Discussions of whistleblowing and employee loyalty usually assume either that the concept of loyalty is irrelevant to the issue or, more commonly, that whistleblowing involves a moral choice in which the loyalty that an employee owes an employer comes to be pitted against the employee''s responsibility to serve public interest. I argue that both these views are mistaken and propose a third view which sees whistleblowing as entirely compatible with employee loyalty.

The first is that a miracle, understood as an event produced by a transcendent agent overriding the usual course of nature, involves a violation of the laws of nature. Larmer argues that events are explained by reference to both relevant laws and units of mass/energy in the sequences to be explained. He contends that a miracle need not be conceived as involving a violation of natural law, but rather as the creation or annihilation of mass/energy by a transcendent agent. In (...) reply to the objection that this account would violate the first law of thermo-dynamics, he distinguishes two forms of the principle -- one metaphysical, one scientific -- and aruges that a miracle would not violate the principle considered as a scientific law. The second assumption is that miracle testimony cannot serve as evidence for theism. Larmer demonstrates that the logical ties connecting the concept of miracle to theism need not imply that one must be a theist to evaluate miracle testimony properly. All that is required is that one is prepared to entertain theism as a hypothesis. Attacking these assumptions allows Larmer to show that Humean balance-of-probabilities arguments, based on a presumed conflict between evidence which establishes belief in the laws of nature and evidence in favour of miracles, miss the point if miracles need not be defined as violations of the laws of nature. He argues that, in the absence of a general argument demonstrating that the testimonial evidence in favour of miracles conflicts with the evidence for the laws of nature, it is up to the atheist to demonstrate, on a case-by-case basis, why the testimonial evidence is to be rejected. His conclusion is that, contrary to what is usually thought, the burden of proof lies not upon the shoulders of the theist, but upon the shoulders of the atheist. (shrink)

The Legitimacy of Miracle defends the view that miracles, in the strong sense of being events produced by a supernatural agent overriding the usual course of nature, can take place without violating any laws of nature. This means that the evidence for miracles cannot be judged to be in conflict with the evidence for the laws of nature; the result being that Humean objections to the rationality of belief in miracles fail.

Questions of Miracle will be a valuable reference book and teaching tool for scholars and students of theology, religious studies, and philosophy. Contents The Logic of Probabilities in Hume's Argument against Miracles - Fred Wilson David Hume and the Miraculous - Robert Larmer Miracles and the Laws of Nature - Robert Larmer Against Miracles - John Collier Against "Against Miracles" - Robert Larmer Miracles and Conservation Laws - Neil MacGill Miracles and Conservation Laws: A Reply to Professor MacGill - Robert (...) Larmer Miracles and Criteria - Robert Larmer Miracles and Natural Explanations - David Basinger Miracles and Natural Explanations: A Rejoinder - Robert Larmer Miracles as Evidence for Theism: A Surrejoinder - David Basinger Miracles, Evidence, and Theism: A Further Apologia - Robert Larmer Authenticating Biblical Reports of Miracles - Phillip Wiebe Miracles and Testimony: A Reply to Wiebe - Robert Larmer Miracles as Evidence against the Existence of God - Christine Overall Miracles and the Existence of God: A Reply - Robert Larmer. (shrink)

Methodological naturalism has been widely accepted as a necessary condition of scientific theorizing, the assumption being that it exacts no questionable epistemological or metaphysical costs. In this paper, I argue that this assumption is mistaken. I further argue that the presumed costs of not adopting methodological naturalism are illusory.

Questions of Miracle will be a valuable reference book and teaching tool for scholars and students of theology, religious studies, and philosophy. Contents The Logic of Probabilities in Hume's Argument against Miracles - Fred Wilson David Hume and the Miraculous - Robert Larmer Miracles and the Laws of Nature - Robert Larmer Against Miracles - John Collier Against "Against Miracles" - Robert Larmer Miracles and Conservation Laws - Neil MacGill Miracles and Conservation Laws: A Reply to Professor MacGill - Robert (...) Larmer Miracles and Criteria - Robert Larmer Miracles and Natural Explanations - David Basinger Miracles and Natural Explanations: A Rejoinder - Robert Larmer Miracles as Evidence for Theism: A Surrejoinder - David Basinger Miracles, Evidence, and Theism: A Further Apologia - Robert Larmer Authenticating Biblical Reports of Miracles - Phillip Wiebe Miracles and Testimony: A Reply to Wiebe - Robert Larmer Miracles as Evidence against the Existence of God - Christine Overall Miracles and the Existence of God: A Reply - Robert Larmer. (shrink)

In his paper "Miracles: Metaphysics, Physics, and Physicalism," Kirk McDermid appears to have two primary goals. The first is to demonstrate that my account of how God might produce a miracle without violating any laws of nature is radically flawed. The second is to suggest two alternative accounts, one suitable for a deterministic world, one suitable for an indeterministic world, which allow for the occurrence of a miracle without violation of the laws of nature, yet do not suffer from the (...) defects of what McDermid terms the ’Larmerian’ model. I briefly describe my model, reply to McDermid’s criticism of it, and evaluate his alternative accounts. (shrink)

I DEFEND THE VIEW THAT MIRACLES, CONSIDERED AS OBJECTIVE EVENTS SPECIALLY CAUSED BY GOD, CAN CONCEIVABLY OCCUR IN A WORLD WHICH BEHAVES, ALWAYS AND EVERYWHERE, COMPLETELY IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE LAWS OF NATURE. GOD, BY CREATING OR ANNIHILATING UNITS OR MASS/ENERGY AND THUS ALTERING THE MATERIAL CONDITIONS TO WHICH THE LAWS APPLY, CAN PRODUCE A MIRACLE WITHOUT VIOLATING ANY OF THE LAWS OF NATURE.

Contemporary commentators on Hume’s essay, "Of Miracles" have increasingly tended to argue that Hume never intended to suggest that testimonial evidence must always be insufficient to justify belief in a miracle. This is in marked contrast to earlier commentators who interpreted Hume as intending to demonstrate that testimonial evidence is incapable in principle of ever establishing rational belief in a miracle. In this article I argue that this traditional interpretation is the correct one.

IN HIS ARTICLE "MIRACLES AND NATURAL EXPLANATION" DAVID BASINGER TAKES ISSUE WITH THE CLAIM I ADVANCED IN MY EARLIER ARTICLE "MIRACLES AND CRITERIA" THAT ONLY A DOGMATIC AND UNCRITICAL ASSUMPTION THAT NATURE IS IN FACT AN ISOLATED SYSTEM CAN EXPLAIN THE INSISTENCE OF SOME PHILOSOPHERS THAT, NO MATTER WHAT THE EVENT AND NO MATTER WHAT THE CONTEXT IN WHICH IT OCCURS, IT IS ALWAYS MORE RATIONAL TO LIVE IN THE FAITH THAT SUCH AN EVENT HAS A NATURAL EXPLANATION RATHER THAN (...) BELIEVE IT A MIRACLE. BASINGER URGES THAT MY ARGUMENT CONTAINS TWO BASIC CONFUSIONS. IN REPLY, I ARGUE THAT BOTH HIS OBJECTIONS ARE MISTAKEN. (shrink)

In this paper, I criticize the commonly accepted view that belief in events plausibly viewed as miracles can only be justified if there exists extraordinarily strong evidence in their favour. Such a claim rests on the mistaken assumption that the evidence for such events must inevitably conflict with what is taken as evidence against their occurrence, such as the evidence for the laws of nature or the existence of evil. Given the arguments I develop that such presumed conflict is apparent (...) rather than genuine, it cannot be urged that belief in events best understood as miracles requires extraordinarily strong evidence before it is justified. This being the case, John Henry Newman’s observation that “miracles differ from other events only when considered relatively to a general system … the same persons are competent to attest miraculous facts who are suitable witnesses of corresponding natural ones … a physician’s certificate is not needed to assure us of the illness of a friend; nor is it necessary for attesting the simple fact that he has instantaneously recovered” can be seen to be correct. (shrink)

It has become commonplace to speak of proteins as sophisticated nanomachines, cells as miniature factories, and genomes as containing information in the form of code. Given that in our experience all other instances of machines, factories, and codes involve intelligent agency in their production, such descriptions, taken literally, suggest that the structures and operations of living things are best explained in terms of intelligent design. Not everyone agrees, however, that these descriptions should be taken literally. In this article, I evaluate (...) arguments for taking these descriptions metaphorically rather than literally and find them wanting. It will not do, therefore, to reject hypotheses of intelligent design on the grounds that we can only speak metaphorically of proteins as machines, cells as factories, and genomes as containing code. (shrink)

In “Breaking Laws of Nature” published in this journal in 2017, Jeffrey Koperski defended a position he termed “decretalism” in which he claimed that the laws of nature should be understood as the decrees of God. In “Decretalism and the Laws of Nature” also published in this journal in 2017, I argued that Koperski’s decretalism amounts to occasionalism. In his recent book, Divine Action, Determinism, and the Laws of Nature, Koperski has responded to my criticisms by changing his account of (...) the laws of nature. In this article, I argue that his new account of the laws of nature is more problematic than his first rendition. (shrink)

In his The Everlasting Check: Hume on Miracles, Alexander George claims to provide readers with a single unified interpretation of Hume’s ‘Of Miracles’ that demonstrates Hume’s actual argument is philosophically rich and far more robust than is generally thought. This response argues that George is unsuccessful, ignoring crucial passages and misinterpreting others.

Hume's essay "Of Miracles" has the reputation of providing, in Hume's own words, an "everlasting check" to accepting reports of miracles. Author Robert Larmer demonstrates that this reputation is undeserved. Taking seriously the environment in which "Of Miracles" was composed reveals that its arguments are neither original to Hume nor compelling. Both before and after the publication of "Of Miracles" these arguments received devastating criticisms by Hume's predecessors and contemporaries. Contemporary revisionary attempts to defend the argument by insisting that Hume (...) cannot really have meant what he has traditionally been understood to claim are inevitably guilty of eisegesis and systematically ignoring crucial passages fatal to their idiosyncratic readings. The clarity of Larmer's writing makes Hume's Counterfeit Check accessible both to professional academics and interested lay persons. Anyone interested in assessing the rationality of accepting testimonial evidence for the occurrence of miracles should view Hume's Counterfeit Check as required reading. (shrink)

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