Precognition paper to be published in mainstream journal

[Jack21222]

I completely agree flex. One paper doesn't constitute perfect evidence, but it is a good starting point.

Well, one good paper would be a good starting point. This paper is no starting point at all, for the reasons I mentioned. If I take all sorts of data and start drawing lines around some of it, I'm sure I could "prove" all sorts of weird things.

"Oh look, dice throws come up as a five 3% more often on the third Tuesday of January, March, and November. We did over 1,000 dice throws every day, so the results are statistically significant."

 

[harrylin]

[I wrote: "Wow [Ionadis 2005] is an amazing paper! But yes, it looks like Bem's paper and the criticism on it is being published to provide a case example of just that problem... ]

[..]
Where'd you get that from? That paper is 5 years old and it applies to the majority of published research, not just a single ESP paper. It specifically refers to the area of biomedical research.

The criticism I referred to is the refutation by Wagenmakers at al, which apparently will be published in the same edition as Bem's paper.

 

[JaredJames]

My post was in response to what flex put (like I said). Which is regarding one paper not being enough.

I'm not saying this paper is the starting point. My comment was a general reply regarding any topic, where one paper (under the conditions outlined by flex) is a good starting point.

For me, this paper is not that starting point.

 

[FlexGunship]

Uh, right. I should've been more clear. I was NOT implying that the paper being discussed would have been "#1" in the list called "Evidence." I'm simply saying that the list called "Evidence" can't be one item long.

 

[nismaratwork]

Uh, right. I should've been more clear. I was NOT implying that the paper being discussed would have been "#1" in the list called "Evidence." I'm simply saying that the list called "Evidence" can't be one item long.

A word I love... "Indication"!

 

[FlexGunship]

I feel like I might've posted this somewhere already, but I love it, and it seems appropriate. I just hope you'll all take it with a grain of salt given the current context within this thread!

The Data So Far

But THIS guy, he might be for real!​

(Source: http://xkcd.com/373/)

 

[nismaratwork]

I feel like I might've posted this somewhere already, but I love it, and it seems appropriate. I just hope you'll all take it with a grain of salt given the current context within this thread!

The Data So Far

But THIS guy, he might be for real!​

(Source: http://xkcd.com/373/)

Sums it up for me!

 

[pftest]

This seems more accurate:

 

[nismaratwork]

This seems more accurate:

Let me get this straight; you believe claims ARE confirmed by experiment?

 

[FlexGunship]

This seems more accurate:

I don't get it.

 

[pftest]

Let me get this straight; you believe claims ARE confirmed by experiment?

Of course. Theres a gigantic amount of such experiments with reported positive results. However, it is mostly said that those experiments are flawed and thereby the results are invalid.

 

[nismaratwork]

Of course. Theres a gigantic amount of such experiments with reported positive results. However, it is mostly said that those experiments are flawed and thereby the results are invalid.

Oh, well then by all means, present the evidence that the world has been waiting for.

 

[FlexGunship]

Of course. Theres a gigantic amount of such experiments with reported positive results. However, it is mostly said that those experiments are flawed and thereby the results are invalid.

 

[nismaratwork]

Don't worry, I'm sure he's been holding back for pages, waiting to pounce! That, or he's just completely and blatantly blasting through the rules as though they don't exist.

One or the other.

 

[pftest]

Look through the references of the paper posted in OP of this topic for some of such experiments. Also just browse through this Skepticism & Debunking forum for many many more examples.

 

[nismaratwork]

Look through the references of the paper posted in OP of this topic for some of such experiments. Also just browse through this Skepticism & Debunking forum for many many more examples.

You said, "Of course. Theres a gigantic amount of such experiments with reported positive results. However, it is mostly said that those experiments are flawed and thereby the results are invalid."

You have a huge burden of proof to meet. I'd start pulling sources together; I'm browsing precisely nada for two reasons:

1.) You made a claim, you get to support it.
2.) Cracked Pottery.

 

[FlexGunship]

You said, "Of course. Theres a gigantic amount of such experiments with reported positive results. However, it is mostly said that those experiments are flawed and thereby the results are invalid."

You have a huge burden of proof to meet. I'd start pulling sources together; I'm browsing precisely nada for two reasons:

1.) You made a claim, you get to support it.
2.) Cracked Pottery.

Meh, I would call it an "off the cuff" remark. He doesn't mean it, it was just a knee-jerk reaction to your post. No need to hammer on the guy.

 

[nismaratwork]

Meh, I would call it an "off the cuff" remark. He doesn't mean it, it was just a knee-jerk reaction to your post. No need to hammer on the guy.

... But it keeps talking to me!
"It provides sources for its claims or it gets the HOSE again!"

 

[JaredJames]

... But it keeps talking to me!
"It provides sources for its claims or it gets the HOSE again!"

 

[pftest]

I'm browsing precisely nada for two reasons

Suddenly its too much trouble to click on the opening post?

Does anyone know when the paper will be published? I thought it was supposed to happen in 2010.

 

[FlexGunship]

Suddenly its too much trouble to click on the opening post?

Does anyone know when the paper will be published? I thought it was supposed to happen in 2010.

Get used to it. This is what always happens. Someone claims an amazing study was performed that will finally blow the lid off of the ______ phenomenon and bring it into mainstream scientific acceptance. But, inevitably, the study proves to be flawed and the paper never gets published (or it does, and then other scientific journals spend years trying to undo the damage (sic. autism/vaccination fiasco)).

 

[pftest]

Get used to it. This is what always happens. Someone claims an amazing study was performed that will finally blow the lid off of the ______ phenomenon and bring it into mainstream scientific acceptance. But, inevitably, the study proves to be flawed and the paper never gets published (or it does, and then other scientific journals spend years trying to undo the damage (sic. autism/vaccination fiasco)).

There was a link to a paper a few pages back, that shows this actually happens to the (vast) majority of published research findings (with a special mention of biomedical research). I don't think this is damaging for science, in fact i think its a strength of science to keep scrutinising results.

 

[pftest]

Here is a PDF of a response paper:

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/1018886/Bem6.pdf

It looks like there are some serious flaws with the ESP paper. The one I have the biggest problem with is coming up with a hypothesis from a set of data, and then using that same set of data to test the hypothesis. It's a version of the Texas Sharpshooter Fallacy.

Bem now has a response paper to Wagenmakers response:

We agree with Wagenmakers, Wetzels, Borsboom, & Van der Maas (2011) that there are advantages to analyzing data with Bayesian statistical procedures, but we argue that they have incorrectly characterized several features of Bem’s (2011) psi experiments and have selected an unrealistic Bayesian prior distribution for their analysis, leading them to seriously underestimate the experimental support in favor of the psi hypothesis. We provide an extended Bayesian analysis that displays the effects of different prior distributions on the Bayes factors and conclude that the evidence strongly favors the psi hypothesis over the null. More generally, we believe that psychology would be well served by training future generations of psychologists in the skills necessary to understand Bayesian analyses well enough to perform them on their own data.

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/8290411/ResponsetoWagenmakers.pdf

It also mentions a gigantic amount of previous experiments. If anyone here still believes they don't exist, read the paper for the references.

 

[nismaratwork]

Sooo... the argument is that 'Those psychologist Bayesian means, "by the bay",'... not impressed. I saw nothing in their analysis of the data to support their claim, just throwing stones... sadly, it happens in the world of academics as anywhere. The assumption and assertion that this is simply a misuse of the statistical process because of another assumed ignorance isn't a response, it's just noise.

 

[pftest]

Wagenmakers response to Bems response:

Does psi exist? In a widely publicized article featuring nine experiments with over one thousand participants, Bem (in press) claimed that future events retroactively affect people's responses. In a response, we pointed out that Bem's analyses were partly exploratory. Moreover, we reanalyzed Bem's data using a default Bayesian t-test and showed that Bem's evidence for psi is weak to nonexistent. A robustness analysis con¯rmed our skeptical conclusions. Recently, Bem, Utts, and Johnson (2011) question several aspects of our analysis. In this brief reply we clarify our analysis procedure and demonstrate that our arguments still hold.

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/1018886/ClarificationsForBemUttsJohnson.pdf

 

[nismaratwork]

Wagenmakers response to Bems response:

He claimed... what... that IF one interpreation of QM is correct then retrocausality could... what? I'm not clear that a concept based in the mathematics of QM is so easily subverted to transmit information, encode it, and decode it on the other end.

 

[dm4b]

I personally dismiss the notion until evidence of it's existence is proven.

I've never understood this mindset.

If you dismiss everything until evidence proves it's existence, you'll personally never come up with anything. Somebody else will do it for you.

If everybody followed this logic, we'd stagnate, as a species. We'd summarily dismiss everything.

Let's dismiss String Theory and cease all work on it right now, right? After all, there is no evidence for it.

Since when does evidence always come first? Since when has science stopped trying to explain observations?

Also, if you just dismiss only certain things until evidence comes around, or until something shows up in a journal, that means you're biased. And, those biases are usually a result of societal/cultural conditioning.

The greatest discoveries were made by men who thought "outside the box", outside societal conditioning, and had the courage to come up with new ideas, despite controversey, and despite hard evidence for their existence. They found the evidence, for something they intuited.

 

[nismaratwork]

I've never understood this mindset.

If you dismiss everything until evidence proves it's existence, you'll personally never come up with anything. Somebody else will do it for you.

If everybody followed this logic, we'd stagnate, as a species. We'd summarily dismiss everything.

Let's dismiss String Theory and cease all work on it right now, right? After all, there is no evidence for it.

Since when does evidence always come first? Since when has science stopped trying to explain observations?

Also, if you just dismiss only certain things until evidence comes around, or until something shows up in a journal, that means you're biased. And, those biases are usually a result of societal/cultural conditioning.

The greatest discoveries were made by men who thought "outside the box", outside societal conditioning, and had the courage to come up with new ideas, despite controversey, and despite hard evidence for their existence. They found the evidence, for something they intuited.

In what way is this necropost relevant to the OP, and not just a personal rant about JarednJames, which is absolutely not OK by the guidelines?

 

[JaredJames]

I've never understood this mindset.

Precisely. You don't understand it and the rest of your post outlines the fact you don't.

Everything below the line above is ridiculous and doesn't follow my mindset at all.

 

[Jack21222]

I've never understood this mindset.

If you dismiss everything until evidence proves it's existence, you'll personally never come up with anything. Somebody else will do it for you.

If everybody followed this logic, we'd stagnate, as a species. We'd summarily dismiss everything.

Let's dismiss String Theory and cease all work on it right now, right? After all, there is no evidence for it.

Since when does evidence always come first? Since when has science stopped trying to explain observations?

Also, if you just dismiss only certain things until evidence comes around, or until something shows up in a journal, that means you're biased. And, those biases are usually a result of societal/cultural conditioning.

The greatest discoveries were made by men who thought "outside the box", outside societal conditioning, and had the courage to come up with new ideas, despite controversey, and despite hard evidence for their existence. They found the evidence, for something they intuited.

The problem with this rant is it's possible to dismiss something and still work on getting evidence for it. Scientists can still play the "what if?" game without personally thinking something is true.

Part of the undergraduate research I'm doing (or rather, helping my advisor with) involves extra-dimensional dark-matter candidates, such as Kaluza-Klein gravitons. Neither of us is some sort of "true-believer" that these things exist, but we're both exploring "what if these things were to exist, what would be the consequences?" Now, if the consequences match up exactly with observation and it is able to predict new observations, perhaps then we'd argue that these things really exist.

Until then, I'm content to argue that these things could possibly exist, but I'd still dismiss the notion that they do exist until the evidence comes out.

 

[nismaratwork]

The problem with this rant is it's possible to dismiss something and still work on getting evidence for it. Scientists can still play the "what if?" game without personally thinking something is true.

Part of the undergraduate research I'm doing (or rather, helping my advisor with) involves extra-dimensional dark-matter candidates, such as Kaluza-Klein gravitons. Neither of us is some sort of "true-believer" that these things exist, but we're both exploring "what if these things were to exist, what would be the consequences?" Now, if the consequences match up exactly with observation and it is able to predict new observations, perhaps then we'd argue that these things really exist.

Until then, I'm content to argue that these things could possibly exist, but I'd still dismiss the notion that they do exist until the evidence comes out.

Yep, I'd be hard pressed to find anyone here who'd stick String Theory into anything except "Beyond The Standard Model", but that doesn't mean it can't be valuable, or eventually groomed into a full theory.

What we have in dm4b is the classic failure to understand both the scientific method, skeptical philsophy and mindset, and a tinge of cracpot "anyone can be Einstein" horse dung.

 

[dm4b]

In what way is this necropost relevant to the OP, and not just a personal rant about JarednJames, which is absolutely not OK by the guidelines?

It's absolutely relevant. And it wasn't meant to be personal. This mindset is not unique to JarednJames' post - it is a common "belief" out there.

It's relevant to the OP, because the OP announces a paper that was recently submitted to a main stream journal and my response was in regards to a post that said the topics considered in that paper (psychic ability) should be dismissed.

I disagree, and stated my reasons on why the reasoning leading to that conclusion are wrong.

Are we not allowed to challenge our views? Are we not allowed to examine if certain mindsets and certain paradigms cause us to come up short on our conclusions? Isn't that part of what science is all about ...

I doubt JaredNJames will lose any sleep over my post.

 

[JaredJames]

I disagree, and stated my reasons on why the reasoning leading to that conclusion are wrong.

Your "reasoning" is incorrect. Your reasoning has absolutely nothing to do with the view I expressed. Put simply, you tried to 'fill in the blanks' and did so very badly (as jack and nismar point out).

Are we not allowed to challenge our views? Are we not allowed to examine if certain mindsets and certain paradigms cause us to come up short on our conclusions?

Certainly challenge our views, but do it properly and don't make things up.

Isn't that part of what science is all about ...

You keep saying that but the only non-scientific view here was your own - where you drew a false conclusions based on your own misguided ideas behinds others ideology.

I doubt JaredNJames will lose any sleep over my post.

Actually it bothers me that you can misrepresent and twist what I said into that non-sense.

EDIT: No sleep lost.

 

[nismaratwork]

It's absolutely relevant. And it wasn't meant to be personal. This mindset is not unique to JarednJames' post - it is a common "belief" out there.

It's relevant to the OP, because the OP announces a paper that was recently submitted to a main stream journal and my response was in regards to a post that said the topics considered in that paper (psychic ability) should be dismissed.

I disagree, and stated my reasons on why the reasoning leading to that conclusion are wrong.

Are we not allowed to challenge our views? Are we not allowed to examine if certain mindsets and certain paradigms cause us to come up short on our conclusions? Isn't that part of what science is all about ...

I doubt JaredNJames will lose any sleep over my post.

I doubt that he will either, nor is it, unfortunately, grist for thought or discussion. While I'm sure your personal diatribe is very meaningful to you, and therefore relevant in all ways, you may want to include some specifics. Right now, we're either faced with tearing your "logic" to unkind shreds, waiting for a mentor to talk to you, or for you to offer something meaningful.

Read the guidelines, they are your friend.

And maybe this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_method
and this!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skepticism

 

[dm4b]

The problem with this rant is it's possible to dismiss something and still work on getting evidence for it. Scientists can still play the "what if?" game without personally thinking something is true.

Part of the undergraduate research I'm doing (or rather, helping my advisor with) involves extra-dimensional dark-matter candidates, such as Kaluza-Klein gravitons. Neither of us is some sort of "true-believer" that these things exist, but we're both exploring "what if these things were to exist, what would be the consequences?" Now, if the consequences match up exactly with observation and it is able to predict new observations, perhaps then we'd argue that these things really exist.

Until then, I'm content to argue that these things could possibly exist, but I'd still dismiss the notion that they do exist until the evidence comes out.

Jack, I basically agree with what you said, except I wouldn't use the word dismiss where you did. So, like many disagreements along these lines, much may be boling down to semantics. However ...

To me (and Webster) dismiss, implies to reject or discard. That is where I was coming from when I heard that word. Rejected and discarded theories don't usually get a lot of research funding.

But, with psychic phenomenon such as ESP, it goes much further than that. As JaredNJames also stated in his original post, most in the scientific community "believe" that ESP, and other psychic phenomenon, are myths - in the negative meaning of the word myth ... as in, not true. And ESP, as well as other psychic phenomenon, is often deemed "unworthy" of scientific investigation.

So, if you guys are telling me that ESP is not taboo in the scientific community, who are you kidding? ESP is typically dismissed in the ultimate sense of that word - meaning totally rejected and ignored.

To reject ESP is scientifically dishonest. Let's ignore the fact that there are some observations that indicate there may be something to ESP (Bem's paper being an example), and take it from another perspective. ESP is, at the very least, an important study in psychology. There may very likely be nothing to ESP physically, but it is still a prevalent phenomenon in the psyche of man in the world today. But, interestingly enough, the pyschology community is the most statistically likely to reject anything to do with ESP (see Bem's paper on that). Hmmmmm, more bias at play here? More cultural conditioning?

Also, many scientific fields outside of psychology, would hardly view a study of ESP as a mental phenomenon as "real science".

So, don't tell me that the scientific world is totally objective and unbiased. It ain't. Scientists are human like everybody else and suffer from the same faults.

 

[dm4b]

Yep, I'd be hard pressed to find anyone here who'd stick String Theory into anything except "Beyond The Standard Model", but that doesn't mean it can't be valuable, or eventually groomed into a full theory.

Did I say it can't be valuable? I'm currently studying String Theory.

 

[nismaratwork]

Did I say it can't be valuable? I'm currently studying String Theory.

Good for you.

Now, you dislike the "myth" of ESP, because that leads to a lack of exploration and funding, fair? How do you think that that ESP came to reside in the realm of (largely) pseudoscience?

Hint: Lots of research and no positive results.

Nobody has rejected ESP, by the same token it's not being accepted either. It's less accepted in general because the preponderance of evidence is against it, but it's still a subject of research.

I think ESP got quite a good break with major government funding and research in Russia and the USA during the Cold War... far more than most pipe dreams. It's not taboo, but it isn't respected either because the most basic tests for it fail to show anything.

In addition, the rejection in this thread is a rejection of the methods and conclusions of the paper presented, that is not a rejection of ESP as a whole. You really should be less dramatic and more grounded, even when engaging in a semi-directed diatribe.

Oh, and psychology isn't a science.

 

[nismaratwork]

Did I say it can't be valuable? I'm currently studying String Theory.

By the way, when you say studying, do you mean you're in grad school and this is your focus, that you're reading something by Brian Greene, or something in between? Please, now that you've raised this, in what context are you studying this?

I'm curious what you think String Theory (whichever you ascribe to) has to say about ESP.

 

[dm4b]

Good for you.

Now, you dislike the "myth" of ESP, because that leads to a lack of exploration and funding, fair? How do you think that that ESP came to reside in the realm of (largely) pseudoscience?

Hint: Lots of research and no positive results.

Well, here is how I see the state of affairs.

There has been lots of research, but it's been done by guys like J.B. Rhine and Dean Radin. In other words, proponents of ESP, but outside the mainstream scientific community. The typical complaint here is that the research was not done correctly. So, their positive results they obtained in almost all (maybe all?) cases need to be discarded.

I personally know of no other research being reported in respectable scientifc journals on ESP, except the ones associated with Dayrl Bem's recent paper, that show negative or positive results.

If there is some, please provide references, because I would be interested in reading more on that.

 

[nismaratwork]

Well, here is how I see the state of affairs.

There has been lots of research, but it's been done by guys like J.B. Rhine and Dean Radin. In other words, proponents of ESP, but outside the mainstream scientific community. The typical complaint here is that the research was not done correctly. So, their positive results they obtained in almost all (maybe all?) cases need to be discarded.

I personally know of no other research being reported in respectable scientifc journals on ESP, except the ones associated with Dayrl Bem's recent paper, that show negative or positive results.

If there is some, please provide references, because I would be interested in reading more on that.

I would turn you again towards the fruitless work on remote viewing and more by the first two superpowers, and subsequent investigation. The paucity now, in my view, reflects a lack of new approaches and a lack of anything substantial to find. It's true, you can't prove a negative, but you'll note that (not GR) Aether is not exactly finding a ton of funding either.

Sometimes it's bias, and sometiems it's a storied history of failure, as with ESP.

 

[dm4b]

I would turn you again towards the fruitless work on remote viewing and more by the first two superpowers, and subsequent investigation. The paucity now, in my view, reflects a lack of new approaches and a lack of anything substantial to find. It's true, you can't prove a negative, but you'll note that (not GR) Aether is not exactly finding a ton of funding either.

Sometimes it's bias, and sometiems it's a storied history of failure, as with ESP.

I don't see a storied history here (of success, or failure).

I don't really know what came of the remote viewing stuff with the government, since the majority of the work is still classified. I'm not saying that points to success, I'm just saying I'm reserving judgement on the matter until I see "all the data".

Once again, I see no research being done, and more importantly published, by the mainstream scientific community. (except, of course, the Bemster).

That doesn't mean anything either, really. You won't find a lot of papers published on General Relativity in the 1700's. It may be that ESP is an emergent phenomenon that appears as consciousness evolves, and we just don't understand it nearly enough yet. It may be that it's nothing but a psychosis. However, there are observations that need to be explained, that haven't been to the extent I would like to see. We'll all disagree on that point though, I'm sure.

In the meantime, I won't dismiss the possibility there is something to ESP. But, that's just me.

 

[dm4b]

By the way, when you say studying, do you mean you're in grad school and this is your focus, that you're reading something by Brian Greene, or something in between? Please, now that you've raised this, in what context are you studying this?

I'm reading a book called The Compete Idiots Guide to String Theory.

 

[nismaratwork]

I'm reading a book called The Compete Idiots Guide to String Theory.

Seriously?! That's the kind of thing I'd say as a gag, but I've been overly literal before...

 

[JaredJames]

I don't see a storied history here (of success, or failure).

It failed. I was under the impression that was common knowledge?

Once again, I see no research being done, and more importantly published, by the mainstream scientific community. (except, of course, the Bemster).

Published doesn't mean the research isn't getting done. It could very well be that the research is being done but it isn't being done correctly (or whatever other reasons block papers being published, it's your choice).

That doesn't mean anything either, really. You won't find a lot of papers published on General Relativity in the 1700's.

Apples and oranges. Completely ridiculous and fallacious example.

 

[JaredJames]

I'm reading a book called The Compete Idiots Guide to String Theory.

You're [what birds do on my nice clean car] me?

In that respect I'm studying muggles and gringots bank right now.

Looking into, maybe. But studying? Really?

 

[dm4b]

C'mon Jared. At least nismaratwork suspected it was a gag.

 

[nismaratwork]

C'mon Jared. At least nismaratwork suspected it was a gag.

Jared can be quite literal, and you DID do the internet version of a "deadpan" delivery. By the same token, you have to understand that as claims go, studying the "Idiots guide to String theory" is not even CLOSE to weird on this forum.

When you have a few dozen people tell you about death-stars and being fondled by little gray men, you lose your sense of freewheeling fun right-quick.

 

[JaredJames]

C'mon Jared. At least nismaratwork suspected it was a gag.

I didn't suspect it (and I still don't).

Perhaps one day I'll see something to change my mind...

(Can't blame me, seeing as your intro here went straight for the kill.)

 

[JaredJames]

Jared can be quite literal

There's no "can be" about it.

 

[nismaratwork]

There's no "can be" about it.

Heh, it's a fun quirk.