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HISTORY AND MYSTERY: Brian Olshansky and Larry Dossey Retroactive prayer: a preposterous hypothesis? BMJ 2003; 327: 1465-1468 [Full text]

Rapid Responses: Submit a response to this article

Rapid Responses published:

Were the control treated, as they should have been?

J Martin Bland   (19 December 2003)

Does this mean the holocaust never happened?

Richard G Fiddian-Green   (20 December 2003)

Did anyone cite Pascal?

Nicholas D Moore   (20 December 2003)

A preposterous hypothesis: retroactive prayer

Keith G Davies   (20 December 2003)

The power of thought in joules.

Richard G Fiddian-Green   (21 December 2003)

Theory of everything and multiple worlds: preposterous hypotheses?

Richard G Fiddian-Green   (22 December 2003)

If retroactive prayer changes outcome what of negative thoughts?

Richard G Fiddian-Green   (24 December 2003)

Retroactive prayer

Sandra Lobo   (27 December 2003)

Re: Retroactive prayer

Sam Lewis   (27 December 2003)

May the Force be with you!

Adam Jacobs   (29 December 2003)

Insignificant Signficance

Robert A. Scopatz, College Station, TX, USA 77845   (29 December 2003)

Re: Re: Retroactive prayer

Sandra Lobo   (30 December 2003)

Retroactive Prayer: an important omission from the data?

Norman Guthkelch   (31 December 2003)

Re: Re: Re: Retroactive prayer

L S Lewis   (31 December 2003)

Is Robert Hooke the real hero?

Richard G Fiddian-Green   (31 December 2003)

Who will rid me of this meddlesome priest?

Richard G Fiddian-Green   (3 January 2004)

Retroactive Prayer, etc

norman Guth kelch   (4 January 2004)

A Scientist's Perspective

Rustum Roy   (19 January 2004)

Responses to the Responders

Brian Olshansky, Larry Dossey   (20 January 2004)

Re: A Scientist's Perspective

Adam Jacobs   (21 January 2004)

In response to: Rustum Roy, 19 January 2004, A Scientist's Perspective.

Brian Olshansky, Larry Dossey   (21 January 2004)

Response to: Adam Jacobs, 21 January 2004 Re: Re: A Scientist's Perspective

Brian Olshansky, Larry Dossey   (22 January 2004)

Does the mind and thought exist in quanta and be temperature dependent

Richard G Fiddian-Green   (26 January 2004)

Hearing hoofbeats outside, does one think of zebras?

Leonard Finegold   (13 February 2004)

The souls of a zebra and its herd.

Richard G Fiddian-Green   (4 March 2004)

Alice hypothesis= alternating type IIA and IIB string theories?

Richard G Fiddian-Green   (10 March 2004)

Influencing the Past, Present and Future with Prayer and Meditation

Joanna Francis   (14 January 2005)

Were the control treated, as they should have been? 19 December 2003
J Martin Bland, Prof. of Health Statistics University of York, YO10 5DD Send response to journal: Re: Were the control treated, as they should have been?	When the paper by Leibovici appeared, I submitted a rapid response as follows: "According to Clause 30 of the latest revision of the Declaration of Helsinki: "At the conclusion of the study, every patient entered into the study should be assured of access to the best proven prophylactic, diagnostic and therapeutic methods identified by the study. "To meet this ethical standard, the prayer should now be said for the control group. If the treatment is effective, this should have the effect of removing the difference between the groups. I await the results with interest." Was this done? If not, Leibovici was surely derelict in his duty. Was the past then changed? If it was not, then this would cast doubt on the power of retroactive prayer. If it was changed, how would we know? Competing interests: None declared
Does this mean the holocaust never happened? 20 December 2003
Richard G Fiddian-Green, None None Send response to journal: Re: Does this mean the holocaust never happened?	How might one explain the length of stay in hospital and duration of fever being significantly shorter in the retroactive prayer group than in the control group (P=0.01 and P=0.04, respectively). There are two possibilites. The first is that the results were indeed altered by retroactive prayer. The second is that the randomisation was influenced by the prayer and the results reflected this bias. Of these two possibilitis the first is consistent with the Alice hypothesis for the arrow-of-time is preserved but the second is not for the arrow-of-time is violated as is entropy and with it the second law of thermodynamics (1). If the arrow of time could be violated it would possible to go back in time and have Hitler killed before he had been able to implement the final solution. All Israelis would surely agree that this is a reductio ad absurdum. If so the Israeli authors of this study would be forced to conclude that their conclusion that retroactive prayer changed outcome was a reductio ad absurdum. The alternative would be to deny the holocast. 1. Patrick Bracken and Philip Thomas Time to move beyond the mind-body split BMJ, Dec 2002; 325: 1433 - 1434. (electronic correspondence). Competing interests: None declared
Did anyone cite Pascal? 20 December 2003
Nicholas D Moore, Professor of clinical pharmacology Université Victor Segalen, 33076 Bordeaux Send response to journal: Re: Did anyone cite Pascal?	Whether the result is real, or just the effect of statistical uncertainty (after all, if p<0.05, then there still is a one in 20 chance of finding this purely by chance), since as far as I know remote praying has no reported adverse effects (unless the time thus spent could have been used to take care of present patients, thus avoiding lengthening the waiting lists), then possibly Pascal's bet is applicable: if if don't hurt, believe and pray. Who knows, it could help. Many medical interventions (eg, homoeopathy) are already founded on the same principle. On the other hand, I believe there is no action without (adverse reaction, no effect without side-effects. I suggest a large-scale prayo- epidemiology study be undertaken to identify possible adverse reactions related to praying (local or remote), that may have been missed in these small-scale studies. And any observed adverse effects of praying (such as sore knees) should be promptly reported using the appropriate yellow (or any other colour according to faith as applicable) card system, reporting to the regulatory authorities. What authorities these are should also be defined by the relevant regulations governing proper evidence- based use of praying resources. There may be some discussion as to whether these should be religious or secular authorities, but I suggest that any serious and/or unexpected reaction (from miracles for instance) should be reported within 15 days to the regulatory authorities, since praying has been demonstrated to be a valid medical device. Churches should observe mandatory reporting of adverse effects, since obviously they have a vested interest in making people think praying is safe. The relevant churches should also report regular PSURs (prayer safety update reports), on a six-monthly basis for the first three years after a new prayer is introduced, yearly and five-yearly thereafter.... And of course prayer books should be sold only with a PIL (patient information leaflet), indicating the proper use of such books and the possible undesirable effects of excessive faith. And since it has been said that religion is the people's opium (Marx, I believe, but I forget which one), and religion is subtended by prayers, obviously praying should be seriously regulated, to be used only on medical prescription, until its safety has been sufficiently established for it to go OTC (over the chasuble?), or from POM (Priest-Only Medicine) to GSL (General Singing by Laypersons) etc. etc. ad nauseam Competing interests: None declared
A preposterous hypothesis: retroactive prayer 20 December 2003
Keith G Davies, Neurosurgeon St Paul, MN 55102 Send response to journal: Re: A preposterous hypothesis: retroactive prayer	No amount of invocation of the mysteries of quantum mechanics or string theory can obfuscate the appropriate interpretation of Dr Leibovici’s study. Martin Bland in his letter two years ago hit the nail on the head: the study should be repeated with retroactive intercessory prayer for the control group. Dr Leibovici has had two years to do this, and as far as I know no follow up study has been published. I am sure that many readers are anxious to know the outcome. If the effect disappears, then that would challenge our concept of time. Competing interests: None declared
The power of thought in joules. 21 December 2003
Richard G Fiddian-Green, None None Send response to journal: Re: The power of thought in joules.	Is it possible that prayer or more specifically thought could have the power in joules to improve health regardless of whether it was delivered prospectively, concurrently or retrospectively? To answer this question it is necessary to consider the implications of aspects of Einstein's theory of special relativity. Inertia is the resistance to change such as that experienced when trying to push a large mass such as a stalled car. It is a common experience in these circumstances for the effort required to get the car moving to seem to be far greater than that required to keep it moving or to accelerate it once it has started moving. Energy is the capacity for doing work and kinetic energy the energy a body possesses when it is in motion. Thus a car acquires kinetic energy once it has started moving. The kinetic energy it has acquired may be calculated with the formula Ek=1/2mv2, where Ek= kinetic energy, m=mass and v = velocity. In 1905 Einstein concluded that m=E/C2 where C is the speed of light. He further concluded, in his theory of special relativity, that mass increased in proportion to the energy applied to accelerate it. Hence his formula delta m=delta E/C2. [Rearranging this equation produced his famous equation, E=MC2, a minor part of his theory of special relativity]. The implication of these conclusions is that mass increases as the velocity of the mass increases and approaches infinity as the speed of light is approached. Judging from the change in size of the Lorentz factor no appreciable change in mass should, however, become apparent until the velocity of the mass exceeds 3/4 C. In other words according to Einstein's theory of special relativity any increase in mass that occurred in a supersonic plane which might travel at 2000 miles per hour or a space shuttle which might travel as fast as 20,000 miles per hour would be negligible and not be appreciated by the crew or an observer on earth. Einstein also concluded that the energy required to get a mass to travel at the speed of light also approached infinity as the speed of light increased. He concluded, therefore, that it was not possible to travel at the speed of light. His conclusion is in striking contrast to the common knowledge that it takes very little power to get photons or electromagnetic waves to travel at the speed of light. The power required to turn on a torch (flashlight) or Prince Philip's radio is, for example, minute relative to that required to push a car and certainly relative to that necessary to increase the velocity of a shuttle above the escape velocity neeeded to get it into orbit. If the Alice hypothesis is correct, in so far as it proposes that bosonic and fermionic phases of existence alternate in the order of once every attosecond, then not only should mass not increase as an object approached the speed of light but the energy required to accelerate it should decrease. It has been proposed that if this hypothesis is correct the energy-density-rate should increase as the mass-density-rate decreases when external energy is applied to a mass to move it. It is, however, been established that power increases as the energy-density-rate increases. An alternative explanation is, therefore, that the energy required to keep a mass moving or accelerate it is less than that required to get it moving because the energy-density-rate has decreased. Either way the amount of energy required to accelerate a mass to the speed of light would approach zero as the speed of light approached in violation of Einstein's theory of special relativity. On a more practical level what proportion of each second would "information" about an object have to exist in terms of the Alice hypothesis for the successive bosonic forms that travel at the speed of light to give the illusion that its succeeding fermionic forms are travelling at 20, 2,000 or 20,000 miles per hour? The answer is some 99.997%, 99.7% and 97% respectively. In other words there would be no appreciable change in either the mass of the object in question or the power required to achieve these velocities. This is consistent with predictions in terms of both Newtonian physics and Einstein's theory of special relativity. Einstein's predictions that mass will increase and the energy required to drive it will increase towards infinity as the velocity , rather than the reverse as proposed in terms of the Alice hypothesis, has to the best of my knowledge never been verified by experimentation. The reduction of mass predicted to occur with radioactive decay has, however, been confirmed by is also consistent with the Alice hypothesis. The relevance of this discussion to the power of prayer is that power is an energy-density-rate that may be increase either by increasing the amount of energy or decreasing the time in which it is applied. Indeed delivering one joule in about an attosecond is said to have the capacity to generate power equal to that being produced by all power plants on earth. If, therefore, the frequency of the energy putatively transmitted by thought is very high, as in gamma rays, the amount of energy needed to power changes in matter could be extremely small. It could be far less than that released from the hydrolysis of just one molecule of ATP. In which case thought has the power to evoke physiological changes if the power being directed were directed appropriately. 1. Patrick Bracken and Philip Thomas Time to move beyond the mind- body split BMJ, Dec 2002; 325: 1433 - 1434. (electronic correspondence). Competing interests: None declared
Theory of everything and multiple worlds: preposterous hypotheses? 22 December 2003
Richard G Fiddian-Green, None None Send response to journal: Re: Theory of everything and multiple worlds: preposterous hypotheses?	When I type rapidly and have restricted time in which to review and correct a document I find that I tend to get letters, words and even phrases reversed subverting on occasions the logic of what I am trying to convey. In my earlier communication I did just that and I apolgise for having done so yet again (1). But as the surgeon William J Mayo once said, "it is better to think and sometimes think wrong than not to think at all". To clarify what I had intended to write it is the possibility that prayer altered outcome that violates the arrow-of-time and the Alice hypothesis in which the arrow-of-time and hence history is preserved. It is the violation of the arrow-of-time that would allow one to go back in time and prevent the holocaust from having happend by murdering Hitler. It is the possibility that randomisation might have been altered by retroactive prayer that is able to violate the arrow-of-time for it would be a timeless bosonic event in terms of this hypothesis. If, however, this is what these data mean then they imply that the analysis of data obtained from all prospective randomised studies might be biased by analysis even if the results are not known until the conclusion of the study. This makes as little sense to us simple surgeons as going back in time to murder Hitler and change the course of history. As neither of these explanations is very plausible the correct conclusion could well be that there is no significant effect of retroactive prayer, a conclusion proof of which may be reductio ad absurdum. In which case it may indeed be a preposterous hypothesis as Keith Davis suggests (2). The positive effect of prayer could, however, still be explained in terms of Everett's multiple worlds hypothesis. This hypothesis is appealing to theists for it permits the existences or heaven and hell as other worlds. Some theists might even argue that we are living in hell because the holocaust did occur and pain and suffering are everyday events. Those who accepted the multiple worlds hypothesis might, however, be persuaded to commit suicide with the intent of starting life again in a new world or even heaven. The events that unfolded in Jonestown, Wacko, and in the Heaven's Gate cult are examples of where this kind of thinking can lead. In terms of the multiple world hypothesis it should be possible, if one could go back in time and murder Hitler, to change the course of history. The revised history would simply occur in another world which would not be apparent in our world. This would imply that there may be an infinite number of histories in an infinte number of different worlds only one of which can be appreciated by us mortals living in the world we know, the one in which the holocaust occurred. This multiple worlds interpretation really does seem to be false, the proof again being by reductio ad absurdum, for the simple reason that it implies that every particle in the universe could have infinite mass. If so the sum of these infinite masses of these particles would be equal to infinity, yet another reductio ad absurdum. The possiblity that there might be just two worlds, heaven and hell, does not appear to be consistent with the multiple worlds hypothesis. The bottom line is that there appear to be serious flaws in the current embodiment of the elusive Theory of Everything (ToE) which seeks to combine Einstein's special and general theories of relativity with quantum theory (3). The most serious flaw may well be the assumption that wave-particle duality is a continuous rather than a discontinuous phenomenon as proposed in the Alice hypothesis. Furthermore even Everett's supervior, Wheeler, has rejected the multiple worlds hypothesis because he thought it carried too much "metaphysical baggage". This is not a credible scientific argument against it. The current embodiment of the ToE permits travel back in time and the possibility of Hitler being murdered to alter the course of history, the conceptual vehicles for travelling back in time being wormholes or Einstein-Rosen bridges(3). I submit that any fermionic expression of travel back in time such as these is a reductio ad absurdum for it violates the entropy contained within the second law of thermodynamics. Travel back in time is, however, still possible and indeed a necessity in the bosonic phase of existence in terms of the Alice hypothesis for it is massless and timeless. But that would not apply to the fermionic phase of existence which as Julian Barbour has proposed is static, and which in terms of the Alice hypothesis is composed of fermions (ordinary matter) and conforms with the laws of thermodynamics. Reductio ad absurdum is an established form of mathematical proof in Euclidean geometry and mathematics. Rejecting the ToE and multiple worlds hypotheses on the basis of reuctio ad absurdum is not grounds for rejecting the belief in an existence after death. The Alice hypothesis, which incorporates the successive refinements in Newtonian physics, Einstein's theories of special and general relativity, quantum theory, and holographic theory the latest embodiment of M theory in the continuing quest for the ToE would seem to be compatible with the basic beliefs in most major religions. It does, however, call for a reevaluation of some of the metaphysical details. 1. Does this mean the holocaust never happened? Richard G Fiddian-Green (20 December 2003) 2. A preposterous hypothesis: retroactive prayer Keith G Davies (20 December 2003) 3. Steven Hawking. The universe in a nutshell. Bantam Press, London, 2001. Competing interests: None declared
If retroactive prayer changes outcome what of negative thoughts? 24 December 2003
Richard G Fiddian-Green, None None Send response to journal: Re: If retroactive prayer changes outcome what of negative thoughts?	Upon re-reading Olshansky and Dossey's very thoughtful article the wider implications of Schmidt's study of "retroactive intentions with electronic generators of random numbers and with inherently random processes such as radioactive decay" became apparent to me (1). I have not had an opportunity to read Schmidt's paper (2) but according to Olshansky and Dossey he showed that "human intent influenced prerecorded events at the quantum level in the present if the recording of the quantum events had not yet been seen, even though the events were in the past and had happened". If so Schmidt's study would suggest that retroactive prayer might indeed have had a significant effect on the randomisation in Leibovici's study (3), a change that would not violate the arrow-of-time in terms of the Alice hypothesis for it would have occurred in the timeless bosonic phases of existence. [This would seem to be the most plausible of the three possible explanations for the results of the Leibovici study considered in earlier electronic responses]. According to Olshansky and Dossey "Schmidt did foundational work about retroactive intentions with electronic generators of random numbers and with inherently random processes such as radioactive decay. Human intent influenced prerecorded events at the quantum level in the present if the recording of the quantum events had not yet been seen, even though the events were in the past and had happened. Schmidt's experiments, widely regarded among the most precise ever in human intentionality, evoke praise, even from sceptics". The key phrase is, "if the recording of the quantum events had not yet been seen" for once it is seen the bosonic wave function collapses and the fermionic phase of existence can be seen and becomes an immutable part of history. [Interpretated in terms of the Alice hypothesis]. In his electronic response to this article Davies repeated the call for a study in which the effect of retroactive prayer is tested on a group of control subjects who are not diseased. Is this enough? Might it be more appropriate to perform a study examining the effects of the negative thoughts of say an atheist or a satanist in addition to the neutral thoughts of an agnostic [Davies's control]? If thought can change the course of a disease then negative thoughts should be able to have an adverse effect upon outcome. Indeed some claim that a negative attitude can compromise outcome from a successful operation. An important question that the Leibovici study raises, therefore, is whether it might be necessary to have investigators with opposing beliefs perform randomised studies to eliminate the possibility of biasing the randomisation one way or the other. The suggestibility of the subject might be as important a variable in prospective randomised studies as it is in hypnosis (4). When, for example, I learned of an anaesthetist who was using acupuncture to anaesthetise patients at the Beth Israel Hospital in Boston I approached him asked where he placed his needles. "It doesn't matter where you place them", he replied, " as long as you place them with conviction". Hypnotic suggestion I concluded having experimented with hypnosis as a medical student and been able to induce anaesthesia but not change the role of the dice. If suggestibility of the subject is important then stratification on this basis should perhaps be included in any future studies examining the effects of positive and/or negative thoughts. 1. Brian Olshansky and Larry Dossey Retroactive prayer: a preposterous hypothesis? BMJ 2003; 327: 1465-1468 2. Schmidt H. Collapse of the state vector and psychokinetic effect. Found Phys 1982;12: 565-81. 3. Leibovici L. Beyond science? Effects of remote, retroactive intercessory prayer on outcomes in patients with bloodstream infection: randomized controlled trial. BMJ 2001;323: 1450-1. 4. Miraculous cures. Chapter 26, pp111-115 in: William A Silverman. Where's the evidence? Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1998. Competing interests: None declared
Retroactive prayer 27 December 2003
Sandra Lobo, Pediatric Neurologist St Paul, Minnesota 55102 Send response to journal: Re: Retroactive prayer	I have prayed many times in the last two years that Dr Leibovici's article had not been published, but whenever I return to the BMJ website it is still there. Competing interests: None declared
Re: Retroactive prayer 27 December 2003
Sam Lewis, GP Surgery, Newport, Pembs, SA42 0TJ Send response to journal: Re: Re: Retroactive prayer	oh ye of little faith ! Competing interests: everything I believe might be nullified
May the Force be with you! 29 December 2003
Adam Jacobs, Director Dianthus Medical Limited, London SW19 3TZ Send response to journal: Re: May the Force be with you!	Olshansky and Dossey ask 'Was the prayer religious and, if so, of which religion?' I think I might be able to shed some light on this. The compelling evidence for remote effects of prayer through poorly understood mechanisms discussed in Olshansky and Dossey's article clearly refers to the Force, a central tenet of the Jedi religion. For those who need reminding, 'The Force is what gives the Jedi his power. It's an energy field created by all living things. It surrounds us and penetrates us. It binds the galaxy together.' [1] If that is not a perfect explanation for retroactive effects of prayer, I don't know what is. Retroactive prayer is clearly a manifestation of the Force, and no doubt the recent awareness of the power of the Force is the reason why the Jedi religion is now Britain's fourth largest religion [2] (or possibly not [3], depending on which part of the ONS website you believe). May the Force be with you! References: 1. Kenobi, O-W. In: Star Wars, 1977 2. http://www.statistics.gov.uk/census2001/profiles/commentaries/ethnicity.asp#religion 3. http://www.statistics.gov.uk/census2001/profiles/uk.asp#ethnic Competing interests: I am (at least according to my census form) a Jedi Knight
Insignificant Signficance 29 December 2003
Robert A. Scopatz, Senior Researcher Data Nexus, Inc., College Station, TX, USA 77845 Send response to journal: Re: Insignificant Signficance	Has anyone looked into the long-term effects of the prayers invoked in Dr. Leibovici's study? I mean, if prayer can retroactively change patient outcomes, perhaps the effect lingered to the point where these folks never needed any further medical attention, and are now immortal. In repayment of the favor, these first few could then be charged with spending the rest of eternity retroactively treating the remaining population until, eventually (and retroactively) we could conquer death entirely. For all time past, present and future. In which case, this response will be seen as an attempt at humor. Which it clearly is not! Livelihoods are at stake! I'm submitting my grant to NIH before they retroactively disappear. Competing interests: None declared
Re: Re: Retroactive prayer 30 December 2003
Sandra Lobo, Pediatric Neurologist St Paul, Minnesota 55102 Send response to journal: Re: Re: Re: Retroactive prayer	If everything Dr Lewis believes could be nullified by the rejection of this piece of junk pseudoscience, it doesn't say much for the validity of his beliefs. Competing interests: None declared
Retroactive Prayer: an important omission from the data? 31 December 2003
Norman Guthkelch, Retired Tunkhannock, PA 18657, USA Send response to journal: Re: Retroactive Prayer: an important omission from the data?	Olshansky and Dossey refer to a study by Leibovici which has been taken as adequately randomized. I don't think it was. Leibovici's Table 1 strongly suggests that the difference in length of hospital stay depended on a feww very long stay cases in the control group. Were these examined for offering or not offering of intercessory prayer at the time of the illness? If some (or all) of the long stay controls originally received this, then we must conclude either that intercessory prayer makes no difference, or that retroactive prayer is more effective than prayer offered at the bedside. Neither conclusion makes much sense (theological or scientific), and one can regard the study as just one of those chance associations, of which a well known one, when I was a student, was that the tonnage of bananas into the UK over a period of I forget how many years varied with the number of ordinations of clergy into the Church of England. Incidentally, Newton's remark "Hypotheses non fingo" -"fingo" means 'invent' as distinct from observing - was not as I understand him a disclaimer about the formulation of hypotheses, though it reads that way; he was claiming that his (published) hypotheses were evidence-based, whereas in the past people had tended to invent an explanation, and then cite only the facte that suited it. Also, anyone who would make the efficacy of retroactive prayer more plausible on scientific grounds should reflect that the sort of energy required to create the appropriate space-time warp is, as Hawking tells us, equivalent to all the energy put out by the stars of our galaxy. That such an outburst should go unnoticed in a hospital ward seems unlikely. Competing interests: None declared
Re: Re: Re: Retroactive prayer 31 December 2003
L S Lewis, GP Surgery, Newport, Pembrokeshire UK SA42 0TJ Send response to journal: Re: Re: Re: Re: Retroactive prayer	How quickly Sandro Lobo jumps to the entirely wrong conclusions, even in this light-hearted Christmas banter ! I believe that the past is done and cannot be changed. I believe that cause always precedes effect in time. Both these beliefs are probably acts of Faith, and everything else I have come to believe through experience/Science seems predicated upon these two assumptions. But if prayer can change the past ( or indeed if anything can change the past ) then all my beliefs are nullified.. I am pretty sure that the same applies in the USA. Thankfully, the evidence that anything can change the past remains dubious, scanty and easily dismissed... But maybe I am deluded. Happy New Year. Competing interests: None declared
Is Robert Hooke the real hero? 31 December 2003
Richard G Fiddian-Green, None None Send response to journal: Re: Is Robert Hooke the real hero?	Lewis Carroll, or Mr. Dodgson as his child friends would refer him as, was born on January 27, 1832 and died on January 14, 1898. In the 66 years of his life, he wrote more than 10 books, some of them were children's stories and some of them were texts of maths and logic, since he was, for 26 years, a mathematics don at Christ Church home of Oxford's cathedral and former home of the current Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams. Almost two hundred years earlier Robert Hooke, a contempory of Sir Isaac Newton who was a don at Cambridge and held the Lucasian Chair in mathematics currently held by Steven Hawking, was apparently a don at the same college. There appears to be much more to these associations than meets the public eye. The formulation of the Alice hypothesis began with this quotation from, "Alice’s adventures in wonderland" by Lewis Carroll. “You’ll see me there” said the cat and vanished. Alice was not so much surprised at this, she was getting so well used to queer things happening”. While she was still looking at the place where it had been, it suddenly appeared again. The quotation was included because of a suspicion that Lewis Carroll might have had a theoretical and even a working knowledge of the practical implications of the Alice hypothesis I devised to explain my observations. It might be of relevance in this context to mention that Oxford was a royalist stronghold during the civil war and Cambridge a parliamentary stronghold. It might be of relevance to note in addition that until relatively recently all dons at Oxford and Cambridge were required to be Anglican priests. "No portrait survives of Robert Hooke. His name is somewhat obscure today, due in part to the enmity of his famous, influential, and extremely vindictive colleague, Sir Isaac Newton. Yet Hooke was perhaps the single greatest experimental scientist of the seventeenth century. His interests knew no bounds, ranging from physics and astronomy, to chemistry, biology, and geology, to architecture and naval technology; he collaborated or corresponded with scientists as diverse as Christian Huygens, Antony van Leeuwenhoek, Christopher Wren, Robert Boyle, and Isaac Newton. Among other accomplishments, he invented the universal joint, the iris diaphragm, and an early prototype of the respirator; invented the anchor escapement and the balance spring, which made more accurate clocks possible; served as Chief Surveyor and helped rebuild London after the Great Fire of 1666; worked out the correct theory of combustion; devised an equation describing elasticity that is still used today ("Hooke's Law"); assisted Robert Boyle in studying the physics of gases; invented or improved meteorological instruments such as the barometer, anemometer, and hygrometer; and so on. He was the type of scientist that was then called a virtuoso -- able to contribute findings of major importance in any field of science. It is not surprising that he made important contributions to biology and to paleontology"(From internet). "Relatively little is known about Robert Hooke's life. He was born on July 18, 1635, at Freshwater, on the Isle of Wight, the son of a churchman. He was apparently largely educated at home by his father, although he also served an apprenticeship to an artist. He was able to enter Westminster School at the age of thirteen, and from there went to Oxford, where some of the best scientists in England were working at the time. Hooke impressed them with his skills at designing experiments and building equipment, and soon became an assistant to the chemist Robert Boyle. In 1662 Hooke was named Curator of Experiments of the newly formed Royal Society of London -- meaning that he was responsible for demonstrating new experiments at the Society's weekly meetings. He later became Gresham Professor of Geometry at Gresham College, London, where he had a set of rooms and where he lived for the rest of his life. His health deteriorated over the last decade of his life, although one of his biographers wrote that "He was of an active, restless, indefatigable Genius even almost to the last." He died in London on March 3, 1703" more than a hundred years before Lewis Carroll was born (1832) and certainly before he became a don at Christ Church. It transpires that Hooke's law, or a simple modification of it, might best describe the behaviour of the universe or multiverse in terms of the Alice hypothesis. I suspect that Hawking appreciates this for in his book, "The universe in a nutshell", he observes that gravitational energy can be "borrowed" to create matter energy and thereby induce expansion of the universe (6). The implication is that the debt is paid off when the universe contracts and that matter energy might even be borrowed to create matter energy as defined in Hooke's law describing the movement of a spring. In so saying Hawking appears to have been referring to quantum flashing and quantum interest. Quantum flashing refers to the requirement of any pulse of negative energy that might be generated to be followed by a pulse of positive energy. Quantum interest refers to the increase in size of the succeeding pulse of positive energy that occurs in proportion to the duration of the pulse of negative energy and the pulse of positive energy that follows directly related to the duration of the pulse of negative energy. The magnitude of a pulse of negative energy is inversely related to its duration and that of the succeeding pulse of positive energy directly related as might have been expected had the expansion and contraction of the universe obeyed Hooke's law which desribes the to-and-fro movements of a spring: Hooke's law states that F=-k.delta x, where F= the potential force in a compressed or expanded spring, k= force constant, and delta x the distance moved by the spring. If the universe if expanding and contracting like a spring then, in terms of the Alice hypothesis, it might do so once in the order of every 10 to the minus 43 of a second. That would require it to expand and contract at rates far exceeding the speed of light, rates associated with the confirmed phenomenon of entanglement or what a sceptical Einstein called "spooky action at a distance". What is more Hawking appears to have been thinking of this possibility for in his book he observes that the sum of negative and positive energies remains zero no matter how large the universe or multiverse for that matter might become. That would imply that the coefficient of restitution of the universe, a measure of its elasticity, would have to be exactly one. In coventional cosmology the size of omega, matter energy/energy density, determines whether the universe is expanding and is "open", static and "flat", or contracting and "closed". If it is open omega is less than one. If it is flat it is one. If it is closed it is greater than one. The only difference between the coefficient of resitution and omega in the timescale in which events are predicted to occur. Reading between the lines not only Lewis Carroll but Hawking may have appreciated that the a prior embodiment of the pricniples of the Alice hypothesis was closer to the truth than conventional cosmology is today and have been constrained from making a public declaration of their beliefs to conform with theological thinking. If so the conflict between Sir Isaac Newton and Robert Hooke goes far, far deeper than has been apparent for centuries. If the Alice hypothesis is correct why did Newton, Einstein or any of the modern theoretical physicists, cosmologists and mathematicians not think of it? It was the first thought that came to my mind after wading throught he popular science literature and trying to understand what they were trying to say. The answer may well be that they have and have been compelled to conceal the fact. Consider John Nash of Beautiful Mind fame. Nash was awarded the Nobel prize for his work on game theory after he had recovered from schizophrenia despite having refused all treatment. His "disease" began shortly after he had began an association with Einstein and was delving into theoretical physicsc. What is more he himself says that he began to get better despite refusing treatment only after he had rejected what appears from what he has written to have been politically incorrect thinking. If so Hooke might well have discovered the truth in the seventeenth century and kept it alive at Christ Church having devised a plan for doing so. Why then the continuing need for this cloak-and- dagger stuff in our liberated society? Because of the fear of the consequences to themselves and to their families and even their friends? Perhaps these issues will come to light with the publication of the Hutton enquiry into Kelly's "suicide". 1. Steven Hawking. The universe in a nutshell Bantam Press, London, 2001, pp 62. 2. Patrick Bracken and Philip Thomas Time to move beyond the mind- body split BMJ, Dec 2002; 325: 1433 - 1434 (Electronic correspondence). 3. Brian Olshansky and Larry Dossey Retroactive prayer: a preposterous hypothesis? BMJ, Dec 2003; 327: 1465 - 1468. (Electronic responses). 4. Anthony Campbell. Why are miraculous cures mainly of cancer? BMJ 2003; 326: 106b (Electronic correspondence). 5. Thomas Szasz The psychiatric protection order for the "battered mental patient" BMJ 2003; 327: 1449-1451 (Electronic correspondence). 6. Sylvia Nasar. A Beautiful Mind: The Life of Mathematical Genius and Nobel Laureate John Nash 2001. 7. The Essential John Nash by John F. Nash, et al (Hardcover - December 2001) by Sylvia Nasar Competing interests: None declared
Who will rid me of this meddlesome priest? 3 January 2004
Richard G Fiddian-Green, None None Send response to journal: Re: Who will rid me of this meddlesome priest?	The confict between the English monarch and the church has a long history as evident from this statement made by the monarch who allegedly set in motion a sequence of events that lead to the murder of Thomas a Becket on Canterbury cathedral. In more recent times the conflict might have been concerned about the ownership and rights to the dissemination of scientific knowledge relating to theoretical physics and raised by this study on the therapeutic effects of retroactive prayer. It is of interest, therefore, to find that Robert Hooke was living on the Isle of Wyte in the year that Charles I lived there during the Civil War. They must have met for found in Robert Hooke's possessions when he died was a bible inscribed by Charles I. Robert Hooke was clearly a royalist for he fasted each year until his death on the anniversary of Charles I,s execution at the conclusion of the Civil War. He was executed because of his stubborn refusal to relinquish his belief in the divine right of kings and in effect agree to ssubbordinate himself to the church. Although Robert Hooke attended Christ Church he was never a don there as I incorrectly suggested in my earlier communication on Robert Hooke. That means he did not have to take oaths of allegence to the Creed as evidently required at the time of all those seeking academic advancement in either Oxford or Cambridge. Isaac Newton, who knew Hooke well and collaborated with him, felt very uncomfortable about these oaths and did not accept the Lucasian chair of mathematics in Cambridge after Barrow had resigned until Charles II had given special dispensation to absolve the holder of the Lucasian chair of this requirement IN PERPETUITY. That means that the holder of the chair was freed in perpetuity of at least some of constraints placed upon academics at the time by the church. Isaac Newton was a don at Trinity, home today of his library. It is of interest, therefore, to note that Prince Charles was an undegraduate there. This raises the possibility that there may have been a direct link between the holder of the chair and the reiging monarch since Newton's appointment at the age of 26. He was recommended for the position by his predecessor Barrow, whose great....great grandson might well be the contemporary cosmologist John Barrow. Viewed in this context the very well documented conflict between Hooke and Newton may have been for appearances only and intended to conceal a collaborative link between the two perhaps enabled by a direct link between the President of the Royal Society and the monarch. Hooke was curator of the Royal Society and Newton the President from immediately after Hooke's death until his own death thereby insuring continuity in the putative reports on new scientific developments between the scientists and the monarch. Much has been written of Newton's involvement with Alchemy and his search for the secret of the Philosopher's stone. Viewed in this context this may have been related to his efforts to explain paranormal phenomena such as thhose I have observed and the disappearance and reapprance of the cat in Lewis Carroll's adventures of Alice in wonderland. What then of Cromwell, whose father had worked for Cardinal Wolsey and is said by some to have been the author of Shakspeare's Henry VIII. The conflict between church and monarch and indeed the strategic link between the monarch and his physican Butts is revealed in this play in addition to what appear to have been the most malicious of covert efforts to prevent him from ever having a legitimate male heir. Indeed viewed in this context his murder of his wives was intended to keep the letter of the church's laws on divorce and remarriage without violating the laws of the land. What then of Cromwell's links with the Puritans, who had evidently been purged from Cambridge by the time Newton was appointed to the Lucasian chair, and Harvard, Yale and particularly Princeton where both Einstein and Nash held their appointments? Furthermore if Hooke and Newton had gone to such lengths to conceal their putative collaboration and links with the monarch might Einstein's theory of relativity and certainly his formula E=MC2 have been acclaimed by informed physicists for the same reasons? Einstein received the Nobel prize but not for his formulation of E=MC2. Nash received the Nobel prize for his work on game theory and no mention was made of his collaboration with Einstein. In which case the development of thermonuclear weapons may have been a giant red herring intended to give time to those physicists trying to explain paranormal phenomena such as the putative therapeutic effects or rather randomisation effects of retroactive prayer and harness the powers. In which case the implication is that parties within the church had knowledge of these laws and were using them to retain and advance their powers. Historical information drived from a recent biography of Robert Hooke and older biographies of Newton. Competing interests: None declared
Retroactive Prayer, etc 4 January 2004
norman Guth kelch, retired tunkhannock, PA 18657 USA Send response to journal: Re: Retroactive Prayer, etc	I have already commented on the validity of Leibovici's data. The more fundamental problem is whether petitionary prayer can ever be effective, since it must be addressed to A Being, and some modern theologians (e.g. Paul Tillich, followed by John Robinson and John Spong would say that God is not A Being but rather Being-in-Itself. Go figure Competing interests: I am a committed Christian
A Scientist's Perspective 19 January 2004
Rustum Roy, Evan Pugh Professor of the Solid State Emeritus Penn State University, University Park, PA 16802 Send response to journal: Re: A Scientist's Perspective	I am not baffled by some of the responses to the Dossey and Olshansky paper on “retroactive prayer: a preposterous hypothesis.” While other responders raise valid statistical questions or question the comparison to the esoterica of modern physics, these betray their deep distrust of the only real principles of science: the unswerving commitment to facts; only facts. Larry Dossey’s credentials in careful research and writing are impeccable. When a responder has to drag in the word “Holocaust” to buttress his case one knows he is short of arguments. Likewise “the Force.” One is reminded of the emotionalism of all fundamentalists. These puerile reactions confirm the view of Alfred North Whitehead, great mathematician and philosopher, who fifty years ago wrote: “Skeptics and believers are all alike. At this moment scientists and skeptics are the leading dogmatists. Advance in detail is admitted: fundamental novelty is barred.” As a materials scientist with one thousand papers, I have learned in fifty years at the bench that genuine innovation comes from the ability to be open to the extrema among observations. Whitehead’s “fundamental novelties.” (vide supra) In five years now of in depth contact with the literature and personal contact with the world’s leaders, it appears to me that the entire field of “whole person healing”—including prayer—and its time- tested empirical data base over millennia, provides the science community with both irrefutable scientific evidence, and the best opening to utterly new science. Compared to the hundreds of millions of dollars of public money for “GUT and superstrings” which has returned a mathematical zero in benefits to the supporters (tax payers), prayer and intuition (and many other practices) are infinitely more cost effective and credible to working scientists (as distinct from dogmatic fundamentalist adherents of some lesser god of a theory). I do not necessarily support more publicly supported research on prayer. Conversely, I believe public support of “research” on hypothetical births of the Universe, parallel Universes, strings, or whatever, which cannot be tested experimentally, and which can have no possible impact on society, should be phased out, as is the public support of (other) religions. The increase of all health giving practices, exercise, learning to enjoy eating modestly, small group connections, meditation, prayer (for those who choose it) should be a much higher priority for private philanthropy. If some form of “worship” of parallel Universes and GUT can be shown to have health effects, I would support those also, in proportion to the amount of data provided, and number of worshippers. Competing interests: None declared
Responses to the Responders 20 January 2004
Brian Olshansky, Professor of Medicine University of Iowa, Iowa City IA 52242, Larry Dossey Send response to journal: Re: Responses to the Responders	Comments by Brian Olshansky and Larry Dossey on the responses to: Retroactive prayer: a preposterous hypothesis? BMJ 2003;327:1465-1468 Were the control treated, as they should have been? —J Martin Bland (19 December 2003) Bland suggests that it was unethical in Leibovici’s study of retroactive prayer to deny prayer to the control group following the experiment. Some researchers in prayer experiments agree and have indeed assigned prayer to the control group after completion of the study. But can prayer be denied? Unlike an experiment involving the testing of a pharmaceutical drug, it is unlikely that the control group in a prayer study is totally denied prayer. Patients pray for themselves or their loved ones pray for them, regardless of which group they are in. This means that human studies test not prayer versus no prayer, but differing degrees of prayer. This situation resembles high-dose versus low-dose drug testing for a particular condition, which is frequently done. This “problem of extraneous prayer” can be overcome by testing prayer not in humans but in animals, plants, and microbes, or generators of random numbers, all of which presumably do not pray for themselves. Bland’s suggestion that the application of prayer to the control group would have abolished the differences between the two groups if prayer is effective is excellent and we support this idea in future studies. We know of no studies that have employed this strategy. — B. Olshansky & L. Dossey Reference 1. Dossey L. The case for nonlocality. In: Reinventing Medicine. San Francisco, Calif: HarperSanFrancisco; 1999: 37-84. Does this mean that the holocaust never happened? — Richard G Fiddian-Green (20 December 2003) Fiddian-Green suggests that if prayer could retroactively influence the hospital course of patients, the Holocaust and other events should be equally amenable to being changed or rendered nonexistent. This assumes that all events should demonstrate equal susceptibility to retroactive influence. It is not obvious to us that this should be so. We do not expect any antibiotic to be universally effective; penicillin is effective against some microbes but not others. The Holocaust is one of the most frequent examples cited by critics of prayer. For all we know, without prayer the Holocaust might have been exponentially more disastrous. One (fortunately) cannot perform controlled trials of holocausts or natural disasters in order to put prayer to the test. We believe that controlled clinical trials of intentionality and prayer are more reliable guides to prayer’s effectiveness or lack of it than examples such as the Holocaust. — B. Olshansky & L. Dossey Did anyone cite Pascal? — Nicholas D Moore (20 December 2003) Professor Moore states that one would expect, by chance, one in twenty studies of prayer to be statistically positive. In fact, five of nine controlled clinical trials of prayer have proved to be statistically positive to date, far more than the one in twenty expected by chance. References for most of these studies were cited in our paper. Professor Moore sees connections between the justifications people make for both homeopathy and prayer. We take no position on homeopathy and leave it to others to decide if homeopathy and prayer are analogous. Moore’s comments on the dangers of prayer are facetious, yet they should be seriously considered. One of us (LD) has reviewed the negative aspects or side-effects of distant intentions and prayer, for which there is considerable evidence. For example, intentions have been employed remotely to increase and decrease the kinetic rates of biochemical reactions, microbial growth rates in test tubes, and the growth of tumors in animals. These findings suggest paradoxically that so-called negative prayers and intentions may have a benevolent aspect. For example, for someone afflicted with tuberculosis or cancer, it would be quite wonderful if prayers or intentions could demolish mycobacteria or cancer cells. The capacity for negative prayers and intentions therefore constitutes survival value for the organism possessing it, and is a rationale for the development of such a trait from the perspective of evolutionary biology. In view of the possibility that prayer might cause harm, informed consent for prayer should be considered in medical settings. Not everyone wants to be prayed for; some see prayer as an invasion of privacy and an attempt to usurp personal control. There are situations, however, where informed consent is impossible, as when the patient is an infant or is unconscious and unaccompanied by next-of-kin. — B. Olshanksy & L. Dossey Reference: 1. Dossey L. Be Careful What You Pray For. San Francisco, Calif: HarperSanFrancisco; 1997 A preposterous hypothesis: retroactive prayer. — Keith G Davies (20 December 2003) We agree that a repeat of Leibovici’s study is warranted, including prayer for the control group to see if the effect disappears. — B. Olshanksy & L. Dossey The power of thought in joules. — Richard G Fiddian-Green (21 December 2003) There are several reasons, as we stated in our paper, why energetic concepts such as joules, drawn from classical physics, are inadequate in understanding remote healing intentions and prayer. Nearly all the evidence from experiments in distant intentionality and prayer suggest that these phenomena are nonlocal — i.e., they do not decay with distance, the distant correlations are immediate, they are unmediated by any demonstrable physical or energetic intermediary signal, and the influence cannot be shielded. Joule-related events do not behave like this. It is unclear to most physicians how prayer could work if one excludes exchanges of known forms of energy from its mechanism. This is the essence of nonlocal events that have been documented in a variety of studies within quantum physics over the past two decades. Several hypotheses that make use of these findings have been advanced to explain consciousness-related events that appear to be nonlocal. There is no solid evidence so far, however, linking quantum physics and the operations of consciousness. Whether quantum physics and nonlocality will eventually prove fruitful in deciphering prayer and distant intentions remains to be seen. — B. Olshansky & L. Dossey Reference 1. Clarke CJS. The nonlocality of mind. Journal of Consciousness Studies. 1995; 2(3):231-40. Theory of everything and multiple worlds: preposterous hypotheses? — Richard G Fiddian-Green (22 December 2003) Fiddian-Green’s suggestion that Leibovici’s findings are consistent with the multiple-worlds hypothesis of Everett, Wheeler, and Graham (sometimes called many-worlds or parallel-universe theory) is intriguing, and we know of no way to disprove this possibility. Although the multiple-worlds hypothesis is said to be mathematically consistent, many physicists and cosmologists disdain it for the same reason some individuals reject retroactive prayer: its seems inherently implausible and therefore distasteful. Everyone to her own taste, we say. We know of no explanation for retroactive prayer — or proactive prayer, for that matter — that goes down sweetly. — B. Olshansky & L. Dossey If retroactive prayer changes outcome what of negative thoughts? — Richard G Fiddian-Green (24 December 2003) As mentioned above, considerable evidence suggests that intentions can function remotely to bring about negative biological effects. Please see our response to Nicholas D Moore, 20 December 2003. Fiddian-Green asks whether it might be necessary to have investigators with opposing beliefs perform randomized studies to eliminate the possibility of biasing the randomization one way or the other. This type of experiment has been performed by parapsychology researchers Marilyn Schlitz and Richard Wiseman. Schlitz, who is cordial to the possibility that conscious intentions can act remotely, was able to effect statistically significant results in a laboratory experiment involving the detection of being stared at, the details of which cannot be described here. Wiseman, a widely known skeptic of these phenomena, was unable to achieve significant results in the same experimental set-up. The experiment was replicated by the same investigators. Fiddian-Green also raises the question of whether hypnosis may help explain some of the effects of acupuncture and whether the intentions of the acupuncturist are involved by placing the needles “with conviction.” We take this possibility seriously. Remote hypnotic suggestion was attempted by many investigators with promising findings, before such a phenomenon in the twentieth century came to be considered too implausible to warrant further study. References: 1. Wiseman R, Schlitz M. Experimenter effects and the remote detection of staring. Journal of Parapsychology. 1997;61:197-208. 2. Wiseman R, Schlitz M. Experimenter effects and the remote detection of staring: an attempted replication. Proceedings of Presented Papers: Parapsychological Association 42nd Annual Convention. 1999;471-479. 3. Dossey L. Hypnosis: a window into the soul of healing. Alt Ther Health Med. 2000:6(2):12-17, 102-111. Re: Re: retroactive prayer. — Sandra Lobo (30 December 2003) Lobo suggests that Leibovici’s study is “junk pseudoscience.” We are well aware of the capacity of prayer research to evince passionate responses. We believe, however, that the denunciation of prayer can be justified only through further empirical studies and through an examination of the already substantial data suggesting that consciousness can act remotely in the world. As we stated in our paper, many phenomena that were originally considered preposterous (the telegraph, atherosclerosis as a cause of heart disease, and so on) are now accepted in science. Several hundred additional examples could be cited. They suggest caution in prematurely condemning phenomena that violate intuition and shock common sense, however difficult this may be to achieve. Reference 1. Cerf C, Navasky V. The Experts Speak: The Definitive Compendium of Authoritative Misinformation. New York, NY: Villard; 1998. Retroactive prayer: an important omission from the data? — Norman Guthkeich (31 December 2003) Guthkeich suggests that Leibovici’s subjects were not adequately randomized. We also raised this possibility in our paper, and suggested that the source of the inadequate randomization could have been Leibovici’s own intentions. He may have unconsciously “randomized” the long-stay cases into the control group, biasing the results toward his preexisting intention. This possibility, we pointed out, is consistent with studies suggesting that human intention can interfere with processes believed to be inherently random. Guthkeich states that the degree of energy required to accomplish retroactive prayer is the equivalent of energetic output of all the stars in our galaxy, an event that would surely have been noticed in a hospital. But we do not know how prayer works. We have suggested above that it does not involve energetic exchanges of the sort Guthkeich proposes, but is is a genuinely nonlocal phenomenon — unmediated, unmitigated, and immediate. References: 1. Dossey L. How healing happens: exploring the nonlocal gap. Alt Ther Health Med. 2002;8(2): 12-16, 103-110. 2. Dossey L. Energy talk. The Network. The Scientific and Medical Network Review [UK]. April 1997; 63: 3-7. 3.Dossey L. The forces of healing: reflections on energy, consciousness, and the beef Stroganoff principle. Alt Ther Health Med. 1997;3(5):8-14. Re: Re: Re: Retroactive prayer — L S Lewis (31 December 2003) Dr Lewis’s recognition of the articles of faith that underlie his assumptions is admirable. However, we are not as certain as he that the past is off limits to the effects of human intention. As we stated in our paper, the work of Schmidt and the review by Braud suggest that both biological and non-biological systems can be affected by human intentions, although the events in question appear to lie in the past. These events are as mind-boggling to us as they are to Drs Lewis, Lobo, and others who have joined this discussion. We find consolation in the fact that they are also mind-bending to the physicists and researchers involved. We are soothed by the observation of Sir Arthur Eddington about the Uncertainty Principle in modern physics: “Something unknown is doing we don’t know what.” Reference: 1. Eddington AS. Quoted in: Wilber K. Quantum Questions: Mystical Writings of the World’s Great Physicists. Boston, Mass: Shambhala Publications; 1984: back cover quotation. Is Robert Hooke the real hero? — Richard G Fiddian-Green (31 December 2003) and Who will rid me of this meddlesome priest? — Richard G Fiddian Green (3 January 2004) We are dazzled by Fiddian-Green’s virtuoso command of English history, of which we Americans are famously ignorant. To avoid displaying this shortcoming, we thank him for his comments and reserve comment on the intriguing connections he draws. Retroactive prayer, etc. —Norman Guthkeich (4 January 2004) Guthkeich states, “The more fundamental problem is whether petitionary prayer can ever be effective, since it must be addressed to A Being….” We regard the mechanism — if that is the proper term — of petitionary prayer as trans-empirical, beyond the reach of science as presently constituted. We cannot imagine an experiment that could decipher whether or not the Absolute, however termed, is involved in the “prayer loop.” This does not mean, however, that prayer is scientifically out of bounds. Throughout history, people who believe in prayer have made the empirical assertion that prayer is correlated with effects in the physical world. Whenever empirical assertions are made, the attentions of science cannot be ruled out. Science can tell us that something happened, even though it may not tell us how. Not all religions and cultures would agree with Guthkeich that petitionary prayer necessarily involves a Supreme Being. For example, some forms of Buddhism are not theistic, yet prayer is precious to such Buddhists. They do not offer prayers to a god but to the universe at large. In several of the clinical studies involving the remote effects of prayer and intentionality, it does not appear to matter which religion the intercessor is affiliated with or whether s/he is affiliated with a religion at all. These observations can be inflammatory to religious fundamentalists who are convinced that their one true god would answer no prayers but their own. Yet studies in intercessory prayer say otherwise. This is one reason why these studies affirm religious tolerance, from which our world could currently benefit. Reference: 1. Dossey L. The return of prayer. Alt Ther Health Med. 1997;3(6):10-17, 113-120. Personal note We are grateful for the thoughtful comments of the many responders to our paper and the time they took to craft them. — Brian Olshansky, MD — Larry Dossey, MD Response to responses, BMJ Competing interests: We are the authros of the manuscript responding to some of the comments
Re: A Scientist's Perspective 21 January 2004
Adam Jacobs, Director Dianthus Medical Limited, London SW19 3TZ Send response to journal: Re: Re: A Scientist's Perspective	Prof Roy characterises my mention of ‘The Force’ as a puerile reaction. OK, it’s a fair cop. I admit it. It was a bit silly. However, behind this puerile reaction was a serious point struggling to get out. As Prof Roy correctly points out, it would be bad science to dismiss Leibovici’s study out of hand simply because it tests a preposterous hypothesis. Progress in science is made by being open to seemingly preposterous hypotheses, and letting experimental evidence be your guide. Nonetheless, extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. I hope we can all agree that retroactive intercessory prayer represents an extraordinary claim. Leibovici’s study found no significant effect of prayer on mortality, and the effects on duration of hospital stay and duration of fever were of only marginal significance (and duration of stay would have been non-significant had Leibovici adjusted for multiple testing). Frankly, this doesn’t even come close to extraordinary evidence. So I do not dismiss Leibovici’s results purely because they test a preposterous hypothesis. But because of the combination of preposterous hypothesis and weak evidence, I cheerfully dismiss them. But let’s suppose for a minute that someone repeats Leibovici’s experiment with a larger sample size and finds that the intervention group fares better on all outcomes with P < 0.00001 for all of them. This would certainly suggest that all is not well with our current view of the space-time continuum. But the study would tell us nothing about the mechanism of the effect. If one is to be guided purely by experimental evidence, and not by prior religious beliefs, in what way would such a result be any less evidence for The Force than for the intervention of a Judaeo-Christian deity? Competing interests: OK, I'd better come clean here. I don't actually believe in The Force.
In response to: Rustum Roy, 19 January 2004, A Scientist's Perspective. 21 January 2004
Brian Olshansky, Professor of Medicine University of Iowa, Larry Dossey Send response to journal: Re: In response to: Rustum Roy, 19 January 2004, A Scientist's Perspective.	We agree with Professor Roy that a scientist's evaluation of prayer should be based on "the unswerving commitment to facts: only facts." This is different from the response of theologians, philosophers, believers, and nonbelievers, who may marshal entirely different classes of responses based on religious teachings, revelation, personal conviction, and private reasoning. In writing about the research on prayer and spirituality over the past decade, we have discovered that this subject is a minefield. Passions run high and observers often conduct themselves unpredictably. Even scientists who profess an unstinting devotion to empiricism often behave in ways they would denounce in others. We understand that science is a rough-and-tumble enterprise and should be, but often the response to prayer research seems overheated in the extreme. The most common departures from "only facts" in physicians' criticisms of prayer research are theological and philosophical assertions about whether prayer research should be done, whether consciousness should operate remotely, whether the Absolute should respond in controlled prayer experiments, whether these experiments are blasphemous, ad infinitum. Usually these arguments are combined with passing objections about experimental design and interpretation, but these often seem secondary to the underlying personal ire stirred by the experiments themselves. We submit that the field of prayer research would be advanced immeasurably if physicians and scientists resisted the temptation to tell the Almighty what to think and how to behave, and just stick with "only facts" as Roy suggests. We encourage genuine skepticism, the setting aside of disbelief until the facts are in. Science requires skepticism and cannot be healthy without it. Yet authentic skepticism is exceedingly demanding. It is a purifying fire. It requires a dispassionate neutrality that, in areas as incendiary as prayer, can be difficult to achieve. Thus much of what passes for skepticism about prayer research is more akin to a contemptuous cynicism, which author Wallace Stegner called "that armor, that curse, that evasion, that way of staying safe while seeming wise." Professor Roy quotes Whitehead's observation that dogma in science bars "fundamental novelty." Is retroactive (or proactive) prayer so fundamentally novel that it should be rejected in principle, as Leibovici suggested, in spite of empirical evidence supporting it? It sometimes seems that we have lost all balance in what constitutes novelty. Consider that most cosmologists adhere to the Big Bang, the primordial explosion that signaled the beginning of the universe. What existed prior to the Big Bang? The answer generally given is nothing. If scientists are willing to believe that something as stupendous as the entire Universe came from nothing, it is difficult to imagine what they would not believe. If skeptics can swallow the tenets of modern cosmology about the origins of the universe, why should they go ballistic when a patient gets better when someone prays for her? There are no controlled studies supporting the Big Bang, while there are nine controlled clinical studies of prayer, five of which show statistically significant results. In addition, as we pointed out, hundreds of controlled studies in nonhuman biological and non -biological systems buttress these findings, suggesting that the remote operations of consciousness reflect a deep principle in nature. Ironically, in spite of this extreme imbalance of evidence favoring remote intercessory prayer, the Big Bang enjoys much greater acceptance than prayer. It seems that some forms of novelty are admissible, while others are not, and that we are dealing with something other than "only facts." With Professor Roy we look forward to the day when the remote, nonlocal expressions of consciousness seem less repellant, and "just facts" are allowed to speak for themselves. - Brian Olshansky MD and Larry Dossey MD References: Chibnall JT, Jeral JM, Cerullo MA. Experiments in distant intercessory prayer: God, science, and the lesson of Massah. Archives of Internal Medicine. 2001;161(21):2529-2536. Dossey L. Prayer and medical science. Archives of Internal Medicine. 2000;160(12):1735-1738. Stegner W. Quoted in: Leonard G. Interview of Wallace Stegner. Brain/Mind Bulletin. 1994;19(6): 7. Competing interests: We are the authors of the manuscript responding to responses.
Response to: Adam Jacobs, 21 January 2004 Re: Re: A Scientist's Perspective 22 January 2004
Brian Olshansky, Professor of Medicine University of Iowa 52242, Larry Dossey Send response to journal: Re: Response to: Adam Jacobs, 21 January 2004 Re: Re: A Scientist's Perspective	Our paper did not defend Leibovici's study but was in fact critical of it and suggested alternative explanations and confounding variables that may have influenced its outcome. We did advocate, however, giving the possibility of retro-temporal intentionality a fair hearing because of abundant evidence supporting this possibility. This includes five experiments of physicist Helmut Schmidt involving time-displaced mental influence of pre-recorded inanimate random events. One of Schmidt's papers is co-authored with Professor Henry P. Stapp of University-California Berkeley, who is perhaps the current dean among quantum theorists. The overall results of these studies was P = 0.0001. This approaches Jacobs' recommended P < 0.00001 as constituting the "extraordinary evidence" he requires before accepting retroactive influence. Yet Schmidt's studies are not the whole of it. Braud reviewed a total of 19 studies of 233 sessions involving attempts to influence, retroactively, various living systems, ten of which yielded statistically significant results. We emphasize that the issue of retroactive mental influence does not hinge on Leibovici's study, but on a great many experiments in living and nonliving systems that are much more precise than Leibovici's. We furthermore suggest that, while more evidence is needed, it is already quite extraordinary. We suggest that the consistency of these findings points to a deep principle within nature: the spatiotemporal nonlocality of consciousness. -- Brian Olshansky, MD -- Larry Dossey, MD References Braud W. Wellness implications of retroactive influence: exploring an outrageous hypothesis. Alt Ther Health Med. 2000;6(1):37-48. References to all of Schmidt's experiments mentioned above can be found in Braud's paper. Schmidt H. Collapse of the state vector and psychokinetic effect. Foundations of Physics. 1982; 12(6):565-581. Schmidt H, Stapp H. PK with prerecorded random events and the effects of preobservation. Journal of Parapsychology. 1993;57:331-349. Competing interests: We are the authors responding to our manuscript
Does the mind and thought exist in quanta and be temperature dependent 26 January 2004
Richard G Fiddian-Green, None None Send response to journal: Re: Does the mind and thought exist in quanta and be temperature dependent	In concluding in their response to the electronic letters that the mind is non-local do Brian Olshansky and Larry Dossey (1) mean that thought travels at the speed of light or faster than the speed of light as in entanglement or "spooky-action-at-a-distance"? If thought travels at the speed of light it would reach the antipodes in about 0.05 of a second and give the appearance of non-locality, a term usually reserved for entanglement in quantum theory. If a magnetic field is placed around a conductor a current is created which produces a voltage the size of which is the product of the current (i) and the resistence (R) of the conductor. This is known as the classic Hall effect. In 1985 Klaus von Klitzing was awarded the Nobel prize for discovering the quantum Hall effect. What he showed was that if a conductor is cooled to two degrees above absolute zero and a magnetic field place is then around it and increased in strength smoothly and progressively the voltage change is generated in discrete steps. The conductor loses all its resistance at the steps and momentarily becomes a superconductor, conductance being the reciprocal of resistance. What is more the rate at which the discrete steps occurrs is proportional to the Planck constant, and I believe is called the fine structure constant. Resistance is in effect "quantized". The implication is that the conductor may change in these circumstances from a fermionic (ordinary matter) to a bosonic (energy waves) form and back into a fermionic form as proposed in the Alice hypothesis (2). This is consistent with Lee Smolin's mathemetical model of quantum loop gravity in which spacetime is treated as quanta (3). Transcranial magnetic stimulation was developed at the Univeristy of Sheffield by Barker (4). It can cause a temporary loss of speech and other "lesions" by causing a "functional knockout". It may also induce events such as an orgasm in a woman. It is being tested as an aid in treating depressions, enhancing cognition, and even fighting fatigue in airline pilots. The magnetic stimulation has, however, to be delivered in pulses to be effective. This raises the possibility that it might be inducing fermionic events within the brain in much the same way that bosonic pulses are proposed to do in terms of the Alice hypothesis. As electromagnetic waves travel at the speed of light and not faster than the speed of light this might imply that the mind is non-local in sense that thought travels at the speed of light. Having said that transfer holography, an integral part of holographic theory, requires a reference beam which, as previously addressed in considering it implications in the Alice hypothesis, might indeed be non-local as enganglement in quantum theory and practice. Whatever its exact nature the mind or rather thought would appear to exist in quanta and might well be distinct but intimately connected with quanta exisiting intermittently in successive fermionic expressions of the body. If so it might exist in quanta appearing at a rate proprtional with the Planck constant and with the ambient temperature. That the symptoms of schizophrenia may disappear when a person develops a fever and return when the fever subsides, as observed in the recent book "The madness of Adam and Eve", makes the hypothetical effect of temperature on the mind clinically relevant. 1. Brian Olshansky and Larry Dossey Retroactive prayer: a preposterous hypothesis? BMJ, Dec 2003; 327: 1465 - 1468. (Plus electonic discussion) 2. Patrick Bracken and Philip Thomas Time to move beyond the mind-body split BMJ, Dec 2002; 325: 1433 - 1434. (Plus electronic discussion). 3. Lee Smolin. Atoms of space and time. Scientific American. January 2004 4. Mark S. GeorgeStimulating the Brain; September 2003 Competing interests: None declared
Hearing hoofbeats outside, does one think of zebras? 13 February 2004
Leonard Finegold, Professor, Biophysics Department of Physics, Drexel University, Philadelphia PA 19104, USA Send response to journal: Re: Hearing hoofbeats outside, does one think of zebras?	Summary: Remember the medical maxim for diagnosis...Whenever you hear hoofbeats outside, first think of horses—not zebras. The original unimpeachable paper: When I saw my namesake’s paper (Leonardo Leibovici, BMJ 2001;323:1450-1) two years ago, I assumed the clue was that the paper was in the end-of-year (Xmas, Equinox) edition of BMJ, which edition I always look forwards to. I suspected that the Editor knew exactly how the paper’s research was done. We have given this paper, as an example of putative unimpeachable research, to students in our Science and Religion course. I believe that my namesake reported his work precisely. I would like to sit down with him over coffee or beer, and say: “Now, I ask you—as Leonard to Leonardo—will you admit privately that you have yet to publish the umpteen similar experiments that you did, and which did not reach any level of significance? Are you familiar with Sokal’s exploits [Sokal and Bricmont]?” And I hope that, a la our namesake’s Mona Lisa picture, Leonardo (and the Editor of BMJ) will give only an inscrutable enigmatic smile, for it is more fun to leave the saga as a mystery with which we can tease students. Exuberant sequel: I first comment on the length of writing in the paper “Retroactive prayer: a preposterous hypothesis” (BMJ 2003;327:1465- 8) and the rapid responses. I sincerely envy the authors in their writing and explicative abilities, for personally I am no orator...but, as you know me all, a plain blunt man. The paper with an abstract “Perhaps the answer lies beyond the superstring theories of today’s physicists”, and much of the ensuing correspondence, will be of interest to future historians of science. They will ask why, just because there is no immediate explanation for something, physicians—otherwise competent, one prays—gleefully and exhuberantly adopt ideas which are but figments of the imagination, at present. Physicians and physicists both believe in Occam’s Razor: “Whenever you hear hoofbeats outside, first think of horses—not zebras.” Physics is an ultimate achievement of the human spirit, in that theory and experiment agree to within the width of a human hair in Los Angeles, measured from New York (this best agreement is not, as one might expect, in gravitation, but in quantum electrodynamics [Kinoshita and Nio]). String theory is our best approach to a GUT (grand unified theory); its proponents will agree that physics is ultimately based on cruel experiment (also known as evidence-based), and that at present, alas, there are no good experimental tests of the theory. To posit “beyond the superstring theories” is, at a minimum, to go out on a limb, build a house of cards, etc. So, to physicists, “Retroactive prayer: a preposterous hypothesis” (with many of the comments) is hilarious and makes wonderful reading [Hobson]. (Some of the comments, however, do show an excellent understanding.) One thanks the Editor of BMJ for not submitting the paper to a physics reviewer..see the last phrase of the preceding paragraph. Conclusion: Prayerfully pursuing Puck “Lord, what fools these mortals be!” I thank Dick Joyce (who co-authored the first controlled study on the efficacy of prayer in medicine) and Som Tyagi for discussions. References: Hobson, A. Physics : concepts and connections.Upper Saddle River, NJ : Prentice Hall/Pearson Education, 2003. This is an excellent accessible introduction to non-locality. Kinoshita T., Nio M. Revised alpha^{4} Term of Lepton g-2 from the Feynman Diagrams Containing an Internal Light-By-Light Scattering Subdiagram. Physical Review Letters 2003; 90: 021803. Sokal, A., Bricmont, J. Fashionable nonsense: postmodern intellectuals' abuse of science. New York : Picador USA, 1999. Competing interests: None declared
The souls of a zebra and its herd. 4 March 2004
Richard G Fiddian-Green, NONE NONE Send response to journal: Re: The souls of a zebra and its herd.	In her review of Baroness Greenfield's book Barbara Godlee wrote, "the nature and seat of consciousness--[is] the faculty that.. distinguishes humans from other animals" (1). How might we know from the sound of its hoofbeats and activities whether a zebra might be conscious or not or whether it might even have a soul as some eastern religions believe? The late Sir Julian Huxley, a zoologist and brother of Aldous the author of "Brave New World", wrote a well known book on, "The soul of the white ant". The point he made was that a colony of ants behaves like a single intelligent being in always keeping, for example, the proportions of soldier and worker ants constant. Who or what dictates the composition and conduct of a colony of ants? A consciousness or soul unique to the colony or a collective consciousness of all the ants? Whatever it is "swarm intelligence" , as it is called, is now being exploited by the business world (2). It appears to be very real. I had the opportunity of examining repeatedly the souls of ant colonies as a boy in Africa when I used to make holes in antheaps to watch them being repaired. Within seconds came the soldier ants who formed a ring around the breech and within minutes the worker ants who repaired the breeches from within. Within hours breeches some 10cm in diameter were completely repaired abandoning the soldier ants who had sacrificed their lives for the colony. In many ways the human body behaves just like a colony of ants in its homeostasis and control of its cellular functions, blood leukocytes behaving just like the soldier ants and osteoclasts and osteoblasts like the worker ants. This is a property of a collective unconsciousness or even consciousness that has sensing and cognitive capabilties. These might be attributed to purely mechanistic properties if it were no for the evidence for the existence of Jungian archetypes, inherited memories and unconsciousness strikingly revealed in the migrations of the Monarch butterflies. These take several generations to occur to and from the same locations. Might that mean that man posesses an hierarchial set of unconsciousnesses and consciousnesses, ones to govern bodily events, one to govern family events, one to govern tribal events and one to govern human events? That would imply that man has no control over his/he existence which is surely untrue to some degree at least. In these behavioural respects, however, it is difficult to distinguish man from a pride of lions or a herd of zebras. The existence of a collective consciousness was illustrated very vividly to me when I followed a pride of ten young lion in a Landrover at night at Londolozi game park in South Africa. The transformation from them being ten individuals as different from each other as Snow White's dwarfs into a single intelligent hunting team when they got the scent of a waterbuck was truelly remarkable. Their conscious or unconscious division of labour, which did not have any evidene of overt direction, was particularly remarkable. Anyone who has ever had a pet dog or even a cat or horse appreciates that they have a consciousness and cognitive abilities which they are able, on occassions, to exhibit and exploit remarkably effectively. Animals and even birds have personalities just like people. The only differences are man's ability to articulate his feelings and learn from his and others' experiences be they heard, seen, or read. Just look into a pidgen's or a European starling's eye in Green Park and watch its reactions to one's eating. They are quite capable of making the most remarkably intelligent assessments and, if a pieces of food are thrown at them, anticipating one's actions and those of its competitors and making intelligent decisons. The starlings watch one's hand and fly up to catch the food before it falls to the ground and is covered in pidgeons. They may not be able to talk or write but some birds are almost as intelligent as dogs and other pets. The longer birds or animals live the more intelligent they appear to become. Parrots, dolphins, and elephants, which are said to have remarkable social abilities and memories, are examples. Watching a fetus grow to term, an infant grow into a child, and a child into an educated adult it is clear that unconsciousness and consciousness transform themselves from types indistiguishable from that in pet animals to those to which Barara Godlee referred in her review of Susan Greenberg's book. What is more in comparing a subnormal child or adult with a normal one it is also clear that the capacity for communication and memory are integral parts in intelligent consciousness or cognitive functioning. If it were possible to transplant a human larynx and hands onto a baby chimp or gorilla and have them grow and function normally would they be able to learn to talk and think like humans? I submit they would. What is more I submit it might even be possible to discuss abstract subjects with them if they were also able to be schooled and educated at university like a human. One cannot, however, expect an animal that looks different from its human peers, does not have the same physical attributes, and does not live longer than ten years to ever acquire the intelligence of a human. It is arrogant to presume that man is endowed with cognitive qualities that are unique and distinct from animals or even birds and insects. If the Alice hypothesis is valid, and individal and collective consciousnesses and unconsciousnesses are hierarchical bosonic events, then pantheism, reincarnation in particular [bosons/fermions] form rather than a recognisable biological form, are credible beliefs. Indeed in most ways these beliefs are more credible than any montheistic belief. In terms of the Alice hypothesis, therefore, the alpha collective unconsciousness and conciousness may be interpreted as one that includes all bosons in the universe and their hierachical collective unconsciousnesses and consciousnesses. The distinction between consciousness and unconsciousness might simply be a consequence of differentiation and delegation of responsibilities within each hierachical unit. We could not finction if ee were conscious of every marcrophage's and organs actvities other tha knowing when it was not working by feeling pain or ill. Does that mean we should not perform animal experiments, eat meat or kill flies and fleas? No, for if the Alice hypothesis is valid, then rocks also have individual and collective unconsciousnesses and even consciousnesses limited only by their inability to acquire memories and the cognitive intelligence of living beings. Like rocks few animals have acquired the cognitive abilities to recognise and therefore anticipate human actions. There may exist, therefore, a hierarchical set of memories and cognitive abilities ranging from those present in ananimate objects to those present in educated and wise adults, wisdom clearly being a function of age. In which case Barbara Godlee's claim, that "consciousness--[is] the faculty that.. distinguishes humans from other animals", is simply a pragmatic one akin to claiming marcophage's do not have an unconsciousness or consciousness because we are not aware of them. The decisions to perform animal experiments, kill flies and fleas are also pragmatic ones without which human evolution, in so far as we can measure it, can be seriously compromised. A unique property of living cells is their co-operativity when combined in collective groups with similar interests. It is a Darwinian survial advantage of which altruism and sacrifice must be integral parts. Conflicts arise only when the interests of one individual or collective unconsciousness and consciousness conflicts with another. In which case the evolution of a humanity in which there is one language, one spiritual belief, and one collective goal should eliminate wars without eliminating altruism or the need for individual sacrifices be they voluntary or imposed. Viewed in this context altruism is an integral part of Nature rather than one imposed upon individuals and communities by an ubermenche, superman, Moses, Pope or god. Gods that are not human idols are also human creations which, in terms of the Alice hypothesis, may simply not have fermionic (ordinary matter) forms and be timeless. Until we understand the nature of consciousness and concept of a god, gods or even pantheism is hypothetical even if one is lead as I am to conclude that there is a higher force of which we might all be fermionic expressions. We may hear the hoofbeats of the hound of heaven but we cannot see its form. 1. Barbara Godlee. The private life of the brain. Susan Greenfield. A book review. BMJ 2001; April 14. 2. Meyer C. Swarm intelligence. Harvard Business Review. May, 2001. Competing interests: None declared
Alice hypothesis= alternating type IIA and IIB string theories? 10 March 2004
Richard G Fiddian-Green, None None Send response to journal: Re: Alice hypothesis= alternating type IIA and IIB string theories?	Professor Leonard Finegold suggested that, "to posit “beyond the superstring theories”... [was]...to go out on a limb". It may indeed be unnecesary to go any further than string theory. There are said to be five string theories which have common features. Hence the term M-theory, M standing for mother, magic, matrix of anything alse that might take a theoretical physicist's fancy. Holographic theory is a refinement that incorporates Hawking's very important observation that the information lost as radiation from a black hole is a function of the surface area of its event horizon. According to Brian Greene, the string theorist from Columbia, the mathematical embodiments of type IIA and type IIB strng theories are equally successful and differ only in their expressions of geometry. The type IIA geometry is a circular surface area, possibly as large as 10 to the 66 sq cm, currently calculated to be 10 to the 61 Planck lengths or 15 billion light years wide. That is the width of the entire universe. The type IIB geometry is a "snippet" or isolted segment of string with a surface area, possibly as small as 10 to the minus 66 sq cm, currently calculated to be 10 to the minus 61 Planck lengths wide. Put in another way type IIA surface area is proportional and type IIB inversely proportional or the reciprocal of the radius of the original. The radius in type IIA is also proportional to its energies, which are also large, and in type IIB inversely proportional and, therefore, extremely small ie. of the order of the size of the smallest of particles. In other words type IIA string theory appears to be the mathematical formulation of the bosonic phase of existence in the Alice hypothesis and type IIB to the fermionic phase of existence. In which case the Alice hypothesis may resolve what is said to be the greatest unsolved problem in string theory, background-independent formulation. This conclusion is also consistent with the Calabi-Yau geometries in which one is the mirror image or dual of the original and has a different number of holes in it. These geometries appear to me to explain what we can see and measure. String theory evolved from particle physics and has sought to incorporate gravity, as gravitrons, in attempting to reconcile quantum theory with Einstein's theory of general relativity. Loop quantum gravity, the competing hypothesis, has evolved from general relativity and from an attempt to reconcile it with quantum theory. In so doing it has retained Einstein's curved spacetime as its geometry. Hence spacetime being illustrated as a twisted pretzel in Hawking's, "the universe in a nutshell" and Einstein-Rosen bridges and wormholes short-circuiting pretzel loops to provide a theoretical basis for time travel. I believe Steven Hawking and George Ellis initiated this approach, one which has since been REFINED by Lee Smolin. There does not appear to be a mathematical formation that has been developed along these lines that can account for the alternating bosonic and fermionic phases of existence proposed in the Alice hypothesis. I am lead to conclude, from my readings of the popular science literature, that the theory of everything (TOE) will evolved from types IIA and IIB string theories. I am further lead to conclude that spacetime is not curved and that the bending of light, first observed by Sir Arthur Eddington, might be an illusion caused by the effects of gravity on fermionic expressions of light waves as they pass through a gravitonal field in which there are frozen particles capable of stopping the photons, as has been demonsrated experimentally, and changing the direction of their passage which resumes at its original velocity. Hawking's fanciful illustrations of the shape of spacetime may , therefore, be interpreted as a reduction ad absurdum and evidence supporting the validity of string theories IIA and IIB and of the Alice hypothesis. In which case the predictions made in terms of the Alice hypothesis, incuding those concerning consciousness, need to be taken seriously. Brain Greene. The elegant universe. , Competing interests: None declared
Influencing the Past, Present and Future with Prayer and Meditation 14 January 2005
Joanna Francis, Writer/lecturer 1750 2nd Ave. # 5S Send response to journal: Re: Influencing the Past, Present and Future with Prayer and Meditation	I have been conducting a series of workshops titled "Spectrum Meditation," in which each stage of life is considered to be influenced by a different band of energy, from red to violet. During the course of the workshop, participants connect to their past, present and future through the medium of meditation. During this process, and with the help of prayer, they are able to heal wounds and project images of how they would want their future to be, as well as energise their present. Although they are not changing their past, they are influencing how they think and feel about it, and from a subjective viewpoint, this is changing the past. I have written a book, based on this process titled "7 Ages of Woman," in which I quoted this article. I hope the research continues and more evidence is gathered. I believe in the power of thought, prayer and in the intelligence of the universe. Competing interests: No competing interests