Peterson, Priestcraft, Profits and the Paranormal

[Everybody Wang Chung]

Here is the CIA’s own summary of the Stargate programme. TL:Dr

The single conclusion that can be drawn from an evaluation of the 40 operational tasks is that the value and utility to the Intelligence Community of the information provided by the process cannot be readily discerned.

If remote viewing was a thing, that gave a return on investment, would the CIA have dumped the programme, or would it have deployed the programme? Come on Dan, stump up the $3,000 and sit the basic course, then tell us just how convinced you are.

You have to wonder if the Afore is getting a kickback for advertising his friend's $12,000 courses.

[malkie]

Peterson:

Roughly a year ago, I read an interesting book by Paul H. Smith entitled The Essential Guide to Remote Viewing:The Secret Military Remote Perception Skill Anyone Can Learn (Intentional Press, 2015). It’s a basic tutorial on, well, remote viewing — which is the alleged ability to perceive information about a distant or unseen target without relying on conventional sensory input but using only the mind. Thus, if it really exists, it’s literally a kind of extrasensory perception. The study of remote viewing is one of the areas of focus within the controversial field of parapsychology. …

I certainly found it interesting. He not only believes in remote viewing but says, quite matter-of-factly, that he has done it many times and that — precisely as he indicates in the subtitle of his book — just about anybody can do it. …

Belief in remote viewing — via what seems, if it’s real at all, to be a natural human ability rather than a spiritual gift — is not essential to my theology. Religiously, I can easily do without it, just as I can do without Nessie..[sic] If it is real, however, it strongly suggests that naïve materialism is likely false. Which I think would be important to know.

It’s been a year since Dr. Peterson read Dr. Smith’s tutorial on remote viewing. Dr. Smith says just about anybody can do it. Has Dr. Peterson attempted remote viewing? I invite him to share his experiences. Just think: Dr. Peterson could be the one to falsify naïve materialism. Funds donated to the Interpreter Foundation to create eighty episodes of Bowdlerizing Brigham should be diverted to make it happen.

Perhaps he could follow up his "pure" remote viewing attempts with experiments to determine if remote viewing while dowsing is more or less successful. Can you imagine the degree to which the scientific world would be rocked by a finding of synergy between these two abilities?

[Marcus]

Someone uses wikipedia to point out the unreliability of a podcast. Peterson's response:

That's certainly the critical view. And maybe it's right. And maybe settling disputed issues by appeals to Wikipedia really is the way to go. (What does Wikipedia say about it?)

This was hilarious to read given how many times Peterson has plagiarized wikipedia for his blog. Even his most recent travelogue/blog entry about Alaska stands almost no chance of being original. My remote viewing skills tell me he cut and pasted from wiki or typed in a passage from a brochure he got handed. Honestly, though, i used zero remote viewing skills to ascertain that. Just common sense and the predictibility of Peterson's proven penchant for plagiarism.

Also, why are so many of Peterson's commenters so gullible--Oh. Never mind.

[Marcus]

...I don't dismiss mainstream scientific skepticism, of course...

Can you guess who wrote this? I can't stop laughing.

[I Have Questions]

Someone uses wikipedia to point out the unreliability of a podcast. Peterson's response:

That's certainly the critical view. And maybe it's right. And maybe settling disputed issues by appeals to Wikipedia really is the way to go. (What does Wikipedia say about it?)

This was hilarious to read given how many times Peterson has plagiarized wikipedia for his blog. Even his most recent travelogue/blog entry about Alaska stands almost no chance of being original. My remote viewing skills tell me he cut and pasted from wiki or typed in a passage from a brochure he got handed. Honestly, though, i used zero remote viewing skills to ascertain that. Just common sense and the predictibility of Peterson's proven penchant for plagiarism.

Also, why are so many of Peterson's commenters so gullible--Oh. Never mind.

Mocking the use of Wikipedia whilst being caught red-handed plagiarising Wikipedia content in what was supposed to be a scholarly article is Peterson at his Trump-like best.

[Physics Guy]

There is no evidence for remote viewing or other kinds of ESP.
Didn’t the CIA find that remote viewing was of no use?
Remote viewing (and ESP in general) is impossible because it would violate the laws of physics.
Positive ESP results are due to fraud.
Positive ESP findings are the result of poor research design or methods.
Confirmation bias explains ESP effects that aren’t the result of fraud or flaws.

That’s a good list of skeptical conclusions. There may be others, but if Smith can really rebut these, it would certainly be a good start. If.

The fact that Smith can concisely and accurately summarize the principal skeptical arguments shows in his favor. That’s how people who understand something talk. It’s the kind of thing I’d expect from someone with a doctorate from UT Austin in philosophy, in fact. So this is promising.

On the other hand, the fact that Smith advertises the list of opposing views in advance, and offers to address each item at separate length in the future, is discouraging. He gives no indication what his rebuttals will be, and that’s a bad sign.

Someone who really had good rebuttals to briefly summarized arguments would also summarize the rebuttals immediately, knowing that even just on brief summary they would be clearly plausible. It might well still be worth fleshing out the points in detail later, but if you really have superior firepower, you don’t open battle by dropping leaflets about your plan for a long series of grinding engagements. You start with shock and awe, if you can.

Teasing a list of objections and promising to answer them at length in the future just doesn’t seem like what anyone does if they actually do have good answers. It seems more like what someone does if they like posing as someone with answers. The longer the build-up and delay, the longer they get to enjoy the pose of knowledge serenely, before the ugly business of laying out long-winded runaround tangles of fallacies, getting holes picked in them, indignantly blustering around the holes with more obfuscation, and finally retiring under covering fire about closed-minded prejudice. You can emerge from that mud wrestling without admitting defeat, but you’re never going to seem as legitimately confident, not even to yourself, as you did when you were just promising arguments, before giving them.

Unfortunately, getting good at that kind of obfuscating fight to a self-declared draw, and even convincing yourself that it is all rigorous intellectual discourse, is also something that doctoral training can give you. With a bit of luck, you can slip through to a PhD with only a haphazard ability to grasp important points, as long as you acquire a convincing facility in talking the talk. The BS, as they say, gets Piled Higher and Deeper.

So we’ll see. Perhaps Smith will surprise.

[Gadianton]

Can you guess who wrote this? I can't stop laughing.

Nice to have deniability. What I wonder is how he would feel if one of his followers who isn't in a good financial situation paid all that money for that course?