Is ESP More Probable Than Advanced Alien Life?

[Dinwar]

But no amount of experimental evidence from parapsychologists could convince me that ESP is real...

A standard question in science is "What would it take to prove you wrong?" If you can't answer it, you either haven't considered the problem adequately or are not approaching it from a scientific perspective.

However, without a viable mechanism that physicists agree on, I think I'd still be skeptical.

I'd accept biologists and psychologists instead of physicists. This wouldn't be a lowering of standards, either--communication between animals is a biological question, and the operations of the human mind is a psychological question.

 

[jt512]

Are you referring to words I typed or those contained in the link I posted? If mine then quote back the offending bits.
If the author's then note that he managed to collaborate with Honorton. Cannot envision that would take place if the later considered the author to be insulting.

I didn't say that you insulted anyone. Your post consisted of naming two people: a parapsychologist and statistician that analyzes psi data. I presumed you did that the article was relevant to a critique of the research because it discussed those individuals, and hence that something about them is relevant to whether their research is valid. That's an ad hominem argument, whether it is true or not. If that's not why you mentioned those two individuals, then I have no idea why you did.

 

[jt512]

A standard question in science is "What would it take to prove you wrong?" If you can't answer it, you either haven't considered the problem adequately or are not approaching it from a scientific perspective.

I'd accept biologists and psychologists instead of physicists. This wouldn't be a lowering of standards, either--communication between animals is a biological question, and the operations of the human mind is a psychological question.

I would accept statisticians, because those two guys are mainly making statistical arguments, and neither has expertise in statistics. Nonetheless, I'd prefer to look at their actual analyses than write them off a priori based on the authors' training.

 

[jt512]

A standard question in science is "What would it take to prove you wrong?" If you can't answer it, you either haven't considered the problem adequately or are not approaching it from a scientific perspective.

What has that got to do with me, exactly?

 

[Dinwar]

I would accept statisticians, because those two guys are mainly making statistical arguments, and neither has expertise in statistics. Nonetheless, I'd prefer to look at their actual analyses than write them off a priori based on the authors' training.

Not what I'm doing in this post. A physicist could come up with the mechanism, sure--nothing in biology contradicts physics, after all. I'm just saying that we should expand the pool of experts you presented. Psychologists and biologists are fully qualified to come up with viable mechanisms, and probably are better equiped to do so than physicists. You'd need a biophysicist (or whatever they're called) in order to find someone who could come up with a viable mechanism from a physics perspective; an astronomer or thin-film expert would just be guessing.

Note that I am ONLY talking about who would be qualified to determine and evaluate potential mechanisms here. An unqualified person could come up with an idea, but it takes a deep knowledge of biology (specificaly physiology and biochemistry) to fully evaluate such a mechanism. At the point where someone has such deep knowledge, they're a biologist. I know an ameture paleontologist who's an editor for a leading decapod paleontology journal in his spare time, and a police officer who does the review part of peer review for a malacology journal (mollusk studies). I'd call the first a paleontologist and the second a malacologist without any hesitation--they have proven their credentials by being accepted as an expert by other experts. You find a physicist with enough in-depth understanding of physiology to be accepted as an expert by biologists--hell, if you find a carpenter with such knowledge--I'd include them under the heading "biologist" for the purposes of this discussion. In other words, I'm basing this off knowledge, not off academic pedigree.

 

[Dinwar]

What has that got to do with me, exactly?

I quoted the part where you admit to violating the principle.

 

[jt512]

I quoted the part where you admit to violating the principle.

Sometimes to understand someone's position, you have to read all the way to the end of the paragraph.

 

[Dinwar]

Sometimes to understand someone's position, you have to read all the way to the end of the paragraph.

I did. Doesn't change my analysis.

Sometimes to understand someone's position, you need to put more than thirty seconds' though into it.

 

[jt512]

Not what I'm doing in this post. A physicist could come up with the mechanism, sure--nothing in biology contradicts physics, after all. I'm just saying that we should expand the pool of experts you presented. Psychologists and biologists are fully qualified to come up with viable mechanisms, and probably are better equiped to do so than physicists. You'd need a biophysicist (or whatever they're called) in order to find someone who could come up with a viable mechanism from a physics perspective; an astronomer or thin-film expert would just be guessing.

Note that I am ONLY talking about who would be qualified to determine and evaluate potential mechanisms here. An unqualified person could come up with an idea, but it takes a deep knowledge of biology (specificaly physiology and biochemistry) to fully evaluate such a mechanism. At the point where someone has such deep knowledge, they're a biologist. I know an ameture paleontologist who's an editor for a leading decapod paleontology journal in his spare time, and a police officer who does the review part of peer review for a malacology journal (mollusk studies). I'd call the first a paleontologist and the second a malacologist without any hesitation--they have proven their credentials by being accepted as an expert by other experts. You find a physicist with enough in-depth understanding of physiology to be accepted as an expert by biologists--hell, if you find a carpenter with such knowledge--I'd include them under the heading "biologist" for the purposes of this discussion. In other words, I'm basing this off knowledge, not off academic pedigree.

Physics says that ESP is impossible, so since biology cannot violate physics (as you say), there is nothing at the moment for biologists to do.

 

[jaydeehess]

I didn't say that you insulted anyone. Your post consisted of naming two people: a parapsychologist and statistician that analyzes psi data. I presumed you did that the article was relevant to a critique of the research because it discussed those individuals, and hence that something about them is relevant to whether their research is valid. That's an ad hominem argument, whether it is true or not. If that's not why you mentioned those two individuals, then I have no idea why you did.

What? I may be wrong but did you not bring up Utts yourself?

I posted a critique by a psychologist about previous work/statements Utts made. How in the name of the old Latin gods is posting a critique of someone's historical work an "ad hominem"?
Had the critique said Utts is a poopy head so don't listen to her, THAT would be ad hom.

ETA: Utts may take umbrage at being criticized, that would not make it ad hom.

 

[Aepervius]

Physics says that ESP is impossible, so since biology cannot violate physics (as you say), there is nothing at the moment for biologists to do.

Physic does not say anything such like.

What physic state is that there is no action at distance, there must be an itnerracting particle for example.

That does not exclude ESP. If everybody was blind, and somebody got eyes, that would be "ESP" like for the others. But there is no action at distance : it is photon interracting. Some people proposed ESP acting on EM (or even only magnetism). Radio/antena principle. That would be what you would go for. Some proposed an hithertio unknown particle again using radio/antena principle, but as mentionend already for the energy range we are speaking of, physic of particle is considered more or less complete.

Now if you pretend that your phenomenon has NO particle itnerracting and has action at DISTANCE without interractin, then yes, physic states it is impossible.

 

[Sideroxylon]

Physics says that ESP is impossible, so since biology cannot violate physics (as you say), there is nothing at the moment for biologists to do.

There is nothing for either of them to do until someone shows there is a phenomena that requires explanation.

 

[Dinwar]

Physics says that ESP is impossible, so since biology cannot violate physics (as you say), there is nothing at the moment for biologists to do.

We're dealing with a biological system. There's plenty for a biologist to do. For example, if a physicist comes up with an idea for how it could work that violates principles of biology, the biologist can step in and say "Slow down there, sparky".

If you deal with a biological system and do not at least have a biologist on the team, you have failed. End of discussion.

I posted a critique by a psychologist about previous work/statements Utts made. How in the name of the old Latin gods is posting a critique of someone's historical work an "ad hominem"?
Had the critique said Utts is a poopy head so don't listen to her, THAT would be ad hom.

"You're wrong because you smell bad" is only an ad hom if smelling bad is irrelevant to the discussion. If it IS relevant, it becomes an important point. A lot of people forget that.

 

[annnnoid]

Is it possible to conclusively establish:

…that a human brain / mind can generate psi events?
…that a human brain / mind cannot generate psi events?
…precisely what a human brain / mind is capable of generating?

I will answer no to all three questions. I can submit evidence that establishes that it is trivially easy support this conclusion. If anyone wants it, just ask (Nonpareil is already very familiar with the evidence…so you can ask him too if you like).

If you are going to submit an answer, be prepared to submit evidence to support it…or be prepared to be ignored (despite Dinwar’s recent blatantly unscientific and unprincipled decision to sanction hand-waving as a valid debating tactic we will assume that, in a science forum, evidence is still required […and don’t waste your time being offended Dinwar…you’re perfectly free to subscribe to whatever double standards you like but don’t be surprised if others call you out on it…especially after you have made such an issue of endlessly pontificating over the sanctity of scientific evidentiary standards!)

Physics says that ESP is impossible, so since biology cannot violate physics (as you say), there is nothing at the moment for biologists to do.

Physics does not say psi is impossible (which is at least one reason why having a theoretical physicist study the issue is useful...which, not surprisingly, resolves yet another one of Dinwars criticisms...oh well). It just cannot explain it (just like it cannot explain a lot of things, including the existence of physics).

 

[Dinwar]

There is nothing for either of them to do until someone shows there is a phenomena that requires explanation.

Well, to come up with a completely off-the-wall example: A biologist could discover that humans do communicate, to some extent, via pheramones or some other mechanism outside the normally accepted communications pathways. That wouldn't be ESP, but may help explain some of the data.

My point is, biologists think that way, and have the expertise to evaluate that sort of argument. Physicists, in my experience, don't and don't. (I've dealt with a number of physicists in my life; my wife's degree is in physics, and I spent a fair amount of time in her grad department when she was in her Ph.D. program.) If you're asking a question about an organism, you need someone with knowledge about organisms to deal with it.

 

[jaydeehess]

Conclusions
When we examine the basis of Utts’s strong claim for the existence of psi, we find that it relies on a handful of experiments that have been shown to have serious weaknesses after undergoing careful scrutiny, and another handful of experiments that have yet to undergo scrutiny or be successfully replicated. What seems clear is that the scientific community is not going to abandon its fundamental ideas about causality, time, and other principles on the basis of a handful of experiments whose findings have yet to be shown to be replicable and lawful.

Utts does assert that the findings from parapsychological experiments can be replicated with well-controlled experiments given adequate resources. But this is a hope or promise. Before we abandon relativity and quantum mechanics in their current formulations, we will require more than a promissory note. We will want, as is the case in other areas of science, solid evidence that these findings can, indeed, be produced under specified conditions.

Ray Hyman is professor emeritus of psychology, University of Oregon

Seems all relevant to the topic to me.

 

[jaydeehess]

"You're wrong because you smell bad" is only an ad hom if smelling bad is irrelevant to the discussion. If it IS relevant, it becomes an important point. A lot of people forget that.

I think it will be easier to demonstrate ESP than to demonstrate that having fecal matter applied to one's head is relevant to the ability to analyze data.

 

[Dinwar]

I think it will be easier to demonstrate ESP than to demonstrate that having fecal matter applied to one's head is relevant to the ability to analyze data.

It's my standard explanation for an ad hom:

Ad hom: "You're wrong because you smell bad."
Not ad hom: "You're wrong and you smell bad."

My point in my statement to you was, if the argument is relevant to the conclusion it's not an ad hom; it's a valid argument. The argument "Syliva Brown is a fraud, therefore we should dismiss her alleged hits" is not an ad hom, despite the fact that it is an attack against her credibility--because her credibility is a relevant factor. Similarly, if someone has demonstrated a history of poor data analysis, saying so is a relevant datum when evaluating the quality of the current data analysis. They're all in the same category.

 

[jaydeehess]

It's my standard explanation for an ad hom:

Ad hom: "You're wrong because you smell bad."
Not ad hom: "You're wrong and you smell bad."

My point in my statement to you was, if the argument is relevant to the conclusion it's not an ad hom; it's a valid argument. The argument "Syliva Brown is a fraud, therefore we should dismiss her alleged hits" is not an ad hom, despite the fact that it is an attack against her credibility--because her credibility is a relevant factor. .

Oh, I got it the first time. I just have a perchance for being a sarcastic so-and-so sometimes.

Similarly, if someone has demonstrated a history of poor data analysis, saying so is a relevant datum when evaluating the quality of the current data analysis. They're all in the same category

Thus my citing Hyman of course. Which you appear to get but others didn't.

 

[Dinwar]

Oh, I got it the first time. I just have a perchance for being a sarcastic so-and-so sometimes.

Fair enough. I wasn't sure if my reference threw you off--once you said it I realized that referencing something that I say frequently may not make sense if people hadn't heard me say it. So I appreciate the excuse to expand on it a bit.