Rhine's Extra-Sensory Perception Experiment

[Krassus]

For those of you who haven't heard, this was a series of tests conducted in the 1930's where a person in one building would guess which cards a person in another building was picking. There were 5 different types of cards, so statistically, his success rate should have been 20%, or 1/5. Instead, this person, who claimed to be gifted, had a success rate of over 30%. The odds of his success rate being this high due to chance is 1 in 1/1000,000,000,000,000,000,000 or 1 to the power of -22. In other words, if you took the combined population of FIFTEEN BILLION EARTHS, you'd get ONE such person! This experiment is legit, as it was conducted in Duke University under strict supervision. It also got a lot of press coverage, so just so you know, this isn't something some kid made up and posted on the net. Your thoughts?

Rhine's Experiments: 30% success rate instead of expected 20% (1/1000,000,000,000,000,000,000 odds of someone being that lucky)
Ganzfield Experiments : 35 - 50% success rate

 

[dighn]

ESP!

 

[KingNothing]

Why is this not in the same thread as "what does 1^-22 mean"?

 

[StageLeft]

My thoughts are that ESP or any other psychic abilities have _never_ been proven in a scientifically veriable arena, and thusly I conclude that they are junk.

 

[morkinva]

use the force, luke

Is this the same power that psychics use when assisting the police force? If so, then I guess I do believe in it. Well, maybe.

 

[Krassus]

Originally posted by: Skoorb
My thoughts are that ESP or any other psychic abilities have _never_ been proven in a scientifically veriable arena, and thusly I conclude that they are junk.

But explain how he beat 1 to 10 -22 odds?

 

[Amorphus]

30%, wow. let's see him do it for another battery.

 

[StageLeft]

Originally posted by: morkinva
use the force, luke

Is this the same power that psychics use when assisting the police force? If so, then I guess I do believe in it. Well, maybe.

Psychics don't help police forces. I read a while back that a bunch of police forces who had tried using psychics were surveyed and the survey results were that they received absolutely no meaningful help from so called psychics.

But explain how he beat 1 to 10 -22 odds?

Let's see it reproduced 🙂

BTW, there is a long standing challenge out, afaik, that offers money to somebody who can consistently prove to have any psychic abilities. The money still has not been claimed.

 

[Krassus]

Originally posted by: Skoorb

Originally posted by: morkinva use the force, luke Is this the same power that psychics use when assisting the police force? If so, then I guess I do believe in it. Well, maybe.

Psychics don't help police forces. I read a while back that a bunch of police forces who had tried using psychics were surveyed and the survey results were that they received absolutely no meaningful help from so called psychics.

But explain how he beat 1 to 10 -22 odds?

Let's see it reproduced 🙂 BTW, there is a long standing challenge out, afaik, that offers money to somebody who can consistently prove to have any psychic abilities. The money still has not been claimed.

Haha, link?

 

[StageLeft]

Originally posted by: Krassus

Originally posted by: Skoorb

Originally posted by: morkinva use the force, luke Is this the same power that psychics use when assisting the police force? If so, then I guess I do believe in it. Well, maybe.

Psychics don't help police forces. I read a while back that a bunch of police forces who had tried using psychics were surveyed and the survey results were that they received absolutely no meaningful help from so called psychics.

But explain how he beat 1 to 10 -22 odds?

Let's see it reproduced 🙂 BTW, there is a long standing challenge out, afaik, that offers money to somebody who can consistently prove to have any psychic abilities. The money still has not been claimed.

Haha, link?

I read it in a book a few years back, so the link is in my head. It's possible the book was full of sh*t, but I doubt it, since this was part of a section in the book about psychics and it was a psyc textbook.

You have to ask yourself: if these guys found 70 years ago evidence for ESP, how come we've heard nothing else meaningful since then? Probably because the experient was flawed and/or unreproducable, which means it's meaningless.

 

[StageLeft]

most police departments (72% according to researchers) have not used psychics (Durm and Sweat 1994). And of those who have, few have done so officially or claim significant success for them.

 

[Krassus]

Originally posted by: Skoorb

Originally posted by: Krassus

Originally posted by: Skoorb

Originally posted by: morkinva use the force, luke Is this the same power that psychics use when assisting the police force? If so, then I guess I do believe in it. Well, maybe.

Psychics don't help police forces. I read a while back that a bunch of police forces who had tried using psychics were surveyed and the survey results were that they received absolutely no meaningful help from so called psychics.

But explain how he beat 1 to 10 -22 odds?

Let's see it reproduced 🙂 BTW, there is a long standing challenge out, afaik, that offers money to somebody who can consistently prove to have any psychic abilities. The money still has not been claimed.

Haha, link?

I read it in a book a few years back, so the link is in my head. It's possible the book was full of sh*t, but I doubt it, since this was part of a section in the book about psychics and it was a psyc textbook. You have to ask yourself: if these guys found 70 years ago evidence for ESP, how come we've heard nothing else meaningful since then? Probably because the experient was flawed and/or unreproducable, which means it's meaningless.

Actually, there've been thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of experiments since then. That's just one of the most famous and best-documented ones. Google up some more if you like. I'm doing that as we speak.

 

[Krassus]

Check this out... source

According to Herodotus, the ancient Greek historian, King Croesus of Lydia dispatched several of his men to test seven oracles to see if any of them could divine what he, the king, was doing on the day of the test. Only Pythia, priestess of Apollo at Delphi, was able to divine correctly that the king was making a lamb and tortoise stew in a bronze kettle.
Convinced of her powers, Croesus then posed the question that really interested him: If he attacked the rival kingdom of Persia, would he be able to defeat its army? Pythia replied, "When Croesus has the Halys crossed, a mighty empire will be lost." Insufficiently alert to the ambiguity of this prediction, Croesus crossed the river, attacked, and lost his mighty empire.

 

[StageLeft]

<a target=new class=ftalternatingbarlinklarge href="http://mailman.efn.org/pipermail/skeptix/Week-of-Mon-20031006/001901.html">James "The Amazing" Randi offers a $1 million reward to anyone "who can show,
under proper observing conditions, evidence of any paranormal, supernatural, or
occult power or event." The prize has never been claimed.
</a>

 

[StageLeft]

Actually, there've been thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of experiments since then. That's just one of the most famous and best-documented ones. Google up some more if you like. I'm doing that as we speak.

Perhaps so, but the jury is still out on ESP - kind of like with God; you can only prove he exists, not disprove him. Similarly with ESP and other things of that nature. There is just no conclusive proof that it is a real phenomenon.

 

[Krassus]

Originally posted by: Skoorb

Actually, there've been thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of experiments since then. That's just one of the most famous and best-documented ones. Google up some more if you like. I'm doing that as we speak.

Perhaps so, but the jury is still out on ESP - kind of like with God; you can only prove he exists, not disprove him. Similarly with ESP and other things of that nature. There is just no conclusive proof that it is a real phenomenon.

You can't prove god exists...

 

[StageLeft]

Originally posted by: Krassus

Originally posted by: Skoorb

Actually, there've been thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of experiments since then. That's just one of the most famous and best-documented ones. Google up some more if you like. I'm doing that as we speak.

Perhaps so, but the jury is still out on ESP - kind of like with God; you can only prove he exists, not disprove him. Similarly with ESP and other things of that nature. There is just no conclusive proof that it is a real phenomenon.

You can't prove god exists...

My point is: you can't disprove God if He doesn't exist, merely proove him if he does. Dito for ESP. It may not exist, but how do we know if we just haven't done the right experiments of if it truly does not exist? But, if we can find an experiment that prooves it, then we know it exists. Same for the tooth fairy, santa claus, etc..

But, food for thought: If any psychic abilities were real and provable there is that reward I mentioned, plus others (do a quick search on google), and yet none have been claimed. Reason? Nobody can prove they have psychic abilities. The proof is in the pudding so to speak.

 

[Krassus]

Originally posted by: Skoorb

Originally posted by: Krassus

Originally posted by: Skoorb

Actually, there've been thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of experiments since then. That's just one of the most famous and best-documented ones. Google up some more if you like. I'm doing that as we speak.

Perhaps so, but the jury is still out on ESP - kind of like with God; you can only prove he exists, not disprove him. Similarly with ESP and other things of that nature. There is just no conclusive proof that it is a real phenomenon.

You can't prove god exists...

My point is: you can't disprove God if He doesn't exist, merely proove him if he does. Dito for ESP. It may not exist, but how do we know if we just haven't done the right experiments of if it truly does not exist? But, if we can find an experiment that prooves it, then we know it exists. Same for the tooth fairy, santa claus, etc.. But, food for thought: If any psychic abilities were real and provable there is that reward I mentioned, plus others (do a quick search on google), and yet none have been claimed. Reason? Nobody can prove they have psychic abilities. The proof is in the pudding so to speak.

Read the info on Honorton's experiments in the link above. I have a friend who believes all this crap, from remote viewing to crop circles, and he labelled me a 'hardcore skeptic.' However, its hard to argue with this.

 

[tcsenter]

There were 5 different types of cards, so statistically, his success rate should have been 20%, or 1/5. Instead, this person, who claimed to be gifted, had a success rate of over 30%. The odds of his success rate being this high due to chance is 1 in 1/1000,000,000,000,000,000,000 or 1 to the power of -22. In other words, if you took the combined population of FIFTEEN BILLION EARTHS, you'd get ONE such person!

So essentially what this proves, provided the probabilities are correct (I'm not taking the time to verify them), is that if there indeed is such a thing as ESP in the sense you're defining it, then this guy must be the only person since the Big Bang to actually possess it and will probably be the only one who will ever possess it.

A "sample of one" doesn't make for sound science, including statistics. The statistical aberrance has always existed, and the accepted statistical method is to toss-out the aberrance, not everything except the aberrance.