On 11/28/09 23:12, somebody wrote:
>> Except that evidence wasn't lacking.
>
> Claims motivated by greed is not evidence.

	Thanks for the non sequitur. Let me know when you're talking about 
psychokinetic and related claims.

>> Because no one came to you stating that they had dug a little and found
>> reason to believe there is a diamond mine there. No one came to you with
>> a story about how 200 years ago, someone found a diamond there, or found
>> clues indicative of diamonds.
>
> So your litmus test is *someone* telling you something. Let's see how you
> respond to the Nigerian scam problem:

	Nope. You asked why it's not analogous, and I told you.

>> It sure could be. Your point? I don't pursue them, because that's not
>> my area of interest. It's not exactly an academic activity, and if I
>> were to dig deep and find that some are legitimate emails, humanity has
>> gained nothing. Sure, I may get rich, but I didn't realize this whole
>> discussion was oriented towards /personal/ gain.
>
> So, instead of admitting that they are *all* scams (which would invalidate
> your point above, since they are claims made by *many people*), you are
> saying that you are not interested in money. Admirable. But why not pursue
> them anyway, get the money, and donate it all to a worthy cause that
> benefits humanity?

	Did you ever pass reading comprehension?

	What you're stating I said is not what I said. I won't bother to respond.

-- 
"A man doesn't know what happiness is until he's married. By then it's 
too late." - Frank Sinatra

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somebody wrote:
> Number of outlandish
> claims in general, definitely has increased dramatically 

I'm not sure that's true. The ability for you to know all the outlandish 
claims going on has increased. But I suspect that there were tons and tons 
of outlandish claims being made during the middle ages that would just be 
scoffed at these days. And no reason to think there were fewer.

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   Human nature dictates that toothpaste tubes spend
   much longer being almost empty than almost full.

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somebody wrote:
> In other words, odds are, all paranormal claims are nonsense. To even
> *begin* investigating, there has to be some extraordinary supporting
> evidence.

And there was. Numerous witnesses all over saying it worked and they had 
seen miracles with their own eyes.

Think up a list of nonsense that *didn't* get investigated that might have 
aided the military, and you'll understand perhaps. :-)

> My argument (not feeling) is, there is a finite set of confirmed truths at
> any finite time, but potentially uncountably many falsehoods. Unless there's
> good evidence *before* we start, we cannot simply waste time investigating
> anything and everything. The onus is on who deem paranormal investigation is
> worthy to show that the paranormal claim in question is somehow different
> than all these falsehoods.

And they did. They offered eye witnesses. Then the scientific method, during 
investigation, showed that the eye witnesses were mistaken. What more do you 
want?

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   Human nature dictates that toothpaste tubes spend
   much longer being almost empty than almost full.

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On 11/28/09 23:45, somebody wrote:
>>>> There was a time when all of humanity honestly believed the world was
>>>> flat, and anybody who claimed it wasn't was *obviously* a lunatic.
>
>>>     AFAIK that's an urban legend. "Popular history" so to speak.
>
>> That's an urban legend if you're looking at "recent history". It
>> wouldn't surprise me if 10,000 years ago everyone thought this. And if
>> not then, keep going further back in time...
>
> Sure, and at one point, all proto humans were hurling feces at each other.
> None of this is relevant to the question of *modern* science investigating
> paranormal *today*.

	Thanks again for the non sequitur. Please raise a red flag for when 
your response is actually a response to something I wrote, as opposed to 
something unrelated that you just want to sneak into the conversation.


-- 
"A man doesn't know what happiness is until he's married. By then it's 
too late." - Frank Sinatra

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TC wrote:
> Once it was known as true that the earth is a disc. Jerusalem was the center 
> of the earth, the sun and the planets were proven to revolve around the 
> earth.

You know, I don't think this is true.  I think the religions pushing this 
stuff always knew they had no idea if they were actually right or not.

Even nowadays, it surprises me (in some sense) that religious people object 
to the teaching of evolution here. You'd think if creationism were *true* 
and they *really* believed it, they wouldn't be worried about *science*.

Why would the church lock up Galileo if they thought his observations and 
deductions were factually incorrect?

 > Look into the old theories of epicycles and hypocycles which were
> used to explain the movements of the planets scientifically. Today we know 
> better.

Epicycles were the String Theory of orbital mechanics. :-)


-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   Human nature dictates that toothpaste tubes spend
   much longer being almost empty than almost full.

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Darren New wrote:

> You know, I don't think this is true.  I think the religions pushing 
> this stuff always knew they had no idea if they were actually right or not.

Oh, I think there have always been people who truly, honestly believe 
that every single syllable of the Bible is the Word of God, and cannot 
be wrong. Whether these are the people "pushing" religion is another 
matter...

> Even nowadays, it surprises me (in some sense) that religious people 
> object to the teaching of evolution here. You'd think if creationism 
> were *true* and they *really* believed it, they wouldn't be worried 
> about *science*.

Oh, I think *today* people just want to be right.

> Why would the church lock up Galileo if they thought his observations 
> and deductions were factually incorrect?

They believed it to be blasphemy, a most evil sin, and that his work 
could corrupt the minds of others. And the church's job, of course, is 
to prevent the innocent from being corrupted. (Or raking in craploads of 
money, depending on how cynical you are...)

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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Patrick Elliott wrote:
> Invisible wrote:
>> (There are people who think that accupuncture is nonesense. But now 
>> scientists are finding that it causes measurable chemical changes in 
>> the body that do, in fact, do something. As crazy as that sounds...)
>>
> 
> It is nonsense.

Thanks for clearing that up for us. I guess all the actual medical doctors 
can stop looking into it now.

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   Human nature dictates that toothpaste tubes spend
   much longer being almost empty than almost full.

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somebody wrote:
> If *nobody else* studying it is good, an unqualified *nobody* studying it is
> even better, is it not?

No.

> Besides, the nature of paranormal claims is such that they can not be
> conclusively disproven. 

This is incorrect.

 > There will never be a study to disprove that which
> is not a theory.

That's why you make theories about it.

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   Human nature dictates that toothpaste tubes spend
   much longer being almost empty than almost full.

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somebody wrote:
> "Orchid XP v8" <voi### [at] devnull> wrote in message
> news:4b111fbd$1@news.povray.org...
> 
>>>> Disproving a theory is every bit as important as proving a theory. By
>>>> proving that the psychic phenominon does not exist, now nobody else
>>>> needs to study it. This is beneficial.
> 
>>> If *nobody else* studying it is good, an unqualified *nobody* studying
> it is
>>> even better, is it not?
> 
>> The only way to scientifically determine whether a claim is valid or not
>> is to, you know, actually investigate it. If we wrote off anything that
>> sounded too weird, human kind would never have advanced anywhere.
> 
> Person A: I can read minds.
> Scientist: Hypothesis: Some people can read minds. Sure, let's test it.
> - Test yields a negative result -
> Person A: I was off that day. I cannot read minds on Fridays.
> Scientist: Sure, let's repeat the test on a Monday.
> - Test yields a negative result -

After a few of these, you start asking questions like "why does the day of 
the week matter."

Just like you say "Things fall at the same speed."  "Well, not a feather and 
a hammer."  "Why not?"

> Person A: The room was too cold. It doesn't work in the cold.

Scientist: Why not?

> So what did the scientist "prove"? 

That's not how science works.

> Even if she tests a million people with
> negative results, she can not conclude that reading minds is not possible

That's not how science works. The scientists investigating the claim weren't 
trying to prove it's impossible. They were trying to find people who could 
do it. If you run out of people who say "I'm willing to prove I can do it", 
or you test a statistically large sample, you can come back and say "we are 
99% sure nobody can do this."  You don't have to prove that remaining 1%, 
any more than you have to prove a drug always works for everyone before you 
can start prescribing it.

> The supposed hypothesis stated at the
> beginning was patently inadequate and nonsensical,

And what hypotheses did the actual scientists actually investigate? Or are 
you just making up straw men and then knocking them down?

> A claim itself is not evidence (unlike what some people here seem to think).

It *is* evidence. It's just not *scientific* evidence.

If I claimed I drove to Las Vegas last week, would you doubt my claim? Would 
you insist it must be nonsense because I'm the only one making that claim?

> With paranormal, there are only personal/subjective claims.

Yes. And that's evidence. It's just not scientific evidence. So then you 
apply the scientific method to see if the personal claims are actually 
scientific evidence.

I can measure cold fusion or irregularities in the orbit of mercury too, and 
until you run through the scientific process, it's also personal/subjective 
claims.

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   Human nature dictates that toothpaste tubes spend
   much longer being almost empty than almost full.

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Warp wrote:
>   *Some* people believed the Earth was flat at some point, but it was not
> as common as most people nowadays believe.

The people arguing against Columbus setting out weren't arguing that he'd 
fall off the edge, but rather that the Earth was far too large to sail 
around in the size ships he was taking. Which was true. He would have died 
had he not run into the Americas.

>   The placebo effect also causes measurable chemical changes in the body.

Interestingly, I've read that the placebo effect has been getting measurably 
stronger over the last few decades. How's *that* for a mind-screw?

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   Human nature dictates that toothpaste tubes spend
   much longer being almost empty than almost full.

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