From: lady@uhunix.uhcc.Hawaii.Edu (Lee Lady)
Subject: Re: NLP  (WAS Re: Xanax
Followup-To: sci.psychology
Summary: The Fast Phobia/Trauma Cure
Keywords:  NLP  NeuroLinguistic Programming
Organization: University of Hawaii (Mathematics Dept)
Date: Thu, 10 Sep 1992 00:36:48 GMT


In article <h0rn7xh.strnlght@netcom.com> strnlght@netcom.com (David Sternlight) writes:
>
>In response to a comment about NLP 15 minute phobia cures, Steve Dyer
>posts a flame without evidence.
>
>Can he provide evidence that there have not been such cures? I personally
>witnessed one myself, and Tony Robbins used to go around the country
>challenging therapists to bring him their worst patients. He was famous
>for the 15-minute cures, and to date has not been discredited.
>
>Let's keep this discussion on a factual level; Dyer's polemics
>don't add to a serious discussion.

First of all, this discussion belongs in sci.psychology not sci.med.  

Second of all, you're never going to get anywhere in this newsgroup by
insisting that it's up to skeptics to provide proof that your claims
are wrong.  You're making the claims (which I agree with, in this case) --
it's up to you to supply the evidence.  Furthermore, the game is
stacked against you in that any evidence you can reasonably come up
with will be attacked as being inadequate and in fact worthless.

What makes this especially frustrating in the case of the NLP Fast
Phobia/Trauma Cure is that the damn thing is so easy to test.  The
technique is not secret.  It's described in several books and I've
posted a description in sci.psychology, which I will email to anyone
who requests it.  NLP Comprehensive sells a videotape for $50 showing it
being used.  (NLP Comprehensive, 2897 Valmont Rd, Boulder, CO 80301
(303) 442-1102.)

The procedure only takes 15 minutes (or maybe 30 if you include the
"Hello, how are you, my name is blah blah blah" part of the session)
and it doesn't take a very sophisticated diagnostic instrument to tell
whether someone has a phobia and to test whether they've been cured or
not.  (The Fast Phobia/Trauma Cure is for "simple" phobias, not
agoraphobia.)  Elevator phobias are really nice because you seldom have
to go far to find an actual elevator to have the subject get in.  The
videotape I mentioned shows a woman with a phobia of bees.  In the
follow-up interview they actually have a jar full of bees for her to
hold and for a while she even let a few of them crawl on her arm.  (Her
comment:  "Gee, I never realized before what really interesting
critters these bees are.")

One videotaped cure is scarcely convincing scientific evidence.  After
watching the videotape, though, you can do your own testing.  

This discussion belongs in sci.psychology, not sci.med, but it is an
excellent example of the way in which the rules are stacked so as to make
it totally impossible for any alternative approach, even the very
simplest, to get serious attention from the scientific establishment.  

--
It is a poor sort of skepticism which merely delights in challenging
those claims which conflict with one's own belief system.  
                                                          --Bogus quote 
lady@uhunix.uhcc.hawaii.edu         lady@uhunix.bitnet