32 replies to this topic

[Bikerman]

What about the people who die painful deaths everyday? Did they not believe hard enough?

[prashansas]

Well many people are dying painful deaths everyday and they must have believed also to get healed. But sometimes we get so deeply involved in the pain/trouble we have that we don't realize that faith can also work out things for us. We start relying on things so much that we tend to forget that there is God and that we can look at him and ask for help. I am not saying this just to say it but through experience and also not just my experience but I have seen so many people getting out of trouble through faith when things had gone worst for them and also in what we are having faith counts.

Edited by prashansas, 22 May 2012 - 04:22 AM.

[Bikerman]

No, sorry, I don't believe it. I know of devout Christians who have died in terrible agony and who were certainly praying during it. To say that they somehow forgot is insulting. It is also pretty easy to demonstrate that prayer in such circumstances does NOT do any good. The most famous such study involved cardiac patients who were prayed for, and some of whom prayed, after heart-surgery. The results showed no benefit from prayer at all and this type of result is repeated in many similar studies.

What REALLY happens is that some people pray when they get in trouble and, statistically, some people get out of trouble. They then draw a causal link where non exists. This is completely normal - we all tend to forget the misses and remember the hits.

Incidentally, this is why shysters like John Edwards and other con-merchant spiritualists can make a fortune - he will try several times to score a hit and the person will forget each miss and only remember the hit.
Classsic cold reading.

Edited by Bikerman, 22 May 2012 - 07:44 AM.