Thread: An Empirical View of Science Dogma

Originally Posted by Linkzelda

It’s completely understandable that during that time, lucid dreaming seemed to be implausible (to those scientists) despite of overwhelming anecdotal cases and experiential truths from lucid dreamers.

Sorry, its late and I dont have time to go through your entire post, but overall I think you've missed understood what I'm saying.

What was my point with the whole apple? It was simply that scientists all to often base reality off of what THEY experience, its human nature. It is a problem however, when that same scientist DENIES the experience of another human being and labels it as hallucination simply because said scientist has not experienced it them self.

Now imagine that the 'apple' is lucid dreaming instead. You just said its understandable that scientists doubt that lucid dreaming was real.

I dont think its understandable, I think its stupid. Those scientists were missing the point. Anyone can have a lucid dream. They didn't have to wait around for a genius like LaBerge. They could have taken the time out to listen to lucid dreamers and experience it themselves. Had they experienced it themselves, they would have never doubted it right?

After all, the scientist who proved lucid dreaming is real to those fools - never doubted lucidity for a moment because he was a lucid dreamer himself!

What does this have to do with my previous post? I was blabbing on about spiritual experiences relating to functions of the brain. The old dogma would label those experiences as random hallucinations - a dying brain. But new understanding now suggests that such experiences directly relate to specific functions of the brain, in other words, we are designed by nature to have said experiences.

And if we are designed to have those experiences, what does that say about reality? That was what I was trying to get at.

Originally Posted by Juroara

Sorry, its late and I dont have time to go through your entire post, but overall I think you've missed understood what I'm saying.

Alright fair enough, I’ll wait to see for you to clarify what you were trying to get at. However, I highly doubt there was a misunderstanding seeing how the response to your previous post was how you felt another member thought there was absolutely no dogma in Science in the progressive strive for developing the epistemological approaches when there’s already been responses made before your post that stated the user did not make such bold presumptions directly.

Originally Posted by Juroara

It was simply that scientists all to often base reality off of what THEY experience, its human nature.

Right, like any other human being that hasn’t had a chance to accumulate experiential learning on something that would typically be abstract from their quotidian lifestyle. The whole notion of “seeing is believing,” and how there aren’t enough counterfactual reasoning for the scientist, or any human being for that matter at that certain epoch before the breakthroughs LaBerge and others have made to actually speculate “what if” in relation to dreaming.

Originally Posted by Juroara

It is a problem however, when that same scientist DENIES the experience of another human being and labels it as hallucination simply because said scientist has not experienced it them self.

I acknowledge that this is something problematic, but like you’ve stated with human nature and sentience of being able to experience subjectivity, how you’re bringing the apple example back again does not make sense whatsoever. And here’s why:

Here’s the quote that I’m sure you’re referring to your recent post on what you were getting at with the apple analogy to lucid dreaming:

Originally Posted by Juroara

Let's say there's an apple in front of you. Its a real apple. And scientists have you plugged in so that they can measure your brain activity. Naturally, when you see the apple the visual cortex is engaged. The scientists are in the room with you, they can see the apple too. When looking at your brain activity are the scientists going to say you 'hallucinated' an apple? Not likely. Because they can see the apple too, confirmation bias and all that.

Now lets repeat the same experiment, except someone has pranked the scientists. A los vegas magician has set up mirrors or whatever and only you can see the apple. As far as the scientists know there is NO apple in the room. Your brain lights up just the same as before.

......Now what do the scientists conclude? You hallucinated an apple.

You were giving two situations that weren’t really hard to misunderstand honestly. One where both individuals would already be capable of conceptualizing the same apple in front of them. I made the argument that it wouldn’t be confirmation bias on the scientist’s end simply because that’s not confirmation bias. How both are able to see the apple would be an inherent attribute to sentience, and the term’s definition of being able to experience subjectivity.

So I already understood what you were trying to get at. The other scenario is what completely demolished the continuity of your post. You already know that scenario, and you were utilizing that hypothetical situation of how a scientist would conclude that the person would be hallucinating. It’s like stripping away that individual’s ability of sentience and mostly all inherent attributes that happen as an unconscious processes and what have you.

If someone actually pranks the test subject, then that scientist is incompetent to not tell that such matters would prevent the possibility of collecting consistent data (and makes the scientist very dogmatic in this situation you created). Which is why I stated the scientist must be an incompetent to fall for that prank (you did state it was a prank, and if it wasn’t, maybe you should use better diction), and part of the scientific method is obviously setting up controlled conditions, and in this case, they did not. If you intended that prank to be a different variable to see the process of conceptualizing the apple would be different, I’m pretty sure a prank in general wouldn’t be something logical to do in an experiment.

The magician just did an abra cadabra that manipulated the individual’s ability to distinguish reality from hallucination, and the scientist concludes the individual hallucinated apple. Now, if that scenario in particular is an actual defense to your post of science being dogmatic, then you sure have weird ways to present that.

I would be more concerned on how the magician was able to do something to have the individual think they still saw the apple. How they were able to affect that person’s mode of perception, and if someone can actually do that, then it would surely (in your disposition I guess) support this quote of yours:

Originally Posted by Juroara

What was my point with the whole apple? It was simply that scientists all to often base reality off of what THEY experience, its human nature. It is a problem however, when that same scientist DENIES the experience of another human being and labels it as hallucination simply because said scientist has not experienced it them self.

But clearly, it does not support your argument at all. This is why I presumed you were probably stripping away some major aspects in the framework of the scientific method. If you can clarify to me on how a prank gets through experimentation and actually becomes part of the scientist’s conclusion that the individual hallucinated, and then you bringing that back to being compatible to a scientific method that’s not stripped of its major constituents, and then back to how the scientist is also dogmatic, then you got me….you completely got me there if that was not a dogmatic approach on your end.


So before we talk about the apple and lucid dreaming, maybe you should take into consideration of defining what dogma is before justifying it with that scenario and apple analogy. Also, imagine for a moment if a Scientist (in that SAME scenario) presents their conclusion for peer-review, or even to the media.



Scientist:

"Hey Guys, I'm proud to announce that based on data and repeated experimentation, we've been able to have an individual that was able to hallucinate an apple. You see, it took an apple, and a little magic, and it was apparently done as a prank on the test subject, and myself too (those clever rascals). But you know, screw the scientific method, and me actually following the logic behind it. Now, this data concludes the person was hallucinating, and if anyone tries to refute to this with the overwhelming amount of data we've had....you are totally ignorant."


Random citizen: "wh---"

Scientist: -sticks fingers in ears- "LALALALALALALALA."

>Scientist is dogmatic
>

Originally Posted by juroara

Yet is happens all the damn time.

If there's actually a misunderstanding from that, I either must be dreaming, or there's some way for you to make exceptions to this scenario, or I seriously need some massive insight on any updates to the framework of the scientific method.

The whole premises of the thread is that experiments have not been done, and studies have not been conducted on parapsychology, which should have - for the furthering of human knowledge and insight. And the reason would be dogma.
It is not true - there are experiments and studies - I started out searching - that's work, unfortunately.

Please check the Feynman video too - from 2:44 min. onwards: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EYPapE-3FRw
".....there are other phenomena, such as extrasensory perception, which cannot be explained by ... If that could be demonstrated, of course that would mean that our knowledge of physics is incomplete... so it's extremely interesting for physicists ... many many experiments exist, which show, it doesn't work..."

This after expounding on the fact, that the phenomenon of superconductivity also did not fit the knowledge of physics at first - but was shown to be there, and knowledge got adapted.


If there had come about an experiment with a positive outcome since back then - I would know it for sure.
Isn't it suspicious, that there are not one or two highly famous such examples, and the dogmatic non-believers and us normal non-believers would have a hell of a headache with it all the time - even while not reproducible?

Isn't the failure to give out his money to somebody proving to him, what he himself believes in, even more suspicious:
One Million Dollar Paranormal Challenge - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The One Million Dollar Paranormal Challenge is offered by the James Randi Educational Foundation (JREF), which says it will pay out one million U.S. dollars to anyone who can demonstrate a supernatural or paranormal ability under agreed-upon scientific testing criteria. Over a thousand people have applied to take the challenge, but none has yet been successful...
Randi has said that few unsuccessful applicants ever seriously consider that their failure to perform might be due to the nonexistence of the power they believe they possess.

It's a really good question:
Why has nobody yet won the one million dollar of the Randi Challenge??

Originally Posted by Original Poster

So far I have still not received any viable explanation on how dogs can anticipate the actions of their owners or how a flock of birds/school of fish move.

"By observing other fish" doesn't hold water and "explore other branches of science" also doesn't hold water.
It doesn't compel me, and it doesn't remove these fundamental questions. You're labeling this confirmation bias, as if these explanations are somehow supposed to satisfy me when they aren't viable and they don't answer the question.

Then, because I say telepathy is a possibility, you jump to say that I think it's the ONLY answer. All I'm saying is that it's a hypothesis that continues to warrant further testing. Xei was satisfied with an explanation that fish just observe other fish, which has been shown not to be true at all, so if the people I'm participating in this discussion are going to give ridiculous and unsatisfactory answers to these questions then don't blame the confirmation bias on me.

Here's what they've got so far:

Honestly - it is beyond me, why you waste so much time with petty back and forths instead of coming along with content.
But there you brought content - thank you:

Originally Posted by Original Poster

Animal flocks, be it honeybees, fish, ants or birds, often move in surprising synchronicity and seemingly make unanimous decisions at a moment's notice, a phenomenon which has remained puzzling to many researchers.

New research published today, Wednesday 15 September, in New Journal of Physics, uses a particle model to explain the collective decision making process of flocks of birds landing on foraging flights.

Using a simple self-propelled particle (SPP) system, which sees the birds represented by particles with such parameters as position and velocity, the researchers from Budapest, Hungary, find that the collective switching from the flying to the landing state overrides the individual landing intentions of each bird.

In the absence of a decision making leader, the collective shift to land is heavily influenced by perturbations the individual birds are subject to, such as the birds' flying position within the flock. This can be compared to an avalanche of piled up sand, which would occur even for perfectly symmetric and cautiously placed grains, but in reality happens much sooner because of increasing, non-linear fluctuations.

As the researchers explain, "Our main motivation was to better understand something which is puzzling and out there in nature, especially in cases involving the
stopping or starting of a collective behavioural pattern in a group of people or animals.

"We propose a simple model for a system whose members have the tendency to follow the others both in space and in their state of mind concerning a decision about stopping an activity. This is a very general model, which can be applied to similar situations."

Possible applications include collectively flying, unmanned aerial vehicles, initiating a desired motion pattern in crowds or groups of animals and even finance, where the results could be used to interpret collective effects on selling or buying shares on the stock market.

Understanding behavioral patterns: Why bird flocks move in unison

And it's a far more viable explanation than "observing each other" (and though it doesn't completely satisfy the question it's a good start) but the fact that "observing each other" was supposed to be a reasonable explanation represents the core of my and Sheldrake's dilemma.

Nothing whatsoever points in the direction of telepathy and hive-mind in this citation.
Not even when and how they make use of surprising, puzzling and seemingly.

You fail to realize, that this article - like the below one - points towards a source of completely regular sensory information input for the birds, with which they then can adjust their positions.
Namely air perturbations.
Yes indeed - it is more viable to propose they feel the air-perturbations too, and take that as a means for orientation instead of just looking at each other - yes, surely.

But how does that support your claims?
It doesn't - it actually speaks against hypothesizing telepathy, because optical data are not enough..

I have coincidentally also come across this topic and found it fascinating - but like with your above citation - the only thing pointing in the direction you want to look in, is the mention of the fact, that it is unclear how exactly their brains work with the information, which their eyes and wings provide them with.
Which is highly interesting - but it's not about how information jumps from one bird to the next, or is in both at the same time. It's about how this input and the motion get integrated to bring forth the phenomenon.

'Nature' paper from last month: Upwash exploitation and downwash avoidance by flap phasing in ibis formation flight

Many species travel in highly organized groups. The most quoted function of these configurations is to reduce energy expenditure and enhance locomotor performance of individuals in the assemblage. The distinctive V formation of bird flocks has long intrigued researchers and continues to attract both scientific and popular attention.

The well-held belief is that such aggregations give an energetic benefit for those birds that are flying behind and to one side of another bird through using the regions of upwash generated by the wings of the preceding bird, although a definitive account of the aerodynamic implications of these formations has remained elusive. Here we show that individuals of northern bald ibises (Geronticus eremita) flying in a V flock position themselves in aerodynamically optimum positions, in that they agree with theoretical aerodynamic predictions. Furthermore, we demonstrate that birds show wingtip path coherence when flying in V positions, flapping spatially in phase and thus enabling upwash capture to be maximized throughout the entire flap cycle. In contrast, when birds fly immediately behind another bird—in a streamwise position—there is no wingtip path coherence; the wing-beats are in spatial anti-phase. This could potentially reduce the adverse effects of downwash for the following bird. These aerodynamic accomplishments were previously not thought possible for birds because of the complex flight dynamics and sensory feedback that would be required to perform such a feat.

We conclude that the intricate mechanisms involved in V formation flight indicate awareness of the spatial wake structures of nearby flock-mates, and remarkable ability either to sense or predict it. We suggest that birds in V formation have phasing strategies to cope with the dynamic wakes produced by flapping wings.

Since you are interested OP - here another link to an article on that article, of which the above was only the abstract: Why Birds Fly in a V Formation | Science/AAAS | News

“From a behavioral perspective it’s really a breakthrough,” says David Lentink, a mechanical engineer at Stanford University in Palo Alto, California, who was not involved in the work. “Showing that birds care about syncing their wing beats is definitely an important insight that we didn’t have before.” To definitively say that the birds are drafting off each other, however, the exact location of the eddies and the areas of downdraft would need to be measured on ibises, which would require flying them in a wind tunnel—a far more intrusive process than simply carrying a data logger.

Hehehe - poor birds..

There is no need to make a leap of faith towards testing a hypothesis of telepathy, when we have comprehensive sensory input for every single bird - pertaining to the whole flock in 3D and time - per feeling the patterns in airperturbations.
Which in themselves they also create.

There are the patterns!!
The real ones.


You brought up that looking at each other can logically not be enough and that is why it was silly to believe they did it by looking (alone).
I actually wonder, how these "silly explanations" really look like, and if you have not been mislead to interpret citations like that by advocates of your pet hypothesis.

But at the very least now you have an elaborate explanation completely within the natural realm - no need for telepathy or a hive-mind left here.
So what now, Original Poster?

Originally Posted by Original Poster

When he proposed his study on pets and owners and was given the explanation "That just shows how good dog's hearing is," it's the same kind of dogmatic explanation, or as StephL put it earlier in the thread, a No-Brainer. In other words, questions are answered this way because alternative methods are simply out of the question.

That took a while for you to refer to! wink.gif

Originally Posted by Original Poster

...
There are problems when one looks at them critically.
Plenty of researchers do look at them critically, and I also believe if true then Rupert Sheldrake's theories or any other theories currently cropping up on telepathy, etc, will with-stand the test in time.
I believe the scientific method is capable of this. It's a matter of time. In the mean time, it's fun to remind people that a lot of the default views of the paradigm were not ever validated scientifically to begin with, and yet still somehow manage to slow down progress.

Research and theories like that are not a thing only currently cropping up - as said above - nothing else will help here, than bringing forth the evidence for the extended scientific research having been done in probably more than the last century.
Coming up dry.


Did you consider this 100th monkey example?
Is what Mr. Sheldrake works with really the sort of science, in which you want to put your faith?
How come you have hope in such a person - if not for pure and clear confirmation bias?

You believe this anyway - so if somebody else says it also - they are highly probably right, despite it being demonstrated, that he builds his assumptions on at best sloppy - at worst fraudulent science.
If I would have been showing such a thing, concerning a scientist with strong opposition to your view - wouldn't you have jumped on the fact, that he builds on such corrupted sources?


Lets for a minute pretend, I was the person believing in telepathy and wanting to prove it existed.
Somebody like Mr. Sheldrake would have to be a red cloth for me - like any charlatan or stage magician trying to fool - for example the Randi challenge people, as has happened - detrimental to the cause.
Wouldn't you say so?

Here's a follow up interview with Sheldrake about his Ted talk for anyone interested:



The premise of this thread is to draw awareness to the dogmatic thinking that has taken hold of the materialist paradigm. It's not that I think experiments are not being conducted which contradict the assumptions of the paradigm, it's that if specific experiments fail the peer review process, I don't think it's reasonable to fall back on assumptions which fail to answer the observations made.

For example, the way I see it, it's sort of like observing that stars are moving farther apart and hypothesizing a big bang, then performing an experiment which confirms your hypothesis but fails when repeated, and receiving the response that because the experiment failed to be repeated, it means the stars aren't really moving farther apart, it's just a psychological illusion.

Since you’re talking about the materialistic paradigm, or those that subscribe mostly to materialistic ontology in science, I can understand you’re also referring to the 10 Dogmas of Science in some way throughout the course of this thread.

You mentioned them in tidbits, especially in post #55 (and in your previous examples like the hive-mind) in your example of how unexplained phenomenon would be considered illusory (in your case: psychological illusion). Now, because you’re intending for it to be fixated on those who subscribe to materialistic ontology in science, it’s catered only to a specific group. If Sheldrake was extending that scope of science as a universal principle of other branches in Science, it would probably just be considered a series of straw man arguments on his end.

Seeing how he’s deemed as a reputable scientist himself, it’s implied he would use the same epistemological approaches for challenging current and long-term theories/models that are pervasive. So when people have been spewing with Science being dogmatic, it’s pretty obvious that it wouldn’t be absolved from scientists that are self-reflective and critical of certain dispositions of others, and even themselves.

People that wanted to make arguments in this thread of Science being dogmatic seemed to fixate on Science as a whole rather than those who subscribe to materialistic ontology in Science. This is why there was constant emphasis to those individuals that it’s perfectly understandable that scientists can be opinionated. But when people like Juroara make arguments of how she couldn't fathom how certain scientists couldn’t believe (or take with a grain of salt) in other people’s experiential truths, anecdotal cases, and such, she seemed to have had the disposition to believe those matters should be considered a priori presumptions as well (seeing how those scientists in the past she mentioned may not have had experiential learning like LaBerge did):

Originally Posted by A priori

relating to or denoting reasoning or knowledge that proceeds from theoretical deduction rather than from observation or experience.

You see, that was one of the major flaws in her sentiment/emotive declarations, and others that went along that path as well.

As much as I agree that there’s going to be scientists that have opinions of varying intensities, if people forget your OP of scientists that subscribe mostly to materialist ontology, and then utilize that as an attack for Science in general, they’re being just as dogmatic as the scientists that would have varying levels of opinions, dispositions, and self-reflective criticisms on these matters; those same individuals so far claiming science as dogmatic are essentially supporting straw man arguments from Sheldrake catered mostly to those who subscribe to materialist ontology.

And it was apparent that you were gradually leading on to those 10 aspects of dogma, and if you read any of the conversation Xei was discussing with you, it seemed like you were just straw manning (in the initial stages). This isn’t to say that Sheldrake’s declarations were 100% pseudoscience or an emotive epithet, it’s just that with the mixed views over:

• Epistemological approaches to Science
• Whether or not science can be metaphysically neutral (i.e. Science as a whole not subscribing mostly to dualism, materialism, or -insert other ontological theories and philosophies here- etc.)
• Whether or not experiential cases, argumentum ad populums, and such should be deemed as a priori reasoning (i.e. when juroara stated that the overwhelming anecdotal cases, experiential truths, and such from others on lucid dreaming for instance should’ve been something that’s self-evident to those scientists (or any other person) to try out before Lucid Dreaming became a scientifically proven phenomenon; but when she mentioned that they didn’t need geniuses like LaBerge, I think that just killed her reasoning there).

I wondered where the direction of this thread was going to. And with the interview you presented (and the topics you presented so far in the thread), it does show there’s a clear sign that how people apply the epistemological approaches to Science can be dogmatic at times (e.g. selective publishing that has mostly positivity than negativity on findings, peer-review processes that may give a free pass to things that may actually be erroneous, and the ad nauseam “show me the evidence!”)

If you’re talking about those who subscribe to materialistic ontology, then it would be challenging a branch of science, and no problem with that I guess when it comes to debating and all. But if it’s encroaching what Science may be in general, the arguments from Sheldrake and individuals that support him specifically for this (and not necessarily all of his findings and declarations in his career so far) can easily be deemed as ad hoc claims and straw man arguments, which would to some extent, be dogmatic as well.

Man, Link, why are you still replying to OP? He's just ignoring anything you or anybody else says to him.

Originally Posted by juroara

For thousands of years mankind has been experiencing lucid dreams. For thousands of years there was never a need to empirically prove because its clearly self-evident if you have a lucid dream.

But it must have been so frustrating for lucid dreamers in the age of science when science decided that lucid dreaming wasn't real - even though people were clearly experiencing it. The science of that day would make silly claims like "you just imagined you were lucid when you woke and created false memories".

Who is 'science'..?

This has already been covered in the thread. Science is not unanimous. There were many scientists who accepted the possibility, and some of them went on to demonstrate it empirically. Then science accepted it.

...what's the problem? Isn't this exactly what should have happened..? What are you saying should have happened instead?

I understand what you're saying about subjective experiences, but really you're just conflating things and failing pretty badly to view a situation from different perspectives. Yes, if an individual, perhaps a scientist, experienced a lucid dream - they would of course be justified in believing lucid dreams. What you're saying is obvious - nobody would contest that. However, this is not enough to prove that lucid dreaming exists to someone else - perhaps to a scientist who tried and failed to become lucid. People report false experiences, wittingly or unwittingly, all the time. I'm sure you can come up with examples for yourself. Anecdotes are obviously not a sound foundation for knowledge. They may give you reasonable suspicion that something is going on, though, and then you can do some direct empirical investigation into it. Sometimes it turns out that the phenomenon is real, as in the case of lucid dreaming; sometimes it turns out there's no sign of it and the anecdotes were mistaken, as in the case of extrasensory perception.

One of these experiences which is currently being researched is the NDE. When the NDE was duplicated in the lab they discovered something amazing - the brain is engaged! When certain areas of the brain becomes active, people experience NDE's and all sorts of spiritual related phenomenon.

Well, I'm sceptical this ever even took place as you describe it, because you're not allowed to bring people close to death "in the lab". In any case; it's not amazing. That's exactly what you'd expect. All subjective experiences correlate with activity in different regions of the brain. If all these people reporting NDEs showed no brain activity, that would have been a really fascinating observation which would have thrown the relation of mind and body into question. Unfortunately, as you admit, this wasn't the case.

But here is the dogma. The dogma says "because these areas of the brain were active during this experience, then these experiences themselves originate from those areas of the brain" in other words, hallucination.

Why is this dogmatic? Because this assumption is based off of fluff.

Let's say there's an apple in front of you. Its a real apple. And scientists have you plugged in so that they can measure your brain activity. Naturally, when you see the apple the visual cortex is engaged. The scientists are in the room with you, they can see the apple too. When looking at your brain activity are the scientists going to say you 'hallucinated' an apple? Not likely. Because they can see the apple too, confirmation bias and all that.

Now lets repeat the same experiment, except someone has pranked the scientists. A los vegas magician has set up mirrors or whatever and only you can see the apple. As far as the scientists know there is NO apple in the room. Your brain lights up just the same as before.

Now what do the scientists conclude? You hallucinated an apple.

Do you understand what I'm trying to say? Why this assumption is dogmatic? Yet is happens all the damn time.

NDE research and other similar research, like the effects of DMT, have discovered that are very specific regions in the brain *and compounds* directly associated with spiritual experiences. Do these regions in the brain and compounds CREATE the experience (hallucination)? Or do they function just like the visual cortex, do they allow us to EXPERIENCE these aspects of reality?

How can a researcher answer that question? Think about the implications of having a region in your brain responsible for experiencing another aspect of reality - another visual cortex.

How does the researcher KNOW that a REAL apple is in the room? Because they have a visual cortex and are actively engaging that region of their brain. If the visual cortex isn't enough they have hands *hopefully* and can pick it up. If picking it up isn't enough they have the sense of smell, the sense of taste.

If you can not EXPERIENCE apple in any way then apple does not exist to you. THERE IS NO OTHER WAY. Experiencing is how you determine reality, even in science we experience data via graphs or lines or numbers or etc. Or it didn't happen!

Are NDEs real and does DMT really let you see the spirit world? You can't ask this standing on the sidelines "blind" and "senseless". The science is there. It says you need to engage in those regions of the brain, those other 'senses', to have said experience. The dogma does not allow this understanding to take place.

This was very cogently argued, so thanks for that... it puts your post miles above anything we've so far received from Original Poster.

This really comes back to what I said before about the scope of science. Science really just means knowledge which talks about patterns in reality. Take for example the case of a schizophrenic who thinks he hears voices when there's nobody around. The statements "the voices are not real" and "the voices are real" aren't actually scientific statements, because there is no difference between the two different models of reality they describe. There are no patterns we can look at to weigh upon the hypotheses. What does "real" even mean? What pattern does "real" describe? How does something which is real look different to something which is not?

So science doesn't actually have any dogma about whether a schizophrenic's auditory hallucinations are "imagined" or are instead tuned into something "really there", because these statements lie outside the language of science. They do not effect science and they are not affected by science.

We can only make statements like, "the schizophrenic hears voices which are not heard by anybody else". This is not a statement of ontology, it's just a statement about things we can observe, which is all that science is concerned with. If you look up the definition of hallucination on Wikipedia, that's actually how it defines it; "a perception in the absence of apparent stimulus that has qualities of real perception". It doesn't say "a perception which is not real", because that doesn't clearly define a set of observed phenomena.

Actually we can do something a bit more substantial. A more complicated statement would be something like "a hidden causal agent is necessary to explain the brain activity correlated with the schizophrenic's auditory perception". This does make substantive claims about things we can observe. An example of a positive test for this would be if the voices in the schizophrenic's head could be shown to provide them with information about the world outside of their senses. In the analogous case of NDEs, in which people often experience OBEs, a positive test for the statement would be if they could see their environments (often an operating theatre). Interestingly this has never been demonstrated, and moreover, people's reports of their experience turn out to be erroneous, seeing objects which were not present, and not seeing obvious objects which were. This doesn't "prove" the statement (about patterns in our observations) is false, it just means there is no sense in affirming it. To observe that it's false is a lot harder - it requires we observe and understand the neural activity underlying hallucinations - but we're making a lot of progress.

Originally Posted by Linkzelda

Since you’re talking about the materialistic paradigm, or those that subscribe mostly to materialistic ontology in science, I can understand you’re also referring to the 10 Dogmas of Science in some way throughout the course of this thread.

You mentioned them in tidbits, especially in post #55 (and in your previous examples like the hive-mind) in your example of how unexplained phenomenon would be considered illusory (in your case: psychological illusion). Now, because you’re intending for it to be fixated on those who subscribe to materialistic ontology in science, it’s catered only to a specific group. If Sheldrake was extending that scope of science as a universal principle of other branches in Science, it would probably just be considered a series of straw man arguments on his end.

Seeing how he’s deemed as a reputable scientist himself, it’s implied he would use the same epistemological approaches for challenging current and long-term theories/models that are pervasive. So when people have been spewing with Science being dogmatic, it’s pretty obvious that it wouldn’t be absolved from scientists that are self-reflective and critical of certain dispositions of others, and even themselves.

People that wanted to make arguments in this thread of Science being dogmatic seemed to fixate on Science as a whole rather than those who subscribe to materialistic ontology in Science. This is why there was constant emphasis to those individuals that it’s perfectly understandable that scientists can be opinionated. But when people like Juroara make arguments of how she couldn't fathom how certain scientists couldn’t believe (or take with a grain of salt) in other people’s experiential truths, anecdotal cases, and such, she seemed to have had the disposition to believe those matters should be considered a priori presumptions as well (seeing how those scientists in the past she mentioned may not have had experiential learning like LaBerge did):



You see, that was one of the major flaws in her sentiment/emotive declarations, and others that went along that path as well.

As much as I agree that there’s going to be scientists that have opinions of varying intensities, if people forget your OP of scientists that subscribe mostly to materialist ontology, and then utilize that as an attack for Science in general, they’re being just as dogmatic as the scientists that would have varying levels of opinions, dispositions, and self-reflective criticisms on these matters; those same individuals so far claiming science as dogmatic are essentially supporting straw man arguments from Sheldrake catered mostly to those who subscribe to materialist ontology.

And it was apparent that you were gradually leading on to those 10 aspects of dogma, and if you read any of the conversation Xei was discussing with you, it seemed like you were just straw manning (in the initial stages). This isn’t to say that Sheldrake’s declarations were 100% pseudoscience or an emotive epithet, it’s just that with the mixed views over:

• Epistemological approaches to Science
• Whether or not science can be metaphysically neutral (i.e. Science as a whole not subscribing mostly to dualism, materialism, or -insert other ontological theories and philosophies here- etc.)
• Whether or not experiential cases, argumentum ad populums, and such should be deemed as a priori reasoning (i.e. when juroara stated that the overwhelming anecdotal cases, experiential truths, and such from others on lucid dreaming for instance should’ve been something that’s self-evident to those scientists (or any other person) to try out before Lucid Dreaming became a scientifically proven phenomenon; but when she mentioned that they didn’t need geniuses like LaBerge, I think that just killed her reasoning there).

I wondered where the direction of this thread was going to. And with the interview you presented (and the topics you presented so far in the thread), it does show there’s a clear sign that how people apply the epistemological approaches to Science can be dogmatic at times (e.g. selective publishing that has mostly positivity than negativity on findings, peer-review processes that may give a free pass to things that may actually be erroneous, and the ad nauseam “show me the evidence!”)

If you’re talking about those who subscribe to materialistic ontology, then it would be challenging a branch of science, and no problem with that I guess when it comes to debating and all. But if it’s encroaching what Science may be in general, the arguments from Sheldrake and individuals that support him specifically for this (and not necessarily all of his findings and declarations in his career so far) can easily be deemed as ad hoc claims and straw man arguments, which would to some extent, be dogmatic as well.

The intention was never made to cover the entire scope of science. This seems impossible considering the fluidity of science and the nature of empiricism itself. The intention was to point out the materialist's worldview's loosened grip on authentic empiricism. I may have lost touch of this for a moment early on, getting carried away by the tactic of proving just one belief held without evidence in thinking it would prove my entire argument. I apologize for this behavior, people have a right to their individual assumptions about life. The problem, as Sheldrake points out, is the confusion materialists have between beliefs and facts. When this confusion occurs, dogma's definitive.

What grinded my gears and caused me to label your arguments as misunderstandings and strawmen was that you seem to cast my arguments as attacks on science itself, and thus a misunderstanding of science's purpose. This may be due to my choice of language, so I may be to blame for it. If anything, my attempt was really to claim that just because you call it science doesn't make it science, and this applies to those who disregard new ideas as well as to those who present them.

Were one to claim that dogma is not currently being argued under the disguise of scientific fact within the community, I need merely point out the second video which goes into detail as to why the first video I posted was censored.

The biggest problem I see here is the same problem you can observe with any debate, and I had to explain this on facebook (yes I know, make fun of me for trying to have intelligent debate on facebook, I deserve it) just the other day. OP, you are arguing against the people who think they are on one side of a debate, but really aren't because of flawed logic and unsound reasoning. For instance, anybody that asserts God does not exist and use "science" to back it up. Science makes no attempt to answer whether God exists or not because it is not falsifiable and therefore fails to meet the first criterion of the scientific method. Please don't be offended (irrationally) or take this analogy out of context, but imagine you are a Christian and you are trying to argue that science is "wrong" because it says God doesn't exist, with your reasoning being the Big Bang Theory. In no way does the Big Bang Theory prove or even mention whether God exists or not. You can agree on this, right? Conversely, anyone that "believes" in science or its principles uses the Big Bang Theory as an argument that God does not exist is also wrong. We on the same page? Alright, now imagine that you, the Christian, realizes that that assertion is wrong, but you then try and prove that science is "wrong" or "false" because those who assert that God doesn't exist fallaciously using science as evidence are wrong. What you are doing is using the people that utilize science's findings incorrectly as proof that science itself is wrong. Those are two completely different arguments. Here, you are guilty of the same logic trap. Science does not contain dogmas because it is flexible, capable of change... by its very nature. The people who use it incorrectly are the ones guilty of dogmas. Do you see why it doesn't make sense now to continue with your argument? What you are arguing and what you think you are arguing are totally different, which therefore makes your argument wrong. Science is not guilty of dogmatic views or thinking because anyone claiming to be a scientist would believe what ever the evidence at the time suggests.

Well stated snoop! Although it could be argued, if one takes an extreme position, that science does imply at least one dogmatic element: that humans can understand what they observe! This idea is of course compelling. But it certainly remains an hypothesis.

Originally Posted by snoop

The biggest problem I see here is the same problem you can observe with any debate, and I had to explain this on facebook (yes I know, make fun of me for trying to have intelligent debate on facebook, I deserve it) just the other day. OP, you are arguing against the people who think they are on one side of a debate, but really aren't because of flawed logic and unsound reasoning. For instance, anybody that asserts God does not exist and use "science" to back it up. Science makes no attempt to answer whether God exists or not because it is not falsifiable and therefore fails to meet the first criterion of the scientific method. Please don't be offended (irrationally) or take this analogy out of context, but imagine you are a Christian and you are trying to argue that science is "wrong" because it says God doesn't exist, with your reasoning being the Big Bang Theory. In no way does the Big Bang Theory prove or even mention whether God exists or not. You can agree on this, right? Conversely, anyone that "believes" in science or its principles uses the Big Bang Theory as an argument that God does not exist is also wrong. We on the same page? Alright, now imagine that you, the Christian, realizes that that assertion is wrong, but you then try and prove that science is "wrong" or "false" because those who assert that God doesn't exist fallaciously using science as evidence are wrong. What you are doing is using the people that utilize science's findings incorrectly as proof that science itself is wrong. Those are two completely different arguments. Here, you are guilty of the same logic trap. Science does not contain dogmas because it is flexible, capable of change... by its very nature. The people who use it incorrectly are the ones guilty of dogmas. Do you see why it doesn't make sense now to continue with your argument? What you are arguing and what you think you are arguing are totally different, which therefore makes your argument wrong. Science is not guilty of dogmatic views or thinking because anyone claiming to be a scientist would believe what ever the evidence at the time suggests.

As I have repeated, my attack was never on Science. I would change the thread's title if given the chance because I see it appears that way, but this was never about disproving Science. I like Science. This is about the materialistic worldview, which currently claims authority over what is considered science and not science. This is a subjective claim, but it's made in an objective manner. Like any dogma, it's about confusing beliefs with facts. Most of my time spent in this thread has been to defend accusations that I am attacking science when I'm really questioning beliefs which are masqueraded as scientific fact so that theories which contradict them are instantly labeled unscientific.

That's not true... not so long ago you were focusing on Sheldrake's claim that the unchanging nature of physical laws and constants was a "dogma". That's nothing to do with materialism, it's just plain physics.

Well, is it not an assumption to say that light is constant and has been a constant since the big bang? Considering we have only been measuring the speed of light for 400 years. I think this is where sheldrake's argument lies. I invite you to come up with a counter-argument, i'm eager to hear ur response

EDIT: I say so.. Because this is likely where Sheldrake ran into trouble with Mainstream science.. That is the point of this thread and it stands. However good a job you guys do in defending science. Xei's arguments for Sheldrake's list is the best i have seen. Although it kinda lacks in the last few points. Indeed since point 7, 8 and 9 have been unanswered I think it still stands that "Memories, Mind is in the brain, Telepathy is impossible" are still unproven assumptions that are widespread in scientific communities and therefore dogma on a large scale.

same thing with the constant of light. try to imply that light is not a constant and people will immediately refer to Einstein and stuff saying that Light is a constant because Einstein said so. However, Einstein never mentioned light will always be a constant throughout the evolution of the entire universe now did he? It is just assumed in a very dogmatic way.

My critique on Sheldrake though is his inability to explain this in a way that everyone understands. He doesn't delve deep enough into the actual science to come up with proper arguments. That is my critique. But then again, not everyone is fit to be a quantum physicist.

As repeatedly stated - science is not about saying something is impossible - like telepathy.
What science does say, is that it could not ever be positively shown to occur.

So it is only reasonable - as a person - to assume it is not possible - a personal belief, but one that makes sense.
Again - I refer to the Randi challenge - one million dollars to a person, demonstrating under regulated and scientific conditions - any sort of psychic abilities.
The prize money rose over time - but the challenge is there since the 1960s - and not one person was able to do it.
See - you do not even need vested interest from mainstream science to get the possibility to prove, what you can do, once and for all - it is privately heavily funded to give this possibility to everyone.
This - plus the usual, many experiments and studies coming from within the scientific community, which have also come up dry.

Imagine this was about making business decisions on what method to use, to increase production.
It would indeed have to be considered highly unwise, to trust and invest money in a production process, which did not ever get reliably shown to work. Not even by you.

I believe, that telepathy is not possible, while being aware, that the basis on which I have this belief, does in itself simply say - there is no positive evidence for it. Not only that - but as Feynman said - if it was shown to be working - a new knowledge in the field of physics and neuroscience would then have to be searched for.
I deem it highly unlikely, that such phenomena are occurring, but have escaped the combined efforts of both fields utterly and completely.
These are two impeccably rational reasons, on which I then base my belief. Which means - I wouldn't invest time in telepathy research. That would look devoid of personal value to me.

Concerning what belief and religion mean to me:
I am an atheist - I do not believe in a god/s.
I am also an agnostic, because I am aware, that the absolute gnosis, an absolute knowledge of there being one - or not - it's not within my reach.
Why do I say that?

It can neither positively nor negatively be found out - it would for example not violate any of our current understandings, if we were a simulation. In which you could then define somebody doing the simulation as a god.
This acknowledgement, that we cannot be sure, due to the nature of perception, observations having to be done through our collective brains - does not lead me to believe such a thing any way.
Because I believe it is highly improbable - for example - why would such an illusion go so deep, and into such detail - and for lots other reasons.

Ha - found an answer, while editing - this resonates with sentiments, that human perception does create reality on a more profound level, than that we always experience it mirrored through our brains.
I still don't believe we are a simulation - but I shot down my own detail and depth argument just now..

So then - being atheist and agnostic is not a belief.

I am sure, that I do not believe in a god/s - I am a-theistic (not god-ish).
I am also sure, that I have to remain ultimately unsure about the true nature of reality - a-gnostic (not knowing for sure).

Then comes on a lower level, which model of reality I operate with.


What is accused by Sheldrake, is the unwillingness on the side of "Science" - lets help him and say scientists - to take seriously for example the 10.000th person with claims of psychic powers.
Why does he himself fail to bring on results, by the way?

It would be a waste of time in the eyes of most scientists - up to now more than 1000 have actually tried themselves in vain with the challenge alone, I don't think, 10.000 is hyperbole, actually.

Just because people so dearly want to believe in the supernatural, in order to soothe their fear of death (and serve their dreams of magical powers) - that they come in their thousands, and for at least decades, and want it tested again - doesn't justify to keep testing.
That is not a rational reason!
Luckily Randi does even away with arguments against being rational concerning where you do your research along "for the sake of furthering human knowledge and insight" - a lá soo important - everybody and everything needs to be taken seriously.
Everybody is taken seriously and can provide positive evidence - the first ever.
Randi himself believes in it - at least, that is why he started it all - so no bias accusations will be feasible here.
Something interesting at the side - I repeat it - most of the people failing to produce the goods, did go on believing in their powers anyway.
Meaning they were oblivious to evidence - delusions - including of grandeur.

But why are we supposed to throw out rational decisions on how to use our resources on the basis of such - immature in my eyes - sentiments? Why?

If it were about, if it is beneficial for milk production, when you feed a cow with mice and beat it daily - nobody would argue for ongoing experiments - to take it to an extreme example.
Either it works - or it doesn't work. If something works, and we can't understand it - that justifies science.
Not wishful thinking.

The day someone proves that it is impossible to turn a dining room table into a pregnant dinosaur, by the power of thought alone, is the day I will believe it.

Originally Posted by Voldmer

The day someone proves that it is impossible to turn a dining room table into a pregnant dinosaur, by the power of thought alone, is the day I will believe it.

Keep trying man.

Originally Posted by Dthoughts

Well, is it not an assumption to say that light is constant and has been a constant since the big bang? Considering we have only been measuring the speed of light for 400 years. I think this is where sheldrake's argument lies. I invite you to come up with a counter-argument, i'm eager to hear ur response

The various aspects of this have already been covered in the thread. There are a couple of points worth repeating. The first is that we can measure the speed of light super accurately, so even if it had only changed 1% since the Big Bang, that's still a rate we could detect. The second is that this is why it's not a assumption - not in Sheldrake's sense of 'dogma', anyway. Scientists are open to the possibility it could have changed; they just generally work with models where it doesn't, because we haven't detected any change. That's what scientists mean by 'assumption'. Sheldrake's trying to say that scientists just randomly decided it was true and will stick to it without paying any heed to the evidence; this isn't true. People never assumed it was true because "Einstein said so". Einstein only said so in the first place because various experiments had shown it. Anybody who just appeals to the person of Einstein is not behaving as a scientist and probably doesn't understand or work in science.

As StephL said, science isn't about claiming things are impossible. "Telepathy is impossible", for example, isn't a scientific statement. All that science does is not assert the statement "telepathy occurs", because it gives special status to a set of observations, when we don't actually observe anything that would point to that set of observations rather than the set given by "telepathy does not occur".

Originally Posted by Xei

That's not true... not so long ago you were focusing on Sheldrake's claim that the unchanging nature of physical laws and constants was a "dogma". That's nothing to do with materialism, it's just plain physics.

So far as I can tell, Sheldrake attacked the dogma of an eternal and fixed universe which predates the big bang and leaves no room for universal laws to continue evolving. The Big Bang Theory necessitates a glitch or accident, but after this glitch universal laws come into being in a fixed manner. It seems more viable to me that if a glitch brought existence into being as we know it, a glitch can reoccur as well. And if laws developed in the early development of the universe, they can continue developing now. This allows physics to follow the same pattern as natural selection.

StephL - It's fine to claim there's not enough positive evidence for something, the issue is that materialists fall back on a default worldview that also stands without any evidence. From there, telepathy leaves the table for any viable hypothesis outright. It becomes the last resort for materialists to answer questions about any of nature's mysteries. The profundity of some of these mysteries in particular, such as the movement of a school of fish, have been marginalized on this very thread to an extreme degree. It's okay to be skeptical, but eventually it just sounds obtuse.

That's already been discussed, I was just making the point about the 'materialism' thing.

Right, so far as I can tell you paraded the materialist worldview as just plain physics. To me that's like upholding Freud's theories as "just plain psychology" even though eventually new ideas became more prevalent.

Any variations in physical behaviour would themselves be aspects of physics. How is one model of physics "materialism" and another not?

Mostly my quips in this thread appear to go unnoticed, but I'll throw in another one, which seems increasingly pertinent.

All our "knowledge" comes about in pretty much the same way: first observations are made, and then a model is constructed based on the observations.

If the model is purely quantitative, then the approach is pure statistics, but a subsequent "understanding" of the model may be applied (or even used in its construction), and this is the case for physics.

Now, when doing proper statistics, it is well known that extrapolating far beyond the domain of the observations is dangerous at best, and often will lead to catastrophicly erroneous models/predictions. Therefore, extrapolation is generally avoided - or at least kept within "good reason".

In physics, all observations have been made on, or near, Earth in recent times. Therefore, proper statistical procedure would entail considering the derived theories applicable only on, or near, Earth in our present time (or the recent past)

However, the general view amongst physicists is that the theories are applicable across all of the universe, and at all times past, present, and future.

A statistician allowing him/herself such largesse would not merely be frowned upon by his/her peers, but would be ridiculed and disregarded as a mere amateur.

It would appear that physicists have lower scientific standards, than do the statisticians. But they make up for this with a profoundly higher level of belief in their own ability to construct theories.

I agree. Theoretical physics is not the same as science. What Einstein did was not science, but extrapolation based on how he assumed the universe works AFAIK. His ideas got varified only after he died.

Xei.. Please answer this.

You say that we can measure the speed of light very precisely. I am intrigued. What method would you use to measure the speed of light 10 billion years ago?

Originally Posted by Voldmer

However, the general view amongst physicists is that the theories are applicable across all of the universe, and at all times past, present, and future.

Hmm. I had thought that this understanding that their model works everywhere in the universe was based not just on math, but on empirical evidence...

Originally Posted by Sageous

Hmm. I had thought that this understanding that their model works everywhere in the universe was based not just on math, but on empirical evidence...

Most people do probably believe the same. But there is no empirical evidence from the rest of the universe; all of it has been collected here.