(2017-08-14, 12:05 PM)Chris Wrote: A criticism often made by sceptics is that after a century or so of experimental psi research, there is still no reliably reproducible demonstration that psi exists.
I wonder if people think that's a fair criticism.
If not, can people suggest an experimental protocol that's capable of reliably demonstrating a psi effect?
If so, what does it tell us? If psi exists, why should it be so elusive?
[I posted this previously at liberaparolado, and the short discussion that followed can be seen here:
http://www.liberaparolado.com/phpBB3/vie...p?f=8&t=11 ]
Is it a fair criticism? It's probably an understandable one. The lack of reliable reproducibility is an issue, as is the the fact that "psi effects" seem to disappear as the controls get stricter. These issues, along with any explanation of mechanism, leave the field exposed to doubt.
(2017-08-14, 09:56 PM)Kamarling Wrote: When a sceptic who can't be bothered to look can dismiss all anecdotal evidence with a hand wave, there is no wonder that the claim that there is no evidence is repeated so often.
When a scientist can say that science is only concerned with the natural and that the "supernatural" is, therefore, not science and unworthy of further investigation, then how is evidence to be found or confirmed?
It's more than a hand wave IMO. Take PK. We know that an object moves when a force acts on that object. If some sort of unmeasurable, unexplained mental force could be acting on an object then this should be affecting physics and engineering projects all over the place.
Your question is a tricky one. One would have to be mad to get into this field of research
but in cases where there is a resultant action in the natural world (like PK) there should be some way of testing it, and finding a mechanism.