Why there is no such thing as paranormal phenomenae (aliens, vision, light)
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Farmer Bob may be the most honest, law abiding citizen anyone has ever known, but we still need physical evidence that a ghost visited him at 3 in the morning.
Not "We"-- "You" or the scientific community need physical evidence. To Farmer Bob, the spirit is probably pretty real and he is not concerned what science thinks.
I believe there are phenomena science just cant explain. I think humans think they are much smarter than they really are. There are fish with more complicated DNA, and birds that have complicated speech/homing mechanisms science can not understand yet. Birds and fish are real aren't they? There is a lot of things not known to man. At one time, science thought the earth to be flat. Later, that changed. I'm sure things that are not known relating to paranormal activity currently will become apparent later. I have confidence that at some point science and para-people will have a little more common ground, Until then, my opinion is that maybe scientists think too clinically and analytically and aren't the best people for just admitting there are things we just don't know about, yet
Not "We"-- "You" or the scientific community need physical evidence. To Farmer Bob, the spirit is probably pretty real and he is not concerned what science thinks.
I believe there are phenomena science just cant explain. I think humans think they are much smarter than they really are. There are fish with more complicated DNA, and birds that have complicated speech/homing mechanisms science can not understand yet. Birds and fish are real aren't they? There is a lot of things not known to man. At one time, science thought the earth to be flat. Later, that changed. I'm sure things that are not known relating to paranormal activity currently will become apparent later. I have confidence that at some point science and para-people will have a little more common ground, Until then, my opinion is that maybe scientists think too clinically and analytically and aren't the best people for just admitting there are things we just don't know about, yet
The fact that we thought the Earth was flat and discovered that the contrary was true is actually NOT evidence that there are things that science cannot explain. The fact is that yes, there are things that we have yet to explain. Scientists are the first to admit this. The fact that we have yet to explain those things is not evidence that we cannot explain them.
By the way, Farmer Bob may have experienced something that, to him, was pretty real. But first person experiences are very difficult to verify absent unambiguous corroborating physical evidence. The fact that he may not care what anyone else thinks does not negate the need for supporting evidence. If he wasn't truly interested in what anyone thought about it, he wouldn't tell anyone, in which case, we'd never know about it, and wouldn't be arguing the pros and cons of whether he really did experience anything. In which case, your point is moot.
There are many genuine unsolved mysteries in the universe and it is okay to say, "We do not yet know but someday perhaps we will." The problem is that most of us find it more comforting to have certainty, even if it is premature, than to live with unsolved or unexplained mysteries.
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OR to resort to silly notions of the paranormal - which doesn't actually mean anything. If it exists, it is part of this world, and therefore there is nothing "paranormal" about it.
well, they didn't believe Galileo either. doesn't mean he wasn't right.
lets remember here, that science has gone officially weird. the newtonian physics folk are a dying breed. and its newton that gave us physics, pretty much. he figured all that kinematic crap out- newtons laws- acceleration equals velocity over time, etc. which are absolutely still relevant. i am not bashing newton. he was a freaking genius. but he was a genius among many. this is the foundation. and what do you do with a foundation? you build on it.
so here come the quantum physicists who, sometime in the mid-90's, officially came out and proclaimed there is NO REALITY AS WE BELIEVED IT TO BE. ok? this is SCIENCE. and they are saying that strange stuff is going down, and its nothing that newton really prepared us for. he gave us some yardsticks and some general laws that apply to OUR gravitational field on earth. but it has a limited use.
another fact to wrap your mind around is that physicists have discovered that the margin of error in the universe is so minute that NOTHING has ever been found in nature or anything we ourselves have created that has that same margin of error. what this means is, that if the universe and all of its gravity and physical laws differed even a whisper, we would NOT EXIST. period. the system is CALIBRATED. it is calibrated, literally, to the trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion times 10 to the negative trillion- there are a LOT of trillions in there- look it up. this CANNOT be by natural design. this is a very very tough thing for some scientists to swallow. but its a fact. when nothing in the natural world has such a small margin of error, yet our whole system that allows us to exist DOES, you gotta wonder.
it is also a fact that things happen on the quantum level that we never even imagined possible. call it the matrix or the multiverse- its a WEIRD FREAKING PLACE. we are pretty much certainly NOT alone, statistically the probability that there is life on other planets is pretty much certain.
the reason i am saying all of this, is that in a world that is as weird as this, ghosts and paranormal phenomena shrink in their weirdness. doesn't seem much of a stretch anymore. its positively Victorian, in my reckoning, to still be saying "there is no such thing". sorry, but science refutes you. maybe not officially, YET, but many quantum physicists are starting to realize how neatly the paranormal fits into this weird and wacky world that they have discovered. and again, its not NEARLY as weird as the other things they already know to be true.
so, for the first time in history, the people that don't believe (or refuse to believe is more like it) in ghosts are actually BEHIND THE TIMES! get with science people! ghosts are positively mundane, they are like sunshine or the gravitational pull.
I have read this entire thread, and something sticks out at me like a sore thumb, and that is the "nature" of the OP.
A couple of years ago, there was a member on this forum who spewed the same information on this subject.
I have not seen a post by that person since 2011.
The OP sounds exactly like this missing member.
I am wondering if he, or she changed user names because it was getting a little "hot" in this paranormal saction for him or her to feel comfortable in.
Just a thought.
I also noticed the join date of the OP.
Remarkably it is about the time the other member stopped posting in 2011 Hmm..
Bob.
I have read this entire thread, and something sticks out at me like a sore thumb, and that is the "nature" of the OP.
A couple of years ago, there was a member on this forum who spewed the same information on this subject.
I have not seen a post by that person since 2011.
The OP sounds exactly like this missing member.
I am wondering if he, or she changed user names because it was getting a little "hot" in this paranormal saction for him or her to feel comfortable in.
Just a thought.
I also noticed the join date of the OP.
Remarkably it is about the time the other member stopped posting in 2011 Hmm..
Bob.
I'm flattered that you took the time to conjure up a conspiracy theory about me. I hate to break it to you but this thread is my first on this particular forum, and so I am not who you apparently think I am. And for the record, I started posting on CD in August of 2011, and was never a member before then, since before then, I didn't even know about these forums.
Last edited by orogenicman; 11-06-2013 at 11:57 PM..
well, they didn't believe Galileo either. doesn't mean he wasn't right.
lets remember here, that science has gone officially weird. the newtonian physics folk are a dying breed. and its newton that gave us physics, pretty much. he figured all that kinematic crap out- newtons laws- acceleration equals velocity over time, etc. which are absolutely still relevant. i am not bashing newton. he was a freaking genius. but he was a genius among many. this is the foundation. and what do you do with a foundation? you build on it.
so here come the quantum physicists who, sometime in the mid-90's, officially came out and proclaimed there is NO REALITY AS WE BELIEVED IT TO BE. ok? this is SCIENCE. and they are saying that strange stuff is going down, and its nothing that newton really prepared us for. he gave us some yardsticks and some general laws that apply to OUR gravitational field on earth. but it has a limited use.
another fact to wrap your mind around is that physicists have discovered that the margin of error in the universe is so minute that NOTHING has ever been found in nature or anything we ourselves have created that has that same margin of error. what this means is, that if the universe and all of its gravity and physical laws differed even a whisper, we would NOT EXIST. period. the system is CALIBRATED. it is calibrated, literally, to the trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion times 10 to the negative trillion- there are a LOT of trillions in there- look it up. this CANNOT be by natural design. this is a very very tough thing for some scientists to swallow. but its a fact. when nothing in the natural world has such a small margin of error, yet our whole system that allows us to exist DOES, you gotta wonder.
it is also a fact that things happen on the quantum level that we never even imagined possible. call it the matrix or the multiverse- its a WEIRD FREAKING PLACE. we are pretty much certainly NOT alone, statistically the probability that there is life on other planets is pretty much certain.
the reason i am saying all of this, is that in a world that is as weird as this, ghosts and paranormal phenomena shrink in their weirdness. doesn't seem much of a stretch anymore. its positively Victorian, in my reckoning, to still be saying "there is no such thing". sorry, but science refutes you. maybe not officially, YET, but many quantum physicists are starting to realize how neatly the paranormal fits into this weird and wacky world that they have discovered. and again, its not NEARLY as weird as the other things they already know to be true.
so, for the first time in history, the people that don't believe (or refuse to believe is more like it) in ghosts are actually BEHIND THE TIMES! get with science people! ghosts are positively mundane, they are like sunshine or the gravitational pull.
Two things, Nighthouse. This thread is not about intelligent design (I know you wanted to hide the fact that that was what you were discussing, but it isn't my fault that you didn't do it very well), and so is off topic. Secondly, since you brought it up, your argument is that the universe is finely tuned for life so there must be an intelligent designer. That is a very poor argument. Why, because it ignores the fact that the vast bulk of the universe is utterly hostile to life. Finely tuned for life? Much of the universe consists of hard ionizing radiation that will fry any life that gets near it. I suggest you watch Neil DeGrasse Tyson's video on the subject for more information on this. You can find it on youtube. That is all I have to say in this thread on the subject.
Back to the topic of the thread. Please post your list of the names of these quantum physicists who are saying that they have scientific evidence of ghosts and other paranormal phenomenon. And I'd also like to see their peer reviewed scientific papers where they present the evidence you claim they have that demonstrates that paranormal activity is anything other than wishful thinking. (this should be interesting).
Last edited by orogenicman; 11-06-2013 at 11:55 PM..
Two things, Nighthouse. This thread is not about intelligent design (I know you wanted to hide the fact that that was what you were discussing, but it isn't my fault that you didn't do it very well), and so is off topic. Secondly, since you brought it up, your argument is that the universe is finely tuned for life so there must be an intelligent designer. That is a very poor argument. Why, because it ignores the fact that the vast bulk of the universe is utterly hostile to life. Finely tuned for life? Much of the universe consists of hard ionizing radiation that will fry any life that gets near it. I suggest you watch Neil DeGrasse Tyson's video on the subject for more information on this. You can find it on youtube. That is all I have to say in this thread on the subject.
Back to the topic of the thread. Please post your list of the names of these quantum physicists who are saying that they have scientific evidence of ghosts and other paranormal phenomenon. And I'd also like to see their peer reviewed scientific papers where they present the evidence you claim they have that demonstrates that paranormal activity is anything other than wishful thinking. (this should be interesting).
this is not off topic at all. i am not "pushing" intelligent design. i am not an evangelical out to save souls. i am someone who has had alot of experiences with the paranormal over the years and i will agree that probably 70 percent of what people experience as paranormal phenomena is easily explained. that leaves quite alot out there without a present explanation. the world of quantum physics being what it is, it does not refute anything to say that the paranormal exists. when every possibility exists somewhere in the universe, its stupid to claim that something ISN'T. and trying to prove a negative is pretty poor logic too.
what you are claiming is that there is no such thing as the paranormal. what i am telling you is that the world is more than what you believe it to be. to demonstrate that fact i would have to send you every physics textbook under the sun. its all in there. i am taking a physics class myself this semester. the one thing my teacher told me at the beginning of the class was, "you are learning classical physics in this class, but the strange thing is that once you go into quantum physics, you are gonna learn that all this stuff is useless." in fact, that is the SECOND physics teacher i have had to say the same thing at the beginning of the class. quantum physics is a weighty subject and if you want me to demonstrate proofs on a thread for an entire body of science, that's like asking me to make it rain on you right now to prove the existence of weather. i promise- quantum mechanics is real. even if you don't know about it.
its obvious to me that there isn't any real point to your thread- why come and state something unequivocal, or that YOU believe to be unequivocal, and then deride others for believing something otherwise, if you have a pure motive to learn something? you don't want to learn anything, you want to pontificate. you want to preach. with that mindset, you will never learn anything, so i could fed-ex you Carl Sagan overnight and you still wouldn't believe it. you'd ask him to bring journals with him and an atom smasher or something. some people are just determined to avoid anything but an argument that leads no where.
Location: Central Bay Area, CA as of Jan 2010...but still a proud Texan from Houston!
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Quote:
Originally Posted by orogenicman
It doesn't mean that it is not, either. You use a qualifier - observable phenomenon. And I would ask observable "by whom"? Is it like a rainbow that everyone can readily observe? Or are we talking about individuals? The issue of bias is very important in any scientific investigation. If you cannot bring it into the laboratory and repeatedly observe and test the phenomenon, and have others do the same in order to root out the bias, or even do the same in the field, one has to question the value of the observations from a scientific perspective.
This is the most absurd thing I have ever read. You are eons behind in thinking.
Let me rephrase...when people experience unexplainable phenomenon...this does not equate to hocus pocus.
BTW no it is not like a rainbow that everyone can readily observe. You are a clear indicator of this...so why do you ask such a silly question?
this is not off topic at all. i am not "pushing" intelligent design. i am not an evangelical out to save souls.
Then why promote their arguments? Because that is what you were doing, whether or not you realized it?
Quote:
Originally Posted by nighthouse
i am someone who has had alot of experiences with the paranormal over the years and i will agree that probably 70 percent of what people experience as paranormal phenomena is easily explained. that leaves quite alot out there without a present explanation.
What it leaves is a lot of stuff that can't be explained because the evidence for it is so thin.
Quote:
Originally Posted by nighthouse
the world of quantum physics being what it is, it does not refute anything to say that the paranormal exists. when every possibility exists somewhere in the universe, its stupid to claim that something ISN'T. and trying to prove a negative is pretty poor logic too.
Science is not so much about possibilities as about probabilities. That is what quantum physics is all about. Probabilities. And for the record, just because quantum physicists refer to something as a "ghost particle" or a God particle" doesn't mean that they believe in ghosts or in God.
As for proving negatives, the notion that one cannot logically prove a negative is an urban legend.
5 + (-6) = -1.
I just proved, mathematically (which is, after all, the purest form of logic), a negative. I'm not being a smartass. Yes, it really is that simple. Moreover, for instance, you cannot divide anything by zero. There is a very good proof in it that you well learn when you get to college calculus. When you learn about limits, you will learn why we cannot divide by 0. And that solution leads to the answer "DNE", which means that the solution "does not exist".
Quote:
Originally Posted by nighthouse
what you are claiming is that there is no such thing as the paranormal. what i am telling you is that the world is more than what you believe it to be.
What I am saying is that paranormal phenomenon, which is synonymous with the supernatural (as I've already shown), is not a scientifically reasonable explanation for anything. Like the creationist argument "God did it", declaring something to be paranormal doesn't actually mean anything, and is not testable, which is why science has never found any unambiguous proof that it is real.
Quote:
Originally Posted by nighthouse
to demonstrate that fact i would have to send you every physics textbook under the sun. its all in there.
Let's assume that I have a level of education that means that you don't have to present every physics textbook under the sun to me. But even if you did, you won't find one that proclaims paranormal phenomenon to be in the purview of scientific reality.
Quote:
i am taking a physics class myself this semester.
Then you are about 27 years behind me. I am a certified professional geologist with 9 years of college education and 23 years of field experience. I am also a board member of the Louisville Astronomical Society, an organization that has been in existence for 80 years. Now that we have finished our dick waving, lets move on.
Quote:
the one thing my teacher told me at the beginning of the class was, "you are learning classical physics in this class, but the strange thing is that once you go into quantum physics, you are gonna learn that all this stuff is useless."
Then you should fire your teacher, because he/she is wrong. No one has thrown out classical physics. Newton's theories on gravity still hold for the macroscopic universe. Einstein didn't refute Newton, and neither has anyone else. Einstein built upon what Newton discovered. Newton's work wasn't wrong - it was incomplete; even Newton understood it to be incomplete. Quantum physics didn't get us to the Moon, Mars, or anywhere else in the solar system. Newton did. Quantum physics didn't build the Eiffel Tower. Newtonian physics did. To call it useless is irresponsible in the extreme and you need to take your teacher to task for suggesting it.
Quote:
Originally Posted by night
in fact, that is the SECOND physics teacher i have had to say the same thing at the beginning of the class. quantum physics is a weighty subject and if you want me to demonstrate proofs on a thread for an entire body of science, that's like asking me to make it rain on you right now to prove the existence of weather. i promise- quantum mechanics is real. even if you don't know about it.
No one has asked you to do that, so whatever point you thought you had in that regard, is moot. Yes, quantum mechanics is a weighty subject, and I would be the first (and certainly not the last) to say that I don't understand all of it, though I am well versed on many of its particulars. Even the best quantum physicist will tell you that. But the real mystery here is what you think quantum physics has to do with paranormal phenomenon. That is something that shouldn't take every physics book on the planet for you to explain to me.
Quote:
Originally Posted by nighthouse
its obvious to me that there isn't any real point to your thread- why come and state something unequivocal, or that YOU believe to be unequivocal, and then deride others for believing something otherwise, if you have a pure motive to learn something?
Now you are being disingenuous and obtuse. First of all, I have derided no one. I have made a point of not using ad hominem or belittling anyone for what they believe. If you want to believe that paranormal phenomenon is real, believe to your heart's content. My reason for being here is that as a professional scientist, I am offering a mainstream view in a forum that is most assuredly not mainstream. If you think that is some form of derision, then your mind is not as open as you apparently think it is. And finally, I hate repeating myself, but for all those who similarly believe that I am stating something unequivocal, nothing can be further from the truth. As I have stated several times in this thread, I can be persuaded to accept the notion that paranormal phenomenon are real. The problem is that a lot of folks have a low benchmark for accepting the reality of paranormal phenomenon. My benchmark is rather high, and for good reason. All of science requires high benchmarks before making declarations. As has been said repeatedly in the history of science, extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. The existence of paranormal phenomenon is an extraordinary claim. How can it not be? The evidence for that claim must, of necessity, be extraordinary before the scientific community will ever accept it. This is nothing new. All major discoveries in science are held to the same high standard.
So folks, get busy. Find us the extraordinary evidence. The first one who does will no doubt win a Nobel prize.
Let me repeat (hopefully for the last time), farmer Bob may be the most well respected, honest man anyone has ever known, but we still need unambiguous physical evidence that he saw ghosts in his outhouse.
You absolutely did not need to repeat that. As I said in my previous post (which you quoted):
"Anecdotal evidence is certainly not scientific evidence or a substitution for scientific evidence"
There is some neuroscience evidence to suggest that these experiences are in our head. The human brain is a complex organ, and many false perceptions can be triggered in it.
I believe that further research will show that similar "glitches" in our brain functions can generate "ghost" experiences and other haunting phenomenon.
That is certainly interesting. But there's a few problems with that. If the human brain CAN make that happen, that doesn't prove that every time someone experiences a ghost or a haunting that the brain is the cause, unless, for lack of a better phrase, you check everyone's brain who claims to experience a ghost or a haunting and that's not going to happen. It also doesn't explain people who experience the same thing at the same place at different times (the person experiencing it later being unaware of previous experiences) and it doesn't explain experiences that have multiple witnesses.
Recent studies have shown that so-called out of body experiences are a result of
I wasn't talking about out of body experiences, I know little about them.
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