Post 6716

To me, the investigation of dubious claims takes a back seat to increasing my understanding of the psychology of belief. I don’t want to prejudge people, I want to actually understand how, why, and in what way people, from believers to skeptics and everyone in between believe what they do. I want to know, not just suppose, how belief structures are formed, acquired and protected by those who hold them.

Most people are fairly decent as long as you leave them alone, and many of my friends, loved ones, and casual acquaintances are themselves prone to views and beliefs that I myself don’t harbor. They’re wonderful people, though some times there are a few that for the sake of my sanity, I can only take in small doses.

There’s a chap whose blog I sometimes frequent, a professed psychic whom I have reason to believe is sincere, and whom I can respect, though not without some criticism at times. Does he really have psychic abilities?

As a skeptic, I agree to disagree with him on the validity of psi-research, so as to avoid providing tinder for the common believer straw man of skeptics, I won’t argue from the impossibility of psi, only its implausibility given our current understanding of physical laws.

Will psi ever be reliably demonstrated no matter who is conducting the study protocol, regardless of their personal beliefs and attitudes? I don’t think that the history of psi-research paints a very pretty picture, and I don’t think it’s likely that this will happen, but it would be cool. All hail discordia!

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