UncaYimmy:
Not a single person has expressed a belief in her abilities. The only reason anyone wants a study is to prove to her that she has no abilities. Yet how has Anita twisted this?
I am working on falsifying a non-ability or proving a paranormal ability which ever it may be. I have repeatedly failed to falsify my paranormal claim on my own which is why I need the assistance of skeptics. Not because I'd be deluded or because I'd be interpreting the results in favor of an ability, but because of compelling apparent accuracy and not a single case of inaccuracy. I for one think this is exciting.
The scale will stay on the health forms. It will help to establish to what extent an ailment must be perceived by the volunteer in order for me to perceive it. And that will be very helpful toward selecting volunteers with ailments for a test.
For scoring the study I will leave it to the discretion of the FACT Skeptics to disregard the when and extent columns entirely if they feel that that is the most appropriate for extracting some results from the study. I however am curious. I am not only trying to find out whether there is a paranormal ability, a cold reading ability, or no ability in acchieving accurate health information, I also want to find out more in general about what it is capable of. Also I could draw conclusions which I could add to make a more specific claim regarding what I think I can and can not do.
She told us the park people said no and that we "dare" not tell her that she didn't try. But in the published exchange they said yes, just that they wouldn't reserve open space or allow a booth. They explicitly suggested that she reserve a room or pavilion.
If you read the first response from
Park and Recreation,
"Anita: I have reviewed the information and we are not going to permit this in a park setting. I wish you the best in this endeavor. It sounds very interesting."
how can you argue when I interpret this e-mail that we are not allowed to have the study in the park? The next e-mail response arrived later that evening,
"you can reserve a room or a shelter and do what you have described, but we won't reserve open space in a park or allow you to set up a booth in a park. You would need to contact the city of charlotte about streets and sidewalks, but my guess is they will not permit it either."
So at this point I did not have a clear message that would tell me that it IS permissible to conduct the study in a park. Forgive me if I do not want to try to "interpret" their words to make it lean in my favor. What I want is a clear yes before I take me and "my crew" to the park because I am the organizer of this event and if me and my FACT Skeptics get in trouble because of me, I just won't let that happen. No one who is respectable arranges an event and involves other people in it without having specific permission to use the location. So therefore I am writing another e-mail to Park and Recreation where I specify that we only need very little space and ask for a more clear answer as to whether the study can be held. I will also contact the city of Charlotte to ask whether we could have the study at the public street.
I know that we are all eager to produce some sort of results to proceed in this investigation, but that will not make me do this in a careless manner that would end up harming myself, my participants, or the volunteers involved.
She made a big stink about not involving her university, yet twice today she has put forth the idea of using students as assistants and/or volunteers. It's not like this hasn't been suggested a dozen times or more. And it's not like she has actually, you know, taken any steps. She just "might" look into it.
I am naturally going to be careful if involving my university in this unconventional paranormal investigation. Maybe those of you who attended college and took it to the Ph.D. level as I will can relate to this. Now that my study is designed and I have spoken about it with persons such as with Park and Recreation and begun to feel that perhaps it is not as bad as it could have been, I feel better about involving people in it. Only now that I feel more confident about this investigation do I consider the involvement of students to be an option. Still I would not involve professors or involve any of the university itself in my investigation.
She was told repeatedly that she should do the study with the skeptics group. You remember, the one run by the guy who actually printed out the forms I created and brought them to not one, but two meetings that Anita attended. She blamed the lack of testing on them not making time, but now she's asking them to hold a special meeting just for her to review her protocol and questionnaire. This is after I told her that the more she sees and talks to these people, the less viable they are as candidates because they violate the no seeing and no talking rules. I guess she needs them because all of our suggestions suck.
I was not going to use the local skeptics as volunteers until I was ready with the design of the study and with my health forms. The local skeptics are going to be the most valuable volunteers I can find so I do not intend to waste that by using health forms that are not as good as mine or until I have thoroughly thought about what I want to learn with the study.
I have sent an e-mail to the local skeptics group asking for an extra meeting this month of February for me to have the study with the skeptics as volunteers. I suggested Saturday February 7. Oh UncaYimmy, stop nagging.
After her tantrum, she's acting all nice and giddy. She's calling people brilliant and throwing around smililes and virtual hugs. The manipulation is so transparent.
I do put my foot down if you guys go overboard with the nonsensical insults and unfounded criticism that strays away from the investigation. However I always remain as friendly and delightful throughout everything, whereas some of you guys are showing some grumpy attitude.
The reason she is happy is that she successfully avoided any real testing. The reason she got all worked up last week was because she painted herself in to a corner by claiming the test was really going to happen. And then she realized what she had done. So what did she do? She added the scale and time frames so there was no possible way to falsify her claim. And then she tried to make sure that the park administrators would say no. When that didn't work, she just pretended they said no. In her back pocket she had the fact that she hadn't actually confirmed that she had four assistants in her pool of six skeptics who expressed interest, much less that they were available.
UncaYimmy, it is unscientific of you to state your assumptions as established facts in which you hold belief. It is better to adopt a more humble form of presenting your ideas where you reserve the possibility that your ideas just might not conform with reality after all. "The reason she is happy is that she successfully avoided any real testing." is entirely untrue, yet you believe in it. That shows to me at least that you are not always going to be a reliable source and that what you say must be inspected carefully. The reason I am happy is because I just might have a study with the skeptics as the volunteers this Saturday and because there are still hopes that I can hold the study with the public as volunteers after all, and I am finally approaching making progress in my investigation. And that is why I am happy.
The now and extent columns can be entirely disregarded by the FACT Skeptics if they want to interpret the results of the study. As I have clearly stated and as you have clearly disregarded the now and extent columns are for educational purposes. I want to understand how recent and how strong ailments I am able to claim to perceive. I do need this knowledge in order to make a more specific paranormal claim by which a test would be designed.
I did not intend for Park and Recreation to say no. As a
scientist science student you do not request a facility to reserve you laboratory space and tell them that you just want to do some simple and safe experiments all the while withholding the information that your experiments could be potentially explosive or leave toxic chemical fumes in the facility. You are required to present the procedure in full. My investigation involves other people and their health information and I consider myself to be fully required to ensure that my investigation is in accordance with law and harmless to those who participate. I will not be ridiculed by you for choosing not to withhold crucial information, information that does need to be known by the management and does need approval. These are my morals and my principles. If you do not like it, so what.
I did not receive a clear yes from Park and Recreation. The first e-mail from them did imply that the study itself is not permissible. The second e-mail seemed to imply that the study itself was permissible but that the problem was in reserving space. Due to these seemingly contradictory statements I need to contact them again and ask them to clarify. As a
scientist science student the words and statements that you work by may not be interpreted by you in your favor. You do not misinterpret a statement and then say "oh, I did this wrong, it's because I didn't understand what you said". Science is written very clearly and specificly and in a way that leaves no room for misinterpretation or miscommunication. *I'm just trying to be a
delightful little science munchkin.*
Six skeptics had said that they were available for the study this weekend. We could have done with fewer if we had to. I just really wanted to get started asap, and I would have made it work. But I will not use a location without specific consent to do so.
Did she think we wouldn't notice? Does she think we're that dumb? Have we seen this before?
You are just being ridiculous. I will not use a facility or space for an event of a controversial and possibly disturbing kind without permission to do so. You can think what you like, UncaYimmy. But I do not break the rules. I don't care if this delayed the study, of course I am disappointed that it did. The study will take place and a location will be found.
Remember back when she was all pumped about doing chemical identification tests? You know, the ones where she was told which was which after each trial with the uncovered cups? When she introduced proper controls (well, except the on about checking her guesses after each trial), she started failing. So in one sitting she removed control after control (number of cups, covers, wetting just the target) until it looked like she was doing okay. Then she stopped because it made her feel sick, but she said she wanted to try further tests. She never did because we found out later it always made her feel sick.
The chemical identification tests give me a serious headache and nausea because these kind of perceptions occur very infrequently so when I force myself to have them repeatedly over a short period of time it is an extensive effort. When it comes to medical perceptions I have more experience and more frequent perceptions and I have never experienced the same difficulties. Besides I was getting 9 out of 10 correct in the chemical identification tests. And it is not my main claim that I am investigating.
She was all gung ho about testing people with photographs and videos. When she finally had people to test, she failed. Then she quit doing it altogether because that wasn't her main claim. She want to concentrate on diagnosing people in person.
No, you guys insisted that I try and I did to satisfy everyone's curiosity including mine. I have never claimed to perceive from pictures transmitted over the internet. That's like if a guy claims to be a really good marathon runner and you read their resume where they say that yeah sometimes they also do biking and swimming just to keep their strength up and you don't want to bother setting up a run track so you ask that they swim across the English Channel. You sillies. What I have experienced with the other aspects of the perceptions have never been frequent enough or compelling enough for me to form a paranormal claim based on them or to put them through a scientific investigation.
When she agreed to test the crushed pills, she made a last minute request (you gotta love this) to get intact samples for comparison. She didn't. She's now spent two hours staring at them (I thought chemical identification made her sick) with zero results posted. But she'll get back to it.
Asking a chemist to take the final exams in business economics isn't exactly very clever even though they said that they know some math.
Oh, yeh! What about her survey? You know, the one at the mall where she tried to figure out what she could detect in strangers. She's gonna type up those results...eventually.
Alright UncaYimmy! Send me your mailing address right this instant and I will mail you photocopies of my notes from the survey! Then you can type them up for me will ya! It'll be a lot of work, meanwhile I am focusing on the study. Should keep you busy for a while.
