Consciousness and the Paranormal

[Wade]

LINK: Marcello Truzzi - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Seems it originated with our friend Marcello Truzzi: "An extraordinary claim requires extraordinary proof." 1978

In 1980 Carl Sagan morphed it into: "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence."

So did I completely read the post by mr Truzzi wrong in the link that constance provided ? Otherwise by the way I interpreted it, mr. TRUZZI SEEMED TO DO AN ABOUT FACE.

Edit: I guess not as extraordinary proof is more exacting than extraordinary evidence and therefore possibly unobtainable whereas extraordinary evidence is not asking for much and if one can't meet that standard you have no basis for your argument ?

 

[Tyger]

If you have some specific objection that relates to the subject matter then state it and we'll discuss it. If you want a summary of the FFCT website, then go there and review the website.

Alls that Constance is asking of you, Ufology, is that you articulate what the criteria is (as you understand it) for 'the tool' of 'critical thinking'. Without filter. It's a fair request, given how much you reference 'critical thinking'.

Constance wrote what she was asking of you -

You've persuaded yourself but not any of the rest of us that you are in a position to evaluate [make judgments about] either 'accuracy' or 'coherency' in sound bites drawn from videos or perhaps pop science articles reporting briefly and incompletely on scientific research on the internet. To begin to understand all that is happening in science as a collective of increasingly specialized subdisciplines, in scientific theory including systems theory and information theory, in consciousness research, and in investigations of anomalous cognition, one needs to read and read and read and keep on reading. Something you've read in that 'critical thinking' website you keep citing has persuaded you that you have an inside track, without doing the necessary reading, on what can be considered rationality and 'truth'. Please do us a favor and quote from that site the authorities and their intimidating theses that have persuaded you that by following their precepts you're in a position to make harsh judgements about every subject, experiment, and theory brought forward for discussion by the rest of us.

Per usual, you do not answer the questions directed to you.

Point being, this is a dialog, it's a discussion. No one here is pretending to be an authority. It's a conversation. We are not thrashing out theory as scientists, but as laymen. There is a desire to get to the core of ideas. To be in the conversation you have to be able to articulate your thoughts and get in the back-and-forth. You don't do that. You supply links and then sit back as though your task is done. Constance is asking for you to articulate your pov. That's fair.

I have seen you routinely ask a poster to encapsulate their views in 'a few sentences', or to define a word, a concept, or please summarize an article. How does this work, Ufology? It's okay for you to ask - but when you are asked, your approach is push-back?

 

[smcder]

. . .

[quant-ph/0105027] 'Beyond quantum theory: a realist psycho-biological interpretation of reality' revisited

[1108.4860] Biological Observer-Participation and Wheeler's 'Law without Law'

NOTE that both papers are available in free PDF downloads at the top right of the abstract pages.

fascinating abstracts, have to go to bed soon but I look forward to reading these in the morning, thank you

 

[Constance]

So did I completely read the post by mr Truzzi wrong in the link that constance provided ? Otherwise by the way I interpreted it, mr. TRUZZI SEEMED TO DO AN ABOUT FACE.

Edit: I guess not as extraordinary proof is more exacting than extraordinary evidence and therefore possibly unobtainable whereas extraordinary evidence is not asking for much and if one can't meet that standard you have no basis for your argument ?

You read it right, Wade. Truzzi did in effect make an about-face from what he recognized as CSICOP's pseudo-skepticism (debunkery). Having been a founder of CSICOP and a member for one year, he later became a founding member of the Society for Scientific Exploration and its journal, the Journal of Scientific Exploration. A description of the journal and an archive of its publications since 1987 are available at this link:

Journal of Scientific Exploration

 

[smcder]

. . .

[quant-ph/0105027] 'Beyond quantum theory: a realist psycho-biological interpretation of reality' revisited

[1108.4860] Biological Observer-Participation and Wheeler's 'Law without Law'

NOTE that both papers are available in free PDF downloads at the top right of the abstract pages.

woke up early and read the Josephson paper - fascinating the distinction between "the many possibilities" and the one that corresponds to reality for us and how that ties in with the Josephson and Pallikari-Viras paper . . . going to read it next!

. . .

The conclusion of the Josephson - Rubik paper makes a pretty good manifesto . . .

 

[smcder]

The FFCT website provides the criteria in a concise manner that uses a flash based interactive graphic. No reasonable person would insist that I reiterate all that here rather than simply checking out the link.

I had a look at the Foundation for Critical Thinking website and also did a search on the web, but it looks like the Wikipedia article on the Foundation was deleted for lack of evidence of notability and lack of coverage by independent reliable sources.

Here are the details:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundation_for_Critical_Thinking

This page has been deleted. The deletion and move log for the page are provided below for reference.

• 01:11, 1 January 2014 Mark Arsten (talk | contribs) deleted page Foundation for Critical Thinking (Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Foundation for Critical Thinking)
  The discussion page on its deletion reads:
  The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it.Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.
  The result was delete. Mark Arsten (talk) 01:11, 1 January 2014 (UTC)
  
  Foundation for Critical Thinking[edit]
  Foundation for Critical Thinking (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log · Stats)
  (Find sources: "Foundation for Critical Thinking" – books · scholar · JSTOR · free images)
  I can find evidence of notability , not any references to it except in works they have themselves published. DGG ( talk ) 21:02, 16 December 2013 (UTC)
  Note: This debate has been included in the list of California-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 23:52, 16 December 2013 (UTC)
  Note: This debate has been included in the list of Organizations-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 23:52, 16 December 2013 (UTC)
  Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.
  Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Mark Arsten (talk) 01:44, 23 December 2013 (UTC)
  • Comment I located various references to the Foundation's work, including the Washington Post (2008) and Rocky Mountain News (2006), both sceptical about "critical thinking" (and both needing a Highbeam subscription to read). The same search also turned up various articles in education journals quoting the Foundation's publications. AllyD (talk) 08:26, 23 December 2013 (UTC)
  • Delete Fails WP:ORG for lack of significant (or pretty much any) coverage by Independent Reliable Sources. Searching finds mainly self-published material or references to "the foundation for critical thinking" in lower case. The same seems to be true of the sister organization Center for Critical Thinking (which claims affiliation with Sonoma State University - maybe we should consider a merge if that affiliation is confirmed). --MelanieN (talk) 23:10, 28 December 2013 (UTC)
  The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

 

[smcder]

There is a short article on Richard Paul at Wikipedia:

Richard William Paul - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[smcder]

It looks like it is free to register and there are some online resources at the site including research articles on critical thinking.

This one is interesting:

A Critical Analysis of Richard Paul's Substantive Trans-disciplinary Conception of Critical Thinking
by Enoch Hale, Ph.D.

Union Institute & University - Cincinnati, Ohio - October 2008

http://www.criticalthinking.org/files/Hale_PDE_Abstract.pdf

full paper: http://www.criticalthinking.org/files/Hale_PDE_Final.pdf

note: Doctoral Supervision is by Dr. Linda Elder, Dr. Gerald Nosich, Dr. Joel Levine, and Dr. George Nagel all of whom appear to be associated with the Foundation or its Critical Thinking programs, Dr. Elder is President of the Foundation for Critical Thinking and Executive Director of the Center for Critical Thinking.

Dr. Linda Elder


ABSTRACT
Many significant thinkers throughout history have articulated the importance of critical thinking in education and life. Since 1980 the topic of critical thinking has been explicitly explored by scholars specifically as it pertains to educational reform. Richard Paul’s views of critical thinking have had a significant impact on how critical thinking is understood today. However, to date there is not a comprehensive analysis of Paul’s theory of critical thinking – an exegesis that clearly identifies and examines the structural components of his model and his general pedagogical point of view. The need for a critical analysis of Paul’s work is significant for three reasons. The first is that Paul’s work is widely acknowledged within scholarship on the topic of critical thinking, teaching and learning. Secondly, Paul’s work experiences high visibility in instructional practices and institutional plans (accreditation reports, mission statements, and general descriptions of the concept and its importance to learning) throughout the United States particularly. Thirdly, Paul’s conception of critical thinking is bold given its trans-disciplinary claims. Specifically, it is a conception that seeks to clarify the essential conditions of what it means to think critically and infuse these concepts within practical and pedagogically sound methods for applying critical thinking within and across every domain of academia and life. The purpose of this dissertation is to conduct the first comprehensive analysis and evaluation of Richard Paul’s work on critical thinking. This includes placing Paul’s work in the larger discourse, succinctly describing his model and suggested applications for teaching, and outlining some of the most significant challenges facing Paul’s work as an approach for educational reform. Paul’s contribution to the discourse and development of critical thinking is significant because it is comprehensive and conceptually applicable to all human thinking, yet its very comprehensiveness poses a challenge. This work argues that the model requires a fresh contextualization when applied to any given field, which implies a need for professional development. Paul and his associates have pointed in the direction of those contextualizations, but a tremendous amount of work must be done for this model to flourish in any discipline and instructional setting.

 

[smcder]

ugh, I just found this - looks like from August of 2013 where the author of the above paper is suing Richard Paul and Linda Elders:

SANTA ROSA, Calif. (CN) - In a lurid lawsuit, a former employee claims the Marin County-based Foundation for Critical Thinking is a "cultlike" group whose married bosses tried to make him have sex with the wife, and fired him for refusing.

Courthouse News Service

According to the complaint, the Foundation for Critical Thinking, based in Tomales, "trains educators how to analyze information in an 'objective 'fair-minded' manner, without allowing their own biases, prejudices and opinions to influence their objective analysis of an issue. It is a 'think tank' of sorts that promotes a casual work environment. Defendants Elder and Paul frequently hold meetings at both FCT offices and their personal residence, where they sit and lie on the floor amongst pillows. To encourage the free flow of ideas, defendants Elder and Paul often discuss uncomfortable topics, and encourage employees to rid themselves of social, including sexual, taboos. The cult-like unprofessional atmosphere present at FCT and nurtured by defendants Elder and Paul created a hostile work environment for FTC [sic] employees, including Hale."

About three years after he was hired, Hale claims, Elder and Paul began bringing up "inappropriate sexual topics" and asking him "about his sex life with his wife" during business meetings. He claims that Elder frequently asked him if he wanted her sexually.
Hale says the frank sex talk made him uncomfortable, but he put up with it because other employees were fired or forced to quit if they disagreed with Elder and Paul.
In October 2010, Hale claims, Elder and Paul graduated from discussing sex to encouraging him to have sex with Elder.

After calling Hale to a meeting, Paul "explained to Hale that he was concerned about defendant Elder, his younger wife by approximately 20 years, and wanted to ensure that her sexual urges could be satisfied," the complaint states. "Defendant Paul proposed that Hale should have sexual intercourse with Paul's wife, defendant Elder, while defendant Paul observed them. Hale immediately became uncomfortable and anxious, as he listened to defendant Paul, and worried about his ability to keep his job, if he declined. Hale politely declined defendant Paul's request."

etc . . . etc . . .

this doesn't mean the critical thinking curriculum isn't worthwhile - but on that, I'm not finding much of anything in terms of an independent assessment of the critical thinking material - everything seems to go back to the Foundation itself - like the Wikipedia article indicates . . . courses and materials seem expensive and some of Richard Paul's books on Amazon have received bad reviews - one for spelling errors/typos and for being over-priced . . . so at this point I'm reluctant to pursue the materials on this site any further

 

[smcder]

You read it right, Wade. Truzzi did in effect make an about-face from what he recognized as CSICOP's pseudo-skepticism (debunkery). Having been a founder of CSICOP and a member for one year, he later became a founding member of the Society for Scientific Exploration and its journal, the Journal of Scientific Exploration. A description of the journal and an archive of its publications since 1987 are available at this link:

Journal of Scientific Exploration

Catching up on my reading . . . a good article from the JSE:

http://www.scientificexploration.org/journal/jse_01_2_bauer.pdf

. . . asserts many of the things brought up on this thread:

Larry Laudan, himself a contemporary philosopher of science of note (Laudan, 1977, 198 l), concluded that there is no epistemological criterion by which one can characterize science. Let me spend a little time on that, since the conclusion usually seems unpalatable to practising scientists when they understand its implications.

. . .

Then came attempts to show that the scientific method (if not facts or theories) has some special virtue, leading progressively to greater certainty, closer to truth if not actually getting there. Those attempts continue, but face great difficulties: first, because there exists no agreement on what a satisfactorycharacterization of "the scientific method" might be: second, because the suggested attributes of "the scientific method" are not accurately descriptive of what scientists actually do: third, because none of the empirically accurate descriptions of what scientists do can be logically proven to have epistemo-logical significance.

. . .

Consider the sort of things said about the scientific method: rational, im-
partial, strict regard for accuracy and controlled experiment, empirically based,
looking to reproducibility and verification; careful, consistent, cautious, and
so on. And those presumed attributes also define the popular stereotype of
the good scientist, Martin Arrowsmith (Lewis, 1925)-careful, objective, dis-
interested, modest, shy of publicity, unconcerned with personal advancement
or possessions, naively idealistic.

Then think about the way scientists describe the best examples of successful
practice in science: creative, original, new; daring, surprising; splendidly cor-
rect; elegant. . . . Does work of that sort really come from carefully disin-
terested people obsessed with strict accuracy and reproducibility? For my
part, I think it happens only rarely. I have known some first-rate scientists,
and they were usually ready to ignore many results in favor of others about
which they had hunches, ready to defend their theories vigorously despite the
lack of sufficient proof, ready to jump intuitively to conclusions . . . and I
have known a few Arrowsmiths, marvelously educated and conversant with
the specialist literature, consulted by all on account of their judiciousness-
who published hardly at all, and never anything of note. The Nobel prize
went to Watson and Crick, not to the systematic, judicious, erudite Erwin
Chargaff-which seemed unfair to a number of people, including Chargaff
himself, who has written in very bitter tones about the manner in which
Science nowadays is not as it ought to be (Chargaff, 1963, 1977, 1978)

 

[Tyger]

The FFCT website provides the criteria in a concise manner that uses a flash based interactive graphic. No reasonable person would insist that I reiterate all that here rather than simply checking out the link.

Any reasonable person would happily articulate their views. You yourself, Ufology, refuse to explore links to research papers. If you feel you can reasonably not read a link, why can't another reasonably not read your link? This is not the first time you have demonstrated a convenient (to you) double standard.

I'm not finding much of anything in terms of an independent assessment of the critical thinking material - everything seems to go back to the Foundation itself - like the Wikipedia article indicates . . . courses and materials seem expensive and some of Richard Paul's books on Amazon have received bad reviews - one for spelling errors/typos and for being over-priced . . . so at this point I'm reluctant to pursue the materials on this site any further

You have done yoeman work, Steve. Thank you.

I think it is a fair request when one is asked to give some idea of the content of a link. Even of a video. It's not always possible, of course (and makes no sense to so do in the rush of an on-going back-and-forth - especially when one has a demonstrated history of supplying relevant and helpful links) - but if one expects to be part of a conversation, one must be prepared to articulate one's views when asked. Insistence over-and-over and again-and-again that a poster must go onto a particular site starts to look odd. Something is not adding up - just a hunch. Starts to look fishy.

 

[Burnt State]

I am definitely interested in the lack of theory critique. These studies were published in the mid 90s, so I don't know where this is now - I think Radin has put forward some theories and maybe others have too. There are 12 papers under the "Theory" section of this page:

http://deanradin.com/evidence/evidence.htm

Let me know what you think when you look at Utts' response. It's brief and she acknowledges Hyman's assessment of where they agree and disagree and then responds, I think effectively, to these three issues with regard to the scientific status of parapsychology:

1. "Only parapsychology, among the fields of inquiry claiming scientific status, lacks a cumulative database (p. 6)."
2. "Only parapsychology claims to be a science on the basis of phenomena (or a phenomenon) whose presence can be detected only by rejecting a null hypothesis (p. 8)."
3. "Parapsychology is the only field of scientific inquiry that does not have even one exemplar that can be assigned to students with the expectation that they will observe the original results (p. 18)."

two excerpts:

"While it is true that parapsychology has not figured out all the answers, it does not differ from normal science in this regard. It is the norm of scientific progress to make observations first, and then to attempt to explain them. Before quantum mechanics was developed there were a number of anomalies observed in physics that could not be explained. There are many observations in physics and in the social and medical sciences that can be observed, either statistically or deterministically, but which cannot be explained."

"Despite Professor Hyman's continued protests about parapsychology lacking repeatability, I have never seen a skeptic attempt to perform an experiment with enough trials to even come close to insuring success. The parapsychologists who have recently been willing to take on this challenge have indeed found success in their experiments, as described in my original report."

I didn't realize her rebuttal was so brief or I would have included that in my initial read through. The bottom line is clear - not enough studies means limited statistical significance. More work needs to be done; more resources are needed and stringent protocols are required as well as the development of a theory. Where is Utts now if this is from the 90's - is she finished with it?

Thanks for pointing the way on this and following up diligently and academically. If I didn't have papers of my own to mark and respond to I would be spending a lot more time on this thread as it is finally trying to get down to the nitty gritty of actually proving and naming a paranormal effect.

I've heard Radin talk on various podcasts - he can be a little trippy and fun. If you identify key papers in the theory section let me know where to start as what I'm seeing in the preliminary discussion is some excellent historical investigation that appears to be insufficient so far in making any broad claims beyond something strange is definitely happening.

I suppose universities don't give out grants or research money for such things do they? Targ and Puthoff present the past remote viewing exercises like they are a complete package, with protocols developed, military viewers trained and now....? It's a history that stops dead in its tracks wth no follow up beyond books and podcast interviews. Utts seems next in the history and then Radin and then where? Is there only this small handful? If so then we should not be holding our breath. Sigh.

 

[smcder]

I didn't realize her rebuttal was so brief or I would have included that in my initial read through. The bottom line is clear - not enough studies means limited statistical significance. More work needs to be done; more resources are needed and stringent protocols are required as well as the development of a theory. Where is Utts now if this is from the 90's - is she finished with it?

Thanks for pointing the way on this and following up diligently and academically. If I didn't have papers of my own to mark and respond to I would be spending a lot more time on this thread as it is finally trying to get down to the nitty gritty of actually proving and naming a paranormal effect.

I've heard Radin talk on various podcasts - he can be a little trippy and fun. If you identify key papers in the theory section let me know where to start as what I'm seeing in the preliminary discussion is some excellent historical investigation that appears to be insufficient so far in making any broad claims beyond something strange is definitely happening.

I suppose universities don't give out grants or research money for such things do they? Targ and Puthoff present the past remote viewing exercises like they are a complete package, with protocols developed, military viewers trained and now....? It's a history that stops dead in its tracks wth no follow up beyond books and podcast interviews. Utts seems next in the history and then Radin and then where? Is there only this small handful? If so then we should not be holding our breath. Sigh.

Where is Utts now if this is from the 90's - is she finished with it?
From her website:

It looks like she has had a continuing interest and activity -on the board of the Parapsychological Association until 2008, From Psychic Claims to Science: Testing Psychic Phenomena with Statistics - presented in Stockholm in 2006 and Are We All Bayesians? Data versus Belief in Evaluating Studies of Belief in Evaluating Studies of Extra Sensory Perception (2011).

I suppose universities don't give out grants or research money for such things do they?

Hansen discusses this in the interview above in terms of his Trickster theory and is not too encouraging to budding parapsychologists . . . - he says most of the money comes from private sources.

As Utts herself says in her response to Hyman:

While critics are fond of relating, as Professor Hyman does in his report, that there has been "more than a century of parapsychological research (p. 7)" psychologist Sybo Schouten (1993, p. 316) has noted that the total human and financial resources devoted to parapsychology since 1882 is at best equivalent to the expenditures devoted to fewer than two months of research in conventional psychology in the United States.

 

[Constance]

The FFCT website provides the criteria in a concise manner that uses a flash based interactive graphic. No reasonable person would insist that I reiterate all that here rather than simply checking out the link.

Any reasonable person would happily articulate their views. You yourself, Ufology, refuse to explore links to research papers. If you feel you can reasonably not read a link, why can't another reasonably not read your link? This is not the first time you have demonstrated a convenient (to you) double standard.



You have done yoeman work, Steve. Thank you.

I think it is a fair request when one is asked to give some idea of the content of a link. Even of a video. It's not always possible, of course (and makes no sense to so do in the rush of an on-going back-and-forth - especially when one has a demonstrated history of supplying relevant and helpful links) - but if one expects to be part of a conversation, one must be prepared to articulate one's views when asked. Insistence over-and-over and again-and-again that a poster must go onto a particular site starts to look odd. Something is not adding up - just a hunch. Starts to look fishy.

Indeed. That the site itself is 'fishy' becomes clearer the more one explores it.

1. There is no unique and penetrating intellectual content presented by the authors of the site. The core of their 'curriculum' as presented in the 'flash activated interactive page' referred to by ufology, at CriticalThinking.org - Critical Thinking Model 1
is a regurgitation of the guidance provided by high school, junior college, and college-level English comp teachers for most of the 20th c., and also provided in introductory courses for majors in many other disciplines in accredited colleges and universities.

2. The site in question claims affiliation with and implies its own leadership role in ostensible 'national' and 'international' organizations and foundations devoted to 'critical thinking' which do not appear to exist except in the imaginations of the site's authors. I made a start on doing the kind of investigation Steve has accomplished (mega-kudos to Steve!!!) by searching last night for information about these significant-sounding organizations and foundations advertised by the site's authors: the "International Foundation for Critical Thinking" and the "National Council for Excellence in Critical Thinking." All links provided by google led back to the site ufology has advertised repeatedly in the Paracast. I checked wikipedia and found that a page concerning the 'International Foundation' named above "has been removed" and that there is no wiki page concerning the so-called 'National Council for Excellence in Critical Thinking'. {I'd expected there to be a wiki page describing that so-called 'National Council' paralleling those that exist for bona fide national educational councils such as the National Research Council. Re the "International Foundation for Critical Thinking," its nonexistence does not prevent the author's of ufo's website from describing the Foundation's goals and asking for donations to support the Foundation through the website authors' own website.}

3. This website to which ufo has continually referred us is a glorified advertisement for a) materials for sale to schools and teachers from the kindergarten level up to the college level -- and even, absurdly, the university level, and b) on-site training for administrators and teachers in schools in need of accreditation. The site's authors are not members of actual accreditation bodies. What they offer is a veneer of creditability for themselves as an organization possessing vitally important skills needed to rescue schools in academic trouble (because of poor student performance on standard tests at the K-12 level, and for a variety of reasons at the junior college and college levels). They even advertise an ambitious re-education program they will oversee for university faculty (for any university lame enough to pay for it) in which university faculty in all disciplines are to be educated over several years in what they call 'critical thinking'. See the flash-interactive page for the core content.

Here is their convenient bulk-ordering form for books, videos, booklets, and other materials this outfit sells:

Critical Thinking

 

[Constance]

Where is Utts now if this is from the 90's - is she finished with it?
From her website:

It looks like she has had a continuing interest and activity -on the board of the Parapsychological Association until 2008, From Psychic Claims to Science: Testing Psychic Phenomena with Statistics - presented in Stockholm in 2006 and Are We All Bayesians? Data versus Belief in Evaluating Studies of Belief in Evaluating Studies of Extra Sensory Perception (2011).

I suppose universities don't give out grants or research money for such things do they?

Hansen discusses this in the interview above in terms of his Trickster theory and is not too encouraging to budding parapsychologists . . . - he says most of the money comes from private sources.

As Utts herself says in her response to Hyman:

While critics are fond of relating, as Professor Hyman does in his report, that there has been "more than a century of parapsychological research (p. 7)" psychologist Sybo Schouten (1993, p. 316) has noted that the total human and financial resources devoted to parapsychology since 1882 is at best equivalent to the expenditures devoted to fewer than two months of research in conventional psychology in the United States.

As I recall, Utts responded two years ago to critiques of the Bem experimentation in precognition, which received wide attention. Should be easy to find through google.

You might find this more theoretical paper by Jahn and Dunne to be interesting. It was presented in 2005 at the third Endophysics conference pursuing deeper understanding of subjective-objective relations and interactions in nature based in quantum information theory.

"Endophysical Models Based on Empirical Data"

Robert G. Jahn, Brenda J. Dunne

http://www.princeton.edu/~pear/pdfs/2005-endophysical-models-empirical-data.pdf

 

[Constance]

I suppose universities don't give out grants or research money for such things do they? Targ and Puthoff present the past remote viewing exercises like they are a complete package, with protocols developed, military viewers trained and now....? It's a history that stops dead in its tracks wth no follow up beyond books and podcast interviews. Utts seems next in the history and then Radin and then where? Is there only this small handful? If so then we should not be holding our breath. Sigh.

The University of Edinburgh has a full program in parapsychology and has for many years. Otherwise, dominant materialist science has been successful in preventing parapsychologists from competing for faculty positions, departmental facilities, grants, etc. Utts and Radin are not the only academically well situated individuals carrying out paranormal research. See Jahn, Dunne, and others. See parapsychological journals.

Re remote viewing and governmental/military support for it, no doubt it continues but once again behind the scenes (as earlier at the Stanford Research Institute). I don't know what prompted the CIA to make a partial public report of its remote-viewing research a decade or more ago (perhaps leaks), but insiders in RV have shared information that training and development in RV continues in the military. There are also well known centers of RV training and practice, whose services are purchased by corporations and no doubt other organizations.

Paranormal investigation has a long future.

 

[Constance]

This page by Radin is worth reading for an overview of recent paranormal research over the last several decades and up to the Bem research;

Entangled Minds: My comments on Alcock's comments on Bem's precognition article

 

[Constance]

This page describes the Bem research and related theoretical issues:

h+ Magazine | Covering technological, scientific, and cultural trends that are changing human beings in fundamental ways.

 

[Burnt State]

Two months of research over a 100 year or so history is pretty slack. It's not a wonder that parapsychology is poked at like it's Swiss cheese. While it may have a lengthy history, if those RV'ers charging exorbitant fees for learning protocols etc. were productive then we would see a lot more of those training facilities making $$$ and we would also see a lot of skewed corporate warfare. But we don't because internet attacks are much more useful. I don't believe corporations have their own private witches or soothsayers, though it presents an interesting alternate reality more in keeping with a history of the Shawman left in the dust. I think, like UFO research, it is more money and time needed. There's a similar quote about how much time has been invested in UFO research and I think it's about 6 months. The problem is that the subject matter is tainted, so are the results and the discoveries are minimal or non-existent. Radin's advice makes perfect sense.

 

[smcder]

Two months of research over a 100 year or so history is pretty slack. It's not a wonder that parapsychology is poked at like it's Swiss cheese. While it may have a lengthy history, if those RV'ers charging exorbitant fees for learning protocols etc. were productive then we would see a lot more of those training facilities making $$$ and we would also see a lot of skewed corporate warfare. But we don't because internet attacks are much more useful. I don't believe corporations have their own private witches or soothsayers, though it presents an interesting alternate reality more in keeping with a history of the Shawman left in the dust. I think, like UFO research, it is more money and time needed. There's a similar quote about how much time has been invested in UFO research and I think it's about 6 months. The problem is that the subject matter is tainted, so are the results and the discoveries are minimal or non-existent. Radin's advice makes perfect sense.

The problem is that the subject matter is tainted, so are the results and the discoveries are minimal or non-existent. Radin's advice makes perfect sense.

Sorry, I missed it - what is the advice by Radin you are referring to here?