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Religion Thread: That's Me In the Corner...

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Re: Religion Thread: That's Me In the Corner...

Kepler said:
Are you kidding? This is one of those instances in which I simply don't understand how someone comes to that conclusion. Doctors know what seizures are, they know what psychotic episodes are. He had one. He interpreted it as seeing God.

Are you saying "well, maybe that's what seeing God reads as"? Because I suppose that is an interpretation, but surely not with Occam's Razor.
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I have actually, at times, found it very difficult to determine capacity in patients during urgent, on the spot, evaluations when they make grandiose religious based claims. If I know a patient well, it really is not that hard. But on a night shift, when you are covering 100 patients that you have 2-3 lines on, you have not seen during the daylight, and you get called to a "Code Violet" and find several hospital cops securing an extremely upset patient who wants to leave the hospital because God told them there was important work to do that night...it is not as easy.

For instance, if I were hospitalized for severe pneumonia and at 2 AM, decide I want to leave, one could hand me my AMA paperwork and send me on my way if they deem I have capacity. Now if I were saying about how God will protect me, pneumonia is the devil's work and all I need is prayer, a physician who knows me should deem me non-decisional based on my prior actions/beliefs. However, swap me out with a patient who is very religious, says things like that when not acutely ill...do they have capacity?

**** ....just realized that was off topic. Anyway...I have had a patient be disappointed that we fixed their seizures because they associated them with gods voice. Our confidence was not based on a "belief," we saw the seizures...we saw them associated on video and EEG...the areas of increased activity correlated with current understanding of neuroanatomy...and we saw them (both EEG activity and the voice) resolve with proper anti-epileptics. Nothing mysterious...just our wonderful brain misbehaving in a consistent, repeatable, and mappable manner.
 
Re: Religion Thread: That's Me In the Corner...

WisconsinWildcard said:
I have actually, at times, found it very difficult to determine capacity in patients during urgent, on the spot, evaluations when they make grandiose religious based claims. If I know a patient well, it really is not that hard. But on a night shift, when you are covering 100 patients that you have 2-3 lines on, you have not seen during the daylight, and you get called to a "Code Violet" and find several hospital cops securing an extremely upset patient who wants to leave the hospital because God told them there was important work to do that night...it is not as easy.

For instance, if I were hospitalized for severe pneumonia and at 2 AM, decide I want to leave, one could hand me my AMA paperwork and send me on my way if they deem I have capacity. Now if I were saying about how God will protect me, pneumonia is the devil's work and all I need is prayer, a physician who knows me should deem me non-decisional based on my prior actions/beliefs. However, swap me out with a patient who is very religious, says things like that when not acutely ill...do they have capacity?

**** ....just realized that was off topic. Anyway...I have had a patient be disappointed that we fixed their seizures because they associated them with gods voice. Our confidence was not based on a "belief," we saw the seizures...we saw them associated on video and EEG...the areas of increased activity correlated with current understanding of neuroanatomy...and we saw them (both EEG activity and the voice) resolve with proper anti-epileptics. Nothing mysterious...just our wonderful brain misbehaving in a consistent, repeatable, and mappable manner.
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interesting post. and true
 
Re: Religion Thread: That's Me In the Corner...

Kepler said:
Are you kidding? This is one of those instances in which I simply don't understand how someone comes to that conclusion. Doctors know what seizures are, they know what psychotic episodes are. He had one. He interpreted it as seeing God.
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OK...help me understand.

I can't prove God exists...but what makes it an absolute impossibility that he did not talk to God? How could you know that?

That is the point.
 
Re: Religion Thread: That's Me In the Corner...

Kepler said:
Your point is a logical fallacy.
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Your typical schtick is to post the 'look at how the Christian is wrong' article - primarily because you need to say something and I've never seen you post anything positive about atheism. So in posting:

Kepler said:
Heaven is for re--- eh, maybe not so much.
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I assume you're saying 'there is no way that this guy could have talked to God'. Or are you now saying 'yeah, this guy could well have talked to God'? Or are you saying you can't defend your position either way...so you better not have one.
 
Re: Religion Thread: That's Me In the Corner...

5mn_Major said:
I assume you're saying 'there is no way that this guy could have talked to God'. Or are you now saying 'yeah, this guy could well have talked to God'? Or are you saying you can't defend your position either way...so you better not have one.
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Ah, the old "if you don't respond to my attack then you're admitting you're wrong!" gambit, a.k.a. the FreshFishFourthgradeFake. But sure, I'll play.

I'm not saying "there's no way this guy talked to God," for the simple reason that you can't prove a negative. I am saying "here we have a completely credible, natural explanation for an effect that corresponds to everything else we know about reality." This contrasts with a completely supernatural explanation which is popular enough to have a silly fantasy film made about it.

But hey...

The desire to communicate with god is as old as the concept of god. It's worth taking seriously enough not to fall for our brains' parlor tricks. The fact that confused people mistake their psychotic breaks with an experience with god doesn't necessarily mean all people claiming divine experiences were wackjobs. But there are wackjobs, and it helps nobody to feed their delusions.
 
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Re: Religion Thread: That's Me In the Corner...

Kepler said:
Ah, the old "if you don't respond to my attack then you're admitting you're wrong!" gambit, a.k.a. the FreshFishFourthgradeFake. But sure, I'll play.

I'm not saying "there's no way this guy talked to God," for the simple reason that you can't prove a negative. I am saying "here we have a completely credible, natural explanation for an effect that corresponds to everything else we know about reality." This contrasts with a completely supernatural explanation which is popular enough to have a silly fantasy film made about it.

But hey...

The desire to communicate with god is as old as the concept of god. It's worth taking seriously enough not to fall for our brains' parlor tricks. The fact that confused people mistake their psychotic breaks with an experience with god doesn't necessarily mean all people claiming divine experiences were wackjobs. But there are wackjobs, and it helps nobody to feed their delusions.
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Its already a well documented fact that when a religious person prays (i.e., a passive talk with God) their brain activity increases. Why couldn't this guy's brain activity change when he actively talked to God?

If the article's position were published in a medical journal, the publication would be a laughingstock. Swearing on a cause from one symptomatic data point is always terrible science.
 
5mn_Major said:
Its already a well documented fact that when a religious person prays (i.e., a passive talk with God) their brain activity increases.
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Using one's brain causes brain activity to increase? NSS.

Next you'll tell me that people engaged in meditation or studying for a test causes brain activity to increase as well...
 
Re: Religion Thread: That's Me In the Corner...

5mn_Major said:
Its already a well documented fact that when a religious person prays (i.e., a passive talk with God) their brain activity increases. Why couldn't this guy's brain activity change when he actively talked to God?

If the article's position were published in a medical journal, the publication would be a laughingstock. Swearing on a cause from one symptomatic data point is always terrible science.
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Not all brain waves look the same. Seizures have distinct characteristics, thinking causes a different type of brain wave.
 
Re: Religion Thread: That's Me In the Corner...

5mn, do you see atheism as a repudiation of something that is good?

I know that is a very vague question, but while I cannot speak for others, I don't think those of us who do not believe in the existence of a supernatural god see that as a repudiation of any good that might come from any particular religious faith or from religious faith in general. But it seems that believers tend not to see it that way.
 
Re: Religion Thread: That's Me In the Corner...

burd said:
5mn, do you see atheism as a repudiation of something that is good?

I know that is a very vague question, but while I cannot speak for others, I don't think those of us who do not believe in the existence of a supernatural god see that as a repudiation of any good that might come from any particular religious faith or from religious faith in general. But it seems that believers tend not to see it that way.
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I think many believers view atheism as a direct challenge, and as such react defensively and sometimes aggressively. It also tends to come across in the mistaken idea that atheism is "just another faith," in, say, science. It's as if the Monarchist must seek a king somewhere; a world without one is too alien.

It makes sense that if you build a significant portion of your identity around something, then far more irksome than someone saying "x is bad" is someone saying "x is nothing." This again seems to be behind some believers' apparently incurable conflation of atheism with anti-theism.

Also, most religious people took their faith from someone/something intimate -- a parent, a close friend, a much valued mentor. Atheists are then perceived as somehow attacking or at least diminishing that intimate thing by essentially saying "that's all very well but the message that person passed on to you literally means nothing to me." Monotheists in particular aren't equipped to deal with this, since their world is a Manichean struggle between those who accept X and everybody else. I suspect polytheists and pantheists have a lot less trouble understanding atheists.

But it's not insuperable. There are many amazing theists out there who understand atheism completely. Charles Taylor is one; Alasdair MacIntyre is another. Now, granted, they are both geniuses :p , so it kinda makes sense that they can see around corners better than most. But it does mean it's possible for people with and without faith to respect one another and not reflexively merely overwrite the other with a strawman persona in order to win some pen-s measuring contest that says more about them than the subject.
 
Re: Religion Thread: That's Me In the Corner...

Kepler said:
I was gonna say no but turns out that not everybody agrees on Pestilence/War/Famine/Death. Sometimes Pestilence is... Conquest. Thanks!
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I thought the same thing too, but that's because you don't get a Cube of Meat (or Ball of Bandages) in The Binding of Isaac game if you fight Conquest.
 
Re: Religion Thread: That's Me In the Corner...

FlagDUDE08 said:
I thought the same thing too, but that's because you don't get a Cube of Meat (or Ball of Bandages) in The Binding of Isaac game if you fight Conquest.
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I thought about checking that out. Now I'm pretty sure I have to.
 
Re: Religion Thread: That's Me In the Corner...

Kepler said:
I thought about checking that out. Now I'm pretty sure I have to.
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If you mean the video game, let's just say the game is a bit of a mind****, but I do enjoy the Let's Plays. I'm way too awful at video games to try it myself.
 
Re: Religion Thread: That's Me In the Corner...

FlagDUDE08 said:
If you mean the video game, let's just say the game is a bit of a mind****, but I do enjoy the Let's Plays. I'm way too awful at video games to try it myself.
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Yes, I mean the video game.
 
Re: Religion Thread: That's Me In the Corner...

burd said:
5mn, do you see atheism as a repudiation of something that is good?

I know that is a very vague question, but while I cannot speak for others, I don't think those of us who do not believe in the existence of a supernatural god see that as a repudiation of any good that might come from any particular religious faith or from religious faith in general. But it seems that believers tend not to see it that way.
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No. Even though I have dozens of acquaintances that are Christian...running in the circles I do, I would figure I have a similar amount that don't believe in God. I would guess my closest friends are non believers. They're just good people and that's what matters.

Really, I'm not a fan of extremism...in large part, because extremists lose sight of the larger objective of improving lives (their own and for others). That typically includes a small percent of extremist negative 'Christians' that put their own agenda in front of that of JC and a similar percent of self proclaimed atheists on the left. They don't have to be negative...its just extremists can't help themselves and put their side agendas before greater problem solving and improving lives for all. It is most often extremism in any of its forms that is the repudiation of good.

The lesson I learned about atheism is that it is really just a philosophy of 'no'. It just stands for 'I don't believe in God' and offers no platform in its place. While not for all, faith has the ability to provide ethics, support, comfort that improves one's life, and charity functions that improves others' lives. Now atheists may be good and/or have ethics, but that comes from them as an individual and not atheism as a movement. That doesn't make atheism bad...it just doesn't serve those purposes. Atheists don't seem to like that. But outside of 'yeah, well we like science' (as if Christians don't)...there is really never any consensus or substantiated case made of what atheism brings to the table.

But in the end, outspoken self labeled atheists always make the case of a philosophy of 'no' with an endless stream of anti Christian articles. I'm not a fan of negativity because it doesn't solve anything. And I suppose I don't approve of attempts to dissuade outsiders from considering what might be their best life choice regardless of the life choice. But these behaviors don't come from the movement...they come from the extremists in the movement.
 
Re: Religion Thread: That's Me In the Corner...

5mn_Major said:
If the article's position were published in a medical journal, the publication would be a laughingstock. Swearing on a cause from one symptomatic data point is always terrible science.
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Well for one, case reports are very common in the medical literature and do not make "the publication a laughingstock." A case report commonly contains a hypothesis or...as I am sure you would describe it..."swearing on a cause." Case reports are more for generating hypotheses than testing them however they can be useful for rare or complex cases where further study is impractical.

The article was published in a medical journal called Epilepsy and Behavior. It has a modest impact factor of 2.26 although neurology journals typically are not high impact even at the top tier level. The thing I find more surprising is that nothing presented is a surprise. This phenomenon is well understood, formally taught during residency, and tested on boards. In fact, the first line of the publication states "Religious experiences have long been documented in patients with epilepsy" In fact, transcranial magnetic stimulation can evoke these type of experiences in subjects not suffering from epilepsy when particular areas of the brain are stimulated. There is actually repeatable differences of the experience based on the subject's beliefs.
 
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