Talk:Law of attraction (New Thought)

Scientific Support - Related Scientific Theory

The skeptical orientation herein is has a key shortcoming (fallacy) of all-or-none rejection of the "Law" of attraction. (Aside: Although it is offensive to science to refer to it as a "Law", that issue has not been addressed.) The shortcoming of this article is the incorrect rejection of the undergirding hypothesis of The Nonsense of Attraction: How you think about your world and daily interactions has an impact on our outcomes. This assertion is a statement of scientific fact, as seen in the long-standing and well developed scientific literatures of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, Cognitive Therapy, Rational Emotive Therapy, Expectancy Effects in science, Placebo Effects, and so on. These effects are seen in education literature, medical treatment literature, medical diagnostic literature, psychopharmacology, psychology, and business, to name a few. Thus, the article's rejection of 'cognitions affect behaviors which in turn affect outcomes", is falsifiable. Back on the skeptic side, however, pseudoscientists run with the established effects of things like cognitive style science (Martin Seligman's mainstream cognitive work, for example), and push it to an irrational extreme of there existing a "mind over matter" power. This is the indefensible and scientific garbage that should be assailed, specifically. For example, special crystals to not direct a secret energy within us to bring about a particular positive result in our lives. Nonetheless, our belief that our day will work out as we need it to increases the likelihood that things go relatively better rather than worse. Thoughts have effects. That is scientifically accepted, and it is the truthful element of this fake "Law". Over-skepticism is present, and this fake "Law" can be attacked as being nothing more than a drastic overstatement of more mundane psychological scientific realities by charlatans claiming secret knowledge. Jason CBR (talk) 16:37, 22 February 2022 (UTC)

If you have reliable sources connecting real things with the childish fantasy called "Law of Attraction", bring them. Otherwise, there is nothing to do here. --Hob Gadling (talk) 07:13, 23 February 2022 (UTC)

And, to answer the charge, yes, thoughts do have effects, albeit the safest bet is that they have rather unpredictable effects (curve balls). tgeorgescu (talk) 08:36, 23 February 2022 (UTC)

I think the “commonsense scientific” standpoint is that thoughts affect their thinker and other conscious empathetic observers, but do not affect inanimate things, except indirectly via the above-mentioned routes. PJTraill (talk) 12:38, 18 September 2022 (UTC)

Emoto

Did someone say Masaru Emoto? He was not a scientist, he was a fringe loon. tgeorgescu (talk) 20:24, 9 April 2022 (UTC)

Criticisms of 1970s self-esteem-based education disproportionately long

I added a coatrack template to the criticism section as the criticism of 1970s self-esteem-based education, which is only tangentially related to the law of attraction in that it is criticized for excessively promoting positive thinking to the detriment of hard work and perseverance, takes up almost half of the section. The paragraph about self-esteem-based education should be pared down and reframed such that it is focused on criticism of the law of attraction and only uses self-esteem-based education as a brief example to the extent that sources connect the two ideas. Tayeriioouu (talk) 20:41, 30 October 2022 (UTC)

Proctor source

Legendary Law of Attraction Expert, Bob Proctor, Shares His Secrets on Navigating The Clickety Clack: How to Live a Peace-Filled Life in a Seemingly Toxic World does not sound like something we should cite. The link is dead, so I know only the header. --Hob Gadling (talk) 05:47, 30 May 2023 (UTC)

Agreed, hardly sounds impartial. MrEarlGray (talk) 05:51, 30 May 2023 (UTC)

"Lucky Girl syndrome" listed at Redirects for discussion

The redirect Lucky Girl syndrome has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2023 December 15 § Lucky Girl syndrome until a consensus is reached. Utopes _{(talk / cont)} 02:05, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

A consensus has now been reached. Rp2006 (talk) 06:17, 3 January 2024 (UTC)

Lucky girl syndrome

I learned of a phrase called “lucky girl syndrome” which has been viral on TikTok for several years and was not otherwise mentioned on the Law of Attraction Wikipedia page (which already covers associated terms like The Secret and "manifestation"). So I made a redirect to that page for the new phrase. An editor disagreed that the two things had anything in common, and marked my REDIRECT for deletion… so it is now up for discussion. So today I decided to go another route and add material to this page concerning lucky girl syndrome. So after reading what I have added, let me know your thoughts. Am I off base linking the two concepts? It seems to me the linking of the names has been written about in the media. Or should this be moved to a new page? You can also comment on the REDIRECT deletion here. Rp2006 (talk) 00:16, 28 December 2023 (UTC)

After a deletion discussion, the decision was to keep the redirect. Rp2006 (talk) 06:19, 3 January 2024 (UTC)