Proof of Immortality, the IV league

[JayUtah]

What qualifications do a single one of you possess....

Funny you should ask about qualifications. By my count this is the fourth time I've asked you what your relevant formal qualifications are in cognitive science, which would include the ability to properly interpret the relevance of online citations. Please tell me what are your formal qualifications in cognitive science.

 

[JayUtah]

…and then we have 3,560,000 results on google scholar claiming otherwise.

No, we have your claim that they say what you say they say and that the statements they make are probative to this thread in the way Jabba intends to use them.

...explicitly refers to NDE anecdotal data in generating, considering, and / or dismissing various hypothesis.

"Various hypotheses" is not what we're talking about. We're talking about whether they're probative to the question of life after death. It has already been stipulated that anecdotal evidence is not without its use in science. I can't believe that pages hence you're still flogging that straw man.

 

[Slowvehicle]

Google "unicorns". 40 million results. Therefore unicorns are real.

Google "fairies". 110 million results. Conclusion: fairies are more real than unicorns and both are more real than near death studies. So is Mordor with 12 million hits. As is Camelot. And as for Santa? Heading for 2 billion results. Must be true.

 

[JayUtah]

These particular studies were designed...

You don't know anything about those two citations except what your second-source editors chose to (mis)represent. You seem not to care that the MD who performed his research concluded they did not support a hypothesis of life after death. But you're citing him as if he did. You don't seem to care that your other source is not a "PhD-level nurse" but rather a nurse who published a popular book, then received a PhD in theology for it from a backwater college, and now makes her living speaking to NDE-as-life-after-death fans.

Yes, they're being cited precisely by a set of authors and editors who are clearly biased in favor of proving that NDEs have a supernatural, mystical explanation. Attempting to call that science is just laughable.

 

[Squeegee Beckenheim]

This has become a waste of my time. Your argument in garbage! I never made any such claim. Read what I wrote. When you've done so, return with a coherent position or be ignored.

I wasn't making an argument. I asked a couple of questions. Questions which you haven't answered.

Let me rephrase - can you explicate exactly what you meant by "if you say so", please?

 

[Mojo]

Anyone who is still determined to argue that the evidence contained in NDE reports does not qualify as scientific data need look no further than google scholar to discover how wrong you are.

Search for ‘near death studies’. Three million five hundred and sixty thousand results say how wrong you are.

I can't be bothered to explain why this is nonsense, so I'll just link to a thread that perfectly illustrates the point: http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=1014169#post1014169

 

[Hokulele]

Annnnoid, how many of those links did you pursue? Did you realize that the vast majority of those 3 million+ hits were studies of the efficacy of treatment for patients that are near death? Here is an example:

http://ascopubs.org/doi/abs/10.1200/JOP.2016.013995

If you change the search parameter to "near death experience" study, rather than "near death studies", the number of results changes drastically.

Were you being deliberately misleading, or did you simply fail to search properly?

 

[Mojo]

Annnnoid, how many of those links did you pursue? Did you realize that the vast majority of those 3 million+ hits were studies of the efficacy of treatment for patients that are near death? Here is an example:

http://ascopubs.org/doi/abs/10.1200/JOP.2016.013995

If you change the search parameter to "near death experience" study, rather than "near death studies", the number of results changes drastically.

Were you being deliberately misleading, or did you simply fail to search properly?

If you say so.

 

[Jabba]

Well, call me an idiot but:




No. At least, they're not scientific evidence. They could be falsified, but have not been. I would label them anecdotes indicating a need for further study...

LL
- Why are they in need of further study?

 

[Belz...]

LL
- Why are they in need of further study?

...because they're unsupported?

 

[JayUtah]

LL
- Why are they in need of further study?

Because they lack the empirical and statistical controls that are the bedrock of the scientific method. Further study would apply those controls and see if the purported effect still exists and still correlates to the purported cause.

 

[Loss Leader]

LL,
- These particular studies were designed to deal with a different objection to the 'truth value' of NDEs -- i.e., Can Specific Descriptions of Resuscitation Procedures Be Explained by Factors Like Prior Knowledge?

O...kay? I can't see how that has anything to do with immateriality or non-physical perception, but okay. So, the "studies" you quoted a summary of were irrelevant to your claim? You claimed that NDE's were evidence of immaterial perception, but the "studies"didn't rule out low brain-activity perception. So ... um ... yeah. They're either incomplete or irrelevant - choose the one that offends you least.

LL
- Why are they in need of further study?

Well, they're not if you don't care about their truth value. Otherwise, my fellow posters have answered for me:

...because they're unsupported?

Because they lack the empirical and statistical controls that are the bedrock of the scientific method. Further study would apply those controls and see if the purported effect still exists and still correlates to the purported cause.

Sure, JU uses big words, but there are only 37 of them.

 

[JayUtah]

Sure, JU uses big words...

High praise from a lawyer.

...but there are only 37 of them.

Which is why I could never be a lawyer.

 

[Belz...]

Yeah but you still have much to learn in order to make your posts more succint.

 

[Jabba]

LL,
- These particular studies were designed to deal with a different objection to the 'truth value' of NDEs -- i.e., Can Specific Descriptions of Resuscitation Procedures Be Explained by Factors Like Prior Knowledge?

O...kay? I can't see how that has anything to do with immateriality or non-physical perception, but okay...

LL,
-The authors are referring to the potential for explanation other than non-physical perception.

 

[JayUtah]

The authors are referring to the potential for explanation other than non-physical perception.

You could have just said they're looking for physical alternatives. In your MD's case, that's true. He doesn't believe what he's observing has any sort of implication for the mystical nonsense he gets dragged into by your editors, and has repudiated it as such. He's not the only one of your editors' sources who have objected to their misuse. Your nurse is patently looking for non-physical sources, which is why she brashly and prematurely asserts that science can't explain her findings, and why she has been thus roundly feted in supernatural fandom.

 

[abaddon]

LL,
-The authors are referring to the potential for explanation other than non-physical perception.

And the authors are failing to provide any evidence for any non-physical anything. Deus ex machina in extremis.

 

[Hokulele]

If you say so.

Stop confusing me by channeling annnnoid! You made me double check your user name.

 

[Loss Leader]

LL,
-The authors are referring to the potential for explanation other than non-physical perception.

If the anecdotes are consistent with both material and immaterial explanations, then they have no evidentiary value whatsoever.

 

[annnnoid]

Funny you should ask about qualifications. By my count this is the fourth time I've asked you what your relevant formal qualifications are in cognitive science, which would include the ability to properly interpret the relevance of online citations. Please tell me what are your formal qualifications in cognitive science.

As you can see below, a significant portion of this thread was devoted to insisting that anecdotal evidence was inadmissible in science (or just inadmissible period). That this argument occurred is further evidenced by the fact that an entire thread was split from this one and begun in the Science section to arbitrate that very question. You yourself have posted in that thread, so I’m sure you’re familiar with it and its objectives.

One need scan no more than the first page of the google scholar results to discover that not only is anecdotal evidence explicitly applied to scientific hypothesis to argue for or against same…but specificly NDE-related anecdotal evidence is used in scientific investigations.

Thus…not only is your general argument proven wrong, your case-specific argument is established to be wrong as well.

0 for 2 so far.

It has already been stipulated that anecdotal evidence is not without its use in science. I can't believe that pages hence you're still flogging that straw man.

...here's the 'straw man' you're talking about. If you travel down the list you will discover that you yourself flatly contract what you state above. Not that your arguments had any credibility before, but I’d say it’s pretty well tanked after this.

Foot...meet mouth...

Anecdotes are troublingly free of evidentiary value.

The plural of "anecdote" is not "evidence."

Evidence is falsifiably and repeatably testable. Nothing else is evidence.

Once again, an anecdote cannot be evidence.

(My bolding.)

No. They may agree or disagree with certain hypotheses, but they will never be considered evidence. Stop trying to dilute the meaning of evidence. Seriously, stop it.

(So my question to you: Can anecdotes support, or counter, a scientific hypothesis?)
NO.

Anecdotes are not evidence of anything because they do not make a hypothesis more or less likely.

The anecdotes have no evidentiary value.

Only falsifiable testing provides evidence.

(I think that anecdotes can support, or counter, a scientific hypothesis)
They cannot.
(Wouldn't these claims be anecdotes that weigh against the previous hypothesis?)
Absolutely not. The hypothesis can be challenged, according to the scientific method, only with testable, falsifiable evidence. Anecdotes are not that.

I agree with Loss Leader and Wikipedia that anecdotes are not scientific evidence.

It doesn't matter if there are hundreds of billions of anecdotes, they will not make one iota of difference to the probability of a scientific hypothesis being supported or falsified.

(Can anecdotes increase (or decrease) the probability of a scientific hypothesis?)

No.

Anecdotes are unverified, and therefore have no value as evidence. They have no effect whatsoever on the probability of a given hypothesis being true.

I wasn't making an argument. I asked a couple of questions. Questions which you haven't answered.

Let me rephrase - can you explicate exactly what you meant by "if you say so", please?

If you say you love your wife…then I will assume you love your wife.

Why?...could it possibly be because that is what those words mean??????

Annnnoid, how many of those links did you pursue? Did you realize that the vast majority of those 3 million+ hits were studies of the efficacy of treatment for patients that are near death? Here is an example:

http://ascopubs.org/doi/abs/10.1200/JOP.2016.013995

If you change the search parameter to "near death experience" study, rather than "near death studies", the number of results changes drastically.

Were you being deliberately misleading, or did you simply fail to search properly?

Yeah of course Hokulele…if I change the search parameter to “near death experience” the number drops to ONLY 3,010,000.

…helluva drastic change there Hokulele!

That half a million just destroys my point doesn’t it!!!!! I’m only down to 3,010,000 google scholar results that confirm that NDE anecdotal evidence CAN be used to support or dismiss a scientific hypothesis (actually, all I need is one).

Did you have a point somewhere there that I’m just not getting?????

…so were you being deliberately misleading in accusing me of being deliberately misleading. Or maybe just typically incoherent.

And BTW ….this will now be the fifth or sixth time I’m gonna ask you (and probably the fifth or sixth time you’re gonna avoid the question):

Are...or are not...the words you just wrote in your post evidence of what you were thinking / feeling / experiencing when you wrote them???