The Abstraction Matching Fallacy

The scientific study of anomalous experiences sits at the border between religious/spiritual and secular physicalist worldviews, which can lead to biased practices. One such practice is the Abstraction Matching Fallacy, where researchers use known hallucinatory phenomena to explain spiritual experiences based on superficial resemblance, achieved by abstracting away incongruent details. This cherry-picking of data to fit theoretical commitments is arguably antiscientific, as science aims to adapt theory to reality through rigorous, objective data analysis. The paper provides examples and calls for researchers to abandon this problematic practice.

Study at a glance

Abstract

The currently expanding science of anomalous experiences is unique, in the sense that it necessarily sits at the treacherous borderlands between the often-opposed ontologies of religion/spirituality and secular physicalism. As might be expected in such an inherently charged position, the scientific study of the hallucinatory neurobiological underpinnings of these experiences has resulted in the emergence of certain biased practices, of which the Abstraction Matching Fallacy is a prominent example. This methodological fallacy involves, on the basis of resemblance, using known hallucinatory phenomena as explanations for what are widely considered to be spiritual experiences, despite the alleged resemblance depending entirely on an abstraction of both phenomena, to whatever extent is necessary to obscure the incongruent details and render them apparently resemblant. This entails a subtle form of cherry-picking that manipulates or filters the consideration of data in the interests of theoretical/philosophical commitments, thus making it arguably antiscientific, inasmuch as the primary goal of science is the adaptation of theory to reality, via data collected and analyzed as rigorously and objectively as possible. Examples and further discussion of this fallacy are provided, along with a call for researchers to cease this scientifically problematic practice.