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Proverbs 14:15. The naive person believes every word, But the shrewd one ponders each step.
Often stories (personal anecdotes) are told. And repeated. And that child’s game of telephone or whatever it’s called goes into effect. Soon the story is miraculous. Boring details forgotten. Other details enhanced. Even when this miracle comes from the mind of one person, you have to know that memory is malleable. When you remember something you aren’t even remembering the event. You are remembering the last time you remembered it. And so each time it’s sort of like that telephone chain. Memory is so untrustworthy.
I once showed someone Brian gillis’ version of a famous effect called “coins across.” The coins travel from one hand to the other, magically, invisibly. There are about 100 different methods. I showed my cousin this effect when I was about 12. She was impressed. The effect was okay. It stayed in her mind for 2 years. She played it over and over in her mind. 2 years later she asked me to repeat the effect. Rule number 2 in magic is never repeat an effect. And there are two reasons for this and one of them is highlighted here:
When I showed this effect to her a second time 2 years later, I did it better. I was much more skilled and natural with the coins. I had practiced a lot more. But something odd happened after I showed it to her again. She said: “oh, that’s not how I remembered it.” She was visibly disappointed. She had remembered a much more spectacular version of what actually happened. She remembered it as if it was real magic. She remembered it as if I never brought my hands together but as if the coins actually miraculously jumped. This is how magic works. It all happens in the mind, as magicians like to say. And it’s true. She remembered it in a way it never actually happened. After that I knew the magicians were right about rule number 2. And I knew why. And I was disappointed in myself for not just letting her believe it was so much better than it really was.The mind, isn’t perfect. It isn’t perfect in so many ways. It’s not just magicians that manipulate this these mind failures. We do it to ourselves far more than others do.
Hi david,
Yes it must be frustrating when you KNOW that there are no miracles and everyone who believes there are must be self deluded.
Quite a burden for you.
Catholic infallibility takes many forms
1. Does anyone here think I have given any reason for anyone to believe that I:
A. Am catholic?
B. Believe the Trinity?I don’t believe everyone should be allowed to use the Internet.
NICK…….THE WORD (INTELLECT) WAS NOT A WORD WHEN THE SCRIPTURES WERE WRITTEN , IT CAME INTO EXISTENCE IN THE 14 CENTURY, BUDT IT DOES EMBODY WHAT SPIRITS IMPART AND IMPUTE TO US, AND DESCRIBES WHAT TYPES AND KINDS OF SPIRIT DO. THEY IMPUT THEIR DESTINCT INTELLECTS (KINDS AND TYPES OF KNOWLEDGE TO US. THAT DOES NOT TAKE A VERY SMART PERSON TO UNDERSTAND THAT. IMO
peace and love to you and yours. ……………….gene
Hi GB,
Scripture offers you many options
DEVILS
SATANS
EVIL SPIRITS
and
DEMONS.
Why would you glorify them with your own chosen name
INTELLECTS?
If a person begins with a belief in Allah and looks for coincidences and miracles he will find things that could be perceived that way. The same goes for every religion and the 10,000 gods that came before. If a person prayed to Poseidon and believes in him and expected to see miracles, he will find a way to see them in his life and the world. Wouldn’t he?
Hi David,
I was not looking for miracles.
Raised as a christian I prayed to the Christian God and received no replies, no miracles, and no answers to my often desperate prayers. Then one day aged about 35 out of the blue I was visited by God (or God made his presence known). I was not in any special place or with special people, I was alone at home. From that day on I witnessed miracles though I was not looking for them. I wondered who this God was because I was not one hundred percent sure. The God I used to pray to had never answered me, and this God seemed to be leading me toward Islam (I was not to become a Muslim myself but it was my calling and I had to learn about them though I did not know that at the time), and I found myself defending and researching a religion I knew nothing about. So, one day, I asked this God who was now in my life who He was. My answer was the God of (can’t remember the names exactly but a few names from the Bible) so the God of the scriptures. My point: I was not looking for miracles as I never knew miracles existed, and I had given up on answers to prayers until this God made His presence known. I also was not sure who this God was one hundred percent. So, your conclusion that we will find a way to see miracles in this life and the world if we belief in a certain God with an expectation to see miracles is not always true.
We should NOT trust our heart.
We should NOT trust our senses, because they are so easily deceived.
We should trust actual real evidence.There is no need to show evidence to other people – it is between us and God. And the evidence is there – we see it ourselves.
Miia…..It’s not that GOD does not still perform mircales today, it’s that TRUE FAITH IS LACKING. READ AND STUDY THE PARABLE OF THE UNJUST JUDGE , the answer is there. True believers are connect with GOD THE FATHER, and he still performs mircales in their lives even today. Scripture says GOD does not change, he is the same today as he was yesterday. Believe me Miia i know where of I speak, i have had many, many, mircales performed in my life instantly as soon as i have ask for the help they were given me. I am without excuse for i have truly seen the proof of GOD THE FATHERS EXISTENCE AND PRESENCE IN MY LIFE.
Hi Gene. Yes I believe you!
Hi miia
How do you judge what is actually a miracle and what is not, given the human minds ability to self deceive?
For thousands of years people who worshipped a thousand different gods have believed they were seeing miracles just as you do.
I think a lot of this is the post hoc ergo propter hoc fallacy. Just because something comes before something does not mean it caused it.
Example: a man prays on Saturday morning for spiritual help. He feels suicidal even. Moments later two people knock on his door with bibles in their hands. A miracle? To the individual who personally prayed it’s hard to dismiss. And for the people at the door who will retell this story over and over again, they too want to believ. But let’s step back and look at the whole. How many people that same day were also praying and no one came? Also, in the U.S. At that time maybe there were a million people making similar prayers. How many had people show up? And given that a million people were going from door to door today, mathematically it would be a miracle if hundreds of people praying for help didn’t have people knocking on their doors. So is this a miracle. My problem is its this sort of thinking, not looking at the whole, and just thinking: A came before B, therefore A caused B.
For the person or hundred people who prayed and actually ad someone show up, it’s a miracle. For the other thousands of people who prayed and no one showed up that day, it goes unmentioned. And forgotten. But maybe someone will show up next week. This too will be a miracle. And yet, it’s just math and balance of probability.
How do you know given all the frailties and bias of the human mind that you can trust your feelings?
Nick……Did I not say spirits come in all kinds and types, they each produce their own intellects,that canbe a good or evil intellect the word intellect still applies to who and what they are and what they produce is their own destinct intellegence. Rather it be clean or unclean spirits, our word intellect still applies to them, your view of unintelligent spirits thinking they are angels is false and that is what does not match scriptures and what scriptures say. IMO
peace and love to you and yours. ……………….gene
David……..YOUR IN A good place because you are at least able to admit,you have not had a true relationship with GOD, OR YOU WOULD KNOW WITHOUT A DOUBT IF HE EXISTS IN YOUR LIFE OR NOT,YOU WOULD SURELY KNOW IF “TRUE” MIRCALES WERE SMOKE AND MIRRORS OR TRICKS OF OUR MINDS OR NOT. THE BURDON OF PROOF IS BETWEEN YOU AND THE FATHER HIMSELF.
I was a doubter like you at one time soi put GOD TO THE TEST AND HE REAVEALED HIMSELF TO ME BY MIRCALES WHEN I PUT HIM TO THE TEST, read MAL 3:10-15
BUT THOSE THAT FEAR GOD ARE WRITTEN IN A BOOK OF REMEMBERANCE IS WRITTEN. Mal 3:16.
David believe me there are still true mircales being performed even today just as there was in the days long ago. There isnothing wrong withyou wanting proof of tbe FATHER EXSISTENCE, BUT WHEN HE GIVE IT YOU SHOULD NOT PASS IT OF AS SMOKE AND MIRRORS, IMO
peace and love to you and yours. …………..gene
Hi david,
Yes there is only one name under heaven by which we can be saved.
But some door knockers offer salvation in the name of Michael the archangel.
We do not think the arrival of such strangers is a miracle.
Hi David,
So Jesus and the apostles and prophets did miracles.
Rather the Spirit of God did them through them.
Is the Spirit of God still promised to men?
Acts 2.39
Hi,
Gal 3.5
“Does HE then,
Who provides you with the Spirit,
and works miracles among you,
do it by the works of the Law,
or by hearing it with faith?”
Hi miia
How do you judge what is actually a miracle and what is not, given the human minds ability to self deceive?
For thousands of years people who worshipped a thousand different gods have believed they were seeing miracles just as you do.
I think a lot of this is the post hoc ergo propter hoc fallacy. Just because something comes before something does not mean it caused it.
Example: a man prays on Saturday morning for spiritual help. He feels suicidal even. Moments later two people knock on his door with bibles in their hands. A miracle? To the individual who personally prayed it’s hard to dismiss. And for the people at the door who will retell this story over and over again, they too want to believ. But let’s step back and look at the whole. How many people that same day were also praying and no one came? Also, in the U.S. At that time maybe there were a million people making similar prayers. How many had people show up? And given that a million people were going from door to door today, mathematically it would be a miracle if hundreds of people praying for help didn’t have people knocking on their doors. So is this a miracle. My problem is its this sort of thinking, not looking at the whole, and just thinking: A came before B, therefore A caused B.
For the person or hundred people who prayed and actually ad someone show up, it’s a miracle. For the other thousands of people who prayed and no one showed up that day, it goes unmentioned. And forgotten. But maybe someone will show up next week. This too will be a miracle. And yet, it’s just math and balance of probability.
How do you know given all the frailties and bias of the human mind that you can trust your feelings?
Hi David,
I hear what you saying, and sometimes that might be true.
But, just think for a minute.
Go back 2000 years ago, and imagine you are there when Jesus is performing his miracles.
We have Jesus changing water into wine, feeding 5000 men and their families, catching a fish with the coin in its mouth.healing the sick, the disabled, the demon possessed, the blind, calming the storm, raising the dead, and then his own death, resurrection from the dead and ascension to Heaven.
Would you consider those things Jesus did to be magic, illusions – or miracles?
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