I agree that while topics like, for example, reincarnation are far behind proven beyond reasonable doubt, saying to any research by Jim Tucker and ,during his lifetime, Ian Stevenson to the question, can science investigate "is there reincarnaton", "no, according to science there can be no reincarnation, we aren't having this discussion" based on what we know in biology and neuroscience is dogmatic. It is one thing to say that based on the evidence against the possibility of reincarnation, the evidence for it is not proportional to it to say, but we can conclude beyond reasonable doubt, it is real. It is another thing to say that the evidence against such possibility means it is not worth science's time amd money to evaluate the evidence for it and it legitimizes "harmful and dangerous belief". It shows that treating anything coming from religion is dangerous superstition shows that atheists in America have allergic reaction to religion (which is understandable, given how atheists are treated by religious right) and that undermines open minded discussions. While argument there were open minded discussions on matters of God and afterlife including reincarnation in the 19th and first three decades of 20th century, and it is just proponents lost, well but now it is 21 century and no they didn't disprove the paradigm. But I salute UVA, a prestigious university for continuing discussion. Now, when it comes to public research universities and National Academy of Sciences, because it is not objective establishef fact, and not a part of any established scientific theory, engaging public institutions like NAS or spending public money on it, compromises principle of separation of religion and state and therefore I think it was good idea for NAS to do away with public funding for any miracle and afterlife research. Let the private funds do it.
Agreed, at this moment using public funds to advance “paranormal” (btw I don’t like this word - if something happens, then it is normal and sooner or later we’ll find out how it works) research is questionable. As you say, let private donors fund paranormal research until there’s a strong case for using public funds.
But the bureaucrats of science must let private donors fund what they want to fund, without complaining, and they must stop harassing the scientists who work in paranormal research. Science advances when and only when the scientists are free to research what they want.
And for the record, I consider very harmful and dangerous all those who claim the right to decide which beliefs are harmful and dangerous.
Agreed, as when those atheists, who had allergic reaction to all religion (and not just any atheist), got into power, we've got Robespierre, Calles, Mussonin, Lenin, Stalin, Khrushchyov, Mao Tsei Tung, Kim Is Sung and Pol Pot, guys responsible for more murders than Inquisition. And the fact that CSICOP decides who is legitimate scientist and who is not, considering that many members are magicians and philosophers with agenda rather than scientists, that is dangerous.
>> "I see strong parallels between Italian fascism and its leader and modern day American fascism and its leader"
> "Sorry, I don’t know who is the leader of modern day American fascism."
Benito Mussolini staged a coup d'état on October 28 1922 in order to become dictator of Italy, Donald Trump staged a coup d'état on January 6 2021 in order to become dictator of America. The only difference is Mussolini's coup d'état worked, Trump's didn't. But Trump hasn't given up.
>> "Nobody says somebody doesn't have a right to do psi research, but such people do NOT have a right to demand respect from scientists for such activities"
> "I’m sitting on the fence with an open mind. If I were a psi researcher, I wouldn’t demand respect. I would just demand to be left in peace, like, do your research and I’ll do mine, and let experiment decide."
If I was a professor and was on a committee to determine if somebody should get tenure at my university, and all they had done was conduct ESP research that had led, just like everybody else's ESP research, precisely nowhere, then I would definitely vote against granting tenure. This is because, due to finite resources, there's only a limited number of people who can receive it and there are plenty of good mathematicians, physicists. chemists and biologists who deserve it more. If that were to happen the rejected professor would undoubtedly scream that he was being discriminated against, and that would be true, we would be discriminating between good scientists and bad scientists, but he would even claim that he was the victim of censorship, but that would not be true. He's free to say whatever he wishes to say and is free to continue with his "research" ; it's just that the university has decided not to continue paying him to do it. If you pay somebody to conduct yet another investigation into spoon bending to go with the 6.02*10^23 ones that have already been done then you don't have the resources to pay somebody else to conduct research in an area that is almost certain to be more productive.
The book I recommended shows that Mussolini was an answer to the concerns of a large number of Italians, mostly young working class men who had participated in WW1, who were feeling that they had been thrown away in the rubbish bin of history. The Italian political establishment ignored them, and Mussolini was the only one who offered an answer.
I’m not an American and I prefer to keep away from US politics, but I have the impression that the same can be said of Trump.
That an answer is questionable doesn’t mean that the concerns it responds to are not valid.
< ESP research that had led, just like everybody else's ESP research, precisely nowhere…>
This is your opinion. Others, including top scientists like Stuart Kauffman and winners of the Nobel Prize in Physics like Brian Josephson, think that there’s plenty of solid experimental evidence for ESP. As a scientist who has been working in other fields, I prefer to watch with an open mind. If humans have natural ESP abilities, good! If not, no big deal, we’ll just have to engineer equivalent abilities, and we’re doing this already.
> Western culture could use an injection of vitality,
At least in the USA the problem is not a lack of vitality, it's a lack of rationality. And vitality is not necessarily a good thing if it's aimed in the wrong direction. I'm not usually big on poetry but I do remember something that W.B. Yeats said about that just before World War II started:
"Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world, The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere The ceremony of innocence is drowned; The best lack all conviction, while the worst Are full of passionate intensity. The center cannot hold."
> Italian futurism and fascism were not natural allies, but were essentially incompatible"
I once thought that American transhumanism and American fascism were completely incompatible, but around 2016 I learned to my sorrow I was entirely wrong about that.
> as emphasized by top representatives of both. That many futurists joined Benito Mussolini’s fascist party was due to realpolitik more than ideology.
I disagree with that, the foundation of realpolitik is practicality not ideology, and the foundation of practicality is rationality but, as events later proved, there was nothing rational about Benito Mussolini's fascism, things did NOT turn out the way his ideology predicted it would. I see strong parallels between Italian fascism and its leader and modern day American fascism and its leader.
> Italian futurists were anti-clerical, but not anti-spiritual. On the contrary, many participated in theosophical salons and were open to paranormal phenomena, life after death, spiritualism and all that.
The same thing could be said about American fascism except that they are pro clerical. And science is open to any idea, new or old, provided there is a rational reason to believe that it might be true.
> I’ll now translate some passages of “La Scienza Futurista” (1916) and comment. The manifesto begins with a strong condemnation of the science establishment that, “hypnotized by the stupid books of the countless university professors of Germany,” is “superficially precise, pettily accurate, idiotically sure of its own infallibility, without any brilliant explosion.”
And according to them one of those German professors who was stupid, petty and idiotic was Albert Einstein.
> I don’t intend to affirm that psi is real or defend any specific result of psi research. I just want to defend the right of scientists to do psi research,
Nobody says somebody doesn't have a right to do psi research, but such people do NOT have a right to demand respect from scientists for such activities if, despite centuries of effort, they fail to come up with anything that is both interesting and repeatable. Instead the interesting stuff is not repeatable and the repeatable stuff is not interesting.
< something that W.B. Yeats said about that just before World War II started…>
This is one of my favorite pieces of poetry as well. Unfortunately, it is very much applicable to our time. However, I don’t read it as an appeal to the rational brain, but as an appeal to the feeling heart.
< I disagree with that, the foundation of realpolitik is practicality not ideology…>
They aligned with the fascist party because they wanted to be left in peace. Sounds practical to me.
< I see strong parallels between Italian fascism and its leader and modern day American fascism and its leader…>
Sorry, I don’t know who is the leader of modern day American fascism. Concerning the leader of Italian fascism, there’s a recent historic novel / biography in three volumes. I read it in Italian, but I see that at least the first book has been translated:
< And according to them one of those German professors who was stupid, petty and idiotic was Albert Einstein…>
This is an interesting topic to research. I’ll do so, but my guess is that the Italian futurists were referring to those stupid, petty and idiotic German professors who condemned Einstein. I guess the Italian futurists would have found Einstein interesting, at least because he was irreverent. Throwing stones at old sacred cows and all that. I’ll research and say more.
< Nobody says somebody doesn't have a right to do psi research, but such people do NOT have a right to demand respect from scientists for such activities…>
I’m sitting on the fence with an open mind. If I were a psi researcher, I wouldn’t demand respect. I would just demand to be left in peace, like, do your research and I’ll do mine, and let experiment decide. I might criticize the anti-psi cancel mobs when they seem to forget the science that they loudly claim to defend.
>> "I see strong parallels between Italian fascism and its leader and modern day American fascism and its leader"
> "Sorry, I don’t know who is the leader of modern day American fascism."
Benito Mussolini staged a coup d'état on October 28 1922 in order to become dictator of Italy, Donald Trump staged a coup d'état on January 6 2021 in order to become dictator of America. The only difference is Mussolini's coup d'état worked, Trump's didn't. But Trump hasn't given up.
>> "Nobody says somebody doesn't have a right to do psi research, but such people do NOT have a right to demand respect from scientists for such activities"
> "I’m sitting on the fence with an open mind. If I were a psi researcher, I wouldn’t demand respect. I would just demand to be left in peace, like, do your research and I’ll do mine, and let experiment decide."
If I was a professor and was on a committee to determine if somebody should get tenure at my university, and all they had done was conduct ESP research that had led, just like everybody else's ESP research, precisely nowhere, then I would definitely vote against granting tenure. This is because, due to finite resources, there's only a limited number of people who can receive it and there are plenty of good mathematicians, physicists. chemists and biologists who deserve it more. If that were to happen the rejected professor would undoubtedly scream that he was being discriminated against, and that would be true, we would be discriminating between good scientists and bad scientists, but he would even claim that he was the victim of censorship, but that would not be true. He's free to say whatever he wishes to say and is free to continue with his "research"; it's just that the university has decided not to continue paying him to do it. If you pay somebody to conduct yet another investigation into spoon bending to go with the 6.02*10^23 ones that have already been done then you don't have the resources to pay somebody else to conduct research in an area that is almost certain to be more productive.
< Brian Josephson was a great scientist and in the early 60's when he was only 22 he wrote an absolutely brilliant paper on superconductivity and won a Nobel Prize for it, but very soon after that he abandoned the scientific method. The parapsychology meme virus infected his mind and thus despite such a spectacular early start to his career he hasn't had a creative thought since then, for the last half century he has accomplished precisely nothing. There seems to be no idea so screwy he can't make himself believe it. The poor man has lost his mind.>
That Josephson was a genius at 22 doesn’t imply that he was always right. But I think it implies that he deserves the benefit of doubt. Perhaps he was right on parapsychology, and his detractors were wrong. Perhaps.
< As for Stuart Kauffman, he has said some things that I've disagreed with, such as:
"if mind is partially quantum, nonlocality is possible so psychokinesis is possible and testable, as is telepathy."
But psi has been tested over and over again, and it keeps on failing. And it's not surprising it failed given that because Bell's Inequality is violated we know that nonlocality is real but we also know that phenomenon cannot be used to transmit information, so it can't be involved in telepathy or signaling by way of psychokinesis.>
I think you forgot to add something like “as far as we presently know.” Also, yes, correlation doesn’t imply causation, but this cuts both ways. Even if there’s nothing involved that we would call causation, the correlation is still there. A particle doesn’t “tell” its spin to its entangled pair (again, as far as we presently know), but the spin of its entangled pair is (anti)correlated anyway. If you and I consistently happen to think the same thing, isn’t this telepathy?
< And Kaufman has said some things that I find puzzling, such as:
"I can find NO direct evidence for free will, but the quantum enigma requires it and it is possible."
I'll know if I agree or disagree with him about that as soon as he tells me what the hell "free will" is supposed to mean. >
I define the free will of an agent as the ability to do things that are not entirely and uniquely determined by the rest of the universe (that is, the universe minus the agent). Kauffman seems to think more or less the same. Much more in my next book. I plan to have the draft ready by the end of the year, and I’ll invite you to read and criticize the draft.
< And Kaufman has said some things that I can't make heads or tails out of, such as:
"Evolution creates the very possibilities into which it becomes, without "selection" "acting" to achieve the very adjacent possible opportunities into which it becomes."
Huh?>
I think he means that actual history changes what he calls the “adjacent possible” and creates new possibilities that could (or not) become actual.
> > psi has been tested over and over again, and it keeps on failing. And it's not surprising it failed given that because Bell's Inequality is violated we know that nonlocality is real but we also know that phenomenon cannot be used to transmit information, so it can't be involved in telepathy or signaling by way of psychokinesis.
> "I think you forgot to add something like “as far as we presently know."
If it turns out that we really can send information faster than light then we'd have to dump both General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics into the trash, but before we do anything that drastic I'd want to see something a LOT more convincing than a third rate stage magician like Yuri Geller bending a spoon.
> "Also, yes, correlation doesn’t imply causation, but this cuts both ways. Even if there’s nothing involved that we would call causation, the correlation is still there. A particle doesn’t “tell” its spin to its entangled pair (again, as far as we presently know), but the spin of its entangled pair is (anti)correlated anyway. If you and I consistently happen to think the same thing, isn’t this telepathy?"
But if you're talking about particles, spin, and Stern Gerlach magnets then it could be a perfect correlation, or a perfect anticorrelation, or anything in between depending on how different the directions are that you and I independently and arbitrarily decided to call "up". If the difference between what you choose to randomly call "up" and what I choose to randomly call "up" is ø then the probability there will be a perfect anti-correlation is [COS(ø)]^2. So you won't know if I'm thinking what you're thinking, or I'm thinking the exact opposite of what you're thinking, or something in between.
> "I define the free will of an agent as the ability to do things that are not entirely and uniquely determined by the rest of the universe (that is, the universe minus the agent)."
Obviously an agent is not uniquely determined by the external environment but is also determined by the previous state the agent was in, that's one reason two people don't behave the same way when confronted with identical conditions. Another possibility is that he behaved the way did because he was determined by absolutely nothing, not logic, not emotion, nothing. He did it for no reason, he behaved UNreasonably. And the very definition of "random" is an action without a cause. In other words you did what you did because of your heredity, or because of your environment, or because of both, or because of neither and you did it for no reason at all and was just an act of pure randomness.
So where does this thing called "free will" enter into this? I think it's just a case of you don't know what you're going to do until you actually do it, and when you do it you say to yourself I guess I decided to do it of my own free will, but it's no more mysterious than the fact that a computer doesn't know what the answer to the calculation it is working on is until it has finished the computation.
It looks like it could be in the book on Amazon that I linked. It includes a lot of his writing and says "manifestos", plural, but of course it's not online.
Hi Max. These books have translations of the original futurist manifesto of Marinetti and other futurist writings, but not of the manifesto of futurist science. I’ll check again, but I have searched for it in vain for months. However, the Italian original is here, ready for translation. I’ve translated some passages using Google Translate (which has improved a lot recently) with only a few manual adjustments, so translating the manifesto of futurist science would be easy.
< If it turns out that we really can send information faster than light then we'd have to dump both General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics into the trash…>
All depends on what you mean exactly by “send information.” Space itself can stretch faster than light in GR, naked singularities and closed timelike loop solutions exist in GR, and QM has entangled correlations.
< the directions are that you and I independently and arbitrarily decided to call "up"…>
The subtle point here is what “independently and arbitrarily” means exactly.
< Obviously an agent is not uniquely determined by the external environment but is also determined by the previous state the agent was in…>
According to conventional Laplacian determinism, both the external environment and the previous state of the agent are determined by the state of the universe long ago, long before the agent existed. Not so in global determinism, where past and future are codetermined in a timeless loop. The agent is an integral and irreducible part of the loop, and this is free will.
Sorry for the very short reply, lots of things to to this morning at the same time, I wish I could do them all in a timeless loop, more soon.
I agree that while topics like, for example, reincarnation are far behind proven beyond reasonable doubt, saying to any research by Jim Tucker and ,during his lifetime, Ian Stevenson to the question, can science investigate "is there reincarnaton", "no, according to science there can be no reincarnation, we aren't having this discussion" based on what we know in biology and neuroscience is dogmatic. It is one thing to say that based on the evidence against the possibility of reincarnation, the evidence for it is not proportional to it to say, but we can conclude beyond reasonable doubt, it is real. It is another thing to say that the evidence against such possibility means it is not worth science's time amd money to evaluate the evidence for it and it legitimizes "harmful and dangerous belief". It shows that treating anything coming from religion is dangerous superstition shows that atheists in America have allergic reaction to religion (which is understandable, given how atheists are treated by religious right) and that undermines open minded discussions. While argument there were open minded discussions on matters of God and afterlife including reincarnation in the 19th and first three decades of 20th century, and it is just proponents lost, well but now it is 21 century and no they didn't disprove the paradigm. But I salute UVA, a prestigious university for continuing discussion. Now, when it comes to public research universities and National Academy of Sciences, because it is not objective establishef fact, and not a part of any established scientific theory, engaging public institutions like NAS or spending public money on it, compromises principle of separation of religion and state and therefore I think it was good idea for NAS to do away with public funding for any miracle and afterlife research. Let the private funds do it.
Agreed, at this moment using public funds to advance “paranormal” (btw I don’t like this word - if something happens, then it is normal and sooner or later we’ll find out how it works) research is questionable. As you say, let private donors fund paranormal research until there’s a strong case for using public funds.
But the bureaucrats of science must let private donors fund what they want to fund, without complaining, and they must stop harassing the scientists who work in paranormal research. Science advances when and only when the scientists are free to research what they want.
And for the record, I consider very harmful and dangerous all those who claim the right to decide which beliefs are harmful and dangerous.
Agreed, as when those atheists, who had allergic reaction to all religion (and not just any atheist), got into power, we've got Robespierre, Calles, Mussonin, Lenin, Stalin, Khrushchyov, Mao Tsei Tung, Kim Is Sung and Pol Pot, guys responsible for more murders than Inquisition. And the fact that CSICOP decides who is legitimate scientist and who is not, considering that many members are magicians and philosophers with agenda rather than scientists, that is dangerous.
Very dangerous indeed!
Hi Giulio
>> "I see strong parallels between Italian fascism and its leader and modern day American fascism and its leader"
> "Sorry, I don’t know who is the leader of modern day American fascism."
Benito Mussolini staged a coup d'état on October 28 1922 in order to become dictator of Italy, Donald Trump staged a coup d'état on January 6 2021 in order to become dictator of America. The only difference is Mussolini's coup d'état worked, Trump's didn't. But Trump hasn't given up.
>> "Nobody says somebody doesn't have a right to do psi research, but such people do NOT have a right to demand respect from scientists for such activities"
> "I’m sitting on the fence with an open mind. If I were a psi researcher, I wouldn’t demand respect. I would just demand to be left in peace, like, do your research and I’ll do mine, and let experiment decide."
If I was a professor and was on a committee to determine if somebody should get tenure at my university, and all they had done was conduct ESP research that had led, just like everybody else's ESP research, precisely nowhere, then I would definitely vote against granting tenure. This is because, due to finite resources, there's only a limited number of people who can receive it and there are plenty of good mathematicians, physicists. chemists and biologists who deserve it more. If that were to happen the rejected professor would undoubtedly scream that he was being discriminated against, and that would be true, we would be discriminating between good scientists and bad scientists, but he would even claim that he was the victim of censorship, but that would not be true. He's free to say whatever he wishes to say and is free to continue with his "research" ; it's just that the university has decided not to continue paying him to do it. If you pay somebody to conduct yet another investigation into spoon bending to go with the 6.02*10^23 ones that have already been done then you don't have the resources to pay somebody else to conduct research in an area that is almost certain to be more productive.
John K Clark
<Benito Mussolini…>
The book I recommended shows that Mussolini was an answer to the concerns of a large number of Italians, mostly young working class men who had participated in WW1, who were feeling that they had been thrown away in the rubbish bin of history. The Italian political establishment ignored them, and Mussolini was the only one who offered an answer.
I’m not an American and I prefer to keep away from US politics, but I have the impression that the same can be said of Trump.
That an answer is questionable doesn’t mean that the concerns it responds to are not valid.
< ESP research that had led, just like everybody else's ESP research, precisely nowhere…>
This is your opinion. Others, including top scientists like Stuart Kauffman and winners of the Nobel Prize in Physics like Brian Josephson, think that there’s plenty of solid experimental evidence for ESP. As a scientist who has been working in other fields, I prefer to watch with an open mind. If humans have natural ESP abilities, good! If not, no big deal, we’ll just have to engineer equivalent abilities, and we’re doing this already.
Giulio Prisco Wrote:
> Western culture could use an injection of vitality,
At least in the USA the problem is not a lack of vitality, it's a lack of rationality. And vitality is not necessarily a good thing if it's aimed in the wrong direction. I'm not usually big on poetry but I do remember something that W.B. Yeats said about that just before World War II started:
"Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world, The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere The ceremony of innocence is drowned; The best lack all conviction, while the worst Are full of passionate intensity. The center cannot hold."
> Italian futurism and fascism were not natural allies, but were essentially incompatible"
I once thought that American transhumanism and American fascism were completely incompatible, but around 2016 I learned to my sorrow I was entirely wrong about that.
> as emphasized by top representatives of both. That many futurists joined Benito Mussolini’s fascist party was due to realpolitik more than ideology.
I disagree with that, the foundation of realpolitik is practicality not ideology, and the foundation of practicality is rationality but, as events later proved, there was nothing rational about Benito Mussolini's fascism, things did NOT turn out the way his ideology predicted it would. I see strong parallels between Italian fascism and its leader and modern day American fascism and its leader.
> Italian futurists were anti-clerical, but not anti-spiritual. On the contrary, many participated in theosophical salons and were open to paranormal phenomena, life after death, spiritualism and all that.
The same thing could be said about American fascism except that they are pro clerical. And science is open to any idea, new or old, provided there is a rational reason to believe that it might be true.
> I’ll now translate some passages of “La Scienza Futurista” (1916) and comment. The manifesto begins with a strong condemnation of the science establishment that, “hypnotized by the stupid books of the countless university professors of Germany,” is “superficially precise, pettily accurate, idiotically sure of its own infallibility, without any brilliant explosion.”
And according to them one of those German professors who was stupid, petty and idiotic was Albert Einstein.
> I don’t intend to affirm that psi is real or defend any specific result of psi research. I just want to defend the right of scientists to do psi research,
Nobody says somebody doesn't have a right to do psi research, but such people do NOT have a right to demand respect from scientists for such activities if, despite centuries of effort, they fail to come up with anything that is both interesting and repeatable. Instead the interesting stuff is not repeatable and the repeatable stuff is not interesting.
John K Clark
Hi John,
< something that W.B. Yeats said about that just before World War II started…>
This is one of my favorite pieces of poetry as well. Unfortunately, it is very much applicable to our time. However, I don’t read it as an appeal to the rational brain, but as an appeal to the feeling heart.
< I disagree with that, the foundation of realpolitik is practicality not ideology…>
They aligned with the fascist party because they wanted to be left in peace. Sounds practical to me.
< I see strong parallels between Italian fascism and its leader and modern day American fascism and its leader…>
Sorry, I don’t know who is the leader of modern day American fascism. Concerning the leader of Italian fascism, there’s a recent historic novel / biography in three volumes. I read it in Italian, but I see that at least the first book has been translated:
https://www.amazon.com/M-Century-Novel-Antonio-Scurati-ebook/dp/B09132GN4M/
< And according to them one of those German professors who was stupid, petty and idiotic was Albert Einstein…>
This is an interesting topic to research. I’ll do so, but my guess is that the Italian futurists were referring to those stupid, petty and idiotic German professors who condemned Einstein. I guess the Italian futurists would have found Einstein interesting, at least because he was irreverent. Throwing stones at old sacred cows and all that. I’ll research and say more.
< Nobody says somebody doesn't have a right to do psi research, but such people do NOT have a right to demand respect from scientists for such activities…>
I’m sitting on the fence with an open mind. If I were a psi researcher, I wouldn’t demand respect. I would just demand to be left in peace, like, do your research and I’ll do mine, and let experiment decide. I might criticize the anti-psi cancel mobs when they seem to forget the science that they loudly claim to defend.
Hi Giulio
>> "I see strong parallels between Italian fascism and its leader and modern day American fascism and its leader"
> "Sorry, I don’t know who is the leader of modern day American fascism."
Benito Mussolini staged a coup d'état on October 28 1922 in order to become dictator of Italy, Donald Trump staged a coup d'état on January 6 2021 in order to become dictator of America. The only difference is Mussolini's coup d'état worked, Trump's didn't. But Trump hasn't given up.
>> "Nobody says somebody doesn't have a right to do psi research, but such people do NOT have a right to demand respect from scientists for such activities"
> "I’m sitting on the fence with an open mind. If I were a psi researcher, I wouldn’t demand respect. I would just demand to be left in peace, like, do your research and I’ll do mine, and let experiment decide."
If I was a professor and was on a committee to determine if somebody should get tenure at my university, and all they had done was conduct ESP research that had led, just like everybody else's ESP research, precisely nowhere, then I would definitely vote against granting tenure. This is because, due to finite resources, there's only a limited number of people who can receive it and there are plenty of good mathematicians, physicists. chemists and biologists who deserve it more. If that were to happen the rejected professor would undoubtedly scream that he was being discriminated against, and that would be true, we would be discriminating between good scientists and bad scientists, but he would even claim that he was the victim of censorship, but that would not be true. He's free to say whatever he wishes to say and is free to continue with his "research"; it's just that the university has decided not to continue paying him to do it. If you pay somebody to conduct yet another investigation into spoon bending to go with the 6.02*10^23 ones that have already been done then you don't have the resources to pay somebody else to conduct research in an area that is almost certain to be more productive.
John K Clark
John:
< Brian Josephson was a great scientist and in the early 60's when he was only 22 he wrote an absolutely brilliant paper on superconductivity and won a Nobel Prize for it, but very soon after that he abandoned the scientific method. The parapsychology meme virus infected his mind and thus despite such a spectacular early start to his career he hasn't had a creative thought since then, for the last half century he has accomplished precisely nothing. There seems to be no idea so screwy he can't make himself believe it. The poor man has lost his mind.>
That Josephson was a genius at 22 doesn’t imply that he was always right. But I think it implies that he deserves the benefit of doubt. Perhaps he was right on parapsychology, and his detractors were wrong. Perhaps.
< As for Stuart Kauffman, he has said some things that I've disagreed with, such as:
"if mind is partially quantum, nonlocality is possible so psychokinesis is possible and testable, as is telepathy."
But psi has been tested over and over again, and it keeps on failing. And it's not surprising it failed given that because Bell's Inequality is violated we know that nonlocality is real but we also know that phenomenon cannot be used to transmit information, so it can't be involved in telepathy or signaling by way of psychokinesis.>
I think you forgot to add something like “as far as we presently know.” Also, yes, correlation doesn’t imply causation, but this cuts both ways. Even if there’s nothing involved that we would call causation, the correlation is still there. A particle doesn’t “tell” its spin to its entangled pair (again, as far as we presently know), but the spin of its entangled pair is (anti)correlated anyway. If you and I consistently happen to think the same thing, isn’t this telepathy?
< And Kaufman has said some things that I find puzzling, such as:
"I can find NO direct evidence for free will, but the quantum enigma requires it and it is possible."
I'll know if I agree or disagree with him about that as soon as he tells me what the hell "free will" is supposed to mean. >
I define the free will of an agent as the ability to do things that are not entirely and uniquely determined by the rest of the universe (that is, the universe minus the agent). Kauffman seems to think more or less the same. Much more in my next book. I plan to have the draft ready by the end of the year, and I’ll invite you to read and criticize the draft.
< And Kaufman has said some things that I can't make heads or tails out of, such as:
"Evolution creates the very possibilities into which it becomes, without "selection" "acting" to achieve the very adjacent possible opportunities into which it becomes."
Huh?>
I think he means that actual history changes what he calls the “adjacent possible” and creates new possibilities that could (or not) become actual.
Hi Giulio
> > psi has been tested over and over again, and it keeps on failing. And it's not surprising it failed given that because Bell's Inequality is violated we know that nonlocality is real but we also know that phenomenon cannot be used to transmit information, so it can't be involved in telepathy or signaling by way of psychokinesis.
> "I think you forgot to add something like “as far as we presently know."
If it turns out that we really can send information faster than light then we'd have to dump both General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics into the trash, but before we do anything that drastic I'd want to see something a LOT more convincing than a third rate stage magician like Yuri Geller bending a spoon.
> "Also, yes, correlation doesn’t imply causation, but this cuts both ways. Even if there’s nothing involved that we would call causation, the correlation is still there. A particle doesn’t “tell” its spin to its entangled pair (again, as far as we presently know), but the spin of its entangled pair is (anti)correlated anyway. If you and I consistently happen to think the same thing, isn’t this telepathy?"
But if you're talking about particles, spin, and Stern Gerlach magnets then it could be a perfect correlation, or a perfect anticorrelation, or anything in between depending on how different the directions are that you and I independently and arbitrarily decided to call "up". If the difference between what you choose to randomly call "up" and what I choose to randomly call "up" is ø then the probability there will be a perfect anti-correlation is [COS(ø)]^2. So you won't know if I'm thinking what you're thinking, or I'm thinking the exact opposite of what you're thinking, or something in between.
> "I define the free will of an agent as the ability to do things that are not entirely and uniquely determined by the rest of the universe (that is, the universe minus the agent)."
Obviously an agent is not uniquely determined by the external environment but is also determined by the previous state the agent was in, that's one reason two people don't behave the same way when confronted with identical conditions. Another possibility is that he behaved the way did because he was determined by absolutely nothing, not logic, not emotion, nothing. He did it for no reason, he behaved UNreasonably. And the very definition of "random" is an action without a cause. In other words you did what you did because of your heredity, or because of your environment, or because of both, or because of neither and you did it for no reason at all and was just an act of pure randomness.
So where does this thing called "free will" enter into this? I think it's just a case of you don't know what you're going to do until you actually do it, and when you do it you say to yourself I guess I decided to do it of my own free will, but it's no more mysterious than the fact that a computer doesn't know what the answer to the calculation it is working on is until it has finished the computation.
John K Clark
"An English translation of the manifesto doesn’t seem to exist." I found that surprising and hard to believe. Indeed:
The Founding and Manifesto of Futurism (multilingual edition)
https://www.amazon.com/Founding-Manifesto-Futurism-Multilingual/dp/2322096792
Critical Writings: New Edition
https://www.amazon.com/Critical-Writings-Filippo-Tommaso-Marinetti/dp/0374531072
You can even get "The Manifesto of Futurist Cooking"!
https://www.amazon.com/Manifesto-Futurist-Cooking-Filippo-Marinetti-ebook/dp/B01DVDUFE8
Online:
http://bactra.org/T4PM/futurist-manifesto.html
https://bluemountain.princeton.edu/bluemtn/?a=d&d=bmtnaai190904-01.2.3&e=-------en-20-bmtnaai-1--txt-txIN-Annunzio+------
This is the original futurist manifesto, not the manifesto of futurist science!
It looks like it could be in the book on Amazon that I linked. It includes a lot of his writing and says "manifestos", plural, but of course it's not online.
I wasn't aware that there were different manifestos. Really surprising that the latter isn't online anywhere.
Hi Max. These books have translations of the original futurist manifesto of Marinetti and other futurist writings, but not of the manifesto of futurist science. I’ll check again, but I have searched for it in vain for months. However, the Italian original is here, ready for translation. I’ve translated some passages using Google Translate (which has improved a lot recently) with only a few manual adjustments, so translating the manifesto of futurist science would be easy.
John:
< If it turns out that we really can send information faster than light then we'd have to dump both General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics into the trash…>
All depends on what you mean exactly by “send information.” Space itself can stretch faster than light in GR, naked singularities and closed timelike loop solutions exist in GR, and QM has entangled correlations.
< the directions are that you and I independently and arbitrarily decided to call "up"…>
The subtle point here is what “independently and arbitrarily” means exactly.
< Obviously an agent is not uniquely determined by the external environment but is also determined by the previous state the agent was in…>
According to conventional Laplacian determinism, both the external environment and the previous state of the agent are determined by the state of the universe long ago, long before the agent existed. Not so in global determinism, where past and future are codetermined in a timeless loop. The agent is an integral and irreducible part of the loop, and this is free will.
Sorry for the very short reply, lots of things to to this morning at the same time, I wish I could do them all in a timeless loop, more soon.