To save @Terrapin Station from hunting it down, it's here.

The principle of sufficient reason is just not unconditional. As per earlier posts, you can find examples to which the principle does not apply, so you have to rule those out before applying it. — jorndoe

There are no cases where the principle of sufficient reason does not apply, if there were, they would be unverifiable as unknowns. Your claim is a trick of definition, the magic of self-deception. The cosmological argument is directed toward contingent existence. The premise is that things are contingent. The conclusion is that the premise, which defines all existence as contingent is a mistaken premise. It does not lead to the conclusion that there is something outside of "existence".

The principle of sufficient reason cannot apply to existence (everything) without circularity, since otherwise the deduced reason would automatically not exist — which is contradictory. — jorndoe

The magic trick of self-deception which you are pulling off here, is that you are attempting to apply the PSR to a generality, a universal, "existence", when the PSR clearly only applies to particular things. When you make such categorical errors you should expect any manner of paradoxical results. "Existence" is what existing things have. If we attempt to apply the PSR to an attribute or property, which has been separated from the object of which it is a property, we should have no expectations that the PSR would apply, because the separated property exists only in abstraction, not as a thing which the PSR would apply to.

Wouldn't it be cool to see news headlines with "Theologians make new ground-breaking discovery" — Jorndoe

Well, they would say they have, that it's in the Bible, that it is indeed big news, and that it's been disregarded by you. But the headline 'JornDoe doesn't believe in Bible' wouldn't sell a lot of newspapers. ;-)

The many worlds hypothesis, and the multiverse hypothesis, are both supernatural (or metaphysical, means the same) because they're outside/beyond/super to the 'event horizon' which bounds the actual universe. But, as I say, they 'sound scientific'. You can get up at a conference with your powerpoint preso and talk about them, and other scientists might not agree, but they won't think you're, you know, religulous.

Honestly, researching this topic, I found a grant application, here in Australia, for research group who are going to try and prove Everett's MWI. David Deutsch is evangelical about MWI. And, sure, I think the idea that everything that exists is replicated through an infinite number of ever-so-slightly-different worlds, is supernatural, albeit without the morally edifying add-ons that the traditionalist models have. At least in their's, there's a point.

Any arbitrary particle could be taken as an example of something with or without a starting point. — Wayfarer

You're looking for an example where we know that something didn't have a starting point, somehow, in contradistinction to what you're taking to be examples where we know particles had a starting point. But we don't actually know this, especially in a knowledge by acquaintance sense, in either case. Rather, as I mentioned, it's a factor of assumptions that we're making, ways that we're interpreting the data.

Again, not that I was talking about things without question starting point in the first place, but it's a metaphysical possibility along with things with a starting point.

: the naive argument that the physical sciences have somehow eliminated the need to a 'supernatural' explanation, is not actually borne out by the current state of science, — Wayfarer

Where we don't already have an explanation, supernatural explanations should have long ago been eliminated by a "We don't know what the natural explanation is yet, but we're working on it" response.

Where we don't already have an explanation, supernatural explanations should have long ago been eliminated by a "We don't know what the natural explanation is yet, but we're working on it" response. — Terrapin Station

Yeah, some of those supposed explanations tend to be arguing from ignorance, and this is also where mentioned personification of the unknown can play a role.

Can anyone give a non-hypothetical example of something supernatural, magic, witchcraft, ...?

Poor examples include the horrible Salem witch trials a few centuries back (though apparently still going in Saudi Arabia, 2013, 2016); Noah's flood; possessions and exorcisms; most miracles that's been examined; ... How about telepathy or telekinesis (by will alone)? :D

Can anyone give a non-hypothetical example of something supernatural, magic, witchcraft, ...? — jorndoe

What would, theoretically, count as supernatural? Something non-physical? Then, given Hempel's dilemma, what counts as non-physical?

I always took God on a leap of faith. — Marty

Honesty. It matters. (Y) (was about to hit "Like", but this will have to do)
And the freedom to entertain such beliefs are non-negotiable (in my opinion).

I'll just note on the side that various theisms can engender behavior that has impact beyond voluntary adherents (sometimes alienation from parents/peers, sometimes fatal, sometimes directed indoctrination, sometimes just within one sect/cult/denomination, ...). And sometimes actions are justified from their (interpretation of their) various scriptures, with notable social consequences. Therefore these beliefs warrant examination on this account alone.

What would, theoretically, count as supernatural? Something non-physical? Then, given Hempel's dilemma, what counts as non-physical? — Michael

Not sure I could say ahead of time.
The alleged miracles of Lourdes? Noah's flood?
It seems a prerequisite that a mind, and perhaps will, have to be behind something for it to be considered supernatural (e.g. witchcraft and sorcery, possessions, divine miracles and creatio ex nihilo, telepathy and -kinesis). Perhaps irreducibility (to something else) is also a prerequisite.
Was just trying to look up the Catholic church's prerequisites for miracles, but didn't find them.
May have to be exemplified before an assessment can be made.

We need more samples for the experiment. — jorndoe

In such matters, maybe more samples will only introduce more errors. The scientific statistical method may very well not be adequate to deal with such matters which depend upon the concepts and beliefs which people already have or don't have - unless of course we're interested to find out what, empirically, the mean of a population is (although this could change in the future - so I don't think it would be a very scientific endeavour). If we're interested in the truth however - then we may need to be careful in the selection of people we consider for the experiment. They should be those people for whom their own behaviour is somewhat transparent - who have followed the train of their minds, and understand what makes them form a belief or not. Otherwise, we'll get a lot of people who are confused and unaware of the ways in which their own minds function - that's not good - that's a source of error. And trying to study the way beliefs form in a confused person's mind is not very helpful - the process becomes intractable, since even the person is not aware of many influencing factors.

I found that honest belief in the elephants didn't come about as a matter of exercising "free will", sort of justifying that sometimes at least "seeing is believing".
On the other hand, I also believe there's snow on the peak of Mount Everest, and that there are exoplanets, though less "seeing", and more thinking, is involved.

"There was a pink elephant on the street"; SP. Kiwiyum; 1m:58s youtube; Jul 2012

Funny video thanks! :D Yes definitely a few things are needed to form and sustain a belief. One is experience, another is reason. I have developed a more extensive framework but will not state it here, although the nuts and bolts are that experience will go through the filter of reason. So to believe in God a few things must happen. First you must clarify for yourself what God means. Second you must have an experience of God. Third your reason must confirm that your experience of God is indeed of God. Then your belief in God will form. So what role does the will have in here? Well the will can intervene either at the first level - meaning that you are simply not interested in God, and therefore have no interest in ever clarifying the concept - or at the third level (or both) - meaning that despite having an experience of God, you will ignore it, refuse to see it, and in other words not be open to it. If you don't have a clear concept of God, your reason will never be able to identify a certain experience as being "of God". If your will is not open to the possibility of God - then your reason will choose another way to interpret your experience in order to avoid God. If you truly want to be honest with yourself, then you must be open to possibility.

Can anyone give a non-hypothetical example of something supernatural, magic, witchcraft, ...? — JornDoe

Ian Stevenson's research on past-life memories has a large body of actual research, of the same kind you would find in support of epidemiological studies. Rupert Sheldrake's research into morphic resonance was condemned by the editor of Nature 'because it was magic'.

@Wayfarer, there are also many reports of alien abductions (and who-knows-what else).
None independently confirmed though, like abductions being examined, recorded and witnessed by outside, credible parties.
They're purely phenomenological experiences.

• non-identity: say I have a chat my colleague, then my experiences of my colleague ≠ my colleague, others may also experience the colleague on their own (phenomenological and empirical)
• identity: say I have a headache, then my experience of the ache = the ache, others don't have my headaches (phenomenological)

It would seem alien abductions belong in the identity category.
They're part of the experiencer when they occur, and nothing else (possibly related to sleep paralysis or mild epilepsy or something, well, unless they're hoaxes).
They still exist, they're just entirely "subjective", mind-dependent, much like hallucinations or dreams, which is not to say real abductions couldn't occur of course, but give it an honest evaluation please.
Humans aren't exactly perfect organisms, introspectively or otherwise.

You clearly say that without any knowledge of Stevenson's research, which observed the same kinds of empirical protocols of any other social science research, albeit in respect of a topic which is considered taboo. Likewise Sheldrake has many peer-reviewed scientific papers published. But I suppose the die-hard materialist will simply label anything that does seem to undermine the paradigm in that way -aliens, UFO's, yetis, whatever.

@Wayfarer, you don't have to be a "die-hard materialist" to come to such conclusions. :)
(Not that it matters much here, but I'm not in particular, whatever your impression may be.)

Admittedly it's been a long while since I read up on Stevenson's stuff, was going by memory alone.
Will have to check that "morphic resonance" stuff once time permits.

Oh, I just got the impression, that when you asked for documentation of anything actually 'supernatural/magical', that you assumed that of course there couldn't be any such documentation, so when it was offered, you simply stamped it in the same category of 'alien abduction story'.

Here are a couple discussions on Stevenson's stuff, with both pros and cons:

• '20 cases suggestive of reincarnation' (2007); International Skeptics Forum
• Ian Stevenson’s Case: Are We ‘Skeptics’ Really Just Cyni (2013); The Skeptics Society Forum

And a couple references:

• Pseudoscience and the Paranormal (2003) » Reincarnation; Hines Terence
• Ian Stevenson (1918-2007); The Skeptic's Dictionary

Not that my own opinion matters much, but, without further information, I'm with Sagan; here's what he wrote in The Demon-Haunted World (1997), full snippet attached:

Maybe some undiscovered reptile left over from the Cretaceous period will indeed be found in Loch Ness or the Congo Republic; or we will find artifacts of an advanced, non-human species elsewhere in the solar system. At the time of writing there are three claims in the ESP field which, in my opinion, deserve serious study:
[...]
(3) that young children sometimes report the details of a previous life, which upon checking turn out to be accurate and which they could not have known about in any other way than reincarnation
[...]
I pick these claims not because I think they're likely to be valid (I don't), but as examples of contentions that might be true. The last three have at least some, although still dubious, experimental support. Of course, I could be wrong. — Carl Sagan

Feel free to open a new thread if you think Stevenson proved supernaturals.

I know the skeptics forum believes that it has discredited Stevenson's research. Stevenson always only claimed to present evidence that 'suggests the possibility of re-birth having taken place'. I think it does that. The reason that it's significant is because it is a subject where evidence can actually be gathered. You can't do that for heaven.

The other point that should be made is that I did bother to get one of Stevenson's books out of the library. It contains masses of data - literally hundreds of cases. These have all been checked against documentary sources, eyewitness accounts, and every other kind of source that a researcher could avail themselves of. And the 'skeptics' claim is basically: well, Stevenson was too gullible, sloppy, and careless and was mislead by wishful thinking. I think it actually serves to illustrate how easy it is for people to believe what they want to believe (which is ironic, in the context.)

Stevenson always only claimed to present evidence that 'suggests the possibility of re-birth having taken place'. I think it does that. — Wayfarer

Fire up a new thread. Present your thinking on (justification of) it. Add a vote. (Isn't that what the site is for anyways?)

I rest my case ;-)

(3) that young children sometimes report the details of a previous life, which upon checking turn out to be accurate and which they could not have known about in any other way than reincarnation — Carl Sagan

Wouldn't this just be the movement of information? Impressive if valid. But reincarnation would just be a metaphorical structuring of a child knowing something that it "shouldn't" according to our current understanding of the possible. .

The weakness of the argument is that it presumes to tackle the conundrum of first cause using logic. Logic (and the understanding it produces) is a product of a causal chain and therefore blind to that outside the chain.

I have encountered a few threads which try to do this with the various conundrums we face philosophically. They all seem to chase their own tail within the chain.

Perhaps it is time for philosophers to try thinking outside the box (chain) a little.

What makes such things supernatural as opposed to unexplained natural phenomena?

'Miracles are not contrary to nature, but only contrary to what we know about nature' ~ Augustine

The issue with reincarnation in particular is that it is doubly taboo. Once because it was anathematised by the Church in about the 4th century, and again by science because it seems to undermine materialism.

Tom Shroder, a journalist who wrote a book on Stevenson (Old Souls), said that Stevenson told him that people in the West would often say 'why waste your time on this subject? Everyone knows it is just a superstition', whereas people in the East would say ' why waste your time on this subject? Everyone knows that it happens all the time'.

@Marty,

I like your radical God, might I say a transcendent God, perhaps. But I would not only elevate ethics to that plain, but every experiential concern of humanity*. So in a sense everything about our(and the experience of other beings in the biosphere) experience can be seen as an imperfect reflection/embodiment of the nature of God, or the divine. Likewise our "spacetime" can be viewed as a dim reflection of eternity, embodied in a causal chain. While the divine realm the cosmological argument is considering, in the person of God, is forever beyond the reach of the very tool employed to address it, namely logic.

Hence your "leap of faith".

*By experiential concern of humanity, I am referring to everything that is, or is an aspect of experience, or what can be conceptually generated and understood in the human mind.

I thought the task was to show a (unique) first cause, like Craig, and then (perhaps) that the first cause is necessary?
— jorndoe

I see. I thought I addressed this, but I myself wouldn't defend the Kalam cosmological argument all the way through. I was addressing the classic cosmological argument (basically the argument from contingency), and explaining how divine attributes follow. But to answer your question it's the exact reversal: because it is necessary for their to be a first cause, then it follows there must be a first cause, and that since it cannot be temporal, it is unique. There is no special pleading involved, imho.

— jorndoe

• the principle of sufficient reason cannot apply to existence ("everything") without circularity, since otherwise the deduced reason would then not exist, which is contradictory
• 2+2=4 may be another example, as suggested by @Wayfarer, which converges on the strange Platonic realm of old
• thus, before applying the principle to some x, you must ensure x is not one such example (this is usually simple enough, or reasonable, for ordinary everyday trivialities)
• unconditional application can be misapplication, and has a logical structure of "everything and then some", which violates the first law, the law of identity
• if the whole universe is everything, then the principle cannot apply to the universe
• you must first show that the whole universe is not everything, or, more accurately, that the principle applies to the whole universe

I'm not sure the mathematical example you said works. I forgot to mention it, but the scholastic PSR states: "everything that is has that by which it is." Which is a weaker PSR. It talks about things that exists, real being, not that there is a reason for things like mathematical equations. That would be a rationalist version of it.

And since you didn't really elaborate and how your other examples really deflate the issue concerning the PSR I'm gonna have to ask you to, again, elaborate on those examples.

As for your last two statements about the universe being everything, this is just simply question-begging. I don't have to demonstrate it's not everything. You have to demonstrate that physicalism/naturalism is true without begging the question.

"The issue with reincarnation in particular is that it is doubly taboo. Once because it was anathematised by the Church in about the 4th century, and again by science because it seems to undermine materialism"

Yes, folk could end up thinking of the world as little more than a dream, or a pool of water, that the soul occassionally dips its toe into. Rather the the totality of existence, perish the thought.

Stevenson always only claimed to present evidence that 'suggests the possibility of re-birth having taken place'. I think it does that. — Wayfarer

Fire up a new thread. Present your thinking on (justification of) it. Add a vote. (Isn't that what the site is for anyways?) — jorndoe

This illustrates my point very well between you two. One is open to believe, and thus believes. The other isn't open to believe, and therefore doesn't believe. You could present as much evidence as you want to jorndoe on this subject - unless one is honestly open to believe, they will always find reasons not to believe - as such matters are not amenable to the kind of studies jorndoe is open to - double blind studies, etc. The sad part is that evidence is rejected when it doesn't fit a method. But it is precisely the method which ought to be rejected when it has reached its limits and cannot investigate further.

Most in our secular world have put everything marked 'religion' in a box and sealed it. Then they're concerned that if anything prized the lid open, it will be a pandora's box. Where will it end up?

(This essay is long, been published a while, but well worth the read. Last line is a kicker.)