To disprove the Jesus miracle stories, you need more than just a conspiracy theory that . . .
. . . historians have secret proof that all miracle claims are false but are covering it up.
Miracle stories are implicitly treated as false for quite some time. There's no need for an explicit decree: it's as implicit as the rule followed by car makers which would say, if made explicit, that cars don't just float up into space so there's no need to shield them for re-entry.
That's a very bad analogy, because no one is making any such claim about cars. There's no need to correct claims which are not being made.
I did not bring up that claim to be corrected;
But you did correct it. You said ". . . that cars don't just float up into space . . ."
That's correcting a claim that cars do float up into space. If you were not correcting it, then you wouldn't say "that cars don't just float up into space."
The only reason historians don't deny that cars float upward is that no one believes such a thing or claims it. If someone seriously did claim it, the historian or scientist would then deny it. But no one does claim it, and there's no need to deny something no one is claiming. And only a wacko nutcase would suggest that this has to also be the reason why they don't deny explicitly that miracles could ever happen. A few actually do declare such a thing, but they're a tiny minority, because it's not their proper function to declare what's possible and what is not. Their job is to determine what happened and report that to us, not make judgments on what is or is not possible.
A natural scientist could properly explain why normal humans cannot float up, or other such things, but this does not mean they decree it impossible for anyone to ever do such a thing under any possible conditions. The possibility of it happening under certain special conditions cannot be ruled out, because there's always the possibility that the normal limits might be overcome.
I brought it up as an analogy to the tactics you chose, that of demanding an explicit statement by historians referring to the inadmissibility of miracles, which you must have known won't be forthcoming because rejecting miracle claims is an implicit rule by now and nobody bothers stating it anymore.
No, you're just repeating your false claim that there is this implicit rule, and this is not somehow proved to be true by your repeating the false claim. There is no such rule, no matter how many times you repeat your false claim that there is.
The rule is to set aside miracle claims into a doubtful category, and generally there is no judgment on the truth of them, except in cases where there is real evidence contradicting the claim, not just the premise that all such claims must be false -- and often there is not the necessary evidence contradicting it. Though there's a general opinion that such claims are usually fictional or have a normal explanation, that's only opinion, not fact. When there's no evidence to disprove the claim, it has to remain in the doubtful category and the claims are not officially ruled as false.
(Of course in extreme cases, like the pagan deities/heroes, it's assumed the stories are fiction. But this is not so for stories for which there is mention in written accounts much closer to the alleged events.)
. . . rejecting miracle claims is an implicit rule by now and . . .
No, your phrase "by now" is wrong because there has always been the same skepticism about miracles as there is today, and historians per se didn't generally pronounce the miracle claims to be either true or false (except when there was real evidence). They generally left it open, though there's always a few who step out of their role as historians and give their opinion, some believing and others disbelieving in the possibility of miracles. But this is not their function, as historians
per se, because it's normal for them to leave many questions open and not to pretend to resolve all unanswered questions, as you are dogmatically demanding from them.
Today there may be more skepticism by historians than 1000 or 2000 years ago, but this doesn't mean that a new "implicit" rule has evolved that no miracle events can ever happen. True skepticism still leaves open the possibility, taking the agnostic approach rather than imposing a dogma that some events are ruled out regardless of any evidence.
There is no official "ruling" on whether miracles ever do happen or do not happen, despite your demand that they must make such a ruling, or that they must have done so "implicitly" in order to appease some whining debunkers who need the security of some expert dictating the "Truth" to us instead of letting people think for themselves.
You are incorrect in claiming that we are not to do our own thinking and judging but must have some appointed experts always dictate the truth to us. The experts have not officially settled the question whether miracle events might sometimes happen or can never happen. Your wishful fantasizing that some appointed experts must decide this for us does not give you an entitlement to have them dictate "the Truth" to you (though you're entitled to fantasize this if it makes you feel more secure).
The appropriate skepticism about miracle claims does not include the dogmatic ruling that such events can never happen, but only the requirement to subject such claims to a higher level of critical investigation -- contrary to your dogma which would make investigation unnecessary and even ban investigation and replace this with a universal condemnation and censorship of all such claims.
The analogy works well for that purpose, and whether anyone made the claim or not is absolutely irrelevant in this respect.
Here are 3 statements experts all tacitly agree on, each denying a claim no one makes, and also a 4th one you say historians have officially adopted but are secretly suppressing, and which denies a claim some people do make. And you see no difference between statement 4 and statements 1-3:
1) Cars don't float up into the air.
2) Apache Indians didn't ride camels into battle.
3) Catholic nuns don't parade around the altar singing "Slap 'er down again, Pa, slap 'er down again" at Mass while the priest blesses the bread and wine.
4) Miracle events can't ever happen.
You think historians have adopted 4) secretly, keeping silent on it for the same reason they keep silent on 1) and 2) and 3).
I.e., you're saying the reason there's no official statement by historians denying all miracle claims is the same reason why there's no official statement by them denying that cars float up into space, or that Apache Indians rode camels, or that nuns sing "Slap 'er down again, Pa" at Mass.
The claim denied by 4) is a claim that is believed by many, whereas claims denied by 1) and 2) and 3) are not made by anyone, along with trillions other similar claims denying something no one believes or would even imagine.
Instead of asking, "What have you been smoking?" let's just sum up your logic here, which is your main argument for not believing the Jesus miracle stories in the gospel accounts:
-- We must reject these miracle claims because historians really know all miracle claims are false, even though they don't say so and some even deny this and say they believe some miracle claims.
-- We can be sure they know all miracle claims are false, even though they don't say so, because there are many claims they know are false without saying so, such as trillions of claims no one would ever imagine making or believing, and since historians don't issue official denials of these claims no one makes, that proves they know all miracle claims are false even though they don't say so explicitly.
Obviously there is a cover-up or conspiracy among historians to suppress the fact that there can be no miracle events.
This is the kind of reasoning why we must disbelieve the Jesus miracle stories in the gospel accounts.
And there is nothing about history which disproves miracle claims generally.
Except they don't happen on camera, ever, and they don't leave physical traces, ever.
That's your conclusion. There are plenty of claims that they have done both, and there is no history source which says all these claims have been disproved. There are plenty of "traces" or images which are ambiguous and interpreted differently, so that it cannot be determined what actually happened.
There is evidence that such events are rare, and so are difficult to verify, like many other events for which there is little or no trace other than a mention in the written record.
And people lie and hallucinate all the time, . . .
No they don't. If they did, then we should not believe any of the historical record. Throw out all the history books if you believe this. Also throw out what you're saying, because you must be lying and hallucinating as you write this.
so what's more likely: that miracles ceased to happen as soon as objective records could be made about them, or that they never used to happen?
What's likely is that they are rare events. And it's not true that there are no "objective records" made about them. No one has analyzed ALL such "objective records" and debunked all of them.
The proof for the implied existence of such decrees is that you still could not present a miracle story accepted by historians, . . .
Yes I did. The story of Rasputin the mad monk who healed the Czar's child is accepted by historians.
Leaving aside the fact that both of my sources from which I've heard this claim before treated it with skepticism . . .
Probably all of them do. But most sources recognize that the events did happen and simply don't have an explanation. Some suggest a "natural explanation" but have no evidence of any. None of them say the events didn't happen, and very few declare that no miracle happened. Rather, they say we don't know what happened, but that the witnesses there generally believed that he healed the child somehow.
The events did happen, and the explanation is not known. There are many doubts and theories about it.
('allegedly' and the like, e.g. Pipes' The History of the Russian Revolution) that would not be a miracle because it does not contradict what we know, . . .
contradict "what we know"? The Rasputin case contradicts normal experience and showed an ability to perform acts which normal humans cannot perform. If "what we know" means normal experience, then your source is incorrect. This case did contradict normal experience. And current science has not determined the explanation, though there are theories.
. . . admittedly mostly because we know so little about placebo effects.
"placebo"? As long as the "miracle" works, it doesn't matter what terminology you give it. If your argument is that the Jesus miracle healings were all just "placebo" effects, that doesn't really contradict the miracle events. What would have happened to those lepers and others who were cured if you told them it was only a placebo? They would turn into a pumpkin?
You seem to wish to muddy the waters by claiming that anything unusual is a miracle.
Anything that normally cannot be done, or which humans cannot do. Once any such acts are recognized as possible in some cases, i.e., that some such thing possibly happened, then you can't say such acts are impossible and that the Jesus miracle acts are ruled out.
What I am objecting to here is walking on water, resurrecting the dead, multiplying the fish, turning wine into water etc. These are miracles because they contravene established physics.
But that only means they are not explained by current physics, or, it's not known how to make such things happen, or, normal humans cannot make them happen.
Physics does not disprove that any of these can happen. Perhaps it proves that normal humans cannot do them, or explains why they cannot.
Healing by placebo effects is something we don't know enough about. But we know a bit about how certain processes should go and why we never see certain other processes. For instance water doesn't usually turn into wine, and we know why -- you'd need large amounts of energy from nowhere to create the new elements needed, because wine is a suspension of all sorts of organic stuff in a mixture of water and alcohol, laced with glycerine and whatnot, and even if you'd create the additional elements, you'd need to extract entropy from the sludge because wine is not the most disorganized state a mixture of the necessary elements could be found.
I'll check into that next time I need to convert water into wine.
There was a History Channel documentary in which an historian said that the healing event did happen and that Rasputin had some unusual power to make this happen.
History Channel does not do history at all, it's a tabloid channel by now.
It's about the same as PBS except for the commercials and the need for high ratings in order to make a profit. This does not mean it's unreliable. They rely on PhD historians, so you have to condemn all the historians also.
This [History Channel] is the source of your claims about historians?
It's one of many reliable sources. You can't name a case where they are known to have distorted the facts. No doubt they make some errors, like any other source, but it's mostly reliable.
Their information is not falsified just because they do some sensationalizing in order to increase ratings. We have to rely on the standard sources. You can't expect everyone to restrict their viewing and reading to only your approved list of sources.
There is no reason to reject the History Channel as a legitimate source. Other than snobbery based on contempt for anything that caters to the common masses.
Soundbites from between two UFO documentaries?
Every UFO documentary I saw on that Channel presented both sides, never only one. That they sensationalize in order to increase their ratings doesn't undermine the general credibility. It's overall reliable. They have to present sensationalist topics in order to enhance their viewership. Those programs then help to subsidize the higher-class ones.
The powers displayed by savants are essentially in the "miracle" category.
Which physical law, verified every day countless times by operating machinery depending on it, is being contradicted here? Because otherwise it's not a miracle, . . .
There is no one fixed definition of "miracle" that everyone is required to conform to.
My meaning, referring to the acts attributed to Jesus in the gospel accounts, is a superhuman act, or an act which normal humans cannot perform, and cannot learn. This fits the standard definitions and also the ancient Greek words, such as
dunamis. But there are other definitions also.
Some of the powers displayed by the savants are in this category. If this kind of power is possible, which obviously it is, then we cannot rule out other reports of superhuman power when there is evidence that such acts were done. We might still disbelieve it, but it's not unreasonable to believe such power is possible, when we do have documented cases of people who possess a particular power which is impossible for normal humans.
. . . lest you are prepared to claim that any special talent is a miracle.
It's a "miracle" when it is displayed by someone, even a child, who never was taught and yet suddenly can perform an act which humans are unable to learn to do. That crosses the line into the "miracle" category.
No, there is nothing about what we "know" that makes all "miracles" impossible.
Thou shalt speak in singular.
So you admit there's nothing you know which makes all miracles impossible.
The miracle acts of Jesus might have happened without negating anything known to science.
Walking on water cannot happen because Archimedes' law and gravity. Bodily ascension of Jesus out of this universe could not happen because of the first law of thermodynamics. Resurrecting the dead can not happen because of the second law of thermodynamics. Multiplying the fish could not happen because both the first and the second law of thermodynamics. Turning water into wine I've touched upon already.
All we know is that humans normally do not have power to make such things happen. That doesn't mean science is negated if someone comes along who does do it. It just means that current science wouldn't be able to explain it.
If all you mean by "superstitious age" is a period when many new religious writings appear, that description fits, but these new writings contain no new miracle stories other than rehashing those of many centuries earlier, such as the Moses stories, or the Flood, etc.
No, by a superstitious age I mean an age when the average Roman subject believed a shitload of impossibilities, like the miracles of Simon of Cyrene and . . .
You're confusing this "Simon" with some other.
. . . the fireproof nature of salamanders and sympathetic magic and numerology and astrology and all this stuff.
All ages believe in such things. The age when the gospels were written was no more "superstitious" than other ages. It was LESS superstitious than the periods both before and after the 1st century when the gospel accounts were written.
They did not yet know that these things are impossible, so they believed them.
People today believe more impossible stuff than those of the 1st century. You're not showing that the 1st century was more superstitious. With today's vast media, there's greatly more proliferation of miracle stories and "impossible" events and superstitions than was the case in the first century AD.
The majority did not believe the superstitions you're citing. DISbelief was more common than belief in them, and superstitions are more widespread today than in the 1st century, especially in terms of what is published.
Men in some African nations believe right now that witches can steal their penises by simply walking past them and they will swear it's absolutely happening left and right. Would you make the claim that this is proof of penis-stealing miracles or perhaps you'd concede they are superstitious and believe because everyone around them believes the same?
That's today, not the 1st century AD.
You're proving my point: The 1st century, when the gospel accounts were written, was no more superstitious, or was even LESS, than most other periods, including today. So, your claim that those Jesus miracle stories were caused by the "superstitious age" or the "context" of the time when the gospels were written is obviously just a slogan without substance. You've still given no example to show that the 1st century was more superstitious. All the facts show that it was LESS, not more.
Almost exactly the same kind of stories were widely believed in late medieval Europe too, see for instance Jean Delumeau's La Peur en Occident, or even the Malleus Malleficarum for colorful stories of this very kind. Were they true then and not true now, or were those also superstitious ages?
You're exaggerating the extent of belief in these. They were mostly rejected.
But you're making my point, that the 1st century when the gospels were written was no more a "superstitious age" than other ages, including even today. You still can't come up with any example to show the 1st century AD was more superstitious.
And the 2nd century saw an increase in miracle stories, inspired by the earlier Jesus miracle stories, for which there is no explanation. To make your claim, you need to show us an excess of superstitions and miracles occurring BEFORE the gospel accounts appeared, such as from about 200 BC to 50 AD. Or even 300 BC to 50 AD. This is the "age" when the gospel accounts were written, or just before then, leading into the period when the Jesus stories appeared. That's the age which needs to have something happening in it which would cause the Jesus stories to appear.
But so far you haven't given us one example of a superstition of miracle pattern unique to this period.
Also note that I'm making a concession here by saying that it would be enough for a miracle to break some well-established physical law. For myself, I'd only accept a clear case of strong emergence as a miracle, but I think the standard can safely be lowered in this case.
It's an act which normal humans cannot do, and cannot learn to do. It doesn't matter whether it violates any "physical law" or not. Just because the miracle act cannot be done by normal humans does not mean it would violate a physical law if someone with superhuman power shows up and does perform such an act.
