Tag Archives: silly

The Power of Prayer

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Matthew 21:22 says

And all things, whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive.

We know this to be bull: when I still was a believer, I prayed that sweet, dark-haired, blue-eyed Susie would be mine – but she went with Pete, that idiot leather-jacketed jerk. I then prayed for a leather jacket. Nope. And no – that’s neither when nor why I eventually became an atheist.

But that verse is pretty much why Christians pray. Many believers take it literally. They especially believe this to be true in dire situations. Usually, the error of this belief should quickly reveal itself.

Yet, for millennia, it hasn’t.

Why not? Well, until recently, there was a simple Darwinian determinator built in: just like history is written by victors, only those who survive a dangerous situation can tell of the ‘powers of prayer’ – you literally have to live to tell. If you pray and die, it’s end of story. So we have many stories of those who pray and live, and none of those who pray and die (well, except for the Christians that were fed to the lions in Rome, but let’s disregard those).

Not even two two centuries ago, medically speaking, we were still savages. Then, when you prayed for your own (or someone else’s) life it didn’t make any difference if there also was a Doctor, Alchemist or Medicine Man present. Your chances of survival didn’t change with either.

Today, you’ll have a significant better chance to survive if you go to a medical doctor instead of just praying.

For anyone who has any sense this is more than just a correlation. The only thing that has changed is modern medicine – religions have remained the same for more than 1000 years. So it’s medicine that cures you, not prayer.

Next time you thank God for curing your illness, please consider also thanking those who actually saved you: your nurses, your doctors, and the researchers who made your cure possible.

Religion – the final frontier

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As children, we learn an important ability; an ability that that makes life so much more enjoyable. As a child, I called it ‘play pretend’ – ‘Let’s pretend I am sheriff, and you are the deputy’, or ‘let’s pretend I’m Captain Kirk, and you are Spock’.

Today, I know its scientific name: it is called ‘Suspension of Disbelief‘: the willful disregard of reality in favor of some fantasy. Almost everyone has this ability, and it allows us to enjoy reading a book, or watching a movie. This ability greatly varies between individuals, and it is quite arbitrary. For example, I enjoyed reading the ‘Hunger Games’ books, but disliked ‘Divergent’ because – for reasons I do not understand – I was unable to keep my disbelief sufficiently suspended while reading it. Yet both stories are equally unlikely, there are many people who like both, and some even prefer ‘Divergent’.

Still, one thing is certain: suspension of disbelief is an active frame of mind. It requires that, for example when you open a book, you consciously switch into ‘play pretend’ mode: I now ‘play pretend’ that what I read is actually happening, and I am inside the story. When I close the book, I snap back into reality.

And that is what I don’t understand: it takes considerable effort to ‘snap into’ the stories of holy scripture; those stories are even more unlikely than most science fiction. Surely it should be effortless to get back to reality. Yet religious people can’t. Otherwise perfectly reasonable people, believers can’t switch out of their play pretend mode when they leave church. They are stuck in a preposterous, horrible, bizarre universe. They can’t get out even though they must invest massive amounts of willpower to stay inside, to ignore their own disbelief.

Maybe they should ask Scotty to beam them up?

Talking to God

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Some time ago, during the Brouhaha surrounding Dawkins’ comment on the professional integrity of a journalist who believes in the literal truth of an obviously allegorical event, the professor tweeted

A believes in fairies. B believes in winged horses. Criticize A and you’re rational. Criticize B and you’re a bigoted racist Islamophobe.

I’m still convinced that Dawkins was spot on. A few days ago, though, I noticed that reality is even stranger. I was walking down a street, encountering someone who was loudly arguing – with nobody. Belatedly, I noticed an earbud and a cable linking it to a phone. Somewhat relieved I walked past.

But the encounter got me thinking: At first I thought the guy was mad, talking to thin air. The phone altered by perception. That is rational. The reverse, though is completely irrational:

If you tell some one that you are talking to god, nobody bats an eye. Do the same while holding a phone, and they’ll put you in the looney bin.

Jesus the Wuss

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On a recent occasion, I attended dinner with a (distant) relative. She’s a full-on believer, and unfortunately equipped with the desire to spread the happy news of Jesus the Savior. Knowing this, I studiously tried to avoid the subject of belief. But, apparently, there is no rest for the assumed wicked. I wasn’t quite done pouring her some water when she fired her first broadside:

You know, Jesus just wants to save you

At the time I ignored her; I started pouring wine for me.

But in retrospect I have to admit: I don’t get it. Let’s consider “Jesus wants to save you”. That’s indeed awfully nice of him. But seeing that he’s supposedly omnipotent, why doesn’t he just do it? God didn’t sit around and tell the universe at large: “you know, I’d really love to create mankind” – no. According to scripture he just bam! did it. Mucho macho style. So he can do it. If Jesus loves me so much, and wants to save me, why the hesitation? Why all the dicking around for millennia with just talk and no walk? If I see someone drowning I (hopefully) won’t be standing around yelling ‘I’d love to save you’ – I’d take action. It’s the moral thing to do.

So if Jesus really wants to save me he should stop talking and start chalking.

Moral Failings

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Pastor Bob Coy, head of a Florida Megachurch (i.e. a congregation of more than 20’000) and evangelical radio show host resigned over unspecified ‘moral failings’ – his church declined to state what failings that would be. Except the admission of multiple affairs outside wedlock, and – of course – addiction to pornography. As lazy, ridiculously dishonest pseudo-excuses go, the latter has recently turned into the de rigueur ‘defense’ for screwing around. Which only makes sense to those who think morals and sex (or morals and pornography) have something to do with each other.

So his church is not clearing up where Bob the Priest’s morals failed, and helpfully removed from their web site all advice he gave on moral issues like screwing around or porn consumption. Which goes to show that his Church doesn’t have the first inkling about what’s being moral.

Being moral also means owning up to your shortcomings, and to take responsibility. Bob Coy and his church don’t do that. They admit only to what can be proven, and try to hide the rest. That’s not taking responsibility. That’s taking evasive action.

There may have been moral failings in Bob, but the good pastor is in good company within his church.

Sharia’s bad rap

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There is no doubt that the word ‘sharia’ carries huge challenges in relation to public relations,

declares UK’s Minister of Silly Thought (a.k.a. Minister of Faith), Baroness Warsi. Indeed. So do ‘Spanish Inquisition’ and ‘Apartheid’. All for good reason. She then goes on to make a couple of important points:

I am a British minister in the British cabinet […]. I am not elected[…]. I therefore don’t represent a constituency and I certainly don’t represent the British Muslim community.

Correct on all accounts – which rather does raise the question what the hell (pardon the pun) her role is. Except being a Baroness, which in the UK can be a job unto itself – see Queen (not the music group). If there is one thing she does it’s opposing ‘secular fundamentalists’ like Richard Dawkins.

The most aggressive post I get is from people who are secular fundamentalists,

she complains. She defines secular fundamentalists as people who say that there should be no public space for faith. It’s not entirely clear what her complaint is, but looking at other fundamentalists, she may complain about the complete absence of violence, calls for murder, or similar paraphernalia of standard fundamentalism that can be righteously denounced or talked away as being done by people who are ‘not true believers’.

It does not occur to her that the obvious opposite, someone who advocates faith in the public space, or, not to put too fine a point on this, holds public office for faith, must be a religious fundamentalist. Then again, reason never was the faithful’s strong suit, and she’s currently UK’s Queen of Faith.

It’s obvious that not only Sharia’s bad rap is well deserved.

The Jaws of God

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Bethany Hamilton is a true hero. At age 13, while relaxing on a surfboard, a 15 feet tiger shark attacked her, severing her left arm just below the shoulder. She almost bled out before she reached the hospital where the doctors saved her life.

This week, she won the Women’s Pipeline professional surfing championship. She has shown the world that you can overcome incredible odds, trauma and even loss of limb if you are strong enough.

Unfortunately, though – although this does not diminish her achievement – she’s not strong of reason. In her book Soul Surfer she wrote that the incident was a divine inspiration and that she did not die that fateful day because God had something else in mind for her.

Bethany, the doctors saved your life, not God. And your achievements are entirely yours, not Gods. Don’t diminish yourself.

You are the inspiration.

Low hanging fruit

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As I wrote on Wednesday, the release of the new fantasy epos ‘Noah (Inspired by the Biblical story)’ is imminent. Like a dark cloud on the horizon, the question ‘How can any intelligent Christian watch this…’ roils on IMDB’s discussion forum.

Let’s not pick the low hanging fruit today, people.

Just grin and walk away.

Hell’s bells!

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A believer recently told me that I was ‘going to hell’ – not because of something I did (even though there are enough crimes listed in the bible that would make me a prime candidate for that journey: for example, I work Sundays), but because of something I am not: religious.

All the urgency and obvious distress my friend was having notwithstanding, I wasn’t overtly concerned. I really like her, and usually heed her advice. But when you threaten an atheist with hell, it’s even less effective than when a child threatens to persuade the bogeyman to eat you tonight.

Now, unfortunately I’m also not diplomatic.

So I encountered hell there and then.

When Creationists speak…

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You know, talking with Pentecostals is already strange; it feels like talking to someone over a cell phone with bad reception. Talking to New Earth Creationists, however, is the intellectual equivalent of an out-of-body experience: Surreal. A recent video on youtube shows excerpts from HBO’s documentation ‘Questioning Darwin’.

It begins with Pastor Peter LaRuffa

‘If the bible said that two plus two equals five, I wouldn’t question it – I would believe it, accept it as true, and then do my best to work it out and understand it’

Again, that’s a pastor talking. The video is an impressive document that shows how unquestioning faith, willful ignorance, and stubborn self-righteousness can make you dangerously out of touch with reality: these people know the (scientifically) correct answers, they even quote them, but then take a step into la-la-land to assert the most disingenuous, stupid and narrow-minded fantasy as the truth.

Dr. Charles Bonner (obviously not a scientific degree)

“To put man down as just an animal […] is totally preposterous. God made us in His image. […] Are you saying God is nothing more than an animal?”

The rhetoric question Bonner poses illustrates that he not only completely missed the boat, but showed up at the airport instead. Darwin must be wrong because Bonner thinks he himself looks like a god? If you watch the video, you’d see how even god would object to that.

Angel Dague:

“I just can’t fathom it. [Evolution] just sounds crazy to me”.

… because making the first human from clay, and the second from a rib of the first doesn’t? This is the caliber of thinking we are dealing with here. Then again, Angel burned her brain with drugs during her youth, so we’ll cut her some slack.

So let’s examine this Creationist’s analysis:

“If that’s the way the world works […] then you believe in a God that doesn’t intervene in nature. That takes away any possibility of miracles, any possibility of answered prayer, or any possibility of the resurrection. In reality, you take away the possibility of Christianity to be true at all”

Spot on! Unfortunately, this was meant as an argument against Darwin.

I recommend you watch the video. See how people over and over say “if [some basic truth] was true, then that would mean that God doesn’t exist”, only to conclude “I don’t like it, so I don’t believe it”.

An interesting study of how wishful thinking replaces rational thought. I feel sorry for these people.