Do you believe in the supernatural? Poll

[Septic]

Psalm 121:2 My help cometh from the LORD, which made heaven and earth.

 

:D:D:D:D

 

This is now quite funny.

[Matt H]

Anyway,

 

So currently 24 members believe in the supernatural, and 34 members don't. Didn't expect that, I thought it would be slightly more even.

[jagman]

Nuwaubianism,The Church of Euthanasia,Prince Philip Movement,Church of the SubGenius,Nation of Yahweh,Scientology,

Thee Temple ov Psychick Youth,Rastafarian,wikka, and followers of the Badger ,Moonies, Does one respect them all ?

Surely someones gotta be wrong and in fact all out full blown nutters!! -LOL , or maybe its me !! and they have it right ,,,

I think they all started out believing in Ghosts,LOL

 

 

 

 

 

 

,

[AndrewOW]

IBTL.

 

This thread is probably currently being discussed in the mod forum, which usually results in a lock.

 

IBTL

 

Nuwaubianism,The Church of Euthanasia,Prince Philip Movement,Church of the SubGenius,Nation of Yahweh,Scientology,

Thee Temple ov Psychick Youth,Rastafarian,wikka, and followers of the Badger ,Moonies, Does one respect them all ?

Surely someones gotta be wrong and in fact all out full blown nutters!! -LOL , or maybe its me !! and they have it right ,,,

I think they all started out believing in Ghosts,LOL

 

 

 

 

 

 

,

 

Is your speech to text module faulty, per chance?

[Animal]

You're the troll that keeps making topics like these basically trying to prompt responses. Then you make silly statements (which is expected of you I understand) leaving me to correct them in case someone might take them seriously.

 

MattH is indeed a Master Baiter.

[Tannhauser]

Good thread. Really liked LBM's account of his experience.

 

and yet you can get a degree in the subject? a subject with no definitve answer ,How can you fail such a qualification , as how can the examiners possibly use existing science to mark the paper ? -lol .

there is a huge cash prize available for mediums ,if they can use their "powers" to predict a sequence of flip cards with symbols on it ; square,star,triangle etc , many have tried ,done the shaking ,vacant stares,and the whole routine,,, but not one person has actually got anywhere close ...... you dont need an O level to work that one out !!

 

I don't see any reason why parapsychology shouldn't be a scientific discipline, depending on the subject matter and method of teaching.

 

Let's say you want to study psychic healing. To evaluate whether there is any evidence for it, you would have to understand (a) processes and effects such as social desirability bias, demand charactersitics, placebos, regression to the mean in illness, spontaneous recovery, observer bias and so on (b) experimental design, variables, controls, statistical techniques, type i and type ii errors © how science works more broadly, principles of empiricism, replicability, peer review etc.

 

Parapsychology potentially covers a lot of scientific methods.

 

A lot of research in parapsychology now focuses on the factors underlying belief or non-belief. That's really fascinating stuff.

[Rob]

That's what I'd like to know about mediums. Are they all con-people or do some genuinely believe in what they are doing?

[catfish man]

MattH is indeed a Master Baiter.

does that mean he is good at fishing

[imi]

You really need to look up the definition of irony. Why is it ironic of me to say the above? Just let it be? You're the troll that keeps making topics like these basically trying to prompt responses. Then you make silly statements (which is expected of you I understand) leaving me to correct them in case someone might take them seriously.

 

Regardless of your views towards organised religion, can you at least show some respect to the members of follow it? I think its asking too much of you. It actually says a lot about you than it does about the followers of such religion.

 

Religion aside, you just need to be taught some manners really. I've ignored/tolerated your past indiscretions but you just keep on repeating your usual manner.

 

Just show some respect ffs- its not hard. Try it- you might like it.

 

well said...

[Tannhauser]

That's what I'd like to know about mediums. Are they all con-people or do some genuinely believe in what they are doing?

 

I went to a talk by Prof Richard Wiseman, who leads a research team at Hertfordshire (?) into parapsychology, and asked him that question. His view was that the small operators - people who see one or two neighbours or friends and maybe make a little bit of cash - usually sincerely believe they have a 'gift'. On the other hand, he believes that the guys working an audience know exactly what they're doing. They may also still think that they have a gift, but they know perfectly well that they are helpig it along through 'cheating'.

[jagman]

QUOTE=Tannhauser;2977838]I went to a talk by Prof Richard Wiseman, who leads a research team at Hertfordshire (?) into parapsychology, and asked him that question. His view was that the small operators - people who see one or two neighbours or friends and maybe make a little bit of cash - usually sincerely believe they have a 'gift'. On the other hand, he believes that the guys working an audience know exactly what they're doing. They may also still think that they have a gift, but they know perfectly well that they are helpig it along through 'cheating'.

 

It took a prof and research team to come to that conclusion !! how about the mediums who believe they have powers actually have long standing issues from childhood ,now theres a thing !!

Whats next for the prof and his team - which teletubby is peoples favourite and the social background or pscychology behind their choice !

[Tannhauser]

QUOTE=Tannhauser;2977838]I went to a talk by Prof Richard Wiseman, who leads a research team at Hertfordshire (?) into parapsychology, and asked him that question. His view was that the small operators - people who see one or two neighbours or friends and maybe make a little bit of cash - usually sincerely believe they have a 'gift'. On the other hand, he believes that the guys working an audience know exactly what they're doing. They may also still think that they have a gift, but they know perfectly well that they are helpig it along through 'cheating'.

 

It took a prof and research team to come to that conclusion !! how about the mediums who believe they have powers actually have long standing issues from childhood ,now theres a thing !!

Whats next for the prof and his team - which teletubby is peoples favourite and the social background or pscychology behind their choice !

 

I didn't say that's what his research was into. I asked him a casual question, and he gave me his opinion as an academic who has extensive experience with working with people who claim to have these abilities.

 

Your implication that the research is mickey mouse stuff and trivial is actually totally off the money. It's not like you to make such a flip judgement based on no evidence. He's actually done some fascinating stuff into factors affecting belief, evidence and cognition. Surely that's important in a culture where millions are spent on homeopathy, faith-healing, crystals - and more broadly where people are sucked into all sorts of pseudo-scientific nonsense about vitamins, super-foods, NLP and all the rest.

[Tannhauser]

Some research has looked at possible biological differences between believers in the paranormal ("sheep") and non-believers ("goats").

 

I can't remember who the researchers were offhand, but this is what they did:

 

1. Used responses to a questionnaire about their beliefs to divide them into sheep and goats.

2. Give both groups a task in which they have to decide very quickly whether a sequence of letters is a genuine anagram (like gtoa) or a false anagram, like gtda)

3. Give both groups a similar task with pictures: some are mixed-up faces, other ones aren't.

 

OK, so the difference between believers and non-believers is in the types of errors. The sheep have a tendency for false positives. So they spot all the genuine anagrams and the genuine faces, but they include some of those that aren't genuine.

 

The goats do the opposite. They miss plenty of the genuine anagrams and faces, but they never get any false positives.

 

Stage 2 of the experiment

 

Both sheep and goats are injected with l-dopa. This is a precursor to dopamine, a neurotransmitter in the brain that's involved in reward mechanisms. The sheep don't change their response styles, but the goats do. They start picking up all the anagrams, but making the same sort of errors that the sheep do.

 

There are loads of issues with the experiment, as always, but it does point towards an interesting possibility. Underneath all the issues of culture, education, training, life- experiences and so on, maybe there is also a biological difference between people who are certain they can talk to the spirits and those who are equally certain it's all cobblers.

[jagman]

none of the above is about the validity of parapsychology, but the belief system in people , and the logical thinking process, it could have been conducted with good chess players and poor chess players with similar outcomes .

You can dress up the subject as you wish but at its root there is no substance ,its all wasted time money and effort , there has not been and never will be anyone with the ability to communicate with " the other side" , or Ghosts ,apart from the age old tales and holywood movies , and those who leave the pub after a lock in ,who can indeed talk in tongues

[Tricky-Ricky]

So some people have either a physical or mental pre disposition to belief in the supernatural/paranormal, and imbibing in mind altering drugs could change that? hmm sounds familiar:sly:

 

So the question is, sheep or goat?

[Tannhauser]

none of the above is about the validity of parapsychology, but the belief system in people , and the logical thinking process, it could have been conducted with good chess players and poor chess players with similar outcomes .

You can dress up the subject as you wish but at its root there is no substance ,its all wasted time money and effort

 

OK, I think we're looking at Parapsychology from two different viewpoints. You're looking at it from the point of view that it's strictly the investigation of anomalous experience. Accepting that for the moment, why exactly would the scientific investigation of that be a waste of time and money?

 

Science tries to put our beliefs about the world on an evidential basis. That's whether you're investigating what causes malaria, the best way to build a bridge, where swallows go in winter or what happens when people die. I suggest that historically, more effort , energy and human thought has been spent pondering the last one than all the others put together. Science tries to investigate things that are of interest to humans. Millions of people experience things that puzzle, mystify, frighten or profoundly change them that they cannot explain. The search for what causes those experiences is a legitimate scientific enquiry.

 

As you mention time and money, and I mentioned Richard Wiseman, one of his expeditions was to India, where he was able to get video footage of a holy man deceiving his flock with some basic stunts. There is an ongoing battle on the subcontinent between science and often exploitative shamans. To me, a branch of science that can prevent the poor being fleeced by cynical con men seems to have a lot of value.

 

As far as definitions of what parapsychology is: I don't really understand the attempt to separate out the study of belief systems and the study of, say, the abilities of a medium. One question is 'how do we account for such phenomena scientifically?' and the second is 'what are the variables that make people tend to one belief rather than another?'

 

there has not been and never will be anyone with the ability to communicate with " the other side" , or Ghosts ,apart from the age old tales and holywood movies , and those who leave the pub after a lock in ,who can indeed talk in tongues

 

I agree. But the reason I agree is that it's been carefully, scientifically and systematically investigated by parapsychologists (or, if you like, psychologists). Without this research, I would be just voicing an opinion based on common sense (which we know can be very misleading), or worse still, based on irrational prejudice. Unless you have research evidence to back your claim up, in what sense is it more believable than those who say - with equal passion - that such phenomena do exist? To find out who is right, you have to shell out some money and spend some time investigating it, right?

 

Where chess players come into it, I'm not at all sure.

[Tannhauser]

none of the above is about the validity of parapsychology, but the belief system in people , and the logical thinking process, it could have been conducted with good chess players and poor chess players with similar outcomes .

You can dress up the subject as you wish but at its root there is no substance ,its all wasted time money and effort , there has not been and never will be anyone with the ability to communicate with " the other side" , or Ghosts ,apart from the age old tales and holywood movies , and those who leave the pub after a lock in ,who can indeed talk in tongues

 

In fact, I've just read your post again and it seems even weirder second time around. You mention logical thinking, so let's look at yours:

 

OK, your argument goes:

 

1. Ghosts do not exist

2. There's no point in spending money on investigating something that doesnt exist

Therefore: investigating ghosts scientifically is a waste of money.

 

However, given that many people believe in the supernatural (currently a substantial proportion of those voting in the poll), why should we accept premise 1 above?

 

I'm putting words in your mouth here, but my guess is that your reason is - like mine I guess - because there is no evidence that ghosts exist. We can discount the testimony of those who see them because it can be explained in conventional scientific ways:

 

3. People have beliefs in ghosts

4. However, those beliefs are based on a lack of scientific evidence

Therefore: ghosts do not exist

 

Maybe I'm missing something here, but it seems to me that you're biting the hand that feeds you.

[Morpheus]

I voted yes, naturally.

 

From my understanding, this is how it goes, (yes, again Charlotte).

 

Let the wittering begin...............again,

 

All is one, that is, the sum total of all that exists - in whatever form of 'energy' or vibrational frequency that it may express itself. It has to be complete and connected as ONE. If 'two' existed, they would have to occupy one space in other words. It all comes back to ONE unified energy source in apparently differing states. This is merely a perceptual limitation, since it is all at once or a spectrum of all possible frequencies from which we see only a tiny fraction as visible light and solid matter. It's theoretically infinite outwards and infinite in, since there's no limit to how many times you can double or cut something in half. I guess at some point though, it loops or comes full circle; so fast that there's no vibration and so slow that there's no vibration, only stillness.

 

Therefore, God, Allah, whatever name you give the to highest level of consciousness or the organising principle, can only be one sum total and we occupy a small part of it as humans but co-exist on all others as multi-dimensional entities.

 

Now, since we are a part of that whole and to some extent conscious, (though regrettably, to wildly varying degrees, hence conflict of interests), we are creative beings and our beliefs create our reality, both individually and collectively.

 

We live in a sea of electro-magnetic energy that some call The Matrix, some call the Astral, Etheric and Ketheric planes etc.

 

Intent first, electrical charge second, chemical third, physical fourth, as the end and most dense result of 'God's creation. Matter is merely condensed energy, thought or consciousness, compacted to varying degrees by gravity or pressure, basically. This pressure or gravity is actually a suction or implosion caused by electrical attraction due to atomic mass/weight, in the physical manifestation.

 

My only question remains, what is charge? Positive and negative polarities give rise to matter but what are they but concepts in the mind of 'God'?

 

Is this not all illusion? Perhaps an advanced computer generated simulation? God Turismo 100?

 

In the beginning there was just consciousness but that consciousness yearned to know what it was.

 

It therefore created relativity, (this illusion we call 'The Universe'), in order to experience what it was by creating what it was not. Only that way could anything have meaning and only then, in a relative way, i.e. from a specific point of view, since in 'reality', there is no right and wrong, only all potential. We call these rights and wrongs morals and ethics but they change over time and culture.

 

Therefore beings can exist in other 'dimensions' given that we simply cannot generally perceive them as they are outside of our frequency range. Despite Witch hunts over the centuries, many people can however still see these other frequencies, either by genetic inheritance or by mental and spiritual training and/or chemical influence.

 

If you can accept or better still, understand the concept of infinity, then it all makes perfect sense, I mean, what would you do if you had forever to think about it?

[Tannhauser]

Despite witch hunts over the centuries, many people can however still see these other frequencies, either by genetic inheritance or by mental and spiritual training and/or chemical influence.

 

You've put forward a possible explanation for psychic phenomena,which to be honest I don't really understand. I think however that the main problem with accepting psychic phenomena lies in the part I've quoted.

 

Many claim that they have psychic powers,such as the ability to communicate with spirits. However, there may be other explanations (e.g. they're deluded, mistaken or lying). To choose between these explanations, it seems reasonable to design systematic tests to eliminate one or more of them. The results of those tests seem to show that when you really carefully exclude all possibilities of cheating, and other explanations, the claimed abilities just disappear. Psychics just don't perform under controlled conditions (despite their self-publicity to the contrary)..

 

As experiments have become more and more careful, and with the involvement of ex-magicians like Wiseman (mentioned above) and James Randi to educate scientists in detecting fraud, the reports of positive findings are getting rarer and rarer. Robust phenomena that really exist tend to do the opposite.

 

That's why I voted 'no'.

[jagman]

Its like the lost city of Atlantis , it never existed , first references were some obscure comments and moral story by a Greek Philosopher,cant remember which one exactly , but over the centuries the story grew and was fattened , it did dissapear for a few centuries in between , then modern times reappear with books , and stories ,and film , the myth now is covered in books ,scientific studies, and low , many people now have the belief,,,,, so we call on modern science to refute something that never existed in the first place ,,,a waste of time and money .

[Tannhauser]

Its like the lost city of Atlantis , it never existed , first references were some obscure comments and moral story by a Greek Philosopher,cant remember which one exactly , but over the centuries the story grew and was fattened , it did dissapear for a few centuries in between , then modern times reappear with books , and stories ,and film , the myth now is covered in books ,scientific studies, and low , many people now have the belief,,,,, so we call on modern science to refute something that never existed in the first place ,,,a waste of time and money .

 

I think it was Plato, but don't quote me.

 

I'm not trying to be an arse about this, I just really can't see how your argument works. Some legends have a basis in reality (flood myths are probably a distorted version of some cataclysm), others are just legends, or -as you say - misunderstood morality tales. But how can you tell the difference between the two without research? What if Calvert and Schliemann (sp?) had just said that Troy was a story?Or is archaeology a waste of time and money?

 

One of the major jobs of science is, and always has been, to distinguish between the real and the ridiculous.

 

The ironic thing is that by claiming that you can tell the difference without modern science is relying on nothing but intuition. Or psychic powers.

[Tannhauser]

no its actually a degree course in parapsychology from St Andrews University but not being a smart a$$ you wouldn't know that :-) and no we dont sit in dark rooms (except on investigations, which are all over the place, just back 6 weeks ago from an investigation in Canada all expenses paid and in January im off to Costa Rica for a fortnight of investigations, again all expenses paid, i love this course its great lol)

 

Sounds interesting. I just looked at St. Andrews prospectus on their Psychology page, but can't find their Parapsychology degree, and they don't list it in their research interests bit. Also can't find anything on UCAS with that title. Is it called something else? Or was it a Psychology degree that focused on anomalistic stuff in the final year?

[Gaz6002]

I think it was Plato, but don't quote me.

 

 

Interesting discussion. I wonder if vampires have been subject to such debate.

[jagman]

Since the start of mankind , stories have been told around the fire,there is a need for such stories,kids are told stories as a means of learning it fires the imagination.

Modern media ensures that there are no shortages of tales and conspiracy theories,lizard men to bigfoot in the back garden .

Science ,engineering,mathmatics however have a purity ,that is corrupted by the storytellers( see Morpheus post, a mix of science and tale (stay off the weed dude))

No matter what science finds and explains, the need for stories and tales will continue as its a human trait . but once science starts looking at these tales it becomes wasteful and pointless ,the time and energy can be spent elsewhere with some return .

The "why " such tales are necessary is one thing , the "where" they came from could just be some guy after a night licking frogs talking to his mate , who in turn talked to his mate ,who ,,,,

[tbourner]

1. Used responses to a questionnaire about their beliefs to divide them into sheep and goats.

2. Give both groups a task in which they have to decide very quickly whether a sequence of letters is a genuine anagram (like gtoa) or a false anagram, like gtda)

3. Give both groups a similar task with pictures: some are mixed-up faces, other ones aren't.

 

OK, so the difference between believers and non-believers is in the types of errors. The sheep have a tendency for false positives. So they spot all the genuine anagrams and the genuine faces, but they include some of those that aren't genuine.

 

The goats do the opposite. They miss plenty of the genuine anagrams and faces, but they never get any false positives.

Interesting proof that the sheep are willing to believe and the goats are more sceptical, even when simply ticking a box for true and false.

 

Stage 2 of the experiment

 

Both sheep and goats are injected with l-dopa. This is a precursor to dopamine, a neurotransmitter in the brain that's involved in reward mechanisms. The sheep don't change their response styles, but the goats do. They start picking up all the anagrams, but making the same sort of errors that the sheep do.

Believers act like they're permanently high? Nice.