Comments on: The Great Lent Challenge

By: JediMoose » Answering some GLC questions

JediMoose » Answering some GLC questions — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 14:48:32 +0000

[...] had a couple of questions asked since I initiated the Great Lent Challenge – I hesitate to call them “Frequently Asked Questions” because they weren’t [...]

By: Nomes

Nomes — Sun, 01 Mar 2009 20:47:38 +0000

Fantastic idea – I shall give it some thought and start tonight.

By: hannah

hannah — Sun, 01 Mar 2009 18:45:58 +0000

mrben you didn’t say what you are praying for?

By: willie

willie — Sat, 28 Feb 2009 15:46:27 +0000

I prayed today (and yesterday) . Not since I gave up motorcycling have I been calling on the unspecifiable with such regularity

By: mrBen

mrBen — Sat, 28 Feb 2009 08:28:32 +0000

@willie: that’s fine
@sil: Ahhhhh – thanks for explaining that for me.
@Kevin: Would you prefer me to add “You mustn’t tell the subject” to avoid any placebo or psychosomatic responses?

By: willie

willie — Fri, 27 Feb 2009 21:29:03 +0000

Ben, do you mind if I modify it slightly to “area within 2km of Glasgow airport” which will include Yoker and will have much more accessible weather records?

By: willie

willie — Fri, 27 Feb 2009 21:26:47 +0000

sil – could that be an “Ohshit -they’re praying for me- It must be bloody serious” kinda thing leading to increased stress?

Apologies I wasn’t really going to comment on this but I’m happy to be a “control” for Ben’s experiment. Us atheists need to inject a spot of realism into this experiment – but I promise to try to carry it through. Only problem is — Lent doesn’t really exist for me cos I am neither an active Christian or a lapsed Catholic – the only groups I know of who would be aware of Lent to any extent – so keep reminding me mrben

By: sil

sil — Fri, 27 Feb 2009 20:28:16 +0000

mrben: blind intercessory prayer had no effect (i.e., if you got someone to pray but didn’t tell the patient, there was no effect). Non-blind prayer (where the patient knew they were being prayed for) was correlated with more complications in the patient. Kind of a nocebo effect in reverse.

By: mrBen

mrBen — Fri, 27 Feb 2009 20:26:05 +0000

@willie: that’s fine
@Kevin: I’m confused – either it had no effect, or it had a negative effect, but surely both can’t be true?

By: Kevin

Kevin — Fri, 27 Feb 2009 18:35:40 +0000

Please don’t pray for anybody who is undergoing an operation, or serious medical treatment.

“Intercessory prayer itself had no effect on complication-free recovery from CABG, but certainty of receiving intercessory prayer was associated with a higher incidence of complications. (Am Heart J 2006;151:934-42)”

If there’s a God, he truly works in very, very mysterious ways…