If seeing is believing

[LoneMateria]

dionysiou I am unimpressed with your story and here is why.  I live a few miles from the beach.  Often times when I go seagulls and other "wild" birds will come near us (mainly because we are fishing).  The birds are not frightened of us because the tourists feed them all the time.  The birds will come close looking for food and if you aren't careful will take food out of our hands (right before you eat it).  There doesn't seem to be anything magical about your story.  It looks like a bird that is fed by humans swooped by you looking for food.  When  you opened your hand and it pecked at it the other birds thought you were feeding it and showed up looking for some free handouts.  If you threw a piece of bread in front of them they'd have started fighting with each other trying to get it.  I went fishing twice this week with my friend (twice because the first time we didn't catch anything).  The first time we were there this hurt crane was hopping along the beach with either a broken or sprained foot.  Though we are all locals and know better my friend started feeding the bird the shrimp we were using as bait (since there were no fish biting).  He tried to get it to take the food out of his hand but since the bird was hurt it wouldn't do it, but it got within about 4 inches of my friend to eat the shrimp and sand fleas everyone was giving to it.  We all went back two days later and the same bird with the hurt foot showed up again and came by us looking for free hand outs.  This time the fish were eating our bait and he couldn't give it as much.  Anyway the point is even though a bird is wild it isn't afraid of us because we feed them.  

I honestly think you mistook this behavior for the sign you admit to be searching for.  The mistake you made was you started with a conclusion and looked for evidence to fulfill it, and you probably would have accepted anything.  If you ran into a deer or a bear you'd have probably came to the same conclusion.  Or if you walked near a mocking bird's nest and it attacked you (like they do everything) then you'd have came to the same conclusion.  Honestly i'd have been more impressed if you didn't run into any birds whatsoever in the woods.  You set out to prove to yourself that there is a god and you were looking for some way you couldn't fail.  If you are walking into the woods to see birds to validate your beliefs ... well its the woods ... bird are almost always there.  You were looking for something you couldn't lose with.  You might as well said to yourself, "If I get fed at least 1 meal today it proves a god exists."  It is as likely you will get fed as running into birds in the woods.

[Whitney]

You cant expect experiences to fall into your lap. You cant expect God to reveal Himself to you without you making sacrifices for Him.

Aside from the fact that quite a few of the atheist members here were Christians at some point in their lives (some of us were actually really involved with our churches); why wouldn't God want to reveal himself to people without them first reaching out into the dark grasping for something...Jesus helped to ease Thomas' doubts; right?

btw, I also confirm that sea birds that live in areas populated by humans are not afraid one bit of us...I've fed many a seagull out of my hand in virginia, north carolina, and texas...it's very typical.  If you want to get a pic with a seagull you just hold out your hand or hold your hand up in any way that might remotely look like you have food; they'll come even if your hand is empty.  I've also fed wild chipmunks in colorado by hand due to this same tendency for wild animals to become partially tame when people feed them.

[LoneMateria]

Ha ha... yes, it is quite flawed. Don't know if I completely agree with that website's information on it though. Even though Pascal was trying to convince readers we should "believe in God without hesitation" he did acknowledge there options of a Finite gain and Finite loss, didn't he?

I'm not sure exactly what you are asking.  Um check pascal's wiki under normal Wikipedia.

[dionysiou]

Ok there are two possibilities, 1. you are right and the kookaburra has been fed before and mistakenly thought i had food, but still stuck around for me to pet it. or 2. It was God who answered my prayer and read my thoughts to fulfill a desire i had in my heart . You can think as you like, I was there.

[Whitney]

Ok there are two possibilities, 1. you are right and the kookaburra has been fed before and mistakenly thought i had food, but still stuck around for me to pet it. or 2. It was God who answered my prayer and read my thoughts to fulfill a desire i had in my heart . You can think as you like, I was there.

Or it was an odd bird who simply didn't have a natural fear of humans or you are embellishing a bit on what really happened.

Weren't you one of the Christians who recently joined because you wanted to truly investigated religious questions?

[dionysiou]

There was no embellishment, if you knew me you'd know. I joined here because i wanted to, not because i needed too. The religious questions never get me anywhere. I feel none the better after ive answered them. another choice would have been time better spent.

[andreasoverland]

Good discussion!

Although it might veer of the original topic a bit I have a few of questions to dionysiou, in the same style as the question in the original post but in different directions.

a) How many miracles (as interpreted by you) would it take for you to

stop believing in your current choice of god if they could all be attributed to natural phenomenons.
b) How many miracles (as interpreted by you) would it take for you to start believing in Ra (or any other deity)  
c) If a muslim believer told the same Kookaburra-story in this forum, would you expect people to take that as proof for the undeniable existence of Allah?
[/list]

My thinking is that if you expected absolute and final answers on your question, you should be able to give absolute and final answers to these, more or less

BTW, I must give you extra credits dionysiou for being able to keeping your posts so friendly and to the point when most people here take a contradictory stand to your views. Not all believers are able to be that open minded and respectful towards other people when their views collide.

[LoneMateria]

There was no embellishment, if you knew me you'd know. I joined here because i wanted to, not because i needed too. The religious questions never get me anywhere. I feel none the better after ive answered them. another choice would have been time better spent.

I want you to note dionysiou that no one has accused of of lying or PURPOSEFULLY embellishing your stories.  Whitney was just pointing out your false dichotomy.  The human brain becomes notoriously inaccurate the further an event is in the past.  Even after a short period of time (a week or so and sometimes less then that) when you recall the information the brain will not get some details right anymore.  Don't get upset this is the human brain and it happens to everyone.  That is why eye witness testimony doesn't mean much in courts anymore.  People will mistake someone for someone else then swear with absolute certainty that this person committed a crime, and then DNA evidence will exonerate them.

http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=4852659n&tag=mncol;lst;2

http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=4852677n&tag=mncol;lst;3

In the videos the lady is given the benefit of the doubt because both people looked similar.  But that isn't always the case.

[Dretlin]

so from what im reading it would have to be something that YOU know was supernatural and that YOU couldnt deny. Even then it wouldnt be enough for some of you, maybe youd need another miracle on top of it. a lot of skeptics

List three "miracles" of the 20th or 21st century.

[Whitney]

There was no embellishment, if you knew me you'd know. I joined here because i wanted to, not because i needed too. The religious questions never get me anywhere. I feel none the better after ive answered them. another choice would have been time better spent.

I was simply pointing out that there were more than 2 explanations to the bird story; I guess I should have also included the additional option of purposefully lying, or the you are/were crazy option....that would be 2 additional explanations off the top of my head not including your 2 and my previous 2....it's not just a choice between bird tamed via repeat feeding and god did it.  Now, from your perspective we can cut out purposefully lying but if I had a weird experience that I was claiming to be a miracle I would personally wonder if I might have been remembering incorrectly or had experienced a temporary moment of insanity (normal healthy humans can hallucinate images from time to time; supposedly we all do at least once in our lives but it's not out of place and so we don't notice; there's a thread covering that somewhere around here)

Anyway, as you can see there are numerous reasons for us to doubt your story as stated and then almost as many reasons for why you should personally doubt your story as stated.

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence....if we have 5 ordinary explanations and 1 extraordinary explanation there is no sense to pick the extraordinary one without reason.  Then if we use the razor to select the simplest of the 6 then coincidence combined with false memory (embellishing a bit unknowingly) is most likely since tame birds probably aren't that common in the forest and since it's not that great of miracle there isn't a reason to think you made it up.

List three "miracles" of the 20th or 21st century.

I'll throw this one in there for fun:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hindu_milk_miracle

[Sophus]

Ha ha... yes, it is quite flawed. Don't know if I completely agree with that website's information on it though. Even though Pascal was trying to convince readers we should "believe in God without hesitation" he did acknowledge there options of a Finite gain and Finite loss, didn't he?

I'm not sure exactly what you are asking.  Um check pascal's wiki under normal Wikipedia.

Oops. Nevermind. Memory failed me. Could've sworn I had read that somewhere. Maybe Dawkins' God Delusion?  

Ah well. I still remember that whole prose book of Pascal's was an utter disaster. Should have stuck to math.

The human brain becomes notoriously inaccurate the further an event is in the past.

What?!?! No it DOESN'T! My memory is unfailing!  lol

[Dretlin]

I'll throw this one in there for fun:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hindu_milk_miracle

I believe you used the correct expression.

"This explanation did nothing to reduce the numbers of faithful rushing to the temples..."

I am surprised (or maybe I shouldn't be) that something this trivial is considered proof of divine presence.

This does also highlight that even in the face of an explanation, it was ignored.

[dionysiou]

alright well theres no point in me listing miracles that i read in articles or on wiki (who can trust it?) but ive got an older friend of mine who tells me while he was driving he was caught up in a vision, in the vision he is holding onto his girlfriend until Jesus approaches him and begins to gently pull her away and says " Shes set apart for me" My friend is on his knees and looking down, he says " Lord, I am alone" Jesus replies "I will sustain you" and the vision ends and his back in the car. You could say he was only hallucinating but He actually broke up with his girlfriend at that time over it. He's happily married to somebody else now anyway. Ive got another friend of mine who is an evangelist and he spends all his time praying with people and getting guidance from the Holy Spirit. His seen jesus 3 times. finally is the pastor of my church who was in a motorcycle accident when he was 18, He told me he went to heaven and Jesus asked him if he wanted to stay, he told Jesus "no" because he wanted to know him better on earth and actually help some people so he woke up. so yea, ive heard others but i dont personally know the people. As for my story, that was written as soon as i got back home, because i knew i would forget things. You know, i was expecting to meet a lot more opposition than i have, i mean you guys are skeptical, which i would be too, but at least your considering the possibilities. oh and btw, no kookaburra has done that since, so it was a once off.

[objectivitees]

Regarding the miracle: "any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." What constitutes a miracle is totally subjective. One person's miracle is another person's magnet trick.

I think your definition is self-serving. It demonstrates a circularity and question begging unwillingness to evaluate evidence that might contradict your already made up mind. In short, any thing you could not explain you'd simply call a "magic trick" and since magic tricks are not miracles by definition, you don't have to acknowledge evidence against your beliefs.

But if we defined a miracle as a "suspension of the  natural laws of physics", and you saw your mother step off a cliff in an attempt to commit suicide, but she floated gracefully to the ground unaided by technology, and found upon her arrival the words "placed here by God" tattooed on her ass, your mother then claimed it was not a magic trick, she'd either be a liar, or the beneficiary of a miracle. But you'd pick liar, wouldn't you, because no one can float gracefully to the ground unaided by technology, can they? You'd completely ignore her previous suicidal state of mind, claiming it was only a "trick", because you've already made up your mind.  

[Whitney]

Regarding the miracle: "any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." What constitutes a miracle is totally subjective. One person's miracle is another person's magnet trick.

I think your definition is self-serving. It demonstrates a circularity and question begging unwillingness to evaluate evidence that might contradict your already made up mind. In short, any thing you could not explain you'd simply call a "magic trick" and since magic tricks are not miracles by definition, you don't have to acknowledge evidence against your beliefs.

But if we defined a miracle as a "suspension of the  natural laws of physics", and you saw your mother step off a cliff in an attempt to commit suicide, but she floated gracefully to the ground unaided by technology, and found upon her arrival the words "placed here by God" tattooed on her ass, your mother then claimed it was not a magic trick, she'd either be a liar, or the beneficiary of a miracle. But you'd pick liar, wouldn't you, because no one can float gracefully to the ground unaided by technology, can they? You'd completely ignore her previous suicidal state of mind, claiming it was only a "trick", because you've already made up your mind.  

Just as you have already made up your mind that curio is closed minded simply because he pointed out why it is not a good idea to jump to the conclusion that something is a miracle?