What is the standard skeptics use for "mass hallucination"?

[Marc_Anthony]

OK, here’s what the skeptics say:

1. The phenomenon
   Let’s say that people at Fatima really did see some uncommon appearance of the sun. Why nobody else in the world saw it at the same time? I mean - there is only one sun that everybody sees - if god made the sun dance it should be noticeable to everyone. The fact that only people at Fatima saw it indicates that there was nothing extraordinary about the sun that day but rather about the sky over Fatima. Did they perhaps see something akin to a Sundog?

Maybe it was a Sundog. But the fact that only the people at Fatima (and those more or less close by) saw it doesn’t really support the atheist position since it was only promised to the people at Fatima.

1. The apparitions
   There is of course the matter of the apparition of Mary to three children, Lucia Santos and her two, younger cousins. Lucia has been talking about seeing angels and Mary for some time before the sun dance phenomenon. At first alone, but later her two younger cousins said they saw them with her. Curiously, when the younger children were asked what the apparition of Mary said they claimed they didn’t remember and that Lucia is the one who knows everything.

Lucia was persuasive enough to attract some attention from the locals and next time they went to see the apparition (at an oak tree in the fields) they were accompanied by a group of villagers. Lucia claimed Mary revealed herself, but none of the villagers could see her - it was just the children. Some claimed they saw some ‘movement in the branches’. Nonetheless the witnessing of the St Mary became something of a regular thing and people continued to accompany the children to the oak and pray. Christians are accustomed to witnessing the ‘presence’ of - say - Jesus in the church without actually seeing him. Why calling it an ‘apparition’ if nobody could really confirm it though is a bit baffling.

They call it an apparition because the three children claimed it to be an apparition.

Everything went fine and well on the fateful day, October 13 1917, when, as usual, the Lady revealed herself only to the children and, as usual, Lucia exclaimed to learn ‘secrets’ from her that she cannot reveal right now when suddenly she exclaimed: “The Sun!”. And people witnessed the aforementioned phenomenon.

What’s to say about that? Well - there’s nothing really unusual about this and I’m inclined to believe that what I described here really happened.

I just wouldn’t call it a miracle.

It was a miracle promised to occur at a certain time and it occurred as promised.

1. The prophecies

People claim though that the miracle was prophesised by Lucia and that the newspapers made fun of her because of that. While you can find local news covering the hiatus around children and their revelations, none of them ever mentions a prophecy of the sun dance. The earliest place the prophecy is mentioned is in Lucia’s memoirs from the 1920’s. Her two cousins died before that. Lucia foretold their deaths as well - or so she claims in her memoirs after the fact.

There was another prophecy - that the sundance would mark the end of the war but that if people did not change their sinful ways, a much more terrible war would come. Curiously, this prophecy is not found in Lucias memoirs written in 1920’s but rather in her memoirs written in 1940’s.

So why do people believe in these miracles and prophecies? Same reason why people believe any other crazy stuff - because they want to. Because it’s reassuring and because it confirms what they believe to begin with.

This information does not fit with other information I have heard about at all. I say this with absolute honesty-I don’t know what your sources are and that is honestly not what I heard.

 

[MindOverMatter2]

lol…this is so ridiculous. First of all many people there didn’t see the sun move or dance. Secondly different people saw different things. Thirdly people were STARING AT THE SUN! If you don’t think you are going to see some funny things if you stare at the sun, you should go outside and try it.

Whether a miracle occurred or not, it is evident to me that your arguments are poor and lacking in any real openness to the possibility that there might be more to reality than you are prepared to deal with. You are closed minded to any divine challenge to your autonomy.

I have stared at the sun. I have seen **none **of the things that were reported by the many people who were present at fatima. Its not something that happens everyday, and so to put it all down to staring at the sun is just a ridiculous attempt to excuse ones self from taking it seriously. The fact is Something happened, and that something happened in correlation with a pre-knowledge of a coming miracle. What happened wasn’t natural. Arguments such as mass hallucination or unexplained natural phenomena is just a ridiculous convenience that you invoke as an excuse, an excuse which you wouldn’t otherwise agree with if we were talking about something else.

You don’t want to believe it. LoL

 

[dostoyevskyfan]

Still no comment on this:
youtube.com/watch?v=NKHaNMTRF1o&feature=related

How can “mass hallucination” be used in the case at Zeitoun where we have photographic evidence and half a million witnesses?

 

[AntiTheist]

Once again, we know that the people at Fatima were mistaken: whatever they saw was not the sun actually moving. If the people at Fatima were not mistaken, we would be able to observe – today, right now – the devastating effects of a moving sun on the planetary orbits of the solar system (i.e. there wouldn’t be a solar system any more).

I have yet to see you adequately address this point, dostoyevskyfant. Your pal StevieD writes the following:

We KNOW that [the sun] didn’t actually move (nobody is saying otherwise)

So…are you saying otherwise, dostoyevskyfan?

 

[humble_catholic]

Once again, we know that the people at Fatima were mistaken: whatever they saw was not the sun actually moving. If the people at Fatima were not mistaken, we would be able to observe – today, right now – the devastating effects of a moving sun on the planetary orbits of the solar system (i.e. there wouldn’t be a solar system any more).

I have yet to see you adequately address this point, dostoyevskyfant. Your pal StevieD writes the following:

So…are you saying otherwise, dostoyevskyfan?

This is the part that made the miracle even more extraordinary and the part that makes it amazing.I believe (I could be wrong) that one of the terms that the vatican uses when defining a miracle is when the natural lkaws are temporarily suspended. I think that could apply in this case.
If God created it all dont you think that he can also do what he did without harming the rest of us or the solar system? If he is all powerful we cant really place limits on what he could do . As I said before Science cannot prove everything and people that think it can have a very narrow way of looking at the world.

Also you havent addressed the drying and cleaning of the clothing adequetly, plus the incredible coincidence that the kids knew that a miracle would happen.

 

[humble_catholic]

Whether a miracle occurred or not, it is evident to me that your arguments are poor and lacking in any real openness to the possibility that there might be more to reality than you are prepared to deal with. You are closed minded to any divine challenge to your autonomy.

I have stared at the sun. I have seen **none **of the things that were reported by the many people who were present at fatima. Its not something that happens everyday, and so to put it all down to staring at the sun is just a ridiculous attempt to excuse ones self from taking it seriously. The fact is Something happened, and that something happened in correlation with a pre-knowledge of a coming miracle. What happened wasn’t natural. Arguments such as mass hallucination or unexplained natural phenomena is just a ridiculous convenience that you invoke as an excuse, an excuse which you wouldn’t otherwise agree with if we were talking about something else.

You don’t want to believe it. LoL

MindoverMatter, I wish I was as eloquent in explaining my position as you are . You wrote exactly what I was thinking. Fatima is exactly the kind of event that either causes Atheists to become silent . Their only other option is to reach for unreasonable explanations to support their biased opinion. So much for the open search for truth.

dostoyevskyfan what was just as amazing about zeitun was that Mary appeared multiple times and many days. When will people start waking up to understand that God is trying to make a statement?

 

[inocente]

How can “mass hallucination” be used in the case at Zeitoun where we have photographic evidence and half a million witnesses?

I watched the video but only spotted one short sequence of the apparition moving, which seems to have been made especially by the producers to illustrate what it may have looked like. I’m not sure about the posted image as some other photos just show random white-outs. Estimates of first-hand witnesses vary greatly, but around 100,000 may be nearer the mark.

The apparition appeared several times from 1968 to 1970. This is the time of the first moon landings, so I was expecting to see extended 35 mm movie footage and lots of high res photos, but no attempt seems to have been made to gather and catalog evidence.

These events would have been far more significant than a few moon rocks, so why didn’t universities and churches flock to send researchers and systematically record the evidence for posterity?

Our tendency to see patterns in random shapes is apparently called pareidolia, and that may be a less judgmental term than mass hallucination in this case. When the apparition first appeared, the police are said to have put it down to reflections from street lights, and a professor at the American University in Cairo said she saw nothing except intermittent flashes of light after several visits.

So don’t flame me, just telling it as I see it.

 

[Marc_Anthony]

You want to know something? That picture doesn’t convince ME.

How come whenever there’s something supposedly legendary/supernatural, like the Loch Ness Monster, the Yeti, or this picture of Jesus/Mary (is it supposed to be Mary or Jesus?) the picture is NEVER clear?

I mean, we have color cameras, and we have special cameras to eliminate glare, and yet the only picture you’re showing us is a glare-filled, black and white picture. For all I know, that could be a picture of a searchlight at the top of a building.

 

[Marc_Anthony]

I watched the video but only spotted one short sequence of the apparition moving, which seems to have been made especially by the producers to illustrate what it may have looked like. I’m not sure about the posted image as some other photos just show random white-outs. Estimates of first-hand witnesses vary greatly, but around 100,000 may be nearer the mark.

The apparition appeared several times from 1968 to 1970. This is the time of the first moon landings, so I was expecting to see extended 35 mm movie footage and lots of high res photos, but no attempt seems to have been made to gather and catalog evidence.

These events would have been far more significant than a few moon rocks, so why didn’t universities and churches flock to send researchers and systematically record the evidence for posterity?

Our tendency to see patterns in random shapes is apparently called pareidolia, and that may be a less judgmental term than mass hallucination in this case. When the apparition first appeared, the police are said to have put it down to reflections from street lights, and a professor at the American University in Cairo said she saw nothing except intermittent flashes of light after several visits.

So don’t flame me, just telling it as I see it.

I actually would have to agree with you. I don’t buy this miracle. It’s like seeing Jesus on burnt toast.

 

[humble_catholic]

lol…this is so ridiculous. First of all many people there didn’t see the sun move or dance. Secondly different people saw different things. Thirdly people were STARING AT THE SUN! If you don’t think you are going to see some funny things if you stare at the sun, you should go outside and try it.

Again this is getting rediculous. The part that scares the skeptics and unbelievers the most about the miracle of fatima is when the clothing of the people and the ground dried up almost instantaneously. We know that it was raining hard that day because everyone was soaking wet , plus almost everyone in the crowds had their umbrellas open. Why do atheists claim to be objective when they pick and choose what parts of a miracle they can explain naturally and seem to ignore the rest. Tell me again how any natural event can dry a crowds clothing instantly without incinerating them???

Not one scientist could explain it and that is why most skeptic sites tend to ignore this part of the miracle.

Maybe for them its ok to throw rationale and logic out the window when they are confronted with the truth and it doesnt fit their beliefs or worldview?

 

[didymus]

Theist: 40,000 people witnessed a miracle. Its documented, so you can look it up. No reasonable person would entertain doubt if the object of their experience was something other than that which implied Gods existence. They would accept it. So why not accept this?

Honest Atheist: I don’t have to look it up. Supernatural events cannot be real.

Theist: Why not?

Honest Atheist: Because i don’t want them to be real!.

You are perhaps being unfair to the atheist. Let’s try:

Atheist: Because the universe is physical there is a material explanation for everything even if we don’t know what it is yet. It is especially difficult with intermittent or one-off phenomena.

Let’s introduce Theist #2:

Theist #2: Let’s be careful. Not every reported miracle is real.

Theist #1: There were 40,000 witnesses!

Theist #2: Maybe, but a lot of folks present didn’t see it. And there can be a herd effect – “I see it!”, Me too!", “Me too!” that alone spreads the idea that there is* something* to see.

Theist #1: What are you, an atheist?

Theist #2: No, we should just be careful hitching our wagon to any alleged miracle that comes down the pike. What if a natural explanation is later found?

Theist #1: I doubt that.

Theist #2: Why?

Theist #1: It’s just not possible. I know it was a miracle.

Theist #2: Now you sound like the Atheist.

Theist #1: How dare you!?

No offense but I’d rather maintain a healthy doubt like my namesake than be too gullible.
“Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof.”

 

[humble_catholic]

You are perhaps being unfair to the atheist. Let’s try:

Atheist: Because the universe is physical there is a material explanation for everything even if we don’t know what it is yet. It is especially difficult with intermittent or one-off phenomena.

Let’s introduce Theist #2:

Theist #2: Let’s be careful. Not every reported miracle is real.

Theist #1: There were 40,000 witnesses!

Theist #2: Maybe, but a lot of folks present didn’t see it. And there can be a herd effect – “I see it!”, Me too!", “Me too!” that alone spreads the idea that there is* something* to see.

Theist #1: What are you, an atheist?

Theist #2: No, we should just be careful hitching our wagon to any alleged miracle that comes down the pike. What if a natural explanation is later found?

Theist #1: I doubt that.

Theist #2: Why?

Theist #1: It’s just not possible. I know it was a miracle.

Theist #2: Now you sound like the Atheist.

Theist #1: How dare you!?

No offense but I’d rather maintain a healthy doubt like my namesake than be too gullible.
“Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof.”

Didymus, this is exactly the stance that the vatican used in investigating this event. Why do you think it took them 13 years to declare this a miracle.
They are probably more thoroughand skeptical then any of us here because they probably recieve thousands of mails from people claiming miracles happened.

 

[Moonstruck888]

Tell me again how any natural event can dry a crowds clothing instantly without incinerating them???

You can’t.

There is no real evidence that this occurred, only highly unreliable anecdotes from lay people.

[Not one scientist could explain it and that is why most skeptic sites tend to ignore this part of the miracle.

I ignored that part because after careful consideration, I think it’s a load of pig swill.

Maybe for them its ok to throw rationale and logic out the window when they are confronted with the truth and it doesnt fit their beliefs or worldview?

Reason would lead one to conclude that it is impossible to dry anything instantaneously.
[/quote]