Because in general, when we "experience" a thing, what we're actually experiencing are perceptions that are the result of that thing, not the thing itself. A set of perceptions is an image.
People also feel experiences they attribute to wind. If the attribution is correct (and we currently have no way of answering that), then your correction is mere pedantry.
Well, no, because we don't often get people saying things like "I'm the only one who knows what I experienced, so you can't question me when I say it's the wind". If someone did say that they experienced the wind and when you asked them what it felt like, they told you it was like a painful electric shock and not a combined sensation of cooling and distributed force, then we can say that what they felt wasn't the wind. It was
something, but not wind.
To get from "I felt 'X'" to "I experienced 'Y'", you have to be able to answer questions like "what does 'Y' feel like?" and "how do you know it wasn't something else?"
Those weren't the definitions I was using. You should know me better by now!
Theophany (as used in the context of neurotheology): A spontaneous trance state, usually of an intensity unattainable by voluntary practice.
Well, if that's what you mean, then that helps clarify things... however, I don't see why you have to conclude that a "spontaneous trance state, usually of an intensity unattainable by voluntary practice" couldn't have been caused by you yourself. Maybe you're not "usual"; maybe you're gifted with an extraordinary skill at trances. Why is this less reasonable than "God did it"?
"Usually unattainable" is not the same thing as "never unattainable".
Miracle is a fuzzier word. I'd call it an unexplained, beneficial event with no known cause. However, the phrasing is unimportant in this case, and if there's another word you prefer, say so.
Serendipity, given that definition.
I think that "miracle" implies some sort of intervention by God, angels, ghosts, etc.
1) Just to be clear, it wasn't a physical sensation. Had it been, I'd be much less confident.
What kind of sensation was it, then?
2) Our senses are all we have.
So? You're not responding to my point.
A: "Can you buy a Cadillac with $100?"
B: "Well, all I have on me is $100."
Who said anything about supernatural? Again, you know me better than that.
I'm leaving the category open. My point is that the same logic works just as well for beliefs about angels, demons, djinn, ghosts, etc., as it does for gods.
But to answer the point, I think 2 is the crux of the matter. Either it's real, and we call it "God," OR it's a neurological illusion.
However, you're missing my point. Since we have no way of answering 2, we have no way of verifying the conclusions. I admit this, and always have.
We don't? I think we can at least make reasonable inferences about 2. For instance, I once heard an offhand remark (which I don't know if it's true) that an inordinate number of descriptions of religious experiences have them set either late at night or early in the morning: "I was just falling asleep when..."; "I was woken up in the middle of the night by..."; "I had just woken up when..."... etc. When we're just entering or leaving a dream-state, I think it's reasonable to treat our experiences with suspicion. In these sorts of cases, it's not always reasonable to assume that our perceptions match reality.
However, until we know, the subject of the experience must still figure out some way of understanding the experience. Maybe in 50 years we'll know for sure. Until then, "God" is as reasonable a conclusion as any.
Not necessarily. Our experiences may suggest an explanation, but that explanation still has to work. It's subject to tests of external and internal consistency: does it suggest things that make it contradict itself? If so, we can dismiss it as false, regardless of how compelling the experience was. Same thing if it contradicts aspects of reality that are demonstrably true.
