MixedNuts comments on How to Convince Me That 2 + 2 = 3 - Less Wrong
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I wouldn't expect a deity to answer that sort of prayer. You're not being sincere, just trying to test them, which many canonically find annoying because it shows mistrust; you don't need that die to land on a four; it suggests you'd use prayer to lowly ends (e.g. "Let me score a touchdown" rather than "Please solve world hunger"); it gives an easily publishable result, which no deity would characteristically accept - if they didn't want to be discreet they'd still be doing showy miracles. Studies where you pray to cure cancer or something are much stronger evidence.
Do those studies have a placebo group?
I read about a study like that, in which Christians prayed for people to recover from cancer. There was barely any difference between the patients that weren't prayed for, the patients that were prayed for and knee that they were being prayed for, and the patients that didn't know that they were being prayed for.
I recall the same study - and I seem to remember that the patients who knew they were being prayed for did a bit worse.
Actually, if you run the test, you are. Given that you'd have changed your mind if it had gone the other way, of course.
(Related: Religion's Claim to be Non-Disprovable)