Reber and Alcock respond to Cardeña's paper in the American Psychologist

Courtesy of the SPR Facebook page - a year on from the publication of Etzel Cardeña's paper, "The experimental evidence for parapsychological phenomena: A review," here's the abstract of a forthcoming response in the same journal by Arthur S. Reber and James E. Alcock:

Searching for the impossible: Parapsychology’s elusive quest.
Recently, American Psychologist published a review of the evidence for parapsychology that supported the general claims of psi (the umbrella term often used for anomalous or paranormal phenomena). We present an opposing perspective and a broad-based critique of the entire parapsychology enterprise. Our position is straightforward. Claims made by parapsychologists cannot be true. The effects reported can have no ontological status; the data have no existential value. We examine a variety of reasons for this conclusion based on well-understood scientific principles. In the classic English adynaton, “pigs cannot fly.” Hence, data that suggest that they can are necessarily flawed and result from weak methodology or improper data analyses or are Type I errors. So it must be with psi effects. What we find particularly intriguing is that, despite the existential impossibility of psi phenomena and the nearly 150 years of efforts during which there has been, literally, no progress, there are still scientists who continue to embrace the pursuit.
https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2019-31453-001

“pigs cannot fly.” Hence, data that suggest that they can are necessarily flawed and result from weak methodology or improper data analyses or are Type I errors.

Wow, case closed. What an excellent argument.

There's a link on that page labelled "Purchase PDF". Based on the published abstract, I can't think why anyone, regardless of stance, would wish to do so. There isn't anything to arouse any curiosity, like "Wow, tell me more. I want to see the details!".

Edit: that may be the aim, to shut down the debate, to turn people away from even looking. Or even thinking.

There's a link on that page labelled "Purchase PDF". Based on the published abstract, I can't think why anyone, regardless of stance, would wish to do so. There isn't anything to arouse any curiosity, like "Wow, tell me more. I want to see the details!".

Edit: that may be the aim, to shut down the debate, to turn people away from even looking. Or even thinking.

Considering that Cardeña's paper was about experimental data, the abstract does give the impression that the response is based on an a priori argument that psi is impossible, rather than an examination of the evidence.

I hope the abstract is supposed to be an attention grabbing device and that the paper itself is more nuanced.

I couldn't remember having seen the name Reber before, so I did a Google search and found his page on the Skeptical Inquirer website:
https://skepticalinquirer.org/authors/arthur-s-reber/

Apparently he's published only one paper in that periodical, 36 years ago, entitled "On the Paranormal: In Defense of Skepticism," but according to his own website one of the courses he teaches is called "Critical Review of Parapsychology."

Anyhow, according to that paper, his reasons for being sceptical in 1982-3 were essentially:
(1) Psi isn't reliable,
(2) Psi contradicts the laws of physics and
(3) Psi hasn't been explained mechanistically.

But in effect he acknowledged that the third of these was dispensable, and that it was the first two - especially the first - that were  most important.

Thankfully there's no need to pay to read this article, as the authors have summarised their arguments in another article in the Skeptical Inquirer, which is available here:
https://skepticalinquirer.org/2019/07/wh...t-be-true/

As suggested by the abstract, they rely on a priori arguments that psi is impossible, rather than examining the experimental data. Indeed, they go so far as to say:
"We did not examine the data for psi, to the consternation of the parapsychologist who was one of the reviewers. Our reason was simple: the data are irrelevant."

The a priori arguments seem remarkably similar to the ones advanced by Reber 36 years ago. They say their comments about physics were vetted by two experts in quantum mechanics and declared correct, but I actually find it hard to believe that an expert in quantum mechanics would endorse stuff like this:
"If the future affected the present, it would violate the thermodynamic principle that energy cannot be created or destroyed in an isolated system. The act of choosing a card from a fixed array, a common procedure used in psi research, involves neurological processes that use measurable biomechanical energy. The choice is presumed to be caused by a future that, having no existential reality, lacks energy."

Following these lines of argument, would it also be possible to rule out the existence of consciousness itself too? I'm not sure it could be located among any of the laws of physics. Do the researchers on realising this then disappear? OK, the last comment was whimsical, but my initial question was entirely serious.

Thankfully there's no need to pay to read this article, as the authors have summarised their arguments in another article in the Skeptical Inquirer, which is available here:
https://skepticalinquirer.org/2019/07/wh...t-be-true/

As suggested by the abstract, they rely on a priori arguments that psi is impossible, rather than examining the experimental data. Indeed, they go so far as to say:
"We did not examine the data for psi, to the consternation of the parapsychologist who was one of the reviewers. Our reason was simple: the data are irrelevant."

The a priori arguments seem remarkably similar to the ones advanced by Reber 36 years ago. They say their comments about physics were vetted by two experts in quantum mechanics and declared correct, but I actually find it hard to believe that an expert in quantum mechanics would endorse stuff like this:
"If the future affected the present, it would violate the thermodynamic principle that energy cannot be created or destroyed in an isolated system. The act of choosing a card from a fixed array, a common procedure used in psi research, involves neurological processes that use measurable biomechanical energy. The choice is presumed to be caused by a future that, having no existential reality, lacks energy."

"Psi doesn't exist, because, um... we say so! Case closed!"

Yeah, great logic. /s *Slow clap*

Thankfully there's no need to pay to read this article, as the authors have summarised their arguments in another article in the Skeptical Inquirer, which is available here:
https://skepticalinquirer.org/2019/07/wh...t-be-true/

As suggested by the abstract, they rely on a priori arguments that psi is impossible, rather than examining the experimental data. Indeed, they go so far as to say:
"We did not examine the data for psi, to the consternation of the parapsychologist who was one of the reviewers. Our reason was simple: the data are irrelevant."

It's perhaps worth pointing out that although they claim the data are irrelevant, they do actually make one claim about the data. They claim that attempts to replicate Daryl Bem's "Feeling the Future" studies "almost uniformly failed." That is perhaps the impression they got from a small number of failures that were publicised soon after the publication of Bem's paper. But the meta-analysis published by Bem and others in 2015 covered 90 studies and showed an overall Z value of 6.4 (and the result remained significant when Bem's original studies were excluded).

This meta-analysis is one of the ones included in the paper by Cardeña which Reber and Alcock are responding to. The second section in Cardeña's Table summarising the data is headed "Precognition/Bem-type studies." But it appears that Reber and Alcock really are serious about not examining the data.