Why Aren't Miracles Verifiable?

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   Emile Rposted 13 years ago

   I admit I'd absolutely love to see a miracle. I think anyone would. People are claiming they know for a fact the dead are brought back to life, sickness is cured and  useless limbs are healed. There are also claims on this forum that Hubbers, themselves, can actually perform miracles.
   
   My question is for those making these claims. Why is it, do you think, that no one has ever been able to verify a miracle? As much as the world would love to see; why is it that the people who claim they have done them are stricken impotent when asked for proof?
   
   Why can't they put their ability where their mouth is?

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      kessposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      Miracles belong to unbelievers....
      ...for the ones working the miracle and the one receiving the benefits of it, remain ignorant of the way and working of all things, which would also show the possibility of all things.
      
      Unbelief and belief lies in the heart of the individual...
      
      The believing heart have the desires of knowledge and especially knowledge of Truth and they receive answers to every and all things.
      
      The unbelieving heart have the desires of ignorance, these also have a desire to know but not necessarily that of Truth. These also ask questions but do not receives answers because they ask falsely or doubtfully....even when answer are given they are not able to receive it.
      
      Unbelieving miracle workers are actually workers of iniquity or witchcraft, because they and those unto whom they do the works remain in ignorance....while using those works as compelling evidence.
      
      Christianity is the most well known for these kinds.

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      livelongerposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      I personally don't believe in miracles, and suspect *most* instances of miracles are people seeing what they want to see, mistakes, etc. But sometimes probabilities work in someone's favor, and something "miraculous" happens.
      
      I fail to see how this bothers anyone.
      
      I can understand that there is a perception that praying for a miracle will be a substitute for actual action, but I find that's rarely the case. Most people who, hearing that a loved one has cancer, for example, will seek every possible medical avenue, *and* pray for a miracle. What's wrong with that? If it's for no other reason than to give them the emotional fortitude to deal with some deeply difficult things, it sounds fine to me.
      
      The reason that "miracles" aren't verifiable is that they seem to be non-reproducible. They don't seem to happen with any consistency or predictability that we expect in the natural world.

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      Valerie Fposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      Miracles may seem unverifiable because most of the people who witness healings, for instance, are ethically and legally not at liberty to disclose the healed person's medical records.

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         Emile Rposted 13 years agoin reply to this

         First.I think I should point out that the miracles in question were people claiming they had personally performed them and someone who was insistent that people were being raised from the dead.
         
         That being said; I'm going to be brutally honest with you. Your answer was extremely unsatisfactory. I can pretty much guarantee that a preacher doesn't have access to anyone's medical records and any 'miraculous' healing verified by the scientific community would not be kept under wraps.

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            Valerie Fposted 13 years agoin reply to this

            That's because you don't know the laws and ethics that regulate the medical profession. Priests, ministers, what have you may not have access to someone's medical records, but honest ones urge those miraculously healed to follow up with their doctors to confirm. The Biblical-era equivalent would be Jesus healing the lepers, then reminding them to have the local priest verify that the leprosy was gone. Now doctors and other medical providers are constrained by patient confidentiality laws and by professional ethics. If we've seen a miracle and we have the records to prove it, we can't go public with that information. The decision to disclose what happened and open up whatever pertinent records rests with the patient. More often than not, the patients do not choose to go public because they won't like the attention. (Really, most secular media devoted to miracles by default tends to treat the whole subject like some freakshow.) And the Catholic Church makes it a point to verify miracles without creating a big media circus over them.

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               Emile Rposted 13 years agoin reply to this

               Let me see if I understand your assertion. You are saying it is unethical for doctors to publish case studies? New procedures for healing? If that's what you are saying, I am in shock that doctors are conducting themselves in this unethical manner. There are many doctors who publish quite a bit without revealing patient identity.
               
               Am I to believe you are implying that, scattered across the world, there are literally thousands of patient's records scribbled with (pardon the term borrowed from the atheists) god dunnit as the reason a person recovered?

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      Todd Psickposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      I feel that the age we live in leaves little room for miracles. You hear of things such as spiritual healing in areas where there are no hospitals or doctors. Our modern age and technology has removed the "need" for such miracles. On another note, how do you explain a drug addict or alcoholic who suddenly is able to stop after 25 or more years? No one chooses to live in this self inflicted hell, it is a disease, yet people stand "cured" without medication. I think if you change your glasses, or how you perceive "miracles", they will and are happening all around you.

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      Dave Mathewsposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      Emile R:   It is so extremely difficult for any skeptic,negatively pessimistic person who is ego-centered and blind to everything, to witness any for of miracle and realize one for just that a miracle. One day though hopefully before you die, your eyes will be opened and you will be permitted to see what is going on infront of your face. Miracles are happening constantly, but you can't won't and don't see them.

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         Emile Rposted 13 years agoin reply to this

         Hey. I'm not ego centered. And I'm not blind. That was kind of mean Dave. For your information, I know a lot of Christians. Not one of them thinks these healing preachers are anything but shams. And if one of them claimed someone had risen from the dead, or that they were doing miracles; the other Christians would laugh at them to their faces before I would.
         
         Edit.. I don't think I'm negatively pessimistic either. Except about politics.

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            Dave Mathewsposted 13 years agoin reply to this

            Emile: Your opening statement made no comment concerning "Healing Preachers." I too believe that most of them are shams, but you were doubting the possibility of miracles of any kind. That is why I applied those labels to you. If I am wrong, I am wrong and I do apopogize.
            
            Doctors heal that's a miracle. Doctor's bring people back to life. That's a miracle. God Creates miracles before our eyes. Do we see them? Yet the miracle occured.

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      IsaiasPablo90posted 8 years agoin reply to this

      Many miracles are verifiable when the scientific and biblical principles are understood. Check my hub out for the explanation.
      
      <snipped>

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   earnestshubposted 13 years ago

   That would require a miracle!

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      Emile Rposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      
      
      I'm sorry, it is not only mind boggling that people insist on believing this garbage; but they become offended when anyone points it out for what it is.

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         earnestshubposted 13 years agoin reply to this

         We had a "miracle" here in Australia where the walls were weeping for a son who had been killed in an accident.
         The very religious family got themselves plastered all over the usual fifth rate TV current affairs program after the news.
         
         Some press who were less than convinced investigated only to discover that the family had been pouring vegetable oil on the wall!
         
         No retraction of the "miracle" story from the current affairs show though.
         
         What gets me is that these callous parents were lying to make mileage from their recently dead son without any conscience at all apparent.
         
         Perhaps that is why many of the religiously impaired assume everyone else would rape and pillage if god didn't stop them? Their moral fibre seems to be missing in many of them.

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   wildernessposted 13 years ago

   Miracles are not verifiable because:
   
   1) They propose actions that violate natures laws and are impossible.  You cannot verify that which didn't happen.
   
   2) People doing miracles will not allow statistical studies for those that would require such for verification.  Instead, a time correlation is declared to be causal when there is no indication of such a relationship.
   
   3)  Miracles never seem to be repeatable for audiences.  One may report that he turned water to wine, but will never repeat the miracle for observers equipped with cameras and/or testing equipment.
   
   Any or all of these reasons may be used, and I've probably missed a few.

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      Emile Rposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      I agree, but I just wonder what answers the people who believe in them will give. I've read some very bizarre posts. I find it difficult to believe people are so willing to swallow this stuff lock, stock and barrel without questioning it at all.

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   Sally's Troveposted 13 years ago

   A miracle is something that has no rational, scientific proof that can explain its happening. The Catholic church has a process for "certifying" miracles, but maybe the protestant religion has none. Blessed are those who believe without seeing. Well, that's a Catholic thing. But if you subject a supposed miracle to proof, and the proof fails, then there's a miracle.
   
   Miracles are verifiable: Something seemingly impossible happened that no one can find a rational, scientific proof for. With enough witnesses to verify this happening, that's all that's needed for it to be known as a miracle.
   
   Emile, you can't prove a miracle; that would be an oxymoron. But you can verify one.

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      Emile Rposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      Well, the OP did ask why they aren't verifiable. I've never heard of one case where someone was definitely dead, had been verified as being dead, and is walking around today. I've never heard of a limb grown back, where anyone could verify it wasn't there in the first place; or any other claim shown to be anything other than shenanigans.
      
      Which makes me flabbergasted that anyone could believe without some type of  acceptable assurance they weren't being played the fool.

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         Sally's Troveposted 13 years agoin reply to this

         I'm sorry.

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         Valerie Fposted 13 years agoin reply to this

         Clinically dead, brain dead, or both? Because we do CPR and defibrillate clinically dead patients quite often, and some of them (granted, quite unlike how they show it on TV, a very small minority) come back.

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            Emile Rposted 13 years agoin reply to this

            Are you claiming that medical intervention falls into the category of miracle worker?

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               TMMasonposted 13 years agoin reply to this

               You see nothing miraculous in the fields of Medicine and Sciences being done in this day?
               
               I would argue just the leap made by mankind in this last century was a miracle in its own right.
               
               Take a look at the century before last, among all the others, and then this last.
               
               You see nothing miraculous in our advancements and accomplishments?

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                  Emile Rposted 13 years agoin reply to this

                  Communication Mr. Mason. It's all in the ability to communicate. And, democracy makes a difference. Capitalism plays a part too.
                  
                  Plus, there's no doubt we've stood on the shoulders of geniuses.
                  
                  I suppose, if I were to imagine the finger of God; I'd think Einstein.  Beethoven. Rodin. People head and shoulders above the norm.

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      wildernessposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      If they are verifiably miracles and something impossible happens, you would think that we would have examples.  But we don't.  Not even once.  Why not?
      
      Is it simply that no one checks for the possibility of fraud or mistake?  Are strange things accepted as a miracle because people want to believe that?  It would seem to me that anyone capable of performing a true miracle would want everyone in the world to know it and would go to great lengths to get it verified.  But they don't - why not?
      
      The only answer I can find is that they can't do it after all.

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         Sally's Troveposted 13 years agoin reply to this

         You have so missed the point of my response, and I don't have the time or energy to do your research for you about examples and fraud.
         
         The Catholic church is in the business of investigating miracles and goes to great lengths in that endeavor. That's how so few become saints.

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   MelissaBarrettposted 13 years ago

   There are some medical miracles that are verifiable... My son had duel blood flow in his one(yes only one)coronary artery.  Medically, this was considered impossible by any doctor who hadn't actually seen his angiograms (which were always quite populated by doctors and medical students) He made a few medical texts as well I've heard.
   
   So it was a miracle, then it wasn't.  It always kinda was for me though.
   
   There are some studies that show the power of pray in healing.  Once again, scientifically explained as either placebo effect or the ability of possitive thinking to improve recovery times.  And "resurrections" used to happen quite frequently until we started quite Thoroughly making sure our dead were really dead... and if they weren't before, embalming made quite certain that they were later.  If you notice, many of the "back from the dead" stories still come from areas that do little invasive preparation to their dead before burial/cremation/whatever.
   
   So, I guess the stories might possibly have some bases in truth, even if the interpretation of the events are different. If you've seen someone who was supposedly dead come up out of a coffin, I assume a rational scientific explanation is the last thing on your list of things to do.
   
   I'm not closed to the idea of miracles in general.  As a matter of fact, I choose to ignore the scientific explanation for lots of things in preference to the emotional miracle.  I refuse to think of my children as sacks of reproducing cells because that takes away from the awe factor of such perfect little creations.
   
   *shrugs* I could easily see that happening in other situations as well.  I don't really see any reason to rain on the believer's parade.

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      Emile Rposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      I don't discount the possibility of miracles. I'm with you, I think the power of positive thoughts are a tremendous boost in healing.
      
      But, sorry. If people tell me I'm going to hell, or call me swine because I don't buy into the insanity; I'm going to ask why they buy into it. I'd like to know.

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         MelissaBarrettposted 13 years agoin reply to this

         Point well taken but realize that there is something in each believer that needs to believe.  In some it is more powerful than others.  They are unlikely to give up those beliefs even presented with facts.  Sometimes their "preaching" is more for their benefit than anyone else's.  And the weaker their convictions often means the louder their voice.  After all, if they convert YOU then it means there is one less person that thinks they are wrong.  If they are the kind whose strength of conviction in their beliefs is based on reaffirmation by others, this is a very big deal indeed.
         
         I hope that made sense, benedryl is kicking my butt.

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            Emile Rposted 13 years agoin reply to this

            I wholeheartedly agree. But, simply because their faith in their beliefs is weak doesn't mean they have the right to expect the world to tuck their heads and pretend everything they say is so. I guess it would be incredibly sweet of me to do that, but I got outed in another thread. I'm just a b*tch. I've decided to embrace it where the religiously challenged are concerned. Which doesn't mean the religious. Just the challenged ones.

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               MelissaBarrettposted 13 years agoin reply to this

               LOL, I saw that. You have to consider the source.
               
               Sometimes you gotta wonder if the religion predated the sexism and arrogance or if some people were just born buttheads and Jesus was unlucky enough to be saddled with them.

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      A Troubled Manposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      Yet, it is within that very sack of reproducing cells which lies the awe factor, not some awe factor in a magical sky fairy offering false hopes, but the awe factor of millions of years of evolution. Too bad you refuse to think.

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         MelissaBarrettposted 13 years agoin reply to this

         Thank you Troubled Man for telling me how I should view my children...
         
         Next time my daughter learns a new word instead of saying "Good Job honey, look what the magical sky fairy taught you" I'll say "Well dear, it looks like dendrites in your neurons have finally sent the chemical signals across the synapses and they have traveled the whole axon!"  Or I can just say "Good job honey!  What a smart girl you are!" Like I usually do.
         
         I'm confused.  Should I follow the atheists or the religionists in completely taking away all credit from her miraculous new ability?  You are missing the point of my post (as you usually do).  I'm sure if you think about it awhile.... nah nevermind you wouldn't get it then either.

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            wildernessposted 13 years agoin reply to this

            I like the second one best.  That way you can spend the next 15 years explaining dendrites, nerons, synapses and chemicals.

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               MelissaBarrettposted 13 years agoin reply to this

               LMAO, planning on it.  It might be a little deep for her right now.  We're still working on "potty"

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            A Troubled Manposted 13 years agoin reply to this

            Still riding high upon that condescending horse, I see.

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               MelissaBarrettposted 13 years agoin reply to this

               Yep, you looked so lonely up there, I thought I'd join you.

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   James Leon Mahanposted 13 years ago

   A scientific answer to a miracle is ,"A freak of Nature"  I have seen things that no one can explain. You are a living, breating and thinking being that in its self alone is a miracle.

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   IntimatEvolutionposted 13 years ago

   The Vatican verfies miracles all the time.  There are very specific things that classify a miracle a miracle.  I am curious as to why someone would think miracles aren't verifiable.

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      Emile Rposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      Hmmm. I wonder which of us is the greater oddity. Me for wondering why miracles haven't been verified, or you for thinking I'm an anomaly.
      
      Just  so you know, I'm afraid the church is biased. I'm talking scientific verification.

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         IntimatEvolutionposted 13 years agoin reply to this

         So you think there is no science supporting a miracle.  So a miracle too for you isnt really a miracle at all, but, rather it is over inflated science project.  I see.

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            Emile Rposted 13 years agoin reply to this

            Whatever you want to think.
            
            Do you have something of value to add, or are you here as a scoffer?

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   tlpoagueposted 13 years ago

   I am not sure what you are looking for when you are asking about proving miracles. For my family, it was when my sister was born with an umbilical cord wrapped around her neck. She was considered legally dead, but the doctors managed to bring her back when my dad wouldn't accept it. Recently I had a friend who's daughter was hit by a trailer being towed by a truck. The EMT's feared the worst. She was life flighted out to a nearby city. Doctor's thought she had a cracked skull, blood on the brain, and broken bones. Twenty-four hours and a few tests later, all she had was a compound fracture. She has a bit of  memory loss, but other than that is fine.  Ask anyone attending that accident that day, and they will tell you that they didn't expect her to make it.
   I have my own reasons for my belief. I don't ask or expect anyone to believe the same as I, because each person is different and views things differently. Hopefully someday you can find the answers you are looking for. In the meantime, I don't blame you for asking questions. It is often the best way to learn and understand why people are the way they are.

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      Emile Rposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      Medical miracles are definitely well known. My own husband has been in two accidents that would have killed the average person, and one freakish incident that the eye witnesses now call him superman.
      
      But, I'm  specifically questioning raised from the dead claims and things of that nature.

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   TMMasonposted 13 years ago

   That is the thing about miracles... those who are not present for them do not believe they occurred.
   
   It seems to be the way of the whole miracle thing.

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      Emile Rposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      Good answer Mr. Mason. Unfortunately, that answer only works when people aren't attempting to make a profit off of their abilities.
      
      Like Edgar Cayce. He could do his thing while others were around, but he didn't seek monetary gain.

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         TMMasonposted 13 years agoin reply to this

         I have not spoken to those who are out there playing games, Emile.
         
         But I do agree with you on the position.
         
         My remarks are as regard Christ the Apostles and the Pophets... no one else.
         
         I do not consider Cayce a prophet, nor do I think he did anything impressive.
         
         Alot, most, of the things he spoke of have never occurred.

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            Emile Rposted 13 years agoin reply to this

            I didn't mean to imply he was a prophet. I don't think so either. Which brings up another point. I know your scriptures say the mark of a prophet is they cannot lie. How come a lot of sects keep following people that have proven themselves liars?
            
            Pat Robertson is one. He has made quite a few statements and claimed them as revelation from God. They have been proven false and he appears to be going strong. I'd think Christians would drum people like this out.

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    knolyourselfposted 13 years ago

    There is an unwritten rule that it is against spiritual law to charge for spiritual beneficials. If you are paying money, you are probably getting ripped off.

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    melporposted 13 years ago

    Miracles are very verifiable because they are not miracles, but are simply natural events that people elevate to something as being supernatural that just happened when there is an explanation for the event, but it is not obvious when it occurred. These events are not really miracles as people think they are when they are just events that are very rare in occurrences. They have happened many times before somewhere else and in some cases there is already an explanation. In many cases this is the first time the event have been witnessed by the person who is calling it a miracle. These events can be explained after further investigations.
    
    For example people claim they have seen an event where a lot of fish have fallen from the sky and they start calling it a miracle because they can't explain what just happened. Sometimes people think this way due to the circumstances that they may be experiencing in their life at the time when these events occur. For example, there may be a drought or some other form of food shortage going on at the moment when all that just happen was a tornado on water probably pulled the fish from the water and carried them for several miles inland in the clouds over land. Then they later fell from the sky when the storm dissipated near the surprised onlookers. There is an explanation for everything. Eventually through investigation it will be be found. Miracles are wishful thinking.

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    Jeramiposted 13 years ago

    The next breath that we take ......     is more mericle than I be looking fore,

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    awareposted 13 years ago

    Unable to see the miracle of life?
    Id rather be blind!
    ray

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