Faith Healing (Belief Therapy, Faith Therapy, Energy Therapy) is a therapeutic approach in which patients resort to healers to treat their disease.
This type of treatment has its own fans and its market is hot in developed countries. Many of "ideological therapists" are hateful and disgusting. They tend to exploit desperate patients because they are greedy. The issue may become serious and dangerous when patients are encouraged to not to use medicine recommended by doctor and stop medical treatment and instead of that seek for "ideological therapists".
Derren Brown, a well-known British mentalist and magician, in a documentary entitled "Miracles for Sale” presents a set of techniques and tricks used by such therapists. This way, he demonstrates that such people do not have any special power; still, patients have an illusion that they have been healed by them.
Perhaps at first glance, the subject of this documentary seems to be specific for Western countries, church and Christianity, and it might have seen that we do not have such fraud in our society. But if you review it with more accuracy you will find out that he uses the same methods to deceive the audience.
The documentary was published in 2011 and was broadcasted on Channel 4.
Questions:
- Have you ever thought about the power of beliefs?
- Have you ever heard about such ideological therapists?
- In your opinion, how can you reduce the percentage of people who believe in such treatments?
Comments
I have heard about such therapists as well as many other unconventional ways of healing. The truth is that I have never really believed that any of them could work and I feel pity for the people that spend their money and waste their time instead of doing something to actually get better. It's in our nature to have doubts in everything, but we shouldn't rely solely on what other people say. I've heard of some cases where people have died because they haven't trusted the real doctors.
How can we reduce the number of people who believe in such treatments? I believe there is no easy way of doing so. People are independent and make their own choices (pretty often irrational ones.) That's why the most efficient way of fighting such scams is to simply educate people and make them smart enough to make their own decisions based on the knowledge, instead of gossips and wild guesses.
No,but the information is really interesting. By the way, thanks for sharing!
I am sure that the way to reduce it exist, but I can't figure out how.
In my opinion, people believe in "magical" healing abilities of so-called "ideological therapists" because they want to believe in it. So many people fell for this fraud because they feel so desperate in their lives that they don't want to believe in own strength. And self-proclaimed "belief" therapists use this weakness to drain money out of people.
Maybe we can reduce the percentage of people who believe in such treatments by raising public awareness of this problem. But I don't think that we can stop people from believing in this "magic" altogether.
I have not heard of any specific case of such a situation. I think that raising awareness about the existence of such cheaters could reduce the number of people who believe in such things. Unfortunately, most such cheats are based on the desperation of sick people.
Honestly, I have no idea)
- Have you ever thought about the power of beliefs?
Beliefs if what our brain have and since all our world porcesse throug our brain and brain decide hoe to interpret the information its our beliefs decide how to react.
- Have you ever heard about such ideological therapists?
Have never heard about it but might seen on some american christian shows.
- In your opinion, how can you reduce the percentage of people who believe in such treatments?
I don't think its needed. Might be brutal but it's natural selection.
I haven't heard about ideological healers.
You can reduce the number of people that believe in pseudoscientific treatments by education.
If anything you believe in makes your life worse u should stop and reconsider your choices in life does not matter if its religion or opinion.
It is proven that positive thinking can help your body function better and healthier and reduce stress. However, it's something simple to me and I don't need a guru, that is usually paid, to tell me how to think positively. I just think that it is one of our basic skills, like reconciliation of thought, and we should try to do it on our daily basis.
- Have you ever heard about such ideological therapists?
Not per se, but spiritual gurus and religions have always been around, and I guess you should be able to do it on your own. I guess, if someone really gets help from these people, to each their own. But in my case, I wouldn't tell it's necessarily a bad thing, but not for me.
- In your opinion, how can you reduce the percentage of people who believe in such treatments?
By education mostly, but again, I think that if someone wants to spend their money that way, it is hard to stop them from it.
I've heard about them but I never believed in their power and I don't think that I will ever try it.
The best way of reducing the percentage of people who believe in such treatments is to flood the internet with real experiments and statistics that it's not what they need.