Jesus type figure: The resurrection of Pope John Paul II

As soon as as a Lovecraftian horror sets foot on my town square I’ll believe run like crazy before my mind catches up and I’m reduced to a wimpering pile of patheticness on the floor.

So any kind of alien will do it for me: as far as I know, they would have to come from (or through, or with) another dimension. We would be basically in the Flatland situation where the 3D beings see the inside of the 2D beings. So our visitors would be (sort of) able to communicate directly with our “inside”.

It could happen like this: suddenly, we hear/see a very friendly and peaceful “presence” directly in our mind: “Hi”. And to defuse the “I am crazy” response, “it” would put us all instantly in contact with one another. Like now on BBQ or any other community/game/chat but “their” presence would act like a direct bridge between all of us through “their” dimension.

Then the fun would begin and sure, I would believe. :-)

For aliens, my level of proof would be a lot lower. I am sure they exist already (1. statistical probability, 2. I saw something in the sky I’ve never been able to explain), so it wouldn’t be hard to convince myself they were close by.

for aliens, there would actually have to be some kind of legitimate proof. that’s it. people act like there’s this massive sceptic movement which refuses to believe in things NO MATTER HOW MUCH PROOF they’re shown. the simple fact is that there hasn’t been any legitimate proof. blurry photographs that might seem to be awfully mysterious aren’t legitimate in any way. for one, as you’ve mentioned, there’s photoshop so digital images are right out either way. for two, these pictures are all long distance blurry indistinguishable photos. I’m sorry, but a vague blur cannot be identified as anything, no matter how much we may want to believe. now, legitimacy is an arguable thing that’s true. but there are things which cannot be questioned. If an alien made a public landing that could be and was recorded by anyone who wanted and hung around long enough for people to just go right by and see it then fuck yeah I’d believe in it. But for reasons only conspiracy theorists seem to understand we only see them in lowlight conditions through the lenses of poor photographers.

Yay for user-posted questions!

Give me a spacecraft coming in for a landing over my hometown, or someone turning water into wine right in front of me. Then I might believe it.

How do we find out what the laws of nature are? We study the natural world and construct a set of laws that best predicts the phenomena we see. Not just all the “normal” phenomena, but all of them. So if people observe and report “miracles”, scientists will alter their theories to construct a set of laws that account for them too. Those laws may end up being fairly complicated if lots of sea-splitting, fish-multiplication and the like goes on, but have you looked at quantum theory lately? Since science’s job is explaining every phenomenon, there can never be such a thing as a “phenomenon that science can’t explain”.

The other way to look at miracles is: who created nature? God, right? (Play along here, if you’re an atheist). So why would God create a law-based system that He knows He must occasionally explicitly violate to get His desired results? Wouldn’t it be better to just create laws that worked right the first time? I find this argument lots of fun, but it depends on understanding God’s psychology so it’s really not that convincing when you get right down to it.

As far as extra-terrestrials: peer-reviewed journals. I’m not a biologist, much less an exobiologist, but if I see it in Nature, I’ll believe it.

A miracle, on the other hand, as BOP says is something that supersedes the laws of nature, and I’m fairly set in my ways when it comes to my belief that reality is explainable without supernatural forces. Even if Jesus stopped by in person, and summoned Richard Dawkins out of thin air to tell me that he was convinced, I suspect I’d keep looking for an explanation that did not involve supernatural powers.

The old tried and true parting-the-sea thing is always a winner, but since the majority of people wouldn’t be able to see it for themselves, we would have to rely on the combined accuracy/honesty/intelligence (not to be hoaxed) of news sources, which - eh.

And there can never be “proof” of a bona fide miracle, because by definition a miracle is an event which supersedes the laws of nature, and so is not bound by empirical rules of evidence. IMHO.