Making the illogical leap of faith

One of my friends recently confided in me (by which he told me over the phone, rather than on Facebook for all the world to see) that he took spiritual and superstitious explanations of the world seriously, because of an experience he'd had when he was younger. He used to play (as did I, obsessively) a football management computer game called Championship Manager, in which you choose a football team to manage and guide them to glory - or ignominy, as the case may be. But he fervently believed that he could go into another room, sit in a particular position that somehow felt right, and this action would influence the result of the match on the computer - it would allow him to win.

He didn't go into great detail about any other such experiences he'd had, although I'm sure, being of such a persuasion, they must have occurred to him. But that seems to be the basis for his beliefs in things like the theories of David Icke, and other supernatural explanations for existence. It's experiences like these that drive him to believe in some higher power - that there must be soem purpose to our lives.

I disagree. I dislike trying to skewer someone's obviously cherished beliefs to their face, but question marks were flashing in my mind even as he spoke.

For one thing, a football management game isn't strictly a game of chance. You pick your team, choose your tactics, and let them loose on rival teams. I know, because I spent countless days of my life doing the exact same thing. Gradually, you build up expertise, and buy better players, until you've got a team capable of beating the world. This was my experience. I could then have happily started a match, gone off downstairs to make a cup of tea, and returned to the screen to find a 5-0 victory awaiting. There was no luck involved, it was almost entirely perseverance and knowledge.

I don't suspect he did a controlled, blinded trial either, he just trusted in his feelings. Ben Goldacre posted on the illusions of control this weekend - it's terribly easy to fall into the trap of believing that somehow, skill, or some other agent, had a part to play in an outcome that on reality was only the result of blind chance. It's a simple task for our brains to weed out results that don't fit our preconceived ideas, and record only what conforms to what we expect.

Two other of my friends told me about an experience they'd had going to see a psychic medium show - they'd gone with their respective partners, and had ended up with tickets sitting next to each other. It doesn't take much for people to be impressed - what if they'd been sitting on seats on the other side of where they were sitting? Or a row in front, or behind? How big was the hall, exactly - how many chairs? Mathematically, what was the likelihood that they would end up sitting, if not next to, then very close to each other?

Mathematics can play a huge part in convincing us that some agent is causing a coincidence, rather than pure blind chance. The birthday problem is a great example of this. Assuming that everyone has the same chance of being born on any given day of the year, it only takes 23 people gathered in the same room to create a 50% probability of two of those people sharing the same birthday. Raise that number to 57, and the probability rises dramatically, counter-intuitively, to 99%.

Correlation does not always imply causation. A and B might invariably occur together, but that does not mean to say that A 'causes' B. B might very well cause A. Or an as yet unconsidered variable, C, might cause both, or perhaps a combination of D and E. Or maybe A and B might be entirely unrelated. But we so often make the illogical leap of faith to confirm our beliefs and superstitions.

God? Nothing to do with it

The rescue of the trapped miners in Chile was reported around the world, and, never ones to miss an opportunity, the respective churches in Chile have all tried to claim credit for the successful rescue.

"God has spoken to me clearly and guided my hand each step of the rescue," said Carlos Parra Diaz, a Seventh-day Adventist pastor at the San Jose mine. "He wanted the miners to be rescued and I am His instrument."

Yards from where he spoke Caspar Quintana, the Catholic bishop of Copiapo, prepared an altar to celebrate an outdoor mass for a small congregation of miners' relatives and phalanx of TV cameras. "God has heard our prayers," said the bishop. "I have received comments of encouragement from all over the world. Let us give thanks."

A litte bit further up the hill of Camp Hope, the improvised settlement of miners' families, rescuers, government officials and media, an evengelical preacher, Javier Soto , wandered from family to family with a guitar and songs of praise. "He listens to the music," said the pastor, gesturing to the azure sky.

Sadly, mining is a highly dangerous occupation, and the 29 miners trapped in the Pike River mine in New Zealand are now believed to have died, following a second explosion in the mine.

I don't think there will be many churches rushing to claim credit for their god this time.

No cure for cancer?

The pope has reportedly canonised Australia's first saint. However, the quality of the Guardian's reporting of the event was diminished for me by its unquestioning acceptance of her "healing" of two sufferers of leukaemia and lung cancer, respectively.

Really? Were these people really cured solely by praying to this nun, or was medicine involved in any way? Are there any reported incidents of cancer victims not being cured by the power of prayer? Were these miracles proven by scientific method? Somehow, I doubt it.

It's unhelpful when a paper like the Guardian, which really ought to know better, allows this superstitious nonsense to pass as news.

Haven't got the facility to post links to the article as we're visiting family for the day, but I will once I get back home.


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Chilean miners' rescue roundup

Bit late with this one, meant to write about this one yesterday, but I still need to get it off my chest.

The rescue of the trapped miners in Chile was fantastic news. Not only in the fact of their rescue, but also in the strength and solidarity of the miners and their loved ones, and the ingenuity shown by those in charge of the rescue operation. It's a story of human courage and tenacity, and deserves to be celebrated.

However, some people seem to think there were other forces at work. Bel Mooney, in the Daily Mail (for those outside the UK, Middle Britain's hate-organ of choice) writes that 

God and the Devil were in that mine. But it was God - and the human spirit - that triumphed.

Um, sorry? I think it was fairly well documented that there were 33 miners trapped. I think someone would have noticed if two supernatural beings had been hanging around ghoulishly as well. Actually, according to Mooney, someone did.

One of the miners said: ‘I was with God and the Devil. They fought. God won.’ We may feel remote from the simple, deeply held beliefs of that region, but you do not have to believe in God to be moved by such a powerful statement of the universal struggle.

This not only demonstrates the false consciousness of the religious, believing that God and the Devil were actually present down there, but Mooney's patronising ideas about the far-flung corners of the world where civilisation, so she believes has yet to penetrate. She even finds time to have a little chuckle at the natives' mating habits.

How many men, all over the world, will have shared a rueful fellow feeling with those San Jose miners who have been a little  -what shall I say? - careless with their love lives?

Even the most virtuous of husbands might have read of wives and mistresses, ignorant of each other’s existence, turning up at Camp Hope with assorted offspring and thought: ‘Oops, mate, now you’ll be in trouble’. Maybe a little ‘there but for fortune’ there, too!

Hang on - so there were adulterers down there too? What on earth was God thinking, allowing such blatant sinners to survive? Surely this was the ideal opportunity to show the world exactly what happens to those who disobey the Ten Commandments?

And has she stopped to consider why God was present for this accident, rather than the accidents which claim 34 lives a year, on average, in the mines of Chile since the year 2000? Truly, this God is a capricious and vengeful god, picking and choosing those he wishes to save.

Maybe Bel should register her opinion on this site, where you can vote in a poll to determine who really saved the miners, God or man. Guess who my money's on? (Thanks to Pharyngula for the link.)

Malawi atheists fight against superstition

Hats off to The Association of Secular Humanism in Malawi, which is fighting for the release of 

dozens of women jailed on allegations of practising witchcraft. The Association of Secular Humanism wants President Bingu wa Mutharika to order the immediate release of 80 women, many of them elderly, sentenced to up to six years imprisonment with hard labour. Most of them were accused of teaching witchcraft to children.

Witchcraft is not currently a crime under Malawian law, however, the government has set up a committee to investigate criminalising the practice.

Recently, Mr Mutharika pardoned Malawi's first openly gay couple after previously sentencing them to 14 years' imprisonment.

That last sentence shows the kind of man the President is. In pardoning the offending couple, President Mutharika said

In all aspects of reasoning, in all aspects of human understanding, these two gay boys were wrong - totally wrong.

However, now that they have been sentenced, I as the president of this country have the powers to pronounce on them and therefore, I have decided that with effect from today, they are pardoned and they will be released.

It's fairly clear from Mutharika's tone, and the hints in the article, that he only let the two go after pressure from countries like the UK and the US, whose aid budgets keep Malawi going, and also keep Mutharika flying to

Canada, Zambia, Namibia, Swaziland, Germany, China, U.S., Cuba and Iran. The president is scheduled to travel to India and Britain before the end of the year.

While the president gallivants around the world on spurious trips, his country suffers fuel rationing, with many businesses suspending operations.

Good luck to the atheists in Malawi, but I hold out little hope for lasting success with figureheads like that.

People I know personally who believe in gibberish

Talking to some work colleagues the other night, the conversation turned to the supernatural, and I was struck by how much superstition was actually present in  their heads.

Of the four of us, I'm an atheist. One other is a practising Catholic, although mostly for the purpose of getting his kids into the local Catholic school, which is one of the best in the area (best for indoctrinating small children into a hateful ideology? I didn't pursue this point). Another revealed himself to be a believer in all sorts of "spiritual" mumbo-jumbo, and the third related the story of his grandad dying, somehow, to coincide with some other family members' birthdays.

So, of the four of us, that made 25% atheist, and 75% nonsense. This got me thinking - what are the proportions in Britain as a whole? How much twaddle is swimming around in the heads of people we work or socialise with?

I found this survey from the British Humanist Association, which isn't as scary to read as I thought it might be. Just to cherry pick some stats:

•  63% of people say they are not religious (compared to 33% that do) from the Guardian
• 36% of people in the 18-34 age group in Britain define themselves as atheist or agnostic, from the Catholic weekly the Tablet
• Overall 62% of the population never attend any form of service, fromthe British Social Attitudes Survey
• 65% of young people are not religious. Though religious belief amongst the young has declined by 10% in less than 10 years, moral attitudes have not and fewer young people are racially prejudiced, from a report for the Department for Education.
• According to the 26th report of the British Social Attitudes Survey published in 2010, 71% of religious people and 92% non-religious (82% in total) believe that a doctor should be allowed to end the life of a patient with an incurable disease.

So, fairly cool. But, according to this article in the Guardian,

Half of British adults do not believe in evolution, with at least 22% preferring the theories of creationism or intelligent design to explain how the world came about, according to a survey.

Still a long way to go, then. But I'm a glass half-full man, anyway.