I'm not saying that God makes/has made intentional errors. I'm saying to OUR finite minds it may seem that he has, but how do we know what God thinks? We don't.
Apparently, the story of "Creation" says that God DID, in fact, fashion a perfect world, but it was man who threw everything off. It seems to me that the entire issue is about faith/belief. You either believe or you don't.

Because in contemporary religious thinking 'Creationism' and 'Intelligent Design' (capital letters intentional) have highly specific meanings, with political connotations. Most (all?) Christians believe that there is a creator, as do Jews, Moslems, some Buddhists and many Hindus. On the other hand, Creationism is a socio-poliical movement that originated in the USA in the early 20th century, It is associated with strong right-wing political ideas; authoritarian, patriarchal social thinking; homophobia, mysogeny, anti-semitism and anti-intelluctualism.

That's how one can be a Christian and not a Creationist.

Right, fire away...

Since the Univ. of Edinburgh experiment showed that negative vibes on the part of a test administrator can wreck people's psychic ability, submitting oneself to being tested would be foolhardy unless one had some control over exactly who was going to do the test.

First laugh of the day. Thanks!

Do you think the negative vibes could be lessened if the administrator wore shoes with rubber soles? How 'bout if the administrator wore a hat lined with aluminum? I bet that would work.

The same phenomenon affects mainstream medical trials, although I've never heard it referred to in a published paper as 'bad vibes'

The gold standard for drug trials, for example, requires that any experimenters who come into contact with the patient -- as well as the patient -- are completely unaware of what substances they are administering. People can (perhaps subconsciously) pick up on very subtle variations in body language, tone of voice, etc.

If there is anything to ESP, then the affects are much more subtle than the minor variations in drug efficacy we routinely test for. So I imagine that there is even greater scope for results to be contaminated by experimenter effect.

ESP -- if it exists -- is not at all a straightforward thing to test for.

I would assume if there were peer reviewed double blind tests of this phenomena that succeeded we'd read about it in Nature? Anyone have a subscription to Nature?

The problem is, even when all the hoops are rigorously jumped through and the results made public, the believers continue to believe what they've always believed. I remember the meta analysis (Lancet 2005) of homeopathy changed nothing in the homeopathic community. I'm guessing the same thing would occur with astral projection.

Fool that I am, I place more credence in those lab experiments than in your sarcasm.

Could you provide a link to that study?

I freely admit my sarcasm ... it's a reflex reaction. I'm treating it with a homeopathic remedy. It's not working.

Well, the interesting thing about the tests at the U. of Edinburgh that I keep referring to is that the results were quite clear. If the psychic tests were administered by people hostile to the idea of psychic abilities, the results were at the same level as pure chance. If administered by people with a positive attitude about psychic abilities, the results were positive, well beyond chance results. The tests seemed pretty well "blinded" to me, although I am not expert in that area, so I don't know what the standards are. What more is required (other than replication of the results by some other team)?

It's hard to get anything published in Nature that is even slightly controversial. In fact, it's hard to get anything into Nature that is even slightly speculative, let alone controversial. So that, in itself, does not really prove anything.

The reality is that most scientists publish in specialist journals within their own field -- that applies as much to mainstream science as to fringe stuff. Most of the stuff that gets published in the British Medical Journal, for example, would be of no interst to the editors of Nature because it's just too field-specific. One of my co-workers did manage to get a paper into Nature -- but only because it was full of glossy colour pictures. That's what we told him anyway, after he'd bought us all many beers.

The problem with ESP research was, and is, that it doesn't suit publication in any mainstream journal. That's as much a reflection on the conservatism of the publishing industry as it is on the quality of the science.



The difference, I think, is that nobody who works in homeopathy treats it as a science, or thinks it is capable of scientific investigation. People who are seriously interested in ESP are generally scientists and _do_ want rigourous scientific investigation (in my experience). Of course I'm aware that there are many charlatans and profiteers who have a non-scientific interest in ESP. But homeopathists often seem to have complete contempt for science, even when they are well meaning (and the generally are).

I'm aware of one serious trial of homeopathy that produced somewhat positive results, and about twenty did not. Compared to the amount of public interested in homeopathy (you can, in some regions, get it at public expense in the UK), there hasn't been much investigation. Homeopathists just don't give a damn about science, and don't believe that a scientific investigation of their methods would prove anything.

The evidence for the existence of precognition is a million times stronger than any evidence for the efficacy of homeopathy. But a million times nearly-nothing doesn't amount to a whole lot

What is required is for everybody with an established career in science to get old and die. Institutional science is enormously conservative.

Darwin proposed that undirected natural selection was the basis of biological evolution in the 1860s. It was _60 years_ before reputable biologists started to follow up the idea. That's how long it takes for radical ideas, even very powerful ones, to become mainstream in the academic world.

What more is required (other than replication of the results by some other team)?

A link?

A particularly interesting recent study is:

Feeling the future: Experimental evidence for anomalous retroactive influences on cognition and affect. Bem, Daryl J. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol 100(3), Mar 2011, 407-425

There's a full-text version on the author's web site:

http://dbem.ws/FeelingFuture.pdf

But I have no idea how close it is to the published version in J Pers Soc Psych.

To make things more complicated, a (Greek!!) epidemiologist published in 2005 a widely read and acknowledged manuscript titled: "Why Most Published Research Findings are False"(*). In this sobering paper, John Ioannides describes how "claimed research findings may often be simply accurate measures of the prevailing bias". Note that he is addressing mainstream "hardcore" science.
I am just throwing it out there to shed some light on the complexities of scientific research. I am of course highly wedded to the latter and believe that it is crucial to the maintenance and advancement of civilization. But I would not discount the importance of the less well scientifically explored part of our nature. Indeed it may some day be "explicable" by a diagram of neural connections and chemicals, but its impact on our psyche and well being is not likely to be altered.

(*) The paper is in the public domain (Kudos to the Public Library of Science). You can read it here

I have a question. If we flip coins and expect heads 50 percent of the time (and tails 50 percent of the time), when the results don't match our expectations, what is the magic percentage? 50.5 percent?, 51 percent?, 53 percent?, 54 percent?

At what point do the results become statistically significant? In that link you provided 53 percent was significant in one of the parameters being tested. (I believe this was the subjects guessing ahead of time which of the photos displayed on the computer screen would be mildly erotic. My eyes glazed over. )

I imagine theirs did, too

If you flip a coin a hundred times, then the odds of getting 54 heads is about one in twenty. That's good enough odds for most mainstream medical research, unless we're talking about genuine life-and-death decisions.

With this kind of stuff, however, I don't think it's enough to be conclusive. It's perhaps enough to think it's worth doing more experiments, however.

Sure you care Dave. You sound full of caring and compassion.
Open, inquisitive, flexible, non judgemental, impartial, receptive...
Most of your posts reflect this.

Bitter skeptic to the end ?
of the wonder of life , spirit
and that it might just carry on
beyond the body.

I care when good people delude themselves with nonsense.

I was friends with a concert pianist who was gay. No one knew he was gay since he was married at one point in his life; he was a really nice guy and everyone liked him. He is dedicating his life by working for a private organization that helps to make gays straight. The basis of this organization (which I won't name here, but feel free to contact me privately) uses religion. You see, since God said something about gay behavior my former friend is now working to help others. He's been involved with the organization for at least 10 years.

He is sincere and I'm sure genuinely believes he's working in the name of God. I look at this as a wasted life and I look at him as a deluded individual.

So, I do care ... though not in a West Coast, one-with-the universe, crystal resonating way.

With the greatest respect, I doubt that you'll undelude (is that a word?) them with sarcasm, whether you care or not.

another lovely sample of insight and intelligence

have you been having OBE's to the "west coast"

What's the saying, extraordinary claims demand extraordinary proof except when we discuss anything on the fringe.

I'd like to think that sarcasm can transcend just about anything.

Dara, your SHIFT key is putting out bad vibes.

hey Dave,
I extend an invitation to you to visit in person.
I'd enjoy to hear you play.

I don't differentiate, but some of my close friends are atheists.
I don't have any set ideas about things,

Though I've always felt a resonance and experienced
a sense of eternal play of the cosmos

My wife's best friend practices homeopathy and by default I'm also friends with her; we just don't discuss science.
What's interesting, her daughter graduated from veterinary college and can only work on small animals while she, armed only with a 'degree' in homeopathy, travels to Africa and treats HIV infected children for fungal diseases. I label that criminal behavior, but I guess the intentions are honorable.



I have absolutely no idea what that means.

You haven't smoked enough ganja

Well... for example

birth, life, death,
and the endless cycle and transformation
of nature and spirit
in this process

I'm a very spiritual person ... 86 proof.

Have to switch forums,
seems I've caused trouble
elsewhere

I think you misunderstood me. The "errors" I was referring to were "errors" from the point of view of us as humans. That is to say, from the point of view of the person praying, God has made a mistake (they may not admit or be aware of this attribution but it has to be readily conceded once God's omnipotence and omniscience is considered).



Ultimately, notions of God are always going to boil down to faith because as Immanual Kant showed us. You can't derive something's existence from its essence. The real question is: Is faith something worthwhile? To this I am reminded of something Sam Harris said . . .

"The problem with faith, is that it really is a conversation stopper. Faith is a declaration of immunity to the powers of conversation. It is a reason why you do not have to give reasons for what you believe. "

---------------------------
Another brilliant quip is by Dan Barker (former evangelist)
"Faith is a cop-out. It is intellectual bankruptcy. If the only way you can accept an assertion is by faith, then you are conceding that it can't be taken on its own merits."

Someone is bound to say at this point, "well science requires you to accept certain things on faith." Yes this is (sort of) true, but the things science asks you to accept are things that, as a human being, you have no choice but to accept. For instance, it is possible to philosophically doubt things like induction and causation (which science accepts as axiomatic premises) but, while on a purely logical level it is possible to doubt these things, it is not practically possible to doubt them. Try living a life were you, as a matter of pure logic, don't believe in causation or induction. You won't get very far.

The point here is that even these things like induction or causation which science seems to accept on faith are not actually accepted as a matter of faith, since we have a pragmatic reason (as opposed to a deductive reason) to accept them.

I don't 'believe in' induction (on faith or otherwise) -- it is a methodological precondition. I do my experimental work in the (unstated) knowledge that the results will be valid to no greater extent than are a whole bunch of untestable preconditions. The validity of inductive reasoning is one of these, as are the constancy of physical laws over time and space, and the completeness and consistency of the mathematical system I use for analysis.

It seems to me that a person who conducts a religious service is doing exactly the same thing.