The toughest questions for atheists to deal with
The easy ones
The hard ones
The hardest issues come when face-to-face with a believer - after the intellectual arguments have finished.
- "I believe because I have witnessed people being cured of acute illnesses."
- "You will never understand unless you have had the personal experience of witnessing God."
Miracle cures
Visit the DRI, the City or the Nuffield hospitals any day of the week and you will see "miracles" performed. You will see people brought back from certain death, you will see cripples made to walk.
These "miracles" are the result of developments in science and medicine. The author would be dead had it not been for a hospital operation. His wife would have been dead had it not been for the DRI and she would have been a cripple without an artificial knee. 2,000 years ago all of this would have been seen as god's miracles.
There are no (none, not one, nil) examples of modern "miracles" that cannot be explained other than by divine intervention - or by "spontaneous remission" (someone simply getting better).
The strange thing about miracle cures is that no-one mentions the thousands who had the laying-on of hands (or whatever) and were not cured.
Why is it that the minuscule number of so-called cures always gets the attention? How do those who were ill, and remain ill, feel about it? Perhaps they are "not good enough", "too full of sin" or "not chosen by god".
This is the god that would keep the whole class in after school because of the behaviour of one pupil - he is an arbitrary, miserable, vicious, un-just old git!
A god who helped everyone, unconditionally, who showed no pride and no prejudice, and demanded nothing in return - now that would be a God!
In fact, he would probably be working for Medecins Sans Frontieres - those people are just about as close to a god as a worldly person can get.
Note from webmaster
I have infinite respect for these selfless people - and I support them financially.
I urge you, believer or non-believer, to do the same.
If someone says that they have seen someone being cured it is hard to argue with them. They have seen what they think they have seen and almost nothing you can say will change their minds.
It is worth mentioning that every academic study examining claims for faith or miracle cures has come out totally against the validity of such cures.
The reasons for rejecting such claims are many:
- Hysteria.
People in the excited, hormone-pumping, atmosphere of whipped-up emotion that is usually the case where these events occur, may well "see" things which go beyond reason. They want to see it, they believe they will see it, they are told they will see it - they see it.
- The adrenaline rush of "the cured".
People can reach such a temporary physiological state, because of the rush of hormones in their blood, that they can do things which appear beyond the normal - they may rise from a wheel chair or move a limb which was previously paralysed.
Such "cures" are entirely temporary and the effect disappears within minutes - or a few hours at most.
- Spontaneous remission.
The human body is a wonderful thing - and we certainly don't claim to understand all there is to know about it.
There are many well-documented medical cases where a patient with an allegedly incurable illness suddenly makes a recovery.
People say many things about this: "she was a real fighter", "the will to live kept him going", "she fought the cancer and won".
Most such recoveries are temporary - a remission in the progress of an illness. However, there are many cases where the recovery is more long term - and where no call to a supernatural being was made and where no such intervention was believed.
- No follow up.
Those who claim to cure through faith rarely document what they have done and, even more rarely, follow up to check on the long-term effect of "the cure". Where third parties have attempted such follow up they have found total relapse, or worse, in the vast majority of cases. One women who could not walk, rose from her wheel chair - and the following day broke both legs.
Perhaps more importantly than any of these is "what about those who were not cured?" Why is god so selective? Why does a faith healer have such a fantastically low rate of success? Why do 99.999% of those who attend Lourdes each year fail to get better?
The believer says: "their belief in god was not strong enough." How do they know? Because they were not cured! A wonderful circular, self-fulfilling argument!
"He died because his time had come." "He died because he was called to god." Good arguments against visiting the doctor, against being taken to hospital after a heart attack and for carrying a non-intervention card in your pocket. God wills it - so therefore a place awaits in heaven - why fight it?
There is no evidence for miracles or cures that stands up to scientific investigation.
Personal witness
This is the toughest nut to crack - because it is almost impossible to tie down exactly what it means!
To some people it seems that this is a "feeling" that god or Jesus has "come into their heart" or "spoken" to them.
This is somewhat vague - what sort of "feeling"? An inner glow? A "buzz" of some sort?
Is it different from the feelings that Buddhists get when they meditate? Is it different from the buzz generated by certain types of drugs? What is it? How can it be described? What does it feel like?
Some people claim that "god or jesus spoke to me". They "hear" an inner voice - as was claimed by Joan Of Arc. We hate to say it but there is a very thin line between "hearing the voice of god" and mental illness.
Most people who claim to be hearing voices in their heads refer themselves to their GP - or they are referred by others to a GP. They move on to a Psychiatric assessment and, if it is deemed serious, they receive appropriate counselling or treatment. We are certainly not saying that the religious are mentally ill - we are saying that hearing voices inside your head is suspect.
Many people "see god/Jesus in a dream". Well, we see all sorts of things in dreams, some very pleasant, some not so pleasant. Most of us take dreams for what they are - dreams!
Many people "see" things - it is so common we have a special word for it: "hallucination". At the time it appears to be real. However, simply because it appears to be real, does not make it real.
If you were spoken to, in a dream, by a pink hippopotamus in a tutu, saying "Go forth and spread the word that man should live at peace with man", you might feel a bit of a chump proclaiming the words of the pink hippopotamus on the street corner. Nothing to stop you trying though! At least the sentiment is sound.
On the other hand, you would be in serious trouble if you took your dream for real and the pink hippopotamus had said "as for those who do not want me for their king, bring them here and slaughter them in my presence." (Luke 19:27).
Request for information
We want to tie down exactly what is meant by "personal witness".
You see, we atheists are hard-nosed rationalists. We are quite happy for people to erect propositions that can be tested. We are deeply unhappy, in fact we totally reject and find beneath contempt, propositions that cannot be tested. To us, an untestable proposition is a pointless waste of mental effort. Life is too short, and there are too many exciting things to do, without wasting time on untestable propositions!
So, if you have personal experience of "witness", or you know someone who has, please let us have more details.
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