Ship of Fools: Pray for Muamba

Thread: Pray for Muamba Board: Oblivion / Ship of Fools.

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Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

Fabrice Muamba, a professional footballer, tragically suffered a heart attack and collapsed during a game on Saturday, and now, wherever you look, people are imploring everybody to ‘pray for his recovery’. One pundit (I can’t remember who this was) told us to pray for him, ‘whatever your religious beliefs’. I kid you not. (Mind you, that’s not as bad as another ignorant tosspole who fauxed pas, ‘our hearts go out to him’. What is it with these football people? Too many headers, I suppose).

Pray for Muamba. What a crock of shit. He needs medical science and skilled physicians, not prayers. If God can be persuaded to intervene miraculously with his cardiac myopathy and spare his life, surely he’d be more approachable on the subject of saving innocent children who are rounded up and shot by various unpleasant people around the world always.

When will people realise that their impulse to ‘pray for Muamba’ is nothing more than their pathetic impulse to do something with their emotional reaction to his imminent death (fear of death, chief amongst these, for their own sake by proxy)?

Go on- realise and admit it. You’re not praying for Muamba at all, you’re praying for your own wretched inadequacy, you moronic fleshbags.

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
...innocent children who are rounded up and shot by various unpleasant people around the world always...

... notably, the DR of fucking C, ironically.

Posted by Sine Nomine (# 66) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
When will people realise that their impulse to ‘pray for Muamba’ is nothing more than their pathetic impulse to do something with their emotional reaction to his imminent death (fear of death, chief amongst these, for their own sake by proxy)?

Yes. You are correct. Feel better now?

Posted by Boogie (# 13538) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:

When will people realise that their impulse to ‘pray for Muamba’ is nothing more than their pathetic impulse to do something with their emotional reaction to his imminent death

This is true.

But praying is doing something. Of course he needs medical science and skilled physicians. There is no way, in my view, that God will do anything to save him.

BUT when people say 'I am praying for you' to me, I'm pleased. Just as pleased as when they say 'I've been thinking about you'. It means someone cares. If they believe in a God who intervenes, they'll pray. If they don't, they'll think. Either way it's kind of them to do so imo.

I don't pray for God to do stuff - because I know S/he doesn't.

Posted by PeteC (# 10422) on :

OOOHHH! We haven't had one of Yorick's It's really all about me and my beliefs. MEMEMEMEME threads in Ever so long.

Pity, really. Did someone remind you that a medical degree doesn't make you God? And you have to take it out on us?

Posted by Sine Nomine (# 66) on :

Yorick,
You are righter than a right thing on a right day. In fact I venture to say we fall down in awe at the rightness of you. [Overused]

Posted by Sine Nomine (# 66) on :

(And I really appreciate your pointing that out. Thanks! [Smile]

)

Posted by Boogie (# 13538) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Sine Nomine:
Yorick,
You are righter than a right thing on a right day. In fact I venture to say we fall down in awe at the rightness of you.

oooooo - a Yorick fan club - can anyone join?

Posted by Sine Nomine (# 66) on :

Why would anybody NOT join…now that is the question!

Posted by Organ Builder (# 12478) on :

If I didn't know Sine to be an American, I would think he was being ironic!

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

My fan club would not have as a member anybody who wished to join it.

Posted by Sioni Sais (# 5713) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
If God can be persuaded to intervene miraculously with his cardiac myopathy and spare his life, surely he’d be more approachable on the subject of saving innocent children who are rounded up and shot by various unpleasant people around the world always.

OTOH, He might do something about a certain misanthropic gobshite who has been indulged by the H and A's of this place for years.

I sometimes think Yorick is on board to remind us that not all atheists and humanists are as reasonable as Richard Dawkins.

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Sioni Sais:
indulged by the H and A's of this place for years

FOAD, junior-host troll.

Posted by Marvin the Martian (# 4360) on :

Ironically, accusations of junior-hosting have traditionally been considered to constitute junior-hosting.

Funny old world, ain't it?

Posted by Sine Nomine (# 66) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
My fan club would not have as a member anybody who wished to join it.

quote:
I sent the club a wire stating, PLEASE ACCEPT MY RESIGNATION. I DON'T WANT TO BELONG TO ANY CLUB THAT WILL ACCEPT ME AS A MEMBER.
--Groucho Marx

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

Oh, well done, Sine. You spotted the frigging obvious reference.

Posted by Sine Nomine (# 66) on :

I was just so pleased you borrowed humor from an American.

Posted by IngoB (# 8700) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
When will people realise that their impulse to ‘pray for Muamba’ is nothing more than their pathetic impulse to do something with their emotional reaction to his imminent death (fear of death, chief amongst these, for their own sake by proxy)?

There you go, now you have made me pray for you... [Votive]

Posted by Jonah the Whale (# 1244) on :

quote:
Originally posted by IngoB:

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
When will people realise that their impulse to ‘pray for Muamba’ is nothing more than their pathetic impulse to do something with their emotional reaction to his imminent death (fear of death, chief amongst these, for their own sake by proxy)?
There you go, now you have made me pray for you...

Ingo, you are not saying you know something about Yorick's imminent death I hope.

Posted by Sine Nomine (# 66) on :

He's praying...

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

Lots of people pray for me, or so they inform me. Doesn't seem to be doing any good, I'm afraid. I ask them to not to trouble themselves but it only seems to make them more determined, poor things. I can't help feeling they might be better employed by picking up litter or something, but there you go.

So I suppose all you prayer fans will be wearing your special tasteful goal celebration vests.

Posted by Sine Nomine (# 66) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
Lots of people pray for me, or so they inform me. Doesn't seem to be doing any good, I'm afraid.

Oh I don't know. It seems to have cured that multiple personality disorder you were suffering from.

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

Typical Christian. You see causality everywhere.

Posted by Sine Nomine (# 66) on :

Well prayer does seem more effective at driving out evil spirits, etc. rather than say – restoring amputated limbs. I have noticed that when watching Sunday morning televangelists.

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Sine Nomine:
Well prayer does seem more effective at driving out evil spirits, etc. rather than say – restoring amputated limbs.

It's a good job we have doctors, then, I guess.

It all makes one wonder why people bother praying for people to be healed of heart attacks, though. Oh, wait, we already agreed on why they do that.

Posted by Sine Nomine (# 66) on :

Prayer didn't do Lord Lothian much good, come to think of it.

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

Yorick wrote:

When will people realise that their impulse to ‘pray for Muamba’ is nothing more than their pathetic impulse to do something with their emotional reaction to his imminent death (fear of death, chief amongst these, for their own sake by proxy)?

Is it pathetic? I found it moving and poignant actually, I mean the response of the footballing world. I guess footballers don't have your acute insight into things, so they express them in a rather ham-fisted way, yet that in itself, seemed moving to me.

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

It's working!*

* prayer / intensive care medicine. (Delete according to which you find most 'moving and poignant').

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

Yorick

I wonder if, by your 'is nothing more than' rule, your scorn for people who pray, conceals (and reveals), your dismissal of your own, presumably deeply repressed, sentimental, or emotional, or superstitious, side?

I think the psychoanalyst Winnicott said something about spotting the wounds of others, in order to conceal my own.

But now, am I telling you this, in order to conceal my own projection onto you, of my scorn, for my own sense of poignancy? Time for a drink.

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

Yorick.

Sorry, forgot this bit.

Go on, realise and admit it. You're not scornful of those praying for Muamba at all. You're scornful of your repressed, but barely concealed, need to have faith, to show empathy, to show love to others.

You're not scornful of those praying at all; you're scornful of your own deeply feared sense of vulnerability and need, you intelligent but inflated puffball.

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

Oh, there's nothing much deeply repressed about my sentimental, emotional and superstitious side, and I feel no inclination to conceal my own rather obvious defects. Indeed, they do say it takes one to know one. The douchebaggery of all this hysterical 'praying for Muamba' is affected how exactly by this?

Posted by rolyn (# 16840) on :

I find it rather uplifting when the secular masses are asked to pray, even if it is just for David Beckham's big toe ahead of the World Cup.

It gives an authenticity to prayer over and above the usual --- 'Oh, isn't praying that sad-arse thing church-goers do on Sundays'

If this footballing fella does get better I daresay some folks will go on to pray for kids who get shot.

Posted by Spiffy (# 5267) on :

Fabrice Muamba was born in what was then Zaire in 1988. His father fled the country fearing for his life in 1994, and after he was granted asylum in 1999, Fabrice and the rest of the family joined him. Fabrice recently proposed to his girlfriend, and they have a three year old son.

Yes, Yorick, I see your point. It's terrible that so many people are thinking good thoughts for the recovery of this 23 year old man who has a lovely, loving family and surmounted great obstacles in his life, who had a tragic accident befall him. It's absolutely terrible he was playing in a country that has advanced medicine that saved his life, instead of the country of his birth which is still torn by violence and has limited health facilities. It's just so *terrible* that he's still breathing and his kid will probably get to grow up having a father.

Wait, no, not terrible. What's the other word?

[ 19. March 2012, 18:53: Message edited by: Spiffy ]

Posted by passer (# 13329) on :

Yorick - are you moonlighting at the beeb nowadays? [Biased]

Posted by Sine Nomine (# 66) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Spiffy:
Fabrice recently proposed to his girlfriend, and they have a three year old son.

(Maybe all the homos wanting to get married encouraged them to finally step up.)

Posted by shamwari (# 15556) on :

This could have been a serious discussion.

Only Boogie seems to have made any attempt at serious discussion.

The rest has been a pathetic interaction between Yorick and Sine ( with a couple of interventions by others).

There is an issue here. I looked for intelligent debate. All I got what the infantile comments of Yoricks fan club.

And Yorick himself.

[ 19. March 2012, 20:28: Message edited by: shamwari ]

Posted by Lamb Chopped (# 5528) on :

Shamwari, dear, it's Hell. Not Purg. You really expected better?

Me, I find it an odd thing to get one's knickers in a twist about (the praying I mean, not the discussion), but whatever. Maybe Yorick needs a dose of outrage? The withdrawal pains can get pretty bad when all is going nicely for too long.

Posted by Organ Builder (# 12478) on :

quote:
Originally posted by shamwari:
This could have been a serious discussion.

Only Boogie seems to have made any attempt at serious discussion.

The rest has been a pathetic interaction between Yorick and Sine ( with a couple of interventions by others).

There is an issue here. I looked for intelligent debate. All I got what the infantile comments of Yoricks fan club.

And Yorick himself.

The thread is still open. The thread is still young.

This isn't Purgatory, but even so--if you want intelligent, serious debate, make an intelligent, serious contribution. No one is stopping you.

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

But surely Yorick's scorn has a pure and numinous quality, so we are simply pausing here, to pay homage to it, and bathe in its effulgence.

He has discovered a great secret - that those who pray for others, are praying for themselves.

And those who scorn others, scorn themselves.

So let us pause, light a candle perhaps, and wash ourselves clean in the torrents of scorn, rather like Ayesha bathing in the eternal flame!

Posted by Sine Nomine (# 66) on :

quote:
Originally posted by shamwari:
I looked for intelligent debate. All I got what the infantile comments of Yoricks fan club.

BY GOD YOU DESERVE A REFUND!!!

(Oh right. You didn't pay anything, did you. Never mind.)

((Kids these days…nothing but a sense of f* cking entitlement.))

Posted by Anselmina (# 3032) on :

quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
But surely Yorick's scorn has a pure and numinous quality, so we are simply pausing here, to pay homage to it, and bathe in its effulgence.

This is true. If it weren't for Yorick we wouldn't know who to despise and look down upon from the lofty heights of his superior intelligence and greater worthiness.

And, of course, we know his worthiness to judge is superior to that of all believers, because nothing about Yorick's intelligence or humanity has ever been distorted by nasty old rotten God-thinginess!

Posted by passer (# 13329) on :

quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
But surely Yorick's scorn has a pure and numinous quality, so we are simply pausing here, to pay homage to it, and bathe in its effulgence....

It's a calling he has - we are blessed (or equivalent)!

Posted by comet (# 10353) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:

When will people realise that their impulse to ‘pray for Muamba’ is nothing more than their pathetic impulse to do something with their emotional reaction to his imminent death (fear of death, chief amongst these, for their own sake by proxy)?

Go on- realise and admit it. You’re not praying for Muamba at all, you’re praying for your own wretched inadequacy, you moronic fleshbags.

okay. you got it. prayer helps the prayer.

so?

do you think you've made some statement we all weren't already fully aware of?

No one is saying, "stop all the medical intervention, it might get in the way of our chants and candles and sniffy stuff doing it's hard work!" (well, okay, there probably are some people saying that. Fuck them.)

Yorick - is there something wrong with people doing whatever they CAN - no matter how medically useless and so long as it doesn't get in the way - at a time when they feel helpless to assist someone they care about? And if all it does is keep that person from feeling despair and give them a little hope.. what's the problem?

you really really really want every faithful person to really be someone who believes in weirdo magic and stuff. I understand how nice it is to be able to put everyone in a little tidy box; how comforting it is to be able to pass judgement on others without having to actually understand them. but you're a big boy now and it's time to get real. We're not all delusional freaks. in this case, you are.

Posted by RuthW (# 13) on :

quote:
Originally posted by comet:
you really really really want every faithful person to really be someone who believes in weirdo magic and stuff.

Who can blame him? It would be more fun if we did.

Posted by Pooks (# 11425) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Anselmina:
And, of course, we know his worthiness to judge is superior to that of all believers, because nothing about Yorick's intelligence or humanity has ever been distorted by nasty old rotten God-thinginess!

Oh, I'm not so sure about that. I suspect that Yorick just decided to shit-stir because the boards have been rather too quiet lately.

He tossed a bone and said go fetch and here we are. I guess this is what a low boredom tolerance level can do to one.

Posted by Lamb Chopped (# 5528) on :

Woof!

Posted by Lyda*Rose (# 4544) on :

comet:

quote:
I understand how nice it is to be able to put everyone in a little tidy box; how comforting it is to be able to pass judgement on others without having to actually understand them.

Like how tempting it would be to place all atheists and agnostics in a tidy, little box with Yorick. But I'm not that cruel a person. And some of my favorite writers are atheists and agnostics. And I'm afraid their muses would wither and die in prolonged close contact with our boy.

Posted by Firenze (# 619) on :

quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:

So let us pause, light a candle perhaps, and wash ourselves clean in the torrents of scorn, rather like Ayesha bathing in the eternal flame!

Yorick's going to shrivel into millennial decrepitude before finally crumbling to dust? That should be worth watching.

Posted by South Coast Kevin (# 16130) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
One pundit (I can’t remember who this was) told us to pray for him, ‘whatever your religious beliefs’. I kid you not.

I heard someone, Peter Reid I think it was, say something very much like this during ITV's coverage of the Liverpool-Stoke game on Sunday. And I'm with you on this point, Yorick, it stuck in my throat too. Sympathy and stuff like 'Our hearts go out to Muamba and his loved ones' is fine with me but 'pray for him, whatever your religious beliefs' is too much. It feels patronising and dismissive of others' beliefs, to me.

Posted by Think² (# 1984) on :

Why, his family are Christian, presumably prayers to the Jewish or Islamic interpretation of the same God ought not to be futile. if you believe in the utility of prayer in the first place.

Posted by Lamb Chopped (# 5528) on :

quote:
Originally posted by South Coast Kevin:

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
One pundit (I can’t remember who this was) told us to pray for him, ‘whatever your religious beliefs’. I kid you not.
I heard someone, Peter Reid I think it was, say something very much like this during ITV's coverage of the Liverpool-Stoke game on Sunday. And I'm with you on this point, Yorick, it stuck in my throat too. Sympathy and stuff like 'Our hearts go out to Muamba and his loved ones' is fine with me but 'pray for him, whatever your religious beliefs' is too much. It feels patronising and dismissive of others' beliefs, to me.

Trouble is, I think the people who say this sort of thing would never in a million years understand WHY it sounds patronizing and dismissive. They consider all beliefs more or less interchangeable, and they assume that every right-thinking person out there does, too, because It's Obviously Right, Isn't It? (Except a few fanatics in far away lands who haven't been enlightened yet)

And if you call them on that assumption, they get hurt feelings, because they meant no offense and can't understand why any was taken.

I don't think there's much to be done about that. Grit your teeth and smile. They just.don't.get.it., bless their cotton socks.

Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on :

I am so sorry for disagreeing with you, Yorick. I am so very, very ashamed of myself.

No one should have to endure the existence of people with different beliefs. I actually admire you for that. You have to wake up every day to a world where people have different beliefs from you, but somehow you keep doing it. You still go on living. So many are crushed by that sort of adversity, Yorick, but you triumph over it. You're beautiful.

Zach

Posted by South Coast Kevin (# 16130) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Think²:
Why, his family are Christian, presumably prayers to the Jewish or Islamic interpretation of the same God ought not to be futile. if you believe in the utility of prayer in the first place.

Yeah, I don't know. I'd have been totally fine with 'Pray for Fabrice, if praying's your thing' but I don't like it when people presume to tell everyone what to do! Like Lamb Chopped said, it seems to ignore the fact that different people have a wide range of dearly-held beliefs about the supernatural.

Posted by Tortuf (# 3784) on :

Someone suggested there is serious discussion to be had here.

Maybe. I am probably not the one to do it, but I will give it a shot.

The everybody pray for . . . reaction is akin to the everybody gets all sentimental at the death of a celebrity reaction. We tend to concern ourselves with the lives of celebrities on a highly personal level for reasons that continue to befuddle me.

So, praying for someone who needs help (prayer, or medical intervention, or whatever) is an opportunity to involve ourselves more deeply with someone who is normally outside of our everyday experience and grasp.

What does the prayer do for the people praying? It makes them feel better, as has been observed before on this thread. Not a terrible thing.

What does the prayer do for the celebrity? How simple is your faith, or lack thereof?

I do not think that prayer by a stranger for the benefit of a celebrity causes God to say "Aha. I was going to let _______ suffer and die, but now I will save him because of all the prayers." Such a scenario sounds pretty silly. It is also inconsistent to have an omniscient and all caring god who would wait for such a prompting to take action.

Do I believe doctors need the guiding hand of God to help them? If the reference is to guiding their hands in supplying medical help the answer is no. Medical training and technology are the important factors.

Do I believe that celebrity _____ might be helped mentally in ways that give them the strength of will and perseverance to recover? It is possible.

Does that mean the Hand of God was at work? That is a more complicated question. God is not a necessary part of the equation mentioned above. The whole feel better, have the will to recover scenario does not require divine intervention.

Does God want us to want to help others? Certainly a lot of religious text and thought suggests so. Is that the sole cause of any sort of charitable instinct? Probably not. I am in a discussion group with a few atheists who are quite adamant on that issue.

So, what have we learned? Faith is hard to prove empirically. There may be physical explanations for everything.

Maybe that is why it is called faith.

Posted by orfeo (# 13878) on :

Given that most people who hear the story can either pray or do absolutely nothing, what's so awful about them praying?

That doesn't negate the idea that those in a position to do something else - namely, the small number of people employed in the relevant hospital - should do something more than pray.

At worst, prayer is a placebo.

Posted by hatless (# 3365) on :

Tortuf said

quote:
So, what have we learned? Faith is hard to prove empirically. There may be physical explanations for everything.

Maybe that is why it is called faith.

That's very weak. It would be better to say that there are indeed physical explanations for everything (everything physical, obviously, not other stuff like geometry or music).

Faith is impossible to prove empirically. It's called faith not because it's some nebulous thing round the edges of the empirical world, like the Higgs Boson is (this week, at least). It's faith because it's an attitude towards all the indisputable physical stuff (and maths and music and politics and all the non-physical stuff).

Prayer doesn't work. It has no utility. That's not why we do it. We do it to hold on to our useless caring and minding and hoping, because they are the only thing that make the world's shit look properly shitty. And that's important.

Posted by comet (# 10353) on :

quote:
Originally posted by South Coast Kevin:

quote:
Originally posted by Think²:
Why, his family are Christian, presumably prayers to the Jewish or Islamic interpretation of the same God ought not to be futile. if you believe in the utility of prayer in the first place.
Yeah, I don't know. I'd have been totally fine with 'Pray for Fabrice, if praying's your thing' but I don't like it when people presume to tell everyone what to do! Like Lamb Chopped said, it seems to ignore the fact that different people have a wide range of dearly-held beliefs about the supernatural.

well, okay, if you really want to be literal and take it as some sort of command: "pray! NOW! Do it, my minions!"

but that's not exactly what's going on. They're saying, "hey, our boy's in trouble, but unless you're a bomber surgeon with a lot of free time, all you can do is pray so do that rather than fuss and whine and stuff."

You know, when Bobby tells me "Don't worry, about a thing..." my reaction isn't, "Piss off! I'll worry if I want to and you aren't the boss of me; you or your little birds!" no... I take it as a form of advice.

lighten the fuck up you literalistic, compassionless weirdos. But if you insist on taking everything as a direct command, fine.

Fuck the hell off. NOW! do it, my minions!

Posted by comet (# 10353) on :

quote:
Originally posted by RuthW:

quote:
Originally posted by comet:
you really really really want every faithful person to really be someone who believes in weirdo magic and stuff.
Who can blame him? It would be more fun if we did.

'struth.

I'm still waiting for my Hogwarts letter. my kids say I'm too old but I don't believe them.

Posted by Tortuf (# 3784) on :

quote:
Originally posted by hatless:
That's very weak.

Actually, I had to close my post sooner than I wanted. I had intended to amend it with a later post.

Now, I am going to hang on to every golden word.

Posted by Evensong (# 14696) on :

quote:
Originally posted by comet:

quote:
Originally posted by RuthW:

quote:
Originally posted by comet:
you really really really want every faithful person to really be someone who believes in weirdo magic and stuff.
Who can blame him? It would be more fun if we did.
'struth.

I'm still waiting for my Hogwarts letter. my kids say I'm too old but I don't believe them.

Quite.

I have looked at all the possible alternatives and decided believing in weirdo magic and stuff is definitely better for ones health, peace of mind and general amusement.

Nihilism is such a drag.

It makes Jack such a dull boy.

My front left hand bumper sticker reads:

God is dead ~ Nietzsche

My rear bumper sticker reads:

Nietzsche is dead ~ God

The sticker on the side reads:

People of faith have more fun

Posted by Patdys (# 9397) on :

Dear Yorick, You have my prayers..

I just have to decide whether they are 'for' or 'against'. [Razz]

[ 20. March 2012, 02:55: Message edited by: Patdys ]

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

The whole ‘Pray for Muamba’ thing annoys me for several reasons.

1. Intercessory prayer does not work. You might as well say ‘Fart for Muamba’ for all the good it will do for Muamba. He needs good human beings who have worked jolly hard to learn stuff in order to save his life. Suggesting God might intervene above their heads and save him is a slur against this genuinely admirable and valuable human endeavour. Continuing to cling on to such superstitious comfort-blanket nuzzling is arguably retardant of real progress. We should all be thinking about ways to cure cancer, not pathetically supplicating a non-existent god that evidently fails to give a shit.

2. It’s hypocritically self-orientated. When you pray for Muamba, you are in fact trying to find a way to deal with your emotional reaction to his heart attack- that’s provoked by your own fear of your own death. Fine, you pathetically hysterical little sheeple. Do whatever you need to do to get your inadequate little excitable minds over it, but fuck off with the imploring me to indulge your ignoble way of handling your fear of death, thanks. Oh, and kindly fuck off with the self-righteous bollocks about compassion. You don’t own the monopoly, just because you lack the dignity to take command of your hysterical need to share it with all the other inadequate sheeple.

3. By suggesting/imploring/commanding that I should pray for Muamba whatever my religious beliefs, you disrespect my beliefs about prayer. By suggesting I should pray in order to show my support for Muamba’s family, you are effectively insinuating that by not doing so I shall be failing to demonstrate my care and solidarity for the unfortunate fellow. Fuck off, thanks.

4. By praying for Muamba, you’re making a travesty of your not praying for other unfortunate people. But you don’t really care about them, do you? You aren’t so shocked by that, but seeing a footballer collapse on a pitch in the middle of a match is really upsetting, isn’t it? The fact that people are so disproportionately moved by this footballer’s illness to call for and indulge in mass prayer is a disgusting indictment of the way we selectively permit, yes permit, human suffering to move us.

Posted by Marvin the Martian (# 4360) on :

quote:
Originally posted by South Coast Kevin:
Sympathy and stuff like 'Our hearts go out to Muamba and his loved ones' is fine with me but 'pray for him, whatever your religious beliefs' is too much. It feels patronising and dismissive of others' beliefs, to me.

Funny, it strikes me exactly the opposite way - inclusive rather than dismissive.

I see it more as him saying "if everyone prays then the True God (or Gods) is bound to hear at least some of those prayers".

Posted by Marvin the Martian (# 4360) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
The whole ‘Pray for Muamba’ thing annoys me for several reasons.

I believe you missed off reason (5), which is of course the way things like this show that there's still a stupidly large religious tendency within society, even if it's buried quite deeply sometimes, and therefore that your dream of an atheist Britain has minimal likelihood of coming true within the lifetime even of your grandkids.

That's the real reason why it's pissed you off so much, isn't it?

Posted by comet (# 10353) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
He needs good human beings who have worked jolly hard to learn stuff in order to save his life. Suggesting God might intervene above their heads and save him is a slur against this genuinely admirable and valuable human endeavour. Continuing to cling on to such superstitious comfort-blanket nuzzling is arguably retardant of real progress.

mm-hmm. because it's totally kept us from making any quantifiable progress these last 2,000 years.

it's not all or nothing. I can still pray and seek out a doctor when I need one and there is just no conflict there.

for us reasoned, gray-area people anyway. obviously you all-or-nothing fundamentalists are different.

PS - when my kid falls and gets hurt, I'm still going to kiss the boo-boo and make it better, despite the fact that kisses have been scientifically proven to do jack shit. That's hardly the point, is it? comfort-blanket nuzzling has value. I'm going to keep using it. and when life fucks me over, I expect you, as my friend, to tell me it's all going to be okay - even if you have no idea if it will. Because you're a kind, compassionate guy who loves me.

Posted by hatless (# 3365) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
The whole ‘Pray for Muamba’ thing annoys me for several reasons.

1. Intercessory prayer does not work. You might as well say ‘Fart for Muamba’ for all the good it will do for Muamba. He needs good human beings who have worked jolly hard to learn stuff in order to save his life. Suggesting God might intervene above their heads and save him is a slur against this genuinely admirable and valuable human endeavour. Continuing to cling on to such superstitious comfort-blanket nuzzling is arguably retardant of real progress. We should all be thinking about ways to cure cancer, not pathetically supplicating a non-existent god that evidently fails to give a shit.

Of course it doesn't work. You have to be a lazy atheist to even think that it's supposed to. Or one of those Christians who say that of course prayer doesn't work in a coin in the slot way, oh no, no, no, how silly that would be - but maybe, in a the teeniest and weeniest sort of unexpected dear little way, when we're not looking, perhaps it just about, unprovably of course, does sort of, slightly.

No it doesn't. Now find a more grown-up understanding of the concept of prayer.

quote:

2. It’s hypocritically self-orientated. When you pray for Muamba, you are in fact trying to find a way to deal with your emotional reaction to his heart attack- that’s provoked by your own fear of your own death. Fine, you pathetically hysterical little sheeple. Do whatever you need to do to get your inadequate little excitable minds over it, but fuck off with the imploring me to indulge your ignoble way of handling your fear of death, thanks. Oh, and kindly fuck off with the self-righteous bollocks about compassion. You don’t own the monopoly, just because you lack the dignity to take command of your hysterical need to share it with all the other inadequate sheeple.

Yes, we're all scared and self-obsessed. That prevents us from demonstrating a serene and noble Apollonian altruism. Instead our compassion is always messed up by our own needs and feelings. But that's just the way it is. It's human. Compassion involves our feelings for ourselves as well as others. And as a result it brings a connection that ends our loneliness.

I'd rather have the kindness of selfish, scared of death humans than the cool concern of gods and angels any day.

quote:

3. By suggesting/imploring/commanding that I should pray for Muamba whatever my religious beliefs, you disrespect my beliefs about prayer. By suggesting I should pray in order to show my support for Muamba’s family, you are effectively insinuating that by not doing so I shall be failing to demonstrate my care and solidarity for the unfortunate fellow. Fuck off, thanks.

You don't think footballers and football pundits might be doing some really good theology here? Yes, we'll do our best to take note of your right not to be offended by us forgetting the nuances of your beliefs, but there are some things that are more important, right? And this is one of them. Dragging someone into a lifeboat even though we haven't been properly introduced would be another one. There's a time to be human, and this is one.

quote:

4. By praying for Muamba, you’re making a travesty of your not praying for other unfortunate people. But you don’t really care about them, do you? You aren’t so shocked by that, but seeing a footballer collapse on a pitch in the middle of a match is really upsetting, isn’t it? The fact that people are so disproportionately moved by this footballer’s illness to call for and indulge in mass prayer is a disgusting indictment of the way we selectively permit, yes permit, human suffering to move us.

Yes, I agree. Muamba is a recent asylum seeker, one of those people who inspire instinctive contempt from many people, not prayers of support. we must not forget that. I hope (daredn't say pray) that he might soon be well enough to remind us of this himself.

Posted by Sine Nomine (# 66) on :

Yorick probably also thinks that when people say "Good morning. How are you?" they really want to know. It's about the same thing really. Just a convention.

Posted by Anselmina (# 3032) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
The whole ‘Pray for Muamba’ thing annoys me for several reasons.

Here follows the arse-drivel....

What surprizes me is that Yorick is taking his precious time to complain about other people praying - when he could be spending his time doing something useful for all these unfortunate people he keeps referring to.

Because by the same token that he is here doing something with no impact, no utility and no humanity, presumably he is withdrawing what could be his help for really important stuff elsewhere - like feeding the hungry, offering medical care to the ill, visiting the elderly and those in prison, writing letters to oppressive governments about their political prisoners, etc, etc, etc.

I mean, how can he possibly have the free time to complain about such a non-issue as people being asked to pray for a footballer, when there is so much of the world yet to be rescued from poverty, debt and death? [Ultra confused]

Posted by Sine Nomine (# 66) on :

I think we all need to pray for Mrs. Yorick.

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Anselmina:
I mean, how can he possibly have the free time to complain about such a non-issue as people being asked to pray for a footballer, when there is so much of the world yet to be rescued from poverty, debt and death?

Well, that’s kind of my point, actually, as Marvin pointed out with my fifth objection. If you take away all the man hours our species extravagantly wastes in superstitious pursuits like praying to non-existent gods, and instead devoted our efforts to developing better science and medicine for the treatment of heart attacks, then we would probably be actually helping Muamba, rather than simply indulging our pathetic need to find comfort in fellowship in the face of our common phobia of death from heart attacks.

Posted by Boogie (# 13538) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Anselmina:

Because by the same token that he is here doing something with no impact, no utility and no humanity, presumably he is withdrawing what could be his help for really important stuff elsewhere - like feeding the hungry, offering medical care to the ill, visiting the elderly and those in prison, writing letters to oppressive governments about their political prisoners, etc, etc, etc.

Nonsense - we are ALL wasting time on here. Each one of us could be doing something more productive.

Of all the anti-Yorick statements, this is the most pointless.

Posted by Anselmina (# 3032) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:

quote:
Originally posted by Anselmina:
I mean, how can he possibly have the free time to complain about such a non-issue as people being asked to pray for a footballer, when there is so much of the world yet to be rescued from poverty, debt and death?
Well, that’s kind of my point, actually, as Marvin pointed out with my fifth objection. If you take away all the man hours our species extravagantly wastes in superstitious pursuits like praying to non-existent gods, and instead devoted our efforts to developing better science and medicine for the treatment of heart attacks, then we would probably be actually helping Muamba, rather than simply indulging our pathetic need to find comfort in fellowship in the face of our common phobia of death from heart attacks.

So Christian doctors and surgeons, nurses, charity workers, educators etc are being prevented from doing their jobs because they pray? And the exercise of praying is preventing people, generally, from doing good work? Strange. I haven't noticed this to any great degree. If anything, I can often make connections between people praying and being inspired to do even greater things than before.

Why, I'm sure if you applied yourself, Yorick, even you could find time to post condescending spiteful tripe on SOF AND do something useful in life. [Razz]

How strange that you should think that people who are being asked to pray for Muamba are doing it to such an excessive degree that they don't have time for anything else in their lives!

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

No, Anselmina, I think you're being a bit disingenuous. I was making a more general point about the historical usage of human resources and endeavour. I know it’s moot, but if we hadn’t spent so much of our time and effort on the invention and religioning of gods, and had instead built hospitals and science laboratories rather than cathedrals and churches, then Muamba would almost certainly be in a better position today. Yes, I understand the contribution of religion to science (esp. Islam), but it seems like pretty shitty cost-effectiveness to me.

Sure, we all know that the cumulative man-hours wasted on praying for Muamba these last few days would actually make little difference to the progress of civilisation, but there’s a principle here. Over a ten thousand year period, these things matter.

Posted by Leprechaun (# 5408) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
No, Anselmina, I think you're being a bit disingenuous. I was making a more general point about the historical usage of human resources and endeavour. I know it’s moot, but if we hadn’t spent so much of our time and effort on the invention and religioning of gods, and had instead built hospitals and science laboratories rather than cathedrals and churches, then Muamba would almost certainly be in a better position today. Yes, I understand the contribution of religion to science (esp. Islam), but it seems like pretty shitty cost-effectiveness to me.

Sure, we all know that the cumulative man-hours wasted on praying for Muamba these last few days would actually make little difference to the progress of civilisation, but there’s a principle here. Over a ten thousand year period, these things matter.

Of course, the onus would be on you to prove that the scientific and technological endeavour would have got off the ground at all without the belief in an ordered world based in the faith of scientists. Which is of course, unprovable, as faith did contribute in such a way at important points. Which just adds this ridiculous post to your ever growing catalogue of inhumane drivel criticising others for not being as strong, clever, and enlightened as you.

Posted by Lamb Chopped (# 5528) on :

Your argument against prayer could be made just as easily and rather more sensibly as an argument against watching football. After all, that takes up more time than prayer for most people, doesn't it? And how does watching football better the world according to your definition?

Down with football, say I. Down with YouTube, ice cream stands, classical music, yappy wee dogs, theatre, art, and television. Get thee to thy hospital-building.

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

[@ leprechaun]

Whoops. Did I accidentally persecute you?

[ 20. March 2012, 11:49: Message edited by: Yorick ]

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
Down with football, say I. Down with YouTube, ice cream stands, classical music, yappy wee dogs, theatre, art, and television. Get thee to thy hospital-building.

Sure. In terms of having hospitals, it would be a good thing, right? If you took all the money out of football and spent it on hospitals, it would undoubtedly help progress in the field of healthcare. QED.

Posted by Erroneous Monk (# 10858) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
...4. By praying for Muamba, you’re making a travesty of your not praying for other unfortunate people. But you don’t really care about them, do you? You aren’t so shocked by that, but seeing a footballer collapse on a pitch in the middle of a match is really upsetting, isn’t it? The fact that people are so disproportionately moved by this footballer’s illness to call for and indulge in mass prayer is a disgusting indictment of the way we selectively permit, yes permit, human suffering to move us.

This is arrant nonsense. Prayer is a team sport and I'm willing to bet that every second of the day someone, somewhere in the world, is praying for the relief of those who suffer in body, mind or spirit, just as every second of the day, someone somewhere is praying for peace.

As far as I can see, it's a simple question: do you want to be part of the problem or part of the solution? And if you're part of the solution, why is it so hard to articulate your longing for that solution?

Posted by Felafool (# 270) on :

This is a repost from another thread which has been closed because apparently we don't want 2 threads on Muamba. It's a tangent, but where else can it go?

am I alone in thinking the nation has gone overboard on collective concern? How many people collapse with cardiac problems every day? I heard that around 10 people under the age of 25 die of cardiac emergencies every week in the UK.

Yes, it was shocking that live on TV many saw an emergency unfold. But Fabrice is not yet dead, yet there are masses of flowers at the memorial window at the Reebok stadium. Bolton Wanderers don't know when they will be able to play their next game.

Come on guys, wake up. My place of work didn't grind to a halt when Mavis in admin collapsed and was carted off to hospital, and we certainly all turned up for work the next morning. What is going on?

Then we might remember another NW team that lost a number of players in an aircrash, yet played a game the next Saturday with a makeshift team rounded up from other clubs. Have we all gone soft?

Posted by Pooks (# 11425) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Felafool:
... What is going on?

... Have we all gone soft?

No. I blame the mirror neurons.

Posted by Anselmina (# 3032) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
No, Anselmina, I think you're being a bit disingenuous. I was making a more general point about the historical usage of human resources and endeavour. I know it’s moot, but if we hadn’t spent so much of our time and effort on the invention and religioning of gods, and had instead built hospitals and science laboratories rather than cathedrals and churches, then Muamba would almost certainly be in a better position today. Yes, I understand the contribution of religion to science (esp. Islam), but it seems like pretty shitty cost-effectiveness to me.

Sure, we all know that the cumulative man-hours wasted on praying for Muamba these last few days would actually make little difference to the progress of civilisation, but there’s a principle here. Over a ten thousand year period, these things matter.

Yorick, you're a smart guy. You don't need me to point out that in the beginning science, hospitals, education, charitable work etc was almost all down to religion, and religious establishments, because the religion-less world didn't exist.

The 'moronic flesh-bags' as you so respectfully refer to your fellow human beings were almost always the only or main pioneers for such things - and often because of their religious beliefs. Even now there are fine talented 'moronic flesh-bags' who carry out incredible humanitarian work and who, regardless, of how despicable to you their belief in God may be, are tremendous human beings and worthy of great respect, from anyone who, genuinelly, has even the least interest in the welfare of mankind.

We have no idea how much more civilized or how much less civilzed the world would be without the existance of that fact; and maybe in the days ahead of you when you're harvesting the time you spend not thinking nice thoughts (or praying as Christians call it) about people you care for, you can build your own wee time machine and go back and 'fix' the horrible old cruel world that so inexplicably allowed religion to pervade everything. Seeing as that's where it all went wrong. Apparently.

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

Yes, the reference to 'moronic flesh-bags' by Yorick is quite interesting. I suppose this is part of the 'progress of civilisation' which he refers to. Instead of praying for people, (old-fashioned), you can call them names, and be generally scornful about them. What a brave new world is conjured up!

Posted by pimple (# 10635) on :

I have done some study into this and I think this is how it works for liberal Roman Catholics:

They do earnestly believe that praying is to, if not for, their own advantage. Their first prayer is for the sufferer. This gives them a warm glow, individually, and an even warmer one corporately; since so many people are thinking compassionate and generous things about one of their neighbours, there is slightly less likelihood that they will beat up their wives/husbands/children.

But there's a negative payoff. For one thing, they feel resentful towards those who don't join in. For another, if the sufferer gets better, they might just feel that it was partly due to the prayers, and they realise that doctors will be miffed and God might feel taken for granted. They will themselves now suffer from the sin of pride, and have to go to confession. Where they will be advised to say a few Hail Marys, which was what they were all doing in the first place.

The clever ones, of course, say their prayers privately and suffer the remorse itself as suitable punishment for the pride, and that lets them off going to confession, where the priest might ask if they've stopped beating their wives yet.

Anybody who wants the Primitive methodist take on prayers for the sick can PM me and I'll send tham my scholarlaly twenty-five page summary in a plain brown envelope.

Or you could all sit at the feet of the immortal fucking Yorick.

Posted by wanderingstar (# 10444) on :

Dear Doctor Yorick,

Fabrice Muamba didn't have a heart attack.

Setting aside all this God/no god bickering, I earnestly pray you would work jolly hard and learn stuff so you don't go around using medical terms inaccurately.

It'll only confuse your patients.

Posted by Eliab (# 9153) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
The whole ‘Pray for Muamba' thing annoys me for several reasons.

1. Intercessory prayer does not work. You might as well say ‘Fart for Muamba' for all the good it will do

[...]

3. By suggesting/imploring/commanding that I should pray for Muamba whatever my religious beliefs, you disrespect my beliefs about prayer.

It's a good thing you had a ‘point 2' to separate these, or you might have been struck by a nasty attack of irony.

quote:

4. By praying for Muamba, you're making a travesty of your not praying for other unfortunate people. But you don't really care about them, do you? You aren't so shocked by that, but seeing a footballer collapse on a pitch in the middle of a match is really upsetting, isn't it? The fact that people are so disproportionately moved by this footballer's illness to call for and indulge in mass prayer is a disgusting indictment of the way we selectively permit, yes permit, human suffering to move us.

I think you've got that all arse-about-face. I don't care about Muamba, not in the way that I care about my grandmother, say. I hadn't even heard of him before this incident. Everything I know about him is on this thread. And, because I know even less about other unfortunate people in the world, I care even less about them.

That is, I don't care about them personally. I have the normal human empathy, I think, for other people who suffer. Of course it matters to me that there are people who are in pain or distress. But I have no reason for preferring that misfortune should light on one person I don't know rather than another.

I can, and do, as I suppose most Christians do, pray for "all them who in this transitory life are in trouble, sorrow, need, sickness, or any other adversity", but that is rather an uninvolved sort of prayer. I can illustrate it with particular instances of adversity known to me, but then I am really praying for those people I know. One reason for praying for Muamba is that, because I know of him without personally knowing him, he is a sort of icon of all those millions of others whose sufferings I cannot care about except in a general sense, because I do not know about them, but who are known to and loved by God.

Yes, it is selective: but it is selective in a ‘representative sample' way, a way of illustrating my prayers for all the sick, whose names I do not know, with one that I do. I'm sure you could indict me for not caring enough about human suffering, but not on this argument.

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

Er.... So, when a football player collapses on a pitch and people are shocked and frightened by their excited sense of mortality, and the club manager implores everybody to pray for this footballer’s recovery whatever their beliefs, and they do so because it makes them feel better, they are really ‘illustrating their prayers’ for the sick and wounded children of the DRC?

Posted by Eliab (# 9153) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
Er.... So, when a football player collapses on a pitch and people are shocked and frightened by their excited sense of mortality, and the club manager implores everybody to pray for this footballer’s recovery whatever their beliefs, and they do so because it makes them feel better, they are really ‘illustrating their prayers’ for the sick and wounded children of the DRC?

No, you tit. That's a the reason why I, as a Christian, might comply with the request, and more specifically, a reason why you are completely wrong about prayers for a famous person not known personally being evidence of a lack of concern for persons wholly unknown (except to God).

I assume that the club manager made the request because he thought it would help. Either (if he is a believer) he thought it would help directly by procuring divine assistance for his player's recovery or (whether he's a believer or not) he thought it would help in some way by offering comfort with an expression of communal support and well-wishing. Why would you imagine that he had any other motivation at all? That's the obvious and sufficient explanation, isn't it?

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

I do not question the good intention of the manager, the Muamba’s fiancée or in fact any of the masses of people whom I suppose have been moved by this terrible event to pray for Muamba. So what? I’m sure everybody wishes Muamba a speedy recovery, and I hope for it myself of course.

My point with this thread is to challenge the generally accepted idea that it must necessarily be a good thing that people seek comfort by such prayer, or even that they should find it.

It is argued that, even if praying does no actual good for the prayee, it does the prayer good, and this is a Good Thing, and that’s what it’s really all about. But that doesn’t seem right to me. The intention is very clearly that the prayee should benefit from the praying, and when his manager asks us to ‘pray for Muamba’, it’s pretty clear that he isn’t imploring you to make yourself feel better by doing so. He wants you help Muamba by praying- presumably because he believes in the healing power of intercessory prayer. It’s ‘Pray for Muamba’, not ‘Pray for Yourselves If You’re Upset About Muamba, You’ll Feel Loads Better’. If you’re praying for Muamba for your own benefit (or, bizarrely, for the benefit of sick children in the DRC), than you’re not praying for Muamba at all. So, why not be honest about it? Why not admit that that’s what you’re doing?

‘Lord, I just ask that you hold Muamba in your Love. Hold him in Your Mercy, Lord, and miraculously heal up his damaged myocardium, and deliver him from this awful tragedy. Make him fit enough for football again, oh Heavenly Father, and don’t worry about all those other innocent children in the DRC who are dying of even more horrid things (I’ll come to them later), because this will make me feel less anxious about my own mortality, because it really is a big scary thing indeed that I might drop dead one day too, and it shook me up something rotten to see that on the telly, Lord. Come to think of it, even if you don’t decide to heal Muamba, I just ask that You make me feel comforted by imagining You’re listening to this prayer and can do really strong magic that might make me never ever die, ever. Thanks, God. Amen. Oh, I do feel better already. Amen again.’

If praying is all about comforting ourselves, I think we might be better off growing the fuck up and facing reality, and concentrating all our efforts on actually helping ourselves and each other. We are not useless against illness and war- we can work to find ways of helping cure it. Let us find fellowship in doing real things that really help, not in the pathetically infantile and superstitious pursuit of self-comfort.

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

Surely the solution is twofold, and rather obvious.

1. Do lots more science.

2. Be very scornful to other people, who are different.

That should cover most situations.

Posted by Tubbs (# 440) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
I do not question the good intention of the manager, the Muamba’s fiancée or in fact any of the masses of people whom I suppose have been moved by this terrible event to pray for Muamba. So what? I’m sure everybody wishes Muamba a speedy recovery, and I hope for it myself of course.

My point with this thread is to challenge the generally accepted idea that it must necessarily be a good thing that people seek comfort by such prayer, or even that they should find it.

...

IF people seek or find comfort in prayer then I fail to see what your problem is. You seem to spend a good deal of your life getting het up about what other people do and think. You may as well take a chair down to the sea and tell the tide to Stop Coming In Right Now. The only thoughts and actions you have any control over are your own.

Tubbs

Posted by Eliab (# 9153) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
‘Lord, I just ask that you hold Muamba in your Love. Hold him in Your Mercy, Lord, and miraculously heal up his damaged myocardium, and deliver him from this awful tragedy. Make him fit enough for football again, oh Heavenly Father,

You're not winning any style prizes for that, but it seems a perfectly acceptable prayer to me.

quote:
and don't worry about all those other innocent children in the DRC who are dying of even more horrid things

Now you are being silly. Why would anyone pray that? Much more likely that someone praying for Muamba would realise that he is the only or most important sick person and add "and help all those who are in hospital today or who are suffering in other ways".

quote:
(I'll come to them later),

No problem in praying for them later.

quote:
because this will make me feel less anxious about my own mortality, because it really is a big scary thing indeed that I might drop dead one day too, and it shook me up something rotten to see that on the telly, Lord.

Nothing wrong with that, is there? Being scared of dying is normal. If you believe in God, and trust him, why wouldn't you tell him that you are afraid?

quote:
Come to think of it, even if you don't decide to heal Muamba, I just ask that You make me feel comforted by imagining You're listening to this prayer and can do really strong magic that might make me never ever die, ever. Thanks, God. Amen. Oh, I do feel better already. Amen again.'

What you are doing here is expressing two sorts of prayer, both perfectly reasonable in themselves, as if one had to undermine the other. And it's nonsense. I can pray for Muamba (or anyone else) to get better. I can take my own fears of death to God. I can do both in the same prayer. I do not need to express one of those sentiments in a way that suggests I don't really care about the other.

Take the religious element out of it for a second. Suppose you were to overhear me say to my wife "Would you look after the kids while I visit my Nan? I'm worried about her". You would conclude that I might appreciate assistance against two unwelcome things: whatever it was that was troubling my Nan, and my own worry. I might appreciate some practical advice to help my Nan, AND I might appreciate someone who (even if they could not help her) at least trying to support and encourage me. You would have to be a first class berk to suppose that, because I didn't like the sensation of being worried, the worry was all I cared about, and that I wasn't really concerned for anyone else at all.

You are being a first class berk about prayer. Just because I hope that my request for help for another might alleviate some of my own worries occasioned by their distress does not meant that the request for help is not sincere. Why should it? The motives aren't in conflict. They sit well together. Praying that someone else not die, and meaning it, is more natural because I, as a human being, see death, my own death, as a fearful thing. My personal fear does not undermine my compassion, and may well strengthen it.

Posted by Sioni Sais (# 5713) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Tubbs:

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
I do not question the good intention of the manager, the Muamba’s fiancée or in fact any of the masses of people whom I suppose have been moved by this terrible event to pray for Muamba. So what? I’m sure everybody wishes Muamba a speedy recovery, and I hope for it myself of course.

My point with this thread is to challenge the generally accepted idea that it must necessarily be a good thing that people seek comfort by such prayer, or even that they should find it.

...
IF people seek or find comfort in prayer then I fail to see what your problem is. You seem to spend a good deal of your life getting het up about what other people do and think. You may as well take a chair down to the sea and tell the tide to Stop Coming In Right Now. The only thoughts and actions you have any control over are your own.

Tubbs

Are you sure about that, Tubbs?

Posted by PeteC (# 10422) on :

Nah, Yorkie's a Pavlovian dog. Mention Christians and prayer and he froths at the mouth. He can't help it.

Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on :

From the BBC:

Fabrice Muamba was 'dead' for 78 minutes - Bolton doctor

quote:
Dr Andrew Deaner, Consultant Cardiologist at London Chest Hospital, who was at the game as a fan, and ran onto the pitch to lend his expertise.

He said: (...)

"If I was ever going to use term miraculous it could be used here. He has made a remarkable recovery so far."

You know my views on healing, but I thought I'd just leave this here.

Posted by Spiffy (# 5267) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Eliab, to Yorick:

You are being a first class berk [...]

Uh, yeah, that's kind of Yorick's entire schtick. He's a berk, a douche, a dingus, a yutz, a prat, a nincompoop, and a socially incompetent fool.

Bless his heart.

Posted by Spiffy (# 5267) on :

Oh, yes, let's also point out that people who are given defib within 3-5 minutes only have a 30% chance of surviving (versus a 5-10% chance if there weren't Automatic External Defibs [AEDs] around and he just had good ol' CPR).

If the young man ever plays football again, it will be a true miracle because the chance of neurological damage caused by having circulation interrupted for over 5 minutes (let alone 78 (if that's true, I'd want to see EKG records) is severe.

Again, though, his kid's still got a father, his family still has a fiancee and son and nephew.

Thank God for AEDs.

Posted by Pyx_e (# 57) on :

quote:
Thank God for AEDs

snigger, thats just gonna piss Yorick off more.

Anyway I have been praying for Lamb and its Mother (Baa Mum) , some of it must have slipped sideways.

AtB Pyx_e

Posted by Tubbs (# 440) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Sioni Sais:

quote:
Originally posted by Tubbs:

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
I do not question the good intention of the manager, the Muamba’s fiancée or in fact any of the masses of people whom I suppose have been moved by this terrible event to pray for Muamba. So what? I’m sure everybody wishes Muamba a speedy recovery, and I hope for it myself of course.

My point with this thread is to challenge the generally accepted idea that it must necessarily be a good thing that people seek comfort by such prayer, or even that they should find it.

...
IF people seek or find comfort in prayer then I fail to see what your problem is. You seem to spend a good deal of your life getting het up about what other people do and think. You may as well take a chair down to the sea and tell the tide to Stop Coming In Right Now. The only thoughts and actions you have any control over are your own.

Tubbs
Are you sure about that, Tubbs?

Under normal circumstances, pretty much. But I'm sure there's a five paragraph explanation of why that's not the case here.

Tubbs

Posted by Sarah G (# 11669) on :

Apparently, according to one of the treating doctors, a miracle has occurred:

Report

Did I hear a Hallelujah in the distance?

Posted by Zappa (# 8433) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Sarah G:
Apparently, according to one of the treating doctors, a miracle has occurred:

Report

Did I hear a Hallelujah in the distance?

Silly girl.. That was not an answer to or result of prayer. That was a result of Yorick doing nothing.

Keep it up Yorick. You're doing well.

Posted by Lyda*Rose (# 4544) on :

Sarah G:

quote:
Did I hear a Hallelujah in the distance?

I don't know. Can a disgusted sputter sound like "Halleluiah"?

Poor Yorick. But there is no reason that he can't or won't declare it a coincidence. He may be quite right. Or maybe not. But it's hard to complain when a guy is "miraculously" alive. Sort of ungracious. [Snigger]

[ 22. March 2012, 01:27: Message edited by: Lyda*Rose ]

Posted by Lamb Chopped (# 5528) on :

Yorick, you nut. (Yes, I need to get that phrase as a one-key macro on my computer.)

You aren't seriously concerned that the thirty seconds or so we take for prayer is destroying Human Civilization as we know it. If you were, you wouldn't be spending much more time posting drivel to the internet like the rest of us dweebs.

Nor are you seriously worried that our alleged preoccupation with praying for the Rich & Famous™ is going to subtract from the time we spend praying for the poor and unknown. Because, obviously, you think neither set of prayers does a darn thing, so why should you care?

You deny categorically that prayer does anything except (possibly) comfort the one who is praying, and you scorn that as an unworthy effect not to be sought after. [Roll Eyes]

In fact, it seems to me that you despise human weakness. Have I got that right? Only the strong, only the relentlessly logical, only the eternal doubters who scorn to waste a breath on anything not proven, may enter the Kingdom of Yorick. All others may lie outside by the gates where the dogs will lick their sores.

Dude, whatcha gonna do when some day it's YOU being weak? Kind of hard to evict yourself from your own world.

Come on out and join the human race.

Posted by orfeo (# 13878) on :

Dear Yorick,

Emphatically NOT Thinking Of You. In case the thinking is offensive. Do you only object when the thinking has a religious tinge to it? Is sending you secular thoughts and best wishes okay? If so, why?

Get Well Soon.

[ 22. March 2012, 02:10: Message edited by: orfeo ]

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

It's just a wind-up, isn't it? Quite a good one, if hackneyed.

Posted by The Great Gumby (# 10989) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Sarah G:
Apparently, according to one of the treating doctors, a miracle has occurred:

Report

Did I hear a Hallelujah in the distance?

Professional athlete has a better health outcome than the norm - finally, proof of God's existence! [Roll Eyes]

Posted by IngoB (# 8700) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
1. Intercessory prayer does not work. You might as well say ‘Fart for Muamba’ for all the good it will do for Muamba. He needs good human beings who have worked jolly hard to learn stuff in order to save his life. Suggesting God might intervene above their heads and save him is a slur against this genuinely admirable and valuable human endeavour.

Let's destroy this nonsense systematically. Firstly, no contradiction exist between praying for someone's health and treating him with all that modern medicine has got. Medicine does not cure all people all the time completely, so in practice there is plenty of scope for imploring additional Divine assistance. However, more importantly, within the framework of Christian faith humans and all their good works are instruments of God. Thus all people involved in providing healing, from the medical researcher over the clinician to the receptionist of the hospital, are part in one giant project of God to help people in this world (and yes, it does not matter that a lot of people involved would positively reject the very concept). A prayer for health hence can simply mean asking God to aid a patient through the modern health system (explicitly or implicitly). And in that way one could pray reasonably for health even if modern medicine reached perfection. Perhaps more importantly, this means that praying for someone's health is in no way or form opposed to developing and applying medicine. Exactly the opposite, it is supporting this.

Secondly, the idea that it has somehow been shown that intercessory prayer does not work is rubbish on multiple level. On the level of principle, God is not a particularly powerful but spacetime-based causal agent. Really not. In particular, God is eternal and His providence encompasses all. Thus it is entirely possible for God to consider the prayers of people in advance of their future free will decision to make them, and factor them into what He predestines to happen earlier in the timeline. If proper medical care arrives to save Muamba now, it could well be so because people decide to pray for him later. That it is incredibly difficult, if not outright impossible, to track such Divine interference by observation and statistics is no argument that it does not exist.

Furthermore, God is not some kind of natural law operating in a predictable manner. He is a Person. An all-knowing, ever-present, all-powerful Person whose IQ is larger than infinite. It is notoriously difficult to find out what persons, rather than natural laws, are doing and psychology experiments quite generally involve either tricking people or put them in situations where their range of action is strongly limited. This is obviously impossible with God, and attempting it is like an amoeba trying to win a chess game against Kasparov, only infinitely worse. So the efficacy of intercessory prayer will be measured exactly to the extent and exactly with the result that God wants this to have. If He doesn't want an "empirically positive" result, there won't be one. And that is totally independent of the question whether there ever are positive results when prayer is not under scientific scrutiny. (And yes, there is very good reason to believe that God would hide any efficacy of prayer from empirical determination. God likes to be followed by faith, not due to calculations of personal advantage.)

Finally, from a purely experimental point of view, determining the efficacy of prayer is a bit of a nightmare. Designing such a study clearly faces many challenges in terms of selecting participants and controls, excluding confounds, avoiding biases introduced by the instructions, etc. Perhaps one can overcome these though. So this is a minor point, though it should come into play when evaluating any specific study.

Posted by passer (# 13329) on :

Generally speaking, IngoB, I'm a fan of your intensely detailed logic trails. Your self conviction is admirable. On this occasion however, I fear you've lost me. Your recent successful foray in Hell (can't remember the interminable thread - I was subsumed more by the excitement of waiting for your ripostes to your debaters than by the content) and the resolution and disdain you showed in the face of counter-argument, were great entertainment. Since then though, I do wonder if you haven't let it go to your head a bit.

quote:
Let's destroy this nonsense systematically.

is more self-absorbed than self-confident. Such smugness detracts from the strength of your argument.

Especially when you base your arguments around statements such as:

quote:
He is a Person. An all-knowing, ever-present, all-powerful Person whose IQ is larger than infinite.

This reminds me of the many happy Sunday afternoons I spent in the late 70s entertaining the JWs in my north London home. I used to have music on in the background, and often chose the album Blind Faith. They didn't pick up on it, and I didn't say anything because they were nice people. You seem happy to make a sweeping statement such as this and yet take others to task for doing similarly.

Also,

quote:
Secondly, the idea that it has somehow been shown that intercessory prayer does not work is rubbish on multiple level.

is surprisingly weak for you.

quote:
That it is incredibly difficult, if not outright impossible, to track such Divine interference by observation and statistics is no argument that it does not exist.

The same principle could be applied to the other fairies - the ones at the bottom of my garden. You are usually better than this.

Posted by Sine Nomine (# 66) on :

quote:
Originally posted by shamwari:
This could have been a serious discussion.

There is an issue here. I looked for intelligent debate..

Happy now?

Posted by Ariel (# 58) on :

Yorick, I haven’t had much time to reply to you before now but firstly, congratulations on an OP that makes it unequivocally clear that you have profound contempt for at least one of the core practices of the community you’re so keen to belong to and liked by.

Secondly, leaving that aside, I think we’re mostly all agreed here that there’s more to prayer than a shopping list of requests to some kind of divine Santa Claus. You can write it off if you like, but if you do, you haven’t understood the other aspects of it. God, and prayer are both rather more complex and sophisticated concepts than the popular image often suggests.

Prayer is essentially communication. It doesn’t always feel like it, but it is basically a two-way process. In its broadest sense, we speak, and we listen. It provides a space to open yourself up to the possibility of an encounter with the numinous. (This is the difficult bit, because there isn't always a clearly recognizable answer. The other difficult bit is when there is.)

The numinous takes many forms. It isn’t all thunderbolts, bangs and flashes and instant miracles. Sometimes it accompanies us, quietly and silently, waiting to be recognized. It can be present in that phrase that leaps off the page at you, or in a chance remark overheard that suddenly brings something home to you, shows you a whole new aspect of a situation that proves transformative, just as much as it can be one of the showier kinds of personal revelation. Sometimes it breaks through and catches you offguard, but whatever form it takes it’s essentially transformative for the better. You might have to wait years. You might wait a lifetime and it might never happen, but you can’t rule it out.

You seem so angry at the idea of people wasting their time in prayer and being subservient to an imaginary concept, but sometimes you remind me of the blind man who ranted angrily that there was no such thing as colour. If you were really indifferent you’d never have bothered with these boards after a preliminary rubbishing of them and everything people here believed and stood for, but no, years later you’re still here, still angry with the image of God you have, and still trying to understand. I think that says quite a lot.

Posted by PeteC (# 10422) on :

Ariel's post being interpreted:

Yorick, you are a 4th class twat.

Posted by Sioni Sais (# 5713) on :

quote:
Originally posted by PeteC:
Ariel's post being interpreted:

Yorick, you are a 4th class twat.

.. who actually likes people getting angry with him. I suppose that kind of attention is better than none. Thank God it's in cyberspace.

Posted by Sine Nomine (# 66) on :

The best thing I ever heard on the subject of prayer was "I hope God is listening when I talk to my imaginary friend called God." As far as I'm concerned that pretty much covers it. And very briefly too. Always a plus. Especially around here.

Posted by birdie (# 2173) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Ariel:
(This is the difficult bit, because there isn't always a clearly recognizable answer. The other difficult bit is when there is.)

Quotes file...

Posted by Chorister (# 473) on :

Saw this and thought immediately that it looked like a visual image of the prayers for Muamba: footie in the sky

Posted by IngoB (# 8700) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Sine Nomine:
The best thing I ever heard on the subject of prayer was "I hope God is listening when I talk to my imaginary friend called God." As far as I'm concerned that pretty much covers it. And very briefly too. Always a plus. Especially around here.

That's very good indeed. Any idea who has said that where?

Posted by Sine Nomine (# 66) on :

Ingo, I don't remember who said it but I do remember it was in a 12 step meeting. We were discussing our relationships with our higher powers. I heard that and thought "Yes! That's it."

Posted by beatmenace (# 16955) on :

On the subject - i have to add this from NewsBiscuit............

http://www.newsbiscuit.com/2012/03/21/search-now-on-for-those-who-prayed-for-muamba%e2%80%99s-collapse-in-the-first-place/

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Ariel:
God, and prayer are both rather more complex and sophisticated concepts than the popular image often suggests.

I do not doubt it, though I do not feel the 'Pray for Muamba' sentiment qualifies as a complex and sophisticated concept. It was more of a mass hysterical reaction, which for me represents the intellectual weakness of religion rather than its rational theological strength.

YMMV.

(And thank you for your painstaking post, and also to others here who have very patiently explained things. For those who love to question my motivation in posting here, you might consider that such well-informed patience and sincerity is very scarce).

Posted by Firenze (# 619) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
It was more of a mass hysterical reaction, which for me represents the intellectual weakness of religion rather than its rational theological strength.

I have to say, taking the ribbons off that one, it comes across as plain old elitist disdain for the Mob - fickle, gullible, sentimental and generally thick. How very unlike Us.

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Firenze:
[this] comes across as plain old elitist disdain for the Mob - fickle, gullible, sentimental and generally thick.

What, and the Mob isn't fickle, gullible, sentimental and generally thick, then? Purleeeease. This isn't elitist disdain, it's elitist contempt.

Posted by Firenze (# 619) on :

So you see no difference between: 'People will believe anything' and 'Anything people believe is therefore rubbish'?

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

Yes, I feel there is a correlation between the fact that people will believe anything, that they tend to believe in whatever they most want to be the truth, and the real truth value of popular beliefs. Often, the more popular the belief, the less likely it is to be true.

Posted by Sioni Sais (# 5713) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
Yes, I feel there is a correlation between the fact that people will believe anything, that they tend to believe in whatever they most want to be the truth, and the real truth value of popular beliefs. Often, the more popular the belief, the less likely it is to be true.

With Yorick however, the reverse applies. It looks and sounds like bollocks and, sure enough, bollocks it is.

Posted by Moo (# 107) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
What, and the Mob isn't fickle, gullible, sentimental and generally thick, then? Purleeeease. This isn't elitist disdain, it's elitist contempt.

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick
Yes, I feel there is a correlation between the fact that people will believe anything, that they tend to believe in whatever they most want to be the truth, and the real truth value of popular beliefs.

And you don't tend to believe whatever you most want to be the truth?

You seem to believe that only the elite are capable of shrewdness. I have known many uneducated people who are quite capable of thinking for themselves.

Moo

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Moo:
And you don't tend to believe whatever you most want to be the truth?

No, I don't. I'm a sceptic. I distrust the truth value of everything I most want to be true, because of the correlation I mentioned. It's everywhere you look.

Take astrological horoscopes, for example. People are commonly inclined to believe they represent truth because they’re superstitious and stupid and because they want them to be true. Obviously, then, horoscopes that tell people what they want to read are easy to sell because people want to buy them, and there arises the conflict between telling objective truth and selling bullshit. When there’s money to be made, guess which wins out.

And in the rest of today’s tabloid newspaper you will find whatever bullshit 'news' people want to read (which is why they’re so popular), irrespective of truthfulness. The pressure is on making money from selling copy, and it obviously pays to tell lies. The only pressure on its printing truth is in the extent to which the tabloid can get away with falsehood.

It’s the same with organised religion. Tell people they’ll burn in hell if they don’t believe and that they’ll spend eternity in heaven if they do, and you have yourself a nice strong selling point. The truth conflict is obvious. It sells so well because people want to believe it’s true, not because it is.

Posted by Moo (# 107) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
Take astrological horoscopes, for example. People are commonly inclined to believe they represent truth because they’re superstitious and stupid and because they want them to be true. Obviously, then, horoscopes that tell people what they want to read are easy to sell because people want to buy them, and there arises the conflict between telling objective truth and selling bullshit.

Have you noticed that not all horoscopes are upbeat? I agree that horoscopes are bunk, but the reason people like them is that they appear to reduce uncertainty.

{tangent}
The week before my first baby was born, my horoscope said, "Don't be afraid to try a new and different experience this week." The baby's horoscope said, "Try not to get involved in anything which is beyond your personal control."
{/tangent}

Moo

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Moo:
Have you noticed that not all horoscopes are upbeat? I agree that horoscopes are bunk, but the reason people like them is that they appear to reduce uncertainty.

For sure, but that does not refute my argument. People believe what they most want to be true, even when they don't like it. In that case, for example, what they most want to believe is that horoscopes reduce uncertainty. Original sin and hell is an example of this in religion, but there are many others.

Posted by Boogie (# 13538) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Moo:

{tangent}
The week before my first baby was born, my horoscope said, "Don't be afraid to try a new and different experience this week." The baby's horoscope said, "Try not to get involved in anything which is beyond your personal control."
{/tangent}

Haha - I like it! But of course any horoscope prediction can apply to any of us, they are so vague.

'Answers to prayer' are pretty much the same I find.

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

Exactly. However, despite this vagueness (and perhaps because of it) many people will believe that all this stupid praying for Muamba helped his recovery merely because they want that to be the case.

Studies show that we’re hardwired to believe what we want to be true because and in spite of what we find to be the truth, and this skews our perception of the real truth-value of our beliefs.

[ 27. March 2012, 13:15: Message edited by: Yorick ]

Posted by Boogie (# 13538) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
Exactly. However, despite this vagueness (and perhaps because of it) many people will believe that all this stupid praying for Muamba helped his recovery merely because they want that to be the case.

Studies show that we’re hardwired to believe what we want to be true because and in spite of what we find to be the truth, and this skews our perception of the real truth-value of our beliefs.

Yes but ...

How about those of us who don't want to believe, yet find ourselves believing anyway? I believe in God because, deep down, I feel there is something/one behind all this. It'd be easier not to believe this (less convoluted explanations for a start!)

Nope, I don't believe prayer helped Muamba one bit - but I do think the knowledge that so many care enough to pray will help him.

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Boogie:
How about those of us who don't want to believe, yet find ourselves believing anyway? I believe in God because, deep down, I feel there is something/one behind all this. It'd be easier not to believe this (less convoluted explanations for a start!

You're not going deep down enough, I think. Under your deep down belief that there is something/one behind all this, I imagine there's a deeper down hope that there is.

Easier don't come into it. You're a slave to your deepest down wants.

Posted by Boogie (# 13538) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:

quote:
Originally posted by Boogie:
How about those of us who don't want to believe, yet find ourselves believing anyway? I believe in God because, deep down, I feel there is something/one behind all this. It'd be easier not to believe this (less convoluted explanations for a start!
You're not going deep down enough, I think. Under your deep down belief that there is something/one behind all this, I imagine there's a deeper down hope that there is.

Easier don't come into it. You're a slave to your deepest down wants.

Probably!

Posted by Marvin the Martian (# 4360) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
You're a slave to your deepest down wants.

As are you. What's your "deepest down want"?

Posted by Firenze (# 619) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
You're a slave to your deepest down wants.

As must you. All the arguments comes down to is the that those of us whose DDWs are for a cold, indifferent cosmos are more right than those DDWing a warm, caring one.

Posted by Anselmina (# 3032) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
You're a slave to your deepest down wants.

I know you are, but what am I? [Razz]

Just thought I'd raise the level of this discussion to really mature debate.

Come on, Yorick! If your 'but you're too stupid to know you're being stupid, not like me because my supposition that people are stupid doesn't apply to me' argument is going to work, you're going to have to do a bit better than that [Big Grin]

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

Well of course I include myself in this too. I'm just as much a slave to my DDW as anyone. So what?

Posted by Marvin the Martian (# 4360) on :

So why are you lambasting some people for doing/believing what their DDWs dictate when you freely accept that you do exactly the same thing as well?

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

I'm not. I'm lambasting the fact that some people seem to think their beliefs are true without the least consideration for the massively strong influence on their holding those beliefs of their wanting them to be true, and the often negative correlation between wishful thinking and objective truth.

IOW, I think as wishfully as you, but at least I know it, and because of this I'm more realistic about the truth-value of my beliefs.

Posted by Anselmina (# 3032) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
I'm not. I'm lambasting the fact that some people seem to think their beliefs are true without the least consideration for the massively strong influence on their holding those beliefs of their wanting them to be true, and the often negative correlation between wishful thinking and objective truth.

IOW, I think as wishfully as you, but at least I know it, and because of this I'm more realistic about the truth-value of my beliefs.

As I said before......

You really, honestly, believe your level of self-awareness is superior to everyone else here? Because why? Because you think it is? Based on what?

Now if that isn't self-delusional and blindness to self, I don't know what is.

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

A fascinating division being revealed here, a sort of oneupmanship about one's wishes affecting one's beliefs. It almost seems like a moral crusade against wish fulfilment, which is quite curious really. I suppose it is saying that 'I am also liable to wish fulfilment, but I am able to filter that out, and be more objective, and therefore, (and this is the crunch), I am superior to you, and you are stupid'.

Or is that unfair?

Posted by Marvin the Martian (# 4360) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Anselmina:
You really, honestly, believe your level of self-awareness is superior to everyone else here? Because why?

Because deep down, that's what he wants the truth to be.

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

Yes, my confirmation bias is less pronounced than yours, and less heinous, and I know this is true, because I want it to be true. But, I hasten to add, this is definitely not confirmation bias, because I say so.

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Anselmina:
You really, honestly, believe your level of self-awareness is superior to everyone else here? Because why? Because you think it is? Based on what?

Yeah, thanks for characterising me that way, but I am not talking about anyone here specifically being inferior to me. I'm talking about the Pray for Muamba sentiment, which I think represents a more common sort of low-grade unthinking religiosity verging on folklore and superstition.

I don't know how self-aware you might be, but many of the religious people I know often deny, when asked, that their beliefs are based (even in part) on wishful thinking, which seems like either bullshit or low self-awareness to me. Maybe I'm wrong.

For myself, I naturally assume that my beliefs are largely informed by my wanting them to be true, and this fact causes me seriously to doubt their truth. That is my scepticism, and, yes, I do feel it is an intellectually superior position to certainty in belief heavily based on wishful thinking.

Posted by Sine Nomine (# 66) on :

So…you want to believe your wife loves you but seriously doubt she actually does?

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

I don't see what that has to do with it.

Posted by Sine Nomine (# 66) on :

So it's just your religious beliefs that are largely informed by your wanting them to be true? I'm not sure I knew you had religious beliefs, being an atheist and all.

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

No, I cannot think of any of my held beliefs that I do not wish to be true. And yes, atheists may have beliefs on religious things like the existence of god. (If you didn't know that, you should read some of the posts on these discussion boards, instead of being such a wise guy, maybe.)

Posted by Sine Nomine (# 66) on :

You REALLY do not have any high ground here so trying to be smarmier-than-thou isn't working.

Posted by Lamb Chopped (# 5528) on :

You know, I've mentioned this fact before, but either it doesn't stick in your memory or you flat out don't believe me. Some of us believe in Christianity IN SPITE OF WISHING IT TO BE TRUE. Because my own particularly perverse psychology insists that, if I want it to be true, it must automatically and absolutely be false, every single time. I don't have wish fulfillment fantasies. I have only fear fulfillment fantasies.

So account for THAT one, Yorick.

Posted by Golden Key (# 1468) on :

Yorrick--

I suspect the situation in the OP was as much about worshipping celebrities as it was about belief in God. Maybe more so.

I don't know if praying for a person or for a particular result works. My own experience has been very mixed. Causality seems to be a very complicated thing. I don't know if God/dess of any sort exists. But I pray for people and situations (and myself), just in case.

Many people like to know they're being prayed for. Even if they have no religious beliefs, they at least know that people care about them. If Someone makes some kind of intervention, and/or provides comfort, so much the better.

I don't have an answer about all the horrible things in the world, or why God (if She exists) doesn't seem to intervene. (If you've read any of my rants about God possibly being an ogre, you know that.) IMHO, the world absolutely should be a fair, kind, thoroughly good place...and it isn't. But prayer might at least be worth a try.

Most people, probably, come to the edge of their beliefs at some point. We really may not know much about what's what. And we have to find a way to live in spite of that.

Have you ever read "I Heard The Owl Call My Name", by Margaret Craven? It's often been something to cling to when I'm way beyond the edge of my beliefs. There's a scene where Mark, a young Anglican priest, is sitting with Calamity, an old logger who is dying. C says that he's never been a religious man. And Mark replies, "none of us knows much, Calamity--just enough to reach out a hand in the dark".

Even if there's no God, sometimes that act of reaching out is comforting. Even just talking things out with yourself and God, as if God is there, can be calming.

Yorrick, I'm not saying that you should become religious, or even reach out in the dark. Just explaining that some people find it useful, beyond the possible excesses that you're raging about.

There's a line in one of Madeleine L'Engle's novels ("A Ring of Endless Light", I think) where there's a painful situation, and a child is upset that prayer isn't working. Her mom says that prayer isn't magic, and the child says "then why pray, if it's not magic?" Her mom replies, "because it's an act of love".

Maybe, sometimes, it's important to act on that, even if--or especially if--there's No One there?

FYI, FWIW, etc.

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

Golden Key

That's a very nice post. I saw 'pray for Muamba' more as a cri de coeur, than an exercise in dogmatic theology.

But Yorick wants to feel intellectually superior to that; fairy nuff.

Posted by mousethief (# 953) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
If praying is all about comforting ourselves, I think we might be better off growing the fuck up and facing reality, and concentrating all our efforts on actually helping ourselves and each other. We are not useless against illness and war- we can work to find ways of helping cure it. Let us find fellowship in doing real things that really help, not in the pathetically infantile and superstitious pursuit of self-comfort.

What exactly do you think I could do that would help to cure illness? Please use small words because as a religious person I am really really stoopid.

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
But Yorick wants to feel intellectually superior to that; fairy nuff.

Are you too pompous to read? As I have said, I do not claim superiority here. As I have also said, I’m as prone to wishful thinking as anybody else. As I have also also said, my belief system is as heavily influenced by this kind of wishful thinking as the next man’s. Why are so many of you kneejerking so defensively to this? Can’t you get over my critical tone and read my criticism? Anyone would think you must feel threatened by it, despite your assertions that I’m so utterly wrong about everything.

GK, thanks for your post. It would seem, from your patient explanation of the value and purpose of caring and compassion between people, that you suppose these things are foreign to me. That is not the case. My point here is that such humanism needs no religion. We don’t need to pray for divine intervention for Muamba- we absolutely do need to use our medical science and expertise to save his life. I feel that to petition for God’s involvement in his healthcare is in a way neglectful of the extremely noble human endeavour, but that’s my variant mileage.

And if people who struggle to come to terms with their upset at his predicament need to comfort themselves individually or by fellowship in prayer, I think this demonstrates a very common (though not universal) but rather ignoble and unhelpful tendency for irrational hysteria, based more on our own fear of death than our genuine compassion for anyone else. Again, YMMV.

If we, as a species, could leave behind our superstitious comfort-blanket inclination to invoke the help of a superior power in our thoroughly godless natural disasters, maybe, just maybe, we would be freer and more inclined to concentrate our resources on the business of finding better ways of actually dealing with them. The argument has been made that we can do both, that praying does not hold us back from our human endeavours, and that it’s only because of religion that we have effective coronary care, but I doubt the truth of this. Indeed, it seems possible to me that if all those people are indeed satisfied by the comfort they gain by praying for Muamba, they will be less hungry to find actual solutions to our real human problems.

[By the way, I note that, as our collective hysteria about Muamba diminishes, and as we hear details of his watching Match of the Day on the telly in his hospital bed, poor old God seems to be getting dumped like a bit of soggy Kleenex after a guilty wank. Apparently, the crowd had a minute of applause and ‘thoughts’ for Muamba before Bolton’s game last night, not prayers.]

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
What exactly do you think I could do that would help to cure illness? Please use small words because as a religious person I am really really stoopid.

I seriously doubt you would be any use whatsoever, mouesthief. For you, read You, and for ourselves, read Ourselves. We're all in this cardiac arrest shit together, after all.

Posted by Marvin the Martian (# 4360) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
Why are so many of you kneejerking so defensively to this?

Says the man whose kneejerk defensiveness against all the "you're no different" comments sets a new standard in the field. Hit a nerve, have they?

Posted by Patdys (# 9397) on :

Medicine is often over compartmentalised.
If you look at mental, emotional and spiritual health as well as physical, then you can make a compelling argument for the value of collective prayer, irrespective of the outcome of the situation being prayed for.

There is healing in being part of something bigger than you are.

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Patdys:
If you look at mental, emotional and spiritual health as well as physical, then you can make a compelling argument for the value of collective prayer

Collective prayer helps people, I do not dispute this. What I am challenging here is whether this need for help is a good thing (I do not think it is), whether it is a necessary thing (I do not think so), and whether it can be met by more helpful means than praying to a god who doesn't exist or doesn't care (I think it can).

The fact that we do need to find comfort in collective prayer shows how insidiously religion fosters our innate superstition.

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:
Hit a nerve, have they?

Yes, they annoy me terribly, because they miss the fucking point. My very obvious failings have nothing to do with it. It's pathetic and futile to answer the criticism that you suck by pointing out that I do too, when I already know this perfectly well thanks.

Posted by Patdys (# 9397) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
...and whether it can be met by more helpful means than praying to a god who doesn't exist or doesn't care (I think it can).

Praps try praying to a God who does exist and does care.

At the end of the day, this collective prayer assists the health of every participant; lowers BP, reduces catecholamines etc. I see a lot of benefit in that.

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Patdys:
At the end of the day, this collective prayer assists the health of every participant; lowers BP, reduces catecholamines etc. I see a lot of benefit in that.

You're ignoring the point. By your argument, we should be busy appeasing the sun's charioteer with human sacrifice, if that makes us think it'll rain on our crops. Nonsense.

We should ditch the comforting superstition and devote ourselves actually to helping each other with our ingenuity and endeavour, free of progress-retarding woo-woo. Then we would begin to see we don't need it so much.

But you don't want that, do you?

Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on :

Meanwhile the Messiah signs for Rennes at Pentecost (referring to the fact that the catholic church is taking over a local stadium on Whit Sunday to do a huge first communion celebration). I have to say the ad is very clever.

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

Yorick wrote:

Are you too pompous to read? As I have said, I do not claim superiority here.

Well, you did say:

That is my scepticism, and, yes, I do feel it is an intellectually superior position to certainty in belief heavily based on wishful thinking.

OK, I accept that saying that your position is intellectually superior is not the same as saying that you are intellectually superior. But come on, buddy, you come across as a real hoity-toity, de haut en bas, character, who might just refer to people as 'moronic flesh-bags'.

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
come on, buddy, you come across as a real hoity-toity, de haut en bas, character, who might just refer to people as 'moronic flesh-bags'.

I've been called worse, which sort of thing is fine on this board, where calling people moronic fleshbags is de rigeur. I don't mind being called hoity-toity, since I actually am, but I'm bound to say this is no answer to my arguments.

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

Yorick

How about the argument that on the one hand, you claim that you are not claiming superiority, yet on the other hand, you did?

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

I don't claim superiority (I'm as prone to wishful thinking as anyone else, as I have said, what, eight or nine fucking times already, and this informs my beliefs just like it does for everyone else, like I've said, what eight or nine fucking times too), but so what if it comes over to you that I did? Yes, you could then hate me more because I'm obviously a shithead, but what about my arguments, eh? You seem more interested in telling me I'm horrid because I appear to think I'm superior than you are in dealing with my points. Get over it.

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

Yorick

But you did claim an intellectual superiority for your position, and you have used very derogatory language for religious people.

It's absurd to say, just follow my arguments, when part of your whole self-presentation is this tough, you're all a bunch of moronic flesh-bags, and you're inadequate, and I'm really intellectually ahead of you, style.

Posted by Sioni Sais (# 5713) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:

quote:
Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:
Hit a nerve, have they?
Yes, they annoy me terribly, because they miss the fucking point. My very obvious failings have nothing to do with it. It's pathetic and futile to answer the criticism that you suck by pointing out that I do too, when I already know this perfectly well thanks.

Yorick, 'they' may miss your fucking point but they do not necessarily miss the fucking point. What you know isn't necessarily right. Your acknowledgement of 'failings' is a pathetic attempt to deflect genuine criticism of misanthropy, which runs through every word you have ever posted. Then again, it's probably misanthropy coupled with a desire to annoy and wind people up that drives you to post here.

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Sioni Sais:
it's probably misanthropy coupled with a desire to annoy and wind people up that drives you to post here.

Why must you obsess about this? What difference does it make? Why should you give a shit why I post here- it's not like you're obliged to read or respond to anything I write. Is it because you realise you're too intellectually feeble to stop yourself getting wound up by my posts, and you want to position the blame for it on me, or something? It's very dull, whatever it is.

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
It's absurd to say, just follow my arguments...

...and yet some people actually manage to do so. I'm here to discuss stuff with them, and frankly don't mind what the rest of you think about what a horrid man I must be. Not cared for a long time, now.

Posted by Sioni Sais (# 5713) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:

quote:
Originally posted by Sioni Sais:
it's probably misanthropy coupled with a desire to annoy and wind people up that drives you to post here.
Why must you obsess about this? What difference does it make? Why should you give a shit why I post here- it's not like you're obliged to read or respond to anything I write. Is it because you realise you're too intellectually feeble to stop yourself getting wound up by my posts, and you want to position the blame for it on me, or something? It's very dull, whatever it is.

Thanks Yorick, that's as good an example of projection as I have seen on the Ship in eight years!

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:

quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
It's absurd to say, just follow my arguments...
...and yet some people actually manage to do so. I'm here to discuss stuff with them, and frankly don't mind what the rest of you think about what a horrid man I must be. Not cared for a long time, now.

Just enjoy it, mate, you're the centre of attention (sort of), you're winding everybody up, you're pretending to be wound up. What's not to like?

Posted by Lamb Chopped (# 5528) on :

Yo, Yorick, I'd appreciate an answer, if you've got one. And it might lower the temp in here by one or two degrees.

Posted by Anselmina (# 3032) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:

quote:
Originally posted by Anselmina:
You really, honestly, believe your level of self-awareness is superior to everyone else here? Because why? Because you think it is? Based on what?
Yeah, thanks for characterising me that way, but I am not talking about anyone here specifically being inferior to me. I'm talking about the Pray for Muamba sentiment, which I think represents a more common sort of low-grade unthinking religiosity verging on folklore and superstition.

I don't know how self-aware you might be, but many of the religious people I know often deny, when asked, that their beliefs are based (even in part) on wishful thinking, which seems like either bullshit or low self-awareness to me. Maybe I'm wrong.

For myself, I naturally assume that my beliefs are largely informed by my wanting them to be true, and this fact causes me seriously to doubt their truth. That is my scepticism, and, yes, I do feel it is an intellectually superior position to certainty in belief heavily based on wishful thinking.

I'm not characterising you in any way to be derogatory to you. You really seem to be coming across as saying that those of us who hope that our wishes are true are deluding ourselves, but that you aren't. And the reason you're stating why, is because you know you want your wishes to be true.

Which means you assume the rest of us don't know this about ourselves, and are not healthily skeptical. You also seem to accept - rather unquestioningly, and therefore contrarily enough - that skepticism must be a good thing as a matter of course.

Have you examined how a habit of indiscriminate skepticism may be the most self-serving of your own Deep Down Wishes?

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Anselmina:
You really seem to be coming across as saying that those of us who hope that our wishes are true are deluding ourselves, but that you aren't. And the reason you're stating why, is because you know you want your wishes to be true.

Yes, I know that's how I'm coming across, but it's not right. I’m saying repeatedly and clearly that I delude myself just as much as you and everyone else does. I’m saying that we all tend to believe what we most want to be true, including myself. I am not claiming that you, personally, are not healthily sceptical, but that we generally tend to be ignorant of or deny that the great engine of our beliefs- those that we hold to be objectively true- is our deep down wish for them to be true. This is not a controversial position.

I also propose (perhaps more controversially) that there is often a correlation between the common popularity of a belief and the likelihood that it is objectively false, and in those cases, some self-awareness of the way our inbuilt wishful thinking influences our adoption of belief is preferable to blind acceptance of certainty. Superior, even, with apologies to the downtrodden. Maybe that’s wrong. Maybe it’s a strawman. I simply put it out there to be discussed.

Obviously, my argument about wishful thinking involves some pretty broad generalising, and I have no doubt there are many exceptions to the rule (I’ll get back to you, LC), and people are likely to be offended by the generalisation. I’m sorry about that, but I think the point is worth making regardless. And, yes, I do think scepticism must be a good thing as a matter of course, even if it may be the most self-serving of my own Deep Down Wishes, because as a stupid fleshbag it’s the only way I know to see these Deep Down Wishes for what they are.[/QB][/QUOTE]

Posted by Moo (# 107) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick
We don’t need to pray for divine intervention for Muamba- we absolutely do need to use our medical science and expertise to save his life.

Given the fact that I have no medical science and expertise, it follows that I should do nothing.

Moo

Posted by Marvin the Martian (# 4360) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
I’m saying repeatedly and clearly that I delude myself just as much as you and everyone else does. I’m saying that we all tend to believe what we most want to be true, including myself. I am not claiming that you, personally, are not healthily sceptical, but that we generally tend to be ignorant of or deny that the great engine of our beliefs- those that we hold to be objectively true- is our deep down wish for them to be true.

So everyone, yourself included, is deluding themselves by believing that what they want to be true really is true, and nobody is superior to anybody else for doing so, certainly not you, but all those people praying for Muamba are stupid fuckwits for doing something that conforms to their deep wishes and you're not a stupid fuckwit for conforming to your deep wishes.

Have I got that right?

Posted by Sine Nomine (# 66) on :

It seems so self-evident somehow that one person's faith is another person's superstition that having made that statement I hardly know where else a 'discussion' could go.

I did see on facebook the other day where a friend posted that you haven't won the argument until your opponent says 'whatever!' And this seems like a very 'whateverish' sort of discussion.

But since Yorick frequently functions as the poor man's IngoB – all of the length but less of the insight – I'm not sure how he has overlooked Karl Marx in his rant. Because of course Karl says it better, and with more compassion:

quote:
Religious distress is at the same time the expression of real distress and the protest against real distress. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, just as it is the spirit of a spiritless situation. It is the opium of the people. The abolition of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is required for their real happiness. The demand to give up the illusion about its condition is the demand to give up a condition which needs illusions.

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

Yeah, but Marx wasn't trolling.

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:
So everyone, yourself included, is deluding themselves by believing that what they want to be true really is true, and nobody is superior to anybody else for doing so, certainly not you, but all those people praying for Muamba are stupid fuckwits for doing something that conforms to their deep wishes and you're not a stupid fuckwit for conforming to your deep wishes.

Have I got that right?

Not really, no (but you knew that, didn’t you?). I would edit it like this:

So practically everyone, myself excluded, is ignoring the significance of the fact that they tend to believe in the things they most want to be true, and nobody is superior to anybody else for doing so, certainly not me, but all those people praying for Muamba are stupid fuckwits for doing something in ignorance or outright denial of the fact that it blindly and unthinkingly conforms to their deep wishes and I’m not a stupid fuckwit for conforming to my deep wishes because I realise the massive influence of my wishful thinking on the way I uphold my beliefs and this makes me sceptical of their objective truth value. Or something like that.

[ 28. March 2012, 15:30: Message edited by: Yorick ]

Posted by Marvin the Martian (# 4360) on :

You might think you've made a significant change to the quote there, but it still reads like the ramblings of someone who is essentially saying "it's good when I do it, but bad when you do it".

Lots of people's morality boils down to that one way or another, of course. My own included. But because I'm aware that my morality works that way, I'm allowed to call you out when you do it as well [Big Grin]

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

It also seems to presuppose that some people can become aware of their wishes, wish fulfilments, deep hidden drives, and so on and so on.

However, this seems to ignore the unconscious, which presumably (if one accepts that such a thing exists), is not amenable to introspection.

One might even argue that it is precisely those who claim to be able to reliably introspect about their own wishes and motives, who are fooling themselves.

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

I must admit that 'I'm not a stupid fuckwit' (Yorick), has great charm, and even a sort of innocence.

It reminds me of children in the playground, who stoutly aver, that 'you're the pudding in the middle, I'm not', yet everyone else can see that they are in the middle.

I suppose, less charitably, you could say that saying 'I'm not stupid' is very very fucking stupid indeed, and is often used in arguments between man and wife, with strange consequences. Well, let's not go there.

Posted by Golden Key (# 1468) on :

quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
Golden Key

That's a very nice post. I saw 'pray for Muamba' more as a cri de coeur, than an exercise in dogmatic theology.

But Yorick wants to feel intellectually superior to that; fairy nuff.

I hope you're not accusing *me* of dogmatic theology? [Biased]

Posted by Golden Key (# 1468) on :

Yorrick--

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
As I have also said, I’m as prone to wishful thinking as anybody else. As I have also also said, my belief system is as heavily influenced by this kind of wishful thinking as the next man’s. Why are so many of you kneejerking so defensively to this? Can’t you get over my critical tone and read my criticism? Anyone would think you must feel threatened by it, despite your assertions that I’m so utterly wrong about everything.

Yorrick, you're wrestling with a bunch of stuff. But you're doing it with knives in your hands, and injuring people around you (to one extent or another). Then you ask why we're bothered by the knives...

FWIW: you really do sound as if you've got one standard for yourself (and, perhaps other atheists), and another for anyone who is religious. You say we're all believing what we wish to be true--including you--but then you keep saying that your wishes are better than ours.

It's ok to wrestle with stuff, rage, and storm. But if you attack people and their hopes of wish fulfillment, while being of two minds about your own, don't be surprised when people don't hear your underlying pain and questions.

If you said something like "Shit, prayer doesn't work, and I'm not sure science and atheism cover everything, either; how the hell does anyone live with this?? And doesn't religion get in the way? I don't get it", you might well get a different reception.

quote:
GK, thanks for your post. It would seem, from your patient explanation of the value and purpose of caring and compassion between people, that you suppose these things are foreign to me. That is not the case.

I only meant that in the context of prayer, and what's going on with people when they do it. I didn't mean to assail your capacity for compassion.
[Smile]

quote:
My point here is that such humanism needs no religion. We don’t need to pray for divine intervention for Muamba- we absolutely do need to use our medical science and expertise to save his life. I feel that to petition for God’s involvement in his healthcare is in a way neglectful of the extremely noble human endeavour, but that’s my variant mileage.

Have you been running into lots of people who eschew all health care for prayer? They do exist; but IME most people don't stick with only prayer. But maybe, as a doctor, you've run into more of them than I have.

I don't think that religion automatically means disdain for medical care. Religions are often involved with it, in one way or another. There may be some disagreements about things like embryonic stem cells, abortions, and such. But, in modern times, religion usually doesn't stop medical care or research.

quote:
And if people who struggle to come to terms with their upset at his predicament need to comfort themselves individually or by fellowship in prayer, I think this demonstrates a very common (though not universal) but rather ignoble and unhelpful tendency for irrational hysteria, based more on our own fear of death than our genuine compassion for anyone else. Again, YMMV.

That's often in the mix...but is it necessarily unhealthy to be afraid of death?

Most people probably didn't have any practical way to help Muamba. As I said upthread, a lot of the response was probably due to celebrity worship...but fans may well have been giving what they could to someone they felt some connection with.

Maybe it's kind of like when Princess Diana died: people cared about her persona, about the way that persona made them feel, about her good works, about her bumpy life...and even about Diana herself. It was a complicated occurrence, with excesses and craziness--but that's not all it was.

quote:
If we, as a species, could leave behind our superstitious comfort-blanket inclination to invoke the help of a superior power in our thoroughly godless natural disasters, maybe, just maybe, we would be freer and more inclined to concentrate our resources on the business of finding better ways of actually dealing with them. The argument has been made that we can do both, that praying does not hold us back from our human endeavours, and that it’s only because of religion that we have effective coronary care, but I doubt the truth of this.

Hmmm. Well, I, too, doubt the coronary care correlation, at least if it includes that "only".

If people--especially governments, civil engineers, and the like--neglect disaster preparedness because they think that God will protect them...they're unwise and deluded.

Are you trying to say that too much money and time are given to religion? And they should be put towards more practical ends? A lot of religious folks and institutions financially support practical help.

quote:
Indeed, it seems possible to me that if all those people are indeed satisfied by the comfort they gain by praying for Muamba, they will be less hungry to find actual solutions to our real human problems.

I absolutely think that people can help people on a humanistic basis, and even on an "if I help others, they may help me" basis, and do wonderful things.

But a lot of people develop that hunger for actual solutions in the context of religion. Maybe they feel God is calling/nudging them to particular action. Or, as they grow and heal and come to know themselves better, they may realize that other people are precious and that they should be helping them.

There are different ways of getting to the "let's make things better" point.

quote:
By the way, I note that, as our collective hysteria about Muamba diminishes, and as we hear details of his watching Match of the Day on the telly in his hospital bed, poor old God seems to be getting dumped like a bit of soggy Kleenex after a guilty wank. Apparently, the crowd had a minute of applause and ‘thoughts’ for Muamba before Bolton’s game last night, not prayers.]

Well, that's a...colorful [Biased]

way of putting it. But I think a lot of that has to do with crowd psychology.

Poor old God does get alternately ignored, praised, beseeched, feared, and kicked from pillar to post, though.

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
Some of us believe in Christianity IN SPITE OF WISHING IT TO BE TRUE...

So account for THAT one, Yorick.

The point is that you want your religious beliefs to be true. Whether you believe in them because or despite wanting them to be true is immaterial- you want them to be true, so you believe they are.

Thank you again, Golden Key, for your measured and generous post. I do of course see that what I’m trying to get across here is falling at the first hurdle- by giving the impression that I feel I’m superior to theists, I lose my audience. My aggressive tone is also to blame, and my intransigence in the face of well-considered counter-argument. I am also finding it quite difficult to articulate what I actually mean.

My gripe is not with theists like you, who have a sober and philosophically intelligent understanding of prayer, but with the mass of sheeple who make and respond hysterically and unthinkingly to the call to Pray for Muamba, many of whom own a very flaccid sort of religious faith. This floppy sort of theism seems shallow and massively ignorant to me, and demonstrates much of what I feel is bad about religious faith. People respond emotionally to something that upsets them- perfectly naturally, of course- and reactively invoke a supernatural force to help them handle it. There’s nothing rational about it. It’s weak minded and pathetic. Yes, yes, it’s all so very human, so common, so understandable, but when I see it in action I despair that our species will ever be capable of rising intellectually above these things by seeing them for what they are, and that we will always be burdened by the rotting albatross of superstition.

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Golden Key:

quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
Golden Key

That's a very nice post. I saw 'pray for Muamba' more as a cri de coeur, than an exercise in dogmatic theology.

But Yorick wants to feel intellectually superior to that; fairy nuff.
I hope you're not accusing *me* of dogmatic theology?

I have to admit, it was the cadence of the line, which attracted me there, so it's a sad case of the triumph of form over content.

Another lovely post from you, I notice. One good thing to come out of this thread, is the very solicitous way in which Yorick has been treated. One might even speak of the tender-hearted way in which he has been cared for, listened to, responded to.

I think everyone can sense the very emotional issues which are evoked for Yorick, and it is a credit to this forum, that he has been cared for so tenderly.

At the risk of sounding pedantic, the triumph of praxis over doxis, I would say, so well done for that.

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

Hello, I am reading this.

Before you get all tearful about the yin round here, you should know there's been plenty of yang.

Posted by agingjb (# 16555) on :

I've met atheists who wished Christianity was true, and Christians who wished it wasn't.

Anyway, would "remember Muamba in your prayers" have provoked a less hostile response?

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

quote:
Originally posted by agingjb:
I've met atheists who wished Christianity was true, and Christians who wished it wasn't.

I doubt the latter. I cannot see how it is possible for a Christian to wish their beliefs were untrue. Surely, you're talking about the superficial false denial of much deeper wishful thinking?

Posted by la vie en rouge (# 10688) on :

"Wishing it wasn't true" may be too strong a way of putting it, but I'm certainly in the category of those who came to Christian faith kicking and screaming all the way. I became a Christian because of a compelling conviction that God was real and Jesus Christ was who he claimed to be, whether I liked it or not. (I know that plenty of people disagree with me on this point, but I was convinced.)

Having made it to the other side, the discovery that God was in fact full of kindness and grace was a very pleasant surprise that I hadn't entirely been expecting.

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

Yes, I've met loads of Christians who now and again, start cussing, damn and blast, if only I could just drop all this, and be free of it. And some of them do just that. But others are brought back to the table.

Reminds me of Herbert's poem, 'The Collar',

I struck the board, and cried, "No more;
I will abroad!
What? shall I ever sigh and pine?
My lines and life are free, free as the road,

How many Christians have said likewise? Yet the poem has a lovely end.

Posted by agingjb (# 16555) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:

quote:
Originally posted by agingjb:
I've met atheists who wished Christianity was true, and Christians who wished it wasn't.
I doubt the latter. I cannot see how it is possible for a Christian to wish their beliefs were untrue. Surely, you're talking about the superficial false denial of much deeper wishful thinking?

"But I beneath a rougher sea,
And whelmed in deeper gulfs than he."

William Cowper

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

I'm struck by the oft-made parallel with falling in love. Nobody wants it, but we all want it.

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
Hello, I am reading this.

Before you get all tearful about the yin round here, you should know there's been plenty of yang.

Indeed, but doesn't love always seek to heal hate? And my enemy is my greatest teacher.

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
doesn't love always seek to heal hate?

You're new here. Stick around in Hell* for a bit, then let me know what you think.

* although INTPIUTB.

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

Which Clint Eastwood film is it, where someone says, go to hell, and he replies, already been there?

Hell isn't punishment, it's training. And through the great training there, I found love.

Posted by Marvin the Martian (# 4360) on :

quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
One good thing to come out of this thread, is the very solicitous way in which Yorick has been treated. One might even speak of the tender-hearted way in which he has been cared for, listened to, responded to.

I think everyone can sense the very emotional issues which are evoked for Yorick, and it is a credit to this forum, that he has been cared for so tenderly.

Take it to All Saints, ya freak.

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

Bless you, my child.

Posted by Lamb Chopped (# 5528) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:

quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
Some of us believe in Christianity IN SPITE OF WISHING IT TO BE TRUE...

So account for THAT one, Yorick.
The point is that you want your religious beliefs to be true. Whether you believe in them because or despite wanting them to be true is immaterial- you want them to be true, so you believe they are.

EARTH TO YORICK!!!! You're missing my point, so I'll type slower. My psychology is such that when I want something to be true, I automatically, INVARIABLY, believe it is not.

examples follow.

I WANT Mr. Lamb to be safe even though he's an hour late home; therefore I call every hospital within a 100 miles, because I'm certain he's not. (I also start thinking about funeral plans, plots, etc.)

I WANT to keep my job after my review today or tomorrow; therefore I am already taking home my things from my desk, being certain I won't. (I solemnly tell you, my crap is in a box RIGHT NOW for easier portability. My cubemates think I'm nuts.)

I WANT to be physically healthy and live to 100; therefore I am planning for my son's guardianship, how to pass along my computer passwords, etc. and in particular how to get my widowed husband through our banking system when he can barely access email.

Do you get it now?

And then there's Christianity. I want (how I want) Jesus Christ to be real and true. Therefore it follows that you, Yorick, must be right, and there is no sech person.

Except He won't go away...

Christianity is the one major contradiction to my psychology, and in a lot of ways it's like having a wedgie--I wouldn't put myself in that position if I had a choice, but obviously I'm There.

Posted by goperryrevs (# 13504) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
I doubt the latter. I cannot see how it is possible for a Christian to wish their beliefs were untrue.

Didn't CS Lewis describe himself as "the most dejected and reluctant convert in all of England"?

Posted by la vie en rouge (# 10688) on :

Yes (worth saying, as he points out, that his conversion at that point was only to theism, not yet to Christianity). And I know exactly what he means. As I said upthread, I kicked and screamed all the way.

In my case (as in Lewis's, from what I remember of the book), it was a lot about intellectual honesty, i.e. if this is true (and I have come to be convinced that it must be), then honesty says that it requires a response from me. Either that or I go on acting as if it isn't true, even though in my heart I think it really is, which means basically lying to myself about one of the most important questions in the universe. So bugger it, I'm *really* ticked off about the situation, but dammit I'll become a Christian. I didn't fall in love, I got bloody taken prisoner. God, you one mean bully.

That's why he calls the book "Surprised by Joy". Because the joy is unexpected. I wasn't really expecting to enjoy following Christ either and pretty much got here against my wishes, but now I'm here, I wouldn't go anywhere else. Now maybe I've got some kind of cosmic Stockholm syndrome, but I don't think so.

[That looks all lonely at the top of the page - replying to goperryrevs about CS Lewis being a "reluctant and dejected convert"]

[ 29. March 2012, 13:04: Message edited by: la vie en rouge ]

Posted by IngoB (# 8700) on :

Golden Key, your post above was great, and I even liked your previous quote from Madeleine L'Engle. It appears that Yorick is a rather potent catalyst of Christian unity... which is rather typical for God's wicked sense of humour.

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
My gripe is not with theists like you, who have a sober and philosophically intelligent understanding of prayer, but with the mass of sheeple who make and respond hysterically and unthinkingly to the call to Pray for Muamba, many of whom own a very flaccid sort of religious faith. This floppy sort of theism seems shallow and massively ignorant to me, and demonstrates much of what I feel is bad about religious faith.

You know Yorick, I'm an intellectual elitist myself - and, well, one a cut or two above you. (Ahh, the sweet self-affirmation of snobbery...) But here's yet another good thing about having faith in the Christian God: knowing that looking down on your fellow man has all actual relevance of Candida albicans considering Escherichia coli a far lesser kind of shit eater.

Perhaps one day you will appreciate the greatness of prayer precisely in its encompassing both human splendour and ordinariness. Prayer is like music in this, indeed, it is nothing but our song to the Lord. And the world would not actually be a better place if everybody only ever listened to Bach. Because our minds and hearts must sing and dance, and sometimes this will move the Cherubim to tears and sometimes it will make the demons jig, and sometimes it will be the gnashing of teeth in the outer darkness of Jetward.

Posted by mousethief (# 953) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
My gripe is not with theists like you, who have a sober and philosophically intelligent understanding of prayer, but with the mass of sheeple...

But he's not saying he's superior, mind. Just because you call people by insulting names having to do with their lack of intelligence or discernment doesn't mean you think you're superior to them in intelligence or discernment. Heavens no.

(emph. added)

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
I cannot see how it is possible for a Christian to wish their beliefs were untrue. Surely, you're talking about the superficial false denial of much deeper wishful thinking?

Not to put words in his mouth, but Marvin the Martin has expressed before an opinion that sounds very much like this.

[ 29. March 2012, 23:11: Message edited by: mousethief ]

Posted by Golden Key (# 1468) on :

Yorrick--

Is reason the only right way to approach life? Why or why not?

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Golden Key:
Is reason the only right way to approach life? Why or why not?

Interesting question. Although rather broad in its terms, and obviously leading, I’ll take it at face value.

Of course no, reason is not ‘the only right way to approach life’. There are apparently as many right ways to approach life as there are people living. Personally, I don’t bother much with reason myself, and try to take an aesthetic approach to life. It’s all about stopping to smell the flowers along the way, rather than reasoning about the best route. Or so ISTM.

However, I think reason offers us the best chance of coming to understand what is objective truth in life, which may or may not be important. In short, a subset of reason- scientific reason- is the best tool we have for discovering truth. It is certainly a superior tool to that of belief informed by wishful thinking- I might believe quite sincerely that I’m Napoleon, but scientific reason gives a better indication of the objective truth in this.

Certain things are beyond the scope of scientific reason, of course. The existence of God cannot be tested by it, for example, and whether He does or doesn’t is strictly a matter of belief. You believe He does, I believe he doesn’t, but neither of us may call upon scientific reason to decide the matter. It remains undecided, which is a good thing when it comes to interesting discussion.

Posted by Marvin the Martian (# 4360) on :

quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
I cannot see how it is possible for a Christian to wish their beliefs were untrue. Surely, you're talking about the superficial false denial of much deeper wishful thinking?
Not to put words in his mouth, but Marvin the Martin has expressed before an opinion that sounds very much like this.

This is true, but (a) I'm trying to ignore those wishes during Lent [thanks for the suggestion, Shippies], and (b) unlike Yorick I see no point in making this thread all about me and why I feel that way.

Posted by Stoker (# 11939) on :

I'm invigilating an exam and have only had 2 questions in 1.5 hours so I'm reduced to reading Mr Y's angst ridden blether.

Isn't he just so angry?

Posted by Anselmina (# 3032) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Stoker:
I'm invigilating an exam and have only had 2 questions in 1.5 hours so I'm reduced to reading Mr Y's angst ridden blether.

Isn't he just so angry?

hehe. I think Yorick should go outside and do something helpful for someone. Clear his head by visiting a lonely person, or sit by a hospital bedside where someone's dying, encourage a mum and dad terrified about the operation coming up for their baby boy; serve tea and wash dishes at a fund-raising whist drive; listen to a teenager angsting over her final exams. Or anything pleasant or positive which adds compassion and kindness to life.

I may be wrong (it happens so often!), but I honestly think if Yorick did more of this kind of stuff he'd stop seeing anyone - religious or not - as 'sheeple'. Or moronic flesh-bags. Or tosspoles. He'd see people as people - valuble, unique, important, worthwhile.

(Of course, some people are moronic - but generally you have to get to know someone first to find that out!)

Posted by Ariel (# 58) on :

What bugs me is he's missing the point when he says prayer is useless. It is if you're thinking in terms of direct practical action, but it isn't if it gets you focusing on other people and thinking about them with concern. Over a period of time one of the side-effects of prayer is that it's more likely to prompt you to translate that into practical action than not.

Also, "flaccid religious faith" or not, everybody has to start somewhere and well-meaning, sincere attempts shouldn't be derided. I just wish Yorick would get past the stereotypes and actually listen to what people are saying.

Oh, well - it won't make any difference what I say, but at least I've said it.

Posted by mousethief (# 953) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:

quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:

quote:
Originally posted by Yorick:
I cannot see how it is possible for a Christian to wish their beliefs were untrue. Surely, you're talking about the superficial false denial of much deeper wishful thinking?
Not to put words in his mouth, but Marvin the Martin has expressed before an opinion that sounds very much like this.
This is true, but (a) I'm trying to ignore those wishes during Lent [thanks for the suggestion, Shippies], and (b) unlike Yorick I see no point in making this thread all about me and why I feel that way.

My apologies, then.

Posted by Mark Betts (# 17074) on :

I have not read all of this thread - far too much intellectualism for me.

One myth this story dispells is that football and church are somehow rivals. With the T-shirts, players kneeling down and praying, Fabrice's partner asking everyone to pray for him, and Fabrice himself now saying he thanks God - "I was dead, and I shouldn't be here."

No, I think we should just consider the facts of the story and (along with Bolton Wanderers) be thankful!

Posted by PeteC (# 10422) on :

And on that cheerful note, we close a thread which is long past its sell-by date.

Laus Deo!

PeteC
Your friendly and cheerful
(I'd be grumpy but I just had a nice cuppa)
Hell Host

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