Parapsychology - a Pretender of Science

In continuing my series on the Philosophy of Science, this is the first of a multi-part video about "The Pretenders of Science." This video deals with parapsychology and why it's not science.

Other videos in the series include:
Science and its Hypotheses - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4OzFth9aTiw


Sources:
Theodore Schick and Lewis Vaughn. "How to Think About Weird Things: Critical Thinking for a New Age." (Chapter 7 "Science and Its Pretenders")

Category:

Education

Tags:

• Parapsychology
• telepathy
• clairvoyance
• psychokinesis
• philosophy
• of
• science
• critical
• thinking
• atheist
• agnostic
• free
• thinker
• open
• minded
• criteria
• adequacy
• Schick
• and
• Vaughn
• Karl
• Popper
• falsifiability
• scientific
• hypothesis
• theory
• laws

[TheTruthgeneral]

So your analogy of the printer as with most analogies is irrelevant or simply not suited with the ideas you are really dealing with.So ID can be judged as a scientific proposition as it is asserting something about about that which is empirically accessible and its validity/invalidity can be established by empirical means

[crazypills2]

@TheTruthgeneral "So ID can be judged as a scientific proposition as it is asserting something about about that which is empirically accessible and its validity/invalidity can be established by empirical means"

Can it? ID is a moving target, as shown with the printer analogy. Once you demonstrate something isn't irreducibly complex (e.g. human eye, bacterial flagellum), they simply move the target and say the components upon which these evolved are irreducibly complex. ID isn't truly testable.

[NanZing1]

As are your unfounded claims in the video, crazypills2. where's your reference list? (I'll go through again and post a note with the specific inaccuracies)

[crazypills2]

@NanZing1 "I'll go through again and post a note with the specific inaccuracies"

Ok, I'll be happy to review your list. I did note a source in my description box.

[NanZing1]

Very concise and clear but shot through with a number of inaccuracies. Want to convince folk who are open minded? Get your facts straight.

[crazypills2]

@NanZing1 "Very concise and clear but shot through with a number of inaccuracies"

Please elaborate. Unsubstantiated statements are meaningless.

[KasparHauser4]

While parapsychology is indeed bunk, It is uncanny how a spouse can predict your behaviour and even your words in a conversation after a few years.

[NubianTribesman]

Parapsychology may be false science, but it makes good sci-fi, nevertheless, 5 stars.

[IceAges14Aces]

and last, what we call an ordinary or extraordinary hypothesis is all in the eye of the beholder.

You can test any hypothesis in science as long as the hypothesis is testable, falsifiable, and makes a prediction in the normal distribution under scientific and statistical criteria...

[IceAges14Aces]

@crazypills2 All experiments whether they are from clinical, biological, psychological, etc. are open to lurking variables just like psi-experiments. On the contrary to this video, lurking variables (e.g. sensory leakage, publication bias, etc.) have been slowly adressed and controled as time went by. Finally, the sheep-goat assumption is a valid hypothesis in scientific research since it makes a prediction in both sides of the normal distribution and legitimate for two-tailed t-test...

[IceAges14Aces]

@crazypills2 Sorry, but this antagonistic video of parapsychology is very misleading. It is so misleading, it even expresses your profound ignorance in its literature. "Parapsychology lacks independent replication" Wrong, if you look at, for instance, the ganzfeld you can clearly see the weighted z-score averages in the meta-studies from different researchers have been replicated. Second, the fact that psi experiments are open to lurking variables doesn't make parapsychology bunk. (continue)

[TheTruthgeneral]

It should be apparent that I mixed up this video for vid on ID please leave a comment here nonetheless

[TheTruthgeneral]

The problem with your presentation in your improper definition of intelligent design.While I agree with you that it is not necessary to posit its validity there is a distinction between metaphysical creation and the intelligent design proposition.So if a suitable use of Darwinian mechanisms can properly reduce that which is classed as irreducible by ID proponents then one has refuted their main assertion and they cannot go any further as intelligent design is not a philosophical position.