Religion and Medicine

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How would you classify YOURSELF. Definitions below in first post.

  • Theist

    Votes: 140 46.2%

  • Deist

    Votes: 28 9.2%

  • Atheist

    Votes: 102 33.7%

  • Other - Please explain

    Votes: 33 10.9%
  • Total voters
    303
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I didn't read through this whole thread, but yeah, I'm a Christian, and I'm happy. I don't feel like anything was forced upon me, and I don't desire to force anything upon anyone. I fully believe in science, and understand its limitations, and I fully believe in God.

I believe most folks hate religion because of the way it is presented to him. Quite to the contrary of what has been said, religion is quite logical and it requires reason. Christianity in particular is not based on forced morals, its fundamentally based on love, and i think that that is where most people are confused. Why did you wash the dishes when your parents asked you to (some of us, lol), because you love your parents, and out that love comes respect for what they ask you to do. I know that was a simple analogy, but it can still apply. I strive not to sin, not because I'm scared of eternal damnation in the LAKE OF HELL, lol, but because I love God, and out of that love comes respect for what He wants me to do.

But I do agree that alot of folks go about religion wrong, forcing it on others. Personally, religion didn't initially have a role in me choosing medicine, but it has certainly kept me in the game when I wanted to quit this ridiculously long and arduous journey. So yeah, thats my .02.
 
45% of future docs are idiots i guess
 
I went through a hard time figuring out what I believed and eventually came to believe in God and Christ. I think that evolution has many holes in it that are never pointed out and some of the "evidence" people have used to prove it has been completely falsified. I won't get into a theological debate b/c I won't convert anyone (nor is that what I am trying to do) but here is a website I have found that helped me in my journey. It is a mixture of science and faith for you science folk ;)


www.answersingenesis.org
 
omegaxx said:
Agnostic here. I don't think we can ever know, or that it can ever matter.
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You're absolutely right omega, except for one thing. The world clearly operates by natural laws, so whether or not there's a god doesn't really matter since his existence/non-existence adds nothing to our understanding of the world. The problem with calling yourself an agnostic is that although no one can ever really disprove the existence of god (since the definition is so mushy), just because something is possible doesn't make it probable. Just ask the little green man named Gazoo hovering over my shoulder, who only I can see. He agrees with me and says you should to, while we can never be certain there is no God, there might as well not be one.
 
ScroogeMcTroll said:
You're absolutely right omega, except for one thing. The world clearly operates by natural laws, so whether or not there's a god doesn't really matter since his existence/non-existence adds nothing to our understanding of the world. The problem with calling yourself an agnostic is that although no one can ever really disprove the existence of god (since the definition is so mushy), just because something is possible doesn't make it probable. Just ask the little green man named Gazoo hovering over my shoulder, who only I can see. He agrees with me and says you should to, while we can never be certain there is no God, there might as well not be one.
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Exactly. Theres the Agnostic's flaw.

All because something can/cannot be proven doesn't mean you cannot assess the situation logically and develop a probability.
 
Could someone start an evolution poll? I would, but I think mine would get shut down immediately. O:) Curious to see how the future doctors of the world think about that.
 
nascardoc said:
I went through a hard time figuring out what I believed and eventually came to believe in God and Christ. I think that evolution has many holes in it that are never pointed out and some of the "evidence" people have used to prove it has been completely falsified. I won't get into a theological debate b/c I won't convert anyone (nor is that what I am trying to do) but here is a website I have found that helped me in my journey. It is a mixture of science and faith for you science folk ;)


www.answersingenesis.org
Click to expand...

Taking Genesis "literally" is pretty small minded. I don't think there is really any spirituality in the whole of Genesis. Just because a monk says from begats that the earth is 6000 years old doesn't make it true. It is not written in the text at all and it is one cultural history/view on their place in the world. God didn't tell Adam and Eve when they were created.
 
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The whole the earth being 6000 years old thing comes from people adding up the lifetimes of people in the Bible. Since there's a pretty much straight lineage back to Adam and Eve, and they appeared on the 6th day, people who take the Bible literally think that's a clearcut date for the beginning of the universe. Personally, I think that Craigslist is the book of God, and his preachings are that we should all covet fat women and short men, and woo via pictures of our penises and lies about our ages and weights.
 
nascardoc said:
I went through a hard time figuring out what I believed and eventually came to believe in God and Christ. I think that evolution has many holes in it that are never pointed out and some of the "evidence" people have used to prove it has been completely falsified. I won't get into a theological debate b/c I won't convert anyone (nor is that what I am trying to do) but here is a website I have found that helped me in my journey. It is a mixture of science and faith for you science folk ;)


www.answersingenesis.org
Click to expand...

The problem with sites such as AiG or those run by the discovery institute is quite simply their extraordinary bias. Instead of trying to fill in the gaps they wildly grasp for any examples they can use to attack science. For example pouncing on a few misguided archeologists who falsly claimed to have discovered a new "ancient human species" in a quest for fame (when in fact they had planted fake bones), while at the same time ignoring the mountains of legitimate fossils from australopithecus all the way to homo sapiens.

If there is anything to be learned from the trends throughout history it is that making your religion contingent upon accepted scientific theories being wrong is a doomed strategy. The greeks were pretty sure the gods lived on Mt. Olympus, Christianity was quite convinced for a while that the earth was the center of the universe, and later that the heavenly bodies were in fact "heavenly bodies". As our understanding of nature has increased, the major religions have altered their teachings accordingly.

Evolution is just the latest example in this seemingly endless battle between science and religion. Asserting that your religion is right and evolution is wrong is just opening the door for science to come along and destroy your belief system. The continued mounting of evidence has been in favor of evolution not against. The simple solution is altering your religious views to jive with the observable body of evidence, not to stubbornly stand in the way of progress, as has so long been the case.

Again check out: http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/

Also a good book about how evolution and religion can be compatable is "Finding Darwin's God". If you happen to be by a library.
 
"Religion has actually convinced people that there's an invisible man, who watches everything you do and everything you say. And he has TEN things that he does NOT want you do to. And if you do any of those things, he will send you to a place of pain and torture and burning and filth to live for the rest of eternity!

...but he loves you."

-props to Carlin, loosely quoted of course
 
Agnostic. Can't prove it one way, can't prove it the other.
 
OncoCaP said:
A biased but interesting article. It's probably not reasonable to force physicians who believe that abortion is legalized murder of children to present that as an option.
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I could not disagree with you more. That is like saying it is not reasonable to force a doctor who is a Jehova's Witness to present a blood transfusion as a viable option to a trauma patient.
 
medhawk1 said:
I could not disagree with you more. That is like saying it is not reasonable to force a doctor who is a Jehova's Witness to present a blood transfusion as a viable option to a trauma patient.
Click to expand...

These are two extraordinarily different cases and circumstances. Comparing blood transfusions with abortions, in the manner that you do, isn't logical.
 
medhawk1 said:
I could not disagree with you more. That is like saying it is not reasonable to force a doctor who is a Jehova's Witness to present a blood transfusion as a viable option to a trauma patient.
Click to expand...

Well, if you believed that abortion was killing (murder) of a child, would you present it as an option? Let me put it to you this way, if murder of children under 4 was legal if the child was ******ed or similarly ill, a member of minority group that the government considered not worthy of living, would you administer the lethal dose or refer them to a physician that performs such procedures?

I don't know any Jehovah's Witnesses who are physicians, so I'm not sure how they handle this. I suggest you actually talk to one before you start talking about purely theoretical and non-relevant issues.
 
medhawk1 said:
I could not disagree with you more. That is like saying it is not reasonable to force a doctor who is a Jehova's Witness to present a blood transfusion as a viable option to a trauma patient.
Click to expand...
I believe they are required to do that actually. As Towelie said, your analogy does not work.
 
Towelie said:
These are two extraordinarily different cases and circumstances. Comparing blood transfusions with abortions, in the manner that you do, isn't logical.
Click to expand...


I know and have had conversations with only two Jehova's Witnesses, an admittedly small representation of the faith. However my understanding from them is that receiving/giving blood products is tantamount to tainting one's immortal soul. Which is based on their interpretation of the biblical admonition to "keep abstaining from blood" based on Acts 15:28, 29. This is certainly on par with aborting a fetus, where the very existence of a soul is in question.


There is in fact a network of Jehova's doctors who practice bloodless surgical techniques. As far as I know their is no requirement for them to inform their patients of the option of receiving whole blood. If I am mistaken and there is a requirement for them to inform patients, there should also be one for those doctor's opposed to birth control and abortions. Either way my analogy still holds weight.

As for the the post about whether I would inform patients or refer them to other doctors to kill their ******ed four year olds; If it was decided by our legal system that this was both legal and ethical, the short answer is yes I would tell them about the option and I would refer them if they wanted, but I would not go about euthanizing them myself. I guess I have never seen the role of a doctor being that of a person who hides relevant options from their patient for whatever reason.
 
Science tells us faith/religion is unscientific... does that mean it is false?
Should science be the ultimate authority that separates all truth from not-truth? I'm not sure.

However, F. Nietzche does repeatedly talk about the complex nature of truth in his writings. So, I think it would be wise for people to see truth as a multidimensional entity(?). In my opinion, claiming a single medium (or lens) as the sole approach to the truth is exceedingly arrogant.

:confused:
 
medhawk1 said:
There is in fact a network of Jehova's doctors who practice bloodless surgical techniques. As far as I know their is no requirement for them to inform their patients of the option of receiving whole blood. If I am mistaken and there is a requirement for them to inform patients, there should also be one for those doctor's opposed to birth control and abortions. Either way my analogy still holds weight.
Click to expand...

At least where I work the pre-op screening schedule has a specific check box for Jehovah's witnesses. If the patient checks said box, the surgeon and team explain to the patient that if a blood transfusion is needed (and they give them the liklihood based on the case), would you like the transfusion. If they say no, well so be it.

Many anesthesiologists have told me that they've seen patients die on the operating table because of a few obscure lines in the bible that they believe their God requires, even in matters of life and death. Hey, its not my place to judge. All i know is I rather be alive.
 
Just because you can scientifically debunk the Hebrew creation story, does not debunk the idea of a God, or even Christianity itself. You can think of the book of Genesis as a children's book, a way of God communicating to a people that would not understand the science behind it. Christians can argue that Genesis is not literal, but rather, a "children's book" explanation for things humans couldn't understand at the time.

(I'm agnostic btw.)
 
Expanding on the above post, and I'm sure someone has posted this already, since we're six friggin pages in, but if Christianity, Judaism, etc. are wrong, that doesn't disprove that God exists. It just means we got the story wrong. Oops.

I'm agnostic too, btw.
 
Mr. McDuck said:
Expanding on the above post, and I'm sure someone has posted this already, since we're six friggin pages in, but if Christianity, Judaism, etc. are wrong, that doesn't disprove that God exists. It just means we got the story wrong. Oops.

I'm agnostic too, btw.
Click to expand...

And that's precisely one of my own points when I have this discussion with other people. One person may call god Christ and another Krishna and yet another Allah, but at the end of the day the basic stories are similar across religions, the most basic moral principles are the same across cultures, its just the customs and stories to which they attach the name god that are different and yet sometimes not so different.

For instance, in Hinduism there's a story about Krishna holding up a mountain to save the earth by lifting the mountain to act as shelter for people due to a flood or something. I don't know the exact story but from what my mom has told me, the story is very similar to the story of Noah's Ark.
 
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