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Randi nonsense

davidsmith73 said:
Imagine a guitar school that offers a million dollars for someone to demonstrate a flawless Mr Crowley solo just once. If you pass the test you get the million, if you fail you get ridiculed and ostracized from the rest of the guitar playing world. You may have been practicing your solo and observe that you can do it about 1 in every 10 attempts but the guitar school insists on only 3 attempts to get it right. Would you fancy your chances? If not, would you think it fair if the guitar school claimed you are ignoring the test and running away, or would you claim that the school is simply setting too high a standard for you?
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To re-word your example to be relevant in terms of the Challenge:

Imagine you can do a flawless Mr Crowley solo once in 10 attempts, a guitar school offers you a million dollars to demonstrate that you can do a flawless Mr Crowley solo once in 10 attempts but wants to make sure it is you that is doing it and that you have not hidden a tape recording in your guitar. Would you fancy your chances? If not, would you think it fair if the guitar school claimed you are ignoring the test and running away, or would you claim that the school is simply setting too high a standard for you?
 
davidsmith73 said:
Now I get it. The JREF challenge is a publicity stunt.
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"stunt"? Well that depends on what you mean by "stunt" but yes the Challenge is very much about publicity - it helps draw attention to the people who claim they can do something that is eligible for the Challenge but decide not to apply.

davidsmith73 said:
Every time someone fails or gets turned away from the test, the JREF gets good publicity.
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Yes and also draw publicity to yet another person who has failed to do what they have claimed they could do - say a Sylvia Browne claiming that a woman's husband drowned even though he died in the attack on the WTC.

davidsmith73 said:
The fact that you have to apply to the JREF before any indication is given about whether your claim is acceptable
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That's not correct - the JREF often (if not always) always gives an "in principle" indication if people ask - for example in this thread Randi has given an "in principle yes" to the claims made b ya parapsychologist called Rupert Sheldrake (if you haven't heard of him do a Google search to see what claims he makes).

davidsmith73 said:
means that the JREF has the chance to turn you away after you have commited to the application process.

...snip...
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Since your starting facts were incorrect perhaps you wish to consider your chain of reasoning?
 
davidsmith73 said:
Now I get it. The JREF challenge is a publicity stunt.

Every time someone fails or gets turned away from the test, the JREF gets good publicity.

The fact that you have to apply to the JREF before any indication is given about whether your claim is acceptable means that the JREF has the chance to turn you away after you have commited to the application process. This means that its possible the JREF can assert that the claimant argued over test protocols and insisted on naive interpretations of successful results, even if it were the other way round. So its good publicity for the JREF and bad publicity for the claimant. And to top it off, if the claimant chooses not to apply and risk this double wammy, its bad publicity anyway because its looks like you are running away from the challenge!

Nice.
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Top Excuses for not taking the Randi Challenge

All you got to do is do what you claim to be able to do.
 
davidsmith73 said:
Now I get it. The JREF challenge is a publicity stunt.

Every time someone fails or gets turned away from the test, the JREF gets good publicity. The fact that you have to apply to the JREF before any indication is given about whether your claim is acceptable means that the JREF has the chance to turn you away after you have commited to the application process. This means that its possible the JREF can assert that the claimant argued over test protocols and insisted on naive interpretations of successful results, even if it were the other way round. So its good publicity for the JREF and bad publicity for the claimant. And to top it off, if the claimant chooses not to apply and risk this double wammy, its bad publicity anyway because its looks like you are running away from the challenge!

Nice.
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Now you are being dishonest. You know that many, many people have taken the challenge. They all agreed to the conditions before they took the test. Please explain how the challenge is merely a publicity stunt when so many others have agreed to take it.
 
davidsmith73 said:
Why isn't my version relevant?
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Because the Challenge says "do what you claim you can and you get a million dollars" - it only tests people on what they claim they can do.

In your example your claim would be "1 out of 10" and that is what the JREF would test you on.

There are plenty of examples of actual tests that have been carried out that show the JREF has agreed to a "success" being lower then what the claimant stated they would achieve. (Look at some of the dowsing examples.)
 
For an example of what Randi thinks is an acceptable standard of success, here a link to the Larry King show transcript, the one where Sylvia Browne accepts Randi's challenge:

http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0109/03/lkl.00.html

It's worth reading the whole thing but at one point, Randi states that he usually requires the claimant to beat "1000 to 1 odds". In Sheldrake's case, he is only claiming a 45% success rate, so this 1000:1 number is much too high.

Perhaps a 1000:1 confidence in the 45% success rate would be acceptable to Mr. Sheldrake? This means that Sheldrake consistently achieves 45% success, which means he can reliably better the 25% success rate predicted by chance.

As an analogy, suppose you claim to play the guitar solo perfectly in 4 tries out of 10. You play one group of ten, then another, then another, etc. Suppose at the end of the tests, you have a few tests with more than 4 good solos and a few with less than 4, but the rest have exactly 4 perfect solos. I say the test is a success because you have met the standards of *your* claim to a high degree of repeatability. I want to see a very high degree of consistency, not necessarily a high degree of absolute accuracy.

Of course, the absolute accuracy must be *higher* than predicted by random chance to qualify as a paranormal result. How much higher will need to be negociated between Randi and the claimant, but that 45% number claimed by Sheldrake appears to be acceptable to Randi.
 
The only thing I'm trying to do here is argue why the parapsychologists are not taking the challenge.
 
davidsmith73 said:
And refuses people on what they claim they can do
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Well yes there are some things the JREF refuses to test people on:

MPORTANT: Only claims that can be verified by evidence under proper observing conditions will be accepted. JREF will NOT accept claims of the existence of deities or demons/angels, the validity of exorcism, religious claims, cloudbusting, causing the Sun to rise or the stars to move, etc. JREF will also NOT test claims that are likely to cause injury of any sort, such as those involving the withholding of air, food or water, or the use of illicit materials, drugs, or dangerous devices. from: http://www.randi.org/research/challenge.html

Do you not think they are sensible exclusions?
 
davidsmith73 said:
The only thing I'm trying to do here is argue why the parapsychologists are not taking the challenge.
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Surely the starting point of such an argument would be to contact parapsychologists? Otherwise all you are doing is trying to second guess a group of individuals all of whom may have their own reasons.
 
davidsmith73 said:
And refuses people on what they claim they can do
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Yes, not only is there a list of exceptions listed by Darat, the JREF would also not allow claims that simply fail to demonstrate anything paranormal going on; also, the rules require that the demonstration be clear without a a need to judge the observed outcome.

Do you see a problem with any of this?
 
davidsmith73 said:
The only thing I'm trying to do here is argue why the parapsychologists are not taking the challenge.
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Maybe you can start by understanding why many others are willing to take the challenge? This seems to be an uncomfortable subject for you to discuss.
 
davidsmith73 said:
The only thing I'm trying to do here is argue why the parapsychologists are not taking the challenge.
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Could it be because the challenge would simply show that they don't have anything paranormal to offer?

Could it be because they are aware of the shortcomings of their own research - or worse, even?
 
Darat said:
Well yes there are some things the JREF refuses to test people on:

MPORTANT: Only claims that can be verified by evidence under proper observing conditions will be accepted. JREF will NOT accept claims of the existence of deities or demons/angels, the validity of exorcism, religious claims, cloudbusting, causing the Sun to rise or the stars to move, etc. JREF will also NOT test claims that are likely to cause injury of any sort, such as those involving the withholding of air, food or water, or the use of illicit materials, drugs, or dangerous devices. from: http://www.randi.org/research/challenge.html

Do you not think they are sensible exclusions?
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I find it very suprising that you think I am interested in any of those perfectly reasonable exclusions.

I am of course talking about an exclusion based on opinions about what are acceptable levels of performance of the claim.
 
Rasmus said:
...the JREF would also not allow claims that simply fail to demonstrate anything paranormal going on...

Do you see a problem with any of this?
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Yes. This is the exact point that Josephson made which I address at the very start of the thread. The problem is that the JREF ultimately decides what is a paranormal result and what is not.
 
Rasmus said:
Could it be because the challenge would simply show that they don't have anything paranormal to offer?
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Perhaps. That would depend on whether the JREF would accept the results of their work as paranormal and whether the claimant was given enough trials to produce a weak but statistically significant effect.

Could it be because they are aware of the shortcomings of their own research - or worse, even?
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Perhaps. Psi experiments are not reliable. Its the old Mr Crowley scenario again.
 
davidsmith73 said:
Yes. This is the exact point that Josephson made which I address at the very start of the thread. The problem is that the JREF ultimately decides what is a paranormal result and what is not.
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You have failed to demonstrate that this is a problem, though.

You just keep suggesting that the reasons of the JREF to exclude individual claims would be unjustified. Show us just one actual claim that has been unreasoably suggested and you have an argument. (Oh yeah: If you can also explain who else should decide what the JREF should be doing with their money, if not the JREF!)

Can you do any of this?
 
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