First of all, congratulations! These kinds of questions are extremely challenging to even ask from within certain philosophical frameworks, and the fact that you're here at all means that you've accomplished something exceptional. Further, by using the question of miracles specifically, you've focused on empirical, testable claims with verifiable consequences. The epistemology that you're associating with atheism or agnosticism is fundamentally the ability to ask exactly these questions, the habit of doing so reflexively, and the willingness to follow those questions to real answers.

The basic Bayesian response to the question of miracles isn't just "are they lying, or is there a God?" Ask the question a different way: in a hypothetical universe in which Christianity is false, how many claims of miraculous events do we expect? In a hypothetical universe in which Christianity is true, how many true (and false!) claims of miraculous intervention do we expect? Do we expect a difference in the kind of miracles that are claimed to occur? For example, we experience people claiming that God cured infertility or cancer, but never people claiming that God cured their amputation. It's an interesting discrepancy, and which universe is that most consistent with? Etc. Don't think about it in terms of picking apart each individual claim. Just ask yourself about an interventionist God in terms of your honest expectations for such a God, and consider the world-as-it-is in comparison. Use the miraculous as a prediction that can succeed or fail, rather than simply as an explanation that is immune to correction.

This isn't just idle curiosity. I am currently a Christian (or maybe an agnostic terrified of ending up on the wrong side of Pascal's Wager), and when you actually take religion seriously, it can be a HUGE drain on quality of life. I find myself being frightened of hell, feeling guilty when I do things that don't hurt anyone but are still considered sins, and feeling guilty when I try to plan out my life, wondering if I should just put my plans in God's hands. To make matters worse, I grew up in a dysfunctional, very Christian family, and my emotions seem to be convinced that being a true Christian means acting like my parents (who were terrible role models; emulating them means losing at life).

As a former Evangelical Christian, I wonder if this isn't the crux of it all.

Of course it's possible real faith healings and resurrections have taken, and are taking, place somewhere on the globe. It's possible that these miracles are happening due to the power of a supernatural entity. And it's possible this supernatural dude is best described by the Christian Bible.

It's going to be difficult for you to dismiss these possibilities no matter how small because you've (presumably) been indoctrinated to believe in things like eternal conscious torment in hell, let alone the guilt/shame/fear associated with all sorts of "secular" worldviews and rational thinking. Indoctrination is very powerful, and it can wreak havoc with your emotions long after your rational mind has (all but) dismissed religion's claims as fairy tales.

The rest of LW has provided, and will provide, plenty of reasons to seriously doubt miracle claims. But religious memes have evolved to survive such skepticism—they are clever enough to avoid being pinned down...they escape and get passed on. They are hard to dismiss and tempting to believe in.

The reality is, there is some non-zero probability that the power of Jesus Christ through prayer raised someone, somewhere, from the grave. And this would provide some evidence of the veracity of Christianity...and this would make hell into a bit more realistic threat...and hell (at least in many Fundamentalist churches) is beyond the worst conceivable punishment...

So, for those who were indoctrinated, Pascal's Wager is a pretty good bet according to the simple math. Believe! Do anything you must do to avoid an infinitely bad eternity in hell! No matter how slight the probability, it makes sense to at least try to believe and "live according to God's plan." It's a mathematically sound wager. (Most Christians I talk to end up revealing Pascal's Wager as the basis for their belief if you dig a little bit. Most start off with flowery sounding stuff about "God's love", etc... but if you push beyond that, they paraphrase the Wager, even if they've never heard of Blaise Pascal.)

For those who don't "take religion seriously", it's pretty easy to make this bet. They just go with the flow and reap the social and psychological benefits of church and faith. If the church gets too demanding, they leave and find a church/denomination that is more accommodating to their lifestyle.

For those who can actually wrap their heads around the implications (hell, etc.) of a Universe ruled by the God of the Bible—for those who take that religion seriously—it's quite a difficult dissonance to resolve when rational thought collides with some of the fantastical claims of faith.

You seem to have compiled a pretty good-sized list of rational reasons to doubt...but you'll never prove God doesn't exist. And there will always be sophisticated sounding theological gymnastics available to provide reasons for why you just need more faith even though things don't seem to make much sense (i.e. God doesn't cure Ebola because..., God never raises someone from the dead in a developed country with pristine medical records and lots of evidence because..., God doesn't heal amputees because...).

I went through something like what you are experiencing. It's very difficult—anxiety and fear galore. After this will come the existential void/sigh of relief phase. Then some anger. Then it gets better. Check out Marlene Winell and Valerie Tarico. Good luck!

There was that time I read all of Jehovah's Witnesses literature for fun, and one theme that was constantly repeated was that the sin of Adam and Eve was to seek self-mastery over their lives. Thus, the great question to be settled between God and Satan was: have humans the right to guide themselves, or do they need divine guidance? Of course, the JW position is that human choices are hopeless without God (that's the reason why JW don't participate in politics; they think humans making their own rules is a terrible sin).

So I suspect the idea of "putting my plans in God's hands" may refer to a fear of usurping God's authority by trying to be your own master.

The Christian philosopher Timothy McGrew ends his Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy article on the subject by saying...

...one's considered rational judgment regarding the existence and nature of God must take into account far more than the evidence for miracle claims. That is not to say that they could not be an important or even, under certain circumstances, a decisive piece of evidence; it is simply that neither a positive nor a negative claim regarding the existence of God can be established on the basis of evidence for a miracle claim alone, without any consideration of other aspects of the question.

Aquinas, for example, maintained that miracles took place but also that the existence of God could be proved through metaphysics. If you find evidence for the former compelling, give the latter a chance. I am an agnostic but I find it hard to believe that God would demonstrate His existence solely through selective and ambiguous appearances. Good luck!

I don't see how a god necessarily solves the problems theists want it to solve. A logically possible god could have created human life without any meaning, purpose, moral absolutes, an afterlife or a guarantee of ultimate justice. Christians and other traditional theists just project this wish list onto a god for basically selfish reasons, when a god has no obligation to arrange the universe for its creatures' convenience.

Hm, substitute 'miracle' with 'supernatural phenomenon', then.

("supernatural" still in this sense: A "supernatural" explanation appeals to ontologically basic mental things, mental entities that cannot be reduced to nonmental entities.)

So the question of whether lightning is a supernatural phenomenon or not is now about an empirical fact, not about my own ignorance. If the lightning is due to electrically charged regions in clouds, it's natural. If it's due to Thor's rage and only a god can produce it, it's supernatural.

And of course even if we think that lightning is a supernatural phenomenon it could still be Zeus and not Thor ;)

Most atheists simply don't believe that miracles exist.

When it comes to near death experiences I did have an experience that could validly labeled that way after 5 days of artificial coma. To me it's not very surprising that I did saw strange things will my brain was in a strange state. While that experience did influence me I don't take it as evidence that the supernatural exists.

But that isn't everything. Even if the supernatural exists, why should I believe that the God of the bible exists. The bible at various points simply doesn't make sense. I would rather go for something like Buddhism. Buddhism is much more coherent then Christianity.

First of all, congratulations! These kinds of questions are extremely challenging to even ask from within certain philosophical frameworks, and the fact that you're here at all means that you've accomplished something exceptional. Further, by using the question of miracles specifically, you've focused on empirical, testable claims with verifiable consequences. The epistemology that you're associating with atheism or agnosticism is fundamentally the ability to ask exactly these questions, the habit of doing so reflexively, and the willingness to follow those questions to real answers.

The basic Bayesian response to the question of miracles isn't just "are they lying, or is there a God?" Ask the question a different way: in a hypothetical universe in which Christianity is false, how many claims of miraculous events do we expect? In a hypothetical universe in which Christianity is true, how many true (and false!) claims of miraculous intervention do we expect? Do we expect a difference in the kind of miracles that are claimed to occur? For example, we experience people claiming that God cured infertility or cancer, but never people claiming that God cured their amputation. It's an interesting discrepancy, and which universe is that most consistent with? Etc. Don't think about it in terms of picking apart each individual claim. Just ask yourself about an interventionist God in terms of your honest expectations for such a God, and consider the world-as-it-is in comparison. Use the miraculous as a prediction that can succeed or fail, rather than simply as an explanation that is immune to correction.

I'm trying to post an article on discussion about a personally important topic, but it's not going through. Any thoughts? It won't even save the material in drafts. I haven't posted much before, but this is a question that I think Less Wrong could be a great help on. It says I have enough karma, so that shouldn't be the problem.