God: The Failed Hypothesis (12 page)

Parapsychologists, on the other hand, are not in the business of saving lives. They are more like particle physicists or astronomers, seeking to uncover facts about the fundamental structure of nature, where no one will die if the report of an important discovery is held off for a few months or years.

Almost without exception, claims of evidence for psychic phenomena come nowhere close to having the statistical errors small enough to rule out more mundane explanations for the results
²⁹
. The handful that claim reasonable statistical significance all have methodological flaws that render their results unconvincing. And none are independently replicated at a statistically significant level.

A number of studies have claimed to be able to overcome the lack of statistical significance of single experiments by using a technique called “metanalysis,” in which the results of many experiments are combined
³⁰
. This procedure is highly questionable
³¹
. I am unaware of any extraordinary discovery in all of science that was made using metanalysis. If several, independent experiments do not find significant evidence for a phenomenon, we surely cannot expect a purely mathematical manipulation of the combined data to suddenly produce a major discovery.

No doubt parapsychologists and their supporters will dispute my conclusions. But they cannot deny the fact that after one hundred and fifty years of attempting to verify a phenomenon, they have failed to provide any evidence that the phenomenon exists that has caught the attention of the bulk of the scientific community. We safely conclude that, after all this effort, the phenomenon very likely does not exist. In any other field, such an unbroken history of negative results would have long ago resulted in the claims being discarded. At the minimum, psychic experiments cannot be used to show that humans possess any special powers of the mind that exceed the physical limitations of inanimate matter.

Does Prayer Work?

One of the defining characteristics of the Judeo-Christian-Islamic God is that he is believed to respond to entreaties from the faithful and steps in to change the natural course of events when he is sufficiently moved by the intensity and piety of the petitioner (or, whenever he wishes). Surely, with the millions of prayers being submitted daily, totaling billions in recorded history, some objectively verifiable (not just anecdotal) positive evidence should have been found by now!

Of course, prayer by or in the presence of a patient plausibly could have some purely natural beneficial effects, such as helping relax an ill person, lower blood pressure, and so on. However, this effect is small at best and indistinguishable from other forms of relaxation that contain no religious or spiritual element
³²
.

Actually, as we will see, some data suggest that such prayer may actually be detrimental, possibly adding to the anxiety of the patient. In any case, to be considered extraordinary evidence in favor of prayer, experiments must be “blinded” so that neither patients nor investigators know who is being prayed for.

It might seem that prayer is not amenable to scientific testing.

First, it is supposedly “spiritual” rather than material. Second, prayer is difficult to control. For example, how could you stop someone from praying or know for sure that a subject is not being prayed for somewhere in the world? However, anything with observable consequences is testable by scientific means, and prayer is widely believed to have observable consequences. A positive signal is possible if, for example, some type of prayer is superior to another. This would show up in a statistically and systematically significant success rate for that type. In chapter 1 I presented a hypothetical example where Catholic prayers were convincingly demonstrated to work in careful scientific experiments, while those of other religions failed. It would be difficult to think of a plausible natural mechanism for this phenomenon.

As already noted, despite official statements from some national science organizations, science is not wholly restricted to the consideration of purely material causes for observable phenomena. If empirical data show some result that cannot be accounted for by current, conventional materialistic means, then good science as well as honesty demands that this fact be acknowledged and published. The issue of whether no material mechanism can ever be found could be left open for further research, which would surely get funded—once again leaving scientists happy as clams.

The effects of prayer should be readily measurable, in particular where prayers may be focused on some specific purpose such as healing the afflicted. As we saw with psychic phenomena, many popular books and articles have been published claiming that science has shown that prayer has positive healing value
³³
.

But, once again, we find that none of the reports is convincing. I discussed several specific examples in
Has Science Found God ?
and will not repeat these here
³⁴
. Every published claim of a positive effect of which I am aware fails to satisfy one or more of the methodological conditions I laid out in chapter 1. As I have emphasized, these conditions are routinely applied to all extraordinary claims in physics or other “hard” sciences. With all the publicity that attends to prayer studies, it is highly unlikely any good quality study has been missed.

Since my previous book went to press, several important new results have been published that have virtually settled the matter.

One case, in particular, has generated considerable attention and provides valuable insight into the admitted difficulties that arise when the attempt is made to use rational science to evaluate long and deeply held religious beliefs. But then we will see that when scientists do their jobs properly, not allowing their personal beliefs to overrule their objective analysis of the data, we can have confidence in their results.

The Columbia “Miracle” Study

In 2001 the
Journal of Reproductive Medicine
published an article submitted by the highly prestigious Columbia University Medical Center claiming to show that infertile women who were prayed for by Christian prayer groups became pregnant twice as often as those not prayed for
³⁵
. This caught the immediate attention of national media, including
ABC
News, whose medical editor, Timothy Johnson, credulously reported on the “surprising results” to millions on
Good Morning America
³⁶
.
It is probably not irrelevant to mention that Johnson at the time was also serving as a minister at the evangelical Community Covenant Church in West Peabody, Massachusetts.

The study was actually not conducted at Columbia but rather in Korea at an institute directed by one of the three coauthors, Kwang Cha. A sample of 219 women was separated randomly into two groups, one of which was prayed for and the other not.

Christian prayer groups in the United States, Canada, and Australia conducted the prayers, with the investigators masked until the data were all collected and the clinical outcomes known.

The reported results showed that the prayed-for group had a pregnancy rate of 50 percent, while the not-prayed-for group had only 26 percent. The statistical significance for the difference was
P =
0.0013. The prayed-for group also had a higher success rate for
in vitro fertilization-embryo transfer,
16.3 percent compared to 8 percent,
P
= .0005.

While the first result does not quite meet the new standard of
P <
0.001 suggested above, these statistical significances are certainly better than the worthless
P
= 0.05 we usually see. At the very least, if this report is correct, then attempts at replication are reasonably justified.

However, doubt has been cast on the validity of the results.

Bruce L. Flamm, clinical professor of obstetrics and gynecology at the University of California, Irvine, found a number of flaws in the study protocol, calling it “convoluted and confusing
³⁷
.” For example, one group of prayer participants prayed directly for the patients while a second group not only prayed for the patients but also prayed for the effectiveness of the prayers of the first group. A third group simply prayed that “God’s will or desire be fulfilled,” whatever that is.

Perhaps these confusions are not too serious and, in any case, could be easily rectified in a follow-up study. However, further convolutions and confusions have been revealed about the participants in the study.

One of the authors, Daniel P. Wirth, is a lawyer without a medical degree. However, he does have a degree in parapsychology and has authored several articles in parapsychology journals claiming documented evidence for faith healing
³⁸
. In an unrelated matter, Wirth has since been imprisoned after being convicted of fraud, which included the use of names of dead people for financial gain.

The lead author of the paper was originally identified as Rogerio Lobo, then head of the Columbia University department of obstetrics and gynecology. However, shortly after publication, Columbia University announced Lobo was not even aware of the study until being informed by Cha six to twelve months after the study was completed. Lobo has since withdrawn his name from the study and any connection between Cha and Columbia has been severed. The paper, however, has not been formally withdrawn—a black mark on a great university.

Neither Columbia University nor the
Journal of Reproductive Medicine
has come completely clean on this fiasco, and while some media outlets have reported on the questionable nature of the claims, that knowledge has not become as widespread as the astounding claims made in the original announcement. What is referred to as the “Columbia miracle study” continues to be referred to by shameless promoters of faith healing, such as Larry Dossey, as one of his exemplars of the “controlled clinical trials and peer-review process” that provide scientific support for the efficacy of prayer
³⁹
. Indeed the experiment was exemplary. It serves as a prime example of how not to conduct a scientific investigation of extraordinary claims.

Can Prayer Change the Past?

Dossey was also impressed by a study reported in the
British Medical Journal
in 2001 reporting that praying for patients reduced their length of stay in hospital (
P
= 0.01) and duration of infections (
P
= 0.04
⁴⁰
). If this was not remarkable enough, the prayers were actually performed
after
the patients had left the hospital, implying that the power of prayer extends into the past as well as the future. Note that the journal did not apply the
P
< 0.001 standard that it, itself, had proposed that same year (see discussion above).

It is not clear how seriously the author of this report, Dr.

Leonard Leibovici, meant for us to take his results. He had earlier declared, “Empiricists are not equipped to recognize the loud signals of alternative medicine as false,” calling alternative (complementary) medicine a “cuckoo in the nest of… reed warblers
⁴¹
.”

Leibovici might regard Larry Dossey and Brian Olshansky as “cuckoo” for taking his report very seriously. They suggest that this result may be reconciled with our present understanding of the universe by going “beyond the superstring theories of today’s physicists
⁴²
.”

Physician (and devout Christian) Jeffrey P. Bishop and I evaluated these claims in a paper published in 2004 in the
British Medical Journal,
where the other reports had appeared
⁴³
. First, we pointed out that none of the studies in medicine and parapsychology that Olshansky and Dossey take as “confirmatory evidence” are significant. Second, we showed that nothing in modern physics suggests a physical basis for the type of backward causality being suggested.

I have written extensively on the misuse of modern physics, in particular quantum mechanics, to support mystical claims
⁴⁴
. I have also argued that the results of some physics experiments may be interpreted as evidence for events in the future affecting events in the past
⁴⁵
. But this only happens at the quantum level, and no theoretical or empirical basis exists for backward causality on the large scale of human experience.

In short, neither robust data nor existing physical, chemical, biological, or neurological theories support the notion that prayer can affect human health—forward or backward in time.

The Duke Study

Two of the studies I reported on in
Has Science Found God?
involved praying for the improved health of coronary patients
⁴⁶
.

While claiming positive results, neither study produced statistically significant effects, and both experiments were also otherwise severely flawed, so they may be safely discarded. These highly publicized reports have been followed by two well-executed experiments that seem to meet all the requirements of a proper investigation. Both find no evidence that prayer improves health.

In a three-year clinical trial led by Duke University physicians, the effects of intercessory prayer and other so-called noetic therapies such as music, imagery, and touch therapy were examined for 748 patients in 9 hospitals in the United States. Twelve prayer groups from around the world were involved, including lay and monastic Christians, Sufi Muslims, and Buddhist monks. Prayers were even e-mailed to Jerusalem and placed on the Wailing Wall.

Patients awaiting angioplasty for coronary artery obstruction were selected at random by computer and sent to the twelve prayer groups. The groups prayed for complete recovery of the patients. The clinical trials were double blind: neither the hospital staff nor the patients knew who was being prayed for.

The findings, reported in the journal
Lancet,
showed no significant differences in the recovery and health between the two groups
⁴⁷
. The result for touch therapy was also negative, while the other techniques showed “some promise.”