I'll admit that the Abrahamic religions have set themselves up for this with their fascistic split between nature and transcendent stuff, but a person could be convinced by an experience and not make some such distintinction. Your saying they could not know is a guess, not having had the experience yourself.
The person could say what they want. In this thread I am only concerned with the nature of the interaction - i.e. what it must be to be identifiable.
From other experiences, sure. Unique, but not necessarily, unnatural. The experience could include a pattern recognition that those not having the experience are not aware of, not having had the experience.
Just being unique doesn't cut it. Every experience is unique.
It has to display characteristics that set it aside from any and every other possible experience of the universe - otherwise it can not be identified from the rest.
The question of whether one can then persuade others they have had such an experience is where your "other minds" issue comes in.
But it does not invalidate the basic point that the experience has to be one that is outside the objective workings of the universe.
If the experience is merely unique but within the natural workings then anyone who claims knowledge of God as a result is being irrational.
And again, I want to keep a clear distinction between their making a claim that some non-experiencer should accept, or simply speaking for themselves. Or simply believing and not even mentioning it, since your blanket denial of the possibility that it could be rational reaches even those who never utter a word, even to other believers.
I feel this issue to be irrelevant to the core point. For the purpose of this thread I am not really concerned with whether one person can convince another, or doesn't and keeps quiet. Or even if a person rationally assesses the supposed interaction with God or not. If someone wants to claim knowledge, that is up to them. All I am doing is illustrating the nature of such an interaction if it is to be recognised as God.
As said earlier, there has to be an interaction that is different to the objective workings, and there also has to be a recognition of that interaction for what it is.
The matter of "well, prove it" is an entirely different question - due to your "other minds" issue and others. But it does not invalidate the logic of the overriding need for the interaction between God and person to be differentiable from the normal / objective workings of the universe.
It is then up to that person to decide for themself whether they are being rational or not in arriving at the conclusion of "God"... but again, another matter entirely.
I know I haven't convinced you you cannot know. I think, in general, it is hubris to think we know what experiences we have not have will have as impacts.
I have no objection to the notion that I can not know what another person experiences. But I do not see its relevance to this thread. Another thread, perhaps?
Sure, of course it would be different, but that does not mean it has to break laws. It could be a natural phenomenon, but one that is not - our own consciences, a fantasy, a hallucination, a dream, etc. Just as we can separate out an encounter with someone from a hallucination, a dream, a fantasy, so could a theist. It would be a natural phenomenon from another category than the ones you are used to.
Then how would you be able to distinguish God's use of this natural phenomenon from... let's say... the same phenomenon occurring naturally (i.e. without God)?
It's like saying that tossing a coin Heads ten times in a row is an unusual natural phenomenon... and thus must be a sign from God.
Or winning the lottery is.
If the interaction is a natural phenomenon, no matter how unusual or unlikely, it is still indistinguishable.
Imagine the universe is a game of chess... the universe plays all the moves by itself.
Every piece is played according to the rules.
After the game you're asked to identify which move was made by God?
How can you know? Answer: you can't.
But if one move was made not according to the rules, then it is possibly identifiable. (Whether we do recognise it and then interpret it correctly is another matter).
However, and as is the case of humanity at present... what happens if you do not know all the rules? You might have a reasonable idea what those rules are, but you haven't got them down to the objective level - or at least you don't know if you have or not.
So - how do you identify which move was made by God?
You identify a move which doesn't fit your understanding of the rules that you currently have. Was this God? It might be. But can you
know it is God?
So, 2 questions:
1. If you did understand all the rules, objectively, what would it take to identify a move made by God?
2. If you didn't yet understand all the rules and you identified the same thing as above... could you still say you "know" it was a move by God?
It is not as if we are without faith even as non-theists, that was part of the point.
If you want to discuss whether everyone has faith, and what type of faith that might be, that's for another thread.