From: davidb@inmet.inmet (David Barton)
Newsgroups: sci.psychology
Subject: Re: Parapsychology
Date: 16 Apr 92 19:01:04 GMT
Article-I.D.: inmet.DAVIDB.92Apr16150053
	<DAVIDB.92Apr8123701@inmet.inmet> <2895@sol.deakin.OZ.AU>
Organization: Intermetrics, Inc.

In article <2895@sol.deakin.OZ.AU> andrea@cm.deakin.OZ.AU (Andrea
Todkill) writes:

   In article <DAVIDB.92Apr8123701@inmet.inmet> davidb@inmet.inmet
   (David Barton) writes:

   >Without a definition of your terms, I do not know if you are
   >ill-informed or simply an intellectual bigot.  Is the work done at
   >the Princeton Engineering Anomoly Research center not
   >"paranormal", or not "scientifically verifiable"?  If you assert
   >either, intelligent people will disagree with you.

   I see. Since I disagree with you I _must_ be either ill-informed or
   intellectually bigoted. No other possibility at all. On the other
   hand, anyone who agrees with you is automatically intelligent. I
   thought this was sci.psychology, not alt.flame. Let's see some
   proof by way of a change from the ad hominem attacks.

Sigh.  Let's try one round here; I freely leave the final blow to you.
Your original message was a wholesale condemnation of an entire field
of researchers.  I characterized this as either uninformed or
intellectually bigoted; this characterization seems to me accurate.  I
then backed this up with your won terms, asking whether specific
research fell under one of your three categories.  I suppose that by
addressing my adjectives to you rather than the message itself, I was
indeed guilty of an ad-hominum attack; for that error, I apologize.  I
do not apologize for my characterization of your message.  I still
believe that to be accurate.

   >The best summary book is "Margins of Reality" by Jahn and Dunne.
   >There is still some discussion concerning their methods and the
   >interpretation of their results.  This discussion is not
   >conclusive at this time (except by dint of close-mindedness).  The
   >results have been replicated in part, by Dean Radin among others.

   Really? Then if there has in fact been some verified research
   proving paranormal forces, the researchers have been _extremely_
   quiet about discoveries which if true would have overturned the
   entire field of research in physics.

Well, this may be a bit of hyperbole.  In general, I agree with this
characterization.  The fact that a lot of this research has not been
replicated in the larger field of physics still surprises me,
somewhat.  I think that some of this is that it does not seem to fit
in any particular field, and some is the instinctive distaste for
anything smacking of the "paranormal".  I have seen only one
thoughtful article taking issue with the PEAR research; it focused on
methods, not on an attempt at reproduction of the results.  I was not
entirely impressed with the article (read in a library some time ago;
I do not have a copy, nor a direct reference), since it made no
substantive recommendations concerning improving the experimental
methods.

The researchers have not been quiet at all about their work.  The book
itself has been published, as well as various papers.  Jahn has been
interviewed in various magazines (Discover, etc.) for the Sunday
supplement set.  Given that you think that they have been quiet, I
suppose this refines my characterization above; you are ill-informed
concerning this particular research.  The only thing wrong with that
is the stridency of your statements; I did not hear about this until I
stumbled across the book.

   >Keep your skepticism level very high, however; this field has been
   >plagued by bad methods and questionable investigators.  It does
   >not take many of these to ruin the overall credibility of an
   >entire body of serious researchers.

   I can only applaud this call for a skeptical approach. And indeed I
   am not saying that most of the researchers are not "serious" (I am
   sure they honestly believe in paranormal phenomena). I am, however,
   making the distinction between honesty of belief on the part of the
   researchers and the lack of validity of the evidence provided by
   their work. Because they are serious in their belief does _not_
   mean that everyone else must agree with them in the absence of
   convincing evidence.

Again, you seem to be painting every investegator who is interested in
paranormal phenomena with the same brush of gullibility.  I do not
argue with your right to your opinion, nor with your septicism.  I
argue with the universal and negative nature of your pronouncements.
If you did not intend them to be universal, then I apologize; however,
I am unable to read your last paragraph as anything other than a
wholesale acusation of scientific incompetance.  There is lots of room
for disagreement here; drop on over to sci.skeptic when this subject
comes up.  Disagreement is not what I take issue with: wholesale
condemnation is.

I recognize that everyone's time is finite, and that no one has the
time to track down and read everything concerning a particular
subject.  I personally recommend "Margins of Reality", as I found it
interesting and convincing.  I more than understand if your time does
not permit you to run off and spend good money and valuable time
obtaining and reading it on my say-so.  However, if you have not even
run across this research, I have no choice but question the depth of
your understanding of the field in general while making universal
judgements of the field in general.

Be skeptical on both sides.  I have not read nearly enough on
"paranormal" studies (I am not even really sure what this means) to
state positively either that it is all true or all hogwash, or that
there is gold among the dross.  I have read enough to object, rather
positively, to wholesale dismissal.  This I have done, and will
continue to do.  I will continue to label such wholesale dismissal as
either ill-informed or intellectually bigoted, for such it seems to
me.

					Dave Barton
					dlb@hudson.wash.inmet.com