Can the scientific method be applied to study supernatural phenomena?

[leroy]

This thread was started off from the off topic discussion from another thread. Since the other party did not want to start a new thread, I figured that I would. At the very least, to pull that distraction out of the other thread. But more to expand on the conversation. I intentionally left my opening remarks brief--perhaps a little too brief. I made an effort to leave out my personal opinion to avoid pushing discussion a certain way and to leave others free to express their own thoughts. I think that worked. Many of you brought up ideas that I hadn't yet considered or thought about.

Overall, my view has been expressed by several on here.

1. You could study events that are labeled as supernatural. You could set up legitimate scientific inquiry into astrology. But it would only tell us what is physically available to study.
2. Those events would not be supernatural, but based on physical evidence.
3. Unexplained phenomena are uncharacterized. We have no idea what they are. Most believers in them have pre-conceived notions that cannot be validated.
4. You cannot test what you have no evidence for.

It's all about labels


Sure you can use the scientific method to determine if an event contradicts a well known scientific law

Whether if you what to lable this as supernatural, or give it an other tag is just semantics

 

[leroy]

Ah.
Yeah, we can try to understand all sorts of things. But there are some things that we cannot readily apply even the scientific method to.

1+2=3

 

[leroy]

I think you have handled the use of ghost as well as I have seen. Observations could be attributed to a phenomenon we call "ghost", but linking that to a classical definition of ghost would be impossible, since there is no evidence to establish that link.

Why not? You can just ask the Gohst who he is, if answers I am your grate grandfather who lived in this house 100y ago, you can then ask him things that only your grate grandfather would know..... And determine if he is saying the truth

 

[gnostic]

Most paranormal phenomena appears randomly and spontaneously leaving nothing for science to investigate. And much is posited to not even be occurring at the physically investigable level or enters a person's awareness spontaneously.

Reason and consideration of those claiming direct insight into the unseen are our strongest weapons in this.

And that don’t strike you as being odd?

 

[gnostic]

It's all about labels


Sure you can use the scientific method to determine if an event contradicts a well known scientific law

Whether if you what to lable this as supernatural, or give it an other tag is just semantics

It not semantics, Leroy.

Nature, natural processes, exist, and there are all sorts of evidence.

Supernatural only exist in myths, fairytale, folklore, fiction, superstition, religious beliefs, religious myths, etc...

...there are no evidence supernatural existing in any reality, others than imaginary made-up ones or made-up delusions. Supernatural is a con job made to swindle into converting silly faiths, or to swindle money from people.

 

[Dan From Smithville]

Why not? You can just ask the Gohst who he is, if answers I am your grate grandfather who lived in this house 100y ago, you can then ask him things that only your grate grandfather would know..... And determine if he is saying the truth

Are you serious! How would I know what my great grandfather knew.

You just cannot get over that everything you post about this is conjecture. None of it has been demonstrated and there is no evidence it could be.

 

[Dan From Smithville]

It's all about labels


Sure you can use the scientific method to determine if an event contradicts a well known scientific law

Whether if you what to lable this as supernatural, or give it an other tag is just semantics

It is not about labels, though the specificity of terminology is important. This is just your continued attempt to mischaracterize my words, since you have not demonstrated anything.

Claiming this is about labels is your claim and nothing that I have done. A claim you have yet to substantiate.

 

[Dan From Smithville]

Why not? You can just ask the Gohst who he is, if answers I am your grate grandfather who lived in this house 100y ago, you can then ask him things that only your grate grandfather would know..... And determine if he is saying the truth

Since you claim you can just ask a ghost with an expectation of receiving an honest answer, that must mean that you have experience with this. Could you provide the evidence that you have accumulated in your many interrogations of ghosts?

There is a circularity to your statement here. It assumes ghosts to be as you want them to be (the classical definition) and that based on that, they will respond as you expect.

 

[Dan From Smithville]

Yes like history, logic, your memories on what you did yesterday, ethics, etc.

The scientific method is too limited, there are other sources of knowledge

Then, by all means, show us what those sources of knowledge have provided and demonstrated.

 

[George-ananda]

That group isn't anti-paranormal, they are anti bad sources, no sources/citations.
I like some of Radins work but there is evidence that he's being too bias with data. Backing mediums is also sketchy. Like I said the problem is people on average are not interested in research. They want to support beliefs so they buy New Age books to support those ideas. Why is this a problem? Because it would be hard to sell a book that debunks new age concepts, even a modest amount.
So you have to go all in.
But in the long run it isn't about Radin. When an actual experiment confirms ESP then it will be repeated by many teams all over the world for confirmation.
From there it will gain more funding and start a whole thing.

Tiller reported his 2010 experiments to be a confirmation of subtle energies.
But they could not be repeated by several teams in Europe so he's still trying.

But that skeptic group are not going after Radin. Do you realize how many scams artists there are looking to make money in ufo, Big Foot, religion and New Age circles?
There is a big study on Kundalini energy that reported all these incredible results and was re-printed on so many websites. Turned out the Yale doctors mentioned did not exist and the institute didn't either.
A ufo journalist/writer recently broke a new story about the moon being a alien monitoring device. Her source a "credible anonymous source". So yeah some policing is needed. Have you seen the law of attraction movie The Secret?
Do you know the sh#*storm this caused in thousands of peoples lives?

Well, we have a strong difference of opinion on which side is generally more honest and objective. Such deep differences are not going to be settled by endless debate.

I've been a keen observer of this scene for decades.

 

[George-ananda]

And that don’t strike you as being odd?

It's a mind bender, yes. Planes of reality not directly detectable by the physical senses and instruments are a mind stretch. It took considerable anecdotal, experimental and investigative evidence for me to believe in them.

 

[Polymath257]

Yes like history, logic, your memories on what you did yesterday, ethics, etc.

Let's take those in reverse order. Ethics is NOT a matter of knowledge. it is a matter of opinion, usually based on culture and upbringing. There are certain ethical feelings that seem to be hardwired into us, but even those don't qualify as knowledge.

My memory of what I did yesterday *is* in some senses, scientific. In fact, it is the basssssssse repeatability aspect of science.

Perhaps your best example here is that of history. But even there, the *knowledge* aspect is based on hypothesis formation, testing (perhaps based on documents), and revision of ideas that fail the tests: in other words, the scientific method. Even the documents have to be analyzed for their provenance, the point of view of the author, and other things. That process is, at base, scientific. And, history is done best when there are other pieces of evidence to bring to bear, say archeology.

Anyway, a good try, but I don't think you succeeded.

 

[gnostic]

It's a mind bender, yes. Planes of reality not directly detectable by the physical senses and instruments are a mind stretch. It took considerable anecdotal, experimental and investigative evidence for me to believe in them.

I don’t see anecdotal evidence as “evidence”.

Too often anecdotes are one-sided, biased, and often used by desperate people who don’t have actual evidence to work with.

If someone were to vividly describe to you have tea party with pink unicorn and host of pixies, would you accept such anecdote as evidence?

 

[Polymath257]

Well, we have a strong difference of opinion on which side is generally more honest and objective. Such deep differences are not going to be settled by endless debate.

I've been a keen observer of this scene for decades.

Let me give you a scenario. Suppose a researcher starts investigating this and learns, repeatedly, that there are no non-natural phenomena involved. What happens?

Well, they very quickly get the reputation of being someone that denies this stuff and whatever trust they originally had is eroded in the minds of the believers. So, even if they are honest and say there is nothing there, no minds are swayed. Also, they are likely to not find further employment to investigate other situations.

On the other hand, those believers are more than happy to pay good money for books, TV shows, etc that cater to their beliefs. And that means that those promoting those ideas are swayed by the money to say there *might* be something there even if there is not.

Furthermore, those who are willing to lie to get money will be amply rewarded for those lies, which means that this study *rewards the liars*. And *that* means that anyone who has been in this for the long term is automatically suspect. They *may* be telling the truth, but it is much more likely they are simply fraudsters bilking people out of their money in a way that has little to no risk.

So, the only people who have any chance of *actually* studying this stuff and maintaining honesty are those who are independently wealthy and just want to get to the bottom of this. But, if such a person finds nothing, they will be dismissed as a 'denier'.

 

[Polymath257]

It's a mind bender, yes. Planes of reality not directly detectable by the physical senses and instruments are a mind stretch. It took considerable anecdotal, experimental and investigative evidence for me to believe in them.

That isn't the issue: it is people who claim to have extra abilities that you have to simply believe because there is no way to test their claims.

THAT is the sure sign of a huckster.

 

[George-ananda]

I don’t see anecdotal evidence as “evidence”.

Too often anecdotes are one-sided, biased, and often used by desperate people who don’t have actual evidence to work with.

If someone were to vividly describe to you have tea party with pink unicorn and host of pixies, would you accept such anecdote as evidence?

You have a hard time understanding the difference between 'accepting' and 'considering' anecdotal evidence. We're probably stuck then. Considering includes a knowledge base and reasoning skills and often not a clean yes/no decision.

 

[George-ananda]

Let me give you a scenario. Suppose a researcher starts investigating this and learns, repeatedly, that there are no non-natural phenomena involved. What happens?

Well, they very quickly get the reputation of being someone that denies this stuff and whatever trust they originally had is eroded in the minds of the believers. So, even if they are honest and say there is nothing there, no minds are swayed. Also, they are likely to not find further employment to investigate other situations.

On the other hand, those believers are more than happy to pay good money for books, TV shows, etc that cater to their beliefs. And that means that those promoting those ideas are swayed by the money to say there *might* be something there even if there is not.

Furthermore, those who are willing to lie to get money will be amply rewarded for those lies, which means that this study *rewards the liars*. And *that* means that anyone who has been in this for the long term is automatically suspect. They *may* be telling the truth, but it is much more likely they are simply fraudsters bilking people out of their money in a way that has little to no risk.

So, the only people who have any chance of *actually* studying this stuff and maintaining honesty are those who are independently wealthy and just want to get to the bottom of this. But, if such a person finds nothing, they will be dismissed as a 'denier'.

All thoughts that are not new to me. I think the very serious like Radin have high scruples.

And even what you speak of is a tiny bit of the 'supernatural phenomena' that influences me anyway. The bulk is the millions of experiences of regular people that make neither fame nor fortune from any of this and sometimes ridicule.

A ghost appears and disappears to multiple witnesses. What is there for science to study?

 

[George-ananda]

That isn't the issue: it is people who claim to have extra abilities that you have to simply believe because there is no way to test their claims.

THAT is the sure sign of a huckster.

Why could it not be a person being honest too as I think is generally the case? A fair person considers both and all the evidence he can scrape up so all things are considered and tries to be as objective as possible.

 

[leroy]

It is not about labels, though the specificity of terminology is important. This is just your continued attempt to mischaracterize my words, since you have not demonstrated anything.

Claiming this is about labels is your claim and nothing that I have done. A claim you have yet to substantiate.

Then put me in the correct context, exactly what claim am I supposed to justify?

 

[leroy]

Since you claim you can just ask a ghost with an expectation of receiving an honest answer, that must mean that you have experience with this. Could you provide the evidence that you have accumulated in your many interrogations of ghosts?

There is a circularity to your statement here. It assumes ghosts to be as you want them to be (the classical definition) and that based on that, they will respond as you expect.

I am just providing an example of a scenario where if real, you can conclude the existence of Ghost using the scientific method.

Obviously this is assuming that you define Ghost as “an apparition of a dead person which is believed to appear or become manifest to the living, typically as a nebulous image”………if you have another definition feel free to share it and I can answer to the OP with that definition in mind.