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Thread: Is hypnosis bunk?

  1. #1
    Elephant CRSP's avatar
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    Default Is hypnosis bunk?

    What exactly is the status of hypnosis, and hypnotherapy? Is it a load of rubbish, or is there something really going on?
    Les sanglots longs des violons de l'automne blessent mon coeur
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    Default Re: Is hypnosis bunk?

    Depends what you mean.

    Yes, there is something "really going on", but it is probably not what most of us would understand by the word "hypnosis". There are also many different types of hypnotism used for different ends, but most of them seem to rely on tacit cooperation between hypnotist and subject rather than any particular power of hypnotism. In short, the claims made by most hypnotist are indeed bunk.

    Here's a good article about it on the Skeptic's Dictionary.

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    Oliphaunt The Original An Gadaí's avatar
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    Default Re: Is hypnosis bunk?

    I've only been to one hypnotist stage show ever but I found it underwhelming. As far as I could see, the participants were the people most likely to want to jump on stage and they did stupid stuff because they were given licence to do it rather than being forced by "hypnosis". The whole thing smacked of a drama class. "Now pretend to be a chicken" etc. Again this was my one and only experience of such matters.

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    The Queen Zuul's avatar
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    Default Re: Is hypnosis bunk?

    I've been hypnotized once and found it underwhelming.

    It was, essentially, guided meditation and depended largely on how much I wanted to please the hypnotist. I gave her the responses she wanted to hear, because I felt comfy and relaxed and agreeable, but there was no secret tapping into my subconscious. People who want to be told what to do or are simply more suggestible might have more interesting experiences, but all the "power" of it is just in your own head and your own ability/desire to follow orders.

    The purpose of my session was to stop me from grinding my teeth. One of the questions she asked me is why I grind my teeth. That was when I realized hypnotism was crap, because in my "trance" I logically thought through it, recognized that it was simply a stress response and then also recognized that wasn't the touchy-feely response you're supposed to give during hypnosis.
    So now they are just dirt-covered English people in fur pelts with credit cards.

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    Default Re: Is hypnosis bunk?

    Quote Originally posted by An Gadaí
    I've only been to one hypnotist stage show ever but I found it underwhelming. As far as I could see, the participants were the people most likely to want to jump on stage and they did stupid stuff because they were given licence to do it rather than being forced by "hypnosis". The whole thing smacked of a drama class. "Now pretend to be a chicken" etc. Again this was my one and only experience of such matters.
    Yes. And a lot of stage hypnotists will admit that this is exactly what stage hypnotism consists of. It's basically getting people to go up on stage and do very mildly embarrassing things because they want to be fun and not come across as uptight; there's social pressure to cooperate and join the fun, and stage hypnotist patter often involves increasing that by claiming, for instance, that people who can be hypnotized are more creative or more relaxed or more intelligent than people who can't be.

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    Elephant
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    Default Re: Is hypnosis bunk?

    Quote Originally posted by Caerie
    The purpose of my session was to stop me from grinding my teeth. One of the questions she asked me is why I grind my teeth. That was when I realized hypnotism was crap, because in my "trance" I logically thought through it, recognized that it was simply a stress response and then also recognized that wasn't the touchy-feely response you're supposed to give during hypnosis.
    Was your session leader the kind who put a touchy-feely spin on everything, or was that your assumption of what you're supposed to do?

    I ask because my old eye doctor studied hypnosis to help patients who had trouble putting in their contact lenses, and his approach didn't seem all that irrational or illogical.
    No cage, thank you. I'm a human being.

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    The Queen Zuul's avatar
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    Default Re: Is hypnosis bunk?

    Quote Originally posted by sublight
    Was your session leader the kind who put a touchy-feely spin on everything, or was that your assumption of what you're supposed to do?

    I ask because my old eye doctor studied hypnosis to help patients who had trouble putting in their contact lenses, and his approach didn't seem all that irrational or illogical.
    She was putting a touchy-feely spin on it. She was trying to explore repressed emotions behind why I was grinding my teeth, which wasn't what I'd been expecting. I had assumed it would be more of a behavioral thing, with her reinforcing that I wasn't going to grind my teeth any longer and my jaw muscles were to remain relaxed. Had she done that, it probably would have been as effective as any other form of guided meditation.
    So now they are just dirt-covered English people in fur pelts with credit cards.

  8. #8
    Stegodon
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    Default Re: Is hypnosis bunk?

    “It was great. It was better than 'Cats'. I would see it again and again.”

    (Sorry, I couldn't resist!)

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    Default Re: Is hypnosis bunk?

    People who have been hypnotized on stage often claim to have had certain subjective experiences, such as having believed they were in a certain setting, having forgotten the number four, or having an urge which they could not explain or understand to act like a chicken whenever a certain word was spoken. Either the people who make these claims are lying or there is something to hypnosis, even if it isn't what it appears to be or what the hypnotist presents it as.

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    Default Re: Is hypnosis bunk?

    Quote Originally posted by Alan Smithee
    Either the people who make these claims are lying or there is something to hypnosis
    That's a pretty black and white way of looking at people's responses. You could say that because of a person's subjective view that a lady was sawn in half, therefore there must be something to magic.

    Hypnotism has nothing to do with what most hypnotists claim, which is bunk.

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    Default Re: Is hypnosis bunk?

    I'm pretty sure you misunderstood me, Petrobey. I'm not sure whether we disagree. Obviously, saying that there is "something to" a phenomenon is a (deliberately) vague claim. I meant only that the phenomenon is of interest, that it accomplishes something, and that it is worthy of further study. I would say that there is definitely "something to" magic. I don't think any magician has actually sawn a lady in half, but I think the illusions are often interesting, entertaining, ingenious, and skillful. I think a magic show differs in this regard from a tarot-card reading, at which nothing of interest at all takes place. Someone like Ian Rowland, SD's ianzin, who has written an excellent book on cold reading and who makes his living largely by studying, replicating, and explaining the techniques of "psychic" performers, might argue that there is quite a lot "to" tarot-card reading, but he'd be under no more illusion than you or I (much less, in fact) about the true nature of the phenomenon.

    Now, I had an acquaintance in college who appeared to be hypnotized such that she could not remember the existence of the day Wednesday, and would become perplexed and confused when asked to name all seven days of the week. Among the many possible explanations, one is that she had a vested interest in the performer being seen to succeed and a desire to appear cooperative in front of an audience, and so she made a conscious choice to play along with the gag. Another is that she had a vested interest in the performer being seen to succeed and a desire to appear cooperative in front of an audience, and so she caused herself by some normal, well-known and fully-described psychological process to believe that she could not remember the existence of the day Wednesday and thereby became genuinely perplexed and confused when asked the days of the week. Now, neither of these explanations involves psychic trances, mind control, or other arcane phenomena. Nevertheless, I find one of them vastly more interesting and worthy of study than the other, which is enough for me to say that there may be "something to" hypnosis.

    Discussions about whether hypnosis is "real" almost invariably center on the question of whether stage hypnotists alleged claims to use mysterious powers and deeply hidden psychological forces are accurate, when no rational person thinks they might be. To me, this is like shutting down a discussion of David Copperfield by pointing out that obviously the Statue of Liberty didn't really disappear, so the whole thing is bunk. It's true, but it misses the point. Something happened and I want to know what. I don't care if it's trivial from a scientific perspective because no new force to make statues disappear was discovered.

  12. #12
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    Default Re: Is hypnosis bunk?

    Yes, we are in complete agreement, and I sort of made this point in my first post. Sorry for any misunderstanding

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