"Religion as a placebo" Metaphor

[deacon blues]

Is religion like a placebo? Does it help some people deal with otherwise insurmountable problems, or inspire some to greater heights? If so, how is it harmful? Do placebos cause harm?

[2bizE]

Someone on Reddit recommend reading the Buddhist parable of the raft. This short parable has been really helpful for me.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/tricycle.o ... -raft/amp/

I think religion is a metaphor, but I don’t think it is a placebo. A placebo is something given with an unknown expected affect that is used to test the outcome of something that should have an affect. Example, a test to see if a new medication has a desired effect. Some participants are given a placebo instead of the real medicine. You would not expect the anticipated outcome with these people.



https://www.google.com/amp/s/tricycle.o ... -raft/amp/

[alas]

Someone on Reddit recommend reading the Buddhist parable of the raft. This short parable has been really helpful for me.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/tricycle.o ... -raft/amp/

I think religion is a metaphor, but I don’t think it is a placebo. A placebo is something given with an unknown expected affect that is used to test the outcome of something that should have an affect. Example, a test to see if a new medication has a desired effect. Some participants are given a placebo instead of the real medicine. You would not expect the anticipated outcome with these people.



https://www.google.com/amp/s/tricycle.o ... -raft/amp/

I am going to take the opposite position, just to play devil’s advocate.

I think religion works like a placebo. The placebo is just a sugar pill that the person believes is real medicine. The person believes it is going to help, and it does help. It helps not because of what it is, but because the person believes it is real medicine and will help. Sort of, if you believe it works, then it works. But placebos do not have to be medicine. When you run a test in psychology to see in neural linguistic programming can help with PTSD, you have to have a control group with a “counseling placebo”. And you compare the specific technique with standard talk therapy. Then you compare to see if the specific technique works better or worse than just talking things over. That way both groups have something that they believe will help. You control for the placebo effect.

So, other things besides just placebo pills can work as placebos. Just like going to the doctor and he tells you, “It’s the flu. You will feel better by tomorrow, because what is going around is just a 24 hour bug.” And you feel much better by the time you get home. You feel better because you believe that seeing the doctor helps you feel better. Or, a better story. When I was 4, I had an “uncle Ralph” you know the typical jerk of an uncle that teases too much and his teasing is just a bit mean. Well, more than just a bit mean when your mother isn’t right there. Well he had teased me mean until I just refused to fall for crap anymore. So, my 7 1/2 and 6 year old brothers and I all got planter warts. So mom takes us to the doctor and he looks at my biggest brother’s warts and he looks in my biggest brother’s eyes and the doctor said, “tell you what, I will buy those warts off you for a nickel.” And he hands my brother a nickel. Then he looks at my other big brother’s warts and looks at my big brother’s eyes and he says, “same deal. I’ll buy those warts for a nickel.” Then he looked at my warts and looked at my cynical, don’t you dare give me any crap eyes. Then looks sadly at my mother and says, “she has a tougher kind of warts. I am afraid we will have to try the medicine and if that won’t work, we will have to burn them off.” But back then a nickel was a lot of money for a 4 y o, and I wanted that nickel, but I knew he couldn’t make the warts go away with a nickel so I knew he was lying. Well, we all went home and within a week both my brothers’ warts were gone, but the medicine was not getting rid of mine and a few weeks later, I had to have the warts burned off. Well, it wasn’t that the warts were any different, it was that the children were different. My brothers still had an innocent trusting gullibility (stupidity) about them that I had lost. They believed the doctor could make their warts go away by “buying” them, while I had lost that trust in adults and my “crap detector” said the doctor really could not “buy” warts off of children’s fingers. He was lying. But my brothers’ warts did go away, while I had the very painful process of getting them burned off, which I still have scars to show for. The doctor didn’t give my brothers a placebo, the doctor WAS the placebo. So, I learned that not trusting lying adults was painful, but still somehow better than trusting lying adults.

For believers, religion just replaces the doctor or the sugar pill that you think is real medicine with God. If you believe that God can make you get better, then you get better. And just like there are some things placebos do not work to fix, there are things that God just can’t fix.

So, take the traditional lost keys that us doubters like to gripe about. So religious zealot loses his keys,and he believes that if he prays, that God will help him remember where he put them. Doubting George loses his keys and he thinks God is a bunch of bunk. So, who is going to find his keys faster? On average it will be religious zealot because he believes God is helping him, he relaxes and quickly remembers. Doubting George, meanwhile is running around in a panic because he is late, and his mental state blocks him from remembering. Placebo effect.

[2bizE]

I better understand the placebo metaphor now. I see how the church is the fake pill that makes you think all is well, but in reality it is just in your head...

[moksha]

Karl Marx thought religion was the opiate of the people, so obviously in that capacity, it can provide some relief when we are hurting.

If religion is "pie in the sky" then I hope they have Key Lime.

[alas]

Karl Marx thought religion was the opiate of the people, so obviously in that capacity, it can provide some relief when we are hurting.

If religion is "pie in the sky" then I hope they have Key Lime.

Religion has been used like opium. In China in the 1700 and 1800s, the rich made opium available cheap to the poor, to keep the poor from revolting. In the 1800s, the American South used Christianity to keep the slaves from revolting. They actively taught that if the slaves were “good” slaves, that they would be rewarded in Heaven. Is the use of opium more evil than using the Lord’s name in vain to keep the slaves from rising up and killing their masters?

Since I have left religion does that mean I don’t get key lime pie in the sky?

[wtfluff]

Karl Marx thought religion was the opiate of the people, so obviously in that capacity, it can provide some relief when we are hurting.

If religion is "pie in the sky" then I hope they have Key Lime.

Religion has been used like opium. In China in the 1700 and 1800s, the rich made opium available cheap to the poor, to keep the poor from revolting. In the 1800s, the American South used Christianity to keep the slaves from revolting. They actively taught that if the slaves were “good” slaves, that they would be rewarded in Heaven. Is the use of opium more evil than using the Lord’s name in vain to keep the slaves from rising up and killing their masters?

Since I have left religion does that mean I don’t get key lime pie in the sky?

Sky Pie? Hmmm.

Oh, Sky Cake; Why are you so delicious???

[Reuben]

Karl Marx thought religion was the opiate of the people, so obviously in that capacity, it can provide some relief when we are hurting.

If religion is "pie in the sky" then I hope they have Key Lime.

Religion has been used like opium. In China in the 1700 and 1800s, the rich made opium available cheap to the poor, to keep the poor from revolting. In the 1800s, the American South used Christianity to keep the slaves from revolting. They actively taught that if the slaves were “good” slaves, that they would be rewarded in Heaven. Is the use of opium more evil than using the Lord’s name in vain to keep the slaves from rising up and killing their masters?

Since I have left religion does that mean I don’t get key lime pie in the sky?

Nah, that's just another psychoactive idea people tend to cut into religion to make it more potent.

[Angel]

Someone on Reddit recommend reading the Buddhist parable of the raft. This short parable has been really helpful for me.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/tricycle.o ... -raft/amp/

I think religion is a metaphor, but I don’t think it is a placebo. A placebo is something given with an unknown expected affect that is used to test the outcome of something that should have an affect. Example, a test to see if a new medication has a desired effect. Some participants are given a placebo instead of the real medicine. You would not expect the anticipated outcome with these people.



https://www.google.com/amp/s/tricycle.o ... -raft/amp/

I am going to take the opposite position, just to play devil’s advocate.

I think religion works like a placebo. The placebo is just a sugar pill that the person believes is real medicine. The person believes it is going to help, and it does help. It helps not because of what it is, but because the person believes it is real medicine and will help. Sort of, if you believe it works, then it works. But placebos do not have to be medicine. When you run a test in psychology to see in neural linguistic programming can help with PTSD, you have to have a control group with a “counseling placebo”. And you compare the specific technique with standard talk therapy. Then you compare to see if the specific technique works better or worse than just talking things over. That way both groups have something that they believe will help. You control for the placebo effect.

So, other things besides just placebo pills can work as placebos. Just like going to the doctor and he tells you, “It’s the flu. You will feel better by tomorrow, because what is going around is just a 24 hour bug.” And you feel much better by the time you get home. You feel better because you believe that seeing the doctor helps you feel better. Or, a better story. When I was 4, I had an “uncle Ralph” you know the typical jerk of an uncle that teases too much and his teasing is just a bit mean. Well, more than just a bit mean when your mother isn’t right there. Well he had teased me mean until I just refused to fall for crap anymore. So, my 7 1/2 and 6 year old brothers and I all got planter warts. So mom takes us to the doctor and he looks at my biggest brother’s warts and he looks in my biggest brother’s eyes and the doctor said, “tell you what, I will buy those warts off you for a nickel.” And he hands my brother a nickel. Then he looks at my other big brother’s warts and looks at my big brother’s eyes and he says, “same deal. I’ll buy those warts for a nickel.” Then he looked at my warts and looked at my cynical, don’t you dare give me any crap eyes. Then looks sadly at my mother and says, “she has a tougher kind of warts. I am afraid we will have to try the medicine and if that won’t work, we will have to burn them off.” But back then a nickel was a lot of money for a 4 y o, and I wanted that nickel, but I knew he couldn’t make the warts go away with a nickel so I knew he was lying. Well, we all went home and within a week both my brothers’ warts were gone, but the medicine was not getting rid of mine and a few weeks later, I had to have the warts burned off. Well, it wasn’t that the warts were any different, it was that the children were different. My brothers still had an innocent trusting gullibility (stupidity) about them that I had lost. They believed the doctor could make their warts go away by “buying” them, while I had lost that trust in adults and my “crap detector” said the doctor really could not “buy” warts off of children’s fingers. He was lying. But my brothers’ warts did go away, while I had the very painful process of getting them burned off, which I still have scars to show for. The doctor didn’t give my brothers a placebo, the doctor WAS the placebo. So, I learned that not trusting lying adults was painful, but still somehow better than trusting lying adults.

For believers, religion just replaces the doctor or the sugar pill that you think is real medicine with God. If you believe that God can make you get better, then you get better. And just like there are some things placebos do not work to fix, there are things that God just can’t fix.

So, take the traditional lost keys that us doubters like to gripe about. So religious zealot loses his keys,and he believes that if he prays, that God will help him remember where he put them. Doubting George loses his keys and he thinks God is a bunch of bunk. So, who is going to find his keys faster? On average it will be religious zealot because he believes God is helping him, he relaxes and quickly remembers. Doubting George, meanwhile is running around in a panic because he is late, and his mental state blocks him from remembering. Placebo effect.

After leaving the church, I prayed to find something and it still worked, I guess God didn't mind my leaving

[Hagoth]

After leaving the church, I prayed to find something and it still worked, I guess God didn't mind my leaving

A couple of quotes from George Carlin pretty much cover it:

“I noticed that all the prayers I used to offer to God, and all the prayers I now offer to Joe Pesci, are being answered at about the same fifty percent rate. Half the time I get what I want, half the time I don't...Same as the four-leaf clover and the horseshoe...same as the voodoo lady who tells you your fortune by squeezing the goat's testicles. It's all the same...so just pick your superstition, sit back, make a wish, and enjoy yourself...”

“And here's something else, another problem you might have: Suppose your prayers aren't answered. What do you say? "Well, it's God's will." "Thy Will Be Done." Fine, but if it's God's will, and He's going to do what He wants to anyway, why the f**k bother praying in the first place? Seems like a big waste of time to me! Couldn't you just skip the praying part and go right to His Will? It's all very confusing.”

[Linked]

Religion is not a placebo, it has real effects and plenty of side effects. Unfortunately with Mormonism it is prescribed for EVERYTHING as a wonder cure by those who peddle it. The real effects and side effects go unacknowledged while all good things that happen are credited to it.