Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence

Atheists often ask for Christians to provide evidence for God. It is a fair request, because despite their slurs, Christianity is not based on blind faith. But in order to look at the evidence, we must first look at both what evidence is and discuss what kind of evidence for God we ought to expect. For it is clear that we have two different approaches when it comes to what is counted as evidence for God. And so if we are not going to talk past each other, it is important to understand what the differences are. Understanding this will help us understand each other’s arguments and communicate more effectively. We must also come to understand how our epistemologies and framework affect our perspectives on this subject and what biases come from those approaches. And we must also examine these approaches and ascertain which approach better deals with the evidence and come to grips with what kind of evidence we can expect.

One popular saying of the atheist community is, “Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.” This statement seems to sum up the epistemology of many atheists on how they believe they can know whether there is a god or not. In other words, they are often looking for indisputable proof of God’s existence or at least evidence that would fall within same confidence level of science. Gravity for example is unseen, but measurable, observable, repeatable, and follows predictable formulas so despite not seeing it, we know it exists. Also, because the presence of God is not something that we experience in our everyday lives or in the lives of those around us, it would take more for one to believe in God’s existence. For example, we don’t tend to believe that unicorns exist because in our experience and in the experience of those around us, they don’t. Because of this for me to believe there is a unicorn, you would have to provide extraordinary evidence. And on the surface, this makes sense. Why believe in something unless you have demonstratable proof of its existence?

This approach, however, relies on underlying unproven assumptions. For example, this approach assumes the type of evidence that will be found and then rejects any evidence that does not fit within these preconceived parameters. This creates a self-confirming bias. If it is not extraordinary or indisputable evidence, we can toss it out and not dwell on it. “Come talk with me when you have discovered something indisputable”. In this way, a plethora of evidence can be ignored.

Here is the deal. For one science doesn’t work that way and if God exists, we should not be quick to assume what those parameters are or what type of evidence we should find. Even with as much as we do know, we barely understand the universe and what we understand today did not come about by telling the universe what its parameters of evidence ought to be and then reject any data that does not fit within those parameters. By no means, for we know this kind of thinking to be foolish. How much more when studying something much more complex than the universe, must we be careful not to be blinded by our assumptions by placing artificial parameters on what that evidence might be. Instead, we observe and collect data as it is and come up with theories that best explain what that data is. But instead of using a scientific method atheist have told God how he must reveal himself and what kind of data and evidence must present to prove his existence. That is ridiculous. How are we to know? For a group that claims to love science, they are quick to throw out the scientific method on this question. If you only accept extraordinary evidence, then you have become blind to other forms of evidence. Evidence doesn’t have to be extraordinary or indisputable to be evidence. If God exists, we cannot presume the means or the type of evidence by which he might reveal himself. We must also keep in mind scientific evidence is not the only kind of evidence. And the scientific method is not the only means by which we come to know things. Not everything is testable. When we study history for example, we can’t do experiments. But this does not mean we can’t take a rigorous scholarly approach when we are approaching this subject. I believe the Bible demands it, I am not to just accept things on so called, “blind faith”.

One of those assumptions atheists have is the Schellenberg argument. It assumes that if perfectly-loving, all-powerful, all-knowing God exists, that he would reveal himself in an extraordinary way or by whatever means necessary to provide irrevocable proof of his existence. And since we don’t find this proof, therefore atheists conclude that God does not exist. In other words, this approach assumes that there will be a specific kind of evidence for God, that everyone can look to and undeniably know that there is a God. I have shown elswhere that the Schellenberg argument is not tenable and that there is another possibility, one in which God would not reveal himself in this way. Since this approach relies on the Schellenberg argument, this approach like the Schellenberg argument is flawed. Because of this we cannot assume that God will reveal himself through extraordinary means. That would be entering an unproven bias into our query. It is possible that God has chosen to reveal himself by very ordinary means. After all, if pride is the ultimate sin, would it not make sense for God to reveal himself through humble means and in a way that is loving both toward those who come to love him and to those who are his enemies. We have to ask ourselves, by what scientific method have the atheists determined that extraordinary evidence is needed to prove the existence of God? It is not the purview of science to approach a subject with the baggage of assumptions. Although at times, it is not without warrant to provide a predictive model of what you believe you might expect, so you can test it. It however is not scientific or scholarly to hold on to that model staunchly in the presence of evidence that shows that that model is indefensible. The statement, “Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence” is indefensible and therefore should be thrown out. Evidence doesn’t have to be grand or extraordinary to be reasonable.

Another problem with this approach is that it is very subjective. What kind of evidence is considered extraordinary? After all, if unicorns or magic were everywhere, we would find them ordinary, instead of extraordinary. It is not so much extraordinary evidence that we need, but reasonable evidence. If you have a subjective standard by which you look at the evidence, since we are creatures that are really good at confirmation bias and conforming the evidence to fit our preconceived standard, we will not believe. We know this and both sides are not immune to this. But one thing that is clear the statement, “Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence” is faulty at best. But the atheists would argue, God would know what kind of evidence it would take for me to believe. After all, how can I know God exists if he does not provide sufficient proof for me to believe. Well, many atheists have made it clear that not even this would be enough for them to believe. Because their standard for evidence is subjective, and there is no definable means to deal with the evidence that is there, it is easy when presented with evidence to just shrug it off and say, “Well, that still is not sufficient evidence for me to believe.” This is a standard based on emotion rather than objective reasoning. Here is the thing, when we presume a perspective of God that is subjective, limiting, and narrow, we cease to analyze the data as a scientist, and we close our minds to the possibilities outside our restricted parameters. We no longer really listen and hear the evidence that is out there, because it doesn’t meet the artificial criteria we have made. This kind approach only works if the assumption is that God would reveal himself by extraordinary means. But since we cannot rely on the Schellenberg argument and we cannot assume that God will reveal himself in extraordinary means, we must look to another approach when addressing the question of whether there is a God or not.

The most problematic assumption of this approach is that it assumes that God’s main goal in revealing himself is for us to believe in his existence and therefore God ought to use the most efficient and effective means to make his existence known to as many people as possible. I have argued that this is not the case. God is not trying to get people to believe in his existence, but instead is using the most effective means to call people who are at enmity with him to himself and bring them into a loving covenant relationship. These are two very separate and distinct objectives that require different means to accomplish. Extraordinary evidence is not the most effective means for this to occur, therefore we should not assume that it would be the means by which God would reveal himself. A scientific approach does not assume foundational premises without evidence. The irony is that though atheists demand scientific evidence, they do not rely on evidence for their foundational premises, nor do they feel the need to provide such evidence. Why do they believe the Schellenberg argument is true? Who knows? Atheists have become irrational demanding God to speak only in the way they have chosen, but when he speaks using humility and speaks in a different Way, instead of listening, they get angry at him for not speaking in the way they have chosen. This is not science, nor is this how any relationship works. These kinds of arguments are not founded on rational thinking.

Again, it really doesn’t matter if you believe the Bible or not, these approaches are not an effective means for determining whether or not there is a God because it relies on unproven assumptions. If you have a premise, “Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence”, you have to prove that God must reveal himself this way. You have provided no proof of this. Therefore, there is no scientific, philosophical, or scholarly reason why we ought to limit God to this criterion. Why could he not reveal himself in the ordinary and with humble means? Because the premise “Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence” falls apart when examined with scrutiny, and God could very well reveal himself in the ordinary, we need to look to some other means to answer these questions.

Thankfully, this is not the only approach when dealing with the evidence that there is a God or not. We can use another approach that fits more in line with the scientific and scholarly approach, one that is not full of baggage and unproven assumptions. Even though, we cannot assume that a perfectly-loving, all-knowing, all-powerful God would not hide himself, we can assume that he would reveal himself in some way. However, even though we can assume that he would reveal himself, we cannot assume by what means he would do so. If having an understanding of the universe is beyond our grasp, how much more the creator of the universe, if he exists. We should be careful about bringing our assumptions into this question. We don’t know that God would provide extraordinary evidence for his existence. And I have shown that this approach would be harmful. This being the case, we should not expect there to be extraordinary evidence. So instead of assuming the criterion for how God must reveal himself, we ought to ask the question is there any reasonable evidence that God has revealed himself. Instead of trying to push the data into our preconceived ideas as is done by the atheist, we can allow the data to speak for itself and form our theory based on the data instead of vice versa. When we do this, we can test these theories against the data to see if those theories hold up. After all this is the more scientific approach because it does not assume the nature God or how he might reveal itself, but instead attempts to objectively look at the data we have for or against the existence of God. This is a far more scientific approach than stating this is the only type of data I will accept. And, as we look at the data, we can ask if there any reasonable evidence that would point towards the existence of God. Again, we are not asking if there is any definitive evidence for the existence of God, for that kind approach has been shown to be invalid, since we cannot assume that there will be definitive evidence.

And there is reasonable evidence for God, for example, the fine-tuning argument. Though this argument is not direct proof, the concept of God would be reasonable to explain this, because even if we have an absolute scientific explanation for the creation of the universe and how it has evolved, this fact does not go away. We should not be surprised that the universe is ordered by science. And even if we have an explanation for this occurring scientifically, that explanation would contribute to the argument rather than detracting from it. And the more we explore science the more this seems to be the case. Just like unicorns and magic can become mundane, we should not lose our wonder and awe. We are stuck with this, and so the argument is not whether fine-tuning exists, but whether it points to God or not. And though this evidence alone cannot prove the existence of God, it is data that is one piece of the puzzle. And it is reasonable especially given the many other evidences to see this as possible evidence for God. And some would say not only is this reasonable evidence but extraordinary evidence. And here is the thing . . . it doesn’t stand alone. This is only one piece of evidence. There are many other arguments and evidence that reasonably point to God. Here is my point, you may not believe in God, you may throw the evidence out because it does not fit your criterion, but you cannot say it is unreasonable for me to believe in God, when there is a plethora of such evidence that support my belief. Nor is it reasonable to claim that there is no evidence for God. No, I may not have the evidence you want, but I don’t think the evidence you want is reasonable, scientific, or scholarly. The fault is with your criterion, not the evidence.

And here we come to another factor in looking at the evidence. Do we determine how God must reveal himself? Or does he determine how he reveals himself? Is it possible if there is a God that he would choose to reveal himself through writings. Yes, it is possible. We cannot just arbitrarily rule this out. And there is a lot of evidence that point to the trustworthiness of the Bible, enough to say that it is reasonable to trust it. And here we come to another aspect that we must address in order to evaluate evidence for God or any religion. As with all that we understand with science we are asking what a reasonable explanation for the evidence is, we have and asking is there any reasonable evidence to nullify the explanation we currently have for the evidence. So, not only do we need to ask, “Is it reasonable?” but we also have to ask, “Is there any reasonable arguments against the validity of the evidence or the proposed explanation for the evidence?”. And this is something atheists have failed to do. For example, you claim that there are thousands of contradictions in the Bible and yet I have not found one atheist that can back up the claim for even one. So, I have a position where I can provide evidence that is reasonable with no valid opposition showing it is wrong. If you want to take a more scientific approach, then this is pretty good evidence. And if that is so then it is a theory that must be on the table. You cannot take it off, till you have evidence to support taking it off. There is a difference between you not believing or disagreeing with a proposition, then you proving it to be false. One is emotional, the other is scientific or academic. I understand that this is not the kind of evidence you want and that you might say that in the absence of extraordinary evidence it is reasonable for me to not believe in God. But I have given evidence to show that this is not a reasonable position, which ought to force you to deal with the evidence that is there instead of ignoring it and quickly tossing it away because it doesn’t fit your agenda. Why should you base your view of the world on logical fallacies and faulty scholarship? You might say, “Ok, well let’s take your proposition and data, which is what I have a problem with. I have thousands of reasons to believe that the proposition of the Christian faith is unreasonable”. Ok, you are doing a little better because if you can show that the Bible or Christian faith is unreasonable by the approach I am proposing, you are right. But this has not been done. We must keep in mind that the Bible is probably the most scrutinized writing ever. The Christian religion is probably the most scrutinized religion. The fact that there are reasonable and objective answers based on solid scholarship to the challenges brought against it is evidence that it is a trustworthy document. And the fact that the charges against the Bible and Christianity rely on a false understanding of the Bible or Christianity says a lot about the atheist arguments. It does not impress me when atheists only fight against an imaginary foe. If you say you have a strong position, then stop being afraid and stand up and fight against the real thing and bring real arguments to the table instead of fluff. If all atheists can do is fight and imaginary foe, I think the Christian faith wins hands down. When atheists do this, they are ironically providing evidence for the Christian faith. You don’t fight an imaginary foe if you can fight the real thing. And I am willing to back this up. Give me the evidence for what you feel like is your strongest claim against Christianity and let’s talk about it. I know you might feel like because you studied to be a pastor you are attacking Christianity, but in our dialogues so far you haven’t, you have only attacked something imaginary. Sadly, I have found this to be true of other former Christians turned atheists as well. I would encourage you to reevaluate your arguments in light of this and work to have more solid arguments. Again, I am willing to back this up, you have not touched the Christian faith with your arguments.

Summary of the two approaches

Approach 1:

A criterion is set up beforehand determining what kind of data will be evaluated as evidence. Evidence not fitting this criterion is thrown out.
Criterion: Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.
- Basically, you start with a prediction, without observation, then create an unproven criterion for collecting data. And then only collect data that fits within that prediction, and then come to the conclusion based on that selected data.
Faults:
- It assumes that extraordinary evidence is necessary.
- Extraordinary evidence is a subjective and biased criteria.
- It assumes that the Schellenberg argument is a proven fact.
- It assumes that the main purpose of God revealing himself is to make his existence known.
- None of the assumptions required for this approach are proven facts.
Conclusion: Because the foundation of this approach requires unproven assumptions it is not a scientific approach.

Approach 1:

Since we cannot definitively say how God might reveal himself, instead of setting up a criterion beforehand of what evidence is acceptable and what is not, look at the data first, evaluate the data and test it. Analyze it both based on whether or not it is reasonable based on the data but also evaluate whether or not there are any reasonable arguments against the proposition.
- Basically, you observe, question, hypothesis, test, scrutinize, and analyze, then make conclusions.
Faults: As with all of science, this will not necessarily give you definitive proof. It will, however, allow you to provide support for the reasonableness of a proposition. Basically, this is the scientific method, and it has the weaknesses of the scientific method.
Strengths:
- It follows the scientific method more closely than Approach 1.
- If the Schellenberg argument is not certain, then Approach 2 would be best.
Conclusion: Approach 2 will produce results that are more consistent with the data and evidence. Approach 1 relies on confirmation bias and unproven assumptions.

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