The second philosophical reason for believing in miracles is Swinburne’s theory that we should believe people’s testimonies. The most important point Swinburne
makes is that ‘we ought to believe things are as they seen unless we have good evidence that we are mistaken.’ This is important because he is also saying that without people’s testimonies, we have no evidence to rely on for proving miracles. He claimed that the principles of credulity and testimony should be applied, that is, we would normally believe what someone tells us to be the case, and therefore we should believe people’s testimonies. He uses the example of the biblical writers, who were aware that many would not believe them about the miracle of Jesus’ resurrection. But religious believers are committed to believing that G-d can, and does intervene miraculously in the world.
b) However there are also problems with believing in miracles. If we go back to the topic of the laws of nature but interpret them to be flexible, then miracles do not exist. Hick said natural laws are ‘generalisations formulated retrospectively to cover whatever has, in fact, happened.’ This means that nothing can be classed as a miracle as we can always stretch the laws of nature to explain what has happened. An example of this is walking on the moon. In the past, people would have said that this could never happen, but it has, therefore we have had to stretch the laws of nature. ‘People were regularly observed not to walk on the moon. But someone did walk on the moon’ (Davies). Through science, we find out new things all the time, which to previous generations would have appeared against the laws of nature and may have concluded that it was miraculous. The most important aspect of this point is that the laws of nature are flexible because this dismisses that miracles exist, and puts it down to a new natural law that we have not yet found out.
The second problem with believing in miracles is Hume’s doubts about testimony. Hume claimed that we should not believe people’s testimony and backs up his opinion with four points; The first is that he says there has never been a miracle with enough witnesses to put miracles beyond suspicion. ‘There is not to be found, in all history, any miracle attested by a sufficient number of men…who have good sense, educated…’ Hume also said that humans are naturally prone to look for marvels in the world and get easily excited which ‘gives a sensible tendency towards the belief of those events, from which it derived.’ This is another reason for being sceptical about reports of miracles. Hume’s third reason for not believing in testimonies is that accounts of miracles derive from people and nations that are themselves unreliable, who are ‘ignorant and barbarous nations.’ Hume finally makes a bold assumption that because different religions all claim to have seen miracles, that they cancel each other out. Hume concludes his argument by saying that man should weigh the evidence and ‘fix his judgement’ by comparing thousands of years of examples and proof that miracles do not happen, to one man who claims that he has seen a miracle. This is the most important point Hume makes as it is empirical evidence which uses a posteriori proof as it comes from our senses, e.g. laws of nature and the years of evidence.
c)The main problem for considering the claim that ‘there are no acceptable solutions to these problems’ lies within the definition of a miracle. I understand a miracle to be something unexplainable, for if it was explained, it would be called a fact, not a miracle. Therefore I am going to argue that there are acceptable solutions to some of these problems. Nonetheless, there is not an ‘acceptable’ solution, as there is no hard proof for miracles.
The most important point when arguing there is not an acceptable solution, comes back to the laws of nature. This is because there is proof which illustrates that the laws of nature are flexible, e.g. walking on the moon, as apposed to Hick’s idea that the laws of nature are rigid. However Davies conclude ‘It follows that a law of nature can reasonably be said to have been violated and that it is wrong to say that nobody can have reason for supposing that miracles have occurred.’ This comment can be linked to Holland’s belief that it is up to the individual to decide what they thing is miraculous and what is not.
Some would argue that there are no acceptable solutions and would back this up by saying that Hume is correct with his problem of Testimony. This is the most important point Hume makes when arguing that there is no solution for the problems of miracles, because it is known that some people do lye, even under oath. You may gain popularity, fame, even fortune and claiming to have seen a miracle is a good way to get others to follow a new religion or belief. However, this is not the case for many, and it is also known that people do tell the truth. Swinburne believed the opposite to Hume, and claimed that we should believe people’s testimonies. Testimony is also the only evidence we have for miracles, so without these, there is no way of proving that miracles do or do not exist. So this point can be argued either way, proving that this does not verify that there are no acceptable solutions, thus there are acceptable solutions to these problems.
Hume makes four reasons for discrediting testimony, and each of these reasons can be argued against. His first, about not a sufficient number of witnesses is very vague. He does not say what a ‘sufficient’ number is and never states what counts as ‘good sense, education and learning’. There are examples of miracles which have been seen by many, for instance the parting of the red sea, or the feeding of 5000. Surely 5000 would constitute as a ‘sufficient’ number. Even if his second claim, that humans become too excited and are swayed by their love of the wonderful is true, does it mean that all accounts of miracles are unreliable? The answer is probably no, but there is no way of proving this. Hume’s thirds reason, that miracles come from nations which are themselves unreliable, is totally unjust. Every nation could say the same thing and Hume’s comment makes himself appear ignorant. The forth point that ‘all religions claim miracles…which destroys the credit of other miracles’ does not make sense. The fact that different religions report miracles is not enough to assume that they just cancel each other out. This critique of Hume’s reasons why testimony should not be trusted, shows that there are acceptable solutions to problems for miracles, as one of the problems was Hume’s theory about testimony, which has been counter argued.
Hume balances up the evidence and says that the evidence for miracles not existing is more convincing. He asks us to compare one person’s claim to thousands of years of evidence against miracles. This is a very persuasive point that Hume makes as he uses empirical evidence, however there used to be ‘evidence’ that the world was flat. This was believed until one man, Columbus proved that the world was round, so it is equally fair to say that one man can prove that there are miracles. This shows that Hume’s belief that there is no acceptable solution, can again be wrong and that there is are acceptable solutions.
To conclude, Hume is not successful in his criticism of miracles because he is vague and incorrect. ‘Nothing in his argument shows that one should ignore a miracle one has experienced’ (Vardi). Also, testimonies can be reliable, they are used in court and are believed by the judge and jury do why should testimonies about miracles be any different? Even scientific evidence is based on testimony to a certain extent. However some would argue that Hume is successful in proving that there are no acceptable solutions for miracles, because people do lye, exaggerate and get over excited. The argument about the laws of nature being flexible is the most convincing argument to shows that there are no acceptable solutions to these problems as it has scientific proof, which we can see. However, it is still my belief that if a miracle was scientifically explained then it would not constitute as a miracle, but would be an every day occurrence and nothing special and that miracles do not need to be ‘testified’ or proven as they are personal. Therefore the acceptable solution to these problems comes back to Holland who says that a miracle can be one, if the individual decides to perceive it to be so.
Jessica Mann