GERALD EPLING - Shimmering Leaf Inventor

From the Challenge Applications thread, the applicant writes:
The post by Ririon comes close to the claim that I am making. I do claim that an egg can sense my intention or action involved with boiling another cohort egg. This is the essence of my paranormal claim.
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Yeay me! What do I win?
 
This is your brain.....


This is your brain believing in paranormal woo-woo claims...


This is your brain believing in paranormal woo-woo claims with a side order of bacon...
 
Why don't we switch from egg jokes (yolks?) to figuring out possible issues with a protocol? This test involves what people are thinking, which is impossible to verify. It's trivial to test detection -- send someone into the room who's thinking about boiling the egg -- but how do you control? Perhaps Mr. Epling would have to provide the "thinkers". Otherwise he could never be sure that the people were or were not thinking of not boiling the egg during the appropriate trials.
 
SkepticScott said:
Why don't we switch from egg jokes (yolks?) to figuring out possible issues with a protocol? This test involves what people are thinking, which is impossible to verify. It's trivial to test detection -- send someone into the room who's thinking about boiling the egg -- but how do you control? Perhaps Mr. Epling would have to provide the "thinkers". Otherwise he could never be sure that the people were or were not thinking of not boiling the egg during the appropriate trials.
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Well, he does the thinking himself. The problem is not getting him to think about boiling an egg. The problem is getting him to not think about it as a control. Try for yourself to go even ten seconds without thinking about penguins, starting... Now. :)
 
This appears to be similar to "regular" telepathy and can probably use a similar protocol. What is transferred is not a word or a symbol, but in essence a binary number. "I will boil you" or "I will not boil you anytime soon", "1" or "0". The statistically inclined can figure out how many such binary numbers you would need for a significant result. Other than that, just make sure everything is blinded, make sure he can't influence the result by non-paranormal means and run the experiment.
 
Ririon said:
Try for yourself to go even ten seconds without thinking about penguins, starting... Now. :)
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That was easy, I stared at your avatar and counted the ten seconds to myself in German. No penquins.:)

This appears to be similar to "regular" telepathy and can probably use a similar protocol. What is transferred is not a word or a symbol, but in essence a binary number. "I will boil you" or "I will not boil you anytime soon", "1" or "0". The statistically inclined can figure out how many such binary numbers you would need for a significant result. Other than that, just make sure everything is blinded, make sure he can't influence the result by non-paranormal means and run the experiment.
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Right. I was pointing out that Mr. Epling might have to be, or provide, the senders, so he'd have no fears that the senders were intentionally messing up the test.

Yes, the precautions and protocol you suggested sound good, Ririon. It should be an interesting test, and regardless of the outcome, all parties can have breakfast afterwards.:)
 
SkepticScott said:
That was easy, I stared at your avatar and counted the ten seconds to myself in German. No penquins.:)
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So that's that problem taken care of. Excellent.
Right. I was pointing out that Mr. Epling might have to be, or provide, the senders, so he'd have no fears that the senders were intentionally messing up the test.

Yes, the precautions and protocol you suggested sound good, Ririon. It should be an interesting test, and regardless of the outcome, all parties can have breakfast afterwards.:)
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OK. My suggestion would be something like this: You need two rooms:

In one room, you put a Faraday cage. Inside the cage is a clock and an egg hooked up to the device (with the beep turned off, a light signal is better). A video camera is filming both.

In the second room is the applicant and a clock synchronized to the egg clock.

A coin is flipped (or some other random event). Heads="Think about boiling the egg". Tales="Count in German while staring into the hungry eyes of a lynx (or something else not egg-related)". He does the chosen activity for a set amount of time (say 2 minutes) and then takes a break for a set amount of time. (say 3 minutes). "Rinse and repeat". THEN compare with the tape from the first room.

ETA: The beauty of this setup, is that he can practise/self test without a single assistant.
 
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Yes, if Mr. Epling were doing the sending that would assure him that the subject was thinking the correct things. But first you should set up everything, with the device and egg isolated -- everyone is outside of the egg's detection range (how far away must someone be before the egg doesn't react to that person's thoughts?). You need to determine the false positive rate.
 
SkepticScott said:
Yes, if Mr. Epling were doing the sending that would assure him that the subject was thinking the correct things. But first you should set up everything, with the device and egg isolated -- everyone is outside of the egg's detection range (how far away must someone be before the egg doesn't react to that person's thoughts?). You need to determine the false positive rate.
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Perhaps the user known as "bassett" can give some input regarding this? If I am not mistaken, Mr. Epling sent a PM to Jeff Wagg using that name, and he reads this thread. (It appears like that in the Challenge Applications section.) As I am sure he understands, we do not represent the JREF, but we are eager to help and/or make silly puns.
 
From the Challenge Applications thread, the applicant writes:The post by Ririon comes close to the claim that I am making. I do claim that an egg can sense my intention or action involved with boiling another cohort egg. This is the essence of my paranormal claim.
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Eggs have cohorts? I knew that birds of a feather flock together, but I didn't realize it was true of eggs too.

(Sorry, I couldn't come up with any original egg puns, so a related idiom will have to do.)
 
hcmom said:
(Sorry, I couldn't come up with any original egg puns, so a related idiom will have to do.)
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I would make a silly joke about eggs usually travelling in packs of 6 or 12, but purple? <Reads color tag> "DarkOrchid"??:confused: :covereyes
 
How you can do this using magic

Method 1
When the Shimmering Leaf™ monitor is turned on it will wait a fixed number of minutes then sound the alarm. After the alarm is deactivated the Shimmering Leaf™ monitor will then sound the alarm after another fixed number of minutes. Gerald A. Epling will know what time the alarm will go off and will ensure that he can give paranormal reasons for it to go off at these times.


Method 2
Gerald A. Epling has a device that can make the Shimmering Leaf™ monitor go off by remote control. This remote control can be hidden in the body in a way that cannot be found by a body search. When the Shimmering Leaf™ monitor Gerald A. Epling will state that there are paranormal reasons for it to go off.


To detect these methods would be very difficult. I say reject the application as I have shown that it can be faked.

I apologise if the wording in the spoilers is insulting to anyone.
 
rjh01 said:
How you can do this using magic

Method 1
When the Shimmering Leaf™ monitor is turned on it will wait a fixed number of minutes then sound the alarm. After the alarm is deactivated the Shimmering Leaf™ monitor will then sound the alarm after another fixed number of minutes. Gerald A. Epling will know what time the alarm will go off and will ensure that he can give paranormal reasons for it to go off at these times.


Method 2
Gerald A. Epling has a device that can make the Shimmering Leaf™ monitor go off by remote control. This remote control can be hidden in the body in a way that cannot be found by a body search. When the Shimmering Leaf™ monitor Gerald A. Epling will state that there are paranormal reasons for it to go off.


To detect these methods would be very difficult. I say reject the application as I have shown that it can be faked.

I apologise if the wording in the spoilers is insulting to anyone.
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Both of which, I am proud to say, are covered by my protocol suggestion on post #50. Method 1 by randomization and method 2 by a Faraday cage. :)
 
A Faraday cage will give protection from electrical fields. But I do not think it will stop radio fields. I just put my mobile phone (you call it cell phone) inside my microwave oven. The phone still worked. If someone can tell me how to build a better Faraday cage I will try again.

In case someone has a sense of humour - I did not turn the oven on.
 
Ririon said:
I would make a silly joke about eggs usually travelling in packs of 6 or 12, but purple? <Reads color tag> "DarkOrchid"??:confused: :covereyes
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Eggs come in packs of purple? <Reads hair dye bottle> "Will not cure blonde-ness.":shocked: :D
 
rjh01 said:
A Faraday cage will give protection from electrical fields. But I do not think it will stop radio fields. I just put my mobile phone (you call it cell phone) inside my microwave oven. The phone still worked. If someone can tell me how to build a better Faraday cage I will try again.

In case someone has a sense of humour - I did not turn the oven on.
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A tighter mesh will do. EM radiation with a wavelength of about the same size as the holes in the cage (or shorter) will pass through. I haven't tried to build one myself, but the Mytbusters (appeal to authority) made one from a fine metal mesh and got no reception on their cell phones on the inside. A 900 MHz mobile phone has a wavelength of 33 cm, and should not work inside a microwave oven. <Walks off to check with the nearest microwave oven.> Nope. The phone worked just fine inside there. Clearly I am missing something, or microwave ovens really ARE dangerous. (And I call it a "mobiltelefon" or just "mobil". :) )
 
Radio waves used by mobile phone can penetrate a metal ammunition box or a fridge. Not to mention a microwave oven. I tried both. We will have extreme difficulty in building a device that will stop a mobile phone from working. So my post 55 in this thread stands.
 
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