Reply to Skeptics

As I may have mentioned (!) I gave a talk on skeptic psychology (see November 2) at the SPR recently. I wouldn't bring it up again, but it produced a couple of responses from skeptics, which I thought I'd reply to here. Here are the posts, followed by my response.

Dave W: Interestingly, it would be easy to write this same piece from a diametrically opposed viewpoint - that the nasty and corrosive responses of some psychic believers to criticism are due to fear that parapsychological effects are not real, confounded with a massive dose of cognitive dissonance. Anecdotes abound, for example, of psi researchers who were taken in by an admitted hoax but dogmatically refused to believe it. If the skeptics were to paint with a brush as broad as you have used, and portray all psi advocates as terrified of facing reality, I'm sure that you would (rightly) object to such a simple-minded generalization. As for the ridicule, it seems to be par for the course. Perhaps you are more polite with your language, but the idea that parapsychologists and their supporters are less insulting to their critics is clearly implied in the above piece, and is also clearly shown to be wrong by the same text. Leiter is obviously intending to be insulting, for just one example. What might be most insulting is your suggestion that cynics, climate-change denialists and creationists are the same sort of "skeptics" as Randi, Shermer, Gardener and the like. Creationists are not "evolution skeptics," they are evolution denialists with nothing but religious ideology to support their position. Such a comparison is at least as personal, divisive and rude as calling Randi a nitwit. But in only avoiding schoolyard-style name-calling (while still being a clear insult), it certainly is not a claiming of the moral high ground. So, obviously this post is at best a double-edged sword. A much more interesting thesis might have been about why the voices (on both sides) are often seen as being nothing more than reactionary cynics, resorting to insult over substance. Undoubtedly, some are, but why? If it's better to communicate without taunts, why doesn't everyone do so? You couldn't, so what drove you to step over the boundary of rational, insult-free discourse?

Greg T: "I'm going to wrap this up by suggesting that parapsychology could usefully devote a bit more time and resources to understanding how sceptics think, and making it part of its case." I wholeheartedly concur. Please do make a concerted effort to understand how skeptics think. You might discover that, when you do, you will be disabused of much of your confusion... but not necessarily in the way you may intend. For example, it might help if you could present a clear idea of what a skeptic is, rather than just hodgepodging groupings of various naysayers (hand-selected of course, to be depicted as universally mistaken) together and equating them all as one demonized group of opponents. From your discussion above, I cannot extricate what it is you mean by the word "skeptic," except that you seem to conclude that being one is a bad thing. Especially if one disagrees with you. It seems you have a rather wordy, and frankly abusive, way of trying to posit some kind of conspiracy of mental and/or emotional illness on the part of people who disagree with you. A singularly uninventive way of vilifying and deriding the person, rather than dealing with the failings of your subject matter. What you seem to be calling for is for this method to be adopted as a means of battling critics on a rhetorical level. How precisely does one make "understanding how skeptics think....part of [your]cause[?]" Again, I wholeheartedly endorse understanding how skeptics think. It likely will have quite a different effect than you are anticipating though... Just this style of rhetoric is precisely why we need an objective means for evaluation of claims. Hence methods of verification. Words are words. Evidence is evidence. What you have presented are a host of insulting, derogatory words attacking something you don't even have a clear idea of yourself. As such, your words are pretty much devoid of content.

This piece was a talk for members of the Society for Psychical Research. Hence it's one-sided tone. I don't mean that I don't stand by everything I said, but if I'd been talking to a mixed or uncommitted audience I'd have chosen a different subject, or presented some of these points in a different way. This particular audience understands the subject well and would have readily empathised with my points.

It's not clear from the written text, but I did acknowledge - since Professor Chris French was present and brought it up - that I was specifically talking about militant skeptics like James Randi, and the more extreme behaviours of psychologists like Richard Wiseman and Susan Blackmore. I certainly didn't mean to imply that everyone who disbelieves in the genuiness of psychical phenomena is an idiot.

I'm also fully aware that committed believers have their own mental blocks. But 'nasty and corrosive' - that's not something I generally recognise among paranormalists, and certainly not serious parapsychologists, except in a reaction of anger and frustration at assaults by people like James Randi, to whom that description really does apply in spades - and for that reason is at least understandable. 

'Angry and excitable' might be a fair description of some (Victor Zammit). But those of us who are serious about this know that's not the way to communicate. All of us are affected by temperamental biases. The only difference is that some of us strive to recognise them and take them into account; others simply let themselves be controlled by them.

'Anecdotes abound ... of psi researchers who were taken in by an admitted hoax but dogmatically refused to believe it.' Yes, the Conan Doyle syndrome. You're right that some paranormal believers insist that a magician must be psychic because they can't figure out the trick. It's embarrassing and doesn't help our argument. But no serious psi researcher can afford to behave this way - the possibility of hoaxing has to be a constant preoccupation. If it isn't - as in the case of Randi's Project Alpha, for instance - the result is instant loss of credibility among their peers, let alone skeptics. 

'... the idea that parapsychologists and their supporters are less insulting to their critics is clearly implied'. Yes I did imply that, and I can't think of any reason not to. Parapsychologists complain bitterly about dogmatic disbelievers, ideologues and so on. But they don't indulge in the casual playground jeering that Randi employs, as I understand it, as a deliberate technique to publicly shame the fools and fraudsters that he assumes us all to be. They don't have that luxury; they have to use arguments and persuasion. If you can come up with examples I'd be interested to hear them, but I'd argue it's not typical.

My perception is that skeptics are free with insults and abuse in a way that I don't find anywhere else - although I suspect it may be quite common in scientific controversies. I don't recall reading anywhere in psychical literature that skeptics are nincompoops, or not rowing with both oars in the water, or might have thinking defects or disturbed relations with reality - as Randi described parapsychologists in Flim-Flam!. It may exist on the margins but that sort of polemic just isn't characteristic of mainstream parapsychological discourse, as it so richly is of some of their militant opponents.

'Leiter is obviously intending to be insulting ...' Don't agree. He was recording his ideas and observations about the way skeptics behave, which you're free to disagree with - he wasn't laughing and pointing.

'What might be most insulting is your suggestion that cynics, climate-change denialists and creationists are the same sort of "skeptics" as Randi, Shermer, Gardener and the like.'... Creationists are not "evolution skeptics," they are evolution denialists with nothing but religious ideology to support their position.'

That was a bit provoking, I agree. Creationists and skeptics of the paranormal are at opposite ends of the intellectual spectrum. But it's legitimate to argue that militant skeptics are not really 'skeptics' in the literal sense, but denalists arguing from a profound and unshakeable belief in the mechanistic worldview. That may seriously get you going, but as long as militant skeptics like Randi and Gardner behave the way they do it's a reasonable conclusion to come to.

I don't know how much you know about psychical investigations, but this is the nub of my argument. It's one thing to disbelieve in the paranormal in a general way - from the beliefs of family, colleagues, peers; from a scientific education; from atheistic convictions and so on - but it's something else when, in order to protect this commitment, one has to perform all sorts of questionable intellectual manoevres, such as:

• refusing to engage with parapsychological investigations on any level as being of no interest, undoubtedly fraudulent, obviously nonsense, etc.

• engaging with them, but explaining them away with all kinds of implausible scenarios which in any other context no one would entertain for a moment

• carrying out experiments with psychics on television with a very precisely determined pre-agreed protocol, getting highly signficant results, and then refusing to accept the results as valid

• carrying out experiments in order to prove that, when properly conducted, the effect will not appear, getting an effect, and then explaining it away on the grounds of 'experimental flaws'

'If it's better to communicate without taunts, why doesn't everyone do so? You couldn't, so what drove you to step over the boundary of rational, insult-free discourse?'  The creationist thing wasn't intended as a taunt - I can't think of anything else that could be remotely construed that way. My discussion was a serious attempt to get at what movitates extreme skeptics, and it's valid to point out that the fear of psi is a real phenomenon with identifiable effects.

If you found all this so insulting, could it be that you're just not used to skeptics being discussed in this way? Surely it's tame stuff compared with what gets said about psi researchers - in print, on your websites and at meetings in skeptics organisations - and it has the virtue of being reasoned argument supported by examples and evidence. Which you're welcome to disagree with, but preferably on questions of substance, rather than because it upsets you. You may not think this applies to you, but I've noticed that debunkers like Randi are often surprisingly thin-skinned when it's them being criticised.

In the end, it shouldn't be about hurt feelings but about the evidence. I spent several years getting to grips with psychical literature, and the investigations and arguments eventually convinced me that psychism is a genuine phenomenon. I'd like to be able to discuss my reasons with skeptics, but it's difficult when they're so certain it's all nonsense, refuse to listen, and use all kinds of colourful language to make that point. That's what motivates me to understand how they think.

Comments

[Tony M]

Frankly Robert, I found your lecture disappointingly mild mannered. :-)

I think you have spent a lot of time here responding to criticism attacking points you made that anyone who has a modicum of objectivity would recognize as indisputable and targeted. But as radical skeptics everywhere do, your correspondents accuse you of doing exactly what they themselves do. There is a typical example above:

"'What might be most insulting is your suggestion that cynics, climate-change denialists and creationists are the same sort of "skeptics" as Randi, Shermer, Gardener and the like.'... Creationists are not "evolution skeptics," they are evolution denialists with nothing but religious ideology to support their position"

How often do radical skeptics group together ESP (they never say Psi, by the way) with Big Foot and Alien Abductions. They try to equate accepting one aspect of the paranormal as genuine with accepting outlandish claims as well. It's why Randi and his pals like to claim that Gary Schwartz believes in the Tooth Fairy.They like to pretend that accepting any part of his research leads to madness.

Your lecture was clearly about the psychology of a type of denial, about the refusal of some people to engage in evidence and debate. (Hence the title, folks.) Therefore the remark about creationists was approproiate. Nothing in your comments suggests that Randi, for instance, is also a creationanalist. What you do suggest, accurately, I believe, is that Randi suffers from the same psychological "mechanism" (for want of a better word), that he has the same relationship to his subjects debate as creationalists do to theirs. That's a point your critics above have failed to account or address.

[Mark]

First of all, to Tony M, I don't know if you were suggesting this, but I don't think that alien abductions and Bigfoot are necessarily outlandish.

Second, I want to talk about this idea that was brought up in the main post that skeptics are driven by a want to protect their materialist/mechanistic world-view. This is true, but I do not believe that it is the only thing that motivates skeptics. If it was, why would they care to attack things like Bigfoot, UFOs, Hollow Earth theory, conspiracy theories, or animal rights? (Seriously, if skeptics were telling the truth about wanting to "protect the integrity of the scientific method" they would not care to get involved with attacking things like conspiracy theories and animal rights - it's hard for any reasonable person to deny that this skeptic movement is a political advocacy movement trying to protect a specific world-paradigm) None of these things that I just mentioned necessarily have anything to say about materialism - pro or con - and yet the skeptics are every bit as angry at proponents of these ideas. I think that what motivates the typical skeptic, much more than the fear of materialism crumbling, is a deep-seated arrogance and refusal to believe that there is any chance in hell that he might be wrong.

[Dave W.]

Mr. McLuhan,

Accepting, for the sake of argument, "that skeptics are free with insults and abuse" in outrageous amounts, you've clearly missed my point. You're complaining primarily about name-calling, and my reply in the previous thread was to point out that one need not call people names in order to heap insult and abuse upon them.

Take Leiter as a case-in-point. He is making an analogy between PhACT and AA, which comes with the clear implication that PhACT members are diseased addicts, who have hit bottom and are looking for help. No, Leiter didn't laugh and point, he stuck the rhetorical shiv right into PhACT's throat and twisted. That's not abusive?

Or, look at yourself. You toss around the word "militant" so much that one might think James Randi is about to bust through your door and unload an AK-47 in your living room. The word has a meaning, and it's not a synonym for "passionate" or "strident" or even "evil and brutish." Randi may be a lot of things, but he's not looking to overthrow the hegemony of the psi believers through force. Repeatedly asserting that he is (by your use of that adjective) is insulting in its hyperbole.

Perhaps you've got some "examples and evidence" which would make your claims of Randi's (and others') militancy a "reasoned argument," but I suspect that what you've got there is a purely emotional response leading to attempts at demonizing your opposition.

Note well that none of this is a defense of any name-calling. I'm not objecting to your complaints themselves, I'm objecting to your hypocrisy. You appear to me to be trying to claim victim status while simultaneously engaging in the same behavior yourself, you're just keeping your (the general "your") insults and abuse to a more-refined level of rhetoric than grade school. You might think you can claim the moral high-ground that way, but it'd only be a superficial victory.

On another note, I'm nobody of import in this debate, but I'm very much interested if anyone's got a solidly consistent and plausible theory of how something that's not "mechanistic" affects something that is. By analogy, some "Intelligent Design" proponents complain about science's reliance on "materialism," but not one of them has ever put forth anything resembling a non-materialistic science. I think telekinesis, telepathy, etc., would be way frikkin' cool, but as soon as you suggest there's something "non-mechanistic" about psi, you lose me because that sort of verbiage implies that it's something we simply cannot effectively study with our current epistemologies.

[The Major]

Well, just quickly Dave W on the militant point. Encarta defines the word as:

1. aggressive: extremely active in the defense or support of a cause, often to the point of extremism

2. involved in fighting: engaged in fighting or warfare

So, maybe Randi doesn't fit no.2, but you're telling me he truly doesn't belong in no.1?

With regard to your last point, that's neither really here nor there. If you're uninterested in something because we know so very little of how it works, or even how to test it, then I guess you don't have too much interest in science then.

Also, Sheldrake's morphic resonance, Josephson's theories, Radin's work and the concept of the holographic universe (cue Art) are attempts to provide that non-materialistic science.

[Dave W.]

Even if I'm flat-out wrong about the definition of "militant," other examples abound of the "polite insults" I was discussing. Aside from Leiter's example, McLuhan (in this post) makes a clear connection between a few skeptics and the label "idiot." There's his "Silly Sceptic Tricks" post title, too.

It's quite probable that there is no intention to insult behind these examples, but the abuse appears obvious to this observer.

And on the other subject, if we're unsure how to test psi, then all of the "examples and evidence" get thrown out the window. Science is unquestionably our best method of gaining understanding of our universe, but if that method fails with regards to psi, then the evidence gathered using it is worthless.

Last, Sheldrake appears to be trying to offer an entirely "mechanistic" theory. Josephson likewise. The holographic universe only attempts to add another "level" of mechanism to what we've already got.

Radin I only know as someone who's done a lot of research attempting to show psi. I was unaware that he'd put forth an explanatory theory. Got a link to a summary?

[Greg T.]

On "Militant:" Let us suppose that the definition you quote for us is an appropriate understanding of "militant." I find myself wondering at what point one draws the line between someone expressing an opinion and being militant in this way. You present an argument in a public venue, Paranormalia, in which some strident accusations are made. Are you militant? If not, why should we not apply this definition to you? Sometimes, and I think you might, on reflection, recognize this as true, stipulations are made for political purpose or to affect persuasive influence rather than accurate representation of the case. If one can water down a term in order to then apply it at a specific target, while hoping to keep the emotive content, then that can be persuasive, even if disingenuous. From the tone of your discussion, I suspect you may have some familiarity with this phenomenon, yes?

We have established a kind of understanding that one has the freedom to swing one's fist right up to the point where it hits someone's nose and there are good reasons for this line-drawing. We must, as freedom-loving people, never forget why we draw that line at (roughly) that point. That someone says to you or to me that we are respectively wrong is not an act of militancy in a democratic, free society. It is only those who would curtail such freedoms that try to equate freedom of speech with violent enforcement. Let us try to keep perspective, shall we?

Is everyone who has the temerity to express an opinion a militant? Or is person X a militant when what is said disagrees with person Y? When did disagreement become a bad thing? At what point does the word "militant" lose its meaning...

Tony M.: Among differing camps of persons and perspectives it is quite a common tactic to disparage others with misnomers. Atheists and skeptics have been called "moral nihilists" for as long as there have been ethical-absolutist dogmas (as if there were no other possible sources of morality). To characterize all "skeptics" as "naysayers" and "deniers" is a profound error. Now I am not saying that there aren't self-professed skeptics who are merely naysayers (I, personally, find them rather embarrassing), but to claim that all are simply deniers is a unequivocal error, just as it is an error to say that anyone who engages in discussion of non-materialist subject matter is a nut job. And, to an epistemic skeptic such as myself, it is just as insulting. Among skeptics, there are as many variations, with varying degrees of sophistication, just as there are with any other group, probably including within your own ranks. For my own part, I recognize clearly that doubt is not denial, however much the perveyers of dichotomous, dogmatic stances proclaim it to be so.

Back on-topic:

Now, to say that there is one or more principle ideas that are foundations of worldviews is, I'm sorry to say, hardly controversial. However, if one is going to depict this as an psychological ailment, lack of faculty, or the catastrophic result of some past trauma, as is attempted quite commonly against skeptics and atheists, then one is making a different kind of claim, one which a particularly onerous and needs to be more carefully considered if it is to be defensible. For example, do you not posit certain ideas at the core of your understandings, perhaps upon which much of your view rests? Well, so it is for individual skeptics. Is that alone a sign of some mental or emotional failure or even error? I would suggest not (assuming of course that they are held provisionally), since without at least some premises, no conclusions at all can be reached. It has actually been humanity's chief exercise in our history to try to develop underlying principles of understanding that grant us predictive power. So far, (note the "so far") science has been wildly successful where almost all alternatives have been abject, often tragic, failures. So it is not enough merely to say that there are premises to prove error. One must consider the content of the premises themselves.

However, all this said, I would like to extend my apologies for interrupting your private forum with the alien and strange ideas you speak of understanding. For my own part, if you can find a flaw in my thinking, I am happy to revise. That is precisely why I, as an epistemic skeptic, maintain the eschewing of certainty - the possibility of growth and progress. It's not just so I can fervently believe whatever I want. At the same time, however, if one is going to overturn a worldview that is stunningly and demonstrably successful, it will probably be expected one provide a very good reason for doing so. Does that really sound so terribly unreasonable?

[The Major]

Admittedly no. I don't want to appear misleading there. I think the idea I was trying to present is that theories are being offered- it's not all pure speculation.

It's just maybe the idea of what's material and what isn't is something worth exploring.

Also, I can't seem to find where Robert refers to skeptics as 'idiots' and 'Silly Sceptic Tricks' refers to the tricks, rather than sceptics. Petty points maybe, but this argument does seem to be resorting to semantics.

[The Major]

My last post was in reply to Dave W. With regard to Greg T, I would say that you seem very specific that someone who is 'militant' is someone who uses violence to their own ends.

To quote: "It is only those who would curtail such freedoms that try to equate freedom of speech with violent enforcement."

However, that's not the whole picture. What about someone who dishonestly distorts someone else's point of view? Who lies about someone's actions and statements in order to discredit them?

Maybe by militant, we could draw an analogy with bully (please note this is my analogy, not anyone else's). A bully isn't only someone who uses physical force. Bullies can also abuse mentally, they can turn others against their intended victims through nefarious ends.

I think the most important point here is that we're not talking about every skeptic. That's clear. Robert speaks well of Chris French, for example. We're talking about a particular group of people here.

Robert states :

"But it's legitimate to argue that militant skeptics are not really 'skeptics' in the literal sense, but denalists arguing from a profound and unshakeable belief in the mechanistic worldview. That may seriously get you going, but as long as militant skeptics like Randi and Gardner behave the way they do it's a reasonable conclusion to come to."

Then, he comments that although one may hold certain views like a disbelief in God etc, but that 'it is another thing' to do it by dishonest means.

There is definitely a lot of emotion being played here.

[Dave W.]

Major: absolutely it's important to explore what's material and what isn't. What isn't?

My objection didn't rest upon something being speculative or not. If there's a phenomenon to be investigated, then by all means let's investigate it to the best of our abilities. Claiming that the critics of such investigation are beholden to some mechanistic wordlview implies that the phenomenon in question isn't investigatable, at all, by our current best techniques (which are, unapologetically, mechanistic). It's a non-substantive argument inside a post which begs for the end of personal attacks and a return to substance.

On the insult subject, if I were to say something like, "I'm only talking about The Major here, I don't mean to suggest that all psi believers are idiots," you would be correct to ask, "did Dave just call me an idiot?" It is in that fashion that Mr. McLuhan called Randi, Wisemean and Blackmore idiots.

And "Stupid Human Tricks," the clear inspiration for Mr. McLuhan's previous post title, was just one of many of Letterman's tools for the humiliation of random people. Sure, the tricks were silly, but the bit was all about pointing and laughing at the people who were willing to perform them on national TV.

But the point is, again, that examples of "polite insults" are all over the place, here and elsewhere among psi advocates. You've objected to three of the four examples I've presented, examples drawn from just three of Mr. McLuhan's recent posts. This is barely scratching the surface. Even if I were to grant that these particular examples aren't insulting (and I've already granted that perhaps they weren't _intended_ to be insulting), other examples aren't hard to find at all.

[Dave W.]

More examples. In the June 7th post "Humbug," Mr. McLuhan calls Randi "the old fraud." In the June 17th post "Psi Rage," he calls the majority of psi skeptics "a rabble of sarky-sneery gremlins."

I found these by clicking category "sceptics," blindly scrolling about halfway down the page and then starting to read at the next post. "Writer's Block" and "Great Global Warming!" were the only other two posts I read for this "experiment." I can now say that out of seven posts of Mr. McLuhan's that I've read in their entirety, four contained clear insults of psi critics, some more egregious than others (these latest two examples can only be described as intentional name-calling).

Sure, it's nowhere close to being a representative example, but if Mr. McLuhan is correct in his thesis that fear that their opponents are correct is what drives skeptics to insult, I must conclude that Mr. McLuhan is driven by fear that psi critics are correct. That's only fair, yes?

[The Major]

By that logic, yes. Possibly...

Some of those comments probably do support your arguments and some don't. After all, calling Randi a fraud when you feel his actions in dealing with certain people have been fraudelent isn't exactly unfair.

Randi and CSIcop have ruined people's careers and destroyed reputations (http://www.skepticalinvestigations.org/New/Mediaskeptics/index.html) and (http://www.skepticalinvestigations.org/New/Mediaskeptics/Randi_dogs.html_).

Although Robert occassionally falls into a little bit of namecalling, it's nothing compared to what the skeptics do. This is the crux of the argument.

Put it this way. I'm a big Manchester United fan. I am disparaging of Liverpool and Chelsea fans. Occassionally, in conversations I will refer to their fans in less than glowing terms. To an extent, I expect this back.

However, there are always those who will be extreme in their actions. People who choose to belittle you in social situations for the team you support. Those who threaten physical violence.

In the nature of debate, there are always loaded terms. Always will be as well. However, we're now talking about the extreme examples. Like those football fans who take it too far.

The important thing to take from this is that all-non Manchester United supporters are idiots.

Only joking... we're talking about an extreme end of the spectrum.

[Mark]

God damn, such bad reasoning that some of you people are using. It makes it hard for me to even want to take you seriously.

"If there's a phenomenon to be investigated, then by all means let's investigate it to the best of our abilities. Claiming that the critics of such investigation are beholden to some mechanistic wordlview implies that the phenomenon in question isn't investigatable, at all, by our current best techniques (which are, unapologetically, mechanistic)."

Uhhh, no, it doesn't necessarily imply that. It is possible for the critics of such investigation to be beholden to a mechanistic worldview and, at the same time, the phenomenon in question is investigable by our current best techniques. I mean, what you said is one possible reason why people would criticize investigations into non-materialist phenomena, but not the only one. Another possible reason that some people might criticize investigation into non-materialist phenomena is because they think that it is possible to investigate such phenomena using current methods and that they are scared that materialism will fall because of such investigation. You skeptics are always jumping to the conclusion that suits your side best.

[Mark]

Christ, you did it again!

"Sure, it's nowhere close to being a representative example, but if Mr. McLuhan is correct in his thesis that fear that their opponents are correct is what drives skeptics to insult, I must conclude that Mr. McLuhan is driven by fear that psi critics are correct. That's only fair, yes?"

No! It isn't fair! There are a lot of reasons why people could be driven to insult. Just because Robert made the argument that some skeptics are driven to insult because of reason A - that does not mean that another group of people are necessarily going to be driven to insult because of reason A. This other group might have a totally different reason for being driven to insult. Damn. I think that you are either not very bright or are being intentionally misleading.

[Dave W.]

Major, the crux of the argument is that name-calling and other abusive behavior was _the_ evidence that Mr. McLuhan provided to make his case that skeptics are afraid of the possibility of psi. Under such conditions, identical behavior (even if different in scale) must point to the same conclusion.

And here is Mark to insult me. Perhaps not the best strategy considering what is being discussed. Neither is misrepresenting my arguments.

There _are_ a lot of reasons that people might be abusive. I tend towards concluding that it's almost all due to frustration, myself, with perhaps a large dollop of copy-catting. Mr. McLuhan comes to a very different conclusion about the psychology of skeptics after starting with the same observations. His (as mine) applies to all parties equally was my point.

There's nothing special about psi advocates (or their critics) that means that we should diverge in our thinking about what drives them. At least there's been no psychological evidence presented that we should conclude "skeptics are abusive because they're afraid" while we should also conclude "psi advocates are abusive only in reaction to abuse" (for another possible alternative).

If you want to, Mark, please present such evidence. Don't just jump to "the conclusion that suits your side best," including that I'm stupid or being unethical.

By the way, materialism shows no signs of falling when the tools being used to investigate psi are all strictly materialistic and the theories being proposed to explain psi are materialistic, also. Assertions to the non-materialism of psi are transparent distractions when the foremost proponents of psi claim to be able to use the normal methods of science to measure its effects.

But clearly the problem is the term itself. It's highly amorphous, in that it means different things to different people. Communications tend to break down under such conditions.

[Mark]

Dave W. I didn't misrepresent your position at all, you liar. Nothing you said changed anything. Everything I said in my previous posts still stands. As far as being insulting, maybe it was, but at least everything I said was necessary. That's different than unnecessary insult. I just called you a liar because you are one. Yes it's insulting, but it's necessary. I can't think of a nicer way to tell someone that he is a liar. That's something much different than the unnecessary insult spewed out every day on Randi's website - like making generalizations about how everyone who would even try to research this stuff is idiotic. I have no problem with necessary insult. I have a serious problem with unnecessary insult.

[Dave W.]

What can I say to that, Mark? You faulted me for not generalizing from a specific situation, and now you call me a liar for not agreeing with your insistence that I should. In the face of such a vehement attitude, what could I possibly say to convince you that you might be mistaken?

For what it's worth, of course I disagree most strenuously with your assessment that your insults were "necessary." I could simply be wrong without being a liar, stupid and/or unethical, couldn't I? Lots of other people are honest and smart and still wrong, but not me, apparently. I am necessarily one (or more) of those things, and you felt a need to express it in the plainest of ways. And then you pre-emptively defend your behavior with a classically fallacious argument, that no matter what faults might be perceived in you, you're still better than those who've done you wrong.

Clearly, however, none of what you've said in your comments has actually addressed the core of my position, and so you've created a pretty massive irony in the face of Mr. McLuhan's repeated calls for skeptics to drop the personal insults and return to the substance. Unless, of course, you don't think that you should be held to the same standards?

[H.H.]

Mark, you are insane, unstable, and totally disconnected from reality. That may be taken as an insult, but consider it a necessary insult, as I have no other way to bring this to your attention.

[Greg T.]

What a shame. There we were with the possibility of a more or less productive and civil discourse and then Mark had to clang in...

I request recommendations from the other involved Paranormalia participants on how Mark can best be addressed. How can one rationally converse with that kind of vitriol?

[Mark]

Robert's position is his own. He was also talking about prominent members of both the skeptic community and the escoteric communities - not message board posters like me. Skeptics love to try to link everyone together, saying that I caused an irony when I don't speak for Robert or anyone else other than myself. Greg T. and H. H. can go to hell. I need to find a forum where dishonest, disrespectful people (in other words, skeptics) are banned.

Oh, and in this case, at least, no you can't be wrong without being a liar.

[Dave W.]

Sure, sure, Mark. But you're a guest in Mr. McLuhan's virtual home, here. You and he aren't two equal members in some third-party forum. It's his blog, he sets the tone, so if he says that people should be less insulting and stick to substance, a person's options are generally limited to either compliance or retreat.

Unless, of course, that person knows that the host only intends for his suggestions to apply to one group of people. I don't know any such thing (because in Mr. McLuhan's reply to me, he didn't say, "oh, I only meant that towards the skeptics"), and here I am, behaving nicely (I haven't been anything but honest with you, despite what you think). You sound like you're about to leave.

And since you've not offered any clarification whatsoever, I can only conclude that your charge against me - that I'm a liar - will remain unsupported. I'm no stranger to that, but it still sucks.

H., I know that you know (because we've been around the block a few times together) that I've sometimes advocated for the "Reverse Golden Rule" in dealing with other people (that one should do unto others as they do unto you, since that must be how they want you to treat them), but wowzers!, this wasn't one of those times.

And Greg: as I said above, this is Mr. McLuhan's blog, it's really only his opinion that matters. Isn't it?

[The Major]

Mark, for crying out loud, couldn't you keep a lid on your anger? We were having a civil discourse even if we did have vastly different view points. That's kind of been blown out of the water and all you've done is undermine mine and Robert's argument.

You left the Michael Prescott blog in a huff as well because, shock upon shock, he doesn't vote the same way as you. You were pretty offensive on here with the global warming debate as well.

I think it would be fair for you to find a forum with people who only share the exact same ideas as you. However, it's not much fun talking to yourself is there?

I'll come back to the main debate shortly.

[The Major]

The idea of why 'skeptics' (and we're talking about those identified in particular) act the way they do has been much debated on this blog. Robert feels that fear and anxiety plays a massive part, and backs this up with examples.

I feel there are a combination of factors. One I feel is, in a sense, arrogance. People love to feel they are an authority on a subject.

It's something inside all of us I feel. Those who spend their careers in science will feel their opinion counts more than others and as a result, may be dismissive. I can be like this when talking about cinema for example.

That's only one reason. There's also the idea that some people are genuinely just not nice people.

My point is, there are a number of reasons people act the way they do. Robert has offered an example of one particular group of the skeptic movement.

Dave, take a look at this forum on your webpage (http://www.skepticfriends.org/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=10552) and ask yourself why exactly it is those people feel it is neccessary to express their opinions that way.

[Robert McLuhan]

Dave / Greg – I take it for granted that skeptics understand this has two sides to it, that each one’s arguments are unpalatable to the other, and that they will express themselves forcefully – that’s the nature of any controversy.

I can understand why you might disagree with my reasoning, but not why you should be surprised or offended by it. Is it that skeptics don’t really expect to be criticised, or to have to defend their own stance? When I got into this subject years ago I read books by Martin Gardner and James Randi, and was astonished at their aggressive language, which I understood they justified on the grounds that ridicule is a potent weapon against fakery and gullibility. That tradition is absolutely fundamental to the skeptic movement. For me to call Randi an old fraud is pretty tame in that context – it was actually meant to be jocular - and it’s not as though he doesn’t invite it.

Major (above) makes the point about ‘militant’ – I can’t accept that my use of the word is controversial, and I don’t even believe Randi would either. The reason I repeated it was merely to differentiate between people who use arguments for disbelieving in psychism from those who seem to view it as an evil that must be extirpated.

The point of my talk was not to shaft skeptics or make them feel uncomfortable, it wasn’t really addressed to them at all. I should add that any skeptic with whom I could have a conversation exchanging views about the evidence, not matter how impervious to my arguments they continued to be, is not remotely someone who I should wish to insult. I don’t mind being taken to task for my language or arguments, and will willingly review my own approach. But we can’t have a conversation if you feel aggrieved about seeing an unwelcome perspective on your own position in print.

Am I militant? Good question. I acknowledge that I express forceful opinions in this blog, and clearly state my positions and responses about people and incidents relating to the subject. Sometimes that may seem provoking. But actually it’s what any good columnist does. Anyone who reads an opinion piece that expresses an opposite viewpoint to the one they hold may find their blood boiling, and that gets a response, as has happened here. What do you want me to do, sit on the fence? I’m guessing every columnist gets a truck load of emails after each piece, but is that going to make them change their minds, or express themselves differently? What would be the point?

Anyway, I’m glad you took the trouble to comment, and I’d be glad to hear your comments on future posts. I’ll spend some time looking through your site also.

Incidentally, James Randi has offered a very reasonable and plausible response to my insults in the SPR talk, (the old fraud), for anyone who’s interested or would like to respond.

[Paul Welsh]

Interesting topic. I agree with Major that there may be many different reasons for being sceptical about psi. Indeed scepticism itself represents a continuum from people at one end who simply ask for reasonable evidence to support claims and for the meantime until that evidence is produced are inclined not to accept, and people at the other end who have formed a view based on no examination of evidence at all, will not consider evidence with an open mind and will defend that viewpoint at all costs. I suspect the majority of us are scattered between these two points of view.

I do think though that if we believe a person is at the latter extreme then there is very little point in wasting effort trying to convince them unless one enjoys the mental gymnastics. Personal attacks the last resort of a person losing an argument IMHO.

[Mark]

Actually, yes, I do think it would be fun talking to myself. Seriously, though, now that everyone is against me I probably should leave, unless Robert bans all of you people who are against me. I mean, even Major - and Major should be on my side, at least on this issue. All you believers wonder why you're getting your asses kicked by skeptics - it's because you are not willing to do what it takes. You can't play nice with these people. I understand not being insulting when it's not necessary, but a lot of times it is. Like now. Goodbye, and fuck all of you!

[The Major]

We'll miss you, Mark.

[Dave W.]

Major, I agree that there are lots of potential reasons for people to behave they way they do. I think that when looking at groups of people, especially, any conclusion that there is a single primary factor at work will invariably be wrong.

Ridicule isn't always a symptom of fear. Dismissiveness isn't always a symptom of arrogance.

On my part, I find that the urge to ridicule is born of anger, typically caused by my attempts at getting through to someone being consistently frustrated. Well, then and when someone is doing something so mind-bogglingly stupid as to be ridiculous (worthy of ridicule).

I can see both in Randi, _and_ a healthy dollop of arrogance. I don't think it helps that he's got thousands - if not millions - of adoring fans, some percentage of whom will overlook his faults because he is who he is (thus missing one of his core messages completely).

He could also just be a mean old man. I've never met him, and I've never seen him have "off camera" moments that might show some truth behind the facade.

But fear? Maybe it's because I've got no fear whatsoever of my own pragmatic evidencialism being overturned (ever) and so cannot empathize, but I'm just not seeing it. As I said before, psi abilities would be awesomely cool. I really can't imagine Randi thinking otherwise.

Now perhaps that's just my own bias. Randi is a very public face within a group with which I self-identify, so it's probably only natural that I'd want him to be like me, and I'd be pretty disappointed if he weren't (witness the many Republicans over here who expressed disappointment with McCain's campaign while endorsing Obama). But I don't think Mr. McLuhan is immune to such bias, and so it's possible that he sees fear and anxiety because he would prefer the public figures arrayed against his conclusions to be cowards.

I submit that without detailed psychological studies of all the main participants by multiple independent observers, we'll never know. And the sort of armchair psychology that I'm engaged in right now (and in which Mr. McLuhan has also engaged) is about the worst possible tool with which to find an answer. What we think of other people's unstated motivations probably speaks more about _us_ than it does about the people in question.

Which is, really, why I was avoiding the question. My point was simpler, and didn't depend on being able to glean someone's deep-down intimate motivators. And that point is simply that if Mr. McLuhan is going to complain about skeptics' nasty ways (which he does), then he'd better have all of his ducks in a row regarding the same issues (which he does not - or at least did not). Otherwise, he risks looking like a hypocrite, even if he's got the best of intentions.

On another note, Major, it appears that the automatic link-maker in this blog software likes to include punctuation at the end of URLs, so in the future you'll want to think about sticking a space between the URL and the close-parenthesis, even though it looks ugly that way. That link is, again:

http://www.skepticfriends.org/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=10552

Why do the folks in that thread feel the need "to express their opinions that way?" Well, I see about a dozen people in that discussion, expressing their opinions in about a dozen different ways. None of them are theists, but the question as posed doesn't really apply to theists, anyway. And we've got a range of respondent views from "theistic beliefs are generally harmless" all the way to "theistic beliefs represent a clear and present danger to freedom-loving people," and they more-or-less answered accordingly.

But I may be too close to them to see accurately. I've known some of them for years. Why do _you_ think they answered as they did?

[Dave W.]

(Wow, only one tiny little symbol for "next page" around here? I spent a good two or three minutes wondering where the heck my previous comment went. Hehehe.)

Mr. McLuhan: I wasn't surprised, offended or aggrieved by your posts. My reply was more a warning that you should avoid creating a double standard. I'm not sure how much more clear I could have made myself, but by your latest reply you seem to have missed my point almost entirely.

Mr. Welsh: I would suggest that the continuum runs from hopeless credulity on the one end to brazen cynicism on the other. "True" skeptics would inhabit a position much closer to the cynic's end than the other (for good reason), but not close enough that they could be considered synonymous.

Mark: You're about where I am regarding fundamentalist theists. Except I'll give them a chance before laying into them, because every once-in-a-while, you find one who's not like the others. Who would have guessed that stereotypes aren't always correct?

[Michael Prescott]

I used to argue against skeptical positions, but I've come to feel this debate is mostly a waste of time.

The fact is, skeptics and paranormalists (for want of a better word) simply have different worldviews. The two sides end up talking past each other, because they start from different sets of assumptions. Those assumptions are so fundamental and so deeply engrained that in most cases they cannot be overcome. As prominent skeptic Ray Hyman put it, "I do not have control over my beliefs."

The argument has been going on for thousands of years. Barring some breakthrough evidence that eliminates all doubt about the paranormal, I would expect the war of words to continue indefinitely.

Maybe it would be best to simply agree to disagree.

[Michael Prescott]

Just to expand on my above comment, I think another reason for the conflict between skeptics and paranormalists has to do with the approach that parapsychologists themselves have taken. Too often, they have suffered from "hard science envy," and have tried to adapt the methods of the hard sciences to their own field.

Certainly it would be nice if psi could be captured in a laboratory and replicated on demand, or if it could be proved with statistics. But psi isn't that kind of thing. It's an aspect of human interaction - subtle, unpredictable, and very much dependent on mood, motivation, and environmental influences. Trying to force psi phenomena in a lab is like holding a gun to a musician's head and ordering him to improvise a melody on the spot.

Instead of thinking of parapsychology as a hard science, it might be better to approach it as a social science, like cultural anthropology. Cultural anthropologists don't rely on laboratory data. They do fieldwork. They immerse themselves in native culture, meeting the natives more than halfway in order to understand their perspective. Their conclusions are never as airtight as the conclusions of physicists and chemists; there is always an element of subjective interpretation. But cultural anthropology is still science. It's just not laboratory science.

In my opinion, parapsychology would be benefit by adopting the social science paradigm and largely discarding the hard science paradigm. If parapsychology stops trying to be something it's not, perhaps it will produce more robust results and invite less criticism.

[Godofpie]

*

" refusing to engage with parapsychological investigations on any level as being of no interest, undoubtedly fraudulent, obviously nonsense, etc."
*
Evidence?

"engaging with them, but explaining them away with all kinds of implausible scenarios which in any other context no one would entertain for a moment"
*
Evidence?
"carrying out experiments with psychics on television with a very precisely determined pre-agreed protocol, getting highly signficant results, and then refusing to accept the results as valid"
*
Evidence?
" carrying out experiments in order to prove that, when properly conducted, the effect will not appear, getting an effect, and then explaining it away on the grounds of 'experimental flaws'"
Evidence?
Thanks!

[The Major]

Godofpie, take a look around this website just for starters:

http://www.skepticalinvestigations.org/New/index.html

[Ben]

I would like to comment on something Greg said: that science is “stunningly and demonstrably successful”. It has been successful at describing and predicting physical phenomena. But it is not at all successful at describing or dealing with anything involving consciousness. Physical processes are ruled by cause and effect, but at a certain level, particularly when consciousness becomes ‘self-conscious’, the factor of ‘free-will’ must be considered. We all know we have free will, and our decisions are not necessarily determined by physical factors – we can choose to disregard our instincts (eg hunger strikers, celibate monks…). This, and the impossible dilemma of trying to describe how consciousness can arise from electrochemical impulses in the brain (when is an electrical impulse more than an electrical impulse? Answer: when it produces consciousness) makes me believe that consciousness is not actually physical.

There is also another sense in which science might eventually be considered to be unsuccessful, by its own criteria (to be successful is to have survival value). Suppose technology (science in action) allows us to outgrow our place in nature and foul our own nest? Reductions in biodiversity are currently occurring at an alarming rate, apparently due to the “success” of human science. This is a controversial topic, but it is worth mentioning to you, because you said that science is never “certain” that it is right, yet you did also say that it was “stunningly and demonstrably successful”. Whatever success it has is being judged from a very limited standpoint, is it not?

Michael Prescott said:
“Certainly it would be nice if psi could be captured in a laboratory and replicated on demand, or if it could be proved with statistics. But psi isn't that kind of thing. It's an aspect of human interaction - subtle, unpredictable, and very much dependent on mood, motivation, and environmental influences. Trying to force psi phenomena in a lab is like holding a gun to a musician's head and ordering him to improvise a melody on the spot.”

Very nicely put, Michael. I've been thinking exactly this lately, and have even suggested to my son that when he does his thesis at college (he’s studying psychology) that he tries to do telepathic tests involving people very well known to the subject (who, Rupert Sheldrake would suggest, are part of the same group, so are more closely linked in consciousness); in addition, instead of “guess the number” or “guess the shape”, what about “guess the photo or picture which has emotional significance to both of us”. If Rupert Sheldrake is right, I would expect better results, maybe even out of the proper environmental context in a sterile lab.

[Dave W.]

Ben wrote:
"We all know we have free will..."

No, we don't. We've got no evidence that the universe is anything but deterministic, our own brains included. If that's true, then we exist as nothing more than highly complex stimulus/response engines, and that complexity leads to an illusion of unpredictability which people label "free will."

"...we can choose to disregard our instincts (eg hunger strikers, celibate monks...)..."

Sure, but there is always some other motivator present. Our desire for justice overrides our instinct for food in the case of hunger strikes, and our desire for enlightenment can override our instinct for procreation. But these desires are themselves little more than instinctive, emotional responses to still other stimuli.

"This, and the impossible dilemma of trying to describe how consciousness can arise from electrochemical impulses in the brain..."

I'm sure that thousands of cognitive researchers and neuroscientists disagree with your assessment that what they are actively researching is "impossible." That's really an unfair premise on your part, Ben.

"...to be successful is to have survival value..."

That is not a criteria of science. Within science, success means adding to our knowledge base in a reliable (replicable) manner, it has nothing to do with survival. Knowledge for knowledge's sake is the goal of science - a very narrow criteria, indeed.

And it's really not science that's fouling our own nest, it's technology. Technologists take the knowledge gleaned by scientists and put it to practical use. Their goal is also generally not survival, but is instead comfort.

(What with all the stereotypical science nerds in film and on TV, it is clear that becoming a scientist actually has a large negative survival value in terms of evolutionary theory. At least for some sciences. Scientists who blow stuff up get all the chicks.)

[The Major]

No evidence at all, Dave, that our mind is not deterministic? What about Dean Radin's research, or indeed a lot of the evidence provided in 'Irreducible Mind'. Now whether you find that evidence not exactly overwhelming or conclusive, or even if you think it is pretty weak, by saying there is no evidence is to try and finish an argument with a false claim.

Your point about other causes for decision making in the mind is certainly plausible. People overcome addictions because it reaps other benefits, for example. However, your conclusion assumes that a deterministic point of view is correct. Again, this is an incorrect argument.

I should point out that Ben is also wrong to point out that we definitely have free will. However, you felt it was necessary to argue against his definitive statement which didn't consider alternatives, with pretty much a definitive statement that doesn't consider the alternatives.

Also, whether neuroscientists and cognitive researchers feel that calling their goal 'pointless' is neither here nor there. Of course they should continue in case they do come up with the overwhelming evidence. However, if someone feels that consciousness does not arise from the brain alone then they are going to feel that the enterprise is ultimately 'impossible'. It's a harsh statement maybe, but could you honestly say that neither you nor any of your like-minded associates don't feel the works of parapsychologists attempting to prove a non-deterministic model of the universe is pointless?

[Michael Prescott]

If there's no free will, then how can we have confidence in our ideas or beliefs? Our beliefs would be, after all, only the result of blind mechanistic processes. This would include all our beliefs about science and philosophy, including the belief that we have no free will.

It is, of course, true that we know we have free will. We know it by direct introspection, which means we know it more surely than we know that there's an external world. We know it more surely than we know that we can trust our physical senses.

The whole attempt to reduce humanity to mere machinery is deeply misguided, in my view, and is responsible for much of the suffering of the past century. Again, though, this is why skeptics and paranormalists will never see eye to eye: different worldviews. One side sees consciousness as no more than an epiphenomenon of matter. The other side sees consciousness as a fundamental property of reality itself, arguably more fundamental even than matter.

Never the twain shall meet. Each side is talking past the other.

[Dave W.]

Major, I think you're making a mistake in thinking that determinism somehow argues against psi. At least, I cannot find anything on Radin or "The Irreducible Mind" that suggests that either one presents evidence contrary to determinism. I honestly had no clue whatsoever that any parapsychologists are "attempting to prove a non-deterministic model of the universe," and I don't see why it matters. Hypothetically, psi could just as easily exist in a deterministic universe as it could in a non-deterministic one. It is just "free will" that conflicts with determinism.

Mr. Prescott, if free will is an illusion, then your direct introspection is also an illusion, the answer you get being provided by nothing more than "mere machinery" that's been shaped by millions of years of evolution to provide just that answer.

After all, the concepts of personal responsibility and fairness benefit society, and so provide a survival benefit, whether they are real or not. With no sense of free will, those concepts are meaningless, and humans would all still be squabbling over who gets to eat the latest kill (if we were to exist at all). An instinctive _feeling_ of free will (and those concepts which follow from it) is a benefit to our species, whether that feeling reflects something that actually exists or not.

And as with my reply to The Major, I fail to see how determinism would conflict at all with the idea that consciousness is "a fundamental property of matter." The questions of where consciousness comes from and whether it is deterministic are largely independent. If consciousness is nothing more than brain chemistry, it could still be the case that brain chemistry is not deterministic, and then free will _exists_, but as nothing more than an epiphenomenon of matter itself (for example).

[Dave W.]

In case it's been missed, James Randi has replied directly to Mr. McLuhan:

http://monkeywah.typepad.com/paranormalia/2008/11/spr-study-day---the-psychology-of-the-sceptic.html#comment-140868300

Also see here:

http://www.randi.org/site/index.php/swift-blog/322-willing-to-be-shown.html

I point it out to say that the armchair psychology we've been engaged in has become moot.

[Shelagh]

"It is, of course, true that we know we have free will. We know it by direct introspection, which means we know it more surely than we know that there's an external world. We know it more surely than we know that we can trust our physical senses."

Now that is the kind of logic I find convincing. Let's hear it for Free Will!!

[Michael Prescott]

if free will is an illusion, then your direct introspection is also an illusion, the answer you get being provided by nothing more than "mere machinery" that's been shaped by millions of years of evolution to provide just that answer.

Which is precisely why it is intellectually incoherent to maintain that free will is illusory. Any answer you get, on any subject at all, will be "provided by nothing more than 'mere machinery' that's been shaped by millions of years of evolution to provide just that answer." Your whole belief that there have been millions of years of evolution, or that you have a physical body, or any belief of any kind whatsoever, would be nothing but the result of automatic processes, and therefore could not be relied on.

Free will is axiomatic; you must tacitly accept it in the very act of denying it. I.e., you must assume that your thought processes are reliable, that your judgment is not entirely conditioned by instinct and reflex; otherwise you could have no confidence in any conclusion you reach, including conclusions about free will.

[Michael Prescott]

Sorry, the first paragraph of my above comment was supposed to be italicized, but the html formatting didn't work. The first paragraph is a quote from Dave W.

[Dave W.]

Actually, I've only got 42 years of experiences stored away in my head. Having my decisions informed by millions of years of evolutionarily honed instincts would be a very much more reliable method of coming to conclusions.

Extraordinarily complex and wholly deterministic algorithms result in correct answers in a very high percentage of cases. I don't understand how adding free will to the mix would create an improvement. Perhaps you could explain the mechanism?

Until then, your premise that free will somehow makes for more-reliable judgement cannot be accepted, and so your conclusion that free will is axiomatic must also be rejected. For the time being.

[Michael Prescott]

"Now that is the kind of logic I find convincing."

Well, you know, "cogito ergo sum" is Philosophy 101. You can doubt the external world, you can doubt yesterday and tomorrow, you can doubt almost anything, but you can't doubt the existence of the consciousness that's doing the doubting!

In this sense, our own awareness is the surest thing we know (the thing least open to doubt).

[Dude]

Wow, solipsism is pointless... who'd a thunk it?

[Michael Prescott]

"Extraordinarily complex and wholly deterministic algorithms result in correct answers in a very high percentage of cases. I don't understand how adding free will to the mix would create an improvement."

Because the algorithm does not know that the answer it obtains is correct. In fact, the algorithm does not even know that it is obtaining an answer.

A self-aware consciousness, on the other hand, not only is aware of the problems it is trying to solve, but is aware of the possibility of error in reaching a solution. And there is no way to guard against error if all mental processes are mechanistic. Mechanistic processes will churn out conclusions automatically. The conclusions may be right or they may be right. How could we ever know?

In order to know, we would have to stand outside all our deterministic mental processes and view our conclusions from some other perspective. And this is, tacitly, what determinists try to do. They say all human thinking is deterministic, but (often without realizing it) they grant themselves an exemption. *Their* conclusions are grounded in logic, not automatic nonrational processes. Thus their conclusions are reliable.

The point is not that automatic processes couldn't lead to correct conclusions. They might, or they might not. The point is that we would have no way to know, one way or the other, and thus no grounds for embracing or defending any idea, including the idea of determinism. (Any attempt to obtain certainty by "reality-testing" or further analysis or what-have-you would simply push the problem back a step: how could we be sure that our judgments about our reality tests, analysis, etc. were correct?)

[Dave W.]

Determinism is not an argument against self-aware consciousness. Free will or not, nobody knows if they've got a correct answer until they check it against something else. And as soon as you dip into solipsism, you're dooming your argument to self-refutation, because the only thing that's trustworthy then is your own mind, so it's impossible to tell if you've got free will or not (you've got nothing reliable to test your putative free will against).

Whether I have free will or not, I can't tell whether my answers are correct by simple introspection. And as soon as you deny that reality-checking is a valid tool, then whether I have free will or not is moot, because I can't tell whether _anything_ is correct. "I think therefore I am" only demonstrates the existence of my ego. Nothing _follows_ from that, not even that I am a conscious being (those terms are meaning-free if my ego is generated by nothing more than an intensely sophisticated computer program).

So, _with_ free will, Mr. Prescott, how can you be sure that your judgement is correct, given that you can't make any reality checks, either?

[Bill I.]

I generally take as dim a view of parapsychology and its practitioners as I do of skeptics of the paranormal, with certain exceptions. (I truly enjoyed Deborah Blum's Ghost Hunters while noting that the conflict of beliefs we see here, on this site, was no less active in the time of William James and Frederick Myers.)

I've explored psychical areas throughout much of my life and frequently with others.

My motives were initially based on experiences for which few existing explanations seemed at all satisfying, particularly those wedded to the scientific method.

That method is simply not suited for such explorations, owing to its frequently unexamined underlying assumptions. (There are some definite exceptions but I'm afraid that, say, statistical proof of telepathy is nothing that interests me, particularly when I've recorded my own instances of telepathy and pre-cognition many times. Why would anyone in my situation need or care for such statistics?)

I would like nothing better than to see great progress made in understanding psychical areas, demonstrating certain realities beyond a shadow of a doubt, but such progress isn't likely to emanate from the activity of official parapsychologists.

(How long have they been at this?)

We live only a certain number of days.

So far as I'm concerned, the best way for anyone to get on with these issues is in a much more informal, personal, and direct way.

The techniques for doing so are easily discovered and not at all difficult to learn and practice. They've existed for untold thousands of years.

When sufficient numbers do so, mass beliefs will change accordingly.

Even if this never happens, even if only a tiny minority of the populace ever chooses to embark in such directions, at least those who do so will have satisfied their desire to know and understand.

Of course whatever they discover will be dismissed and discounted by those who simply can't believe in such experiences.

So what? Who cares? Expending energy in an attempt to convince them to open up their minds is almost a complete waste of effort. (Not entirely -- such efforts do provide an opportunity to tinker with and improve communication of such nearly-impossible-to-communicate topics, while maybe such energy will be what's required to inspire one or two fence sitters to finally stop sitting.)

Regards

Bill I.
RealityTest

[Greg T.]

For your amusement...

Quoth Ben:
I would like to comment on something Greg said: that science is “stunningly and demonstrably successful”. It has been successful at describing and predicting physical phenomena. But it is not at all successful at describing or dealing with anything involving consciousness. Physical processes are ruled by cause and effect, but at a certain level, particularly when consciousness becomes ‘self-conscious’, the factor of ‘free-will’ must be considered. We all know we have free will, and our decisions are not necessarily determined by physical factors – we can choose to disregard our instincts (eg hunger strikers, celibate monks…). This, and the impossible dilemma of trying to describe how consciousness can arise from electrochemical impulses in the brain (when is an electrical impulse more than an electrical impulse? Answer: when it produces consciousness) makes me believe that consciousness is not actually physical.

There is also another sense in which science might eventually be considered to be unsuccessful, by its own criteria (to be successful is to have survival value). Suppose technology (science in action) allows us to outgrow our place in nature and foul our own nest? Reductions in biodiversity are currently occurring at an alarming rate, apparently due to the “success” of human science. This is a controversial topic, but it is worth mentioning to you, because you said that science is never “certain” that it is right, yet you did also say that it was “stunningly and demonstrably successful”. Whatever success it has is being judged from a very limited standpoint, is it not?

Thank you for your reply, Ben. If I may...

Before I begin, I should make a disclaimer. My views are my own and do not necessarily represent those of all, or indeed any, other skeptics.

As a brittle diabetic, reliant on insulin, I have discovered something very interesting, Ben, that perhaps you may not be aware of. Sugar levels in my blood do, in fact, have an effect on my moods and my state of consciousness. I have also had the unfortunate benefit of being around at least two clinically depressed persons, both of whom found chemistry, yes chemistry, alleviated their distress and helped them out of crippling emotional states. That we can see such consistent and measurable physical interactions having such profound influence upon mental/emotional states doesn't help your case for the independence of consciousness from physical phenomena. Varying states of consciousness can be induced by quite physical means, some of which are less than subtle. I'm afraid you are going to have to account for these if you are going to make a claim about he independence of consciousness from the material world. The evidence suggests, quite firmly, that the presumed realm of independent self-ness is not so independent as some of the claims being made.

Now, why is it "impossible" to describe how consciousness can arise from electrochemical impulses in the brain? Could that be a matter of definition? Much like trying to disprove the existence of God, the "impossibility" you refer to might very well be a matter of nonsensical stipulations.Why does one assume that consciousness is any more mysterious that say that gold appears yellow? I have no problems with consciousness; it doesn't create any particular difficulties for me because I do not attribute anything mystical to it. Who knows, maybe I'll feel differently at 30 mmol/L or .5 mmol/L.

In short, we may know more about consciousness than we suspect, and the meaning of the word "consciousness" sometimes used may be specifically designed to refuse to admit of material considerations, in which case what we are struggling with is a matter of mere stipulation.

I'll be honest with you, Ben: We've done to death the "mystical self" business over thousands of years and really progressed not at all, that is until we started allowing for scientific understanding of it - then we started discovering that we can influence brain capability, consciousness and emotional states through quite physical means. This is how it usually goes. Once, we assumed illnesses were demonic possessions and shook rattles at them for thousands of years, to no effect. Once we started thinking in terms of microbiological infection, suddenly vast realms of possibilities and human efficacy were opened. But the shift in thinking was more subtle than that. The shift in thinking was about the possibility of understanding, predicting and affecting - not just one or two "special" people, but everyone in a systematic means. The average life span is three times what it was because of our use of science and the simple shift in thinking that assumed we can understand, rather than thinking that things are mystical and beyond us.

So far, I see no reason to mystify consciousness, and I even have qualms about strict determinism (as a concept). But that's a topic for another day...

The Purpose of Science
As far as the purpose of science is concerned, you said it right once and then wrong the next. The purpose, one of our contriving, is predictive power and in this respect science has indeed been "stunningly successful," (in terms of possibilities, choices, efficacy and potential) whole orders of magnitude more so than anything that has come before. The technology you refer to are not just amusing toys, they are artifacts/products/results of a particular way of viewing the world, one in which we assume we can understand and predict happenings in the world. How we use that predictive power (survival value) is another issue, although one might make a solid argument that being armed with an efficacious methodology for predictive power gives one an advantage in the "survival value" game.

To say that some technology have resulted in some unfortunate results is not an indictment of the technology itself. One does not blame the hammer if some psycho uses it to bash in skulls. One does not blame the message service is someone hurls hurtful vitriol across it. What you point to as a failure of human science is really a failure in human judgment and management, arising in part from a tragically misplaced notion of humanity and nature as being opposed, that presented and perpetuated by some rather twisted archaic mindsets.

Intuitively Obvious
Now, the "intuitively obvious" argument has been tattered and worried to an ignoble death by most for quite some time now. It is a shame to see it rear its ugly head again as a defence for something as ambiguous as free will.

After all, we all know that the intuitively obvious argument is a faulty one. That's just intuitively obvious, right? All pointed flippancy aside, the number of times things we have "just known" have turned out to be false are almost too numerous to count. A firm, determined belief alone does not make truth. We've had to learn that the very hard way and we are still in the process of learning it.

There are many different ideas about what "free will" means, if anything. Is it some kind of objective fact? Is it some kind of mystical, extra-physical property? Is it a concept of self arising from a social context? Like consciousness, whether one attributes extra-real properties to free will or not is a matter of definition. As such, like consciousness, I don't have the problems with the idea of free will that many do. I see no need for mystical qualities.

My apologies for the wordiness.

[The Major]

Greg, with reference to your post, I won't have time to go in to all the points as it is a long comment with lots of interesting points.

However, I will say that no one would claim that the mind is completely independent from the brain. Even William James I believe comment that we know the effect a blow on the head does for the state of our mind. The question is not whether it is soley or not at all independent, but to what extent that it is.

Alternative evidence for this (even if not overwhelming at this stage) would be those with small brain masses who still possess a high level of intelligence, and possibly the day of clarity that some people with degenerative diseases like Alzheimers experience the day they pass away. Now whether this evidence changes your mind or not is sort of irrelevant at this stage. We're asking questions that contradict what we appear to 'know'.

Also, with regard to the mystical self being 'done to death' and only understood when scientists became involved. What about the Buddhist monks who have reaped the benefits of their approach to consciousness and the mind? Okay, so it's not exactly caught on like the ipod, but that is perhaps due to Western perceptions of an Eastern culture. Also, science has based a deal of their understand by studying the aforementioned monks.

You also say the intuitive argument has been 'done to death' and that it is a 'shame to see it rear it's ugly head'. I will say you seem to have a great deal of knowledge of what debates should and shouldn't be argued. Even if you felt someone provided a clear cut argument a while back, it doesn't mean it can't be brought up again.

"There are many different ideas about what "free will" means, if anything. Is it some kind of objective fact? Is it some kind of mystical, extra-physical property? Is it a concept of self arising from a social context? Like consciousness, whether one attributes extra-real properties to free will or not is a matter of definition. As such, like consciousness, I don't have the problems with the idea of free will that many do. I see no need for mystical qualities."

Well, some do I guess. Dave, for example, has a problem with the concept of free will. It's interesting that two people approaching from a similar argument can have such differing views.

With regards to the questions about free will, however, I will say... we don't know. These are questions we are trying to find the answers to. To take it back to the main topic thread, these are questions worth exploring even if it does come to a dead end, and therefore, it's unneccessary for certain scientific groups to try and close ranks and stop the concepts being studied.

By now, I'm sure you've guessed I did have time to reply to your whole post! Now I'm late for work, but I look forward to your response.

[Kato]

IMHO, the recent work by Jeffrey Schwartz on the neuroplasticity of the brain,Andrew Newburgs findings and Mario Beauregards FMRI experiments with Carmelite nuns as well as the placebo affect et al, make the currently accepted materialistic view of the brain held by the neuroscientific majority hard to hold on to,but no doubt "Promissory Materialism" will raise its ugly head as usual.

[Ben]

Greg said:
“To say that some technology have resulted in some unfortunate results is not an indictment of the technology itself.”

I don’t agree, Greg. Many of the scientists responsible for the A bomb felt guilty about their involvement…afterwards. You cannot wholly divorce science from context (environment). This is one of the major problems with lab tests for parapsychology, as Michael P stated so eloquently above –the erroneous belief that context can be ruled out. Dave W thought I confused science and technology, but I wasn’t confused. I said technology is ‘science in action’: holistically, the two are inseparable. Without technology, science is symbolic sudoku. Technology feeds back to science, and science responds with new ideas. Dave also said that science is not about success; but he took me out of context. I was referring to your suggestion that science is demonstrably successful, and the branch of science I was referring to was evolutionary science –“survival of the fittest”. It is in that context that science may one day be judged wanting -if we destroy our environment. Context is important! But I am not a doom-monger. I still hope, with the right feedback, that science can work wonders.

Greg also said:
“Why does one assume that consciousness is any more mysterious than say that gold appears yellow?”

Yellow can be explained as a portion of the electromagnetic spectrum, but its perception as a colour to conscious beings is an aspect of “qualia” (a word for: “it’s real…but it’s not objectively out in the world”). Neuroscientists have agonized over qualia for decades, in particular over the problem of pain. (Dave W implies I make a new and unfair premise that the problem of consciousness is impossible to resolve. I invent no premise; rather, I reach a conclusion that the “hard problem” is insoluble to the materialist paradigm. I’m certainly not the first to reach that conclusion).

As with “qualia”, it is useful to reflect on what the term “epiphenomenon” really means. After reflection, I can’t see how it has any meaning at all. Zinc plus Sulphuric acid produces Zinc sulphate, and gives off hydrogen; but what part of electron flow and chemistry gives off consciousness? My answer: it doesn’t!

Qualia are no big deal if you accept that consciousness is the primary stuff of the universe: matter becomes the dream (or epiphenomenon, if you prefer), held in place by thoughts (laws).

You mention the effects of chemicals on the brain. Yes –mystics, especially shamans, use chemicals too. If the brain is viewed as a transducer or transceiver (see, for example, Rupert Sheldrake), then interference with chemistry interferes with the signalling process. This has been discussed on Michael Prescott’s blog.

I agree with Michael that arguments are, by themselves, not sufficient to convince anyone of anything. Studies have been done to show how people blot out what they don’t like, or even interpret it in the opposite sense than what was intended. We see that every day in the House of Commons. Minds are only really changed by a significant personal experience –something that raises consciousness. And experience usually means the complex interplay of self (subject) with environment (context).

[Dave W.]

Major, I don't have "a problem with the concept of free will," I'm just at a complete loss for why you seem to think that psi requires free will. It makes as much sense to me as saying something like, "oranges are needed for skateboards."

I also don't grok Mr. Prescott's ideas that free will adds something to our ability to come to reliable judgements.

Both of these ideas are brand new to me, I have never encountered them anywhere before, not even when I was a deep psi believer, well convinced of my own gifts. A discussion of free will and/or determinism seemed to be the best way for me to understand the necessity of free will in your arguments, but you've offered no clarification, and Mr. Prescott just seems to be offering more ideas that are utterly alien to me (like that the existence of self-aware consciousness somehow denies determinism).

Kato, can you explain to me how neuroplasticity or the other things you mention require non-materialistic explanations (because materialistic explanations are and always will be inadequate for them), and what those non-materialistic explanations might be?

[Dave W.]

Ben wrote:
"Dave also said that science is not about success; but he took me out of context. I was referring to your suggestion that science is demonstrably successful, and the branch of science I was referring to was evolutionary science –“survival of the fittest”. "

But that's still confusing the facts of biology with the science. The success of evolutionary theory itself is that it adds to our knowledge of the world. The success of a _species_ is that it survives.

Ben wrote:
"I invent no premise; rather, I reach a conclusion that the “hard problem” is insoluble to the materialist paradigm. I’m certainly not the first to reach that conclusion"

I'd never suggest originality, either as a premise or a conclusion. But since I was wrong about it being a premise, perhaps you can enlighten me as to how you reached it as a conclusion?

Ben wrote:
"After reflection, I can’t see how it has any meaning at all. Zinc plus Sulphuric acid produces Zinc sulphate, and gives off hydrogen; but what part of electron flow and chemistry gives off consciousness? My answer: it doesn’t!"

Which part of Hydrogen, Sulphur or Oxygen contain the qualities displayed by Sulphuric acid? They don't! There's a reason that I won't argue that that sort of reductionism is good and proper: it isn't. There are gazillions of examples of the qualities of a system being very different from the qualities of its parts, and so no reason to think that consciousness is any different.

[The Major]

Dave W, I didn't mean to state that you have a problem with free will as a concept. I meant to say that you have trouble accepting it as a convincing theory, which you've been stating for most of this argument.

I don't recall really making the point that psi requires free will. I know my point grew a little hazy. I can understand how psi is deterministic in the sense that it is still a force affecting your mind.

You argued that there is no evidence for a non-determinstic model of the mind. Of course, I made a mistake in citing Dean Radin's work. I should have pointed more towards, say, near death experiences. That was my mistake but one I don't think I kept repeating.

I could be wrong. I'm in work and so tired I can just about keep my eyes open!

An important thing to remember is that none of us are saying determinism is clearly wrong- there's too much evidence to even consider it. We know it's a factor in certain decisions, but maybe not all decisions.

For further examination of this, I would take a visit to Michael Prescott's blog where he discusses these ideas in more detail. He's moved on from the nuts and bolts and is at a more philosophical position. At least, that's my opinion.

[Michael Prescott]

I'm afraid I've failed to explain my position on free will successfully. Sorry I couldn't make myself clearer, but for those who are interested, any introductory book on the subject will present the argument in more detail. (It's certainly not original with me.)

Basically, my point is that if you are a programmed automaton, you cannot possibly know it, nor can you know if your programming will generate correct or incorrect conclusions. Therefore, you can have no confidence in anything you believe. Tacitly you are assuming you're not a programmed automaton when you express any opinion or belief - you're assuming that you do have the ability to distinguish truth from error, and that your judgment (in principle) is sound. So free will is tacitly assumed even in the attempt to deny it. Ergo, free will is axiomatic.

Now, this seems obvious to me, but evidently not to others. Maybe I'm overlooking something, or maybe they are. It is probably just another case of people with different worldviews talking past each other.

In saying that "cogito ergo sum" is the only indisputable proposition (other than purely logical formulations), my point was to draw attention to the fact that all experience is subjective experience. This should be obvious, since an experience is, by its nature, always processed by some consciousness. Kant based his epistemology on this point, and it is the basis of modern philosophy. So again, it's hardly an original idea, or even controversial anymore.

The value of seeing experience as ultimately subjective is that it undercuts the most common error we humans make - the error of thinking that "how things look to me" equals "how things are." As a commenter on my blog named Michael H often puts it, we "identify our thoughts with reality." It is helpful to learn not to do this - to see our thoughts as interpretations of reality, but not as reality per se. Much of the friction in our world would be eased if people adopted this approach. That's why I like to emphasize the importance of worldviews. Different people will look at the same facts in different ways. This is normal. It is even desirable, since a society of conformists who all think exactly the same way would be stagnant and uncreative.

Are there objective facts? Yes, in the sense that there are facts we all agree on. But if "objective" means "existing without reference to any perceiving consciousness," then the question cannot be answered, because we would have to step outside of consciousness in order to find out.

This realization need not lead to solipsism, but it does lead to an appreciation of how intimately our thoughts and preconceptions are entangled with what we call reality. And this in turn can make it easier for us to respect and honor points of view contrary to our own. Skeptics and nonskeptics might even agree to an honorable truce, or at least they might stop sniping at each other (and I agree that such sniping is done by both sides).

Anyway, it's been an interesting discussion. Thanks to Dave W and others for addressing my comments, and to Paranormalia for inspiring the conversation.

[Robert McLuhan]

Godofpie - you asked for evidence, you shall receive - see my post of Dec 3.

Michael P - thanks for stopping by. -‘I used to argue against skeptical positions, but I've come to feel this debate is mostly a waste of time… Maybe it would be best to simply agree to disagree.’

It’s certainly hard work :-) But as a comparative newcomer I’m willing to give it a go. When it’s defending my own arguments I suppose I don’t have much choice.

I don’t really have any expectation of changing skeptics’ minds. But I do think it’s important to engage with them, for the sake of all the uncommitted people out there who need to watch the debate to help make up their minds. If we can be more coherent and persuasive about psychical claims than skeptics it might make up for the sheer difficulty of believing that it happens.

But the argument about free will – whoa, another matter.

‘I think another reason for the conflict between skeptics and paranormalists has to do with the approach that parapsychologists themselves have taken. Too often, they have suffered from "hard science envy," and have tried to adapt the methods of the hard sciences to their own field.’ An interesting point, which I’d like to devote a post to.

[Robert McLuhan]

Michael, I meant to add that what started here as a slightly ill-tempered exchange developed into a useful debate. If we can get the hostilities with skeptics over with early on perhaps we can find common ground for discussion.

Also, I just looked on Randi's site, apropos of his response to my lecture, in which he insists that he's not a cynic and is open to persuasion. There's a rather interesting comment (to Randi's response and to the original essay), which I quote below -

http://www.randi.org/site/index.php/swift-blog/322-willing-to-be-shown.html -

'I've read the entire article being referenced, and I think it's worthwhile that its main thesis might be true EVEN IF WE ALL AGREE THAT PSYCHIC PHENOMENA ARE FALSE. I see the paper as saying that many psychics [skeptics ? rm] are predisposed psychologically to disbelieve, and I take this as a useful warning to all skeptics about the way we are perceived by a larger world. We need to remember two things: first, that open hostility on our part to believers will make it much easier for them to dismiss our claims. The first part of the article contains some useful cautionary tales about those who rejected the Wright brothers' plane or Edison's lightbulb because they were afraid of having their paradigms overturned; if we we show hostility, it will be easier to dismiss us as just being like those stuffy conservatives. My wife, after looking over one of my Skeptical Inquirers, said, "They may be right, but they all sound like cranky old guys yelling at the kids to get off his lawn." We want to avoid that.

'But second, I also think we need to be honest about our own motivations, and admit openly whatever predispositions we have. Maybe there are scientists out there able to be purely motivated by a desire for knowledge and nothing else, but most of us, I think, have some psychologically motivation for what we do. I'll start with myself. Why do I like to frequent skeptical blogs? Is it to better educate myself about the scientific method? If that was true, I'd hang out on the science blogs more, or crack actual textbooks. And I don't really expect to learn much at these sites; I'm already convinced that woo-woo is bogus. No, I hang out here because it's great entertainment to see fools being made to look foolish. It's a basic human desire to see the credulous and the tricksters have their phony worlds collapse; it's why we love seeing Falstaff get caught in his lies. A secondary motiviation may be for me to get enough information to put the smackdown on some idiot sometime when I get the chance. But I'm not going to pretend to myself that either motivation is particularly noble.

'Read Randi's letter above, and ask yourself, is it really credible? Look at the first sentence, "canards I'd not previously heard" -- do you really believe that this is the first time he's been accused of being predisposed pyschologically to disbelieve? And we've all seen, from his many posts on the subject, that he looks at most so-called psychics as greedy and vile. This is a guy who's dedicated his entire life and a sizable fortune towards a specific end; isn't it a bit disingeuous for him to ask us to believe that he doesn't have an emotional, as well as a financial, stake in the outcome? If Geller or one of his ilk were to show up at hq tomorrow and, miraculously, somehow manage to pass the test and claim the check, can you really imagine Randi handing it over with a smile on his face?'

[Bill I.]

Dear Greg:

Your entire comment reflects a personalized version of what might be called a general worldview.

I adopt my own version of this frequently, particularly when focused on business activities (I work for a technology focused market research firm).

This worldview -- like the scientific method -- incorporates quite a few basic assumptions.

It has great strength, too, owing to so many having adopted it for so many years (centuries and millennia, too, if you consider its antecedents).

It's not the only worldview, however, while only those who have never tried out an alternate worldview are thoroughly convinced of its "correctness."

Proponents of alternate worldviews will seem perhaps very stupid or even daft to those who are thoroughly wedded to what amounts to a materialist/scientific worldview.

It's entirely possible to move between various worldviews, however, even if doing so requires some practice, some effort.

I don't believe anyone can adequately address any of these issues (particularly those relating to, say, mind-brain) without doing so.

This is not a statement that, in my opinion, can be proved or refuted strictly by logic or by quoting those who share a similiar worldview, even if there are thousands or even millions of them.

This is so owing to the fact that more than the exercise of intellect is required.

(In fact, a great many alternate worldviews are accessed by temporarily stilling the intellect and employing other natural abilities, abilities that have become as atrophied as a Roman orator would find the memorization skills of a typical modern citizen. The modern worldview is skewed in certain directions but this fact is generally invisible to those who have adopted it, simply by becoming socialized into a modern society.)

Regards

Bill I.

[Greg T.]

Thanks, Ben. This is fun. Usually, on skeptics boards visitors are people looking to make a name for themselves by beating up on the big, bad skeptics or quote as much text as possible in hopes of battering skeptics into submission or trolls hoping to instigate unfortunate wordplay. The result of this is exactly what one wold expect. This has been a refreshing change.

Please accept my apologies in advance for the format of this response. I am not failiar with quoting functions on blog pages.

-----------------------------
Greg said:
“To say that some technology have resulted in some unfortunate results is not an indictment of the technology itself.”

Ben replied:
I don’t agree, Greg. Many of the scientists responsible for the A bomb felt guilty about their involvement…afterwards. You cannot wholly divorce science from context (environment). This is one of the major problems with lab tests for parapsychology, as Michael P stated so eloquently above –the erroneous belief that context can be ruled out. Dave W thought I confused science and technology, but I wasn’t confused. I said technology is ‘science in action’: holistically, the two are inseparable. Without technology, science is symbolic sudoku. Technology feeds back to science, and science responds with new ideas. Dave also said that science is not about success; but he took me out of context. I was referring to your suggestion that science is demonstrably successful, and the branch of science I was referring to was evolutionary science –“survival of the fittest”. It is in that context that science may one day be judged wanting -if we destroy our environment. Context is important! But I am not a doom-monger. I still hope, with the right feedback, that science can work wonders.
-----------------------------

Hmmm So, as a mattter of interest...
When your hammer strikes your thumb instead of the nail's head, will you punish it from the rehabilitationalist perspective or the retributivist perspective? Which do you think will be more efffective in modifying the hammer's behaviour?

Now why would I ask such a question? Well, first it helps focus more clearly on what we are presumably talking about, namely the culpability of a tool in the results of its use. And second it displays that we can contrive frankly bizarre questions at will. Once we assume that a tool has culpability, are we then not interested in mitigating that culpability and the humaneness of our methods in doing so? Never mind that the hammer is not the sort of thing that admits of behavioural modification, because it is not the sort of thing that behaves.

If members of the Manhattan Project expresses regret over their work, I suspect it is not about the empowerment of humanity via the development of a tool, but rather in the use to which it is to be put, possibly even in their own motivations for developing this tool in this way. To extend this to the tool itself is a misdiretion, possibly even on their own part.

Yes, context is important. This is precisely why discussion of culpability and/or regret cannot focus on the tool itself, but on its use. A hammer can be used to build a shelter for homeless children, or it can be used to bash in skulls. Is the hammer good or evil because of this? Is the ability to build a hammer (and the nails) good or evil? Some would have us believe that that ability is evil (whatever that means).

Now, science permits human efficacy, the likes of which we have never known before. Rather than being the helpless victims of our environment, desperately pleading mercy from powers we cannot perceive, we are now, more and more, the masters of it. It's not our enemy anymore, if it ever really was. But the enemy mindset persists. I would argue that a fundamental shift in perspective, from masters to managers is needed. I don't think that is terrribly controversial at this point. For all I know, we may be in agreeement aboout this, albeit with possibl diffferent wording. But I think it is clear that there is a difference between the capability to do harm and the will to do so.

I will admit, however, that if you are going to say that efficacy is a bad thing, then we are on completely different playiing fields. I appreciate tripled lifespans (medical technology), broadened perspectives (communications technology) along with many of the other benefits a "we can understand stuff we once thought was mystical" asssumption offers us. Take heart. We have used some technolgy terrribly. But we have also done some wonderful things. And the truly astonishing part of it is that we did it.

It is probably true that there is hidden normative content in assumptions about the world, and hence normative consequences. I, myself, have argued for the existence of hidden normative content in logical truth-values. If that's what you want to talk about, then that's a whole other kettle of fish.

------------------------------
Greg also said:
“Why does one assume that consciousness is any more mysterious than say that gold appears yellow?”

Ben replied:
Yellow can be explained as a portion of the electromagnetic spectrum, but its perception as a colour to conscious beings is an aspect of “qualia” (a word for: “it’s real…but it’s not objectively out in the world”). Neuroscientists have agonized over qualia for decades, in particular over the problem of pain. (Dave W implies I make a new and unfair premise that the problem of consciousness is impossible to resolve. I invent no premise; rather, I reach a conclusion that the “hard problem” is insoluble to the materialist paradigm. I’m certainly not the first to reach that conclusion).

As with “qualia”, it is useful to reflect on what the term “epiphenomenon” really means. After reflection, I can’t see how it has any meaning at all. Zinc plus Sulphuric acid produces Zinc sulphate, and gives off hydrogen; but what part of electron flow and chemistry gives off consciousness? My answer: it doesn’t!
------------------------------

Your answer may or may not be correct, but, even if correct, it is still not to say that we have exhausted all possible natural explanations.and must therefore move into the realm of the supernatural. I actually agree that "mere chemistry" is not sufficient to explain "consciousness." However, I suspect social context and language to be more promising as explanatory devices that mysticism and reversion to entirely private realms..

The problem with your answer is that it is another variation of the "God of the gaps" argument. (We can't explain it [yet] so it must be inexplicable and therefore God did it. We do not understand the mechanism [yet] so it must have no mechanissm and therefore it is supernatural.) I mentioned this before, but once we felt that illnesses represented spiritual corruption. We couldn't explain illnesses. We had no understanding or even a concept of microbiology. We did all kinds of wierd stuff to try to appease and/or deflect the mystical powers that be. Some even claimed that llnesses were proof of spirits. We had no other explanation, so it must have been spirits right? A fallacy of false alternatives. It turns out there was an altogether other explanation that fell within the realm of the natural. We just didn't know it, didn't have the tools to work with iit, and simply refused to consider any possibilities other than the ones we had. Not to try is to fail, and we failed forr a very, very long time.

And here's another possibility, one I touched on earlier, but that was overlooked. Perhaps some of the questions we ask are meaningless, in part because of their stipulated meanings. "How many angels can dance on the head of a pin?" assumes quite a lot that is not necessarily the case. it asssumes there are "angels" (whatever that means), that they can dance (so you think you can dance! ;) ), and that they are rather strangely capable of dancing on the heads of pins. These asssumptions are presented as given and if they are true, then the question can be asked. If, however, any of these asssumptions are false, then the question is meaningless.

We are incredibly creative and ingenious, as a species. Our languages have an open-ended quality that allows for invention and exploration of concepts. We can stipulate stipulations at will, and seemingly without restraint. Given that we understand reality and ourselves in terms of our ideas, his represents astonishing power - and astonishing potential for abuse. There is no guarantee that a given stipulation will be useful, or advance a subject matter, or be true. While I do not disdain this power as some others do, I do see a need for caution - I see it as prudent to be aware that our flights of fancy can take us anywhere, right up to he point where they are not true. In part, that is why I am a skeptic.

So, with regards to qualia, free will, and consciousness, what is yyour definition of it? Is it really that these things not only do not, but cannot admit of understanding except in mystical terms, or is it that some have defined it, using the God-of-the-gaps error, as being mystical a priori and threrfore do not permit themselve to conceive of possible natural explanations? Perhaps we have a stipulation that leaves us wondering how mnay qualia can inhabit a microliter of grey matter. Perhaps those cavorting angels will tell us...

-------------------------------
Ben said:
You mention the effects of chemicals on the brain. Yes –mystics, especially shamans, use chemicals too. If the brain is viewed as a transducer or transceiver (see, for example, Rupert Sheldrake), then interference with chemistry interferes with the signalling process. This has been discussed on Michael Prescott’s blog.

I agree with Michael that arguments are, by themselves, not sufficient to convince anyone of anything. Studies have been done to show how people blot out what they don’t like, or even interpret it in the opposite sense than what was intended. We see that every day in the House of Commons. Minds are only really changed by a significant personal experience –something that raises consciousness. And experience usually means the complex interplay of self (subject) with environment (context).
-------------------------------

Hmmm. Public worlds versus private worlds. Tasty, but another topic for another time perhaps. ;)
Now, you claim that minds are only changed by significant personal experience. Let us asssume, for the moment, that that is true. Why would that be the case? Might it be because of a simple failure of imagination and a desperate clutching at certainty? My mind has been changed quite profoundly on the JREF boards actually (coincidentally about free will as a concept and in a way many there might not approve of) - yes, I was a JREFfer for a time. But that's because I am a skeptic and admit of the possiblity of error. I am intensely concerned with the ways our concept of self and the structure of our ideas can chain us to dogma and some of the terrible results thereof. Is your claim necessarily true or incidentally true due to some factor that prevents versatility - say dogma or belief or a sense of certainty?

We are in an exciting transitional period - between a time when change occured at a snail's pace to a time when change is so rapid ones understandding was five minutes ago. Perhaps people resist change because their own sense of certainty means far, far too much to them and they have been indoctrinated with a stick-to-yyour-guns mentality.

Perhaps it is true simply because we have been trained to not think of ourselves as natural beings in a natural world, and to assert that thinking so is somehow disabling, denigrating or limiting. The all too brief history of science and a "we can understand" mentality vigorously puts paid to such a claim. And we have three times the pre-science average lifespan to contemplate that.

Some folks think my view is pessimistic. They have been taught that supernaturalism equals possibilities, but it has done nothing in the history of humanity but hold us back and hobble us. I leave the end-of-days prophesy sorts in the dust in the name of a future, any future (fatalists be damned!). I leave eternal capitulation to forces we cannot perceive in the dust in the name of human efficacy, potential and possibility. I leave father figures in the dust in the name of future growth and progress (whatever the stipulation for progress). Mine is a philosophy of possibilities.

[Bill I.]

There's nothing quite like the endless spinning of mental and philosophical wheels -- qualia, the "hard problem," Descartes, free will versus determinism, etc., etc., etc. (Some might also choose to review the thoughts of Husserl and Kant. Why not? There is more than enough in their teachings alone to consume several life experiences.)

What has any of this to do with actually coming to grips with "psi?"

It's all a very complex exercise in avoidance that's been going on for far too long.

Bill I.

[Dave W.]

Mr. Prescott, you wrote:
"Basically, my point is that if you are a programmed automaton, you cannot possibly know it, nor can you know if your programming will generate correct or incorrect conclusions. Therefore, you can have no confidence in anything you believe."

But if I'm _not_ a programmed automaton, can I know it, or can I know that my thinking will generate correct or incorrect conclusions? I don't see how whether I'm programmed or not makes a difference to my capability for self-awareness or error correction.

Automatic, unthinking systems have the capacity for error detection and correction (blood pH homeostasis, for a simple example). And thinking people with free will often believe things that are demonstrably incorrect, and even fight to maintain those wrong beliefs.

Our brains even seem predisposed to erring on the side of caution, because seeing a lion in the grass when there isn't one carries much less of a biological penalty than failing to see an actual lion in the grass.

But neither self-awareness nor free will are required for a system to be able to react to the detection of a lion (real or not). And neither quality is necessary for a system to be able to detect when a false detection has occured.

[Dave W.]

Good point, Bill I. One little mention of free will and the whole train of discussion has become derailed. I humbly accept my share (most) of the blame for that.

[Bill I.]

Dave W.:

I get a bit impatient at times, for which I apologize. This site is relatively polite compared to others I've frequented.

I once spent quite a bit of energy interacting with the Journal of Consciousness Studies Yahoo Group then, later, on another philosophical site of the Web 2.0 sort.

Both were polite environments (JCS is tightly moderated and only allows six posts on any given day) but in the end I grew exasperated.

This a.m. I dreamt of becoming disconnected with a long-time meditation partner. In the dream, we were travelling somewhere by train and I got off to make some change; the train continued with my friend but without me.

Prompted by this, I gave her a call and we set up a time to meditate, something we've not done in ages owing to incompatible schedules.

She has a tendency to enter a fairly deep trance during meditation.

Our m.o. is to find and discuss something of mutual interest before meditating; often, afterwards, she will sit down at my computer, eyes glazed over, and type an essay, invariably quite interesting and usually associated with our pre-meditation discussion topic.

Sometimes the topic will seem to have come from left field, as the time in which she produced a somewhat unusual explanation for the 1908 Tunguska (Siberian) explosion in a style that had a distinct Victorian whiff to it.

Once an essay on coming geopolitics was written in such a way that we could easily imagine it as having been written by Colonel Edward House, Woodrow Wilson's advisor, who once lived a short distance from my coastal Massachusetts residence. (The author of the piece wrote of the coming "marginalization of the U.S. as an international power.")

I consider myself fortunate in having met, physically, a number of very interesting folks first encountered on-line, many of whom have distinctive gifts or talents in the "psychic" arena (none of them are professionals).

We discovered that the results definitely vary depending on who is physically present.

We also noted how specific pairs of individuals seemed to get much better results than others and even sought and obtained mediumistic information on exactly this point.

My business and personal life has been such that such experimentation hasn't been nearly as frequent in the past few years as I would like (one great advantage of the Internet -- the ability to connect with those of shared interests -- is also a disadvantage in terms of physically getting together).

During a particularly busy phase of this group experimentation (in the 90s) this all seemed to be heading towards something amazing, but then it died down.

What is easy to forget, years afterwards, is the sheer intensity of that period.

There was a point when all things psychic seemed to be catching -- those who'd never managed to previously enter trance, for example, had no trouble doing so; many began to spontaneously "autotype," too, with very interesting results; conscious instances of pre-cognition, telepathy, and vivid dreams in which both were featured (and were easily recordable and verifiable, sometimes thanks to the Internet) all increased.

Maybe we pulled back from this because it began to almost seem as though we were beginning to resemble some strange and nearly apocalyptic cult such as you might find in the Mediterranean region in the first century.

The last thing any of us had any interest in getting involved in was anything that could be remotely construed as being "religious" in nature.

(I'll grant you that there are strong connections between realms of expansive awareness and those activities that have generated religious myth but this need not be so.)

Anyway, my sense of futility and exasperation has passed. I'm looking forward to a good meditation with my friend sometime in the next week or so. Maybe another intriguing essay will follow.

Bill I.

[Greg T.]

---------------------------------------------------
Quoth: Bill I.

There's nothing quite like the endless spinning of mental and philosophical wheels -- qualia, the "hard problem," Descartes, free will versus determinism, etc., etc., etc. (Some might also choose to review the thoughts of Husserl and Kant. Why not? There is more than enough in their teachings alone to consume several life experiences.)

What has any of this to do with actually coming to grips with "psi?"

It's all a very complex exercise in avoidance that's been going on for far too long.

Bill I.
---------------------------------------------------

My apologies, Bill. It seemed to me that these ideas (qualia, free will, consciousness) were being put forward as "proofs" of paranormalism, of which psi is one aspect if I understand properly. Naturally, being philosophically oriented, I was merely attempting to indicate that these ideas do not necessarily represent proofs of that kind at all. Yes, I can get rather wordy, but, in my defence, I'd like to point out that I was fielding things thrown at me. I am not hand-cuffed by qualia, free will nor consciousness. These things are not mystical for me and I do not need mystical explanations for them. That may seem alien and strange to some, but it is the mindset that has brought us the benefits I have mentioned above. I, personally, have had my life saved three times (urinary shutdown, pneumonia and staph aureus infection of blood, bladder and prostate coupled with diabetes) by modern medical technology. Without it, I am dead three times over.

It seems to me the real question is not what we are going to do to come to grips with "psi," (that assumes something not yet established) but, rather whether there is anything to come to grips with at all - other than the belief in it (which is obviously an altogether separate issue). It's a little like asking me how I will deal with the anger I have caused the Flying Spaghetti Monster. First, I don't know (cannot know, actually) there actually exists a Flying Spaghetti Monster, second I cannot evidence it being angry and third, I have no way of knowing how I might have caused its rage. What services would I be performing if I try to deal with a non-existent entity's rage? Now, that the FSM is posited in such a way that it can never be proven to exist or not exist is only a matter of definition and warrants no special mental gymnastics on my part. I can look at it and say, "I can neither prove it or nor disprove it, just like any of an infinite number of other possible ideas. Maybe, just maybe, it is a fundamental error to define things this way."

There are a lot of misunderstandings about skepicism, even among some self-professed skeptics. (Don't even get me started on Shermer. Grrr!) and it doesn't help that religious dogmatists have waged a multi-millennia propaganda war against skepticism, using mischaracterization, indoctrination, and outright lies. People use the word "skeptic" as if it means mere "naysayer" as if there is nothing to it, but a desire to be contraddictory. This is simply not the case. If you are going to understand skeptics, you will need to get over that contrived hurdle. The dogmatic affirm-or-deny dichotomy has been drilled into our heads seemingly forever, but doubt is not denial. To say that something may not be the case is not to say that something is not the case. But also, to say that that something may not not (double negative intended) be the case is not to say it is the case either. Sorry, your English teachers lied to you. And our theologians have been lying to us about that for thousands of years, too.

The problem I have with "psi," Bill, is that until there is actually evidence for it, it remains precisely what you claim serves us not at all above - an argument. It's not just about me, cannot be about my experiences; no one person can be the sole arbiter of evidence. My personal experiences could be (almost certainly are) flawed (as in the blurry book example I give earlier). I plunged headlong into solipsism and came out the other side realizing we, not I, we need external referents and independent verification. Some folks see the face of solipsism and think it is a free license to think and go wherever one wants. But the harsh reality is that 2000+ pounds of onrushing plastic and steel doesn't care at all about how we feel about getting run over. Are you going to teach your kids to check both ways before crossing the road, or are you going to teach them that what they believe is enough, without any real reason for doing so?

[The Major]

Ah, the old Flying Spaghetti monster argument. It's a bit of an unfair argument that and I think it sullies the debate.

Now you say there is 'no evidence' for psi. There are studies of course that contradict this view. My point is, even if you are not convinced by the evidence, and of course that is your right, by refusing to consider there is anything on the table, that's trying to end a debate on a bit of a false premise.

If you have a court case, and the evidence for a crime is a bloody knife, and one feels it proves the case and the other feels the opposite. If the one who says the opposite says there is 'no evidence', that doesn't mean the knife doesn't exist.

You may think this is merely a matter of semantics, and it is to an extent, but this is an important issue. If people state continually that there is no evidence because they don't feel its convincing, people assume that there is no argument or debate. It's an unfair argument to present to people coming to the debate.

[Bill I.]

Dear Greg:

(btw -- greetings to the particular personality buried behind your conscious mind with whom a version of me is quite familiar. If my hunch about this is correct, you and I are both subconsciously very familiar with the operations of a particular Victorian enterprise. Think of horse drawn wagons, not Internet distribution.)

You write: "It seems to me the real question is not what we are going to do to come to grips with "psi" (that assumes something not yet established) - other than the belief in it (which is obviously an altogether separate issue)."

This suggests you have never personally experienced anything in the "psi" area that you have been able to verify.

Is this true?

If so, I can well understand your position, including your belief that without modern medical technology you are "dead three times over."

At the same time, it's not difficult to obtain personal proof of "psi."

This can be accomplished without recourse to philosophy although this kind of shared personal proof is not of the same nature as evidence obtained by controlled laboratory experiments.

It can be accomplished by as simple a method as teaching yourself to wake up and record dreams or simply periodically recording thoughts that seem to emanate from someone else and then comparing them, later, with pertinent friends or associates. (This verification addresses your concerns with solipsism.)

These simple methods merely afford brief glimpses of inner realities, however; there are also ways to probe much deeper.

In this era these aren't at all secret and can be easily found.

Skepticism and doubt are normal for any thinking modern person; the degree varies from person to person but also from one day to the next (and sometimes from one moment to another) for any particular person.

Consistent and unyielding skepticism suggests to me, however, an unwillingness to try even the most basic methods. (I'm using skepticism here to refer to the materialist worldview, with all of its assumptions.)

It's a kind of close-mindedness.

Simplifying greatly, we end up with two basic opposed camps and while members of each camp reinforce their perspective with layers of belief, there is a middle ground and this based on direct, personal experience.

I'd suggest that the more reasonable members of the "inner" camp (I'm not equating these with religionists) fully understand the practical value of a physical-sense based materialist view even while being aware of its flaws, its incomplete nature -- holding this view is much like a horse wearing blinders.

What this comes down to, again, is experience, not philosophy, and not belief (except where belief serves as a wall or batrrier, preventing or denying experience that conflicts with the materialist view).

Backing up a bit: Recording a dream in which future events are clearly revealed or in which a distant person communicates details of which the dreamer has no conscious knowledge or recording similar items obtained while fully awake reveals merely just the tip of an enormous iceburg.

Anyone who has experienced the above _knows_ that "psi" exists and can safely discard their overall skepticism. (They've crossed one particular preliminary barrier and can dismiss comments like your "until there is actually evidence for it.")

You say: "It's not just about me, cannot be about my experiences; no one person can be the sole arbiter of evidence."

This is bs, when applied to the above.

Who else is the arbiter of your experience but you? Further, my examples involve two people, at a minimum, but could just as well involve three, four, an entire group of people, or a great many.

What about the rest of the great iceburg?

Here I could drone on and on, but I would prefer you (or anyone in your position) to take the first steps before making any comments. I've been to another country but you, apparently, haven't, and you're not even sure it exists! Why talk about it, then, until you've at least been to the border, seen the customs officials, the gates, and so on?

The iceburg in question is large enough that very few, so far as I know, have gained a conscious glimpse of its entirety. Depending on the extent they have glimpsed, they can make surmises, nothing more. (I'm expressing a different kind of skepticism here.)

Even so, you can review a great amount of material from such explorers and find a high degree of agreement.

What emerges is a take on reality that is quite different from the blinkered materialist version.

Very basic assumptions -- so basic as to be, in many cases, unexamined -- associated with the materialist view must be drastically overhauled, if not discarded completely.

I believe that we, as a race, are collectively engaged in doing this right now, but this process isn't instantaneous -- it takes time.

The short version is that we are starting to finally loosen the iron grip of the ego with its self-protective and frequently conceited "rational approach."

This does not spell the destruction or elimination of rationality but rather the creation of a kind of "enlarged" rationality that encompasses that which is gained when the blinkers begin to be removed.

Regards

Bill I.

(It's time to return to my study of smart grid technology. I have yet to figure out a way to generate coin by writing about the limits of the materialist worldview and how it may be surmounted.)

[Michael Prescott]

"This does not spell the destruction or elimination of rationality but rather the creation of a kind of 'enlarged' rationality" - Bill I.

I like to compare philosophical materialism to Newtonian physics. For a long time it was thought that Newtonian physics provided a complete world picture. Then quantum physics came along and the picture changed. But Newton's ideas were not discredited or proved false; they were simply relegated to a subset of a new, larger, more complete picture. Newtonianism is still perfectly valid and immensely useful in its appropriate context, but the context is not coextensive with all of physical reality.

Similarly (but only by analogy - I'm not trying to claim any metaphysical implications of quantum mechanics), I think philosophical materialism is a valuable and efficacious worldview in a certain context, as proved by its enormous, ongoing success in the hard sciences and technology. But I don't think it's a complete picture, and I suspect that someday it will be relegated to the status of a subset of a larger, more comprehensive worldview. It will still be a marvelously useful approach; indeed, you can make a case that methodological (as opposed to ontological) materialism is essential to the scientific method. But methodology is not metaphysics.

BTW, those who believe there's no evidence for psi might want to read Irreducible Mind, by Kelly & Kelly et al, which provides 800 pages of carefully documented evidence, much of it from peer-reviewed journals outside the realm of parapsychology.

[Bill I.]

Michael: "I think philosophical materialism is a valuable and efficacious worldview in a certain context, as proved by its enormous, ongoing success in the hard sciences and technology. But I don't think it's a complete picture, and I suspect that someday it will be relegated to the status of a subset of a larger, more comprehensive worldview."

Dear Michael:

I completely agree.

I believe "someday" might arrive sooner than later if only the right multi-disciplinary approach were taken.

This would require a degree of cooperation we rarely see between competing groups.

I thought Charlie Tart's TASTE project was a step in this direction (I don't remember whether you've discussed this or not; its website is found at http://issc-taste.org but hasn't been active in years).

The project enabled scientists to submit "anecdotal evidence" anonymously, without the fear of career damaging consequences.

Of course this was merely a tentative beginning.

In the best of all possible worlds something stronger and more direct would be much more to my liking.

We've read of the experiments in which Tibetan monks sitting in meditation were wired to EEG devices.

In my imagined situation a group of scientists -- of various disciplines -- would be taught a rudimentary form of meditation (sans theology) and then exposed to some mind bending stuff they would ordinarily never pay any attention to.

This would take place over a period of time sufficiently long to enable them to attain proficiency.

They would become the experiment, the laboratory, the subjects, and the detached observers, simultaneously.

The group would include more than scientists -- I'd make sure it also included experienced hands and a few non-professional but gifted channellers.

Experiments somewhat like this have been tried (reference the Institute of Noetic Sciences) but participants have tended to be those already persuaded, not hardened skeptics, while an effort is always made to maintain "objectivity" such that these never seem to accomplish much of anything.

I'm aware of experiments -- such as those you reference -- that have demonstrated all sorts of things beyond the material worldview, but those who don't believe in such things continue to ignore the results, while there is still a deep prejudice against anyone who is willing to risk their professional reputation by actually stepping into the water. In some ways, little has changed since William James' day.

Regards

Bill I.

[Dave W.]

I don't know of anyone who is a philosophical naturalist, and I don't know why it matters to the question of psi, unless psi is a priori assumed to be a non-material process.

(Most scientists, in fact, are not philosophical naturalists, because while they're methodological naturalists at work, they most certainly aren't naturalists of any sort while they're at church, temple, synagogue, ashram or whatever. While the majority of the members of the National Academy of Sciences are non-religious, most scientists are religious.)

And if parapsychology does nothing more than eventually add a new branch of uncontroversial, wholly accepted science to our already large collection of them, then it, too, will be materialistic.

[clegg]

"And if parapsychology does nothing more than eventually add a new branch of uncontroversial, wholly accepted science to our already large collection of them, then it, too, will be materialistic."

You have an extremely odd definition of materialism, Dave W. It’s as though you’re going out of your way to avoid someone calling psi “supernatural”. No-one on this message board believes in a supernatural God altering physical laws to suit his Zeus-like whim. The point is that materialism is based on what can be physically understood. QM has already to the borderland of materialism (correlations between previously linked particles, collapse of particles by conscious minds from wavelike probability etc), and nobody really understands it. Similarly, at the border on the other side –the high macro end, with dark matter.

Psi obviously involves forces that are over that border -beyond the physical – because our senses and instruments cannot detect them. Get used to it. There are things that earthbound science is not equipped to handle. Only the human mind can deal with them, as they are subjective in nature, not physically objective in our everyday universe. As Bill I said, you need meditation techniques to get to grips with them. If you don’t want to get into meditation, then you’re not going to get near them. Sorry.

[Dave W.]

clegg, I don't understand your hostility to the idea that what we currently call "paranormal" might be discovered to be materialistic. It's as though you think it would be a very bad thing if psi were understood in scientific terms.

Of course, you've got a poor understanding of quantum mechanics. Quantum entanglement was a prediction of the math long before it was ever seen in the lab, and is well understood from that perspective. And conscious minds do not collapse any particles from wavelike probabilities (whatever that means). "Dark matter" is nothing more than a placeholder name for a phenomenon we don't fully grok, yet, but the fact that it has mass means it's entirely material (by any definition). Perhaps you're just hostile to science in general, I can't yet say.

And I don't understand your hostility to me. You've jumped to a poor conclusion about my understanding of meditation, and your attitude is clearly that I've either got to agree with you or... "Sorry." I hope you don't teach for a living.

[Bill I.]

Dave W., responding to Clegg: "It's as though you think it would be a very bad thing if psi were understood in scientific terms."

An associate of mine was long the chairman of a physics department, another worked at CERN on particle physics.

They both acknowledge that the assorted answers to questions put to a number of spooks and oversouls regarding the nature of reality suggest that what we presently call science will never be able to grasp psi.

If these answers (all heavily qualified with references to the limitations of language and basic concepts taken for granted by our conscious selves) truly point to the nature of reality, science must radically change if it is to encompass this area. I'm not sure whether anyone will still call it science at that point.

The picture they paint (which I'm crudely assembling from bits from some very different sources) suggests that the brain and entire nervous system is a kind of organic transducer.

It transduces what I'll call "energy" (for lack of a better word -- here the limitations of language begin to rear their head) into what we call matter.

The kicker? Everyone does this, all of the time; few ever become conscious of it but it's theoretically possible to do so.

This suggests that everyone -- to sound a bit "New Agey" -- literally creates their own personal reality or "space continuum."

There are endless ramifications.

Note the very basic disagreement with the unspoken assumptions of present science.

This variation of the ancient "perennial philosophy" is like an incompatible operating system compared to that collection of assumptions we call "science."

This turns the idea of "objectivity" on its head and with it cause and effect, the reliability of observation (as the term is usually understood), etc., etc.

Time, space, gravity, the idea that each of us is a completely separate entity delineated by our skin -- these assumptions, too, must be re-evaluated.

Take time. I'm not the only person -- not by a long shot -- who has proved beyond a doubt to myself that my own mind is capable of pre-cognition.

Think of the implications of just this alone.

One connection with this non-standard or unofficial worldview or collection of related worldviews to QM concerns probable realities, a concept also imparted by a diverse collection of spooks and oversouls.

The first time I came across the term "probable realities" it sounded much like science fiction to me.

That was before I did Exercise 2. found at http://www.realitytest.doors.htm .

Here again, we bump into the little problem of figuring out how to connect powerful subjective experience with so called "objective reality."

In this case, this can't be accomplished quite as easily as noting a very clear experience of pre-cognition by recording it and then witnessing the event happening, in a future moment.

Even so, anyone who does the exercise -- doesn't just read it and pronounce it as being strictly an exercise in imagination -- and succeeds will very often experience a considerable and impossible not to notice alteration in consciousness.

"Wavefront collapse" also begins to take on new significance.

Mind can transcend time, and a personality can consciously connect with endless other minds, unrestricted by time. It's not just that time is not as we've imagined; minds, personalities, people are all connected in a way that defies any possible way to prove this, scientifically. The connections are not "made" of anything we'd call physical, while if they're closer to the realm of energy they doesn't fit any present definition of that term, either. Yet they exist.

Once past initial conscious barriers, the remaining obstacles involve the great differences between minds.

You might not be able to gain much from, say, connecting with someone in a future probable century who has devoted a lifetime to studying some area that combines a future understanding of the brain with
certain unusual terrestrial features, all the while employing math based on theorems not yet even created.

No scientific experiment will ever touch this last area -- it's outside the boundaries of science and will remain that way until or unless science morphs into some very different discipline.

This doesn't prevent anyone who's interested from delving into it and related areas, however.

Connecting the dots could take centuries, while those involved could easily feel very estranged from the official beliefs held by many of those around them.

Yet strange new areas have always opened up exciting new vistas for humanity and there are always some willing to explore them, to be the first.

In some ways, the "New" world was like this, initially, to those who'd never imagined its existence; science itself is another example.

Fortunately no church authority is sufficiently strong in our present society to burn those who make such explorations. Suffering ridicule is a minor discomfort by comparison.

Regards

Bill I.

[Dave W.]

Bill, the primary assumption of science is that there exists an objective reality. If there is no such thing, then _all_ of science is worthless, including the science that led to the creation of the computer you're using to access this blog. This isn't a matter of science "not being able to deal" with a variable, subjective reality, science would be _pointless_ if objectivity were false.

We certainly create our own realities through the sum of our experiences and desires. In my reality, my wife isn't cheating on me. I've got no evidence that she is, and because I value the trust that I place in her, I'm not going to spend any effort in snooping. But whether I'm correct or not is, in principle, objectively discoverable.

What we _think_ is true may not actually _be_ true, but if what _is_ true is different for everyone, then science - which is, by definition, the search for objective knowledge of the universe - cannot be done.

Shouldn't we be able to determine if, for someone, Earth's gravitational acceleration is 10 m/s/s, instead of 9.8 (for example)?

[Bill I.]

Dave W.: "Bill, the primary assumption of science is that there exists an objective reality. If there is no such thing, then _all_ of science is worthless, including the science that led to the creation of the computer you're using to access this blog. This isn't a matter of science "not being able to deal" with a variable, subjective reality, science would be _pointless_ if objectivity were false."

Dear Dave:

My limited understanding is that there is an objective reality but it won't be understood for a very long time.

This doesn't make present science worthless; it has obvious endless practical applications. It "works" within certain limits.

"We certainly create our own realities through the sum of our experiences and desires. In my reality, my wife isn't cheating on me. I've got no evidence that she is, and because I value the trust that I place in her, I'm not going to spend any effort in snooping. But whether I'm correct or not is, in principle, objectively discoverable."

The alternative worldview I crudely sketched dealt with creating reality on a much more basic level, that creation roughly equivalent to the perpetual emergence of Bohm's explicate order from his implicate order, if you're familiar with his thought. This is much more basic than what your wife may or may not be up to, physically removed from your immediate sensory reality, and ascertainable only by hiring a detective or doing some remote monitoring.

Thus everything in the room in which anyone reading this has been and is being created by them, now, including their computer monitor.

This also suggests that if someone else were to enter one of our rooms, there would be two of everything.

You and that other person would agree, however, that this is not so; you would each see one of everything, while also agreeing on the size, shape, and other physical parameters of any particular object. (Again, all such material objects are continuously created, transduced from an "energy." Some would call this energy thought, such that all and everything in what we take to be the material universe is actually a kind of solidified thought. Note how this is a very old idea.)

This agreement, per some sources, is accomplished telepathically and applies to mass creations as well, not just a situation involving two or three folks.

Note, too, how this creation has distinct ranges.

Your creation of your primary physical reality is limited by the range of your sensory apparatus. Everything you are consciously aware of beyond this -- say by reading, watching television, or looking at a webpage -- would be in your secondary physical reality.

Note how scientists conducting an experiment in a laboratory -- per this worldview -- are creating everything, including the laboratory and all instruments.

They aren't consciously aware of this, however, and assume that the laboratory and equipment are "objective;" they assume that they themselves are discrete units, you might say, and so on.

This creation does proceed in accordance with certain rules, however. Here we get into a mishmash as no "perennial philosophy" source agrees completely with any other and none of them (a great many predate the rise of science) aligns perfectly with present scientific understanding (note, too, how that understanding is dynamic -- it sits still only briefly, as when a generation of scientists taught particular "truths" waxes strong; after that generation dies out, those truths have a way of waning and being replaced by new truths).

"What we _think_ is true may not actually _be_ true, but if what _is_ true is different for everyone, then science - which is, by definition, the search for objective knowledge of the universe - cannot be done."

Again, there are rules to everyone's creation of their own unique space continuum and everything in it, however poorly understood these may be.

These creations do have "things" in common, after all, not just particular material objects. This would include time, 3D space, and gravity -- what is missing from a scientific understanding of these parameters is how they only apply to the collectively created physical realm.

(Even so, there are physical regions in which even these parameters fluctuate, however slightly.)

One area of experience/knowledge that becomes quite interesting when attempting to connect the two very different worldviews is that of "chakras."

Per science, these don't exist; anyone who's ever bothered to explore their nature knows otherwise, however.

This suggests one of many possible regions to explore more thoroughly, from both basic perspectives. What is a chakra? Is it associated with the transduction I mentioned? Can we find chakra-like structures/processes associated not with living human bodies, but the earth itself?

"Shouldn't we be able to determine if, for someone, Earth's gravitational acceleration is 10 m/s/s, instead of 9.8 (for example)?"

Sure, according to all of the various rules and assumptions underlying such a measurement. Why not? This doesn't invalidate the "reality creation" worldview.

Reference Michael's comment above. This applies here. You can make measurements, discover "laws of nature," and so on; these apply within a particular domain, but that domain is a subset of something larger, imperfectly understood and poorly defined, and to us, very strange.

You could take this idea -- of a physical domain existing within larger, non-material domains, and apply them to any number of past situations.

Such a situation might be that of William James, puzzled and intrigued with the utterances of Leonora Piper in trance.

Bill I.

[Dave W.]

Bill wrote:
"You could take this idea -- of a physical domain existing within larger, non-material domains, and apply them to any number of past situations."

But why think that the larger domain is non-material?

Everyday experience doesn't offer hints of the "larger domain" of General Relativity, with its bizarre warping of spacetime, but that model is still entirely materialistic.

[someone]

Bill:
"You and that other person would agree, however, that this is not so; you would each see one of everything, while also agreeing on the size, shape, and other physical parameters of any particular object. (Again, all such material objects are continuously created, transduced from an "energy." Some would call this energy thought, such that all and everything in what we take to be the material universe is actually a kind of solidified thought. Note how this is a very old idea.) "
The problem here is that there is nothing special about human (unconscious) thoughts, e.g. in comparison to animals.
So an ape should create reality like a human, and also a cat. Or a mouse, a butterfly, a worm, a single cell, or a virus.
But since latter is only a big molecules, other molecules, atoms or photons.

But what could they think/feel? What is their awareness like? Or have they chakras?

Dave:
"Everyday experience doesn't offer hints of the "larger domain" of General Relativity, with its bizarre warping of spacetime, but that model is still entirely materialistic."

What exactly does the term materialistic mean for you? It seems you're using it as a synonym for describable, but I for example wouldn't consider quantum waves as being materialistic.

[Dave W.]

someone, the argument seems to be against philosophical materialism, which (classically) was the position that the only thing that could be proven to exist was matter, but which in modern times would have to include all known forms of energy, as well as their interactions. All types of quantum physics are therefore materialistic.

To be consistent with a suggestion that quantum effects are non-material, one would have to suggest that magnetism isn't matierial, either, which would turn my use of fridge magnets into acts of the paranormal.

I'm sure that you don't want to go that far, so where would _you_ draw the line?

[clegg]

Dave W, I really don’t know how someone whose every post reeks of arrogance and self-importance, who is intolerant of every alternative viewpoint, can accuse someone else of being hostile. It just goes to prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that we create our own reality!

As for your suggestion that I don’t understand QM, well, remember Richard Feyman? Nobody understands QM. I was referring to the Copenhagen interpretation –the suggestion that a conscious observer is required to collapse a particle from a wave, as you must have known, but chose to issue an insult instead. Doubtless you try not to think about that idea (the conscious observer). But if you go for the Bohm interpretation, you need to bear in mind that he was certainly NOT a materialist. Maybe you are going for a new Dave W interpretation?

As for Dark Matter being material –well, maybe. But we’re a long way from proving that, aren’t we? It’s just a theoretical idea to account for gravitational anomalies. It is not made of atoms, and it is not directly detectable. Correct me if I’m wrong, but it seems to me that if it’s modelled mathematically in someone’s mind or in a computer simulation, you think it must be true. Math models are not the truth. They’re just models. Reality has to be experienced by sentient beings. Get used to it.

[Dave W.]

clegg, your reality appears to consider a search for understanding to be "arrogance" and "intolerant," the pointing out of an error to be an insult, and that statements about QM which are clearly wrong can be justifiably defended with the invocation of Feynman's Dictum (I don't think Feynman would have agreed).

I will insult you again: the Copenhagen interpretation of QM is that interactions between quantum particles collapse their wavefunctions. The Participatory Anthropic Principle (PAP, or "consciousness causes collapse") is an add-on to the Copenhagen interpretation that states that only conscious minds can cause that collapse. But if the wavefunction isn't real (if it's only math), then Wheeler's PAP as a solution to the Wigner's Friend "paradox" is unnecessary. Whether wavefunctions are real or not is a matter of some controversy among theoretical physicists even today.

But the Copenhagen interpretation (with or without PAP) does not suggest that particles are collapsed _from_ waves as you say, and to make such a suggestion means nothing less than that you reject wave-particle duality, a central feature of the Copenhagen interpretation. Your statements are thus self-contradictory.

And to contrast Copenhagen (with PAP) to only Bohm's interpretation ignores the dozen or so other major interpretations of QM. But the fact of the matter is that none of the interpretations are actually necessary to make use of QM. The interpretations are just attempts to relate the highly abstract math of QM to something more "real." They are all analogies. Every interpretation makes the same physical predictions (which have been experimentally verified), and so which one you pick is a matter of philosophy more than science, if you decide to pick one at all (not a few physicists consider these sorts of questions to be irrelevant to their QM work).

Finally, and on another note, I would correct you about what I think is true, but you consider correction to be insulting and I don't want to insult you more than twice in one comment.

[someone]

Dave:
"which in modern times would have to include all known forms of energy, as well as their interactions. "
But if all interactions are materialistic, and everything someone sense (be it with eyes/ears/or telepathic powers) is an interaction between him and something else, there is nothing left to label it as paranormal, so you have defined everything as materialistic.

" But if the wavefunction isn't real (if it's only math), then Wheeler's PAP as a solution to the Wigner's Friend "paradox" is unnecessary. Whether wavefunctions are real or not is a matter of some controversy among theoretical physicists even today."
Actually that is the reason, I wrote that quantum waves aren't materialistic IMHO , since they probably aren't real, so they only exists in the physicians mind.

[Dave W.]

someone wrote:
"But if all interactions are materialistic, and everything someone sense (be it with eyes/ears/or telepathic powers) is an interaction between him and something else, there is nothing left to label it as paranormal, so you have defined everything as materialistic."

Indeed, the problem may be one of definitions. That's why I asked where you draw the line.

"Actually that is the reason, I wrote that quantum waves aren't materialistic IMHO , since they probably aren't real, so they only exists in the physicians mind."

There's a difference between "quantum waves" and "quantum wavefunctions." But if you're going to consider the math of the latter to be non-materialistic, then all sorts of completely ordinary acts are non-material (like balancing one's checkbook), and a statement (for example) that psi doesn't perform well in scientific tests due to its non-material nature becomes pure evasion (when non-material math is the bedrock of physics).

Again: there seems to be an argument that materialism is either false or is a hurdle to understanding psi. So, "non-materialistic" must be defined in such a way that everyday science cannot cope with it, and the paranormal can. The two examples so far seem to fail to meet those conditions, don't they?

[Bill I.]

Dave W., referencing my comment Re: Physical domain as subset of larger non-material domains:

"But why think that the larger domain is non-material?"

This deals with definitions and semantics as well as a great body of collective experience.

I don't like "planes of existence" and similar language from, say, Hermetics or spiritualism, but I can understand why such terms were/are used and this is pertinent to your question.

Physics offers definitions of matter and energy while in everyday experience we treat physical reality as that which we can ascertain with our physical/organic senses.

Yet we can ascertain aspects of reality without using these, aspects that do not comply with the definitions, even though you are free to argue that this isn't so.

An example would be a vivid dream which clearly symbolizes events that have yet to happen. The dreamer wakes up and records the dream; later, these events happen, physically.

The dream wasn't perceived through the physical senses and so far as anyone knows, we aren't capable of perceiving future events through those senses.

You can argue that there is an unknown physical mechanism involved but someone else could beg to differ.

When I mention non-physical domains I'm referring to regions of mind in which nothing can be weighed or measured and in which nothing is perceived by the physical senses.

Telepathy is similar. It exists, period, yet no one has ever discovered any physical mechanism.

You might argue that we can't directly perceive, say, certain wavelengths of light yet these have a physical existence per our theories and instruments; entire industries are built upon such phenomena.

Our instruments _extend_ our sensory range; we have no instruments at present that can detect a telepathic message or signal.

So I'm making a distinction.

I believe that thoughts actually have an "electromagnetic validity" even if we are presently unable to measure or detect this.

It won't bother me if, in the future, our official definition of physical reality is extended to encompass what I'm presently called "non-material."

In such an event, I'll simply change my own expression to accommodate this. In the meantime, I'll stick with "non-material" or "non-physical" to refer to certain realities I'm aware of that don't fit the current definitions and which I can't perceive, physically.

This is really the old split between mental and physical.

(I'm too beat to ramble on about this but I surely could if less tired, boring the hell out of you and everyone else.)

Somebody: "The problem here is that there is nothing special about human unconscious) thoughts, e.g. in comparison to animals.
So an ape should create reality like a human, and also a cat. Or a mouse, a butterfly, a worm, a single cell, or a virus. But since latter is only a big molecules, other molecules, atoms or photons. But what could they think/feel? What is their awareness like? Or have they chakras?"

I suggest that there is no "matter" that is not sentient, even down to the tiniest subatomic particle, and that reality creation is universal -- not restricted to humans.

Clearly the reality created and experienced by, say, a virus will be different from what you or I create.

Not being a virus, I can't truly say what they might think or feel, although it might be possible to attune to and translate this into human terms. (This borders on Shamanistic territory.)

On the other hand, I'm quite familiar with dogs and cats; I've long firmly believed that cats are telepathic, based on years of experience, but I wouldn't expect anyone else to necessarily agree with me, nor would I expect laboratory analysis to demonstrate this, statistically.

On a related note, is there anyone here who has never wondered, if only for a moment, whether a girlfriend was "psychic" or telepathic?

Science at present is associated with the symbolically male; we've tended to consign "intuition" to the symbolically female, and in fact not just the symbolically female.

In our western societies this has been true for a very long time (with certain exceptions, such as the gambler or investor who successfully employs hunches). This is correlated with the removal of feminine deities from our mythical pantheons.

Much of what we've been discussing connects with this dichotomy, which could also be symbolized as William James versus Leonora Piper.

James wasn't afraid to investigate areas considered unworthy of attention by others, but he still maintained a rational, "objective" stance.

In the huge body of collected trance writings I've accumulated over the years, acquired from many in-person and on-line sessions involving dozens of amateurs, a collection of folks ranging from physicists to authors and artists, one theme repeats itself.

This is the idea that we are collectively moving into an era which combines or blends the symbolically masculine and feminine.

One way to picture this is to imagine William James and Leonora Piper changing roles.

James now enters trance and conveys messages; Leonora analyzes them and hires private detectives to investigate all possible physical means by which James might have acquired the information, including tailing James as he goes about his business.

They reverse their roles, again.

In this way, they accelerate their researches above and beyond that which we're familiar with from old SPR proceedings accessible in our present probable reality.

Bill I.

[Dave W.]

Bill, there's so much that you're saying that (I think you'd agree) is subjective and experiential, that I really can't address it. My goal here isn't to argue with you, anyway, but to try to understand where you're coming from.

However, I can tell you that I'm a wholist. Your "the old split between mental and physical" is clearly dualist, and I just don't see how dualism on its own adds anything but complication to our understanding of how the universe functions.

Also, you wrote: "Science at present is associated with the symbolically male; we've tended to consign "intuition" to the symbolically female..."

You're dead wrong, here. Intuition, hunches and the like are _vital_ to the scientific process. Without them, science doesn't even really begin.

Look at the stereotypical "scientific method" that most of us learn in grade school. Step one, of course, is to make an observation about the world. Some phenomenon that you see, feel, taste or otherwise can experience (with or without tools which "expand" our senses).

Step two is creating a hypothesis to explain your observation. This is where intuition, hunches and other "feminine" qualities are absolutely necessary. Without the creative, step two of the scientific method is impossible, because observations (step one) do not imply their own explanations in any logical, mechanistic fashion. If things were otherwise, we would already have machines doing our science for us.

The rest of the process is to test the hypothesis to see if it's correct, and to use the results of the tests as further observations with which to refine (creatively) one's hypothesis.

The first, third (and beyond) steps of the scientific method are _boring_. They are the drudgery that's foisted off on grad students and unpaid interns. It's the creative hypothesis formation that nets people Nobel Prizes and chapters in history books.

(Okay, okay, the testing itself is pretty exciting - witness the brouhaha surrounding the start of Large Hadron Collider operations - but it's only exciting because it's what tells us whether our intuitions were correct. But you still won't find any big-time awards being handed out for proper laboratory techniques.)

[clegg]

Some people see a loose thread and try to unravel it. Others look at the pattern and purpose of the garment. You, Dave W, are an unraveller and need to learn how to meditate. This is the procedure: first, you direct one pointed attention to an object - an idea, an image or a feeling. The ground of all Being follows the lead of attention and flows to the object, charging it with meaning. After much practice, the ego, responding to the attraction, allows itself to be drawn to the object and to become absorbed in it as a self-controlled phenomenological world. This changes your definition of self, which now is known to be mind, though unity of mind and body is still understood. Whilst still in a body, it is hard to dissolve an object completely; it is held in place by more than human power. But the boundaries between objects do become blurred or fluid, and are seen to be linked by cause and effect, which can be traced backwards and forwards in time. The meaning of objects is clearly understood to be constructed by the individual. The greater Reality is perceived as acausal, synchronous, interconnected and relativistic. This perception is accompanied by feelings of bliss.

[Dave W.]

clegg wrote:
"Some people see a loose thread and try to unravel it. Others look at the pattern and purpose of the garment. You, Dave W, are an unraveller..."

Again seeming to prove that you're creating your own reality. After all, mind/body dualism denies the beautiful weave of the brain, turning it little more than an antenna made of goo.

Quantum physics (our knowledge of the very small) now informs our cosmology (our knowledge of the largest structures and events). Our cosmology informs our knowledge of the everyday things and events we encounter. Our knowledge of the everyday allows us to measure and theorize about the very small. Those who suggest that universal consciousness is necessary for all this (for example) are looking at the absolutely gorgeous and intricate tapestry that we call the universe and are saying, "meh, it's not pretty enough. It needs something else. And look at all those loose threads! Can't we just bundle those up together?"

clegg continued:
"...and need to learn how to meditate."

Did so, thirty years ago. I am the person I am today in no small part because of my earlier deep commitment to the paranormal.

[someone]

Dave:
" That's why I asked where you draw the line."
Actually I draw it always there, where I need it ;-)
"There's a difference between "quantum waves" and "quantum wavefunctions." But if you're going to consider the math of the latter to be non-materialistic, then all sorts of completely ordinary acts are non-material (like balancing one's checkbook), and a statement (for example) that psi doesn't perform well in scientific tests due to its non-material nature becomes pure evasion (when non-material math is the bedrock of physics).
Math always is non-materialistic in my opinion, because it doesn't depend on any aspect of the reality. (except of the physical carrier, but paper/blackboard/thoughts doesn't matter for the math).
But if you use math to describe balancing one's checkbook you can measure every aspect of the formula. However it is not possible to fully measure a qt. wave functions (I always meant the functions so far) because only real numbers can be measured, and 'half of' the function is imaginary.

Bill:
"I suggest that there is no "matter" that is not sentient, even down to the tiniest subatomic particle, and that reality creation is universal -- not restricted to humans."
But since a human consist of molecules its consciousness (or spirit, to include the unconscious reality creation) is also created (at least mostly) by the combination of all the spirits of all the molecules.
So since the feelings of an molecules are a included with one's spirit, everyone should exactly know how the atoms feel and want.

[Bill I.]

Dave: "Bill, there's so much that you're saying that (I think you'd agree) is subjective and experiential, that I really can't address it. My goal here isn't to argue with you, anyway, but to try to understand where you're coming from."

Dear Dave:

Good luck. I went to Sunday school as a child but rejected its ideology after being exposed to science and became an atheist.

Later, I grew extremely curious about the nature of reality after some unusual experiences.

This involved searching literature over many years and, eventually, learning basic techniques of meditation, then, later, experimenting (frequently with others) with trance and "spirit" communications.

Throughout all of this I've periodically dug into philosophy and science, too, but not in a particularly disciplined way.

I'm self educated and have tended to work as an independent researcher and writer, with occasional forays into sales, marketing, and (when no other work is available) back office functions like (ugh!) bookkeeping and accounting.

To do this, I must have to be reasonably grounded and have my s__ together, although during sales stints intuition plays a major role.

When I create a list of all of my unusual experiences (something I do periodically when I'm feeling sceptical) and compare those to everything I've encountered in "esoteric" literature, science, and philosophy, I inevitably come away with a strong sense that much of our present science -- in an overall sense -- is truly primitive, a subset of a larger general ignorance.

This doesn't mean I believe in my own brilliance, or that I believe I'm "enlightened" or a master of the secrets of the universe; rather I'm referring to what some call the "ego-bound" condition.

I've learned how to loosen my ego, but with my lifestyle I can't afford to stay in such a condition, so I restrict this to limited times.

I do believe, however, based on all of my experience, that I am one physical expression of a series of larger and larger beings.

It's taken years to reach this place, a place that isn't as static as it may sound.

In some ways I've settled on the general thrust of some of the mystical writings I encountered as a young man during my literature searches, even though I was reasonably sceptical of them at the time, and definitely puzzled.

"However, I can tell you that I'm a wholist. Your "the old split between mental and physical" is clearly dualist, and I just don't see how dualism on its own adds anything but complication to our understanding of how the universe functions."

Remember that I couched my explanation within a statement concerning the limitations of words and present definitions and understanding.

I consider myself a "wholist," too, believing in one ultimate conscious being -- "The One" or "The All."

Still, I have no trouble making a distinction between what I can perceive with my physical senses and what I cannot, even if I believe in a fundamental unity.

How else can we even discuss this area?

Within our language, there is inner and outer or mental and physical, and these terms refer to actual experience, definite realities.

Even so, there is as yet no way to transmit a mental image directly to, say, a computer network, unlike the possibility of scanning an image I might physically draw.

Thus I suggest there is validity to this kind of dualism, underlying unity or not.

"Also, you wrote: "Science at present is associated with the symbolically male; we've tended to consign "intuition" to the symbolically female..." You're dead wrong, here. Intuition, hunches and the like are _vital_ to the scientific process. Without them, science doesn't even really begin."

I'm fully aware of this, Dave.

I was speaking in much more general terms, treating science as an overall symbolically masculine activity -- it's a questing sort of activity, regardless of whether brilliant scientific innovators rely on their intuition or not.

It's associated with "the rational approach" and that is truly quite different from a purely intuitive -- symbolically feminine -- approach.

Endless writers and commentators have commented on this division over the centuries using any number of symbols -- Apollo and Dionysis, solar knowledge and lunar knowledge, etc., etc.

Think of the gender associations we still have and have had for centuries, despite relatively recent movements, associations still instilled during socialization.

There's a physical reality to our idea of gender and a symbolic reality as well; I was referring to the symbolic reality but consider, too, our prejudices regarding not just intuition versus the rational but emotion, as well.

This is actually quite deep, but not so deep as what I call "entity," the immediate larger region of self sometimes called "soul."

This being is of no physical gender; its constituent physical selves or focus personalities -- which may number in the thousands or tens of thousands -- may include a balance of feminine and masculine forms (or not, depending on the particular entity).

Here's an area I expect you'll completely disregard as it's well outside the boundaries of science and, to some, reeks of religious belief.

What others believe in this matter is of little concern to me, as I am just as convinced of the reality of entity as the reality of telepathy, precognition, or "chakras."

The idea of an entity can be explained, but here experiencing the reality involves more than just teaching yourself how to meditate.

I'm not sure there is any easy method to elaborate, either, although I wish there were. (My first crude attempt at this is Exercise 5. at http://www.realitytest.com/doors.htm .)

It's possible, though, to consciously access your own entity, and it's also possible for a good "medium" to do this for you, although in that case any communication from your entity to you will be necessarily translated by the third-party.

The very first time I encountered someone with an amazing gift for this it truly "blew my mind."

This is a good story but too long to tell now. Short version: I found out what a "crown chakra expansion" is all about.

I've left out huge areas and don't wish to bore anyone still left here.

One might be my experiences with a hired hypnotist, in the late 70s -- very interesting.

Another might be the shock that attended a group gathered to engage in mediumistic activities when what "came through" (with great power) was not the usual familiar spook or entity but rather a being claiming to be Nataraja, the being of Hindu myth that none present were at all familiar with at the time.

Then, too, I've witnessed -- in some cases with others -- "physically impossible" events on several occasions. I refrain from posting about these as I doubt anyone would believe me. Why bother?

I've visited other worlds (for lack of a more precise term -- I'm not speaking of distant planets elsewhere in the galaxy) twice in the course of my life, consciously, and lived to tell the tale (but these are complex tales far too long for this space).

The key experience in all of this happened in 1972, when I lived in the woods as a hermit, and this is something I still ponder.

Late one night, walking down an old wagon road, I encountered a being, the size and shape of a man, consisting entirely of a deep golden light, as though made of a dark brown glass with the light evenly suffused throughout its form.

This was no hallucination but, unfortunately, I was alone at the time and so when hearing of this many assume I must have been hallucinating -- there were no other witnesses and I didn't take time exposure. Whatever this was, it had nothing in common with any description of a ghost.

I confess to having been more than a little apprehensive -- I kept right on walking until this being was out of sight. I lacked the courage to walk right up to it and inquire as to its nature, something I would hope I would find the courage to do were I to encounter it or another like it again.

If you're still wondering why I believe present science to be primitive, incomplete, and somewhat flawed and limited, I don't know what else to say.

Bill I.