section_path: Approaches to prayer/Direct petitions
section_name: Direct petitions
paragraph_text: Direct petitions
  
  There are different forms of prayer. One of them is to directly appeal to a deity to grant one's requests. Some have termed this as the social approach to prayer.
  
  Atheist arguments against prayer are mostly directed against petitionary prayer in particular. Daniel Dennett argued that petitionary prayer might have the undesirable psychological effect of relieving a person of the need to take active measures.
  
  This potential drawback manifests in extreme forms in such cases as Christian Scientists who rely on prayers instead of seeking medical treatment for family members for easily curable conditions which later result in death.
  
  Christopher Hitchens (2012) argued that praying to a god which is omnipotent and all-knowing would be presumptuous. For example, he interprets Ambrose Bierce 's definition of prayer by stating that "the man who prays is the one who thinks that god has arranged matters all wrong, but who also thinks that he can instruct god how to put them right."