Consciousness and the Paranormal

[Randall]

Happy New Year to All.

Same to you Constance . That post was really great up until this last part:

For we have, after all, evolved in a universe that contemporary physics recognizes to be unified and totally interconnected at the quantum level of reality.

Physicists haven't quite got a unified theory of everything figured out yet. They keep trying, but they always run into problems that require making assumptions in order to make their models work. Dark matter is a contemporary example of one such assumption. Also, while there is no question that a relationship of some kind can be drawn between any two quanta, that doesn't mean that we are certain that any particular quanta is going to have a measurable effect on all other quanta. However you may want to note, that generating a universe from a single source would logically necessitate total interconnectedness.

 

[smcder]

Why is the scientific acceptance of Ψ phenomena such an important thing for you to pursue?

Why would reframing the study of psychology in it's own academic terms rather than as a scientific discipline be considered a downgrade?

What makes you think I am pursuing the scientific acceptance of psi phenomena?

"downgrade", as I said before, only in terms of its being considered a scientific discipline, not in terms of overall value

 

[smcder]

Happy New Year to All.

I'm catching up on recent posts and have a few responses.

I'm in agreement with Radin's take on the trickster 'meme' as it's propagated in contemporary culture and pop culture:




Burnt State observed:



Matt Williams, the hoaxer we've heard from at length, is a popular spokesman for the current crop of cc hoaxers rather than a theorist. A trickster theory was adopted and entangled with social constructionism, Dada, performance art, actor network theory, ritual, religion, and other cultural phenomena by the authors of The Field Guide to Crop Circles (two still extant members of the original TeamSatan/CCmakers who have long been suspected of employment as disinformation agents focused on the ufo and cc subjects). This mixed bag of 'theories' continued to be talked up in the CCmakers website (Circlemakers.org), the now-defunct CropCircleConnector Forum, and elsewhere as a way to erase the persistent question of the origins of crop circles and simultaneously to justify cc hoaxing {indeed to demand the adulation of cc hoaxers who were bringing the 'truth' to all crop circle researchers and other reality seekers). The point to be absorbed by those who would accept it was the essence of anti-reason -- that the possibility of nonhuman agency/ies in the production of crop circles didn't matter and need not be investigated, that one should simply have one's individual experience in crop circles and be content with one's 'personal reality' since that was to be understood as the only sense of reality possible for humans.

I saw the ideology being preached by these people as essentially nihilistic, and still do. It denied the value of scientific investigation of physical anomalies manifested in crop circles and discouraged the attempts of people from a variety of other disciplines to combine the resources of their insights and explorations toward a more comprehensive study of cc in terms of information expressed in them. Mediums as well as scientists were blown off and scoffed at. Prosaic explanations were casually suggested for every kind of biological, mineralogical, and energetic anomaly found in crop circles. And there was no possibly valid core understanding that might be reached in common by mediums, mystics, meditators, intuitives, and experts in ancient sacred geometry. In a world dominated by the trickster, no perceptions -- scientific or mental -- could be trusted to be valid paths to understanding the nature of reality. Hoaxing became the means by which ordinary people could gradually come to accept reality as inscrutable -- made inscrutable by the ever-present trickster, a viewpoint promoted as intellectual progress.

My problem with the trickster notion, even before that exploitation of it, has been that it's fraught with the reification fallacy. What was originally a Jungian archetype {an insubstantial theoretical concept unknown to consciousness that in itself still requires definition even in depth psychology}, readily became many things for many people (even concrete living things or agents, forces, explanatory powers), and employed by those people in disciplines seeking deeper explanations for the subject matters they interpreted. So the archetypes in general, and the trickster in particular, became 'structures of thought' and even 'structures of reality' for academics in the humanities and social sciences -- in large part, in my opinion, a decision to hang both one's hat and one's thinking on a hook that might not hold up (being simply assumed to exist). We're still asking here whether the 'trickster' resides in the subconscious mind or in nature -- or maybe in both. Obviously we don't have any idea where or indeed what the trickster is.

A scholar like Hansen accumulates large files of data from various fields that seem to confirm the 'reality' of something he identifies as the 'trickster' as busily at work in all aspects of human life laying down pools of quick-sand in the ground upon which we walk and the ground -- a wide and partially undisclosed terrain -- upon which we perceive and experience existence and think about what our perceptions, experiences, and thinking mean about the nature of reality, of being. Can we make progress in understanding the nature of reality? It seems to me that we unquestionably have, and that we've done so by multiplying and combining our perspectives on what we encounter in the physical world. For too long, though, our disciplines of knowledge have failed to work together on the ground of our thinking based as it is in our experience in the world, which must include our anomalous experiences in order to be complete. Nor does it enable progress in this endeavor to assume that the full range of human experience is radically and hopelessly disunified by our existing in different 'zones' of reality, or in a world in which every kind of progress is ultimately vulnerable to confusion by a zone ruled by the 'trickster'. For we have, after all, evolved in a universe that contemporary physics recognizes to be unified and totally interconnected at the quantum level of reality.

[/quote]

If you haven't - I hope you will read Hansen's book at some point - he applies the Trickster theory to very specific instances and probably wouldn't agree with the trickster label being given to any instance of uncertainty or to the broad application of the trickster as a meme (although he might certainly be bemused that it has become so).

Rather he points to specific areas that are liminal/marginal - areas in which knowledge hasn't been clearly established or in which there are social taboos - and what sorts of things go on there, so in that sense it could be seen as a constructive theory, a way of making predictions in chaotic places, where there hadn't been tools to work with these things before . . . but I'm not sure he is saying those exact boundaries are forever fixed.

His own writing is the best source, but this is a good overview and collection of sources available on the internet. It includes his own research, critique of psi experiments and research on skeptical organizations. I've simply tried to present his theory as I understand it fairly to the best of my ability in response to questions, but I don't want that to be a substitute for his own writing - which I think is well worth reading for anyone interested in the field.

George P. Hansen - Randi's Prize

 

[smcder]

Happy New Year to All.

I'm catching up on recent posts and have a few responses.

I'm in agreement with Radin's take on the trickster 'meme' as it's propagated in contemporary culture and pop culture:




Burnt State observed:



Matt Williams, the hoaxer we've heard from at length, is a popular spokesman for the current crop of cc hoaxers rather than a theorist. A trickster theory was adopted and entangled with social constructionism, Dada, performance art, actor network theory, ritual, religion, and other cultural phenomena by the authors of The Field Guide to Crop Circles (two still extant members of the original TeamSatan/CCmakers who have long been suspected of employment as disinformation agents focused on the ufo and cc subjects). This mixed bag of 'theories' continued to be talked up in the CCmakers website (Circlemakers.org), the now-defunct CropCircleConnector Forum, and elsewhere as a way to erase the persistent question of the origins of crop circles and simultaneously to justify cc hoaxing {indeed to demand the adulation of cc hoaxers who were bringing the 'truth' to all crop circle researchers and other reality seekers). The point to be absorbed by those who would accept it was the essence of anti-reason -- that the possibility of nonhuman agency/ies in the production of crop circles didn't matter and need not be investigated, that one should simply have one's individual experience in crop circles and be content with one's 'personal reality' since that was to be understood as the only sense of reality possible for humans.

I saw the ideology being preached by these people as essentially nihilistic, and still do. It denied the value of scientific investigation of physical anomalies manifested in crop circles and discouraged the attempts of people from a variety of other disciplines to combine the resources of their insights and explorations toward a more comprehensive study of cc in terms of information expressed in them. Mediums as well as scientists were blown off and scoffed at. Prosaic explanations were casually suggested for every kind of biological, mineralogical, and energetic anomaly found in crop circles. And there was no possibly valid core understanding that might be reached in common by mediums, mystics, meditators, intuitives, and experts in ancient sacred geometry. In a world dominated by the trickster, no perceptions -- scientific or mental -- could be trusted to be valid paths to understanding the nature of reality. Hoaxing became the means by which ordinary people could gradually come to accept reality as inscrutable -- made inscrutable by the ever-present trickster, a viewpoint promoted as intellectual progress.

My problem with the trickster notion, even before that exploitation of it, has been that it's fraught with the reification fallacy. What was originally a Jungian archetype {an insubstantial theoretical concept unknown to consciousness that in itself still requires definition even in depth psychology}, readily became many things for many people (even concrete living things or agents, forces, explanatory powers), and employed by those people in disciplines seeking deeper explanations for the subject matters they interpreted. So the archetypes in general, and the trickster in particular, became 'structures of thought' and even 'structures of reality' for academics in the humanities and social sciences -- in large part, in my opinion, a decision to hang both one's hat and one's thinking on a hook that might not hold up (being simply assumed to exist). We're still asking here whether the 'trickster' resides in the subconscious mind or in nature -- or maybe in both. Obviously we don't have any idea where or indeed what the trickster is.

A scholar like Hansen accumulates large files of data from various fields that seem to confirm the 'reality' of something he identifies as the 'trickster' as busily at work in all aspects of human life laying down pools of quick-sand in the ground upon which we walk and the ground -- a wide and partially undisclosed terrain -- upon which we perceive and experience existence and think about what our perceptions, experiences, and thinking mean about the nature of reality, of being. Can we make progress in understanding the nature of reality? It seems to me that we unquestionably have, and that we've done so by multiplying and combining our perspectives on what we encounter in the physical world. For too long, though, our disciplines of knowledge have failed to work together on the ground of our thinking based as it is in our experience in the world, which must include our anomalous experiences in order to be complete. Nor does it enable progress in this endeavor to assume that the full range of human experience is radically and hopelessly disunified by our existing in different 'zones' of reality, or in a world in which every kind of progress is ultimately vulnerable to confusion by a zone ruled by the 'trickster'. For we have, after all, evolved in a universe that contemporary physics recognizes to be unified and totally interconnected at the quantum level of reality.

The other thing I like about Hansen's take on the Trickster is that he isn't afraid to roll his sleeves up and get involved directly with these things . . . he talks about precautions he takes when dealing with the paranormal and gives cautions but I don't take his work to be discouraging to people who want to explore these areas, rather he tries to give some ideas of what to expect - looking at his own body of work, he seems to have plunged in in many areas.

 

[smcder]

A lovely post, Constance, that makes a wonderful argument on behalf of wholeness and unification. There has been too long a history of the segregation and polarization of thought, that has left us huddled up against a wall separating the sane from the irrational. Destructuring & restructuring reality is good for the mind, body and spirit.

You also asked:

Do you actually inhabit this space? And if so, how do you manage?

I hope this is the permalink to the long quote I gave from Kay Redfield Jamison's book on Manic-Depression:

The Art of Magical Thinking | The Paracast Community Forums

and a short piece of it because I think it's a beautiful essay that reflects my experiences on "inhabiting this space":

So why would I want anything to do with this "illness"?

Because I honestly believe that as a result of it I have felt more things, more deeply; had more experiences, more intensely; loved more, and been more loved; laughed more often for having cried more often; appreciated more the springs, for all the winters; worn death “as close as dungarees,” appreciated it – and life – more; seen the finest and most terrible in people, and slowly learned the values of caring, loyalty, and seeing things through. I think I have seen the breadth and depth and width of my heart, and seen how frail they both are, and how ultimately unknowable they both are. Depressed, I have crawled on my hands and knees to get across a room, and have done it for month after month. But, normal or high, I have run faster, thought faster, loved faster than most I know. And I think much of this is related to my illness – the intensity it gives to things and the perspective it forces on me. I think it has made me test the limits of my mind (which, while wanting, is holding) and the limits of my upbringing, family, education and friends.

 

[smcder]

Thanks, Burnt State. I like the way you put it: "Destructuring & restructuring reality is good for the mind, body and spirit." We need to resist system builders in the world of ideas who ignore or dismiss persistent categories of human experience and thought. It requires interdisciplinary work and thinking, a maintenance of the dialectic as our species learns more, and above all the vigorous investigation of anomalous experiences for which we have not yet discovered appropriate methodologies.


Re your next post: Adolescence is a very rough road, moreso for girls in my experience. Taking guitar lessons together is a great idea. Your kitchen also sounds like a very good place to be.

Constance, did you listen to the Afterlife FM interview when Hansen responds to Radin's critique of the Trickster theory as anti-science? I'll try to go back and transcribe that if I get time, I do think he acknowledged Radin's work as being extremely important - I think he was more emphasizing the need to be aware of Trickster effects when do experimental work.

 

[smcder]

Why is the scientific acceptance of Ψ phenomena such an important thing for you to pursue?

Why would reframing the study of psychology in it's own academic terms rather than as a scientific discipline be considered a downgrade?

I think where I am at right now is opinion - I hear what you (and others) are saying and the critique of science/parapyschology - even to the extent that some say there is not one scrap of evidence out there . . . but on the other side I have Jessica Utts, Dean Radin and many others who say (perhaps even at some risk to their academic reputation if not to their careers) that there is an effect, it is well-established (by science) and its not being fairly acknowledged. What do we do with these claims? I don't feel like I can accept or reject them without having a closer look at both sides.

I think many of the issues of methodology, control of variables and the questions about statistical issues also apply to psychology but are these experiments critiqued to the extent that Psi is? Do the (S)keptics ever go over and have a look at the science is being done in other fields?

As Constance points out and Radin also claims in his book - I believe it's in The Conscious Universe and then more developed in Entangled Minds - that there is now room in theory to account for Psi phenomena. If so, then perhaps that will help. I haven't read Entangled Minds yet.

So, do the proponents who spend years studying this - are they fooling themselves? Do we, as laypersons, know better? I don't, because I've only ever read one or two studies, really read them and tried to understand them. Authority is no argument, but I want to know more about the work that has been done and what the people who have done that work think.

I doubt it can all be disentangled and made clear, I doubt that there is even a clear boundary line between what is and isn't science . . . so, I don't know what conclusion, if any, I'll come to - but no, I'm not committed, at this point, to seeing Psi accepted as science - I think there are any of a number of other possible outcomes that would be just as interesting.

Does that help clarify?

 

[smcder]

It seems to me that we've already answered your inquiry to the extent that it needs to be answered. Those who take the position that science requires unequivocal empirical evidence do not have sufficient cause to consider anything else to be within the boundaries of science, and that includes Ψ phenomena. Those who take the position that ambiguous indirect evidence such as statistical analysis constitutes scientific evidence disagree. What more do you need to know ( except which side of the fence you're on )?

Skepticism and science are separate things. Skepticism in its purest form is a mindset, not a methodology. However it's been my experience, particularly online, that those who brand themselves as skeptics have their own personal self-serving definition of skepticism that they use to justify their denial and criticism ( not to be confused with critical thinking ).

I haven't read those titles either but I'll hazard a guess that it theorizes that the quantum processes that take place within the brain are what give rise to minds and that because of the phenomenon of quantum entanglement it follows that minds are similarly entangled, and if that guess is correct, then we're looking at yet another pseudoscientific work infused with quantum mysticism.

Some probably do and some probably don't. I think the answer depends on the particulars of the people and cases involved.

Argument from authority is not necessarily a logical fallacy. Argument from authority can be perfectly acceptable provided that the authority cited is actually a recognized expert. This doesn't automatically make them correct, but it is better to cite a respected authority than make mere unsubstantiated proclamations. Therefore wanting to check out the work of recognized researchers is entirely reasonable.

Yes that does help clarify. I've went through much of the same process while sorting out ufology. The most reasonable approach IMO is to adopt the most defensible and clear-cut stance on how science is defined that you can, and then see if the methods used in the study of Ψ phenomena match that criteria and don't venture outside those boundaries. Personally, I don't see how it's possible to jam parapsychology as a whole into the science mould without resorting to a definition of science that is so broad as to invite allegations of pseudoscience and criticism. The solution is therefore to avoid doing that in the first place and create a foundation upon which academic parapsychology can stand on its own two feet.

10-4

 

[smcder]

It seems to me that we've already answered your inquiry to the extent that it needs to be answered. Those who take the position that science requires unequivocal empirical evidence do not have sufficient cause to consider anything else to be within the boundaries of science, and that includes Ψ phenomena. Those who take the position that ambiguous indirect evidence such as statistical analysis constitutes scientific evidence disagree. What more do you need to know ( except which side of the fence you're on )?

Skepticism and science are separate things. Skepticism in its purest form is a mindset, not a methodology. However it's been my experience, particularly online, that those who brand themselves as skeptics have their own personal self-serving definition of skepticism that they use to justify their denial and criticism ( not to be confused with critical thinking ).

I haven't read those titles either but I'll hazard a guess that it theorizes that the quantum processes that take place within the brain are what give rise to minds and that because of the phenomenon of quantum entanglement it follows that minds are similarly entangled, and if that guess is correct, then we're looking at yet another pseudoscientific work infused with quantum mysticism.

Some probably do and some probably don't. I think the answer depends on the particulars of the people and cases involved.

Argument from authority is not necessarily a logical fallacy. Argument from authority can be perfectly acceptable provided that the authority cited is actually a recognized expert. This doesn't automatically make them correct, but it is better to cite a respected authority than make mere unsubstantiated proclamations. Therefore wanting to check out the work of recognized researchers is entirely reasonable.

Yes that does help clarify. I've went through much of the same process while sorting out ufology. The most reasonable approach IMO is to adopt the most defensible and clear-cut stance on how science is defined that you can, and then see if the methods used in the study of Ψ phenomena match that criteria and don't venture outside those boundaries. Personally, I don't see how it's possible to jam parapsychology as a whole into the science mould without resorting to a definition of science that is so broad as to invite allegations of pseudoscience and criticism. The solution is therefore to avoid doing that in the first place and create a foundation upon which academic parapsychology can stand on its own two feet.

It seems to me that we've already answered your inquiry to the extent that it needs to be answered. Those who take the position that science requires unequivocal empirical evidence do not have sufficient cause to consider anything else to be within the boundaries of science, and that includes Ψ phenomena. Those who take the position that ambiguous indirect evidence such as statistical analysis constitutes scientific evidence disagree. What more do you need to know ( except which side of the fence you're on )?

Not sure I agree with all of this or that it makes sense. At any rate it, the above only seems to cover a small part of my inquiry and so it doesn't seem to me that it has been addressed to any real extent - but doing so is the point of my blog or intellectual diary. At any rate, there is still much more that I want to know.

Skepticism and science are separate things. Skepticism in its purest form is a mindset, not a methodology. However it's been my experience, particularly online, that those who brand themselves as skeptics have their own personal self-serving definition of skepticism that they use to justify their denial and criticism ( not to be confused with critical thinking ).

That's my understanding too.

The following is a good site for etymology, which is instructive in this case:

Online Etymology Dictionary
skeptic (n) also sceptic, 1580s, "member of an ancient Greek school that doubted the possibility of real knowledge," from Middle French sceptique and directly from Latin scepticus "the sect of the Skeptics," from Greek skeptikos (plural Skeptikoi "the Skeptics, followers of Pyrrho"), noun use of adjective meaning "inquiring, reflective" (the name taken by the disciples of the Greek philosopher Pyrrho, who lived c.360-c.270 B.C.E.), related to skeptesthai "to reflect, look, view" (see scope (n.1)).

Skeptic does not mean him who doubts, but him who investigates or researches as opposed to him who asserts and thinks that he has found. [Miguel de Unamuno, "Essays and Soliloquies," 1924]

The extended sense of "one with a doubting attitude" first recorded 1610s. The sk- spelling is an early 17c. Greek revival and is preferred in U.S. As a verb, scepticize (1690s) failed to catch on.

--- I'm not sure if it's Radin or maybe Hansen who discuss capital S and little s skeptics. I came across the phrase "skeptical advocacy" this cracks me up in the same way that "evangelical atheism" cracks me up . . . I haven't looked into it much but I've heard that Wikipedia bears the marks of this activism in terms of how any paranormal subject is covered - probably including Ufology.

I haven't read those titles either but I'll hazard a guess that it theorizes that the quantum processes that take place within the brain are what give rise to minds and that because of the phenomenon of quantum entanglement it follows that minds are similarly entangled, and if that guess is correct, then we're looking at yet another pseudoscientific work infused with quantum mysticism.

All guesses are hazardous! To correct/clarify - I have read The Conscious Universe but not Entangled Minds - but I don't think this is 100% right, not sure. There is an interesting theory by mathematician Roger Penrose along these lines, so maybe that is what you are thinking of? - there is a short chapter on it in The Conscious Universe and then I (hazard) Radin's theory is developed further in Entangled Minds - there is probably more on it on Radin's blog:

Entangled Minds

But I would say it's best to read the book for yourself. You could do a book report for us on the thread. I bet if you buy it here on Radin's website:

Dean Radin - Entangled Minds

he may get something extra for the purchase, which would then go into his research.

Argument from authority is not necessarily a logical fallacy. Argument from authority can be perfectly acceptable provided that the authority cited is actually a recognized expert. This doesn't automatically make them correct, but it is better to cite a respected authority than make mere unsubstantiated proclamations. Therefore wanting to check out the work of recognized researchers is entirely reasonable.

I thought it was probably a pretty reasonable thing to do too!

Yes that does help clarify. I've went through much of the same process while sorting out ufology. The most reasonable approach IMO is to adopt the most defensible and clear-cut stance on how science is defined that you can, and then see if the methods used in the study of Ψ phenomena match that criteria and don't venture outside those boundaries. Personally, I don't see how it's possible to jam parapsychology as a whole into the science mould without resorting to a definition of science that is so broad as to invite allegations of pseudoscience and criticism. The solution is therefore to avoid doing that in the first place and create a foundation upon which academic parapsychology can stand on its own two feet.

I don't know much about ufology, but that seems a reasonable approach. As I said, I'm not particularly concerned at this point with who considers parapsychology to be scientific.

 

[smcder]

Interesting article from Wired:

The End of Theory: The Data Deluge Makes the Scientific Method Obsolete

At the petabyte scale, information is not a matter of simple three- and four-dimensional taxonomy and order but of dimensionally agnostic statistics. It calls for an entirely different approach, one that requires us to lose the tether of data as something that can be visualized in its totality.
. . .

Speaking at the O'Reilly Emerging Technology Conference this past March, Peter Norvig, Google's research director, offered an update to George Box's maxim: "All models are wrong, and increasingly you can succeed without them."

. . .

But faced with massive data, this approach to science — hypothesize, model, test — is becoming obsolete. Consider physics: Newtonian models were crude approximations of the truth (wrong at the atomic level, but still useful). A hundred years ago, statistically based quantum mechanics offered a better picture — but quantum mechanics is yet another model, and as such it, too, is flawed, no doubt a caricature of a more complex underlying reality. The reason physics has drifted into theoretical speculation about n-dimensional grand unified models over the past few decades (the "beautiful story" phase of a discipline starved of data) is that we don't know how to run the experiments that would falsify the hypotheses — the energies are too high, the accelerators too expensive, and so on.

. . .

There is now a better way. Petabytes allow us to say: "Correlation is enough." We can stop looking for models. We can analyze the data without hypotheses about what it might show. We can throw the numbers into the biggest computing clusters the world has ever seen and let statistical algorithms find patterns where science cannot.

. . .

 

[Tyger]

The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents. We live on a placid island of ignorance in the midst of black seas of infinity, and it was not meant that we should voyage far. The sciences, each straining in its own direction, have hitherto harmed us little; but some day the piecing together of dissociated knowledge will open up such terrifying vistas of reality, and of our frightful position therein, that we shall either go mad from the revelation or flee from the light into the peace and safety of a new dark age. - HP Lovecraft

Love this quote!

 

[smcder]

OK, now I'm a bit confused. It seems from your past posts that you were trying to determine if parapsychology has any scientific validity. It goes back to somewhere in these posts where you said:

"The comparison to psychology is whether the variables in psychology are no more controlled than those in parapsychology (reference above the Harvard studies of methodology - purporting to show that parapsychology experiments exceed standards in comparison to other fields, I want to see this in more detail). Are there consistently applied standards that allow us to delineate what is and isn't science?"​

The most defensible way to sort that out is by going through the process we've been discussing. On the other hand, if you're just out there exploring the territory in general, then perhaps the issue of scientific validity doesn't need to be hashed out in so much detail.

The most defensible way to sort that out is by going through the process we've been discussing.

Which process is that again?

What I am interested in now is reading the actual studies and critiques of the studies (Radin's site and Utts' both provide exchanges between researchers and their critics). Until that's done, it's all just speculation.

 

[smcder]

I was referring loosely to the discussion we're having as it pertains to the criteria for forming your own well reasoned and defensible conclusions about the issues you have raised.

I'm not talking about drawing conclusions about the information prior to looking it over. I'm talking about knowing how you're going to parse it as you review it. Or are you now, "not particularly concerned at this point with who considers parapsychology to be scientific." If so, what is the point of your investigation? What is motivating you to explore this topic? Are all these issues simply passing points of interest with no particular focus?

Right now I'm just focusing my energy on reading the research and taking notes. You could read the research too and apply the critical thinking process.

I'm currently working through these four papers:

• An Assessment Of The Evidence For Psychic Functioning
• Professor Hyman's report.
• Utts' reply to Hyman's report
• Response by Dr. Edwin May, the lead investigator for the government-sponsored work and Director, Cognitive Sciences Laboratory

Found at: JESSICA UTTS' HOME PAGE

points 2. and 3. in this paper seem to address some of the concerns you have expressed in previous posts -

 

[smcder]

What Educated Citizens Should Know about Statistics and Probability, American Statistician, 57(2), 74-79.

http://www.ics.uci.edu/~jutts/AmerStat2003.pdf

Much has changed since the widespread introduction of statistics courses into the university curriculum, but the way introductory statistics courses are taught has not kept up with these changes. This article discusses the changes, and the way the introductory syllabus should change to reflect them. In particular, seven ideas are discussed that every student who takes elementary statistics should learn and understand in order to be an educated citizen. Misunderstanding these topics leads to cynicism among the public at best, and misuse of study results by policy-makers, physicians, and others at worst.

A summary of the seven topics covered in this article is presented first, followed by a more in-depth explanation with examples for each topic:


1. When it can be concluded that a relationship is one of cause and effect, and when it cannot, including the difference between randomized experiments and observational studies.

2. The difference between statistical significance and practical importance, especially when using large sample sizes.

3. The difference between finding “no effect” or “no difference” and finding no statistically significant effect or difference, especially when using small sample sizes.

4. Common sources of bias in surveys and experiments, such as poor wording of questions, volunteer response, and socially desirable answers.

5. The idea that coincidences and seemingly very improbable events are not uncommon because there are so many possibilities.

6. “Confusion of the inverse” in which a conditional probability in one direction is confused with the conditional probability in the other direction.

7. Understanding that variability is natural, and that “normal”is not the same as “average.”

 

[smcder]

Thanks for that info. Personally, parapsychology is not my main focus, and I have other things I should be doing besides reading through more Ψ studies that in all likelihood don't include any verifiable, definitive, consistent, evidence. However if you run across any, by all means please surprise me. Once again, such evidence would be a verifiable situation where under controlled conditions that leave no appreciable room for chance, someone claiming Ψ powers can repeatedly and unambiguously demonstrate that their powers are real to an independent study group.

You're welcome! What project are you currently working on?

 

[Tyger]

Thanks for that info. Personally, parapsychology is not my main focus, and I have other things I should be doing besides reading through more Ψ studies that in all likelihood don't include any verifiable, definitive, consistent, evidence. However if you run across any, by all means please surprise me. Once again, such evidence would be a verifiable situation where under controlled conditions that leave no appreciable room for chance, someone claiming Ψ powers can repeatedly and unambiguously demonstrate that their powers are real to an independent study group.

If 'parapsychology' is not your focus, why are you on a thread that has that topic (pretty much) as one of it's main items of discussion? If you are not willing to read and become informed about the topics of the thread, you lose all credibility as a serious thinker about, and contributor to, the discussion.

Here you have pretty much said it. You already have a pov. You have no interest in changing that pov. Further, your belief system is such that you have already discounted it ever being adequately challenged.

As an aside: it appears that you make sure your pov won't be challenged by avoiding any intellectual heavy lifting on your own part. You 'instruct' other people to 'report to you' what they find, and you will then lazily offer rebuttal from behind your wall. You do this consistently. Methinks your 'critical thinking' has become a substitute for actual intellectual activity in the world - and rather than actually engage in informed dialog, you prefer the armchair method of critique.

 

[Burnt State]

Right now I'm just focusing my energy on reading the research and taking notes. You could read the research too and apply the critical thinking process.

I'm currently working through these papers:

• An Assessment Of The Evidence For Psychic Functioning
• Professor Hyman's report.
• Utts' reply to Hyman's report

Well, I read through all of Hyman's report and look forward to reading Utts' response. I thought that of everything I read the following two concluding summary points are the most salient features of his discussion. Firstly, that there is something measurable taking place that exceeds chance (point #4) but that because there is no established positive theory of the paranormal we have no way of making any claims of paranormal activity (point #5). Also, because there is no positive theory of the paranormal there are no teaching or baseline experiments that could be used to prove a positive theory of the paranormal.

4. The statistical departures from chance appear to be too large and consistent to attribute to statistical flukes of any sort. Although I cannot dismiss the possibility that these rejections of the null hypothesis might reflect limitations in the statistical model as an approximation of the experimental situation, I tend to agree with Professor Utts that real effects are occurring in these experiments. Something other than chance departures from the null hypothesis has occurred in these experiments.

5. However, the occurrence of statistical effects does not warrant the conclusion that psychic functioning has been demonstrated. Significant departures from the null hypothesis can occur for several reasons. Without a positive theory of anomalous cognition, we cannot say that these effects are due to a single cause, let alone claim they reflect anomalous cognition. We do not yet know how replicable these results will be, especially in terms of showing consistent relations to other variables. The investigators report findings that they believe show that the degree of anomalous cognition varies with target entropy and the `bandwidth' of the target set. These findings are preliminary and only suggestive at this time. Parapsychologists, in the past, have reported finding other correlates of psychic functioning such as extroversion, sheep/goats, altered states only to find that later studies could not replicate them.

Hyman seems to be evaluating the work thoroughly and thoughtfully. That we don't know what is taking place, how it's taking place or why, makes paranormal phenomenon hard to measure, hard to test and hard to theorize on. I know that you've been offering up the end of theory as a consideration along with the notion that the world is much more random than we think, and perhaps it is in the paranormal we will find a true pattern.

But, if we can make some simple claims about replication of experiments and an understanding of cause and effect, it strikes me that parapsychology has a much bigger hill to climb still, for there are only effects and no real cause, condition or situation that we can put at the forefront of a positive theory, only a '?' stands there.

 

[smcder]

Well, I read through all of Hyman's report and look forward to reading Utts' response. I thought that of everything I read the following two concluding summary points are the most salient features of his discussion. Firstly, that there is something measurable taking place that exceeds chance (point #4) but that because there is no established positive theory of the paranormal we have no way of making any claims of paranormal activity (point #5). Also, because there is no positive theory of the paranormal there are no teaching or baseline experiments that could be used to prove a positive theory of the paranormal.

Hyman seems to be evaluating the work thoroughly and thoughtfully. That we don't know what is taking place, how it's taking place or why, makes paranormal phenomenon hard to measure, hard to test and hard to theorize on. I know that you've been offering up the end of theory as a consideration along with the notion that the world is much more random than we think, and perhaps it is in the paranormal we will find a true pattern.

But, if we can make some simple claims about replication of experiments and an understanding of cause and effect, it strikes me that parapsychology has a much bigger hill to climb still, for there are only effects and no real cause, condition or situation that we can put at the forefront of a positive theory, only a '?' stands there.

I am definitely interested in the lack of theory critique. These studies were published in the mid 90s, so I don't know where this is now - I think Radin has put forward some theories and maybe others have too. There are 12 papers under the "Theory" section of this page:

http://deanradin.com/evidence/evidence.htm

Let me know what you think when you look at Utts' response. It's brief and she acknowledges Hyman's assessment of where they agree and disagree and then responds, I think effectively, to these three issues with regard to the scientific status of parapsychology:

1. "Only parapsychology, among the fields of inquiry claiming scientific status, lacks a cumulative database (p. 6)."
2. "Only parapsychology claims to be a science on the basis of phenomena (or a phenomenon) whose presence can be detected only by rejecting a null hypothesis (p. 8)."
3. "Parapsychology is the only field of scientific inquiry that does not have even one exemplar that can be assigned to students with the expectation that they will observe the original results (p. 18)."

two excerpts:

"While it is true that parapsychology has not figured out all the answers, it does not differ from normal science in this regard. It is the norm of scientific progress to make observations first, and then to attempt to explain them. Before quantum mechanics was developed there were a number of anomalies observed in physics that could not be explained. There are many observations in physics and in the social and medical sciences that can be observed, either statistically or deterministically, but which cannot be explained."

"Despite Professor Hyman's continued protests about parapsychology lacking repeatability, I have never seen a skeptic attempt to perform an experiment with enough trials to even come close to insuring success. The parapsychologists who have recently been willing to take on this challenge have indeed found success in their experiments, as described in my original report."

 

[smcder]

Well, I read through all of Hyman's report and look forward to reading Utts' response. I thought that of everything I read the following two concluding summary points are the most salient features of his discussion. Firstly, that there is something measurable taking place that exceeds chance (point #4) but that because there is no established positive theory of the paranormal we have no way of making any claims of paranormal activity (point #5). Also, because there is no positive theory of the paranormal there are no teaching or baseline experiments that could be used to prove a positive theory of the paranormal.

Hyman seems to be evaluating the work thoroughly and thoughtfully. That we don't know what is taking place, how it's taking place or why, makes paranormal phenomenon hard to measure, hard to test and hard to theorize on. I know that you've been offering up the end of theory as a consideration along with the notion that the world is much more random than we think, and perhaps it is in the paranormal we will find a true pattern.

But, if we can make some simple claims about replication of experiments and an understanding of cause and effect, it strikes me that parapsychology has a much bigger hill to climb still, for there are only effects and no real cause, condition or situation that we can put at the forefront of a positive theory, only a '?' stands there.

I know that you've been offering up the end of theory as a consideration along with the notion that the world is much more random than we think, and perhaps it is in the paranormal we will find a true pattern.

I'm not really linking the end of theory article with the paranormal - it was just an interesting article I remember reading and it seems to call into question the basic ideas of how we do science by looking for a mechanism, a cause - many implications there . . . but you raise some interesting connections . . . can you flesh out how you see that this might be related to the paranormal?

 

[Constance]

Why is the scientific acceptance of Ψ phenomena such an important thing for you to pursue?

Why would reframing the study of psychology in it's own academic terms rather than as a scientific discipline be considered a downgrade?

Just catching up today. Steve has replied clearly to ufo's first question above, but I'd like to add the following perspective. Science for the past two hundred years has been materialist science, operating under the presupposition that the only place to look for the 'real' is in materiality. The term 'physical' has been increasingly substituted for the term 'material' in recent decades, but in effect that change of terminology has been no less reductive. It is only in the last two decades that consciousness (subjectivity) has been taken up as an aspect of reality that needs to be studied by science and, predictably (given the long commitment of 'science' to materialism) it is the material brain rather than the nonmaterial mind that has been chosen as the subject to be investigated. Thus, except for some notable quantum information physicists, scientists in general maintain the long-standing materialist presupposition that all explanations for reality (accounts on the road to reality) are to be found in objectively measureable quantitites of one sort or another. And as 'science' in general continues to operate according to Popper's definition -- that replicability and predictability are required for any subject to be considered a 'scientific subject' -- the prejudice against investigations of anomalous, 'paranormal' phenomena in consciousness remains steadfast. In general, this prejudice still assumes that nature and the universe are machinelike and closed systems, despite the ever-increasing recognition by scientists of how little is yet understood about the nature of reality. Quoting from a review of Radin's most recent book, Supernormal (2013):

Though the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), as one of the leading science institutes in the world, formally inducted the Para-psychological Association into its organization in 1969, the ugly truth is the majority of the science and academic leaders in the world continue to snub their noses and ignore the important research, knowledge and cutting-edge progress that has been made in the field of parapsychology over the last 50 years. The biased cynicism of these dinosaurs is totally unacceptable and diametrically opposed to legitimate advancement in any age of reason.

Accordingly I think it's easy to understand why many people interested in anomalous and 'paranormally' received and generated experience do press for a change in the attitude (among scientists and other academics, and trickled down to general consensual thinking in our time) characterized in the quotation above.

Ufology also asked:

Why would reframing the study of psychology in it's [sic] own academic terms rather than as a scientific discipline be considered a downgrade?

The answer to that question is more than obvious given the dominance of what is called 'science' in our time. It's also clear from ufology's question that he would prefer that parapsychology be categorized as a minor player in the field of abnormal psychology rather than as a door opening into new knowledge of the nature of reality.