Telepathy

[Cosmic Yak]

We can't be entirely certain of anything, but the bolded stands out. You're giving yourself wiggle-room. Why would alien brains allow psi-powers while human brains don't? Are you opening the door to the existence of psi powers in possible non-humans? What about psi abilities present in possible advanced machine intelligences?

It seemed obvious to me, but I'll spell it out for you as you've clearly misunderstood, and attempted to insert your own snark into my post.

We can only measure what interects with particles here on earth, because we live here on earth. If there are telepathic aliens out there, the effect of their ability would not be measurable because it is too far away.

 

[Cosmic Yak]

Yawn...

Do you want to help or not?

Respect has and will always be extended where it is offered.

Offer helpful advice or not.

Volunteer or not.

Characterizations of me are unwelcome.

I'm quite happy to apoligise if I have mischaracterised your post.

Please explain to me what positive reaction "Yawn" was supposed to convey.

Thanks.

 

[Fudbucker]

It seemed obvious to me, but I'll spell it out for you as you've clearly misunderstood, and attempted to insert your own snark into my post.

We can only measure what interects with particles here on earth, because we live here on earth. If there are telepathic aliens out there, the effect of their ability would not be measurable because it is too far away.

That's a trivial point. The "IF" implies you believe telepathic aliens are possible, just undetectable (at the moment). Is that what you think?

 

[Fudbucker]

Thing is - and Darat mentioned this and you dismissed it - we actually do know an awful lot about the way the universe works. We know that there are only four fundamental ways in which particles can interact. Of the four, only two are capable of acting at greater than subatomic distances - gravity and electromagnetism. There are literally no other ways for particles (ie, stuff) to interact, and we know this for a fact. A century of experimentation and mathematical rigour have led us to this conclusion.

Furthermore, we know very precisely when and how these forces work. Very precisely indeed. For the electromagnetic force, we know how it operates more precisely than we have ever known anything else.

What you're proposing, though you don't even realise it, is the existence of some method for stuff to interact with other stuff that has previously gone unnoticed. Given the precision and accuracy with which we know the existing methods of stuff to interact, it is pretty much inconceivable that there exists another method that we have been unable to pin down with equal accuracy and precision.

We're very good at discovering how things work. That we haven't discovered yet how telepathy works - or even that telepathy works - very strongly suggests that there is no phenomenon there to discover.

The gap in our knowledge in which telepathy might be able to fit is extremely small.

Like I said, I would agree with you if it wasn't for the fact that certain aspects of the brain are still deeply mysterious (e.g., what is consciousness/how is it created).

For the record (if anyone cares), I think human telepathy is very unlikely (Prestige makes several good points). But the existence of psi powers in general? That remains an open question.

 

[Darat]

Like I said, I would agree with you if it wasn't for the fact that certain aspects of the brain are still deeply mysterious (e.g., what is consciousness/how is it created).

For the record (if anyone cares), I think human telepathy is very unlikely (Prestige makes several good points). But the existence of psi powers in general? That remains an open question.

You have still missed the point - we know supernatural telepathy and yes all the other supernatural "psi" powers cannot exist, until about 20 years ago we could not say that but now we can. As ever science moves on and our "folk lore" struggles to keep up with it.

This has nothing to do with our understanding of consciousnesses, this is about what is possible in the universe in which we live.

 

[Fudbucker]

You have still missed the point - we know supernatural telepathy and yes all the other supernatural "psi" powers cannot exist, until about 20 years ago we could not say that but now we can. As ever science moves on and our "folk lore" struggles to keep up with it.

This has nothing to do with our understanding of consciousnesses, this is about what is possible in the universe in which we live.

Lol. We KNOW light travels through a luminerferous ether!

 

[Loss Leader]

So, ONLY all 10 correct answers, with numbers and suits, will be considered a success?

10 out of 52, numbers and suits.

 

[Hokulele]

Lol. We KNOW light travels through a luminerferous ether!

That was tested and shown to be incorrect. Much as telepathy has been tested and shown to be incorrect. Repeatedly.

 

[Startz]

10 out of 52, numbers and suits.

I assume you mean 10 or more.

 

[Cosmic Yak]

That's a trivial point. The "IF" implies you believe telepathic aliens are possible, just undetectable (at the moment). Is that what you think?

It may seem trivial to you, but it is in fact the crux of the matter.

We (by which I mean human scientists) have shown conclusively that telepathy does not exist on earth.

We have not tested the entire universe. It is possible that there are things out there that we don't yet know of.
Could that include telepathic aliens? It could. It would overturn what we know now, but that's happened before. It's unlikely, given our current state of knowledge, but I think it would go beyond what we know to make any kind of definitive statement about a universe we have only just begun to explore.

 

[Loss Leader]

You shuffle the deck.
You look through all 52 cards, one at a time, and concentrate on each. While doing so you record where in the sequence each card falls.
KotA posts a sequence of all 52 cards, naming the position in the sequence where each card occurs. If at least 10 of the card positions in KotA's sequence match the corresponding card positions in your sequence, this is counted as a success.

Is that correct?

Dave

I look through the cards at an exact time KotA decides, concentrating on each card for as long as he decided.

I then post the sequence her as a hash (with some nonsense words dropped in to make it harder to crack. KotA posts his sequence and we compare.

I ran a quick program to check the probability. Assuming the test is run carefully (cards shuffled and all that), and ignoring my well known tendency to write buggy code early in the morning, the probability of hitting 10 or more by chance is effectively zero.

We can make it 5 cards. The probability would be 1:3.8 million.

 

[Darat]

Lol. We KNOW light travels through a luminerferous ether!

No not like that at all, as we actually did not know that.

I know it is an astonishing thought, that we are approaching in some areas absolutely accurate descriptions of reality at certain scales, but we really are. Watch the video linked to earlier, we can now make claims based on descriptions of reality that are so accurate that there is simply no room for supernatural psi. All the gaps where it could have lived have been explored, there are no more gaps for it to hide in.

 

[dlorde]

Lol. We KNOW light travels through a luminerferous ether!

Even when that was a popular idea, it was an untested hypothesis - until experiments showed it to be false.

We have far better knowledge of how particles and forces interact at the energy regime relevant to biological functions, through literally millions of experiments (e.g. particle colliders, etc). We know how the protons, neutrons, and electrons we're made of behave within this regime and what particles and forces significantly influence them. The only known force with both the range and strength to be a possible telepathy candidate would be the electromagnetic force, but we also know it can't do the job.

There may be other forces yet to be discovered, but they're either too weak or too short range to be relevant to biological organisms; if they were strong or long range enough to significantly affect our everyday biological functioning, we'd have detected them long ago.

 

[Startz]

We can make it 5 cards. The probability would be 1:3.8 million.

Are you quite sure of that? I'm getting the probability of 5 or more to be 3.7 out of 1,000. (Mind, there's little I'm worse at than combinatorics.)

 

[Spektator]

Be sure that it has to be ten out of 52 in the correct order. If your number 7 is the Ace of Spades, and the respondent's number 33 is the Ace of Spades, that is a miss.

Otherwise, the respondent could say, "I got all 52 right! Named every one of them! Just not in the order that the tester recorded." And, you know . . . there have been people on this forum in the past who would claim that.

 

[Fudbucker]

It may seem trivial to you, but it is in fact the crux of the matter.

We (by which I mean human scientists) have shown conclusively that telepathy does not exist on earth.

It doesn't seem to exist. There is an extrapolation you're making from results in scientific settings to reality in general. Mistakes have been made along those lines before.

We have not tested the entire universe. It is possible that there are things out there that we don't yet know of.
Could that include telepathic aliens? It could. It would overturn what we know now, but that's happened before. It's unlikely, given our current state of knowledge, but I think it would go beyond what we know to make any kind of definitive statement about a universe we have only just begun to explore.

I agree with this.

 

[Fudbucker]

Even when that was a popular idea, it was an untested hypothesis - until experiments showed it to be false.

We have far better knowledge of how particles and forces interact at the energy regime relevant to biological functions, through literally millions of experiments (e.g. particle colliders, etc). We know how the protons, neutrons, and electrons we're made of behave within this regime and what particles and forces significantly influence them. The only known force with both the range and strength to be a possible telepathy candidate would be the electromagnetic force, but we also know it can't do the job.

There may be other forces yet to be discovered, but they're either too weak or too short range to be relevant to biological organisms; if they were strong or long range enough to significantly affect our everyday biological functioning, we'd have detected them long ago.

For some reason I am reminded of someone in the 1800's talking about disease and miasmic vapors.

 

[Hokulele]

This is probably the most depressing part of discussing things like telepathy with people who want there to be room in the world for magic. They discount the amazing things we can do with technology as mundane, even trivial or unimportant. Cell phones allow us to communicate across large distances. We can view things in places and at scales we never dreamed possible. We can remotely control devices that allow us to move objects, or even explore other planets.

And yet, this isn't good enough. There must still be some sort of magic that we cannot yet explain or comprehend. There has to be room for souls, fairies, and extraordinary powers of the mind. No matter how fascinating the universe as it is may be (and that video linked earlier really is fascinating), it will never be satisfying for some.

 

[carlitos]

KOTA's sports stories are just as true as his alien flying saucer stories.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Loss Leader]

Be sure that it has to be ten out of 52 in the correct order. If your number 7 is the Ace of Spades, and the respondent's number 33 is the Ace of Spades, that is a miss.

Certainly. The card must be in exact position. Even one away would not count as a hit. Calling the Queen of Spades as the eighth card when it is the 7th would be a miss. Calling the Queen of Clubs as the seventh card would be a miss. Calling the King of Spades as the seventh card would be a miss.

Are you quite sure of that? I'm getting the probability of 5 or more to be 3.7 out of 1,000. (Mind, there's little I'm worse at than combinatorics.)

It's ... um ... 1/52*2/51*3/50*4/49*5/48
So that's 240 / 311875200
Which is 1:1299480

But even at 1:1000, I think that's a demonstration that warrants at least a second test.