Moderated Is the Telekinesis Real?

Buddha said:
...although I do not have time to cover all topics that you have presented.
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Your standard excuse. I don't believe you. I think you're avoiding a detailed response because in order to do it you would have to expose the same ignorance we've seen in your previous threads. You're "responding" only so people think you're actually engaged in the debate, when in fact you're doing your best to avoid it.

The Palmer article is my next target. I had to start somewhere, so I started with the Alcock article...
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You could have started with what your critics asked you about first, which you still haven't done. Steven Jeffers' critique was linked several times, both before and after you solicited links from your opponents. His articles will require you to demonstrate actual expertise in statistical analysis, not just handwaving dismissals and vague claims of superiority.
 
Buddha said:
To you the results may look unimpressive, but to a mathematician they support the researchers ' claim
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Then you should be able to cite the opinions of independent mathematicians who support the researchers' claims and can refute the criticism leveled by others. Please do so.

You are not a mathematician. Or at least you are unwilling to demonstrate any proficiency in statistics here. And we are naturally wary, because in your other threads and in your work outside this forum we have seen you happily claim expertise you obviously don't have and can't demonstrate when required. So we have every reason to believe you're lying now too. And you have further assured us that you are impervious to criticism and therefore unteachable. We simply don't believe your ongoing, unsubstantiated claims to relevant expertise, and we certainly don't accept them as an argument-from-authority in lieu of actual direct responses.

You still seem to maintain that the professional experimental scientists who have reviewed PEAR's work are somehow unqualified to do so. You are unwilling to address the disparity in your standards, nor the actual qualifications of real experimental scientists. If your claim is that these researchers have erred because they lack appropriate qualifications, then you should be able simply to identify their errors and show where such errors contradict easily-discovered facts. As it is you're simply insinuating that you're smarter than anyone else who has discussed the PEAR research. That is not an adequate claim, but it is typical for you.
 
Dave Rogers said:
Speaking as someone with long experience of electronic devices and measurements thereon, I have to say that this shows a laughably simplistic level of understanding. Microscopic current fluctuations may indeed be considered truly random, but to handwave away the possibility of any systematic effects in the apparatus used to transform those microscopic fluctuations into macroscopically observable results is somewhere between asinine and outright moronic; a minor systematic error in a single piece of equipment could easily skew the statistics. Without actually measuring the distribution of results, it's impossible to say whether the actual measurement being used is a reasonable appriximation to a random sequence, whatever the microscopic origin it's derived from.

But this is a classic example of Buddha reasoning; he wants to believe something, so he looks for a single argument in favour of it and then declares that to be the only relevant argument, and anybody who raises any others to be incompetent. It's confirmation bias on steroids.

Dave
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At least you confirmed that the fluctuation are truly random, which is a gigantic step forward. Now, about the hardware -- as you said, a single improperly functioning piece of equipment could distort the results. It is left to the observers to make sure that a malfunction doesn't happen. Since neither Alcock nor any other critic provided evidence that a malfunction, indeed, happened, there is no reason to believe otherwise.

But let's say for the sake of argument that you're right, there was a malfunction. Alcock suggests to establish the baseline by running the equipment without a subject. But if there is a malfunction, it would be impossible to establish the baseline for the same reason.

Unfortunately, my argument applies to all experiments involving some kind of equipment -- if the possibility of malfunction is not excluded, it would be impossible to assert anything and the science would stop dead in its tracks. For this reason it is always assumed that an experiment is flawless if certain rules are followed. It seems to me that the Princeton group complied with all those rules.

My friend develops software for the signal processing applications; their group use the same technique for generation of white noise. Their equipment is much more complicated than the apparatus used by the Princeton group. So far there were no complains about their software, which means that their equipment functions properly.

Anyway, it is nice to meet someone at this board whose experience is somewhat similar to my own. I will pay more attention to your posts than to the posts made by some other members.
 
Buddha said:
I will take a look at these articles after I finish with the Alcock article and Palmer article.
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As you have done for the past couple of days, you are dealing only with the straw men you have chosen to represent Jahn's critics. You have utterly failed to address a single critic your opponents here have asked you to look at. You are trying to script both sides of the debate so that you can avoid material you known you can't answer.

It looks like this is going to be a long thread.
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Is it your goal to prolong the thread unnecessarily in hopes that it will appear to be productive despite your evasion?
 
Buddha said:
At least you confirmed that the fluctuation are truly random, which is a gigantic step forward.
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That's not at all what he said.

Since neither Alcock nor any other critic provided evidence that a malfunction, indeed, happened, there is no reason to believe otherwise.
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No, that's not how experiment design works. The experimenters are responsible for discovering and controlling for anomalies. When we note that the experimenters failed to do that, we cannot be assured no such anomalies must have occurred.

But let's say for the sake of argument that you're right, there was a malfunction. Alcock suggests to establish the baseline by running the equipment without a subject.
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That's not why Alcock suggests running the baselines without a subject present.

Unfortunately, my argument applies to all experiments involving some kind of equipment -- if the possibility of malfunction is not excluded, it would be impossible to assert anything and the science would stop dead in its tracks.
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But you aren't a scientist and you admitted you were ignorant of empirical controls. Just because you can't figure out how to do science doesn't mean others are similarly hobbled.

I will pay more attention to your posts than to the posts made by some other members.
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Every fringe theorist tries to find excuses to not have to pay attention to his critics. You are no different.
 
Buddha said:
Jahn is a member of the Princeton ESP research team. I was asking for the links to the articles of INDEPENDENT researchers who were unable to reproduce the Princeton research results.
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Ad hoc revision.

I am asking for the titles. Is it too much to ask for?
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After having been given the reference describing the attempts to reproduce -- including 50 pages of their data -- you revised your request to ask for them in a form you either know or suspect doesn't exist, just so you can try to make a big deal out of their supposed absence.

If you suspect they don't exist, or that they have been misrepresented in some way, then why would PEAR's principal researcher invent a story that works against him? Robert Jahn was quite content to admit that other researchers using his method could not reproduce his results. If you're going to insinuate some sort of bias or misrepresentation, can you explain why the supposed bias works in the direction that which would be expected from Jahn?

Or maybe you didn't realize that Jahn himself published the putatively reproduced results. Did you think one of Jahn's critics published it, and supposedly doctored it?
 
I have no time to read "Buddha"'s pathetic excuses.

Let me guess: he keeps ignoring Jeffers'; he claims to be an accomplished something (statistician, mathematician, etc.) instead of a being full of complexes; his replies have little to do with the posts he's quoting; his replies are mainly repetitive; and he argues he has not enough time.
 
Buddha said:
I am asking for the titles. Is it too much to ask for?
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Again? What are the chances that you might actually read them this time? Nil.

Your MO is to ask for links, have them provided, ignore them and then proceed to claim the links were never provided.
 
Buddha said:
I will take a look at these articles after I finish with the Alcock article and Palmer article. TankThank you for bringing these articles to my attention. It looks like this is going to be a long thread.
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Fixed "speelunk".

And pigs might fly. You know that you will read nothing. We know that you will read nothing.

That's just how you rock.

I am not the first to link such studies, but you have ignored all of the previous links and even claimed that they do not exist. What are the chances you will follow mine? Bob Hope and no hope.
 
Buddha said:
The Palmer article is my next target.
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Except that you already pre-rejected him.
Buddha said:
The way I see it, the critic [Palmer, quoted in Alcock] “massaged” the data to fit it into his version of truth...
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This was before you even knew who he was and assumed he was some biased skeptic. Clearly you're not approaching the criticism with an open mind.

I had to start somewhere, so I started with the Alcock article because it is a summary of all methods of critique of the Princeton ESP research.
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No, it isn't. As you keep noting, Alcock doesn't bring up everything that can be seen as problematic in the PEAR research. He doesn't even bring up everything discovered by Palmer, the author on whom he relies the most in his summary. You're trying very hard to make it seem like Dr. Alcock is all you have to answer, and that if he didn't bring up a thing, you're not responsible for it. You brought up Alcock only because you dashed to Wikipedia to learn belatedly what the criticisms actually were against PEAR and latched onto him. This is the essence of the straw-man fallacy, especially since you lied outright about no other critics having been referred to you.

Palmer covers only statistical aspects of the Princeton research...
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No, that's false. He is the discoverer of the "Operator 010" phenomenon, which is less about statistics and more about empirical controls.

...so his article was not my first target.
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But your claim to fame is as a statistician. By rights that would be the only thing you would be remotely qualified to discuss, since you proved in your reincarnation thread that you have absolutely no knowledge of or experience with the empirical side of experimental science. A significant criticism against PEAR is, in fact, that they got their statistics wrong. So for you to ignore that and delve into stuff you don't know anything about is very suspicious and disappointing.

Specifically, you were led immediately to the review by Dr Steven Jeffers, who found exactly the kind of statistical problems in Jahn's work that a statistician should be able to discuss off the top of his head, as I did in my posts you keep sidestepping. And you've been directed several times a day to that. Again, since we've caught you several times professing expertise you could not demonstrate, and demanding acquiescence on the basis of nothing more than those professions, we have every reason to skeptical of your claim to be a competent statistician and thus able to simply declare your critics are wrong.

Once I get to it, I will be happy to discuss statistical aspects with you.
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We're six pages in and you haven't done any of that. Your argument -- laid out by you in your opening post -- is essentially that all those critics must somehow be wrong because you say so, and you're a mathematician and they're not so what you say goes, and you can't be bothered to explain the details because you're so busy. You start the thread by focusing on the criticism of the statistics, then you seem to drop it like a hot potato when it becomes apparent you can't bluff your way through it. This is not convincing, nor is it encouraging for your promised exhibit. You're simply inventing a private reality and demanding we all accept it without objection.
 
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JayUtah said:
Is it your goal to prolong the thread unnecessarily in hopes that it will appear to be productive despite your evasion?
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I invoke my career as a graduate engineer. Shall we put our effort into a solution which demonstrably works, or one which demonstrably does not?

Buddha would have us chose the latter. In my experience, such round table discussions can ramble on for days or even weeks. The shortcut is the simple word "No".

Now, personally, I put my engineers hat on and am as brief as possible while conveying the meat of the topic. In contrast, you, Jay, are willing to compose lengthy responses. I buy that concept having been an engineering educator in the past. I simply lack the patience for it. For my students? Sure, I had endless patience. For Buddha? Not so much.
 
I must say I am disappointed. Normally the woo slingers at least change up their routine when they change topics. This is just sad.

I’m reminded of the series of Happy Birthday songs Richard Simmons sang to the same tune. It’s entertaining the first few times you hear one, but it gets repetitive fast. Buddha threads are becoming more formulaic than a Harlequin Romance novel.

 
abaddon said:
In my experience, such round table discussions can ramble on for days or even weeks.
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Or years ( *cough* Jabba *cough* ).

In contrast, you, Jay, are willing to compose lengthy responses.
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I write to educate, but also to demonstrate. Buddha is desperately hoping his bluster and gaslighting will work. In order for it to work, there would have to be a vacuum of thorough, correct exposition from his opponents. I fill that vacuum. Not everyone has to commit to filling it, but it must be filled to defuse his blustery rhetoric. "You guys just don't understand" falls flat when there is a demonstration of understanding he has to deal with. "I'm so much smarter than you all" falls flat when he can't deal with the demonstrations. More people will read your posts than mine. Mine don't have to do much more than exist, than be on the record. You stand a greater chance of reaching an audience.
 
JoeMorgue said:
Enough with goddamn "Is this random nonsense with zero evidence that's already been debunked a million times real?" threads.

No. We need to add Betteridge's Law of Headlines to the MA in regards to thread titles.
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Buddha said:
To be honest, I started this thread without a specific goal in mind, I just wanted to see the audience’ reaction.
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Just Asking Questions, eh?
 
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