[extropy-chat] Re: Damien grants psi evidence

[Damien Broderick]

At 12:36 PM 12/17/2004 -0500, John K Clark wrote:

>I went to the page you cited with the intention on reading the entire thing
>but in the end I just glanced at it.

I know it's boring to say so, but isn't this precisely what Galileo's 
detractors did? They just *knew* he was talking crap, right from the get-go.

>"There is little benefit to continuing experiments designed to offer proof,
>since there is little more to be offered to anyone who does not accept the
>current collection of data."
>
>In other words Jessica Utts thinks the proof that this phenomena actually
>exists is as good as it's ever going to get

Utts is saying that further research needs to explore *process*, rather 
than the simple reality of the phenomenon. She's also saying that the 
existing evidence is *already sufficiently strong* that those who remain 
skeptical after examining it are unlikely to change their minds. (I would 
say that about creationists and darwinism, for example.) She might be 
overstating the case, of course. You'll never know if you decline to read 
what she says.

>In my wildest dreams I can't imagine Faraday saying that about
>electromagnetism 150 years ago

Faraday didn't waste his life on ever-more careful demonstrations meant to 
show nothing more than that electricity exists.

>When I read those words my baloney detector went off big time!

Oddly enough, when I read this sort of prima facie refusal to look closely 
at the extant evidence, a quite similar kind of detector goes off in my mind.

Damien Broderick