Whether you believe it or not, this is a pretty neat story.
Link -Thanks, Cassie!
A 14-year-old girl with a history of serious health issues lay dying of pneumonia in a hospital room. But as her mother waited for the girl to take her last breath, an image of bright light appeared on a security monitor. Within an hour, the dying girl began a recovery that doctors are at a loss to explain.
But Colleen Banton, the girl's mother, has an explanation. “This was an image of an angel,” she told NBC News in a story reported Tuesday on TODAY. She credited the apparition with saving the life of her daughter Chelsea.
Link -Thanks, Cassie!
Paredolia is becoming an even murkier science.
Obviously I'm talking about the mother here.
It can happen, I saw it on telly once.
Why is the miraculous so hard for some to believe? After all, Darwin's miracle of evolution is so easy for the world of "science" to believe; is that no less extraordinary than an angelic healing?
Because it's utter bullsh*t, that's why. Stop believing in every bit of ridiculous nonsense and use your brain. Seriously, Dave, what's more likely: That an actual "angel" manifested in a some random hospital and was magically caught on camera, or that it's just a common reflection?
This is just as stupid as seeing the Virgin Mary in your toast or on the back of a road sign. Get real, people. If you truly believe in this kind of nonsense then you shouldn't be allowed to vote, own a handgun, or drive a car on public roads.
Mike
no
To quote the Princess Bride: Plato. Socrates. Aristotle. Morons.
Now shush Dave.
Just because someone believes something different, does not make it wrong. Belief is a matter of opinion. It's down to interpretation.
Just because the mother wants to hold on the belief that her child would go to a "better place" rather than have her life and potential cut short, then it is noones place to argue.
It's Christmas guys. Be nice. Be human.
I'd like to praise the doctors for their work in saving this girl's life. And the past doctors whose work contributed to the pool of medical knowledge we have now. I'd like to thank those who didn't settle for 'will of god' as an answer, and believe they could save another's life. I praise all of those scientists who stood defiantly and dedicated their work to understanding biology when all else said they were 'playing god'. I thank those whose work led to the creation of hospitals. I honour the nurses whose tireless work made the girl feel better.
An interventionalist deity intervenes at the 11th hour, after a little girl has fallen ill and has suffered. And an angel is thanked instead of those who truly contributed?
This woman's lack of gratitude is insulting.
Merry Xmas to all of those who in this case deserved it.
Athon
And by focusing too much of the illogical 'miracle', and not focusing on many other factors that actually saved her life, this would pretty much sums up the little girl's rest of her life in this flowchart:
A. Become a devout believer after the 'miracle'
B. Thinks Mom is just over-reacting -> END
A-A. Become egotistic and self-important about how God loves her and saved her life, forces friends to believe
A-B. Find out that the miracle is not really it. Thank God to be alive. "Miracle" becomes just a funny story to chat about in the rest of her life. -> END
A-A-A. Does not understand why the angel does not come to save her from her depression one more time.
A-A-B. Thinks angel is protecting her for her whole life. Nothing bad ever happens again to her, so there is no way to prove the existence of such angel. -> END
A-A-A-A. Got really pissed off and found out the religion could not save her from her teenage problem. Ditch religion and went goth. -> END
A-A-A-B. Tries to justify the existence of the miracle by bending facts. Becomes an evangelist and brag about it all the time. -> END
Whats wrong with this article? Nothing. Absolutely nothing. Yet still enough to piss off commenters on some blog somewhere.
CHILL OUT
believe in something beyond what "is known" sometime. seriously. you'll regret it if you dont. trust me.
It's all bunk anyways-- so why not have a little faith for faiths sake?
Maybe it was just a reflection, but maybe, just maybe it wasn't. We can't be sure, and we shouldn't be flaming people just because they choose to believe it is an Angel. Some people don't need science to tell them it's true. Some people use faith. Some people, call those people stupid, delusional, or moronic.
You can state your collective opinions on the subject without acting as if those who disagree with you are idiots and deserve to be attacked. That's whats wrong with the Internet discussions it seems, nobody respects other people's opinions. They would rather resort to hate filled responses than form a smart, intelligent opinion.
To those of you who have made a smart, intelligent response without flaming, thank you. To those who haven't, please keep your thoughts to yourself.
Anyways, it is UTTER BULLSHIT!!!
I'm just glad the girl is ok, and the mom is spared the grief of a lost kid.
It would certainly seem like that to her, I am sure. Grief can do funny things to people. It is certainly no reason to shoot them or take away their right to vote. Some people here need to chill out a little.
A) The comment was made in jest.
B) No, I probably couldn't say that stuff to her face considering I'd be busy laughing my ass off to even get a single word out my mouth.
Terminal people coming off life support and actually improving is not anything really uncommon. Chalking it up to the influence of some deity is just an insult to the intelligence of humanity, regardless of how limited that is. Occams razor all the way!
It's not stupid to think angels cured this girl. It's stupid to lash out as those who do.
Sigh.
Like someone said, if angels really cured this girl then that proves that god is evil. Why wouldn't he save every little child that is terminally ill? There are probably (guesstimating here) a hundred children in similar situation that dies for every one that survives a similar situation. Do they not deserve to live as much, or even more, than this girl?
As said, ignorant.
That is not pareidolia.
But this news story quickly became about whether or not angels exist. This was a NEWS story! What the crazy is wrong with the media that they treat this like news???
The mother said in the video "either this is an angel here to take my daughter to heaven, or it's here to heal her". Yeah....those are the only two options. God forbid (so to speak) that maybe it's NOT an angel, but a trick of the light.
The skeptic in me also would like to point out that we're only treated to a single frame of the offending video, not the whole video itself. I know a thing or two about cameras and I know how poor their lenses are compared to our eyes, and how easily they can malfunction and create images that aren't there (need proof of this? take a photo of someone pointing a lit flashlight at the camera), and I guess what I'm trying to say is how important it is for people to smarten the crap up and think for 5 fucking seconds.
Oh, and stop equating the word "skeptic" with "cynic". That trick is old and meaningless.
Their conclusion wasn't that it was. Maybe it still was, but for god's sakes, people, calm the hell down and get your head out of your ass.
Stop attacking this women for believing in something you obviously don't want to understand or be respectful about.
But beyond even that, this is about the girl being cured, not the other things. It's a miracle in every sense that she didn't die.
^ How exactly does that prove God is evil? How is that even remotely logical?
And Athon, lovely post.
Why are the religious so afraid of death?
Now, God doesn't really exist so it's really a moot point, but either way.
Next time her daughter falls ill, will she just keep her at home, in hopes that the angel will save her again?
The word "miracle" is bandied about so much these days, it's trivial. I saw on the news "a Christmas miracle" with a picture of some reporter and Bill Gates, and I thought "unless he's walking on water, Mr Gates is NOT performing miracles".
And that, by far, is the most ignorant and insultive thing that has been said in this discussion thus far.
Being curious and inquisitive does not mean that you are not an atheist. I suggest that you actually look up what being an atheist is about. It's about not believing, or completely rejecting, the idea of one or many dieties. How is my inquisitive mind, my drive to find things out, proof that I am not an atheist?
"For all those non-believers…explain how humans were made…why are we here?…What is the purpose of life?How was the world was formed?…explain DNA?…that no two snowflakes are the same???"
If you didn't have your head so far up your own ass you would actually realize that science has theories for all of those things, and they all have more credibility than some wondrous being created it all some four thousand years ago.
There's actually nothing that suggests that no two snowflakes are the same. It's a saying, not a fact. If you consider how many snowflakes fall each year in the world and the average count of atoms making up each snow flake then unavioidably two snowflakes will look the same, it's just that we haven't found two that does. It's all simple math and physics.
The purpose of life does not have anything to do with religion. The purpose is getting born, reproducing and dieing. Anything else is just filler.
I don't believe flashing lights from the beyond are ever involved in those acts.
I believe in this. That's awesome.
That doesn't make God evil. People don't always understand what God does, because it's always mysterious and not completely tailored TO our ideas or wishes.
Frankly I find most of what your saying insulting. If you are an atheist, agnostic, or flying spaghetti monster believer thats fine but that does not give you clearance to blast God just because every person who is sick isn't cured.
If every sick person in the world, including young girls were cured by just praying or expecting miracles, the world would be perfect. It's clearly not. But again, that isn't God's fault.
This is absolutely true, there is no other explanation of how a girl could be miraculously healed when she was laying on her death bed. There is a God out there, He loves us and made us. How is that so hard to believe? How else could we get here? This world is too complex for science to just occur and make it all "happen". This is what God does, because He loves us.
The reasons I did submit it for, just in case any one was wondering...
1) I just found it neat that the little girl recovered and that she was home with her family this Christmas; that the mom didn't have to know what it was like losing a child. Seeing that I recently lost a loved one in a similar situation (pneumonia and making the difficult decision to turn off life support), it was a story I could relate to, even if I'm not religious or believe in Angels at all. It was GOOD to read a happy ending to a story I knew all too well.
2) I simply thought it was a feel-good article, plain and simple. Something NICE and HAPPY to read on Christmas Eve, during a time which should be about family and being loved and giving love in return. It was an article which was very hard to find that day, sadly enough.
Anyway, now I feel like a sh*tty human being for starting all of this... And yes, I've also lost a little more faith in the human race.
Yes
Why is it so hard for people to accept the idea that the girl recovered due to natural causes that the doctors overlooked or do not understand and that the flash of light on the monitor was a coincidence? Doesn't that sound a lot more plausible than an angel? I wish people would really stop and think about how bizarre the idea of an angel is. I doubt they would accept this story as easily if the mother was convinced that the daughter was saved by Snoopy's ghost.
And... No. I am not miserable (or hateful).
I will say, though, that neatorama commenters tend to get waaay vehement about stuff, very unironic, uncircumspect in their appraisals of controversial topics. It's weird. But amusing.
I could care less about what other people believe, personally. Have at it if it gets you through the night, but people like CRaZZi and JOE, who want to demonize people who don't believe what they do, are the reason so many turn away from religion altogether and assume that all religious people are crack pots. Look at some of the examples, after all.
And JOE, just because one is an atheist doesn't mean that they have no respect for human life or feel the need to sleep around. If anything, it's the hypocrites who try and push their beliefs on others who are guilty of such things.
And when I die, I have no desire to be anything but dead.
Furthermore, it's sad that this post became all about religion when it's really just a huge stretch of the imagination to think that the picture in question is anything of significance. It's not about religion, it's about making something out of nothing.
CRaZZi, the first half of your screen name says it all, but there is nothing beautiful about the hate in your soul which is in direct contradiction to true Christian teachings. If I were a Christian, you would be the example I would use as to what a Christian should not act like. You are so fake up there on your high horse that it would be comical if it weren't so frightening.
Now, I'm not going on to the "all about god" side here, but I just wanted to point out: for all of you that just said that this is all bull, why don't you come out and explain exactly how "the dying girl began a recovery that doctors are AT A LOSS TO EXPLAIN."
Yes, science helps our world, but it isn't absolutely everything.