If that's the case then it really didn't matter did it? Science (the process) is agnostic to what people think; therefore, the dismissers (supposedly scientists) were invalidated by reality.
in the long run yes, but up untill that point the people reporting those phenomena have to put up with a tide of complete nonsense and name calling from people terminally unable to engage in the process of consideration and speculation.
There's really nothing wrong with saying the data is 'inconclusive' but there's something very wrong with scientific witch-hunts in which people are either branded liars or fantasists.
Show me a single one then.
Quite an interesting experiment in recent times is where a group of researchers collaborated in an atempt to debunk homeopathy.
What in fact happened was that 3 out of 4 of the labs involved recorded statistically signifcant results, with (from what i remember) quite a few of the original naysayers eating some very humble pie after the data had been analysed.
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0ISW/is_252/ai_n6160487
The interesting thing here is - i dont actually believe in homeopathy.
But the point is, i dont use that as a basis in which to go around claiming that 'no evidence exists for it'.
As i said earlier you cant use your own beliefs to make false claims about positive data being 'non-existant', no matter how much you would like that to be true.
Well no. Looking at the experiment design and execution is what shows the flaws... not the results; however, because we know how much humans can screw things up in paranormal human ability experiments, positive results do become an indicator that the expriment was in fact flawed and follow up always uncovers the flaws.
Positive results would only be an
absolute indicator of poor experiment control 'if' we knew with complete certainty that nothing remotely paranormally actually existed.
Ultimately if you want to invoke a flaw in the methodology you have to really point out exactly where you think the flaw is.
If you cant find any - then you have to assume there is no design flaw and accept the data as it is.
Science explores the 'what'. There is simply no 'what' to explore in this case.
Well this is the thing you have to actually dedicate a certain degree of time and energy to probing the validity of claims.
Otherwise youre trapped in a tautological loop of 'there's no evidence because we dont believe there will be any evidence out there to find'.
You are always welcome to ask for evidence of any claim I make and of course I will provide:
Charles Honorton's autoganzfeld studies. 35% rate vs. expected 'random chance' 25% hit rate. Biggest critical flaw: human communication (it was not double-blind).
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m2320/is_n2_v60/ai_18960809
Thanks! its a rather long article though, so im gonna have to continue reading it tomorrow in order to make any kind of intelligible remark on it
Gathering evidence provides strong insights into human psychology. How values and emotional needs often trump truth for example. It also filters in valid claims (ex. aerial phenomena). It also prevents valuable expriement time from being wasted when the 'what' is known human psychology disguised as a paranormal human ability.
Well i think youre right in as much as emotional need almost always gets in the way of experimentation.
Which is essentially the whole reason behind single-blind and double-blind testing. It's certainly an ongoing problem in science whatever you try and do to get around it.
What im not sure on is is what you mean by when you say the 'what' is simply disguised human psychology.
What 'what' are you refering to? if youre talking about telepathy then even alot of psychologists these days actually agree that there's something going on way behind cold reading and neuro linguistic programming, or any other form of known psychological trickery.