(2018-05-05, 09:57 PM)Chris Wrote: [ -> ]That's rather like claiming someone is mentally ill, and when asked to back up your claim, posting without comment a link to a web page entitled "How to diagnose mental illness".
Why would that be upsetting?
(2018-05-05, 09:39 PM)fls Wrote: [ -> ]http://cccrg.cochrane.org/sites/cccrg.co...r_2016.pdf
This is particular to research for journals. And, in the end, do you actually believe that it changes any of what I said about being arbitrary?
Quote:Reasons to downgrade the evidence quality:
1. Risk of Bias
2. Inconsistency
3. Indirectness
4. Imprecision
5. Publication Bias
For these 5 criteria, if
• no serious concern exists, do not downgrade quality from the baseline quality (e.g. high for RCTs)
• serious concern exists, downgrade the evidence one level, e.g. from high to moderate (- 1)
• very serious concern exists, downgrade the evidence two levels, e.g. from high to low (- 2)
Care to point out which of these is so set in stone as to not be impacted based on who the person is that is applying them? Certainly risk of bias is entirely subjective. Inconsistency is vague, though I get its general purpose. Indirectness, same thing. Imprecision could perhaps be measured more soundly in a statistical manner than the others and is the only one I can really see as having any sort of potential truly objective basis. Publication bias is, again, entirely subjective.
What is "serious concern"? How is that defined? Surely that too is obviously subjective. Again, nothing concrete at all.
Quote:Decisions to down- or up-grade are not all or nothing, and they rely on your judgement.
Interesting that the very link you shared points this out. This is not a technical standard, nor is it an objective one. It is an arbitrary points system that is applied subjectively and requires the judgment of anyone doing the analysis. At their core, the factors above are guidelines for helping one analyze evidence. Does this, in some way, indicate "technicality" to you? Those seem like ordinary things that a well informed person would consider when considering any evidence. I'm confident that many of us here consider those factors and more when analyzing evidence for psi. Because some come to conclusions that you do not agree with does not mean that the evidence is not sound or would not satisfy many of those criteria just because you, personally, do not think they do.
The link is reinforcing exactly what I am saying, and flies in the face of your suggestion that there is some tried and true method for evidentiary analysis that makes it clear that the evidence strongly favors the skeptical position. Just as I said at the beginning, it depends on who is doing the analysis. There is nothing set in stone about it, and rational and well reasoned individuals could certainly look to the factors in that link and conclude that the evidence for specific occurrences of phenomena or the phenomena themselves at large generally satisfies them, without too much "serious concern". The analysis is laden with subjectivity - there is nothing "strictly speaking" about it, in spite of your best attempts to play the role of rational guardian of objective fact here.
The links are meant to show that it isn't that this information hasn't already been offered, in exquisite detail. It's that it's not going to make a difference to go over it yet again.
Regardless of what anybody believes, I think there is general recognition that there is widespread skepticism amongst the scientific community, rather than acceptance.
(2018-05-06, 02:44 AM)fls Wrote: [ -> ]The links are meant to show that it isn't that this information hasn't already been offered, in exquisite detail. It's that it's not going to make a difference to go over it yet again.
Regardless of what anybody believes, I think there is general recognition that there is widespread skepticism amongst the scientific community, rather than acceptance.
I'm not really focusing on that information. I'm focusing on challenging your notion that this is as objective as you're suggesting, which you haven't responded to.
Widespread skepticism in the scientific community can be for a variety of reasons. That's a nice appeal to authority that doesn't take your argument anywhere. People who aren't members of that community are also capable of thinking for themselves and critically and reasonably assessing evidence, though it has always seemed clear that you believe otherwise.
What the scientific community says about any given topic is not creed or automatically, unassailably correct.
(2018-05-06, 02:44 AM)fls Wrote: [ -> ]I think there is general recognition that there is widespread skepticism amongst the scientific community, rather than acceptance.
In the
relevant scientific community (of parapsychology), there is
widespread acceptance.
This is the scientific community that actually studies the phenomena. If you want to know the scientific consensus on a physics theory, you don't ask biologists or appeal to "the scientific community" in general - you ask physicists.
If you want to know the scientific consensus on the strength of evidence in the field of parapsychology, you ask parapsychologists.
They've been asked. There's a consensus.