PEAR remote viewing - what the data actually shows

[Flange Desire]

...
http://www.jsasoc.com/library.html

Thanks for this link to a group of papers all authored by Spottiswoode.
Among other things, he talks of correlations between psi and GMF.

Unfortunately I see no mention there of what correlation one might expect during an MRI scan.

/ironic

 

[Ersby]

A closer look at the paper with the 30 descriptors shows that alongside the "yes" or "no" option was "emphatic" and "unsure", effectively giving four options rather than two.

These are marked as being purely exploratory, but it's curious that these aren't mentioned anywhere else. You'd have thought, in their decision to go from binary to other more sensitive scoring methods, they'd have described the results this method got.

 

[Zep]

The whole "measurement" thing is a problem for some parapsychologists. They have no idea what it IS they are measuring, so they find it a bit hard to create a guage with which to measure it. Hencse the waffly windy vague "descriptors" at times.

However one would have thought that the first thing you would do is develop a baseline standard of detection, beginning with the results of people who make no claim to RV whatever trying to match the same selected targets as chosen by some completely unknown people at an unknown time and unknown location. Then simply vary one of those variables at a time to see what the differences are. Starting with the RVer's themselves as recipients, but keeping all the rest the same.

But has PEAR done that? Not that I can find, even though it seems obvious to my aging and decaying mind...

 

[CFLarsen]

A closer look at the paper with the 30 descriptors shows that alongside the "yes" or "no" option was "emphatic" and "unsure", effectively giving four options rather than two.

These are marked as being purely exploratory, but it's curious that these aren't mentioned anywhere else. You'd have thought, in their decision to go from binary to other more sensitive scoring methods, they'd have described the results this method got.

I have a pretty good idea what results they got.

 

[Zep]

I have a pretty good idea what results they got.

...as opposed to the results they published.

 

[davidsmith73]

Don't be cheeky. Answer the question.

You are the one who mentioned the phrase "paranormal". I have no idea what you mean by the term, so I can't answer your question. I suggest you define it.

 

[davidsmith73]

Thanks for this link to a group of papers all authored by Spottiswoode.

Thats ok. What do you think of the papers?

Among other things, he talks of correlations between psi and GMF.

Unfortunately I see no mention there of what correlation one might expect during an MRI scan.

I don't understand your point about the MRI scan. Can you explain what you mean?

 

[davidsmith73]

Zep,

I was wondering if you have had a chance to think about my question regarding your binary vs distributed artifact idea?

 

[CFLarsen]

You are the one who mentioned the phrase "paranormal". I have no idea what you mean by the term, so I can't answer your question. I suggest you define it.

No, you brought it up, by opening this thread about the results from PEAR. What PEAR is trying to detect is clearly paranormal:

not scientifically explainable : SUPERNATURAL

1 : of or relating to an order of existence beyond the visible observable universe; especially : of or relating to God or a god, demigod, spirit, or devil
2 a : departing from what is usual or normal especially so as to appear to transcend the laws of nature b : attributed to an invisible agent (as a ghost or spirit)
(Webster)

Remote Viewing clearly falls under that.

Has PEAR detected something that is paranormal? That they can, in fact, obtain information by remote viewing?

Yes or No?

 

[Zep]

I don't get this. If your method is valid, why didn't the data collected using the distributed or FIDO method and then converted to binary scores inflate the results? (Tables 4 and 5)

The answer is in the question.

OK, I'll make it easier for you: What base data would you need to have in order to make no difference?

 

[davidsmith73]

No, you brought it up, by opening this thread about the results from PEAR.

We're talking about your use of the term "paranormal", not the PEAR results. If you look back over the thread, I never used the term "paranormal" once. I deliberately don't use the term because it causes confusion as people use it in different ways (see below). In fact, I'm quite perplexed why you should ask such a question, considering this fact.

What PEAR is trying to detect is clearly paranormal:

not scientifically explainable : SUPERNATURAL

1 : of or relating to an order of existence beyond the visible observable universe; especially : of or relating to God or a god, demigod, spirit, or devil
2 a : departing from what is usual or normal especially so as to appear to transcend the laws of nature b : attributed to an invisible agent (as a ghost or spirit)
(Webster)

Remote Viewing clearly falls under that.

Nope. What you have defined is the supernatural. The best I can do is to say if I take someting to be explainable in natural terms but we know very little about it yet, then its paranormal. Having said that, I'm sure that kind of definition would automatically include things other people would surely not include in the paranormal such as exotic phenomena studied by physicists. All this makes my point that the term "paranormal" is redundant, scientifically speaking. The only use of the term is by people who want to group certain phenomena under its title for their own personal agenda, beit debunking or promoting. If your above definition is what you mean by the "paranormal" then I was cleary wise to ask for your definition!

Has PEAR detected something that is paranormal?

Silly question. Next.

That they can, in fact, obtain information by remote viewing?

Very difficult to say from the PEAR data because of the methodological problems. Other labs have got positive results however (see earlier links).

 

[davidsmith73]

The answer is in the question.

OK, I'll make it easier for you: What base data would you need to have in order to make no difference?

I'm sorry, I don't understand. Could you just explain to me your answer to my question?

 

[Zep]

I'm sorry, I don't understand. Could you just explain to me your answer to my question?

There. Was. ZERO. Effect.

Variations from zero in the data sets included statistical noise. So ANY statistical process that attempted to eliminate the statistical noise would tend to produce the same result, i.e. zero, no effect, nothing to report.

And deep within that PEAR paper, right after the final and most searching analysis results were posted, is the following admission that the results simply did not appear:

"Once again, there was reasonably good agreement among the six scoring recipes, but the overall results were now completely indistinguishable from chance."
(PEAR, p227, Distributive Scoring)

http://www.skepticreport.com/psychics/shapesintheclouds.htm

Therefore any claim that there WAS an effect would have been despite any statistical evidence to support it.

OK?

 

[CFLarsen]

We're talking about your use of the term "paranormal", not the PEAR results. If you look back over the thread, I never used the term "paranormal" once. I deliberately don't use the term because it causes confusion as people use it in different ways (see below). In fact, I'm quite perplexed why you should ask such a question, considering this fact.

I don't care if you don't use the term. What you are talking about - Remote Viewing - is clearly paranormal.

Nope. What you have defined is the supernatural. The best I can do is to say if I take someting to be explainable in natural terms but we know very little about it yet, then its paranormal. Having said that, I'm sure that kind of definition would automatically include things other people would surely not include in the paranormal such as exotic phenomena studied by physicists. All this makes my point that the term "paranormal" is redundant, scientifically speaking. The only use of the term is by people who want to group certain phenomena under its title for their own personal agenda, beit debunking or promoting. If your above definition is what you mean by the "paranormal" then I was cleary wise to ask for your definition!

You are quite right: By your definition, interstellar dust grains are paranormal. We know very little about those, either.

Now, since your definition clearly is ridiculous and totally useless, do you think you can come up with a better definition - or perhaps simply accept the commonly used one?

Silly question. Next.

No, it is not silly. You can't avoid questions by refusing to acknowledge how a word is commonly understood.

Very difficult to say from the PEAR data because of the methodological problems. Other labs have got positive results however (see earlier links).

I am not talking about other labs. I am talking about PEAR.

You don't need to point to their statistical analysis. All you need is to point to one instance where they did obtain information by remote viewing. Has PEAR obtained information by remote viewing? Yes or no?

 

[davidsmith73]

There. Was. ZERO. Effect.

Variations from zero in the data sets included statistical noise. So ANY statistical process that attempted to eliminate the statistical noise would tend to produce the same result, i.e. zero, no effect, nothing to report.

This doesn't make sense. If the binary data that got positive results were due to statistical noise, then the distributive data treated as binary would be predicted to produce the same positive results, ie statistical noise. But it did not. Neither did the FIDO data when treated as binary.

Again, why is this so?

http://www.skepticreport.com/psychics/shapesintheclouds.htm

Therefore any claim that there WAS an effect would have been despite any statistical evidence to support it.

If the binary data that got positive results were due to statistical artifact, then we would expect the same artifactual result when the FIDO and distributive data were treated in the binary fashion. Why are you persistently ignoring this fact?

 

[davidsmith73]

I don't care if you don't use the term. What you are talking about - Remote Viewing - is clearly paranormal.

Only according to your use of the word! Hence why I didn't answer your question, cos I don't use the term paranormal.

You are quite right: By your definition, interstellar dust grains are paranormal. We know very little about those, either.

Now, since your definition clearly is ridiculous and totally useless, do you think you can come up with a better definition - or perhaps simply accept the commonly used one?

No. Like I said, the term "paranormal" is scientifically without meaning. Its only a term used by people with a personal agenda to group certain phenomena together with the aim of debunking or promoting. The point of my definition was to show how silly a term it is.

Got any sensible questions?

No, it is not silly. You can't avoid questions by refusing to acknowledge how a word is commonly understood.

I am not refusing to acknowledge how a word is commonly understood at all. Its commonly understood as an umbrella term that groups certain phenomena together, not based on objective criteria, but on personal opinion and agenda as described above. I clearly acknowledge how this term is understood, I just refuse to join in because I'm a sceptic.

I am not talking about other labs. I am talking about PEAR.

You don't need to point to their statistical analysis. All you need is to point to one instance where they did obtain information by remote viewing. Has PEAR obtained information by remote viewing? Yes or no?

I was refering to their lack of randomisation and lack of safeguards for fraud. Unfortunately, because of this the PEAR data cannot be regarded as evidence for remote viewing, IMO. Having said that, on the issue of randomisation of targets, both the data for volitional and instructed trials got similar positive results. We would expect the volition trials to get far higher scores if personal bias were at play, which is interesting.

 

[CFLarsen]

I was refering to their lack of randomisation and lack of safeguards for fraud. Unfortunately, because of this the PEAR data cannot be regarded as evidence for remote viewing, IMO.

No, then.

PEAR has not obtained information by remote viewing.

 

[davidsmith73]

No, then.

PEAR has not obtained information by remote viewing.

This statement could imply that PEAR performed a methodologically sound experiment and found no positive results, which is not the case.

If I could summarise a bit clearer, PEAR reported positive results and a decline in effect, which was not due to their analysis method. However, due to issues of randomisation, lack of fraud prevention and doubts over the sizes of their reported p-values (from the Hansen et all paper), their data cannot be regarded as evidence of remote viewing.

Are we all happy about that?

 

[Zep]

This doesn't make sense. If the binary data that got positive results were due to statistical noise, then the distributive data treated as binary would be predicted to produce the same positive results, ie statistical noise. But it did not. Neither did the FIDO data when treated as binary.

Again, why is this so?

Because that is a mistaken assumption you have just made. You are assuming that the TYPE of data (binary/distributed) makes the difference, regardless of the validity of the data. If the data is simply not valid, it doesn't matter if it's binary, ternery, distributed, one derived from the other, two-tailed normal distribution, or inverted Polynesian blindfolded darts scores. It's still crap data - garbage in, garbage out. The situation is that PEAR's base data was often derived from protocols that clearly allowed flawed or biased results in the measurements.

Further, since each set of results was obtained by a different set of flawed test protocols using different guages, there is no reason to assume that "adjusting" one flawed set to make it "compatible" with another flawed set is going to eliminate any artifacts in either set, nor in the resulting combined set. Logically thinking, it is more likely to introduce artifacts (i.e. errors) than reduce existing ones. Don't you think?

If the binary data that got positive results were due to statistical artifact, then we would expect the same artifactual result when the FIDO and distributive data were treated in the binary fashion. Why are you persistently ignoring this fact?

No, you would not expect that at all. I am not ignoring you, you seem to be ignoring the obvious. See above.

 

[CFLarsen]

This statement could imply that PEAR performed a methodologically sound experiment and found no positive results, which is not the case.

If I could summarise a bit clearer, PEAR reported positive results and a decline in effect, which was not due to their analysis method. However, due to issues of randomisation, lack of fraud prevention and doubts over the sizes of their reported p-values (from the Hansen et all paper), their data cannot be regarded as evidence of remote viewing.

Are we all happy about that?

So, PEAR has obtained information by remote viewing in at least some cases? Yes or no.