Supernatural

==Epistemology and metaphysics==
{{see also|Anthropology of religion}}
The [[metaphysics|metaphysical]] considerations of the existence of the supernatural can be difficult to approach as an exercise in philosophy or theology because any dependencies on its antithesis, the [[Naturalism (philosophy)|natural]], will ultimately have to be inverted or rejected. One complicating factor is that there is disagreement about the definition of "natural" and the limits of [[metaphysical naturalism|naturalism]]. Concepts in the supernatural domain are closely related to concepts in [[religion|religious]] [[spirituality]] and [[occultism]] or [[Spiritualism (beliefs)|spiritualism]].

{{quote|For sometimes we use the word ''[[nature]]'' for that ''Author of nature'' whom the [[scholasticism|schoolmen]], harshly enough, call ''[[natura naturans]]'', as when it is said that ''nature'' hath made man partly corporeal and [[Mind-body dualism|partly immaterial]]. Sometimes we mean by the ''nature'' of a thing the ''[[essence]]'', or that which the schoolmen scruple not to call the ''[[quiddity]]'' of a thing, namely, the ''[[property (philosophy)|attribute]]'' or ''attributes'' on whose score it is what it is, whether the thing be [[matter|corporeal]] or not, as when we attempt to define the ''nature'' of an ''[[angle]]'', or of a ''[[triangle]]'', or of a ''[[fluid]]'' body, as such. Sometimes we take ''nature'' for an internal principle of [[motion (physics)|motion]], as when we say that a stone let fall in the [[air (classical element)|air]] is by ''nature'' carried towards the centre of the [[earth (classical element)|earth]], and, on the contrary, that [[fire (classical element)|fire]] or flame does ''naturally'' move upwards toward [[firmament]]. Sometimes we understand by ''nature'' the established course of things, as when we say that ''nature'' makes the [[night]] succeed the [[day]], ''nature'' hath made [[respiration (physiology)|respiration]] necessary to the [[life]] of men. Sometimes we take ''nature'' for an [[physiology|aggregate of powers]] belonging to a body, especially a living one, as when [[physician]]s say that ''nature'' is strong or weak or spent, or that in such or such [[disease]]s ''nature'' left to herself [[immune system|will do the cure]]. Sometimes we take nature for the [[universe]], or system of the corporeal works of [[God]], as when it is said of a [[phoenix (mythology)|phoenix]], or a [[chimera (mythology)|chimera]], that there is no such thing in ''nature'', i.e. in the world. And sometimes too, and that most commonly, we would express by ''nature'' a [[mother nature|semi-deity]] or other strange kind of being, such as this discourse examines the notion of.<br><br>And besides these more absolute acceptions, if I may so call them, of the word ''nature'', it has divers others (more relative), as ''nature'' is wont to be set or in [[opposite (semantics)|opposition]] or contradistinction to other things, as when we say of a stone when it falls downwards that it does it by a ''[[classical elements|natural motion]]'', but that if it be thrown upwards its motion that way is ''violent''. So chemists distinguish [[vitriol]] into ''natural'' and ''fictitious'', or made by art, i.e. by the intervention of human power or skill; so it is said that [[water (classical element)|water]], kept suspended in a sucking pump, is not in its ''natural'' place, as that is which is stagnant in the well. We say also that wicked men are still in the [[state of nature|state of ''nature'']], but the regenerate in a state of ''[[divine grace|grace]]''; that cures wrought by [[medicine]]s are natural operations; but the [[miraculous]] ones wrought by [[Christ]] and his [[Apostles in the New Testament|apostle]]s were ''supernatural''.<ref>
{{cite book |first1=Robert |last1=Boyle |first2=M.A. |last2=Stewart |year=1991 |title=Selected Philosophical Papers of Robert Boyle |series=HPC Classics Series |publisher=Hackett |isbn=978-0-87220-122-4 |lccn=91025480 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_tNzGMLGSGwC&pg=PA177 |pages=176–177}}</ref>
|[[Robert Boyle]]|''A Free Enquiry into the Vulgarly Received Notion of Nature''
}}

[[Subjunctive possibility|Nomological possibility]] is possibility under the actual [[scientific laws|laws of nature]]. Most philosophers since [[David Hume]] have held that the laws of nature are metaphysically contingent—that there could have been different natural laws than the ones that actually obtain. If so, then it would not be logically or metaphysically impossible, for example, for you to travel to [[Alpha Centauri]] in one day; it would just have to be the case that you could travel faster than the speed of light. But of course there is an important sense in which this is not [[nomological]]ly possible; given that the laws of nature are what they are. In the philosophy of [[natural science]], impossibility assertions come to be widely accepted as overwhelmingly probable rather than considered proved to the point of being unchallengeable. The basis for this strong acceptance is a combination of extensive evidence of something not [[phenomenon|occurring]], combined with an underlying [[scientific theory]], very successful in making predictions, whose assumptions lead logically to the conclusion that something is impossible. While an impossibility assertion in natural science can never be absolutely proved, it could be refuted by the [[observation]] of a single [[counterexample]]. Such a counterexample would require that the assumptions underlying the theory that implied the impossibility be re-examined.  Some philosophers, such as [[Sydney Shoemaker]], have argued that the laws of nature are in fact necessary, not contingent; if so, then nomological possibility is equivalent to metaphysical possibility.<ref>{{Cite journal|url = https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00048400903159016|doi = 10.1080/00048400903159016|title = Some Laws of Nature are Metaphysically Contingent|year = 2010|last1 = Roberts|first1 = John T.|journal = Australasian Journal of Philosophy|volume = 88|issue = 3|pages = 445–457|s2cid = 170608423|access-date = 2021-09-07|archive-date = 2021-09-07|archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20210907071107/https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00048400903159016|url-status = live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book|chapter-url=https://philpapers.org/rec/SIDOTM|title=Conceivability and Possibility|chapter=On the Metaphysical Contingency of Laws of Nature|year=2002|pages=309–336|publisher=Oxford University Press|access-date=2021-09-07|archive-date=2021-09-07|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210907071107/https://philpapers.org/rec/SIDOTM|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.researchgate.net/publication/339957498 |title=The Contingency of Physical Laws |date= |accessdate=2022-02-11}}</ref>

The term ''supernatural'' is often used interchangeably with [[paranormal]] or [[preternatural]]—the latter typically limited to an adjective for describing abilities which appear to exceed what is possible within the boundaries of the laws of physics.<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=znMqAQAAIAAJ&q=%22supernatural+beliefs%22+%22paranormal%22 |title=The paranormal |access-date=July 26, 2010|isbn=9780824210922 |year=2009 |last1=Partridge |first1=Kenneth |publisher=H.W. Wilson Company }}</ref> [[Epistemology|Epistemologically]], the relationship between the supernatural and the natural is indistinct in terms of natural phenomena that, ''ex hypothesi,'' violate the laws of nature, in so far as such laws are [[Philosophical realism|realistically accountable]].
{{quote|Parapsychologists use the term psi to refer to an assumed unitary force underlying the phenomena they study. Psi is defined in the ''Journal of Parapsychology'' as "personal factors or processes in nature which transcend accepted laws" (1948: 311) and "which are [[Non-physical entity|non-physical]] in nature" (1962:310), and it is used to cover both extrasensory perception (ESP), an "awareness of or response to an external event or influence not apprehended by sensory means" (1962:309) or inferred from sensory knowledge, and psychokinesis (PK), "the direct influence exerted on a physical system by a subject without any known intermediate energy or instrumentation" (1945:305).<ref name="Winkelman1982">{{cite journal |title=Magic: A Theoretical Reassessment [and Comments and Replies] |author=Winkelman, M.|journal=Current Anthropology |volume=23 |issue=1 |date=February 1982 |pages=37–66 |jstor=274255 |doi=10.1086/202778|s2cid=147447041|display-authors=etal}}</ref>|Michael Winkelman|''Current Anthropology''}}

Views on the "supernatural" vary, for example it may be seen as:
* '''indistinct from nature'''. From this perspective, some events occur according to the [[Natural law|laws of nature]], and others occur according to a separate set of principles external to known nature. For example, in Scholasticism, it was believed that God was capable of performing any miracle so long as it did not lead to a logical [[contradiction]]. Some religions posit immanent deities, however, and do not have a tradition analogous to the supernatural; some believe that everything anyone experiences occurs by the will ([[occasionalism]]), in the mind ([[neoplatonism]]), or as a part ([[Nonduality (spirituality)|nondualism]]) of a more fundamental divine reality ([[platonism]]).
* '''incorrect human attribution'''. In this view all events have natural and only natural causes. They believe that human beings ascribe supernatural attributes to purely natural events, such as [[lightning]], [[rainbow]]s, [[flood]]s, and the [[origin of life]].<ref name="Zhong1976">{{cite book |author=Zhong Yang Yan Jiu Yuan |author2=Min Tsu Hsüeh Yen Chiu So |year=1976 |title=Bulletin of the Institute of Ethnology, Academia Sinica, Issues 42–44 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=yyQZAAAAIAAJ}}</ref><ref name="Ellis2004">{{cite book |first1=B.J. |last1=Ellis |first2=D.F. |last2=Bjorklund |year=2004 |title=Origins of the Social Mind: Evolutionary Psychology and Child Development |publisher=Guilford Publications |isbn=9781593851033 |lccn=2004022693 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=-UjiZwYGdFoC&pg=PA413 |page=413}}</ref>