Q&A: Again on the Miracle from Gedera and the Twin Towers Disaster
Again on the Miracle from Gedera and the Twin Towers Disaster
Question
I’m still mulling over your remarks about the miracle from Gedera.
I understand that you think there is no individual providence. If I understand correctly, you’re not insisting that it cannot exist; rather, you’re arguing that since we have no evidence that it does, and we haven’t seen that it does, there is no reason to believe in it (correct me if I’m wrong).
And this is where I don’t understand: why does it not seem plausible to you that the miracle from Gedera really was providence, admittedly an exceptional case (maybe God wanted to signal to you personally that sometimes there is individual providence…)?
In the Twin Towers disaster, when the first plane hit the tower, it was reasonable to say it was an accident. But after the second one also hit, it was clear with almost complete certainty that there was intentional direction behind it (with practical implications for the response, such as grounding flights, declaring an emergency, etc.). Even though statistically, if one accident can happen, there is some possibility that there would be two in a row. And nevertheless, common sense determined that there was an intentional hand here.
Why not say the same about the miracle from Gedera?
Answer
You begin with a correct explanation of my position and then assume the opposite position. You ask why not explain it the other way, when I said that the lack of evidence is the basis for my claim. a0
Discussion on Answer
In such a case, you always compare possibilities and examine which of them is more plausible.
With the Twin Towers, there are two alternatives facing one another: 1. Two planes got into accidental trouble and happened, by chance, to hit two neighboring towers (and also the Pentagon). 2. This was a deliberate terror attack.
In the case of Gedera, I saw an event in which there was a special coincidence. I do not know whether there were other such cases or not, and in how many of them all the components were present and in how many they were not. So here there is no way to assess the possibilities against one another. If I knew that there were no other such cases and only in my case did the entire combination occur, then indeed it would be called for to say that this was providence.
Moreover, regarding the accident in Gedera there is a general question about providence. Terror attacks certainly happen, and we know this from personal knowledge. Therefore that possibility is not surprising, and its probability is high relative to the alternative of chance. By contrast, we have no indication whatsoever that providence and divine involvement even exist at all. Therefore its probability is low relative to the thesis of chance.
That’s what I was asking: after all, in the case of the Twin Towers too, there was no evidence (in the first moments) that there was deliberate intent, and yet from the moment the second plane hit the tower, it was almost certainly clear that this was not a random coincidence.
Why is an “exceptional coincidence” evidence in the Twin Towers disaster, but not in the miracle from Gedera?