Nothing Fails Like Prayer (not)

[macgyver]

I wish he would call you instead, too. I can't make him.

Isn't that what prayer is for?

Also, could you expand on the meaning of your signature? "Evolution is false", I find it a confusing statement if there's no "because" after it.

 

[ChaoticLimbs]

I always love dealing with people who believe there's a benevolent God watching over them and taking care of them.
The reason this is absurd to me is that I usually see it in the First World, where bad things are statistically less likely to happen to them than in the Third World. I've been to the Third World and let me tell you guys one thing:
Being born in Europe, or the USA basically means that unless you screw up REALLY bad, you're gonna have a statistically high likelihood of being all right.
If you're born in Haiti, or one of the central or west central African republics, you're pretty much screwed.
What I want to know is how come God's been spending so much time making sure Americans are okay, when they're surrounded by opportunity and wealth, while he systematically and callously allows over 20,000 children to die in Africa in one day? I mean really, I'm good, get your butt over there and fix some stuff, great and powerful creator!
I used to be a Christian. For 30 years. Then I realized that all the good fortune and charmed life that I had for so long attributed to a benevolent God was more adequately explained by the favorable situation of my birth, and that had I been born somewhere else, this benevolent God would have been a no-show.
Once I saw how the situation on Earth is so ridiculously unfair, unjust and horrible, I realized that there can be no benevolent God, and no story about how it's all related to FRUIT can POSSIBLY convince a rational person that the overwhelming lack of any action of benevolence from God is explained away by how "bad" humans are or were in the beginning.
I won't worship a deity who's less forgiving and enlightened than I am, and I won't admire a parent who sentences their child to death at the first infraction. Such a thing simply is not admirable. If there's a God, I reject him as capricious, hateful, unforgiving, nasty, callous, and utterly unredeemable as a being.
An all powerful being has an OBLIGATION to oversee the development of his subjects/children, and to supervise and control the circumstances of their development. If this were not the case, our children would be born not into carefully prepared sterile linens, but into the desert to fend for themselves and pass or fail the test of life. For how much more powerful is God in comparison to a parent?
Sorry, but prayer to an all powerful but still arbitrary deity has to be a hopeless exercise. And studies show that it is. They don't prove that he doesn't exist, they prove that he is not active as a force on this planet. This can mean he doesn't exist, doesn't care, or, per Schroedinger, both.

 

[slingblade]

Nominated!

 

[Mick Houlahan]

Regular $3.09 a gallon today in Ohio.

Praise Jesus!

 

[slingblade]

Yeah, it's something I've noticed. if you base your decisions on what to believe entirely on the quality of grammar used by Internet supporters, you end up with the skeptical position being overwhelmingly convincing.

Well, I think of it this way: if you're not concerned about the details, the little things, the picky stuff, why should I trust you with the big things, the things that really matter? Like your arguments?

If you've read enough, learned enough, and explored enough to at least have some grounding for your opinions, wouldn't your writing reflect that? Maybe you haven't read much, explored much, or learned much. Maybe your opinions reflect that, as well as your grammar and spelling?

If you care enough to create a post, don't you care enough when you're done to go back over it, examine it for flaws, errors, maybe even read it aloud, as written, to yourself, before you hit "send?" You know: maybe raise your credibility points a little?

Look, if you don't care, you don't care. But in that case, when you make it so obvious, you can't expect me to care, either.

(Should have used the neutral "one," instead of "you," but am too lazy to recast, so take it as given, please.)

 

[politas]

Well, I think of it this way: if you're not concerned about the details, the little things, the picky stuff, why should I trust you with the big things, the things that really matter? Like your arguments?

But there's a bigger question, and that is why do so many woos have such poor grammar? Setting aside those for whom English is a second language, I suspect it is a matter of habits of thought.

I like to do things properly and well. In my writing, I try to use correct grammar and spelling. In my thinking, I try to do likewise. I like to examine my thoughts in the same way that I proofread my writing. Interestingly, I find that people who get upset by corrections to their grammar tend to be the same people who get upset about challenges to their arguments.

I actually don't mind a proper grammar or spelling flame. Typo flames are a different thing, of course.

(Should have used the neutral "one," instead of "you," but am too lazy to recast, so take it as given, please.)

No, it's fine as it is. I generally find it a better way to cast such statements in a gender-neutral way than messing about with "one."

 

[articulett]

Why is it that all of the evangelists on here seem to lack a basic understanding of grammar?

And the "Gas Price Prayer" is a fail-proof prayer. If at ANY POINT in the future, gas prices fall, they can claim success.

But if prices never go down, does that mean Satan wins? And is invoking Satan still called prayer?

Oh the conundrums!

 

[CFLarsen]

Why is it that all of the evangelists on here seem to lack a basic understanding of grammar?

They only speak in tongues?

 

[slingblade]

But there's a bigger question, and that is why do so many woos have such poor grammar? Setting aside those for whom English is a second language, I suspect it is a matter of habits of thought.

I think that's a large part of my point, as well: careless habits of mind, which come through in the writing, and in the reaction to correction.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Had there been proper data collection about that bad grammar-evangelical preponderance? Or is it a potentially faulty anecdotal data analysis?

If it is a factual conclusion I think it has significance.

 

[KelvinG]

People, people. This whole thread is a waste of time.
A couple of simple sentences will put all you nasty skeptics in your place:

God works in mysterious ways. It is not our place to question his methods.

There you go. Threads over. Believers win.
I think the moderators should lock this thread.

 

[articulett]

They only speak in tongues?

...and thus write in jibberish...

 

[politas]

Had there been proper data collection about that bad grammar-evangelical preponderance? Or is it a potentially faulty anecdotal data analysis?

If it is a factual conclusion I think it has significance.

Oh, at this stage, it's entirely anecdotal. I certainly know of no studies into this area.

However, anecdotal evidence of this sort is a perfectly acceptable basis for a hypothesis. It's a hypothesis I doubt will ever be tested in a meaningful way, but as long as no one starts claiming it to be some kind of law, or making a theory out of it without sufficient study, it can remain a harmless amusement.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Oh, at this stage, it's entirely anecdotal. I certainly know of no studies into this area.

However, anecdotal evidence of this sort is a perfectly acceptable basis for a hypothesis. It's a hypothesis I doubt will ever be tested in a meaningful way, but as long as no one starts claiming it to be some kind of law, or making a theory out of it without sufficient study, it can remain a harmless amusement.

Just trying to keep the skeptics honest.

 

[slingblade]

Had there been proper data collection about that bad grammar-evangelical preponderance? Or is it a potentially faulty anecdotal data analysis?

I don't know; maybe it's simply where research questions begin?

"Hmmm...I've noticed that folks who tout woo the hardest also seem to have problems with proper grammar and spelling. I wonder if there's some connection? Hey, you guys! Yeah, you! Have you noticed this, too? You have? Maybe it bears looking into........"

Like that.