I gotta admit that he has a point. I don't know that published studies should be the only way of producing rationalist self-help; I think the way is open for sound DIY empirical studies (but hasty generalization is an inductive fallacy). But look at it this way--you can imagine a lot of really bad advice being given front page status, and the problem is that there is no threshold, no point at which enough is enough.

I think your post is interesting as an abduction instead, and should probably be in the discussion pages. This should be a way of describing your experiences, and indicating what possible explanations and hypotheses could explain those experiences. By no means should we discount our experiences, that would be anti-empirical. The problem is unsound generalization of those experiences.

That said, I find your post valuable as abductive material, and the discussion it resulted in was stimulating.