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    Carmelics

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    LoyalLoyalJusticeJustice
    Made withinDC&Austin
    Statements
    321,452
    Perspectives
    108,905
    Topics
    42
    Home/Original/inverse
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    Inverse View

    It is not the case that The evidential standard required to establish that a miracle has occurred is higher than that required for other unusual events

    ?Set your confidence on the premises below to see your aggregate.

    Reasons For

    2 perspectives
    Reason for 1 of 2
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    • 1.Hume's criterion illicitly assumes the very conclusion it purports to establish by treating 'uniform experience' as closed to revision by testimony.
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    • 2.A genuinely open empiricist epistemology must allow sufficiently strong testimony to count as evidence that revises prior probability distributions, including near-universal ones.
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    • 3.Treating prior experience as lexically superior to testimonial evidence is a dogmatic asymmetry incompatible with Bayesian norms of rational belief updating.
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    Reason for 2 of 2
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    • 1.John Earman argues in 'Hume's Abject Failure' that Hume conflates the prior improbability of a miracle-type with the posterior probability given specific testimonial evidence.
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    • 2.Even very low prior probabilities can be overcome by sufficiently reliable independent witnesses, as standard Bayesian analysis of conjunctive testimony demonstrates.
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    • 3.Therefore the claim that miracle evidence must always fail a fixed evidential threshold confuses a static prior with the dynamic output of proper probabilistic inference.
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    Reasons Against

    1 perspective
    Reason against
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    • 1.Unusual but naturally possible events (e.g., a healthy man dying suddenly) are improbable but not contrary to all experience
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    • 2.Miracles are contrary to all other experience and observation
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    • 3.The ultimate standard for judging miracle claims must reflect the strength of evidence against them
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    Next step

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    Strongest counterpoint
    Explore the most compelling reason on the other side.