A famous study, published in the Columbia University Medical Center Journal of Reproductive Medicine in October 2001, purporting to prove (or at least indicate) the efficacy of intercessory prayer, looks like it may have been fraudulent.
One of the study’s authors is a conman obsessed with the paranormal who has admitted to a multi-million-dollar scam. Daniel Wirth, now under house arrest in California awaiting sentencing, has used a series of false identities for several decades, including that of a dead child.
Wirth is at the centre of a network of bizarre scientific research, often working with co-researcher Joseph Horvath. Horvath has pleaded guilty to fraud, has used a series of false names and is accused of burning down his house for insurance money.
[…] The study was based on an IVF programme in Korea. Prayer groups in the United States, Canada and Australia were shown anonymous pictures of women on the programme and asked to pray. The subjects were not told they were part of a study, but the results claimed to show that the group had double the success rate of a group not being prayed for.
The story goes on to describe a laundry list of crimes, indictments, lack of qualifications, and other damning evidence against Wirth and Horvath’s bona fides.
Lots of questions here. First and foremost, how did CU let something like this past their peer review process? Something as controversial as this should have raised a lot of eyebrows. “Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof.” That two of the authors (not those listed above) were Columbia faculty ought not to have made a difference here, though …
Secondly, science generally works through testing and retesting of hypotheses. Have there been attempts to replicate the results? If not, why not, and, if so, what did they indicate?
Finally, why has it taken two and a half years for someone to dig up the dirt on the paper authors? This study has been widely touted by various religious folk as proof of the power of prayer. Certainly some skeptics, cynics, or unbelievers out there must have tried investigating further both the study and its authors.
Note that the indictments and criminal record doesn’t necessarily invalidate the study. But it certainly should warrant another look at it.
For myself, even as a religious person, I’m more than a bit conflicted over the whole issue of intercessory prayer. Prayer clearly doesn’t work like magic — pray X and God grants X, or pray in Y way, and God will give over with the miracle. The study in question didn’t identify that everyone prayed for had success, which raises the issue of why God would pick and choose whose prayers (or which prayer targets) to answer.
I think prayer’s primary effect is on the pray-er, to consideration and contemplation and as a call to personally act in support of one’s prayers. Does God (positing God’s existence) actually answer prayers? I think so, but I strongly doubt it’s something that can be easily studied or measured. “If it were that easy, anyone could do it.”
At any rate, though, interesting stuff.
(via Les)
Philosophers have argued that it is conceptually impossible for science to verify that a miracle has occured on the grounds that a miracle is necessarily something that is unique and not bound by any scientific laws. Experimental science can only verify a theory through repeatable experiments. By necessity, no miracle can be repeatable, so science can’t verify that one has occurred.
I haven’t stated the argument quite carefully enough here since science can deal with a good number of things through observation and analysis (it’s really hard to conduct experiments on astronomical objects, for example). But the point should be clear: if intercessory prayer is a miracle, and if miracles are necessarily outside the bounds of science, then science cannot verify that intercessory prayer works. This is true even if intercessory prayer really does work, since it’s an argument for an epistemic limitation on science, not an argument for a metaphysical limitation on God’s power.
Oh, one other thing regarding peer review. Many academic articles are “blind reviewed.” The reviewers are not supposed to know who the author(s) of the paper is(are). So any lack of qualifications or potentially fraudulent activities on the part of the authors shouldn’t be known by the reviewers. Even if the article wasn’t blind reviewed, the peer reviewers don’t go trying to dig up dirt on the authors of papers they review. Their job is to review the paper, not to determine whether or not the author is of good moral character. A journal editor might consider such things, but the peer reviewers shouldn’t.
After the unusual events of my last week’s adventure in child bearing, I can say that while I do not know for certain that the energy expenditure in thinking about me and my daughter is responsible for my quick recovery, I do know all the positive e-mails have contributed to my mood, and mood is certainly a part of such improvement. [shrugs] With that in mind, I will certainly pass on such prayer and good wishes to those I know in need whether or not it has any measurable benefits. [smiling]