Matthew Le God

Is your god tolerant? If you think he is... why is he a mass murderer in the Bible? He wipes out huge numbers of people in the flood and many other examples throughout the horrific book.

Hard to see how someone with a rational upbringing from birth would suddenly switch to believing things with no evidence. Which of the thousands of man made gods are you saying they will follow? If they reduce the level of evidence they are willing to accept for one god, the same low level of evidence applies to all the other man made gods.

If god created everything... he created the virus. Praying to such an evil god seems odd, he doesn't deserve praise.

Time

That would be unlikely to happen as they'd have had an upbringing with a rational, evidence based grounding.

Parents have done just that and had such a strong belief prayer works that they only prayed and didn't seek medical help. Their children died as a result! Belied in prayer impacts actions, actions killed those children!

I didn't miss the point, you have. I am part of society, society doesn't benefit from having gullible members whose actions impact others.

It is that kind of thinking that majority views show the path to truth that leads to things like people thinking the universe is geocentric.

No, because the actions of adults have wider ramifications in general than the actions of children. Possibly yes

We have learned... - Turkish can't provide evidence of anti-antisemitism - Turkish thinks people who believe in flying horses are not gullible - Turkish doesn't know the difference between facts and beliefs - Turkish doesn't understand that false hope/comfort isn't healthy to both yourself and society in the long run Oh... and he doesn't answer questions

It does because you'd use the occasions prayer appeared to work to reinforce your belief that prayer works. When prayer has been shown to work the same, or slightly less than chance.

If you believe that god would do that for you because you prayed then it shows a level of gullibility that you would likely take into other aspects of your life and that would impact other people in society.

Say what?

If you believe that god would alter the weather for you because you prayed then it shows a level of gullibility that you would likely take into other aspects of your life and that would impact other people in society.

I didn't say it did. But I don't think it is unreasonable to think a religious adult who believes the Bible is the word of God is going to have the book impact a wider range of their actions than a 4 year old who believes the tooth fairy gives them money for a tooth.

Name something you could pray for that has no impact on anyone else?

That post doesn't say I did say that. But it is true to the extent that the indoctrination churches do impact on the actions of people who go to church. Actions impact wider society.

The tooth fairy impacting on the actions of a child, is very different to the religious beliefs impacting on the actions of an adult. People make all kinds of actions based on religious belief that impact on those in their families and wider society. Parents circumcising their children for religious reasons really is child abuse, all children are born atheist so they shouldn't have body parts removed without consent for religious reasons.

See post #922

1) Do you agree beliefs impact on actions? 2) Do you agree actions impact on other people? If people believe prayer works then that impacts their actions and their actions or lack of action impacts society as a whole. There have been cases where people have been so brainwashed to believe praying for the sick to recover works... that parents prayed for their children to recover rather than take them to hospital and those children died.

They are harmless on their own as long as they aren't followed up with church, home or school indoctrination and brainwashing. Spring equinox (Easter) and Winter solstice (Christmas) presents to children pre-date Christianity.

We are just playing around with words here. What do you believe and why concerning god...?

There is no 'my reality', reality is the same for all of us. In reality there is no credible evidence that prayer works. In fact the counter is true, it has been shown under scientific conditions prayer has a negative impact on medical conditions, perhaps through performance anxiety having a negative impact if people know they are being prayed for. People claim prayer heals cancer, but we know that cancer can go into remission on its own. Why has prayer never grown a limb back for an amputee?

Yes, things like believing Mohammed flew to heaven on a winged horse is gullible. They are more than welcome to show me otherwise. Same with Christians, Hindus etc etc with the claims in their holy books.

It is very relevant to a discussion about beliefs to know the position of someone. My position is... I don't believe any god claim has met it's burden of proof. That is not the same as saying there is no god. I'd rather live believing in things that correspond to reality. Making up comforting things is asking for disaster as it limits your motivation to actually do something yourself to iprove your situation as you think there is a chance god will sort it out for you.