So, much like the ‘rejected for ideology’ thread, this thread stands testament to the ability of creationists to believe things which are demonstrably, objectively untrue.
I’m sure that various law enforcement agencies, out of desperation or foolishness, have indeed engaged psychics over the years. I know they have in fact, And this seems to have led to the belief that it’s now a normal standard part of procedure.
Except it’s not. If it was, and it was done ‘all the time’ it would be easy to fill up the comments with news and links to where it was done. But that won’t happen will it?
And I wonder, if psychics were used all the time why do we still bother to train agents? Why not just train them in psychic? Why bother with surveillance and evidence gathering if ‘all the time’ psychics are giving the correct answer?
Or perhaps this is creationist doublespeak. Perhaps the FBI use physics all the time, but unsuccessfully! Either way, I look forwards to reading all about the evidence the FBI are indeed doing such a thing all the time.…
Intelligence agencies too:
[start of quoate]
Stargate Project was the 1991 code name for a secret U.S. Army unit established in 1978 at Fort Meade, Maryland, by the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) and SRI International (a California contractor) to investigate the potential for psychic phenomena in military and domestic intelligence applications. The Project, and its precursors and sister projects, originally went by various code names—GONDOLA WISH, GRILL FLAME, CENTER LANE, SUN STREAK, SCANATE—until 1991 when they were consolidated and rechristened as “Stargate Project”.
Stargate Project work primarily involved remote viewing, the purported ability to psychically “see” events, sites, or information from a great distance.[1] The project was overseen until 1987 by Lt. Frederick Holmes “Skip” Atwater, an aide and “psychic headhunter” to Maj. Gen. Albert Stubblebine, and later president of the Monroe Institute.[2] The unit was small-scale, comprising about 15 to 20 individuals, and was run out of “an old, leaky wooden barracks
[end of quote]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stargate_Project
I’m sure SRI rings a bell with people who’ve followed remove viewing history.
I just listened to part (all I could take) of a podcast interviewing the historian of a the DIA where he said that remove viewing was proven will beyond chance by these DIA experiments. As usual, these guys need to hire more magicians and fewer psychologists since magicians are much better at understanding how to detect cheating and to point out poor design in tests of psychic phenomena.
When they do use psychics, this gets a lot of press. And that gives people the false impression that they use them all the time.
In a way, the occasional use of psychics by the FBI disproves the assertions of the critics of the scientific approach. The critics say that scientist have closed minds and never look at other possibilities. But the occasional use of psychics shows that they are willing to try. They don’t try very often, because experience has taught them that it doesn’t work.
Unfortunately you don’t know what you are talking about regarding this. I do.
Omagain doesn’t. But he is proud of his lack of knowledge of things.
What? Know something about psychics? Could you assuage my doubts by supplying some evidence?
Sure you do. Do you have some insider knowledge then regarding what the FBI do and don’t do? You said they do it “all the time” and there must be a basis for that claim, right? Otherwise someone of your integrity would not have made it! That’s my working assumption anyway. And I’m interested in that claim being backed up. Perhaps I’m wrong, perhaps they do do it “all the time” as you claim. Or perhaps not. I’m willing to learn.
Feel free to educate me then.
Who do you believe has genuine psychic powers and what are those powers?
And why do you believe they have those powers? What is the evidence for it.
Phoodoo everyone is on tenter hooks waiting to educated via your self-acclaimed expertise on the subject.
Please enlighten us and disabuse us of our misguided skepticism of your claim that “the FBI uses psychics ALL the time”
Anyone think he is up to the chalenge of backing up his claims? Nope didn’t think so.
Do you really think I need to tell you how I have knowledge of things, because some idiot skeptics are playing skeptics about things they know nothing about?
Ha. No.
My prediction has been resoundingly confirmed! Thanks phoodoo you did not disappoint. That didn’t take long now did it?
so funny, fool indeed.
PeterP,
Omagain has already said he knows they don’t use psychics. Why haven’t you asked him to prove how he knows this, skeptic?
Team player, natch.
https://www.cia.gov/library/readingroom/docs/CIA-RDP96-00788R000100280009-3.pdf
The National Institute of Justice said it. https://nij.ojp.gov/
https://www.ncjrs.gov/App/Publications/abstract.aspx?ID=144859
If you can find a more authoritative source I’d be interested in hearing more about it.
It’s clear I know nothing about it because apparently the FBI use psychics all the time and I had always thought that they did not because psychics are either liars or have deluded themselves into thinking they have real powers.
I’m sceptical of your claim that the FBI uses psychics all the time, yes. So far from “playing skeptics” I’m actually calling you on something that anyone can research for themselves and understand.
And “things I know nothing about”. Very ominous. Yeah, well, I’m real scared now. Why don’t you come remote view me and tell me how many fingers I’m holding up?
It seems to me you are being called out on things you know nothing about and your response?
Just more insults.
The FBI does not, no. Unless you know otherwise?
Because I am waiting for you to support your claims which noticeably you’ve failed to do. Piss poor attempt at defelction and obsfucation while you try to wiggle away from your claims that the FBI uses psychics ALL the time.
No you don’t. Your desperate need to believe in magical powers is however rather amazing.
I have no idea about your needs but I’m not surprised you are unwilling to support your assertion. Ah well.
Well, to be fair, there are TV shows that make this claim. These shows also document the afterlife, and haunted houses. I’ve watched a few of these and they look very convincing. They seem to feature someone who rejects such nonsense out of hand, but who was obliged to change their mind when exposed to hard evidence collected not only by psychics, but by the experiences of normal people and instrumentation like thermometers. Needless to say, the leads provided by the psychics are always spot on, and the crimes could not have been solved otherwise.
We understand that they wouldn’t have much TV material of they ignored all the cases where psychics weren’t used, or who were used by contributed nothing useful.
(And as a footnote, I agree there are plenty of tricks that consistently fool scientists, that stage magicians learned in stage magic 101. And if it’s easy to fool people who aren’t expecting a trick, imagine how easy it is to fool those who sincerely believe there’s no trick. The Will To Believe conquers all.)
I know of a local case in which a psychic was used successfully. I know of it because a relative was involved in the case.
I asked, wouldn’t it be useful to have a psychic tell the police where a murder weapon can be found, rather than expose a friend or relative of the perp?
I mean, it saves a lot of money for witness protection. A nationally celebrated psychic could make a living this way, or at least supplement an income.
Note that what I’m suggesting does not involve anyone testifying falsely. The police still have to find actual evidence and develop the case.
Can anyone cite an example where a psychic did any more than lead to evidence that could be known about by someone who knew the perp, but wished to remain anonymous?
That’s a bit like saying, I know there are some drugs for cancer treatment, wouldn’t it be better if they would just eliminate cancer altogether, then there would be no need for drugs! Yea, well, I guess so…
There are plenty of experiments that show success in precognition studies, just like some drugs are effective some times. Of course if we used the logic of the Omagains and the PeterP’s of the world, if the drugs aren’t 100% successful all the time, then of course its a fraud.
But hey, no one has ever told Omagain about what the FBI does, so , there you have it! What more proof do you need! He is a skeptic!
There are no well controlled experiments demonstrating psychic phenomena. Rhine sent his career attempting to demonstrate psychic phenomena, and the better his experiments got, the fewer the results.
Pretty simple, really.
Phoodoo, answer my question. Are there any cases not more easily explained by the motive to disguise the identity of an informer?
Just like any good Russian propagandist could do, you could try to discreet something by complaining you don’t like some aspect of a study. You could do that to practically any experiment ever conducted on Earth. But to say they don’t exist? That is a lie.
There are scores of studies, conducted by people with PhDs in their science field, with blind controls, published in science journals. So complain all you want, but I could apply those same complaints to any study in psychology that has ever been performed.
Who knows, maybe you and Alan are Russian bots. The experiments have been done.
I have no idea what this question means. I am not relaxing anecdotes that I read about in some chat forum
That show what?
It’s rigor! Lol
List them. Let’s have a look at the quality.
And, I ask once more, who out there has these powers we are talking about? I know you think Uri does, anyone else?
They are the records of the applications for the JREF foundation.
And you don’t like that the evidence for the applicants to the challenge is in a forum, so you dismiss it?
The people in that forum, the people with all sorts of claims who cannot often even articulate what their ‘power’ is, those are the people you are putting all your faith in.
Not relaxing? Try to discreet something? Seems your typing ability is failing. Perhaps you should invest in a PSI keyboard – works out what you meant to say.
If you read in the forum you’d see claims of 100% reliability are not unusual.
But the point is that if we could cure cancer with PSI at 10% efficacy then that would be part of the standard treatment course!
What success rate does the best psychic have, in your opinion? And who is that person?
If you believe in all this so much how come you cannot name names and the powers they have?
score so far:
Evidence that The FBI use psychics all the time, fool: 0
except for the secret evidence that phoodo can’t share with us, presumably for reasons of national security. He can allude to it however, insist it does exist, he just can’t say what it is.
OMagain,
Internet investigative skeptic Omagain. He learned how to cook hamburgers just using Google!
OMagain,
What experiment is the most convincing that random mutations and natural selection can create useful complexity?
Do you have proof? Can you google it? What does the skeptic Bible tell you?
Is it bacteria eating? Is that what you can find on Google? I bet you ten million dollars you can’t find even one?
I’m pretty sure the answer to your question is no, you don’t have the money and are incapable of admitting if you are wrong.
The money is in a fund, all you have to do is pass the vetting, what are you evolutionists so afraid of, don’t you want to win the money?
Prove it.
Not just Rhine. AFAIK, there aren’t ANY studies that show the existence of psychic powers. And it hasn’t been for lack of trying. Soooo many failed tests.
I suppose it’s possible that scientists or the institutions they worked for have somehow managed to suppress those studies that have conflicted with their core beliefs (or profit motives).
Weird that “The Man” couldn’t have managed that with quantum effects. Or Michaelson-Morley. Or the relation between stuff like asbestos or cigarettes and conditions like cancer or mesothelioma. Just harder work and better stealth, I suppose.
I see the dawn brings nothing but deflection, obsfucation, and total failure on phoodoos part to support a single aspect of his claim.
Phoodoo why don’t you list the ten published studies that you believe provide the best/strongest evidence for psi, psychic ability, canine psi, or any other such demonstration of paranormal capabilities? That would put al those meany skeptics in their place.
That ain’t never gonna happen, though, is it phoodoo?
I wouldn’t be surprised if phoodoo is next going to be advocating psychic surgery as a efficacious treatment for cancer.
The FBI uses psychics ALL the time, fool is evidently the best evidence that exists for phoodoos claims. So funny and so sad at the same time.
What do you mean, I just did! Same as Randi, I said so.
Its no wonder you don’t want to claim the 10 million though, because you just don’t have a single experiment to demonstrate natural selection. So easy, and you can’t do it.
There are no studies showing the existence of psychic powers only in the same way there are no studies showing a link between cigarettes and lung cancer.
And if you say there are studies, all I have to do is ask you to show a study and if you do, I just hand wave it away by claiming it is not rigorous, done by hacks, blah, blah,…just like Peterp and Omagain, and Rummy…
So there is not a single study showing a link between cigarettes and lung cancer. In fact there isn’t even a single study linking cigarettes to any harmful health effects. So I think we should make them legal for kids again.
Please show a study that “fails” in just the same way that the cigarette studies “fail” (i.e., where the R2s between the psi predictions and the actual results) are as high as the cigarette/cancer studies believed by one victim side and derided by the industry side.
Generally, this “it’s just like blah blah” response of yours is very easy to make, but much harder to support. “The psi studies fail” generally means something like “the correlations between the predictions of “psychics” and the actual results are no higher than we would expect by chance.” That’s not the sort of test that could “prove” or “disprove” natural selection. The latter is an explanation (one that you evidently do not buy). But in that case there’s already something to be explained. There hasn’t been found anything to be explained in the psi studies.
So your “whataboutism” isn’t very convincing.
Then phoodoo is being his normal self. I suppose we could take that as a sign of good health.
walto,
What study, you haven’t shown a single study that shows that cigarettes cause health problems. So since you can’t show any, they must not be any.
See how this works. Anyone can play their stupid game. Claim none exists. If shown one, then claim it doesn’t count. Show another, do it again. Repeat.
Its the bullshit con game of the skeptic. Its in your bible.
Here’s one. https://www.cancer.org/latest-news/the-study-that-helped-spur-the-us-stop-smoking-movement.html
There are lots of them though.
Now it’s your turn.
Possibly good health or perhaps a sign of underlying pathology
the russian bot comments were pretty funny and I imagine if we were discussing his antivaccination lies the accusation would be ‘paid pharma shill’.
the pattern is all too obvious. Outside of credulity he has nothing to support his position.
walto,
From the American Cancer Society? Oh please. And all they did was ask them if they smoked or not. We don’t know what kind of exercise they did, what they ate, if their houses had asbestos, what their jobs were, …Oh, come on, no one can take such a poorly correlated cause and effect screening (its not even an experiment, its a questionnaire for crying out loud) seriously.
See, I knew there wasn’t any.
So, now Rupert Sheldrake actually showed that dogs could sense when their owners came home. Now THAT’S a serious experiment.
Your turn. Easy game right?
phoodoo, your ignorance about epidemiology is evidence of your ignorance of epidemiology, no more.
The fact that you claim to be unable to see the difference between your “hand waving” rejection of the cancer-smoking link and competent people’s rejection of Bem and Sargent and Sheldrake (WTF?) merely means that you are ignorant.
We have tried to explain to you how statisticians control for confounding factors, but to no avail…
Oh now, talk about hand waving! Your studies are valid, right right.
It started off by all your skeptic brethren claiming the studies don’t exist. Now here comes Jock to the rescue, proclaiming, oh, fine there are studies by Bem, Sheldrake, Sargent, etc…but they don’t count. You know because, statistics!
See there ignorant folks, watch Jock move the goalposts. Heck that’s in the second chapter of the bible, right after making shit up.
So sorry Omagain, Peter, Petrushka, Walto, Jock thinks your don’t know what you are talking about, the studies exist. But don’t worry, Jock your superhero is here to dismiss them. You know how? By saying, “Hey, you are ignorant!” Powerful retort there Jock. Quite a superpower you have.
See why its a waste to try to convince skeptics of anything. They will just keep playing these ridiculous games forever.
Patently false, phoodoo. I for one have never said that studies don’t exist so there goes yoru claim of ALL right out the window. What a failure so early in the week, phoodoo.
So how about it, phoodoo, link to the single (lowered the threshold by 90%) study that you find to be the most compelling that supports your claim that psi, psychics, and any other such paranormal abilities are demonstrable and therefore exist.
Can you do it? Survey says not only wlll you fail to support your claims you will attempt (to no avail) to project your failure onto others. Surprise us! The link will provide much grist for the mill.