Science cannot Explain why a Psi Wheel Turns

This is the fifth post in my series on psi wheels.

In the first post, I discussed how everyone can measure the energy field surrounding their body with a psi wheel and how to use a psi wheel to measure this energy as you bring it into and through your body when you practice spiritual healing. In the second post, I discussed how the phenomenon of the psi wheel shows that the energy in the field surrounding the body is probably the same as the energy that flows through you when you give spiritual healing to another person. In the third post I discussed using qi gong to increase the flow of healing energy (qi) through your body to help develop your abilities as a spiritual healer. In the fourth post, I discussed how to use an Egely wheel (a very sensitive psi wheel manufactured by the Egely Research Company) to demonstrate that healing energy can be stored in inanimate objects.

In this fifth post, I will discuss the scientific research George Egely did that shows a psi wheel does not turn because of any known phenomenon such as heat, air currents, electricity or magnetism. Egely concluded that a psi wheel turns because of a different type of energy he called bioenergy.

George Egely, the inventor of the Egely wheel, worked on problems of energy transfer in nuclear power plants and he earned a Ph.D. in that subject. He later studied the phenomenon that causes the Egely wheel to turn. By conducting many different types of experiments, he ruled out heat, air currents, electricity, magnetism and any other normal explanation for the phenomenon. He found correlations with health and psychological factors which led him to use the term bioenergy to refer to the energy that causes the Egely wheel to rotate. His research on the Egely wheel phenomenon demonstrated the phenomenon cannot be explained by current scientific knowledge. This research is described at the Egely wheel web site in The story of the vitality meter. He also published his research in Experimental Investigation of Biologically Induced Energy Transport Anomalies, KFKI report, 1986-94/K.

The following is a summary of the information in the The Story of the Vitality Meter.

Summary of Experiments and Results

• Glass boxes were used to isolate the experimental system from wind which showed the rotation is not caused by air currents.
  
• Using gloves to thermally insulate the hand from the air, Egely showed that the rotation is not due to heat from the hand.
  
• Metal tanks shaped like a hand and filled with hot water did not cause appreciable rotation. This showed heat does not cause the rotation.
  
• Results from experiments involving an electrical apparatus that used a colored chemical solution to visualize the rotation ruled out wind, heat, electricity or magnetism as a cause of the rotation. These experiments also demonstrated an unknown phenomenon that caused the electrical resistance of the solution to change.
  
• The speed of rotation depended on how tired or fit the individual was. This ruled out heat and air currents because the phenomenon varied with the biological condition of the subject.
  
• Egely found weather fronts or worries reduced rotation. Once storm clouds passed, rotation increased immediately. He believed moods improved when this happened which showed the mind influences the phenomenon.
  
• Egely found ill people did not rotate the wheel well even if they had a fever which showed the rotation is not due to heat from the hands. People who were healthy and vibrant always caused good rotation. This also cannot be explained by heat or air currents.
  
• Egely found correlations with psychological factors such as meditation, scholastic achievement, physical attractiveness, worry, remote influence of one person over another. All these factors rule out normal explanations.
  
• Because health and psychological factors affected the rotation, Egely use the term bioenergy to describe the energy that causes the rotation. Egely believed bioenergy is conducted by all materials and that explained why an Egely wheel will not turn well inside a jar. The jar acts like a Faraday cage.
  

  UPDATE: For ease of reference I have included additional evidence not listed The Story of the Vitality Meter below:
  

  • Dr Parisetti described his experiences with a psi wheel here.
    
    • "Perhaps the warmth from my hand was heating the nearest part of the aluminium, which in turn would result in a tiny uplift air current, enough to make the wheel spin. To test that hypothesis, I dipped a spoon in boiling water to heat it up, placed it besides the wheel and could not detect any movement."
      
    • "...I reflected, air provides very good thermal insulation, and my hand would only be some 15 degrees warmer than the aluminium. So, the heat explanation doesn’t seem to hold up."
      
    • "I then started experimenting with means to block any possible direct influence from my hands to the wheel. I placed a transparent plastic CD jewel box between my right hand and the Egeli Wheel: this made no difference whatsoever - the wheel would still immediately start turning!"
      
    • "I’ve seem movies on the Internet in which people place the Egeli Wheel under a salad bowl, blow on it with a blow drier to show that there is no outside influence, and still, when they place their hand besides it, the wheel start turning."
      
  • It cannot be the hand channeling air flow that causes the wheel to spin because if there were a draft in the room, the wheel would spin when no hand was near it.
    
  • It cannot be heat from the hand causing a convection current with a horizontal component that causes the wheel to spin because if that were the case, the wheel would not be level. The side of the wheel in the rising air would be higher than the opposite side. Particularly with a home made psi-wheel, which is very sensitive to any air flow, you can tell if it is being affected by drafts or not.
    
  • When I place my hand near the edge of a table as if I was turning a psi-wheel but without a psi-wheel near it, and I hold a burning stick of incense below the edge of the table, the smoke rises smoothly without any indications of horizontal air flow. If the hand could produce a convection current with enough of a horizontal component to turn an homemade psi-wheel, it should easily influence the much lighter particles of smoke. I know that slight air currents can influence the smoke from the incense because if I then place an Egely wheel near my hand, its turning creates air currents that do influence the smoke.
    
  • When I place an Egely wheel near a red hot heating element on an electric stove, the Egely wheel barely moves and not in one direction continuously. Similarly, if I place an Egely wheel near a small tub or a latex glove filled with warm water at approximately body temperature, the wheel sometimes moves slowly but not continuously in one direction. When a hand is placed near the Egely wheel, once started, the wheel moves continuously in one direction and much more rapidly.
    
  • If I am sitting at a table turning a psi-wheel, and I move my hand away from the wheel, the wheel stops moving indicating there is no appreciable air flow near it. If a convection current caused by heat from my hand was causing the wheel to turn, surely the convection current from my entire body a few inches away would be much stronger and the wheel should continue to indicate some air flow by some type of movement. If my breath was causing the wheel to turn when my hand was near it, similarly the wheel should continue to indicate some air flow after I move my hand away.
    
  • If you are trying to prove that convection currents due to heat from the hand cause a psi-wheel to turn, it is very easy to fool yourself. This is because heat does cause convection currents that will have a horizontal component. As warm air is rises, air will flow horizontally towards the rising column to replace the rising air. Therefore it is definitely possible to construct a device that uses heat to create a horizontal air flow that can turn an psi-wheel. But the fact that such a device is possible does not prove that a psi-wheel turns when a hand is near it because of a convection current due to heat from the hand. You can blow on a psi-wheel to make it turn, but that does not prove the breath of the experimenter causes it to turn when a hand is placed near it.
    

    Egely made his conclusions that bioenergy moves the wheel partially based on experiments with many individuals. If you want to assert some phenomenon, such as convection currents, cause a psi-wheel to turn, you have to demonstrate that it can make the wheel turn under the same conditions and with the same characteristics (smooth, continuous, rapid turning) that a human hand will turn the wheel. You also have to do it with a the same type of psi-wheel. An experimental apparatus may be able to impart slight motion to an Egely wheel, but can it turn a homemade paper psi-wheel which has much more resistance to turning but which many people are able to turn by placing their hand near it?
    

    You also have to account for differences in the ability of different people to turn the wheel. If you think it is heat from the hand that causes the wheel to turn, you have to show a correlation between hand temperature in different people and rate of turning. A few people are not able to turn a psi-wheel, are their hands always cold? And you have to distinguish between correlation and causation. If you think heat is causing convection currents you have to prove it is the convection currents that are influencing the wheel, for example, by using smoke to visualize the convection currents without the presence of a psi-wheel to provide evidence that there is appreciable air flow moving in the direction and speed necessary to move the psi-wheel.
    

    If you don't do controls with humans, if you don't compare the phenomenon caused by laboratory apparatus to the phenomenon caused by a human, if you don't distinguish between correlation and causation, it is very easy to fool yourself into believing that you have found a physical explanation of the psi-wheel, when all you have done is, for instance, demonstrate the principle of buoyancy 2200 years after Archimedes did.
    

  • I have found that during the hot summer when my hand, the wheel, and the air are all approximately the same temperature, the wheel still turns. This rules out heat and convection currents.
    
  • I put a cotton wash cloth around my hand to provide thermal insulation and the wheel still turned. This rules out heat and convection currents.
    
  • If I use two wheels, one near each hand, they turn slower than one alone. If I use one wheel and place my other hand near a second wheel, the first wheel slows down as the second speeds up. This is not explained by heat, convection currents, or drafts.
    
  • I and many other people have enough power coming from our hands to turn a wheel covered by some type of container. This rules out air currents as an explanation for the rotation.
    
  • I find that I can "magnetize" a plastic jar so that it will turn a wheel without my hand near it. The direction of rotation is always the same depending on which hand was used to magnetize the jar even though the jar is a symmetrical cylinder. This rules out any normal explanation including heat, convection currents, drafts, electricity, and magnetism.
    
  • When turning a home made psi-wheel for several minutes by placing my hand near it, I often feel a snapping sensation in my hand and sometimes I can feel the vane on the wheel as it passes my hand even though it does not touch my hand. Others have also reported the snapping sensation. This is evidence there is an unknown phenomenon occurring that has nothing to do with heat convection.
    

If you want to show a certain phenomenon, such as drafts or heat, can cause a psi-wheel to turn, you should use a certain type of psi-wheel depending on the conditions of your demonstration. If you want to show a certain phenomenon will cause a psi-wheel to turn, you must show that phenomenon can cause a home made psi-wheel made of paper to turn because that is the hardest psi-wheel to turn. If you want to show a psi-wheel will not turn under certain conditions, even with a hand near it, you must show an Egely wheel will not turn in those condition because an Egely wheel is the easiest psi-wheel to turn.

Any theory that tries to explain what causes a psi wheel to turn by means of some ordinary phenomena such as heat, convection, or drafts must also explain all the evidence that shows none of those explanations are possible. Some people will find a condition where the wheel does not turn and proclaim that condition prevents, for example, air currents. This is not proof that air currents cause the wheel to turn. There may be another phenomenon the same conditions inhibits that is the real cause of rotation. Unless they can explain all these forms of evidence that show it is not air currents, they have not proved anything.

Overview of Experiments by George Egely

Egely believes the energy that causes the rotation, which he calls bioenergy, is conducted by all materials. That is why if you cover the Egely wheel with a jar, the jar acts like a Faraday cage, the bioenergy is conducted by the jar, it does not penetrate inside it.

Egely first started experimenting with water in a dish and put small pieces of aluminum foil on the surface of the water. The aluminum would rotate when a hand was placed next to the dish. He tried wearing gloves that would reduce heat transmission from his hand. The aluminum would rotate even if there was no temperature difference between the surface of the glove and the air. This ruled out heat transmission as an explanation of the phenomenon.

In the mid 1980's Egely developed the Egely Wheel and had dozens of friends try his apparatus. Most people were able to rotate both the water apparatus and the Egely Wheel. He found, "The speed of the rotation depended on how tired or fit they were and how much they could or could not concentrate." This shows that the phenomenon is not due to air currents, it varies with the biological condition of the subject.

Egely found the temperature of the hand did not influence the speed of rotation. Then he tried using hand shaped metal tanks and found that putting hot water in them did not cause rotation beyond 10% of what a real hand could cause. This also ruled out heat transfer to explain the phenomenon.

Using a complex electro-chemical apparatus that allowed him to visualize the movement inside the liquid by a change of color, he showed that the phenomenon could not be caused by wind or heat. He also found that during the phenomenon the electrical resistance of the liquid changed. This cannot be explained by any known phenomenon.

Egely used glass boxes to isolate the apparatus from the wind to show that air currents were not the cause.

Egely did experiments with 500 high school students the liquid rotated fast with one third of them. Another one third could rotate the apparatus slowly, and another 1/3 could not rotate the apparatus significantly.

Other experiments showed that a weather front or worries could inhibit rotation in people who would otherwise rotate the system very well. Good weather, and good moods correlated with good rotation. After rain and clouds passes, he says, people cheered up, and the results improved immediately, before any appreciable change in humidity or hand temperature could occur. This showed there was something in the human mind that effected the phenomenon.

Calculations showed that electricity and magnetism could not explain the rotation.

After all these experiments the real nature and cause of the rotation still remained a puzzle, I just could not decide what kind of an energy transfer might be the reason for it. I made calculations, but for the liquid to reach an angular speed of one revolution per minute, which is a good result, it would have to be very salty. The magnetic field would have to be a hundred times stronger than that of the Earth, or the person must have submerged his/her hand in the water, and a direct current of lethal power would have had to flow between his/her fingers. But, none of these four conditions were met during experiments. So, to find the answer to this problem some hypothesis had to be drawn about things unknown so far.

Egely found, "Extrovert, positive thinking, active, leading-type students had much higher vitality levels, and could maintain this level for a longer period than their quiet, restrained, silent, negative thinking, shy classmates. Experience showed the interesting fact that good-looking teenage girls were influenced by their beauty. Probably, they got more encouragement, or positive signs than their less lucky mates, so they had higher scores."

Egely also found, "In a strange way, vitality did not strongly depend on grades. Although students with good grades had vitality values generally above the average and this tended to be even higher if they were playing sports, the most outstanding results were achieved not by the good pupils."

After testing thousands of people and recording written records of about 1100, he found that seriously ill people could not rotate the wheel well, even if they had a fever which shows the phenomenon is not due to heat from the hands.

Healers or successful businessmen would get good rotation. sick people could hardly move the wheel and vibrant healthy people always had good rotation. These observations were consistent over many, many observations and could not be explained by chance.

Other observations included:

I experienced the highest vitality values, above 100%, with students who could not always fit in with the tight school regulations, but showed great interest towards the different forms of meditations and had close relation to their friends, took care of them, and had charisma. If they were a few meters from the one who just measured, the results were definitely better. To tell the truth, they could also make it worse if I asked them to do so. In this case, the vitality value of the one measuring himself/herself decreased to a great extent. To produce this result they did not have to touch the other person, it was enough to use their willpower. This was again an important reason for me to accept the reality of this phenomenon. It showed also that many people have known and all of us used this energy, even without knowing it, for a long time, still it has remained unexplained. We have also tried to see if two, three or more people together could reach a higher score than separately, i.e. if their vitality sums up. To some extent the resulting vitality level was really higher, but not significantly. As if discharged batteries were connected parallel. In some cases two or three people together reached a lower level of vitality than separately, when they did not know or did not like each other. Interpersonal relation, the mere fact of somebody standing beside or behind us, may influence results considerably.

Copyright © 2012 by ncu9nc All rights reserved. Texts quoted from other sources are Copyright © by their owners.

Out-of Body Experiences, Real and Fake. Don't be fooled by how-to books making false claims. Better Ways to Have a Genuine Paranormal Experience.

Six Studies of Out-of-Body Experiences by Charles T. Tart, Ph.D. (PDF HTML) is an interesting paper that describes six studies of out-of-body experiences (OBEs) that Tart conducted himself.

The excerpt below is from the Conclusions section of the paper. It gives a good summary of Tart's findings. He found that an OBE may be one of a variety of experiences. In some OBEs, the mind seems to leave the body. However some OBEs are just illusions. And, in other OBEs it appears that the experience is due to extra sensory perceptions. In these latter type of OBEs the experiencer seems to perceive without using his normal senses, but the mind does not leave the body. What is particularly important in assessing an OBE is whether the experiencer perceives anything that can be verified which he could not perceive with his normal senses. When that type of veridical information is obtained by an experiencer, it suggests the experience is more than an illusion.

The most important point to understand from this paper is that even for people who are experts at having OBEs, OBEs are very rarely veridical and even fewer OBEs are really cases where the mind leaves the body. Tart's findings have implications for people who are interested in trying to learn to have OBEs. Many people buy books and audio CDs that claim to teach how to have an OBE. However, many customers end up feeling cheated because all they experience are a few non-veridical dreams of being out of the body. Understandably, people buy these books because they want to have some type of paranormal experience. I don't mean to discourage people from trying them, they may work for some, but they should have realistic expectation and not be fooled by misleading claims.

My belief, from reading the literature, from personal contacts with other people who have OBEs, and from my own experiences with OBEs, is that spontaneous OBEs, where the OBE occurs without the experiencer trying to have the experience, are the most likely to involve the mind leaving the body and be veridical. The techniques described in books and audio CDs that claim to allow a person to learn to induce an OBE are more likely to produce non-veridical dreams of OBEs. This should not be surprising since most of these techniques involve going into a deeply relaxed state and doing some type of visualization of being out of the body or imagining leaving the body. It seems likely that this could lead to dreams of an OBE if the person drifted off into sleep. Some of these techniques are similar to techniques used for hypnotic induction, and they might induce a form of self-hypnosis. One form of OBEs Tart found to be illusory were OBEs induced by hypnosis.

While I don't endorse any teacher or institution, it is possible that working individually with a teacher or taking a class might produce better results than working alone from a book or CD. Those conditions have been shown to work well for other types of psychic learning. For example, my own experiences learning mediumship occurred in a group class. I also worked individually with a teacher. There is an effect from having a group of people working together that enhances psychic experiences and it is also possible that there may be spiritual entities working with a particular teacher that can help the student. Unfortunately, you can't put those things into a book like an audio CD tucked inside the back cover.

However, there are much better ways to have a genuine paranormal experience than trying to have an OBE and they don't cost money:

• Keep a dream log to identify precognitive dreams.
  
• Turn a psi-wheel using psychokinesis.
  
• Experience psychic perceptions while in the hypnogogic state.
  

Here is the excerpt from the Conclusions of Tart's paper:

I believe that in some OBEs, the mind may, at least partially, really be located elsewhere than the physical body; this may have been the case with Miss Z. At the opposite extreme, as with my virtuoso hypnotic subjects whose experience was vivid and perfectly real to them but whose perception of the target room was only illusory, I believe an OBE can be a simulation of being out of the body, with the mind as much "in" the physical body as it ever is. In between these two extremes, I believe we can have OBEs that are basically a simulation of being out, but which are informed by information gathered by ESP such that the simulation of the OBE location is accurate and veridical. This is a messy situation in some ways, especially because all three of these types of OBEs may seem experientially identical to the person having them, at least at rough levels of description.

Here are some excerpts that from the different studies.

First study:

My participants' descriptions of the target had occasional resemblances to the target materials, but the similarities were much too vague for me to put any reliance upon them.

Second Study:

On the first three laboratory nights Miss Z reported that in spite of occasionally being "out," she had not been able to control her experiences enough to be in position to see the target number (which was different each night). On the fourth night, at 5:57 AM, there was a seven minute period of somewhat ambiguous EEG activity, sometimes looking like stage 1, sometimes like brief wakings. Then Miss Z awakened and called out over the intercom that the target number was 25132, which I wrote on the EEG recording.

...

The number 25132 was indeed the correct target number. I had learned something about designing experiments since my first OBE experiment and precise evaluation was possible here. The odds against guessing a 5-digit number by chance alone are 100,000 to 1, so this was a remarkable event!

Third Study:

Thus we have only weak evidence that Monroe was actually "out" on this occasion, a result he found as unsatisfactory as I did

Fourth Study:

When Monroe finished his brief OBE he got out of bed to telephone me: it was 11:05 PM, our time. Thus he experienced a tug pulling him from his body within one or two minutes of the time we started concentrating. The portion of his account that I have omitted, on the other hand, his description of our home and what my wife and I were doing, was quite inaccurate. He perceived too many people in the room, and perceived my wife and me performing actions that we did not do.

Fifth Study:

Again we have that frustrating pattern of my research with Monroe of no ESP results clear enough to be conclusive, but not results so clearly inaccurate that I would feel comfortable saying nothing at all happened.

Sixth Study:

All the participants reported vivid OBEs that seemed like real experiences to them. They included journeys to places they knew, like downtown Davis, that were vividly experienced, as well as vivid experiences of journeying to the target room. None of their reports of what they saw on the target table bore any clear resemblance to the targets. A formal analysis was not worth the trouble.

Copyright © 2012 by ncu9nc All rights reserved. Texts quoted from other sources are Copyright © by their owners.

Charles T. Tart: Hovering on the Threshold of the Dream World

Here is an article by Charles Tart that describes a technique for maintaining the hypnogogic state. I think it is quite interesting because it seems to corroborate the method of psychic development I have described on my web site.

Lie down comfortably on your back, eyes closed. A quiet, fairly dark room helps. You can let all of your body relax except for one forearm, which is held vertically upright, resting on its elbow. You’ll quickly find tactile vertical as the position in which it takes almost no effort to keep your arm balanced there. The hand can also be kept balanced vertically too, but sometimes I find it easiest to just let my hand fall to some relaxed position. It’s the forearm position that matters.

Now you just calmly observe your mind as you continue to relax. If your forearm starts to tilt to the side, gently bring it back to vertical, to the minimal effort position. As you slide toward sleep, the imagery of the bhavanga, from vague, amorphous shapes and colors to full dreamlets, will manifest.

The skill you eventually learn is to keep a little attention on the forearm, such as by lightly checking on it every few seconds, and when it starts to tilt – this happens as you start sliding too far down into the bhavanga – gently make it balanced again. You now have a biofeedback device, your forearm, that enables you to hover on the threshold, far enough into the bhavanga or hypnagogic state to observe a lot, but which gives you gentle feedback if you sleep too far into the falling asleep zone, and which gives you even stronger feedback – the arm falling and hitting the bed – if you go all the way.

...

I came across this technique while still a teenager, reading old journals on psychical research and parapsychology. I can’t find the exact reference, my journals don’t go back that far, but I think it was a little article titled something like the “Four-eyes Technique” in an issue of the Journal of the American Society for Psychical Research in the early 1900s. The author had figured this balancing technique out and was using it because he thought it would help ESP messages get through when they couldn’t penetrate the everyday noise of his conscious mind.

Copyright © 2012 by ncu9nc All rights reserved. Texts quoted from other sources are Copyright © by their owners.

Convincing Evidence and Moving Goal Posts

I have updated my web page on Skeptical Fallacies
to include several new sections within About Skeptical Thinking:

Evidence Will not Convince a Pseudo-skeptic

There is a fundamental difficulty in convincing people to change their minds by presenting them with evidence. The difficulty is that the level of proof people require for giving up a strongly held belief is much more rigorous than the level of proof they require for holding on to a pre-existing belief. In order for someone to change their mind about a strongly held belief, they require absolute, 100%, ironclad proof and sometimes even that is not sufficient because in order to maintain a strongly held belief in the face of contradictory evidence, people only require a tenuous hypothesis to explain away the evidence. This is human nature. It is the real meaning behind the phrase "extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof". That phrase is not about the scientific method, it is about human psychology. This is why, for a pseudo-skeptic, it is so easy to fall back on the last bastions of skepticism, claiming the researchers are committing fraud, they are incompetent, or they are victims of deception in order to explain the researcher's observations of paranormal phenomena.

Moving the Goal Post

When trying to provide evidence to convince pseudo-skeptics, believers in paranormal phenomena often observe that the skeptics keep moving the goal post. For example, after a parapsychologist improves an experimental design and repeats an experiment in response to a criticism of a skeptic, the skeptic always seems to come up with a new objection. This can be easily understood if one considers why skeptics raise objections to evidence. When skeptics raise objections to evidence, it is not because they would actually believe the evidence if you satisfied their objection. Skeptics raise objections because they don't want the phenomenon to be proven. They raise objections to maintain their disbelief. That is why if you satisfy their objections, they will not change their minds and give up their disbelief, they will just come up with another objection to allow them to maintain their disbelief.

This is why it can be pointless to discuss the evidence with a pseudo-skeptic or to let a pseudo-skeptic dictate what evidence you should obtain. They are not sincerely interested in evidence, they are interested in maintaining their prejudice and they will invent as many new hypothetical problems with the evidence as necessary. Any hypothesis that supports his world view no matter how tenuous will be preferable to a to a pseudo-skeptic than any non materialist explanation no matter how much evidence there is supporting it. Repeated observations and repeatable experiments haven't convinced skeptics. Statements by Nobel prize winning scientists who were convinced by evidence hasn't convinced skeptics. When pushed to the limit, the skeptic always has recourse to the last bastions of skepticism: accusations of fraud, incompetence, and self-delusion.

Copyright © 2012 by ncu9nc All rights reserved. Texts quoted from other sources are Copyright © by their owners.

Magicians cannot reproduce the phenomena of physical mediumship and other paranormal abilities under conditions that psychics produce those phenomena.

I have updated my web page on skeptical fallacies to include the following material in the section Magicians cannot reproduce the phenomena of physical mediumship and other paranormal abilities under conditions that psychics produce those phenomena.:

According to Chapter 8 Scole Experiment proves the afterlife of A Lawyer Presents the Case for the Afterlife by Victor Zammit, during the Scole Experiments, "James Webster, a professional stage-magician, ... who has more than fifty years experience in psychic research ... [on] three occasions he attended sittings with the Scole group and published reports. His conclusion was clearly set out in a recent letter to the English newspaper, Psychic World (June 2001):"

I discovered no signs of trickery, and in my opinion such conjuring tricks were not possible, for the type of phenomena witnessed, under the conditions applied….

The following excerpt from the zerdinisworld.com article on the medium Elizabeth Blake states that "Two expert conjurers David P. Abbot and E. A. Parsons" validated the mediumship of Elizabeth Blake.

Two expert conjurers, David P. Abbott of the ASPR and E. A. Parsons, investigated Blake in 1906 and became convinced of the identity of the spirit communicators. Blake used a 2-foot long double trumpet; putting the small end to her ear and the larger one at that of the sitter, it appeared as if the voices came from her ear. If she covered the small end with her palm, the result was the same. The voices grew from whispers to such loudness that occasionally they were heard at a distance of 100 feet.

The zerdinisworld.com article on medium Alec Harris quotes from The Mediumship of Alec Harris By Isa Gray to show that magician A.G. Fletcher-Desborough was unable to explain Harris' phenomena by means of tricks.

A.G. Fletcher-Desborough described his “unique” experience in Liverpool Evening Express.

I examined the cabinet which he used. Having been on the stage as an illusionist and magician, I knew exactly where to look for such things as panel and floor escapes, and ceiling and wall slides.

I was satisfied nothing could make an exit or an entrance in any way. There was no chance for deception."

A short stout man materialised from the cabinet, walked straight to him and mumbled the sitter’s name, Bertie. “It was my father and, in his mumbling way of speaking, gave my family pet name used by my parents. No one but the family knew it.

Copyright © 2012 by ncu9nc All rights reserved. Texts quoted from other sources are Copyright © by their owners.

Can Spirits Interact with the Physical World?

A week or two ago I was involved in an on-line discussion on whether spirits can interact with the physical world. It got quite heated. The moderator had to get involved, and one member decided to leave the forum. The discussion was not about whether consciousness survives death but what type of evidence for the afterlife is genuinely caused by spirits. One member of the fourm did not believe spirits could communicate in language, or appear in human form, or interact with the physical world.

I posted a lot of evidence I think shows that spirits can communicate in language, appear in human form, and interact with the physical world. Since some readers of this blog may find those posts interesting I have included the links to them below:

• Excerpts from my article on Mrs Piper. The article describes how the characteristics of communication varied with the spirit not the medium or the sitter. This is strong evidence that the communication is coming from spirits.
  

• Excerpts from my article on The Icelandic Physical Medium Indridi Indridason where his arm was temporarily amputated during a seance.
  

• I discussed my own experiences learning mediumship at a spiritualist church.
  

• My article on super-psi explains why survival after death is a much better explanation than super-psi for the afterlife phenomena.
  

• A person I know of who at first was frightened when he started to see spirits but eventually became a very good medium.
  

• A boy who saw spirits that I know of from my own contacts among mediums.
  

• Excerpts from A Lawyer Presents the Case for the Afterlife by Victor Zammit. The excerpts indicate that the well respected investigators, Guy Lyon Playfair, William Roll, and Ian Stevenson all believed some poltergeist phenomenon is due to spirits.
  

• One might suppose that when a mediums sees a spirit it is just a mental impression that looks real, a type of hallucination. This might make sense if the spirit is trying to communicate with the medium. However that does not explain why mediums see spirits going about their own business and not attempting to communicate with the medium.
  

• The possibility of spirits interacting in the physical world was said to be unlikely, it would be redundant because the way spirits interact in the physical world is through human bodies. I replied that as incarnated humans we are not aware of our spiritual nature. However, spirits are able to interact with the physical world while remembering they are spirits and retaining their spirit faculties, so it is not redundant.
  

• I made the point that the mediums generally believe they are perceiving spirits. Because mediums live with the phenomenon every day of their lives, over decades, and know intimately all the intricate details of the phenomenon, they are more likely to form a correct interpretation of the phenomenon than someone who is basing his opinion on written second hand accounts.
  

• My post about William Cartheuser that linked to the article on him at zerdinisworld.com. It describes a test conducted in a recording studio under controlled conditions where spirits spoke into microphones 20 feet in the air and spoke at frequencies higher and lower than any human voice could produce.
  

• Excerpts from the zerdinisworld.com article on George Chapman, who was a trance medium who performed psychic surgery.
  

• The point came up that many of the best mediums worked in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. I pointed out that there were also extremely good mediums in the relatively recent past:
  
  • George Chapman 1921-2006
    
  • Leslie Flint 1911-1994
    
  • Alec Harris 1897 - 1974
    

• Excerpts demonstrating that the mediumship of the past cannot be disregarded as fraud. There are many cases where conjurers were unable to produce mediumistic phenomena under the conditions in which the medium did and refused challenges to attempt it. Furthermore reputable observers have observed phenomenon under conditions where fraud was impossible.
  

Copyright © 2012, 2014 by ncu9nc All rights reserved. Texts quoted from other sources are Copyright © by their owners.

The Double Standard of Proof for Parapsychology

I have updated my web page on Skeptical Misdirection to include more information in the section on The Double Standard.

In addition to a quote from Richard Wiseman saying ESP is proven to scientific standards but the standards for parapsychology should be higher, I have added the examples of Chris French, Ray Hyman and others.

Chris French has also stated he believes that ESP has been proven to scientific standards. However, he does not accept that those results should be accepted by science until the results have been replicated by skeptical scientists. These results have been replicated by parapsychologists. What French is saying is that replications are not valid unless the researcher has a certain philosophical beliefs. That is unheard of in any other branch of science.

...

Skeptic Ray Hyman in his 1995 article Evaluation of Program on Anomalous Mental Phenomena admits that the results of remote viewing and Ganzfeld experiments have demonstrated statistically significant effects. However, he implies there could be unknown methodological flaws in the experiments. This demonstrates a double standard because in no other field of science would a positive experimental result be criticized because there might be sources of errors that no one can think of. It is impossible for any scientist to defend his work against that type of criticism.

...

More evidence of the double standard is described by Chris Carter in his article Does Telepathy Conflict with Science?. Carter quotes Donald Hebb admitting there is sufficient evidence to prove ESP but he won't accept it because it conflicts with his "prejudice". Carter also quotes George Price who published an article in the journal Science where he implied that despite the proof, belief in ESP could be rejected because it conflicts with scientific theories. This is equivalent to saying he prefers to ignore empirical evidence when it conflicts with his beliefs.

The full information with references and quotes is here

Copyright © 2012 by ncu9nc All rights reserved. Texts quoted from other sources are Copyright © by their owners.

Evidence That God Exists: People Who Have Near Death Experiences Meet God.

People who have near death experiences often meet God during their experience. This is evidence that God exists. Below is a video from an IANDS conference and several excerpts from near-death.com of people describing their meetings with God. Kevin Williams summarizes near-death experiencer observations about God here

Jessica haynes

In this video from an IANDS conference, Jessica Haynes discusses her near-death experience. She says that she had died and after reviewing her life she wanted to come back and live her life better. Unfortunately, she was dead and she was told, "You can't get back you don't have a body to get back to". But she insisted, repeatedly. So they took her to talk to God who enabled her to come back. She describes her experience of God as, "Pure love.", and "The most loving light you could imagine." He tells her "I am all, I created everything." The part where she describes this is from 10:30 to 15:00.

George Rodonaia

Many people have asked me what I believe in, how my NDE changed my life. All I can say is that I now believe in the God of the universe. Unlike many other people, however, I have never called God the light, because God is beyond our comprehension. God, I believe, is even more than the light, because God is also darkness. God is everything that exists, everything - and that is beyond our ability to comprehend at all. So I don't believe in the God of the Jews, or the Christians, or the Hindus, or in any one religion's idea of what God is or is not. It is all the same God, and that God showed me that the universe in which we live is a beautiful and marvelous mystery that is connected together forever and for always.

Anyone who has had such an experience of God, who has felt such a profound sense of connection with reality, knows that there is only one truly significant work to do in life, and that is love; to love nature, to love people, to love animals, to love creation itself, just because it is. To serve God's creation with a warm and loving hand of generosity and compassion - that is the only meaningful existence.

Linda Stewart

I was home and I wanted nothing more than to remain in the light of God. Christ had delivered me into the light and I stood in the presence of God. I was filled with complete knowing: The light was love and love was God. Waves of consummate love which emanated from the light obliterated every burden I carried and every thought that kept me from knowing God.

Mellen-Thomas Benedict

Then, like a trumpet blast with a shower of spiraling lights, the Great Light spoke, saying, "Remember this and never forget; you save, redeem and heal yourself. You always have. You always will. You were created with the power to do so from before the beginning of the world."

In that instant I realized even more. I realized that WE HAVE ALREADY BEEN SAVED, and we saved ourselves because we were designed to self-correct like the rest of God's universe. This is what the second coming is about.

I thanked the light of God with all my heart. The best thing I could come up with was these simple words of totally appreciation:

Arthur Yensen

If you saw heaven, why didn't you mention God and salvation?

I didn't omit them intentionally. It's only that I didn't see God, Christ, or hear anything about salvation. However, I do consider the Master-Vibration as part of God because it controls the universe and seems to regulate everything except the evil minds of people on Earth.

To understand God, I believe one would have to be almost as great as God is. Or at least be like Christ who was in harmony with God. On the other hand, salvation is simple. All one has to do is to love so unselfishly that his soul-vibrations will rise high enough to fit him into heaven.

Jan Price

The Wise One continued speaking. "Throughout the vast unlimitedness of All That Is, the creative energy - that which is called the Spirit of God - is expressing itself as you, me, and everything else. Wherever we are, the God-source is, and we are always somewhere."

"Sometimes I am in places where God doesn't seem to be, as in the middle of a heart attack," I responded. "Surely God is not there."

"Yes. Wherever we are, the Source, God, is. A heart attack isn't bad. It is just an experience accepted on a certain level of being. We are so unlimited that we can limit, restrict, contract. Such power is awesome, for it is our very nature to create. We are constantly expressing in some way.

...

In the center of the universe I stand encircled by divine being. In this I live and move and have my being. I am in this world, and of it. The world of natural order, ease, and joy. Eternal goodness flowing, doing, being all. There is only joy; waves of love support, sustain. I am in God, not outside.

I am in love, consciously at peace with all there is. In God, I love and move and have my being. In love, I live and move and have my being. In peace, I live and move and have my being. There is nothing else. There is no outer. All is in the circle of God, Love, God Love. GOD LOVE.

The Kingdom of God is within me. Yes. But more important, I am in the Kingdom of God. The Spirit of God is within me, but more important, I am in the Spirit of God. The love of God is within me, but more important, I am in the love of God. All there is is God. I can be nowhere else. I cannot be separate from God.

Laura's NDE (age three and a half)

God in the manifestation of infinite light appeared off to my left, and I was engulfed in a form of all-powerful, all-nourishing love. That divine being appeared as a massive column of golden light, with the suggestion of a human shape inside. I both saw and felt his light, feeling as if I were in a warm bath that completely healed and protected me. I never wanted to leave. No conversation passed between us, but in those infinite moments I acquired the knowledge that allowed me to go back to Earth to complete my life.

Cecil's NDE (age eleven)

Behind me and to the left was a strong light source, very brilliant and filled with love. I knew it was a person. I called it God for lack of a better term. I could not see it; I felt what seemed like a male presence. He communicated to me, not so much in words but telepathically,

Clara's NDE (age ten)

I was taken to a huge iridescent white room and told to sit down on some steps that led up to a large white chair, and wait there for someone who was to talk to me. He came out a door at the other end of the steps, walked to the chair above me, and sat down. He was dressed in a white, long-sleeved, floor-length robe with a wide gold band around the mid-section. He wore sandals. His dark brown hair was shoulder length; he had a long face, broad chin, dark eyes with black around both eyelids, like eyeliner pencil, but it wasn't. His skin was olive colored and his eyes were as liquid love. He communicated by looking at me. No words had to be spoken, as we could hear each other's thoughts. He told me what I had to do in life and had me go to the other side of the room and look down into something like a TV set so I could see my future. What I saw made me very happy. This man, who I believe is Jesus Christ, said that once I woke up in the hospital I would forget what I was supposed to do in life.

"Nothing can happen before its time," he cautioned.

As I was leaving the room he said I must obey his commandments if I wanted to come back.

When I revived, a nurse was sitting beside my bed and she said, "Thank God you finally woke up." I told the doctor that I had watched him work on me and the color of the machine brought into the surgery room. He didn't know what to say.

Copyright © 2012 by ncu9nc All rights reserved. Texts quoted from other sources are Copyright © by their owners.

Dean Radin Interviews Julie Beischell: Can Mediums Really Talk to the Dead?

Dean Radin Interviews Julie Beischell: Can Mediums Really Talk to the Dead?

Radin: One of the things I think is unique about Windbridge is the large number of mediums that have passed through a variety of hoops to make sure that they are actually as good as they think they are. Would you describe this process of forming what you call the research medium?

Beischel: We have an eight-step process. First, I should point out that we’re not looking for any new mediums. We have a bunch going through the eight steps at this time—currently the six mediums on our website have passed all eight steps. I won’t go through them all now; there are a lot of tests, interviews, and blinded readings. Once a person passes step five, the blinded reading part, he or she goes on to be trained. We’ve found that about 25 percent of people who think they’re good enough to pass our stringent testing do no better than chance.

Physicalism is Dead: Still another Post on NDEs

Physicalism is Dead: Still another Post on NDEs: This paper makes an important point regarding NDEs and whether or not they are mere hallucinations: Defenders of the mind-brain productio...

Zerdini's World: William Cartheuser

Zeridni's World has a new post about the medium William Cartheuser. It describes a test conducted in a recording studio under controlled conditions where spirits spoke into microphones 20 feet in the air and spoke at frequencies higher and lower than any human voice could produce.

William Cartheuser

Posted on September 20, 2012

SEANCE OF THE CENTURY

by George Cranley

One of the most remarkable experimental direct voice séances ever conducted took place in 1933 and was recorded on nine long-playing records. The medium was William Cartheuser who had a severe speech defect, caused by a harelip and a cleft palate yet the spirit voices that spoke at his séances were free of impediment. His sittings remain for many some of the greatest Spiritualism has ever seen.

Copyright © 2012 by ncu9nc All rights reserved. Texts quoted from other sources are Copyright © by their owners.

If you believe your mind operates according to the laws of materialism, like a computer, it is irrational of you to believe anything.

I have updated my web page on Skeptical Fallacies to include the following:

Edward Feser, in his blog post, Popper contra computationalism, explains a flaw in any argument that the brain is a conscious computer operating according to the laws of materialism. First he shows that a purely physical system operating according to the laws of materialism, such as a computer, cannot explain rational thought. Then he points out that since materialism cannot explain rational thought, any argument asserting materialism is true cannot be considered rational. Therefore, the materialist's assertion that the mind is a purely physical system such as a computer is irrational. In other words, there can be no justification to believe in materialism or that the mind is a computer.

Feser shows that materialism cannot explain our ability to reason:

1. Materialism says that thinking is ultimately a mechanical process. Like a computer running a program, thought is a transition from one physical state to another caused by known laws of physics.
   
2. Such a transition occurs due to physical laws not due to any inherent meaning in the physical states.
   
3. But a "thought can serve as a rational justification for another only by virtue of" it's "meaning"....
   
4. "If materialism is true, ... there is nothing about our thought processes that can make one thought a rational justification for another".
   
5. "If materialism is true none of our thoughts is ever rationally justified."
   
6. "This includes the thoughts of materialists themselves."
   
7. "If materialism is true it cannot be rationally justified", materialism "undermines itself".
   

If you believe the brain is a conscious computer, it is irrational of you to believe anything. If you believe anything, you must believe materialism is false, the brain is not a conscious computer, and the mind is not produced by the brain.

Copyright © 2012 by ncu9nc All rights reserved. Texts quoted from other sources are Copyright © by their owners.

Why Skeptics Deny the Existence of Evidence

Often skeptics will state that there is no evidence for the afterlife, or psychic phenomena, or God.

However, there is plenty of evidence for the afterlife and psychic phenomena.

There is also evidence of God. This evidence comes from mediums and people who have had veridical Near Death Experiences who obtain information that they could not have obtained with their normal senses. Some of this information is often verifiable and proves accurate. Therefore, the information they obtain that is not easily verified, such as information about the existence of God, may also be accurate. This is particularly true when many sources agree, and many such sources do agree that God exists.

When a skeptic who first denies there is any evidence is confronted with this evidence, the skeptic will say that he meant he is not convinced by that evidence. However, if a skeptic is going to say there is no convincing evidence for something when there is evidence that is widely considered to support it, rather than deny any evidence exists, he should explain why that evidence is not valid. In some cases the skeptic may be referring to a purely philosophical argument, for example a philosophical argument that God exists. But if a skeptic is going to dismiss a philosophical argument, he should also know what the argument is and be able to explain what part of the argument he disagrees with and why. Most of the attacks on philosophical arguments for the existence of God misstate those arguments.

The argument that "there is no evidence" or "it doesn't convince me", is actually a rhetorical device and not appropriate in a supposedly rational debate. If a skeptic can't explain why the evidence doesn't convince him, if he can't explain what is wrong with the evidence, then he probably doesn't really know what the evidence is, or he is not really trying to understand the evidence, or he has no valid argument against the evidence.

Why do skeptics insist on denying the evidence exists? Because if they actually discuss the evidence it becomes much harder to maintain that materialism is true. It is so much easier for the skeptic to deny the existence of evidence. It is easier for him to mislead than to explain why he believes in materialism when there is so much evidence against it.

Copyright © 2012 by ncu9nc All rights reserved. Texts quoted from other sources are Copyright © by their owners.

The Human Brain is not A Conscious Computer

I have updated my web page on Skeptical Fallacies to include the following:

A skeptic may say that materialism can explain consciousness because the brain could be a conscious computer. As evidence to support this position, he may cite the paper Computing Machinery and Intelligence by Alan Turing. This paper is about a test for computer intelligence that has come to be called the Turing test. The Turing test involves two people and a computer. One person communicates remotely with both the computer and the other person. If he can't tell which is the person and which is the computer, then the computer passes the Turing test.

Turing argued that if you can't distinguish a computer from a person and if you doubt a computer is conscious, you must also doubt other people are conscious. Since we accept that people are conscious, if a computer passes the Turing test, the computer should be considered conscious too.

However, there are several reason it is incorrect to use this paper as evidence that the brain is a conscious computer.

• Turing believed in the evidence for ESP and he felt a computer couldn't reproduce it.
  

  (9) The Argument from Extrasensory Perception
  

  I assume that the reader is familiar with the idea of extrasensory perception, and the meaning of the four items of it, viz., telepathy, clairvoyance, precognition and psychokinesis. These disturbing phenomena seem to deny all our usual scientific ideas. How we should like to discredit them! Unfortunately the statistical evidence, at least for telepathy, is overwhelming. It is very difficult to rearrange one's ideas so as to fit these new facts in. Once one has accepted them it does not seem a very big step to believe in ghosts and bogies. The idea that our bodies move simply according to the known laws of physics, together with some others not yet discovered but somewhat similar, would be one of the first to go.
  

  ...
  

  If telepathy is admitted it will be necessary to tighten our test up. The situation could be regarded as analogous to that which would occur if the interrogator were talking to himself and one of the competitors was listening with his ear to the wall. To put the competitors into a "telepathy-proof room" would satisfy all requirements."
  

• Turing wrote that the proof of his belief that a computer could pass the Turing test would only occur when a computer actually passed the Turing test. He incorrectly believed this would happen by the end of the twentieth century. However, it is already the second decade of the twenty first century and no computer has ever passed the Turing test. So there is no actual evidence that a computer can pass the Turing test.
  

  The only really satisfactory support that can be given for the view expressed at the beginning of §6, will be that provided by waiting for the end of the century and then doing the experiment described.
  

  From §6:
  

  I believe that in about fifty years' time it will be possible, to programme computers, with a storage capacity of about 109 [10^9], to make them play the imitation game so well that an average interrogator will not have more than 70 per cent chance of making the right identification after five minutes of questioning. The original question, "Can machines think?" I believe to be too meaningless to deserve discussion. Nevertheless I believe that at the end of the century the use of words and general educated opinion will have altered so much that one will be able to speak of machines thinking without expecting to be contradicted.
  

  Clearly this prediction has not come to pass.
  

• Even if a computer could pass the Turing test, that would not prove human consciousness is produced by the brain. There is a large amount of evidence that human consciousness survives the death of the body. A computer cannot imitate this. Any theory to explain human consciousness has to account for that evidence. You can't ignore empirical evidence because it contradicts a theory. A theory must be consistent with the empirical evidence, otherwise the theory is wrong.
  

Philosophers have also addressed, and rejected the possibility that consciousness could be produced by a computer. Edward Feser discusses this in his blog posts Popper Contra Computationalism and Kripka Contra Computationalism

Copyright © 2012 by ncu9nc All rights reserved. Texts quoted from other sources are Copyright © by their owners.

Spiritual Healing

I have updated my web page on Skeptical Falacies to include the following:

Two common fallacies about Spiritual healing are:

• A well known spiritual healer died young so spiritual healing must not work.
  
• A well known person wasn't helped by spiritual healing so spiritual healing must not work.
  

These fallacies are an example of a common trick skeptics use. Skeptics often make all sorts of unrealistic assumptions about a phenomenon they know nothing about and don't even believe exists. Then, they show their unrealistic assumptions are not true and assert that is evidence the phenomenon is not genuine. The fallacies here can be made obvious if you try to apply them to mainstream medicine. If a doctor dies young, that doesn't mean modern medicine is a fraud. No one lives forever, even with mainstream medicine. People die in hospitals every day. That doesn't mean mainstream medicine is a fraud. Unfortunately, there are many people who are not helped by mainstream medicine. There are diseases for which there is no effective treatment, and not all treatments are effective for every patient. All known methods of healing, including mainstream medicine and spiritual healing, have limits. They cannot always help every recipient of healing.

More information can be found on the web page on Spritiual Healing.

Copyright © 2012 by ncu9nc All rights reserved. Texts quoted from other sources are Copyright © by their owners.

If materialism was true, you would not know you are reading these words.

I have updated my web page on Skeptical Fallacies to include the fallacy: Humans are biological machines that operate strictly according to physical laws.

Humans are more than biological machines that operate strictly according to physical laws.

According to materialism, humans are biological machines and everything about us can be explained by the physical descriptions of the atoms that make up our body and brain. If that were true, there would be no need for consciousness because all the functions of a machine are determined by its physical structure. A machine does not need to be conscious to function. Therefore, according to materialism, consciousness should not have evolved because there is no need for it. If materialism were true, consciousness would not exist. Since you are aware of reading these words, you know that consciousness does exist and therefore materialism is not correct. Humans are more than just biological machines. Materialists will answer this by saying consciousness is an emergent property, or an illusion, or an epi-phenomenon of the brain. These are also fallacies which are explained in the two following sections.

Copyright © 2012 by ncu9nc All rights reserved. Texts quoted from other sources are Copyright © by their owners.

The Flawed Evidence for Evolution

In a previous post I explained why Darwinism is False. In this post I will explain why the evidence for evolution is flawed.

The article A Primer on the Tree of Life by Casey Luskin discusses the scientific research into the evolutionary relationships between species. The evolutionary relationships between species are determined by examining how similar species are with respect to one or more characteristic. Species that are most similar are believed to be most closely related evolutionarily. These evolutionary relationships can be illustrated with a tree of life. Each new species formed during evolution is represented by a fork in a branch on the tree of life and the new species is represented by a new branch. This illustrates the belief that a new species evolves from only one other species and the resulting two species, the original species and the newly evolved species, are shown on the tree by the two branches of the fork.

If the theory of evolution is correct, then when you examine different characteristics of organisms they should show the same evolutionary relationship between species. However what scientists have discovered is that when they examine different genes they find that they may indicate different trees of life. This contradicts the theory that a new species evolves from only one other species. The theory of evolution cannot explain how a species could evolve from more than one other species.

Someone may say that some of the similarities between species are due to common ancestry while other similarities are due to convergent evolution - where similar environmental factors lead to the evolution of similar characteristics. This could explain why a species might seem closer to one species when one characteristic is examined and closer to another species when a different characteristic is examined. However the theory of evolution says that all species evolved from a common ancestor. If there is no way to tell which characteristics are due to common ancestry and which are due to convergent evolution, if there is no way to tell which species evolved from which, then there is no evidence for evolution.

Casey Luskin provides detailed evidence and a thorough discussion of it in the body of the article, but he sums it up well in the conclusion:

The methodology for inferring common descent has broken down. Proponents of neo-Darwinian evolution are forced into reasoning that similarity implies common ancestry, except for when it doesn’t. And when it doesn’t, they appeal to all sorts of ad hoc rationalizations to save common ancestry. Tellingly, the one assumption and view that they are not willing to jettison is the overall assumption of common ancestry itself. This shows that evolutionists treat common descent in an unfalsifiable, and therefore unscientific and ideological, fashion.

Meanwhile, as far as the data is concerned, the aforementioned New Scientist article admits, “Ever since Darwin the tree has been the unifying principle for understanding the history of life on Earth,” but because “different genes told contradictory evolutionary stories,” the notion of a tree of life is now quickly becoming a vision of the past — as the article stated “today the project lies in tatters, torn to pieces by an onslaught of negative evidence. Many biologists now argue that the tree concept is obsolete and needs to be discarded,” and as scientists quoted in the article said, “We have no evidence at all that the tree of life is a reality” or the tree is being “annihilated.” Perhaps the reason why different genes are telling “different evolutionary stories” is because the genes have wholly different stories to tell, namely stories that indicate that all organisms are not genetically related. For those open-minded enough to consider it, common design is a viable alternative to common descent.

Copyright © 2012 by ncu9nc All rights reserved. Texts quoted from other sources are Copyright © by their owners.

Skeptics ignore the results of their own research when it conflicts with their beliefs.

I've updated my web page on Skeptical Misdirection to include the following:

Skeptical Investigations explains how the skeptical organization CSICOP while trying to debunk astrology, actually found evidence supporting astrology and "In order to get the result they wanted, ... had to commit a total of six statistical blunders...".

The statistician and psychologist Michael Gauquelin had done a statistical analysis providing evidence that astrology might have some basis in fact. His analysis showed a correlation between the position of Mars in the sky at the time of birth and the odds of a person becoming a sports champion...

In 1976, in an attempt to make this embarrassment go away once and for all, Harvard professor of biostatistics and CSICOP fellow Marvin Zelen proposed a simplified version of the original Gauquelin study which he subsequently performed with the assistance of CSICOP chairman and professor of philosophy Paul Kurtz and George Abell, a UCLA astronomer. In order to get the result they wanted, the trio had to commit a total of six statistical blunders, which are discussed in detail in the article The True Disbelievers: Mars Effect Drives Skeptics to Irrationality by former CSICOP fellow Richard Kammann. Proper analysis showed that the new study actually supported the Gauquelin effect.

Copyright © 2012 by ncu9nc All rights reserved. Texts quoted from other sources are Copyright © by their owners.

Belief in Physicalism is Unscientific

I have updated my web page on Skeptical Fallacies with the following entry:

One of the common reasons skeptics give for belief in physicalism is that there is no theoretical model to explain psychic phenomena, the afterlife, or how consciousness might not be produced by the brain. This is not sound logic. This is no reason to prefer physicalism over dualism or idealism. Physicalism offers no explanation for consciousness and there is a huge amount of empirical evidence for psychic phenomena and the afterlife that is impossible under physicalism but is consistent with dualism or idealism. Rather than ignore empirical observations, which would be unscientific, most people recognize that dualism or idealism is a better model than physicalism.

Copyright © 2012 by ncu9nc All rights reserved. Texts quoted from other sources are Copyright © by their owners.

Skepticism, The Big Lie. Activist Skeptics and Atheists are a Danger to the Health and Well Being of Believers.

If you think all skeptics are honest truth seekers, then you need to read my web page on Skeptical Misdirection. There is overwhelming evidence for the afterlife and psychic phenomena. The skeptical atheist view that consciousness is produced by the brain is an absolute fraud. Skeptics claim to be interested in truth. This is the Big Lie of our time.

However the problem is not just that skeptics and atheists are spreading misinformation.

Research shows that belief in the paranormal and religion can be conducive to the health and well being of people. These beliefs can help people cope with grief, divorce, job loss, the fear of death, particularly in the terminally ill, and can deter suicide. Therefore, when skeptics and atheists try to convince people to stop believing in the paranormal and religion, they may be doing harm to other people. Furthermore, research also shows that having meaning in life is necessary for people to thrive but skeptics claim consciousness and meaning are illusions. When skeptics spread their philosophy of materialism they may cause harm by taking the meaning and purpose of life away from people.

I am not saying anyone, skeptic, atheist, or believer should change their beliefs because of this research. You should believe what you think is right.

Also, I am not saying all skeptics and atheists are bad people. We all incarnate for different purposes, to learn different lessons. Some people need to have the experience of being a skeptic or an atheist. I went through a period of my life where I was a materialist atheist and during that time I formed a highly developed sense of ethics. That sense of ethics is much more valuable to me than one based on fear of karmic retribution or punishment in the afterlife. I follow those values because I know they are right not because I am afraid to do otherwise. I had to have the experience of being a materialist to develop those values.

However, if your beliefs are dangerous to another person, if they will harm his health and well being, you should not go on a crusade to convert him to your way of thinking. If someone is grieving, or suffering from a terminal illness, or feeling suicidal, you shouldn't try to convert him to materialism. But it is not just the afterlife. The references I link to below show religion can help if you are going through a divorce or have lost your job. These are not theoretical points. Real people experiencing real suffering can be harmed by activist skeptics.

I realize this attitude may upset some skeptics. However my overriding concern is to protect people from being harmed by skeptics and atheists.

Below I include links, quotes, and references to research that shows how helpful religion and belief in the paranormal can be to people. But I also know this from my own experience. I have been to many Spiritualist church services and I've seen what I am writing about first hand. Many people come to a Spiritualist church for the first time when they are suffering from grief because mediumship is part of the Sunday service. Some of these people are suffering from extreme grief from the death of a spouse or a child. Losing a child is one of the most difficult of all things to have to experience in life. During church services, I've seen and heard with my own senses the comfort and relief that a communication from a deceased loved one can give to another person.

Imagine a child conceived in love, who you carried in pregnancy, gave birth to, fed from your own breast, and raised from infancy. Who you taught to walk and talk and took to their first day of school and had birthday parties for. Who you loved and who loved you and trusted you completely in their innocent childlike way. Imagine your hopes and dreams for their future. Now, imagine their life is cut short, maybe by a sudden accident or a lingering illness. Actually, you can't imagine the grief and sense of loss a parent would feel in that situation. Now try to imagine what it is like for that parent to know that their child's existence has not been cut short but that their child is living with Grandma in another plane of existence, and they can still know about each other and communicate words of love.

I've been there during Spiritualist church services and seen and heard a medium provide this comfort to people suffering from extreme grief. I knew the medium, I knew the church, I know it wasn't cold reading or hot reading and I know the information the medium gave to identify the spirit was specific, detailed, and impossible to guess by chance.

So I also know the harm that can be done by skeptics who never had this experience and who don't know what they are talking about when they try to convince someone else that it is all a delusion or a fraud.

The people who are deluded and who are committing fraud are the skeptics and atheists. There is overwhelming evidence for the afterlife and the skeptical atheist view that consciousness is produced by the brain is an absolute fraud. Skeptics claim to be interested in truth. This is the Big Lie of our time.

References

Here are links, quotes, and references to back up my assertions about the benefits of belief in the paranormal and religion:

An Exploratory Study of the Effects of Paranormal and Spiritual Experiences on Peoples' Lives and Well-Being by J.E. Kennedy and H. Kanthamani,Original publication and copyright: The Journal of the American Society for Psychical Research, 1995, Volume 89, pp.249-265.

Recent research suggests that a world view that is open to aspects of life beyond the physical-materialistic realm can be conducive to health and well-being ....

Religion 'linked to happy life' from news.bbc.co.uk.

...

Professor Clark said: "We originally started the research to work out why some European countries had more generous unemployment benefits than others, but our analysis suggested that religious people suffered less psychological harm from unemployment than the non-religious.

"They had higher levels of life satisfaction".

...

Even though churchgoers were unsurprisingly more likely to oppose divorce, they were both less psychologically affected by marital separation when it did happen, he said.

"What we found was that religious people were experiencing current day rewards, rather than storing them up for the future."

...

But Justin Thacker, head of Theology for the Evangelical Alliance, said that there should now be no doubt about the connection between religious belief and happiness.

"There is more than one reason for this - part of it will be the sense of community and the relationships fostered, but that doesn't account for all of it.

"A large part of it is due to the meaning, purpose and value which believing in God gives you, whereas not believing in God can leave you without those things."

Are Religious People Happier than Atheists? by By Susan Perry at minnpost.com

In fact, some research has found that people who regularly attend religious services can expect to live an average of seven years longer than their peers who never step inside a church, synagogue or mosque.

...

New research has found “that the positive effects of religion depend enormously on where you live,” writes Upson. “Religious people may be happier than their godless counterparts, but only if the society they belong to values religion highly, which not all societies do.”

Bereavement and belief in the Afterlife from candidaabrahamson.wordpress.com

Grief from the loss of a loved one is often overwhelming and crushing. Religions often try to ease that gaping sense of emptiness through ritual aimed at facilitating gradual release. And the literature on the positive effects of religion on healing is significant. Becker, in his 2007 paper, “Do religious or spiritual beliefs influence bereavement?: A systematic review,” analyzed 32 studies, covering a total of 5715 persons. 94% of the studies showed some positive effects of religious or spiritual beliefs on bereavement [all references below].

...

There is a comfort that a belief in life after death brings, and it allows the belief holder to better reconcile his loss, to be less gripped by overwhelming fears, to adapt better, and, in some cases, to recover faster.

...

Becker G. Do religious or spiritual beliefs influence bereavement?: A systematic review.” Palliative Medicine 2007; 21(3):207-217.

Billings AG, Moos RH. The role of coping responses and social resources in attenuating the stress of life events. Journal of Behavioral Medicine, 1981: 4(2):139-157.

Braun M, Berg D. Meaning reconstruction in the experience of parental bereavement. Death Studies 1994; 18(2):105-29.

Clarke SM, et al. Religiosity, afterlife beliefs, and bereavement adjustment in adulthood. Journal of Religious Gerontology 2003; 14(2):207-224.

Davis C, Nolen-Hoeksemea S. Loss and meaning: How do people make sense of loss. American Behavioral Scientist 2001; 44(5):726-741.

Schoenrade P. When I die…Belief in afterlife as a response to mortality. Personality and Social Psychology Journal 1989; 15(1):91-100.

Smith P, Range L, Ulmer A. Belief in afterlife as a buffer in suicidal and Other bereavement. OMEGA–Journal of Death and Dying 1991-92; 24(3):217-225.

Lessons from the Light by Kenneth Ring and Evelyn Elsaesser. The link goes to a page in the book that describes how knowledge of Near Death Experiences deters suicide.

As far as I know, the first clinician to make use of NDE material in this context was a New York psychologist named John McDonagh. In 1979, he presented a paper at a psychological convention that described his success with several suicidal patients using a device he called "NDE bibliotherapy." His "technique" was actually little more than having his patients read some relevant passages from Raymond Moody's book, Reflections on Life after Life, after which the therapist and his patient would discuss its implicatins for the latter's own situation. McDonagh reports that such an approach was generally quite successful not only in reducing suicidal thoughts but also in preventing the deed altogether.

...

Since McDonagh's pioneering efforts, other clinicians knowledgeable about the NDE who have had the opportunity to counsel suicidal patients have also reported similar success. Perhaps the most notable of these therapists is Bruce Greyson, a psychiatrist now at the University of Virginia, whose specialty as a clinician has been suicidology. He is also the author of a classic paper on NDEs and suicide which the specialist may wish to consult for tis therapeutic implications. (14)

Quite apart form the clinicians who have developed this form of what we migh call "NDE-assisted therapy," I can draw upon my own personal experience here to provide additional evidence of how the NDE has helped to deter suicide. The following case ...

Materialism: Meaning is an illusion. Science: People need meaning to thrive.

Copyright © 2012, 2015 by ncu9nc All rights reserved. Texts quoted from other sources are Copyright © by their owners.

Physicalism is Dead: Paranormal Interest and Well-Being

Physicalism is Dead: Paranormal Interest and Well-Being: People who are actively interested in parapsychology and have had experiences they interpret as paranormal or transcendent report that thes...

Update to Objects That Contain Healing Power

I posted an update to Objects That Contain Healing Power. Scroll to the bottom of the post to get to the update. The update describes another experiment I did in which healing energy is stored in a plastic jar and used it to turn an Egely wheel (a very sensitive psi wheel).

Copyright © 2012 by ncu9nc All rights reserved. Texts quoted from other sources are Copyright © by their owners.

An Easy Altered State

Recently, the topic of altered states came up on a discussion forum I participate in. I posted this information...

One easy way to experience an altered state is to just observe yourself as you fall asleep at night and try to notice when you are in the hypnogogic state. When that happens it is very hard to concentrate on one thing for more than a few seconds and you have very vivid mental imagery.

If you try repeating a phrase over and over as you fall asleep, (or while you are doing relaxation exercises), you get to a point where you can't concentrate on it for more than a few seconds without your mind wandering and at the same time you experience very vivid mental imagery. Then you are in the hypnogogic state and your brain is probably producing lots of theta waves. Theta waves have been reported to coincide with psychic experiences.

I find the hypnogogic state is a good state for doing remote viewing and spirit communication. I explain this in more detail on my web site.

If you don't want to get too spooky, just consider the hypnogogic state a good state to access the unconscious. If you have a personal or spiritual question, repeat the question over and over and when your mind wanders and you have mental imagery, see if there isn't an answer or symbolic answer somewhere in the mental noise.

Copyright © 2012 by ncu9nc All rights reserved. Texts quoted from other sources are Copyright © by their owners.

T. H. Huxley: Accidental Founder of Modern Pseudo-skepticism

The majority of Americans believe in psychic phenomena. People usually believe in psychic phenomena and the afterlife because of their personal experiences, the experiences of people they know, or their religious beliefs. Unfortunately, there is still a lot of ignorance about the evidence for afterlife and the evidence for psychic phenomena.

There are also many people who are drawn to skepticism for several reasons. Because skeptics are influential, politicians and scientists are afraid to acknowledge belief in psychic phenomena and the afterlife or to advocate increased research in those fields.

This is a problem for Science and a problem for Humanity. What could be of greater significance to science than the huge gaps in our understanding of the universe that are revealed by our inability to explain psychic phenomena? What could be more important to humanity than an understanding of the survival of consciousness after death?

If most Americans believe in psychic phenomena, why do skeptics have such a disproportionate influence in society?

A large part of the problem is that the many scientists are skeptics and they have a lot of influence on our culture in many different areas: they advise politicians, they publish popular books, they control research funding, they influence the editorial policy of scientific journals, they consult for the news and entertainment media, etc etc. Because science has been so successful in modern times giving us improved medical care, agriculture, transportation, communication, and many other technologies, the opinions of scientists are highly respected. But the biggest problem is that scientists persecute any scientist who shows an interest in anything paranormal. This is what is really stifling greater acceptance of psychic phenomena in society and what is preventing more money from being spent on parapsychological research. Scientists' skepticism also gives moral authority to anyone else who also advocates skepticism.

Why are so many scientist skeptics? Because naturalism is an implicit part of the culture of science and science students are indoctrinated in that philosophy during their education. Naturalism is the belief that science should only study natural processes and consider natural explanations for phenomena. This is a mistake. Science should be the search for the truth where ever it leads. This flaw in the culture of science is due to a large extent to T. H. Huxley and the X club. The X Club was Founded by T. H. Huxley and played an important role in making naturalism a fundamental tenet of modern science.

The nine men who would compose the X Club already knew each other well. By the 1860s, friendships had turned the group into a social network, and the men often dined and went on holidays together. After Charles Darwin's On the Origin of Species was published in 1859, the men began working together to aid the cause for naturalism and natural history.

...

More importantly, the men of the club all shared an interest in natural history, naturalism, and a more general pursuit of intellectual thought free from religious influence, commonly referred to as academic liberalism.

- Wikipedia

One of the great successes of the X Club was engineering the supremacy of Darwinsim over the theories of Alfred Russel Wallace who also discovered the theory of natural selection. Darwin was an agnostic who believed in naturalism. Wallace was a Spiritualist.

Why isn’t Wallace remembered like Darwin?

The reasons are complex but largely related to the complete and sweeping dominance of Darwinian evolution. From the very beginning, when the theory of natural selection was unveiled to the scientific community at the Linnean Society on July 1, 1858, the entire program was engineered by Darwin’s colleagues and close friends, Joseph Hooker and Charles Lyell, to give their friend priority. When Origin was published a little over a year later modern evolutionary theory became Darwin’s theory. Another of Darwin’s allies, his “Bulldog” defender Thomas Henry Huxley, sought to solidify the theory by managing its every promotional and public aspect so as to gain paradigmatic status for it within the scientific community. In order to facilitate this end, Huxley composed the X Club, a group of eight kindred spirits: Huxley (the leader), Joseph Hooker, John Tyndall, George Busk, Edward Frankland, Herbert Spencer, Thomas Hirst, and John Lubbock. Under Huxley’s skillful management the X Club ensured the success of Darwinism, establishing it as the preeminent theory of biological life first in England and later throughout all of Europe. As if this weren’t enough to consign Wallace to obscurity, his insistence upon using the term “Darwinism” in the context of his own very different theory tended only to cause confusion and misunderstanding. Today, when Wallace is mentioned at all it is usually through a decidedly Darwinian lens.

http://www.alfredwallace.org/faqs.php

This conspiratorial tradition continues today in the persecution of scientists who criticize Darwinism, advocate intelligent design, or suggest psychic phenomena are real and are deserving of scientific study.

The formation of the X Club was happening during the second half of the 19th century, also the time the Society for Psychical Research was getting started. Huxley did not want studies of psychic and Spiritualist phenomena to become part of science.

The only good that I can see in the demonstration of the truth of "Spiritualism" is to furnish an additional argument against suicide. Better live a crossing-sweeper than die and be made to talk twaddle by a "medium" hired at a guinea a séance.

Review in the Daily News (17 October 1871), quoted in Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley F.R.S (1900) edited by Leonard Huxley, Vol. 1, p. 452.

http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Thomas_Henry_Huxley

Because of T. H Huxley and the X club, naturalism has become so ingrained in modern scientific culture and education, students don't even realize they are being indoctrinated. Because of this, Huxley can be considered a major cause of modern of science's intolerance to psychic phenomena and the source of modern pseudo-skepticism.

It is unfortunate that Darwin was used this way in the adoption of philosophical naturalism and materialism by the scientific establishment. Materialism is a gross misrepresentation of Darwin's thinking. Darwin believed that natual laws were designed - which is a form of intelligent design. Darwin also doubted human reason could be reliable if it arose through natural selection. If you cannot trust reason, then it is not rational to believe in anything including materialism. This argument is a well known flaw in materialism whereby materialism refutes itself. Darwin's beliefs did not support materialism yet his theory of natural selection is a keystone in the philosophy of materialisim because it provides materialism with an explanation of how complex organisms arose naturally.

Because naturalism is such an integral part of the scientific worldview, working as a scientist tends to brainwash a person into believing in physicalism. This is because scientists spend all their time trying to find physicalist solutions to problems. They get stuck thinking that way and can't conceive there might be something that current science can't explain or that there could be significant gaps in scientific knowledge. Like the proverbial man with a hammer to whom everything looks like a nail, to a scientist every question must have a physicalist answer.

Another part of the problem of skepticism is anti-religious fanatics, some of whom are also scientists. They have been injured in some way by religion and are out for vengeance. Anything that contradicts their humanist worldview is labeled religion and equated with ignorant religious fundamentalism and labeled a threat to modern enlightened rational society. Many of these people are "activists" who use the moral authority of the scientists to justify their militancy. Skeptics are not smarter than other people, they just claim they are and use that to justify their beliefs. However, people who have more education are more likely to believe in the afterlife and ESP and most doctors believe in the afterlife.

A third source of the problem of the inordinate influence of skepticism is the government suppression of parapsychology.

Because the skeptical attitudes of scientists give moral authority to the anti-religious fanatics and allow the government to use scientists as pawns in their suppression of parapsychology, the root cause of the influence of skepticism in society stems from the intolerance of scientists. This intolerance originates in the belief in naturalism. T. H. Huxley was not a pseudo-skeptic, and it is sadly ironic that his good intentions have had such unfortunate consequences.

Copyright © 2012 by ncu9nc All rights reserved. Texts quoted from other sources are Copyright © by their owners.

Is Self-directed Neuroplasticity Evidence That Consciousness is not Produced by the Brain?

There is a lot of discussion on an internet forum I follow about self-directed neuroplasticity. Some people feel that self-directed neuroplasticity is evidence that consciousness is not produced by the brain.

I disagree with this opinion.

Self-directed neuroplasticity is the phenomenon whereby the brain is altered by conscious thought. Meditation and cognitive therapy are conscious processes that have been shown to alter the brain.

However, some people believe the brain cannot be capable of modifying itself and therefore self-directed neuroplasticity shows that consciousness must be independent from the brain.

The reason I don't consider this to be correct is as follows:

1. Ordinary neuroplasticity is not controversial. Neurons in the brain alter their connections during any process that involves learning.
   

2. If you want to demonstrate that self-directed neuroplasticity is different from ordinary neuroplasticity and is evidence that consciousness is not produced by the brain, you have to start from the premise that consciousness is produced by the brain and try to show that premise leads to a contradiction. If you start from the premise that consciousness is not produced by the brain you are starting from the point you are trying to prove. Those who believe that self-directed neuroplasticity is evidence that consciousness is not produced by the brain often ask "who is doing the meditation that alters the brain" - as if this implied consciousness was not produced by the brain. However that implication is the point to be proved not an assumption you can start with.
   

3. Self-directed neuroplasticity, like the placebo effect, demonstrates that consciousness can influence the brain and therefore consciousness is not an illusion or an epiphenomenon of the brain.
   

4. Do the two statements 1) consciousness is produced by the brain, and 2) consciousness is not an illusion or an epiphenomenon of the brain - constitute a contradiction?
   

5. No. Consciousness might be produced by the brain and also influence the brain. For example, one part of the brain might influence another part of the brain. As an analogy, a computer system or network of computers can be programmed to allocate and reallocate resources depending on changing usage requirements. You could try to refute this point by saying in self-directed neuroplasticity consciousness alters the part of the brain that is responsible for consciousness. If you do that, you are admitting that the brain produces consciousness which is what you are trying to disprove.
   

6. You cannot argue that it is impossible for the brain to alter itself, because in self-directed neuroplasticity consciousness has effects on the brain that alter consciousness. Cognitive therapy and meditation are both conscious processes that alter the brain and have effects on consciousness. If consciousness can alter itself, which is not in dispute, you are admitting there are conscious systems that can alter themselves and therefore there are no grounds to argue that the brain cannot produce consciousness and alter itself.
   

7. Therefore self-directed neuroplasticity, whereby consciousness alters the brain, does not provide evidence that consciousness is not produced by the brain.
   

I think there is so much confusion over this issue because people who believe consciousness is not produced by the brain bring that opinion to the debate and they don't realize how it influences their reasoning. They start from that premise and don't realize it. They often refer to some other phenomenon that is evidence consciousness is not produced by the brain as if it bolstered their argument. But that is just another way of assuming the premise they are trying to prove or proving the premise by alternate means. In order to show self-directed neuroplasticity is evidence that consciousness is not produced by the brain, you have to start from the premise that consciousness is produced by the brain and try to show that leads to a contradiction. Otherwise you are starting with the premise you are trying to prove. However as I have tried to show above, that premise does not lead to a contradiction.

However there is a large amount of evidence from other phenomena that does show consciousness is not producecd by the brain.

Further reading on self-directed neuroplasticity:

• Fusing Mind and Matter by Dr. Jeffrey M. Schwartz at www.vision.org
  

• Quantum physics in neuroscience and psychology: a neurophysical model of mind–brain interaction Jeffrey M. Schwartz, Henry P. Stapp and Mario BeauregardPhilos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci. 2005 June 29; 360(1458): 1309–1327.
  

• Evolution, self-directed neuroplasticity, and quantum entanglement by Bernardo Kastrup at bernardokastrup.com
  

Copyright © 2012 by ncu9nc All rights reserved. Texts quoted from other sources are Copyright © by their owners.