I ask the readers to read this post carefully, because some complex philosophical concepts will be discussed. Some ideas will seem to be hard to grasp, but actually you will get them if you read the post carefully. This is fully necessary to expose one of the most common skeptical objections.
Intellectual honesty implies that we have to understand objections to our positions accurately, in order to address them objectively. For example, if you think that the evidence for psi is good, you have to understand exactly why the skeptical objections against it fails. You have to fully understand the objections against psi posed by professional critics and skeptics.
If you are familiar with the pseudo-skeptical literature, you will know that the principle Extraordinary Claims Require Extraordinary Evidence, is often used in order to explain away any evidence for PSI presented by parapsychologists. No matter that evidence they present, the skeptic will say that such evidence is insufficient, because the psi claim is extraordinary and hence it requires much more scientific evidence than the one provided by the parapsychologists. Therefore (so conclude the skeptic), we have to conclude that no (sufficient) evidence for psi exists.
This skeptical principle is extremely comfortable and appealing, psychologically speaking, to skeptics, allowing them to keep their skepticism even in the face of positive evidence against their position.
The most egregious example of this approach can be seen in Richard Wiseman, who candidly conceded that the evidence for ESP meets the standards of any other area of science, but given the extraordinary nature of ESP, extraordinary evidence for it is needed. In Wiseman's words: "Because remote viewing is such an outlandish claim that will revolutionise the world, we need overwhelming evidence before we draw any conclusions. Right now we don't have that evidence"
Wiseman is saying that given the extraordinary nature of the claim for remote viewing, the evidence for it has to be equally extraordinary in order to be scientifically acceptable.
Most critics of pseudoskepticism ignore that the above skeptical objection is a modern version of Hume's Argument against Miracles, an argument that in his original formulation has been refuted and exposed as fallacious by philosophers in the 19th century. In his book An Inquiry Concerning Human Understanding, Hume argued: "A miracle is a violation of the laws of nature; and as a firm and unalterable experience has established those laws, the proof against a miracle, from the same nature of the fact, is as entire as any argument from experience can possibly be imagined
In other words, the uniformity of experience about as the world works suggests that certain exceptional events which contradict such uniformity (e.g. miracles or, for example, outslandish cases of remote viewing or the paranormal) cannot happen or at least they're so extraordinary and unlikely (compared with the "uniform experience"), that any evidence for such extraordinary claim has to be equally extraordinary in order to be accepted.
Can you understand the Hume's objection? Can you see the structural equivalence with Wiseman's objection? I assume most of the readers can.
An event is extraordinary in relation with a previous background considered as ordinary (= Hume's "uniform experience"). For example, if experience shows that consciousness is always connected with the brain, then the claim "consciousness exists independently of the brain" is extraordinary (and unlikely) in that context. This is why materialists reject near-death experiences.
Philosophers of religion deal with Hume's argument because many religions claim the historicity of miraculous events (e.g. the resurrection of Jesus). So, if the uniform experience (or ordinary knowledge) shows that dead people cannot back to life (i.e. cannot be resurrected), then any claim for a resurrection is extraordinary on that context and the evidence for it has to be extraordinary too. This is why liberal New Testament scholars don't address the resurrection and cannot accept any evidence for it.
So, the property of being "extrarordinary" is a function which is established in relation with the previous accepted knowledge of how the world works. Against the background of given accepted knowledge, any piece of evidence can be considered "ordinary" (if it fits with the background) or "extraordinary" (if it doesn't fit well or is at variance with the background).
Note that the structure of Hume's objection is the same structure of the argument used by contemporary skeptics (like Wiseman) against paranormal claims (Not suprisingly, Chris Carter addressed Hume's argument against miracles in his book Science and Psychic Phenomena, precisely because as a trained philosopher Carter understood the structural logical equivalence of both arguments)
BAYES' THEOREM, MIRACLES AND THE PARANORMAL
Bayes' theorem was devoloped by probability theorists in order to evaluate how much evidence is needed in order to accept a given explanatory hypothesis for a set of data (or evidence). Keep in mind that this theorem was developed AFTER Hume wrote. Roughly, the theorem is the following:
In the above graphic, you can see how the overall probability of a given hypothesis is calculated.
P(h/D) is called "posterior probability" of h (where "h" is the hypothesis), because it is the probability obtained after (posterior to) the evaluation of all the factors in the theorem. This is the overall probability of a given hypothesis.
P(h) is the prior probability of the hypothesis, that is, the probability of the hypothesis considered in relation with the background knoweldge alone (that is, regardless of the specific evidence for the hypothesis). This is called "prior" because it is the probability PREVIOUS to the examination of the evidence.
Astute observers will have realized that Hume's argument (and the skeptical contemporary version of it) is a statement of P(h) or prior probability, but P(h) is just ONE of the factors to be considered in the evaluation of any hypothesis, and not the most importat one.
In fact, one of the most important factors of Bayes' Theorem (and one omitted by Hume, Wiseman and skeptics) is the factor P (D/h), that is, the probability of observing the evidence D given the hypothesis h. This factor is so important that it could outbalance any prior/intrinsic improbability.
For example: suppose that a given explanatory hypothesis (e.g. remote viewing) is improbable regarding our background information alone, it still could be the case that it is very probable given the specific evidence for it (e.g the.SAIC experiments). In other words, the probability of getting positive evidence in the SAIC experiments given the hypothesis of remote viewing could outbalance any prior or intrinsic improbability of the same hypothesis (prior improbability = the improbability of remote viewing given the background information alone, that is, prior to the SAIC experiments), making very high the overall probability of the hypothesis of remote viewing.
Can you see now where Hume's (and Wiseman) argument goes wrong? The Humean principle that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence fails because it only takes into account just one factor (the prior/intrinsic probability) to assess the probability of a given hypothesis. But it doesn't take into account the key factor P (D/h), that is, the probability of observing the specific evidence D given the hypothesis H.
So, according to Bayes' Theorem, Hume's argument is mathematically fallacious and demostrably wrong.
As consequence, I'm astonished by "skeptics" who keep repeating the Humean mantra, without realizing that, despite the appearences, it is a technically wrong objection and easily answerable.
And this is not just the case in parapsychology, I've seen the same fallacious argument being used by skeptics in New Testament Studies (for example, regarding Jesus' resurrection).
Regardless of whether Jesus' resurrection was historical or not (this is besides the point in this moment), it is true that the skeptical objections against it based on Hume's argument are demostrably wrong, exactly by the same reasons that such objection is wrong regarding parapsychology.
For example, in his debate against William Lane Craig, skeptic Bart Ehrman argued that Jesus' resurrection, being a miracle, is by definition, the "most improbable event". And since historians can only claim what is historically probable, they can't never accept any miracle as being historical.
With the above explanations about Bayes' Theorem, you are in position to see where Ehrmar's error lies (he's conflating the prior probability of the resurrection hypothesis, which could be improbable in relation with the background information alone, with the probability of the resurrection hypothesis given the evidence for the empty tomb, Jesus' post-mortem apparitions and the origin of disciples' belief. The latter probability could be very high, even if the prior probability of the resurrection hypothesis is low, making the overall probability of the resurrection hypothesis very high).
In his reply to Ehrman, Craig showed exactly where Ehrman's error lies (which Craig calls Ehrman's egregious error and Bart's blunder) based on Bayes' theorem:
Ehrman's reply was saying that he was impressed with Craig presenting a mathematical argument for God's existence!
Ehrman's reply is astonishingly inept. Craig wasn't even arguing for God, he was clearly reconstructing Ehrman's objection to the resurrection in the light of Bayes' Theorem in order to show where Ehrman's blunder lies, but Ehrman didn't even understand that!
This kind of extremely low intellectual sophistication plus atheistic-materialistic prejudices underly the skeptical claim that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.
This is another example of atheistic deception, pseudo-intellectualism and charlatanism, and I consider intellectuals who uncritically accept such a principle to be intellectually unprepared for sophisticated discussion of complex topics.
The most sophisticated technical discussion of Hume's argument in the light of Bayes' Theorem can be read in the book "Hume's Abject Failure" by an agnostic philosopher of science called John Earman, which I strongly suggest to you:
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CONCLUSION
The main skeptical objection against "extraordinary claims" have been shown to be demostrably, mathematically, fallacious. Don't be fooled by the skeptical suggestion that even if such argument is fallacious regarding miracles, it could be true regarding the paranormal. The logical structure of the argument, as constructed by Bayes' Theorem, is exactly the same, and the reasons for it being fallacious stand regarding whether we're discussing miracles, the paranormal or even extraordinarily rare non-paranormal events.
Also, the key insight in this discussion is to realize that the skeptical principle doesn't take into account the P (D/h) factor, which is a very important factor which could counterbalance and even outbalance any putative intrinsic or prior improbability. In the minute 1:02 of the following brief video, Craig summarizes the whole point like this: "You must consider more than simply the inherent probability of that event, you also have to take into account the probability of the evidence being just as it is IF that event has NOT taken place".
In other words, if you're critically examining the evidence for remote viewing for example, you have to consider not only the prior probability of remote viewing given our background information (a probability which according to skeptics like Wiseman is extremely, amazingly low), but ALSO the probability of getting positive evidence in the SAIC experiments IF remote viewing is NOT true. This latter factor could outbalance any prior or inherent improbability of the hypothesis of remote viewing, making the OVERALL probability of remote viewing given the total evidence and factors very high.
Don't be misled by bad skeptical arguments anymore.
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