Talk:Law of attraction
Bah. They lifted that thing right off Foucault's Les Mots et les Choses. Amateurs. --AKjeldsen 17:57, 24 May 2007 (CDT)
To be much fairer than such a notion probably deserves, the human brain does have a limit to its perceptive abilities, and paying attention to a given idea or goal will make it easier to notice around you. --Gulik 18:00, 24 May 2007 (CDT)
- That was my attitude before I watched the The Secret DVD. This is far far past the (defensible and maybe even true) notions that "positive thinking will make you happier than negative thinking will" and "having confidence you can meet a goal will help you do so". This is literally (okay, I'm paraphrasing because I don't want to watch the thing again, but I swear I'm not changing any meaning or implications) "My mail used to be full of bills. I visualized getting checks instead, and it worked -- instead of bills, I now get checks in the mail." and "I visualize getting good parking spaces, and it works every single time". Not to mention the "nobody understands electricity" bit. --jtltalk 18:47, 24 May 2007 (CDT)
- I'm thinking very hard about the Conservapedia servers' processors melting… --Marvin the Paranoid Android 11:24, 2 June 2007 (CDT)
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[edit] Just a re-hash ...
Law of Attraction just seems to me to be a re-hash of autosuggestion popular about a century ago -- it was called Coueism. Named after the man which popularized it: Émile Coué.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cou%C3%A9
Émile Coué (February 26, 1857, Troyes, France – July 2, 1926, Nancy) was a French psychologist and pharmacist who introduced a method of psychotherapy, healing, and self-improvement based on optimistic autosuggestion.
The application of his conscious autosuggestion, "Every day, in every way, I'm getting better and better" (Tous les jours à tous points de vue je vais de mieux en mieux) is called Couéism or the Coué method.
The Coué method depended on the routine repetition of such expressions, according to a specified ritual, at the beginning and the ending of each day.
-- RemBeau 00:22, 15 August 2008 (EDT)
- Sure sounds like it - hey, you ought to bring that up at the WP article, too, if no one has! Feel free to add these tidbits if you can figure out a way to section them in... ħuman
00:51, 15 August 2008 (EDT)
[edit] Is the law of attraction real?
It makes a testable claim does it not? Thoughts are able to "manifest" reality. There are multiple problems with this. One is that it violates all known principles of science and how we understand the way the human mind and the universe works. The other issue is that it makes a testable claim, thinking of "x" should make "x" happen. Could we not simply construct and experiment to test the LOA and be done with it? tmtoulouse nettle 02:17, 15 August 2008 (EDT)
- I wanted a pony and I got one. QED. ħuman
02:27, 15 August 2008 (EDT)
- These people are even more brutal than that. They actually have the nerve to apply it to disease, particularly terminal disease. They say that the way you beat cancer is by "not wanting cancer" and if you die...well I guess you just wanted cancer more than you wanted to live. Better luck on your next reincarnation. tmtoulouse nettle 02:29, 15 August 2008 (EDT)
- Hey, I said "QED" first, so I win! I guess I hadn't run across that version, it was more like the woman I knew who taped a picture of a guitar to her fridge to help her "get one". Meanwhile, on my lib talk radio, I get inundated with ads for cancer cure places that embarrass me. I hate the "politicization" of the site because it ignores that so many woomeisters and their chillunz are pretty darn "liberal". Just as clueless, though, as YECs. ħuman
02:34, 15 August 2008 (EDT)
- If you tried running tests then the woomeisters would always have the 'out' that those who didn't get what they wished for weren't trying hard enough. You're up against the old 'skeptics disturb the psychic forces' argument as well. Anyway, as MJ famously said, you cant always get what you want but if you try you might just find you get what you need. Silver Sloth 02:58, 15 August 2008 (EDT)
- True, but what kind of argument is that? If I say "wow, that sunset is beautiful, eh?" and you say "no, not really", I would tend to then talk about something else, not accuse you of being distracted, bored, frustrated, etc. I might ask you why you weren't able to enjoy it, and we'd probably have a good conversation. But if I said "YOU WERE BLOCKING IT YOU ARE WRONG", I'd be teh luzer, eh? Oh, and see double blind and audiophile (which needs to be renamed audio woo and rewritten now I am off my "no-compete" agreement!) LALA I CAN'T HEAR YOU, hehe. ħuman
03:37, 15 August 2008 (EDT)
- True, but what kind of argument is that? If I say "wow, that sunset is beautiful, eh?" and you say "no, not really", I would tend to then talk about something else, not accuse you of being distracted, bored, frustrated, etc. I might ask you why you weren't able to enjoy it, and we'd probably have a good conversation. But if I said "YOU WERE BLOCKING IT YOU ARE WRONG", I'd be teh luzer, eh? Oh, and see double blind and audiophile (which needs to be renamed audio woo and rewritten now I am off my "no-compete" agreement!) LALA I CAN'T HEAR YOU, hehe. ħuman
- If you tried running tests then the woomeisters would always have the 'out' that those who didn't get what they wished for weren't trying hard enough. You're up against the old 'skeptics disturb the psychic forces' argument as well. Anyway, as MJ famously said, you cant always get what you want but if you try you might just find you get what you need. Silver Sloth 02:58, 15 August 2008 (EDT)
- Hey, I said "QED" first, so I win! I guess I hadn't run across that version, it was more like the woman I knew who taped a picture of a guitar to her fridge to help her "get one". Meanwhile, on my lib talk radio, I get inundated with ads for cancer cure places that embarrass me. I hate the "politicization" of the site because it ignores that so many woomeisters and their chillunz are pretty darn "liberal". Just as clueless, though, as YECs. ħuman
- These people are even more brutal than that. They actually have the nerve to apply it to disease, particularly terminal disease. They say that the way you beat cancer is by "not wanting cancer" and if you die...well I guess you just wanted cancer more than you wanted to live. Better luck on your next reincarnation. tmtoulouse nettle 02:29, 15 August 2008 (EDT)
[edit] Does the law of attraction allow a person to do harm?
So I imagine that there is something within all this mumbo jumbo that says the universe only picks up on good vibrations and not bad/harmful ones because honestly most new ager hippie types aren't going to follow something that says you can kill someone if you want it bad enough and the idea might get some bad press too. What about things though where good comes from bad like in the case of organ donation. I'm just curious after watching an episode of ER where a young girl waiting for a liver transplant says she feels guilty waiting for something bad to happen to someone to which the doctor tells her that she isn't the one making the bad thing happen. However if this "law" is true then every single person who desperately wants an organ transplant are indirectly killing people. To me this makes the whole thing even more insidious than I already thought it was (before it was just the implication that those who are suffering just aren't trying hard enough). --Sammygirl (talk) 22:06, 5 July 2012 (UTC)
- Yes, in some forms, the idea really is that noxious, in both directions. Every time a natural disaster or terrorist attack, etc, occurs, it must be because the people were spending their time thinking about such disasters. 173.163.25.70 (talk) 19:13, 5 September 2012 (UTC)
Every effect has a cause. One can be affected by other's thoughts but only if one chooses to, and the sub-conscious mind will only choose so if a cause has been created. Unless they have sub-conscious guilt, and they choose to learn their lesson at that particular time, in that particular way, they will never be affected by negative thoughts.— Unsigned, by: Serectrus / talk / contribs
- Not every effect has a cause. Radioactive decay is spontaneous. Wackyvorlon (talk) 23:44, 6 September 2013 (UTC)
[edit] Inadequate criticism
"it is unclear what the universe is supposed to to when two or more people want contradictory things"
This is actually fairly obvious. When such a situation happens, two parallel universes are created. In each one, the wishing person gets what she wants, while the other one doesn't, so from the observer's point of view it looks like you get what you want regardless of the wishes of other people. This could actually be justified by the many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics. See wp:Quantum suicide and immortality.
The bigger problem is that thinking is unrelated to a quantum measurement, so it's unclear why any quantum effects should occur. --Tweenk (talk) 01:48, 31 October 2012 (UTC)
- I think this video on spaceology will change your mind: http://youtu.be/sarJtKM-Ku4 Wackyvorlon (talk) 23:46, 6 September 2013 (UTC)
- How is it not related? I believe it deals with phenomena at microscopic scales, and i believe thinking is related to microscopic phenomena.— Unsigned, by: Serectrus / talk / contribs
- In quantum mechanics, "measurement" has a very specific (and very real) definition. The idea of thought does not satisfy the conditions necessary to meet said definition. - GrantC (talk) 00:14, 7 September 2013 (UTC)
- You thought something before writing this. Something happened in your brain in relation to that. That phenomenon has quantum effects.— Unsigned, by: Serectrus / talk / contribs
- Sure, and if you want to get technical about it, everything has quantum effects. Again, I'm a physicist, and my area of research is in quantum mechanics. Explain to me why thought is in any way more "quantum" than anything else out there. - GrantC (talk) 01:04, 7 September 2013 (UTC)
- P.S. Could you please indent your posts with ":" as you can see me doing in the edit page? Note that each additional ":" adds an extra indentation. Also, please sign your posts by using the signature button up on the editing bar. - GrantC (talk) 01:06, 7 September 2013 (UTC)
- I am not saying that thought is more 'quantum' than anything else. Everything is the same. As they say, God is everywhere. According to quantum entanglement, supposing we come from one energy, everything is connected. So, our thoughts can affect certain events. Serectrus (talk) 04:56, 8 September 2013 (UTC)
- You thought something before writing this. Something happened in your brain in relation to that. That phenomenon has quantum effects.— Unsigned, by: Serectrus / talk / contribs
- In quantum mechanics, "measurement" has a very specific (and very real) definition. The idea of thought does not satisfy the conditions necessary to meet said definition. - GrantC (talk) 00:14, 7 September 2013 (UTC)
- How is it not related? I believe it deals with phenomena at microscopic scales, and i believe thinking is related to microscopic phenomena.— Unsigned, by: Serectrus / talk / contribs
The particles immediately respond to one another. They must be connected. And if everything forms from 1 energy, everything must be connected.— Unsigned, by: Serectrus / talk / contribs
We have the free will and free agency to create in all our existences. If a person wants another to do as they want, they have to learn to honour their free will.— Unsigned, by: Serectrus / talk / contribs
- ... What does that even mean? - GrantC (talk) 23:55, 6 September 2013 (UTC)
- Is that even English? Wackyvorlon (talk) 23:55, 6 September 2013 (UTC)
If you were talking of what i said, i meant that nobody can make us do anything against our free will even in parrelel universes. We can get what we want by thought, but only what is fair.
- We can often get what we want by a combination of thought (determination) and action, but there is no force in the universe that causes wonderful things to happen based on thought alone. - GrantC (talk) 00:25, 7 September 2013 (UTC)
- I believe there is such a force. But in this world of physical matter, physical action is also necessary.
- Thought is also action. And every action has an equal and opposite reaction. But here, physical action is also necessary.— Unsigned, by: Serectrus / talk / contribs
- That statement is total gibberish. Look, you want to know how QM works? Go read Chad Orzel's How To Teach Physics To Your Dog, then go read the quantum woo article. You don't have to be a PhD quantum mechanic to know that what you're saying is not even wrong. EVDebs (talk) 23:19, 8 September 2013 (UTC)
- We can often get what we want by a combination of thought (determination) and action, but there is no force in the universe that causes wonderful things to happen based on thought alone. - GrantC (talk) 00:25, 7 September 2013 (UTC)