State Farm Syndrome Derail:Miracles.

[Bisto]

Here is the information I would need:

1. Who are the other physicians on the panel? I would want their full names, hospital affiliation, training history, and previous research history.
2. What religious affiliation do each of the physicians on the panel have? If they are all Roman Catholics, I am suspicious of their ability to be impartial. Even if the panel contains no agnostics or skeptics, if the panel had even a few Calvinist Protestants and liberal Jews who agree with the miracle claims, I would be impressed.
3. Does the Lourdes committee have a printed procedure for evaluating miracle claims that anyone can review?
4. Has the Lourdes committee published, in detail, one of the miracle cases with evidence "proving" a miracle occurred, as this doctor claims, in a respected, peer-reviewed, non-religion-affiliated, medical journal?
5. Has the Lourdes panel of experts released their findings on any one of these 69 "confirmed" miracles for outside experts to review?

These are the criteria that I would require for any claim. For instance, if a group of physicians and lay persons claimed that shark cartilage cures pancreatic cancer, I would be dubious of any expert panel consisting entirely of physicians who believe that holistic medicines cure cancer. I wouldn't object to a couple of holistic physicians being on the panel but I would want to see a diversity of worldviews on the panel, in particular, I would want oncologists with standard western medical views regarding the treatment of pancreatic cancer included.

Of course.

I have no idea about that data, but I'm sure if one looks hard enough it can be found. I found those three links in a 5 minutes search that day. I'm currently studying for some tests so I won't do it, but again, if I found this so quickly, what could you do? You know where to search these matters much better. This is your field.

See the second link. It's about a physician's article or book (I don't remember exactly), she says she started her research on the topic after she was called to give expert opinion on a miracle claim by the Catholic Church once, IIRC. I believe she mentions the panels having agnostics and skeptics.


After that, you might want to check the first link, though by comparison it was more methodological and not as interesting :p. I have no doubts you'll find more info if you actually search yourself. Probably more if you were to actually dig into this topic beyond the web and its browsers.

[Gary]

Of course.

I have no idea about that data, but I'm sure if one looks hard enough it can be found. I found those three links in a 5 minutes search that day. I'm currently studying for some tests so I won't do it, but again, if I found this so quickly, what could you do? You know where to search these matters much better. This is your field.

See the second link. It's about a physician's article or book (I don't remember exactly), she says she started her research on the topic after she was called to give expert opinion on a miracle claim by the Catholic Church once, IIRC. I believe she mentions the panels having agnostics and skeptics.


After that, you might want to check the first link, though by comparison it was more methodological and not as interesting :p. I have no doubts you'll find more info if you actually search yourself. Probably more if you were to actually dig into this topic beyond the web and its browsers.

I will check out your second article.

Just remember: I read an entire book on miracles, so I am not just pulling things off of the internet.

[Bisto]

Here is the difference between proponents of alternative medicine such as myself and proponents of miracles.

I offer alternative treatment options with the clear understanding given to my patients that the treatment is investigational or alternative and that the treatment has not undergone the intense studies normally required by western medicine to determine its effectiveness to be considered standard medical treatment. If the patient chooses to try the alternative treatment, they do so because others have claimed success with the treatment, not because there are studies proving the alternative treatment is a proven cure for the health issue in question.

Proponents of miracles push prayer as a proven cure! That is the big difference.

If Christians would advise people that prayer may be an effective treatment; that many people have anecdotally seen improvement after prayer, BUT, that there are no medical or other scientific studies that prove the effectiveness of prayer in healing cancer, blindness, lameness, death, that would be one thing. But proponents of miracles push prayers for healing as a proven means of healing.

I give a disclaimer verbally and in writing for my alternative treatments, Christians do NOT!

I get your point. I was just saying that for some atheist who doesn't want to read too much on the topic, your case might SEEM amusing, and might even cement their own naturalistic beliefs at your expense in ways you wouldn't achieve if you weren't somehow related to alternative medicine.

[Bisto]

I will check out your second article.

Just remember: I read an entire book on miracles, so I am not just pulling things off of the internet.

I know. I was saying in case you happened to be planning on researching miracles as a hobby of sorts. I'm sure you would have access to resources not found on the web.

Heads up: now that I look at my message again, I put four links, the second of which is simply the source of the first. The one I'm talking about here is the third link, or "second source".

[Gary]

Third time.


You can assess the sites' credibilities by yourself. That was the point of the private message in the first place. I trust you can do it better than me.

1.) Ok, so I read your article from the New England Journal of Medicine listed above; obviously the NEJM is a respected medical journal. The article is a book review. Here are some excerpts:

---Medical Miracles: Doctors, Saints, and Healing in the Modern World
By Jacalyn Duffin. 285 pp., illustrated. New York, Oxford University Press, 2009. $29.95. ISBN: 978-0-19-533650-4

---This book is an important new study of the relationship between religion and medicine. Penned by a well-established medical scientist and modern historian, it places this relationship at the forefront of research on miracles.

---After an opening chapter on the making of saints, Duffin takes a statistical approach to miracles in chapters on the supplicants and the saints, the illnesses that were involved, the role of the doctor, and the various dramas — such as invocations and pilgrimages — that were enacted in quests for cures. With so many miracles, drawn from six continents, the statistical approach is unavoidable, but it does lead to a lack of specificity. Many of these cases demand the kind of contextualized micro-study that medievalists now undertake. Yet Duffin recognizes the limitations of her survey, and she is committed to nonretrospective diagnosis of illness.

---Duffin argues that religion and medicine are remarkably similar belief systems, with the same attention to evidence and standards of proof, and that both exist as ways for people to deal with suffering and dying. Although this study will no doubt prove controversial among physicians, it opens up a realm of opportunities to historians, for whom it will no doubt become a seminal work. Medievalists, too, will now have to reconsider their own work in the light of Duffin's findings.

Gary: This is NOT a study to confirm any specific miracle, only a history of miracle claims and how the Catholic Church in particular investigates those claims. Just because the Catholic Church can find a couple of physicians who are willing to say "It must have been a miracle" does not cut it. We need an independent, unbiased panel of experts to conduct a thorough investigation and publish its findings in a respected, non-religion-affiliated medical journal.

Nick et al demand mythicists to accept the standards of evidence for History and NT Studies. Nick et al should then be consistent and accept the standards of evidence for Medicine. But they do not. Nick and his conservative Christian colleagues are being inconsistent.


2.) I briefly skimmed this article that you mention in your comment: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/arti...00586-0027.pdf

It is a very long article in the British Journal of Medicine, written in 1983, in which the author compares miracle claims from the seventh century to miracle claims in the twentieth century. I did not read the entire article as that would take several hours, but I did look at the opening paragraphs and the conclusion. Here is what is said in the conclusion:

"No attempt has been made to prove that miracles have occurred, such proof being probably impossible. The adjective "miraculous" is however permissible as a convenient short hand for an otherwise almost inexplicable healing which occurs after prayer to God and brings honour to the Lord Jesus Christ."

What do we notice in this statement:

---The author defines a miracle as an ALMOST inexplicable healing which occurs after prayer to God. But if it is almost inexplicable, that means that there are still possible natural explanations, so jumping to "It's a miracle" is premature.

---The author admits that he made no attempt to prove the miracles, so once again we have a collection of anecdotal claims of miracles.

---The author is NOT unbiased by any stretch of the imagination since he believes that miracles "bring honor to the Lord Jesus Christ"!!! Can you imagine such a statement in the New England Journal of Medicine??? I don't think so.

Notice that a miracle is defined as an almost inexpliclable healing after prayer. But what about all the non-healings that occur after prayer? Even Christians admit that most prayers for healing, and especially most prayers for resuscitation from death, are NOT answered with a healing or resuscitation. Most people who pray for a cancer cure are NOT cured after prayer. Most people who pray to be healed of paralysis are NOT healed after prayer. Most people who die and are prayed for do not rise from the dead after prayer.

If every time someone prayed for healing a healing occurred, THAT would be great evidence for the reality of miracles. Even if most times that someone prayed for healing, healing takes place, that would be great evidence for the reality of miracles. But since only a few prayers result in healing out of the billions of prayers for healing that have been directed to God, isn't it much more likely, my Christian friends, that the few healings which occur immediately after a prayer has been said is nothing other than...random chance?

[Bisto]

1. Ok, so I read your article from the New England Journal of Medicine listed above; obviously the NEJM is a respected medical journal. The article is a book review. Here are some excerpts:

---Medical Miracles: Doctors, Saints, and Healing in the Modern World
By Jacalyn Duffin. 285 pp., illustrated. New York, Oxford University Press, 2009. $29.95. ISBN: 978-0-19-533650-4

---This book is an important new study of the relationship between religion and medicine. Penned by a well-established medical scientist and modern historian, it places this relationship at the forefront of research on miracles.

---After an opening chapter on the making of saints, Duffin takes a statistical approach to miracles in chapters on the supplicants and the saints, the illnesses that were involved, the role of the doctor, and the various dramas — such as invocations and pilgrimages — that were enacted in quests for cures. With so many miracles, drawn from six continents, the statistical approach is unavoidable, but it does lead to a lack of specificity. Many of these cases demand the kind of contextualized micro-study that medievalists now undertake. Yet Duffin recognizes the limitations of her survey, and she is committed to nonretrospective diagnosis of illness.

---Duffin argues that religion and medicine are remarkably similar belief systems, with the same attention to evidence and standards of proof, and that both exist as ways for people to deal with suffering and dying. Although this study will no doubt prove controversial among physicians, it opens up a realm of opportunities to historians, for whom it will no doubt become a seminal work. Medievalists, too, will now have to reconsider their own work in the light of Duffin's findings.

Gary: This is NOT a study to confirm any specific miracle, only a history of miracle claims and how the Catholic Church in particular investigates those claims. Just because the Catholic Church can find a couple of physicians who are willing to say "It must have been a miracle" does not cut it. We need an independent, unbiased panel of experts to conduct a thorough investigation and publish its findings in a respected, non-religion-affiliated medical journal.

Nick et al demand mythicists to accept the standards of evidence for History and NT Studies. Nick et al should then be consistent and accept the standards of evidence for Medicine. But they do not. Nick and his conservative Christian colleagues are being inconsistent.

Now that I look for it, here's said book on Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Medical-Miracl.../dp/019533650X

From the look of things, Yes, indeed, it doesn't attempt to prove any one miracle, but to show instead the increasing exhaustiveness with which the Catholic Church evaluates miracle claims, and how their approach and that of Medicine itself grow together -- arguing, it seems, that both disciplines are not that different, historically speaking.

About the author:

Jacalyn Duffin, M.D. (Toronto 1974), FRCP(C) (1979), Ph.D. (Sorbonne 1985), is Professor in the Hannah Chair of the History of Medicine at Queen's University in Kingston where she has taught in medicine, philosophy, history, and law for more than twenty years.

A practicing hematologist, a historian, a mother and grandmother, she has served as President of both the American Association for the History of Medicine and the Canadian Society for the History of Medicine. She holds a number of awards and honours for research, writing, service, and teaching.

She is the author of five books, editor of two anthologies, and has published many research articles. Her most recent book is an analysis of the medical aspects of canonization, Medical Miracles; Doctors, Saints, and Healing in the Modern World, Oxford University Press, 2009. It was awarded the Hannah Medal of the Royal Society of Canada in November 2009. The second expanded edition of her History of Medicine a Scandalously Short Introduction, appeared in May 2010.

Her CV and teaching profile are at http://meds.queensu.ca/medicine/histm/index.html

A few reviews point out that she was a skeptic when she was first approached for the process.

From the reviews on Amazon, here's a quote from the book that you might want to mine:

"[In the face of medical miracles] medical scientists are not prepared to attribute the unknown to God . . . their discomfort also arises from a kind of faith - the absolute belief in the nontranscendence of earthly events. Like those who believe in God, they believe in the existence of a natural explanation, as yet unknown but open for discovery . . . But as Mark Corner wrote, 'there can be no certainty (since we obviously cannot anticipate what medical science will know in a century's time) that a miracle has taken place. At the same time, however, there is no certainty that a miracle has not taken place.' . . . only another form of belief sustains that interpretation" (page 189).

You could argue thus too, if so you choose.

[Bisto]

2.) I briefly skimmed this article that you mention in your comment: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/arti...00586-0027.pdf

It is a very long article in the British Journal of Medicine, written in 1983, in which the author compares miracle claims from the seventh century to miracle claims in the twentieth century. I did not read the entire article as that would take several hours, but I did look at the opening paragraphs and the conclusion. Here is what is said in the conclusion:

"No attempt has been made to prove that miracles have occurred, such proof being probably impossible. The adjective "miraculous" is however permissible as a convenient short hand for an otherwise almost inexplicable healing which occurs after prayer to God and brings honour to the Lord Jesus Christ."

What do we notice in this statement:

---The author defines a miracle as an ALMOST inexplicable healing which occurs after prayer to God. But if it is almost inexplicable, that means that there are still possible natural explanations, so jumping to "It's a miracle" is premature.

---The author admits that he made no attempt to prove the miracles, so once again we have a collection of anecdotal claims of miracles.

---The author is NOT unbiased by any stretch of the imagination since he believes that miracles "bring honor to the Lord Jesus Christ"!!! Can you imagine such a statement in the New England Journal of Medicine??? I don't think so.

I do not know what he meant by "almost inexplicable". From his use of it, he argues similarly to how others do about "inexplicable" recoveries. You can also stop with the bias thing, it goes pretty obviously both ways when dealing with topics with implications outside the fields themselves and adds nothing to the discussion. And unless the article is being deliberately deceptive, I would think this did appear in said journal at some point in time. Maybe people were still gullible in the eighties?

Notice that a miracle is defined as an almost inexpliclable healing after prayer. But what about all the non-healings that occur after prayer? Even Christians admit that most prayers for healing, and especially most prayers for resuscitation from death, are NOT answered with a healing or resuscitation. Most people who pray for a cancer cure are NOT cured after prayer. Most people who pray to be healed of paralysis are NOT healed after prayer. Most people who die and are prayed for do not rise from the dead after prayer.

If every time someone prayed for healing a healing occurred, THAT would be great evidence for the reality of miracles. Even if most times that someone prayed for healing, healing takes place, that would be great evidence for the reality of miracles...

These last paragraphs brought to mind the goalposts memes you always get. It seems that, IF you eventually get your hands on witness from independent, mixed-religious-views experts on the "unexplainable-ness" of a miracle claim, you might fall back on this (strawman, as you know) argument from un-answered prayer against the potential reality of actual miracle claims.

...But since only a few prayers result in healing out of the billions of prayers for healing that have been directed to God, isn't it much more likely, my Christian friends, that the few healings which occur immediately after a prayer has been said is nothing other than...random chance?

I believe biology and medicine are naturalistic disciplines. A point of asking for experts must be to verify that the stuff being verified didn't spontaneously happen at random, don't you think?

Perhaps you can always fall back on an argument like "You can never be 100% sure!!!", but, is that how you guys do it in Medicine to decide stuff? At least we're clear that's not how History is done. And like in the quote I posted in my previous message, you can always think "Perhaps in X years we will know how this can happen". But then you have no basis. You just believe it will have to be so. Isn't that what you call faith?


SO... If you had access to the medical statements by independent doctors giving their expert opinion on the "inexplicable-ness" of a sudden recovery, would that persuade you of the reality of miracles? Because if Mrs. Duffin is to be believed, these things are open to the public. You might see if you get access to the records of some modern miracle claim -- after all, you are a doctor. If you have good enough of a CV in your profession, maybe they'll consider calling you next time





@apologiaphoenix: Mr. Nick, do you think this would make an interesting Book Plunge and/or Podcast guest? :-P

[Adrift]

Got something against the Irish, Gary?

*There are no unbiased people, or unbiased products of people.

He's looking for that mythical individual: an expert who has the cognitive dissonance to witness and verify the truly miraculous without accepting a source for the miraculous. Unfortunately, so many people, once they've witnessed the miraculous, end up believing.

Essentially, he's stacked the deck so that it's impossible for him to accept the miraculous, which is perfectly in line with something a self-confessed Non-supernaturalist is likely to do. Despite his repeated cries to the contrary, he does not, and (outside of maybe a kick in the rump by the HS) will not accept that a "miracle cause" is possible.

[Gary]

Now that I look for it, here's said book on Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Medical-Miracl.../dp/019533650X

From the look of things, Yes, indeed, it doesn't attempt to prove any one miracle, but to show instead the increasing exhaustiveness with which the Catholic Church evaluates miracle claims, and how their approach and that of Medicine itself grow together -- arguing, it seems, that both disciplines are not that different, historically speaking.

About the author:

A few reviews point out that she was a skeptic when she was first approached for the process.

From the reviews on Amazon, here's a quote from the book that you might want to mine:

You could argue thus too, if so you choose.

I agree, and have said so several times before: Skeptics of miracles cannot prove that miracles do not exist.

Skeptics can only point out that no miracle has ever been proven, by the standards of the experts in the relevant field, to exist. The existence of miracles, as well as the existence of leprechauns, fairies, and goblins, and other metaphysical concepts cannot be disproven, but until better evidence is provided that they do exist, I suggest we ignore them all.

[Gary]

I do not know what he meant by "almost inexplicable". From his use of it, he argues similarly to how others do about "inexplicable" recoveries. You can also stop with the bias thing, it goes pretty obviously both ways when dealing with topics with implications outside the fields themselves and adds nothing to the discussion. And unless the article is being deliberately deceptive, I would think this did appear in said journal at some point in time. Maybe people were still gullible in the eighties?



These last paragraphs brought to mind the goalposts memes you always get. It seems that, IF you eventually get your hands on witness from independent, mixed-religious-views experts on the "unexplainable-ness" of a miracle claim, you might fall back on this (strawman, as you know) argument from un-answered prayer against the potential reality of actual miracle claims.


I believe biology and medicine are naturalistic disciplines. A point of asking for experts must be to verify that the stuff being verified didn't spontaneously happen at random, don't you think?

Perhaps you can always fall back on an argument like "You can never be 100% sure!!!", but, is that how you guys do it in Medicine to decide stuff? At least we're clear that's not how History is done. And like in the quote I posted in my previous message, you can always think "Perhaps in X years we will know how this can happen". But then you have no basis. You just believe it will have to be so. Isn't that what you call faith?


SO... If you had access to the medical statements by independent doctors giving their expert opinion on the "inexplicable-ness" of a sudden recovery, would that persuade you of the reality of miracles? Because if Mrs. Duffin is to be believed, these things are open to the public. You might see if you get access to the records of some modern miracle claim -- after all, you are a doctor. If you have good enough of a CV in your profession, maybe they'll consider calling you next time





@apologiaphoenix: Mr. Nick, do you think this would make an interesting Book Plunge and/or Podcast guest? :-P

Bisto: I am not the one setting the standard for the believability of miracles related to health recoveries. Medicine has set the standard for ALL medical cure claims. If you don't think those standards are fair, take it up with organized western medicine. My opinion isn't worth much.

But, speaking personally, if a panel of unbiased medical experts investigated an unusual health recovery and found that there is no possible natural explanation for the recovery and published this in a peer-reviewed journal article, and after a period of time, no expert in the field could demonstrate that the study was flawed, I would then be willing to admit that it is possible that a supernatural event had occurred.

But I am not going to believe in supernatural causation based simply on anecdotal claims, even by physicians. I want a thorough review, just as I would want a thorough review for any herbal cancer cure claim. No more, no less. I am being consistent.

Bottomline: If Christians expect mythicists to accept the consensus position of relevant experts on the historicity of Jesus, then to be consistent, they must accept the consensus position of relevant experts regarding the unproven status of miracle healings. Nick can't decry the mythicists for accusing the relevant experts of being biased regarding Jesus while at the same time using the same excuse to reject the relevant expert opinion regarding the unproven status of miracle healings. Nick can't have it both ways.

Accept the obvious, my Christian friends: Miracles have not been proven to exist, therefore, there is no proof of a miracle-producing God, therefore, there is no reason to believe that a once in history resurrection is a more probable explanation for the early Christian Resurrection belief than that someone moved the body or that there was no tomb to begin with.

I've done what Nick asked. I've read his book. Now Nick should demonstrate some integrity and admit that his argument has been defeated.

[Adrift]

Medicine has set the standard for ALL medical cure claims. If you don't think those standards are fair, take it up with organized western medicine. My opinion isn't worth much.


But, speaking personally, if a panel of unbiased medical experts investigated an unusual health recovery and found that there is no possible natural explanation for the recovery and published this in a peer-reviewed journal article, and after a period of time, no expert in the field could demonstrate that the study was flawed, I would then be willing to admit that it is possible that a supernatural event had occurred.

But I am not going to believe in supernatural causation based simply on anecdotal claims, even by physicians. I want a thorough review, just as I would want a thorough review for any herbal cancer cure claim. No more, no less. I am being consistent.

If you were consistent, you'd stop practicing "alternative" pseudomedicine altogether.

Source: John Farley, Ph.D., professor of physics at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas

"Integrative" medicine is purportedly combining alternative and mainstream approaches to medicine. The claim is that integrative medicine provides the best of both approaches. This may sound reasonable, but actually it is not. Suppose that the "integrative" approach were to spread beyond medicine, and were to be more broadly adopted by other disciplines in the sciences. The biologists would "integrate" creationism with Darwinian evolution, while the chemists would integrate alchemy into modern scientific chemistry. The geologists would integrate the belief that the world is only 6000 years old (and flat) with modern dating of rocks. Physicists would integrate perpetual motion machines with the conservation of energy and the laws of thermodynamics. And the astronomers would integrate astrology and astronomy. Of course, this is ridiculous. It's not a good idea to integrate nonsense with valid scientific knowledge.

© Copyright Original Source

[Sparko]

He peddles what is widely known as "integrative medicine" which is a combination of orthodox medicine and pseudomedicine including acupuncture, herbal therapy, and prolotherapy among other "alternative treatments" (many of which originate in eastern mysticism, and 19th century spiritualism). Alternative therapy is largely considered quackery and pseudoscience, and there are physician blogs and networks like the National Council Against Health Fraud and Quackwatch that warn patients about the fraudulent, largely placebo and potentially dangerous alternative treatments he practices.

You can read a bit about what some of the nation's top physicians say about his treatments here and here.

Of course, he believes that people pointing out his hypocrisy in extolling what many experts consider nothing more than superstitious woo, while he himself rails against the miraculous for being superstitious nonsense, is actually some sort of sinister cultic plan on my part to besmirch his good name or something stupid like that. The guy's a huckster and a quack, and his posts expose an angry little man who thinks he's shaking his fist at heaven whenever he jumps up onto his soapbox here and on his crappy little blog.

there goes another irony meter factory.

A pseudoscience quack railing against religion and claiming that everything should be evaluated by experts in science, except his own field, of course.

yeah that fits with the Gary I have been reading. Thanks, Adrift.

[Sparko]

Medical experts can never rule out a supernatural cause for a health recovery since the supernatural/metaphysical defies investigation by the standard means of investigating evidence using the scientific method. Therefore a miracle cause, a supernatural cause, is ALWAYS possible.

Let me repeat that: A miracle cause is ALWAYS possible. Medical experts, including myself, have never said that miracles are non-existent/impossible.

However, if an expert, unbiased medical panel were to come to the conclusion that a particular health recovery (cure) has no known natural explanation and that it defies the laws of nature and science, THAT would be earth-shaking. If Christians could present such a miracle case this would be excellent evidence for the reality of miracles. The problem, however, is that no miracle has ever been found that meets this standard. There are always potential natural explanations, and by the laws of probability, a natural cause, which is known to have occurred on at least a couple of times in the past, is more probable than an act of the divine which has NEVER been proven to have previously occurred.

My employment and profession is irrelevant to the discussion. This discussion is not about me.

Perhaps you should go back and read that link I gave you, or the links that Bisto gave you. You don't think such evidence or cases exist because you refuse to accept any that claim to be so. Your bias limits your viewpoint to the cases that have a natural explanation. Also who is to say that God doesn't use natural solutions to create miraculous recoveries? God can heal anyway he wants to. He actually CREATED nature, ya know? so using nature is well within the bounds.

And now I know your profession thanks to Adrift. You should be the last person to claim that we should base our "truths" soley on science, since your profession relies on pseudoscience and mumbo-jumbo to heal people. If it does work, it isn't because of accepted scientific truth, it is because of something science claims is wrong and unworkable. Yet you peddle it just the same.

[Sparko]

Here is the difference between proponents of alternative medicine such as myself and proponents of miracles.

I offer alternative treatment options with the clear understanding given to my patients that the treatment is investigational or alternative and that the treatment has not undergone the intense studies normally required by western medicine to determine its effectiveness to be considered standard medical treatment. If the patient chooses to try the alternative treatment, they do so because others have claimed success with the treatment, not because there are studies proving the alternative treatment is a proven cure for the health issue in question.

Proponents of miracles push prayer as a proven cure! That is the big difference.

If Christians would advise people that prayer may be an effective treatment; that many people have anecdotally seen improvement after prayer, BUT, that there are no medical or other scientific studies that prove the effectiveness of prayer in healing cancer, blindness, lameness, death, that would be one thing. But proponents of miracles push prayers for healing as a proven means of healing.

I give a disclaimer verbally and in writing for my alternative treatments, Christians do NOT!

That is basically a strawman, Gary. Other than the word-of-faith TV Evangelists like Benny Hinn who no orthodox Christian thinks is legitimate, Christians do not promise that prayer WILL cure or heal anyone. Sometimes God's answer is NO. Just like when Paul asked him to heal the thorn in his side and God said no. Just like when Jesus prayed for the cup to be taken away (the burden of the crucifixion) and God said "no" -

Prayer isn't a cure all and God isn't a vending machine, you don't pop in a prayer and out comes a miracle. God has his own plans. Sometimes he heals, sometimes he doesn't. Prayer is about aligning your will with God's, not God's will to yours. It is about accepting what is to come. To ask for healing, but if healing doesn't happen, to give you the courage and grace to carry on and accept that.

We believe in the power of prayer, but we don't claim the answer is always "yes"

You don't believe in your "alternative medicines" and yet you offer them to your patients anyway telling them it might work. And you do it for money. You don't care if you cure your patients or not, you just want their money. You are like the televangelists, not us. Benny Hinn doesn't really care if the people on his stage are really cured or not. He just wants people to give him money for the show he puts on. You are putting on a show too, and you do it for money. You pretend to be a doctor like Hinn pretends to be a servant of God. You make me sick. and that is not a pun.

[Sparko]

If every time someone prayed for healing a healing occurred, THAT would be great evidence for the reality of miracles. Even if most times that someone prayed for healing, healing takes place, that would be great evidence for the reality of miracles. But since only a few prayers result in healing out of the billions of prayers for healing that have been directed to God, isn't it much more likely, my Christian friends, that the few healings which occur immediately after a prayer has been said is nothing other than...random chance?

Weren't you just arguing that if Christians didn't claim that prayer was PROVEN to create miracle cures, and that if Christians just said it might help sometimes, like your "alternative medicines" that you would have no problem with it?

If Christians would advise people that prayer may be an effective treatment; that many people have anecdotally seen improvement after prayer, BUT, that there are no medical or other scientific studies that prove the effectiveness of prayer in healing cancer, blindness, lameness, death, that would be one thing.

And yet here you are claiming because prayer only works sometimes, that it is just random chance and not prayer that helps.

The same could be said about your alternative medicines. If it only works sometimes and hasn't be scientifically proven to work all of the time or most of the time, then isn't it likely that it is just random chance and you are taking their money and giving them false hope? That you are just selling snake oil? That you are nothing but a conman?