[zeek]

Originally Posted by aron

Zeek can't understand and so won't believe. So I bring up the paradoxes of modern science which are difficult to understand rationally. Initially, for example, Einstein was aghast at the implications of quantum propositions, and put forth his "EPR paradox" as a kind of sarcastic rebuttal, but eventually his "EPR paradox" was experimentally confirmed! It seems that Niels Bohr was one of the first to really grasp the implications, and the limits of scientific understanding. Bohr realized that the act of measuring and weighing distorts the very thing we measure and weigh! In fact our very intention of determining whether the thing we seek is either energy or matter may affect the result we find. It was as if our "thought" or "intention" sent ripples into the quantum field, and pre-determined the actual finding.
I am no expert but my view has been that the experts have been challenged by this for decades. Yet they don't abandon science. Why? Because they have faith in the process. They're willing to accept uncertainty in the short term. And you may say that the probability of scientific hypothesis "x" is bigger than the probability for the hypothesis of "virgin birth" or what-have-you. I merely was making the point that in both cases some amount of faith is needed to advance, to test and measure. So don't give up so quickly; improbability according to our understanding doesn't equal impossibility.
I'm not particularly interested in virgin birth, or "miracles" as a subject - I merely note that it seems that the disciples were "astonished beyond measure" frequently in the gospel record. Something interesting possibly happened there! I think Timotheist has some points, and applaud his gumption to pursue them and put them out for public scrutiny. I simply was making a comment on science vs faith. It's not as clear-cut as you may wish it were.

All this seems to be a response to Awareness' jokey remark not my response in #255. Quantum physics is frequently proffered online as evidence for all kinds of absurd cultists http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PnvMzD-Zj6A https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/What_t...Do_We_Know!%3F

That God or quantum physics makes all thing possible is insufficient warrant for accepting any particular proposition. Given lack of compelling evidence for a supernatural event, a natural explanation is more probable.

Lastly, it turns out that at least some of the biography George Washington was actually myth. Look at Parson Weems and his "I cannot tell a lie" story with the cherry tree. Fabricated, apparently. Yet generations of school children read it in their history primers. And mythmaking, and Hellenization are rather evident in the U.S. Capitol rotunda. George Washington was actually "sonized" or "deified" by his hagiographers. Paid for by tax dollars.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ap..._of_Washington
Pretty fascinating stuff. Good Ole George is surrounded by the gods of Commerce, Industry, War, Arts, and so forth.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ap...Washington.jpg

I've seen the apotheosis of Washington on the ceiling at the capitol which is a latter day instance of the historic human tendency to deify it's heroes. The more instances of the phenomenon you produce the greater the evidence for my contention that it's a common human response that probably occurred in the case of Jesus.

So anything's possible; both miracles and myths. And we should pay attention to probability, but my point to zeek was that improbability doesn't equate to impossibility, nor does lack of understanding. Especially when you're dealing with God.

All things are possible but all propositions are not equally probable. So, what's your argument for going with the less probable option, as in the case of a supernatural explanation for the "virgin birth" of Jesus?