A point I tried to put across earlier in this thread.
"He has been quoted as saying that he regards parapsychology and other research into the paranormal as tantamount to "tempting God" and seeking "signs and wonders". wiki
And yet if this is helpful to us I don't see it as tempting God.
For example the noetic sciences study the physical and psychological effects of yoga, that can hardly be thought of as seeking signs and wonders. More likely it helps people with depression and back problems, a more prosaic outcome.
One may as well say that a runner's high is tempting God.
I'm not even sure I find anything wrong with looking for signs, actually.
What sceptic researchers? Most sceptics agree that parapsychology isn't even worth researching.
He's not a real scientist. He has a degree in engineering and works in the "field" of parapsychology which isn't a real science; it's a pseudoscience based on the wishful thinking that psi and other paranormal crap are true. The whole "field" is based on slight statistical anomalies which have been hailed as being significant through statistical manipulation.
It's all rubbish.
Not to mention totally pointless. In what way do slight statistical anomalies in people guessing the shapes on cards in different rooms or whatever prove that people have psychic or telepathic powers? On the other hand, if you could demonstrate people being able to say the correct shapes on all the cards 100% of the time in a different room would, that would convince me.
No that's not the case at all Fez. There are several skeptics with flawed research and others who misrepresent positive findings.
Your other statements are just plain unscientific for someone who is supposedly coming from an evidence- based POV. What if I told my doctor I would only take a medicine if 100% of the subjects in the trial were cured? He would snort, and with good reason, as he gave me a medicine for off label use ( benefits not proven at all).
If you are going to use science as your basis of skepticism, be consistent.
And yet if this is helpful to us I don't see it as tempting God.
For example the noetic sciences study the physical and psychological effects of yoga, that can hardly be thought of as seeking signs and wonders. More likely it helps people with depression and back problems, a more prosaic outcome.
One may as well say that a runner's high is tempting God.
I'm not even sure I find anything wrong with looking for signs, actually.
Many of the religious pray for them.
I'm not commenting on noetic sciences as such just those that may be associated with the spiritual. I don't think God can be tempted in any real sense. It's all about our thoughts and actions and especially those we may associate with god, the divine or divine interference. Not for example including the "physical" or "psychological" benefits of yoga. Praying for signs and wonders seems counter productive to me because you are specifically expressing the inherent thought of doubt with relation to god.
The spiritual isn't an exact science and people are complex though, so praying for a sign might work for some. imo
added. Maybe you always get the perfect sign but your free will enables you to effectively and unconsciously block it - is what I'm trying to say.
Your other statements are just plain unscientific for someone who is supposedly coming from an evidence- based POV. What if I told my doctor I would only take a medicine if 100% of the subjects in the trial were cured? He would snort, and with good reason, as he gave me a medicine for off label use ( benefits not proven at all).
You've completely misinterpreted my argument. If you wanted to draw an analogy between my argument for paranormal research and medicine (which in itself is idiotic), then I'd expect the medicine to be 100% effective on at least one person. In reality, medicine has much higher standards and it has to be effective on a hell of a lot more than one person.
In medicine, if the drug works for only a few people, they are considered anomalies or statistical outliers... but in parapsychology research even one "anomaly" (out of thousands of subjects) who is able to clearly demonstrate psychic powers would prove the existence of psi etc.
I never claimed that 100% of subjects in parapsychology "research" should be able to demonstrate psychic powers, I claimed that there should be at least one person who clearly demonstrates psychic powers by getting 100% (or close) in whatever telepathic test they gave him/her, because as I mentioned earlier unlike medicine it only would take one person to prove the existence of psi. Slight statistical deviations do not suggest psychic powers. I don't understand how showing that a generalised group of people appear to have slight psychic powers, but only occasionally, shows that psychic powers exist.
It should be easy to prove psychic powers exist and they should be obvious. You shouldn't have to resort to statistical analyses to see whether they exist or not. After all, you're attempting to found a new branch of science completely and utterly separate from any other; if you want to do this, slight statistical deviations aren't quite going to cut it when there may be many other perfectly rational explanations for such findings.
I also don't like that the field, unlike most sciences, is founded solely on wishful thinking and anecdotes rather than actual repeatable observations.
Anyway, if my arguments against parapsychology appear somewhat irrational, it's because I've passed the point of caring. It angers me how many people buy into this blatant shite and how the people who do "research" in the field so obviously manipulate and distort their findings to push their own agenda.
In short; I'm pissed off.
You've completely misinterpreted my argument. If you wanted to draw an analogy between my argument for paranormal research and medicine (which in itself is idiotic), then I'd expect the medicine to be 100% effective on at least one person. In reality, medicine has much higher standards and it has to be effective on a hell of a lot more than one person.
In medicine, if the drug works for only a few people, they are considered anomalies or statistical outliers... but in parapsychology research even one "anomaly" (out of thousands of subjects) who is able to clearly demonstrate psychic powers would prove the existence of psi etc.
I never claimed that 100% of subjects in parapsychology "research" should be able to demonstrate psychic powers, I claimed that there should be at least one person who clearly demonstrates psychic powers by getting 100% (or close) in whatever telepathic test they gave him/her, because as I mentioned earlier unlike medicine it only would take one person to prove the existence of psi. Slight statistical deviations do not suggest psychic powers. I don't understand how showing that a generalised group of people appear to have slight psychic powers, but only occasionally, shows that psychic powers exist.
It should be easy to prove psychic powers exist and they should be obvious. You shouldn't have to resort to statistical analyses to see whether they exist or not. After all, you're attempting to found a new branch of science completely and utterly separate from any other; if you want to do this, slight statistical deviations aren't quite going to cut it when there may be many other perfectly rational explanations for such findings.
I also don't like that the field, unlike most sciences, is founded solely on wishful thinking and anecdotes rather than actual repeatable observations.
Anyway, if my arguments against parapsychology appear somewhat irrational, it's because I've passed the point of caring. It angers me how many people buy into this blatant shite and how the people who do "research" in the field so obviously manipulate and distort their findings to push their own agenda.
In short; I'm pissed off.
This is a long post and I stopped at where you said medicine has to be effective on more than one person, that I did not understand what you mean, as no one suggested otherwise.
This is a long post and I stopped at where you said medicine has to be effective on more than one person, that I did not understand what you mean, as no one suggested otherwise.
I didn't think anyone suggested otherwise. I just rambled perhaps a bit unnecessarily in my last post.
I didn't think anyone suggested otherwise. I just rambled perhaps a bit unnecessarily in my last post.
Yeah I think you are misunderstanding psi phenomena. Psychic events like telepathy are really anomalies in themselves, so you would expect them to occur infrequently and often at times of stress, like war, illness, death. That is why these events are hard to test under scientific conditions. Anyone who got 100% consistently I would suspect is using magic. That is why Derren Brown is almost always right.
Healing is another subject with so many variables. Some healers claim success with people who don't expect to be healed. We really know very little about it, including self- healing.
Yeah I think you are misunderstanding psi phenomena. Psychic events like telepathy are really anomalies in themselves, so you would expect them to occur infrequently and often at times of stress, like war, illness, death. That is why these events are hard to test under scientific conditions. Anyone who got 100% consistently I would suspect is using magic. That is why Derren Brown is almost always right.
Healing is another subject with so many variables. Some healers claim success with people who don't expect to be healed. We really know very little about it, including self- healing.
But why would you expect them to occur at all unless by chance?
But why would you expect them to occur at all unless by chance?
I don't think chance and two persons communicating are the same. Telepathy doesn't occur exclusively during emotionally a roused states but there appears to be a connection.
That is why studies are done, to try to reproduce this phenomena, where you are probably going to have less than ideal conditions.
To expect people to perform better than expected by scientific method, that makes no sense.
I also posted links to papers and video links in the past on many occasions. The only objection seems to come from people confusing this with the God helmet. Ironically the God helmet itself was very popular with skeptics and even certain psychologists.... These much later experiments seems to have slipped right under the radar and rarely get a mention.
this thread comprises different religionists and atheists slinging mud at one another ..... whereas only one religion can possibly be true if any at all. folks seem to forget that ......
i make valid points in logic which are mostly ignored .....
i am equally rude to all viewpoints where believers think they have cracked a problem thats puzzled the best thinkers for thousands of years ....... the great philosophers were titans and we are not .....
I think folks just disagree - there being many ways to the roof and a ladder being no truer than a staircase.
I'm not sure what an evangelical is but surely it can't damage the CoE any worse than the heretical vicars who didn't believe in God. I'm thinking here of the Sea of Faith aka the "Godless vicars" and "atheist priests"
Anyway, if my arguments against parapsychology appear somewhat irrational, it's because I've passed the point of caring. It angers me how many people buy into this blatant shite and how the people who do "research" in the field so obviously manipulate and distort their findings to push their own agenda.
In short; I'm pissed off.
Yup, I can relate to that.
I initially approached it all, and we're going back years now, thinking that there was maybe something to it. I expect that was precisely because of the shoddy work involved in this 'field' and not knowing better at the time.
Wind on many years and the bollox I found at the beginning of my research is still trying to masquerade as science, the same crap is being repeated, the same slight of hand is still at work as those invested in the paranormal try to fool... well, themselves half the time, or so I strongly suspect.
There are some good points, like studies for psi had the same level of evidence as was accepted for mainstream studies of aspirin against heart attacks.
Clearly this is a very heated subject, with sceptics yelling pseudoscience, psi reserachers charging outright deception by anti-psi who make a living by debunking, and evangelists yelling it's the work of the devil.
I also posted links to papers and video links in the past on many occasions. The only objection seems to come from people confusing this with the God helmet. Ironically the God helmet itself was very popular with skeptics and even certain psychologists.... These much later experiments seems to have slipped right under the radar and rarely get a mention.
Is that me told off? Your fault letting me sit at the back of the classroom:D
Thanks for the link.
Very interesting. I'm sure they'll get there in the end and why isn't this type of research taken more seriously? It seems scientist's egos get in the way.
Alex Tsakiris: Wow, very fascinating stuff. It does lead me – I can’t resist asking this one more question. If you do seem to be kind of leaning in the direction of saying that there might be other ways that consciousness interacts with other consciousness, you know, the telepathy thing with the light flashing, then are you open to the possibility that maybe the physical structure of our brain is more of a transceiver than the agent that creates consciousness, as some people have suggested. Is that on the table for you, or…
Dr. Michael Persinger: Absolutely. The idea that the brain, of course, is a source of all experiences because the brain, obviously if you terminate it you don’t have experiences, but the counter hypothesis – actually it’s not even counter, it’s a parallel hypothesis – that the brain is microstructured. This infinitesimal, complex pattern, is microstructured so that it can serve as a substrate for electromagnetic patterns.
And those electromagnetic patterns are the behaviors and the experiences, which means technically they could exist somewhere else
Obviously I'm not a scientist or an academic but I've always thought this, haven't you? I don't know what else to say. Are those pesky Quantum thingies involved?:D
I take it all for granted having experienced the paranormal since childhood. Then in adulthood, "God". When the scientists do catch up will it prove I and millions of others aren't imagining things. Not that I care about that.:D How could this knowledge be used in the future?
There are some good points, like studies for psi had the same level of evidence as was accepted for mainstream studies of aspirin against heart attacks.
You can't really equate the two. Based on our detailed biochemical knowledge of how aspirin works we are able to come with the hypothesis that it should be effective in the treatment of heart attacks. The studies thus provide evidence to support such a hypothesis.
Telepathy/psi etc. on the other hand is not based of any theory beyond wishful thinking so when "evidence" is found there isn't really a hypothesis for any "evidence" to support and there are often possible non-paranormal explanations to explain the results which are usually casually ignored by the "researchers".
Obviously I'm not a scientist or an academic but I've always thought this, haven't you? I don't know what else to say. Are those pesky Quantum thingies involved?:D
Most neuroscientists believe that consciousness and other brain functions are material phenomena produced as a result of the brain's electrochemistry and connections between neurones etc.
This idea is, of course, rejected by many other people (most of whom aren't necessarily neuroscientists) in favour of a more mysterious immaterial explanation.
Neuroscience is very much a science in its infancy, so who knows what it may uncover in the future... but at the moment I'm very much in the former camp. Being a physicalist, naturally I'd agree with the neuroscientists, and to me at least most of the arguments against this view seem to be simple arguments from incredulity; I can't believe consciousness is produced from matter, therefore it isn't. That sort of thing.
Most neuroscientists believe that consciousness and other brain functions are material phenomena produced as a result of the brain's electrochemistry and connections between neurones etc.
This idea is, of course, rejected by many other people (most of whom aren't necessarily neuroscientists) in favour of a more mysterious immaterial explanation.
Neuroscience is very much a science in its infancy, so who knows what it may uncover in the future... but at the moment I'm very much in the former camp. Being a physicalist, naturally I'd agree with the neuroscientists, and to me at least most of the arguments against this view seem to be simple arguments from incredulity; I can't believe consciousness is produced from matter, therefore it isn't. That sort of thing.
ESP and telepathy apparently. Perhaps miracles and gods are further down the line.
Interesting you accuse others of your weakness - argument from incredulity - I can't believe matter is produced from mind, therefore it isn't. Of course I take the view it's likely that's its all "something" entirely different to mind or matter but almost certainly not matter .
ESP and telepathy apparently. Perhaps miracles and gods are further down the line.
Who knows? But I'll wait for the evidence.
Interesting you accuse others of your weakness - argument from incredulity - I can't believe matter is produced from mind, therefore it isn't.
I suppose you could accuse me of that... but matter being produced from mind is a concept which, to me, makes about as much sense as "Jack-in-the-box substantiate loop of elephant".
Call it a weakness if you like, but it's an idea I wouldn't even consider even if I were in the middle of some kind of LSD trip. It's something which doesn't make sense to me at a deep fundamental level.
So never mind not being able to believe it, I can't even understand it as a concept. An argument from total incomprehension, might be better if you felt to inclined to use such a label.
Of course I take the view it's likely that's its all "something" entirely different to mind or matter but almost certainly not matter .
Why almost certainly not matter? I presume you have a compelling argument which isn't based on you own incredulity seeing as you've just told me off for that.
You can't really equate the two. Based on our detailed biochemical knowledge of how aspirin works we are able to come with the hypothesis that it should be effective in the treatment of heart attacks. The studies thus provide evidence to support such a hypothesis.
Telepathy/psi etc. on the other hand is not based of any theory beyond wishful thinking so when "evidence" is found there isn't really a hypothesis for any "evidence" to support and there are often possible non-paranormal explanations to explain the results which are usually casually ignored by the "researchers".
Most neuroscientists believe that consciousness and other brain functions are material phenomena produced as a result of the brain's electrochemistry and connections between neurones etc.
This idea is, of course, rejected by many other people (most of whom aren't necessarily neuroscientists) in favour of a more mysterious immaterial explanation. To say it isn't based on any theory wouldn't be correct then.
Neuroscience is very much a science in its infancy, so who knows what it may uncover in the future... but at the moment I'm very much in the former camp. Being a physicalist, naturally I'd agree with the neuroscientists, and to me at least most of the arguments against this view seem to be simple arguments from incredulity; I can't believe consciousness is produced from matter, therefore it isn't. That sort of thing.
Now Fez the argument I'm getting seems to have changed. First the argument was, we need to see that it works, not know how it works. For years we did not know how aspirin worked, only that it did. That was acceptable. If we see evidence of psi, you want to know how it works, not just that it does.
We now have hypotheses about psi as well, in that most studies suggest a connection between two persons, or a form of entanglement, exists. We might not know much about this now, but as the article shows, it can take many years to develop a scientific understanding of a phenomenon. We really have the vaguest notion of how antidepressants work. They may affect the dopamine receptors, but we don't know how or if what we are doing is better than a placebo. Evidence of efficacy is usually based on self-report, that is not more scientific than reporting a precognitive dream.
There is an equally good argument that mind exists outside the physical world and can influence physical states of the brain in a way that cognitive science does not understand. I see references to work that supports the Hammeroff- Penrose hypothesis that microtubles in brain neurons could extend outside the physical body.
Now Fez the argument I'm getting seems to have changed. First the argument was, we need to see that it works, not know how it works. For years we did not know how aspirin worked, only that it did. That was acceptable. If we see evidence of psi, you want to know how it works, not just that it does.
But we haven't seen that it works. We've seen slight statistical deviations which don't necessarily have to have a paranormal explanation.
Knowing how something works in theory is great, but not essential. My point was that you cannot equate studies on aspirin to studies on the paranormal.
Anyway, it's not just the results which matter, the methodology is hugely important and if the methods used are biased and flawed then the results are meaningless.
There is an equally good argument that mind exists outside the physical world and can can influence physical states of the brain in a way that cognitive science does not understand. I see references to work that supports the Hammeroff- Penrose hypothesis that microtubles in brain neurons could extend outside the physical body.
I'll read up on this later as it seems interesting, but from what I can tell, there's nothing in this idea which is immaterial or necessitates a magical or supernatural explanation.
Anyway, if this is true or if any supernatural ideas of how consciousness arises are true what I'd like to know is what is the point in the electrical activity in the brain? Why do ions move in and out of brain cells to transmit electrical impulses and why do neurotransmitters exist? Why can brain function and consciousness be so drastically altered simply by introducing certain molecules which just happen to have similar shapes to various enzymes and substrates? Why does the human brain have so many more connections between neurones than any other organism? Surely the correlation between number of connections per neurone and apparently cognitive ability can't simply be a coincidence?
But we haven't seen that it works. We've seen slight statistical deviations which don't necessarily have to have a paranormal explanation.
Knowing how something works in theory is great, but not essential. My point was that you cannot equate studies on aspirin to studies on the paranormal.
Anyway, it's not just the results which matter, the methodology is hugely important and if the methods used are biased and flawed then the results are meaningless.
I'll read up on this later as it seems interesting, but from what I can tell, there's nothing in this idea which is immaterial or necessitates a magical or supernatural explanation.
Anyway, if this is true or if any supernatural ideas of how consciousness arises are true what I'd like to know is what is the point in the electrical activity in the brain? Why do ions move in and out of brain cells to transmit electrical impulses and why do neurotransmitters exist? Why can brain function and consciousness be so drastically altered simply by introducing certain molecules which just happen to have similar shapes to various enzymes and substrates? Why does the human brain have so many more connections between neurones than any other organism? Surely the correlation between number of connections per neurone and apparently cognitive ability can't simply be a coincidence?
You CAN equate a research study of psi with a research study of aspirin or antidepressants. Why not? You are making up arbitrary rules of research and applying one set to mainstream studies and another to psi studies. What does this accomplish?
You can equally criticize methodology of antidepressant studies. Yet rarely do you see critiques of their validity.
The point of the article is that what you call slight statistical deviations are the same criteria accepted in other studies.
No one is arguing that the brain isn't complex. They are arguing that it is complex and it is physically affected by the external world.
Comments
And yet if this is helpful to us I don't see it as tempting God.
For example the noetic sciences study the physical and psychological effects of yoga, that can hardly be thought of as seeking signs and wonders. More likely it helps people with depression and back problems, a more prosaic outcome.
One may as well say that a runner's high is tempting God.
I'm not even sure I find anything wrong with looking for signs, actually.
Many of the religious pray for them.
No that's not the case at all Fez. There are several skeptics with flawed research and others who misrepresent positive findings.
Your other statements are just plain unscientific for someone who is supposedly coming from an evidence- based POV. What if I told my doctor I would only take a medicine if 100% of the subjects in the trial were cured? He would snort, and with good reason, as he gave me a medicine for off label use ( benefits not proven at all).
If you are going to use science as your basis of skepticism, be consistent.
I'm not commenting on noetic sciences as such just those that may be associated with the spiritual. I don't think God can be tempted in any real sense. It's all about our thoughts and actions and especially those we may associate with god, the divine or divine interference. Not for example including the "physical" or "psychological" benefits of yoga. Praying for signs and wonders seems counter productive to me because you are specifically expressing the inherent thought of doubt with relation to god.
The spiritual isn't an exact science and people are complex though, so praying for a sign might work for some. imo
added. Maybe you always get the perfect sign but your free will enables you to effectively and unconsciously block it - is what I'm trying to say.
You've completely misinterpreted my argument. If you wanted to draw an analogy between my argument for paranormal research and medicine (which in itself is idiotic), then I'd expect the medicine to be 100% effective on at least one person. In reality, medicine has much higher standards and it has to be effective on a hell of a lot more than one person.
In medicine, if the drug works for only a few people, they are considered anomalies or statistical outliers... but in parapsychology research even one "anomaly" (out of thousands of subjects) who is able to clearly demonstrate psychic powers would prove the existence of psi etc.
I never claimed that 100% of subjects in parapsychology "research" should be able to demonstrate psychic powers, I claimed that there should be at least one person who clearly demonstrates psychic powers by getting 100% (or close) in whatever telepathic test they gave him/her, because as I mentioned earlier unlike medicine it only would take one person to prove the existence of psi.
Slight statistical deviations do not suggest psychic powers. I don't understand how showing that a generalised group of people appear to have slight psychic powers, but only occasionally, shows that psychic powers exist.
It should be easy to prove psychic powers exist and they should be obvious. You shouldn't have to resort to statistical analyses to see whether they exist or not. After all, you're attempting to found a new branch of science completely and utterly separate from any other; if you want to do this, slight statistical deviations aren't quite going to cut it when there may be many other perfectly rational explanations for such findings.
I also don't like that the field, unlike most sciences, is founded solely on wishful thinking and anecdotes rather than actual repeatable observations.
Anyway, if my arguments against parapsychology appear somewhat irrational, it's because I've passed the point of caring. It angers me how many people buy into this blatant shite and how the people who do "research" in the field so obviously manipulate and distort their findings to push their own agenda.
In short; I'm pissed off.
This is a long post and I stopped at where you said medicine has to be effective on more than one person, that I did not understand what you mean, as no one suggested otherwise.
I'll try to come back to it later.
I didn't think anyone suggested otherwise. I just rambled perhaps a bit unnecessarily in my last post.
Yeah I think you are misunderstanding psi phenomena. Psychic events like telepathy are really anomalies in themselves, so you would expect them to occur infrequently and often at times of stress, like war, illness, death. That is why these events are hard to test under scientific conditions. Anyone who got 100% consistently I would suspect is using magic. That is why Derren Brown is almost always right.
Healing is another subject with so many variables. Some healers claim success with people who don't expect to be healed. We really know very little about it, including self- healing.
No idea who he is! I want to apologise as I've misread your name all this time MrQuike!
Although with my failing memory you'll probably be Mr Quick again Quickly.
But why would you expect them to occur at all unless by chance?
I don't think chance and two persons communicating are the same. Telepathy doesn't occur exclusively during emotionally a roused states but there appears to be a connection.
That is why studies are done, to try to reproduce this phenomena, where you are probably going to have less than ideal conditions.
To expect people to perform better than expected by scientific method, that makes no sense.
Since you started that I keep trying to sign in as mrquick. >:(
“God Helmet” Inventor, Dr. Michael Persinger Discovers Telepathy Link in Lab Experiments
Neuroscience Researcher and Laurentian University professor, Dr. Michael Persinger, demonstrates telepathy under laboratory conditions.
http://www.skeptiko.com/michael-persinger-discovers-telepathic-link/
I also posted links to papers and video links in the past on many occasions. The only objection seems to come from people confusing this with the God helmet. Ironically the God helmet itself was very popular with skeptics and even certain psychologists.... These much later experiments seems to have slipped right under the radar and rarely get a mention.
I think folks just disagree - there being many ways to the roof and a ladder being no truer than a staircase.
Don't start me on these frauds. >:(
Yup, I can relate to that.
I initially approached it all, and we're going back years now, thinking that there was maybe something to it. I expect that was precisely because of the shoddy work involved in this 'field' and not knowing better at the time.
Wind on many years and the bollox I found at the beginning of my research is still trying to masquerade as science, the same crap is being repeated, the same slight of hand is still at work as those invested in the paranormal try to fool... well, themselves half the time, or so I strongly suspect.
I am the way, also is believed by Yogananda to refer the the Christ consciousness within, not Jesus as mediator between others and God.
Jesus also insisted that only the Father in heaven is good.
He did not pose as a perfect person.
Some verses are trotted out, but out of the context of Jesus' life, a context that becomes more apparent when you read modern theologians.
Nice one Droogie.:)
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/cassandra-vieten/esp-evidence_b_795366.html
There are some good points, like studies for psi had the same level of evidence as was accepted for mainstream studies of aspirin against heart attacks.
Clearly this is a very heated subject, with sceptics yelling pseudoscience, psi reserachers charging outright deception by anti-psi who make a living by debunking, and evangelists yelling it's the work of the devil.
Is that me told off?
Thanks for the link.
Very interesting. I'm sure they'll get there in the end and why isn't this type of research taken more seriously? It seems scientist's egos get in the way.
Obviously I'm not a scientist or an academic but I've always thought this, haven't you? I don't know what else to say. Are those pesky Quantum thingies involved?:D
I take it all for granted having experienced the paranormal since childhood. Then in adulthood, "God". When the scientists do catch up will it prove I and millions of others aren't imagining things. Not that I care about that.:D How could this knowledge be used in the future?
You can't really equate the two. Based on our detailed biochemical knowledge of how aspirin works we are able to come with the hypothesis that it should be effective in the treatment of heart attacks. The studies thus provide evidence to support such a hypothesis.
Telepathy/psi etc. on the other hand is not based of any theory beyond wishful thinking so when "evidence" is found there isn't really a hypothesis for any "evidence" to support and there are often possible non-paranormal explanations to explain the results which are usually casually ignored by the "researchers".
Most neuroscientists believe that consciousness and other brain functions are material phenomena produced as a result of the brain's electrochemistry and connections between neurones etc.
This idea is, of course, rejected by many other people (most of whom aren't necessarily neuroscientists) in favour of a more mysterious immaterial explanation.
Neuroscience is very much a science in its infancy, so who knows what it may uncover in the future... but at the moment I'm very much in the former camp. Being a physicalist, naturally I'd agree with the neuroscientists, and to me at least most of the arguments against this view seem to be simple arguments from incredulity; I can't believe consciousness is produced from matter, therefore it isn't. That sort of thing.
ESP and telepathy apparently. Perhaps miracles and gods are further down the line.
Interesting you accuse others of your weakness - argument from incredulity - I can't believe matter is produced from mind, therefore it isn't. Of course I take the view it's likely that's its all "something" entirely different to mind or matter but almost certainly not matter .
Who knows? But I'll wait for the evidence.
I suppose you could accuse me of that... but matter being produced from mind is a concept which, to me, makes about as much sense as "Jack-in-the-box substantiate loop of elephant".
Call it a weakness if you like, but it's an idea I wouldn't even consider even if I were in the middle of some kind of LSD trip. It's something which doesn't make sense to me at a deep fundamental level.
So never mind not being able to believe it, I can't even understand it as a concept. An argument from total incomprehension, might be better if you felt to inclined to use such a label.
Why almost certainly not matter? I presume you have a compelling argument which isn't based on you own incredulity seeing as you've just told me off for that.
Now Fez the argument I'm getting seems to have changed. First the argument was, we need to see that it works, not know how it works. For years we did not know how aspirin worked, only that it did. That was acceptable. If we see evidence of psi, you want to know how it works, not just that it does.
We now have hypotheses about psi as well, in that most studies suggest a connection between two persons, or a form of entanglement, exists. We might not know much about this now, but as the article shows, it can take many years to develop a scientific understanding of a phenomenon. We really have the vaguest notion of how antidepressants work. They may affect the dopamine receptors, but we don't know how or if what we are doing is better than a placebo. Evidence of efficacy is usually based on self-report, that is not more scientific than reporting a precognitive dream.
There is an equally good argument that mind exists outside the physical world and can influence physical states of the brain in a way that cognitive science does not understand. I see references to work that supports the Hammeroff- Penrose hypothesis that microtubles in brain neurons could extend outside the physical body.
But we haven't seen that it works. We've seen slight statistical deviations which don't necessarily have to have a paranormal explanation.
Knowing how something works in theory is great, but not essential. My point was that you cannot equate studies on aspirin to studies on the paranormal.
Anyway, it's not just the results which matter, the methodology is hugely important and if the methods used are biased and flawed then the results are meaningless.
I'll read up on this later as it seems interesting, but from what I can tell, there's nothing in this idea which is immaterial or necessitates a magical or supernatural explanation.
Anyway, if this is true or if any supernatural ideas of how consciousness arises are true what I'd like to know is what is the point in the electrical activity in the brain? Why do ions move in and out of brain cells to transmit electrical impulses and why do neurotransmitters exist? Why can brain function and consciousness be so drastically altered simply by introducing certain molecules which just happen to have similar shapes to various enzymes and substrates? Why does the human brain have so many more connections between neurones than any other organism? Surely the correlation between number of connections per neurone and apparently cognitive ability can't simply be a coincidence?
You CAN equate a research study of psi with a research study of aspirin or antidepressants. Why not? You are making up arbitrary rules of research and applying one set to mainstream studies and another to psi studies. What does this accomplish?
You can equally criticize methodology of antidepressant studies. Yet rarely do you see critiques of their validity.
The point of the article is that what you call slight statistical deviations are the same criteria accepted in other studies.
No one is arguing that the brain isn't complex. They are arguing that it is complex and it is physically affected by the external world.