# If you were raised to believe disease was caused by curses, would you still believe it today? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [June 26, 2012, 6:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-were-raised-to-believe-disease-was-caused-by-curses-would-you-still-believe-it-today/626376 "2012-06-26T18:54:12Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![MyFactCheckBounced](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/46a35a/32.png) [@MyFactCheckBounced](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MyFactCheckBounced)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2012, 3:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-were-raised-to-believe-disease-was-caused-by-curses-would-you-still-believe-it-today/626376/101 "2012-07-04T15:43:40Z")
> [@Victor\_Charlie](#): > > Schroedinger’s Cat has nothing to do with self-created reality. In answer to the OP: it’s not curses, it’s demons. Dumbass. In answer to the above, we’ve obviously determined that God both exists and does not exist, until we open the box and observe him. He’s either withered into nothingness from the sustained attack of logicians, or not. The only way to know is to open the box. Trouble is figuring out what constitutes the box. Until we all universally agree what the box is, and what constitutes opening it, we’re sort of ultimately stuck with uncertainty on the subject, if we’re playing by quantum rules. That said, in practical application, I think we’ve got it about right in the U.S. Everybody’s _meshugas_ on the subject is their own business, unless and until it bumps into someone else’s _meshugas._ And they say we’ve lost our humility 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2012, 4:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-were-raised-to-believe-disease-was-caused-by-curses-would-you-still-believe-it-today/626376/102 "2012-07-04T16:00:40Z")
> [@MyFactCheckBounced](#): > > Dumbass. Not in Great Debates. Don’t do this again. [/Moderating] ---
**Author:** ![MyFactCheckBounced](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/46a35a/32.png) [@MyFactCheckBounced](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MyFactCheckBounced)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2012, 5:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-were-raised-to-believe-disease-was-caused-by-curses-would-you-still-believe-it-today/626376/103 "2012-07-04T17:01:53Z")
> [@tomndebb](#): > > Not in Great Debates. > > Don’t do this again. > > [/Moderating] Sorry man. I thought it was clear that the jibe in this case would be understood to be entirely ironic and good-natured to boot. ---
**Author:** ![Musicat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/musicat/32/20189_2.png) [@Musicat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Musicat)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2012, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-were-raised-to-believe-disease-was-caused-by-curses-would-you-still-believe-it-today/626376/104 "2012-07-04T17:42:33Z")
> [@MyFactCheckBounced](#): > > Sorry man. I thought it was clear that the jibe in this case would be understood to be entirely ironic and good-natured to boot. Welcome 🙂 to the 😉 world :rolleyes: of smileys. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![ITR\_champion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/c67d28/32.png) [@ITR\_champion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ITR_champion)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2012, 11:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-were-raised-to-believe-disease-was-caused-by-curses-would-you-still-believe-it-today/626376/105 "2012-07-05T23:51:57Z")
> [@Victor\_Charlie](#): > > You’re actually going to deny that Catholicism wasn’t spread in the Americas through conquest, a specific example of which was listed earlier by another poster? (South and Central America represent the largest faction of Catholics in the world.) The Muslims conquest of Iraq, Syria, Palestine, Egypt and Iran by Abu Bakr and al Katthab? Those don’t count? How about Charlemegne who spread the Frankish empire beyond western and central Europe by conquering Italy and other regions? You know what he did? He ordered conversion to Christianity on pain of death. > > So far we’ve got Central and South America, huge portions of Western, Central and Southern Europe, North Africa and the Middle East. Should I go on? > > The Spanish Inquisition, the Crusades, the Puritans… the list goes on and on. > > Even when they didn’t force conversion, religious combatants for centuries have used non-conformity as an excuse to slaughter. You really need examples of that? > > Or is your gambit to suggest that the conversions were not the result of the military conquests and merely happened coincidentally? That those who converted did it of free will and not out of fear of persecution from their brutal conquerors? Are you going to suggest that when a bloody, overwhelming military force like Constantine conquers your lands while professing Christianity as the official religion of the empire that you wouldn’t feel a less-than-spiritual motivation to convert? You don’t have to have the sword pointed directly at your own neck to get the message. I have asked you over and over again to provide a cite to back up your claim that “the major religions spread by force”. Thus far, you haven’t provided any cite. Instead you’ve just repeated yourself over and over again. Repeating a claim over and over again doesn’t make it true. If your claims were actually true, you wouldn’t find it so difficult to provide a link to an outside source of widely acknowledged reliability, otherwise known as a citation, or often just a “cite” for short. ---
**Author:** ![ITR\_champion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/c67d28/32.png) [@ITR\_champion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ITR_champion)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2012, 12:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-were-raised-to-believe-disease-was-caused-by-curses-would-you-still-believe-it-today/626376/106 "2012-07-06T00:12:04Z")
> [@Victor\_Charlie](#): > > No I haven’t. It is you who keeps repeating the same argument. I’ll simplify: You keep insisting that “converting” from Methodism to Presbyterianism counts as a conversion. That’s absurd in the context of this debate. It’s converting from Christianity to Christianity. Methodism is NOT, in and of itself, a religion. Presbyterianism is NOT a religion. They’re denominations of the Christian religion. You’re not renouncing your faith by switching from Baptism to Assembly of God. But you are if you switch from Baptism to Shi’a. To convert means to change. A person who changes his or her religious identification from Baptist (not Baptism) to Assemblies of God (not Assembly) has changed his or her religious identification, and therefore by definition has converted, even though both Baptists and Assemblies of God are both Christian denominations. Your unproven theory is that a person’s religious identity is determined by the way their parents brought them up. A person brought up by Baptist parents with a Baptist identity, who then converts to Assemblies of God, flies in the face of this theory. However, even if we ignore cases of conversion from one denomination of Christianity to another, there are still tens of millions of people in the United States alone who have changed religions in their lifetime, according to a poll that you yourself linked to. > [@](#): > > Of the more than 2 billion Christians, the overwhelming majority of which were raised in Christian households, 100 million is tiny by comparison. Plus, you can’t claim 100 million Chinese as converts because a huge number of those were raised in Christian homes after their parent or grandparents converted. The more we analyze the smaller your number of converts gets. First of all, please provide a cite to back up your claim that “a huge number of those were raised in Christian homes after their parent or grandparents converted”. Second, please provide a cite that “the overwhelming majoirty of [Christians] were raised in Christian households”. If it’s actually true, you shouldn’t have so much trouble providing a cite. > [@](#): > > Are you serious? Faith is absolutely THE defining tenet of religion, as DEFINED in the dictionary: The ritual observance of faith. Once again, you pick a single definition out of five while ignoring the others. Nice try. > [@](#): > > You keep dancing around the basic facts presented in my argument, which are: > > Religion has no basis in logic or critical thinking - Fact > > Any religious claim is no more legitimate than the most preposterous flight of fancy I or anyone else can dream up - Undeniable > > The VAST majority of religious adherents practice the same primary religion in which they were raised (i.e., Christianity, Judaism, Islam, etc) - The numbers are quite clear and you’re grasping to suggest otherwise > > Fear has been a major motivating factor in the spread of religion: > Fear of damnation - It’s right there in the Bible > Fear of death - A seemingly endless list of religion spread through military conquest, persecution and murder of the unfaithful > Fear of economic persecution (I didn’t even get to the examples of tax and trading benefits extended to religeously like-minded merchants by the likes of Constantine and others.) If you want me to believe that these are facts, provide some evidence, backed up by cites, in support of them. ---
**Author:** ![Victor\_Charlie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/7ea924/32.png) [@Victor\_Charlie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Victor_Charlie)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2012, 2:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-were-raised-to-believe-disease-was-caused-by-curses-would-you-still-believe-it-today/626376/107 "2012-07-06T14:24:50Z")
> [@MyFactCheckBounced](#): > > Sorry man. I thought it was clear that the jibe in this case would be understood to be entirely ironic and good-natured to boot. No sweat. That’s how I took it. ---
**Author:** ![Victor\_Charlie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/7ea924/32.png) [@Victor\_Charlie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Victor_Charlie)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2012, 3:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-were-raised-to-believe-disease-was-caused-by-curses-would-you-still-believe-it-today/626376/108 "2012-07-06T15:00:32Z")
> [@ITR\_champion](#): > > I have asked you over and over again to provide a cite to back up your claim that “the major religions spread by force”. Thus far, you haven’t provided any cite. Instead you’ve just repeated yourself over and over again. Repeating a claim over and over again doesn’t make it true. If your claims were actually true, you wouldn’t find it so difficult to provide a link to an outside source of widely acknowledged reliability, otherwise known as a citation, or often just a “cite” for short. For God’s sake, how many examples do you need? Do you need a remedial history lesson? Have you never heard of Charlemagne, Cortez, Pizarro, Abu Bakr, etc., etc., etc? Do you need a cite for me to prove Washington was the commander of the Continental Army? Fine. Charlemagne conversion by force: > **[Charlemagne](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charlemagne)** > > This is an accepted version of this page > > > > Charlemagne (/ˈʃɑːrləmeɪn/ SHAR-lə-mayn; 2 April 748\[a\] – 28 January 814) was King of the Franks from 768, King of the Lombards from 774, and Emperor of what is now known as the Carolingian Empire from 800, holding these titles until his death in 814. He united most of Western and Central Europe, and was the first recognised emperor to rule from the west after the fall of the Western Roman Empire approximately three centuries earlier. Charlemagne's re... The relevant entry: “By forcibly Christianizing the Saxons and banning on penalty of death their native Germanic paganism, he integrated them into his realm and thus paved the way for the later Ottonian dynasty.” This essentially Christianized Europe. From wikipedia on Cortez (he’s the guy who subjugated by force the Aztecs. The Aztecs were the dominant civilization of what is now primarily Mexico.) “Then he proceeded to Tabasco, where he met with resistance and won a battle against the natives. He received twenty young indigenous women from the vanquished natives and he converted them all to Christianity.” [Here](http://www.christianitytoday.com/ch/1992/issue35/3536.html) is a short description of his bloody campaign to crush paganism and spread his religion. That takes care of Central America. Fracisco Pizarro brutally crushed the Incas (they were the dominant civilization in the Andes and northern South America. This was Spain’s initial foray into the continent and their influence spread from there. Don’t believe me? There’s a reason they all speak Spanish down there.) One source: > **[The Spanish Colonization of the Inca Empire (Tahuantinsuyo) and Francisco...](https://www.rediscovermachupicchu.com/spanish-conquest-colonization.htm)** Relevant entry: “Christian fanaticism was ruthless with the Incas. The Christians had despised the Inca values and applied brute force to demolish everything that was non-Christian. We ache today when seeing the remains of the Inca cities which had once thrived.” From wikipedia: “Though Pizarro is well known in Peru for being the leader behind the Spanish conquest of the Inca Empire, a growing number of Peruvians regard him negatively. By taking advantage of the natives, Pizarro ruled Peru for almost a decade and initiated the decline of Inca culture. The Incas’ polytheistic religion was replaced by Christianity and both Quechua and Aymara — the main Inca languages — were reduced to a marginal role in society for centuries, while Spanish became the official language of Peru, Ecuador, Bolivia and Chile. The cities of the Inca Empire were transformed into Spanish, Catholic cities. Pizarro is also vilified for having ordered Atahualpa’s death despite his paid ransom of filling a room with gold and two with silver which was later split among all his closest Spanish associates after a fifth share had been set aside for the king.” I refuse to further explain how the Crusades affected the spread of Christianity. As for Islam, I’ve already given you names and places and am bored researching facts which to anyone with a cursory knowledge of world history is plainly obvious. If, at this point, you refuse to grasp the vital role military force has played in the spread of religion, I can’t help you. ---
**Author:** ![Victor\_Charlie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/7ea924/32.png) [@Victor\_Charlie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Victor_Charlie)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2012, 3:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-were-raised-to-believe-disease-was-caused-by-curses-would-you-still-believe-it-today/626376/109 "2012-07-06T15:22:51Z")
> [@ITR\_champion](#): > > To convert means to change. A person who changes his or her religious identification from Baptist (not Baptism) to Assemblies of God (not Assembly) has changed his or her religious identification, and therefore by definition has converted, even though both Baptists and Assemblies of God are both Christian denominations. Your unproven theory is that a person’s religious identity is determined by the way their parents brought them up. A person brought up by Baptist parents with a Baptist identity, who then converts to Assemblies of God, flies in the face of this theory. However, even if we ignore cases of conversion from one denomination of Christianity to another, there are still tens of millions of people in the United States alone who have changed religions in their lifetime, according to a poll that you yourself linked to. > [@ITR\_champion](#): > > Second, please provide a cite that “the overwhelming majoirty of [Christians] were raised in Christian households”. If it’s actually true, you shouldn’t have so much trouble providing a cite. You can bob, weave, and twist all you want. “Converting” from Christian to Christian is not converting from one religion to another. A person moving from Brooklyn to Queens is still a New Yorker. In the statistics quoted, the number of those practicing the religion in which they were raised is around 90%. But, that includes the people who stopped practing altogether. So, the actual number of those who converted to another religion is even smaller. Don’t ask me to cite what amounts to 3rd grade math. Over 90% is an overwhelming majority by any standard. > [@ITR\_champion](#): > > Once again, you pick a single definition out of five while ignoring the others. Nice try. If you can’t even grasp that “religion is the ritual observance of faith”, you’ve excused yourself from any debate on the subject. Bottom line: You desperately need to believe that religion was spread through love and goodwill and that all those who practice would’ve chosen their faith without parental influence. Perhaps being faced with reality is shaking your own faith. Maybe you just enjoy being contrarian to the point of absurdity. Either way, your continued demand for cites which A: have been extensively provided and B: are largely unnecessary for someone with a rudimentary understanding of world history and English, continues to demonstrate serious denial. I’ve already wasted enough time going round and round with you. ---
**Author:** ![Victor\_Charlie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/7ea924/32.png) [@Victor\_Charlie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Victor_Charlie)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2012, 8:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-were-raised-to-believe-disease-was-caused-by-curses-would-you-still-believe-it-today/626376/110 "2012-07-06T20:26:12Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > There is no logical reason for someone, once convinced that curses cause illness, to disbelieve this concept based on current scientific thinking. Here’s what you’re missing: Scientific thinking disallows someone to believe something that has no basis in fact. Critical thinking doesn’t just teach us to look for evidence before accepting something as true, it teaches us to dismiss anything that relies purely on superstition or random speculation. Once somebody grows to understand the concept or rational thought, they should realize they had no reason to be convinced of curses in the first place. As far as scientific method is concerned, not believing something is true (or even possible based on current knowledge) is nearly the same as believing it is not… until evidence to the contrary arises. > [@BigT](#): > > The idea that curses cause illness is not falsifiable. It’s also no more proven nor verifiable than the existence of Zeus, Cthulu or the Spaghetti Monster. Non-critical thinkers seem to believe that if something can’t be disproven it should remain in the realm of discussion. What they’re missing is the fact that a literally infinite number of un-falsifiable scenarios is possible, which makes their study or consideration such a colossal waste of time they are a disservice to legitimate scientific thought. Given this infinite number of possibilities, the probablilty of any specific one of them being true approaches zero. ---
**Author:** ![ITR\_champion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/c67d28/32.png) [@ITR\_champion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ITR_champion)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2012, 11:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-were-raised-to-believe-disease-was-caused-by-curses-would-you-still-believe-it-today/626376/111 "2012-07-09T23:41:09Z")
> [@Victor\_Charlie](#): > > Charlemagne conversion by force: > > [Charlemagne - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charlemagne) > > The relevant entry: > > “By forcibly Christianizing the Saxons and banning on penalty of death their native Germanic paganism, he integrated them into his realm and thus paved the way for the later Ottonian dynasty.” > > This essentially Christianized Europe. Uh, what? Charlemagne Christianized Europe? The Wikipedia entry that you cited only mentioned that be brought Christianity to the Saxon Kingdom that constituted only a portion of modern-day Germany. How did you arrive at the conclusion that this “Christianized Europe”? Do you even know what Europe is? If so, then why would you make such a ridiculous claim? ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2012, 9:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-were-raised-to-believe-disease-was-caused-by-curses-would-you-still-believe-it-today/626376/112 "2012-07-23T21:09:29Z")
> [@Lobohan](#): > > I notice that Damuri refuses to admit that he can’t prove your pixies don’t exist. I can sit in front of that coffee maker and see that invisible pixies never replace your coffee maker with another coffee maker. In any event, you very obtusely miss the pioint. The OP is comparing something that has been disprovem to something taht is not idsprovable. > [@](#): > > It really seems like the advocates for religion (at least in this thread) are unified in their desire to assert things then run away when asked for substantiation. losing interest in arguing with people who have no interest in honest debate isn’t running away, its walking away. > [@](#): > > Religious dudes, if you can’t back up your assertions, don’t run away, face that fact, and realize that what you believe, might, just might, not be true. Right back at you, buddy. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-were-raised-to-believe-disease-was-caused-by-curses-would-you-still-believe-it-today/626376.md?page=5)