God as a non-empirical being

[robvalue]

I think you're talking about the placebo effect Hatsch? I don't deny that prayer can do this, as can anything else. But this is not the claims made by religion. Or if it is, I don't dispute that particular one. I doubt many church leaders would admit that prayer is no more than a placebo. It certainly does not do the ridiculous things they often claim it does.

When I said testable claims, I meant non-trivial ones, I should have been clear, you're right. No one would dispute things like prayer having a placebo effect. I'm talking about religious stuff doing things above and beyond what is well understood.

If you think prayer has been shown to do something other than placebo, then I'd be interested to hear about that. As far as I'm aware, no proper study has demonstrated this.