Matthew Le God

A lot of the time when people pray they are harming themselves as they don't seek real answers or make real actions if they think god will solve things, this can impact on others in wider society and in the cases where there is little or no impact on individuals or wider society... so what? I haven't claimed prayer is 100% negative all the time.

This is a complete red herring as an argument and fundamentally flawed. They may be great thinkers, but to believe in a god given the lack of evidence is not being rational. So in this aspect of their lives they aren't being rational. The rational thing to do is withhold beleif until evidence supports it. That is how science works, so if a scientist is religious then they are not using the rational scientific method when applied to that part of their life.

They may be rational when working as doctors and petrochemical engineers but they are not applying the same level of rationality when it comes to god. There is not sufficient evidence to believe in any god. The level of evidence they are using to believe in the Christian god is so low if used consistently then they would have to believe in every other god claim from the thousands of other gods.

There is plenty of contemporary evidence for Caesar's existence. None for Jesus. The only evidence for Jesus is books written decades after he was supposed to live by unknown authors. That is terrible evidence!

You say 'many'... but really? The holy books of Christianity, Judaism and Islam all say god is the creator of everything!

I don't think there is sufficient evidence to believe in a god... so obviously no I don't think he created those things.

Page 1 of the Bible... God created everything Are you saying Christians and Jews don't believe page 1? Where are these none Bible believing Christians? The Bible is the foundation of the religions, without it we wouldn't know about the myths. No mention of Jesus outside the Bible from any contemporary source.

Geopolitics is heavily influenced by religion!

Not merely 'my own views'! You'll find it hard to find many Chrisitans, Jews or Muslims that don't think god created everything! The holy books of all three state god created everything!

Why do you think I've said all prayer is harmful? Do you think god created everything? Do you think he created the virus? For what 'good' reason would he create a universe where such viruses exist? The Bible outlines god as a mass murderer... so at least creating a deadly virus fits his profile!

Lets combine the two...!

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.