Daniel Dennett - Rationality gone too far??

Now I know this is a little old but I dont think it's been discussed.

http://www.youtube.com/user/richarddawkinsdotnet#p/u/16/BvJZQwy9dvE

So basically here we have a 65+ year old atheist coming back from a near death cardiac arrest. When he recovers friends come to him and say that they prayed for him, he in response feels like telling them how stupid it is to pray, really?:?

People so sincerely prayed for you and all you gonna say is "Oh you fool, you should know how irrational the concept of praying is".:|

In defense of this I guess it could be said that because daniel is a known atheist and everybody who knows him is well aware of that, he has been a strong advocate of atheism all his life and it only shows his commitment and mental strength in the face of adversity to stay strong with his rationality and not let fear come in the way.

But if I am really not missing something here I just think this is rationality gone too far, yes it is the most rational thing to say from a pure logical point of view for an atheist but that's not the way life always happens. People who know that I am a religious sckeptic still tell me that they will pray for me so x and y goes well with me and I just thank them and be happy that people care for me. I just find it incredibly rude to laugh at someone who tells me that they will pray for me in a worldly matter(by worldly I mean not including the prayer of "seeing the light" and finding the true god, that's an entirely different matter).

What's your opinion on this?

 Sometimes it ok to just say thank you and maybe roll your eyes when they're not looking.

The appropriateness of such a response largely depends on the context of the situation. Recently my ex-girlfriend committed suicide and all of our mutual Christian friends were praying and making mentions of her in the afterlife. Should I have taken the rational approach and reminded them that there's no one to pray to and that my ex is simply dead rather than continuing her existence in another plane?

Well that's not what I did and it's not what I think a rational person should do. Not only do my friends already know my opinions about prayer and the afterlife (rendering a reminder pointless) but in all probability they are praying and thinking of her in heaven because it's helping them to cope with her death. To lunge into a point about the factual accuracy of their claims would be totally insensitive, overly combatative (insecure prehaps?) and completely unneccesary.

So really I think that rationality by itself doesn't quite do the trick when it comes to social interaction. You need a bit of sentiment there, not to work against rationality, but to complement it. When people pray for me (and this happens all the damn time at my Bible study) I simply stay quiet and let them go for it. If they're being thoughtful I'll thank them for it later and if they feel like discussing it I'll argue about it later. It all just depends on the context.

Dom, I'm sorry to hear about that tough time. I totally agree.

Personally, I think "people offering prayer" invokes feelings of absurdness, uslessness, seperation from responsibility and has darkly patronising overtones for me. Nonetheless, in my recent past life I've had to plan my own wedding and my Dad's funeral. Both events were hosted by an atheist celebrant/officiant and both ceremonies had time and space for people to pray if they wanted to.

I think rationalism is a method used to reach decisions, but I wouldn't like it as a tool to enforce ways of behaviour on people, or to deny them their own free thought.

I don't believe that prayer has any effect beyond a meditative one, but people who pray for someone's safety, health, or what have you are really at the heart of things saying that they want that person to be safe, healthy, and so forth.  And that really doesn't seem like something that it makes much sense to discourage.

I don't believe that prayer has any effect beyond a meditative one, but people who pray for someone's safety, health, or what have you are really at the heart of things saying that they want that person to be safe, healthy, and so forth. And that really doesn't seem like something that it makes much sense to discourage.

GabuEx

I agree. It's the sentiment that counts. It's like someone saying to me "I hope you find God in 2010.". I see that as an expression of hope, which I suppose is friendly because the person wants [what they believe is] the best for me. I would thank someone if they told me that they hope I come to whatever dogma they believe.