Wednesday, May 22, 2013

God's grace or chance in oklahoma tornado tragedy

I here people in Oklahoma City unwittingly indicting God of murder by saying "but for the grace of God I was spared from the tornado".  It sounds pious, but if God intentionally spared these people then he also intentionally refused to spare all those school children crushed in the rubble.  I think what these people mean is "there but for fortune" it could have been them instead.  But substituting the word "fortune" with "God's grace" is not an equivalent cut-and-paste replacement.  Fortune means it's an accident, but if God was pulling the puppet strings then it happened on purpose.  It makes a huge difference if something is merely bad luck, as opposed to a psychopath intentionally plotting an act of mass murder. And if we wouldn't accept such behavior from a human psychopath, why would God be held to a lower standard? Think about it.

Tuesday, May 21, 2013

Why would God murder oklahoma elementary school kids?

The flip side of the standard evangelical assertion that "god is in control" of everything is that he would have to be responsible when things go wrong, like when tornados rip through oklahoma city and kill dozens of children at their elementary school.  See, it doesn't work to say that it's just a natural disaster that is out of God's hands if he created the universe and everything in it, and constantly pulls strings to influence other minute details, like whether you get a parking space at the mall.  Furthermore, the standard "free will" excuse doesn't work too well with children in an elementary school in the suburbs of "God-fearing" Oklahoma City.  And the notion that god purposely created the tragedy to allow "greater good" to come through the rescue efforts, etc would be like excusing a mass-murderer like Adam Lanza, on the grounds that good things might ultimately result from his act of evil.

Friday, May 10, 2013

Sylvia Brown Wrong As Usual

Browne had a 50% chance of being right, when she wrongly claimed Amanda Berry was dead, and was clearly playing the odds that someone who hadn't been heard from in 10 years is already considered "legally dead" for purposes like insurance.  But, she was wrong, as usual.  It's hardly the first time that her coin flips have been wrong.  She also predicted that Obama wouldn't be re-elected.  In fact, as CSICOP notes, of 115 cases in which she has offered her "psychic detective services", 90 have been unsolved and in the other 25 that have been solved, she has been wrong in her predictions.   Thus, so far she is batting zero in terms of her crime solving services.