Virtual Worlds and ESP 310
"Instead of thinking about telepathy from a present perspective, as in 'we have/use it now,' consider it from an evolutionary standpoint.Prehistoric humans with even a little telepathy would have enormous survival advantage. You'd be able to tell whether a predator was hiding behind the next rock, or whether it's an animal you're hunting for food. Or nothing, in which case you go off and hunt somewhere else.
In that case, natural selection would at the same time pressure animals, both predators and prey, to evolve to a form where they could block the effect so that their adversary (human or other) would have no idea where they were hiding.
Even if we can't tell where animals are hiding, even a little telepathy between humans could be used in group hunting and teaching offspring, or summoning help in a dire emergency. Even a brief feeling which influences your actions based on information from another human would confer enormous advantage.
Some people have reported that they have gotten 'feelings' that some loved one is in trouble, but frankly there is an overwhemingly enormous number of dire incidents throughout human history, each one of which would select for having the telepathic trait. Something as simple as children having the ability to alert their parents that they are in trouble would still confer enormous survival advantage.
From an evolutionary perspective, telepathy is a strong survival trait. Since we don't see it in the gene pool, it's unlikely that it's even possible."
Sesticulus raises a similar idea in a more compact form (it could be called the haven't been slapped" argument): "Invariably if I'm in a public place, there will be someone I find attractive and I will think "hey now". I've never had someone come up and slap me for thinking rude thoughts, so at the very least, women I find attractive, as a rule, do not have telepathy."
Reader seanellis writes with his prediction of the experiment's outcome:
"This experiment is very poorly controlled (who's to say that two people aren't also on the phone to one another, for example?), and some startlingly accurate correlations will occur. These will be debunked as the players come under scrutiny and the communication channels between players are detected.However, after these have been removed, some correlations between players will still remain, below the level of statistical significance. Rather than being dismissed as insignificant, the woo-woo crowd will seize on these random correlations as 'proof of need of more research.'
This prediction is not the result of clairvoyance, rather it is an educated guess based on previous observations of this kind of setup."
Even more dubious, dpbsmith writes not to "discount the possibility of outright fraud," asking: "Are they planning to strip-search the participants for hidden transmitters and receivers? To test and debug the system, have they hired a couple of good magicians skilled at 'mentalist' acts, with a promise to pay them well for their time if they can successfully cheat? Or, like most scientists, are they just protecting against unconscious cheating by honest, good-faith participants?"
Further, dpbsmith is disappointed that the article "doesn't really discuss the possibility of conscious, clever cheating... or implies that it's impossible because, well, gee, the system is so high-tech. ... People have smuggled transmitters and receivers into casinos, where the management is probably far more savvy, cynical, and experienced at detecting cheating — and financially motivated to do so — than these scientists."
Reader mdkemp took issue with the implication in some readers' comments that this research was disreputable, pointing out that such research is also undertaken "at respected institutions," writing: "Research into this stuff isn't just for [k]ooks and crazies -- even Princeton has a small lab the goal of which is to experimentally gather a 'better understanding of the role of consciousness in the establishment of physical reality.' It's called the 'Princeton Engineering Anomalies Research' (PEAR) lab, and its web page can be found at princeton.edu/~pear."
This met with an acerbic response from reader aepervius, who calls PEAR "a laughing stock" with "bad hypotheses, bias, bad statistical analysis, etc." He points out critical reports critical of PEAR at skepdic and at the Skeptic Report.
Reader RexRhino expressed a common sentiment:
"Can someone tell me why this isn't as outrageous as spending tax money to research 'intelligent design'? I mean, there is no real scientific theory that describes how telepathy would work, and virtually all scientific evidence says that telepathy doesn't exist. Telepathy is pretty much to fortune telling what Intelligent Design is to creationism — turning superstition into pseudo-science to make it palatable to the modern audience. I realize that England doesn't have the same strict legal seperation between religion and state as other countries, but even if research into the mystical and supernatural isn't strictly illegal it is certainly a questionable use of taxpayer money, no? Why are people outraged over Intelligent Design but not this kind of stuff?"
Reader Pyromage provided one answer to that question, writing: "Because it's possible to devise an experiment that could provide scientific evidence in its favor. ... Such an experiment does not — even in theory — exist for [Intelligent Design]."
Other responses to the story show that at least many Slashdot readers are none too happy with research into telepathy being done with tax monies. A long thread on that very topic raised several good points:
Reader denoir kicked off this thread with a sarcastic call to "invest some more tax money on finding UFOs, the Loch Ness Monster and inventing the perpetuum mobile!"
To this, reader misleb responded "I'm always been surprised at the kind of reaction anything labeled 'paranormal' gets from rational people. Why exactly couldn't telepathy exist? Is there some fundamental law of nature which states that two people cannot communicate over a distance without sound or visual cues? Obviously, you'd have to identify a mechanism for the communications. If telepathy exists, it isn't magic. ... If you had told someone from 200 years ago that you could communicate with people across the globe in real-time, they'd probably think you were some kind of sorcerer. But since then we've discovered radio waves..."
Reader Alsee has a satirical reponse: "Why exactly couldn't invisible pink unicorns exist? Is there some fundamental law of nature which states that invisible pink unicorns cannot exist? Obviously, you'd have to identify a mechanism for invisible pink unicorns. If invisible pink unicorns exist, it isn't magic. ... Telepathy, invisible pink unicorns, elves, Zeus, telekenesis, Narnia, rain dances, flying potions, the Tooth Fairy, I'm always surprised at the reaction of rational people when they think that these things do not exist."
Wavicle offers another reason for the widespread skepticism about such research:
"While there may be some out there shouting paranormal things couldn't possibly exist, most of us are just pissed. Pissed that for every genuinely deluded person who believed they had witnessed a paranormal event, there are 20 others out there looking at using it to scam people out of money.We have looked, and looked, and looked and come up empty handed EVERY TIME. The vast majority of the people who have said they had special powers were LIARS. The rest were just wrong. Nobody has ever passed muster. There are people out there doing genuine harm to others under the veil of paranormal abilities.
For example EVERY instance of 'psychic surgery' (where someone performs surgery with just their hands, leaving behind no scar or wound) has been a scam for money."
The same corner of the discussion led to a freewheeling exchange of comments on scientific credulity and exotic explanations for telepathy involving quantum mechanics.
Reader kfg writes "I am, at least nominally, a physicist. You wouldn't catch me saying any such thing as 'telepathy can't exist.' However, you first need to demonstrate that it does exist if you expect me to do work on that basis. If and when that happens I will not posit any 'paranormal' event, but rather that there is a quite normal mechanism at work. Then it will be my job to find it, because, at the moment, there is no valid theory of such a mechanism. ('Well, maybe it could be ...' is not a theory.) A theory is model that is concordence with data. ... Which brings us back to the need to show me it exists, particularly since everything I have ever seen so far indicates that the world works just spiffily in accordance with the rules of chance."
Reader Thing 1 asserts "if the human brain works on quantum principles, and one of those principles is communication at a distance, then that tells me that telepathy is possible," and mentions the phenomenon of entanglement as a mechanism for instantaneous communication: "Through a process, two electrons become 'entangled,' and when separated experimentally up to 10 km, when the spin on one is changed, the spin on the other is changed immediately--with no speed-of-light delay."
To this, reader aardvarkjoe responds that "The problem is that, in these 'entanglement experiments,' no information is being transmitted from the first site to the second. By measuring the state of the first electron, you can instantaneously affect the state of the second electron — but according to all of the current theories, there is no way to actually use that to communicate. (If that sounds weird ... it is. Quantum theory is rather unintuitive.)"
Several readers' comments were not about the experiment at issue in this case, but rather about the James Randi Educational Foundation prize I mentioned. Two comments in particular sum up many of the others: Reader nido calls Randi a fraud with an agenda" and says this is how Randi is viewed by "people who can," to which Mr2001 responds "Well, there's also the slight difference that he has facts on his side. None of these so-called 'people who can' have ever been able to demonstrate their alleged abilities under controlled conditions. Until they can do that, they're nothing more than 'people who lie to others,' or at best, 'people who lie to themselves.' ... It's a pity that there's no evidence that these experiences actually took place in reality, not just in the participants' imaginations, don't you think? Because if there were evidence, someone would be a million dollars richer."
Many thanks to everyone who took part in the discussion, in particular those readers whose comments are quoted above.
ESP, I sensed that. (Score:2, Insightful)
I think for the large part, the world of psychics is snake oil, predators preying on the gullible.
But, if you're familiar with the double-slit "interference" experiment [physicsweb.org], you may get an uneasy sense there is much for us to learn about interaction of particles, forces, energies, etc. It's not for me to determine ESP is real but I've experienced unexplainable phenomena at least to my level to understand.
One example, a very close friend in college, she was an identical twin, and talked about the typical enta
Re:ESP, I sensed that. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:ESP, I sensed that. (Score:4, Funny)
Re:ESP, I sensed that. (Score:3, Insightful)
Don't forget the gullible dancing for money. Not everyone who operates on a false premise are predators; some are just ignorant.
But, if you're familiar with the double-slit "interference" experiment, you may get an uneasy sense there is much for us to learn about interaction of particles, forces, energies, etc. It's not for me to determine ESP is real but I've experienced unexplainable phenomena at least to my
Re:ESP, I sensed that. (Score:4, Insightful)
I've been with my wife for nearly eight years, married for four. I finish her sentences, she seems to know when I've forgotten my keys, and keeping presents and surprises secret from one another is a huge undertaking. That doesn't make us telepathically linked, though. Intuitive about each other, maybe, but that's nothing paranormal.
Ee:ESP, I sensed that. - NOT ESP!! (Score:2)
I have proof! See the star next to his name!
Re:ESP, I sensed that. (Score:2)
Re:ESP, I sensed that. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:ESP, I sensed that. (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:ESP, I sensed that. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:ESP, I sensed that. (Score:2)
Re:ESP, I sensed that. (Score:2)
In other words, the mind is not only selective about paranormal-sounding things. It's selective about all things, including what we consider factual.
In other words, selectivity of human mind is evenly distribu
Gullible (Score:2)
Advice: When someone says 'I was going to call you later' do not take it literally.
Re:Gullible (Score:2)
Re:ESP, I sensed that. (Score:3, Insightful)
Why not? Things with long-shot odds happen everyday. Somebody winning the 'jackpot' in a lottery has obscene odds (far worse than those two girls picking the same card) yet I don't hear people attributing ESP to it.
It happens often enough. (Score:2)
(And at certain points in your life, news that seems life changing is silly in retrospect)
That last comment isn't supposed to be a barb, since I don't know how old you are. Just a thought...
Re:ESP, I sensed that. (Score:2, Insightful)
When you break into your "can you really feel object"
Re:ESP, I sensed that. (Score:2)
Try reading a book on QM other than The Dancing Wu Li Masters and get back to us.
It's just standard procedure for every woo-woo to pull out the word "quantum" these days. And really it's just gotten old. My computer works on actual understood quantum principles that are repeated a billionfold, but there still ain't one ghost, telekinetic, telepath, or dowser that c
Re:ESP, I sensed that. (Score:2)
Re:ESP, I sensed that. (Score:2)
There's a huge
Re:ESP, I sensed that. (Score:2)
What you're arguing is semantics - no science can possibly COMPLETELY understand something by your reasoning - science explores the "how"s, not the "why"s. Stick to religion if you want to know "why" light does what it does.
Re:ESP, I sensed that. (Score:2)
So unless our understanding has grown by a substantial amount since 1988, I'd say that we don't understand light completely. As such, we don't understand the behaviour of light in arbitrary situations, such as the double slit. Indeed, we can come up with some pretty sure probabilities by wrapping math around them, but we cert
Re:That doesn't answer his question... (Score:2)
Re:ESP, I sensed that. (Score:5, Funny)
Depends. I think I have latent psychic powers, but its not very useful.
Mostly, I notice it when people call in to my job at tech support and I already know what the problem is.
And I already know the solution to their problem.
You know... Rebooting the computer
Unfortunatley I haven't been able to figure out how to strangle people remotley with my mind... yet.
Re:ESP, I sensed that. (Score:2)
I'm getting something... here it comes... you do Windows support for a living!
Re:ESP, I sensed that. (Score:2)
Re:ESP, I sensed that. (Score:2)
Not that odd really - given the (statistically) limited number of birthday card styles out there.
I don't have twins. (Score:2)
I think it's partly due to the fact that we already know what kind of card a person wants (funny, mushy, religious, plain), and there usually isn't much selection turn-over from year to year.
Have you ever picked up the same card for someone's birthday like 3 times in a row? I have. WHY DON'T THEY FIND NEW PEOPLE TO MAKE CARDS ANYWAY? Ugh.
Comment removed (Score:4, Funny)
Context (Score:2)
I'm studying the effects of negative reinforcement on E.S.P. ability.
The effect? I'll tell you what the effect is, it's pissing me off!
Of course it's possible! (Score:4, Interesting)
That doesn't mean it was likely to have evolved naturally though. There does seem to be a whiff of real "irreducible complexity" in an iPod...
Re:Of course it's possible! (Score:2)
Only 400 posts... (Score:4, Insightful)
Duh! Editors w/ ESP (Score:5, Funny)
Obviously the editor has a strong premonition the other 400 were on the way!
Paranormal Scmaranormal (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm always been surprised at the kind of reaction anything labeled 'paranormal' gets from rational people. Why exactly couldn't telepathy exist?
There's nothing logically impossible about the idea of telepathy. Or the Loch Ness Monster. Or UFOs.
The thing you need to realize, however, is that they're labeled 'paranormal' for a reason. If we had solid evidence of any of them, we'd call them scientific fact. People look down on these ideas because, while there may be some people who believe in them, rigorous studies haven't been able to substantiate any of them.
That being said, I don't see any reason there shouldn't be some continued research into these areas. The more basic research, the better, I say. What doesn't make sense, however, is sinking substantial amounts of money into research in areas that show no actual promise of ever turning up anything. Or, spending a lot of time doing non-scientific work in these areas. I'm sure paranormal enthusiasts can point to lots of "evidence" for telepathy. How much of it would actually stand up to scrutiny, though?
Re:Paranormal Scmaranormal (Score:2)
Ther
Re:Paranormal Scmaranormal (Score:5, Interesting)
It goes further than that, though. This touches the question whether there are phenomena that cannot be described by current scientific practices or not. If true, then telepathy may well be unproved for a very long time.
Also, if someone is REALLY capable of telepathy, chances are high that this person keeps it a secret. Reading thoughts allow revealing true motives. If one reads the minds of ESP-interested people, one may well find some rather sinister motives (like, abusing it for stealing, blackmail, military applications..) Also, reading other's minds could be quite scary and disturbing, so it would not surprise me to find lots of insane people among the real psychics.....
Re:Paranormal Scmaranormal (Score:2)
Intuition is not tele
Re:Paranormal Scmaranormal (Score:2)
Empathy would be a logical step above intuition. If people's emotions emit signs we do not know of, and if these signs are just crude psychic projections or whatever, then it would be hard to distinguish it from intuition in the first place. Of course, once detected, an experiment would be easy: sit the supposed psychic in a sealed chamber, stick a totally random person whose mood is known (sad, amused, enraged...) in a sec
Re:Paranormal Scmaranormal (Score:2)
This wasnt mentioned as evidence, just some random thoughts. I am allowed to have random thoughts without some rationalist inquisition knocking on my door, am I not?
Well, when you have random thoughts maybe you shouldn't present them in such a manner as it looks like you're trying to defend the idea of telepathy. Given that you mentioned these random thoughts in the context of a discucussion about what science is, I think it's quite normal for someone to call you on that and say it's not scientific, and in
Re:Paranormal Scmaranormal (Score:2)
Suppose you're watching a cardsharp. He has you extract all the queens, put them back in the deck, then he shuffles it and the queens appear on the top. How did he do that?! Buggered if I know. This doesn't mean that it's "unproved" that a cardsharp can do that, bcos we've seen it happen. All it means is that we don't know the method yet.
Now telepathy. Can someone read someone else's mind? It's really a very simple test - do they continuously get i
How James Randi helped me see the light (Score:2)
Yes, and if you ask Randi he will tell you that magic tricks are also heavily dependent on the environment and situation. (The rest of the post is not aimed at you personally)
How Randi helped me see the light (a bedtime story):
Thirty odd years ago I dropped out of high school with reasonably good marks in science, shortly after this Uri Geller appered on my TV and started bending spoons and such. He conducted an "experiment" with th
Re:How James Randi helped me see the light (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Paranormal Scmaranormal (Score:2)
You are missing the point. It isn't about detecting ESP, UFOs, ghosts, it's investigating unexplained phenomenon. People tried to explain
Re:Paranormal Scmaranormal (Score:2)
It's because it's not normal, and it sounds better than "abnormal".
-Adam
Subjectiveness (Score:5, Insightful)
People with greater than average skill are always derided by the masses. Or, as Einstein put it: "Great thinkers will always face violent opposition from mediocre minds." Just because someone might be more perceptually evolved is no reason to cast them away.
Moreover, it is vastly ignorant of us to think we know everything there is to know about consciousness or any aspect of the physical world. As soon was we start thinking that way, the sooner the evolution of science stops.
We should honor this experiment, not immediately dismiss it. Yes, let's make sure rigorous checks are in place, and that the data is properly validated. But give it a chance, eh?
Re:Subjectiveness (Score:5, Insightful)
It is not uncommon for people with psychological disorders to think they are better than everyone around them, or "more aware" of what's truly going on in the world. Especially people that have severe insecurity issues.
Re:Subjectiveness (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Subjectiveness (Score:2)
Your response is the typical defensive "nutjob" response - whether you actually
Re:Subjectiveness (Score:3, Insightful)
Actually it is up to whomever the claim is being made to decide the validity of
Re:Subjectiveness (Score:2)
General relativity (as opposed to special relativity) wasn't testable then. But to his credit, at least the model was consistent and backed by rigorous formalism, which is far more than can be said for the woo-woo crowd.
Nowadays, our GPS satellites depend on compensating for both special and general relativistic effects, otherwise they'd be off by miles. Science wins another one. I bet that flaming ball in the sky actually i
Re:Subjectiveness (Score:2)
"Great spirits have always found violent opposition from mediocrities. The latter cannot understand it when a man does not thoughtlessly submit to hereditary prejudices but honestly and courageously uses his intelligence."
a question of power (Score:2)
Suppose, for a moment, that Telepathy was a normal phenomena, a skill that anyone could access. However would the earth's self-appointed ruling class keep the roiling masses in line?
For example, could George W. Bush's handlers have pushed the populace into initially accepting the
Re:Subjectiveness (Score:2)
People with greater than average skill are always derided by the masses. Or, as Einstein put it: "Great thinkers will always face violent opposition from mediocre minds." Just because someone might be more perceptually evolved is no reason to cast them away.
They laughed at Einstein.. but they also laughed at bozo the clown. (And in actuality, respected scientists didn't laught at Einstein). What makes you think you're Einstein, and not Bozo?
Meta: Escaped Backslash (Score:4, Interesting)
But I wish it were less centralized. Slashdot is better than newspapers because it's mainly "letters to the editor", sparked by editors' published stories. Because those LoE's are letters to each other. Maybe the top 5% by moderated points, weighted by metamoderation and negative comments (also metamoderated), of posters to each day's top story or two (by comment count), could be autoinvited to a Backslash discussion among themselves, summarizing and highlighting comments. That competition might also encourage better comments.
Deja Vu .. The First Time Around (Score:2, Insightful)
I haven't had much of this lately, but I used to see before I'd be somewhere I'd never been, people in place and all. I wasn't sure it was the same as Deja Vu as I'd actually see these places in my dreams and be stunned when I saw them come together. I think something works, but I haven't had one of these episodes for years.
Score: -5 Daft?!? I didn't foresee that!
Re:Deja Vu .. The First Time Around (Score:2)
The problem with such anecdotes is that memory is simply not reliable. Really, you forget more than you remember, and your brain just sort of invents things to fill in the gaps. Over
Re:Deja Vu .. The First Time Around (Score:2)
My High School psychology class Experiment... (Score:5, Interesting)
Everyone scored between four to six right answers except for one kid who on all three tests scored between twelve to fifteen correct answers.
Re:My High School psychology class Experiment... (Score:3, Insightful)
Everyone scored between four to six right answers except for one kid who on all three tests scored between twelve to fifteen correct answers.
Yah, and when I was in high school I measured the acceleration do to gravity, g, and found the published value to be off by 20% by my experiment. Obviously there's nothing wrong with my experiment, and someone wrong with the published value of g.
Re:My High School psychology class Experiment... (Score:3, Informative)
Re:My High School psychology class Experiment... (Score:4, Informative)
I disagree. There is a strong connection between your mind and body, and I've sat through several experiments where a person can mimic the very subtle body language of a subject and can start to have the same thoughts as the subject. It's uncanny, and you can do this yourself. Sit down with a friend and concentrate about any one thing (easier if you are emotional about it) and have your friend mimic you exactly - including breathing, then have them describe their thoughts. Most of the time they'll tell you what you're thinking, sometimes even including images.
Do that from across the room, and you've got one explanation for ESP.
Re:My High School psychology class Experiment... (Score:2)
Re:My High School psychology class Experiment... (Score:2)
Re:Prove?? (Score:2)
If your memory of the runs is correct he also improved over the course of your experiment.
This, however, to me, even more strongly suggests that the student in question was aware of some form of 'read' or 'tell', or otherwise expert in some other, completely mundane, method of doing well at t
Proof that ESP exists! (Score:2)
I want my million dollars in small bills.
How about man - machine telepathy? (Score:2)
Ever heard a tune in your mind then switched on the radio and it was there? Maybe
Re:How about man - machine telepathy? (Score:2)
Or maybe it's just selective memory. Doesn't it freak people out when you expect a system to do something nobody expected... but it doesn't ? Well, no, that doesn't freak people out because they're used to it. They only remember that one single time when you were right, and forget the thousands
Genetics vs Telepathy (Score:2)
For example, what if telepathy worked only when you were standing at a particular location? When you moved, no more telepathy. This would clearly be an environmental factor NOT genetic.
BTM
There have been both (Score:2)
Indeed, both person-associated (genetic or chance) phenomenoa have been said to occur, as well as environmental/locational.
Re:There have been both (Score:2)
Additionally, my wife can "read" colors from my mind (i.e. I think of a color and she guesses, with very high accuracy, the correct color. And no, I don't think of simple colors like red, green, or blue, bu
Evolution is not instant (Score:4, Interesting)
If we make the relatively trivial assumption that telepathy would require a relatively high level of brain function (both as a matter of technical requirement, and also of being able to process and understand the information) then suddenly the point in our evolution it would be most possible for these traits to begin to appear we have already began stagnating our gene pool by artificially protecting those of weaker traits, thus significantly reducing any evolution.
If we look through recorded time, and due to our nature likely much before recorded time as well, people who can 'hear voices' or otherwise know things they should not be able to know are typically regarded as crazy, devilspawn, witches, or some other name in which heavy medication, stoning, or burning at the stake would be prescribed. I would pose that because of this, not only would telepathy not be a survival advantage, any marked ability would indeed be a disadvantage.
IMO it's also very realistic to assume telepathy would be like other ability, and require some practice and training before it would be any more than rare and involuntary flashes of thoughts.
Re:Evolution is not instant (Score:2)
Re:Evolution is not instant (Score:2)
'Supernatural' is the label given to things that people do not understand. Yes, I realize there are a lot of hoaxes and BS out there, which is what makes the persuit of information about anything related to ESP a futile battle against an army of minds that were closed by so many liars and so many that proclaim they understand The Truth(TM) that are just as clueless as everyone else.
Imagine if you will, a video walkie-talkie. Simply a screen, a cheap camera, a m
Re:Evolution is not instant (Score:2)
The primary difference is in the training people pursue.
Ingo Swann [biomindsuperpowers.com] says the "superpowers" are universal, and can also be trained. Some people are better than others, as with any field of
Why Always with the "Quantum"? (Score:5, Informative)
Quantum Mechanics is not magic. It's also not dimly understood. It is counterintuitive, but that doesn't mean that it somehow turns black into white.
The big problem with QM is how people write about it. With the double-slit experiment, for example, you'll read a phrase like "when you observe which slit each photon goes through, the interference patterns disappear". The problem is, most people think of observation as something completely passive. But in the realm of QM, observation is very active and very destructive. In QM-speak, it goes without saying that to observe something is to change it. If the above phrase were written "when you jigger with each photon to try to get an idea of which slit it goes through, the interference pattern vanishes", it would be equally accurate and sound a lot less magical. A pretty pattern of waves on the surface of a pond will vanish if you jump into the pond to get a look at the waves up close.
Entanglement is described with equal misguidance. Usually you get a phrase like "when you measure measure one photon of the entangled pair, the other one's spin changes instantly across any distance to match". Sounds magical, right? But it ain't. The spin "changes" from a state where it has all possible values with equal probability of each into a state where you know what the value of that spin is. QM is all about probabilities and information and not so much about the actual particles. Instead of saying "the particle's spin changes", it would be more correct to say "what we know about the particle's spin changes". But instead we get shorthand that is clear to anyone who groks QM but is counterintuitive to the layman. By observing your electron (and remember, observing means you've destroyed information in it by getting the spin information out), you've gained some information about it. Because of the entanglement, you've also gained information about the other memeber of the pair, without disturbing it, at that very moment, no matter where the other member of that pair is. That's it.
Re:Why Always with the "Quantum"? (Score:2)
Anything where you don't understand how it works is magic.
Why do we find this video amusing for example?
http://www.pistolwimp.com/media/45492/ [pistolwimp.com]
If some how the video went back in time a few hundred years (and you took the laughter away) what would the people think he was doing?
Re:Why Always with the "Quantum"? (Score:2)
Re:Why Always with the "Quantum"? (Score:2)
Boring? How about fascinating!
Maybe telepathy is not possible. Maybe it is. Maybe the human race is just on the cusp of beginning to evolve it, so experiments are unpredictable. Or maybe "work without effort" is something the human race strives for, and why I'm so into automation, and people just want to believe.
Well anyway, I'm borg now so you won't be hearing from me again.
Conjecture and questions (Score:3, Insightful)
Haven't been slapped: women I find attractive, as a rule, do not have telepathy
Depending on what you find attractive in women, chances are that such women will also be attractive to others. In that event, I believe they'd be somewhat immune due to constant hinting thoughts of passerby.
Taxpayer's money: research into the mystical and supernatural isn't strictly illegal it is certainly a questionable use of taxpayer money
How many expeditions across the world, expected to fall off the "edge" were funded by what would have then been something similar to taxpayer's money?
Why exactly couldn't invisible pink unicorns exist?
There's a likelyhood to all things, as well as a case history. Cases of various paranormal events exceed those of invisible pink unicorn reports (although how something can be pink when invisible?). It leaves the possibility of lots of crazy people, lots of easily influenced/misled people (more likely), or the possibility that various paranormal circumstances may exist. Lots of things that would have been 'witchcraft' or paranormal years back are commonplace. I suppose the trade-off is in exactly how much money is spent vs the results received.
By measuring the state of the first electron, you can instantaneously affect the state of the second electron -- but according to all of the current theories, there is no way to actually use that to communicate
Why not? If you can in any how tell that the state of the second electron has been altered, and you could consistently alter/un-alter/re-alter the second electron, you could transfer binary data... with the limits being on how quickly one could read the changes given or affect a change.
It's a pity that there's no evidence that these experiences actually took place in reality, not just in the participants' imaginations, don't you think
Which leads to a previous statement. Not everyone is a liar, some people honestly (but mistakenly) believe in a paranormal ability or event that may have an existing scientific explanation beyond their own knowledge. Of course, some other unexplainable/supernatural events over time have become normal scientific data as science progressed as well.
One thing I do wonder is about experiments done with twins (quite a few interesting cases of people having an unusual 'connection' there), and experiments vs situations of duress. Sure, a million bucks is a nice incentive, but if one did have an invisible supernatural transmitter in one's head... say a weak one... a life-threatening situation might just be the thing that squeezes out the juice in it, and that's not really something that can be (legally) simulated. Certainly there are cases where humans put in "impossible" situations have gone beyond what science dictated should be possible.
Re:Conjecture and questions (Score:2)
You are using a false assumption there, which is that it's repeatable. The thing about entanglement is, you can just do it once. And you can't figure out which way it'll go. Once you observe either electron, and force it to a particular spin, the other one is forced to the opposite spin. Then you're done, they both have fixed spins. To get them to d
PEAR results (Score:3, Insightful)
I think they ought to have a World Wide Telekinetic Westling Federation where they pit two cerebral pro's against each other in ring with a noise generator between them; each combatant would either have with a big 0 or 1 on his jersey. After the bell the cumulative results in big readable digital displays in real-time above their heads.
Summary of the Backslash Summary (Score:2)
The Experiment
Many readers pointed out flaws in the experiment, it was not controlled enought to the point that any results from it would be completely invalid and would only play into the hands of the crackpots.
Proving Telepathy doesn't exist
Althought it is not possible to "prove that something doesn't exist", it is possible to show that the consequences of something existing would disagree and conflict with present knowledge and would lead to absurd consequences - reductio ad absurdum et al...
Fo
Re:Summary of the Backslash Summary (Score:2)
Sounds like a mental dictatorship.
"We decide what your scientific interests have to be! Deviating from them is heresy and will be punished by exclusion from the scientific community! Be a good scientist
Re:Summary of the Backslash Summary (Score:2)
Ah, such delicious flamebait, I cannot resist the temptation.
Ok, aside from the fact that I was not suggesting any of those things that you claim and was only pointing out "my dismay of the lack of critical thinking and imagination people have"...
I think someone's a bit touchy-feely about supposedly being "excluded" from the "scientific community", whatever that means. Unlike your characterization of science as 'mental dictatorship', things are appreciated as science based on the merit of consistant log
Re:Summary of the Backslash Summary (Score:3, Insightful)
No one is dictating to anyone what to think. The problem is the sharing of a limited resource (language). When different groups of people use the same word (science) for to represent different concepts it creates a namespace collision. We all know how in
Re:Summary of the Backslash Summary (Score:2)
Meh, we've all had those moments. (Score:2, Interesting)
Some "coincidences" do occur for many people often everyday mainly because of our own intuitive processes and subconscious processes picking up a lot more subtleties than our conscious minds are aware of - is this "telepathy" per se? Probably not, but many people make a very good business out of reading others almost as good as the real thing. Even then, our subconscious minds pick up so much of what we don't that often we'll get excited about something bad
Glitches in perception? (Score:2)
Of
ID test (Score:2)
"Because it's possible to devise an experiment [slashdot.org] that could provide scientific evidence in its favor.
I replied that
I don't think it would be too hard to come up an experiment that could falsify a particular stain of ID.
First, we'll define an impersonal ID: the intelligent designer is simply a phenomena that is intelligent, like a human being or other
Slap Theory (Score:3, Interesting)
Consider this scenario: You're in the public place. You see the woman. You look her up-and-down and think, "Hey now." The woman turns around and sees you looking her over and thinks, "Gads. What a jerk." Well, obviously, there was no telepathy involved here. She saw you looking at her like a hungry dog at a piece of meat and immediately knew what you were thinking. But what made her turn around at that moment? Was it just a coincidence? Obviously, it had to be. There's no way she could have known what you were thinking.
Or, her "sixth sense" told her there was a potential mate/threat/whatever. Automatic reaction was to look around for it. When she saw you looking her over, she figured she'd found the target of the problem (since the feelings went away) and the rest of her senses allowed her to form a better picture of what was happening and since she never really knew why she was looking around (lower brain function caused the reaction), she wouldn't chalk it up to telepathy.
Remember, there are tons of things that we do that we don't consciously do. A simple example is we pull our hands away from hot things. There's no conscious decision there. We know why we did it, sure, but there was no higher-brain decision process involved.
+5, Preinsightful (Score:2)
comment numbers understated ... (Score:2)
The only comment I remember trying to make was that my wife tends to know what's on my mind, but that's because she's known me for over 10 years and my thoughts in that area are pretty predictable
Correction: Project is privately funded (Score:2)
I made a comment about this [slashdot.org] the last time around, pointing out that despite the prevalent Slashdotter belief, this pseudoscientific research is privately funded. Here's a paste of what I said before:
I'm pretty sure there isn't any tax payer money involved. According to this page [manchester.ac.uk], the project is sponsored by a Portuguese group called the "Bial Fo [bial.com]
How to increase traffic to your blog (Score:2)
2. Select the most controversial comments.
3. Post story about controversial comments.
4. Three question marks.
5. Traffic!!!
Good job, timothy. I expect to see a lot more or your stories about gay marriage, abortion, and flag burning being posted on the main page. Keep up the dubious work.
Telepathy = some sort of Group Consciousness? (Score:2)
Also, the question needs to be asked: what physical property of the universe would allow the miniscule electrical signals in human brains to be able to be receieved and understood by persons disconnected in space? Even if only by a few millimetres? To me (at least) it seems unlikely there is this unknown quality of the universe. It seems likel
Better spent on Telepathy (Score:2)
Then again, that's just me. And, like you, I'm screwed there.
Re:I got to meet Randi (Score:3, Informative)
After having done so, many people will naturally be interested in finding out how you do so in an effort to advance hum
Re:Holographic Physics (Score:2)
Of course, this descr
No proof there (Score:2)