Empirical Prayers & Logical Fallacies
Sunday, June 17, 2007 
In Prayer: A Neurological Inquiry Skeptical Inquirer author David Haas asks "Are silent prayers transmissible to, or readable by, a supernatural being?" He then attempts to answer this question using "modern information about the brain."
Haas makes a distinction between thoughts and prayers and the underlying brain activity, stressing the non-naturalness of the prayer processes:
"The brain, an electrochemical organ, consists of matter and energy, but the mental states that are the epiphenomena of its physiological processes are neither material substances nor forms of energy ...If thoughts—including silent prayers—are not a form of energy, then there is no known natural means by which they could be transmitted beyond ourselves or read within us. "
Haas then gets to his main question - "Though thoughts and prayers are neither transmissible nor readable by any natural means, could they be known to a supernatural being?"
This is a provocative, $64,000 Question, one which cannot be answered to anyone's satisfaction, but one that leads to all sorts of meta-issues involving all-knowing and all-powerful deities.
Unfortunately, Haas trips up immediately. Here's how he wishes to answer the question of whether prayers can be known to a supernatural being:"Evidence for or against this can be obtained by determining whether prayers are followed by what was solicited by them."
That is, Haas wishes to base his conclusions on whether or not the prayers were answered. He goes on to cite a number of studies that have failed to find a therapeutic effect of intercessory prayer. (In a previous post I noted that The Templeton Foundation had funded one such study. )
The fallacy of Haas argument is stunning - just because a prayer is not answered does not mean that it was not sent, and/or that it was not received. Note that the reasoning would cut both ways: if there had been some therapeutic effect found, it would still not verify that a supernatural being had received the prayers and acted on them.
Haas makes some interesting points about actual brain activity, but again ends with a totally unsupported conclusion:
"Whether they can be known to a supernatural being hinges on the effects of the prayers’ solicitations as judged by proper scientific studies. To date, such studies of intercessory prayer have not shown it to improve health-care outcomes. In contrast to thoughts themselves, the brain activity from which thoughts arise does consist of energy—electrochemical energy within neural circuitry. Reading this teeming energy in millions of circuit neurons and translating it into the thought or prayer arising from it seems theoretically impossible for even a supernatural being."
Unfortunately, Haas' article just muddies the Religion/Science debate. Neither side benefits from illogical arguments.
Reader Comments (3)
Dr. DiDio,
You write that "just because a prayer is not answered does not mean that it was not sent, and/or that it was not received" which seems logical to me. A large number of people, however, expect a supernatural being to behave in a certain way, given a specific situation, if that message was indeed received. This expectation arises from some common assumptions about that supernatural being. These assumptions might include the existence of the being, the being's benevolence, the being's ability to intervene, and that the being's interventions are good.
Not that I would want to do this, but might it be possible to design an experiment that tests this bundle of assumptions? If it is true that a situation exists that requires intervention from the assumed being, one could observe that situation and reasonably expect the being to intervene in a testable and consistent manner. If agreed that the being "should" act in a particular situation (agreement is perhaps unlikely), one could then study the different outcomes of that situation and make some conclusions about the assumptions.
Would such an experiment further muddy the religion/science debate, and if so, why? Is a supernatural being that can adjust the causal order of the universe subject to any scientific observation?
Bryan -
I don't see how any of your If-clauses could ever hold. e.g. start with "If it is true that a situation exists that requires intervention from the assumed being, one could observe that situation and reasonably expect the being to intervene in a testable and consistent manner."
How could one ever determine what this situation is? If it is a situation that has occurred in the past then presumably you already have "proof" of existence of the being. If it hasn't happened in the past, then you are assuming a behavior for a being that is normally thought to set the rules, rather than follow them.
And if a supernatural being "can adjust the causal order of the universe", then how could there be any theory-building around a set of observations that by definition can change at any moment - this would put inductive reasoning on a much worse footing than it already is.
Professor,
Agreed. The "ifs" are certainly too many and thoroughly vague. My post is more a thought experiment than anything substantial and this makes problems for real scientists. What I was aiming at was more the question of whether a benevolent, omniscient, omnipresent, omnipotent supernatural being has any responsibilities to earth, and if so, what are they? If (again with the ifs) we were to agree that a supernatural being does have responsibilities, might that narrow the search for intervention?
As for adjusting the causal order of the universe, you are right that there would be no theory-building because as you put it the definitions "can change at any moment."
Will write more later, but I happen to be late for class.
Bryan