ABSTRACT
John Earman, in his book David Hume's Abject Failure: the Argument Against Miracles and his chapter "Thomas Bayes, Hume, Richard Price, and Miracles" subjects Hume's essay on miracles to an abusive and merciless attack. According to Earman, Hume's argument is "a confection of rhetoric and schein Geld and "a shambles from which little emerges intact". Earman then turns to the specific case of religious miracles, arguing—more against Mill and other Humean sympathisers than against Hume himself—that there is no reason in principle why testimony for a miracle should not support a religious doctrine. The chapter argues that Hume’s essay on miracles does indeed have some significant flaws, but it is far better than alleged by Earman, whose interpretation of it can indeed be decisively refuted. Hume's maxim is the correct but unhelpful principle that no testimony is sufficient to establish the credibility of a miracle unless the testimony makes the miracle more likely than not.
