tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1812431336777691886.post8146310457250408980..comments2024-02-29T03:57:00.088-05:00Comments on The Mermaid's Tale: Extra sensory perplexion?Anne Buchananhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09212151396672651221noreply@blogger.comBlogger23125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1812431336777691886.post-70237608989478615232011-01-07T11:47:12.428-05:002011-01-07T11:47:12.428-05:00"Maybe the reality is that these kinds of thi..."Maybe the reality is that these kinds of things properly have to struggle in the shadows of scorn until and unless they find some real support, which means support that a phenomenon actually exists in some definable, meaningful sense, AND that there is good evidence for it."<br /><br />I should also add that I completely agree with this.:)James Goetzhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02412501436355228925noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1812431336777691886.post-18763976025645359592011-01-07T11:16:24.823-05:002011-01-07T11:16:24.823-05:00"Should major journals have a section of Spec..."Should major journals have a section of Speculative Science?"<br /><br />I suppose that any scientific hypothesis that has yet to ascend to the status of theory is speculative science. Or would state this a different way?<br /><br />Also, in the case of cosmology, any multiverse hypothesis is speculative.<br /><br />In short, I don't see how we could develop criteria for "Speculative Science."James Goetzhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02412501436355228925noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1812431336777691886.post-15164373128546438852011-01-07T07:38:18.449-05:002011-01-07T07:38:18.449-05:00I guess the problem is striking a balance between ...I guess the problem is striking a balance between being open to non-conventional ideas, and not being tolerant of non-sensical ones. I don't know Bem or his ideas, so can't comment on that side of things.<br /><br />If the critics are right, and we also spotted a variety of problems in our quick perusal of the paper, then this is a case in which the peer review system failed.<br /><br />This also reflects what happens to humans, in the past and even in our age of science, in the face of perplexing phenomena. There's a tendency to construct (make up?) possible explanations. When this is framed in reasonable hypotheses, then they can be addressed in acceptable ways. <br /><br />But when the hypotheses are far out, we're less sound in handling them. The real problem arises when it isn't even clear that the phenomenon actually exists as something that demands explanation.<br /><br />Calling crap by its true name is fine, but Galileo was put under house arrest as a symbol of the ostracism faced by heretical views. Even if only a tiny fraction of them turn out to be true, we should be open to what seem like oddball ideas.<br /><br />In this case, I have no idea how the paper managed to be published. The putative explanation in terms of quantum theory or whatever was so post hoc that it's hard to see how it was persuasive to anyone.<br /><br />There is (or was) a journal called Medical Hypotheses that was founded to serve as an outlet for the Twilight Zone ideas. Few people paid any attention. Should major journals have a section of Speculative Science? It would separate out such things from the kind of criticism Bem's paper gets and probably deserves. The papers probably should not have the usual sort of peer review....but should have some kind of review? Or does that just cater to and reward crackpots? <br /><br />Maybe the reality is that these kinds of things properly have to struggle in the shadows of scorn until and unless they find some real support, which means support that a phenomenon actually exists in some definable, meaningful sense, AND that there is good evidence for it.<br /><br />Science (and wishful-thinking) seems always to have its fringe, and some spokespersons who can get attention. Is it mainly harmless? That would be a hard case to make, depending on what counts as 'fringe'. But new ideas do eventually push through (continental drift is a kind of example, perhaps).Ken Weisshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02049713123559138421noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1812431336777691886.post-60958222050355533462011-01-07T07:28:35.384-05:002011-01-07T07:28:35.384-05:00Thanks, John. We tried to use this paper to make ...Thanks, John. We tried to use this paper to make a point that this paper didn't deserve to be used to make, that it can be difficult to tell whether something's bad because it's bad, or that it just seems bad because we just don't like the idea. We stand by the general point, but agree, and are happy to have you say so in no uncertain terms, that this paper is just bad science.Anne Buchananhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09212151396672651221noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1812431336777691886.post-16696574322401457432011-01-07T01:19:57.144-05:002011-01-07T01:19:57.144-05:00I am a long-time acolyte of Bem: self-perception t...I am a long-time acolyte of Bem: self-perception theory was and is brilliant. But this? Utter nonsense. This quotation: “It’s craziness, pure craziness. I can’t believe a major journal is allowing this work in. I think it’s just an embarrassment for the entire field.” is not over the top or untoward or uncalled for: it is the correct response. We all know that Bem's results are nonsense. Seriously. We can't hide behind walls of seeming objectivity, stroking our chins, and saying "well, that is what the data say", because as we all know the data don't speak at all.<br /><br />This paper is nonsense, and should not have been published, not because we are close-minded bigots, but because it is pseudo-science, bullshit in less politically-correct terms. It hides behind a wall of stupid ("ignorant" would imply some charity) statistics, ridiculous research designs, and less than clear protocols. I can't see how it made it through the review process, but as it did, the reviewers and the editor should hang their heads in shame. This is sham science, stupid science, and a pox on all that we do. As an experimental psychologist, I am embarrassed, but more deeply ashamed. I will have to spend the next decade digging my discipline out of this fucking hole. Thanks.John R. Vokeyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03822243132435056442noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1812431336777691886.post-19240768607630959002011-01-06T23:58:29.761-05:002011-01-06T23:58:29.761-05:00Ken, I appreciate your feedback. I'm trying to...Ken, I appreciate your feedback. I'm trying to apply an approach of cosmology by John Leslie to parapsychology. I also hope to one day develop the approach into a historical method for contemporary religious experiences. And I hope to avoid falling for scientific research with poor methodology and insignificant test results.<br /><br />Regardless of how little you could understand of what I wrote in my previous post, you helped me. For example, I suppose if empirical experiments would ever indicate compelling evidence of "non-chemical" consciousness in a dualistic mind, then it would be become part of science. But if only compelling historical evidence indicates a dualistic mind, then it would only be part of philosophy and history. On my part, I need to do a lot more work on this before I can pound out a quality paper, but your blog post perked ideas in the back burner of my mind.James Goetzhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02412501436355228925noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1812431336777691886.post-7902567563216113322011-01-06T18:42:08.574-05:002011-01-06T18:42:08.574-05:00Jim,
I failed to respond to your saying that what ...Jim,<br />I failed to respond to your saying that what this could be called is philosophical or parapsych. conjecture. I don't get your point, I fear, but that is certainly something scientists would be comfortable with....but it doesn't imply anything more than just conjecture. Scientists defending regular science would say that instead of that conjecture they think sooner or later these phenomena...if they actually exist and are not huxterism or mis-used statistical analysis...will turn into ordinary material phenomena.Ken Weisshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02049713123559138421noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1812431336777691886.post-61165086148227289822011-01-06T17:42:07.731-05:002011-01-06T17:42:07.731-05:00Anne's fishing expedition comments are cogent ...Anne's fishing expedition comments are cogent because that is exactly what all the 'Omics' fads are about. It's an avowedly proud denial that we need to have hypotheses. And in legitimate science as well as questionable science, there are problems with fishing expeditions, and they have to do with the informal number of tests that are done.<br /><br />As to Jim's comments and quote from the book, the problem with things that we cannot explain in normal physical terms does not imply that the phenomena are of other than physical nature: our ignorance of one kind of explanation is not an argument for any other specific hypothesis. That's the mistake of Intelligent Design, too.<br /><br />That, of course, doesn't mean there aren't physical processes that some day will account for psi phenomena. The first problem is the skepticism of results--if the statistics or study designs are sub-standard or flawed, then (as many in science argue) there isn't any psi phenomenon even to demand explanation!<br /><br />If there are some such phenomena, then we should either eventually be able to explain them in normal physical terms, or to show that they force new ideas about physical terms, or to show that something we haven't yet considered 'physical' is responsible.<br /><br />But then the phenomena become normal ones, not supernatural ones. The issue we raise here is that it's hard to know when the data say something real that even has to be explained.Ken Weisshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02049713123559138421noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1812431336777691886.post-29381521436606166922011-01-06T17:20:42.431-05:002011-01-06T17:20:42.431-05:00Here's a related 800-page tome I hope review w...Here's a related 800-page tome I hope review when I somehow have free time: <i>Irreducible Mind: Toward a Psychology for the 21st Century</i> (2006/2009) by Edward F. Kelly, Emily Williams Kelly, Adam Crabtree, Alan Gauld, Bruce Greyson, and Michael Grosso.<br /><br />Here's the blurb from the book:<br /><br />"Current mainstream opinion in psychology, neuroscience, and philosophy of mind holds that all aspects of human mind and consciousness are generated by physical processes occurring in brains. Views of this sort have dominated recent scholarly publication. The present volume, however, demonstrates—empirically—that this reductive materialism is not only incomplete but false. The authors systematically marshal evidence for a variety of psychological phenomena that are extremely difficult, and in some cases clearly impossible, to account for in conventional physicalist terms. Topics addressed include phenomena of extreme psychophysical influence, memory, psychological automatisms and secondary personality, near-death experiences and allied phenomena, genius-level creativity, and 'mystical' states of consciousness both spontaneous and drug-induced. The authors further show that these rogue phenomena are more readily accommodated by an alternative 'transmission' or 'filter' theory of mind/brain relations advanced over a century ago by a largely forgotten genius, F. W. H. Myers, and developed further by his friend and colleague William James. This theory, moreover, ratifies the commonsense conception of human beings as causally effective conscious agents, and is fully compatible with leading-edge physics and neuroscience. The book should command the attention of all open-minded persons concerned with the still-unsolved mysteries of the mind."<br /><br />If after my literature research I would conclude that the researchers compiled compelling evidence for a dualistic theory of the mind, then I would refer to the evidence as a philosophical conjecture or a parascience conjecture. I suppose such research might point to an exotic physics of consciousness that has a root origin apart from chemical reactions in neurons. But unless we could analyze the substance of such an exotic physics, then I wouldn't say that the researchers are restricting themselves to the scientific method, but a philosophical conjecture could be reasonable.<br /><br />When it comes to published psi research (one branch of psychical research) from major universities such as cited in original blog post, I've seen only slim statistical margins that don't impress me.James Goetzhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02412501436355228925noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1812431336777691886.post-39351400716167153232011-01-06T15:51:18.571-05:002011-01-06T15:51:18.571-05:00Brilliant, Holly!Brilliant, Holly!Anne Buchananhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09212151396672651221noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1812431336777691886.post-49284149738374056552011-01-06T15:40:56.858-05:002011-01-06T15:40:56.858-05:00Computers are more erotoresponding because most pr...Computers are more erotoresponding because most programmers are men. Based on all of this 'blue' discussion, one wonders if mega-doses of Viagra could amplify the signal or be used to test various peoples' level of psi-ability.<br /><br />The idea of quanta being a tad smaller than a neuron is right on the mark. How could quantum entanglement have sending pattern enough to be detected as such by a brain: each brain is wired differently, too (and each computer may be different).<br /><br />Holly likes psi-entists to paleoanthropologists, presumably because they are good storytellers, only sometimes constrained by the facts. But at least paleo-Just-So storytellers have some material to show as part of the entertainment, while Just-Psi storytellers only have very small p-values. Better than the response meters on some of the males that were too small to measure, or one might say came up short.<br /><br />The interesting thing about this, and the arsenic and Space-Life stories, is that anybody publishes them. That really proves that science and the media are entertainment phenomena, and unfortunately that is spreading to other sciences, certainly including genetics as well.Ken Weisshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02049713123559138421noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1812431336777691886.post-25299434168768265612011-01-06T14:55:59.433-05:002011-01-06T14:55:59.433-05:00Untestable?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zrzMhU_...Untestable?<br />http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zrzMhU_4m-gHolly Dunsworthhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05260104967932801186noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1812431336777691886.post-26053141895015968962011-01-06T14:41:33.502-05:002011-01-06T14:41:33.502-05:00Not sure if you ever experience this, but it seems...Not sure if you ever experience this, but it seems when you have to make a guess at something and two answers randomly pop into your mind you almost always say the wrong one while the skipped over answer was actually correct. Then there is the "I was thinking that was the answer!" Maybe we're evolutionarily programmed to hide our psi so we're not killed off for being a witch. Haha! Just a thought. And untestable.Lunanoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1812431336777691886.post-4713198714548311462011-01-06T14:22:40.688-05:002011-01-06T14:22:40.688-05:00psi-chologists! love it.
They all just need to tr...psi-chologists! love it.<br /><br />They all just need to try harder. Way harder. C'mon! It's so easy.Holly Dunsworthhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05260104967932801186noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1812431336777691886.post-66848793310978116052011-01-06T14:17:13.983-05:002011-01-06T14:17:13.983-05:00Holly, do physicists actually understand quantum t...Holly, do physicists actually understand quantum theory? Why should psi-chologists be expected to understand their elusive subject any better?!Anne Buchananhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09212151396672651221noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1812431336777691886.post-22372737217475747122011-01-06T14:15:03.096-05:002011-01-06T14:15:03.096-05:00There's at least a start to this in the rebutt...There's at least a start to this in the rebuttal paper, here, starting on page 3: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/1018886/Bem6.pdf <br /><br />"As such, there is nothing wrong with fishing expeditions. But it is vital to indicate clearly and unambiguously which results are obtained by fishing expeditions and which results are obtained by conventional confirmatory procedures. In particular, when results from fishing expeditions are analyzed and presented as if they had been obtained in a confirmatory fashion, the researcher is hiding the fact that the same data were used twice: first to discover a new hypothesis, and then to test that hypothesis. If the researcher fails to state that the data have been so used, this practice is at odds with the basic ideas that underlie scientific methodology"<br /><br />In fact, Bem did do a lot of fishing around in his data, including throwing out outliers to see what happened, and regrouping them and playing around with which pictures gave him the best results and so on. Not that that's necessarily wrong, but he needed to have corrected for it, and as far as I can tell, did not.Anne Buchananhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09212151396672651221noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1812431336777691886.post-64302440082162059442011-01-06T14:13:07.647-05:002011-01-06T14:13:07.647-05:00Erotic internet pictures cause computers to emit s...Erotic internet pictures cause computers to emit some sort of frequency (compared to a blank screen) that well-trained consumers are tuned to without realizing it?<br /><br />Gosh, speculating is so much fun! I'm tempted to become a psi-researcher!<br /><br />Oh wait, I'm a paleoanthropologist already.Holly Dunsworthhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05260104967932801186noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1812431336777691886.post-10108163898461027152011-01-06T14:08:49.365-05:002011-01-06T14:08:49.365-05:00I'd like to learn more about the exploratory v...I'd like to learn more about the exploratory vs. confirmatory data problem.Holly Dunsworthhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05260104967932801186noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1812431336777691886.post-92108228651850682512011-01-06T14:00:22.482-05:002011-01-06T14:00:22.482-05:00That is an important point about the impossibility...That is an important point about the impossibility of this being a blind study. <br /><br />Several other important points -- on the first pass, only women passed the erotic picture test. So, Bem decided the pictures weren't erotic enough for men, so he pulled some better ones off the web. Which seemed to have worked -- well, if one considers 53.1% correct to mean anything important, statistically significant or not. But shouldn't he have foreseen this problem with men and erotic pictures? Not to mention that his solution surely complicated his analysis (the exploratory vs confirmatory data problem).Anne Buchananhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09212151396672651221noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1812431336777691886.post-20539499932045442192011-01-06T13:49:34.829-05:002011-01-06T13:49:34.829-05:00Seriously, if esp is real then we need to criticiz...Seriously, if esp is real then we need to criticize this paper for not being able to "blind" the participants to the study.Holly Dunsworthhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05260104967932801186noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1812431336777691886.post-16001703307425344082011-01-06T13:48:52.345-05:002011-01-06T13:48:52.345-05:00I'm surprised that people with psi were able t...I'm surprised that people with psi were able to be "blinded" to make the experiment scientific!!!<br /><br />Also, neurons are a bit larger than quantum. A bit complicated for entangling.<br /><br />Also, were the erotic pictures (which were the ones psi-people were best at detecting) ever previously in contact, physically, with the psi-people? Because wouldn't they have to be to be in order to be quantumly entangled? <br /><br />Very weird ;).Holly Dunsworthhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05260104967932801186noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1812431336777691886.post-39637970740079477792011-01-06T12:41:02.731-05:002011-01-06T12:41:02.731-05:00And then there are _those_ kinds of methodological...And then there are _those_ kinds of methodological problems. Thank you, Holly!Anne Buchananhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09212151396672651221noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1812431336777691886.post-56324913687659256142011-01-06T12:30:55.620-05:002011-01-06T12:30:55.620-05:00http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fn7-JZq0Yxshttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fn7-JZq0YxsHolly Dunsworthhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05260104967932801186noreply@blogger.com