139 replies to this topic

[Chrlzs]

Mr Walker, on 26 January 2013 - 07:21 AM, said:

You are confusing conrete evidences with transferrable evidences

No, I'm just asking for acceptable evidence.  It doesn't even have to be acceptable to me personally, I'll accept a valid, credible, unbiased authority on the topic.   In science there is this concept of 'peer review' that takes care of that to a reasonable extent.  It's not infallible, but mostly it works pretty well ... and no-one has come up with a better model.

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if i talk about the time a dolphin jumped right over my boat when i was out fishing

Dolphins are well known for jumping quite high - I even have relevant video footage (see below) and it's in the scientific literature..  So I happily accept that story.

Can you not spot the difference?

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It is impossible for me to transfer those evidences to you and they are not the sort of events which can be reproduced in a laboratory

And that is a strawman argument.  The sort of thing you are claiming could be reproduced in a laboratory, or could be properly tested and documented by following some very basic rules, often loosely called the Scientific Method...

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One online test I had to do was view the contents of a room that was on the other side of the world. I had to describe it as acurately as i could,  knowing nothing about it. If i  believ the response form the test site, I was over 85% accurate

Now, here you are trying to 'transfer some evidence' right?  You're on the right track now, but if you want that evidence to be accepted, you have to be specific and a bit more comprehensive.  In particular, how did you get the 85% rating?  Was the abitrator an unbiased observer, or were they the site owner (and what sort of site was it, exactly....)?  Did an unbiased person set up the test and did they have any experience in doing so?  You say you didn't know which room, but *how* was the room chosen?  Had you ever encountered the room owner before?  Given that rooms generally have a set of fairly predictable items in them, how did they define 100% and 0% accuracy?  Were there set questions about the room, or did you just describe stuff that was later interpreted/checked (and how exactly was it checked/evaluated?).  Did you get any feedback at all as you gave the description?  And what were the 'controls' - how did they eliminate confirmation bias?  How could you/they run a falsifiability test on the outcome?  Do you know why I am asking these questions?

Frankly, guessing room contents sounds pretty easy to me!  I know that sounds flippant, but I've run into this sort of thing before, and when the 'tests' are given even a cursory examination, they fail completely.  Please do prove me wrong by giving details (and preferably a link to the forum conversation or whatever other form it took)..

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Ps i cant speak for others but i know my stories are true because i use the same evidence and logic in decihering them as i do for alll reality.
So for example I KNOW I am having chicken shaslicks for tea tonight. They are under the griller as I speak.

Apples and oranges..  That is nothing like what we are discussing.

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But i couldnt satisfactoriy prove to you that, right now, I am cooking and about to eat chicken shaslicks.

Actually, you could, quite easily, but why would you want to?  This is not comparable to the extraordinary claim about other abilities.  You *could* prove those too, but telling stories is not the best way.

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Its simply daft to suggest that things are only real or true if ,and when, they can be scientifically verifiable.

That sounds quite reasonable, when we are discussing occurrences like seeing a dolphin leap or cooking a shaslick - such things are relatively mundane and not up for debate.
Having said that, while I don't have any video footage of a dolphin actually leaping over my boat, I've got plenty showing them riding my bow wave, and frolicking and leaping nearby.  During that footage, you can hear my voice, even see me as the camera is panned around - and then later you can see the same boat parked in my driveway, including its registration number - so all in all, I can provide reasonable evidence of any dolphin frolicking claims I may wish to make, quite easily.  Just ask if you think it's not believeable, and I'll load some of it on Youtube...

But if you make a claim about stuff that isn't quite that mundane, in fact stuff that has never been shown to happen anywhere except perhaps tv shows, and where the nature of that claim involves interpretations and potential biases.. why are you surprised that the quality of evidence required goes up a little?

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None of us could accept the  validity of the majority of our own lives if we applied that test.

The majority of our lives do not include paranormal powers... so such tests are not required..

[Mr Walker]

Chrlzs, on 26 January 2013 - 12:23 PM, said:

No, I'm just asking for acceptable evidence.  It doesn't even have to be acceptable to me personally, I'll accept a valid, credible, unbiased authority on the topic.   In science there is this concept of 'peer review' that takes care of that to a reasonable extent.  It's not infallible, but mostly it works pretty well ... and no-one has come up with a better model.


Dolphins are well known for jumping quite high - I even have relevant video footage (see below) and it's in the scientific literature..  So I happily accept that story.

Can you not spot the difference?


And that is a strawman argument.  The sort of thing you are claiming could be reproduced in a laboratory, or could be properly tested and documented by following some very basic rules, often loosely called the Scientific Method...


Now, here you are trying to 'transfer some evidence' right?  You're on the right track now, but if you want that evidence to be accepted, you have to be specific and a bit more comprehensive.  In particular, how did you get the 85% rating?  Was the abitrator an unbiased observer, or were they the site owner (and what sort of site was it, exactly....)?  Did an unbiased person set up the test and did they have any experience in doing so?  You say you didn't know which room, but *how* was the room chosen?  Had you ever encountered the room owner before?  Given that rooms generally have a set of fairly predictable items in them, how did they define 100% and 0% accuracy?  Were there set questions about the room, or did you just describe stuff that was later interpreted/checked (and how exactly was it checked/evaluated?).  Did you get any feedback at all as you gave the description?  And what were the 'controls' - how did they eliminate confirmation bias?  How could you/they run a falsifiability test on the outcome?  Do you know why I am asking these questions?

Frankly, guessing room contents sounds pretty easy to me!  I know that sounds flippant, but I've run into this sort of thing before, and when the 'tests' are given even a cursory examination, they fail completely.  Please do prove me wrong by giving details (and preferably a link to the forum conversation or whatever other form it took)..


Apples and oranges..  That is nothing like what we are discussing.

Actually, you could, quite easily, but why would you want to?  This is not comparable to the extraordinary claim about other abilities.  You *could* prove those too, but telling stories is not the best way.


That sounds quite reasonable, when we are discussing occurrences like seeing a dolphin leap or cooking a shaslick - such things are relatively mundane and not up for debate.
Having said that, while I don't have any video footage of a dolphin actually leaping over my boat, I've got plenty showing them riding my bow wave, and frolicking and leaping nearby.  During that footage, you can hear my voice, even see me as the camera is panned around - and then later you can see the same boat parked in my driveway, including its registration number - so all in all, I can provide reasonable evidence of any dolphin frolicking claims I may wish to make, quite easily.  Just ask if you think it's not believeable, and I'll load some of it on Youtube...

But if you make a claim about stuff that isn't quite that mundane, in fact stuff that has never been shown to happen anywhere except perhaps tv shows, and where the nature of that claim involves interpretations and potential biases.. why are you surprised that the quality of evidence required goes up a little?


[size=4]The majority of our lives do not include paranormal powers... so such tests are not required..

Unfortunately, like most others without experience your mindset makes it impossible to help you to understand  That is not a criticism just a natural part of human thought.

For example you say you accept my story about the dolphin because it is common place. So are stories of ghosts or angel sightings. Comonality is not proof  of validity.Nor is lack of commonality proof of invalidity.

You have no scientific evidence for my story of the dolphins and neither did I yet you chose to believe it. Why, when you do not accepet stories of precognitive expernces.?

And just how do i reproduce a dolphin jumping over my boat to establish "scientific" validity of that event. I dont believ your story nor your "documentaion " You faked it.
Finally you say eating chicken shasliks is different to an obe experince Why? If you truly doubted that last night i ate chicken shasliks, it would be impossible to prove it to you. What undeniable proofs could i even offer of who I" am. Even a date stamped photo of someone eating a shaslik would not prove it was me, or that the shaslik was not pork, or that the photo was not doctored. Finally MY life and that of many others is a mix of 'normal" and "paranormal" on a daily basis. Since i learned to recognise my self  my inner intelligences and the nature of extenal realities, i have had to constantlty test for concrete realities in everything, and to be very careful in my personal relationships with others. I stil do.

Ps as ive said many times I am well educated and well read. i am a fan of science modern medicine and technologies, and i know and use scientific method on a daily basis, if not in a laboratory. None the less, it is very clear to me on the physial evidences available that many things not yet recognised/understood by science are quite real and common place. The world is not quite the mundane, ordinary, and predictable place some people find comfort in believing it is. As to the test I added IF you accet the site managers truthfulness I did wonder if it was some sort of advertising gimmick BUt i described a room I knew nothing about not whether it was a bathroom living room bedroom mans or womans etc  I just "saw" it and described it including the age colour and nature of thigs like furnishings lamps etc.
How would you expalin the abilty to see into a persons mind and describe a nineteen fifty's cadillac, under a tarpaulin in a  shingle roofed barn on a farm in outback canada when no one elese in Australia even knew the  barn or the car existed? I described the surrounding countryside, her house etc taken from her memory, years before google earth was heard of.

[Chrlzs]

I'm afraid we are not even on the same page.  If you wish to convince anyone of these abilities (in you or others), the please post your best available evidence (NOT anecdotes) for perusal.  If it's evidence of your abilities, then fine - even a link to that website where you predicted the room contents would be a start.  If it's in any way peer-reviewed or -examined, that would be better.

To be precise, here's the problem in your own words:

Mr Walker, on 27 January 2013 - 12:50 AM, said:

Unfortunately, like most others without experience your mindset makes it impossible to help you to understand  That is not a criticism

Well it sure sounds like one, your mindset being so much more able to 'understand'..

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For example you say you accept my story about the dolphin because it is common place.

It is not just common place.  Dolphins are a known and documented species.  Their behaviours are also known and documented by reams of unquestionable evidence.

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So are stories of ghosts or angel sightings.

Commonplace?  Yes, indeed, and so are stories about pink unicorns, easter bunnies....  But commonplace (commonality) by itself means pretty much nothing.  It's just like saying MacDonalds has the best food in the world (more people eat there than anywhere else), or that because you get ~300,000 hits on a Google search for "uri geller bends forks with his mind" that statement must be true..  It isn't.

The difference between ghosts/angels/pink unicorns/easter bunnies and dolphins is that for the former we only have anecdotes, cartoons and fake or inconclusive footage, plus there is NO location at which you can take anyone and point them to the ghosts/angels, nor can they be produced in a lab (to date..).  But for the latter, ie dolphins or (shaslicks..) we ALSO have innumerable videos that are absolutely conclusive, I can point at a multitude of places like gee, pretty much every part of the Ocean, harbours, estuaries, SeaWorld, aquaria - and in all of those places they can be found and viewed doing exactly what has been documented and claimed.  THAT's why the anecdote is 'accepted'.

If your mindset can't spot the very distinct difference there is nothing further to discuss, it seems - unless you wish to elaborate and substantiate your 'tests'.

[Simatong]

I must admit Chrlzs, you are very good at making and backing up your arguments. I actually enjoyed reading your exchanges

[Chrlzs]

Simatong, on 27 January 2013 - 05:07 AM, said:

I must admit Chrlzs, you are very good at making and backing up your arguments. I actually enjoyed reading your exchanges

Thanks, Simatong - I try!  And in return, what I've seen you post has been well worth reading too.

What I simply cannot fathom is why (IF the abilities are genuine) people who have them do not wish to have them tested, exposed, analysed and 'brought into the mainstream'.  Because (IF they exist) these abilities could be a huge, almost unimaginable boon and benefit to humankind.  By bringing them into the mainstream and studying how they work and thence developing and encouraging them from an early age... well, surely a new and better era would begin - who wouldn't want that?

But nope.  It's all so personal, needs to be hidden, needs to be shyly nurtured, only one's friends are allowed to know or benefit, no details about the testing, just take their word... in fact the reasons/excuses for not proving what would probably be the biggest news in scientific history, keep flowing like wine .. or vinegar.

So, I keep coming back to those rather big IFs.

And IF I had any of these abilities, I'd be into the surgical gown in a shot .  Yep, I'd be off to the lab and asking the best scientists to do whatever they wished (short of dissection..) to test me out and find out why I was so special...

[Mr Walker]

Chrlzs, on 27 January 2013 - 05:00 AM, said:

I'm afraid we are not even on the same page.  If you wish to convince anyone of these abilities (in you or others), the please post your best available evidence (NOT anecdotes) for perusal.  If it's evidence of your abilities, then fine - even a link to that website where you predicted the room contents would be a start.  If it's in any way peer-reviewed or -examined, that would be better.

To be precise, here's the problem in your own words:

Well it sure sounds like one, your mindset being so much more able to 'understand'..


It is not just common place.  Dolphins are a known and documented species.  Their behaviours are also known and documented by reams of unquestionable evidence.


Commonplace?  Yes, indeed, and so are stories about pink unicorns, easter bunnies....  But commonplace (commonality) by itself means pretty much nothing.  It's just like saying MacDonalds has the best food in the world (more people eat there than anywhere else), or that because you get ~300,000 hits on a Google search for "[size=4]uri geller bends forks with his mind" that statement must be true..  It isn't.

The difference between ghosts/angels/pink unicorns/easter bunnies and dolphins is that for the former we only have anecdotes, cartoons and fake or inconclusive footage, plus there is NO location at which you can take anyone and point them to the ghosts/angels, nor can they be produced in a lab (to date..).  But for the latter, ie dolphins or (shaslicks..) we ALSO have innumerable videos that are absolutely conclusive, I can point at a multitude of places like gee, pretty much every part of the Ocean, harbours, estuaries, SeaWorld, aquaria - and in all of those places they can be found and viewed doing exactly what has been documented and claimed.  THAT's why the anecdote is 'accepted'.

If your mindset can't spot the very distinct difference there is nothing further to discuss, it seems - unless you wish to elaborate and substantiate your 'tests'.

This discussion is not about me convincing anyone else. I have no need for validation nor any desire to preach.  It is about how I know what is real, concrete and has independent existence, and what does not.

You need to show me why /how what i experience cannot be, and is not real, if you wish to prove it is not..

I have no need to dempnstrate its reality to you.  And it is very difficult to transfer conclusive evidences between third parties.. You are basically arguing that, if i cannot establish its validity with you then my reality is not valid. Which is silly. And yes unless you experience some things first hand your mindset will ten to be a denial of their existence That is logical but  not in itself correct. All human's primary knowledge comes from first hand experience. We all tend to disregard that which we do not know to be true from experience unles we acept other peoles word for it or take it on faith


. I am not talking about the proof of dolphins existence. I asked why you believed a story about a dolphin jumping over my boat with absolutley no evidences for it yet would not belive a story about poltergeists or obes or clair voyance or mind reading Why do you not expect identical proofs before you accpet either  account?

You do realise that most second hand evidence is anectodal? Again it comes back to commonality. Common anecdotes are accepted, uncommon ones are not.

My anecdotes are true ,be they about dolphins or ghosts. It is my job to ascertain the validity of each experience, because i am there to experience them, and I am the only one who can validate them, using evidence and logic.. You,  not being there for any of them, have to take my word for them (or not)

I tell my stories on Um for several reasons. One is to ensure that they are "out there" for people to read and  think about. The other, originally, was in the hope of finding a lot more people with a life like mine. That didn't happen, but there have been a few adult and sober writers whom i have enjoyed listening to, and whom I have learned from.

I know from experience at least one house which was haunted by an active ghost for 100 years or more. Dozens of people saw and heard her  and independently described her appearance, and   she was so common that the house was abandoned and no one would live in It.

I know of a bed which was haunted, also for a hundred years. It was researched and at least a dozen couples (including our neighbours ) had experienced the same development of haunting over the entire twentieth century and several thousand square miles of territory; without any connection or knowledge of  the other people's experiences, until it was researched in the late twentieth century. When twenty people from half a dozen towns/cities, and over a hundred years of time, describe exactly the same process of haunting of an object, without any of them having prior knowledge of the bed's nature or history, or background, you KNOW something very real is happening.
I might logically suggest that a lot more people have seen ghosts than say, platypi. Why then deny the validity/reality of ghosts, but not of platypi, just because the latter have a "solid state" existence while the former seem to exist in a form of "phase state"

As i said earlier, commonality does not mean anything. Only one person has to truly see or experience a ghost, or an alien, or  a platypi, for its reality to be validated. On the other hand even if a million people have seen a dolphin, and there are pictures of them; until i meet one I have to chose to believe in their existence by accepting, on faith, the words and evidences of other people.

[Mr Walker]

Chrlzs, on 27 January 2013 - 10:57 AM, said:

Thanks, Simatong - I try!  And in return, what I've seen you post has been well worth reading too.

What I simply cannot fathom is why (IF the abilities are genuine) people who have them do not wish to have them tested, exposed, analysed and 'brought into the mainstream'.  Because (IF they exist) these abilities could be a huge, almost unimaginable boon and benefit to humankind.  By bringing them into the mainstream and studying how they work and thence developing and encouraging them from an early age... well, surely a new and better era would begin - who wouldn't want that?

But nope.  It's all so personal, needs to be hidden, needs to be shyly nurtured, only one's friends are allowed to know or benefit, no details about the testing, just take their word... in fact the reasons/excuses for not proving what would probably be the biggest news in scientific history, keep flowing like wine .. or vinegar.

So, I keep coming back to those rather big IFs.

And IF I had any of these abilities, I'd be into the surgical gown in a shot .  Yep, I'd be off to the lab and asking the best scientists to do whatever they wished (short of dissection..) to test me out and find out why I was so special...

I dont think you would, because from birth, or whenever you discovered your differences you would live in a different reality to that you lived in in your present life, and you woud learn to react and respond differently You would learn how people react to real demonstrations of difference How they feel/react when they realise you can read their mind. How they look at you run away from you or lash out at you  You would learn this in childhood and you would adapt to keep yourself safe first, as all children do.
Ii remember as far back as primary school in the play ground (the sandpit actually) when i was a bit over 5, how other children reacted. In high school aged about 13/14 the police were called in because of one incident where i knew stuff i shouldnt /couldnt have known. I learned to shut myself off and especially as a govt employed  teacher of children/adolescents i had to be careful how i helped others. Despite this, i got a reputation (mostly positive) in my school and neighbourhood especaiily for helping people. As i get older i am less afraid, but i am still careful, in real life, what I do and what I say with people.

I walked into a happy hour one night at school and every body laughed. A colleague had just explained how i had obed into her bedroom and observed the boxer shorts she was wearing, then asked her about them.  She said she never went to bed at night after that without checking the ceiling to see if i was hovering up there.

I explained that, as a gentleman i would never deliberately intrude on a lady's boudoir, and it was passed off as a joke. But it could have gone the other way, because the event really happened a year or two earlier.

I asked her why she was wearing these particular men's boxer shorts that i had observed one night while obeing, and she explained her partner was away barramundi fishing for a few months and she wore his shorts to feel closer to him.

I felt safe talking to her because she has a sense of humour and also some experience with the paranormal, but i NEVER thought she would tell anyone else about it, or i wouldnt have said a thing

Ps I am also aware that my own attitudes are influenced by the cuture of my child hood. I grew up in the fifties and sixties i read  thousands of science fiction books from the nineteen twenties until the nineteen seventies, along with everything else i could lay my hands on to read.

In those days a common theme was how people with differnces were treated by govt agencies and by communities.  I am sure this also made me more reluctant to demonstrate any difference to others but the main influence was the reatcion of real people to me, and to any demonstration of unusual abilities..

Edited by Mr Walker, 27 January 2013 - 12:44 PM.

[Seeker79]

Chrlzs, on 27 January 2013 - 05:00 AM, said:

I'm afraid we are not even on the same page.  If you wish to convince anyone of these abilities (in you or others), the please post your best available evidence (NOT anecdotes) for perusal.  If it's evidence of your abilities, then fine - even a link to that website where you predicted the room contents would be a start.  If it's in any way peer-reviewed or -examined, that would be better.

To be precise, here's the problem in your own words:

Well it sure sounds like one, your mindset being so much more able to 'understand'..


It is not just common place.  Dolphins are a known and documented species.  Their behaviours are also known and documented by reams of unquestionable evidence.


Commonplace?  Yes, indeed, and so are stories about pink unicorns, easter bunnies....  But commonplace (commonality) by itself means pretty much nothing.  It's just like saying MacDonalds has the best food in the world (more people eat there than anywhere else), or that because you get ~300,000 hits on a Google search for "[size=4]uri geller bends forks with his mind" that statement must be true..  It isn't.

The difference between ghosts/angels/pink unicorns/easter bunnies and dolphins is that for the former we only have anecdotes, cartoons and fake or inconclusive footage, plus there is NO location at which you can take anyone and point them to the ghosts/angels, nor can they be produced in a lab (to date..).  But for the latter, ie dolphins or (shaslicks..) we ALSO have innumerable videos that are absolutely conclusive, I can point at a multitude of places like gee, pretty much every part of the Ocean, harbours, estuaries, SeaWorld, aquaria - and in all of those places they can be found and viewed doing exactly what has been documented and claimed.  THAT's why the anecdote is 'accepted'.

If your mindset can't spot the very distinct difference there is nothing further to discuss, it seems - unless you wish to elaborate and substantiate your 'tests'.

Let me ask you something chrlz. If you lived A few billionyears from now,10s or 100s,  when all the galaxies are moveing faster than the speed of light away from each other on some random galaxy. Then someone came to you and told you that there are other galaxies, things called quasars, and that the nature of the universe is one of expansion, and that it had all started in a thing coined as the big bang, would you aply the same analytical bias?

Edited by Seeker79, 28 January 2013 - 09:29 PM.

[Chrlzs]

Seeker79, on 28 January 2013 - 09:26 PM, said:

Let me ask you something chrlz. If you lived A few billionyears from now,10s or 100s,  when all the galaxies are moveing faster than the speed of light away from each other on some random galaxy. Then someone came to you and told you that there are other galaxies, things called quasars, and that the nature of the universe is one of expansion, and that it had all started in a thing coined as the big bang, would you aply the same analytical bias?

Yes.  Let's be specific - allow me to call this hypothetical claim a 'theory' - I'd then ask that person:
- what evidence do you have for this theory?  Show me.
- does your theory in some way explain something you have observed, or have collected data on?  Show me.
- does your theory in some way better explain some phenomena than any current theories we might have?  Show me.
- how can we test its usefulness and repeatability? If they can do that, then we're well on the way..
- how could we falsify this theory?  The final check - throw everything at the theory to see if it falls down.

Now, if you like, I can explain exactly why I would ask all those questions (that last one might seem a bit strange to someone who doesn't understand how science works, but it's probably the most important test of all...) and in what way the answers would be useful not only to me, but also to the person making the claim and the general public.

But I suspect you may rather just keep adding more reasons why these claims shouldn't be backed up or questioned...



BTW, how about you answer your own question?  What would you do?

[Simatong]

Chrlzs,
Strictly out of curiosity (and nothing more, really). How long do you think these tests should last? Do you think a couple of days would suffice? A couple of weeks? Months? Maybe a year? I ask this simply because to me, in order to get a satisfactory answer, I personally wouldn't be satisfied until there was at least a couple of weeks or months worth of testing. Then again, you are talking to a guy who spent nearly his entire high school years and about half of his college years testing himself rigorously. (I just got done taking a zener card test online, made by a parapsychologist who seems legit, and I didn't stop until after more than 2500 guesses and had calculated everything).

[Seeker79]

Chrlzs, on 29 January 2013 - 11:51 AM, said:

Yes.  Let's be specific - allow me to call this hypothetical claim a 'theory' - I'd then ask that person:
- what evidence do you have for this theory?  Show me.
- does your theory in some way explain something you have observed, or have collected data on?  Show me.
- does your theory in some way better explain some phenomena than any current theories we might have?  Show me.
- how can we test its usefulness and repeatability? If they can do that, then we're well on the way..
- how could we falsify this theory?  The final check - throw everything at the theory to see if it falls down.

Now, if you like, I can explain exactly why I would ask all those questions (that last one might seem a bit strange to someone who doesn't understand how science works, but it's probably the most important test of all...) and in what way the answers would be useful not only to me, but also to the person making the claim and the general public.

But I suspect you may rather just keep adding more reasons why these claims shouldn't be backed up or questioned...



BTW, how about you answer your own question?  What would you do?

yes, I would probably ask those very questions ( please oh please do not resort to the "you don't understand science argument you have far to much potential for   good debate than that old cop out) , probably, but then we would both be  wrong wouldn't we? do you understand what I'm trying to get you to see?

Edited by Seeker79, 30 January 2013 - 06:03 AM.

[Simatong]

Seeker79, with all due respect, I don't see anything wrong with Chrlzs's line of questioning; it's logical to ask questions like this. If we didn't, we'd probably still be stuck with the philosophy of the Medieval Times. If you are going to make a claim about an existence of any kind, whether it be about the origins of those "falling rocks" known as comets or the extraordinary powers of clairvoyance and telekinesis, you must be prepared to be questioned. It is a part of human nature. Plain and simple. If you don't want to answer him, that's all well and good, but please don't imply that his questioning is wrong.

[Seeker79]

oh, what if that smoneone told you that there is another method of inquiry that with a measure of discipline  not unlike the discipline  that you trust, ccould give  you the " show me" that you asked for. and then could you be intellectually honest if you dId not have  the discipline?

[Simatong]

Seeker79, it doesn't matter if that discipline was different from my own or similar to it. As long as the methods it used were verifiable and methodically sound, I would have no problem with that. I would have no need to be "intellectually dishonest" about something I didn't have. Quite frankly, that would be stupid.

[Mr Walker]

Part of the problem is the division between scientific thought processes, and non scientific, but very human, thought processes.

Scientific thought processes and procedures work fine within the confines of science They are also helpful in everday life, but they are self limiting. If a scientific minded person saw a unicorn, his/her mind would run through a different set of thougths to a non scientist, starting from a different point.  For example  they might think, "Science says unicorns cant/dont exist, therefore I am hallucinating or misperceiving what i see."

My own mind would tend to say. "Oh that looks like a  unicorn. Lets apply scientific observation and thought to ascertain its independent existence and biological classification, or lack thereof."

Another person might say. "Oh a unicorn. How nice." and just accept it at face value.
We dont get a chance to do lab tests and peer reviews on many natural occurences BUT, many independent sightings and experiences are, in a way, the same as peer tested reviews of scientific observations. And they can be used create  theories, to modify and even challenge or test existing perceptions(theories) about things like precogniton or obes or ghosts.

  For example if there are 10,000 recorded sightings of angels over history form all human cultures and ALL of them are basically consistent in description one could write up a scientific theory about the nature of angels Then one could look at all current and new sightings and check the descritors in them to verify how closley they approximate classical descriptions And so on.

Now if those 10000 sightings were clearlry divided into 3 separate categories of angelic form, then the theory would be different, and  would have to explain or fit  around those 3 categories. Then observation could be used, again, to confirm this categorisation.

One might begin to test if certain forms appeared to serve different purposes etc. One could test for language used by different forms of angel and variations in manifestaion methods of different angels.  How many events happened in broad daylight were witnessed compared with those unwitnessed and unverified.

These things ARE amenable to scientific method, they just arent really within the domain of science in the western world.