Assignment
Engage in the following discussion exercises.
1. Discuss the evidentiary problems raised by the following questions:
a. After drinking tea made from tarragon leaves every day for a year, your grandfather reports that his bunions cleared up. Does this prove that tarragon tea has the power to cure bunions?
b. You go to a psychotherapist who diagnoses your emotional condition as resulting from suppressed Oedipal tendencies. When these tendencies rise to the surface they can cause outbursts of emotion, but when they are held in check your behavior may be either normal or overly placid. Is the psychotherapist's hypothesis a good one?
c. Every time the star running back of your school's football team makes a touchdown, he kneels for a quick prayer in the end zone. Is God blessing this player's performance on the field?
d. In 1998, Rose Creek Health Products began marketing a product it called "Vitamin O," for which it charged $10 per ounce. In newspaper and Internet ads the company published several testimonials from users. One of them, from a lung cancer victim, read, "Three days after starting the Vitamin O, I threw my cane away. In November we went to Arizona and I bought myself a bicycle." Another, about a man who had suffered severe headaches for twenty years stated, "The day he began taking Vitamin O his headaches disappeared." Yet another said that a man received "very significant relief from his emphysema." Do these testimonials prove that Vitamin O provides relief from disease and pain? In 2000 the Federal Trade Commission obtained an injunction against Rose Creek after proving that Vitamin O is nothing more than ordinary salt water. Rose Creek still sells Vitamin O without making any beneficial claims for it.
e. Shortly before drifting off to sleep, your roommate reports that she heard someone call out her name in a loud, clear voice. Since no one else was in the room at that time, does this mean that the voice came from a ghost? f. In 2002, the Hubble Space Science Institute released new high-resolution photographs of the Cone Nebula that were taken by the recently refurbished Hubble Space Telescope. On viewing these images, hundreds of Christians thought they could see the face of Jesus in the nebula, which they renamed the Jesus Nebula. Do these images prove that Jesus is alive in the cosmos?
The response should include a reference list. Double-space, using Times New Roman 12 pnt font, one-inch margins, and APA style of writing and citations.