New thread on Religion and Politics, to avoid going off topic

In 2019 my wife was having chest pains, but they had gone away. I was out of town, but made it back home. We took her blood pressure and it was good. So we agreed to take her to one of those stand alone emergency rooms and they did an EKG which was fine. The also did blood work on her. The results were on the hospital tv's and when I saw the results for the troponin I, it was 1.9. Troponin I should always be 0.00. So seeing her blood work was bad, I told them to get an ambulance and get her to St. Lukes.


I had to go home and pack up some things for her, and I headed to St.Lukes ER. She had only been there 30 minutes max, and they told me in the ER she had been moved upstairs. Nothing more was said. As I'm getting on the elevator a worker mentioned he was also going to the CCU floor because one lady had taken a serious turn for the worse. I got to the CCU and come to find out it was my wife he was talking about. I was in total shock because I could see in the picture windows what was going on. There were nurses running to her room. I saw her get shocked 5 times, and her body raised up from prone to sitting due to the shocks. Apparently they got things back on track and no further shocks were needed.


The heart specialist told me it was bad news, that her kidneys had shut down and her blood work was not good at all. He gave her 50/50 at best to live. He mentioned something about her being in cardiogenic shock, and that meant nothing to me. I had heard of septic shock and he mentioned cardiogenic shock was worse. So now I'm totally numb, watching the doctors and nurses working on her. About an hour later, the same doctor told me her kidneys were working again and her blood work had vastly improved. But we were far away from being 'out of the woods'.


My wife's sisters and one nephew and his wife showed, so I had support, and they were there with her. They did a heart cath. on her which took several hours. They left and 30 minutes later I was leaving, then on the PA system they called for a code blue in the cath. lab. So I knocked on the door, scared shitless that code blue was hers, but it wasn't.


She was in the hospital for about 3 weeks, in the CCU for all but one or two days. And every day was touch and go. There is no doubt in my mind that she wouldn't made it in our local hospitals. About a week later she was given a new valve without cutting open her chest. What a miracle to be able to install a new heart valve through the femoral artery. They also installed a device that will shock the heart if needed and through the phone lines can check her heart functions if needed.


Did I pray? You bet your ass I did. Did praying make any difference, well that's something none of us can answer, however it did give me peace.


So to those claiming to be atheists or agnostic, I ask you this, if your wife, child, parent, sibling were given 50/50 at best a chance to live, how many would actually pray. Of course nobody will admit to praying under these circumstances, because you have that agenda you and the clique are playing and for a lot of you the truth comes second.


They say there are no atheists in foxholes, but I've never been under fire so I can't answer that, however I believe it.


Six years after the fact, she's doing OK, however she has small vessel disease. The cause of her issues was a medicine a doctor had put her on for pain, and after all of this, I did a google on this medicine and it said it could cause heart issues. So since this ordeal, she's never come close to taking this medicine again

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A question for you, Tech Papi, Rooster and the other atheists and agnostics. Do you believe religion, the opiate of the masses, is a force for good? Like government, is it an institution that evolved so people wouldn't be as likely to kill each other, steal, take advantage of other people, etc.? Or as Jacky says, is it a mechanism to keep us from going mad, thinking about the end of our existence?

And, since they're working toward the same goal, should religion be a part of government? For example, should a majority of voters or politicians decide religious issues like the legality of abortion and euthanasia?
.... Originally Posted by Tiny

I think that the first statement is mostly true. Mostly. But it's more complicated. I do think that many religious adherents are genuine and truly believe. That includes some of the very finest people that I have known.

There is no doubt about the "control of the masses" philosophy also. How else are you going to appeal to the better instincts of people who are poor and desperate, have little hope of change in this life? Offering them a better one after death has obviously worked well for many cultures over many centuries.

The sentence about "mechanism to keep us from going mad"...is a particularly interesting idea. No one wants to feel like this is all for nothing, right? Like...is that all there is? I'm sure that drives many people mad. So maybe a lot of them self-medicate with religion. If it helps them personally and does not lead them to otherwise hurt others, I'm good with it.

For the last part...I would literally fight for this idea...religion should have NO PART in government. I am more frustrated about the influence that the Christian Right has in our government than almost anything else. And they are doubling down, taking advantage of their momentum.

Those fucks need to be exposed for their false ideologies and driven back to the margins.

Although...you may be surprised to find out that I am a bit of a student of the New Testament! As I've said, I am agnostic. And I am especially skeptical about many of the "stories" told about Christ and his life. I have questions as to whether he even existed.

But it kind of doesn't matter overall. I think that the words and acts attributed to him are absolutely fascinating. I am hugely respectful of these ideas. And of similar ideology of other religions.

But when the Right-wing Christians pick and chose which of Christ's "teachings" to focus on and constantly invoke his name in their often anti-Christian acts...well...it makes me hope a bit that I am wrong. That there is a God. And a Hell. And a very special place is being warmed for them in it.

I think the same of other religious fanaticisms, of course. The vast majority of Muslims are peaceful, good people. But there are a bunch of assholes who pervert the ideas of their religion and use it to justify harm of others. Fuck them.

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In 2019 my wife was having chest pains, but they had gone away....

Did I pray? You bet your ass I did. Did praying make any difference, well that's something none of us can answer, however it did give me peace.....


So to those claiming to be atheists or agnostic, I ask you this, if your wife, child, parent, sibling were given 50/50 at best a chance to live, how many would actually pray.

Six years after the fact, she's doing OK, however she has small vessel disease.... Originally Posted by DEAR_JOHN

Sorry that she and you both had to go through this.

I fully support your choice to pray, would never criticize it, and I am very glad that it helped you.

I think that I myself would not pray. But I have not been through anything quite this bad (YET!), so I cannot say with confidence. One thing I would fear is that...if there is a God...he would laugh at my hypocrisy. But the truly faithful would tell me not to fear that, that God is truly forgiving. Whew. THAT is intense.

I am glad that she came through this. I hope she only continues to get better and have no further problems.

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How do you get from organic chemicals 3-1/2 billion years ago to humans and dolphins today? And for that matter, how do you end up with a universe that sprang from nothingness 14 billion years ago?

No offense to board member TechPapi, but you need a dose of healthy self confidence, or arrogance depending on how you look at it, to be an atheist.

Also atheism isn't helpful at all to the ministry of the Church of Tiny. Originally Posted by Tiny

I offer you the work of Dr. James Tour of Rice University, Professor of Synthetic Inorganic(I think) Chemistry. He's challenged the entire organic chemistry field for years to produce even the most basic of cells by some sort of natural prebiotic process and no one has been able to that I'm aware of. Like with everyone, you can find Tour's detractors, but I've seen no one able to take up his challenge.


Tour's specialty might be synthetic organic chem.
I'll have another link for Vita you might be interested in. See below.

First you need to realize 3 1/2 billion and 14 billion years is a very long time. Plenty of time for nature's experimentation. Second, evolution is proven.


Then there is the fact chimps have approximately 96% of human DNA.


Then there is the idea of God floating around, and it will visit someday. What is it doing today ?


The idea we are God's experiment, and it is watching us and will punish us if we don't follow some behaviors or rules, is a stretch. Was God lonely, so it came up with this idea of humans ? Originally Posted by VitaMan

Even in 14 billion plus years there isn't enough time to run the necessary number of experiments, per these three.

I offer the trite, old adage that lack of evidence is not proof of a negative (which is also an argument against atheism, come to think of it). And there is an overwhelming amount of physical evidence that proves Darwin was at least very close to right.

I would offer the works of Richard Dawkins on that, if anyone cares....

Dawkins is a credible scientist and committed atheist. But he is most concerned about the ways religion has been abused and contributed to massive problems in societies throughout history. To paraphrase one of his more popular ideas...is following an ancient book written by tribes of desert nomads a good way to run modern society?

The problem that I have with religious "faith" is that it requires one to fully buy into the "mystery." You won't be able to understand it, you won't be able to prove it, but you MUST believe it. Sounds like a perfect recipe for a scam. And worse...you can be persecuted horribly for refusing to go along. OF course, we will do that over modern politics and made-up culture wars also...

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Quite familiar with Dawkins. He has no answer for these guys.
Watch the video. You certainly didn't watch a 57 minute video in 55 minutes.
Dawkins has no answer for Tour either.
Faith is one problem you'll find hard to escape. Even in science.
"Modern science is based on the principle: ‘Give us one free miracle and we’ll explain the rest." Terrance McKenna

Sorry that she and you both had to go through this.

I fully support your choice to pray, would never criticize it, and I am very glad that it helped you.

I think that I myself would not pray. But I have not been through anything quite this bad (YET!), so I cannot say with confidence. One thing I would fear is that...if there is a God...he would laugh at my hypocrisy. But the truly faithful would tell me not to fear that, that God is truly forgiving. Whew. THAT is intense.

I am glad that she came through this. I hope she only continues to get better and have no further problems.

. Originally Posted by rooster

Thank you very much for these nice comments.


You sometimes hear or read that you can see things you can't un-see or hear things you can't un-hear and this is one of them.

Neil deGrasse, Carl Sagan, and Brian Cox are excellent scientific based speakers on these topics.

Religion has played a role to guide humanity and help suffering. It has also created a lot of suffering.

She was in the hospital for about 3 weeks, in the CCU for all but one or two days. And every day was touch and go. There is no doubt in my mind that she wouldn't made it in our local hospitals. About a week later she was given a new valve without cutting open her chest. What a miracle to be able to install a new heart valve through the femoral artery. They also installed a device that will shock the heart if needed and through the phone lines can check her heart functions if needed.


Did I pray? You bet your ass I did. Did praying make any difference, well that's something none of us can answer, however it did give me peace.
Originally Posted by DEAR_JOHN

I'm glad that story has a happy ending. It's amazing what they can do with percutaneous valve procedures these days.

There was a Korean study years ago where Americans prayed for Korean women who were doing IVF. The Koreans were mostly Buddhists and the Americans Christians. The praying appeared to work. The women who people were praying for were a lot more likely to get pregnant than the sample group. There were some flaws in the study though.

I wonder if the knowledge that people care for you and are praying for you would help in your recovery, even if there is no divine intervention. I suspect so.

I offer you the work of Dr. James Tour of Rice University, Professor of Synthetic Inorganic(I think) Chemistry. Originally Posted by Ducbutter

I will take a look at that Ducbutter, I only had time to watch a few minutes this afternoon. It's probably organic chemistry. I actually took that class, organic chemistry for chemistry and chemical engineering students and was damn good at it. I could figure out a way to synthesize anything they threw at us.

For me it's harder to envision going from chemicals in a primeval sea to a unicellular creature than it is going from that creature to a human. Based on the fossil record and sedimentation rates, evolution has occurred over billion of years. But was it divinely inspired?

In an attempt to keep VitaMan happy about this being a political thread, I'd like to link to Rooster's comment,

For the last part...I would literally fight for this idea...religion should have NO PART in government. I am more frustrated about the influence that the Christian Right has in our government than almost anything else. And they are doubling down, taking advantage of their momentum. Originally Posted by rooster

OK, we should have secular government. I agree with that, and to a great extent so did the founders of the country. We have freedom of religion.

So how about schools? Who should decide whether evolution is taught? How about creationism? Should it be the federal government? The state? Local school boards? Is it OK to display the ten commandments? How about private schools, should they be able to teach whatever they want? I don't have answers btw. I'd probably leave it up to the local school boards, and let the private schools teach what they want, even if it meant no evolution in the curriculum.

This is a huge political issue in Texas. It's one of the biggest reasons why oil billionaires Tim Dunn and Ferris Wilks are pumping tens of millions into Texas Republican primaries. They also promote far right, pseudo-religious positions on abortion, trans issues, etc. (I use the word "pseudo" because I don't believe the Bible has anything to say about those issues.)

They may just turn Texas purple, from red. They're big supporters of Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who's corrupt but willing to do their bidding. Paxton is running against John Cornyn, the incumbent, for the Republican nomination for Senate. With the Dunn/Wilks machine behind him, Paxton may just win. If Colin Allred decides to run again as the Democrat nominee, against Paxton, I bet he'd win. Cornyn on the other hand would win easily over Paxton.

The Iran political leaders are the religious leaders....mullahs and ayatollas. How is that working out ?

I have no doubt that man evolved from unicellular organisms over the course of billions of years. As to the big bang, my math and physics background isn't sufficient to opine, but that and other aspects of relativistic physics make me think, like Rooster, that "I don't know shit." Could there be some kind of divine guidance that ordered the universe? Maybe so.

A question for you, Tech Papi, Rooster and the other atheists and agnostics. Do you believe religion, the opiate of the masses, is a force for good? Like government, is it an institution that evolved so people wouldn't be as likely to kill each other, steal, take advantage of other people, etc.? Or as Jacky says, is it a mechanism to keep us from going mad, thinking about the end of our existence?

And, since they're working toward the same goal, should religion be a part of government? For example, should a majority of voters or politicians decide religious issues like the legality of abortion and euthanasia?

This is a layup for TechPapi. He may get three touche's in one thread. Originally Posted by Tiny

If you're a Christian, the biggest mistake you can make is having a conversation with an Atheist about Christianity or politics.

Thread has drifted from Politics and Religion to a discussion of Religion.
Thread drifted to the Sandbox.

Quite familiar with Dawkins. He has no answer for these guys.
Watch the video. You certainly didn't watch a 57 minute video in 55 minutes.
Dawkins has no answer for Tour either.
Faith is one problem you'll find hard to escape. Even in science.
"Modern science is based on the principle: ‘Give us one free miracle and we’ll explain the rest." Terrance McKenna Originally Posted by Ducbutter

I could not disagree with that statement more. I started in research, and have worked in Engineering in advanced technology for many years. I don't know the context in which that statement was made...maybe it was even made in irony, or as a joke. But I consider it to be one.

Edit add: Christ, I know who that guy is. I.....had a book he wrote. I doubt he was joking. He had a professional life full of controversy, for sure.

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