Your's is a legitimate question with a fairly simple answer. I go to a church that spends a lot of money on the poor but also a lot of money on nice buildings and fun activities. Why not just give all the money to the poor and needy? Because building community and building a sanctuary where people can go to to be uplifted is important too. The people that go to my local church have vastly different income levels some who are dirt poor and some who make more than $100,000 a year. There are many who go to our local leader when they can't pay the bills and he helps them out. There are many low income kids who get to do things they never would get to do if it weren't for the church activities. There are single moms who only get a break when they go to church activities and there is someone there to watch their kids for a while. I know of many people who have gotten better jobs because people that they met at church helped them find better opportunities. I know many people who live in old run down homes, who get help from the church to fix up their homes and who enjoy going to a nice clean place to get away from the harried existence of their lives for a few hours.
Your summary of how the Bible came to be is very good, and I wish more people understood that. I personally believe in the Bible, but with the caveats that come with knowing how it came to be. That is, I believe that we can learn a lot about God from the Bible, but I don't think the Bible is the ultimate authority on God. One nit though, you said "If they were really eye witness accounts, then they would agree". I have found in real life two peoples accounts of what happened in a certain situation rarely agree exactly. Especially if they are recounting it years after it happened. My point is that the fact that certain parts of Mark and Matthew don't agree doesn't mean they were not first hand accounts.
You are right about semantic versus syntax, and of course static code analysis cannot catch a lot of things. But it is very useful to catch a lot of things so it doesn't miss the point, it just doesn't cover all the points that a manual code review could cover. What it does do though, is free up more time for doing more in depth code reviews because you don't have to waste as much time manually reviewing syntatic junk.
Would you like to eleborate on that or are you just giving a emotional response with no substance? Saying Religious people are full of shit is not a further your argument in any way. Nor does pointing out mispelling.
The article you referenced was a sad abuse of taking things out of context. His whole premise was based on the poor interpretation of the scriptures. His interpretation basically was Jesus said "You will get whatever you ask God for", this is obviously not true so Jesus is false. But his interpretation of Jesus' words are wrong because he took them out of context. God is not a vending machine where we push a button a get what we want. Jesus said those who believe. Now that means a lot of different things to a lot of different people. But true belief is not manifest by just saying you believe or going to church. It is by doing all the things that Jesus enumerated in the surrounding verses. If millions of people who where real believers prayered that an amputees legs would grow back, it is quite possible they would. More amazing things have happened.
This study is sham science at its best. It is utterly ridiculous in determining if prayer helps heart patients. It makes the assumption that God is an on-demand service and that if someone prays for something they automatically get it. So I guess they have proved that God does not give us everything we demand. Most religious people don't believe that God just does whatever we tell him, so this doesn't really show anything.
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Your's is a legitimate question with a fairly simple answer. I go to a church that spends a lot of money on the poor but also a lot of money on nice buildings and fun activities. Why not just give all the money to the poor and needy? Because building community and building a sanctuary where people can go to to be uplifted is important too. The people that go to my local church have vastly different income levels some who are dirt poor and some who make more than $100,000 a year. There are many who go to our local leader when they can't pay the bills and he helps them out. There are many low income kids who get to do things they never would get to do if it weren't for the church activities. There are single moms who only get a break when they go to church activities and there is someone there to watch their kids for a while. I know of many people who have gotten better jobs because people that they met at church helped them find better opportunities. I know many people who live in old run down homes, who get help from the church to fix up their homes and who enjoy going to a nice clean place to get away from the harried existence of their lives for a few hours.
Your summary of how the Bible came to be is very good, and I wish more people understood that. I personally believe in the Bible, but with the caveats that come with knowing how it came to be. That is, I believe that we can learn a lot about God from the Bible, but I don't think the Bible is the ultimate authority on God. One nit though, you said "If they were really eye witness accounts, then they would agree". I have found in real life two peoples accounts of what happened in a certain situation rarely agree exactly. Especially if they are recounting it years after it happened. My point is that the fact that certain parts of Mark and Matthew don't agree doesn't mean they were not first hand accounts.
You are right about semantic versus syntax, and of course static code analysis cannot catch a lot of things. But it is very useful to catch a lot of things so it doesn't miss the point, it just doesn't cover all the points that a manual code review could cover. What it does do though, is free up more time for doing more in depth code reviews because you don't have to waste as much time manually reviewing syntatic junk.
Would you like to eleborate on that or are you just giving a emotional response with no substance? Saying Religious people are full of shit is not a further your argument in any way. Nor does pointing out mispelling.
The article you referenced was a sad abuse of taking things out of context. His whole premise was based on the poor interpretation of the scriptures. His interpretation basically was Jesus said "You will get whatever you ask God for", this is obviously not true so Jesus is false. But his interpretation of Jesus' words are wrong because he took them out of context. God is not a vending machine where we push a button a get what we want. Jesus said those who believe. Now that means a lot of different things to a lot of different people. But true belief is not manifest by just saying you believe or going to church. It is by doing all the things that Jesus enumerated in the surrounding verses. If millions of people who where real believers prayered that an amputees legs would grow back, it is quite possible they would. More amazing things have happened.
This study is sham science at its best. It is utterly ridiculous in determining if prayer helps heart patients. It makes the assumption that God is an on-demand service and that if someone prays for something they automatically get it. So I guess they have proved that God does not give us everything we demand. Most religious people don't believe that God just does whatever we tell him, so this doesn't really show anything.