Instead of Thanking God, Let’s Hear it for the Doctors

There are only two options here: there is no god, and this is just something that happened (and which purely human ingenuity is working to repair), or god is the most disgusting, foul, rotten piece of corruption in the Universe.

I opt for the first- although as a fiction, it’s hard to avoid the second.

Thank you.  This is exactly how I feel about it.   “God’s prevenient grace” sure is feckin’ subjective! 

Precisely my thoughts. Why did god have to be a jerk and let the others die of gunshot wounds, if he was clearly able to stop the bullet from taking their lives like he did for Petra Anderson? No. As humans, we struggle to understand why and how bad things happen to shatter our illusions that our world should be a peaceful, well-ordered place. We then have to find some explanation for that. We need to come to terms with the fact that the world is not a peaceful, well-ordered place and that s*** just happens. There is no reason for it necessarily. Bad shit happens to good people, good shit happens when we don’t expect it, and we can’t explain it all. Be happy for the good moments when they come so that you can hold onto those memories when the bad shit happens. 

In Christianity we call it prevenient grace:

In the real world we call that bollocks. What a disgusting comment to make. Does this person really believe that this god creature knew about this in advance, that it had it all planned, that it knew that so many would die and be injured, does he really believe all that and still believe that this god is somehow wonderful and deserving of worship? What a crock of shit!

This young woman is an acquaintance of some of my relatives. 

Needless to say my mother called last night to recount this story. To her credit, she left it at “isn’t that amazing”. We really do somewhat try to avoid the God topic, but she knows the rules. If she references it directly she gets a response from me. 🙂

It got me to thinking last night about what a true miracle would have looked like in that theatre:

1) The shooter had shot off 200 rounds into the crowd and not one person was injured.
2) Or how about dozens shot, and each of them would be healed completely by now.
3) How about everyone in the theatre is shot and killed, and then they come back to life. 

Those would be miracles. The story I’ve read is just a coincidence. And don’t get me wrong, coincidences can be awesome! But to say this was a miracle, means that this God is a pretty heartless to intervene at this point, rather than earlier.

Best wishes to Petra and the other 57 people in recovery.  My heart goes out to them.

It’s one thing to see the silver lining of a horrendous situation.  The small victories make events like this a little easier to process and collectively heal.  However, statements like, “It’s just like the God I follow to plan the route of a bullet through a brain long before Batman ever rises. Twenty-two years before.”  What. The. Hell?  Where does one even begin to dissect all the outrageous claims tied up in that?  What an insult to the doctors and the deceased.

Did your mother’s tale line up with the pastors regarding this strange brain “anomaly?”   That’s the part that I’m most skeptical of, and I’ve learned not to listen to pastors on matters of science 😉

I find it easier to imagine that God compelled the shooter to stop the midnight worship of Batman.

I would have been happy with 70 misfires.

That’s first-rate ungratefulness, right there, treating doctors like God’s little interns. Apparently doing radical life-saving surgery is the equivalent of fetching coffee to these people.

The family has already started a fundraiser for the medical costs of Petra and other survivors’ families. http://www.indiegogo.com/readytobelieve

“In Christianity we call it prevenient grace: God working ahead of time for a particular event in the future.” 

This right here infuriates me (and I don’t get infuriated easily).  This idea that god saves people “for a reason”, or as part of his greater plan puts an enormous amount of psychological pressure on the survivor of any accident or illness. 

And those that don’t survive?  Is it because god  knew their future and saw no promise at all?  Or just a ho-hum existence, so he couldn’t be bothered?  The concept of a god picking and choosing as part of his plan is insulting to the survivors and victims alike. 

Does a great football defense always stop the opponent from scoring? Does a pitcher always throw a perfect game? No theist will say “God” is perfect.  

I got in an argument a long time ago with a woman who believed in angels. I forget exactly the story but there was an accident waiting to happen that would have killed or injured a child if not for an adult (maybe that person) spontaneously checking on the sleeping child and removing the danger. One of my relatives died of SIDS. And yet, I’m the monster for pointing out that it was a lucky coincidence and angels don’t exist. This argument went on for weeks or months, and all these people thinking I’m an asshole and arguing me down for having a death in my family (and that’s all too bad and all, but angels exist), that I’m being insensitive to point out that angels don’t exist and that it’s horribly insensitive to other people to suggest or defend that they do. The kid didn’t even get hurt, and grown adults going on and on that I have to allow them their fantasy version of events in an everyday situation in which someone didn’t die or even get hurt, but could have – BUT DIDN’T.

This story also reminds me of the ongoing story of Aimee Copeland, the Georgia woman who was infected with a flesh-eating bacteria after cutting her leg after falling from a broken zipline. While she could have died, she didn’t, and she lost all her limbs. Her father credits god and prayer. I just have to shake my head at the god who created flesh-eating bacteria and broke the zipline in order for her to be saved in a situation that would certainly be fatal not too long ago, without her arms or legs, and with other injuries she is recovering from. I have also read some articles mentioning her refusal of morphine, as it conflicts with her convictions, and some reliance on “holistic” medicines.

The prayer gave them great comfort, but the couple believes prayer has
done even more. They believe faith in God has healed their daughter, and
they cite her medical progress as proof.

I can understand using belief as a lever in such an extreme event, where one might be depressed, and she is acting fully brave and recovering well, so of course I’m an asshole for even bringing it up.

“The words I hear from the medical professionals to describe Aimee’s
continued recovery are ‘astonishing, incredible, confounding, mind
boggling, and unbelievable,’ ” Copeland wrote on Aimee’s Facebook page
on May 12. “My favorite word is miracle.”

Except that for an omnipotent being supposed to watch and listen to 7 bilion people at all times he seems to be on the impotent side of things.

My experience is that these people think God is behind both scenarios – even if they only call one  a”miracle.”. As if it was “her time” to die or something. Like God tried to kill her (ahem…”call her home”) in the first shooting, but because she resourcefully escaped, he “got her” later in another shooting. They don’t actually put it that starkly, but that’s the obvious implication.

It’s twisted, but it’s just something people say and/or think without really analyzing what they’re thinking/saying.

I’m not the best person to explain statistics to anyone, but something with extremely low odds of happening still happen. Nobody ever believes such an unlikely coincidence will happen to them, therefore “god” and “personal savior” and “purpose” and “miracles”. When someone survives something with a 5% survival rate, well, that’s where they get the 5% figure from. We are all moving around the earth with each other and sometimes some of us hit something just hard enough to not die. That’s not a miracle, that’s on the grade between almost hitting it and dying from the impact.

 What gets me, I think this came up recently here or on another blog, when disaster strikes: people who credit god when nobody died; people who credit god when only a few people died; and people who still credit god when he kills almost everyone, but a few make it out alive.

There in this situation – one gunman shoots 70 people and about 17% die. 12 people. All over America, the same day, I’ll go out on a limb and suggest more than 12 homicides at 100% fatality each. This is an unusual and brutal massacre, it’s not a hold-up or a domestic argument out of control.. there is an apparent serial killer in LA? http://www.sfgate.com/news/article/3-LA-area-homeless-people-found-stabbed-with-notes-3721261.php

People find it both easy and difficult to believe god is anywhere but where they are. I think this was something I could never manage to understand, as much as I ever tried to. God is “prevenient” for this woman but out to get another one. He’s concentrated so much power on this one event, but he’s also everywhere else, drunk people putting their keys in the ignition, drowning toddlers, catching autistic girls falling from window ledges instead of.. blocking the fucking window? “Mysterious” statistical coincidences and accidents: sometimes someone doesn’t get the treatment they need and they become dramatic and homicidal. Sometimes just one or the other or something else. Not a good combination, but hopefully a rare one, a statistically small chance of happening every once in a while. We suck as a society for understanding how the brain works and how it can malfunction so devastatingly. A good look at how people are prone to credit god whenever, focus on the heroes, survivors and victims; to shun the murderer as an evil person who doesn’t deserve any attention (his illness and what caused this certainly does need more attention if we wish to prevent horrifying events like this); and distractions about the gun debate and trying to find something to blame him for going over the edge – his illness, blame his illness. It’s not movies or evolution or video games or his mother. It’s like, even when people analyze this stuff somehow rationally, overlook the obvious. When it boils right down to it, people want an easy answer and banning costumes at movies is easier than figuring out how brains work and don’t sometimes work. Evident in this: people’s brains not working to comprehend that low statistical outcomes are still possible hardly ever, but are not, in fact, miracles from god.

luck =/= an all knowing, all powerful “all loving” power that controls the fate of the entire universe. that’s not too hard to understand, is it? most atheists have no problem with chance and “luck,” but to stretch that into the believers gods is a bridge way, way too far. 

He  (pastor) almost speaks about the doctors with DISTAIN… they helped that woman’s LIFE for Pete’s sake. I can understand believing in God and miracles… but DISTAIN for the DOCTORS? I don’t even…

http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/homicide.htm

Death by assault (homicide) for 2009:

Mortality

All homicides

Number of deaths: 16,799Deaths per 100,000 population: 5.5Cause of death rank: 15

Firearm homicides

Number of deaths: 11,493Deaths per 100,000 population: 3.7

My favorite example of “statistical unlikeliness does not imply miracle” is the Powerball.  Roughly a one-in-one hundred and ninety-six million chance of any one ticket hitting the jackpot, and yet the jackpot gets hit typically every month or so.  Are there really twelve miracles a year?  Or is just that for any infinitesimally-small probability of something happening, as number of chances that thing has of happening approaches infinity, the chance of it happening once becomes significantly large?

Weirdly, I think people partially understand that those are very long odds. I’m not sure they comprehend exactly how long those odds are, as demonstrations I’ve found on youtube, etc., just make it so much more dismal.

Where it really catches people is in the small day-to-day things, the close timing, the near misses. Something was about to kill me but I jumped out of the way just in time, because that’s the sort of thing that never happens. I don’t think people understand how many people do die or suffer injury from accidents, falls, etc., and how many people are, say, 5-10 feet away from a potential fatality as opposed to right next to it, or how their brains activate quick responses.  Even people who have been injured in an accident are sure that it should have killed them, and in many cases it would have, but not all. I’m not even sure I understand it all, as a lot of people have some scenario where they sensed to stop or go quicker right at the right time, as if their senses had access to let their brain know information they could not consciously realize before it was all over. And then again, most people have been injured, however slightly, by not reacting fast enough or reacting as fast but, hey, circumstances, and maybe it could have been worse… statistically between it not happening at all and having a much worse outcome always seems to amaze people. I think that being one of 12 people getting killed in a mass murder scenario has a hardly ever chance of happening (statistically a “miracle”), while getting killed by one person who only wants to kill you right then has a much greater chance of happening.

 Ray-  I’m just impressed with your mastery of the internets. 😉  Welcome.

Was that for someone else?

There were other survivors on the news with the exact same type of  “God saved me” story. Whatever helps them get over the tragedy I guess. 

Still, I could never personally believe I was worth saving more than the people who died. It’s amazingly selfish and self-centered that they think their life was more important in some cosmic way than those who were killed.

 By the way, what was Ted Bundy’s guardian angel doing when he was murdering all those women? Standing there twiddling its thumbs?

Maybe it won several invisible fights with the guardian angels of the victims, and that’s why the murders happened?

Maybe Ted’s G.A. did its level best helping Ted escape police detection after each murder?

Again, more examples of people just believing things for warm fuzzy reasons without seriously thinking of the implications and questions that should naturally arise if their silly belief was actually true.