Arguments on Edgar Cayce

[UrsulaV]

And what's your explanation for Professor Dietrich's affidavit? Was he part of the conspiracy to defraud as well?

Dietrich may well have believed everything he wrote.

So what?

It's still an anecdote. Do you have detailed medical records from somebody other than Cayce? Do you have X-rays? Do you have any HARD evidence?

Articles about how great Cayce was aren't evidence. Speeches about how great Cayce was, given by his business partner, DEFINITELY aren't evidence. That you'd even mention them as if they had any significance says something about the standard of evidence you're working with. I strongly suspect that if I found a speech saying "I think Cayce is a fraud!" you wouldn't accept that as evidence of anything. Likewise, I don't think your anecdotes are worth much.

Testable evidence. What we need--and are unlikely to get--is testable evidence. I'm not saying it's been proved Cayce was a fraud, but I AM saying that you have nothing like enough good data to prove anything. All your accounts of "Gee, Cayce was great!" are meaningless without hard, testable evidence to back them up.

 

[Psiload]

What year was the article published?

1910... around the same time that The New York Times was printing articles giving glowing praise to the business prowess of a one Mr. Charles Ponzi, and his wonderful money-making scheme.

It was printed in the New York Times... it must have been true.

 

[UrsulaV]

If that is sufficient criteria for proof of psychic powers then my grandmother is psychic, as she always said to eat my greens, and hey, those contain antioxidants which help reduce the risk of cancer. Oh, wait, let me rephrase that in woo, they prevent cancer.

William Radam, a famed snake oil salesman, used to sell water tinted with a drop of red wine as a cure for all diseases.

Under this woorific standard of evidence, the fact that red wine may be beneficial in preventing heart disease means that Radam's cure-all has been 100% confirmed and he was ahead of his time. Pass the patent medicine!

 

[Nyarlathotep]

Not exactly your garden variety "anecdote."

Yes it is. More detail does not make an anecdote into "not an anecdote"

 

[Nyarlathotep]

Because you haven't shown that Cayce was incorrect in any way either about almonds or coca cola syrup. If you can cite a study that he was wrong about either or both, bring it on.

Shifting the burden of proof. It is up to the people making the claim to prove that almonds or Coca-Cola would be as effective as claimed, not the rest of the world to claim otherwise.

I claim that the lava lamp on my desk keeps tigers away, prove me wrong.

 

[Arkan_Wolfshade]

1910... around the same time that The New York Times was printing articles giving glowing praise to the business prowess of a one Mr. Charles Ponzi, and his wonderful money-making scheme.

It was printed in the New York Times... it must have been true.

Only NYTimes hit for Cayce that year: http://pqasb.pqarchiver.com/nytimes...LITERATE+MAN+BECOMES+A+DOCTOR+WHEN+HYPNOTIZED

Above link also appears to be the only relevent hit for Ketchum.

No obvious relevent hits for Dietrich

 

[Rodney]

Probably not. I'd surmise that Professor Dietrich was just a grateful parent, who could be forgiven for singing the praises of two medically unqualified individuals whom he'd erroneously assumed had cured his daughter.

So exactly how was Aime Dietrich cured?

 

[Mojo]

So exactly how was Aime Dietrich cured?

Who knows? Is this good evidence for the claims about Cayce?

 

[UrsulaV]

So exactly how was Aime Dietrich cured?

I don't know.

And neither do you.

Lack of knowledge doesn't mean you get to plug your favorite pet theory in and trumpet it as truth.

What happened on the slopes of Mt. Kilamanjaro in 4291 BC, at about three in the afternoon?

I don't know. I doubt you do either. But the fact I don't know doesn't mean I can thus claim that six sexy wildebeests got together and did the can-can for an appreciative audience of mountain gorillas and secretary birds, then climbed up a rope and vanished through a hole in the sky.

It just means that we don't know. Perhaps we never will.

 

[Mojo]

So exactly how was Aime Dietrich cured?

This is the same "argument" used by IDers: "we don't know how (or indeed if) Aime was cured, so Caycediddit!"

 

[LTC8K6]

Well shoot, if I say enough things cure enough diseases in enough combinations, I am bound to get a few near the bullseye and maybe even one or two dead center.

This doesn't mean I am special.

 

[UrsulaV]

Well shoot, if I say enough things cure enough diseases in enough combinations, I am bound to get a few near the bullseye and maybe even one or two dead center.

This doesn't mean I am special.

Hey! We should start now, thus securing our place on pedestals in the minds of Rodneys of the future.

I would like to say for the record that cancer is cured by polliwogs. And grilled Muenster. And pistachios.

Also, acne is a form of nonmalignant face cancer caused by bunny dander.

 

[Psiload]

So exactly how was Aime Dietrich cured?

The lava lamp on Nyarlathotep's desk cured her. If you can cite a study proving that it didn't, bring it on.

 

[kookbreaker]

Well shoot, if I say enough things cure enough diseases in enough combinations, I am bound to get a few near the bullseye and maybe even one or two dead center.

This doesn't mean I am special.

Some psychics use a shotgun approach. Cayce is using double-loaded grape-shot.

 

[LTC8K6]

And pistachios.

How did you know that I am eating pistachios? Can you see me through my LCD?

I really do have a bag of them right here with me as I surf.

 

[Hawk one]

Pistachio ice cream is just about the best thing that humanity's created on this planet. I bet eating pistachio ice cream will make them pistachios freeze and kill the cancer cells!

 

[Rodney]

Shifting the burden of proof. It is up to the people making the claim to prove that almonds or Coca-Cola would be as effective as claimed, not the rest of the world to claim otherwise.

I claim that the lava lamp on my desk keeps tigers away, prove me wrong.

According to the March 2004 Reuters article that I posted, two studies have confirmed that almonds help prevent cancer, whereas -- to my knowledge -- no studies have even suggested that your lava lamp keeps tigers away. Granted -- again to my knowledge -- there has never been a study where a control group ate almonds and another group did not, nor has there been any controlled study of coca cola syrup. However, regarding the latter, Cayce never made the claims for it they he did for almonds. I know people, including myself, who have used coca cola syrup or flat coke to help with an upset stomach, but that IS truly anecdoctal and it's not that big of a deal anyway. But don't assume based on uninformed comments here that Cayce promoted coca cola syrup as a magic elixir -- some of his followers may have done that, but not Cayce himself.

 

[Rodney]

The lava lamp on Nyarlathotep's desk cured her. If you can cite a study proving that it didn't, bring it on.

So your view is that after Aime Dietrich's doctor informed her father that her case was incurable and that she did not have long to live, she experienced a spontaneous recovery coincident with Cayce-prescribed osteopathic adjustments being administered?

 

[Psiload]

According to the March 2004 Reuters article that I posted, two studies have confirmed that almonds help prevent cancer, whereas -- to my knowledge -- no studies have even suggested that your lava lamp keeps tigers away. Granted -- again to my knowledge -- there have never been a study where a control group ate almonds and another group did not, nor has there been any controlled study of coca cola syrup. However, regarding the latter, Cayce never made the claims for it they he did for almonds. I know people, including myself, who have used coca cola syrup or flat coke to help with an upset stomach, but that IS truly anecdoctal and it's not that big of a deal anyway. But don't assume based on uninformed comments here that Cayce promoted coca cola syrup as a magic elixir -- some of his followers may have done that, but not Cayce himself.

Cayce promoted coca cola syrup for purification of the kidneys, not just for yucky tummys.

Cayce's "clearing the ducts through the kidneys" by coca cola claims are a classic example of medicine by magic elixer.

 

[Nyarlathotep]

According to the March 2004 Reuters article that I posted, two studies have confirmed that almonds help prevent cancer, whereas -- to my knowledge -- no studies have even suggested that your lava lamp keeps tigers away.

Yes, your article says that a specific form of vitamin E, present in many types of nuts, including almonds, may have some benficial effects against a particular form of cancer, prostate cancer specifically. It also says that it offers no benefit against bladder cancer and it doesn't mention any of the myriad other cancers at all. This is a far cry from Cayce's claim that eating two or three almonds a day is proof against cancer.

As for my lava lamp, that is exactly my point. If I wanted to prove that lava lamps keep tigers away, it would be my job to provide a study or other proof that they do, not yours to prove they do not.

Granted -- again to my knowledge -- there have never been a study where a control group ate almonds and another group did not, nor has there been any controlled study of coca cola syrup. However, regarding the latter, Cayce never made the claims for it they he did for almonds. I know people, including myself, who have used coca cola syrup or flat coke to help with an upset stomach, but that IS truly anecdoctal and it's not that big of a deal anyway. But don't assume based on uninformed comments here that Cayce promoted coca cola syrup as a magic elixir -- some of his followers may have done that, but not Cayce himself.

That being the case, you cannot claim that Cayce was correct about his almond claims. If his claim had been "eating almonds makes you less likely to get prostate cancer" you might be able to claim a "hit" on that one. As it is, his claim was far more broad than the the study you DO cite.