God Guided “Magical” Events
Zeus was the god of Sky in greek mythology, he is responsible for the mother nature of the universe. Zeus symbolizes his power by his almighty thunderbolt, therefore makes him practically associated with thunders. By our general scientific knowledge of astronomy, we understand that the sound of thunder are caused by a rapid increase in pressure and temperature produced from lightning. In fact, there are no direct scientific evidence that proves any god’s involvement in the creation of thunder. Intuitively, one can explains the thunder as a wrath of Zeus, which Zeus himself personally directed the sonic shock wave via the sudden increase of pressure and temperature. Both explanations are logically plausible. One cannot deny the involvement of a god simply because of one’s failure to observe god physically.
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The term “magical” is relative. Two centuries ago, flying is magical. Few decades ago, Internet is magical. The degree of magical is reflected upon the combined knowledge of mankind. Theoretically speaking, if we take the absolute proximal approach into “God’s magical events” – there is nothing mysterious about religious healing or any sorts of miracles. Assume Jesus’ ability to heal a person’s eye instantly involves the regeneration of the degenerated cranial nerves via a highly complex signaling pathway, or where the turning of water into wine involves a precise and specific pathway of alcoholic chemical conversion – whatever Jesus did back in 2000 years ago worked. Jesus evoked all sorts of unknown mechanisms, whether they were biological, chemical or physical approaches to heal, to feed, to change lives. If we were able to observe every single particle involved in Jesus’ miracle, then there is nothing mysterious at all. Again, because the term “magical” is merely relative based on mankind’s general knowledge of the universe, God will ALWAYS be the magical one due to the fact that men’s knowledge will ALWAYS be limited. Unless mankind ever achieves the complete Wikipedia of knowledge, there is always something magical. The fact we know for sure is the ability of Jesus, he has the ability to change the natural events directly and indirectly through his capability. Jesus’ capability is undeniably “magical” to all of us.
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Let’s look at a specific example of a so-called “miracle”. Claviceps purpurea is a parasitic fungi that grows on common grains. Insects deposit their fungal spores on grains like rye during wet seasons, and the fungal spores grow hyphae (cellular mass) into ovaries of rye to get nutrients. When cattles and humans who eat the infected rye gets ergotism, a disease with terrifying symptoms such as gangrene, nervous spasms, psychotic delusions and convulsions. The ancient Romans referred the disease as Ignis sacer, a holy fire that cause burning sensations in extremities; the symptoms are retribution for sins. Ergotism was responsible for 40,00 deaths in Europe back in 944 A.D. Interestingly, shrines built for St. Anthony the monk were often find from where ergotism outbreaks occurs. The Shrine were a popular pilgrimage for those with ergotism. Most “magically”, many who made the journey were healed! It was simply a miracle.
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Well, now we know the gangrene of extremities is due to the plant’s vasoconsrictive effects caused by the ergoline based compounds which shuts off blood supply and leads to rotten extremities. We know now the ability to the MAGICAL recovery was largely accounted by the increase of peripheral circulation from walking to the shrine and a change in diet from place to place (no infected rye). The recovery is relatively not as magical to us at this modern world. In this case, the identity of god does not matter; could the “god” guided through the event and indirectly healed the patients through the long walk to the shrine? Definitely. In this sense, the “god” chose to use the mechanism of a “long walk” to increase peripheral circulation and healed the ill men.
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There are no question that Jesus’ miracles were FAR and FAR more “magical” than healing people with ergotism. If a person with ergotism walks up to Jesus – Jesus can probably elicits all sorts of “magical” events and heal his gangrene instantly, OR Jesus can direct him for a long walk. After all, Jesus is able to his job. Jesus can do whichever ways he want to and heal the sicked.
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Psilocybe mushrooms are often referred as the magic mushroom in our modern time. These psychedelic mushrooms had a long history of use in religious ceremonies particularly in Mexico and central America that dates back more than 3000 years ago. They were also named by the locals as “Teonanacatl”, God’s flesh. These hallucinogenic mushrooms were often eaten because of the belief to be able to communicate with gods by eating these “sacred mushrooms”. Effects of consumption are highly variable which is often influenced by mental state and environmental setting. These effects include, illusions and alterations of perceptions, distortions of shade, movement and form, visual effects of colors, patterns, wave motions, and dreaminess, sense of euphoria etc. The question is – can God induce prophetic visions on his servants by means of hallucinogenic elements? Yes, and God is likely to have a specific control of his brain state to view specific episodes. In the contrary, can God induce prophetic visions WITHOUT hallucinogenic drugs? Definitely. Both ways are very plausible and “magical”, only varies in the choice of mechanisms.
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The concept of relative magical opens up many controversies of science. God may directed “magics” and “miracles” to trigger the creation of universe, whether through big bang, or string theories, and he may directed another “miracle” to create living things through evolution. The nature of this ordered world can be rationally induced by a God guided process. Indeed the involvement of God may not be often necessary to many non-believers, but deeper considerations must be taken into account – the creation of this complex ordered world through a non-guided process is highly improbable.
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There is one thing to keep in mind - Can God create the living world without involving evolution, such as an instant pop of a human? Definitely, he can do that by a sequence of “magical” events.
Memorti
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Zea mays (maize) is the common corn that we can find from almost anywhere. A very unique property is that the plant can emit volatile terpenes, a communicating agent that attracts enemies of its eater. First when the plant is damged by its herbivore, specifically, butterfly larvae, the chemical from the larvae’s saliva miraculously triggers a cascade of molecular events through its signal transduction pathway and evokes the emission of attractants that attracts a particular type of parastic wasps. Then the wasps lay eggs on the larvae, and soon enough – the newly born baby wasps on the caterpillar consumes it alive.
Edward Wong is a Year 3 Neuroscience student at University of Alberta, Canada.
