Sponsor |  dragonhead | Apr 2, 2:21am | >I think that if you hit Dawkins with rock solid evidence then he would have no choice but to believe it.
"I don't want to discuss evidence"
And the results don't always come up negative. Plenty of studies have found that there are "hits" above the level of statistical chance. The propblem is that we have, as yet, to find a reliable way of measuring it time after time.
As an aside - Here's a bit about Sony's ESP lab mindpowernews.com/DreamFactory.htm [mindpowernews.com/DreamFactory.htm]
"We found out experimentally that ESP exists," Sony spokesman Masanobu told Benjamin Fulford of the South China Morning Post for a story that appeared on 7 July, "but that any practical application of this knowledge is not likely in the foreseeable future." And so, without the promise of marketable products, Sony decided to shut down its ESPER lab.
tinyurl.com/2crbwb [tinyurl.com/2crbwb]
To demonstrate the unbalanced nature of extreme skepticism, let's consider the case of telepathy. Cynics wring their hands, lamenting that the apocalypse is near because the general public believes in extrasensory perception (ESP). They assume that this widespread belief is a sign of mass mental deterioration because science has declared ESP to be impossible. Why is it impossible? Because psychic phenomena violate unspecified Laws of Science, and therefore all claims about such events must be hopelessly flawed or fraudulent.
I am not impressed by this argument because the history of science is replete with confident proclamations about all sorts of impossible things, and most of those proclamations have proven to be hilariously or poignantly wrong. Unfortunately, the authorities' declarations do not merely provide historical entertainment, they have also significantly impeded scientific progress as very few scientists are willing to risk the wrath of the mainstream. As a result, in the educated Western world we find ourselves in the bizarre state of affairs where the mere study of certain common experiences is essentially forbidden...
More recently, anthropologist Marilyn Schlitz and I surveyed the telepathy literature to update all known ganzfeld trials. As of late 2001, we found a grand total of 929 hits out of 2,878 sessions reported by researchers from at least 15 different laboratories. The overall hit rate of 32% is associated with odds against chance greater than a trillion to one |
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Sponsor | | emortis9 | Apr 2, 3:22am | "most of those proclamations have proven to be hilariously or poignantly wrong."
...and when that is the case...scientists admit it and correct the mistake. It is the nature of science. Anyone who does not, is not a scientist.
"The overall hit rate of 32% is associated with odds against chance greater than a trillion to one"
Chance is around 20% and that is what most experiments conclude...not much more than chance when a real controlled experiment is done. Sometimes more...some times less, but always within the realm of chance.
James Randi has 1 million dollars in a bank account waiting for someone to show any kind of telepathy or esp in a controlled experiment...the tests always seem fair. But no winners yet. |
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Sponsor | | dragonhead | Apr 2, 3:30am | >always within the realm of chance
Well, matey in the article says 32% is a trillion to one. Which seems unlikely to me - playing games with statistics, but that's what his analysis says.
>James Randi has 1 million dollars in a bank account waiting for someone to show any kind of telepathy or esp in a controlled experiment
Randi agreed he might have to pay up someday. But Dawkins had a trick up his sleeve. If a "psychic" phenomenon turns out to be real, then by definition it is physical and therefore not really psychic after all, and thus Randi still shouldn't have to pay.
tinyurl.com/y2savg [tinyurl.com/y2savg] |
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Sponsor | | dragonhead | Apr 2, 7:15am | That "some article on the internet" is from the Royal Insititute of Philosophy!
Randi would give the money in a heartbeat? You really think so? Perhaps we should email him and ask! :D
edit: I just read that the prize is being discontinued! |
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Sponsor | | emortis9 | Apr 2, 9:20am | "That "some article on the internet" is from the Royal Insititute of Philosophy!"
Well...this isn't a philosophy forum...lol...I would guess is belongs under that though. So that doesn't help your cause...
THE JREF MILLION-DOLLAR CHALLENGE
"It was March 6th, 1998, when the JREF Million-Dollar Challenge first came into existence. That's almost ten years ago. It's always been a simple, direct, matter: do what you claim you can do of a paranormal nature, and walk away with the prize. Our expectations at first were that we'd attract major personalities by this means, but they've avoided having to take the test by simply not applying; those who have actually applied are generally honestly self-deluded persons who have difficulty stating what they can do, which can be understood if they really don't know what they're experiencing; we at JREF have gone through involved procedures to help them recognize their problems. Usually, they have indicated that they don't know what real scientific rules are, when it comes down to their actually being properly tested.
All this is obvious to anyone who has followed the action over the last decade. Now, while the JREF earns a certain income from having the prize money very conservatively invested, that sum could certainly be used more productively if it were made freely available to us.
As of March 6th, 2010 - twelve years after the challenge was first offered - it will be.
The James Randi Educational Foundation Million-Dollar Challenge will be discontinued 24 months from this coming March 6th, and those prize funds will then be available to generally add to our flexibility. This move will free us to do many more projects, which will be announced at that time.
This means that all those wishing to be claimants are required to get their applications in before the deadline, properly filled out and notarized as described in the published rules.
Now, we're sure that there will be those who will offer all kinds of objections to this decision - though they could have simply applied and won the prize. There will be accusations that the JREF is concerned about the safety of the prize money - which was never any sort of concern, I can assure you - and there will be more claims that the money was never there in the first place. I can see the professionals out there sighing in relief that they no longer have to answer questions about why they won't take the prize, and they'll just wait out the remaining period that the prize is available. All that's to be expected.
Ten years is long enough to wait. The hundreds of poorly-constructed applications, and the endless hours of phone, e-mail, and in-person discussions we've had to suffer through, will be things of the past, for us at the JREF.
Those who believe they have mystic powers now have two full years to apply... Let's see what happens."
randi.org/joom/swift/swift-january-4-2008.html [randi.org/joom/swift/swift-january-4-2008.html] |
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