A Skeptic Eats His Own Words???

[tommyz]

Can you think of any subliminal clues that the power would go out?

Actually, yes. Since a few of my coworkers seemed to have taken offense at my opinion of psychics (veiwing my practical, sensible and rationally-based analyses in a very pejorative, negative kind of way) I have (2) theoretical possibilities:

(1). The sudden power shut-off was done intentionally as an elaborate hoax to debunk my previously stated claim of how many of my "prophetic" dreams do NOT come true, thereby cajoling me into believing in some kind of "psychic" phenomena, which in turn would have ultimately convinced me to go to my co-worker's psychic party this weekend and waste $25 for the same cockamamy advice I could get for FREE by reading the horoscope in my local newspaper.

By the way, don't worry; I'm NOT going...I've got better things to do with my time and money!

Anyways, I have to admit that this hypothosis is a VERY far fetched one, but I'm only trying to look at this event from ALL possible angles. In all honesty, I don't think anyone would be that brazen and desperate enough to risk losing their job by performing such a prank as that just to convince me to go to some psychic party. During those few seconds when our power was out, I was in the middle of a lenghty email, and had lost ALL of my unsaved work, as did 50 other people in the office. So to do something like that would be grounds for immediate termination, which I really don't think anyone would want to risk just for my lousy $25.

A more realistic and definite possibility:

(2). Since I do work in a window blind manufacturing facility, I would have to rationally surmise that at that particular moment, EVERY single piece of operating machinery was on FULL POWER, which would have thereby caused a trip in the switch, and sudden loss of power.

Yeah...I think I would have to go with the latter on this one.

Does anyone else have any other possibilities or theories that you'd like to share???

 

[PatKelley]

"Coincidence" is another one of those words what I think we use to stop thinking. "It's just a coincidence". Sure, there are plenty of things we cannot know, but let's be honest - what is a "coincidence" if not ignorance ?

Coincidence. Two things happening at the same time or in a sequence does not establish causation. You have a data-point. If one can show a causal relationship, demonstrate it with repeatable testing... wait, this sounds like the Challenge!

Amazingly, I can bring up one from the everyday. I'm at a stoplight, as an observer. When the light goes green, the cars go. So I've established that green lights make cars move, right? Well, based on the logic of "coincidence" not being "coincidence" I'm done reasoning. I then watch as a bird flies over and lands on a telephone pole nearby. Now I can say that green lights attract birds. Now a squirrel crosses the line. Now they attract squirrels! Amazing!

Now, I could observe that the light changing and the bird and squirrel showing up are coincidence, but that involves more thought than accepting that all are related, because I am attempting to delve further into what I'm seeing.

So, how does blind acceptance involve more thought now?

 

[H'ethetheth]

I should really lay off the coffee. Somehow I read: "A Skeptic Eats His Own Hands??", which I thought was rather odd.

 

[Ipecac]

You're just pushing it back to the word "accidental". "Accidental" still means you're giving up on trying to explain a situation. "It's just accidental". What does that mean ?

What's to explain here? What happened that needs explanation? Someone predicted something which, days later, didn't occur. What occurred was only slightly similar to the prediction. Why does that need any explanation?

 

[Starrman]

You're just pushing it back to the word "accidental". "Accidental" still means you're giving up on trying to explain a situation. "It's just accidental". What does that mean ?

I would explain it as an occurrence that is rare for an individual, but which happens numerous times a day across the world's population. If only half the people on earth dream and remember it on a given night, then that is 3 billion dreams that have the potential to come true to some degree. Is that not an adequate explanation? Do you think my numbers are overstated since I am, admitadely, guessing at how many people dream and remember?

 

[Beth]

Does anyone else have any other possibilities or theories that you'd like to share???

One thing I'd like to point out that only your first theory (deliberate sabotage - which you rank as very unlikely, less likely than the coincidence hypothesis perhaps?) provides an explanation for the coincidence. Whatever other cause might result in the power outage does nothing to explain the coincidence of your dream about it.

Now, coincidence may indeed be the explanation, but I have become reluctant to accept it as true without further work to compute the probability of such coincidences. How many can such experiences can one person have before the coincidence hypothesis wears too thin? I'd like to know, so I've been working on trying to compute odds of such things occurring to get a better feel for how well the coincidence hypthothesis holds up to the actual rate of occurrance.

This is what I would call a category 2 prediction. I classify them into 4 categories. 1 - A perfect or near perfect match. 2 - Enough details match to make the concurrence improbable due to chance alone, but there are considerable differences as well. 3 - A hit with a high probability of success. 4 - A miss.

If you don't mind answering a few more questions, I'd like to know a few more details. Have you ever had a similar experience of dreaming something that later seemed to come true? If so, how often? Have you ever had similar dreams of power outages? If so, how often? How often do you remember your dreams? Are there any other details of the event or your personal background that seem relevant that you woudn't mind sharing. Did that particular dream seem different in any way from other dreams?

Thanks for your patience. I really appreciate hearing about your experience.

 

[Starrman]

One thing I'd like to point out that only your first theory (deliberate sabotage - which you rank as very unlikely, less likely than the coincidence hypothesis perhaps?) provides an explanation for the coincidence. Whatever other cause might result in the power outage does nothing to explain the coincidence of your dream about it.

Beth - do you agree that there must be billions of dreams occurring on the planet each and every night?

Do you really think that it is beyond chance that one idividual on the entire planet had a mundane dream that came somewhat true? Are you just ignoring the people who keep pointing this out, or is there a hole in my logic I'm just not seeing?

 

[DrMatt]

6 billon people each have about 20 dreams per night. When analyzing "magical" dreams, believers throw out the nearly 120 billion meaningless dreams per night and focus attention on the few which seem to corrolate with life. This is called confirmation bias, and it's a waste of time.

 

[Beth]

Beth - do you agree that there must be billions of dreams occurring on the planet each and every night?

Do you really think that it is beyond chance that one idividual on the entire planet had a mundane dream that came somewhat true? Are you just ignoring the people who keep pointing this out, or is there a hole in my logic I'm just not seeing?

Accounts of such dreams are quite common. Certainly, it's not beyond chance that one individual on the entire planet had such a dream come true. The problem is that we have no idea how many individuals had such dreams or how frequently. But we could try to determine that. If, in addition, we could make some sort of computation of the likelihood of such matches occurring by chance we would have better evidence to contemplate and discuss. As it stands now, there is no valid evidence one way or the other to make a determination as to whether coincidence is a reasonable explanation for all such occurrances.

 

[Beth]

6 billon people each have about 20 dreams per night. When analyzing "magical" dreams, believers throw out the nearly 120 billion meaningless dreams per night and focus attention on the few which seem to corrolate with life. This is called confirmation bias, and it's a waste of time.

First of all, how many of those nearly 120 billion dreams are remembered to make a comparison with? I rarely remember mine and I never remember all of them. That drops the possible matches down per night to say, 10 billion? Second of all, how many of those remembered dreams come true. No data at all on that. We know such occurrance are frequently reported, with some people having them frequently and others never. But we have no idea of the actual frequency of such dreams. Third, there is little data on the probability of matches occurring by chance alone, although that can sometimes be computed on a rough basis. All of that information would be needed before being able to come to a firm conclusion about whether or not coincidence is sufficient to explain such dreams.

You are right regarding the problem of confirmation bias. However, that doesn't mean it is a waste of time to consider the problem, only that to actually research it would require a methodology to eliminate the confirmation bias. Not easy, but it is doable.

 

[Bronze Dog]

Coincidence + confirmation bias is the most reasonable explanation thus far, since it doesn't posit any new entities. It'll take something quite unusual in the data before it's worth considering new entities.

 

[Starrman]

First of all, how many of those nearly 120 billion dreams are remembered to make a comparison with? I rarely remember mine and I never remember all of them. That drops the possible matches down per night to say, 10 billion? Second of all, how many of those remembered dreams come true. No data at all on that. We know such occurrance are frequently reported, with some people having them frequently and others never. But we have no idea of the actual frequency of such dreams. Third, there is little data on the probability of matches occurring by chance alone, although that can sometimes be computed on a rough basis. All of that information would be needed before being able to come to a firm conclusion about whether or not coincidence is sufficient to explain such dreams.

You are right regarding the problem of confirmation bias. However, that doesn't mean it is a waste of time to consider the problem, only that to actually research it would require a methodology to eliminate the confirmation bias. Not easy, but it is doable.

Even if only 10% remember their dreams, that is 1 billion dreams a night. That is a HUGE number. If none of them come true to some degree you might have something paranormal. If these kinds of things didn't happen you would have something to investigate. If you counted every reported dream that came partially true, do you think it would come anywhere near 1 million per day, which would be one tenth of one percent of them?

Investigating this and investing anything other than a thought about it is equivalent to trying to figure out why just one guy won the lottery, when the odds were just so small that he would.

 

[Francois Tremblay]

I would explain it as an occurrence that is rare for an individual, but which happens numerous times a day across the world's population.

See, now that's an approach that doesn't reject explanation. Other people on this thread should take your example.

 

[monoman]

This reminds me of a couple of stories. I was once in Spain with some mates walking home after a night out and we were reminiscing about childhood board games – ludo in particular. Anyway, we rounded a corner and right before us was a parked car using a ludo board as a sun shield.

About 2 years later I was climbing in Spain with my brother. We were staying at a hostel and I related the story to him. Just after that some Spanish lads came in with some ‘chocolad’ and asked me to have a rummage in the rafters for some rizlas. Well, blinking hell fire, if it wasn’t a ludo board I blindly came across!

…. Sorry, I actually bored myself re-reading that

 

[tommyz]

If you don't mind answering a few more questions, I'd like to know a few more details. Have you ever had a similar experience of dreaming something that later seemed to come true? If so, how often? Have you ever had similar dreams of power outages? If so, how often? How often do you remember your dreams? Are there any other details of the event or your personal background that seem relevant that you woudn't mind sharing. Did that particular dream seem different in any way from other dreams?

Thanks for your patience. I really appreciate hearing about your experience.

Thanks for your post, Beth. Without sounding too "woo-ish" I must honestly say that every once in a while (maybe once or twice every year or two) I have these "prophetic" dreams, that can be classified (per your rating system) as mostly category 4's, with some 2's and 3's. I can only remember one specific dream which was a perfect hit, when someone was knocking on my front door. I go to open it, and standing there with his hand stretched out for a handshake was my boyhood friend (whom I hadn't spoke to or seen in 10 years). I remember waking up that morning, thinking "boy, now why the hell would I dream of HIM of all people out of nowhere?"

Two weeks later...as I was eating dinner, this event DID actually happen. Talk about deja-vu! I was so mesmerized and speechless beyond words; I simply invited him in to eat with us, sharing hours of wonderful, nostalgic memories. Oddly enough, since my girlfriend and other people who were there at the time knew that I'm a skeptic, I was too embarrassed to talk about this dream of mine to them. Not that I expect anyone here to believe it either, but as a matter of fact, in my personal, subjective and anecdotal experience, it DID happen.

While I can't say I dream often of power outages (last week's was the first one for me) I vividly DO remember my dreams a few times a week. Someone else had stated (earlier in this thread) that that dream was more or less influenced by my subconcious desire to have a PAID day off without taking a sick, vacation, or personal, and that this occurence would've created that ideal situation.

Truthfully, he or she is really not that far off. As a part-time writer, I actually had been thinking of taking a day off or two just to catch up on some chapters in a novel that I'm writing, so most realistically, that dream I had probably stemmed from this inner subconscious desire.

While I do have a dream dictionary, and do refer to it from time to time, rest assured that I do so VERY skeptically, being very judicious in my approach not to accept every possibility as "fact," especially with regard to supposed "favorable" outcomes, which can and often times will be incorrent, and thus leading to grave disappointments and embarrassments should they be unquestioned.

Dreams are indeed very real and can be very entertaining and even educational, but to reap the full educational benefits that dreams can offer, one must be able to look at them very objectively from ALL possible angles. Without this responsible and rationally-based approach, our attempts at dream interpretation will amount to nothing more but a complete pile of woo-woo nonsense.

 

[Ceritus]

Would a mechanic still be called a mechanic if he only fixed half of your car's problems? Would a doctor still be called a doctor if he/she only treated and cured only half of your medical problems? More importantly, would you still be able to keep your job if you did only HALF of your work? With the possible exception of ---> metereologists <----

Hey I had a 96% Error free rate last year with a total of 3,688 different products. But then again I only forecast for within 5 miles of the base, set threshholds, for example I have to have a forecast line for ceilings below 3000ft 1500ft 1000ft 800ft and every 100ft below that! Its just everyone remembers when we are wrong

 

[Beth]

Thanks for your post, Beth. Without sounding too "woo-ish" I must honestly say that every once in a while (maybe once or twice every year or two) I have these "prophetic" dreams, that can be classified (per your rating system) as mostly category 4's, with some 2's and 3's.

Thanks so much for posting more information about your experiences. I hope this isn't becoming tedious for you, but I really am interested in learning more about experiences such as these. You mention that most such dreams are category 4's or misses. Is there some way you can distinguish these "prophetic" dreams that you get once or twice a year that then don't happen from other dreams that don't happen? If so, could you try to describe the difference? Or do you simply mean that most of your dreams don't happen?

 

[Beth]

Coincidence + confirmation bias is the most reasonable explanation thus far, since it doesn't posit any new entities. It'll take something quite unusual in the data before it's worth considering new entities.

Yes, coincidence & confirmation bias would be the null hypothesis. What causes me to consider alternative hypothoses is that many people report having many such dreams. I have begun to wonder how many such coincidences it's reasonable for one person to have? Thus my desire to estimate both the probability of the coincidence occurring and the base rate of such dreams throughout the population.

 

[petre]

I suppose for a propper evaluation, all data should be collected.

I don't remember my dreams often, perhaps once a week. Given the period during which I would be able to properly evaluate a prophetic dream, let's say the last 20 years, that's 1040 remembered dreams. There are usually several elements to these dreams that could relate to something in real life, say perhaps at least 4 on average, so that's 4160 elements that could relate to something after the dream.

Of all of them, I can recall no association between anything I have dreamed and real life events, even several days after the dream. That I could have so many dream elements and NONE of them ever relate to anything that actually happens later, I find ASTOUNDING! I must have anti-prophetic dreams! I hope tonight I have a dream that I will never be rich and die young.

Actually, a good many of my remembered dreams follow one of the following themes:

- Attempt to flee something unknown/scarry, but unable to (stumbling, moving very slowly, etc)
- A falling event (always wake up before impact, though still unable to avoid impact the one time I was actually falling out of bed )
- Gain the ability to levitate (usually requires great effort, and normally achieved after sitting indian style)
- Lucid dreaming -- I realize I'm dreaming, and begin to direct the dream. This state usually doesn't last very long, so I don't get to have much fun before I reach partial wakefulness. If my profile is complete enough, you can probably guess from age and gender the theme these dreams take once I'm in control.

My point is that I tend to have dreams that have very little chance of relating to something in real life (except as an allegory), but folks are welcome to bring Freud to the table, since I'm aware a lot of those are classic cases as well

 

[Beth]

I suppose for a propper evaluation, all data should be collected.

Thanks for your contribution. Actually, a properly designed sample would be required. Data collected on a forum such as this cannot be considered representive. However, I find it useful to study anecdotes for a number of reasons.

I don't remember my dreams often, perhaps once a week. Given the period during which I would be able to properly evaluate a prophetic dream, let's say the last 20 years, that's 1040 remembered dreams. There are usually several elements to these dreams that could relate to something in real life, say perhaps at least 4 on average, so that's 4160 elements that could relate to something after the dream.
Of all of them, I can recall no association between anything I have dreamed and real life events, even several days after the dream. That I could have so many dream elements and NONE of them ever relate to anything that actually happens later, I find ASTOUNDING! I must have anti-prophetic dreams! I hope tonight I have a dream that I will never be rich and die young.

Actually, a good many of my remembered dreams follow one of the following themes:

- Attempt to flee something unknown/scarry, but unable to (stumbling, moving very slowly, etc)
- A falling event (always wake up before impact, though still unable to avoid impact the one time I was actually falling out of bed )
- Gain the ability to levitate (usually requires great effort, and normally achieved after sitting indian style)
- Lucid dreaming -- I realize I'm dreaming, and begin to direct the dream. This state usually doesn't last very long, so I don't get to have much fun before I reach partial wakefulness. If my profile is complete enough, you can probably guess from age and gender the theme these dreams take once I'm in control.

My point is that I tend to have dreams that have very little chance of relating to something in real life (except as an allegory), but folks are welcome to bring Freud to the table, since I'm aware a lot of those are classic cases as well

[/quote] This is interesting information, so thanks for posting it. I do think people often have continuing themes in their dreams. Mine often involve a moving vehicle of some sort. I have come to believe that who is driving, how fast and what direction the vehicle is moving (forward or backward) are symbolic of how I feel my life is going.

Another thing I find interesting about dreams is how few have any possibility of occurring later. For example, dreams of running away from monsters or levitation aren't really candidates for being "prophetic" the way a power outage at work or an old friend stopping by unexpectedly are. At any rate, good luck with your dreams of dying young and poor. May they never come true!