Penn wrote: » I believe the power of prayer can definitely help health-wise, but how do you separate prayer as a placebo effect from actual supernatural intervention from God? Even scientifically speaking, the placebo effect would depend on how much the patient believed it, something which can't (as far as I know) be measured or monitored scientifically to a great enough extent to separate it from some type of supernatural intervention. Which basically means it's a moot point akin to sportspeople praying. Praying and belief in God might give them greater confidence, thereby helping them achieve their goal, whereas they would believe God actually helped them, it was their belief in God which acted as a confidence booster and helped them focus which actually helped them achieve their goal by themselves. In order for the prayer to work, you need to believe God is listening (even if you're not asking him to actually intervene, but even just knowing he's listening and watching). So the power of prayer can't really be measured, can it? (I'm just spitballing here, no facts or studies behind what I'm saying)
JimiTime wrote: » TBH, such a test is akin to Satan saying, 'Throw yourself of the cliff, for God will send his Angels....' 'Do Not put God to the test' When God wants to reveal himself in a more explicit way to you, he will. 'A wicked and adulterous generation demand signs, but none will be given, but the sign of Jonah'
Tim Robbins wrote: » There have been clinical trials on the power of prayer for people having heart surgery and religious praying came our worse. If it came out better we'd never hear the end of it.
Sin City wrote: » So you agree the prayer so in itself is pretty usless as God wont talk back or reply in anyway. You could argue your more or less talking to the wall
PDN wrote: » In fact, reading Tim's link, what was studied bears little or no relationship at all to what I would consider to be real prayer.
Fanny Cradock wrote: » There have been severial trials that point to a positive correlation between prayer and patient health. (Example). That you weren't aware of them suggests that your statement "If it came out better we'd never hear the end of it" is wrong. What makes your statement amusing is that you are the one telling us that we would never hear the end of it while harping on about the negative correlation found in a particular trial. You then go on to act surprised when somebody hasn't heard of said trial. Pot meet kettle and all that. I would suggest that these trails are next to useless whatever results they show. This is because they can't guarantee discrete test groups. For example, there is no way to know that the group supposedly not being prayed for is in reality not receiving any prayer from a family member, a friend, a neighbour or the little girl who asks God to "make the sick people better". Secondly, the don't always tell us what god they are praying to.
Finally, the assumption here is that God is some kind of Divine slot machine. All your wishes will be answered if only you have enough people putting prayers into the slot. That isn't Biblical.
Tim Robbins wrote: » I can't read that paper. Can you give a summary of it?
Tim Robbins wrote: » I think they are trying to establish if there is any objective measureable benefit to prayer. Let's say there was a super prayer which actually really worked with God, surely it would be good to establish that?
Tim Robbins wrote: » How about a time machine was invented and we could see how accurate the Gospels were?
Fanny Cradock wrote: » Google is your friend. I can't give a summary of a meta analysis. But as I've said, all this research comes crashing down on its face at the first hurdle. What god are you talking about? Because there is no such super prayer in Christianity.
Slav wrote: » Leaving aside that backwards time travelling belongs really to science fiction rather than science, the ability to observe the gospel events would still make very little difference if any at all. For example, a time traveller observes the events exactly as described in the gospels. Would that somehow prove a certain interpretation of those events known as Christianity or theism in general? I don't see how. After all Christians themselves claim that many witnessed the events but not all of them accepted Jesus as Christ.
Similarly, if the observer sees the events not as they described in the gospels it will only invalidate the narrative. At best, if the real events had nothing in common with the gospel story like no resurrection or nobody like Jesus at all, then Muslims or Jews just would say "see? told ya!", so in any case it will become only an inter-religious issue.
Tim Robbins wrote: » Our Father? Suppose we proove Our Father was more effective than say Hail Mary - empiracall, consistently? Of suppose you had different denomiations of Christianity (and various other religions) up against each other praying for different outcomes - woudl that not be an empiracle way of saying who might have the correct God?
JimiTime wrote: » I'm scratching my head about how you extrapolated that from what I said There is a difference between asking God for something, and asking him for something while a team of scientists are trying to put him under the microscope. One is asking him, one is trying to test him.
Fanny Cradock wrote: » And how is any of that not testing for a Divine Slot Machine? Christians believe that God is a person and as such is an intentional being. In other words, God has his own mind and your desires may not align with his.
Sin City wrote: » if.god won't answer you , how do.you.know he is.listening?
Tim Robbins wrote: » Well maybe time to delete the prayer request thread then.
Tim Robbins wrote: » Why do you think they considered it real enough and you don't?
Sarky wrote: » Much more effective, weeping.
JimiTime wrote: » Could you show me where I said God wont answer you?
PDN wrote: » You can get someone to bow their head and read from a list: "Lord, we pray for Tom B. Paddy M. & Doris K. who we don't know but they're part of a scientific study." Or you can really pray, where you weep with those who are weeping and cry out to God on their behalf.
Wiggles88 wrote: » So god is indifferent until you're on your knees weeping? Seems like god's a bit of a sadist.
PDN wrote: » Hey, why not totally misrepresent what I'm saying? What I was pointing out was that there is a difference between reading from a list and actually being emotionally engaged in acting out of love. But, if you prefer to twist my words for a cheap shot then I guess I can't make you engage in real discussion.
