Tests Prove Mediums Really Can Contact Dead
Nyarlathotep
Philosopher
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So ruling out cold reading=testing cold reading=not a test of mediumship?
How is eliminating those things that are not mediumship not testing for mediumship? Has someone invented a ghost detector and if so are proton packs far behind?
How is eliminating those things that are not mediumship not testing for mediumship? Has someone invented a ghost detector and if so are proton packs far behind?
Loki
Graduate Poster
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Clancie,
We'll have to disagree about the "outline" thing, Clancie. I watched the LKL appearance, and was disappointed that Randi's proposal seemed 'unclear' - disappointed because I felt it weakened his case, and the entire thing is about "public relations". The LKL appearance was discussed on the Forums over the next few days, and the concensus was that "he couldn't possibly have meant EXACTLY what he said - it's too flawed". This is still the case - I believe Randi would never agree to test Sylvia according to the letter of proposal he made on LKL. Chance alone would give Sylvia a strong possibility of winning. If and when Sylvia decides to be tested, the REAL protocol - based entirely on the LKL proposal, but with the details straigthened out - will be developed, agreed to, and published.
But this misses the point!!! Sylvia and Randi know exactly who they are, and what the 'game' is they are engaged in. Sylvia's a fraud, she knows it, Randi knows it, and she knows he knows it! There is no legitimate testing to be done here - this is just posturing by both parties to try and win the PR battle. If you watched the LKL appearance, you would have seen Sylvia reveal her true self and motives - the "anti-god' opening comments; the innuendo at the end about Randi and "the police" and her "knowing somethings". A week after the appearance, Sylvia's web site carried a link to a web site that once again raised the Randi/sex-scandal allegations, including transcripts of the phone taps. She's playing to win - Randi can hurt her business bad, and she has no intentions of going down quietly.
Sorry Clancie, but I think you're being far too "academic" about this. IMO Randi and Sylvia both know the truth, and Randi was "slack" in his test proposal because he knows damn well it will never NEVER come to that.
Again, this is semantics - no one can "test mediumship" since no one can define or describe the mechanism and it's limitations. The R&R test is NOT a test of mediumship, it's a test to eliminate cold reading and 'generic reading'. The principle is "if we elimiante these, what's left? - ADC!". Randi's test is identical - it seeks to show that Sylvia CANNOT eliminate the simple possibility of "generic readings". If Sylvia took and passed the Randi test, it would not "prove" ADC, it would disprove "generic reading" (of course, this assumes a much better 'Randi test" that the documented one!)
I feel compelled to answer, since the "ouline" comment is one I've made, and the "pass any test" statement appears to possibily refer to my Camille Walsh comments.
We'll have to disagree about the "outline" thing, Clancie. I watched the LKL appearance, and was disappointed that Randi's proposal seemed 'unclear' - disappointed because I felt it weakened his case, and the entire thing is about "public relations". The LKL appearance was discussed on the Forums over the next few days, and the concensus was that "he couldn't possibly have meant EXACTLY what he said - it's too flawed". This is still the case - I believe Randi would never agree to test Sylvia according to the letter of proposal he made on LKL. Chance alone would give Sylvia a strong possibility of winning. If and when Sylvia decides to be tested, the REAL protocol - based entirely on the LKL proposal, but with the details straigthened out - will be developed, agreed to, and published.
But this misses the point!!! Sylvia and Randi know exactly who they are, and what the 'game' is they are engaged in. Sylvia's a fraud, she knows it, Randi knows it, and she knows he knows it! There is no legitimate testing to be done here - this is just posturing by both parties to try and win the PR battle. If you watched the LKL appearance, you would have seen Sylvia reveal her true self and motives - the "anti-god' opening comments; the innuendo at the end about Randi and "the police" and her "knowing somethings". A week after the appearance, Sylvia's web site carried a link to a web site that once again raised the Randi/sex-scandal allegations, including transcripts of the phone taps. She's playing to win - Randi can hurt her business bad, and she has no intentions of going down quietly.
Sorry Clancie, but I think you're being far too "academic" about this. IMO Randi and Sylvia both know the truth, and Randi was "slack" in his test proposal because he knows damn well it will never NEVER come to that.
It's not wrong, it's essential. It's the only way forward. That's why R&R take the same approach as Randi.
There is no such thing as a test of mediumship! Can you explain to me ANY way in which any pro-mediumship researcher has proposed to control for "super-psi" versus "after death communications"? ALL pro-ADC research is 'negative' based, in that it simply works by saying "we've eliminated all other answers, so ADC must be the one remaining possibility". Of course, the problem with this approach is that it offers no way of separating ANY 'paranormal' abilities from each other. Randi's test is simply designed to show that Sylvia HASN"T eliminated all possibilities.
Again, this is semantics - no one can "test mediumship" since no one can define or describe the mechanism and it's limitations. The R&R test is NOT a test of mediumship, it's a test to eliminate cold reading and 'generic reading'. The principle is "if we elimiante these, what's left? - ADC!". Randi's test is identical - it seeks to show that Sylvia CANNOT eliminate the simple possibility of "generic readings". If Sylvia took and passed the Randi test, it would not "prove" ADC, it would disprove "generic reading" (of course, this assumes a much better 'Randi test" that the documented one!)
Hi Loki,
Just to clarify. I was actually thinking of a post by the Boy Paj.
And we agree about R&R, in what you said here:
As for Sylvia's part in the Challenge protocol Randi proposed, I'm much more interested in what we can learn from Randi's idea of test design (and whether people are consistent in their standards of good paranormal testing with regard to it) than I am about Sylvia. I see her response, lack of response, ability, lack of ability as totally and completely irrelevant to the points I'm interested in regarding the Challenge.
Loki
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Clancie,
I think you understand me, but just to be sure...
If there's anything to learn about Randi from examining this specific case, I think it's that he (a) only has so many hours in the day, so he has to spend his time where it's worth spending and (b) he really really dislikes Sylvia, and doesn't for one second have any illusions about what she is and what she does.
I think you understand me, but just to be sure...
I understand, but I think you're picking a poor example to work from if your proposal is to "Analysis Randi's general approach to testing claims by closely examining his approach to testing a specific claim - in this case, the Sylvia claim". I believe in this particular case the protocol put up Randi is flawed NOT becuase Randi doesn't know it, NOT because he doesn't care about proper testing protocols, but because he knew it was a meaningless offer. Sylvia wasn't going to touch it no matter what he said, so why bother making it a 'tight' and 'formal' testing protocol? They were sparing, trying to score PR points off each other. It wasn't, and isn't ever, going to go any further.
If there's anything to learn about Randi from examining this specific case, I think it's that he (a) only has so many hours in the day, so he has to spend his time where it's worth spending and (b) he really really dislikes Sylvia, and doesn't for one second have any illusions about what she is and what she does.
Feel free to draw some general conclusions about Randi's 'testing methodologies' from the Sylvia example if you wish - but I still feel your barking up the wrong tree here. This specific case is about "how Randi chooses to deal with Sylvia" not "how Randi chooses to test claims" - but you can of course disagree!
TheBoyPaj said:There you go again. "Fall for it"
Fall for what? If someone offered me a one in ten (at worst) chance of a million dollars, I'd jump at it!
Hey, that's a thought. I wonder if he'd offer me the same protocol?
Sheesh more reading an ulterior meaning into something that had no ulterior motive.
I was meaning fall for it, in her thinking that the odds were better than they are and thus losing her cash cow (with the cow bit being redundant when discussing SB) due to her own greed.
I know I would have jumped at the chance for that protocol if I was a psychic (assuming its real), 20 minutes work for a million dollars (assuming that JR was willing to forgo the prelim-test for SB).
Obviously SB didnt like the fact that she would most likely fail and lose her lucrative business.
Clancie said:
I provided a clarification. Email is by far the easiest way to get someone's attention on the Internet. It also helps readers connect with the authors directly. However, it follows, that if the author is already posting here, or anywhere else, or - for that matter - makes a public appearance, the author should be open to questions about the article.
It encourages a free debate, a free exchange of ideas, and the acceptance that you could be wrong.
How can you possibly object to that?
Clancie said:
It is very consistent with my usual "attitude": If you have a question, email the author. I also said that SkepticReport is not a message board.
Clancie, it seems to me that you have now put me back on ignore. If you have, then I find it extremely disingenious of you to ignore my explanations and clarifications.
You seem determined to misunderstand my point. You seem determined to nitpick at certain wordings, when explanations and clarifications are there in abundance. You just don't want to read them.
I have offered to publish an article of yours in SkepticReport, a magazine for skepticism and critical thinking, you asked if I would publish it, and I said yes.
What did you expect? If you thought you could publish and walk away, you were wrong. If you thought you would never have to answer to criticism, you were wrong. If you thought you could use SkepticReport as a pulpit, you were wrong.
Write the article. It will be published, if it has skeptical value. Be open-minded. Answer your critics. Just like everybody else. No freebies. No favors. No exceptions.
How can you possibly object to that?
(Deleted since some external force made me post into the wrong thread! Well must have been external otherwise I'd have to admit to making a mistake.)
When it would have been just as productive to deal with the criticisms given about the R&R test. However, you jumped in so quick redirecting the focus to Randi's test design that no one really had a chance to make a comment on the R&R test design. Although some have still commented on it.Clancie said:
Interrogating is a gross overstatement in my opinion. Most people gave the opinion that they didn't think the design read that way that they could remember, then on re-reading almost all restated that yes, as it read, it was not a good protocol. No where did I say you answering questions derailed the thread so don't put words in my mouth. However, your very first post in my opinion did change the focus of the thread, that's what we seem to disagree with.
That's what tends to happen when you change the focus of the thread and then start going back and forth with people about it.
Damned if we do, damned if we don't no?
Again focusing on the negatives.
Yes. You have. You just obviously don't agree or don't feel like addressing them. Read my post, the only part of it you didn't comment on:
See above. Sylvia has not provided him with a specific claim. He has given her a test protocol based on something he can quantify, cold reading, and asked if she thinks she could succeed under it. She seemed to agree that she could. This is all he can do barring her giving him a description of her mediumship process. There is no seeming one-size-fits-all for the process of mediumship, everyone talks about it somewhat differently.
And yet again we don't know Sylvia's specific paranormal claim. The paranormal claim varies in different degree's depending on the medium. If Randi picked one, then he'd likely have to revise it again depending on what any particular medium stated their "claimed" process was. Which again they are free to do. Everyone agree's that if Sylvia simply accepted this test, she'd be agreeing to a poor protocol.
Fair enough. I'll have to read it in more detail. However, while I understand mediums say things don't work that way, I think there should be no place for the results having to be interpreted. If this is a form of communication at all, if they can get first names, and numbers and months, why do we never see spirits giving dates of birth, or the time of their death, or their address, social insurance number, or any other large number of easily identifying information that should consistent with the process of mediumship, be able to be communicated?Loki said:
Some say if a medium came up and gave this information they would just assume hot reading, and in that case rightly so. But if mediumship is true, the medium is just relaying information from the spirit communicator. Are we then to assume that all spirits are of the opinion that by giving specific numerical data to identify themselves, that it could be construed as hot reading, and therefore never think to provide it? This is such a glaring problem for the process of mediumship that it is a large factor in what makes me doubt the supposed process.
If mediumship is real, spirits not trying to give this information makes no sense. If mediumship is bunk, then it makes all the sense in the world for live mediums to not provide this information as it too easily implies cheating, or forehand knowledge of the sitter. So they go the vague subjective route. I just don't think there's a very solid way of testing this that involves interpretation of results and subjective scoring and fitting of information given.
Well, if you don't want "me" to keep derailing the thread, I will simply say that, imo, Randi would leave nothing to chance, especially involving a million dollars. I think he gave the protocol -very- careful thought before suggesting it to Sylvia. To do otherwise would have been sloppy and irresponsible. He has laid out all the "hows", including participants, methodology of testing and even claimed statisitical support for the scoring and judging of the results. But...we disagree.
Yes...why don't we table this topic so "I" am not derailing it further?
As I pointed out before, the R&R protocol is a good one and is testing for mediumship, not cold reading.
davidhorman
Muse
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Sloppy? Isn't that exactly what you're claiming (and most of us are agreeing) the proposed protocol to be?
I don't think a protocol can be very carefully thought out and sloppy, but I suppose it depends on the thinker...
David
My point wasn't that he gave it careful thought. I'm sure he did. The main difference here is that as it applies to the challenge, the majority of the time people submit their claim to Randi. Therefore he has the claim to work with and design a protocol around. In Sylvia's case he was pretty much calling her out, challenging her to prove herself. So in this case he did not receive a stated claim from her. Instead he based a protocol around his claim that she cold reads and asked if she could succeed at it. I think this is a rather crucial point in the whole Sylvia mess. Is the protocol poor? Yes, we all agree, so lets move on.Clancie said:
My main problem with the R&R protocols is that it still relies on a large part to subjective rating of application of information to the sitter, judged by them. This is the fundamental flaw in all of these test protocols in my opinion. From what I understand the people sitting down are aware that there is a medium, that mediumship is what is being tested. This right off the bat introduces unwanted bias. People that believe will look harder, or knowing that this is information that was potentially "given" about them from a source, may try harder to make it fit, or vice versa, not make it fit. There is absolutely zero reason for the audience to be aware that mediumship is what is being tested.
If this protocol had to be used my first change would be to eliminate the possibility of any of the audience members knowing that what they were there for. I would disguise it as a simple survey about their personal information, or perhaps a personality test. Which of this information pertains to you and your life. That would be an instant improvement in my books. The second the audience has any idea the information is coming from a medium is to introduce a subjective bias.
*groan* not another thread on this!
"My main problem with the R&R protocols is that it still relies on a large part to subjective rating of application of information to the sitter, judged by them. This is the fundamental flaw in all of these test protocols in my opinion." [voidx]
OK, point taken. BUT, and it's a big BUT, There really isn't any way around this, feasibly. There is only one person who can possibly comment on the medium's performance - the sitter. Nobody else could understand the personal content. Therefore, the sitter must be invloved in the scoring process. I suppose the only adjustment which could be made to this would be the type of sitter. I can't see how this could make any difference, because these minor adjustments will never convince hardened sceptics.
"If this protocol had to be used my first change would be to eliminate the possibility of any of the audience members knowing that what they were there for. I would disguise it as a simple survey about their personal information, or perhaps a personality test. Which of this information pertains to you and your life." [voidx]
I'm trying to imagine this, honestly, but I cannot see how this could ever reasonably work; unless the audience were actually thick as two planks, it wouldn't take long for the penny to drop. The medium would have to completely change his/her style of delivery, which would most likely impact negatively on the quality of the content, and it would still be hard to fool anyone. Can you imagine being shown into a small room, given random seat numbers, and hearing through a microphone from another room such comments as; 'did your father die in a car crash?', 'I have an old woman here with bright hair', etc.? There is no way that could be disguised as a personality test.
"The second the audience has any idea the information is coming from a medium is to introduce a subjective bias." [voidx]
Agreed...I think universally. But a strict and rigid scoring system would, I think, minimise the effects to at least some extent.
As I have said before, I am all for the R/R methods. It is unfortunate that so many people in these threads comment on it without ever having read the papers! I'm not aiming that at anyone in particular but it seems that way to me. More frustrating is that most posters seem to have gathered their information from the sunday herald article linked on the other R/R-related post, which is ridiculously vague and actually incorrect. Who else has recently, is planning to in the near future or is currently doing any BETTER resarch with mediums? (Apart from Randi of course, ho ho ho)
Anyone who is interested, please try to get hold of a copy of R&R's own papers. I suggest reading paper 3 (last one) first. SPR (UK) Journal, january 2004. www.spr.ac.uk
There's my tuppence worth
"My main problem with the R&R protocols is that it still relies on a large part to subjective rating of application of information to the sitter, judged by them. This is the fundamental flaw in all of these test protocols in my opinion." [voidx]
OK, point taken. BUT, and it's a big BUT, There really isn't any way around this, feasibly. There is only one person who can possibly comment on the medium's performance - the sitter. Nobody else could understand the personal content. Therefore, the sitter must be invloved in the scoring process. I suppose the only adjustment which could be made to this would be the type of sitter. I can't see how this could make any difference, because these minor adjustments will never convince hardened sceptics.
"If this protocol had to be used my first change would be to eliminate the possibility of any of the audience members knowing that what they were there for. I would disguise it as a simple survey about their personal information, or perhaps a personality test. Which of this information pertains to you and your life." [voidx]
I'm trying to imagine this, honestly, but I cannot see how this could ever reasonably work; unless the audience were actually thick as two planks, it wouldn't take long for the penny to drop. The medium would have to completely change his/her style of delivery, which would most likely impact negatively on the quality of the content, and it would still be hard to fool anyone. Can you imagine being shown into a small room, given random seat numbers, and hearing through a microphone from another room such comments as; 'did your father die in a car crash?', 'I have an old woman here with bright hair', etc.? There is no way that could be disguised as a personality test.
"The second the audience has any idea the information is coming from a medium is to introduce a subjective bias." [voidx]
Agreed...I think universally. But a strict and rigid scoring system would, I think, minimise the effects to at least some extent.
As I have said before, I am all for the R/R methods. It is unfortunate that so many people in these threads comment on it without ever having read the papers! I'm not aiming that at anyone in particular but it seems that way to me. More frustrating is that most posters seem to have gathered their information from the sunday herald article linked on the other R/R-related post, which is ridiculously vague and actually incorrect. Who else has recently, is planning to in the near future or is currently doing any BETTER resarch with mediums? (Apart from Randi of course, ho ho ho)
Anyone who is interested, please try to get hold of a copy of R&R's own papers. I suggest reading paper 3 (last one) first. SPR (UK) Journal, january 2004. www.spr.ac.uk
There's my tuppence worth
davidhorman said:
Here are some quotes of what Clancie thinks of the test:
Clancie said:
I think what Clancie is saying is that she feels that Randi did not do a good job of designing a test for Sylvia. Clancie has a better design. However, we cannot see it. She was going to "save" it for the article she was going to write for SkepticReport. This article, I fear, will never be written, because Clancie realized that she had to answer to criticism about it.
So, it all boils down to this:
- Clancie has many complaints about the test.
- Clancie claims to be able to do better.
- Clancie refuses to let us see how, because she doesn't want to listen to criticism herself.
I could be wrong, of course. I could receive the article from Clancie in my email. Any day soon.
I know there's really no way around it and people are simply working with what they've got so to speak. To my mind though the fact that the performance is so geared towards the sitter is what makes me a little skeptical in the first place. If a medium could without any prompting from me give me a list of details about the spirit they were relaying information for, it would have detail, and really, without any scoring from the sitter could be shown to be accurate. "I have Tim Jones sitting with me today, and yes, I'm getting information from Tim's Uncle, name...Fred Lindsay, date of birth...April 10th, 1943. Fred is now showing me..." and on from there. We could verify this information knowing simply who the sitter is, without them having to do any judging. I know this does not happen, but there's no reason techinically it shouldn't or couldn't. And that it does not makes me suspicious of the whole process. But since I'm sure most everyone knows my take on that I'll let it rest.CPL593H said:
True enough, point taken.
Agreed certainly. The R&R protocol itself seems quite improved from previous ones I'll admit. I haven't checked your link as of yet, but what I'd actually like to see before I judge their conclusion is just what kind of information was being given, how vague, how general, how specific. I've read the links provided in the linked threads at the start(rather than Winston's link, which I also read but found lacking in information of the actual protocol), which also had a link to Mark Tidwell's review of the protocol which seemed pretty thorough.
I assume the only source for these papers currently is through SPR which requires you to be a paid member? I'm not saying anything negative about this, but rather that if there was a source I could read them from without having to pay, I'd much prefer it.
Well, this was addressed to me, and I -do- need to respond. To begin with, I never said I thought the test was sloppy. I think it is flawed, david, and that what I see as being design flaws are intentional. I think Randi's intention was absolutely to get Sylvia to agree on a test of cold reading rather than a test of mediumship. I think everything else I've criticized (and that's almost all parts of it) were thought through to support that goal.
I do not think Randi is a man who would be careless with a million dollars and the PR it involves--nor do I think he is someone who would leave important JREF matters like the Million Dollar Challenge up to chance. I think the flaws are planned and, in that, are very revealing.
But...we all disagree...so....onward with Robertson and Roy.
(Now, back to R&R....)