Evaluating Hume's claim that miracles are the least likely of events.

For Hume a miracles is 'A transgression of a law of nature brought about by a particular violation of Deity.'
Hume was an empiricist and believed that it was more likely the report of a miracle was mistaken than the laws of nature were violated. Hume is arguing inductively from observation that the laws of nature cannot be violated. He is not directly saying that miracles do not happen but that the probability of a miracle actually happening is so low that is is illogical to believe that they do occur.

Hume emphasises the fixed and universal nature of natural laws. According to Hume, laws of nature appear to be fixed and unvarying (e.g the law of gravity.) Since Miracles appear to violate the laws of nature, it is more likely that the report of miracle happening is incorrect than the laws of nature were violated.

Consider the story of Jesus bringing Lazarus back from the dead. (John 11) According to the Bible, people witnessed the event. However, our experience of nature is that people do not come back to life. So there is a conflict between a law of nature and the miracle. Hume's question is: Which is more likely? - That the laws of nature has been violated or the eyewitness account is mistaken? Hume's conclusion is that miracles do not happen because there is so much clearly testable evidence in favour of the laws of science.

Hume's argument has been very influential amongst philosophers. However, Richard Swinburne has recently defended the idea of God acting and performing miracles.

Swinburne points out a problem with Hume arguing inductively from observation. The only way to challenge his argument would be to find new empirical evidence. From our experience, the fact that something is not probably is not on its own proof that a miracle does not happen. Let's consider the Lottery. The likelihood that you or I would win the National Lottery in our lifetimes is improbable but that does not mean that people never win the lottery. Thousands of people have won the lottery and will continue to win it.

Swinburne's defence of miracles considers first what it is meant by natural laws.
He argues:
1. Laws of nature are generalisations i.e. they communicate a general picture of how things work as simply as possible.
2. Swinburne says that all nature laws are 'corrigible', meaning that a law of nature is the best description of how the world works at this moment in time, but a new discovery may mean that a law of nature has to be modified or changed.

This leads Swinburne to define a miracle as 'an occurence of a non-repeatable counter instance to a law of nature'. By this Swinburne means that a miracle is an event that does not fit in with the laws of nature as we understand them, but equally you could not define a new law from an instance which does not fit into the normal laws.

Swinburne also adds that the more evidence there is for a miracle for a miracle, the stronger the possibility that it happened, providing that the sources of evidence support one another.

So...are miracles the least likely of events?

Of course, by definition a miracle is the least likely of events but this does not mean, as Hume argues, that miracles cannot happen. The occurrence of miracles must be a very rare event, however not impossible.