Relationships are important

By "relationships," I mean family, friends, and romantic relationships. Close human connection in general is what I'm talking about.

I used to know a woman who thought it was a sign of weakness if somebody felt like they needed other people. I always disagreed with that. We are a social species. The fact that we are a social species is a strength, not a weakness. It's the reason we developed language, why our brains got so powerful, how we were able to develop civilizations, etc. Since we are a social species we rely on each other, not only in a cooperative way, but in an emotional way, too.

I haven't always had this opinion, but it has gotten stronger the older I've gotten. Ironically, the older I get, the less I feel the need to have a lot of social interaction. But I still believe social interaction is very important for our mental, emotional, and physical well-being.

This is true not only for extroverts, but for introverts like myself, too. In my case, I have always been happy with a small circle of close friends. I don't enjoy large gatherings of people I barely know. But since I become more content with solitude the older I get, I actually have to make a conscious effort to maintain personal relationships. If you're married and have a family, it probably requires more effort to get a little alone time than to invest in your relationships, but if you're single and live alone, like me, then it requires effort to be social.

Anyway, this video from Veritasium came up on my feed today, and I wanted to share it with you. It's about this 50 year on-going study about what makes people happy. It confirms a lot of what I've come to believe about the importance of social connection, friendship, and even marriage. I think it is a grave mistake to consider one's need to have companionship to be a weakness. It is not a weakness. It's simply the way we were designed. People who have more fulfilling relationships tend to have better health, better mental acuity, they live longer, and they are happier. It's worth it to put in the effort. I'm not just preaching to you, either. I'm preaching to myself. I haven't done that great of a job working at, pursuing, and nurturing relationships, especially since the pandemic.

Are EV's worth it?

Earlier this year I started thinking about getting a car with better acceleration. It can be stressful trying to merge onto an interstate when your car has no get up and go. Having a car without good acceleration is frustrating sometimes.

I discovered that EV's (particularly Teslas) have really good acceleration. This sent me down a rabbit hole learning about EV's and the EV market. Now I want to express an opinion based on what I've learned.

One of the major appeals of EV's is that they don't spit out pollutants or carbon dioxide. They're environmentally "clean." While that is true, it is offset by the fact that you have to charge them. That electricity has to come from somewhere. Most of the power in the electrical grid comes from burning fossil fuels. Due to the second law of thermodynamics, the more energy conversions you have between the source and the use, the less efficiency you're going to have. If you have to convert fuel to heat, then to mechanical energy in a turbine, then electrical energy in a generator, then send it out in the electrical distribution system, raising and lowering voltages through transformers, then store it as chemical energy in your battery, then convert it into mechanical energy in the car's motor, you're losing a lot more efficiency than if you're just burning fuel in your engine, turning it to mechanical energy, and making your car go. So probably you're burning more fossil fuels using an electric car than you are a gas powered car.

Also, it requires a lot of heavy machinery to mine the lithium, cobalt, and other minerals required to make those batteries, and that also burns fossil fuels. And I'm not sure how environmentally friendly those batteries are and whether disposing of them will be an issue in the future.

Another issue with EV's is that they don't have the range of gas powered cars. I think this is a problem that can be fixed as battery technology improves. Right now, though, it causes what people are calling "range anxiety."

Infrastructure is also a big problem, but this is only a temporary inconvenience that can be fixed with time. There weren't gas stations everywhere when gas powered cars were invented either. At the time, though, range anxiety is a consequence of both the low range of EV's and the paucity of charging stations, especially in rural areas.

It takes longer to charge a car than it does to fill your car with gas. That's going to be a real pain for people who are driving long distances. I think improvements can be made, but it's always going to be an issue. Maybe it'll just be something we adjust to.

Most people who own EV's will probably charge their car over night at home. That won't work for people who live in apartments, though. Europe wants to ban gas powered cars altogether. If they do, apartments are going to have to supply their parking lots with charging stations. A lot of people in the U.S. want to ban gas powered cars, too. That will either create a huge headache for people who live in apartments, or it will cause a headache for people who build apartments. Rents will have to go up if they're going to be forced to provide charging stations.

Most people buy used cars. I've never bought a new car. EV's have a major disadvantage when it comes to used cars, though. As the battery ages, the range of the car is diminished. When the battery wears out, the car becomes totaled because it costs more to replace the battery than the car is worth. Nobody is going to want to buy used EV's because the battery will already have diminished capacity. You can't keep a used EV running indefinitely just by taking really good care of it like you can with a gas powered car. Used gas powered cars don't lose range as they get older either. They just have more maintenance issues.

I question whether EV's will be good to have in snowstorms. If you're stuck somewhere because of a blizzard, you're probably better off being stuck in a gas powered car. At least then you can keep it running and stay warm. I'm not sure how long an EV would last in those conditions. I also don't know how much running the air conditioner or heater affects range. I've heard the batteries don't work as well when it's really cold or really hot. Heat is a bigger issue than cold for me personally, since I'm from Texas, but I'm just thinking about the rest of the world, especially our neighbors to the north.

Running out of gas in the middle of nowhere is an issue, but it's a bigger issue with an EV. With an EV, you're more likely to run out of charge because charging stations are fewer and farther between, and you don't get as much range anyway. With a gas car, somebody can bring you a gallon or two of gas so you can get to the next gas station. With an electric car, somebody will have to come along with a way to charge your battery. I don't know if anything like that even exists yet. You'd probably just have to get your car towed.

The batteries used in EV's require lithium, which has to be mined. They also use cobalt and other materials that have to be mined. These materials aren't everywhere, which means there has to be a lot of cooperation between different countries to make the EV world work. If we all go EV-only, this could create problems. Political disputes could make it easier for some countries to impose sanctions on other countries. From what I understand the U.S. has a lot of its own lithium, but I think most of the cobalt comes from the Republic of Congo. I don't know how abundant the materials necessary to make batteries are. If batteries are to improve, I imagine we might use materials we're not necessarily using now, which makes the future somewhat unpredictable. A lot of us Americans don't mind importing goods from other countries, but we're uneasy about being dependent on other countries, like we are to a large extent on oil and gas. We don't have to be dependent on other countries for oil and gas. We just tend to prefer dependence to drilling and refining in our own country. But if we go all electric, we may have to be dependent on other countries in case we don't have all the raw materials to make the batteries we're going to need.

As far as I know, Tesla is the only company that has been able to make EV's profitable. With them lowering their prices all the time, it makes it very hard for anybody else to compete. Companies like Rivian may make good EV's, but if they can't turn a profit, they're going to go under. Telsa may become a monopoly. That's not so bad if you're an investor. Actually, I think there's an EV company in China that may be profitable. I'm not sure.

There are some advantages to EV's, though. Charging your car is probably less expensive than buying gas. If you just use your car to drive around town, and you can charge it at home while you sleep, you can avoiding going to gas stations and charging stations altogether. Also, there's the good acceleration. They also don't have as many moving parts, so the maintenance isn't going to be as frequent or costly, at least until the battery wears out. On the other hand, I've heard it can sometimes be a nightmare trying to get your EV serviced by Tesla, and normal auto mechanics can't help you.

I think EV's probably are going to be our future in spite of all these drawbacks. I suspect we'll just adjust. I mean they're still better than a horse and buggy. I'm going to keep driving gas powered cars, though, because at the moment, I don't think EV's are worth it. That is unless you live in a city, don't travel long distances, own a house, and maybe a second car that runs on gas. Then it might be worth it.

Food snobbery

Food snobbery is the enemy of innovation. With the exception of fresh fruit plucked right off the tree, every dish was invented at some point. Tacos, pizza, and sushi were all created by assembling different ingredients in a way that nature would never have produced if left to itself.

With that in mind I do not understand people who turn up their nose, roll their eyes, and say things like, "That's not authentic Mexican food," or, "You put what on your pizza?" or, "The Japanese don't put the wasabi in the soy sauce." I don't care if some dish isn't traditional or authentic. I care if it's good. I just want to enjoy my food. We can all thank the Italians for inventing the pizza, but New Yorkers made it better. Imagine a world in which food snobs insisted the rest of the world never improve upon the pizza.

There are a lot of dishes that have become their own thing, but they were inspired by something that came before. The Hawaiian's came up with spam musubi, which was inspired by sushi. Sushi snobs must've been having conniptions when that happened. Spam musubi is pretty good, though, especially when you use seasoned Korean nori.

I like avocado in my sushi, I like pineapple on my pizza, and I like tomatoes in my tacos. One of my favourite things in the world to eat is fajitas. Thank goodness the man who invented fajitas didn't have a food snob looking over his shoulder scolding him because it wasn't authentic Mexican food.

An argument against the Many Worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics

I was just watching a new video by Sabine Hossenfelder about the many worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics, and I had an idea for an argument against Many Worlds. This argument is based on my flimsy understanding of physics, so take it with a grain of salt.

The many worlds interpretation is based on the idea that the wave function of a particle is real, and it never collapses. The wave function describes the movement of subatomic particles (like electrons) over time, and it gives you a probability distribution of where you should expect to find the particle if you were to try to measure it. You can observe the wave-like nature of particles using the double slit experiment. If you shoot a laser of photons or a beam of electrons through a double slit, it produces an interference pattern on the other side, which is what you would expect if there were a wave.

But the individual photons or electrons hit the wall in one particular spot. In the Copenhagen interpretation, this is understood to mean that the wave of probability collapsed to one particular result. Whereas the probability of where an electron might hit the wall is described by the wave function, it actually only hits in that one spot.

In the many worlds interpretation, though, the wave function doesn't collapse. Instead, the electron actually does hit the wall in each spot where it's possible it could have hit. This is possible because for each possibility, there is a branching universe in which it happens. We observe it hitting the wall in one spot because we're only in one of those branches at a time.

Since there's an interference pattern on the wall, that means there will be more branching universes in which the electron hits within the peaks of the probability distribution than in the valleys.

Since there is a branching universe with every possible outcome of every subatomic particle (including photons) in the universe, there are an unfathomable number of universes being generated each moment. For every possible scenario that could happen, given the laws of quantum mechanics, there is a branching universe in which it does happen.

If you take the many worlds interpetation seriously, you can have a lot of fun thinking about the other branching worlds that exist. In some of them, you are wildly successful because you made all the right decisions. In others, you've already been eaten by a bear. In several of them, you are Batman.

It's crazier than that, though. It also means that what we might usually think of as a miracle could happen purely by natural means. If the subatomic particles of a dead person could take a path resulting in them being rearranged in such a way as to cause the person to be alive, then a person could rise from the dead purely by natural means. It wouldn't be a miracle, but it would look like a miracle. It would be a wildly unlikely scenario, but since the location of each particle necessary to make the person alive exists somewhere in the probability distribution, and the wave function never collapses, then there are definitely worlds in which dead people come to life. Maybe this is one of them.

Now, let me get to the argument I came up with. If the wave function never collapses, and there's a different world for every possible outcome of every particle in the universe, then we should expect there to be a lot more universes in which the subatomic particles all randomly move in such a way as to kill us. I mean if my body kind of disintegrates because every particle went the wrong way, I would die. It seems more likely that given all the possibilities, there are more possibilities in which I die than in which I continue to live. Since I'm still alive, does this cast doubt on many worlds?

One response might be to invoke an observer selection effect. I can only observe worlds in which I live, so the fact that I'm not dead doesn't tell me anything. I would have to be in one of the rare worlds in which I live to be thinking about this.

But what about everybody else? Granted, I must be alive in a world in which I'm thinking about this, the same thing doesn't apply to everybody else. Shouldn't I observe a world in which I'm alive, but people are dropping like flies all around me? The fact that they aren't suggests that many worlds is probably not true.

As I was watching Sabine's video, I saw what might be the clue to a flaw in this argument. She made a distinction between a path integral and a measurement. She said the many worlds interpretation is about measurement outcomes, not path integrals. My argument kind of assumes the path integrals are spread out along a probability distribution.

But it seems to me that path integrals and measurement outcomes are related. If an electron hits the wall at a specific location, doesn't that tell you something about its path integral? It had to travel along some path to get there.

I don't know. I suspect there's something wrong with my argument, but I'm not sure what it is. Maybe the problem is in misunderstanding what a measurement even means. I take measurement to refer to causal interaction. When an electron hits the wall, that's essentially a measurement because it collapses to one specific result. So if the subatomic particles in our bodies are interacting with each other, they should be collapsing to specific locations all the time.

But I don't know. Electrons in orbitals seem to fill the orbitals. The whole reason they occupy spread out space, rather than specific points, is because they have wave functions. As I mentioned in a different post, the size of an electron is defined by its Compton wavelength. If they are waves, they can only exist in specific energy levels, just like how a guitar string can vibrate in different specific harmonics, but not just any-ole-where. An electron can only exist in specific orbitals, but not between them any-ole-where. So if electrons are in their wave-like states around all the atoms in my body, rather than some specific location, that seems to suggest that their wave functions are not collapsing, and they are not being "measured." If so, that would undermine my whole argument. Maybe that's why I'm wrong. I don't know, though.

Anywho, check out Sabine's video, but don't read the comment section. There's a lot of nonsense going on there. And yes, I do see the irony in that statement.

Edit (11/5/2023): I have decided this argument is completely flawed. If what I argued here were true, you wouldn't even need there to be a multiverse before you should expect people to be dropping like flies all around you. On the many worlds interpretation, many worlds exist, but you only observe one. The one you observe is every bit as random as the many others you might have observed. So even without all those worlds actually existing, people should be dropping like flies all around you because your path through life takes you through many random outcomes. If the mere randomness of the outcomes is enough to put our lives into jeopardy, then your life would be just as much in jeopardy under the Copenhagen interpretation. If we have nothing to fear from random quantum events on the Copenhagen interpretation, then we should have nothing to fear from the randomness of which world you happen to live in under the many worlds interpretation.

What would Superman do?

I've been thinking for a long time about writing a fan fiction for Superman. In the fanfiction, Superman comes to the realization that he could save more lives if he went into the medical field than he could using his superior strength and speed. By using his x-ray vision, he can quickly and efficiently diagnose people with cancer, blood clots, and all kinds of other things. He would become an expert surgeon, too, knowing exactly where the problem lies and being able to see it clearly. So he goes to medical school.

In the past, I've used fan fictions to fulfill wishes I've had about stories. In the case of Superman, I've come up with all kinds of things he could do that he hasn't done in other Superman stories. Here's a few of them:

1. He could go camping anywhere in Alaska or Yellowstone for as long as he wants and not worry about being eaten by a bear.

2. He could walk all the way across Africa, from the north down to the southern tip, and never worry about being eaten by a lion, gored by a buffalo, or killed by a warlord. Mosquitos couldn't even harm him.

3. He could fly to various moons, planets, and astroids in the solar system to gather samples for scientists. Or he could take video and do other kinds of research that are difficult or impossible for us to do now with our technology and the money it takes to do it.

4. He could perform repairs and upgrades to satelites and space telescopes. He could deliver satelites and telescopes to space for a lot less than what it costs with rockets. And since he's not limited by the rocket equation, engineers would have a lot more flexibility in what they could put into space. They could make an even bigger space telescope. Superman could take it to space and oversee its deployment to make sure everything goes smoothly.

5. He could transport materials and help build a space station on the moon, Mars, or just someplace in earth's orbit. I've always thought it would be cool if we could build spaceships in space. Superman could deliver the materials and supplies.

6. He could provide propulsion for a spaceship to take humans to Mars or wherever. It wouldn't matter how big the spaceship was, either. That means you could cover the spaceship in shielding to protect the astronauts from radiation without having to worry about the added weight. Plus, Superman could get them there faster. He could possibly provide them with artificial gravity by accelerating at a constant rate for half the trip, then decelerating at a constant rate for the rest of the trip. Or he could just spin it.

7. He could find your keys or pretty much anything you've lost using his x-ray vision.

8. He could be a blacksmith or a bladesmith. He could heat the steel up with his laser beam eyes and sculpt the hot steel with his bare hands. He wouldn't need a forge, an anvil, or hammers. He could sculpt hot steel like it was a piece of clay.

There are just all kinds of things Superman could do. He could be a construction worker and elminate the need for cranes or heavy equipment in a lot of cases. He could help build bridges or underground tunnels. There's no reason for Superman to ever be unemployed unless he wants to be.

What would you have Superman do? Or what would you do if you were Superman?

Apologetics: practical vs. theoretical knowledge

A note from the author (11/5/2023): I originally wrote this back in September. I took it down because I was afraid it might be too negative and sound like I was attacking other apologists. Truth be told, I was a little annoyed when I wrote it. But I just re-read it and decided it's worth posting after all. So here you go.

Knowledge of what is is different than knowledge of how to. Unfortunately, there are a lot of people who want to make a living by giving advice to other people on how to without having a lot practical experience.

If you want advice from somebody about how to invest in the stock market, you should talk to somebody who has been successfully investing in the stock market for a long time. You shouldn't go to somebody who has only read a lot of books about investing or taken college classes on investing but hasn't actually put that knowledge into practice.

Would you want to learn how to do brain surgery from somebody who had never performed a brain surgery but who had only read about it or came up with what he thought was a great idea? Would you want fishing advice from somebody who has only watched fishing shows on TV but has never gone fishing?

If you want parenting advice, you should go to somebody who has succesfully raised good, moral, well-adjusted, and successful children. I don't care if somebody has a PhD in psychology. If they haven't successfully raised children of their own, then their knowledge is only theoretical. It doesn't necessarily mean they have nothing to contribute, but they are not the best person to go to for advice, especially if you have access to somebody with real experience who has been successful.

Speaking of which, Brett and Erin Kunkle are the real deal.

The internet is full of people who want to give life advice, relationship advice, and all sorts of advice, but haven't lived long enough or had enough experience to really be qualified. Just today I stumbled across a 25 year old kid who called himself a life coach. That is ridiculous. He may have gained some insight from people who mentored him or from the short life he has lived, and maybe he has something to offer, but nobody should go to somebody that age for life advice. He doesn't have enough life experience to justify putting himself in that kind of position. If you want a life coach, go to somebody in their 60's or older, who has already lived out the majority of their lives. And go to somebody who has done so succesfully--who has had good relationships, done well in life, and is thriving.

Everything I've said so far is leading up to the real point I want to make in this blog post. There are a lot of people who are trying to make a living by being professional apologists. Apologetics is about defending your worldview, your beliefs, or whatever cause you want to promote. There are some apologists who actually do that, but many of them don't. Instead, they make their living by teaching apologetics to others. Their audience is other Christians, and they insulate themselves from real criticism.

The problem is that unless they have real world experience defending their beliefs and interacting with people who disagree with them, and unless they have had success in doing so, they aren't qualified to teach others how to defend their faith. A lot of people think they are qualified to teach because they've read a lot of books, watched a lot of lectures and debates, and they have developed a lot of theoretical knowledge. Theoretical knowledge is important, but it's not adequate to being a good apologist. Being a good apologist is something you learn by being in the trenches, dialoging with people, finding out what's pursuasive and what isn't, getting feedback from critics, etc. There's a trial and error aspect to communicating. As you go back and forth with people, you find out where your weaknesses lie. You may have weaknesses in communicating clearly, or you may have weaknesses in the content of your defense. You may have all the right answers and all the best arguments which you learned from books, but you are unable to have a productive conversation with people because they won't listen to you, or you can't control your emotions, you lack the people skills necessary to keep people interested, or you dont know how to communicate your knowledge in an accessible way.

This is something I've been thinking about for a few years. Since I have social anxiety, I don't engage in apologetics much in real life. Most of my interactions happen on the internet. They have happened on this blog, other people's blogs, and on YouTube, but the vast majority of it has happened on discussion forums. A few years ago, I was pretty active on Reddit. The longer I was there, the more I started noticing that I was mostly all alone. There were a few Christians trying to do apologetics on there, but I didn't see many people who were really good at it--who knew there stuff, were articulate, could respond well to objections, and could engage hostile people with grace and maturity. I began to wonder, "Where is everybody?" That's when I started thinking about this. There are a lot of people who presume to teach others how to defend their faith, but they aren't in the trenches doing it themselves. They are doing apologetics without an opponent.

I believe you can learn something from anybody. Everybody knows something, and most people know something most other people don't. But if you are going to seek out people to learn from, seek out people who know what they're talking about. If you want to learn how to defend your faith, learn from people who actually defend their faith, who listen to what their critics say, and who respond to their critics. And seek out, especially, people who are successful at it.

That last part is the hard to define, though. How do we measure success? At what point can we say that our apologetic method is effective? Success and effectiveness can be measured in different ways. A Christian can be considered successful if they were obedient in sharing the gospel even if nobody converts. Success is measured by their obedience and in overcoming whatever fear and anxiety they had about sharing the gospel. Success can also be measured by whether you got your point across in a way the other person could understand, even if the other person doesn't agree. Success can be measured by whether you maintained civility when dialoging with somebody about a controversial and emotionally charged subject. In the case of formal debates, success can be measured by your win rate. Yes, as crass as that may sound, that's how you measure success in debating. When it comes to apologetics, the purpose is to persuade, and the primary way we ought to measure the effectiveness of our apologetic is by whether it successfully persuades others.

By that criteria we might as well admit that most of us are not effective at all. In that last 25 years, there have been maybe a handful of times when somebody has contacted me and told me I changed their mind about something. But aside from somebody telling you that, you probably have no idea how many people you have influenced. People can be influenced who were just on the sidelines watching.

I have been talking so far about effectiveness in "doing apologetics," and by "doing apologetics," I mean communicating reasons to think your point of view is true to other people and responding to their questions and objections. Doing apologetics well requires having a good vocabulary, having good communication skills, having good people skills, and having some degree of cleverness. However, you can't even get off the ground if you don't have some knowledge. By stressing practical knowledge, I do not at all mean to diminish the necessity of theoretical knowledge.

In the case of theoretical knowledge, though, you should be mindful of who you go to for information. Do you go to your dentist for advice on how to fix your car? Do you go to your mechanic for dietary advice? Do you go to a doctor for legal advice or a lawyer for medical advice? If you want good theoretical knowledge, you should go to people who are experts in the subject you are interested in.

Apologetics is a multisciplinary field. It draws from other fields like history, science, philosophy, and theology. There are some apologists who are experts in one of these fields. William Lane Craig, for example, is an expert in philosophy. But most professional apologists are not experts in any particular field, and they quite frequently butcher some of the subjects they address in their literature and talks. I'm not saying you shouldn't bother reading apologetics literature at all. I think you should if you want to get into apologetics. What I am saying, rather, is that you should not rely solely on apologists for your information about science, philosophy, history, or theology. If you want to master some subject in apologetics that involves cosmology, then you should read literature from actual cosmologists. If you want to master historical arguments about Jesus, you should read literature from professional New Testament historians.

You shouldn't just read literature from people who agree with you either. If you were to get a PhD in physics, you'd be forced to read literature from people who subscribe to string theory and people who reject string theory. If you want to get a PhD in ethics, you'll be forced to read literature from people who subscribe to consequentialism and people who reject consequentialism. Part of becoming educated in a particular subject involves hearing all the voices of all the people who are experts in that field. If you want to become a good competent apologist, you should strive to become as well-equipped as you can on whatever subject in apologetics you want to specialize in. It's good to know a little bit about everything, but realistically, you're never going to be an expert on everything.

My advice is only aimed at those who want to excel at apologetics. If you want to dip your toe in, sure, just read a few apologetics books. But if you want to become a good apologist, you need to be mindful about who you learn from. When it comes to theoretical knowledge, go to people who are experts in their field. Think of apologetics books as introductions to various topics, not as authoritative sources. When it comes to practical knowledge, go to people who are actually engaging in apologetics and doing it well, not people who are simply teaching other people to do apologetics without doing it themselves. And by "doing it," I don't mean just writing blog posts or books or making youtube videos. I mean interacting with people who disagree with them, subjecting their arguments to scrutiny. And if you decide you want to become a professional apologist (i.e. make a living at it), please don't become somebody who does apologetics without an opponent. If you do, you will be doing yourself and your audience a disservice.

"The first to present his case seems right, till another comes forward and questions him." Proverbs 18:17

Did Paul really perform miracles?

Yes, probably. You can go now.

Seriously, though. . .the book of Acts says that Paul performed multiple miracles, but it's easy to see why somebody might be skeptical. However, there are some things Paul wrote in his own letters that aren't as easy to deny.

I'm not just talking about a situation in which Paul says he did a miracle or that he witnessed a miracle. That, too, would be easy to deny. We could just say Paul tells tall tales. Instead, I'm talking about a situation in which Paul claims to have done a miracle that his audience witnessed.

For example, in 2 Corinthians 12, Paul was defending his apostleship. He talked about these grand visions he had and how God gave him a thorn in his flesh to keep him humble. He says that he is not inferior to other apostles, then follows it by saying, "The distinguishing marks of a true apostle were performed among you with all perseverance, by signs, wonders, and miracles" (2 Corinthians 12:12).

That is pretty crazy, if you think about it. Whereas anybody might just make up a story they hope their audience will believe, Paul is reminding his audience of something they are in a position to know about. He's claiming they saw it themselves. They would know whether that was true or not. If it wasn't, we should expect them to think, "What on earth is he talking about?" And we wouldn't expect Paul to say something like that if he knew they knew it wasn't true.

If Paul was lying, then that's some major gaslighting.

If Paul is telling the truth, as he almost certainly was, then what sort of an event might he have been talking about? One possibility is that Paul's signs and wonders are no different than what we see in a lot of charismatic churches today. There's little evidence that anything miraculous is taking place, but people seem to think the Holy Spirit is healing people, casting out demons, knocking them down, making them speak in tongues, etc. There's a lot of silliness and hysteria that goes on in some charismatic churches. There's probably nothing miraculous going on most of the time, but people do believe there is. Maybe something like that is what Paul is referring to.

That seems unlikely, though. In the case of these charismatic churches, the hysteria and belief people have about these faith healers and word-faith preachers is the result of them already being converted to the worldview, and them having their expectations up. It's different in Paul's case because it looks like, from other passages, that it was common for Paul to use signs and wonders in his evangelism. He was in the process of converting people who did not already believe.

There are a handful of places where Paul reminds his audiences that he is not a good speaker. He expects his audience to already know this. He attributes their conversion to the power of Holy Spirit rather than the pursuasive power of his words. For example, in his first letter to the Thessalonians, he said:

"For our gospel did not come to you in word only, but also in power and in the Holy Spirit and with full conviction; just as you know what kind of men we proved to be among you for your sakes" ~1 Thessalonians 1:5

I used to read that and think Paul was just talking about the inner work of the Holy Spirit in changing people's hearts so that they would be receptive to Paul's message. But when looking at it in light of 2 Corinthians 12, I'm not so sure if that's what he meant. Consider what he said to the Corinthians in an earlier letter.

"And when I came to you, brothers and sisters, I did not come as someone superior in speaking ability or wisdom, as I proclaimed to you the testimony of God. For I determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified. I also was with you in weakness and fear, and in great trembling, and my message and my preaching were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, so that your faith would not rest on the wisdom of mankind, but on the power of God." ~1 Corinthians 2:2-5

In this passage, Paul says he came to them "in demonstration of the Spirit and of power," but in 2 Corinthians he says, speaking to the same audience, that he performed signs, wonders, and miracles (2 Corinthians 12:12). It's possible he's talking about two dististinct events, but I doubt it. I suspect when Paul refers to the "demonstration of the Spirit and of power" that accompanied his speech, he was talking about the signs and wonders he performed for the Corinthians.

When Paul wrote his letter to the Romans, he had not yet visited Rome. He was writing to a church he did not plant. But he explains his mission to gentiles in that letter. He says,

For I will not presume to speak of anything except what Christ has accomplished through me, resulting in the obedience of the Gentiles by word and deed, in the power of signs and wonders, in the power of the Spirit; so that from Jerusalem and all around as far as Illyricum I have fully preached the gospel of Christ." ~Romans 15:18-19

It looks like it was normal for Paul to present the gospel to people both in word and in demonstrations of the Spirit that manifest themselves in signs and wonders. That's a pretty bold thing for Paul to say, and it should be a little startling for us to read.

There is always room for doubt, but considering the fact that Paul claims on multiple occasions to different audiences that his preaching of the gospel was regularly accompanied by signs and wonders which were instrumental in the conversion of his audience, and he even says these thing to the very people who were the recipients of the message and the signs, that it almost definitely happened. Add to that Luke's account of Paul's miracles in Acts, and this strikes me as good evidence that Paul performed miracles. At the very least, if you're bent on being skeptical, Paul performed what he and his audience took to be miracles.

Is Last Thursdayism possible?

Last Thursdayism is the idea that all of us and the world around us just came into existence last Thursday. We have what appear to be memories of a past that pre-dates last Thursday because when we came into existence, our brains were formed in such a way as to contain those false memories.

Last Thursdayism isn't actually a belief a certain segment of the population believes in. It's mainly just used as a thought experiment to illustrate certain points. I've invoked it to illustrate how it's possible to know some things without being able to prove them. I can't prove that anything happened before last Thursday, but I'm nevertheless justified in thinking it did. However fallible my memory may be, it still justifies me in believing certain things about the past.

Last Thursdaism can't be disproved by some appeal to evidence because the world would look exactly the same whether it's true or false. Our memories would be exactly the same, too.

This thought experiment rests on the mere possibility of Last Thursdaism. A person might object to Last Thursdaism on the basis of something else they know by intuition--it's impossible for something to come from nothing. If it's impossible for something to come from nothing, then Last Thursdaism isn't possible.

Does this undermine the thought experiment? I don't think it does. First, I think Last Thursdaism can be offered as a logical possibility. Creation out of nothing isn't a logical impossibility. It's more of a metaphysical impossibility. So Last Thursdaism can be logically possible without being metaphysically possible.

Second, it depends on what you're using Last Thursdaism to illustrate. I use it to illustrate the fact that we can know some things without having to prove them. A person might object to my illustration by saying, "We know there's a past because creation out of nothing is impossible, so things couldn't have just popped into being fully formed." But the reality is that we all know there's a past, and our intuition about creation out of nothing has nothing to do with it. We don't reason from that intuition to our belief in the past. That makes the impossibility of creation out of nothing irrelevant to the illustration.

Third, as I've said in some previous posts, I don't think thought experiments necessarily have to describe possible states of affairs in order to do some work for us. Even if we grant that Last Thursdaism isn't possible (whether physically, logically, or metaphysically doesn't matter), we can imagine it being possible, and we can use that imaginary state of affairs to illustrate our point. It's similar to how Aristotle imagined a state of affairs in which the law of non-contradiction didn't hold in order to illustrate why we all know it does. His scenario wasn't possible, but it gets the point across.