Paranormal?

[SlightlyDarkFrancis]

you're no fun

 

[clownvicoria]

Sue me.

 

[mikeyb30790]

aw come on, you can't be asking us to believe there are people who really are possessed by demons? that's platinumpi4U territory.

 

[Ladybird14]

Not demons, it's a state of disharmonious chi caused by the crystals in the Earth not aligning properly when ancient chi masters are reincarnated. People just call it demons because they don't want to be associated with chi balls.

 

[NekoJoaaa]

Me too. It's incredibly exciting

 

[bommarito_c]

Cool. I just need a holocaust denier and I earn the right to shout 'bingo'.

 

[power_d_69_1]

If a TV show counted as a proper peer review we'd all be heading for a galaxy far, far, far away. Pegasus to be precise.

 

[reject]

** waits for someone to say "I'll get me coat!" **

And Randi's work? Is that to be discounted as well?

 

[NeoJoe]

There is no middle ground and nobody suggested there was. You either have pancreatic cancer or you don't. There's no middle ground there either. But diagnosis can be difficult. Especially in the early stages.

 

[QuasiIntellectual]

Yes. I saw that idiot on TV once. They were testing homoeopathy or some such. The clown spent the entire time doing magic tricks distracting the people conducting the experiments. Randi has a conflict of interest in disproving the paranormal. He promised to pay anybody who could provide proof a million dollars. I don't think he's really willing to pay out.

Wherever there is a significant conflict of interest it's difficult to accept an individual is approaching the subject in the proper professional and objective manner.

 

[RemiJ]

Okay, but considering how few people are willing to attempt it, and how not a single person has ever won the prize, how do you figure this is a conflict of interest? It could be argued that the fact that people are afraid to take it, or maybe they're just too busy to take it, is an admission of guilt.

 

[rohits]

People don't take him up on it because he has little to no credibility with anybody who would want to prove such a thing. Randi insists on being involved in the experiments at every stage and having a say on what is and isn't tested. Basically taking control of the entire process and making it impossible to conduct a fair test.

If we compare Randi's challenge to something like the X Prize for example you'll get the picture. For the X Prize, while there were rules governing the competition, the sub-orbital space craft designers retained full control of their projects.

 

[Kharisma12]

Maybe something has changed with Randi's site, but the videos and bits I've seen on the challenge are that the "contestant" sets the parameters of the test. Even if Randi's group requires the initial input from the contestant to be modified, the contestant still agrees to the parameters of the test and is supposed to be confident they'll win the prize. If someone was a credible contestant, they'd actually have the abilities they claim to have, and very few agreeable parameters would probably impede their million dollar payday. It wouldn't matter if Randi was credible or not, the contestant would simply exhibit their abilities and satisfy the requirements. If Randi didn't pay, there'd be a huge, very public lawsuit to take down the million dollar skeptic.

 

[SweetasSuga2008]

Doesn't matter. The conflict of interest is still there and you just don't really know how it works until you try it out.

 

[danny19752005]

So, professional psychics, those who make their money from their 'abilities' presumably also suffer a conflict of interest?

 

[blue_dott13]

They have their work properly peer reviewed. But yes they do in a sense. Especially when they've been working on something for a long time.

 

[nielpatricks]

Randi has very simple criteria

1) What do you say you can do?
2) How do you propose to demonstrate this?

The protocols are agreed in advance and he has no say on it once they are agreed to. It is absolutley fair and this is arranged in advanced.

Name ANY of the tests Randi has conducted that you class as unfair

There is not ONE person that has even come close to it - not one. The problem is that as soon as any level of control is put in place their powers mysteriously fail.

The million is chump change compared to what they could make if they passed. Interviews, endorsements, nobel prizes and whole new vistas of science would open up to them - the books would literally have to be re-written/

 

[PHILP]

I did name one. The Homoeopathy test where he was distracting all the lab assistants with magic tricks. If you're going to conduct a test on something you should do it properly.

 

[Jones]

Which test was it? Was it a formal JREF test or an nitial screening?

I have seen Randi "OD" on Homeopathic crap lots of times with no ill-effects, which in and of itself should prove something.

And now some classic Randi

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OTVWMY8EZCA&feature=related

 

[hottiepie]

He can OD on whatever he likes. I couldn't care less. I also couldn't care less if there was any truth to homoeopathy or not. It's the way Randi behaves during the test that bothers me.

The test I saw was on the BBC's Horizon program.