DO GREAT CLAIMS REQUIRE GREAT EVIDENCES?

Atheists generally say that the existence of God is a great claim. Therefore, this claim requires great evidence.

Actually I tend to agree. However, I would insist that the evidence for the Creator should be compared to its competing great claim – that natural forces (NFs) are the creators. Both of these are necessarily extraordinary claims, which require extraordinary evidence. Both claim that either these NFs or the Creator must be eternal and therefore don’t require an illogical and endless source of causes to explain their own existence. Instead, they are eternal. However, I think that the God hypothesis has more support. From the little we understand:

1.    NFs cannot explain the creation of matter, energy, time, and space. Instead, NFs would require that these already exist before they can act upon them. Besides, time cannot be eternal. It would mean that an infinite number of years would have to be fulfilled before we could arrive at the present.

2.    NFs could not explain their elegance of formula. Instead, this suggests ID.

3.    It is more parsimonious to accept the initial existence of one creative Force than many NFs.

4.    The omnipotent God hypothesis can explain everything. The initial Cause must be adequate to account for the rest of the universe. However, NFs are hard-pressed to account for many things – life, consciousness, freewill, objective moral law.

5.    There is no evidence that anything has ever been caused by a NF. Perhaps instead, these NFs are created by God and emanate from His Being.

However, theism and ID have other great claims like miracles, one-time phenomena, which go beyond the grasp and purview of science. Consequently, don’t miracles require extraordinary supportive evidences (ESEs)?

At this point, we need to make a necessary distinction between a single miracle and miracles in general (MG). MG already possess ESEs in the form of millions of supporting testimonies or reports.

But where are the scientific evidences? They do not exist! Why not? Because science can only address repeating events, events that can be retested! But miracles are anomalous, one of a kind. Therefore, they cannot be repeated. It is therefore not appropriate to ask for scientific proof for things outside of the reach of science. Consequently, science cannot disprove miracles.

But what do we make of the claims for individual miracles, like the Bible’s insistence on the Virgin Birth? From a materialistic and naturalistic perspective, the Virgin Birth would require extraordinary evidences, but not from the perspective of ID. If there is a God, then all of His creations are miraculous and transcend the grasp of science.

In light of this, we are taken back to the original question – “Does the Creator exist?” If He does, then He is the ESE.

This doesn’t mean that we should not be diligent about examining miraculous claims. In fact, the Bible tells us to examine all things, including ourselves. However, assuming ID, we test in different ways, using different criteria.