Vaccines

I object to the word, "feeling," as in, "the parent has a feeling the vaccination caused their child's autism." That the child lost speech or motor skills within a few days of/beginning with a vaccination is a different and serious matter and deserves a different word. That someone would describe it like so is clearly deceptive wordplay.

Hah... B.S. ...you were using rhetorical tactics to try and assert your superiority and authority. Now you're acting like the victim. It is impossible to have a productive conversation with you, because it is impossible to build consensus around any set of facts. Even when something is blatantly obvious, you won't simply agree on it without throwing in misdirection, rhetorical tactics, or tossing it in a word salad.

 "It is impossible to have a productive conversation with you, because it is impossible to build consensus around any set of facts. Even when something is blatantly obvious, you won't simply agree on it without throwing in misdirection, rhetorical tactics, or tossing it in a word salad."

Precisely.
 

Please look at this video in the link, I'm sorry for the advert at the beginning, but it was the only one I could find quickly. Can you see that the interviewer is not really listening to the lady being interviewed. It's the same with so many others. Listen to her say that she knows 'so many others' that had the same experience. It's both fascinating and very sad. You will never convince my friend or this lady that there is not a problem with the MMR vaccine, they'll probably go to their grave knowing that. 

Why is there not an option to have them separately? 

Why is mercury included in the jab? Or at least in some, as I have said, we paid extra to have a 'mercury free' one. Looking at the video I put up earlier, I wouldn't want mercury near me, never mind injected into a baby!

I think we ought to keep in mind that the vast majority of us want the same thing. Our intentions are pure. I know about intentions and roads.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/health/n...ccine.html

I agree that the woman seems impervious to anything but her perception that the vaccine caused her son's autism.

Are you suggesting that her reasoning is valid?

Linda

I object to the word, "feeling," as in, "the parent has a feeling the vaccination caused their child's autism." That the child lost speech or motor skills within a few days of/beginning with a vaccination is a different and serious matter and deserves a different word. That someone would describe it like so is clearly deceptive wordplay.

Feeling, gut feeling, hunch, intuition...are all synonyms for a way of thinking ("thinking fast") which relies on heuristics like those described in Stan's video. There is no insult in the use of the word, in that the use of feeling is somehow a bad thing. Emotions can be a powerful decision-making tool. It's a matter of which process produces valid results for a particular set of conditions.

See "Thinking Fast and Slow" by Kahneman for more.

Linda

I agree that the woman seems impervious to anything but her perception that the vaccine caused her son's autism.

Are you suggesting that her reasoning is valid?

Linda

Maybe you are the first example of a computer becoming 'conscious' Linda. 

I agree that the sense of 'know it' is difficult to dismiss. And people have been relying on it for millennia to make sense of the world. Doctors relied on it for centuries to come up with treatments like bloodletting and purgatives, for all that ails you. We have grown more sophisticated in our knowledge base, but that feeling remains in use.

The problem is that when you have the opportunity to get feedback on whether or not 'know it' was right (the high-validity environment I mentioned earlier in the thread), it is often discovered to be wrong. In particular, the confidence you have in the feeling is pretty much unrelated to whether 'know it' is right or not when that knowledge was gained in a low-validity environment.

Yes, some parents 'know' that vaccines caused autism in their kid. And when the opportunity arose to get feedback on whether that feeling was right, with the investigations into this possibility with decent quality research, it didn't support the idea that the feeling was right. Even the study in "Vaxxed" shows that there is no increased risk for any kids, except maybe black, boys who had their vaccine late. That doesn't mean the feeling goes away, though, so it comes down to whether you trust validity or whether you trust your feelings, and I think we all know which is likely to be the winner in all that. 

Research pretty clearly shows that, even among scientists (who at least have some practice in depending upon validity), people will go with their gut, unless the information is presented in a way which makes questions about validity explicit and intuitive. For example, if you ask people what you would expect to see if there were no connection between vaccines and autism, the fact that some diagnoses of autism will be made in proximity to vaccination through happenstance becomes explicit. Then when you ask if there is a way to sort out beforehand which of the vaccine/autism combinations was due to happenstance and which were due to causation, the results of an investigation which shows that the number of vaccine/autism combinations is indistinguishable from happenstance, becomes more intuitively acceptable.

Linda

You might like to watch if you've not, the video I posted yesterday titled "The Illusion of Truth". It backs up what you've described.

As I've said previously to Dante several times, someone who lacks knowledge and experience on a particular subject would not be considered an expert on that subject, regardless of their credentials. The bulk of Dante's rant does not represent something I have said or would agree with. I have mentioned this to her/him before (and I imagine mentioning this yet again will not matter).

Linda

This is absolutely false, because you have stated that you consider certain scientists with no knowledge or experience on psi topics to be experts on that and disregarded the actual experts who have done studies. As I said before, someone like Tim is a person I'd consider more credible to speak on NDE research than the bulk of random neuroscientists who blindly dismiss the research and whose word you take as valuable. I have said all that to you in the past, and in just the same way I imagine it will not get through your unwavering commitment to the traditional materialistic approach.

That even people with expertise can make incorrect predictions or wrong judgements is a wholly unremarkable claim. What I questioned was, if even people with expertise can get it wrong, does it make sense to give weight to the judgements and predictions of people without expertise? And then I invited you (and anyone else here) to give thoughtful consideration to that question and see if  you could find examples where doing so turned out to be valid. I'm the only one who has offered up an example, so far.

Linda, I repeat, the whole point of our disagreement was who we were defining as experts. I don't lend a ton of credence to those who haven't done any research, reading, or studying at all (again, I generally read that broadly). The vast, vast majority of those who have conducted psi research or reading or studying in some capacity have tended to believe the legitimacy of the phenomena, as has been said to you and others before. Your usual nonsense response is that that's only because we wouldn't know about the people who disagree. The point is, the heavy majority of those who actually do studies on the stuff think there's more to it than reductive, ordinary explanations that current science can or will certainly account for. With that being the case, and your heavy deference to such experts, why are their opinions not more persuasive to you?

We did? All I remember is that you went off on some rant about scientists who weren't familiar with the research and I explicitly agreed with you that they shouldn't be considered experts. I still haven't figured out what you think we disagree on.

You can continue to say "rant", it lends no more validity to what you're saying. We disagree because you blatantly have discussed opinions of neuroscientists at large who say the phenomena are "impossible", which is complete nonsense and isn't backed up by anything remotely conclusive in current science, and who have not seriously considered or conducted any research themselves (let alone experienced an NDE or the like - note that there are a number of stories of scientists or doctors undergoing an NDE and changing their mind). 

Yes, of course I've considered it. That's why I started a thread asking for people to demonstrate their analysis of a scientific study, that's why I bring up research for discussion, that's why I talk about those details someone familiar with reading and analyzing scientific studies would also be interested in. It would be wonderful to be able to discuss issues with studies or consider underlying factors, especially those that people who don't challenge authority have missed (I've brought up many of these in my time on these forums).

No one is going to play a game where you post a paper, they analyze it, and then you essentially rate their performance in analysis. Amazing that you'd say that you've brought up many of them without acknowledging the necessity to challenge mainstream scientific "authority", including those who incessantly criticize paranormal research without giving it the time of day or much more than that. Your thinly veiled attempt at saying people here don't challenge authority is just hilarious.

This is absolutely false, because you have stated that you consider certain scientists with no knowledge or experience on psi topics to be experts on that and disregarded the actual experts who have done studies. As I said before, someone like Tim is a person I'd consider more credible to speak on NDE research than the bulk of random neuroscientists who blindly dismiss the research and whose word you take as valuable. I have said all that to you in the past, and in just the same way I imagine it will not get through your unwavering commitment to the traditional materialistic approach.

I have not said that. I agree with you that a neuroscientist with no experience or knowledge on psi topics would not be an expert on psi, and I would not have any interest in what they have to say on the subject. 

How many times do I have to say this?

Linda

You might like to watch if you've not, the video I posted yesterday titled "The Illusion of Truth". It backs up what you've described.

I dislike watching videos, by the way.   It's way too slow as a method of gaining information.

Eight minutes isn't bad, though. That was a good video.

Linda