>That's where it gets interesting for empirical study. Can good prayer make >it rain? Not predictably.
One of the images people have of science is that it leads to clear, objective results, whereas conclusions in history, theology and other aspects of the humanities, are vague and nebulous. However, I think such an impression of science is more likely to arise amongst those who have only studied the philosophy of science and not been involved in actually *doing* science itself. The determination of causation can often be extremely difficult. Correlation is a "necessary but not sufficient" condition, and even the mere claim of correlation can be dubious. My own experiences of gathering data and interpreting it have shown me that the interpretation is often a matter of overlaying the data points with some kind of mathematical analysis - in my case, a Fast Fourier analysis. The results may be highly dubious and depend upon assumptions about sampling, harmonics, and statistical significance. Such interpretations can be highly subjective and the biased proponent of a theory may maintain that there are "numerous studies showing a strong relationship", but nevertheless be deceiving himself. Typically in such cases, all studies to the contrary are filtered out of consciousness or explained away with ad hoc rationales. Sometimes sample sizes which are impossibly small are the basis of such "evidence". Normally, the assessment of one's peers is required, but many researchers by-pass their "peers" by going straight to the media and announcing their "discovery". So, I am not surprised when Andrew Dutney refers to conflicting results about the association of prayer and healing. Is this because there is no causal relationship or because actual science is a difficult matter? There is a hymn in the Australian Hymn Book, included also in Together in Song (343), "Nature with open volume stands". This is a fine piece of 17th century idealism about the openness of the Book of Nature as a revealer of God. But the idea has become a little tired in view of the difficulty with which Nature turns over her secrets. - Greg ------------------------------------------------------ - You are subscribed to the mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] - To unsubscribe, email [EMAIL PROTECTED] and put in the message body 'unsubscribe insights-l' (ell, not one (1)) See: http://nsw.uca.org.au/insights-l-information.htm ------------------------------------------------------
