On 2013-05-30 02:49, Sean Giles wrote:

Quote:

On 2013-05-30 01:42, Smoking Camel wrote:
I recon that in the moments right before death, all skepticism crumbles.

I reckon that in the moments right AFTER death, all religion crumbles

On 2013-05-30 09:22, Slim King wrote:
Scientists may have THEORIES but there has NEVER been any proof of exactly what DeJa Vu is .. It's all theory and conjecture.
Yet many millions of people have memories before the events happen!!!!! It is so frequent that others say it's NORMAL .... But it's not. We are surrounded daily buy many Paranormal events.

On 2013-05-30 01:42, Smoking Camel wrote:
I recon that in the moments right before death, all skepticism crumbles.

On 2013-05-29 23:48, Pakar Ilusi wrote:
Those who need scientific evidence will never convince those who don't that scientific evidence is needed.

Case in point, deities.

I'll leave it at that.

On 2013-05-30 12:24, Slim King wrote:
Garret. You are simply wrong and your assumptions are just that.

On 2013-05-30 17:43, Smoking Camel wrote:
Here's an interesting take on "The science delusion" .the science folk at TED subsequently banned(?) the talk. It's 20 mins but well worth a watch.

http://youtu.be/JKHUaNAxsTg

On 2013-05-30 21:35, Garrette wrote:

Quote:

On 2013-05-30 17:43, Smoking Camel wrote:
Here's an interesting take on "The science delusion" .the science folk at TED subsequently banned(?) the talk. It's 20 mins but well worth a watch.

http://youtu.be/JKHUaNAxsTg

I’ve got a lengthy discussion of Sheldrake’s lecture, but I’ll start with a short version for those who don’t want to read the whole thing (and I don’t blame you):

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Sheldrake speaks well, but his talk has at least the following flaws:

1. He moves between definitions of “science” without making it clear when he does so

2. He falsely attributes 10 Dogmas to science

3. He misrepresents changes in the speed of light and in the Gravitational Constant as actual changes as opposed to refinements in measurement

4. He presents his idea of Morphic Resonance as both hypothesis and theory

5. He claims evidence of Morphic Resonance but has no references for that evidence either within the lecture or outside it

6. He takes a Dawkins quotation out of context to misleadingly change its meaning

In short, it is not a convincing lecture at all.

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And here’s the long version for those of you with too much time and too high a tolerance for boredom and pain:

I’m afraid that I find Sheldrake to be far from convincing, and given his obvious intelligence, breadth of experience, and excellent education, I find it hard to be charitable regarding his motives for basic errors.

He speaks at time of “science” as a methodology, as an institution, and as a body of facts. The problem is he slips between them without making it clear in order to imply whichever definition fits his current point. He starts out saying

Science believes it understands the nature of reality in principle, leaving only the details to be filled in.”

Well, science believes no such thing as it is simply a methodology. As for individual scientists, the degree to which they think there are only details left varies, but if the majority thought there were no more houses to be built but instead only baseboards and carpeting to be installed, then no one would be discussing String Theory or M-Theory and no one would be using the Large Hadron Collider. Frankly, on behalf of the legions of scientists who toil every day both in the application of known facts and in the search of new knowledge, I take offense every time somebody who knows better (like Sheldrake) throws out this misguided insult.

Do you not think that any of the scientists that Sheldrake derides wouldn’t love to be the one to prove that the speed of light is NOT constant, that G is not constant, or even that Morphic Resonance is true? Fame and Nobels await such a scientist.

Sheldrake compounds his insult with the tired and mistaken characterization of scientists as people who “don’t believe in God [but] believe in science.” Do no scientists believe in God? If they don’t, does this automatically mean they are blinkered functionaries? What if they believe in a God different from the one in which Sheldrake believes? Are they still men of little mind? More than that, the idea of “believing” in science is nonsense. Belief implies a non-evidentiary position. Science is exactly the opposite. The methodology has proven to be effective (note: it has not proven to be perfect). As such, it has earned the trust of those who practice it as well as those who deride while enjoying its benefits.

Frankly, Sheldrake’s statement that there is a conflict between “science as a method of inquiry…and science as a worldview,” and that the latter “has come to inhibit and constrict the free inquiry which is the very lifeblood of the scientific endeavor” is ludicrous. Science is not a worldview. Science is, as he says, a method of inquiry. Even if it were a worldview, how does it inhibit or constrict anyone’s free inquiry? Sheldrake himself is free to conduct whatever inquiry he likes. The fact that he can’t support his conclusions with evidence is not indicative of a shortcoming of science but of his methods. He is a man made of souring grapes.

Sheldrake further earns my scorn when he quotes Richard Dawkins out of context. Sheldrake says that Dawkins called humans “lumbering robots,” and Sheldrake means it as an example of Dawkins subscribing to the evil scientific worldview. But the entire context of Dawkins’ remarks (from “The Selfish Gene”) make it quite clear that he was calling both the body and the mind together (remember that Dawkins distinguishes the two; it disproves another of Sheldrake’s points) a lumbering robot in their role as the vessel that allows the replication and therefore survival of the gene. It is not a trivial distinction, and Sheldrake’s characterization of Dawkins’ comment as evidence that scientists view everything, including people, as mere machines is simply and factually wrong. Moreover, Sheldrake is smart enough to know this. If he isn’t, he has no business making such a speech as is in the link; if he is, he’s being intentionally deceptive.

Sheldrake lists 10 “Dogmas of Science” in order to attack them. I won’t list all ten, but most are simply incorrect. I will list a couple of the major ones that are incorrect and incorrect in such a way as to undermine all of Sheldrake’s position.

Dogma #2: ”Matter is unconscious. There is no consciousness in stars, planets, or plants or animals, and there ought not to be consciousness in us, either, if this thing is true.”

While it is true that most scientists do not hold that there is consciousness in stars, planets, or plants, it is a minority of scientists who hold that there is no consciousness in at least some animals and certainly a negligible minority who think there is or ought not to be consciousness in humans (though most won’t separate them from other animals, either). Sheldrake is simply wrong, and as his attack on this dogma is one of the key pillars of his position, his entire argument falls here. Scientists, psychologists, neurologists, and biologists cannot fully explain consciousness, but its existence is not in itself a puzzle. Consciousness as an emergent property (and “mind” as an emergent property) is hardly new and is certainly not the means by which Sheldrake’s evil materialistic enemy is to be overthrown.

Dogma #4: The total amount of energy in the universe is always the same except at the moment of the Big Bang ”when it all sprang into existence from nowhere in an instant.”

The first part of that is true in a broad sense. The net amount of energy (calculating mass in there, too), is zero, just as it has been since at least micro-seconds after the Big Bang.

The second part is only trivially true. “Nowhere” didn’t exist at the moment of the Big Bang because “somewhere” didn’t exist. Sheldrake may have meant “nothing” instead of “nowhere,” but it doesn’t help his case. “Nothing” can’t really exist. This isn’t a philosophical position; it is a consequence of quantum physics and its principles, specifically the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle. I am far, far, out of my depth in discussing this, but I am knowledgeable enough to know that Sheldrake (who, though well educated, is no more a quantum physicist than I am) is out of his depth, too, and has missed a key point.

Dogma #10: ”Mechanistic medicine is the only kind that really works” therefore Governments ”ignore complementary and alternative medicine.”

In the United States, the National Institute for Health began sponsoring Complementary and Alternative Medicine Centers in 1994, and the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine in 1999. In the United Kingdom, complementary medicine has been part of the National Health Service for years. Frankly, I don’t think the NCCAM should exist, and its track record bears that out, but the fact remains that Sheldrake is again factually wrong. The Government has adopted those medicines, and it did so long ago.

He is wrong about his other dogmas, too, at least most of them, but I don’t want this to be longer than it already will be, so I will skip the others and move on to physical constants.

Sheldrake spends a lot of time discussing the speed of light and whether it actually is a constant. To be honest, I don’t know why he spends time on this, because if it were shown that the speed of light isn’t constant it would mean that most of the models of the universe and cosmos would need to be adjusted. That would win people some Nobels and lead to even greater understanding, but it would not suddenly prove telepathy. Universal models have changed before; it is likely they will change again. Big deal.

But even if it mattered, Sheldrake provides exactly zero evidence that the speed of light isn’t a constant. His entire argument rests entirely on a misunderstanding of what he was told by the head of “Metrology at the National Physics Lab.” Finding the exact speed of light is a matter of measurement AND of correlating with other knowns in the scientific world. Sheldrake fixates on a non-controversy from 1928 to 1945 when the recognized speed of light shifted by less than an error bar from earlier measurements. He then misstates when the latest speed of light was settled on by saying it was defined into existence in 1972. Well, it actually was “defined”, but it was in 1983 and it wasn’t arbitrary. There was science behind the decision, science based on the knowledge that finding a perfect vacuum in which to use perfect instruments to perfectly measure how fast light moves is impossible.

He does virtually the same thing with the Gravitational Constant, though he is more vague in his attacks. Suffice it to say that, just like for the speed of light, Sheldrake offers exactly zero evidence to support his claim.

Finally, there is why Sheldrake is really at the TEDx talk: To promote his hypothesis of “Morphic Resonance.” He bounces back and forth between calling it a hypothesis and a theory, but it doesn’t matter. There is insufficient evidence to say it has merit. I’m not saying he should abandon it. Sheldrake can hypothesize it and research it all he likes, and when he actually proves it, then I will applaud him as he accepts his own Nobel Prize. Until then he needs to be honest and say that his hypothesis is no more than that, but he doesn’t.

He talks about evidence. Evidence that isn’t really there. He says there is evidence that rats trained on a new trick in one location make it easier for rats of the same breed to learn the same trick in another location, yet he provides no references. (I went to his website hoping to find references there; the only remote reference is an offhand comment in one of his articles (not scientific papers) about how it happened long ago, but there is no mention of a paper confirming it and no indication that Sheldrake himself has attempted to replicate it).

He says the same thing of crystals. They have memories. Make a new crystal, and it may be difficult to do. Make a second and it is easier because the second crystal has the memories of the first. The third is easier still, and so on. Is there evidence of this? No. Has Sheldrake done any experiments on it? No.

One can only assume that dogmatic scientists hide in Sheldrake’s lab waiting to knock beakers from his hand should he dare attempt to create a crystal.

Sheldrake speaks well, and he is quite engaging, and he quotes a friend of his who has a catchy phrase about scientists and the Big Bang (”Give us one free miracle, and we’ll explain the rest.”). But the catchy phrase is in the end as empty as Sheldrake’s lecture.