Whew!

[mdlbear]

I'm not sure it was sufficiently advanced to be indistinguishable from magic, but the demo worked (after we found and danced carefully around some interference between my demo and finagler's other demo).

There may conceivably be another demo next week, but anything after that should be using the next round of software, held together by baling wire and duct tape rather than cobwebs and wishful thinking.

Comments

[mdlbear]

Indeed. The same researchers had previously done studies of telepathy and "remote viewing"...

[acelightning.livejournal.com]

Well, it turns out that there is some scientific data supporting the existence of certain forms of psi. The Princeton Engineering Anomalies Research (http://www.princeton.edu/~pear/) project, a/k/a PEAR, produced many years' worth of extremely thought-provoking data. (Here (http://de.youtube.com/watch?v=fLLIkTo4KLc) is a lecture by the head of the PEAR lab, York Dobyns. (I happen to know him, and in fact took part in a laypersons' Q&A session he gave quite recently.) As I understand it, there's definite evidence that there's something that doesn't obey the usual laws of physics, but they don't know what it is, or how it works, or why. Yet.

[mdlbear]

I believe I've heard a talk on that one, and I'm not convinced by any means. Random data plus human selection of what looks "interesting" can be very convincing.

[acelightning.livejournal.com]

Speaking as a life-long user of psi, I feel that there is just far too much anecdotal evidence for me to accept that there isn't a scientific explanation for it. As Dobyns pointed out, the prevailing opinion is that any research into psi is "junk science", so experiments that seek to study it don't get any funding. Then there isn't any experimental evidence to indicate that it needs further study. Lather, rinse, repeat. In the end, of course, the phenomena wind up not getting studied at all. (Although there are a few related experiments being done.)