From: bear@tigger.cs.Colorado.EDU (Bear Giles)
Subject: Re: Partial Legalization
Organization: National Oceanic & Atmospheric Adminstration / Boulder Labs
Date: Fri, 21 Aug 1992 01:07:15 GMT

In article <86618@netnews.upenn.edu> zorrilla@cattell.psych.upenn.edu (Eric Zorrilla) writes:
>In article <1992Aug19.235745.11059@colorado.edu> bear@tigger.cs.Colorado.EDU (Bear Giles) writes:
>
>>I _am_ saying that I have seen a lot of
>>
>>  We did X and Y stopped (or started or ...)
>>
>>and immediately jumped to the conclusion that X caused the a _real_
>>change in Y, rather than a _perceived_ change in Y.
>
>I'm not disputing that selective interpretation is a problem in psychology.
>I'm not sure if it can be argued that it's a unique problem (though I can't
>argue against that since I'm not familiar enough with hard science research).

N-rays.  'Discovered' by Rene' Blondlot (from Nancy, France) in 1903.
A lot like recently discovered X-rays.  Several sites, primarily in France,
verified his results.  Over 100 papers were printed by the French Academy,
and it was ready to award him its highest honor.

Then Dr. Robert Wood, an American visitor, reported to _Nature_ that
he had secretly removed, and replaced, a critical element of the apparatus
(while the lights were out) without Blondlot reporting any difference in
the experimental results.  A suspicious lab assistant (who did not know
Wood had replaced the aluminum prism) offered to read off values... and
read values appropriate for a missing prism.

Only two more papers were printed by the French Academy, none elsewhere.

(_Flim Flam_, by James Randi.  Chapter 10, "The Will to Believe".  Highly
recommended).

Also, cold fusion.  polywater.  "continuous" model of cosmology after
discovery of 3-degree background radiation (Sir Fred Hoyle).  There are
a _lot_ of examples in physics and allied fields (the ones I'm most
knowledgable about).

>It's just bad science, though.  Nothing wrong with psychology, obviously,
>but with the SPECIFIC psychologists making those assertions.

Agreed.

>>Perhaps nobody mentions this sort of possibility because it's understood...
>
>More likely because it's not understood or because it's deemed to be
>"unlikely." (where that leaves science is beyond me).

Shudder.  That sounds frighteningly familiar.  (I now work in software,
but I apply the rigor I learned as a math/physics undergrad.  I _never_
release software unless I know precisely what it is doing at all times,
and why.  But I have known people to 'tweak' code until it works for
their sparse test cases,... and consider the job done).

>>then why do "hard" science types _always_ provide equivalent information
>>(or have it available on demand) even though inanimate systems are _much_
>>easier to study?
>
>Part of the problem may lie in the fact that psychological concepts appear
>so accessible to intuition, thus making selective interpretation often
>intoxicating.  I'd expect this would be less so in hard sciences (conjecture,
>only, of course).  Probably also simply a question of standards - it goes
>on because it's allowed (wrong as that may be).
>
>Eric Zorrilla - Dept. of Psychology
>University of Pennsylvania

Ahh!

I remember a _lot_ of exercises where we were given an 'intuitively'
obvious problem and told to solve it.  After we gave up the professor
told us where we went wrong.

A freshman level example:  is there a (smooth) shape that can hold 
a finite amount of paint but can never be painted because it has
infinite volume?  Of course not... except the surface of revolution
formed by the curve 1/x from a > 0 to infinity has finite volume
(1/a^2) and infinite surface area.

The fact that I _still_ remember this, after 14 (gasp) years and
another 5 years of advanced mathematics shows just how strongly we
were conditioned (!) to mistrust our original intuition.

Perhaps you could split classes into two groups, one that suggests
a psychological solution to a problem (e.g., torture the POW until
he provides the information you want) and another that suggests an
alternate response (the POW talks, but makes up stories of the type
that make his interogators stop).  General discussion of 'horror
stories' -- attempts at applied psychology that backfired.


Bear Giles
bear@fsl.noaa.gov
Newsgroups: sci.psychology