Researcher Bias & Materialist Methodology: Kant, Sherif, and McGilChrist state real-world context is required. The Maxim that spirituality is "intangible and beyond the senses" (Miller & Thorensen) is wrong on several levels 1. That is a Definist fal
"When logic and proportion Have fallen sloppy dead And the White Knight is talking backwards" (Jefferson Airplane 1960's White rabbit song) "Professionals" say they are objective. My experience says otherwise. Dr Harold Koenig observes "Religious and spiritual factors are increasingly being examined in psychiatric research. Religious beliefs and practices have long been linked to hysteria, neurosis, and psychotic delusions." It seems there are still a number of psychiatrists who believe that. Sr Director Evans of Kaiser Permanente Member Services sent me a written letter - by registered mail no less - stating that my rights to KP services had been suspended for abusive conduct. Director Evans listed my critique of materialist methodology as the number 1 abuse. She quotes from a December 8, 2022 message "I felt that the acceptance of the Definist fallacy and your refusal to acknowledge my rights and beliefs as extremely offensive" I even filed a complaint with the DOJ which was accepted. My position is endorsed by Dr. Koenig, Dr Wong, and Dr Farra, and Stefan Schindler" It is very true that I find the materialist maxim that "spirituality is unreal" very offensive – especially since the materialist argument includes a "loaded term" - putting it in the category of the Definist Fallacy. In a nutshell, the critique centered on the materialist argument that "the belief that there is nothing to study because spirituality is intangible and beyond the senses." That is a fallacy - specifically the "Definist fallacy" - because it uses "loaded" terms. "The Definist Fallacy occurs when someone unfairly defines a term so that a controversial position is made easier to defend. Same as the Persuasive Definition." (Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy) "Death" of course is "intangible and beyond the sense" – and if you follow the materialist argument – then, that would make "Death a figment of your imagination." The materialist argument is a fallacy. Lastly as Muzafer Sherif, Iain McGilChrist and Kant emphasize – a theory is not valid unless it is supported by real-world context-evide3nce – which for spirituality would be "people" of course. For perspective The Psychoanalytic school of thought is listed among the top 8 schools of thought in psychology – Frankl and logotherapy is excluded from mainstream academia, as well as Jungian psychology. That is in spite of a large number of scientists who state that psychoanalysis is pseudoscience! "Linguist Noam Chomsky has criticized psychoanalysis for lacking a scientific basis.[131] Evolutionary biologist Stephen Jay Gould considered psychoanalysis influenced by pseudoscientific theories such as recapitulation theory. Psychologists Hans Eysenck, John F. Kihlstrom, and others have also criticized the field as pseudoscience." (Wikipedia) So, psychoanalytic theory is "intangible and beyond the senses" – much more so than the spirituality of compassion, grieving, art or music. It would seem an inescapable conclusion that in psychology and psychiatry there is a distinct researcher bias. As Supreme Court Justice Rehnquist states, "It is not true if the major premise is not true" (p. 795 Logical Fallacies and the Supreme Court..)
Institutions
- The Centers (US)
Publication Details
- Journal
- Knowledge Commons (Lakehead University)
- Published
- 2025-05-20
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.17613/bd9jw-4zf45
- Primary Topic
- Religion, Spirituality, and Psychology
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 0.00