Healing and the Power of Faith
Offline "And, behold, a woman, which was diseased with an issue of blood twelve years, came behind him, and touched the hem of his garment: for she said within herself, If I may but touch his garment, I shall be whole. But Jesus turned him about, and when he saw her, he said, Daughter, be of good comfort; thy faith hath made thee whole. And the woman was made whole from that hour." Matthew 9:20-22 KJV
Can an individual's faith really lead to healing? The unbeliever says "no." But the scientific evidence says otherwise. Clinical studies have demonstrated that positive belief can lead to healing. It's called the placebo effect. IOW, if you believe a treatment will work, then it is more likely to actually work. Conversely, negative belief or skepticism can lead to harmful effects. This is known as the nocebo effect. Both the placebo effect and the nocebo effect are well known in medicine.
The placebo (typically a sugar pill) has proven successful in a variety of illnesses or disorders - especially in managing pain, treating ulcers and clinical depression.
Placebo analgesia is more likely to work the more severe the pain[122] It can be effective: one study found for postoperative pain following the extraction of the third molar, that a saline injected while telling the patient it was a powerful painkiller was as potent as a 6–8 mg dose of morphine.[123](source: Wikipedia: Placebo)
The placebo proved to be almost as effective as the drug "cimetidine" in treating gastric or duodenal ulcers.
A meta-study of 31 placebo-controlled trials of the gastric acid secretion inhibitor drug Cimetidine in the treatment of gastric or duodenal ulcers found that placebo treatments, in many cases, were as effective as active drugs: of the 1692 patients treated in the 31 trials, 76% of the 916 treated with the drug were "healed", and 48% of the 776 treated with placebo were "healed".[132](source: Wikipedia: Placebo)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Placebo#cite_note-Moerman_book-131
The placebo accounts for 75% of the causal efficacy of anti-depressant medication.
A meta-analysis in 1998 found that 75% of the effectiveness of anti-depressant medication is due to the placebo-effect rather than the treatment itself.[128](source: Wikipedia: Placebo)
This is not a small thing. The anti-depressant drug business is a huge, multi-billion dollar industry. The costs to the healthcare system are staggering.
The bottom line is that faith heals and I have just provided you with the scientific evidence to prove it.
"Scientists animated by the purpose of proving they are purposeless constitute an interesting subject for study." - Alfred North Whitehead
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Faith by who, in what, and with what results. LIke I said, if you're simply claiming that the patient believing he's being given a drug, which for whatever reason then boosts the body's own healing mechanisms, I accept that.
But if you claim that the parents of a child that's been struck by some nasty lethal illness that the body has no chance of curing having faith in Jesus can actually miraculously heal that child, I think you're insane.
So would you stop flipflopping back and forth between definitions of faith and tell us what you mean exactly when you say "faith heals".
I have no idea what you mean. I was just showing an example of how well the faith placebo works in healing.
...That is what this thread is about right?
Theism is why we can't have nice things.
Note that the placebo effect does not "heal" in those cases, the patient simply feels better. The article you cite also suggests that the effect only works on about a third of the population, and there's no way to tell if it will work. I'm not suggesting that the patient feeling better isn't a good thing, but it's not to be compared to healing, especially with neurological disorders like Parkinson's, MS, and depression. With viral infections like herpes, the virus is still there, but the patient may feel better about it. The same could be said for Crohn's.
I mean to say that the placebo effect is great and everything, but to say that it "heals" is a great exaggeration.
Saint Will: no gyration without funkstification.
fabulae! nil satis firmi video quam ob rem accipere hunc mi expediat metum. - Terence
Funny I define faith as "Belief in spite of contrary evidence" The definition of faith you attribute to atheists is the Christian definition (the substance of things unknown and the evidence of things unseen).
"I do this real moron thing, and it's called thinking. And apparently I'm not a very good American because I like to form my own opinions."
— George Carlin
The placebo effect has measurable physical effects.
Hopefully the day will soon arrive when you finally dispense with adolescent regressions and display the emotional and intellectual maturity to actually contribute to a discussion. Until then, you will continue to embarrass yourself and your cause.
"Scientists animated by the purpose of proving they are purposeless constitute an interesting subject for study." - Alfred North Whitehead
I have little patience for juvenile stupidity.
"Scientists animated by the purpose of proving they are purposeless constitute an interesting subject for study." - Alfred North Whitehead
You would not do well in a world comprised of yourself then.
The physical effects you are trying to insult Kevin over? They are psychologically driven. That is the whole point of the placebo effect. Sidestepping doesn't help whatever case you are trying to make. You already proved that faith is worthless, and even compared it to a placebo. Let alone faith healing, which I provided ample evidence as to how much THAT helps.
Theism is why we can't have nice things.
Think so ? Then I invite you to spend a few weeks in the company of a severly depressed person who's just had their pills switched to m&ms. Their faith will be of no use whatsoever, and neither will yours.
Yeah, that's a good call.
Saint Will: no gyration without funkstification.
fabulae! nil satis firmi video quam ob rem accipere hunc mi expediat metum. - Terence
Offering examples of people who take your thesis to it's logical conclusion, actually implement it in their lives and then suffer the horrific consequences is "juvenile stupidity?" I agree that there is some juvenile stupidity going on here, but I don't think that ClockCat is the one guilty of it.
All that is necessary for the triumph of good is that evil men do nothing.
Of course. It's entirely expected that a self-regulating organ will experience some level of feedback. There is a very limited scope in which the placebo effect will occur, almost entirely limited to pain blockage. Imagining that this effect is an indication that the type of faith healing that Christians often claim they perform is just silly. It does, however, explain the experiences of those poor saps who flock to those healing services by Benny Hinn and his ilk.
All that is necessary for the triumph of good is that evil men do nothing.
Here you are equating faith with the placebo effect; which is understandable.
Yes, the placebo effect can have an affect on health. That is why we do controlled studies for it. The fact of the matter is, people who believe they are receiving a treatment that works tend to release more opiods, like dopamine, into the bloodstream. This can have many positive effects on health.
However, without your heavily biased lenses of dualism, I can't make the leap you are making from the placebo effect to "faith heals" to "immaterial overcoming the material." I can certainly make the leap to "faith heals," since faith is, and as you have admitted, no better than a placebo. I cannot make the leap to "immaterial overcoming the material," because I don't see the immaterial in this. I don't see the magic in the placebo effect.
You might as well say "friendship heals," or "having pets heals", or "laughter heals," since all of these release comparable amounts of dopamine and can have a similar effect on health. Does this mean there is some "magic brain energy" associated with faith, friendship, pets and laughter? Of course not. It simply confirms our understanding of the brain, a physical organ, having an effect on the physical body. To make a leap from the placebo effect to faith-healing mumbo-jumbo requires the nonsensical dualism that you so happily ascribe to.
Now, what we know does not "heal" is the faith of others. Many double-blind studies of prayer-healing have been done. It turns out, when a "prayer team" comes into your room and prays for you, it makes you less likely to recover. While, if a prayer team does it outside of the room without your knowledge or consent, it does nothing for you. Again, this confirms that the patients conscious awareness and expectation of the event (ie, the placebo effect, or in this case the nocebo effect) affects health, while the faith-healing mumbo-jumbo of prayer has no effect on health.
Whatever. For the purposes of this thread, it really doesn't matter how the faith or trust in the physician/treatment was derived. The bottom line is that there is compelling scientific evidence that faith heals.
"Scientists animated by the purpose of proving they are purposeless constitute an interesting subject for study." - Alfred North Whitehead
Translation: "I really can't argue with the fact that faith heals."
"Scientists animated by the purpose of proving they are purposeless constitute an interesting subject for study." - Alfred North Whitehead
Translation: "I like to put words into people's mouths instead of coming up with a well reasoned counter-argument."
You seem to think if you can make us say your equivalent of "faith heals," then you've won the argument. You're playing some kind of semantic game, just to get us to say your irrelevant ad nauseum slogan.
Yes, if we define "placebo effect" to be "faith," and we define "noticible statistically significantly greater chance of recovery" as being "healed" then "faith heals." So what?
All you have shown is that your faith is no more than a well-documented psychological condition. Where does your God come into this? Where does the leap from psychological condition to magical, spiritual voodoo come in? That is what we would like to hear. You seem to be taking this leap for granted and assuming that we're taking it along with you. We're not. You're assuming something that you should prove.
Your argument so far:
P1.The placebo effect is a well documented psychological condition which can improve the health of a patient.
P2. Let "placebo effect"="faith healing."
C. Therefore faith heals.
And therefore ????
Therefore what paisely? Therefore Jesus made the faith heal? Therefore God made the faith heal? Therefore, specifically, your faith heals? Therefore, some magical, spiritual force is at work?
What is it that you find so relevant about this conclusion?
Mind has power over matter. The mind is matter. Matter has power over matter.
This is hardly a novel concept.
You believe in the reality of angels? Interesting.
The reason that I am the most annoying theist on this forum is because I am systematically dismantling the worldview of atheistic materialism.
The woman's faith in the scriptural narrative was based on evidence. She had learned of Jesus' reputation as a healer and believed and hope that if she could but touch the hem of his garment she would be healed. And I'm sure that there are individuals who go to faith healers today using the same line of reasoning. So, you have no argument. Besides, how an individual acquires faith is really irrelevant here. The bottom line is that faith heals. That's the point. And all your ranting and raving will not change this fact.
"Scientists animated by the purpose of proving they are purposeless constitute an interesting subject for study." - Alfred North Whitehead
The bottom line is that faith heals. The scientific evidence bears this out. And if Richard Dawkins believes that it is some kind of trait naturally selected by evolution, then it stands to reason that faith has already proven its worth. IOW, you're making my case!
"Scientists animated by the purpose of proving they are purposeless constitute an interesting subject for study." - Alfred North Whitehead
If what you're suggesting is true, then not one single person should ever be conscious and fully mobile (and be quite used to being mobile), then get into a vehicle accident, and then wake-up in the hospital as a paraplegic. They had no reason to believe that they would wake-up with grotesquely limited mobility, and every reason to believe (and want to believe) that they would have full mobility upon regaining consciousness.
But guess what? It happens all of the time. A person's belief and 'the placebo effect' have no impact at all on the physical matter of their spinal injury.
Is that just an 'adolescent regression' now? Pointing out facts that contradict what your theory predicts? Proposing blind trials to test your proposals? Or just maybe, Paisley, is it not me who needs to start displaying some intellectual maturity and grab a reality check here?
- Leon Trotsky, Last Will & Testament
February 27, 1940
Then you agree with Jesus that an individual's faith can heal him. Feel free to say "Amen Brother!"
"Scientists animated by the purpose of proving they are purposeless constitute an interesting subject for study." - Alfred North Whitehead
Congratulations. You've proved that faith can act as a placebo. I'm not going to argue against that in the way that a lot of people seem to have tried in this thread.
I just don't see how this proves anything beyond that some people use their religious belief to comfort themselves and strengthen their will to live. This doesn't prove that religious belief is in any way true. It also doesn't prove that it's better than secular ideals. People can find the will to live from many different aspects of life, and while religion can be one of them it is by far not the biggest.
And anyways, I love the analogy you made with this whole thread anyways. You know that placebos don't actually have a medical reason for helping anybody other than that the people who receive them believe that they do. You basically made a comparison suggesting that religious faith isn't true, it just comforts people who believe that it is. One I completely agree with.
Please provide source and link.
What so extraordinary about the placebo? I believe at the top of your post you said that a study of the placebo "indicated something REMARKABLE." Perhaps you're being slightly disingenuous.
No, it's a simple way to say that faith heals. You're merely attempting to obscure this fact. Why? Because the idea that faith heals is anathema to atheism. I know it; you know it; we all know it.
"Scientists animated by the purpose of proving they are purposeless constitute an interesting subject for study." - Alfred North Whitehead
Translation: That faith heals is nothing new. Agreed. It's ancient.
Also, I'm glad to see that a materialist believes in "mind over matter." How exactly do you explain "downward causation" on the materialist worldview? IOW, how does an effect (the mind) change it's causal chain (the brain and nervous system)?
Jesus is like the physician (not the nurse) in this analogy.
"They that be whole need not a physician, but they that are sick." Matthew 9:15 KJV
"Scientists animated by the purpose of proving they are purposeless constitute an interesting subject for study." - Alfred North Whitehead
Paisley, if anything, you're 'the most annoying theist on this forum' because regular posters like Hamby, DeludedGod, etc (I can't even believe the amount of valuable time Bob has wasted on you. Aussies must be a patient bunch) see you posting the dumb shit that you do but have to restrain themselves from engaging in rebuttal because they know it would only enable/encourage your behavior. You'd get to gloat (likely mostly to yourself) about how you went toe to toe with 'the experts', they'd waste their time.
Here's the thing, boss:
That's a visual of our current level of intellectual discourse (and I'm being pretty cruel to bricks with that one). Arguing that you're just kicking experts' asses all over the place is laughable, because...
...It's not even that they're a league up from you. They're entire orders of magnitude above and away from anything you've ever demonstrated the capacity for conveying. Saying that you're 'dismantling' them is like claiming that your BB gun carries the same punch as Krakatoa. It's not just inaccurate; it's so silly that not a single person with an inkling of what the words you're using mean is going to take you seriously.
- Leon Trotsky, Last Will & Testament
February 27, 1940
The point of this thread as far as I can tell is to equate faith to a placebo to show how useless it is.
Are you becoming an atheist Paisley?
Theism is why we can't have nice things.
Wait. Looking closer...is Paisley negative? I do believe he is below the base line.
Theism is why we can't have nice things.
*Squints*
Why yes, I do believe you're right. The black line at the bottom of the bar graph is officially smarter than Paisley.
You'd better watch yourself, Kevin- that black line's coming up on you pretty fast!
I hope this isn't drawn to scale. Being only twice as smart as paisley is comparable to being the smartest kid with down syndrome. Not to mention you'd have the combined intelligence of 4 bricks.
After eating an entire bull, a mountain lion felt so good he started roaring. He kept it up until a hunter came along and shot him.
The moral: When you're full of bull, keep your mouth shut.
MySpace
Researchers Question Placebo Effect May 24,2001
The Associated Press
One of the most strongly held beliefs in medicine - that dummy pills or other sham treatments greatly help many patients - has been called into question by Danish researchers who found little or no ``placebo effect'' in dozens of studies.
That led the researchers and other doctors to recommend that for ethical reasons, placebos, or inactive substances, no longer be given to patients outside of controlled medical experiments.
``The shoe is on the other foot now. The people who claim there are placebo effects are going to have to show it,'' said Dr. John C. Bailar III, a just-retired professor of health studies at the University of Chicago who wrote an editorial accompanying the research in Thursday's New England Journal of Medicine.
Arthur Caplan, director of the Center for Bioethics at the University of Pennsylvania, said: ``I was shocked by this study. This just goes completely against the grain.''
In many medical studies, patients in one group receive an experimental new treatment, while a comparison group gets a lookalike dummy pill or other placebo. Neither the patients nor the doctors know who is getting what. The goal is to see if medicines being tested do more good than people's will to get better.
Studies occasionally include a third group not getting a placebo. Those patients receive nothing, or just get the standard treatment for a condition if the study is testing whether combining a new treatment with the current one is better.
The Danish researchers combined the findings of 114 such studies from around the world, involving dozens of conditions ranging from colds and seasickness to Alzheimer's disease and schizophrenia, to see how the sham treatment stacked up to no treatment.
In most of the studies, the placebo group fared about the same as the group getting no treatment. The exceptions were studies of pain treatments and some others with subjective results, meaning patients reported how much symptoms bothered them, rather than having an objective measure such as blood pressure.
Placebo recipients in the pain studies averaged a 15 percent reduction in pain, and patients in the other subjective studies had even smaller improvements.
Many past studies and textbooks suggest that about one-third of patients given placebos in medical experiments get better, presumably because they believe they are getting an effective treatment. But the new research casts doubt on this long-held belief.
``The high levels of placebo effect which have been repeatedly reported in many articles, in our mind are the result of flawed research methodology,'' said Dr. Asbjorn Hrobjartsson, a professor of medical philosophy and research methodology at University of Copenhagen who ran the study with colleagues at the Nordic Cochran Center there.
The researchers and other experts said the improvements in subjective measures might be explained by ``reporting bias,'' where patients, thinking they are getting a powerful treatment, incorrectly judge their condition or overstate any improvement to please their doctor.
Dr. Stephen Schneider, a professor of medicine at University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey in New Brunswick, has worked on many trials where patients on placebo improved. He said some of those patients would have gotten better with no treatment. In addition, he said, simply participating in a medical study induces patients to eat better, exercise more or otherwise pay more attention to their health.
Right after you read my post and agree that the body can heal itself thanks to the biochemical processes in the brain (that you decided to give the name "faith"
and acknowledge that Jesus has nothing to do with it.
If Jesus was the placebo, Benny Hinn, et al. would have a documented 100% success rate.
Waiting on your Amen...
"I do this real moron thing, and it's called thinking. And apparently I'm not a very good American because I like to form my own opinions."
— George Carlin
Paisley seems to be using the placebo effect as evidence of 'downward causation', ie that mental states can produce measurable physical effects.
Why he is bothering with such a marginal thing as the placebo effect is weird, since it is far more clearly demonstrated every time I decide to raise my arm, or move my body in any way.
It has been explained to him ad nauseum that mental states are the subjective manifestation of physical processes taking place in the brain, not some separate process, so when we make a decision, or adopt a positive mental state based on faith or other equivalent reason, that is what that particular process, physically manifested by a particular pattern of neuron interaction, 'feels like' from the 'inside'. There is no separate 'mental' process 'causing' some effect in another, 'physical', process. This integrated, ie, non-dualistic, model is supported by countless experiments.
The objective and the subjective are different viewpoints on, or aspects of, the one process, which easily has direct physical effects on the body, because it is inextricably tied to underlying physical processes.
The thoroughly demonstrated bothway coupling between detectable, measurable physical processes in the brain and body, and subjective experience, supports this model, but is less consistent with the dualistic viewpoint, which seems to assume a separate mental entity or 'soul' communicating with the physical body.
Favorite oxymorons: Gospel Truth, Rational Supernaturalist, Business Ethics, Christian Morality
"Theology is now little more than a branch of human ignorance. Indeed, it is ignorance with wings." - Sam Harris
The path to Truth lies via careful study of reality, not the dreams of our fallible minds - me
From the sublime to the ridiculous: Science -> Philosophy -> Theology
In conclusion, carrots.
No, no. Translation: "Faith is the opiate of the masses."
All that is necessary for the triumph of good is that evil men do nothing.
You actually made me laugh out loud with this statement. Good job!
All that is necessary for the triumph of good is that evil men do nothing.
I guess he thinks if he agrees with it while acting like he doesn't long enough, he'll take it out when his head explodes.
"I do this real moron thing, and it's called thinking. And apparently I'm not a very good American because I like to form my own opinions."
— George Carlin
Or in Mark 5:25-34 where the real reason for the cure is explained. V30 "And Jesus, immediately knowing in himself that virtue (power) had gone out of him, turned him about in the press and said, ' who touched my clothes?'" Also in Luke 8:46, "And Jesus said, 'Somebody hath touched me: for I perceive that virtue (power) is gone out of me.'" The woman sucked power from Jesus which supposedly cured her bleeding (hemophilia).
No followup visit is mentioned which indicated she was still cured after a period of time.
This is not admissible as proof of 'faith healing'. It is best only a story that was propagated. No names are mentioned to provide verification and no expert examination occurs at the Mao Clinic as it was 2000 years before it was established.
This in no way refers to healing sick people at all. In context it means Jesus has come not for the righteous but to call sinners to repentance.
You can try to use other legends that are included in the Gospels but they have as much merit and verification as Xena Warrior giving CPR.
____________________________________________________________
"I guess it's time to ask if you live under high voltage power transmission lines which have been shown to cause stimulation of the fantasy centers of the brain due to electromagnetic waves?" - Me
"God is omnipotent, omniscient, omnibenevolent, - it says so right here on the label. If you have a mind capable of believing all three of these divine attributes simultaneously, I have a wonderful bargain for you. No checks please. Cash and in small bills." - Robert A Heinlein.
Okay, you're a troll. I guess it was justification of effort that kept me going this long.
Saint Will: no gyration without funkstification.
fabulae! nil satis firmi video quam ob rem accipere hunc mi expediat metum. - Terence
Or, "I can't deny the solely physical origins of faith and consiousness but if I keep ignoring everyone and yelling "Then you agree with me and Jesus!" maybe they'l give up and I'll actually win for once."
"I do this real moron thing, and it's called thinking. And apparently I'm not a very good American because I like to form my own opinions."
— George Carlin
Clinical studies have demonstrated that placebos have done as well or even better than antidepressant drugs. Moreover, the placebos have shown to have cause the same changes in brain chemistry as the antidepressant drugs.
One recent study concluded that St. John Wort (an herb) had a 24% depression cure rate, Zoloft had a 25% depression cure rate, while the placebo had a 32% depression cure rate. So yeah, you probably are better off taking a sugar pill than Zoloft (providing of course, that you have the pre-requisite faith).*
* (source: "Against Depression, a Sugar Pill is Hard to Beat: Placebos Improve Mood, Change Brain Chemistry in Majority of Trials of Antidepressants" by Shankar Vedantam (Washington Post staff writer) originally published in JAMA)
http://www.chelationtherapyonline.com/technical/p58.htm
"Scientists animated by the purpose of proving they are purposeless constitute an interesting subject for study." - Alfred North Whitehead
You may want to check who exactly payed for those studies.
And the invitation still stands by the way.
No, I am employing the placebo effect to prove that faith heals. I have clearly stated this in the OP. Having said that, it is true that mental states can produce measurable physical effects.
You're right. And I have already successfully argued that our first-person experience of free will demonstrates that the mind is not identical to the brain. I won that argument. Now, I am moving on. I suggest you do the same.
"Scientists animated by the purpose of proving they are purposeless constitute an interesting subject for study." - Alfred North Whitehead
Seriously, you need to think before you quote nonsense like this. Depression is extremely hard to diagnose and gets confused with hundreds of different conditions. Anything that can get cured with St John Wort barely qualifies as a bad mood.
Severe clinical depression can only be kept from turning into suicide with a complicated cocktail of several different anti-depressants. Electroshock can sometimes help as well, but the effect only lasts for a few weeks and can have terrible side-effects. Imagine feeling so depressed that you would willingly consider such a treatment, and you'll get an inkling of what this is about.
Not a single person who suffers from severe clinical depression has ever been cured by a placebo. Not. A. Single. One.
Having the "pre-requisite faith" doesn't help either. Would you like me to introduce you to a few extremely faithful, and extremely depressed catholic nuns ?
The placebo effect has cured depression. In fact, 75% of the causal-efficacy of antidepressants is attributed to the placebo effect! Also, the placebo effect has cured gastric and duodenal uclers (which is known to be cause by the bacterium Helicobacter pylori).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Placebo
"Scientists animated by the purpose of proving they are purposeless constitute an interesting subject for study." - Alfred North Whitehead
You said..."When I type, it's "mind over matter". That's just a platitude. Someone's mind affecting her health is nothing new."
How is that any differ from saying that faith heals is nothing new? Answer: It isn't. Besides, you have already conceded this point in an earlier post.
I'm a troll? Translation: "I'm losing this debate and it's time to cut my losses and run."
"Scientists animated by the purpose of proving they are purposeless constitute an interesting subject for study." - Alfred North Whitehead
Now you're stealing from the physical and claiming it to be non-physical.
How do you come up with (brain chemicals + physiological reactions) = magic man's woo-woo?
Do you define winning an argument as being the last to repeat an assertion?
"I do this real moron thing, and it's called thinking. And apparently I'm not a very good American because I like to form my own opinions."
— George Carlin
Really, this is so incredibly stupid, I'm convinced you don't even believe it yourself. I wonder if you would be prepared to treat a severely depressed patient with a bag of skittles, and then take responsibility for what happens next.
Stop feeding the Paisley.
He doesn't want to debate, he only wants to shout "I win" again and again and thinks that if he does it enough someone might believe him.
Theism is why we can't have nice things.
I'm sorry, man, but the brand of stupid he's chosen to champion this time can actually kill people, and I happen to know some of the people it's killed. This is just really, really pissing me off.
The conclusions of the Danish researchers (Hrobjartsonn and Gotzsche) have been criticized in the scientific community. The placebo effect only works if the patients believe they are receiving bonafide treatment. In clinical trials, the patient does not know whether he is receiving a real treatment or a sham one. So the Danish research proves nothing. It's irrelevant.
"Scientists animated by the purpose of proving they are purposeless constitute an interesting subject for study." - Alfred North Whitehead