Is the Supernatural Natural?

[man]

The natural and the supernatural are obviously two very different things.

The supernatural exists outside of what we call natural, it is by definition not natural.

If something is not natural calling it unnatural is the same as saying it is not natural.

If god is supernatural then by definition god is unnatural.

[catnip]

The natural and the supernatural are obviously two very different things.

The supernatural exists outside of what we call natural, it is by definition not natural.

If something is not natural calling it unnatural is the same as saying it is not natural.

If god is supernatural then by definition god is unnatural.

Definition of super- in its combining form can be found here: http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/us/de ... ish/super-

In short, it is NOT that it is not natural! Of course it is. It simply is beyond nature, to an extreme degree. If it is "super" it is not diminishing nature. If you can't grasp it, look at other words employing "super" in its combining form.

Just because we can't explain something scientifically does not mean that it does not fall within the scope of what is "natural" at some level.

Let's say we are speaking of ghosts and what we are focusing on is the idea that they are merely an imprint left behind when a person experienced a traumatic or emotional event in the past--it scientifically possible in theory but not proven. But the experience of it is classified as a supernatural event.

[man]

[Replying to post 2 by catnip]

I find your argument thoroughly unsatisfying.

Ghosts are also unnatural, no amount of explaining will change that.

[liamconnor]

[Replying to post 1 by man]

Sounds like a word game; it all depends on what connotations you are giving to words.

For instance, I think of "unnatural" as something going "against" nature: it is a teological solecism. A broken bone is unnatural, since that is not how bones are suppose to be. To apply this connotation to God would leave us with "God is not how God is supposed to be." Which surely is nonsense.

The "unnatural" are things that occur within nature and are derived from nature; the supernatural exist outside of nature and are not derived from nature.

[Divine Insight]

The problem is that we don't yet fully understand the true nature of our reality. Therefore we aren't in a position to be calling anything "super" natural. We would first need to know what constitutes the natural.

[man]

The problem is that we don't yet fully understand the true nature of our reality. Therefore we aren't in a position to be calling anything "super" natural. We would first need to know what constitutes the natural.

As far as I am concerned the supernatural does not exist no matter how much we know or don’t know.

[man]

[Replying to post 1 by man]

Sounds like a word game; it all depends on what connotations you are giving to words.

For instance, I think of "unnatural" as something going "against" nature: it is a teological solecism. A broken bone is unnatural, since that is not how bones are suppose to be. To apply this connotation to God would leave us with "God is not how God is supposed to be." Which surely is nonsense.

The "unnatural" are things that occur within nature and are derived from nature; the supernatural exist outside of nature and are not derived from nature.

A broken bone is unnatural?

I’m sorry, but your definition of unnatural could apply to anything and is actually an argument against your own position.

[Hawkins]

The natural and the supernatural are obviously two very different things.

The supernatural exists outside of what we call natural, it is by definition not natural.

If something is not natural calling it unnatural is the same as saying it is not natural.

If god is supernatural then by definition god is unnatural.

In modern terms, supernatural simply means "not in our time-space". Our science can only be efficient in the 3D time-space we are living in, because we can't do experiments/observations outside this time-space.

Thus God is supernatural because He is basically not inside our time-space for us (and our science) to speculate in our terms.

[Divine Insight]

The problem is that we don't yet fully understand the true nature of our reality. Therefore we aren't in a position to be calling anything "super" natural. We would first need to know what constitutes the natural.

As far as I am concerned the supernatural does not exist no matter how much we know or don’t know.

Sure you could make this as an argument of semantics by simply claiming that the term "Supernatural" implies the existence of something more than natural.

However, the fact remains that don't yet know what constitutes the natural world. Therefore we are in no position to be even speaking about what might be "supernatural". And in terms of semantics one could argue that word "supernatural" could simply refer to natural things that we simply don't yet understand.

For example, in ancient times people believe that a "supernatural" God held the planets in place. It wasn't until Isaac Newton came along and realized that Gravity is a perfectly natural explanation for what holds the planets in place.

So suddenly what was previously deemed to be "supernatural" instantly became "natural".

The same could apply for a "supernatural" entity. If science ever discovered that there actually exists a conscious entity behind the universe, then it would no longer be thought of as a "supernatural" entity but instead it would instantly be recognized as a 'natural' entity.

So you can't rule out these kinds of things based on semantic definitions.

The term "supernatural" can simply be seen to mean, "Natural events that are simply beyond what we already know about nature". Obviously once we know about them they become "natural".

In fact, many theists have recognize these silly semantic problems and are prepared to acknowledge that their Gods would indeed be "natural". They are just in a realm that is beyond our current understanding of the full scope of nature.

Science does not yet understand the full scope of nature. So science is in no position to say that anything would need to be "supernatural".

There are also other caveats as well.

For example, physics considers the physical laws of our universe. However, if there actually exist higher dimensional worlds that have laws beyond our physical universe, those laws could be seen as "supernatural" in comparison with the laws of our world. And those laws may allow those higher dimensional beings to override the laws of our universe when interacting with it.

If that happened we would still call that a "supernatural event" because it overrode the natural laws of the physics we know and cherish. In this way the "supernatural" can exist all around us in higher dimensional worlds and we would have no way of detecting it until someone from that higher dimensional world reaches into our world and violates our laws of physics.

We would then claim to have experienced a "supernatural event". But technically it would still be a "Natural Event" once the higher-dimensional world is taken into consideration and accounted for as being part of the nature of reality as a whole.

[man]

[Replying to post 9 by Divine Insight]

Supernatural could simply refer to natural things that we don't yet understand?

No, things we don't yet understand are called things that we don't yet understand, not that we don't yet understand them so they must be supernatural.

Saying that something is supernatural is saying that you understand something when you don't.