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Post by abacus9900 on Oct 5, 2010 11:53:13 GMT 1
It is very easy to ridicule the idea of survival after death and ordinarily I would not introduce such a topic on a science board, however, the question remains unanswered as to how some mediums are able to relate very personal and often idiosyncratic details of people who have passed on. The usual explanations given by skeptics are either attributed to 'cold reading', 'warm reading', or 'hot reading', but can such rationales really be responsible for ALL instances of knowledge that the 'reader' seems to be aware of in regard to people they have never met before? I would have thought the statistical chances of knowing very specific details about people would have supported the idea that certain individuals have access to information through some hitherto undefined 'channel' that science has yet to recognize.
On a more general note, how did the precursors of the primates, that eventually led to us, communicate? Before complex language got going, could there, perhaps, have been other means of 'communication' between individuals in non-verbal terms? How do other species communicate without using language? Life has been going for an immense amount of time on earth and language is a very recent development, so I was wondering, in fact, if there does exist other natural 'remote' channels of communication between individual members of species, not just the usual verbal and non-verbal forms or via the remaining 'usual' senses. In a harsh environment, where being 'aware' of certain things could have meant the difference between life and death, any ability to gain access to information 'at a distance' and beyond the normal five senses would have been conserved as an important survival strategy and would have been passed on to certain individuals, which raises the question as to whether some form of 'psychic gene' could have been passed on over the generations, even to the present day. Do mediums actually communicate with the dead or do they possess an ability to read other people's minds?
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Post by marchesarosa on Oct 5, 2010 13:18:39 GMT 1
It's a mystery!
But an interesting one, abacus.
It's strange you should raise this matter because I was talking to a friend only on Sunday who, at a loss for something to do recently, just popped into a church in another town for a few moments peaceful reflection. He found a medium was in the process of holding a meeting there.
He was almost immediately picked out as the recipient of a message and given info about his grandparents that astounded him and also about the state of his marriage (very rocky)! I keep an open mind about this stuff myself. Personally, I have never used clairvoyant or a medium. I certainly don't dismiss the idea of the supernatural, though.
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Post by abacus9900 on Oct 5, 2010 16:26:02 GMT 1
It's a mystery! But an interesting one, abacus. It's strange you should raise this matter because I was talking to a friend only on Sunday who, at a loss for something to do recently, just popped into a church in another town for a few moments peaceful reflection. He found a medium was in the process of holding a meeting there. He was almost immediately picked out as the recipient of a message and given info about his grandparents that astounded him and also about the state of his marriage (very rocky)! I keep an open mind about this stuff myself. Personally, I have never used clairvoyant or a medium. I certainly don't dismiss the idea of the supernatural, though. Exactly, so how does one explain the knowledge the medium seemed to possess of a complete stranger? I think the standard explanations used by skeptics are simply not sufficient. |
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Post by eamonnshute on Oct 5, 2010 16:49:17 GMT 1
Exactly, so how does one explain the knowledge the medium seemed to possess of a complete stranger? I think the standard explanations used by skeptics are simply not sufficient. If someone claims to have paranormal ability, the onus is on them to prove it, because it is unreasonable to expect anyone to disprove it by working out how the trick is done. So far no psychic has demonstrated their ability when cheating is impossible - and there are big financial rewards to anyone who can. On the other hand, many psychics have been shown to be cheating. On a recent Derren Brown programme a psychic knew an amazing amount about a woman which seemed impossible to know without psychic ability, but it turned out that she lived next door to the psychic's sister! It is rather like stage magicians - their tricks look amazing, but when you find out how they are done they are rather pathetic. The only difference between psychics and magicians is that magicians are honest.What is more likely, that the psychic has paranormal ability or that he is a dishonest trickster? Fantastic claims require fantastic evidence. |
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Post by principled on Oct 5, 2010 17:18:05 GMT 1
I have often wondered this when seeing how a shoal of fish move almost in unison when a predator nears. One would expect some degree of hysteresis between fish 1 seeing the predator and fish xxxx at the back of the shoal, but movement is almost instantaneous. This would seem to suggest that the fish in the shoal become "aware" of the predator at the same time, but by what mechanism?
As for mediums, I'm not sure. I always think that it's a bit like the daily horoscope. When it reflects accurately your day you think "Hmm, that's spooky", but when it is out by a mile you think "That's a load of old tosh"! The probability is that, providing it contains enough general information, it will apply to someone reading it or being in the church/audience.
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P
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Post by abacus9900 on Oct 5, 2010 17:28:20 GMT 1
"Using the standards applied to any other area of science, it is concluded that psychic functioning has been well established. The statistical results of the studies examined are far beyond what is expected by chance." Professor Jessica Utts Division of Statistics University of California, Davis www.stat.ucdavis.edu/~utts/air2.html |
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Post by abacus9900 on Oct 5, 2010 17:32:01 GMT 1
What about mediums who seem to know about very specific information they could not have possibly known about beforehand or could have possibly guessed?
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Post by eamonnshute on Oct 5, 2010 17:43:14 GMT 1
Using the standards applied to any other area of science, it is concluded that psychic functioning has been well established. The statistical results of the studies examined are far beyond what is expected by chance. "Critical analysts, including some parapsychologists, are not satisfied with experimental parapschology studies. Some reviewers, such as psychologist Ray Hyman, contend that apparently successful experimental results in psi research are more likely due to sloppy procedures, poorly trained researchers, or methodological flaws rather than to genuine psi effects." en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parapsychology#Criticism_of_experimental_resultsSo genuine phenomena, or bad science? There are many examples of bad science, and when the scientist is ignorant of the kind of tricks that people use it is hardly surprising that they reach the wrong conclusion. Why do these psychics repeatedly fail when they come up against someone like James Randi? (Or refuse to be tested by him). |
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Post by marchesarosa on Oct 5, 2010 18:00:12 GMT 1
Eamonn
The fact that nothing that is done by "mediums" cannot also be replicated by charlatans is not evidence that all mediums are charlatans, only that charlatans are clever in reading the runes.
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Post by abacus9900 on Oct 5, 2010 19:37:28 GMT 1
Well, you have to remember that Randi 'rigs' his experiments in a way that allows him to claim that no scientific demonstration has been successful in supporting this or that claim. The point about something like psi is that because what evidence there is relies on statistics Randi can claim that any given experiment or even a series of experiments has failed to substantiate its claims. It does not work like that. If remote viewing is genuine, it may not necessarily show up in any given set-up or be 100% accurate. It is the statistical analysis of a battery of tests over time that is important, not one-off demonstrations that are designed to ridicule phenomena. Randi, in my view, makes a circus of serious scientific research (do not forget that he is an accomplished trickster himself). He is hardly going to offer a substantial amount of money to someone who might seriously avoid his 'traps.'
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Post by eamonnshute on Oct 5, 2010 20:17:13 GMT 1
Randi does NOT rig his experiments (normally he doesn't even perform the experiment himself) - when people fail the test they have plenty of excuses, but not that one, so I don't know where you get that idea from. And why would he rig them? He would love to see a demonstration of the paranormal! Please don't say it is to avoid paying up - the money is not his, and even if it was he could avoid paying the money by simply not offering the prize!
The subject does not even have to achieve 100% accuracy. 50% is enough, all that matters is that the chances of winning by guesswork are less than 1 in a million. And subjects always agree beforehand that the test is fair.
As for scientific research, Randi doesn't do any, so how does he make a circus of it? All he asks is for people to demonstrate their ability. When someone succeeds the scientific investigation can begin.
Baroness Greenfield set out to prove psychic phenomena and become famous, thinking they were real, but she eventually realised that they are not. So it is not because people are biased against the idea. It is a pity that some people on this board do not have the same intellectual honesty.
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Post by abacus9900 on Oct 5, 2010 21:00:05 GMT 1
eamonn, do you know of any famous psychics who have undergone Randi's tests? Just asking.
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Post by eamonnshute on Oct 5, 2010 23:48:39 GMT 1
Several famous psychics have been challenged, and Sylvia Browne agreed to take the test, but she has refused to take the test so far. Why do you think they are so reluctant? If I was a psychic I would demand to be tested. Unfortunately on a scale of 1 to 10 my psychic ability is about the same as Uri Geller, ie zero. Challenge applicants: forums.randi.org/forumdisplay.php?f=43 |
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Post by abacus9900 on Oct 6, 2010 10:53:28 GMT 1
I'm not sure that conducting psi experiments in such a controlled and paranoid atmosphere is very conducive to attaining the optimum mental state that is required for psi functioning. If psi exists at all it might be easily disrupted by negative 'vibes', and it seems to me that Randi looks for indisputable data, which he is entitled to do, however, sometimes reality is not always as clear cut as that. Reading some of the posts on the site you provided a link for did strike me as a bit like conducting a sideshow. I'm not saying psi is a reality, but if not, how does one account for the statistical evidence produced by Prof. Utts?
Anyway, thank you for responding and I don't think there is much more we can say. I think this is one of those areas where you are either a believer or non-believer.
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Post by eamonnshute on Oct 6, 2010 11:02:23 GMT 1
I'm not sure that conducting psi experiments in such a controlled and paranoid atmosphere is very conducive to attaining the optimum mental state that is required for psi functioning. Paranoid??? The subject always agrees to the protocol before the demonstration. If they are happy with the conditions then I don't see why you would not. If the subject is a dowser they are initially asked if they can detect the water when they actually know where it is, and they always can, so the "paranoid atmosphere" obviously doesn't create difficulties. |
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