I’m sure a positive attitude helps. But remember, you can have a positive attitude without prayer, just like you can have a negative attitude even with prayer, and the other way around for both, as well. Prayer might help some achieve a positive attitude, but others can achieve it without prayer, and some who pray do not achieve a positive attitude.

Tobra is focusing on a dozen or so of his own patients that he believes prayer helped. There are four cases for the outcome of low probability surgery:

1) Patients that pray and have success
2) Patients that pray and do not have success
3) Patients that do not pray and have success
4) Patients that do not pray and do not have success

He is focusing on group 1, while conveniently ignoring or forgetting or in denial of groups 2, 3, and 4. To show that prayer itself has an effect (and rule out positive attitude achieved by other means), you’d have to show a statistical difference between the groups that pray and the groups that do not. This has never been shown.

Strangely (and fortunately) this is proving to not be true. Many cancer patients feel (and are told) that a "positive outlook" is helpful in their fight against the disease. The problem is that they just can't seem to have a "positive outlook". They're depressed (for good reason). The vicious cycle begins when they feel that their depression is actually making things worse and so they get more depressed, etc.

Luckily, studies have shown that a "positive outlook" really doesn't make any difference. This finding has been a relief to those patients who simply found it hard to "remain positive" in their situation.

LOL, resentful of a god that doesn't exist? Sorry, you must be confusing me with a deluded believer. Or maybe you were reading into my post something that is weighing on your mind/ideology.
I'll spell it out for you. Humans have an almost infinite capacity for self-delusion which is, of course, no better illustrated than by religious belief and the affirmations used to justify it. This is the message I was conveying with that allegory.

Oh, we all know the message you tirelessly and forcefully convey in each and every one of these religious threads, i think.
But if God is no more than thin air, why do you direct vociferous, oft-repeated assaults at something that does not exist?

Religion exists, god is imaginary.

Because not doing so will eventually result in a theocracy.

It is the ignorance and anti-intellectual ideology displayed by the "true believers" that is so deserving of derision. God belief is a form of repressive intellectual capitulation that can be quite malignant in and "dumbing" of society.

Jim, if God is imaginary, then we are nothing more than the result of evolution. Since religion does exist, why would you argue that this is a bad thing, nature has obviously programmed us this way, and we have used what nature has selected us to be to rise to where we are as a species. Why would you want to fight against this gift from nature and deny the existance of a God that nature wants us so badly to believe in?

You impart human like qualities to "Nature," in a way the religious do with their god, Taz. Nature doesn't "want us" to do anything. Nature doesn't care. We have to choose what we want to do, and live with our choices. :)

Some believe in a "god gene," although, I'm not one of them. I just think it's a behavioral trait to belong to a society to improve on one's safety and chances of survival. Religon is one such society. It's not one that I'm compelled to be a part of. :)

Nature also "programmed" some people to be mass murderers. "Evolution" also resulted in e. coli. I don't get your point.

Man created religion. That doesn't necessarily mean it's a good thing.

You actually believe your mean-spirited commentary to be helpful (let alone impactful) to society?

LOL, well, that's interesting. By all means, carry on. :)

In the distant past, humans that had a tendency to believe in a god and/or religion and/or those who spoke for those gods had a survival advantage over those who did not have this tendency. In the absence of modern governments and laws, religion was required as a means to control the masses. Rather than “steal something, go to jail” they had “steal something, go to hell.” Religions evolved over time, just like other aspects of our culture.

While religion might have been useful eons ago, it is no longer useful. In fact, it can be a major hindrance. The penultimate rules of religion are governments like the Taliban. This no longer has a place in our society, as we have the rule of law.

IROC, what man is is a result of evolution. Nothing is outside nature, and good and bad really aren't applicable terms.

Jim you are right, nature doesn't want us to do anything, however throughout recorded history the most successful human societies have shown a propensity for a belief in God. Since evolution is the result of successful adaptation, and religion is a tool which humans have ably used to achieve tremendous success, I think I want to see actual proof that humans as a species would be better off without religion before I would advocate disregarding God and religion.

God belief is a form of repressive intellectual capitulation that can be quite malignant in and "dumbing" of society.

I think this was one of the most succinct summations of religion I've ever read. I don't think it's mean-spirited at all. Religion thrives on the status quo and prefers the status prior. Religion expects unquestioning belief of it's dogma; the church is the infallible authority on all subjects. Depending on the religion in question, anyone who disagrees is branded a heretic, excommunicated, or killed.

If that's not repressive intellectual capitulation and dumbing of society then I don't know what is.

+1

Are the Mayans, Egyptians, Persians, Romans, Greeks, Dynastic Chinese, Phoenicians, etc., included in your thinking on this?

Whether or not "religion" serves any real benefit to society or not has no bearing at all on whether or not its basis (existence of a supernatural being) is true. Are you suggesting that we live our lives under a complete falsehood just because it may benefit some of those in society?

Kang, I want to see the proof that humans would be better off without religion. I mean it is easy to throw out the Taliban, but look where the rule of law got those under Stalin or Pol Pot.

Atheistic society doesn't necessarily correlate with brutal dictatorships. These dictators suppressed religion so as not to have a competing authority to challenge their brutal rule. Why can't we take a Republic/representative Democracy and go from there?

IROC, that is a very interesting concept. How can something imaginary be so pervasive and significant, and beneficial?

Jim are you using those as examples of atheistic socities?

Jim are you saying that religion would have been an effictive competitor to the brutal dictators (moreso than the rule of law)?