Noetic Science

[wombatwal]

On a New Zealand forum for the TV show "Sensing Murder" one of the "woos" suggested the Sceptics read a book called.
"The Vast Enquiring Soul, Explorations into the further reaches of consciousness" by Ronald Russell.
She claimed it was backed up by scientific research so I questioned her on that. She was evasive but I got out of her a scientific institute called "Institute of Noetic Sciences." Below is the URL for their website. Anyone know anything of it. It does not seem to be mainstream to me but not being a man of science I am asking those here more knowledgeable than myself.
http://www.noetic.org/

[Zep]

Edgar Mitchell, Apollo 14 astronaut, turned woo: http://www.noetic.org/about/founder.cfm

Apart from his cachet, long worn out, it has little or no claim to any matters of substance.

[wombatwal]

Maybe this should be in the science section. Can any of the mods move it.

[Apathia]

Maybe this should be in the science section. Can any of the mods move it.

It belongs in this section.
Take for example its endorsement of this con artist:
http://www.noetic.org/main/SIALanding_Intent.cfm

[Ersby]

Dean Radin works there. Despite hearing about them on and off for some years and poking around their site, I'm not entirely sure what it is they actually do.

[JoeTheJuggler]

Isn't "noetic" a term of philosophy and not a scientific term? In other words, there are no "noetic sciences"--any more than there are "paranormal sciences".

[wombatwal]

This is from the Noetic "Science" web site.

The word "noetic" comes from the ancient Greek nous, for which there is no exact equivalent in English. It refers to "inner knowing," a kind of intuitive consciousness—direct and immediate access to knowledge beyond what is available to our normal senses and the power of reason.

Sounds a bit woo.

[DrewD]

Sounds alot woo.

[Zep]

Sounds very made-up.

[Philip]

I know the intstitute use to fund "Hearts of Space" (http://www.hos.com/) on public radio. I haven't listened since long before HOS was was taken of public radio, so I don't know whether it still funds the internet or satellite broadcast of the show.

I noticed on the intitute's site that its magazine is called "Shift" (formerly IONS Noetic Sciences Review). The magazine's name was changed in 2003. I wonder whether the new name was chosen intentionally to be similar to "Swift".

[Zep]

Shift Happens?

[Cuddles]

Noetic science? Like this (http://www.amazon.co.uk/Can-Reindeer-Fly-Science-Christmas/dp/0753813661)?;)

[Collin Merenoff]

A noetic perception is a perception that seems to be real but is actually just a metaphor that got manifested as a hallucination. I've seen the word used referring to synesthesia, a mental condition in which someone has a set of metaphors from one sense to another, so that every perception of one sense results in the hallucination of the corresponding metaphor in the other sense.

In other words, if doing some spiritual new-age stuff gives you the delusion that it has a scientific meaning, that's noetic science.

At least you have to give them credit for admitting they're a fraud. :rolleyes:

[JoeTheJuggler]

I thought I'd read the term in some philosophy book or another.

Wikipedia says that "Noetic Theory (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noetic)" is a branch of philosophy often closely linked to metaphysics.

Not science.