ISF Logo   IS Forum
Forum Index Register Members List Events Tags Help

Go Back   International Skeptics Forum » General Topics » General Skepticism and The Paranormal
 


Welcome to the International Skeptics Forum, where we discuss skepticism, critical thinking, the paranormal and science in a friendly but lively way. You are currently viewing the forum as a guest, which means you are missing out on discussing matters that are of interest to you. Please consider registering so you can gain full use of the forum features and interact with other Members. Registration is simple, fast and free! Click here to register today.
Reply
 
Thread Tools
Old 15th March 2010, 03:29 AM   #1
edd
Master Poster
 
edd's Avatar
 
Join Date: Nov 2007
Posts: 2,120
Undiscriminating Skepticism

I think this is a great post http://lesswrong.com/lw/1ww/undiscri...ng_skepticism/

(Actually I think it's a great blog too - careful and detailed consideration of rational thought in general.)

I think skeptics would do well to read it and review their stances to make sure they're doing things right
__________________
When I look up at the night sky and think about the billions of stars out there, I think to myself: I'm amazing. - Peter Serafinowicz
edd is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 15th March 2010, 04:38 AM   #2
Dancing David
Penultimate Amazing
 
Dancing David's Avatar
 
Join Date: Mar 2003
Posts: 37,866
Interesting, thanks. I will reread it later.
__________________
I suspect you are a sandwich, metaphorically speaking. -Donn
And a shot rang out. Now Space is doing time... -Ben Burch
You built the toilet - don't complain when people crap in it. _Kid Eager
Never underestimate the power of the Random Number God. More of evolutionary history is His doing than people think. - Dinwar
Dancing David is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 15th March 2010, 05:08 AM   #3
Aepervius
Penultimate Amazing
 
Join Date: Aug 2003
Posts: 13,069
Quote:
"The "skeptic" opens by remarking about the crazy true believers and wishful thinkers who believe in X, where there seem to be a surprising number of physicists making up the population of those wacky cult victims who believe in X. (The physicist-test is not an infallible indicator of rightness or even non-stupidity, but it's a filter that rapidly picks up on, say, strong AI, molecular nanotechnology, cryonics, the many-worlds interpretation, and so on.) Bonus point losses if the "skeptic" remarks on how easily physicists are seduced by sci-fi ideas. The reason why this is a particularly negative indicator is that when someone is in a mode of automatically arguing against everything that seems weird and isn't a belief of their tribe - of rejecting weird beliefs as a matter of naked perceptual recognition of weirdness - then they tend to perceptually fill-in-the-blank by assuming that anything weird is believed by wacky cult victims (i.e., people Not Of Our Tribe). And they don't backtrack, or wonder otherwise, even if they find out that the "cult" seems to exhibit a surprising number of people who go around talking about rationality and/or members with PhDs in physics. Roughly, they have an automatic template for mocking weird beliefs, and if this requires them to just swap in physicists for astrologers as gullible morons, that's what they'll do. Of course physicists can be gullible morons too, but you should be establishing that as a surprising conclusion, not using it as an opening premise!"
I never saw such a comportment here around. If he had given an example that would be nice, because right now this read more on a rant toward a strawman false-skeptic he built up than anything else.

PS: physicist and other are only human. Claims should be looked at their inherent value and evidence, and not at WHO is supporting the claim. It does not matter if a majority of physicist support the claim, if there are NO EVIDENCE for or against it. Everett's interpretation fall unto this.

Last edited by Aepervius; 15th March 2010 at 05:09 AM.
Aepervius is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 15th March 2010, 05:42 AM   #4
Bikewer
Penultimate Amazing
 
Bikewer's Avatar
 
Join Date: Sep 2003
Location: St. Louis, Mo.
Posts: 11,745
Recall that a number of physicists (and other scientists) were taken in by Uri Gellar. Randi pointed out at the time that scientists do not generally work with fraud and cheating; they expect nature to be sometimes obscure but never dishonest.

As I recall, this was the essential basis for the formation of CSICOP.
Bikewer is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 15th March 2010, 07:09 AM   #5
Limbo
Jedi Consular
 
Limbo's Avatar
 
Join Date: Feb 2008
Posts: 3,103
"But I do propose that before you give anyone credit for being a smart, rational skeptic, that you ask them to defend some non-mainstream belief. And no, atheism doesn't count as non-mainstream anymore, no matter what the polls show. It has to be something that most of their social circle doesn't believe, or something that most of their social circle does believe which they think is wrong. Dawkins endorsing many-worlds still counts for now, although its usefulness as an indicator is fading fast... but the point is not to endorse many-worlds, but to see them take some sort of positive stance on where the frontiers of knowledge should change."

Great idea.
__________________
"Faith in what?" he asked himself, adrift in limbo.

"Faith in faith," he replied. "It isn't necessary to have something to believe in. It's only necessary to believe that somewhere there's something worthy of belief."
Limbo is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 15th March 2010, 07:22 AM   #6
Sledge
Grammaton Cleric
 
Sledge's Avatar
 
Join Date: Oct 2009
Posts: 7,114
Stopped reading around the time he admitted he hadn't checked but was just going off his memories of what Project Blue Book said. The whole thing seemed to be a load of assertions that any true Scotsman skeptic should agree with without any evidence given as to why.
__________________
"The perfect haiku would have just two syllables: Airwolf" ~ Ernest Cline

"Science knows it doesn't know everything, otherwise it would stop" ~ Dara O'Briain.
Sledge is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 15th March 2010, 09:17 AM   #7
Nonpareil
The Terrible Trivium
 
Nonpareil's Avatar
 
Join Date: May 2009
Location: Nethescurial
Posts: 7,975
Originally Posted by Limbo View Post
"But I do propose that before you give anyone credit for being a smart, rational skeptic, that you ask them to defend some non-mainstream belief. And no, atheism doesn't count as non-mainstream anymore, no matter what the polls show. It has to be something that most of their social circle doesn't believe, or something that most of their social circle does believe which they think is wrong. Dawkins endorsing many-worlds still counts for now, although its usefulness as an indicator is fading fast... but the point is not to endorse many-worlds, but to see them take some sort of positive stance on where the frontiers of knowledge should change."

Great idea.
Why?
__________________
"The only thing you can do easily is be wrong, and that's hardly worth the effort."
- Norton Juster, The Phantom Tollbooth
Nonpareil is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 15th March 2010, 09:23 AM   #8
Hokulele
Penultimate Amazing
 
Hokulele's Avatar
 
Join Date: Feb 2007
Location: The Biggest Little City in the World
Posts: 28,349
Originally Posted by Limbo View Post
"But I do propose that before you give anyone credit for being a smart, rational skeptic, that you ask them to defend some non-mainstream belief. And no, atheism doesn't count as non-mainstream anymore, no matter what the polls show. It has to be something that most of their social circle doesn't believe, or something that most of their social circle does believe which they think is wrong. Dawkins endorsing many-worlds still counts for now, although its usefulness as an indicator is fading fast... but the point is not to endorse many-worlds, but to see them take some sort of positive stance on where the frontiers of knowledge should change."

Great idea.

Holy self-contradiction, Batman!
__________________
"Oh god...What have you done, zooterkin? WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?!?!?!" - Cleon
Hokulele is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 15th March 2010, 10:21 AM   #9
Sunsneezer
Thinker
 
Sunsneezer's Avatar
 
Join Date: Feb 2010
Posts: 161
...And I thought skepticism was not about defending beliefs (mainstream or not) but examining the facts.
Sunsneezer is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 15th March 2010, 10:55 AM   #10
technoextreme
Illuminator
 
technoextreme's Avatar
 
Join Date: Jun 2007
Posts: 3,787
Originally Posted by Sledge View Post
Stopped reading around the time he admitted he hadn't checked but was just going off his memories of what Project Blue Book said. .
He also blundered through the definition of artificial intelligence confusing Data from Star Trek with true definition of the word.
Quote:
The many-worlds interpretation isn't just the formally simplest explanation that fits the facts, it also sounds weird and is not yet a tribal belief of the educated crowd; so whether someone makes fun of MWI is indeed a good test of whether they understand Occam's Razor or are just mocking everything that's not a tribal belief.
Oooo god.... He's whining about something that has ten different explanations.
__________________
It's amazing how many of these "paranormal" icons seem to merge together. There always seem to be theories about how they link together in some way. I'm sure someone has a very good explanation as to how Bigfoot killed JFK to help cover Roswell.-Mark Mekes
This isn't rocket surgery.-Bill Nye

Last edited by technoextreme; 15th March 2010 at 10:59 AM.
technoextreme is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 15th March 2010, 09:06 PM   #11
DevilsAdvocate
Illuminator
 
DevilsAdvocate's Avatar
 
Join Date: Nov 2004
Posts: 4,425
Originally Posted by Hokulele View Post
Holy self-contradiction, Batman!
Could you explain your comment? I don’t see anything contradictory in what you bolded.
__________________
Heaven forbid someone reads these words and claims to be adversely affected by them, thus ensuring a barrage of lawsuits filed under the guise of protecting the unknowing victims who were stupid enough to read this and believe it! - Kevin Trudeau
DevilsAdvocate is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 15th March 2010, 09:32 PM   #12
quixotecoyote
Howling to glory I go
 
quixotecoyote's Avatar
 
Join Date: Jun 2006
Posts: 10,379
Originally Posted by DevilsAdvocate View Post
Could you explain your comment? I don’t see anything contradictory in what you bolded.
I think it had something to do with butchering the definition of non-mainstream.
__________________
If people needed video games to live, a national single payer plan to fund those purchases would be a great idea.
quixotecoyote is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 15th March 2010, 10:13 PM   #13
DevilsAdvocate
Illuminator
 
DevilsAdvocate's Avatar
 
Join Date: Nov 2004
Posts: 4,425
Originally Posted by quixotecoyote View Post
I think it had something to do with butchering the definition of non-mainstream.
Hmmm… I understood what the article was saying.

God does not exist. Most people believe that God exists. So a belief that God exists is mainstream. A person who believes that God exists is a woo.

A belief that that God does NOT exist is, therefore, non-mainstream. But a person that believes that God does NOT exist is not necessary a skeptic. A person who believes that God does NOT exist is a skeptic only if the person arrived at that belief through critical thinking and skepticism. A person who has the same belief, but who adopted that belief simply because it was popular among their friends, is a poser (pseudo-skeptic) because the person has not actually done any critical thinking or skepticism.

The poser can defend skeptical positions by repeating the same arguments he has heard his friend use. So if we want to know whether the person is an actual skeptic using critical thought or just a poser regurgitating the beliefs and statements of his or her friends, then we can do so by having the person defend a position that not popular with their friends. If the person can defend a position that his or her friends do not hold, then we know that the person is establishing his or her own beliefs using critical thinking and not simply adopting the beliefs of friends.

I’m not that concerned with applying labels to people or testing people’s critical thinking skills, but if you wanted to do that in this type of situation, this seems to make sense to me.
__________________
Heaven forbid someone reads these words and claims to be adversely affected by them, thus ensuring a barrage of lawsuits filed under the guise of protecting the unknowing victims who were stupid enough to read this and believe it! - Kevin Trudeau
DevilsAdvocate is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 15th March 2010, 11:08 PM   #14
Hokulele
Penultimate Amazing
 
Hokulele's Avatar
 
Join Date: Feb 2007
Location: The Biggest Little City in the World
Posts: 28,349
The person was stating that atheism cannot claim to be non-mainstream, as his/her definition of non-mainstream is something that "most of their social circle doesn't believe, or something that most of their social circle does believe which they think is wrong." However, as the blogger noted, most polls show that most people do think atheism is wrong, hence by the blogger's own definition it is non-mainstream. Granted, the blog is based in the UK where the demographics are different, but to make that a general claim is self-contradictory.
__________________
"Oh god...What have you done, zooterkin? WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?!?!?!" - Cleon
Hokulele is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 15th March 2010, 11:21 PM   #15
Hokulele
Penultimate Amazing
 
Hokulele's Avatar
 
Join Date: Feb 2007
Location: The Biggest Little City in the World
Posts: 28,349
Originally Posted by DevilsAdvocate View Post
Hmmm… I understood what the article was saying.

God does not exist. Most people believe that God exists. So a belief that God exists is mainstream. A person who believes that God exists is a woo.

A belief that that God does NOT exist is, therefore, non-mainstream. But a person that believes that God does NOT exist is not necessary a skeptic. A person who believes that God does NOT exist is a skeptic only if the person arrived at that belief through critical thinking and skepticism. A person who has the same belief, but who adopted that belief simply because it was popular among their friends, is a poser (pseudo-skeptic) because the person has not actually done any critical thinking or skepticism.

The poser can defend skeptical positions by repeating the same arguments he has heard his friend use. So if we want to know whether the person is an actual skeptic using critical thought or just a poser regurgitating the beliefs and statements of his or her friends, then we can do so by having the person defend a position that not popular with their friends. If the person can defend a position that his or her friends do not hold, then we know that the person is establishing his or her own beliefs using critical thinking and not simply adopting the beliefs of friends.

Close, but the blogger it taking it a bit further than that. They are suggesting that "skeptipoints" should only be awarded to those who defend an idea that no one takes seriously, at least not yet. Really, really fringe stuff. As such, their definition of non-mainstream needs a bit of tweaking. The blogger is looking for people who support things that are actually ground-breaking.
__________________
"Oh god...What have you done, zooterkin? WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?!?!?!" - Cleon
Hokulele is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 16th March 2010, 12:08 AM   #16
PixyMisa
Persnickety Insect
 
PixyMisa's Avatar
 
Join Date: Dec 2002
Location: Sunny Munuvia
Posts: 16,346
I don't believe things that no-one's even thought of yet.
__________________
Free blogs for skeptics... And everyone else. mee.nu
What, in the Holy Name of Gzortch, are you people doing?!?!!? - TGHO
PixyMisa is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 16th March 2010, 12:24 AM   #17
DevilsAdvocate
Illuminator
 
DevilsAdvocate's Avatar
 
Join Date: Nov 2004
Posts: 4,425
Originally Posted by Hokulele View Post
The person was stating that atheism cannot claim to be non-mainstream, as his/her definition of non-mainstream is something that "most of their social circle doesn't believe, or something that most of their social circle does believe which they think is wrong." However, as the blogger noted, most polls show that most people do think atheism is wrong, hence by the blogger's own definition it is non-mainstream. Granted, the blog is based in the UK where the demographics are different, but to make that a general claim is self-contradictory.
I see. I interpreted it differently.

I interpreted “no, atheism doesn't count as non-mainstream anymore, no matter what the polls show” as saying that even though polls show that most people (in the US) are not atheists, that it doesn’t count as non-mainstream anymore (because skeptic cliques have accepted atheism as normal, while atheism used to be a more borderline position among skeptic cliques).
__________________
Heaven forbid someone reads these words and claims to be adversely affected by them, thus ensuring a barrage of lawsuits filed under the guise of protecting the unknowing victims who were stupid enough to read this and believe it! - Kevin Trudeau
DevilsAdvocate is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 16th March 2010, 12:39 AM   #18
DevilsAdvocate
Illuminator
 
DevilsAdvocate's Avatar
 
Join Date: Nov 2004
Posts: 4,425
Originally Posted by Hokulele View Post
Close, but the blogger it taking it a bit further than that. They are suggesting that "skeptipoints" should only be awarded to those who defend an idea that no one takes seriously, at least not yet. Really, really fringe stuff. As such, their definition of non-mainstream needs a bit of tweaking. The blogger is looking for people who support things that are actually ground-breaking.
Yes. I agree that the article does take that too far.

I would also have issue with exactly how you find out “something that most of their social circle doesn't believe, or something that most of their social circle does believe which they think is wrong.” Perhaps I, and all my friends, happen to believe the same things because we only believe things that are true. If we all only believe things that are true, then we all believe the same thing. So you can’t “find the poser”. That’s where he seems to get into pushing things into wanting to question about fringe stuff that “he” seems to believe in. It logically won’t work.

And, as I said in a previous post (and Pure_Argent probably expressed more eloquently with the post “Why?”), I don’t see the need to “find the poser”. The only purposes seems to be a juvenile task of labeling people into cliques so that you can decide who to like and who to hate rather than actually listening to and understand individuals that you are communicating with.

If someone is a poser regurgitating pseudo-skeptic, but they make a solid argument for something, I don’t know why it matters whether or not they are a “real” skeptic or not.
__________________
Heaven forbid someone reads these words and claims to be adversely affected by them, thus ensuring a barrage of lawsuits filed under the guise of protecting the unknowing victims who were stupid enough to read this and believe it! - Kevin Trudeau
DevilsAdvocate is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 16th March 2010, 12:53 AM   #19
Andrew Wiggin
Master Poster
 
Andrew Wiggin's Avatar
 
Join Date: Aug 2009
Posts: 2,914
I prefer a different article:

http://amasci.com/freenrg/bead.html

Critical thinking implies a willingness to change one's belief in the face of new evidence: this is the antithesis of the groupthink that the reference in the OP claims is the motivation for scepticism.

A
__________________
"Everyone takes the limits of his own vision for the limits of the
world." - Arthur Schopenhauer

"New and stirring things are belittled because if they are not belittled,
the humiliating question arises, 'Why then are you not taking part in
them?' " - H. G. Wells
Andrew Wiggin is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 16th March 2010, 08:13 AM   #20
Hokulele
Penultimate Amazing
 
Hokulele's Avatar
 
Join Date: Feb 2007
Location: The Biggest Little City in the World
Posts: 28,349
Originally Posted by DevilsAdvocate View Post
Yes. I agree that the article does take that too far.

I would also have issue with exactly how you find out “something that most of their social circle doesn't believe, or something that most of their social circle does believe which they think is wrong.” Perhaps I, and all my friends, happen to believe the same things because we only believe things that are true. If we all only believe things that are true, then we all believe the same thing. So you can’t “find the poser”. That’s where he seems to get into pushing things into wanting to question about fringe stuff that “he” seems to believe in. It logically won’t work.

And, as I said in a previous post (and Pure_Argent probably expressed more eloquently with the post “Why?”), I don’t see the need to “find the poser”. The only purposes seems to be a juvenile task of labeling people into cliques so that you can decide who to like and who to hate rather than actually listening to and understand individuals that you are communicating with.

If someone is a poser regurgitating pseudo-skeptic, but they make a solid argument for something, I don’t know why it matters whether or not they are a “real” skeptic or not.

I agree with you completely.


Whoops, I must not be a "real" skeptic.
__________________
"Oh god...What have you done, zooterkin? WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?!?!?!" - Cleon
Hokulele is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 16th March 2010, 08:13 AM   #21
Sledge
Grammaton Cleric
 
Sledge's Avatar
 
Join Date: Oct 2009
Posts: 7,114
Originally Posted by PixyMisa View Post
I don't believe things that no-one's even thought of yet.
I don't believe you.
__________________
"The perfect haiku would have just two syllables: Airwolf" ~ Ernest Cline

"Science knows it doesn't know everything, otherwise it would stop" ~ Dara O'Briain.
Sledge is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 16th March 2010, 01:19 PM   #22
technoextreme
Illuminator
 
technoextreme's Avatar
 
Join Date: Jun 2007
Posts: 3,787
Why is it such a bad thing to be mocking cryonics? The amount of assumptions one has to make is way past the border of point where it is actually sane to undergo the procedure.
Take this quote from his lovely article:
Quote:
Even given that the proposition put forth by cryonicists is true - that people suspended with modern-day technology will be revivable by future technology - you cannot expect them to revive a cryonics patient using modern-day technology.
And guess what technology that commonly gets thrown out as being required? Nanotechnology. And guess what the skeptical stance says? We have no clue whats going to happen with nanotechnology. So how the hell is this not stupid?
Quote:
(The idea that critical brain information is stored dynamically in spiking patterns has already been contraindicated by the evidence; dogs taken to very low (above-freezing) temperatures, sufficient to suppress brain activity, do not seem to suffer any memory loss or personality change.)
This sounds like he's comparing hypothermia to solid as an ice cube freezing.
__________________
It's amazing how many of these "paranormal" icons seem to merge together. There always seem to be theories about how they link together in some way. I'm sure someone has a very good explanation as to how Bigfoot killed JFK to help cover Roswell.-Mark Mekes
This isn't rocket surgery.-Bill Nye

Last edited by technoextreme; 16th March 2010 at 01:35 PM.
technoextreme is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 17th March 2010, 06:40 AM   #23
Cuddles
Penultimate Amazing
 
Join Date: Jul 2006
Posts: 18,495
Quote:
where there seem to be a surprising number of physicists making up the population of those wacky cult victims who believe in X
Originally Posted by Aepervius View Post
I never saw such a comportment here around. If he had given an example that would be nice, because right now this read more on a rant toward a strawman false-skeptic he built up than anything else.
I think this could well be a simple example of confirmation bias. Physicists, and scientists in general, may appear to be more common as believers in X because when someone finds a scientist who believes in X they are immediately touted around as "Look, this guy's a scientist and they believe X, therefore it must be true". No-one cares if a hairdresser, or whatever, also believes in X, since that would add any authority to the argument.

I very much doubt scientists are more likely to believe in woo than the general population. However, it seems very likely that scientists will be represented much more among those presented as examples of believers in efforts to persuade others.
Cuddles is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Reply

International Skeptics Forum » General Topics » General Skepticism and The Paranormal

Bookmarks


Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off
Forum Jump


All times are GMT -7. The time now is 11:41 AM.
Powered by vBulletin. Copyright ©2000 - 2016, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.
© 2014, TribeTech AB. All Rights Reserved.
This forum began as part of the James Randi Education Foundation (JREF). However, the forum now exists as
an independent entity with no affiliation with or endorsement by the JREF, including the section in reference to "JREF" topics.

Disclaimer: Messages posted in the Forum are solely the opinion of their authors.