Dawkins declines to discuss evidence
January 13, 2008
At the Daily Grail, Dr. Rupert Sheldrake describes an interview between him and Richard Dawkins which ends rather abruptly when Sheldrake suggests they actually take a look at the scientific evidence for telepathy:
We then agreed that controlled experiments were necessary. I said that this was why I had actually been doing such experiments, including tests to find out if people really could tell who was calling them on the telephone when the caller was selected at random. The results were far above the chance level.
The previous week I had sent Richard copies of some of my papers, published in peer-reviewed journals, so that he could look at the data.
Richard seemed uneasy and said, “I don’t want to discuss evidence”. “Why not?” I asked. “There isn’t time. It’s too complicated. And that’s not what this programme is about.” The camera stopped.
The Director, Russell Barnes, confirmed that he too was not interested in evidence. [ Richard Dawkins Comes to Call ]
Posted in Science
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January 13th, 2008 at 6:39 pm
Elf can remind you of the day our psychology professor came into class, did a survey to see who believed in ESP, then did some magic tricks. He then did a follow up survey to see who had changed their minds. I raised my hand to point out that during our last class he’d spent a great deal of time talking about how much we DON’T know about the brain, so how are magic tricks supposed to prove or disprove ESP? The professor refused to call on me. I think I kept my hand up for several minutes. The idea that something like telepathy might be testable and supported by data is simply not acceptable to many scientists. The sun goes around the earth, you know.