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Christopher’s Challenge

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Christopher Hitchens is nothing if not a straight-shooter. He calls it like he sees it, and not even a vicious attack could stop him from denouncing evil, racist ideologies that are still with us today. He is also a fearless and formidable debater. In recent years, he has declared himself an anti-theist, a term he defines as follows:

You could be an atheist and wish that the belief was true. You could; I know some people who do. An antitheist, a term I’m trying to get into circulation, is someone who’s very relieved that there’s no evidence for this proposition.

On Bastille Day in 2007, in response to an article entitled What Atheists Can’t Answer by op-ed columnist Michael Gerson in The Washington Post, Christopher Hitchens threw down the gauntlet to theists:

Here is my challenge. Let Gerson name one ethical statement made, or one ethical action performed, by a believer that could not have been uttered or done by a nonbeliever. And here is my second challenge. Can any reader of this column think of a wicked statement made, or an evil action performed, precisely because of religious faith? The second question is easy to answer, is it not? The first – I have been asking it for some time – awaits a convincing reply. By what right, then, do the faithful assume this irritating mantle of righteousness? They have as much to apologize for as to explain.

Hitchens has repeated this challenge on numerous occasions since then. The first time I heard him issue this challenge, I thought: “He has a point.” Going through the Ten Commandments (a natural starting point for someone raised in the Judeo-Christian tradition), it seemed to me that the only ones that a nonbeliever couldn’t keep were the ones relating to the worship of God. But Christopher Hitchens might reasonably object that if religious belief only makes believers more ethical in the way they relate to God, then it has no practical moral value. Surely, if God exists, then the belief that God is real should also infuse a deeper meaning into our interactions with other people. For the belief that God is real is meant to transform the way in which we think about and act towards others. In that case, there should be ethical actions directed at other human beings that a believer can perform, and that a nonbeliever cannot.

Christopher Hitchens has been criticized before for failing to provide a secular justification for his moral beliefs, and for waffling on the subject of free will. I will not rehash those criticisms here. Instead I will throw the floor open, and invite submissions from readers in answer to the following question:

Can you name an ethical action directed at other human beings, that a believer could perform, and that a nonbeliever could not?

To help readers along, I’ll make my question more focused. Let’s call it “Christopher’s Challenge”:

Can you name an ethical action directed at Christopher Hitchens, that a believer could perform, and that a nonbeliever could not?

I’m deeply ashamed to say that it took me two whole weeks to think of the answer to this question, and then I kicked myself hard for not having thought of it sooner. But I confidently predict that someone reading this post will come up with the answer within 24 hours.

Answers, anyone?

Update on Professor Feser’s response to my post

(By the way, I would like to thank Professor Edward Feser for his lengthy and detailed reply to my post, and I would like to add that I deeply respect his passion for truth. Professor Feser and I have a somewhat different understanding of Thomist metaphysics and how it should be interpreted in the 21st century, and I would also disagree with his bold claim that even if scientists one day managed to synthesize a life-form from scratch in a lab, that life-form would not be an artifact. But in the meantime, I would like to draw readers’ attention to a remark Professor Feser made in his post, “Intelligent Design” theory and mechanism, on 10 April 2010:

Perhaps the biological world God creates works according to Darwinian principles; and perhaps not.

Those were incautious words, and I believe they betray a profound misunderstanding of what Aquinas wrote on the Creation. In a forthcoming post, I will demonstrate that Aquinas would never have accepted the Darwinian account of how evolution is supposed to work, even if he had known then what we know now. I will also show that according to Aquinas, certain life-forms cannot be generated from non-living matter by any kind of natural process, even in a universe sustained by God, and rife with final causes. Stay tuned!)

Comments
---Toronto: "What is your response StephenB?" Response to what? I didn't say atheists are incapable of giving up their lives for loved ones. Rather than ask me to defend points that I did not make, why not address the points that I did make?StephenB
April 24, 2010
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I wrote: "There are many other ethical practices that a Christian could execute that would normally be out of range for an atheist, including the act of loving his enemies, refraining from lust, fulfilling his moral obligation to worship the Creator, and pursuing his final end." ---seversky: "I have never understood this concept of ‘worship’, let alone that we are under any “moral obligation” to undertake it." When all else fails, consult a dictionary: Worship = extravagent respect or admiration for or devotion to an object of esteem. If you can't imagine anyone deserving that kind of response, then perhaps it is because you cannot conceive of anyone or anything being nobler than you are. ---"Quite apart from the fact that such a need would undermine the proposition that He is a necessary entity, it would imply that we can add to His list of ultimate attributes, such as omniscience or omnipotence, that of omnivanity." If the Creator of the universe has a "need," then such an entity would not deserve to be worshipped. Again, you seem unable to conceive of an entity generous enough and good enough to create for the creature's sake, not for the Creators's sake. The problem is not in identifying the moral obligations that atheists cannot fulfill but rather in finding atheists who will acknowledge them as moral obligations. ---"No, the problem is finding believers who can provide any justification for asserting such obligations other than ‘God says so’ Once again, you have lost track of the argument. I said IF God DESERVES to be worshipped, then atheists, who refuse to acknowledge the point cannot perform that moral act. IF God does NOT deserve to be worshipped, then atheists can be just as moral as theists in that context. Both statements are obviously true, but you missed their significance because you ideology has prevented you from following a simple hypothetical statement.StephenB
April 24, 2010
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Good conversation. VJTorley, Your point about benefiting the eternal future of a person or people is a good one. When we were talking about moral duties I was going to add that; we are required to be the salt of the Earth. Christians are to keep the meat from spoiling. Overwhelming responsibility.Charlie
April 24, 2010
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There is a story about a traveler in the Middle Ages, who visited a city where many stone cutters were working. Approaching several, he asked the same question: "What are you doing?" The first stonecutter he met replied, "I'm cutting stone. It's dull work, but it pays the bills." A second stonecutter responded, "I'm the best stone cutter in the land. Look at the smoothness of this stone, how perfect the edges are." A third pointed to a foundation several yards away, and said, "I'm building a cathedral." There are many morals one might get from this story, but one moral I'd like to point out is that sometimes we need to take a long-range view of our actions, in order to appreciate their true significance. Humans are the only animals that are capable of planning over a life-time. We even plan our own funerals. Whole industries are built around this capacity for long-range planning - insurance being an obvious example. We can plan ahead like this because we are rational animals. If you look at the bodily activities we perform, you would have a hear time finding anything that another animal could not do as well or better. Indeed, you might doubt that there was anything unique to humans at all. Jumping, running, walking, swimming - there are animals that can excel us in all of these. But that would be missing the big picture. Only we can make life-time plans. If the religious view of life is correct, then we can not only make plans for the long-term future, but we can also plan for our eternal future as well. And it stands to reason that a fair proportion of the actions undertaken by a believer would fall into that category. One doesn't just plan for one's own future; one plans for the future of others as well. So one would expect that many of the actions believers would perform fall into the category of actions aimed at benefiting the eternal future of some other person. Taking your child to church, or giving your child a religious education, certainly constitute such acts. But there are many other actions we perform on others' behalf that are imbued with "eternalistic" thinking. And so I conclude that the number of ethical actions performed by a believer that would benefit others would be quite substantial.vjtorley
April 24, 2010
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Clive Hayden @220, If I sacrifice my life for yours I believe my existence will completely end. Jesus believed he would have some form of existence after his sacrifice. I give up all existence but Jesus only gives up one form of existence. I'm not offering a key to anything, I'm simply giving up 100% of my life so that yours is saved. Jesus didn't give up 100%, I the atheist did.Toronto
April 24, 2010
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Toronto,
Any sacrifice I might make is based on my belief that there is no after-life, so my sacrifice is greater than someone who does believe in an after-life.
It's not greater, for you're saying that you'd offer a key to a door you believed doesn't exist. There's nothing great about that. But if someone else knows that their sacrifice can provide a real key to a door that they know exists, the door to the afterlife, then their sacrifice is greater, yours is just futile.Clive Hayden
April 24, 2010
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Seversky:
Agnostics or atheists who sacrifice their lives for loved ones, on the other hand, do so without any expectation of life after death. Their act is the greater and more ethical because they give up everything, all that they have ever been or could have been.
But in fact atheists don't give up everything, because they are not "living sacrifices". They don't generally give charitably of either their time or money as much as do Christians. Atheists don't setup hospitals, schools, soup kitchens, homeless shelters and orphanages, or donate money, etc., rather they fund abortion clinics and transit advertisements proclaiming "there is no God". Upon death, both atheists and Christians alike relinquish their life, yes, but prior to death Christians have on average relinquished more both quantitatively and qualitatively than atheists. That atheists live and die without expectation of 'life after death' is not a sacrifice ethical or otherwise, because it is not something they "give up" because they don't believe they ever had it to give up. You can not claim having an ethic for not receiving something that does not exist. Further, atheists die without expectation of 'punishment after death' as well, but in this case they believe they are getting away without 'paying' something. They believe whatever they ignore, commit or accummulate during life is without cost or penalty after death. Believing they've evaded punishment (for unseen or uncharged wrongs during life) is an additional negative ethic which applies to atheists. Believing Christians, OTOH, do give up (to varying degrees) worldly trappings and time during their lives, as well as their giving up their life upon death, because it is the Christians, not atheists, who setup hospitals, schools, soup kitchens, homeless shelters and orphanages, and donate money, etc.
That, to my mind, makes such a sacrifice greater than that of Christ on the cross.
But when you wrote
"that knowledge plus the certainty of everlasting life after death makes his death on the cross more of a gesture than anything else ... To put it another way, Jesus undoubtedly showed courage in voluntarily enduring what must have been an agonizing death but he did so in the knowledge that he would be resurrected."
that "gesture" as you so glibly put it was multiplied by all the sins of all mankind for all time. It was not just His singular pain of torture and death, rather it was the punishment due all the sins of all mankind for all time that was multiplied upon Him alone. It was a punishment that has mental and spiritual dimensions as well as physical. And he did have the foreknowledge of His resurrection, yes, but He also had the foreknowledge of that multiplied punishment. Lastly, when the Son of God was incarnated into the physical body of Jesus Christ, it was permanent. He gave up for all eternity all the benefits of an infinite spiritual being and accepted a lesser existence as a finite physical human being. He did so for the sole purpose of becoming a substitute sacrifice for humanity. Doing good without expection of eternal reward is arguably "ethical", but acting indifferently or doing worse without expectation of eternal punishment is arguably unethical and, as evidenced by the relative scarcity of their charitable acts, atheists as a group are indifferent or worse more often than not. No atheist (or Christian) ever gave up more than his own singular physical life, whereas Jesus gave up a higher form of spiritual existence in exchange for a human physical form (and did so permanently) as well as endured the multiplied punishment due all humanity.Charles
April 24, 2010
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Seversky, Doctor Who: Your Own Personal Jesus http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Luup3qublm0bornagain77
April 24, 2010
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Seversky @ 210 If the first cause is infinite that is beyond our ability to comprehend it then I would imagine there are many things that we do not understand fully (who can know the mind of God?). The lack of understanding for why does not preclude the answer to the question of what. What were we created for is to Love God and Love others. It is hard for me to imagine the agony Jesus Endured. The full weight of humanities sin was laid on Him. That seems to me a fate worse than death. So I would disagree with the notion that nihilism holds ethical high ground to what Jesus sacrificed. It does not compute in my mind. In fact giving one's life to accomplish some temporal good in exchange for nothingness seems completely immoral and a waste (but maybe that is just my perspective). Another thing that does not make sense to me is varying degrees of ethical. It seems to me it either is or is not. Unless you are proposing relativism or situational ethics as a foundation for ethics. Pelagius @ 209 You seem to miss my point. A study that is methodologically flawed does not demonstrate an acceptable protocol. And No I am not proposing that God did not answer the prayers, but He may have prevented the newspaper editor from publishing names (or any number of other explanations; further demonstrating design flaws in the study). It also says nothing about the number of Christian parents whose babies did not die which seems to be the question at hand if you want to know the efficacy of prayer (and is why I object to his assumptions). I am not sure that "God save the Queen" would qualify as a prayer in the biblical sense. So I am not sure that gets to the question either. I did not say that God decides who to heal based on who prays for them. How did you draw that conclusion from what I have posted? God acts according to his sovereignty, which includes giving grace to the humble.olsonbj
April 24, 2010
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Phaedros, Yes I did know that, in fact I've heard it said by one theologian that the historical evidence is so overwhelming for Christ's existence, from his impact on world history, that he was convinced that there was more evidence for Christ than there was evidence that George Washington had existed from his impact on world history.bornagain77
April 24, 2010
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bornagain77- People like Seversky get away with denying historical fact for some reason that I cannot fathom. Perhaps it is only because the life of Jesus is so detrimental to their case and worldview that they must deny it in any way possible. I just heard a talk on the reliability of the Bible. Did you know that we have far less copies of Plato's works and Aristotle and Tacitus, and from much later dates than when they lived (up to 1000 years), than we do of the New Testament and Old? In addition, some of these copies are from the time that the events took place.Phaedros
April 24, 2010
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Phaedros @212,
If there isn’t an afterlife and Jesus was wrong then his sacrifice was just as “great” as an atheist’s would be.
Exactly. The best Jesus could do is to match the degree of self-sacrifice of an atheist. If however, there is an after-life that he knew about, then his sacrifice does not reach the level of an atheist. Any sacrifice I might make is based on my belief that there is no after-life, so my sacrifice is greater than someone who does believe in an after-life.Toronto
April 24, 2010
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Seversky, If God would not have died on the cross for our behalf we would forever be separated from God: ;;;;;;;;;;;; I find it extremely interesting that quantum mechanics tells us that instantaneous quantum wave collapse to its "uncertain" 3-D state is centered on each individual observer in the universe, whereas, 4-D space-time cosmology tells us each 3-D point in the universe is central to the expansion of the universe. Why should the expansion of the universe, or the quantum wave collapse of the entire universe, even care that I exist? Though these are very unexpected findings from materialistic/atheistic presuppositions, from Theistic presuppositions, of a higher dimensional being creating this universe, it finds resonance: Psalm 33:13-15 The LORD looks from heaven; He sees all the sons of men. From the place of His dwelling He looks on all the inhabitants of the earth; He fashions their hearts individually; He considers all their works. This is obviously a very interesting congruence in science between the very large (relativity) and the very small (quantum mechanics). A congruence they seem to be having a extremely difficult time "unifying" mathematically (Einstein, Penrose). The Physics Of The Large And Small: What Is the Bridge Between Them? Roger Penrose Excerpt: This, (the unification of General Relativity and the laws of Quantum Mechanics), would also have practical advantages in the application of quantum ideas to subjects like biology - in which one does not have the clean distinction between a quantum system and its classical measuring apparatus that our present formalism requires. In my opinion, moreover, this revolution is needed if we are ever to make significant headway towards a genuine scientific understanding of the mysterious but very fundamental phenomena of conscious mentality. http://www.pul.it/irafs/CD%20IRAFS%2702/texts/Penrose.pdf Yet, this "unification" that mathematicians are having such a difficult time with, between what is in essence the "infinite world of Quantum Mechanics" and the "finite world of the space-time of General Relativity" seems to be directly related to what Jesus apparently joined together with His resurrection, i.e. related to the unification of infinite God with finite man: General Relativity, Quantum Mechanics and The Shroud Of Turin - video http://www.metacafe.com/watch/3993426/ The End Of Christianity - Finding a Good God in an Evil World - Pg.31 - William Dembski Excerpt: "In mathematics there are two ways to go to infinity. One is to grow large without measure. The other is to form a fraction in which the denominator goes to zero. The Cross is a path of humility in which the infinite God becomes finite and then contracts to zero, only to resurrect and thereby unite a finite humanity within a newfound infinity." http://www.designinference.com/documents/2009.05.end_of_xty.pdf "Miracles do not happen in contradiction to nature, but only in contradiction to that which is known to us of nature." St. Augustine Thus, much contrary to the mediocrity of earth, and of humans, brought about by the heliocentric discoveries of Galileo and Copernicus, the findings of modern science are very comforting to Theistic postulations in general, and even lends strong support of plausibility to the main tenet of Christianity which holds Jesus Christ is the only begotten Son of God. Matthew 28:18 And Jesus came up and spoke to them, saying, "All authority has been given to Me in heaven and upon earth." Thus Seversky, it seems regardless of whatever gripes you may have as to the philosophical aesthetics of the whole situation with Christianity, the fact is that the scientific evidence is very favorable to something "universally" powerful happening in the tomb of Christ.bornagain77
April 24, 2010
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Seversky- Is there an after life or isn't there? You're saying that Jesus knew that there was so his sacrifice was less significant somehow. So if he knew there was an afterlife then there is one, which makes the atheistic position wrong. If there isn't an afterlife and Jesus was wrong then his sacrifice was just as "great" as an atheist's would be. Which is it?Phaedros
April 24, 2010
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Seversky @208, StephenB,
Agnostics or atheists who sacrifice their lives for loved ones, on the other hand, do so without any expectation of life after death. Their act is the greater and more ethical because they give up everything, all that they have ever been or could have been. That, to my mind, makes such a sacrifice greater than that of Christ on the cross.
Well said. What is your response StephenB?Toronto
April 24, 2010
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olsonbj @ 200
The notion that God is Omnivanity makes absolutely no sense to me. Jesus died on a cross for your sin. How does that act (the central act of God toward human beings according to Christians) demonstrate vanity? In that respect worship is thankfulness and sacrifice not idolization. I think you may have those mixed up. I can say that Worship at least for me is much greater than God Said So. The heart of worship is loving God.
I accept that for many worship is as you describe it but I was responding to what, for me, was StephenB's more authoritarian tone. The reference to "omnivanity" was intended to draw attention to the central question of God's purpose in creating the Universe and humanity. God is proposed, in a philosophical sense, as the Christian version of the Uncaused First Cause, that which draws an uncrossable line across an otherwise infinite regress of cause and effect. To be uncaused He must be His own explanation, entirely self-sufficient, not contingent, not dependent in any way on anything outside Himself. If such a deity creates a Universe and living intelligent beings like ourselves within it, what could be His purpose? Why, in fact, would a self-sufficient, perfect and necessary being do any such a thing at all? Some believers have suggested that the answer lies in God's desire to have a close and loving relationship with His creations. But that implies that God has a need which cannot be met by His internal resources which means that He cannot be considered a necessary being. He is contingent, to some extent, on something outside Himself. This, in turn, undermines the argument that God can be the Uncaused First Cause which is required to explain Creation. One alternative, albeit an unsatisfactory one, is that there was no purpose at all. There was no unfulfilled need to be met, not even a whim. The Universe erupted from God as lava erupts from a volcano. Of course, an obvious response to that suggestion would be to ask in what way it differs from the atheist or agnostic hypothesis of undirected causality. Does it make any meaningful difference?
Jesus died on a cross for your sin.
First, if we are God's creation then sin, or at least our capacity for it, was part of that creation. The responsibility for any sinning, therefore is at least as much His as ours. Second, the significance of the Crucifixion is debatable. Jesus is supposed to be the Son of God. Whether that makes him an ordinary human being at that time or something more is unclear. There are stories in the Bible which describe him exercising superhuman powers. Again, it is unclear whether they are innate or some external power on which he can call at will. Whichever it is, he is aware of his status as the Son of God and the power available to him. Although he declines to exercise that power when tempted by Satan, that knowledge plus the certainty of everlasting life after death makes his death on the cross more of a gesture than anything else. To put it another way, Jesus undoubtedly showed courage in voluntarily enduring what must have been an agonizing death but he did so in the knowledge that he would be resurrected. Christians who sacrifice their lives for their faith or for others are also brave and deserve respect for what they endure. But they do so in the belief that death is but a passage to a better existence in which they could be re-united with those that have gone before and those that will pass on after. I would argue, therefore, contra StephenB and others, that atheists and agnostics are capable of behaving more ethically than believers. Christians who die in a good cause leave behind the physical part of their beings but their essence or soul is presumed to survive, either ascending to Heaven immediately or being raised come Judgement Day. Agnostics or atheists who sacrifice their lives for loved ones, on the other hand, do so without any expectation of life after death. Their act is the greater and more ethical because they give up everything, all that they have ever been or could have been. That, to my mind, makes such a sacrifice greater than that of Christ on the cross.Seversky
April 24, 2010
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olsonbj:
I am sorry pelagius, but that study seems hopelessly confounded and makes too many assumptions to mean anything.
I guess you missed what I wrote:
My point is not to assess the validity of Galton’s study, but to point out that prayer can be studied without requiring people to pray or not pray according to some experimental protocol.
olsonbj:
What is more the absence of evidence is not the same as disproof. Especially in an ex post facto designed pseudo experiment. What is more clearly Galton was testing God it would seem to me.
Of course Galton was testing God (or whoever it is that supposedly answers prayers). That's the point of the investigation. Surely you're not suggesting that God refused to answer prayers for the health of royalty because he knew that Galton would come along and study it later!
God is Sovereign and acts according to His will. So in that sense when He acts he does the right thing. Which then leads to the Euthyphro dilemma.
It's worse than that. Even if you ignore the Euthyphro dilemma, you still face the problem of a capricious and seemingly petty God. What sort of a God decides to heal Joe's cancer just because Steve prays for him, but would have refused to heal him otherwise?pelagius
April 24, 2010
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"pelagius" (206) asked: "I realize that the Bible says that prayers are answered, but why would a good God do so? Shouldn’t he always do the right thing, regardless of whether someone asks him to?" This is one of the fundamental differences between God and governments: God deals with individuals, not statistical population masses. Your question is complicated because doing the right thing for an individual may not be the right thing for the family or the neighborhood or the species - and vice versa. Governments enact seatbelt and airbag laws, knowing that seatbelts and airbags may kill a few infants, but save far more adults. Governments enforce flu vaccination, knowing that Guillain-Barre Syndrome may kill a few people, but many more will be saved. And when we ask God for help, God will do what God wants, which may not be what we want. "Olsonbj" is right - God is not a vending machine.PaulBurnett
April 24, 2010
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I am sorry pelagius, but that study seems hopelessly confounded and makes too many assumptions to mean anything. What is more the absence of evidence is not the same as disproof. Especially in an ex post facto designed pseudo experiment. What is more clearly Galton was testing God it would seem to me. With regard to your other question I think prayer is more a method by which God draws us into greater intimacy with him. There is a spiritual danger to view God as some type of cosmic vending machine. God is Sovereign and acts according to His will. So in that sense when He acts he does the right thing. Which then leads to the Euthyphro dilemma. I could share my thoughts on this, but I am not sure this thread is the right place.olsonbj
April 24, 2010
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A question for the believers on this thread: I realize that the Bible says that prayers are answered, but why would a good God do so? Shouldn't he always do the right thing, regardless of whether someone asks him to?pelagius
April 24, 2010
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olsonbj:
At the risk of sounding like making excuses I would raise an objection to the empirical study of prayer. There is an underlying assumption that God would answer prayer offered for the express purpose of demonstrating it’s efficacy.
Not necessarily. You can use a statistical approach to test the efficacy of prayer in groups of people who are praying sincerely, without intending to test God. Francis Galton applied this approach as early as 1872, in his paper Statistical Inquiries into the Efficacy of Prayer:
The efficacy of prayer may yet further be tested by inquiry into the proportion of deaths at the time of birth among the children of the praying and the non-praying classes. The solicitude of parents is so powerfully directed towards the safety of their expected offspring as to leave no room to doubt that pious parents pray fervently for it, especially as death before baptism is considered a most serious evil by many Christians. However, the distribution of still-births appears wholly unaffected by piety. The proportion, for instance, of the still-births published in the Record newspaper and in the Times was found by me, on an examination of a particular period, to bear an identical relation to the total number of deaths. This inquiry might easily be pursued by those who considered that more ample evidence was required.
He also famously tested the longevity of royalty versus the rest of the population:
An inquiry of a somewhat similar nature may be made into the longevity of persons whose lives are prayed for; also that of the praying classes generally; and in both those cases we can easily obtain statistical facts. The public prayer for the sovereign of every state, Protestant and Catholic, is and has been in the spirit of our own, "Grant her in health long to live." Now, as a simple matter of fact, has this prayer any efficacy? There is a memoir by Dr. Guy, in the (Vol. XXII. p.355), in which he compares the mean age of sovereigns with that of other classes of persons. His results are expressed in the following table: [The table shows that the life expectancy of members of royal families is significantly less than that of clergy, doctors, lawyers, aristocrats, and other affluent members of society.] The sovereigns are literally the shortest lived of all who have the advantage of affluence. The prayer has therefore no efficacy, unless the very questionable hypothesis be raised, that the conditions of royal life may naturally be yet more fatal, and that their influence is partly, though incompletely, neutralised by the effects of public prayers.
My point is not to assess the validity of Galton's study, but to point out that prayer can be studied without requiring people to pray or not pray according to some experimental protocol.pelagius
April 24, 2010
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#201 I just had an idea. What about longitudinal studies of people who have changed their religious beliefs during their lives? Has anyone looked at patterns of illness during the “believing” and “unbelieving” parts of their lives? That seems to merit study. I would guess that any such study would show that "believing" is good for you (after allowing for bad health driving you to become religious). But it would nothing about the what caused the better health. Having a vocation in life, being optimistic, having a circle of good friends are all good for you - and they all tend to come with the religious territory.Mark Frank
April 24, 2010
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At the risk of sounding like making excuses I would raise an objection to the empirical study of prayer. There is an underlying assumption that God would answer prayer offered for the express purpose of demonstrating it's efficacy. This concept is completely foreign to the Biblical concept of Prayer which says that a prayer offered up by faith without pretense and or selfish motive (James 4:3). In addition God states in his word that he does not attend to prayer that is offered without reverence (Prov 1:28-29). In scientific study we are always testing the Null (ie that it is not true that...) God's word says that prayer is answered when it is offered without doubt (James 1:6-7). Testing the null implies some level of skepticism and doubt. Given the Biblical preconditions of prayer I am not sure that prayer naturally lends itself to empirical study beyond personal experience of efficacy or in case studies. The longitudinal study seems interesting. I know that there is evidence that religious people are generally healthier and more satisfied with life http://trans.nih.gov/cehp/HBPdemo-religion.htm.olsonbj
April 24, 2010
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Allen MacNeill: You asked:
At this point it also seems quite striking to me that vjtorley (a person whose discernment and judgment I respect) can only find one action that a believer could perform that a non-believer could not (i.e. intercessory prayer) and that there is no reliable empirical evidence that this action has detectable effects, it raises the question “What difference does it make if one is a believer or not?”
Thank you for your kind words. There are two issues here: (1) Can a believer perform actions that help other people, which a non-believer cannot? and (2) Can the efficacy of these allegedly beneficial actions be demonstrated, in a scientific manner, at the present time? The answer to (2) might be "No" even the answer to (1) is an emphatic "Yes." I am somewhat disappointed that you think praying is the only ethical action a believer can perform that a non-believer cannot. The answer that I originally gave for Christopher Hitchens was "trying to save his soul." That doesn't mean just talking. It might mean going all out to convert him, in debate, as Dinesh d'Souza has done. It might mean giving him practical assistance with any spiritual problems he is experiencing, as a wise pastor of souls could do. That could include actions as diverse as recommending a complete change of lifestyle and career to help him surmount his difficulties, and helping him to make this change by providing him with practical assistance. Goodness takes all sorts of forms. Care for someone's soul is not limited to prayer.vjtorley
April 24, 2010
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Mark Frank (#147) You asked:
Do you still hold that:
“A fair-minded person would conclude that there is good evidence that prayer works sometimes.”
Or would you now concede that perhaps that was a mistake?
Thanks for the information on the Hodge meta-study. After reading your post, I am willing to concede that currently there is no satisfactory scientific evidence from randomized double-blind trials on groups of people that intercessory prayer works. However, I would like to say, in passing, that there is something strange about telling a hospital patient that he/she might be prayed for, as happened in some of the studies I cited. That qualifies as messing with someone's mind, in my book. Better to tell them nothing at all, and see what happens when some are prayed for and others are not. Also, I wouldn't try to control the format of the prayer. But as Clive pointed out earlier (#125) in his quote from C. S. Lewis, perhaps this whole approach to prayer may be misconceived. Who's to say that God doesn't step in to help people who are not prayed for, precisely because they have no-one interceding on their behalf? And yet I think it would be unwise to disparage intercessory prayer. Many of us know of incidents in our own lives where prayers seem to have worked. Many people can cite a case where God answered a need of theirs in a very personal and specific way. The specificity is hard to calculate mathematically; but it seems to make a deep impression on people from all walks of life. Many of us, too, have friends and relatives who were severely ill or in danger of death, but pulled through after people rallied around and prayed. So I won't say God doesn't intervene, but at the present time it would be hard to convince a scientist of that, unless he/she looked at miraculous cures (which we've discussed before). I just had an idea. What about longitudinal studies of people who have changed their religious beliefs during their lives? Has anyone looked at patterns of illness during the "believing" and "unbelieving" parts of their lives? That seems to merit study.vjtorley
April 24, 2010
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Seversky: An unbeliever is neither obligated nor is their worship accepted. This due to the fact that one that does not love God nor acknowledge God's existence cannot possibly sincerely praise God. So I do not expect that you would understand it. But since you posed the question and challenge I will do my best to describe it. The notion that God is Omnivanity makes absolutely no sense to me. Jesus died on a cross for your sin. How does that act (the central act of God toward human beings according to Christians) demonstrate vanity? In that respect worship is thankfulness and sacrifice not idolization. I think you may have those mixed up. I can say that Worship at least for me is much greater than God Said So. The heart of worship is loving God. Hope this helps you! ~BJolsonbj
April 24, 2010
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StephenB @ 169
There are many other ethical practices that a Christian could execute that would normally be out of range for an atheist, including the act of loving his enemies, refraining from lust, fulfilling his moral obligation to worship the Creator, and pursuing his final end.
I have never understood this concept of 'worship', let alone that we are under any "moral obligation" to undertake it. Are you really suggesting that God's only purpose in creating us was to provide Himself with a congregation of fawning supplicants? Quite apart from the fact that such a need would undermine the proposition that He is a necessary entity, it would imply that we can add to His list of ultimate attributes, such as omniscience or omnipotence, that of omnivanity.
The problem is not in identifying the moral obligations that atheists cannot fulfill but rather in finding atheists who will acknowledge them as moral obligations.
No, the problem is finding believers who can provide any justification for asserting such obligations other than 'God says so'.Seversky
April 24, 2010
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Allen [185]: If you don't think your salary is "ethically" justified, then please tell your Dean.PaV
April 23, 2010
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Allen says:
Lest anyone accuse me of misrepresenting sociobiology, it is indeed the case that there are several branches of evolutionary biology that propose mechanisms for the evolution of altruism.
Agreed.
But none of these theories nor the evidence supporting them can legitimately be used to formulate or especially to justify any system of ethics. They all describe how humans and other social animals are and say absolutely nothing about what we ought to be.
Agreed.Charlie
April 22, 2010
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It seems like christopher is a little confused as always. Although there have been some good responses to his question that put the matter to rest, the issue between atheists and believers as it pertains to ethics is not that atheists are incapable of being good/ethical. It would be a gross and disgusting generalization to say that one is an evil person incapable of doing good simply because he is an atheist. The deeper and insurmountable problem that the atheist is faced with is that his ideology/beliefs do not provide him with any objective standanrd of good and evil. Moral relativism doesn't cut it either as it evidently becomes self-refuting as a foundation for ethics. Simply put, an atheist can be ethical by the standard of Theism for example just like a believer can. In fact, I would be the first to admit that I know atheists that act more like Christians for example, than some self-proclaimed "christians" do. But God forbid we find ourselves in an atheist universe, then neither the believer not the unbeliever can either be good or bad. They will just "be" drifting aimlessly into and out of oblivion...above
April 22, 2010
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