Study of prayer

[DangerousBeliefs]

I've never understood the scientific study of prayer.

Are the testers trying to show that God favors the prayed upon more?

Or that one religious group is better at praying than others?

Or that mass prayer favors the single prayer?

Or that the studied prayer outweighs the unstudied prayer (after all, these patients no doubt have people praying for them)?

What exactly are they trying to measure? It seems unmeasurable to me.

 

[TruthSeeker]

I haven't studied it carefully but my impression is that the question is usually: Do patients who are prayed for make better/speedier recoveries or survive longer?

As such, we have a pool of ill individuals and we call God's attention to a number of them. They will do better because God will intervene.

In order to control for the possibility that thinking someone is praying for you may make you feel better, patients are told there is a chance they will be in the "not prayed for" or placebo group.

In some studies, patients are told nothing (although I don't understand how their names can be released to the prayers without their consent)

So, it is God as the treatment versus placebo

My sense is that he generally performs no better than placebo.

One objection when this happens is to say that the treatment was delivered inadequately (i.e. God doesn't listen to or help buddhists or muslims)

Mind you, in other studes where God outperforms the placebo, you do not hear this objection.

God seems to be fickle and will sometimes listen to non-Christians and sometimes not.

 

[DangerousBeliefs]

I haven't studied it carefully but my impression is that the question is usually: Do patients who are prayed for make better/speedier recoveries or survive longer?

As such, we have a pool of ill individuals and we call God's attention to a number of them. They will do better because God will intervene.

In order to control for the possibility that thinking someone is praying for you may make you feel better, patients are told there is a chance they will be in the "not prayed for" or placebo group.

In some studies, patients are told nothing (although I don't understand how their names can be released to the prayers without their consent)

So, it is God as the treatment versus placebo

My sense is that he generally performs no better than placebo.

One objection when this happens is to say that the treatment was delivered inadequately (i.e. God doesn't listen to or help buddhists or muslims)

Mind you, in other studes where God outperforms the placebo, you do not hear this objection.

God seems to be fickle and will sometimes listen to non-Christians and sometimes not.

But it's not a very valid study if you have all of these extranaous prayers flying around, unaccounted for.

And how do you factor in that one prayer group might be more favored than another?

How about we take a group of Christians with some easily curable disease (Syphillis, perhaps?) and have groups pray for them night and day.

If most of them are cured, we can say God is powerful.

If most of them die, well, it must have been God's will.


Seriously, I don't think such a thing can be measured... good or bad.

Personally, I think the whole idea of prayer is ridiculous - especially given what most people pray for - personal gain.

 

[TruthSeeker]

But it's not a very valid study if you have all of these extranaous prayers flying around, unaccounted for.

And how do you factor in that one prayer group might be more favored than another?

How about we take a group of Christians with some easily curable disease (Syphillis, perhaps?) and have groups pray for them night and day.

If most of them are cured, we can say God is powerful.

If most of them die, well, it must have been God's will.


Seriously, I don't think such a thing can be measured... good or bad.

Personally, I think the whole idea of prayer is ridiculous - especially given what most people pray for - personal gain.

My sense (but I'm not sure) about extraneous prayer is that it is expected to be randomly distributed between the groups and so would not create a systematic bias between the groups.

I don't think anyone has ever done a head to head comparison of the outcomes of praying to different gods. I think there is a showdown like this in the Old Testament (Bal versus Yahweh?) if anyone would like to provide details.

I think your syphillis example is clever ~ no matter the outcome, God's existence and "better judgement" are not to be questioned. I think it is televangelist Robert Schuller who says the answer to any prayer can be yes, no, or not now. So, how's that for unfalsifiable?

 

[Ladewig]

One of the flaws with many prayer studies is that they don't specify beforehand what they will measure to determine success. Pain relief, decrease in mortality rate, length of overall hospital stay, length of intensive care ward stay, remission rates, heart rate during stress test, or total hospital bill. If the variable being measured is not defined, then testers can cherry pick the data looking for the one dimension that showed the largest increase.

 

[Hand Bent Spoon]

Prayer Is Not Testable

I reject this and all other 'scientific' studies on prayer. There is simply no way to control for whether your control group is being prayed for by someone, somewhere in the world. You just don't know, and so can't control for it.

 

[BillyJoe]

I think the only purpose of this study is as a counterexample to studies that seem to show an effect of prayer. These studies seem to show an effect because of methodological errors, chance effects or trawling expeditions.

 

[Ladewig]

I reject this and all other 'scientific' studies on prayer. There is simply no way to control for whether your control group is being prayed for by someone, somewhere in the world. You just don't know, and so can't control for it.

That's why some researchers have taken to studying the effects of prayer on bacteria cultures. Several cultures of a specific bacteria are started and half of them are prayed over while half do not receive any prayers. There is no way of knowing how often this experiment is performed because negative results are so rarely reported, but every now and then, one hears of a positive result - usually through a source somewhat sympathetic to prayer.

 

[TruthSeeker]

That's why some researchers have taken to studying the effects of prayer on bacteria cultures. Several cultures of a specific bacteria are started and half of them are prayed over while half do not receive any prayers. There is no way of knowing how often this experiment is performed because negative results are so rarely reported, but every now and then, one hears of a positive result - usually through a source somewhat sympathetic to prayer.

Why would God care about bacteria growth rates while people (who he supposedly loves) are suffering and their prayers go unanswered?

Maybe it's like a pub game for him. Everyone needs a hobby, I guess.

 

[DangerousBeliefs]

Why would God care about bacteria growth rates while people (who he supposedly loves) are suffering and their prayers go unanswered?

Maybe it's like a pub game for him. Everyone needs a hobby, I guess.

Exactly. This assumes that prayer has an effect on other creatures.

Also, it does not rule out some as-yet-unknown human power which could affect the outcome. (If we're going to go WOO WOO, we gotta consider all the possibilities!)

 

[allanb]

Belief in the power of prayer presupposes that God has control over human conditions like sickness and disease. A question I would like to ask all believers is this: if you pray for recovery from a sickness, and it seems to work (i.e. you recover), before you give thanks does it never cross your mind that God must have been responsible for the sickness in the first place?

 

[Ladewig]

Belief in the power of prayer presupposes that God has control over human conditions like sickness and disease. A question I would like to ask all believers is this: if you pray for recovery from a sickness, and it seems to work (i.e. you recover), before you give thanks does it never cross your mind that God must have been responsible for the sickness in the first place?

One can easily find a wide variety of responses to that question:

Of course he was, the sickness was a punishment for some individual's sin.

Of course he was, the sickness was a punishment for the community's sin.

Yes, the sickness was a test of faith, just like Job's test.

Well, sickness came about because of the Fall of Man. Before then there was no sickness, but after that, there was. It's mankind's fault, not God's fault.

A demon was responsible for the sickness.

No. Just because a doctor can heal a disease does not mean the doctor caused the disease.

Pain is a gift from God - it is a learning experience. (Mother Theresa believed this and refused to administer pain-relieving drugs in her shelters).

 

[allanb]

Of course he was, the sickness was a punishment for some individual's sin.

Of course he was, the sickness was a punishment for the community's sin.
In either case, do you think God is going to change his mind at your request?

Yes, the sickness was a test of faith, just like Job's test.
If you believe this, then your God is remarkably cruel - not the same fellow who looks after little children, surely.

Well, sickness came about because of the Fall of Man. Before then there was no sickness, but after that, there was. It's mankind's fault, not God's fault.

A demon was responsible for the sickness.
Two alternative forms of cop-out. "It isn't my fault, it's yours, or somebody else's", says God. Is he omnipotent or is he not?[/B]

Just because a doctor can heal a disease does not mean the doctor caused the disease.
Agreed. But the doctor does not claim to be the benevolent creator of the universe.

Pain is a gift from God - it is a learning experience. (Mother Theresa believed this and refused to administer pain-relieving drugs in her shelters).
Then you should be thanking him for the gift, not asking him to take it away. As for Mother Theresa, I have never had much respect for those who believe in the value of pain for other people.

 

[Ladewig]

Hey, I didn't say that they were rational responses, I just said they they were responses.

 

[allanb]

Hey, I didn't say that they were rational responses, I just said they they were responses.

I thought you were presenting your own views - you are entitled to feel insulted. My apologies.

 

[Quasi]

Also, don't forget that funding is tight these days. An administrator might just put prayer to the test to get Bush's federal research money. With the push to get rid of rational, secular NGO's replaced with irrational religions, it is an easy way to supplement the budget of research centers. I suspect this is why many so called distinguished institutions like Harvard and the Framingham heart study tolerate such nonsense.

 

[BobM]

There was some questionable study about praying for bacteria in a petri dish around. I'm too lazy to try and find it though.