Help me out with questions for Rupert Sheldrake :)

[drfrank]

Due to some unknown reason, Rupert Sheldrake has been invited to talk at my academic department tomorrow (Thursday 6th). From the abstract, it's obvious that he will be dipping into the wibbly world of morphic fields.

I'm obviously going to ask him about the $1m challenge, but I would also like quite a few other searching questions to ask but other people who may be more familiar with Sheldrake's schtick.

[On this note, I did actually email James Randi himself and he was kind enough to reply, basically to definitively confirm that the staring experiments would make a good test - I knew he'd say yes, of course, but it completely avoids any possibility of Sheldrake saying that Randi refused to test him or any other similar excuse.]

Unfortunately, although I'm going to spend some time tomorrow morning collating references, I don't have enough time to do the job as thoroughly as I'd like.

So, what incredibly searching questions would you folks ask, and what's the best way to refute his claims? I've already checked the Skepdic pages, but I'm looking in particular for something about his crystal growth stuff: I'm pretty sure that it's an artifact due to the chemists involved learning to grow crystals more efficiently (since that's the point), and that Sheldrake hasn't controlled for changes in experimental protocol, but it would be good to have evidence confirming/refuting this idea.

Thanks

[ETA: I'm also aware of the inadequate randomisation in the original staring experiments, but since then he's claimed to have replicated them in `airtight' conditions. Can anyone shed any light on this? Also, I assume there's evidence that Sheldrake had the inadequate randomisation pointed out to him but continued to promote the experiment and kept the protocol the same for quite a while - this makes him look highly dishonest].

 

[Garrette]

Mention the article discussed in this abstract at Sheldrake's website and ask why the best evidence available is merely a hinted at effect from cherry-picked results. Further ask why there are no replications of his studies.

 

[CFLarsen]

Ask Rupert about the pigeons.

 

[blobru]

According to Sheldrake's theory, behaviour and knowledge resonates via "morphic fields" (sort of a telepathic subconscious internet). I think part of his theory was the "hundredth monkey" myth: once enough members of a species acquire some know-how -- like washing sweet potatoes in the case of the monkeys -- a 'critical mass' is achieved and it becomes encultured, a group instinct, even a heritable trait.

I've always wanted to ask him how morphogenesis would account for rates of mathematical illiteracy. For example, Euclid systematized geometry almost 2500 years ago. According to morphic theory, Euclid's methods of proof should have spread like psychic wildfire throughout the ancient world, turned everyone into geometry whizzes, become instinctive, so that today proving Pythagoras should come as easy to a child as learning how to tie his shoelaces. But it doesn't. The majority of people never learn how, in spite of the methods being discovered and "morphically resonated", so the claim goes, throughout our species for thousands of years. So -- why not? (Fields go on the blink during the Dark Ages, maybe?)

 

[CFLarsen]

According to Sheldrake's theory, behaviour and knowledge resonates via "morphic fields" (sort of a telepathic subconscious internet). I think part of his theory was the "hundredth monkey" myth: once enough members of a species acquire some know-how -- like washing sweet potatoes in the case of the monkeys -- a 'critical mass' is achieved and it becomes encultured, a group instinct, even a heritable trait.

I've always wanted to ask him how morphogenesis would account for rates of mathematical illiteracy. For example, Euclid systematized geometry almost 2500 years ago. According to morphic theory, Euclid's methods of proof should have spread like psychic wildfire throughout the ancient world, turned everyone into geometry whizzes, become instinctive, so that today proving Pythagoras should come as easy to a child as learning how to tie his shoelaces. But it doesn't. The majority of people never learn how, in spite of the methods being discovered and "morphically resonated", so the claim goes, throughout our species for thousands of years. So -- why not? (Fields go on the blink during the Dark Ages, maybe?)

Hunting and farming.

Ye oldest occupations of all. Lots of good practices acquired since the beginning of civilization.

Yet, people have to learn how to do it.

 

[drfrank]

Some very good stuff, guys - I'd read about the 100th monkey phenomenon (and why it's apocryphal), but I hadn't considered the implications for humanity if it were actually true.

Keep it coming

[ETA (mainly for my own reference): the link to the telegraph article mentioned by CFLarsen is here]

 

[drfrank]

Email telepathy

This is an interesting paper by Sheldrake on telepathy via email.

http://www.sheldrake.org/papers/Telepathy/email_telepathy.html

The controls actually sound quite good until you realise that the receivers were given a video-camera and asked to set it up in their own house. I'm pretty sure that no experimenter was there to prevent cheating during the experiment, as the participants had to just mail the video back afterwards.

In which case, there was absolutely nothing to stop people having an off-camera friend in the room who received a phone call from the designated sender and then surreptitiously signalled to them.

Also, the `senders' were *not* taped (as far as I can tell), which means that they could have been doing absolutely anything.

How you can pretend that a protocol dealing with the paranormal is valid without having an experimenter there to ensure there is no cheating is completely beyond me.

 

[krelnik]

On the topic of the MDC, be prepared for him to dispute whether the $1 Million actually exists (a standard tactic).

Go to this site:
http://www.guidestar.org/pqShowGsReport.do?npoId=523196

You'll have to create an account (it's free) before the link works. Download the JREF's 2006 Form 990 (PDF) from the bottom of that page and print it out and bring it with you. (It's about 23 pages).

Then if he disputes the existence of the million dollars, you can whip out page 4 and point to line 68 on the form. "The United States Internal Revenue Service accepts that the million dollar exists, why don't you?"

--Tim Farley

 

[rjh01]

On the topic of the MDC, be prepared for him to dispute whether the $1 Million actually exists (a standard tactic).

Go to this site:
http://www.guidestar.org/pqShowGsReport.do?npoId=523196

You'll have to create an account (it's free) before the link works. Download the JREF's 2006 Form 990 (PDF) from the bottom of that page and print it out and bring it with you. (It's about 23 pages).

Then if he disputes the existence of the million dollars, you can whip out page 4 and point to line 68 on the form. "The United States Internal Revenue Service accepts that the million dollar exists, why don't you?"

--Tim Farley

Better still go to the OP of this thread and look at the link provided which is the 990. No registration required.
JREF Loss $79,859 FY 2006

 

[Vitaliy]

Thank you, drfrank - I have never heard about Rupert Sheldrake. After your posting have read only one his article about e-mail telepathy. So my impressions are sort of preliminary ones. First, he was far not first to formulate hypothesis about morphic (other name: energo-information) fields. Sri Aurobindo, for example, tales about Akashic records, and so on. These ideas have no right to be called natural science theories - only hypotheses. As for me, I have not a slightest inclination to consider them. The main issue is - either ESP really exist, or not. So, the first question is to find out the existence of ES-communication abilities. If we cannot reliably prove it - no need in any theorizing. It is strange why Rupert use indirect experimenting - I mean e-mailing, where there are so many chances to be mystified. And why he is so enthusiastic about various types of events - phone calls, SMS'es - and so on. He can study all this stuff all his life and do not obtain scientifically reliable results.

I think that the test should be very simple, clear and straight: either exist ES information exchange, or not. In our experiments we used Zener and ordinary play cards for subjects in one or two neighboring rooms. The main requisition is the number of "readings" - it should be not less than 100. Our results was within statistic expectation +-2%. It says that either this channel does not exist, or that subjects involved in experimenting did not possess abilities sought. So, I think that probably more ES-gifted persons should be involved in reliable experimenting.

Of course, I expect nothing reasonable from seminar with Dr. Sheldrake, asking him questions or "scientific" explanations.

 

[drfrank]

I think that the test should be very simple, clear and straight: either exist ES information exchange, or not. In our experiments we used Zener and ordinary play cards for subjects in one or two neighboring rooms. The main requisition is the number of "readings" - it should be not less than 100. Our results was within statistic expectation +-2%. It says that either this channel does not exist, or that subjects involved in experimenting did not possess abilities sought. So, I think that probably more ES-gifted persons should be involved in reliable experimenting.

The thing I was going to suggest to him was a replication of his staring experiments, as he's done them so many times under airtight protocols (he claims) and has consistently gotten a hugely significant result.

He's also a supporter of the idea that this phenomenon can be replicated by having someone stare at someone else via CCTV - this removes almost all possibility of sensory leakage.

Of course, I'm guessing it would be fine to recruit anyone who performed well in his previous experiments as starers/starees to ensure he didn't just end up with anyone with poor psychic powers.

In the email Randi sent me he recommended Chris French as a supervisor who'd make sure that the trial was properly double blinded.

 

[CFLarsen]

In our experiments we used Zener and ordinary play cards for subjects in one or two neighboring rooms. The main requisition is the number of "readings" - it should be not less than 100. Our results was within statistic expectation +-2%. It says that either this channel does not exist, or that subjects involved in experimenting did not possess abilities sought. So, I think that probably more ES-gifted persons should be involved in reliable experimenting.

What experiments?

What "more ES-gifted persons" do you know of?

 

[drfrank]

What experiments?

What "more ES-gifted persons" do you know of?

Well, in my case it'll just be whoever Sheldrake thinks, so he can't complain about it afterwards

I'll be posting a video of me making the challenge request to Rupert on YouTube when I get time.

As recommended, I have the JREF's 990 form with the million dollars handily highlighted to avoid the "money doesn't exist" complaint

Right, an hour to go before the seminar begins.

 

[drfrank]

Rarrr!

Sheldrake spanned his talk out for absolutely ages, meaning that I had to leave before the end as I had to teach a maths tutorial. How enormously irritating

I can still post the video, though, of most of the presentation (I persuaded someone to video the end and Q&A for me) but, alas, I simply couldn't be there for the Q&A itself, meaning he got off incredibly lightly.

Quite a bit of his talk was on biology, including body plan formation and protein folding. His basic point can probably be summarised to "Hey, working out gene networks and how proteins will fold is harrrrrrd, therefore let's pretend it's done with magical fields, because that's much easier! Yayy!"

He showed how limb regeneration in animals was evidence for morphic fields, somehow skipping over the fact that it only works in a tiny number of organisms. Hey, why can't *I* grow my arm back?

He also somehow managed to rape homeobox genes by asserting that they turned on and off various "morphic fields".

I'm really sorry about any wasted effort you put in on my behalf.

 

[Vitaliy]

What experiments?

What "more ES-gifted persons" do you know of?

Starting from the end. I do not know ANY people with any unusual abilities.

I came to esotericism from artificial intelligence four years ago, when it occurred to me that probably in our AI efforts we dig at the tip of the iceberg - trying to simulate consciousness quite superficially. Marvellous healing, telekinesis, telepathy, clairvoyance... I came to the idea that in order for all these wonders to exist - there must be some natural replica of our noosphere's cultural layer - that same energy-information field. And main its functions should be akin to computer DBMS - information storage, support and transfer. It could be also thought as God's natural science incarnation. And here we obtain the possibility in materialistic experiment prove the existence of such God... though, a step further brings us to the idea that - even if God exists, it is the same materialistic world which we probably learn a step better.

Thus, telepathy, or clairvoyance, become the key problems in studying consciousness, intellect. I was amazed when learnt what exotic efforts researchers evolve around this simple issue. Thousands of miles, submarines, North Pole, even astronauts were put into operation - and no clear and reliable results on existence of this phenomena. We choosed to read Zener cards in online experiments with the help of SKYPE, ICQ, MSN Messenger. I tossed the deck of Zener cards, took randomly one of it, stared at it, trying to translate to my colleague the figure, typing them: Ready! They answer their "reading", and I put the result into table. When we have Zener cards of 5 types, the random guess gives 20%. Of course, in short series we obtained very bad results - much less: say, 12-16% - which is worse than random choice, and also very good figures: 40, or sometimes 60%. Very soon we understood that these results are explained by natural properties of stochastic processes, and started to increase the number of readings to 100, or even more. Besides, we switched to ordinary play cards and recipient should "read" only the color: black, or red (random guess: 50%). And at last we further simplified the experiment: doing reading with both inductor and percipient being in one room.

You should agree, that either online experiment, or operators in one (better in adjacent) rooms are much cheaper, transparent and reliable than using e-mail method with time synchronization and many questionable details - requiring cameras and what else... The main drawback was the absence of positive results... No phenomenon, or no gifted parapsychologists...

 

[krelnik]

I'm really sorry about any wasted effort you put in on my behalf.

Not wasted. This thread is now in the Google index, and the next time someone wants to confront Sheldrake its here for them too.

--Tim Farley

 

[CFLarsen]

I'm really sorry about any wasted effort you put in on my behalf.

Not wasted at all. These things happen.

Starting from the end. I do not know ANY people with any unusual abilities.

I came to esotericism from artificial intelligence four years ago, when it occurred to me that probably in our AI efforts we dig at the tip of the iceberg - trying to simulate consciousness quite superficially. Marvellous healing, telekinesis, telepathy, clairvoyance... I came to the idea that in order for all these wonders to exist - there must be some natural replica of our noosphere's cultural layer - that same energy-information field. And main its functions should be akin to computer DBMS - information storage, support and transfer. It could be also thought as God's natural science incarnation. And here we obtain the possibility in materialistic experiment prove the existence of such God... though, a step further brings us to the idea that - even if God exists, it is the same materialistic world which we probably learn a step better.

....what?

What is "our noosphere's cultural layer"?

Why must there be some natural replica of it?

Why should it be like a DBMS?

 

[Vitaliy]

....what?
What is "our noosphere's cultural layer"?
Why must there be some natural replica of it?
Why should it be like a DBMS?

CFLarsen, sorry! Now I will disclose my secret - the main goal of my coming here. I worked out my own viewpoint on esotericism and would like to discuss it here. Of course, it cannot be done in short posting, so I planned to put 2-4 my materials in Repository. Due stern restrictions - I am too young newbie here - I met some juridical and technical problems with it. Four days ago Darat promised to consider my case, and I am still waiting for his answer.

So I propose - if you are really interested in these issues - let me first present my materials, and then answer all your questions. As for me, I liked your three questions. Of course, I have answers to them.

 

[CFLarsen]

CFLarsen, sorry! Now I will disclose my secret - the main goal of my coming here. I worked out my own viewpoint on esotericism and would like to discuss it here. Of course, it cannot be done in short posting, so I planned to put 2-4 my materials in Repository. Due stern restrictions - I am too young newbie here - I met some juridical and technical problems with it. Four days ago Darat promised to consider my case, and I am still waiting for his answer.

So I propose - if you are really interested in these issues - let me first present my materials, and then answer all your questions. As for me, I liked your three questions. Of course, I have answers to them.

And I'll be looking forward to them.

 

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

I would ask him when the experiments begin to figure out what morphic fields are and how they work and when we might expect some useful derivative technology. Or is he saying that they are supernatural?

~~ Paul