David Hume's Argument Against Miracles with George Williams

George Williams, PhD, has a wide, interdisciplinary background. As an undergraduate, he studied engineering at Vanderbilt and worked at IBM for 8 years. He switched to a different direction and studied literature at Maharishi International University, where he also became very curious about the notion of group consciousness. Then, he pursued a doctorate in economics at Northwestern University. Since the late 90s, he has worked for a government agency.. But during that time, he began to focus on what the parapsychological data can tell us about the nature of consciousness.

Here he focuses on the influential eighteenth century, Scottish philosopher, David Hume, his philosophy of naturalism, and his argument against religious miracles. He examines how that argument has been wrongly used by those hostile to parapsychology.

00:00 Introduction
02:05 David Hume
05:43 Naturalism
09:13 Miracles
13:33 Parapsychology
24:41 Consciousness
29:33 Religion
33:05 Paradigms
42:05 Ground of being
45:19 Non-locality
48:38 Conclusion

Edited subtitles for this video are available in Russian, Portuguese, Italian, German, French, and Spanish.

New Thinking Allowed host, Jeffrey Mishlove, PhD, is author of The Roots of Consciousness, Psi Development Systems, and The PK Man. Between 1986 and 2002 he hosted and co-produced the original Thinking Allowed public television series. He is the recipient of the only doctoral diploma in "parapsychology" ever awarded by an accredited university (University of California, Berkeley, 1980). He is also the Grand Prize winner of the 2021 Bigelow Institute essay competition regarding the best evidence for survival of human consciousness after permanent bodily death.

(Recorded on September 20, 2023)

[NewThinkingAllowed]

Statement of Comment Etiquette for New Thinking Allowed

[TomVernonUAP]

what a wonderful discussion. I keeping thinking about what Jeffery said on his 'theories of everything' interview, that he releases these discussions so prolifically so that people with an interest in this side of life don't feel alone if they don't have someone to share it with. This speaks volumes about the depth of his compassion, and I will be forever grateful.

[celt]

Thanks so much for posting this important and thought-provoking discussion. It is greatly appreciated that you share your work in this way.

[sawmill]

To really find the answer to all these questions you have to go in to your own being . But nothing wrong with intellectual attempts to find some answers.

[anjaknatz]

As I could not sleep I was listening to " New Thinking allowed" as often. When I finished, I did a prayer: "As my life is so blank right now, please would you allow me another clear sign, that shows me, I am in alinement with the good forces in universe, as I need this connection to the other side as I have no nice connection on this side of reality." In the morning, still fast asleep, suddenly I could hear a female voice, loud an clear, as if someone was standing right beside my bed, telling me: By this I woke up, immediatelly understanding what it meant. NEW THINKING ALLOWED!!! 🎉 That was such a lovely sign!! I thank you soo very very much!! 🎉

[albertperks]

Kudos to your stepson Jeffrey on the use of 'Hyper Point' as an alternative to worm hole. I agree hyper point makes more sense.

[UnderStanding_with_Javid]

@10:33 I pointed out the circularity in his argument during a lecture in the 2nd year Philosophy course on the Epistemology at a very prestigious North American university and was left with a tremendous and sort of a silent abandonment. It felt very peculiar that the place where analytical thinking was to be taught was the very same place where you could be abandoned for the application of it..

[anonymoushuman]

What is a philosopher, anyway? Somebody once said, "To call someone else a philosopher is a compliment. To call one's self a philosopher is a conceit." I say Jeffrey Mishlove is a philosopher in the sense of a lover of wisdom, recognizing wisdom as deep knowledge present in spiritual and philosophical traditions all over the world.

Maybe we should try to contact David Hume and ask him for his current opinion on these things.

Now, coming back to philosophy in the narrower sense used in analytical academic departments that bear the name (which do have their merits, in spite of ethnocentrism and neglect of wisdom traditions) . . .

There are probably some philosophical naturalists around who do take parapsychology seriously, people who regard at least some psi phenomena as natural or physical processes of a kind that we don't understand yet. But maybe our concepts of 'natural' and 'supernatural' are completely artificial.

The quotation from Hume that Jeffrey mentions about the supremacy of the passions is about their role in motivating the human will to action, in contrast to the role of reason -- not logic. The word 'logic' is sometimes used as a synonym for 'reason' (as by Spock and the other Vulcans in Star Trek, most famously), but that's not what philosophy professors usually mean by 'logic'. In western academic philosophy, logic is usually a set of maximally abstract rules for making valid inferences, whereas reason is said to be an intellectual faculty of the mind that makes use of those rules together with other input in thinking, judging, and deciding. Professors of philosophy who teach introductory courses correct their students about this a lot.

About the roles of reason and the passions in motivating the will, Hume writes, "Reason is, and ought only to be the slave of the passions, and can never pretend to any other office than to serve and obey them." (Treatise of Human Nature Book II, Part III, p. 415) This is an assertion about a causal psychological law that Hume believes governs the operation of the human mind, even though he doesn't think he (or we) can know causal laws. A person could be a rationalist, regarding reason as a source of knowledge independent of the other faculties, and still hold this view. But there are also other senses of the word 'rationalism'.

End of pompous windbag screed.

[amanitamuscaria]

Very interesting interview. It is so obvious to me that consciousness is the ground of everything, it's beyond me to understand how any of these very clever and educated philosophers can argue against it. After all, at which point does any of them experience anything outside of their consciousness? Which experiment is conducted and which measurement is taken, outside of consciousness? Every single experience we have is experienced through our conscious awareness. Even dreams, OBEs and NDEs take place in our conscious awareness. I'm not alone in this. Philisophers in India have talked about it for thousands of years. You can call it God. Or you can call it something else. Buddhists don't call it God, for instance. But they are essentially talking about the same thing. A rose by any other name will smell as sweet.

[mikecopley]

Consciousness is simply a connection.
Occam’s razor is correct. Without a connection consciousness would not be possible -Ayeieye

[paulrodriguez]

What is the best proven example of psychokinesis ? With best regards from Stockholm, Paul

[sabrinanecci]

Hi to all
A month ago in a few seconds seeing a huge and wide black shadow covering the top of a tree, flying from south to north, around 4:pm afternoon, sunny day.
We are all connected and we are not alone.
Cordially

[pauldavid]

There's a big difference between the sort of anomalous phenomena studied by parapsychology and the miraculous claims made by the various religions. The latter should rightfully be taken with a truckload of salt. I think Hume would've been open to the former if he was around today.

[OdjoAdja]

miracle is not in physical terminology but only apply in metaphysical terminology and this is an intangible science and apply only to particular entities not as in general term and this difference would be good if those philosopher understand the different..

[OldEarthWisdom]

I wonder how remote viewing fits into all of this.

[rossmcleod]

Great conversation, many thanks though I struggle mightily with non locality and that stupid cat.

[kengemmer]

Microphone noise distracted from this interesting dialogue.