never are responsible of anything regardless our actions were good or bad .
We’re just robots !
Great life .
Why would we care about eternal life then Since it’s already been decide by god in advance anyway ?
And if it’s god miracle given to us that l’articula medical procedure , why waited for so long after billions of people dead before giving it to us ?
What So special about that football player to have access to that miracle and not the other dead before him ?

More likely we help ourself by being better and do stuff by our own …
If we kept to gods prayers that guy wouldn’t be with us anymore …..

Even if you don’t willingly co-author your life with God, it is being co-authored by nature and socialization. The wise person realizes that he must co-author his life. He gets to choose whether that is with life or death.

Whew. Reminds me of Stephen Fry who called God an ‘evil, capricious, monstrous maniac".

In spite of our knowledge of suffering and evil, as a species we seem to believe that life is worth living. Yes, there are natural dangers and we can be our own worst enemy, but as a species we are better now off than ever. Life is getting better each generation. Why? Because we have some control over our situation and we are doing something right. We can be hopeful that our future generations will endure, persevere, and triumph. Hang in there.

Why do we feel far better for thinking this? It’s an open question, but one possibility is too treacherous for the Son of Man to ignore.

Hey, I'm trying to eat my delicious bacon and eggs, huevos rancheros breakfast with Pike Place coffee with a Trader Joes lemon square. A highly recommended way to start a day. But words are being put in my mouth.

Obviously we have to use our free will to choose to search for a solution to alleviate an affliction or it won't happen. Isaac Newton was religious and Einstein was raised in a Catholic school. I'm just suggesting maybe some of the our great discoveries were found with a combination of intense motivation, brain work, and a little help from a greater power. Since some solutions come in a "Eureka" moment and produce wonderment maybe they should be called miracles.

Probably 99% of the millions of people people in human history who have had heart failure prior to the year 1890 permanently died. Yet a few days ago we saw that amazingly reversed. Didn't Damar Hamlin's recovery seem miraculous?

Yes, and the earth SEEMS to be flat. It SEEMS like particles follow well-defined trajectories where one can know their exact position and velocity at any given time. It SEEMS like the chair I am currently sitting on is very much solid and not made up mostly of empty space. It SEEMS like an ace always hits the flop when I am holding KK.

Trouble is that word “seems”. What seems to be true often is actually false. That is what the history of scientific discovery has shown us.