WinAce

I've been wondering--spontaneous remission is like a mystical experience and, just like every other subjective human experience, can be used as support of anything, right?

Are there any relevant studies on the occurence of this phenomenon? Based on my hypothesis that they're bunk as proof of anything, I'm expecting them to show equal spontaneous remission rates for Christians, other religions and the non-religious. Am I wrong?

Of course, some groups (like atheists, who tend to be more skeptical) might not report 'healings' as often and skew the results, but there should still be discernable trends in the rest. Are there?

Corwin

Cancer sometimes just goes into remission. Let's remember, if you're older than, say, 25.... you've probably had cancer at least once. Your immune system detects and eliminates most tumors. (This is a defense we lose as we get older, which is one reason cancer is more common as you get older.)

Another issue is the fact that frequently people hear 'well it MIGHT be cancer' and assume they have cancer. Then when the whole 'MIGHT' issue comes into play... people immediately assume that prayer healed them. (When they didn't actually have cancer to begin with...)

WinAce

Thanks, but I'm aware of the explanations for most cases of spontaneous remission (which turn out to be either hoaxes, misdiagnosis or cases where it didn't really go into remission but came back later).

What I was asking is, do evangelical Christians experience it more often than evangelical Muslims, for instance? Are there studies showing the occurence of remission across all faiths?