Prayer and Magic Pencils

[leftrightleftrightleft]

Lets say you're a teacher. You give your students a true and false test in which they can fill in answers to a variety of questions. For half the students you tell them that you are giving them special pencils that will allow them to get every answer right, regardless. To the other half of the students, you tell them to choose answers randomly. You get the results back and find that both groups scored roughly 50% on the test.

The teacher (you) then concludes, "Oh! The magic pencils do work, but only selectively. The people in the group with the magic pencils who got the answers wrong just weren't selected to get them right. But don't worry, the magic pencils still work."

Is your conclusion correct or should you have assumed that the magic pencils actually have no effect? If you randomly select true and false answers, the probability of getting a right answer is 1 in 2, so on a test, the expected result of randomly guessing is around 50%. If you were not randomly guessing but instead had some means of getting the answers right (studying, reading the question, magic pencils etc), then it would be expected that you would receive a score higher than 50%.

If you would say the teacher's conclusion is wrong and he should have instead assumed the magic pencils have no effect, then read on....



Why doesn't the same logic apply for Christians when investigating intercessory prayer?

There have been several studies done investigating the benefits of intercessory prayer. In such situations you are given two option, just like a true and false test: either prayer benefits the group that received prayer, or it does not. A or B.

In most cases (Elsevier , Prayer does not heal the sick, study finds - Times Online , Efficacy of prayer - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia), the efficacy of intercessory prayer hovers around 50%. Yet we always find proponents of prayer piping up that God is "selective" (just like the magic pencils were "selective", remember?) For reasons "unknown" to us (aka ignorance), prayer doesn't work all the time. Perhaps the reason intercessory prayer doesn't work all the time is that it doesn't work at all. Its just as beneficial as a placebo.

Thoughts?


(As a side note, you'll notice I specifically am targeting intercessory prayer whereby people actually pray for someone or something; directly making petitions to a deity or force. I think prayer as a personal tool for focus, relaxation and well-being is incredibly powerful and helping in a personal way. It is also a comforting way to know that people are thinking of you and focusing on you and encouraging you. I don't think prayer is a genie-in-a-lamp-make-a-wish scenario, which is how prayer is so often framed; I do think its beneficial, just not in the way that many people use it.)

 

[Habakk]

There are two types of evidence objective and subjective. Objective evidence is verifiable by a third party, subjective evidence sometimes is not.

The evidence that you are speaking of is objective evidence, used in the scientific method. However the scientific process is used as a tool to attempt to understand the physical world. Faith is about believing God and natural methodology is ineffective in that area. The Bible tells us that, "Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” Hebrews 11:1." Jesus left us evidence of the resurrection by appearing to faithful witnesses. That’s how it works. The apostle Paul said “And the things that thou hast heard of me among many witnesses, the same commit thou to faithful men, who shall be able to teach others also.”

Intercessory pray does work. I have witnessed it working many times, I have seen God do things by the prayers of others. Do I have statistical data to prove it? No, and I don’t want or need it because prayer is by faith and trust in a real God.

 

[solarwave]

I would say that the problem with the comparison between the two scenarios is that the magic pencils don't have consciousness. These tests forget that God isn't a law that can be isolated and tested.

I don't know how prayer works but I don't think this argument fully proves intercessory prayer doesn't work. It is also hard to accept that intercessory prayer doesn't work when some seemingly impossible healings have happened within a short amount of time (seconds to minutes).

 

[drich0150]

Lets say you're a teacher. You give your students a true and false test in which they can fill in answers to a variety of questions. For half the students you tell them that you are giving them special pencils that will allow them to get every answer right, regardless. To the other half of the students, you tell them to choose answers randomly. You get the results back and find that both groups scored roughly 50% on the test.

The teacher (you) then concludes, "Oh! The magic pencils do work, but only selectively. The people in the group with the magic pencils who got the answers wrong just weren't selected to get them right. But don't worry, the magic pencils still work."

Is your conclusion correct or should you have assumed that the magic pencils actually have no effect? If you randomly select true and false answers, the probability of getting a right answer is 1 in 2, so on a test, the expected result of randomly guessing is around 50%. If you were not randomly guessing but instead had some means of getting the answers right (studying, reading the question, magic pencils etc), then it would be expected that you would receive a score higher than 50%.

If you would say the teacher's conclusion is wrong and he should have instead assumed the magic pencils have no effect, then read on....



Why doesn't the same logic apply for Christians when investigating intercessory prayer?

There have been several studies done investigating the benefits of intercessory prayer. In such situations you are given two option, just like a true and false test: either prayer benefits the group that received prayer, or it does not. A or B.

In most cases (Elsevier , Prayer does not heal the sick, study finds - Times Online , Efficacy of prayer - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia), the efficacy of intercessory prayer hovers around 50%. Yet we always find proponents of prayer piping up that God is "selective" (just like the magic pencils were "selective", remember?) For reasons "unknown" to us (aka ignorance), prayer doesn't work all the time. Perhaps the reason intercessory prayer doesn't work all the time is that it doesn't work at all. Its just as beneficial as a placebo.

Thoughts?


(As a side note, you'll notice I specifically am targeting intercessory prayer whereby people actually pray for someone or something; directly making petitions to a deity or force. I think prayer as a personal tool for focus, relaxation and well-being is incredibly powerful and helping in a personal way. It is also a comforting way to know that people are thinking of you and focusing on you and encouraging you. I don't think prayer is a genie-in-a-lamp-make-a-wish scenario, which is how prayer is so often framed; I do think its beneficial, just not in the way that many people use it.)

Just because one does not benefit from prayer the way he or she wishes to benefit from it, does not mean their is no benefit from the prayer. Many times the purpose of prayer is not a wish making/granting session, but a way for God to make His will apart of your own decision making process. Meaning His will may not be for the hardship itself, but more over that you would see His way out of the hardship whatever that maybe over your own quick fix of the hardship.

 

[leftrightleftrightleft]

Just because one does not benefit from prayer the way he or she wishes to benefit from it, does not mean their is no benefit from the prayer. Many times the purpose of prayer is not a wish making/granting session, but a way for God to make His will apart of your own decision making process. Meaning His will may not be for the hardship itself, but more over that you would see His way out of the hardship whatever that maybe over your own quick fix of the hardship.

I totally agree with you! Which is why I singled out intercessory prayer. What you described here would not be intercessory prayer. Praying as if you're "making a wish" may be helpful, but the wish is no more or less likely to come true, statistically, then if you had not prayed for the wish at all. I like the idea of praying so that you make God's will a part of your decision-making process

 

[leftrightleftrightleft]

I would say that the problem with the comparison between the two scenarios is that the magic pencils don't have consciousness. These tests forget that God isn't a law that can be isolated and tested.

This is a good point but you can't use this point to simply ignore the statistics. You can still perform statistically tests on humans despite them being conscious to see if statistical trends emerge. That's basically the whole premise of quantitative sociology. Humans do not behave according to strict laws but observing them and making quantitative assessments reveals trends which can lead to inferences. Similarly, if God is God then he can do whatever the heck he wants to do; but if we study, quantitatively, the way he consciously handles intercessory prayer, we find (via the numbers) that his "helping" is no better than chance or a placebo. Even if he is doing his will and what he is doing is objectively right and true and the people he saves are "meant" to be saved and the people he lets slip away are "meant" to slip away, it still doesn't change the numbers. The numbers are there; interpreting them via faith and interpreting them via scientific materialism lead to different conclusions. But the numbers stay the same.

I don't know how prayer works but I don't think this argument fully proves intercessory prayer doesn't work. It is also hard to accept that intercessory prayer doesn't work when some seemingly impossible healings have happened within a short amount of time (seconds to minutes).

Got any testimonies? For every testimony you supply appealing to the Christian God, I promise to provide a testimony of a miraculous healing via prayer to a different god, shaman or witch.

 

[humblehumility]

If you can remain intellectually honest with yourself (which this would be tough here), try praying to a jug of milk instead of God for a couple weeks. You'll notice that your prayers are answered just like God answers them. You either get a result right away, you have to wait a little bit, or you're left waiting for weeks, months, etc. Same goes with prayer to God.

 

[solarwave]

This is a good point but you can't use this point to simply ignore the statistics. You can still perform statistically tests on humans despite them being conscious to see if statistical trends emerge. That's basically the whole premise of quantitative sociology. Humans do not behave according to strict laws but observing them and making quantitative assessments reveals trends which can lead to inferences. Similarly, if God is God then he can do whatever the heck he wants to do; but if we study, quantitatively, the way he consciously handles intercessory prayer, we find (via the numbers) that his "helping" is no better than chance or a placebo. Even if he is doing his will and what he is doing is objectively right and true and the people he saves are "meant" to be saved and the people he lets slip away are "meant" to slip away, it still doesn't change the numbers. The numbers are there; interpreting them via faith and interpreting them via scientific materialism lead to different conclusions. But the numbers stay the same.

I havn't read all that much of the subject to be honest. Maybe God doesn't answer pray for healing all that often or the method used to pray for healing isn't right (praying to prove something rather than just for the good of the sick person). Again I don't know how it works and these replies might seem like an easy way out.

Got any testimonies? For every testimony you supply appealing to the Christian God, I promise to provide a testimony of a miraculous healing via prayer to a different god, shaman or witch.

I know of someone who I don't know but was at the same place as me when they had one blind eye which was healed, for another person it was one deaf ear, a girl I somewhat know had a condition that meant her reading age was 8 when she was 15 who was healed. Another person couldn't eat apples (I believe it was apples) was prayed for and afterwards the condition was gone and she could. Of course they could be lying or it could be placebo, but if the mind is capable of such things in such a short amount of time then doctors should probably focus a bit more on it.

I have no problem with real healings in other religions if such things exist. God is a God of all people, not only Christians.

 

[salida]

If you can remain intellectually honest with yourself (which this would be tough here), try praying to a jug of milk instead of God for a couple weeks. You'll notice that your prayers are answered just like God answers them. You either get a result right away, you have to wait a little bit, or you're left waiting for weeks, months, etc. Same goes with prayer to God.

This is what it really boils down to:

1Co 2:14 But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.

 

[drich0150]

I totally agree with you! Which is why I singled out intercessory prayer. What you described here would not be intercessory prayer. Praying as if you're "making a wish" may be helpful, but the wish is no more or less likely to come true, statistically, then if you had not prayed for the wish at all. I like the idea of praying so that you make God's will a part of your decision-making process

Not my Idea, it belonged to Christ as in Luke 11:1 One day Jesus was praying in a certain place. When he finished, one of his disciples said to him, “Lord, teach us to pray, just as John taught his disciples.”

2 He said to them, “When you pray, say: “‘Father,who is in Heaven
hallowed be your name,
your kingdom come. Your will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven.3 Give us each day our daily bread.
4 Forgive us our sins,
for we also forgive everyone who sins against us.[c]
And lead us not into temptation.

God's "intersession" in our prayers is limited to our daily bread, in Christ example of what our prayer should look like.. The rest we are to turn over to Him.

I have found this is much easier said than done.

 

[solarwave]

The problem with doctors is that they shouldn't lie to patients (Dr. House is not a real doctor). And then patients expect cures with pills or operations.
A doctor can't tell a patient to have a given medication which is just a placebo.
We have homeopaths for that!
On the other hand, some studies have been made regarding the placebo effect for some psychological disturbances versus established drugs and the result was that both worked equally well roughly on the same percentage of people. It's a statistical result, which is worth what it's worth... but since most medicine is based on statistical results and not on the exact understanding of the medicinal properties of chemical agents, then we're ok with a statistical result for placebos.
But the bottom line is: doctors can't, in conscience, prescribe placebos.
That's why homeopathy is on the rise.
And, of course, you have the great effect of religious prayer - free placebo! No homeopath can top that!

Of course a Doctor shouldn't normally lie to a patient, but the Doctors duty is also to heal, and if lying heals then what is the higher moral cause?