Proof of Immortality, the IV league

[Jabba]

Your previous example from that book turned out to be nothing like what your book described. This happened to you in the Shroud thread, remember? Remember how you trusted the editors of these sorts of summaries to accurately and completely report the primary sources, and you found out far too late that they didn't?

So the question is what have you done to vet this and all the other anecdotes, given that your editors are not faithful?

Jay,
- Can you be more specific?

 

[Jabba]

I've asked you several times to describe the empirical controls applied in your book to rule out prosaic causes. It appears there aren't any; it appears that all it can do is rely on attestations by witnesses, none of whom the editors themselves seem to have contacted. Hearsay in this context is not probative. Loss Leader may have corrected himself on what he meant by "falsifiable evidence," but I'm sticking to that gun: this sort of n-th level hearsay is not falsifiable evidence. You don't know what empirical controls may apply, your editors don't, and hence we can't test this evidence. Untestable evidence is unfalsifiable evidence, and it is not probative.

Jay,
- Did you purchase the book?

 

[JayUtah]

Jay,
- Can you be more specific?

Jay,
- Did you purchase the book?

Ah, now that you're paying attention, please go back several pages where I began to be specific about your book. Answer all my questions to date, including today's about what you have personally done to verify the stories it contains. You don't get to suddenly break a month's worth of silence toward my posts with your own time-wasting questions that I'm immediately supposed to answer.

Repent, and address my questions.

 

[Loss Leader]

LL,

- That to which I'm referring is not an experiment.

- But anyway, there are numerous anecdotes that include claims made by the subject, and agreed to by witnesses, that could not be known to the subject except by non-physical means. The witnesses could be lying -- but otherwise,
we have evidence of immateriality.
- Here's an example:
So she [the patient] described this whole scene. And I says, “Well, where were you?” And she says, “I was, like, flying above everybody.” And so, she described, typical of what you would see if you’re doing, like, we’d do CPR on her. Now, I’m not there. I’m just describing what she’s saying. And then she said something that was kinda funny. She said, “There was a penny on top of one of the cabinets but you’d have to climb up to see.” And I happened to mention this to another nurse who talks about things like I do. And she actually looked up there and found it.

Rivas, Titus; Dirven,Anny; Smit,Rudolf. The Self Does Not Die: Verified Paranormal Phenomena from Near-Death Experiences (pp. 31-32). International Association for Near-Death Studies. Kindle Edition.

Jabba,

I addressed this already. The experiment must define what is a "hit" or "miss" beforehand so that people don't just look for interesting things. The experiment must have a large sample size to rule out luck.

This one I didn't mention in my last post: The experiment must be repeatable. Others should be able to run the same experiment and get the same results.

This repeatability is, by is nature, impossible in an anecdote. That's one of the reasons they aren't competent evidence.

Stop telling ghost stories, especially second-hand stories curated third-hand and passed on by your fourth hand. We need falsifiable, repeatable experiments that show that immateriality is necessarily true and that all other possible explanations are ruled out.


ETA: And remember, this is just step one. We then need falsifiable, repeatable experiments that show that immateriality is somehow a sign of a soul. Then we need falsifiable, repeatable experiments that show that the soul is immortal. (And, since immortality is impossible to prove, I have no idea how you clear that hurdle.)

 

[Slowvehicle]

I call Sean Hannigans.

 

[Pixel42]

Jabba's anecdote from his book has reminded me that I omitted from my list of possible non-supernatural explanations for NDEs the 'someone is having a laugh' explanation.

 

[Mojo]

Mojo,
- In the study I referred to, they explained why it wouldn't be a lucky guess.
- How much is reasonable to quote? Again, my book has 100 anecdotes that seem to rule out lucky guesses.

How did they rule out lucky guesses?

 

[Mojo]

Mojo, I only looked through 3 Google pages of "NDE false claims," but most of the examples were from religious points of view, and none of them contained the kind of false claims I was looking for...

That's because of the way anecdotes like this are collected. If nothing remarkable happens, it doesn't get reported. As I pointed out.

 

[Pixel42]

That's because of the way anecdotes like this are collected. If nothing remarkable happens, it doesn't get reported. As I pointed out.

One of the best examples of this kind of selection bias I've come across was in a documentary I saw about the era of exploration, in which the story was told of how an intrepid explorer ventured into a desert, almost perished of thirst, but then by an amazing stroke of luck came across an oasis and lived to tell the tale. "Many such stories are told by those who come out of the desert" remarked one of the talking heads, somewhat portentously. Then he thought for a moment and added "Of course those who don't find water don't come out of the desert ... ".

 

[Garrette]

One of the best examples of this kind of selection bias I've come across was in a documentary I saw about the era of exploration, in which the story was told of how an intrepid explorer ventured into a desert, almost perished of thirst, but then by an amazing stroke of luck came across an oasis and lived to tell the tale. "Many such stories are told by those who come out of the desert" remarked one of the talking heads, somewhat portentously. Then he thought for a moment and added "Of course those who don't find water don't come out of the desert ... ".

Good story. Bad tactic. Countdown to Jabba saying "Sure, but do you agree that those who come out of the desert support the idea of water there?

 

[Pixel42]

Good story. Bad tactic. Countdown to Jabba saying "Sure, but do you agree that those who come out of the desert support the idea of water there?

That would require a phenomenal ability to miss the point.

Oh, right.

 

[Jabba]

Ah, now that you're paying attention, please go back several pages where I began to be specific about your book. Answer all my questions to date, including today's about what you have personally done to verify the stories it contains. You don't get to suddenly break a month's worth of silence toward my posts with your own time-wasting questions that I'm immediately supposed to answer.

Repent, and address my questions.

Jay,
- No.
- Give me one question or comment at a time, and I'll try to answer it.

 

[Sideroxylon]

Jay,
- No.
- Give me one question or comment at a time, and I'll try to answer it.

Why?
Do you think this is rude?
Do you think you should give up at this stage?
Are you aware that you have utterly failed in what you have set out to do here?

 

[Jabba]

Jabba,

I addressed this already. The experiment must define what is a "hit" or "miss" beforehand so that people don't just look for interesting things. The experiment must have a large sample size to rule out luck.

This one I didn't mention in my last post: The experiment must be repeatable. Others should be able to run the same experiment and get the same results.

This repeatability is, by is nature, impossible in an anecdote. That's one of the reasons they aren't competent evidence. Stop telling ghost stories, especially second-hand stories curated third-hand and passed on by your fourth hand. We need falsifiable, repeatable experiments that show that immateriality is necessarily true and that all other possible explanations are ruled out.


ETA: And remember, this is just step one. We then need falsifiable, repeatable experiments that show that immateriality is somehow a sign of a soul. Then we need falsifiable, repeatable experiments that show that the soul is immortal. (And, since immortality is impossible to prove, I have no idea how you clear that hurdle.)

LL,
- Do you now accept that anecdotes can be weak evidence?

 

[Mojo]

Jay,
- No.
- Give me one question or comment at a time, and I'll try to answer it.

Perhaps you could try reading them one at a time.

 

[Jabba]

Perhaps you could try reading them one at a time.

Mojo,
- OK. I'll give that a try.

 

[Jabba]

Ah, now that you're paying attention, please go back several pages where I began to be specific about your book. Answer all my questions to date, including today's about what you have personally done to verify the stories it contains. You don't get to suddenly break a month's worth of silence toward my posts with your own time-wasting questions that I'm immediately supposed to answer.

Repent, and address my questions.

Jay,
- If I understand your question, I haven't done much.
- Would seeing what I could find out about the various authors and researchers count?

 

[Mojo]

Mojo,
- OK. I'll give that a try.

Maybe you could answer my recent question:

Jabba,
- I could post a series of videos of me throwing a die and it coming up as a six. Would you accept that as evidence that I throw a six every time I throw a die?

 

[Loss Leader]

LL,
- Do you now accept that anecdotes can be weak evidence?

Oh, for the love of Anne Hathaway's Oscar ...

NO!

Does an anecdote make a hypothesis necessarily true or necessarily false? Is it repeatable? Did it set out what was or was not a hit beforehand? Does it control for confounding variables?

No, no, no, no, no.

For this purpose it is not evidence - neither weak, tepid, provisional nor anything else.

 

[The Sparrow]

In a way, Mojo's die coming up 6 example is a little like how you are trying to use this thread Jabba. The way you are desperately probing for anyway you can claim someone agreed with you while ignoring the thousands of points against you is just like Mojo's die. Ignoring every hit that isn't a 6, and only accepting the times a 6 comes up, then making yourself believe that the die prefers coming up as a 6.