VFF Preliminary Kidney Detection Test

[Akhenaten]

Absolutely not. The Skeptics find the volunteers and by no means should they have to find 20 volunteers and then send 10 of them home and keep 10. I won't know the makeup of the test either way. Only the Skeptics will know what luck they are having in finding how many one-kidney volunteers and two-kidney volunteers, so they can either use what ever persons they have found and make a test out of that, or they can all get together before they even begin finding volunteers and randomly determine how many one-kidney persons and how many two-kidney persons to find. Look, I just used an online randomizer and it told me to use four one-kidney volunteers and six two-kidney volunteers for the test! Gee, if I were setting up the test for VFF, and I wasn't her, she would never know what numbers I came up with! Good thing I'm a clever Skeptic and I know how to use a randomizer so that I don't have to find 20 volunteers and send half of them home, because now I know what ten I have to find! Aren't I clever!

No

Of course you don't want to make the test easier for me to pass, but meanwhile surely you understand that it is in the interest of the claimant to ask for a test that best allows for her claimed ability to come through, within the limitations of ensuring a proper test. It is a matter of balancing out test requirements and the claim and meeting somewhere in the middle where both can be happy. Or how about we just try the underground bunker test? It would be really good for test purposes, and who cares about that "vibrational stuff" that VFF claims to detect, it doesn't exist anyway and she's going to fail the test anyway.

You are going to have to drop this "claimant" and "researcher" nonsense.

You present no credible argument supporting a skill in either of these røles, let alone both at once.

Notwithstanding the above, objectivity demands that you can't be both.

This is something you have never, and never will, understand.

ETA: Bring extra volunteers in case I need to pass on some.

No.

 

[VisionFromFeeling]

If we are testing apples to see how many seeds they produce, we go out and find apples and open them up and count the seeds. If we run out of apples, we do not extrapolate the results and guess on apples that are not there.

In science we must only analyze the data sets that are available.

So if I make 9 perceptions we test the accuracy of those. If I don't have the tenth perception we do not make one up ie. I am not forced to guess so that we can have our desired ten data sets.

 

[Akhenaten]

Good point. I will have to think about that, I think you are right, even though of course as a claimant I would like to be allowed to pass if I wasn't certain with a person. But if you are right, of course I would try a test where I am not allowed to pass. Just make sure you guys aren't making a really hard test for me, if a test could allow me to pass on a couple volunteers then by all means let me do that.

Pass=Fail

Why does this continually escape you?

 

[Apology]

If we are testing apples to see how many seeds they produce, we go out and find apples and open them up and count the seeds. If we run out of apples, we do not extrapolate the results and guess on apples that are not there.

In science we must only analyze the data sets that are available.

So if I make 9 perceptions we test the accuracy of those. If I don't have the tenth perception we do not make one up ie. I am not forced to guess so that we can have our desired ten data sets.

If you cannot perceive the kidneys of any of the subjects, that counts as a fail. This is your claim, that you can see kidneys inside the body. If you can't see kidneys inside the body, then your claim is invalid, end of story.

 

[Sun Countess]

but one isn't supposed to see a kidney through the clothes and back of a person just by looking? And surely we wouldn't use the same persons twice on a test? Their specific outline and movements would give them away!

If you see ten people in person, nine of whom know they are there as decoys and one who knows she is the only target, you're not perceiving the number of kidneys. You're trying to pick which of the ten people is hiding something.

Why did you want 30 minutes and why do you still insist on 15 minutes per volunteer? It's not to see their kidneys, which you cannot do. It's to see which people give off a vibe of, "I'm so bored, I can't believe I agreed to do this, there are plenty of people with two kidneys out there, how did I get roped into this...." versus the one person giving off a vibe, "OMG, I hope I'm not giving away that I'm the one with only one kidney. Is she looking at my left side? Can she tell it was my left kidney that was removed? Oh no, I just glanced at my left as I said that. Breathe. Stay calm, act normal, OMG why is she still staring at me?"

The way your test is designed, you're picking a person who has something to hide, not a person with one kidney. That's not paranormal. Since your volunteers haven't been properly blinded, will you at least see if you do better than random readers? They don't need to know that they're looking for kidneys, only that they're looking for the one target person who's been chosen especially for this study while nine know they're only there as decoys.

eta: I see you're now talking about a new design that wouldn't allow for as much hot reading, and that VfF is asking to pass on the volunteers who don't offer up visual clues about whether they're there as targets or decoys.

 

[Ashles]

What if I have medical perceptions but not always?

Then this is indistinguishable from guessing and will never be testable.
By the way that is a very old and standard excuse by claimants, especially those who claim to predict the future. They make loads of gusses then any 'hits' are claimed to be when their power was working and any 'misses' are when their power was off.
But the moment you say this is what is happening with your claim it is effectively over. It could never be tested. And it would colossally contradict your previous stories.
By the way, what about the excellent suggested protocol of simpoy detecti a live human behind a screen? You wanted a protocol - that is by far the best one yet and completely fits in with what you have claimed to be able to reliably detect.

 

[Akhenaten]

<snip>

ETA: Akhenaten, what is a "full-body test"?

This:

It seems that we have overlooked probably the easiest test that could be done.
Use a full screen and VfF has to tell if there is someone on the other side or not.
10 trials and only once in the 10 trials will there be no one behind the screen.

It should be easy to for her to detect if there is a person/isn't a person behind the screen, right?

 

[Akhenaten]

If we are testing apples to see how many seeds they produce, we go out and find apples and open them up and count the seeds. If we run out of apples, we do not extrapolate the results and guess on apples that are not there.

In science we must only analyze the data sets that are available.

So if I make 9 perceptions we test the accuracy of those. If I don't have the tenth perception we do not make one up ie. I am not forced to guess so that we can have our desired ten data sets.

The above mess is the result of you pretending to be a claimant and a researcher. Put that in your data set and sort it.

 

[JoeTheJuggler]

With this new suggested test protocol, I have to work really hard with each and every volunteer. Oh well, I'll do it. But don't forget that I'm going to pass on a volunteer if I'm not absolutely certain. I won't be forced to guess. I'll either report what my perception was, or I won't try to fill in the blanks and scramble up some guess if the perception was not there and was not clear enough.

Again, the claim that for any reason you need to "work really hard" is not consistent with your original claim, "When I look at people I perceive images in my mind that depict the inside of their bodies".

You've also not satisfied me that there's any reason to require 15 minutes (or even 1 minute) for each subject other than an opportunity to cheat. Ashles has pointed out that you yourself claim you do better when you don't think about it, but just say what you see.

What exactly would you do with all that time?

How do you go about checking your answer?

This requirement for more time is not compatible with your claim that this is some sort of perception at work. It sounds more and more like you're trying to figure something out.

ETA; Do you understand why I'm grousing about you making requirements that aren't consistent with your claim? It wouldn't be fair for us (or JREF) to make a burdensome requirement that wasn't necessary to proving your claim. Similarly, your requirement for so much time merely opens up avenues for you to skew the odds in your favor by ordinary means. If you can actually perceive what's going on inside a person's body, then you ought be able to pass a test instantly. If your claim is now something else, then please say what it is.

 

[LightinDarkness]

If we are testing apples to see how many seeds they produce, we go out and find apples and open them up and count the seeds. If we run out of apples, we do not extrapolate the results and guess on apples that are not there.

In science we must only analyze the data sets that are available.

So if I make 9 perceptions we test the accuracy of those. If I don't have the tenth perception we do not make one up ie. I am not forced to guess so that we can have our desired ten data sets.

I believe the above post pretty much concludes that Anita is not a researcher or a real science student (in case anyone had any doubts). Anita, we do this all the time in real science - its called statistical significance and its not extrapolation. Statistical significance is the standard for most scientific studies because it is extremely rare that anyone can analyze the entire population of apples, or anything else.

What are they teaching you at the University of Charlotte? I expect my Political Science 101 students to know about statistical significance, I would think a hard sciences student would certainly know about it.

 

[Ashles]

If we are testing apples to see how many seeds they produce, we go out and find apples and open them up and count the seeds. If we run out of apples, we do not extrapolate the results and guess on apples that are not there.

In science we must only analyze the data sets that are available.

So if I make 9 perceptions we test the accuracy of those. If I don't have the tenth perception we do not make one up ie. I am not forced to guess so that we can have our desired ten data sets.

Then you fail your claim as explained to you above. Your claim is to be able to detect which person out of ten has a single kidney. If you can't do this you fail the claim. It's really that simple. If you are so unconfident that your 'ability' can work for ten people then this claim becomes completely indistingishable from chance and is no longer a paranormal claim. It already is pretty much a guessing game, although identifying which kidney was missing would at least raise the odds to 1 in 20 (1 in 40?).

 

[JoeTheJuggler]

If we are testing apples to see how many seeds they produce, we go out and find apples and open them up and count the seeds. If we run out of apples, we do not extrapolate the results and guess on apples that are not there.

Faulty analogy. Your claim is, "When I look at people I perceive images in my mind that depict the inside of their bodies".

Are you changing your claim now to say that only sometimes when you look at people you perceive the inside of their bodies? That's a completely different claim.

So if I make 9 perceptions we test the accuracy of those. If I don't have the tenth perception we do not make one up ie. I am not forced to guess so that we can have our desired ten data sets.

Why on earth would you be "forced to guess" if your claim that "When I look at people I perceive images in my mind that depict the inside of their bodies" is true?

It's your claim. We're trying to set up a test that would rule out guessing with some level of confidence.

 

[VisionFromFeeling]

Revised Claim: I claim that when I have a medical perception of a person's kidneys, that based on that perception I can distinguish whether the person has one or two kidneys.

The claim is not that I will be able to always know how many kidneys a person has.

I have not experienced not being able to see the kidneys in a person, but I do require the option to pass just in case the perception does not form. The accuracy will be tested based on the perceptions. I will not be forced to guess.

 

[dafydd]

Revised Claim: I claim that when I have a medical perception of a person's kidneys, that based on that perception I can distinguish whether the person has one or two kidneys.

The claim is not that I will be able to always know how many kidneys a person has.

I have not experienced not being able to see the kidneys in a person, but I do require the option to pass just in case the perception does not form. The accuracy will be tested based on the perceptions. I will not be forced to guess.

Sigh........

 

[Jeff Corey]

Revised Claim...but I do require the option to pass just in case the perception does not form. The accuracy will be tested based on the perceptions. I will not be forced to guess.

Sounds familiar. Didn't she use that out before?

 

[JoeTheJuggler]

Revised Claim: I claim that when I have a medical perception of a person's kidneys, that based on that perception I can distinguish whether the person has one or two kidneys.

This is not a paranormal claim. It could apply to me--someone who claims no paranormal powers at all. I never have such perceptions, but I could make the claim as you worded it here. With the claim as it's stated, both you and I could take a test and both of us could make a perfect score. (Mine would be zero wrong for zero perceptions.) There is no way to distinguish the two of us.

The claim is not that I will be able to always know how many kidneys a person has.

I have not experienced not being able to see the kidneys in a person,

You just contradicted yourself.

but I do require the option to pass just in case the perception does not form. The accuracy will be tested based on the perceptions. I will not be forced to guess.

No--you're changing the claim because you want to make it more difficult to discredit your claimed ability.

(ETA: That is, you want an "out" for failure. You remember when Uri Geller used the same approach on Johnny Carson? He claims this paranormal power, yet it gets shy whenever someone looks too closely--or he doesn't shy away and gets caught cheating.)

In the same breath you say you've never not been able to perceive, but you shy away from your original claim (yes, "When I look at someone" is equivalent to saying you "always" have this perception--which are both equivalent to saying you've never not been able to make this perception).

It's plain you're not serious about backing up your claim and winning a million dollars.

 

[Ashles]

So on a test in which Anita (who has claimed to reliably be able to see into people's bodies to a molecular level and has never been incorrect) has to identify which of 10 people has only one kidney we already have the current problems:

This is described as her strongest of many many claims, but it is based on a single instance which was not even reported until after the subject volunteered the information.

15 minutes could actually be considered too long per person as Anita has already said that when she starts thinking about a reading too much she says things other than what she perceived. This alows Anita an 'out'.

She might not be able to detect any information from certain people so wants to be able to have 'passes'. This allows Anita another 'out' if her ability curiously wasn't working for some or all of the volunteers.

The test is also not a perfect 1 in 10 in the sense that the one different person will know they are different so there is possibility of them iving away their identity somhow. This could be reduced by using a screen but allows Anita another 'out' if she fails to detect the kidney ('I always had doubts about using the screen').

And now she seems to be studiously ignoring the person behind the screen test (and of course much simpler tests in oter threads).
This does not seem very genuinely open to self-testing and commitment to carryng out research into her ability.

ETA: This post was made before Anita turned this claim into a children's guessing game.

 

[Giggywig]

Revised Claim: I claim that when I have a medical perception of a person's kidneys, that based on that perception I can distinguish whether the person has one or two kidneys.

The claim is not that I will be able to always know how many kidneys a person has.

I have not experienced not being able to see the kidneys in a person, but I do require the option to pass just in case the perception does not form. The accuracy will be tested based on the perceptions. I will not be forced to guess.

It is posts like these that make people like me to think you are a scam artist. What you are saying is that you have a paranormal ability, except when you don't. Well **** me sideways, that's awesome. It's also completely unfalsifiable. And for this you wanted me to participate? Not in a million years.

 

[Audible Click]

Which brings me to the question: Why do we need a paper screen in the first place? Obviously it would be better for the test, to control for various visual clues that could interfere and throw off the statistics, but one isn't supposed to see a kidney through the clothes and back of a person just by looking? And surely we wouldn't use the same persons twice on a test? Their specific outline and movements would give them away!

The reason I suggested a paper screen was because any screen had become a major sticking point in the attempt to design a protocol. If a paper screen works then we could move along to other points that need to be addressed when making a professional and viable protocol.

 

[Akhenaten]

Sounds familiar. Didn't she use that out before?

Moto perpetuo, China.