(October 16, 2018 at 9:18 am)SteveII Wrote: It is only begging the question if I am making an argument for the existence of the supernatural by miracles that I can't be sure are miracles. That's not what I am doing. I am saying that given that I believe in the supernatural (for other reasons) and given the background information that such events do not happen with any regularity, it is reasonable to infer that miracle x after prayer y may be supernatural.
I can only say -- you would make a very poor scientist.
Science deals with weird postulates all the time. Saying "I'll assume my postulate is true, and then determine which of my experiments can be explained with it" is terrible. That is how pseudoscience gets done.
The problems are:
1) The postulate is not accepted fact, meaning that any stories you come up to link it to experiment are often exercises in wish fulfillment. You will not look for counter-evidence.
2) Other explanations must be ruled out before an experiment can be used as evidence of the postulate.
3) The postulate, to be useful, must make clear what it predicts, and what sort of evidence would invalidate it. Otherwise, any evidence could be woven into the postulate's story. A postulate becomes a theory when all attempts to invalidate it's specific predictions fail, and no better theory also makes those predictions.
Your investigation of miracles fails on all 3 counts.