Do Extraordinary Claims Require Extraordinary Evidence?

[The Grand Nudger]

Yeah, I don't get it either.  We all die, even the believers die (lol).  There's nothing I can do about that.  Similarly, whatever does or doesn;t happen after I die is beyond my control, just as whatever some hypothetical divine power decides to do with my "soul" is beyond my control.  There's nothing for me to consider in any of it, and no difference in it considering whatever these believers propose, for me.

Meanwhile, in life...it's a -complete- non issue.  It doesn't matter, at all, whether or not there's an actual god, or whose god that is, or what kind of god it is.....so?

[pocaracas]

Bayesian probabilities... hmmm.... How about we apply it to psychology?

What are the odds that an extraordinary claim has extraordinary origins, with the prior knowledge that humans have:
- a fertile imagination
- the ability to Willingly Suspend Disbelief
- the ability to lie
- the tendency to follow charismatic people
- a prior belief system already composed of a few similar extraordinary claims
- a natural evolutionary based tendency to accept a claim if it comes from a trustworthy source (parents at a young age, for example)
- a relatively short lifespan
- a brain that tends to be affected by the Dunning Kruger effect ("a cognitive bias wherein persons of low ability suffer from illusory superiority, mistakenly assessing their cognitive ability as greater than it is.")
- an inability to accurately assess non-intuitive probabilities
- senses that make it challenging to measure the very small quantum world and the very large extra-galactic Universe.
- etc, etc, etc...

Yet that would be all wiped away in a second if the paralyzed guy got up and walked. Instead of applying the probability to the event, you are applying it to the reliability of the witness. So you really are not talking about the event anymore, you are describing an a priori assumption that witnesses cannot be reliable in the case of extraordinary events without any actual facts that would mitigate these issues on a case by case basis.

Of course I am.
That's what everyone is doing.
You either believe the account, or you don't. To believe the account, you have to assume the witnesses to be reliable.

And I can provide you with a few actual witness accounts, with photographic evidence and all.... and the account is false and shouldn't be trusted. They were fooled.

Every day(?), many preachers claim to heal paralyzed people, all over the world, in front of crowds of people. Many of those present believe they are witnessing a real healing... but no. They were fooled.

It is totally possible to fool a witness into providing a truthful extraordinary account.... however, it is not an accurate description of the real event. It is not truth.

Should I, an external, independent actor, trust an account, if it has clear markers of what is still done in the present to fool people?

[Neo-Scholastic]

See above. It is not a option to say "I don't know" when, for example, faced with certain end of life decisions, such as pulling the plug on a critically injured loved one.

Aren't you really just arguing for comfort in the face of death?  Think I'll wing it without a security blanket.  I'm sure I'm not worried about any awkward posthumous interview at the pearly gates.  So really it just seems to be about spinning our mortality in a candy-land direction.

That's not the issue. Deciding if and when it is permissible to end a human life, what it means to be human, and how to make and live in a just society has very little do with what someone believes about the afterlife. Whether we acknowledge it or not, everyone has a philosophical world view.

Personally, I find non-theistic appeals to the "golden rule" and evolved empathy to be such loosely held principles that one could justify almost any horror that is personally or collectively convenient at the moment. That is not to say that poorly formed and rigidly held philosophical and religious convictions don't often result in judgmental and heartless choices, but corrective measures and restraints are contained within those traditions that are not available to atheistic ones.

[Whateverist]

Aren't you really just arguing for comfort in the face of death?  Think I'll wing it without a security blanket.  I'm sure I'm not worried about any awkward posthumous interview at the pearly gates.  So really it just seems to be about spinning our mortality in a candy-land direction.

That's not the issue. Deciding if and when it is permissible to end a human life, what it means to be human, and how to make and live in a just society has very little do with what someone believes about the afterlife. Whether we acknowledge it or not, everyone has a philosophical world view.

Personally, I find non-theistic appeals to the "golden rule" and evolved empathy to be such loosely held principles that one could justify almost any horror that is personally or collectively convenient at the moment. That is not to say that poorly formed and rigidly held philosophical and religious convictions don't often result in judgmental and heartless choices, but corrective measures and restraints are contained within those traditions that are not available to atheistic ones.

When societies spiral into war and atrocities are committed I don't imagine it is on account of which philosophical world view the main players hold.  I mean that in the sense that such considerations rarely factor in for the worst of the worse.  What they do then doesn't follow from their failed philosophical views but from their particular psychological twistedness and character failings.  You can say, "well if they'd just embrace xtianity this would never happen" but you know, it wouldn't happen either if I was simply appointed absolute ruler of the earth.

[Cyberman]

My general principle is that things are as they appear to be until shown otherwise.

I bet you had an uncle who really could pull coins from your ear, yes?

[Minimalist]

He does so want to believe that fairy tales are real.

Shame, really.  Otherwise he seems fairly intelligent.

[Neo-Scholastic]

That's not the issue. Deciding if and when it is permissible to end a human life, what it means to be human, and how to make and live in a just society has very little do with what someone believes about the afterlife. Whether we acknowledge it or not, everyone has a philosophical world view.

Personally, I find non-theistic appeals to the "golden rule" and evolved empathy to be such loosely held principles that one could justify almost any horror that is personally or collectively convenient at the moment. That is not to say that poorly formed and rigidly held philosophical and religious convictions don't often result in judgmental and heartless choices, but corrective measures and restraints are contained within those traditions that are not available to atheistic ones.

When societies spiral into war and atrocities are committed I don't imagine it is on account of which philosophical world view the main players hold.  I mean that in the sense that such considerations rarely factor in for the worst of the worse.  What they do then doesn't follow from their failed philosophical views but from their particular psychological twistedness and character failings.  You can say, "well if they'd just embrace xtianity this would never happen" but you know, it wouldn't happen either if I was simply appointed absolute ruler of the earth.

Sure. 90% of all wars are about natural resources and imperial aspirations. I guess I just have a pre-modern sense that philosophy is not simply an academic disciple; but rather,a means to improve one's character by the pursuit of knowledge and virtue. I always have. I also believe, like John Adams, that a free society that preserves individual liberty can only be maintained by a moral populace. IMO, the Anglo-American slave trade wasn't upheld by any firm principle. Instead it was thoughtlessly tolerated as a seemly practical necessity for an oligarchical economic system. The supposedly 'natural order' rationalizations and 'biblical' cover for the practice were there just so people didn't have think too much about what was really happening. It wasn't until people with strong religious and moral objections to it did things actually change.

And I don't mean to derail the thread, but in my mind, abortion is very similar in the sense a truly horrific practice is permitted based almost entirely on the material convenience of adults or disingenuous concerns about a child growing up in poverty. The whole notion that a woman's bodily integrity and volition are the only things at stake depends on denying the humanity of a very young human being. Similarly, even if a someone's health is so severely compromised that they seem completely unresponsive to life on what basis does someone else decide for them if their life is "worth living." What is it exactly about human life that makes it valuable? If we don't have any convictions about that then making a decision on-the-spot and persevering through the long-haul IMHO would most likely be based on one's personal convenience and practical needs. The case of Martin Pistorius comes to mind.

I have to wonder, when confronting fears and apprehensions about how their life will be affected by bring the child to term or caring for the severely disabled, and if people truly considered what it means to be human, they would make much different choices in such dire circumstances. These are not the only issues. We could just as easily be talking about any number of issues; I just went for the low-hanging fruit.

[The Grand Nudger]

That's not the issue. Deciding if and when it is permissible to end a human life, what it means to be human, and how to make and live in a just society has very little do with what someone believes about the afterlife. Whether we acknowledge it or not, everyone has a philosophical world view.

Personally, I find non-theistic appeals to the "golden rule" and evolved empathy to be such loosely held principles that one could justify almost any horror that is personally or collectively convenient at the moment. That is not to say that poorly formed and rigidly held philosophical and religious convictions don't often result in judgmental and heartless choices, but corrective measures and restraints are contained within those traditions that are not available to atheistic ones.

When societies spiral into war and atrocities are committed I don't imagine it is on account of which philosophical world view the main players hold.  I mean that in the sense that such considerations rarely factor in for the worst of the worse.  What they do then doesn't follow from their failed philosophical views but from their particular psychological twistedness and character failings.  You can say, "well if they'd just embrace xtianity this would never happen" but you know, it wouldn't happen either if I was simply appointed absolute ruler of the earth.

It doesn't seem to have anything to do with a god anyway, and obviously many people who "accept christianity" still blissfully murder others.  A disproportionately large number of murderers just so happen to be christians, lol.  

Meanwhile, appeals to god -have- been used to justify -every- horror...whereas Neo here is wondering about the what ifs his god addled mind come up with...which just -might- have more to do with god addled minds than what secular moral systems do or can justify. In the same vein..we don;t appear to have any trouble whatsoever coming up with corrective measures and restraints outside of pixie belief. Laws and prisons and good upbringing are hardly predicate on god, but they sure do end up housing a hell of alot of christers.......

I expect a believers notions of the supernatural to be fanciful...but in Neos case, as is the case with many christians, their beliefs about the mundane world and the people in it, what we can and can;t do or can and can;t justify appear to be no less fanciful....and perhaps more so on account of them not being hidden from plain view, as the divine purportedly is.

......................?

All of it, every jot above, is an attempt to argue for some sort of necessity of god in the absence of evidence...but when that fails..what;s left? God is neither in evidence nor a neccessity, either logical or practically. It sure -seems- like a useless idea, all of a sudden, and the examples chosen make it look even worse - in that they highlight the ways in which the god idea not only fails to help, but actively harms. It's, at least, a few steps ahead of tarot cards on the shittiness count.. and at best no further behind on irrelevance.

[Neo-Scholastic]

Laws and prisons and good upbringing are hardly predicate on god, but they sure do end up housing a hell of alot of christers.......

It was the conviction of Quakers that changed our thinking about prison, from a place of punishment to forced penitence. That is where the word penitentiary came from.

[The Grand Nudger]

Are quakers gods?  No, they are not.  So, it was the ideas of men that changed our ideas of prison.   OFC, the quakers aren't around any more, and we continue to refine our model.  Penitentiaries may soon become relics, as the quakers became relics...on account of being well meaning but mistaken adventures in correction. Kind of like the quakers, when you think about it.

What was the point of that?