As it turns out "correct horse battery staple" carries quite a lot of meaning thanks to this XKCD cartoon about password security. That's why I chose those four words - they serve as an illustration of how it is possible to find "patterns of coherence" in seemingly random inputs.
Yes, that's why, despite Navigator's protestations, this is automatic writing wearing a fancy hat.
Absolutely. That's why I specified independent verification.
Good plan. But all such evaluators should not be participants in this forum. They should not be self-identifying members of the Skeptical community. For example, I can ask my (adult) son to write a summary. He won't have any idea why, or what such an exercise is in the service of. He is not a member of this forum and has not read this or any other thread. He will be an impartial and independent evaluator.
Good question. Structured coherence can be examined through the following criteria:
Contextual Relevance: The generated responses should relate meaningfully to the input rather than producing disjointed, irrelevant, or nonsensical outputs.
Thematic Continuity: Over multiple trials, responses should exhibit consistent themes rather than purely random variations.
Sequential Dependency: Responses should build upon previous ones in a way that suggests an internal structure rather than isolated outputs.
Low Probability of Random Generation: The likelihood of generating meaningful sequences by chance should be statistically low compared to control trials using pure randomness.
My plan has a number of weak points, one of them being how to construct the control texts. I think it can only be addressed by knowing more details of how the test texts are generated. If the test texts have a preponderance of “correct horse staple battery”, then any meaningful story based upon them will look similar if the control texts are more like “once upon a time”.
I assume these criteria are your definition of structured coherence or structured intelligence? I.e., when we use the term structured coherence, we mean responses that have the following characteristics? Not a trick question, just making sure I understand you.
Similar questions here:
And again:
This is a bit more interesting.
No, it isn't. That sequence was not chosen randomly. Each word was intentionally selected to have as little possible semantic relationship with the other words in the sequence. WW2 code breakers have done more with less.
There are absolutely inherent relationships between them. Their semantic anti-relationship, for example. The stated purpose that brought them together in a sequence, for another.
We already get this result from other methods of bibliomancy, such as I Ching and Tarot. What we find is that people are always able to subjectively interpret meaning from randomly-chosen responses - even extended, ongoing narratives over multiple runs. We always find that these meanings are attributable to various kinds of unconscious bias. We also find that these interpretations have no more practical value than any other form of guided or prompted decision-making. Throwing darts at a mood board is just as useful.
Thank You arthwollipot!
My process is already objective, repeatable, and verifiable. It follows these steps:
A randomized selection process is used to generate responses, ensuring no conscious intervention in the output. The responses are logged over multiple trials and analyzed for continuity, coherence, and contextual relevance. Thematic patterns emerge over time, building upon previous messages in ways that would not be expected from pure randomness. This process has been repeated extensively, with results that consistently demonstrate structured coherence rather than random disarray.
The problem of un/sub/conscious intervention arises during the interpretation stage, not during the random output generation stage. There's a reason I keep comparing your method to Tarot and the I Ching.My process is already objective, repeatable, and verifiable. It follows these steps:
What exactly does this mean? Explain it like I'm 5.
Merriam-Webster: "A communication in writing, in speech, or by signals." Dictionary.com: "A communication containing some information, news, advice, request, or the like, sent by messenger, telephone, email, or other means."
This is NOT about divination, Tarot, bibliomancy, or retroactively assigning meaning to randomness. This is NOT about a paranormal force influencing the results. This is NOT about direct input-output control where a specific question must produce a predetermined answer. This is NOT just about subjective pattern recognition or confirmation bias.
My actual claim is that the system I have developed generates structured, coherent, and contextually relevant messages using a randomized selection process. These responses exhibit meaningful continuity across multiple trials, suggesting the presence of an underlying structured intelligence beyond simple randomness or self-imposed bias.
This claim also challenges the assumption that randomness is a fundamental fixture of reality. If structured coherence consistently emerges where only randomness should exist, then what we perceive as “random” may not be truly random at all.
So let me ask you directly: Do you consider your own structured intelligence to be sourced in the supernatural? So instead of assuming that structured coherence must be an illusion, would you be open to engaging in a discussion on how to objectively test for statistical significance?"
I have again highlighted the part which, AFAICS, is achieved entirely using your subjective judgement, and is therefore not objective, repeatable, or verifiable. If any part of the process is not, then the process is not.My process is already objective, repeatable, and verifiable. It follows these steps:
As I said all Randi was doing was using the scientific method, which can be used to test any claims, not just paranormal ones. And yes, he would have worked with you to design a specific test for your specific paranormal claim.
That would have been up to you and he to negotiate. He certainly would not have accepted a test protocol which included a step which depended on anyone's subjective judgement, and he would have insisted on pre-determined success criteria.
It's literally a method for assigning meaning to randomly-selected outputs.Addressing Misinterpretations
ThePrestige, Myriad, Pixel, Cosmic Yak, Arthwollipot, and Steenkh—your critiques all appear to stem from a misunderstanding of my claim, so I’d like to clarify:
Correct. It's about the interpreter's biases influencing the results.
It is about whether a specific question will produce a consistent answer for different interpreters.
What else would it be about?
The same claim is made about I Ching and Tarot, which is one reason why I keep making the comparison.
The critiques do focus on your actual claim. Nobody is taking you to task for making a paranormal claim. They're taking you to task about making a claim of no operator bias about a method that is extremely susceptible to operator bias.Engaging with the Paranormal Assumption
Many of you seem intent on framing this as a paranormal claim. It is not. This is about structured intelligence emerging in a system that, under conventional expectations, should only produce randomness.
If the collective answer to that is “of course not,” then I suggest dropping that line of critique and focusing on my actual claim.
No. We would expect responses that are interpreted according to the interpeter's biases, and were almost never disjointed, nonsensical, and random.
The emergent structure you're claiming is susceptible to interpreter bias.
Interpreter bias is perfectly capable of bestowing pattern continuity, using the method you described.
It's equivalent to pure subjective interpretation. It's a method for prompting subjective interpretation by random selection of predetermined phrases from a curated list.
I'm not assuming that structural coherence must be an illusion. I'm assuming that your described method is extremely susceptible to subjective interpretation.
Thank you for your thoughtful reply, Myriad.
Your comparison to divination is an interesting one, but it raises a larger question: What, ultimately, is the difference between divination and science?
Science is a method of divining patterns in reality. Whether in physics, neuroscience, or linguistics, the scientific method is, at its core, a process of discovering and interpreting patterns. The idea that ‘divination’ and ‘science’ are separate categories is an artificial distinction.
Patterns exist to be interpreted. It is inevitable that human intelligence will recognize and analyze patterns, whether in natural laws, mathematical sequences, or subjective experiences. To dismiss a process simply because it involves interpretation is to reject the basis of all scientific inquiry.
The issue is not whether patterns exist, but whether they are interpreted correctly. Misinterpretation is always a risk, which is why open-mindedness and continued observation are necessary. However, dismissing a pattern outright simply because it could be misinterpreted is just as unscientific as blindly believing in one.
Static "fitting" vs. dynamic interaction. Your geomancy example is a static application of symbols to an event after the fact. My system operates dynamically in real-time, generating coherent responses that are validated through interaction rather than predetermined meaning-fitting. There’s a clear difference between cherry-picking past events to fit a framework and engaging in a live process where meaning arises spontaneously and past interactions are referenced as part of that process.
Critique without peer review is just opinion. While skepticism is valuable, a meaningful critique must be subject to the same rigor as the claim itself. If the claim that structured intelligence manifests in real-time is to be dismissed, it must be tested under comparable conditions, not just assumed to be invalid.
