No, There Are NO Real Angels Among Us

Sent to The Star, Johannesburg, Thu 23/04/2015 18:08 in response to the reader’s letter below.  Not published.

Sir

I refer to the letter “Proof angels are among us” in The Star, Thursday April 23, by Judy Bennett.

Linden Cycle Shop is to be praised for their “angelic” behaviour.  They are obviously good people.

However, the letter can hardly convince us that real angels –mythical spirit beings commonly depicted with wings, haloes, and harps— exist.  Good people, or at least people who behave commendably in certain circumstances, definitely exist: The letter is proof of that.  Taking it as proof of the supernatural is not a logical conclusion.

It is also not logical of Ms Bennett to thank her god and pray for Linden Cycle shop.  What evidence does she have that a god was responsible, let alone the specific one that she believes in?

If I were the unnamed owner of Linden Cycle Shop, I would be annoyed that Ms Bennett believes that a supernatural agency made me behave well, rather than that I did it myself out of my own goodness!

As for praying, scientific studies of the effects of prayer have concluded that it does not work.  The most extensive of these was the "Study of the Therapeutic Effects of Intercessory Prayer" in 2006 (see the STEP project in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Studies_on_intercessory_prayer). It found that prayer had no noticeable effect on healing, unless patients knew they would receive prayers, in which case (on average) the patients fared worse!

Ms Bennett’s letter may be good for the cycle shop, but her prayers are just a way of pretending to do something, while doing nothing.

Thanks and RICKgards

ASA Defends Imaginary, Not True Values

Sent to The Star, Johannesburg Thu 10/11/2011 22:01, not published.

I refer to Irvine Moyo's letter "Ads can't venture where even angels dare not tread" in the Star Letters, Thursday November 10, supporting the ASA's banning of the Axe "Fallen Angels" advert.

The ASA should have banned Axe's adverts for their sexism, but we can see that the ASA supports religion but not gender equality.

Mr Moyo, you can wax lyrical about your "Almighty God", His Bible, and His Angels.  However the reality is that your god and his angels are imaginary, and your bible is a quaint collection of fables.

You like the moral standards given by the bible?  The bible approves of murdering people for collecting sticks on Saturday, the subjugation of women, slavery, and genocide.

If you do not want your religion to be mocked, you should not follow such a mockable religion.

Consider what you as a Christian probably believe: That in the face of all geological and other scientific evidence to the contrary, the earth is only a few thousand years old and was created over six days.  That god is one person and three people at the same time, which any maths teacher can tell you is nonsense.  That god committed adultery with another man's wife so that the other part of him could be born into the world.  That this part then died to make up for the sin we inherited from some people who ate the wrong fruit generations before.  But actually he didn't stay dead; he got his life back again.  That if a priest mumbles over wafers and wine, they become the flesh and blood of your god (never mind that no human DNA is present).  And you should take part in ritual cannibalism by eating this.

You probably also believe that anyone who doesn't believe what you do, will be tortured forever after they die by your just and loving god.

Muslims believe the latter too, except that you have to believe in their god.  And in a polygamist who flew to Jerusalem and heaven on a magical flying horse.  That if you enrich the corrupt dictatorship in Saudi Arabia and throw stones at a pillar, you will be blessed. And other nonsense like, if you do something really evil by blowing yourself up along with a lot of people you don't like, you will be rewarded in an unverifiable hereafter with many virgins. Or maybe they won't' be virgins, but raisins: What a let-down!

You think that such superstition deserves respect, instead of gales of raucous laughter?