.png)
In light of the potential for credibility issues and psychological distortions with paranormal events, two questions immediately present themselves: 1) should critical investigators possess a “presumption of truthtelling” with regards to a claimant’s credibility, suitability, and accuracy until proven otherwise; and 2) who has the burden of proof when proposing a causal explanation (natural or supernatural) for a “paranormal” event?
First, in his book, Scaling the Secular City, J. P. Moreland argues that eyewitnesses ought to have the benefit of the doubt with a “presumption of truthtelling.” For him, a presumption of lying is simply self-refuting, further implying that skeptics are unduly selective in which kinds of witnesses they believe.[1] In reality, Moreland is presenting a false dichotomy by suggesting there are only two options: either a presumption of truthtelling or a presumption of lying, both of which are equally unreasonable.[2]
This mischaracterization is, in fact, a false dilemma. Rather than presume anything, it is possible (and more judicious) for people to withhold judgment until a thorough investigation is completed and all available data has been collected. Regardless, as any skilled investigator will explain and as Moreland partially admits, a presumption of truthtelling is only rational if the following elements are present:
claimants are mentally capable of expressing the truth;
they explicitly claim to be telling the truth, as opposed to engaging in (for example) irony or sarcasm;
they are willing to provide factual information that can be independently corroborated;
they lack a strong motivation for deception;
and they do not have a propensity for transmitting falsehoods about the subject matter under consideration.[3]
Coming Soon from GCRR Press!
In this sense, critical investigators are not obligated to presume a claimant is either (in)credible, (un)suitable, or (in)accurate, especially with regard to fantastical stories such as paranormal events. This critical approach is especially relevant when considering that even honest witnesses, who are legally liable for some aspect of the event, may resort to distorting their accounts in order to hide embarrassing or incriminating details.[4] More innocently, people will also attempt harmonizing, ignoring, or discarding information from their testimony in order to alleviate the cognitive dissonance that occurs when other witnesses or details conflict with their version of the event.[5]
Second, the question about burden of proof is easy to address. The burden of proof rests on the person proposing an explanation for the cause of a “miraculous” event.[6] Because this blog series argues that apologists rarely engage in a thorough fact-finding investigation, it is practical to point out that their periodic endorsement of supernatural causation has not met the burden of proof and is, thus, premature and unfounded. There exists ample evidence, as presented in this blog series, that even honest, competent, confident, and sincere people can be mistaken about the facts and, therefore, require a thorough investigation before passing judgment about their claims to have witnessed something paranormal.
Hyperskepticism
Some might argue that many skeptics merely presume an antisupernatural stance, rather than a critical one, which automatically dismisses praranormal claims a priori. These hyperskeptics may offer ad hoc rationalizations for why a bona fide miracle or supernatural incident could not have occurred, even resorting to implausible explanations, moving the goal posts, or promoting an as-yet unknown naturalistic explanation (a kind of “nature-of-the gaps” approach). No amount of evidence will likely convince hyperskeptics, and it may even be possible that academics are too inflexible in what they consider “evidence.”[7]
Of course, the criticisms go both ways. While this blog series is not advocating for hyperskepticism, there appear to be instances where apologists and paranormal sleuths are simply not skeptical enough about the stories they catalogue. In any case, to withhold judgment because a thorough fact-finding investigation has not been established is not an example of hyperskepticism nor is it a confusion of probability with logical possibility. It is, rather, an example of critical thinking.
Oftentimes, “extranormal” explanations rely on the lack of falsifying evidence, which is simply an argument from ignorance. It is not the case that paranormal proponents merely engage in abductive inference-building, either, where their training and experience result in educated guesswork. Instead, their “God-of-the-gaps” tendencies, where they believe a supernatural agent plausibly instigated a paranormal event, engages in causal oversimplification. They are right that a naturalistic explanation, such as the placebo effect or psychoneuroimmunology, does not preclude supernatural involvement. However, is a paranormal entity really a necessary or even sufficient explanation for the event in question? Or does an “extranormal” hypothesis create more questions than it answers, too severely restricting the number of other possibilities, such as those derived from the variables introduced in this blog series?
Critical thinkers know that a paranormal claimant’s confidence and sincerity does not make the claim credible, suitable, or accurate. These characteristics are malleable and can be artificially amplified.
Ultimately, critical investigators should not only review the relevant data surrounding paranormal claims, but they should try to falsify them, as well, by exploring alternative explanations and subjecting all sources to critical inspection. At the very least, investigators ought to provide publicly identifiable and scrutable evidence before suggesting an “extranormal” explanation.[8] Otherwise, the desire to corroborate paranormal claims lends itself to a “confirmation bias” by interpreting unexplainable events as validation of their already held religious beliefs.[9]
Citations
[1] J. P. Moreland, Scaling the Secular City: A Defense of Christianity (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 1987), 137‒38. [2] Louis Gottschalk, Understanding History: A Primer of Historical Method, 2nd ed. (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1969), 150. [3] These criteria, however, do not endorse an overly skeptical (and irrational) position of “poisoning the well.” Just because someone has a criminal history, improper motives, or has falsified information in the past does not mean they are falsifying information in the present (though these factors should not be ignored, either). [4] Cf. Ruback and Greenberg, “Crime Victims as Witnesses,” 421. [5] Redman, “How Accurate Are Eyewitnesses?,” 187. [6] T. Edward Damer, Attacking Faulty Reasoning: A Practical Guide to Fallacy-Free Arguments, 7th ed. (Boston, ma: Wadsworth, Cengage Learning, 2013), 7, 16‒18. [7] See the entire discussion in Keener, Miracles, 645‒711, 739‒59. [8] Webb, “The Rules of the Game,” 70‒74. [9] Cf. Peter C. Wason, “On the Failure to Eliminate Hypothesis in a Conceptual Task,” Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology 12, no. 3 (July 1960): 129‒40; Margit E. Oswald and Stefan Grosjean, “Confirmation Bias,” in Cognitive Illusions: A Handbook on Fallacies and Biases in Thinking, Judgement and Memory, Pbk. ed., ed. Rüdiger F. Pohl (2004; repr., New York: Psychology Press, 2012), 79‒96; and Yoshifumi Harada and Murray Hunter, “‘Walking Under a Ladder’: Superstition and Ritual as a Cognitive Bias in Management Decision Making,” Economics, Management, and Financial Markets 7, no. 4 (December 2012): 34‒41.
