[extropy-chat] Re: Damien grants psi evidence

[Acy James Stapp]

I'll just say that her analysis convinced me (pretty much as hardcore a
rationalist as they come) that there is something to be investigated and
we do need to determine its causal mechanisms. But I did read the entire
article, refutations, and replies :)

When her detractors come out and essentially say "We can't find any
methodological or statistical problems, but there must be some! That's
just crazy!" it tends to set off my tenure-protection detector.

Acy

-----Original Message-----
From: John K Clark

"Damien Broderick" <thespike at satx.rr.com> Wrote:

>  http://anson.ucdavis.edu/~utts/

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 confess I totally lost interest
when
I read the following:

"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 and in her opinion it's good
enough. In my wildest dreams I can't imagine Faraday saying that about
electromagnetism 150 years ago, or a scientist today at CERN saying the
same
thing about a theory of particle physics that was far less radical than
ESP.
When I read those words my baloney detector went off big time!

  John K Clark        jonkc at att.net