Chaos Magic

[AkuManiMani]

How do you know this? Do you have access to knowledge that is hidden from the rest of humanity?

No, genius. I've just enough honest presence of mind to realize that every answered question simply opens the door to still more questions. There have been countless other people who've, in previous generations, assumed that the scientific state of the art in their day was pretty much the whole story. The truth is that there is no end to scientific inquiry and whatever understandings are gleamed from it are always tentative and liable to change.

 

[AkuManiMani]

But nobody here has ever asserted that we know all there is to know.

Pixy, has a very small list of minor things that he thinks humanity has left to learn. Aside from this small list, he is under the distinct impression that science pretty much has it all figured out already. Instead of merely giving him the benefit of the doubt, just ask him.

 

[Resume]

There are some here that seem to be confusing limits of knowledge with lack of it, and don't seem to understand the meaning of the term provisional conclusion.

 

[AkuManiMani]

That is one of the truest statements I've ever come across. All too often do I run across folks who believe that our model of reality is reality. On the contrary, our model of reality is merely that which our minds are capable of comprehending. Who's to say that we're even capable of sensing all that there is to be sensed (directly or indirectly), let alone being capable of understanding all there is to be understood.

Of course, one should always be skeptical of others' claims, to avoid many of the negatives associated with organized religions and such. However, this cuts both ways. One should always be skeptical of one's own claims as well. More often than not, if you believe you have something figured out; in reality, you truly don't.

Science is our attempt, our tool, to try and figure out what reality really is. Perhaps reality can be comprehended entirely by logical, mathematical laws; perhaps not. Science, logic, and mathematics seem to be quite good tools nevertheless. They seem to encompass that which can be described in an objective sense. However, I've yet to see a convincing explanation of quite a few things; namely, subjective experience, the elementary properties of nature (what are electrons and why do they behave as they do for instance), and existence itself, in terms of science and mathematics.

It is my personal belief that, no matter how much empirical evidence we gather, we will never be able to describe such things in an objective sense. Much like how in mathematics there must always be some undefined terms, I believe there will always be undefined terms in physicality.

The only evidence I have to support such a belief is the evidence brought about by physicality itself. If indeed we are solely a product of evolution, then I believe that our brains (minds) have evolved to a point where we can comprehend only the information obtained from our sensory organs. After all, why would we evolve a trait in our minds to comprehend all of reality, when we do not necessarily need such a trait to survive. I believe that our model of reality (anything describable within the context of mathematical language) is simply a result of our evolution. Reality is much deeper and more complicated than a simple human could ever understand.

AkuManiMani, I am quite skeptical of your "supernatural" story. I do believe that it is possible that you experienced a seizure or that you are currently experiencing false memories. Nevertheless, I have a much deeper respect for you than I do those who cling on to prevailing scientific opinion as their interpretation of all that which they experience. As much as I believe it is possible that your experience falls within the framework of an "objective explanation", I also believe it is possible that your experience falls outside such an explanation as well.

Either way, I shall not fall prey to the delusion that my interpretation of the sum total of all my experiences is the correct and complete interpretation of that which is "reality". In my mind, scientific fanatics are just as bad as religious fanatics.

Irrational, illogical belief plays just as much a part in the entire scheme of humanity as rational, logical belief plays. Indeed, there are a great many sound, rational theories that we now have at our disposal which would have not come about had their pioneers not been subject to "belief" at some level. Calculus, for example, was not set on firm foundations until the late 19th century. Nevertheless, its pioneers discovered a great many true facts about it much earlier.

Well, I have no idea if the lengthy post I have just written will make a lick of sense to anyone. I expect it will draw quite a great deal of criticism from those who firmly believe in the infallibility of scientific theory. I guess there can be no communication between me and such people. But, if I have communicated anything at all, all I wish to say is that I respect your philosophy AkuManiMani. People like you and me could very well end up being dead wrong in the end. However, it is not the "rightness" or "wrongness" of one's stance which stimulates me; it is the manner and depth in which they argue it. For your subtle assertion that you do not believe you know "all there is to know", I give you praise.

It's truly refreshing to see that the real skeptics are still following this discussion

 

[PixyMisa]

But nobody here has ever asserted that we know all there is to know.

Though I have pointed out that the known puts boundaries on the unknown:

No, there aren't dinousaurs living on the inside of the hollow Earth. No, we don't need to go and take a look for ourselves before we make this statement.

 

[Resume]

Yeah, of course Pixy. The single most meaningful word in the human vocabulary and all that’s required is a short definition to do it justice. Typical nonsense.
QUOTE]

According to whom?

 

[AkuManiMani]

There are some here that seem to be confusing limits of knowledge with lack of it, and don't seem to understand the meaning of the term provisional conclusion.

Then there are the ones who turn the provisional conclusions of science into a pseudo-religious orthodoxy to be defended from all heresy.

 

[Limbo]

But science has been - by far, by orders of magnitude - the most successful epistemology in human history.

That is not to shout hallelujahs and praise science - that is simply to state a plain an inescapable fact.

(And one with which I think you probably agree).

Take a page from Freeman Dysons book.

Foreword

by Freeman Dyson,
Institute for Advanced Study,
Princeton, New Jersey

"This book begins with an extraordinary story about a harp - one that is typical of thousands of others in which somebody knows something without having any normal way of knowing. This kind of extraordinary knowing is typically called extrasensory perception, or ESP. Since I am a scientist, the story puts me in a difficult position. As a scientist I don't believe the story, but as a human being I want to believe it. As a scientist, I don't believe anything that is not based on solid evidence. As a scientist, I have to consider it possible that Elizabeth Meyer and Harold McCoy might have concocted the story or deluded themselves into believing it. Scientists call such stories "anecdotal," meaning that they are scientifically worthless.

On the other hand, as a human being I find the story convincing. I am impressed by the fact that Elizabeth Meyer is herself a scientist and would normally be skeptical of such anecdotal evidence. She understands why the majority of scientists do not believe her story. She is eager to maintain a friendly dialogue between skeptics and believers in ESP. She feels herself in many ways closer to the skeptics. But she does not have the luxury of not believing the harp story, because it happened to her and she knows it is true. I am convinced, not by the story itself, but the portrait that Elizabeth paints of herself as a scientist confronting a mystery that orthodox science cannot grasp.

The greater part of this book describes the history of ESP research, some of it is based on anecdotal evidence and some based on scientific experiments. The Society for Psychical Research, with branches in England and America, has been the main collector and publisher of anecdotal evidence. The society has been active for more than a century. It has published a large number of well-documented stories in its journal and in a famous book with the title Phantasms of the Living. A phantasm of the living is an episode in which person A at a moment of extreme crisis or danger is seen by person B hundreds of miles away. The society documented these episodes with firsthand testimony from A and B, recorded as soon as possible after the events. The evidence is of very uneven quality, and all of it is anecdotal.

The scientific investigations of ESP have been pursued with dogged determination for long periods of time, initially by Joseph Rhine at Duke University, later by Harold Puthoff at Stanford Research Institute, and recently by many other groups. The history of these efforts is murky, partly because there were some accusations of cheating in Rhine's laboratory, and partly because much of Puthoff's work was sponsored by the CIA under conditions of secrecy. Elizabeth Meyer gives us the clearest account of ESP research that I have seen, with an excellent bibliography of relevant documents. The results of the scientific investigations were in the end disappointing. Investigators claimed to have positive and statistically significant evidence of ESP, but the positive results were always marginal, large enough to be statistically significant but not large enough to convince a skeptical critic.

There are three possible positions one may take concerning the evidence for ESP. First, the position of orthodox scientists, who believe that ESP does not exist. Second, the position of true believers, who believe that ESP is real and can be proved to exist by scientific methods. Third, my own position, that ESP is real, as the anecdotal evidence suggests, but cannot be tested with the clumsy tools of science. These positions also imply different views concerning the proper scope of science. If one believes, as many of my scientific colleagues believe, that the scope of science is unlimited, then science can ultimately explain everything in the universe, and ESP must either be nonexistent or scientifically explainable. If one believes, as I do, that ESP is real but is scientifically untestable, one must believe that the scope of science is limited. I put forward, as a working hypothesis, that ESP is real but belongs to a mental universe that is too fluid and evanescent to fit within the rigid protocols of controlled scientific testing. I do not claim that this hypothesis is true. I claim only that it is consistent with the evidence and worthy of consideration.

I was asked to write this preface because I published in The New York Review of Books a review of a book about ESP with the title Debunked!, by George Charpak and Henti Broch. Elizabeth Meyer read my review and refers to it in her Chapter 12. In my review I said that ESP only occurs, according the the anecdotal evidence, when a person is experiencing intense stress and strong emotions. Under the conditions of a controlled scientific experiment, intense stress and strong emotions are excluded; the person experiences boredom rather than excitement, and so the evidence for ESP disappears. That, I wrote, is why scientific investigation of ESP fails. The experiment necessarily excludes the human emotions that make ESP possible.

After my review was published, I received a large number of angry letters in response. Orthodox scientists were angry because I said ESP might be real. True believers in ESP were angry because I said ESP could not be scientifically proved.

What I like best about Elizabeth Meyer is her eagerness, throughout this book, to maintain a friendly working dialogue between believers and skeptics. I am happy that she and I can disagree and still stay friends." (emphasis mine)


You can't rely on science to act as a substitute for 'building your own telescope'. It is too limited. It isn't the right tool for the job. Something like chaos magic is the right tool even though its difficult for people with certain temperaments.

 

[Resume]

It's truly refreshing to see that the real skeptics are still following this discussion

But how many real Scotsmen?

 

[Resume]

Then there are the ones who turn the provisional conclusions of science into a pseudo-religious orthodoxy to be defended from all heresy.

Like no dinosaurs inside the hollow earth?

 

[PixyMisa]

Indeed.

Remember that all this outrage at science started because I pointed out to AkuManiMani that his idea that he was conversing with spirits of some sort was patently silly.

Which of course it is.

He's not cross with science or with me; he's cross with reality for not according to his dreams.

 

[Resume]

Up next, blather from the film What the Bleep Do We Know? and an attempt to equate the paranormal with quantum mechanics.

 

[AkuManiMani]

But just who are these "scientific fanatics" he is referring to?

He has already said that he is not referring to anybody here.

Some people are much more diplomatic than I

 

[AkuManiMani]

But how many real Scotsmen?

He hasn't chimed into this thread as of yet. If hes smart he'll avoid the headache entirely

 

[Katopale]

Take a page from Freeman Dysons book.

Foreword

by Freeman Dyson,
Institute for Advanced Study,
Princeton, New Jersey

"This book begins with an extraordinary story about a harp - one that is typical of thousands of others in which somebody knows something without having any normal way of knowing. This kind of extraordinary knowing is typically called extrasensory perception, or ESP. Since I am a scientist, the story puts me in a difficult position. As a scientist I don't believe the story, but as a human being I want to believe it. As a scientist, I don't believe anything that is not based on solid evidence. As a scientist, I have to consider it possible that Elizabeth Meyer and Harold McCoy might have concocted the story or deluded themselves into believing it. Scientists call such stories "anecdotal," meaning that they are scientifically worthless.

On the other hand, as a human being I find the story convincing. I am impressed by the fact that Elizabeth Meyer is herself a scientist and would normally be skeptical of such anecdotal evidence. She understands why the majority of scientists do not believe her story. She is eager to maintain a friendly dialogue between skeptics and believers in ESP. She feels herself in many ways closer to the skeptics. But she does not have the luxury of not believing the harp story, because it happened to her and she knows it is true. I am convinced, not by the story itself, but the portrait that Elizabeth paints of herself as a scientist confronting a mystery that orthodox science cannot grasp.

The greater part of this book describes the history of ESP research, some of it is based on anecdotal evidence and some based on scientific experiments. The Society for Psychical Research, with branches in England and America, has been the main collector and publisher of anecdotal evidence. The society has been active for more than a century. It has published a large number of well-documented stories in its journal and in a famous book with the title Phantasms of the Living. A phantasm of the living is an episode in which person A at a moment of extreme crisis or danger is seen by person B hundreds of miles away. The society documented these episodes with firsthand testimony from A and B, recorded as soon as possible after the events. The evidence is of very uneven quality, and all of it is anecdotal.

The scientific investigations of ESP have been pursued with dogged determination for long periods of time, initially by Joseph Rhine at Duke University, later by Harold Puthoff at Stanford Research Institute, and recently by many other groups. The history of these efforts is murky, partly because there were some accusations of cheating in Rhine's laboratory, and partly because much of Puthoff's work was sponsored by the CIA under conditions of secrecy. Elizabeth Meyer gives us the clearest account of ESP research that I have seen, with an excellent bibliography of relevant documents. The results of the scientific investigations were in the end disappointing. Investigators claimed to have positive and statistically significant evidence of ESP, but the positive results were always marginal, large enough to be statistically significant but not large enough to convince a skeptical critic.

There are three possible positions one may take concerning the evidence for ESP. First, the position of orthodox scientists, who believe that ESP does not exist. Second, the position of true believers, who believe that ESP is real and can be proved to exist by scientific methods. Third, my own position, that ESP is real, as the anecdotal evidence suggests, but cannot be tested with the clumsy tools of science. These positions also imply different views concerning the proper scope of science. If one believes, as many of my scientific colleagues believe, that the scope of science is unlimited, then science can ultimately explain everything in the universe, and ESP must either be nonexistent or scientifically explainable. If one believes, as I do, that ESP is real but is scientifically untestable, one must believe that the scope of science is limited. I put forward, as a working hypothesis, that ESP is real but belongs to a mental universe that is too fluid and evanescent to fit within the rigid protocols of controlled scientific testing. I do not claim that this hypothesis is true. I claim only that it is consistent with the evidence and worthy of consideration.

I was asked to write this preface because I published in The New York Review of Books a review of a book about ESP with the title Debunked!, by George Charpak and Henti Broch. Elizabeth Meyer read my review and refers to it in her Chapter 12. In my review I said that ESP only occurs, according the the anecdotal evidence, when a person is experiencing intense stress and strong emotions. Under the conditions of a controlled scientific experiment, intense stress and strong emotions are excluded; the person experiences boredom rather than excitement, and so the evidence for ESP disappears. That, I wrote, is why scientific investigation of ESP fails. The experiment necessarily excludes the human emotions that make ESP possible.

After my review was published, I received a large number of angry letters in response. Orthodox scientists were angry because I said ESP might be real. True believers in ESP were angry because I said ESP could not be scientifically proved.

What I like best about Elizabeth Meyer is her eagerness, throughout this book, to maintain a friendly working dialogue between believers and skeptics. I am happy that she and I can disagree and still stay friends." (emphasis mine)


You can't rely on science to act as a substitute for 'building your own telescope'. It is too limited. It isn't the right tool for the job. Something like chaos magic is the right tool even though its difficult for people with certain temperaments.

If we find better tools for studying a phenomena, tools that add to our objective understanding or use of said phenomena, those tools become part of science.

 

[AkuManiMani]

Then there are the ones who turn the provisional conclusions of science into a pseudo-religious orthodoxy to be defended from all heresy.

Like no dinosaurs inside the hollow earth?

More like no atoms, no acausal mechanisms or any of a number of scientific assumptions that have been revised over the centuries. In every generation there are people who think that the scientific state of the art in their day is the full and final word on reality.

 

[Katopale]

More like no atoms, no acausal mechanisms or any of a number of scientific assumptions that have been revised over the centuries. In every generation there are people who think that the scientific state of the art in their day is the full and final word on reality.

And by what method did those revisions come about?

People said "you'll never get it off the ground!".
But the Wright Brothers proved them wrong through telekinesis!

 

[AkuManiMani]

And by what method did those revisions come about?

New generations of scientists started making observations and positing theories at odds with the current orthodoxy. They eventually gained enough traction in their respective fields to be taken seriously by their colleges [in the case of atomic theory, the main proponent Ludwig Boltzmann committed suicide before he could be vindicated]. Those who wished to maintain their professional credibility went with the tide and those that could not dug in their heels in faded into obscurity.

People said "you'll never get it off the ground!".
But the Wright Brothers proved them wrong through telekinesis!

They proved them wrong thru perseverance, ingenuity, and a willingness to not simply acquiesce to the prevailing beliefs of their time.

 

[PixyMisa]

If we find better tools for studying a phenomena, tools that add to our objective understanding or use of said phenomena, those tools become part of science.

Indeed. Special pleading doesn't stop being a logical fallacy when it's wrapped in an appeal to authority.

Limbo, first get some evidence, then we'll talk. Evidence first. And no, anecdotes still don't qualify.

 

[AkuManiMani]

Indeed. Special pleading doesn't stop being a logical fallacy when it's wrapped in an appeal to authority.

Limbo, first get some evidence, then we'll talk. Evidence first. And no, anecdotes still don't qualify.

How do you submit non-anecdotal evidence on a web forum, wise one?