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Of Miracles
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Of Miracles
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"Of Miracles" is the tenth section of David Hume's An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding (1748). In this piece, Hume states that evidence of miracles is never sufficient for rational belief.

Overview

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Put simply, Hume defines a miracle as a violation of a law of nature (understood as a regularity of past experience projected by the mind to future cases)[1] and argues that the evidence for a miracle is never sufficient for rational belief because it is more likely that a report of a miracle is false as a result of misperception, mistransmission, or deception ("that this person should either deceive or be deceived"[2]), than that a violation of a regularity of experience has actually occurred. For obvious reasons, the argument has infuriated some Christians,[3] especially given the reference to the Resurrection:

When anyone tells me, that he saw a dead man restored to life, I immediately consider with myself, whether it be more probable, that this person should either deceive or be deceived, or that the fact, which he relates, should really have happened.... If the falsehood of his testimony would be more miraculous, than the event which he relates; then, and not till then, can he pretend to command my belief or opinion.[4]

Origins and text

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Hume did not publish his views on miracles in his early, 1739, Treatise, and the sections on miracles were often omitted by publishers in early editions of his 1748 Enquiry.

For instance, in the 19th-century edition of Hume's Enquiry (in Sir John Lubbock's series, "One Hundred Books"), sections X and XI were omitted, appearing in an Appendix with the misleading explanation that they were normally left out of popular editions.[5] Although the two sections appear in the full text of the Enquiry in modern editions, chapter X has also been published separately, both as a separate book and in collections.

In his December 1737 letter to his friend and relative Henry Home, Lord Kames,[6] Hume set out his reasons for omitting the sections on miracles in the earlier Treatise. He described how he went about "castrating" the Treatise so as to "give as little offence" to the religious as possible. He added that he had considered publishing the argument against miracles—as well as other anti-theistic arguments—as part of the Treatise, but decided against it so as to not offend the religious sensibilities of readers.[7]

The argument

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Hume starts by telling the reader that he believes that he has "discovered an argument ... which, if just, will, with the wise and learned, be an everlasting check to all kinds of superstitious delusion".[8]

Hume first explains the principle of evidence: the only way that we can judge between two empirical claims is by weighing the evidence. The degree to which we believe one claim over another is proportional to the degree by which the evidence for one outweighs the evidence for the other. The weight of evidence is a function of such factors as the reliability, manner, and number of witnesses.

Now, a miracle is defined as "a transgression of a law of nature by a particular volition of the Deity, or by the interposition of some invisible agent."[9] Laws of nature, however, are established by "a firm and unalterable experience";[10] they rest upon the exceptionless testimony of countless people in different places and times. In this way Hume is careful to distinguish the miraculous from the merely wondrous or unusual.

Nothing is esteemed a miracle, if it ever happen in the common course of nature. It is no miracle that a man, seemingly in good health, should die on a sudden: because such a kind of death, though more unusual than any other, has yet been frequently observed to happen. But it is a miracle, that a dead man should come to life; because that has never been observed in any age or country.[11]

As the evidence for a miracle is always limited, as miracles are single events, occurring at particular times and places, the evidence for the miracle will always be outweighed by the evidence against – the evidence for the law of which the miracle is supposed to be a transgression.

There are, however, two ways in which this argument might be neutralised. First, if the number of witnesses of the miracle be greater than the number of witnesses of the operation of the law, and secondly, if a witness be completely reliable (for then no amount of contrary testimony will be enough to outweigh that person's account). Hume therefore lays out, in the second part of section X, a number of reasons that we have for never holding this condition to have been met. He first claims that no miracle has in fact had enough witnesses of sufficient honesty, intelligence, and education. He goes on to list the ways in which human beings lack complete reliability:

  • People are very prone to accept the unusual and incredible, which excite agreeable passions of surprise and wonder.
  • Those with strong religious beliefs are often prepared to give evidence that they know is false, "with the best intentions in the world, for the sake of promoting so holy a cause".[12]
  • People are often too credulous when faced with such witnesses, whose apparent honesty and eloquence (together with the psychological effects of the marvellous described earlier) may overcome normal scepticism.
  • Miracle stories tend to have their origins in "ignorant and barbarous nations"[13] – either elsewhere in the world or in a civilised nation's past. The history of every culture displays a pattern of development from a wealth of supernatural events – "[p]rodigies, omens, oracles, judgements"[14]– which steadily decreases over time, as the culture grows in knowledge and understanding of the world.

Hume ends with an argument that is relevant to what has gone before, but which introduces a new theme: the argument from miracles. He points out that many different religions have their own miracle stories. Given that there is no reason to accept some of them but not others (aside from a prejudice in favour of one religion), then we must hold all religions to have been proved true – but given the fact that religions contradict each other, this cannot be the case.

Criticism

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R. F. Holland has argued that Hume's definition of "miracle" need not be accepted, and that an event need not violate a natural law in order to be accounted miraculous,[15] though as J.C.A. Gaskin has pointed out,[16] other definitions of miracles make them fall under the order of nature, and then they would be subject to Hume's critique of the Teleological Argument. It has been argued by critics such as the Presbyterian minister George Campbell, that Hume's argument is circular. That is, he rests his case against belief in miracles upon the claim that laws of nature are supported by exceptionless testimony, but testimony can only be accounted exceptionless if we discount the occurrence of miracles.[17] The philosopher John Earman has argued that Hume's argument is "largely unoriginal and chiefly without merit where it is original",[18] citing Hume's lack of understanding of the probability calculus as a major source of error. Hume scholars were nearly unanimous in rejecting Earman's account, however. Fogelin[19] and Vanderburgh[20] show in detail how Earman and other critics have made serious errors in interpreting Hume's account of miracles and his treatment of evidential probability. J. P. Moreland and William Lane Craig agree with Earman's basic assessment and have critiqued Hume's argument against being able to identify miracles by stating that Hume's theory "fails to take into account all the probabilities involved" and "he incorrectly assumes that miracles are intrinsically highly improbable".[21]

C. S. Lewis echoes Campbell's sentiment in his book Miracles: A Preliminary Study, when he argues that Hume begins by begging the question. He says that Hume's initial proposition — that laws of nature cannot be broken — is effectively the same question as 'Do miracles occur?'.

See also

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Notes

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References

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Revisions and contributorsEdit on WikipediaRead on Wikipedia

Of Miracles

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"Of Miracles" constitutes Section X of David Hume's An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, published in 1748, in which the Scottish empiricist philosopher contends that human testimony cannot rationally justify belief in miracles, understood as violations of natural laws established by uniform experience. Hume defines a miracle as "a transgression of a law of nature by a particular volition of the deity, or by the interposition of some invisible agent," emphasizing that such events contradict the consistent causal patterns observed empirically across human history. The essay's central argument hinges on probabilistic reasoning: the evidence supporting natural laws derives from vast, repeated observations, rendering any contrary inherently suspect unless the falsehood of that testimony would itself constitute a greater improbability than the alleged . Hume elucidates that "no is sufficient to establish a , unless the testimony be of such a kind, that its falsehood would be more miraculous, than the fact, which it endeavours to establish," thereby privileging experiential uniformity over anecdotal reports prone to , , or motivated distortion. In Part II, he extends this to religious , observing their in ancient, illiterate, or "barbarous" contexts where verification is scant and passions run high, further undermining their evidential weight. This work has shaped modern skepticism toward supernatural claims, influencing debates on evidence in by underscoring the primacy of empirical consistency in assessing extraordinary assertions, while eliciting counterarguments that challenge its priors on fixity or evaluation.

Historical and Philosophical Background

David Hume's

David Hume's posits that the contents of the human mind derive exclusively from sensory and the ideas copied from them, eschewing innate principles or knowledge obtained through pure reason alone. In (1739–1740), he delineates perceptions into impressions, which possess greater force and vivacity, such as sensations and passions, and ideas, fainter mental images derived from impressions, thereby grounding all in empirical origins. This framework rejects rationalist metaphysics, which posits a priori necessities discernible without experience, insisting instead that abstract concepts must trace back to phenomena. Central to Hume's philosophy is his analysis of causation, where he denies any introspectible "necessary connection" between cause and effect, attributing our sense of causal power to repeated observations of constant conjunction—events that invariably succeed one another—rather than an inherent metaphysical bond. Belief in future uniformity thus stems from custom or habit, a psychological propensity formed by past experiences, not from demonstrative reasoning or intuitive grasp of objective necessity. This empiricist skepticism extends to broader metaphysical claims, undermining proofs reliant on unobservable essences or faculties beyond sensory verification. Hume refined these ideas in An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding (1748), a more concise exposition intended for wider readership, which retains the core empiricist commitment to as the sole arbiter of meaningful propositions while critiquing dogmatic excesses in and . of the Enquiry, "Of Miracles," emerges within this context, applying the framework to evaluate testimony against established experiential regularities, though the essay's argumentative details lie beyond the foundational here outlined.

Composition and Publication Details

David Hume composed "Of Miracles" circa 1737 while preparing his A Treatise of Human Nature for publication, intending initially to incorporate the essay's arguments into that work as part of his critique of religious testimony. However, he withheld it from the Treatise due to apprehension regarding its skeptical stance on supernatural claims, which he recognized could provoke significant opposition from religious and academic establishments. This caution is evidenced in Hume's 1737 correspondence with Henry Home (later Lord Kames), where he explicitly noted the decision to exclude the miracles discussion to mitigate potential controversy. The essay first appeared in print as Section X in Hume's Philosophical Essays Concerning Human Understanding, published in by Andrew Millar in November 1748. This collection, later retitled An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding in subsequent editions, marked the essay's public debut after over a of delay, reflecting Hume's strategic timing amid Enlightenment-era sensitivities to challenges against orthodox Christianity. Hume oversaw revisions to the Enquiry across multiple editions through 1772, with a posthumous 1777 version incorporating minor textual adjustments for clarity and consistency, though the core arguments of "Of Miracles" remained substantially unchanged from the 1748 original. These updates focused primarily on stylistic refinements rather than substantive alterations to the miracles essay, preserving its probabilistic framework against testimonial evidence.

Initial Reception in Enlightenment Debates

Hume's "Of Miracles," appearing as Section X in the 1748 Philosophical Essays Concerning Human Understanding (later retitled An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding), encountered polarized responses amid Enlightenment tensions between and religious orthodoxy. Skeptics and deists lauded its challenge to uncritical acceptance of testimonies, interpreting the argument's emphasis on uniform experience as a rational antidote to and priestly . This aligned with broader campaigns against , as seen in the essay's resonance with freethinking circles that prioritized probabilistic reasoning over dogmatic assertions of divine intervention. Orthodox critics, particularly clergy defending scriptural miracles as foundational to , condemned the piece as an assault on and historical . Responses proliferated in Britain, with figures like William Adams, Master of , publishing An in Answer to Mr. Hume's Essay on Miracles in 1752 (expanded in later editions), arguing that Hume undervalued the moral and contextual reliability of witnesses while over-relying on abstract induction. These rebuttals framed the essay within ongoing quarrels over deism's of miracles, linking it to debates in Scottish periodicals during the 1750s, where Moderates in the grappled with evangelical insistence on supernatural evidences amid Hume's rising influence in intellectual life. In private correspondence, Hume reflected on the essay's fallout, noting its contribution to his notoriety as an "" that barred academic appointments and fueled public suspicion. Writing to Mure of Caldwell in 1748, he anticipated backlash but affirmed the work's necessity for philosophical candor, while later letters to in the 1750s acknowledged how the miracles discussion entrenched perceptions of , intertwining personal reputation with wider Enlightenment schisms between and .

Structure and Key Elements of the Essay

Division into Parts I and II

The essay "Of Miracles," appearing as Section X of An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding (first published in ), is structured into two distinct parts that build upon each other rhetorically, with Part I laying foundational principles and Part II extending them to concrete cases. This division allows Hume to first articulate a probabilistic framework for evaluating extraordinary claims before applying it to historical testimonies, creating a logical progression from abstract reasoning to empirical scrutiny without immediate entanglement in sectarian disputes. Part I focuses on establishing a general maxim concerning the inverse reliability of human testimony proportional to the improbability of the reported event, particularly when that event contravenes established patterns of experience, with defined as violations of natural laws derived from uniform observation. Here, Hume introduces core concepts like the balance between testimonial evidence and experiential uniformity, using illustrative devices to clarify without delving into specific religious narratives. Part II then shifts to particular applications, examining miracle reports in religious traditions—predominantly but extending to others—while highlighting variables such as the incentives of religious authorities to fabricate or amplify stories and the tendency for such claims to cluster in illiterate, superstitious societies rather than among the educated or in proportion to global population. Throughout both parts, Hume deploys footnotes as an ancillary rhetorical tool to expand on examples or counter potential objections, maintaining the main text's flow while enriching its evidential texture; for instance, in Part I, a footnote recounts the of an Indian prince who dismisses European accounts of freezing into or , as these phenomena contradict his entire experiential history in a , thereby exemplifying resistance to testimony conflicting with personal uniformity. This organizational strategy—principles first, then instances—serves as a roadmap, directing readers from theoretical groundwork to practical critique and underscoring Hume's commitment to a methodical, experience-based over dogmatic assertion.

Central Definitions and Concepts

In David Hume's "Of Miracles," a miracle is precisely defined as a transgression of a law of by a particular volition of the or by the interposition of some . This formulation emphasizes that miracles, if they occur, involve a deliberate suspension or override of established natural regularities through agency, distinguishing them from mere anomalies or unexplained phenomena within the natural order. Central to Hume's framework is the concept of uniform experience, which refers to the consistent, repeated observations that underpin our belief in the laws of nature. He posits that "there must... be a uniform experience against every miraculous event, otherwise the event would not merit that ," meaning that the designation of an event as miraculous inherently presupposes its conflict with the entire body of accumulated human experience confirming natural laws. This uniform experience serves as the foundational evidential basis for inferring natural necessities, without which claims of miracles would lack the requisite opposition to qualify as such. Hume evaluates the reliability of supporting claims through specific criteria, including the number of witnesses, their character and , absence of personal interest or , consistency among accounts, and the manner of their delivery—such as avoiding hesitation or excessive vehemence. gains strength from multiplicity and agreement among disinterested, reputable observers but weakens under contradictions, scarcity, or suspicious motivations. Hume rejects any a priori impossibility of , acknowledging their conceptual coherence within a framework allowing divine or invisible agency; instead, their assessment turns on evidential improbability, where must render the falsehood of the report more miraculous than the event itself to warrant . This probabilistic lens, grounded in rather than logical contradiction, underscores that are not precluded by reason in but demand extraordinary corroboration to countervail uniform .

Illustrative Examples from the Text

Hume illustrates the improbability of accepting miracle testimonies through a hypothetical resurrection of Queen Elizabeth I, positing that if all contemporary historians attested to her death and burial, followed by her reappearance after a month to resume governing for three years, such an account would still fail to convince due to the uniform human experience of mortality. He extends this to direct eyewitness claims, such as one reporting the restoration to life of a dead man, which he weighs against the greater improbability of universal deception or error among observers. To test the thresholds of credible testimony, Hume invokes scenarios involving extreme violations of natural laws, akin to a dead body speaking or natural elements undergoing inexplicable transformations, arguing that these would demand evidence surpassing the established constancy of nature, such as consuming wood or extinguishing flames without exception. He draws an to an Indian prince's incredulity toward European reports of freezing and , highlighting how testimony clashes with personal or cultural experience of uniform laws. Hume references historical cases like the miracles attributed to Emperor , reported by as curing blindness with spittle and lameness by touch in , presenting it as one of the best-attested profane miracles yet undermined by contrary probabilities. Similarly, he cites the numerous attestations of healings, including restorations of sight and hearing, at the tomb of the Abbé Paris in early 18th-century , involving affidavits from physicians and witnesses, to exemplify how even multiplied testimonies falter against experiential uniformity. Observing patterns in miracle reports, Hume notes their tendency to cluster among ignorant and barbarous nations or in eras of popular credulity, such as the impostures begun by in , which spread even to Roman philosophers and Emperor , illustrating how enthusiasm propagates unverified prodigies. These examples serve descriptively in the essay to demonstrate the evidentiary burdens on miracle claims without resolving their ultimate validity.

Hume's Core Argument Against Miracles

Testimony Versus Uniform Experience

David Hume argues that a , defined as a violation of the laws of nature, is inherently improbable because firm and unalterable human experience has uniformly confirmed those laws, providing proof against any alleged violation that is as complete as experience-based reasoning allows. This uniform experience encompasses countless observations across where natural regularities hold without exception, such as the dead remaining dead or water not turning to wine spontaneously. supporting a miracle, no matter how numerous the witnesses, must therefore contend with this overwhelming evidential baseline, rendering it presumptively unreliable unless extraordinary conditions are met. Hume's central maxim states: "No is sufficient to establish a , unless the be of such a kind, that its falsehood would be more miraculous, than the fact, which it endeavors to establish." In practice, this threshold is unattainable because the alternative explanation—widespread , , or —is far more consistent with observed patterns of than a genuine suspension of laws. Even if witnesses are multiplied, their agreement does not proportionally strengthen the case against the vast scope of non-miraculous experience; for instance, Hume illustrates that claims of resurrections fail against the uniform observation of mortality in billions of cases, where the improbability of collective falsehood pales in comparison to the claimed event. Factors like the witnesses' proximity, disinterestedness, or consistency may enhance for ordinary but diminish sharply for marvels contradicting entrenched expectations. Consequently, Hume advises suspending judgment on miracle reports rather than affirming them, as rational belief requires the evidence for the event to outweigh the evidence against it. When testimony clashes with uniform experience, the rational course is to favor the latter, attributing the report to or over endorsing a natural infraction. This approach prioritizes the inductive reliability of repeated natural observations, which form the foundation of empirical knowledge, over isolated contravening accounts.

Probabilistic Weighing of Evidence

Hume argues that rational assent to any depends on a balance of probabilities derived from , where supporting an event must outweigh the contrary from uniform human . In assessing —defined as violations of established laws—the cumulative weight of observations confirming those laws provides an overwhelmingly strong inductive basis against any specific miraculous occurrence. This uniform , amassed through repeated instances across history and cultures, renders the prior improbability of a exceedingly high, requiring testimonial of extraordinary reliability to tip the scales. The frailty of human testimony further undermines its capacity to overcome this evidential barrier. Hume identifies multiple empirical factors diminishing testimonial credibility, including the human tendencies toward , , and , which intensify under the influence of , , or prevalent in reports of extraordinary events. Testimony is particularly vulnerable when propagated through chains of reporters, where each link introduces potential distortion, and its force is inversely proportional to the event's deviation from common experience. Consequently, the probability assigned to a via testimony remains subordinate unless the evidence for falsehood in the report is deemed less likely than the law-violating event itself. This proto-Bayesian framework culminates in Hume's maxim: no testimony suffices to establish a unless its falsehood would be more than the alleged fact. Achieving such a threshold demands testimony that effectively nullifies the inductive foundation of natural laws, a standard unmet by historical claims due to the vast disparity in evidential strength between singular reports and pervasive experiential uniformity. Rational belief thus favors toward miracles, as the probabilistic privileges the continuity of observed natural order over exceptional assertions.

Implications for Historical and Religious Claims

Hume's framework casts doubt on historical religious claims predicated on testimonial evidence for miracles, asserting that no such testimony suffices to counter uniform natural experience. Central to Christianity, the resurrection of Jesus, reported circa 30–33 CE by a small cadre of disciples in the New Testament Gospels—composed between approximately 65–110 CE—lacks the evidentiary strength to establish a violation of mortality's universality, observed without exception in billions of documented deaths across civilizations. Hume specifies that witnesses to such events, often from "ignorant and barbarous" contexts with motives tied to propagating a new faith, render their accounts probabilistically inferior to the "full proof against a miracle, from the very nature of the fact." This reasoning undermines claims in religious texts, which Hume equates to miracles as they demand supernatural prescience defying probabilistic patterns of human knowledge and prediction. Biblical prophecies, such as those in the Hebrew scriptures purportedly foretelling messianic events, falter under the same scrutiny, as their fulfillment interpretations rely on prone to and confirmation, outweighed by experiential consistency in natural causation. Competing miracle attestations across religions, including non-Christian traditions, further erode mutual credibility, as each set of claims implicitly falsifies rivals without resolving the foundational improbability. Hume positions miracles as impediments to rational , arguing they foster and priestly rather than moral virtues derivable from reason and observation. Foundational events like the virgin birth or apostolic healings, absent contemporary corroboration beyond partisan narratives, serve doctrinal ends but hinder acceptance of a deistic order governed by invariable laws, where true emerges from ethical untainted by historical anomalies. Religious institutions propagating such claims risk perpetuating —unreasoned fervor—over evidence-based belief, a dynamic Hume traces to figures leveraging testimonial gaps for influence.

Philosophical Underpinnings and Assumptions

Role of Induction and Causal Realism

David Hume's theory of causation posits that the concept arises from the mind's association of events observed in constant conjunction, rather than from any perceivable necessary connection inherent in the objects themselves. Repeated instances of one event reliably preceding another foster a customary expectation, whereby the extends this observed pattern to anticipate future occurrences, forming the basis of without invoking unobserved metaphysical necessities. This process eschews a priori deductions, grounding causation empirically in the accumulation of sensory impressions rather than speculative powers or essences. Induction plays a foundational role in establishing the reliability of these causal projections, as the uniformity of —derived from extensive past experiences—serves as the sole warrant for extrapolating regularities to unobserved cases. Hume emphasizes that such inferences stem from habituated response to empirical constants, not logical entailment, rendering deviations from these patterns inherently at odds with the evidential foundation of . In assessing claims that contravene inductively derived laws, the probabilistic balance tilts decisively toward continuity unless contradicted by evidence surpassing the aggregated weight of confirmatory observations. This framework prioritizes observable sequences over hypothetical intrusions, aligning with a commitment to causal patterns as they manifest in , thereby sidelining unverified anomalies that lack proportional empirical backing. By anchoring judgments in the tangible repeatability of conjunctions, Hume's approach underscores the improbability of disruptions to established orders absent data that empirically outweighs the inductive baseline.

Presuppositions of Naturalism

Hume's framework in "Of Miracles" presupposes a uniform course of nature, wherein laws are derived from repeated observations and hold without exception, rendering divine interventions—detectable primarily through human —fundamentally at odds with this experiential foundation. This assumption aligns with methodological naturalism, prioritizing explanations consistent with established natural regularities over violations unless provides evidence exceeding the aggregate improbability of such events. Implicit in this approach is the dismissal of a priori divine voluntarism, the notion that a deity's omnipotence could suspend natural laws at will without evidential warrant. Hume contends that probabilistic reasoning, rooted in inductive experience, demands that any miracle claim's credibility surpass the uniform testimony against it, effectively subordinating theological possibilities to empirical standards that favor natural continuity. This naturalistic commitment generates inherent tension with , which envisions a rational creator who ordains immutable laws post-creation but abstains from intervention. Miracles, defined as transgressions of these laws by divine agency, contradict such a non-interventionist , as they imply arbitrary suspensions incompatible with a deity's purported adherence to rational order. Hume's reliance on experiential uniformity thus embeds an outlook where disruptions remain presumptively extraneous to a coherently deistic cosmology.

Relation to Broader Skepticism

Hume's essay "Of Miracles," as of An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding (1748), embodies his doctrine of mitigated , which endorses reliance on empirical probabilities derived from uniform human experience while withholding assent from claims defying such patterns without compelling counter-evidence. This approach contrasts with radical Pyrrhonian by permitting practical judgments in everyday affairs, yet it rigorously scrutinizes extraordinary assertions, including those in , to avoid credulity. In the Enquiry, Hume applies analogous reasoning across domains, such as doubting the self's substantial identity in the absence of sensory impressions, thereby linking miracle to a general wariness of unobservable entities or processes. The argument interconnects with Hume's critiques of religious inference in adjacent sections, particularly Section XI ("Of a Particular Providence and of a "), where he dissects analogies—likening the universe's order to human artifacts—as insufficient to establish benevolent divine agency, given observed natural imperfections like widespread . Hume contends that such analogies overextend from limited experience, mirroring his objection that testimony cannot override the "full proof" of nature's constancy; both reflect a unified epistemological caution against projecting human-scale causes onto cosmic scales without proportional . This integration underscores how "Of Miracles" advances Hume's broader dismantling of providential , prioritizing causal uniformity over interpretive liberties. Hume's mitigated stance fostered his contemporary reputation as irreligious, with critics interpreting his evidentiary thresholds as tantamount to , despite his private affirmations of deistic leanings and rejection of dogmatic unbelief. By demanding extraordinary proof for interruptions, the essay contributed to toward revealed religion's foundational claims, aligning with Hume's naturalistic emphasis on observable regularities over faith-based exceptions, though he maintained that mitigated doubt preserves moral and social utility without necessitating outright rejection of .

Major Criticisms of Hume's Position

Logical Flaws and Question-Begging Charges

Philosopher John Earman argues that Hume's essay "Of " constitutes an "abject failure" primarily because its core maxim—that no is sufficient to establish a unless the falsehood of the testimony would be more miraculous than the event itself—relies on ambiguous and question-begging presuppositions about the nature of evidence and induction. Earman contends that Hume attributes to himself a defensible principle of induction while actually employing a cruder version that dogmatically excludes exceptions to natural laws, thereby assuming the very uniformity of nature that would challenge. This renders the argument circular, as it presupposes naturalism's exceptionless laws to dismiss violating those laws. Critics further charge Hume with by framing miracles solely as violations of established laws of nature, without justifying why such laws must be inviolable in principle rather than descriptive generalizations open to rare counterinstances. Hume's naturalist implicitly prioritizes experiential uniformity over testimonial evidence without neutral grounds for doing so, embedding the conclusion that cannot occur into the definitional setup of the . This approach fails to engage the possibility that laws of nature might admit suspensions under specific causal conditions, such as divine intervention, rendering the probabilistic dismissal of invalid from the outset. Hume's reliance on uniform experience also invites charges of inconsistent application of his own inductive skepticism, as outlined in his broader philosophy. While Hume famously questioned the rational justification for expecting future uniformity based on past observations—arguing that induction lacks deductive or probabilistic warrant—he treats past non-occurrence of miracles as providing infallible certainty against their future or historical reality. This selective dogmatism misapplies induction by immunizing natural regularities against exceptions while demanding extraordinary evidential burdens for anomalies, thus committing a form of special pleading that undermines the argument's logical coherence. Additionally, Hume's framework overlooks independent lines of reasoning that could establish the existence of a agent capable of enacting , such as cosmological or teleological arguments for a divine cause. By not integrating such , which would rationally elevate the antecedent plausibility of divine interventions over naturalistic priors alone, Hume's isolation of miracle testimony to mere historical reports begs the question against theism's broader evidential base. This omission assumes a low baseline probability for derived solely from naturalistic experience, circularly excluding theistic metaphysics that could justify higher expectations for exceptional events.

Challenges to the Uniformity of Experience

Critics of Hume's reliance on uniform experience contend that advancements in physics reveal inherent non-uniformity at fundamental levels, particularly through ' embrace of indeterminacy. Quantum phenomena, such as the probabilistic outcomes in and particle interactions governed by the formulated in , demonstrate that natural events do not follow strictly deterministic paths but exhibit and superposition states where multiple outcomes coexist until measurement. This challenges Hume's assumption of unbroken regularity, as quantum laws incorporate chance rather than absolute uniformity, implying that exceptions or anomalies may be intrinsic rather than violations requiring extraordinary disproof. Historical scientific paradigm shifts further illustrate how presumed uniformities can dissolve under new evidence, serving as analogs to potential disruptions by rare events. Newtonian physics, established in Isaac Newton's published in 1687, posited uniform absolute space, time, and motion as foundational, yet Albert Einstein's special in 1905 and general theory in 1915 overturned this by introducing relative simultaneity, time dilation, and curvature, rendering prior "uniform" laws context-dependent and incomplete. The quantum revolution, marked by Werner Heisenberg's in 1925 and Erwin Schrödinger's wave equation in 1926, similarly exposed non-local correlations and wave-particle duality, phenomena absent from classical uniform experience and requiring probabilistic interpretations like the Copenhagen view adopted widely by the 1930s. These shifts demonstrate that empirical baselines once deemed inviolable—such as conservation laws facing apparent exceptions in early formulations—yield to refined understandings, cautioning against treating current uniformity as a fixed barrier to anomalies. Empirical rarity alone does not establish impossibility, as uniform experience yields only probabilistic assessments rather than certainties. Philosopher of science John Earman argues that even extensive non-occurrences, such as a million observed without failure, confer exceeding 1,400,000:1 for regularity but remain fallible, allowing or novel data to shift posteriors under Bayesian frameworks developed by in the 1760s. Charles Babbage, in his 1837 analysis, applied to show that sufficiently numerous independent witnesses could render a rare event's occurrence more likely than coordinated falsehood, countering Hume's weighting without presupposing zero priors. Thus, absence of evidence for exceptions reflects observational limits, not , as incomplete sampling—human experience spanning mere millennia against cosmic scales—cannot preclude low-frequency occurrences akin to rare quantum tunneling events observed in experiments since the mid-20th century.

Epistemological and Definitional Objections

Critics contend that David Hume's definition of a as a "violation of the laws of nature" by divine volition embeds a naturalistic that undermines theistic conceptions of divine agency. In frameworks where authors and sustains natural laws as descriptions of habitual divine action, represent exceptional interventions by the same rather than arbitrary transgressions, rendering Hume's terminology question-begging against explanations. This definitional choice, critics argue, privileges a view of laws as autonomous regularities independent of any transcendent cause, sidelining the coherence of within theistic metaphysics where no genuine "violation" occurs but rather a purposeful divergence from norms established by the lawgiver. Epistemologically, Hume's framework imposes an asymmetric evidentiary burden, demanding that testimonial evidence for a miracle exceed in improbability the falsehood of the testimony itself—a threshold not equivalently applied to historical events or inductive generalizations about nature, which rely on similar chains of testimony without direct observation. This double standard undervalues scenarios of robust corroboration, such as multiple independent witnesses whose reports align without evident collusion or motive for fabrication, potentially tipping probabilistic scales when uniform experience alone cannot conclusively preclude rare anomalies. Furthermore, Hume's insistence on uniform experience as overriding testimony mirrors the inductive assumptions he elsewhere critiques as uncertain, yet here treats natural regularities as epistemically sacrosanct, creating an internal tension where miracles face a higher bar than the foundational beliefs sustaining science and history.

Counterarguments and Defenses of Miracles

Theistic Prior Probabilities and Bayesian Analysis

Theistic proponents contend that Hume's probabilistic assessment of miracles presupposes naturalistic priors, thereby undervaluing alternative metaphysical frameworks where divine intervention is antecedently plausible. In Bayesian terms, the probability of a reported M given evidence E, such as , is given by P(M|E) = [P(E|M) × P(M)] / P(E), where P(M) represents the of the miracle independent of E. Under strict naturalism, P(M) approaches zero due to the uniformity of observed natural laws, rendering insufficient to overcome this low . However, theists argue that P(M) must be conditioned on broader : P(M|H), where H is the background hypothesis (e.g., versus naturalism). If theism H_t posits an omnipotent capable of suspending laws for purposeful reasons, then P(M|H_t) is non-negligible, potentially elevating the overall prior P(M) = P(M|H_t) × P(H_t) + P(M|H_n) × P(H_n), with H_n as naturalism. Richard Swinburne, in works such as The Concept of Miracle (1970) and The Resurrection of God Incarnate (2003), formalizes this by assigning a of roughly 1/2, grounded in criteria of explanatory simplicity and scope relative to naturalism's multiverse postulates. Under this setup, Swinburne maintains that reliable —modeled via likelihood ratios P(E|M)/P(E|¬M)—can shift the posterior odds in favor of specific miracles, such as the , to over 50:1. This contrasts with Hume's implicit assignment of near-zero priors to events by anchoring solely in empirical regularities, which theists criticize as question-begging: it privileges naturalism's uniformity without probabilistically weighing 's independent evidential support from domains like cosmology. Swinburne's approach thus reframes miracles not as violations defying all priors but as confirmatory data discriminating between worldviews. Cosmological fine-tuning bolsters the prior P(H_t) by highlighting the improbability of life-permitting physical constants under chance or necessity alone. Parameters such as the Λ, whose value must fall within 1 part in 10^{120} of observed levels to avoid a collapsing or expanding too rapidly for , and the , tuned to within 0.5% for stable atoms, collectively yield chance probabilities below 10^{-200} in some analyses. Theists like Swinburne integrate this as raising P(H_t | fine-tuning data) substantially, as theism predicts intentional calibration whereas alternatives invoke unobservable entities, diluting their explanatory power without independent verification. This elevated P(H_t) in turn amplifies P(M|H_t), allowing reports to contribute meaningfully to Bayesian updates rather than being dismissed outright. Critics of naturalism's priors, including John Earman, note that Hume's experiential baseline similarly fails to account for such metaphysical alternatives, rendering his low priors for exceptions arbitrary absent a full hypothesis comparison.

Empirical and Historical Evidence for Supernatural Events

The historical case for the relies on several widely accepted facts among scholars, including non-Christian ones. Jesus of Nazareth was crucified under around 30-33 AD, a death confirmed by multiple independent sources such as , , and the Gospels. Within a few years, his disciples reported experiences of seeing him alive post-mortem, as evidenced by the early creed in 1 Corinthians 15:3-8, dated by most critical scholars to 32-35 AD and reciting appearances to Peter, the Twelve, over 500 others, James, and Paul. These experiences transformed fearful followers into bold proclaimers willing to face martyrdom, with spreading rapidly in a hostile Jewish and Roman context despite no material gain. The adds further attestation, reported in all four Gospels and accepted by approximately 75% of scholars per surveys, including the detail of female discoverers—unlikely to be invented due to women's low testimonial credibility in first-century . The conversion of skeptics like Paul (a persecutor) and James (Jesus' brother) provides additional corroboration, as both shifted to belief based on claimed encounters. Proponents argue these data points, granted by the majority of historians regardless of , challenge the uniformity of natural death experiences, as alternative explanations like hallucinations fail to account for the group's diversity, the , and subsequent conversions without prior expectation of resurrection in Jewish messianic hopes. In modern contexts, the Lourdes Medical Bureau has documented over 7,000 claimed cures since 1858, subjecting them to rigorous scrutiny by independent physicians, with 70 declared inexplicable by natural means as of 2018, including the 71st recognition in 2024 for a case involving . These involve sudden, complete remissions of conditions like peritoneal cancer or , verified through pre- and post-event medical records, biopsies, and follow-up observations spanning years, often defying known remission rates (e.g., a 1950s case of femoral resolving instantly after immersion, with no recurrence over decades). The Bureau's process, involving skeptics and non-Catholics, rules out psychosomatic effects or fraud, as many cures occurred in non-believers or without expectation, with statistical analysis showing rates far exceeding baselines for verified pathologies. Near-death experiences (NDEs) provide additional empirical claims of veridical during . Studies document cases where patients, under or flatlined, accurately describe events or objects (e.g., surgical instruments or conversations) unverifiable by normal senses, corroborated post-event by witnesses. Over 110 such instances have been reported, including blind individuals describing visual details later confirmed, as in research by Kenneth Ring and Sharon Cooper. Peer-reviewed analyses, such as those examining NDE memory quality, find them comparable to real events in richness and detail, distinct from imagined or drug-induced states, suggesting non-local challenging brain-dependent . These cases, while not universally accepted as , represent documented anomalies resistant to full naturalistic reduction, with replication in controlled settings like studies yielding consistent veridical elements.

Philosophical Rebuttals from Apologists

, in his 1947 book Miracles: A Preliminary Study, contended that Hume's dismissal of miracles presupposes naturalism, which undermines the reliability of human reason itself. Lewis argued that under naturalism, cognitive faculties arise from non-rational evolutionary processes geared toward survival rather than truth, rendering —including Hume's appeal to uniform experience—untrustworthy. In contrast, a theistic worldview posits reason as grounded in a rational divine mind, making interventions coherent and potentially verifiable within that framework, thus rebutting Hume's a priori exclusion of miracles as philosophically circular. Apologists drawing from maintain that miracles do not constitute violations of natural laws but manifestations of higher divine causation that exceed created powers while aligning with God's authorship of nature. Aquinas, in (I, q. 105, a. 6-8), classified miracles by degree: those surpassing all created power (e.g., ), those exceeding specific agents but not all nature, and those where effects are hidden from natural causes. This framework portrays God as the primary cause acting directly, rendering miracles extensions of divine ordinance rather than arbitrary interruptions, thereby challenging Hume's characterization of them as inherently improbable contraventions of established order. Critics of Hume's position highlight its anthropocentric in devaluing from "ignorant and barbarous nations," where he claimed reports predominantly originate, as this criterion ethnocentrically privileges Western experiential uniformity over diverse global attestations. Such a stance, apologists argue, dismisses credible non-European evidences—such as early Christian accounts from the Roman periphery or contemporary reports from developing regions—without independent verification, by assuming naturalistic priors that undervalue culturally distinct witnesses. This approach, they contend, reflects a parochial that fails to engage on its merits, potentially overlooking philosophically viable claims embedded in broader historical contexts.

Reception and Ongoing Debates

Historical Influence on and Naturalism

Hume's essay "Of Miracles," appearing as Section X in his 1748 An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, played a pivotal role in fostering post-Enlightenment toward religious claims dependent on testimony, by emphasizing the primacy of uniform natural experience over human reports of violations thereof. This perspective resonated in , where it informed probabilistic evaluations of extraordinary assertions. John Stuart Mill, in his 1843 A System of Logic (Book III, Chapter XXV), drew upon and sought to refine Hume's argument, contending that testimony for events contravening established natural laws requires evidence surpassing the cumulative weight of contrary experience, thereby extending Humean doubt into utilitarian and inductive frameworks. Mill's engagement underscored the essay's enduring appeal among agnostics and atheists, who leveraged it to question foundational religious narratives without outright denying deism or abstract theism. In historical , Hume's reasoning bolstered methodological naturalism—the default assumption of natural causation in reconstructing past events—which sidelined explanations unless supported by irrefutable proof, influencing 19th-century to treat accounts as presumptively unreliable. Victorian-era debates, such as those surrounding David Friedrich Strauss's 1835 , exemplified this, with skeptics invoking Humean principles to reject Gospel miracles as incompatible with rational historical inquiry, framing them instead as cultural myths reflective of early Christian expectations. The essay's emphasis on experiential uniformity contributed to broader in , equipping thinkers with a tool to dismantle miracle-dependent and promote naturalistic interpretations of human history and , though critiques from probabilists like Condorcet highlighted limitations in its absolutism. This legacy reinforced causal realism in intellectual discourse, prioritizing verifiable patterns over anomalous claims amid rising empirical standards.

Modern Philosophical and Scientific Responses

John Earman, in his 2000 monograph Hume's Abject Failure: The Argument Against Miracles, critiques Hume's essay as logically flawed and rhetorically ineffective, arguing that it relies on an unstated strong inductive principle that Hume's own about induction elsewhere renders untenable, thus against miracle testimony. Earman maintains that Hume's maxim—that no is sufficient to establish a given uniform contrary experience—fails to engage probabilistic reasoning adequately and overlooks scenarios where multiple independent testimonies could outweigh background priors. Responding to such critiques, Robert Fogelin's 2003 A Defense of Hume on Miracles contends that detractors like Earman misinterpret Hume's core claim, which centers on the evidential standards for rather than a rigid inductive ; Fogelin reconstructs Hume's argument as emphasizing that reports inherently demand overcoming the full weight of experiential uniformity, a threshold rarely met in practice. Fogelin argues this framework withstands formalization attempts, preserving Hume's without circularity, though he acknowledges interpretive ambiguities in the original text. Scientific developments in the have prompted responses questioning Hume's reliance on nature's strict uniformity. John , a theoretical and Anglican , posits in works like Quantum Physics and Theology (2007) that ' inherent indeterminacy and chaos theory's sensitivity to initial conditions reveal a not fully predictable by classical laws, challenging the a priori dismissal of events defying observed regularities as impossible. Polkinghorne suggests miracles need not "violate" laws but could align with underlying divine action in a probabilistic framework, where uniformity describes typical patterns rather than absolute constraints. In 21st-century , engagements with Hume often intersect of amid rising concerns, highlighting tensions in calibrating reliability for extraordinary claims. Philosophers like those examining propagation note parallels to Hume's discounting of biased or multiplied reports, yet argue that Bayesian updates on —incorporating and contextual priors—allow nuanced assessments beyond blanket rejection, as uniform experience alone underdetermines improbability in non-deterministic models. This reflects ongoing refinement, where Hume's framework informs but requires adaptation to empirical variances in evidential chains.

Implications for Contemporary Miracle Claims

Contemporary miracle claims, including faith healings reported in Pentecostal and charismatic contexts, face Hume's evidential threshold by pitting testimonial accounts against the entrenched uniformity of natural laws governing and physics. Empirical investigations, such as those examining -induced recoveries, reveal that while participants often report subjective improvements, objective medical documentation of inexplicable cures—beyond or psychosomatic effects—lacks robust replication in controlled settings. A 2023 Dutch study of "remarkable recoveries" after found explanations distributed across (e.g., misdiagnosis), biographical (e.g., lifestyle changes), and spiritual narratives, with no cases definitively excluding naturalistic causes. Similarly, analyses of Pentecostal healing practices highlight limited biomedical efficacy, attributing perceived successes primarily to mechanisms rather than agency. The proliferation of video and digital evidence for phenomena like apparitions or instantaneous healings ostensibly addresses Hume's reliance on fallible human , offering purportedly objective records that could elevate claims above historical precedents. However, such media introduces countervailing challenges: susceptibility to editing, fabrication, or optical illusions, which undermine their capacity to conclusively violate uniform experience without independent forensic verification. Hume's maxim—that establishes a only if its falsehood proves more improbable than the event—adapts here to demand corroboration surpassing digital artifacts alone, as isolated videos rarely integrate with repeatable scientific protocols to rule out mundane explanations like or staged demonstrations. Ongoing debates over verification criteria emphasize to the best explanation, prioritizing hypotheses with , , and consistency with broader empirical data. Naturalistic accounts prevail in most cases due to their alignment with and absence of ad hoc posits, though institutional processes like the Catholic Church's 2024 norms for phenomena assess claims via witness credibility, doctrinal fit, and exclusion of deception—yielding cautious approvals without empirical override of Humean priors. For UFO sightings occasionally framed as , declassified U.S. reports since 2021 document anomalous aerial behaviors but attribute them to advanced technology or sensor errors rather than miracles, reinforcing absent causal mechanisms defying physics. Thus, contemporary claims infrequently satisfy the heightened bar for rational acceptance, perpetuating Hume's challenge amid advanced scrutiny tools.

Legacy in Philosophy and Theology

Impact on Arguments for God's Existence

Hume's essay "Of Miracles," published in 1748 as Section X of An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, challenged the foundational role of miracle in evidential arguments for God's by arguing that uniform human against violations of laws outweighs any finite supporting them. This probabilistic framework rendered biblical , such as the , insufficient as standalone proofs for , as the antecedent likelihood of uniformity precludes accepting reports of the without extraordinary counter-evidence. Consequently, the essay diminished reliance on within evidentialist , which had previously drawn on scriptural accounts to infer divine intervention. In response, post-Enlightenment theistic arguments increasingly prioritized non-testimonial proofs to establish independently, such as Anselm's , which posits as a necessary being whose follows from the concept of maximal greatness, or Aquinas's cosmological arguments, which trace contingent realities to an uncaused first cause. These a priori and causal reasoning approaches circumvent Hume's critique of empirical testimony, providing a probabilistic for divine agency that could then render specific miracles more credible as confirmatory evidence rather than initiatory proofs. Apologists like have formalized this in Bayesian terms, where a high for —derived from cosmological fine-tuning or moral order—elevates the of reported miracles, inverting Hume's uniformitarian presumption. William Paley's 1802 watchmaker analogy, analogizing the universe's order to a designed artifact implying an intelligent artificer, attempted to fortify teleological arguments against skeptical probability critiques but was indirectly undermined by Humean emphasis on experiential uniformity and weak analogies. Hume's earlier had already questioned design inferences from limited observations, and "Of Miracles" reinforced the evidential burden by highlighting how rare, testimony-dependent claims fail against established natural patterns, sidelining Paley-style in favor of arguments less vulnerable to probabilistic dismissal. This enduring legacy positions miracles within as secondary validations, contingent on prior theistic warrant, rather than decisive standalone evidences.

Role in Debates Over Science and Faith

David Hume's argument in "Of Miracles" (1748) posits that uniform human experience establishes the constancy of natural laws, rendering testimony for violations—miracles—probabilistically inferior unless corroborated by evidence exceeding the improbability of falsehood in reporting. This framework underpins methodological naturalism (MN) in scientific inquiry, which restricts explanations to natural causes and repeatable mechanisms, effectively sidelining supernatural hypotheses as non-falsifiable or antecedent-improbable. MN, while distinct from metaphysical naturalism's ontological denial of the supernatural, inherits Humean priors that prioritize naturalistic uniformity, fostering a de facto exclusion of miracles in empirical disciplines. In , particularly of religious texts, Humean manifests as an a priori rejection of claims, where antecedent probability—derived from assumed natural regularity—overrides testimonial unless it meets extraordinary thresholds often deemed unattainable. Scholars applying principles of demand modern parallels for ancient reports, presupposing that deviations from expected natural patterns indicate fabrication or misinterpretation rather than genuine anomalies. This approach, prevalent in academic , reflects a broader institutional commitment to naturalistic epistemologies, where systemic biases toward secular interpretations diminish openness to causation despite clusters of corroborative historical data, such as multiple independent attestations in first-century sources. Critics contend that rigid MN conflates methodological heuristics with metaphysical closure, advocating instead for evidential openness where empirical anomalies—unexplained by natural mechanisms despite rigorous testing—warrant considering causal alternatives beyond presupposed limits. Proponents of metaphysical openness argue that science's success stems from provisional naturalism, not dogmatic exclusion, and that Humean priors falter against Bayesian updates from high-quality , as uniform experience alone cannot negate localized interventions without circularity. Thus, debates hinge on whether commitments or naturalistic presuppositions dictate interpretive priors, with truth-seeking demanding data-driven assessment over antecedent dismissal.

Enduring Questions on Evidence and Rational Belief

A persistent question in assessing claims involves determining when can justify rational belief in events contravening established natural laws. David Hume's maxim holds that no suffices to establish a unless its falsehood would be more miraculous than the event itself, emphasizing the weight of uniform human experience against such reports. Bayesian analyses formalize this tension, requiring 's likelihood ratio to overcome low priors on occurrences, where priors reflect historical frequencies of verified near zero and reliability varies by corroboration, independence, and witness competence. Critics like John Earman argue Hume underestimates how robust, multiply attested could elevate posterior probabilities sufficiently, as in cases with high reliability outweighing base-rate scarcity. Yet skeptics counter that without repeatable empirical controls, alone rarely shifts posteriors beyond , given tendencies toward error, exaggeration, or fabrication in extraordinary reports. Causal realism raises whether first principles of metaphysics—such as contingency of the natural order and possibility of agent causation—permit divine or interventions without requiring antecedent empirical instances to warrant them. If laws of nature describe regularities rather than inviolable necessities, interventions could manifest as exceptions grounded in higher-order causes, challenging Humean induction that extrapolates solely from observed uniformity. Proponents contend this allows rational openness to if metaphysical priors favor a theistic , where a transcendent cause could suspend secondary causation without contradicting primary principles. Opponents maintain that absent direct warrant, such allowances risk undermining predictive , prioritizing explanatory parsimony over speculative possibilities. Truth-seeking inquiry demands disinterested evaluation, favoring verifiable data like independent attestations, physical traces, or predictive consistency over ideological commitments to naturalism that preemptively exclude explanations. Critiques highlight how presupposing no interventions begs the question against claims, potentially overlooking that cumulatively challenges naturalistic priors, as argued in linking testimonial credibility to broader worldview reliability. This approach urges weighting empirical specifics—such as chain-of-custody for reports or convergence across hostile witnesses—against both skeptical dismissals and credulous acceptances, maintaining where data remains inconclusive.

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