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John Edwards on Dr. Oz

Poor George is a fawning idiot. He has never asked a hard question in his entire career. It's Infotainment folks. :(
 
Gord_in_Toronto said:
Poor George is a fawning idiot. He has never asked a hard question in his entire career. It's Infotainment folks. :(
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I thought it was the height of nonsense when Strombo, whose main claim to fame, as far as I'm aware, was being a VJ on MuchMusic, landed the gig at CBC. But at least he got cut from an hour to a half-hour. I'd rather Rick Mercer be given an hour.
 
Corsair 115 said:
I thought it was the height of nonsense when Strombo, whose main claim to fame, as far as I'm aware, was being a VJ on MuchMusic, landed the gig at CBC. But at least he got cut from an hour to a half-hour. I'd rather Rick Mercer be given an hour.
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The Snuffleupagus Show is the CBC's answer to CTV's e-Talk Daily. Full of sound and lack of substance and signifying not very much. :(

I'd rather Mercer be elected President Prime Minister. ;)
 
I don't know if I'd hold my breath. Dr. Dean is not pleased with Oz, pointing out many egregious cases where he crosses the line into quasi-quackism and not being particularly rigorous, even allowing for TV show leeway in letting the guest freely promote their junk before asking some tough questions. And he has sympathy, having been a TV doctor off and on for years, with the ratings pressure it brings.
 
skullerello said:
Wow! When did Kreskin go from being an astounding mentalist act (I don't recall him ever claiming any special paranormal ability) to making predictions and dabbling in other woo?
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He became a woo in the last 20 years after his popularity waned and maybe his judgement has failed with old age.
i want to give him the benefit of the doubt.

Joey McGee said:
Kreskin is a waffler. It depends who asks, why and when. In general, he has always been a scumbag, depending who you ask. I know that Penn Jillette hates him for dozens of reasons, mostly because Kreskin sold him and his parents a useless ESP game when he was 12, that's A grade trash right there. Johnny Carson stopped having him on when Kreskin would allure to special powers. And even Art Bell, the king of kooks banned him for some stupid stunt. Maybe Kreskin thinks he's some kind of hero for being a deep undercover troll. Nah, he's a scumbag.

ETA: Just look at the comments on the youtube video of him on "The Hour" half of the people believe that he's the real deal and there's even a lot of comments about Randi's prize being corrupt or Kreskin could easily win it. He's absolutely playing for the other team.
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I am the skeptic I am because of Kreskin. I wanted to reproduce his act as a young magician and as I learned about mentalism I subsequently learned it was all woo. He was/is worth the price of admission as far as being entertaining because I remember being entertained. He didn't pretend to predict events when I was young. He lost his way on this topic. One topic he didn't lose his way was explaining about suggestion.
 
JD

Okay,
I have just one more add to this post.

Pick up a copy of Pim Van Lommel’s “Consciousness Beyond Life: The Science of the Near Death Experience.”

One of the striking points made by PVL is how consciousness accounts for the brain’s neuroplasticity-the brain literally rearranging itself due only to the mind’s will. Neurophysiologist and Nobel Prize laureate Roger Sperry, who has done a great deal of research among “split-brain” patients, also reached the surprising conclusion that the mind directly determines neural activities. This conclusion is supported by neuropsychologist Benjamin Libet, known for his theory of “readiness potential” (RP), an unconscious “ready” signal in the brain preceding a conscious decision to act (“free will”) or not to act (“free won’t”) by 350 milliseconds. He concluded that the conscious mental field can consolidate subjective experiences but also has the potential to directly influence neural activities. There has also been research into voluntary self-regulation of emotions among men viewing sexually arousing film excerpts. With the help of MRI techniques the researchers demonstrated this correlation between special aspects of consciousness and brain function because certian centers were activated for emotions, and the conscious and voluntary regulation of emotions specifically involved increased activity in the frontal lobes (ie: prefrontal cortex) .

So what does the aforementioned have to do with John Edwards? These results empirically and quantitatively support the dualistic nature of man by showing that conscious and voluntary self-regulation of emotions has a very real effect on the activity of the various brain centers involved. In summation, the human mind can change the brain rather than the brain changing the mind as Dennett would argue. Therefore it would be incorrect to claim that consciousness can only be a product of brain function.

The brain contains only 10 to the fourteenth synapses and if one synapse contained only one bit of information, brain function would require more than that amount for information processing than our human DNA can handle according to current knowledge.

If the medical science isn’t smart enough for you, then consider Wolf Prize winning physicist Penrose claims that a computer’s (similar to a brain) algorithms are incapable of stimulating mathematical reasoning and can therefore never produce consciousness. A machine (the brain) no matter how cleverly constructed by human intellect, is not in a position to answer philosophical questions about the meaning of life. In other words, our consciousness cannot be localized within the brain.

Nobel Prize winning neuroscientist, John Eccles, points out that the there are only one of two possibilities for the first neuron to fire in a cascade of subsequent neurons to effect-whether that be a motor response or a thought. The first neuron must be preceeded by an infinite regression of neurons in light of cause and effect (as any hard nosed materialist would argue) which is impossible given the finite number of neurons in the brain, or the first firing of a neuron just “spontaneously” happened, which is exactly what the disbelieving skeptics would have us believe. Yes, the skeptics are the mystics-not the believers. The skeptic materialist is always quick to point out that scientifically every effect must have a cause and yet when you try to resolve the origination of the first neuronal impulse, you are left with but two choices: 1)this just happens without a cause or 2) the cause is something transcendant.

Ladies and gentlemen, I believe in the soul and something that transcends the natural world of physics for the aforementioned reasons and others.This is not a debate between the intelligent and the stupid as the skeptics would have you believe, it is only a debate between those who want to believe and those who don’t want to believe. Because you see, almost invariably the person who doesn’t believe that consciousness survives bodily death also inists there isn’t a god or a primal mind behind all of this-a god that they and all the rest of us will one day be accountable to. And mostly we will hold ourselves accountable on that near death experience and the life review.

Does any of this prove that John Edwards is real? No! But it should at least prohibit you from insisting he isn’t authentic and that anyone who thinks he is authentic is somehow daft and negligent of the science. This should at least temper the scathing mockery coming out of the non-believers mouths who would have us believe that they are only sharing the truth with us because they don’t like to see the grieved abused by charlatans.If you really care, then why are you so insulting and abusive of those who are looking for hope? Therein lies your true motives and it’s all about ego.
 
Bikewer said:
Nice critique of the show from the Science-Based Medicine blog:

http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/?p=11513
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This quote, "Given these facts, it is far better to use the services of a qualified psychologist trained in grief counseling" agrees with the earlier quote from Michael Shermer and with a certified psychologist I know who specialized in grief counseling. As well as being an evil exploitation of grieving people, it delays the healing process.
This quote, "Given these facts, it is far better to use the services of a qualified psychologist trained in grief counseling" agrees with the earlier quote from Michael Shermer and with a certified psychologist I know who specialized in grief counseling. As well as being an evil exploitation of grieving people, it delays the healing process.
As for the APA representitive, it is likely her statement was cherry-picked or distorted
 
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I checked with the APA reps' office and the extremely helpful assistant there gave me this link. http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2011/03/kathleen_nordal_on_dr_oz_and_john_edward.php
"In a letter to producers of "The Dr. Oz" show Nordal said, "I provided very balanced responses to Dr. Oz's questions during the show's taping, however, the editing of my responses did not capture my full comments or give viewers an accurate portrayal of my professional view on John Edward's methods. Instead, it seems that 'The Doctor Oz' show intentionally edited my responses in a way that gave the appearance of my endorsement of Edward's methods as a legitimate intervention."
 
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jerrydecaire said:
Does any of this prove that John Edwards is real? No! But it should at least prohibit you from insisting he isn’t authentic and that anyone who thinks he is authentic is somehow daft and negligent of the science.
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"The science" demands that a phenomenon is demonstrated to actually exist before speculating about an explanation for it.

Anyone who thinks John Edwards is authentic in the absence of a single shred of scientific evidence for his claims is certainly negligent of the science.
 
jerrydecaire said:
Okay,
I have just one more add to this post.

Pick up a copy of Pim Van Lommel’s “Consciousness Beyond Life: The Science of the Near Death Experience.” ....( large amounts of irrelevant crap)...would have us believe that they are only sharing the truth with us because they don’t like to see the grieved abused by charlatans.If you really care, then why are you so insulting and abusive of those who are looking for hope? Therein lies your true motives and it’s all about ego.
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Fify.
 
jerrydecaire said:
Okay,
I have just one more add to this post.

Pick up a copy of Pim Van Lommel’s “Consciousness Beyond Life: The Science of the Near Death Experience.”

One of the striking points made by PVL is how consciousness accounts for the brain’s neuroplasticity-the brain literally rearranging itself due only to the mind’s will. Neurophysiologist and Nobel Prize laureate Roger Sperry, who has done a great deal of research among “split-brain” patients, also reached the surprising conclusion that the mind directly determines neural activities. This conclusion is supported by neuropsychologist Benjamin Libet, known for his theory of “readiness potential” (RP), an unconscious “ready” signal in the brain preceding a conscious decision to act (“free will”) or not to act (“free won’t”) by 350 milliseconds. He concluded that the conscious mental field can consolidate subjective experiences but also has the potential to directly influence neural activities. There has also been research into voluntary self-regulation of emotions among men viewing sexually arousing film excerpts. With the help of MRI techniques the researchers demonstrated this correlation between special aspects of consciousness and brain function because certian centers were activated for emotions, and the conscious and voluntary regulation of emotions specifically involved increased activity in the frontal lobes (ie: prefrontal cortex) .

So what does the aforementioned have to do with John Edwards? These results empirically and quantitatively support the dualistic nature of man by showing that conscious and voluntary self-regulation of emotions has a very real effect on the activity of the various brain centers involved. In summation, the human mind can change the brain rather than the brain changing the mind as Dennett would argue. Therefore it would be incorrect to claim that consciousness can only be a product of brain function.

The brain contains only 10 to the fourteenth synapses and if one synapse contained only one bit of information, brain function would require more than that amount for information processing than our human DNA can handle according to current knowledge.

If the medical science isn’t smart enough for you, then consider Wolf Prize winning physicist Penrose claims that a computer’s (similar to a brain) algorithms are incapable of stimulating mathematical reasoning and can therefore never produce consciousness. A machine (the brain) no matter how cleverly constructed by human intellect, is not in a position to answer philosophical questions about the meaning of life. In other words, our consciousness cannot be localized within the brain.

Nobel Prize winning neuroscientist, John Eccles, points out that the there are only one of two possibilities for the first neuron to fire in a cascade of subsequent neurons to effect-whether that be a motor response or a thought. The first neuron must be preceeded by an infinite regression of neurons in light of cause and effect (as any hard nosed materialist would argue) which is impossible given the finite number of neurons in the brain, or the first firing of a neuron just “spontaneously” happened, which is exactly what the disbelieving skeptics would have us believe. Yes, the skeptics are the mystics-not the believers. The skeptic materialist is always quick to point out that scientifically every effect must have a cause and yet when you try to resolve the origination of the first neuronal impulse, you are left with but two choices: 1)this just happens without a cause or 2) the cause is something transcendant.

Ladies and gentlemen, I believe in the soul and something that transcends the natural world of physics for the aforementioned reasons and others.This is not a debate between the intelligent and the stupid as the skeptics would have you believe, it is only a debate between those who want to believe and those who don’t want to believe. Because you see, almost invariably the person who doesn’t believe that consciousness survives bodily death also inists there isn’t a god or a primal mind behind all of this-a god that they and all the rest of us will one day be accountable to. And mostly we will hold ourselves accountable on that near death experience and the life review.

Does any of this prove that John Edwards is real? No! But it should at least prohibit you from insisting he isn’t authentic and that anyone who thinks he is authentic is somehow daft and negligent of the science. This should at least temper the scathing mockery coming out of the non-believers mouths who would have us believe that they are only sharing the truth with us because they don’t like to see the grieved abused by charlatans.If you really care, then why are you so insulting and abusive of those who are looking for hope? Therein lies your true motives and it’s all about ego.
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Welcome to the forum. I sense intelligence in your post, and I look forward to you defending your liberal position amidst the onslaught of haughty pragmatists and pedantic atheists.

I never mention it here, but I also believe (or hunch, hypothesize) that consciousness pre-exists matter. No god is required; no laws violated in this.
Yet, it is strenuously rejected here, for the most part.

Like any mutual admiration society, JREF can get smug about knowing the truth of any and all matters. Why i hang out amongst the bastards?
I trust that they aren't about to burn witches or impose martial law.
 
This is the USA, we burned no witches here. The British colonials hung a score or two and pressed Giles Corey with stones, but no burning.
 
@jerrydecaire

You have completely misunderstood and misrepresented the results of the scientific work of the people you mention.

This is what you said...

One of the striking points made by PVL is how consciousness accounts for the brain’s neuroplasticity-the brain literally rearranging itself due only to the mind’s will. Neurophysiologist and Nobel Prize laureate Roger Sperry, who has done a great deal of research among “split-brain” patients, also reached the surprising conclusion that the mind directly determines neural activities. This conclusion is supported by neuropsychologist Benjamin Libet, known for his theory of “readiness potential” (RP), an unconscious “ready” signal in the brain preceding a conscious decision to act (“free will”) or not to act (“free won’t”) by 350 milliseconds. He concluded that the conscious mental field can consolidate subjective experiences but also has the potential to directly influence neural activities. There has also been research into voluntary self-regulation of emotions among men viewing sexually arousing film excerpts. With the help of MRI techniques the researchers demonstrated this correlation between special aspects of consciousness and brain function because certian centers were activated for emotions, and the conscious and voluntary regulation of emotions specifically involved increased activity in the frontal lobes (ie: prefrontal cortex) .
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The subject of the research you mention was the influence of the subconscious neural processes on conscious decisions not the influence of a non-physical mind.

This is a quote by Libet...

The CMF is not a Cartesian dualistic phenomenon; it is not separable from the brain. Rather, it is proposed to be a localizable system property produced by appropriate neuronal activities, and it cannot exist without them. Again, it is not a ‘‘ghost’’ in the machine. But, as a system produced by billions of nerve cell actions, it can have properties not directly predictable from these neuronal activities. It is a non-physical phenomenon, like the subjective experience that it represents. The process by which the CMF arises from its contributing elements is not describable. It must simply be regarded as a new fundamental ‘‘given’’ phenomenon in nature, which is different from other fundamental ‘‘givens,’’ like gravity or electromagnetism
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If you want to use neurobiology to prove the existence of a soul, you will need to do better than that.

Dualism aside... John Edwards is an obvious fraud. If you cannot see that, please provide evidence that he is genuine.
 
We are engulfed in fraud.
Drowning in it.
John Edwards fraud is so obvious, its almost refreshingly honest in its simple falsehood.

Some day, we will be nostalgic about crooks like him and Sylvia.
Their scam is relatively green, for instance.
Hot air, but not tons of CO2.
 
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Enjoying delusions is an evolutionary artifact in our psychology. We'll kill that meme one day soon. I'm doing my best by writing the stations of anyone who hosts this slimeball/mental patient and explaining the disservice they are doing to humanity. I suggest you copy me.
 
Memes

Why don't you clarify for us and identify exactly where this "Meme" virus is located and its specific physiology, its origins, and a demonstrable demonstration of its activity in a lab. I would like to be enlightened. I find it amazing that the atheists who insist on empirical evidence are not themselves giving out any.
 
If it has been proposed to be a "localizable system property" and "produced by appropriate neuronal activities" I have to ask what makes you assume "appropriateness"-are these defined by the results without giving account for the intermediary steps? Even more importantly, the first firing neuron? And how did that happen? Was it spontaneous thereby defying your materialistic assumption that every effect requires a cause? Or was it an infinitely regressive array of neuronal firing which is materially impossible given the finite number of neurons in the brain? And once again, this is a defeater for your materialistic assumptions. Give me an answer to that and win the Nobel Prize. That point goes back to Eccles arguments concerning downward causation. And I can give you example after example of the effects of placebos which are measurable and almost invariably, whenever a comparison is made between the placebo and the tested drug in question, there is a deviation from the control in either case; belief literally sets into motion a cascade of events that demonstrably change physiology (The "ghost in the machine). What the person thought was staking place-did. And the stats prove it over and over. It's one of the challenges in medicine and it’s a phenomenon that helps us to ascertain the effectiveness of new drugs. You ask me for proof; give me the science behind that. Show me and the rest of the scientific community how that happens. If you can explain that, you can wear your arrogance with confidence. As for gravity and electromagnetism some physicists, like string theorist Erik Verlinde, are now arguing that gravity is an illusion and Dr. Robert Lanza would concur that these, like time and space, are mental constructs rather than measurable and palpable matter. Is Lanza smart enough for you? He’s one of the world’s cutting edge biologists who was first to demonstrate regression of age in mice and he’s carving the road with new science. Are you? Planck insists that matter is an illusion and this genius believed in a conscious intelligence that was the “matrix of all matter.” Think this is nonsense? Is this the argument from authority? Damn right! Who would you rather I quote, the local janitor? Where is the graviton? Prove to me where that is and I'll give you evidence for Edwards authenticity. You expect evidence from me, I expect the same. You want evidence for a "ghost", I want evidence that your billiard ball universe is all there is. And these billions of nerve cell actions, how did they conspire to affect such an elaborate system which supposedly gives me the illusion of choice? Give me that information and the evidence for that. And don’t quote Dennett-even other atheists say his “Consciousness Explained” hardly lives up to its claims and even the summation by Dennett concurs it’s a mystery. It’s a fool who thinks that these atoms just collided into each other and fashioned such an intricate pattern which gave rise to complex molecules and quaternary protein structures and billions of letters arranged in just the right way to create a DNA helix that serves as a blueprint for the elaborate developmental biology that creates a plethora of tissues which then conspire with all the cells and other tissues to create organs and then an organism which presents with the epiphenomenon of consciousness and the sense of self and “I.” And then there’s the hard problem of consciousness which even Pinker admitted may never be resolved (The Ghost in the machine?). The subjective experience is very indicative of a “ghost” whether you like it or not. And how could a non-sentient universe of dead matter ever conspire to find a way to take on sentience and create humans as a means to look upon itself? I know, you think it’s just chance. And you think that’s smart? Whoa! I’ve got some swamp land I’d love to sell you!
As for consciousness, you keep laughing and keep talking about the “quantum Kool-Aid” because you can’t reason how particles could behave in such a counter-intuitive fashion. In fact, entanglement (two particles separated by the breadth of a solar system with one spin and one counter spin happening simultaneously destroys you notion of space and time travel) and superposition (where a particle can be in more than one place at the same time-sounds an awful like the omnipresent qualities of God to me), and the two-slit experiment which has been repeated since the 30’s and no matter how you slice it or dice it with any number of controls, CONCIOUSNESS determines how the particle behaves either as a particle or a wave of potentials. Yes, virtually anything can make it decohere or collapse into a classical model but those have been taken into account through multiple trials and in the end and no matter how you slice or dice it, CONSCIOUNESS is the Prime Player-not billiard balls. You’re living in the past dude! So keep laughing it up. Like Planck said, “science advances one funeral at a time.” So what do you do to preserve your atheistic world view? You look the other way just like when you said “It must simply be regarded as a new fundamental ‘‘given’’ phenomenon in nature, which is different from other fundamental ‘‘givens,’’ like gravity or electromagnetism.” And a “given” explains anything? Sounds like the “God of the Gaps argument” only for you it’s the “Given of the Gaps.” And I can’t help but notice how atheists slip God through the back door with words like “nature”. It’s like somehow that explains anything. Funny how that works.
I’m paraphrasing but I recall a statement by an astrophysicist which basically said that any idiot will accept a proof. It’s an intelligent man that can accept a reasonable argument. All of these questions I have asked should get any man of intelligence wondering and reconsidering his materialist position. To me, your staunch insistence on materialism demonstrates even more that there are two spirits in the world-the one that loves God and the other that will do everything in their means to deny Him. Like John Lennox said, “There’s a battle for our minds.”
As for John Edwards, my insistence that consciousness is primal rather than some secondary spin-off (look at thermodynamics and Roger Penrose to explain how something hugely complex must have been first rather than the Dawkins view of bottom-up)doesn’t rely on my belief in him. He may well be the phony you say. I have seen guys like Chris Angel and others pull off stunts that leave you mesmerized and wondering how? And yet we all know they are tricks. But I have also watched cold readers and John and I am far more impressed with John’s readings and he has in fact named names unlike what others have said. I don’t know if he’s real but if he isn’t, he’s still talented and an ******* for leaching off the misery of the bereaved. I’ll give you that.
I hope the people here can see that two people can have the same science and information and yet reach entirely different conclusions. You would say my conclusions are based on wishful thinking giving me your Freudian analysis. But I could turn it around and apply Freud to you as well, like your disbelief is also based on wishful thinking so as to escape accountability to the mind and maker of this universe-the big Kahuna Consciousness that’s gonna kick all our $#@ some day! I’m half kidding.
And oh yes, give me proof that Edwards is a phony. Can you provide that other than the conjecture of skeptics? John submitted himself to triple blind studies at University Of AZ and the Amazing Randi was invited by Schwartz to replicate his results but Randi declined. Interesting, eh?
Do you think I am under the illusion that I will somehow convince you that God and the Ghost are real? Of course not. I’ve lived long enough to know that the vast majority of people are pig headed and unswerving in their loyalty to a world view. Am I the same way? Not necessarily. I was an atheist. One of the reasons for this is that I’ve come to notice that atheists are generally nasty people. That says a lot.
 
Thanks for the support Quarky. As a "believer" I have certainly thrown myself in with the sharks haven't I? Even a purely naturalistic world view would do better to assume agnosticism rather than atheism. Atheism presumes proof against a negative-the very thing atheists tell us they are no obliged to provide as you cannot disprove a negative. With the admittance that they cannot disprove what they deny, how then can they be so dogmatic in their insistance there is no "ghost in the machine?" There are smart people who post here but even smart people can make assertions they are not prepared to give evidence for. I say evidence and not PROOF. There's a difference.
 
Perhaps you can clarify for me what science is being encroached upon and in an unreasonable fashion? What science is being negated by the principle of dualism? I am not saying there are not brain correlates to consciousness -the "easy" problem, the real mystery is causation and subjective experience and the temporally on-going sense of "I". Which science accounts for those phenomena because you would have to give us that before you can insist that one needs to be negligent of the science to believe John Edwards may be genuine. I am waiting for an answer and if you can provide the proof (You know, the same proofs demanded by the skeptics) then step up and get the Nobel Prize. You'd deserve it!
 
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