The Columbia University 'Miracle' Study: Flawed and Fraud

[Anonymous]

Hey everyone, I don't know if this is the right place for this post but if it isn't it can be moved to the appropiate place. I was researching the net on prayer and came up with this startling article about the Columbia University "Miracle" Study ---> http://www.csicop.org/si/2004-09/miracle-study.html . On GodandScience.org the same results are on the website which is linked here ---> http://www.godandscience.org/apologetics/prayer.html .

Now we know, it was a fraud, a hoax, nothing miracoulous. I advise the article on GodandScience.org for the miracle study to be edited or removed since we know the real deal.

[Kurieuo]

JesusFreak (and anyone else), if you have things to do with articles you would like changed, contact the author (usually Rich). Us moderators generally have absolutely nothing to do with articles on the main website.

Thanks,
Kurieuo.

[Anonymous]

This is a bummer, and I thought it was real and it turned out to be a big lie. What shame the people that did the study have. Well, this proves prayer doesn't work. I'm a Christian, I have been prayed for and have prayed for myself and NOTHING happens. Prayer just doesn't work. Maybe religion is just a game we are playing. Maybe we are doing it for no reason for a reason.

[Kurieuo]

I'd disagree. Scripture provides certain conditions attached to prayer that Christians often glim over. At the same time the point of prayer isn't necessarily to receive receive receive. Perhaps this is an issue to discuss here: Does prayer work, and why bother if God does as He wills?

The new knowledge you point to also only calls one study referenced to at http://www.godandscience.org/apologetics/prayer.html into question. Although I don't generally trust studies of such statistics, and would be hesitant to use them in any argument for God's existence, they are interesting to know in bypassing.

Kurieuo.

[Deborah]

Prayer works, but it is not always what we want to hear, sometimes his answer is NO

When we pray for needs we get them, when we pray for wants we don't.

example I have asked god to win lotto, looking back that is a very selfish want, and I had no right to ask for it. very rarely is a want given.
but I did have one want given and I to my shame did not even reconize the miracle of it. For 5 years we had tried to have another child, and well it just wasn't happening. So I asked God and it did. I can't even remember if I thanked him. I was a very selfish person.
The day he certainly made his presence known was the day I nearly died.
I knew then I was in his hands, but when I recovered I struggled with it for weeks before I finally accepted that God cares enough for me to save me. That experience changed the way I live my life. I will never again be selfish enough to ask god for a want, I only ask for his guidance and that I find the understanding of the knowledge that he left with me the day he saved my life, which I desperately seek.

God looks out for his children, he comforts us, he guides us if we ask for his guidance and above all he is patient.

[Anonymous]

Well, for me, I often pray for myself most of the time in Gods will but I also prayer for others. God doesn't want a person to pray exclusively for themselves although prayer can be repeated for the same things wanted. Could it be that God IS working in lives, it is just so subtle to relize it? Are there any other links besides on GodandScience.org to "prove" that prayer works? I mean I consider myself a Christian yet I induldge into pornography and masturbation , and through a course I am taking to quit it cold turkey, it says that God often won't answer prayer if you are taking part in sexual impurity which is against his commandments. If I were God and my creation took part in sexual impurity on a daily basis that went agaisnt my word, do you think I would care too much to help that person with other things? No! Unless you prayer the sinners prayer with a contrite heart.

[Anonymous]

yeah your looking at prayer all wrong. I don't see why prayer has to only involve God giving you something. God has saved you and prepared an everlasting kingdom for you what more could you want or need?

God guides our lives in ways that he see's fit, we aren't aware of what he might be doing, but that's the point as we also can't see him. That's why its our duty to alway's thank him no matter what, whether your life is great or full of problems because in the end it won't matter.

[Prodigal Son]

some of God's greatest gifts are unanswered prayers...

--Garth Brooks

[Mastermind]

Didn't Jesus say that if we believe in him and pray, everything we ask for will be recieved?

[Deborah]

Yes, but Jesus also said Mat 16:26 For what is a man profited if he shall gain the whole world and lose his own soul? Or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?

Mat 16:26 - For what is a man profited,.... Such persons, though they are only seeking their own profit, will find themselves most sadly mistaken; for of what advantage will it be to such a man,

if he shall gain the whole world; all that is precious and valuable in it; all the power, pleasures, and riches of it; if with Alexander, he had the government of the whole world, and with Solomon, all the delights of it; and was possessed with the wealth of Croesus, and Crassus,

and lose his own soul? If that should be consigned to everlasting torment and misery, be banished the divine presence, and continually feel the gnawings of the worm of conscience that never dies, and the fierceness of the fire of God's wrath, that shall never be quenched, he will have a miserable bargain of it.

Or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul? Or, "for the redemption" of it, as the Ethiopic version renders it: see Psa 49:8 for the redemption of their soul is precious, and it ceases forever, If he had the whole world to give, and would give it, it would not be a sufficient ransom for it; the redemption of an immortal soul requires a greater price than gold and silver, or any corruptible thing; nothing short of the blood and life of Christ, is a proper exchange, or ransom price for it. But in the other world there will be no redemption; the loss of a soul is irrecoverable: a soul once lost and damned, can never be retrieved.

John Gill

Perhaps this means we should be careful what we ask for.

[RGeeB]

Well, for me, I often pray for myself most of the time in Gods will but I also prayer for others. God doesn't want a person to pray exclusively for themselves although prayer can be repeated for the same things wanted. Could it be that God IS working in lives, it is just so subtle to relize it? Are there any other links besides on GodandScience.org to "prove" that prayer works? I mean I consider myself a Christian yet I induldge into pornography and masturbation , and through a course I am taking to quit it cold turkey, it says that God often won't answer prayer if you are taking part in sexual impurity which is against his commandments. If I were God and my creation took part in sexual impurity on a daily basis that went agaisnt my word, do you think I would care too much to help that person with other things? No! Unless you prayer the sinners prayer with a contrite heart.

JF, if we think God wanted us to be a certain standard before He answered prayers, then we underestimate His grace. We can even ask Him what to do to get our prayers answered the way we want. Of course, the key is to know His will and act accordingly.

As for the issues where you want to go cold turkey - Many Christian guys have struggled / still struggle with these. Its just the way society has conditioned our minds. Every Christian has his own battles with the flesh till the day he/she dies. Importantly, I would suggest that the devil can only make you feel guilty while the Holy Spirit convicts. There have been discussions about these issues on this site. Be encouraged because you do not deal with these alone. Even Jesus knows what its like to be tempted.

[Kurieuo]

Didn't Jesus say that if we believe in him and pray, everything we ask for will be recieved?

No, it was qualified with everything you ask in His name (John 14:13; 15:16; 16:23). In other words, it has to be in accordance with Christ's will (1 John 5:14-15). How many who pray here would temper their prayers to God with the attitude of your will be done. Or is prayer simply all about our will be done?

Kurieuo.

[Anonymous]

Prayer works, but it is not always what we want to hear, sometimes his answer is NO

When we pray for needs we get them, when we pray for wants we don't.

So when people pray for others to live, even when this other is a complete stranger, they're praying for wants not needs and asking selfishly?

That's basically what the study was about, you do realise. It wasn't people praying to win the lottery, it was people praying for the lives of others and those prayers were shown to have no effect. It doesn't seem to me that prayers do anything that wouldn't happen on its own.

[Kurieuo]

Now we know, it was a fraud, a hoax, nothing miracoulous. I advise the article on GodandScience.org for the miracle study to be edited or removed since we know the real deal.

Quick to always assume secular skeptics are right, something I overlooked myself this time.

I brought this to Rich's attention, and he looked into the issue but was unable to confirm that the study was false. He discovered that one of the co-authors was arrested for fraud, which was unrelated to the study. Rich also responded (and I'm sure he wouldn't mind me posting):

"the data came from a study that was performed in Korea, from a well-recognized researcher (the guy who was arrested was not involved in the actual study data collection). There were some questions about informed consent (even praying for people requires informed consent in the US, but not Korea). This is actually the extent of the "poor design" of the study, which I was already aware of.

Some of the claims in the Committee for the Scientific Investigation of
Claims of the Paranormal article are distortions - written to specifically
discredit the study, although they are completely unrelated. I could find no evidence "that the Journal of Reproductive Medicine would remove the flawed Columbia study from its Web site and published an editorial clarifying their author requirements." In addition, the article claims that no other double blind studies have been published in peer-reviewed journals. This is false. It looks like a hacket job to me.

The CSICOPs link says "JRM's belated decision to remove the Columbia study from its Web site..." Almost half a year later, the paper is still available in the Journal of Reproductive Medicine (http://www.jreprodmed.com/abs/jrm1137.htm). There also appears to be no "hard" evidence that the study was false, other than the spurious claims implying that there is some sort of a religious conspiracy going on. The author of the CSICOPs writing asks, "How did a bizarre study claiming extraordinarily unlikely and apparently supernatural results end up in a peer-reviewed medical journal? We may never know. For two years the editors of the Journal of Reproductive Medicine (JRM) refused to answer my calls or respond to letters about this study." Now they may not know how it got published, but the fact the study remains in a peer-reviewed medical journal that has strict standards of acceptance, points more to the truth of the study, rather than to the truth of the CSICOPs spurious claims based on a silence (or rejection?) by JRM.

Kurieuo.

[Anonymous]

So you think it is the real deal? You think this study was real and not entirely a hoax?