Thursday, January 06, 2011

More on that method ...

... Journal’s Paper on ESP Expected to Prompt Outrage. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)

There's a bit of mixing up apples and oranges here, it seems to me. The null hypothesis would be that ESP either exists or does not, and the point would be to determine one or the other. (Drug A either cures disease B or it does not; a controlled test is done with half of participants getting said drug and the other half not getting it. If those who get it are cured, the null hypothesis has been disproved.) There is plenty of evidence of unusual phenomena that might be categorized as ESP and the question is to explain those, not to explain them away, or to assume that they are illusory.
Bayesian analysis employs Bayes's theorum, which is a mathematical formula used, most notably in risk analysis, to determine probability.

The objections here seem to have more to do with the faith biases of the objectors.

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