Skeptiko – Science at the Tipping Point

Wow, this was a real battle royale. Everyone should get a nice long bath and a massage. For me it’s an Alex win, but then I’m sold anyhow.

One person I would have talked about in the ‘killer psi ap’ conversation is Stephan Schwartz. Not only because he actually does have such an ap, but because he deliberately set out to acquire it just in order to answer the Radford-style question, “where’s the real world results on tap?” He has them — they didn’t make any difference to the debate.

In a couple of weeks on my blog I’m going to come up with a set of ideas surrounding the nature of reality which feed into the “skeptic/believer debate”. I’ll suggest that we don’t have one single paradigm in our culture but a multitude of paradigms with different relations among them — just as we have multiple intersecting realities in this universe, IMO. This is partly to get away from the adversarialism. It dips into the idea of polytheism as opposed to a monotheistic “one single correct god and paradigm” into a series of interlocking alternate realities which  I think is what we actually have. That has psychological results.

With Stephan Schwartz on the table it’s relatively easy to answer the ‘why no bin laden’ question. Schwartz got his results from deliberate effort which I don’t think the current authorities are willing to make. Anyway so far as I know, I’m no expert! But loading in all the questions at once (eg. lumping in ‘why don’t we have cancer cures from medical intuitives?’ to the bin laden thing) obscures the issue. The ‘why’ of bin laden may not be the why of the cancer cures. Strong adversariality might not be able to cover these details. It may get too courtroom too quickly, I don’t know.

On the ‘level playing field’ I suggest the recent claim of FTL particles goes *against* previous research, no matter what paradigm of reality you hold. But psi only ‘goes against’ the worldviews of those who have decided on
materialism as a default position. Nothing in previous research ruled psi out, therefore successful psi results only go against belief systems, not against actual data that we know about the universe. That’s the distinction for me.

For some not knowing of it or how it works in any scientific way means it never existed, but that can’t be shown on the data of course. So the case is way different.

Stollznow prevaricates too easily. I think it’s good that Alex stood up to her because she does try to steamroll. Blake was good at keeping it light, he’s a gentleman.

On the psychic detective case: it is ironic that venn diagrams were mentioned at the beginning. Radford often uses the word “contradictory” when he means more vague… well we know that, it was covered thoroughly. As for the ‘I solved it myself’ thing I don’t see why we shouldn’t have another conference call.

I’d agree with Ben that he took the case on and put his heart and soul into it. At the end you have amazing audio and paper trails that anyone can follow and it becomes a very interesting record. For reasons that I’ll go into on my
blog sometime, I felt it was very unlikely we’d be seeing anything conclusive but I thought it was great work from all. (And maybe not finished.) I agree the conference calls also were a highlight. If nothing else data is being provided for
those social psychologists who want to answer the question why there is room for such huge debate and what is behind it.

thx Jason… will be interested to see your multi-paradigm reality post… pls ping me when it’s up.

Great debate, Alex, I thoroughly enjoyed it. Gotta tell you something, though: Ben lied shamelessly again:he said that somebody on your site compared him to Hitler and the Holocaust deniers. Actually, he refers to the comment I made, distorting it so indecently, I’m really stunned, here is the comment in question: ” He does the same thing Goebbels did: if you repeat the same lie no matter what, people, at least some of them, are gonna believe it.” Is it comparing him to Hitler and saying that he’s like a Holocaust denier? Wow, this guy has no shame….

Good interview but, as someone wrote, I’m a Skeptiko fan anyway. I found the “skeptic” questions, many of them I should say, to be almost insulting … the kind of questions you might ask to someone you believe has very little experience reading and analyzing data/questions … and they switch their arguments by arguing “what’s the value if you can’t predict when a killer will act?”  Again, so what?  It’s sort of like the skeptic who wants to test psi and demands that lead shielding be used just so the data isn’t affected by mind reading — wait, why would a skeptic be worried about mind reading since a skeptic doesn’t believe in it??!! The constant questions about “real world applications and real world benefits” (to use Ben’s phrase) is, to me, a red herring. We are in “black swan” territory; you only need to find one black swan instead of saying you won’t believe in black swans until you’ve seen 1000 of them.

What’s also clear is that they, the skeptics, have read very, very little of the research to which Alex refers … in hindsight, it would have been great to have one of the researchers respond directly to skeptics during this particular interview.

… and for Karen to say you’re acting too much like the “interviewer’ … I guess she wants to be the “prosecutor” and you’re the “defendant”!

Wow, that was long…
The real world application thing… why does that matter?
They just threw that in there to make you look bad (typical I want to win over the crowd stuff).

Heck, lot’s of mathematics and physics (multidimensions) deal with stuff that isn’t even relevant to 0.0001% of the planets people (I don’t even give a rats ass about it), so why don’t they ask those scientists these questions.

The use of an NDE and the stories that we get from these is maybe not in hunting down a criminal like osama through a new super-technology but attacks the direct roots of creating such an individual (talk about acting in hindsight).
That whole discussion point is so mind-numbingly stupid that I’ll just leave it at that.

Honestly, Karen Stollznow had no game whatsoever in this discussion, really bad. I think she just wanted to get into a superior position as soon as possible but your comeback was just too strong.

Blake Smith seemed quite fair and reasonable, the only point that tainted that impression a bit was at the end about the psychic detective case (don’t remember what it was).

And of course Ben Radford.
You know, I really didn’t dig in to the psychic detective case but you don’t even have to, to understand that he’s not fair.
I really wanted to turn the podcast off when he got loud and shortly afterwards answered Alex’s “I didn’t understand what you mean by that” with a smug “I get that a lot”.

I mean come on, that kind of narcissism is just repulsive.
The way he tries to pound that “you said it’s THE best case”-thing is just childish at best. And the end, oh gosh, where he just had to frame it as “but there is at least one point where I would like to hear you say that you were wrong”… I thought he wanted a discussion and not the typical inferior/superior -thing that I seem to hear in all skeptic broadcasts.

Again, I don’t know much about the psychic detective case but aren’t they mixing things up when they talk specificity of information that seems congruent versus specificity that lead to an end.
I mean, the info seemed quite specific and seemed to match up but it’s a different question if they we’re specific enough to solve the case, those are two different pair of shoes.

Thx again for the interview Alex!

Great post, as usual, Karim, that’s the exact impression I got from this interview… Alex has a lot of, ahhhh,cojones to go single-handedly against a triumvirate of inquisitors who believe to possess the Ultimate Truth about everything and beat them. When he was delivering blow after blow to Karen who had become particularly bad-mannered and pushy I was shouting “Ole!!” as if I were at the bullfights. 

Oh, by the way, and the manner by which Ben completely distorted my comment says a lot about his ethical integrity as a person.

Precisely, Enrique. Little details like that don’t bother Ben. I don’t trust the guy at all, he clearly is only interested in distorting the facts. 

Hey, Tim, nice to “see” you again; you’re absolutely right about Ben, moreover, I think it’s not such a little detail, it’s a pretty serious accusation to say that he was compared to Hitler and Holocaust deniers on Alex’s website, it denotes the modus operandi that he and the rest of the professional debunkers like him perpetrate: destroy people’s reputations and credibility with half-truths or outright lies. 

You have the patience of a saint, Alex. Thanks.

Thank you Enrique.
The way he twisted your comment is really disingenuous.
Probably he felt offended when the name Goebbels fell.
That is no excuse for his distortion but it just shows how careful we have to be with our wording.

Yeah, Alex is quite something.
By the same token I admire all the researchers that venture into these topics (Radin & co.), they sure have guts.

True enough, Karim, I agree with you completely, however, let me clarify a bit: the name Goebbels is normally used as a synonym of the propaganda based on half-truths and bona fide lies and not as insinuation of pro-nazi ideological inclinations. Another often used synonym is “Agitprop”, from Russian “Agitatzia i propaganda” (???????? ? ??????????) , a Soviet propaganda strategy. Both of this synonyms are used, as I said, to denote certain propagandistic strategies, not ideologies, so, Ben’s fake indignation is hypocritical and morally objectionable, especially keeping in mind his blunt distortion of the comment in question.

As to Radin and co, I feel the same way.

Hi, Enrique,
Yes, I agree, It’s not a little detail… I was being sarcastic  

hehehe, I know you were, just used it as a pretext to stick it to Ben one more time…..

This kind of rhetorical game-playing is to be expected… the Skeptics don’t have a lot else to go on

I was also a little surprised at the level/depth of the questions… not very deep.

yes they are mixing things up… sorry to belabor the whole psychic detective thing, then again is was great to get that far into a case.  It gave me a much deeper appreciation for this Skeptical craziness.  

Ben is not a dumb guy, and not a rotten-to-the-core dishonest guy, he’s just caught up in this Skeptical craziness.  It’s exactly like talking to a very conservative Christian who is otherwise smart and capable, but has this blind-spot about their faith.

While I agree that skeptics are as close-minded as some off-the-wall fundamentalists, the spirits move me to inform/remind you that there are many brilliant scientists and philosophers who are devout Christians. I have included a small sampling of sites with access to such folks Start a conversation with these folks, put in due dilligence, and then decide whether being a person of deep faith in God in Christ affects one’s intellectual capacity.

http://www.designinference.com/
http://www.reasonablefaith.org
http://www.apologetics315.com/2009/06/100-christian-apologists.html

fair enough… and as you may know I’ve engaged with many Christians on the show. 

IMO the Christians are right about the most important big stuff… spirit, free will, afterlife.  But, their apologetics are terrible.  The Bible is a wonderful document, but fatally flawed when it comes to history or infallibility.  Sadly, Skeptics engage in the same kind of “let’s start with our answer and work backwards” apologetics.   

FYI. Ben was compared to a holocaust denier in the skeptiko forum by 2 people.
It says a lot about you that you immediately assume other people to be liars.
How sure are you that he lied even once?

Anon dixit: “FYI. Ben was compared to a holocaust denier in the skeptiko forum by 2 people.”
He was? Where? Give me the proof. Without that proof it’s hearsay, which is nice a nice way for saying b…s…. Well, a read this forum every day, and I don’t remember anybody call him “a Holocaust denier”, so, basically, I think you’re a lier. As far as Ben (aca “Anonimous”?) goes, after having listened to the evidence presented by Alex I’m inclined to think that he lied. 

P.S. See, mr. Ben-animous, how it escalates? First, a claim was made that “somebody on Alex’s website compared Ben to Hitler and the Holocaust deniers”. Now, it’s “2 people”. What’s next, a worldwide organized anti-Ben conspiracy?? Gimme a break….

The link to the skeptiko forum is to the left of the comments, right under the picture of Alex. This is just a comment thread.
A simple misunderstanding leads you to accuse others of lying. Will you apologize?
Where else do think Ben lied? Perhaps we can clear up another misunderstanding?

Could you please paste the comments in question? And  course I will apologize if I was wrong about this particular incident. Which, I must say,  is totally irrelevance to the psychic detective case.

lapsus calami: “of course” and “irrelevant”

Person 1 about Radford:
“What, in essence, makes this technique any different from what holocaust
deniers do? They dismiss the witness reports as unreliable or biased,
claim any exagerration of number of bodies means it didn’t occur at all,
offer different reasons why bodies were buried … and so on.”

Person 2:
“I compared skeptics to Holocaust deniers because of a tendency to ignore
or dismiss quite a lot of information that does support the existence
of psi. To deny actual strong evidence and to claim it does not exist is
the same mechanism that creates a “Holocaust denier”. The thing denied
is different, but the purposeful bigoted denial of actual data is the
same.”

Person 2 makes the comparison regularly but maybe not about Radford specifically.

OK, after I realized that by forum you were not referring to the comments posted here (my mistake, I thought the forum was this page, where we are writing) I started doubting myself a bit. However, after I’ve read the comments that you refer to, I am even more strongly convinced that Ben’s modus operandi is precisely how I defined it: to tell half-trouths, misrepresent and distort other people’s statements, etc. For example: 1) nobody here has compared you to Hitler as you stated on Monster Talk. 2) Nobody compared you directly to Holocaust deniers, it was said that you use the same technique, without making ideological or moral comparisons, it’s exactly like what I said before: if somebody says that you’re using Goebbels’ technique they don’t call you a nazi, they refer to similar propaganda tactics. If somebody says that you’re doing Agitprop, that don’t call you a commie, they say you use the same propaganda tactics. To sum it up: to say that you were compared in this forum to Hitler and the Holocaust deniers is a cynical misrepresentation of truth, if not an outright lie.

1) Ben’s been compared to a holocaust denier and to Goebbels. Misremembering a Hitler comparison is a small thing that does not seem to warrant such accusations.
2) Saying that only his actions were compared is one of those fine points that only people who argue like assholes would make.

Sure, no problem!

I also did a post here about denial of the spiritual and paranormal being possibly a question of unadmitted and subconscious fear:

http://lightningoak.wordpress.com/2011/10/29/is-it-fear/

… probably fits in quite well with your ideas, trying to determine just what makes people hold so desperately to worldviews.

nice!  I linked it up on my Facebook.

You could cut Ben Radfords condescension with a knife..wow..you are a better man then me Alex

That was a great show. 
Consider the Osama Bin Laden Straw Man. 
Skeptics exaggerate the power of the paranormal to discredit it.  They imagine if psychics were reality they’d
found Osama Bin Laden, no problem.  Since
when?  There is no history of paranormal
supermen.  We don’t have supermen who
can fire heat rays from their eyes, able to fly around a planet faster then
light speed to turn back time (Superman movie).  Where is Professor X?  I
can’t find him.  The true paranormal is
not a comic book. 

The paranormal is elusive, subtle, spontaneous and
fleeting.  It’s no wonder science can’t
easily perceive it.  What is amazing is
parapsychology has caught glimpses of it, even hardcore evidence.  That is truly remarkable.  Something like string theory has zero evidence
supporting it, yet it has big mojo. There is far more evidence for aspects of
the paranormal then anything string theory. 
What is science afraid of?

Another CERN experiment suggested neutrinos actually do
travel faster then the speed of light. 
Skeptics are wasting time begrudging evidence of the paranormal when
Einstein’s theories are collapsing around them.

I remember listening to this psychic detective topic the first time around and I was tearing my hair out hearing to it being rehashed again. I appreciate what Ben was trying to do and I think his conclusions are correct but its pretty much impossible to make a convincing case against the psychic detective with only the testimony of 2 witnesses who mostly agree with it. You would need documented evidence of what was actually said 30 years ago, word for word. And even if you had that it couldnt prove she is psychic; given the amount of supposed psychic detectives in the world it would be inevitable that someone would accidently make some correct guesses like “his name had a K”, “he was from florida” (I wouldnt even count “he was in jail” because thats too easy). Not to mention that occam’s razor would suggest its more likely she was getting her information from non-psychic means.

So, basically, you are saying that: 
1) it was impossible to make a case against this psychic detective.
2) there were only two witnesses who were mainly agreeing with the psychic. (I heard them speak and they seemed very impressed with the psychic after all these years)
3) thus, since the only witnesses mainly agree with the psychic, it’s more likely than not that she is a real McCoy, 

isn’t it?

agreed… the skeptical response looks more and more like a worldview thing than a science thing — “I wouldn’t believe that even if it was true.”

it was quite strange when they said what use is the psychic power if its effects are only discovered after than event. Surely like Alex said it doesn’t matter, it shows our mind isn’t only confined to our head

The TED talk The Divided Brain http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dFs9WO2B8uI gives an excellent high level perspective on the kind of thinking demonstrated during this interview.

Boy these people like to jump around. First they ask about the usefulness in real life or paranormal stuff. Then, when Alex shows how it can be usefull, they just turn around and ask something else that is not relevant to the original question. Frustrating stuff.

Of course you’re absolutely right about that.
(I just meant that for somebody who likes to distort things it’s the first target that they’d go for due to it’s emotional impact.)

Alex is a conspiracy theorist already? I figured it was only a matter of time before he goes completely Coast to Coast.

When he said ‘So you are admitting that Sheldrake didn’t prove that dogs are psychic’ RIGHT after that spiel gave about the truisms of science, my jaw hit the fucking floor. Normally, those protocols and data would prove anything else as far as they concerned, but just because Sheldrake is working with dogs and telepathy they just look right over that and immediately move the goalpost. They’re nothing more than gatekeepers for materialism, whether it’s right or wrong.

Completey agree. I got a strong impression that these people more of political comissars than science reporters or whatever they call themselves.

Ben is such a disingenuous putz.

The point of asking about psi applications is that when people get all postmodernist about science and its lack of absolute certainty, one can point out that “It works, bitches,” that it eradicated smallpox, makes your GPS work, and images your insides. So the question is, after decades of studying psi (or UFOs or homeopathy), why don’t we see the kind of progress and applications that would make it obvious that it works?

Here’s a summary of the whole debate about the psychic detective Nancy Weber.
Ben: 1. Weber says she provided details that detectives don’t recall her providing.
2. Had she provided the details that she says she provided, it would’ve been easy to check them out and solve the case.
3. The detectives said the information she provided was too vague to solve the case.

Alex: But the detectives were impressed with the information they do recall Weber providing.

Conclusion: If we believe what the detectives say now, Weber did provide useful information, but it wasn’t as detailed as Weber claims.

I don’t understand the “what practical use does it have” argument.
When evolution was first discovered, it had no practical use, now it’s vital for developping new antibiotics. Today, we study the origin of the universe and stars that have been dead for centuries while we observe their light. I doubt any of these things will have any mayor effect on my life anytime soon.  Wether these phenomena can be useful or not has no influence whatsoever on wether they are real or not.

Let me rephrase for clarity:
1. Detectives don’t recall Weber providing some details that she says she provided.

I’m a skeptic, and this was the first time I’ve ever heard Skeptiko (because I heard it through Skepticality). And I’m sorry about the behavior of the skeptics in this. The “skeptics” I had so badly wanted to side with were refusing to be skeptical of their own biases, which is the entire point of scientific skepticism!

The fact is that, while I do not believe that this case proves psychic detective abilities because probability dictates that even random predictions will appear surprisingly accurate one out of [insert big number here] times, and because the original predictions in this case was not recorded, so all we have are the memories of three people that may have all been skewed toward what actually happened, BUT…

These skeptics were acting like they had debunked the case, when they clearly hadn’t. The “contradictions” were not contradictions at all! Florida/the south is not a contradiction. A contradiction would be Canada/the south. The fact that they didn’t solve the case faster with the information is an interesting point, but it can easily be refuted by saying that maybe the officers were trying to pursue leads that they could justify with something besides “a psychic detective told me this is the guy.”

As skeptics, we should accept that, at the end of the day, no matter how unlikely we think it is, it is impossible to prove with scientific rigor whether or not there was psychic activity in this case, and to pretend that we have disproved it is dishonest.

Hi Kevin… this is cool, but you’re only half way there  I mean, probability and randomness can only get you so far.  If you’re going to defend the mind=brain/biological-robot thing you gotta do it all the way.  You can’t have experienced homicide detectives (who didn’t know each other prior to the case) be blown away by a psychic… cops are not fooled that easily.  

So, you invariably wind-up with this kind of wild Apologetics (akin to Christian Apologetics) where each point is wrapped up in an increasingly contorted improbable series of events.  Anything by psychic phenomena! :)

Anyone can be fooled. Project Alpha showed that scientists can be blown away by two young magicians.
Have you seen the series Psych? Maybe Weber is a real life Shawn Spencer, except that he actually solves the crime.

Great interview, Alex! It’s so refreshing to listen to your show because you are a true skeptic in the classical and scientific sense in that you follow the evidence where it leads. Thank you for that. You blew the “septics” out of the water.

thx Lynn

 I do not believe there is some great conspiracy by the skeptics, but that the reason why they may be antagonistic to psi, mediumship et al is that the evidence causes them to have cognitive dissidence. Put it this way, say you were devout christian and then someone comes along and shows evidence that jesus never existed etc. naturally you would deny it because you would find it too hard to comprehend

I agree… and I also think it’s more complicated… there is a lot at stake in preserving the existing paradigm… whenever there’s “a lot at stake” there are manipulators.