Would proof change your skeptical nature?

[Flame]

A matter of opinion.

If you don't agree with the question posed, if you think it's stupid, or pointless or badly worded, then don't answer!
No one is forcing you to participate in a discussion which you think is pointless or full of errors of one kind or another.

I'm enjoying the responses, and the discussion - and looking at the results of the poll - I don't really care if you aren't.

Toni

 

[Flame]

Option number five is picked by posting or pm'ing me.

Option number 5: This is a dumb question, and this poll means nothing to me - I do however want to waste my time responding to it anyhow, for reasons known only to myself.

Toni

 

[Flame]

I agree



I am prepared to hear that I am wrong. Are you prepared to accept that your world view won't necessarily get validation here? To accept that what you want to hear from this poll and what is said may not give you the affirmation that you appear to be seeking?

Sorry, what's my world view again? if you'd be so kind as to let me know I'd really appreciate it.
You seem to think that I need to hear what people think before I can make up my own mind.
Let me assure you, my dear, that you are dealing with no naive or easily influenced woman.
I don't know how you got your opinion of who I am and what my motives are but here's two things I'd like to say to you:

1. You have no clue about my motives - and nothing to base your assumption on. Your claim to know what I think and why is as ridiculous as Sylvia Browne's claims that she is psychic.

2. If I ever need validation, I won't seek it on an internet board full of people who for the most part I don't know, and who mean nothing to me at the end of the day (no offense to anyone ).

Toni

ps. Some have said at times that you are an insightful and intelligent poster, but due to the fact that I do not usually accept heresay as valid evidence, I'm still waiting to see that for myself.

 

[thaiboxerken]

Option number 5: This is a dumb question, and this poll means nothing to me - I do however want to waste my time responding to it anyhow, for reasons known only to myself.

Toni

It doesn't mean anything at all. People are responding to it and telling you that it's a BS poll.

 

[Flame]

It doesn't mean anything at all. People are responding to it and telling you that it's a BS poll.

Yep, some people are - and your point is?

Toni

edited to add italics

 

[PygmyPlaidGiraffe]

"Sorry, what's my world view again?"

I don't know, I am just communicating that it appeared from this statement

"so you are to assume that the couch situation happened and you were satisfied that I could, in fact perform telekinesis... With that in mind, then you answer the question."

that I did in fact get the impression:

"that You seem to think that I need to hear what people think before I can make up my own mind."

A case of jumping to conclusions, I do that quite a bit, and forget to check if my impressions are right. And there is no need to capitalise you, I am not a deity


"I don't know how you got your opinion of who I am and what my motives are but here's two things I'd like to say to you:

1. You have no clue about my motives - "

True

" and nothing to base your assumption on."

Well in my defense you did say participants need to assume and you did use if statements. I was taking you literally and took the exercise to the extreme.

"I Your claim to know what I think and why is as ridiculous as Sylvia Browne's claims that she is psychic."

That is an analogy, not necessarily an accurate one.
I never claimed I knew why. In fact I stated that I did not know why.

"2. If I ever need validation, I won't seek it on an internet board full of people who for the most part I don't know, and who mean nothing to me at the end of the day (no offense to anyone )."

If this is an honest statement, then great!

"Toni

ps. Some have said at times that you are an insightful and intelligent poster,"

Not true, that would be another behooved poster.

"but due to the fact that I do not usually accept heresay as valid evidence,"

good, testimonies are notoriously poor indicators of the way things are, as are polls.

"I'm still waiting to see that for myself."

Don't hold your breath

 

[Flame]

*screw snip, try hack!*

that I did in fact get the impression:

"that You seem to think that I need to hear what people think before I can make up my own mind."

A case of jumping to conclusions, I do that quite a bit, and forget to check if my impressions are right.

Ok, I'm one for jumping to conclusions myself (or so i'm told)

And there is no need to capitalise you, I am not a deity

A mere typo, don't let your head swell!

"I don't know how you got your opinion of who I am and what my motives are but here's two things I'd like to say to you:

1. You have no clue about my motives - "

True

" and nothing to base your assumption on."

Well in my defense you did say participants need to assume and you did use if statements. I was taking you literally and took the exercise to the extreme.


All true.


"I Your claim to know what I think and why is as ridiculous as Sylvia Browne's claims that she is psychic."

That is an analogy, not necessarily an accurate one.

Well, I meant that it was on the same level of absurdity - not that they were 'like' situations.
I never claimed I knew why. In fact I stated that I did not know why.


Yep, you did say that.




ps. Some have said at times that you are an insightful and intelligent poster,"

Not true, that would be another behooved poster.

Well, actually I heard it from the horse's mouth... and I shouldn't have said 'said' I should have said 'implied'

"but due to the fact that I do not usually accept heresay as valid evidence,"

good, testimonies are notoriously poor indicators of the way things are, as are polls.

"I'm still waiting to see that for myself."

Don't hold your breath

Well, actually I went rooting around the boards looking up your posts to satisfy myself that you were a big eejit.
Unfortuanately I wasn't able to, mostly you seem be be quite well spoken.

Just not regarding me

Toni

 

[Flame]

Who the hell voted 'yes'?

and why?

Toni

 

[athon]

Athon, everything you said in your reply I agree with.
With that line of logic you can't go far wrong... the only thing is that if I moved a truck for you *once* and could never do it again, you wouldn't give me the credit - I want the credit dammit

Seriously though, when you put it like that I can't do anything but agree.

Toni

If you moved the truck once under controlled conditions, it would pique my interest. I would then want to know why it couldn't be done again, and what was the reason it moved the first time.

I would then accuse you of drug-cheating and spread viscious rumours about you that were not true.

Athon

(as for those of you rubbishing the poll - get a life. What, aren't there any flies about you can pull wings off, or any children to torment? sheesh!)

 

[Schizobunny]

I think that I would believe telekenisis if it were some how prooven, but that has nothing to do with ghosts what so ever so why would I start to believe in them? That would be like believing in creationism just because they discovered bacteria on another planet. It would be quite vacuous to do such a thing.

 

[Ratman_tf]

I voted #2. "Yes, but only in things related to the proven case."

If someone could levitate a sofa, duplicate the feat under controlled conditions, I would probably listen to what their explanation would be. Maybe poltergeists moved it. Maybe telekinesis. Maybe aliens helped out with their keen tractor beams.

And then I would need evidence for the explanation as well, of course.

But not just general woo-wooisms. I wouldn't be inclined to believe in ghosts because someone has telekinesis. Or believe in bigfoot because someone's got a chunk of alien spacecraft.

 

[Zep]

I voted No.

As said previously, if a particular "paranormal" phenomenon is shown to reasonably exist and can stand up to decent robust scientific examination then it is no longer "paranormal" but just plain "normal". But this is the same criteria of acceptance for ANY new hypothesis undergoing examination scientifically, paranormal or otherwise.

However...

My own understanding, after some personal study over the last few years, is that the plethora of paranormal phenomena (a load of p's!), regardless of what they purport to be, do not seem to share any consistent description or hypothesis between their proponents. One may say that telekinesis is alien technology (UFO), another may say it is power-of-prayer (God), another may say it is unknown human brain forces (man).

Further, some paranormalists say that telekinesis is somehow involved in PK, some not. Some tie it to psi, some not. Some to the spiritual world, some totally deride that idea. Some feel it is all three, and more. Really, there are as many competing combinations of theories as there are paranormalists!

So what would happen if TK was shown to exist? Which paranormalists would jump on an "opposition" bandwagon rather than admit their own pet theory was a crock? Who knows... But it would be fun to watch! And would it change my skeptical nature? Heh heh, nope!

 

[Darat]

Have to vote a resounding "no".

Obviously if compelling evidence can be produced for a particular phenomenon then I'd accept that as provisionally as I accept that the sun will rise tomorrow. But it's still provisional.

I'm "sceptical" about a lot of things, indeed as a young child I had a tendency to say "not necessarily" to nearly everything (bloody annoying brat I was). If someone would say "the sky is blue" I would say "not necessarily so - at night it is black, what about at some sunsets?"

I'm not any more sceptical about the "paranormal" then I am about anything else. Granted I make a lot of rough and ready assumptions everyday but at the back of the mind I always maintain awareness that whatever it is it might "not necessarily" be true.

(Edited for a ceres of speeling misteaks.)

 

[roger]

I vote no because if you really moved the couch using TK, then your claim is based on evidence, not speculation, wishful thinking, etc. It in no way stands as evidence that wishful thinking or delusions lead to knowledge, though of course they may be accidentally correct.

If someone wants to make a claim about how the world works, then I'll need proof.

 

[Tricky]

From personal experience, I'd have to say "no". Years ago, I saw a UFO. It was quite obvious to me (at the time) that it was an alien spacecraft. Years later I recalled the incident and thought of something I hadn't thought of before that explained the whole scenario. In my youthful credulity, I might have ignored such a thing, but now as a skeptical adult, I would not trust any "proof" that was based on my observation. I've had too many waking dreams and similar experiences to trust my own powers of observation.

Show me some measurements, some controlled experiments, some mechanism, and I might believe. But as someone has already pointed out, if you have a mechanism, it is no longer paranormal. Sort of like my UFO experience.

 

[Yahweh]

Well, good solid repeatable proof would change my skepticism... of course that kind of proof will never come along, so looks like I'm bound by this straightjacket of skepticism forever, arent I?...

 

[crocodile deathroll]

From personal experience, I'd have to say "no". Years ago, I saw a UFO. It was quite obvious to me (at the time) that it was an alien spacecraft. Years later I recalled the incident and thought of something I hadn't thought of before that explained the whole scenario. In my youthful credulity, I might have ignored such a thing, but now as a skeptical adult, I would not trust any "proof" that was based on my observation. I've had too many waking dreams and similar experiences to trust my own powers of observation.

Show me some measurements, some controlled experiments, some mechanism, and I might believe. But as someone has already pointed out, if you have a mechanism, it is no longer paranormal. Sort of like my UFO experience.

I saw a UFO. Well it was green, flying and I could not identify it, so I guess that qualifies it as a UFO.

Is it flying little green men? I doubt it. I suspect it is far more likely to be a flying green garbage bag.

 

[HerNibs]

When we are discussing this proof, I am assuming that the proof hasn't rewritten the laws of physics or anything correct?

In my opinion then the proof would solidify my non-belief. If the proof explains something that was previously thought to be "magical" or from some type of mystical intervention then the believer has now shown that nature and science are correct.

So, bottom line, nope, proof would actually give me a reason to "not believe" even more.

I dunno, sounds reasonable to me.

*shrug*

 

[Jeff Wagg]

It's funny..many people voted yes and no for the same reasons.

I think what we've "proved" here is that polls can be pretty useless.

I voted Yes for items related to case, but I had to ignore the word Paranormal to do so, because once something is "proven," it's no longer paranormal.

Take pandas and mountain gorillas for example. Not too paranormal today, but 120 years ago, they were in league with the Loch Ness Monster.

 

[AOK Tiger]

I voted yes but only in related cases.

You example of a telekinesis being proven would make me much more amenable to other mind based abilities like ESP etc.

I also had to ignore the “paranormal” bit because it would then become normal.. the first proof would be the amendment to physics that allowed TK to work !