[quote]Magicpunch wrote:
[quote]Cortes wrote:
[quote]Magicpunch wrote:
[quote]Cortes wrote:
[quote]Brother Chris wrote:
[quote]forlife wrote:
How about subjecting the material to scientific scrutiny by objective scientists without a preexisting religious bias? For example, the claim that the material is divinely protected from explosive damage is easily tested. Wrap it around a few sticks of dynamite, light the fuse, and see what happens.
Of course, we both know that will never happen.
The same criticism applies to other supernatural claims, like being able to read minds. People appear to have unexplainable psychic abilities, but when you put them in a lab and study their performance under controlled conditions, they are no more accurate than would be expected by chance alone.
I believed there was undeniable, indisputable, rock solid evidence for my religious beliefs back in the day…and now I realize that it was all a crock.
Am I now under a denial bias? Could be, which is why I think the most honest and accurate position toward the supernatural is to say we simply don’t know, and leave it at that. [/quote]
Indifference is for the cats…
Second you want to wrap a stick of dynamite with the clothe to test it, but won’t take in the fact that there was a bomb set off right next to it?[/quote]
You got to this before I could. This is a classic example of the fact that there will never, ever, ever, ever, evereverever be enough evidence for someone to be convinced of something they are dead-set on not being convinced of.
Yeah, I understand it works both ways, but right now we’re talking about this way.
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I can see what you’re saying (re: biases) but I think what he was suggested was that the event should be repeatable. But I’m intrigued - these things fascinate me.[/quote]
If we did and the thing came out of the explosion immaculately (harhar), skeptics would offer up their “scientific” explanations for why the cloth was unharmed, because the reason could never, ever, evereverever be that the material really is divine, or divinely protected, or whatever. The game is set up so we won’t win.
Thing is, I’ll say it again, there was a bomb that went off a few feet under the completely unprotected cloth. The marble steps the bomb was placed upon were demolished, the windows of the church and even those of neighboring structures were blown out, the brass crucifix you see above was warped into the shape it is by the force of the blast, and the cloth remained completely unharmed. This story is corroborated by hundreds of people, it’s not some made up fantastical event, it’s not a conspiracy. But the naysayers won’t be happy until we douse the thing with gasoline and set fire to it.
Give me a break.
Could it possibly, just maybe, be that there are still some things that we cannot explain with our current knowledge? That are outside of our ability to experience or measure?
To listen to the arguments I’ve been hearing the past few weeks, one gets the impression that we have reached the pinnacle of all possible knowledge. There is nothing new under the sun, and all we have to do is explain things in light of our currently held notions, and all other possibilities can be damned.
Who sounds like the religious one in this case? [/quote]
How wrong you are! Who said that we’ve explained everything, or that it can be explained? If anything, science is a method to determine whether we can understand new things.
At no point have I said that we know it all. It could be divine; equally, it could be aliens. Yes, I take your point that there is so much we don’t know. And probably so much more that we don’t know we don’t know!
I find it ironic however, that you say this and yet pretend that the world has been explained by a particular strand of christianity.
As a side, do you have any reading material (preferrably by someone not in the church) that I could peruse regarding Guadalupe? Also, regarding the explosion?
As much as I’d like to take your word for it (that 100s can testify to it happening the way you’ve described it) it’d be nice to see some first hand accounts. Perhaps an analysis of exactly where the bomb was, how many saw the bomb go off, etc.
Or was it a case of the bomb going off, and then a few hours later the story emerging that the cloth had survived etc?
I’m not being difficult, but asking questions that no doubt you once asked yourself too!
[/quote]
I did not say, nor do I believe, that the world has been explained by Catholicism. We leave that kind of stuff to the scientists. I just get annoyed when people start telling me things HAVE to be this way because evolution, for example, is what IS and so this is the way it MUST fit into the framework of evolution. If evolution can explain events in the past, I’m really happy with that. When you start using evolution to explain how we should or shouldn’t act in the future, though, that’s when things start moving out of the realm of science into religion.
As to Our Lady of Guadalupe. It’s been a long time and my books on the subject are in America, but I think this was one of the books I read on it that was really good.
You are going to have a hard time finding a book on the subject without an absolute bias one way or the other, but I believe this book covered the events by providing plenty of corroborating evidence and testimonies. There is another book that that relies pretty much strictly upon historical documents and evidence, but it’s $74, and I highly doubt you feel like paying that much money for any book. Maybe you can find it at a half-price books or something for cheaper. Looking again I see there are some cheaper copies from independent sellers from $49, but that’s still pretty expensive.
If you are genuinely interested, though, It would be my pleasure to buy the first book for you. You just PM me a mailing address, and I’ll order it and get it in the mail to you right now. This offer doesn’t apply to the second one, though 
