On the lunacy of prayer

[vulcanlogician]

Confirmation bias.

I think this is the literal biggest one that keeps people believing in prayer. And it's conveniently built into our minds to engage in this sort of thing. It seems evolution favored an acquired belief being held onto rather than being scrutinized for its truth-value. Plenty of reasons for this. Acquired beliefs create bonds with one's tribe being a big one. The second biggest was beliefs (for most of humans' evolutionary history) were not used against people, to control them, to undermine their good senses etc.

Christianity even has a "It's God's will." explanation for when prayer doesn't work. But when it DOES work "You see? God answered your prayer! Hallelujah!" I mean, you could use this very practice as an example to explain confirmation bias fully to a person unfamiliar with the concept. If that doesn't make prayer exemplary of conf bias, I don't know what does.