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76
General Discussion / Re: The "WTF? Check this link out!" thread!
« on: October 09, 2009, 07:55:13 pm »77
General Discussion / Re: The $%*! frustration thread
« on: September 28, 2009, 02:24:43 pm »A friend begged me to watch this...
Yeah. That's bullshit riding the name of QM to try and gain credibility. I wouldn't even bother finishing it.
Quote
Objects never actually touch each other.
Bear in mind that objects are abstracts for collections of matter, and matter is abstract for energy, so in a physical context we have to define 'touching' with regard to energies (urgh, crap like this film make me uncomfortable even using that word). The only physically meaningful definition for 'touching' between energies is 'interaction' between them in some way. Obviously energies interact; obviously things touch. Touching as we usually mean doesn't exist per se.
Quote
(Paraphrased) There's no way we'll ever describe in mathematical terms the act of observing and "collapsing the waveform".
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wave_function_collapse
Interestingly enough, I've found that fat-bashing (and fat acceptance) are almost totally indifferent to conventional ideological divides. There's a lot to be learned from studying subjects where the points of contention are so transparent to the political spectrum.
Yes. I didn't mean that the article was bigoted because it was from a right-wing source. I meant that one shouldn't be caught dead reading the Mail.
78
General Discussion / Re: The $%*! frustration thread
« on: September 28, 2009, 02:06:50 pm »
The Daily Mail's a right-wing rag not fit for toilet paper.
79
General Discussion / Re: Stuff you LOVE, baby
« on: September 18, 2009, 06:27:35 pm »
I love Kanye West's style. 'It's hard being the voice of a generation.', 'I'm a musical wordsmith.', 'I'm a musical genius.' The world would be a much duller place without Kanye West. (Although it's fortunate that there's only one because he's still an ass and the novelty of his occasional 'incidents' would wear off if there were more of him.)
80
General Discussion / Re: The $%*! frustration thread
« on: September 12, 2009, 08:11:43 am »I lost control on a low spot heading uphill on an overpass during pouring rain; the truck did a 180 and slammed into the guardrail at about 60 mph. I was under the limit, but apparently not under enough.
...
It's hard to say, 'I'm sorry to hear that,' with a straight face when I keep tittering at the rest of your post. 'It's so Z': using your car crash as an opportunity to blast religion and go SoY on our collective asses. Badass.
81
General Discussion / Re: The $%*! frustration thread
« on: September 08, 2009, 07:31:26 pm »Quite true, but please, do show me where there is extensive peer reviewed research on the topic of paranormal phenomenon. Usually (or always) a scientific experience on, say, ESP will produce negative results, yes? Alas, negative results are seldom publishable and so while there may be a lot of studies, they remain outside the realm of public accessibility.
Fair enough. I think I overestimated the amount of formal studies into it. That said, anyone should be able to see on a personal level the inconsistency of any number of paranormal ideas. Invariably, something like telepathy is claimed that only ‘explains’ the facts a tiny minority of the time. If such theories were correct they would always apply and be consistent and repeatable. But they’re not.
Additionally, just because something hasn't been proven yet does not preclude the possibility that future advancements might lead to confirmation.
See, this is what I meant about ridiculousness. That’s technically true on some impractical epistemic level, but it completely misses the point that some claims are so inconsistent with reality as to be unworthy of consideration.
For quite some time String Theory didn't actually make any verifiable predictions; it was the physics equivalent of ghosts. Technology and our understanding have improved so that String Theory is starting to enter the realm of real science.
So far as I know, String Theory’s claims are still untested. Indeed, I don’t see that it deserves the title of ‘theory’; at this point, it still seems to be ‘hypothesis’. I would question how much you know and understand (and I know and understand) of String Theory though, as from what I gather, it’s popular to invoke it and get excited about it without understanding it.
Perhaps in another 20 or 30 years advancements in neuroscience will allow us to scientifically prove the existence of ghosts. Probably not, but I can see no logical reason to bar it from even being brought up in scientific circles.
It shouldn’t be illegal, but ridiculous claims shouldn’t distract from meaningful research. Of course people have the right to waste resources on bogus claims, but they shouldn’t.
An additional word seems to be in order for the PEAR group that Faust mentioned earlier. As far as I can tell, the best science has done to disprove their "research" is to call into question their methodology (and a few object to the significance of their "results). I haven't found a single example of anyone replicating the experiments, either exactly or with corrected methodology. The first step in peer review of any scientific study is a critique of the methodology. The second step is to actually run the experiments. If the methodology of the PEAR group was flawed, it should be corrected and the experiments re-run. It appears that this has never happened.
I wonder what your standards for ‘disproof’ are, considering a consistent failure of a hypothesis apparently isn’t enough. At the end of the day, if paranormal ideas were correct and consistent, they would be repeatable, but they’re not—because they’re not correct and consistent.
I suspect you misunderstand my intent. I am merely arguing for the possibility that something that is currently considered paranormal could be scientifically tested.
Perhaps. Though, I suspect that you misunderstand the implications of what you’re saying. The way you’re arguing—particularly the analogies you keep making—suggest that you consider baseless, biased ideas that blatantly don’t hold up, which make no sense and which have no explanatory depth to be on par with proper hypotheses that tick all the boxes. You keep making direct analogies between the two implying that they’re both equally worthy of formal consideration.
Conceptually, I find the claim that there is a teapot orbiting the sun between Earth and Mars to be no more unbelievable than the claim that there is a space station orbiting the Earth. Neither claim requires extraordinary proof, just actual proof. Likewise, I reject the claim that an idea somehow needs more proof to be proven true simply because it is in contradiction to commonly held ideas: all it needs is proof. Thorough proof, to be sure, and sound proof. But nothing particularly unusual or extraordinary.
Again, the implications are ridiculous. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, but claims can only be extraordinary with respect to a frame of reference. If our frame of reference is as strong as current physics, a paradigm shift as dramatic as accommodating the paranormal would certainly require extraordinary evidence. If you ask someone for the time, you’d probably accept their answer; are you telling me that if they told you they had proof of a telepathic Teapot instead, that'd be good enough for you? Or perhaps that you would require a formal study to be done to determine whether or not they were giving you the right time?
Though, given how rare such proof is in paranormal circles, perhaps such mundane proof is perceived as being extraordinary?
Relatively extraordinary but not absolutely extraordinary, perhaps?
82
General Discussion / Re: The "WTF? Check this link out!" thread!
« on: September 08, 2009, 05:02:29 pm »83
General Discussion / Re: The $%*! frustration thread
« on: September 08, 2009, 03:34:30 pm »(with Asians making up 8% of the remainer).
That would be 80% of the remainder! ; )
Before I continue, I’ll say that I was using a different notion of the paranormal than you (i.e., ‘outside science/logic/etc.’), which simply seems to be the potential undiscovered of nature. Indeed, I don’t even accept the premise of the paranormal/supernatural, so I’m fighting off my turf here and so you might yet be able to corner me, but let’s see how run with this.
To be fair, humans had to first prove the existence of DNA before we could prove that certain genes were could cause heart disease. A lot of "research" into the paranormal isn't scientific, but that doesn't preclude the possibility of scientific research into those fields. Various "paranormal" phenomenon could be tested scientifically. Let's design an experiment right now to test for telepathy.
First off, as our physics gets better, the bar for a paradigm shift climbs, meaning that time must be factored in and thus the comparison may be invalid simply because the bar was lower. Further, the explanations supplanted by ideas like DNA were often arbitrarily conjured to explain a single phenomenon a priori, and had no predictive power or reliability. However, let’s assume your analogy isn’t wrong because of that.
Sure, there is little to no evidence suggesting that telepathy exists. But scientists are supposed to approach topics in an unbiased manner, so that isn't a relevant factor.
Actually, that’s bad scientific practice. If one’s hypothesis has repeatedly been ‘proved wrong’ by the trend of significant data, one should reform the hypothesis, not keep repeating to get favourable results. In the case of the paranormal, these studies are often pathological science or refusal to accept that an idea just doesn’t fit.
Anyway…your study. Let’s say we have a correlation inexplicable by anything other than probability. We think this is a new fundamental phenomenon. Then we’d repeat to reduce the probability that the phenomenon is just an uncommon yet expectable outlier. In that case, we would either repeat several times and prove that we’ve found such a new fundamental phenomenon (which never happens with the paranormal) or we would find that we couldn’t repeat our result. The key thing is that all the analogies you-plural have made fail because lunar orbits and DNA and the rest were all borne out (because they weren’t bullshit somebody pulled out of their ass). That’s why it’s exasperating (and worrying and in a way insulting and disrespectful) that…five people now…seem to be implying that mechanics is a hypothesis equalled by the paranormal. It’s exasperating because it’s so obviously rubbish caused only by social influence as opposed to true curious enquiry. It’s worrying because people are even giving credence to the ridiculous. Further, I know that if I were to walk up to any of you on the street preaching about the four elements and how I can explain scientific observations with the idea, you'd realise my craziness and yet can't see you do just the same with the paranormal just because it has more social credence. It’s insulting because it equates brilliant, working ideas from centuries of human progress to unconsidered premises that only survive as parasites on the social consciousness. It’s similarly disrespectful and again insulting and disrespectful because the wishy-washy idea of tolerating all ideas is antithetical to knowledge and curiosity; it’s only by accepting that some ideas are valid and better and some invalid and awful that one can pursue curiosity and make any claim to knowledge. Mucking around entertaining idle conjectures just isn’t logically compatible with anything other than pitiful nihilism.
84
General Discussion / Re: The $%*! frustration thread
« on: September 05, 2009, 01:14:42 pm »
Egads! Repetitions of repetitions!
'Yeah, I agree it's dumb, but as soon as anyone actually, ya know, points that out, they're probably freedom-hating intolerant science freaks.'
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appeal_to_authority
‘But it’s not a fallacy bla bla bla…’
‘I’d say that the authority of the mainstream scientific community trumps…you get the idea.’
Waidda minute…
Erm…?
Better put the glasses on…
Hm?
Oh shi—
Snap.
i say that we just run a whole lot of tests to prove if it is real or not. and when these tests reveal the truth -- the absolute truth -- then we can say if esp is real or not. until then, your bickering is useless.
this morning i woke up to find that chrisie had used me as a pillow. it was adorable, but i couldnt breath. and it didnt help that im suffering from some kind of allergy. my nose is running and i have a cough and its tough to breath in general.
These kinds of ideas have consistently failed to consistently hold up in objective testing. If that's not enough, add that the only reason they're tested and considered at all is their legacy from more superstitious pasts. It's equally likely at this point that goblins exist, but, curiously, I've yet to hear of 'scientists' trying to prove their existence. That's because there's no historical precedent; that's the only reason you're susceptible to 'ESP'--it could just as easily have been goblins if things had been slightly different.
Pretty small if.
Same for my goblins?
Come off it. What's with this sudden nonsense from you?
Limiting the scope of scientific enquiry based on what is currently understood is (pardon me) stupid.
I said 'fancies' specifically because these aren't scientific analyses. These people were trying to find statistical rarities to support fanciful ideas. They weren't observing and trying to explain statistical abnormalities using what they knew; they were trying to find evidence of superstitions.
(Side note: No, I don't believe in telepathy or any of the rest of it...but I do believe that conducting scientific experiments regarding such matters should--indeed, must--be allowed. Call it freedom of speech writ small.)
...I don't really give a flying fuck about parapsychological
research. It's just that you seem to be following a certain trend that really bothers me...
'Yeah, I agree it's dumb, but as soon as anyone actually, ya know, points that out, they're probably freedom-hating intolerant science freaks.'
And its unscientific because you say so? What authority do you have to make that judgment, may I ask?
I said 'fancies' specifically because these aren't scientific analyses. These people were trying to find statistical rarities to support fanciful ideas. They weren't observing and trying to explain statistical abnormalities using what they knew; they were trying to find evidence of superstitions.
The authors of my text book have their respective PhD's along with tenured occupations at San Jose University and certifications in several specialized aspects of their field. As with any other college-level textbook, its peer-edited by members of the American Psychiatric Association.
I'd say that their authority on the matter trumps yours.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appeal_to_authority
‘But it’s not a fallacy bla bla bla…’
‘I’d say that the authority of the mainstream scientific community trumps…you get the idea.’
American Psychiatric Association
Waidda minute…
Psychiatric Association
Erm…?
Psychiatric
Better put the glasses on…
Psychiatric
Hm?
scientific analysis
Oh shi—
Superstitious 'psychic' fancies have no place in scientific analysis.
Snap.
85
General Discussion / Re: The $%*! frustration thread
« on: September 05, 2009, 12:10:18 pm »No, its not, because as my psych book pointed out, there has been some scientifically sound evidence of ESP and telepathy. Moreover, it has been replicated in controlled environments.
Woah! Stop the presses!
'It's scientific because my psych textbook said it was.'
86
General Discussion / Re: The $%*! frustration thread
« on: September 05, 2009, 11:39:49 am »Why do you consider this a bad thing? The Theory of Relativity forced a similar reappraisal in its time--in fact, I would say that such reappraisal is sometimes necessary for expanding the state of human knowledge. It's what experimental science is for.
Relativity explains and is a validly reached hypothesis. Besides that, the new ideas it lead to dealt with the extreme (e.g. extremely small, extremely fast); classical mechanics' explanations remained useful and explanatory (and still do), it was just that the scope was reduced. Classical mechanics was superseded by a better explanation. Telepathy and the like are neither better explanations nor can they generalise our existing observations and explanations.
Really, these examples you're giving me are distractions, because even if you were right that lunar orbits, relativity and telepathy were equally valid, that would say nothing of their absolute validity, but only of their relative validity.
Additionally, you're trying to find some inconsistency in my attribution of validity and yet none of you seems to have explained why my goblins shouldn't be acceptable. The only reason any of you gives any credence to ESP is because our culture has made it one of the superstitions of the day. That is, you're trying to be 'objective' and impartial but you're only considering these things because of custom and biases (and textbooks that put the 'spu' in 'spurious'). I'll even go one better and add explanation: My goblins are the cause of turbulence. Turbulence is so chaotic because it depends on the whims of my microscopic goblins. That's at least an equally valid crackpot idea as ESP, right?
87
General Discussion / Re: The $%*! frustration thread
« on: September 04, 2009, 11:35:24 pm »
Sounds like a pretty worrying book. =P (Oh, another post. Make that pretty damn worrying books.)
The usefulness of ideas like lunar orbit comes from their ability to explain past, present and future minimalistically; they illuminate the past, help understand the present and have predictive power. Investigation of 'paranormal' conjectures like ESP invariably doesn't explain at all, but just tries to prove the existence of some phenomena. They don't deserve scientific treatment because they're not scientific hypotheses, nor are they even close to coming from a scientific method. Orbital moon cycle explanations don't necessitate breaking logic or violating fundamental physical laws; 'the paranormal' does. It's fair enough to be open-minded, but there really are good reasons for the scientific community supporting theories like orbital cycles but not wild 'supernatural' conjectures.
(On top of that, even if moon cycles were somehow unreasonable hypotheses, that would say nothing of the validity of superstitious conjectures.)
Edit: I'd add that telepathy and the rest of the 'supernatural' are such fundamental breaches of physics as we know it that such phenomena would necessitate a reappraisal of physics and all of science from the fundamental level up. A couple of studies (which might not even be valid) showing a correlation is to be expected statistically, and isn't strong enough evidence for a claim as extraordinary as one that would uproot all understanding of the cosmos.
In all honesty, the mentioned parts of the textbooks sound like bullshit if you're both representing them correctly: A statistics book undermining astrophysics and a psychology textbook supporting telepathy? Lame.
The usefulness of ideas like lunar orbit comes from their ability to explain past, present and future minimalistically; they illuminate the past, help understand the present and have predictive power. Investigation of 'paranormal' conjectures like ESP invariably doesn't explain at all, but just tries to prove the existence of some phenomena. They don't deserve scientific treatment because they're not scientific hypotheses, nor are they even close to coming from a scientific method. Orbital moon cycle explanations don't necessitate breaking logic or violating fundamental physical laws; 'the paranormal' does. It's fair enough to be open-minded, but there really are good reasons for the scientific community supporting theories like orbital cycles but not wild 'supernatural' conjectures.
(On top of that, even if moon cycles were somehow unreasonable hypotheses, that would say nothing of the validity of superstitious conjectures.)
Edit: I'd add that telepathy and the rest of the 'supernatural' are such fundamental breaches of physics as we know it that such phenomena would necessitate a reappraisal of physics and all of science from the fundamental level up. A couple of studies (which might not even be valid) showing a correlation is to be expected statistically, and isn't strong enough evidence for a claim as extraordinary as one that would uproot all understanding of the cosmos.
In all honesty, the mentioned parts of the textbooks sound like bullshit if you're both representing them correctly: A statistics book undermining astrophysics and a psychology textbook supporting telepathy? Lame.
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General Discussion / Re: The $%*! frustration thread
« on: September 04, 2009, 10:51:13 pm »Much agreed. However, other things held equal, I feel real-world outcomes might be more just than the current situation, where men are taught to be depraved and given power over life and death. If militaries are to be composed of men and women in equal numbers, then the society arming them needs to train them to care about human relationships equally, because this carries over to their treatment of civilians, and through that, the course of the war.
Looking back, maybe I misunderstood. I'd thought you meant that you'd support forcefully making armies all-female, as opposed to going along with it if it somehow happened to be so. I'm not sure what you meant now.
I see no reason not to subject "psychic fancies" to scientific analysis.
I said 'fancies' specifically because these aren't scientific analyses. These people were trying to find statistical rarities to support fanciful ideas. They weren't observing and trying to explain statistical abnormalities using what they knew; they were trying to find evidence of superstitions.
Why not disprove that which is actually false, and further scrutinize that which has not been proven false via the most objective methodology available?
These kinds of ideas have consistently failed to consistently hold up in objective testing. If that's not enough, add that the only reason they're tested and considered at all is their legacy from more superstitious pasts. It's equally likely at this point that goblins exist, but, curiously, I've yet to hear of 'scientists' trying to prove their existence. That's because there's no historical precedent; that's the only reason you're susceptible to 'ESP'--it could just as easily have been goblins if things had been slightly different.
Science belongs squarely in the field of the paranormal; the main concern should be whether preconceived notions are swaying the scientists studying a given phenomenon.
To the contrary, the whole point of the paranormal is that it's outside of the truly explainable and describable, making it outside of the scope of science. If it could be covered by science like anything else, it wouldn't be paranormal, would it?
What I'm trying to say, is, sure, we might waste resources studying ESP if it's false.
Pretty small if.
But on the offchance those PEAR people come back ten years from now and take over the world with mind lasers, the skeptics who didn't want to even study this stuff will be awfully sorry.
Same for my goblins?
Alternatively, let's take the example of the "black cat crossing someone's path" superstition. If, over the course of years of objective analysis, a black cat crossing someone's path demonstrably produces bad life outcomes with statistical significance, humanity is better off for the study. If the black cat results are not statistically significant, then humanity is also better off for disproving a superstition that could have harmed productivity (via people going out of their way irrationally to avoid black cats).
Come off it. What's with this sudden nonsense from you? Black cats harbingers of doom? For real? Goblins too then, yes?
89
General Discussion / Re: The $%*! frustration thread
« on: September 04, 2009, 07:32:28 pm »To balance currently existing patriarchy and the lack of self control it tries to inculcate within men, I would certainly support all armies being composed entirely of women. If women were running all aspects of the wars in the Congo, there wouldn't be half as much rape going on there. Maybe close to none at all, especially since it's the women who would have the guns, and therefore power of physical coercion, in that case.
Reversing sexual disparities and discrimination isn't a very good solution for sexual inequality. 'Reverse sexism' is still sexism.
Anyway, the fact that they basically got laughed off the campus of Princeton University doesn't help foster the scientific analysis of things previously thought unscientific, which I'd like to see more of. I'd also like to get a hold of their data and confirm that their results are, indeed, quantifiable, objective and statistically significant.
Superstitious 'psychic' fancies have no place in scientific analysis.