Prayer

[Minimalist]

You are very selective with your cut and pastes huggy,

The article goes on to explain that even belief that they have had surgery helps, even when they know it's a placebo !!

''the theater of healing is designed to draw us in by creating powerful expectations in our brains. These expectations drive the so-called placebo effect, which can affect what happens in our bodies as well. Scientists have known about the placebo effect for decades and have used it as a control in drug trials. Now they are seeing placebos as a window into the neurochemical mechanisms that connect the mind with the body, belief with experience.''

It does not connect that belief to your god in any way, just say that believing that the treatment or prayer that you have, helps. Most these trails took place recently, we have yet to see the long term effects.  It could also apply to any religion, belief (including ones that exclude the supernatural)  or cult.

*Emphasis mine

Of course science doesn't connect it to God, you can't draw a connection to something if you don't acknowledge it's existence.

Ask yourself this, why is science only just discovering what has been in the Bible for thousands of years?

Huggy, be careful.

[Antares]

Prayer is wishful thinking. You are trying to telepathically communicate with The Supreme Being who should already know what you want. This same Supreme Being, if you go with the Judeo-Christian version, ordered up genocides, rape, child sacrifice and advocated slavery in his magic book. Do you think this Being would alter his Divine Plan for you? What if it was in his plan to give little Timmy leukemia or crush Sally in a head-on collision? Who are we, mere humans, to ask for such a deviation from the Grand Plan?

[emjay]

There's also the Study of the Therapeutic Effects of Intercessory Prayer (STEP), funded by the good 'ol Templeton Foundation.
Groups of patients for heart surgery were being prayed for in a very large study, the results were that no positive effect from the prayers could be observed. And before anyone comes dragging with the placebo bullshit, the group of people who knew they were receiving prayers actually did worse in the study!

Prayer does no good unless it's backed by belief.

A placebo does no good unless it's backed by belief.

What's the common denominator? So that study is nonsense unless it can determine the amount of faith a subject possesses, which is not something that is quantifiable by science.

I don't get you Huggy. If you readily acknowledge the power of belief outside the context of your God, such as the placebo effect... where belief in any arbitrary deity or superstition has the same effects for believers, such as healing... how on earth do you conclude that any one of those beliefs - in this case the Christian God - is the cause? How do you not conclude that the common denominator is the power of the mind, rather than any particular belief?

[Huggy Bear]

Prayer does no good unless it's backed by belief.

A placebo does no good unless it's backed by belief.

What's the common denominator? So that study is nonsense unless it can determine the amount of faith a subject possesses, which is not something that is quantifiable by science.

I don't get you Huggy. If you readily acknowledge the power of belief outside the context of your God, such as the placebo effect... where belief in any arbitrary deity or superstition has the same effects for believers, such as healing... how on earth do you conclude that any one of those beliefs - in this case the Christian God - is the cause? How do you not conclude that the common denominator is the power of the mind, rather than any particular belief?

Ok show me in any other religious text where it states that faith can heal.

Power of the mind? Is this power quantifiable?

[Amarok]

And so comes the escape hatch. Enough faith can always be used as an excuse when nothing happens .

---

No science can test god . it's just that theists don't want it too . Because they don't the myth shattered . So excuses will always be made when theism fails . 

Science is an ever building and revising house . 



Religion is a crumbling building with swarms of apologists and theologians desperate to nail boards on  and paint over cracks

[emjay]

I don't get you Huggy. If you readily acknowledge the power of belief outside the context of your God, such as the placebo effect... where belief in any arbitrary deity or superstition has the same effects for believers, such as healing... how on earth do you conclude that any one of those beliefs - in this case the Christian God - is the cause? How do you not conclude that the common denominator is the power of the mind, rather than any particular belief?

Ok show me in any other religious text where it states that faith can heal.

Power of the mind? Is this power quantifiable?

I don't know what other religions have to say about it, but what does it matter if the Bible makes that observation of the human psyche? Surely it's saying faith in its claims specifically, not just faith in anything, can heal?

Quantifiable? I don't know. Psychology and neuroscience are ongoing... maybe these things will be fully understood, maybe they will not, but the point is, the common denominator is the mind.

[GrandizerII]

So we go sit at the gate for the next 4 hours or so till they start boarding the next flight. Long story short, they board the plane and it's full, they are just waiting for one person when a medical emergency (nothing serious) empties 5 seats (the exact number we needed, since Dinah being an employee could ride jumpseat) across row 3, so not only did we get on the flight we were all sitting together.

So God inconvenienced 5 other people for you lot? How special.

So no one can convince me that God doesn't exist, I've seen too much evidence of the contrary.

What evidence for God? You made the interpretation that it was your God behind this coincidence. But it could have also been a mere coincidence. And we know that can happen naturally.

And just as there are hits, there are also misses. But we tend to only focus on the hits.

[KevinM1]

If faith alone could heal, then Christian Scientists wouldn't have a higher mortality rate than others at the same age.

[Minimalist]

So no one can convince me that God doesn't exist, I've seen too much evidence of the contrary.

You're easily conned.

Hey....I've got this bridge in Brooklyn that I can let you have cheap.

[FatAndFaithless]

If he's clearly saying that nothing can possibly convince him that he's wrong, then why do all you doofuses still bother giving him the time of day? Just roll your eyes and move on. We've seen how horribly he disfigures logic and how inconsistently he applies his own rules of argumentation, and just how fractured and cherry-picked his "understanding" of science is. Just move on to people that can actually hold a reasonable conversation.