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13th June 2011, 10:46 PM | #521 |
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All 'mystical experiences' are the result of brain/mind activities and knowledge of their causes, which most certainly was not available in previous centuries, has only recently become more understood. There are probably still many which are not yet understood, but there is enough knowledge to put them under a heading of 'we don't know yet', not assume they 'transcend time and place'.
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13th June 2011, 11:47 PM | #522 |
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But doesn't that kind of make discussions like this kind of redundant, since what you state is, in short "I cannot prove anything, but I and many with me have experiences only explainable thorugh forces for which there can never be any conclusive evidence"? Or, in other words: As an individual I'm free to ignore science and believe anything, no matter how wrong it is.
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14th June 2011, 02:31 AM | #523 |
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The other part of Dyson's preafce included:
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Furthermore even if PSI were dependent on intense emotions, one has to look no farther than the scientific study published a few years ago that was trying to test the hypothesis that time was perceived differently by people under intense stress - the experimenter had people fall backwards off a 150 foot bungee tower and ran perception tests on the falling person. We have the technology. We have the capability. I would love to discuss this further. Is a new thread more appropriate? |
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14th June 2011, 02:40 AM | #524 |
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A left over question from a few pages back:
Originally Posted by Ladewig
Originally Posted by Limbo
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14th June 2011, 02:41 AM | #525 |
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14th June 2011, 03:38 AM | #527 |
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Yes, it's special pleading, pure and simple.
If ESP worked, if it did anything whatsoever, we could distinguish that from it not working, and could test it scientifically. Dyson's usually a bit smarter than that.
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14th June 2011, 05:17 AM | #528 |
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Great summary. Any force capable of affecting the world is by definition measurable (though of course finding a method by which to do that might be difficult).
Placing PSI (or god, or whatever) outside the sphere of that which can be observed also means defaulting on any statements about its existence or effects, relegating it to the realm of fiction and imagination. |
14th June 2011, 07:00 AM | #529 |
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Really? I think the fit is horrible. First, it is the wrong sub-forum. Second, there are people would who like to participate in this discussion, but have already given up on this thread. Third, there are knowledgeable, well-read people who could contribute to this topic but will not find the discussion because of the thread title. Fourth, people looking for threads on this topic will not find this thread by searching tags. Fifth, it distracts from the thread's topic and makes it hard to follow any of the three things currently being discussed at this point. Sixth, Plato never said that PSI is the most important thing in the world.
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14th June 2011, 07:06 AM | #530 |
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Why can't you just read a few books about it? Here is an incomplete list of books about it that I have read and recommend. Knock yourself out. Extraordinary Knowing Varieties of Anomalous Experience The Parapsychology Revolution An Introduction to Parapsychology Outside the Gates of Science Randi's Prize Entangled Minds Parapsychology and the Skeptics The Intention Experiment |
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14th June 2011, 07:09 AM | #531 |
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And this brings us back to the crux of the matter. What exactly is being claimed. Dowsing? Map dowsing? Telepathy? Telekinesis? Clairaudience? Clairescence (smelling at a distance)? Clairgustance (tasting at a distance)? Precognition? Retrocognition? Remote viewing? Channeling? Psychic healing? Speaking with the dead?
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14th June 2011, 07:34 AM | #532 |
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Evidence is not proof. There IS evidence for psychic functioning out there but it is not proof. Skeptics can still weasel out from under it, so it is not conclusive enough to end the debate. They can still ignore it, spin it, mock it. Its not that the cumulative evidence is weak. Its that the ignorance of skeptics is strong. Skeptics rely on science and on the MDC to serve them but that is a mistake. Science can't take psi and separate it from the influence of the minds of the experimenters in a lab. Therefore it can't properly control and replicate psi experiments. It can't control for the parapsychological experimenter effect and the MDC can't control for the sheep-goat effect. Science can't separate subject from object when it comes to psi. Game over. Its up to the individual truth-seeker to operate outside the influence of those effects and prove it to himself. It can be done but I don't think the average JREFer has what it takes. |
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"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." |
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14th June 2011, 07:38 AM | #533 |
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14th June 2011, 07:39 AM | #534 |
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The conclusions I adopt are essentially a mindfulness akin to solipsism. A constructive take on the understanding that in reality our knowledge and understanding of the nature of existence is in its infancy. Alongside a consideration that the reality of existence may not be as it seems or what we would expect.
The creation of a blank canvas for the intuition. |
14th June 2011, 08:03 AM | #535 |
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Game over?! Not hardly. Game on! The old sheep-goat effect. Even if it existed shouldn't we see hundreds if not thousands of encouraging studies from pro-PSI investigators? If everyone in the room believes in PSI, then the results should clearly demonstrate the existence of PSI? Plus such a scenario would be fascinating. We could put one hundred pro-PSI experimenters in a room and demonstrate dowsing. Then we would add one skeptic and see if the dowser could still perform. Then add a second skeptic and a third, etc, etc. Eventually the dowser could not perform. We could scientifically measure the sheep-goat effect. How paradoxical. |
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14th June 2011, 08:06 AM | #536 |
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14th June 2011, 08:10 AM | #537 |
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The author and her daughter had intense emotions about it, and that is enough. The dowser doesn't need to have intense emotions too. The dowser is like a middle-man, he lets their emotions do the work.
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How? Do you picture scientists stealing little girls harps?
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What about the intense emotions of the enemy army? Don't you think they will have an influence? What about the intense desire of the murderer to avoid being caught? What about the emotions of skeptics who don't want to see psi effectively used and therefore proven? Psychic functioning takes place against a transpersonal backdrop of conflicting emotions, desires, beliefs, expectations, intentions, worldviews. Thats why its so elusive, inconsistent, fluid. Thats why the 'trickster' archetype is universally associated with psi. |
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"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." |
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14th June 2011, 08:12 AM | #538 |
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14th June 2011, 08:13 AM | #539 |
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14th June 2011, 08:14 AM | #540 |
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14th June 2011, 08:18 AM | #541 |
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14th June 2011, 08:19 AM | #542 |
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"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." |
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14th June 2011, 08:25 AM | #543 |
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14th June 2011, 08:32 AM | #544 |
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So what you're saying, really, is that PSI is real but so unreliable, impotent and undirectable that it's indistinguishable from nonsense, and useless as anything but a parlor game. I don't think we need to get all sciency and stuff to apply the basic pragmatic rule here; if you can't find a difference between "on" and "off" the thing's not working.
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14th June 2011, 08:32 AM | #545 |
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14th June 2011, 08:40 AM | #546 |
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14th June 2011, 08:44 AM | #547 |
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"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." |
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14th June 2011, 09:01 AM | #548 |
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14th June 2011, 09:09 AM | #549 |
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Simple probability tells us that we should expect coincidences, and simple psychology tells us that we'll remember the ones we notice... |
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14th June 2011, 09:18 AM | #550 |
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14th June 2011, 09:40 AM | #551 |
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Simple probability tells us that we should expect coincidences, and simple psychology tells us that we'll remember the ones we notice... |
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14th June 2011, 09:53 AM | #552 |
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Randi tested dowsers (vid on line somewhere). They agreed to the test conditions, were very successful and happy with a preliminary unblinded run. They then did the dowsing test, and thought they'd been very successful. They were crestfallen when the results showed they'd done no better than chance.
A rational interpretation is that they were deceiving themselves in believing their dowsing was effective. You appear to be suggesting that sceptics involved exerted a psychic suppression field that the dowsers, self-proclaimed experts in dowsing, were totally unaware of, and that this suppression acted only during the blinded test... It's pretty obvious to me which explanation Ockham would have chosen. |
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14th June 2011, 09:56 AM | #553 |
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14th June 2011, 10:05 AM | #554 |
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I won't tell you your beliefs are wrong, but until you can make a better argument than "because I know it to be so and so does a bunch of other people", I will consider them highly unlikely to have any basis in reality. Since that's the only argument you've put forth so far, I don't believe we're going to get much further here.
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14th June 2011, 10:36 AM | #555 |
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Its not the only argument I've put forth. I've argued that the individual has the ability and maybe even the duty to go where science can't and see for himself that psi is real. This is similar to the argument of the OP. I've argued that skeptics are too damn lazy in that they don't read ****. That they are woefully ignorant of the body of parapsychological evidence and what it means and what the philosophical implications are for religion and science. I've also argued that the sheep-goat effect and the parapsychological experimenter effect are real and that they limit the ability of science to deal with psi. There is evidence out there that these effects are real and therefore they must be taken onto account. I've also argued that psi is a component of classical mysticism. The Catholic charisms, the Buddhist iddhi and the Hindu siddhi are all different mystical models of the same psychic abilities. Mystical exercises alter the consciousness of the mystic and strengthen psychic ability. "It is true that certain psychic faculties capable of a worldly application, such as the Dibba-cakkhu (clairvoyance), Dibba-sota (clairaudience), Mano-Maya-Kaya (projection of the ‘astral body’) and other paranormal powers are developed in the course of Buddhist meditation. . . .The Buddha and the Arhats possessed such powers and when need arose they exercised them for the sake of the ignorant who demanded ‘signs and wonders.’ But in general the Buddha deplored their use, preferring to spread the Dhamma by the ‘miracle of teaching’ and the self-propagating power of truth. To those not yet fully emancipated from worldly delusion they can become attachment-forming faculties, and as such have to be guarded against and overcome in the struggle for Nibbanna. In the Buddhist view, one who embarks on concentration exercises to obtain supernormal powers (Iddhi) is doing so with the wrong intention and at great danger to himself. If all power corrupts, supernormal power can corrupt superlatively." (Mahathera, 1975, p.iv) "I am well aware, however, of the danger of tying spiritual belief to any scientific system. . . . This is not to say that I consider things like the oracle and the ability of monks to survive nights spent out in freezing condition to be evidence of magical powers. Yet I cannot agree with our Chinese Brothers and sisters, who hold that Tibetan acceptance of these phenomena is evidence of our backwardness and barbarity. Even from the most rigorous scientific viewpoint, this is not an objective attitude. At the same time, even if a principle is accepted, it does not mean that everything connected with it is valid. . . . . Great vigilance must be maintained at all times when dealing in areas about which we do not have great understanding. This, of course, is where science can help. After all, we consider things to be mysterious only when we do not understand them. . . . . Through mental training, we have developed techniques to do things which science cannot yet adequately explain. This, then, is the basis of the supposed ‘magic and mystery’ of Tibetan Buddhism." (Dalai Lama, 2002, pp. 230-243) |
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"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." |
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14th June 2011, 11:00 AM | #556 |
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"There are three possible positions one may take concerning the evidence for ESP. First, the position of orthodox scientists, who believe that ESP does not exist. Second, the position of true believers, who believe that ESP is real and can be proved to exist by scientific methods. Third, my own position, that ESP is real, as the anecdotal evidence suggests, but cannot be tested with the clumsy tools of science. These positions also imply different views concerning the proper scope of science. If one believes, as many of my scientific colleagues believe, that the scope of science is unlimited, then science can ultimately explain everything in the universe, and ESP must either be nonexistent or scientifically explainable.
If one believes, as I do, that ESP is real but is scientifically untestable, one must believe that the scope of science is limited. I put forward, as a working hypothesis, that ESP is real but belongs to a mental universe that is too fluid and evanescent to fit within the rigid protocols of controlled scientific testing. I do not claim that this hypothesis is true. I claim only that it is consistent with the evidence and worthy of consideration." -Freeman Dyson How would he know if something is consistent unless he could measure it? If he can measure it, then it's measurable (duh). Therefore, it falls under scrutiny that we call 'science.' When mystics say, "do x,y,z and you will be able to psionically contact your loved ones" that's measurable and therefore falls under scrutiny that we call 'science.' By the way, just curious, but I just suddenly wondered why these gurus who no longer need to eat don't go and teach their techniques to people in Africa who have tens of thousands of children starving to death every year. It seems that only rich, fat Americans and Europeans are interested in this nonsense. And if obtaining-sustenance-from-the-sun skills are gained only after a lifetime of dedication, then what's the bloody use? |
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14th June 2011, 11:16 AM | #557 |
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14th June 2011, 11:23 AM | #558 |
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14th June 2011, 12:26 PM | #559 |
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14th June 2011, 12:48 PM | #560 |
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