Hindering progress: The Church of the west now the Scientific establishment

[sackett]

[quote]Originally posted by Antonio Alejandro
[b]. . . there are publications about cold fusion today...

Not many anymore; cold fusion has been discredited.

Come on now, let's hear more about empty force; sounds like qi, come round again to trouble the wits of the martial artists.

My long-ago t'ai chi teacher, who believed just about everything, once got exasperated at me and shouted, "Look, just believe! Okay?" But it wasn't okay, and still isn't. Going on about paradigms is just uttering hot air: it's long, long past time to produce the goods.

[hgc]

from here

Um, it looks more like a business problem than a science problem. As you've been repeatedly told, there was no established resistance to the fact of flight. There were, however, powerful economic factors in the Wrights' fight with the budding aviation establishment.

Quote:

Although the Wrights initially received wide acclaim for their invention of the airplane, the aviation community was quickly overcome by jealousy and greed: airplane developers did not want to pay the modest license fee the Wright brothers asked when others employed their method of lateral control in heavier-than-air flight. To escape this fee, the aviation industry engaged in a prolonged smear campaign against the Wright brothers, minimizing their contributions in the invention of the airplane.

France and Germany simply refused to issue the Wrights patents for controlling the lateral motion of airplanes by ailerons or wing-warping. Europeans were free to copy the Wrights ideas without restrictions, or the embarrassing admission that the Wrights had done something the Europeans had not.

...

So Antonio, will you persist to the bitter end in your erroneous claim? Or will you find some other examples of scientific establishment malfeasanse to bolster your initial claim?

[Samus]

Quote:

From the article hgc posted:
Although the Wrights initially received wide acclaim for their invention of the airplane, the aviation community was quickly overcome by jealousy and greed: airplane developers did not want to pay the modest license fee the Wright brothers asked when others employed their method of lateral control in heavier-than-air flight. To escape this fee, the aviation industry engaged in a prolonged smear campaign against the Wright brothers, minimizing their contributions in the invention of the airplane.

The problem was with the Wright's very liberally worded patent, and their attempt to use it to enforce their license fees on inventions that had nothing to do with the patent itself. For instance, Glenn Curtiss' methods of achieving lift, under reasonable legal inspection, had nothing to do with the Wright patent, but the Wrights battled him in court to get him to stop flying. And it wasn't a "modest" license fee to begin with.

For some interesting perspective, read Unlocking the Sky by Seth Shulman. Very well done, I don't think it paints the Wrights in a bad light, but it does do a good job of showing another point of view.

[Antonio Alejandro]

The Wright Brothers did a lot of their experimentation in hoffman prairie, which on one side was the railroad and the other, a highway. At one time the chief engineer of the train asked to stop the train so that they could watch the plane in flight.
The editor of the Dayton newspaper received so many inquiries regarding the flights (who are those young man with the flying in Hoffman Prairie) that the editor wamted to report it as a nuisance.
In later years when the editor was questioned by a newspaper man regarding why he never reported the flight, the editor responded by saying...well the Wright brothers were very secretive. The newspaper man said...secretive while flying between a highway and train track? The editor just responded...well, I guess the truth was that we were just ignorant back then.

[hgc]

Quote:

Originally posted by Antonio Alejandro
The Wright Brothers did a lot of their experimentation in hoffman prairie, which on one side was the railroad and the other, a highway. At one time the chief engineer of the train asked to stop the train so that they could watch the plane in flight.
The editor of the Dayton newspaper received so many inquiries regarding the flights (who are those young man with the flying in Hoffman Prairie) that the editor wamted to report it as a nuisance.
In later years when the editor was questioned by a newspaper man regarding why he never reported the flight, the editor responded by saying...well the Wright brothers were very secretive. The newspaper man said...secretive while flying between a highway and train track? The editor just responded...well, I guess the truth was that we were just ignorant back then.

Use your imagination a little. They were NOT secretive about that fact that they flew and were intent on selling airplanes, but were secretive about how they were built. It was a competitive business issue.

And, no duh that people were generally ignorant about flight in the few years after 1903. It was kinda new then.

[Antonio Alejandro]

Read the wording of the Scientific American Publication. There is no indication of a Legal issue at hand. Non whatsoever. Do you feel that Scientific American was part of the smear campaign? I dont believe this was the case. I do believe that the establishment was in doubt of heavier than air flight as was sampled by Melville and Newcomb.
Additionally, the issue here is between the tinkerer's, independant scientist, basement-garage laboratories vs the well funded and educated establishment. The subgroups vs the grand institutions.

[hgc]

Quote:

Originally posted by Antonio Alejandro
Read the wording of the Scientific American Publication. There is no indication of a Legal issue at hand. Non whatsoever. Do you feel that Scientific American was part of the smear campaign? I dont believe this was the case. I do believe that the establishment was in doubt of heavier than air flight as was sampled by Melville and Newcomb.
Additionally, the issue here is between the tinkerer's, independant scientist, basement-garage laboratories vs the well funded and educated establishment. The subgroups vs the grand institutions.

OK, so what's the point? This writer is not doubting flight, per se, but is doubting a particular set of half hour flights the Wrights reported performing in Dayton (some time after Kitty Hawk). There could be any number of things at work here... one is that he wants better experimental documentation before he'll buy the results and the other is that he may be skewering the Wrights because he thinks they're offering the technology to the French rather than to his own country. There could also be other things at work in the mind of this writer that I can't imagine. What remains unproven is that the "scientific establishment" (which one writer in SI does not make) held back the Wrights.

As an aside, the Wrights tried very had to get the U.S. Army as a customer.

[Antonio Alejandro]

I practice hard and soft meditation everyday, I adhere to this practice everyday, as well as yoga and gymnastics.
I would consider being subjected to a double blind study, etc etc. You can parade five ten people in front of me. You can even use animals as subject. I needed just one thing, as a pre-test prerequisite. Just one thing.

[Samus]

Quote:

Originally posted by Antonio Alejandro
I practice hard and soft meditation everyday, I adhere to this practice everyday, as well as yoga and gymnastics.
I would consider being subjected to a double blind study, etc etc. You can parade five ten people in front of me. You can even use animals as subject. I needed just one thing, as a pre-test prerequisite. Just one thing.

WTF? What is the one thing you need? Are you like a creature from The Wizard of Oz, missing one essential component?

[hgc]

Quote:

Originally posted by Antonio Alejandro
I practice hard and soft meditation everyday, I adhere to this practice everyday, as well as yoga and gymnastics.
I would consider being subjected to a double blind study, etc etc. You can parade five ten people in front of me. You can even use animals as subject. I needed just one thing, as a pre-test prerequisite. Just one thing.

What is it? A bowl of beans? A hooker? A sign from above? I have to know!

[BillHoyt]

Quote:

Originally posted by Antonio Alejandro
I practice hard and soft meditation everyday, I adhere to this practice everyday, as well as yoga and gymnastics.
I would consider being subjected to a double blind study, etc etc. You can parade five ten people in front of me. You can even use animals as subject. I needed just one thing, as a pre-test prerequisite. Just one thing.

"Empty force," Antonio? No, "empty farce" is more like it. The minute we pick apart your empty claim you divert to a yoga claim. Pah. Up your kundalini.

[Antonio Alejandro]

You should reflect a bit on what you are saying. What difference does it make to the "evidence vs bias" question at hand? What if the Wright Brothers conducted their design in secrecy. I know that is in an irrelevant statement because if the Scientific establishment knew the secret design vs witnessing flight....the latter would most definately be the most important. Once you see the plane flying, and you understood its significance, you world would be changed forever. The science behind the flight is irrelevant to the debate at hand. It is the experience of witnessing plane flying and understanding the significance.
It appears you are writting without fully thinking about its relevance to the debate at hand.

[Antonio Alejandro]

Without this component, emptyforce will not work. It may sound irrelevant....but it is most relevant....

[espritch]

Quote:

Without this component, emptyforce will not work. It may sound irrelevant....but it is most relevant....

Well don't keep us in suspense. What is this missing component without which empty force will not work?

[Antonio Alejandro]

You mean your old martial arts tai chi teacher could not demonstrate anything, and you had not experience anything? You must not get around much, then. I have had many martial arts teacher who had chi development and would use it. Most notable was a KoreanTeacher who build a Cult and a Martial Arts empire. His name was John C. Kim. A greedy and powerful man who made millions. One day as part of a demonstration, he gently touch my solar plexus with two fingers and floored me. I had to sit on the floor and try to squeeze out the pain that was overcoming my body. I could not even think about countering his top students and much less him. He left such an impression with me that since then i measure a teacher in relation to john c. kim's abilities.
In Fort Lauderdale, I once met this hard martial artist who was able to break 2x4 with his shin. I asked him what he thought about internal martial arts? He said..I believe. And he proceeded to tell me of a story about a tai chi teacher who struck him and made him feel sick. Not only was he sick, by morning he was so sick he called the teacher to tell him how sick he was and what he could do about it. For years I was curious who this tai chi teacher was but he would not tell me. I eventually found out who he was and went to visit him.
I have had met many martial artist who demonstrated chi, that is including emptyforce.
However, If you feel that you can sit around and wait for randy to tell you what is really happening, then that is your choice. I am interested in learning and I realize that I have to make my own judgements about things. For myself, I am most definately convince that i cannot learn anything of significance, from Randy.

[Dragon]

Quote:

Originally posted by Antonio Alejandro
.... snip ...

For myself, I am most definately convince that i cannot learn anything of significance, from Randy.

Can you demonstrate this power to Randi, though?
Yes or no?

[espritch]

Quote:

For myself, I am most definately convince that i cannot learn anything of significance, from Randy.

I am pretty well convinced that you cannot learn anything of significance from Randi either. But that still doesn’t explain why, if empty force is real, you can not provide convincing evidence of the fact. The medium supporters are always talking about how they are convinced that such and such medium is the real thing. But as soon as you ask them to put that claim to the test, you get the standard litany of excuses.

Quote:

The training for emptyforce is not that easy and the people that do this type of training are few and far between. It entails more than three hours a day, 365 days a year, minimize sex, etc.
Additionally:
Due to the fact that humans are not machines are therefore not one hundred percent efficient one hundred percent of the time, then it would be a statistical issue. Yes it would be interesting if Robert Jahn, took an interest and validated emptyforce statistically.
No I would not be interested in randy's method of discovery. I dont suggest it to anyone who practices emptyforce. Anyone can design a bad test:

So let’s see. The empty force folks have a genuine power that allows them to knock a man down at a distance, that takes years of constant practice and minimized sex (?) to achieve, but they can’t reliably demonstrate it under test conditions? What a useless super power that is.

All the medium supporters claim exactly the same thing: “So and so can speak to the dead. It took him years to develop the skill. But he isn’t a machine so he could have a bad day and fail the test. Beside, Randi would cheat and design a bad test. Blah blah blah, statistics, blah blah blah, blindly following Randi, blah, blah blah, think for my self, yada yada yada.”

It gets a little tiresome after a while.

I find the parallels between the claims and excuses of the medium supporters and the empty force proponents like yourself far more interesting than the actual claims themselves. If you aren’t prepared to present any evidence to support your claims, why post here? You know this a skeptic board. You know we are going to ask for evidence to support claims of super powers. So what could possibly make you think we would just accept your word for it?

[Antonio Alejandro]

I needed only one thing to demonstrate emptyforce, and i am certain that randy would not be able to provide this, thus your demans are irrelevant.

[Antonio Alejandro]

So you are waiting for Randy to tell you what is true and what is not true. Is that your contention? You dont want to bother going out and finding out things for yourself? You dont trust yourself...is this what you are saying?

[c4ts]

Quote:

Originally posted by Antonio Alejandro
So you are waiting for Randy to tell you what is true and what is not true. Is that your contention? You dont want to bother going out and finding out things for yourself? You dont trust yourself...is this what you are saying?

That's not what he's saying at all. Are you even paying attention?

[Chaos]

Quote:

Originally posted by Antonio Alejandro
I needed only one thing to demonstrate emptyforce, and i am certain that randy would not be able to provide this, thus your demans are irrelevant.

Tell us what this "one thing" is. What do you need?

[Jet Grind]

I'd reccommend that those participating in this thread stop feeding someone who is obviously a troll.

[espritch]

Quote:

I needed only one thing to demonstrate emptyforce, and i am certain that randy would not be able to provide this, thus your demans are irrelevant.

This still ignores the question. Since you are certain that Randi would not be able to provide this one mysterious thing you need to demonstrate empty force, why post here to begin with? You’ve already made up your mind that nothing will come of it. You know that without a demonstration of your claims, no one here will be convinced. So what’s the point?

Let me be clear. I'm not laughing with you, I'm laughing at you. I demand nothing. I have absolutely no expectation that you will agree to demonstrate your super power regardless of whether Randi can provide this one thing or not. You are just like every other woo woo believer who posts on this board. You talk and talk and when someone asks you to prove it you just talk some more. Your words are as empty as your force. Put up or shut up.

[Ladewig]

Quote:

Tell us what this "one thing" is. What do you need?

Stong anti-psychotic drugs?

[c4ts]

Quote:

Originally posted by Chaos


Tell us what this "one thing" is. What do you need?

A life? A clue? A date? A day job? ... Magic Superman underpants?

[CapelDodger]

If Randi can't provide this "one thing", and you don't have it, then one must assume that targets of your super-power have to bring it with them. Since you won't enlighten us, I'll make a wild guess and asume "it" is their medication. Which suggests a rather simple way of negating the effect - leave your medication at home. Whatever "it" is, at least Randi is immune to your black arts.

[CapelDodger]

A possible protocol:

The target is to be suspended by a harness and unable to see or hear the testee. A strain-gauge on the cable will be able to measure any movement of the target when the alleged force is invoked. Cameras can be set up to record any movement on three axes, although any effect noticable enough to be worthwhile in self-defence will create a very obvious oscillation. No "double-blind" will be necessary, as all that's being done is detection and measurement of an applied force - something that scientists do quite regularly.

Obviously the target and other circumstances are mostly immaterial, unless the "force" requires a specific environment (which would make it pretty useless as a self-defence technique). Even darkness is no problem - infra-red cameras are readily available.

(edited to remove most typos)

[Antonio Alejandro]

I never initiated a discussion about emptyforce, nor should it be a subject to be discuss here.

[Antonio Alejandro]

Yes you are correct, it cannot be reliably demonstrated. My experience so far is that it cannot be reliably demonstrated. Not only can it not be reliably demonstrated, it can exhaust the individual rapidly.
However, it does exist.
Additionally, no one wants to be involve in what is perceive as a political quagmire.

[CathodeRay]

This place just draws 'em in, doesn't it? It's a real loon magnet.

[c4ts]

Oh yeah. Agur, Franko, Jedi Knight, Muscleman, and now this guy... the list goes on. Why does the R&P board get all the genuine lunatics?

[xouper]

I guess I shouldn't be surprised that while people were focused on the main woowoo in this thread, namely Antonio Alejandro, the following comment fell through the cracks:

Quote:

Ladewig: The RCC was not following the Aristotelian model of the universe until 1983(!) when it reversed its decision against Galileo.

I always thought it was the other way around. Is it possible someone snuck the word "not" in your post while you weren't looking?

[xouper]

Quote:

Antonio Alejandro: Anyone can design a bad test: Reference sTARBABY http://www.psicounsel.com/starbaby.html

For me, anyone who cites something from Danny "the woowoo" Kettler in support of his argument has lost a huge chunk of credibility. Sure, anyone can design a bad test, but if you're trying to claim that Randi is likely to design a bad test for you, you're going to have to come up with a whole lot more evidence than the word of a known fruitcake like Kettler. You'd have to show that a good percentage of Randi's recent tests are badly designed, and it's highly unlikely you can do that.

Quote:

Also let me add that i know emptyforce to be factual.

I'll wager half a million dollars you can't knock me backwards with your "emptyforce". Wanna put your money where your mouth is?

[c4ts]

Wait. Did he say what "empty force" was? If he didn't specify, it could be a really heavy mallet or a large rock.

[xouper]

Quote:

c4ts: Wait. Did he say what "empty force" was? If he didn't specify, it could be a really heavy mallet or a large rock.

Dragon's post earlier in this thread quoted Antonio Alejandro's webpage:

Quote:

... The Lin Kong Jing practitioner has the ability to move an individual, without physical contact but by mere projection of their internal energy. ...

Sounds like a paranormal claim to me. Anyone else have an opinion?

[Zep]

We are still waiting for Alex to tell us the "one more thing" he requires to allow Emptyforce to work. But he is being extremely evasive so far. Never mind that Randi would probably be in another country lecturing or appearing on TV or something, and the JREF challenge would be scrupulously fairly done by reputable and credentialed scientists. I'm sure Alex would be allowed to prepare in whatever way he liked, but he would not be allowed to cheat.

Actually, I suspect that, given that the test subjects would be something like 5 metres away, Alex's secret ingredient is a 6-metre pole.

BTW, all this chat about the Wright brothers was merely a diversion - it has no relevance at all to what Alex is claiming to do. One could just as easily bring Roswell and the Titanic and Leonardo Da Vinci into this - all utterly irrelevant. But regardless, here's his chance to "prove his point" and he's letting it and immortality slip through his hands. And US$1M too, if he is of a mind.

One gets the feeling that Alex is now too scared to tell us because he realises his "powers" are illusory, no matter how much he would like to believe otherwise.

Well, Alex, are you going to even THINK about applying for the JREF Challenge if you are so sure of your powers?

[Dragon]

Quote:

Originally posted by Antonio Alejandro
I never initiated a discussion about emptyforce, nor should it be a subject to be discuss here.

Antonio,

• You started this thread purporting to show that the "Scientific establishment" is hindering progress.
• On the front page of your own website you make a paranormal claim for a martial art called Lin Kong Jing.
• Putting these two facts together, I am asking if you are prepared to demonstrate this power under controlled conditions.
• In other words, I am challenging you to put your claim where your mouth is.
• If you can do this you, Antonio Alejandro, can reveal something truly amazing; that is, a new force which the "Scientific establishment" says does not exist.

So, do you see how Emptyforce is very much 'on topic' here?

[Samus]

Quote:

Originally posted by Antonio Alejandro
You should reflect a bit on what you are saying. What difference does it make to the "evidence vs bias" question at hand? What if the Wright Brothers conducted their design in secrecy. I know that is in an irrelevant statement because if the Scientific establishment knew the secret design vs witnessing flight....the latter would most definately be the most important. Once you see the plane flying, and you understood its significance, you world would be changed forever. The science behind the flight is irrelevant to the debate at hand. It is the experience of witnessing plane flying and understanding the significance.
It appears you are writting without fully thinking about its relevance to the debate at hand.

*sigh* okay, I guess I can go over this one last time.

The scientific community doubted the Wright's claims because the Wrights were not willing to perform public demonstrations. This was mostly a business decision, not a scientific one. While they may have been good engineers, they were very also very shrewd businessmen. I agree that demonstrating flight would have silenced the skeptics. I agree that from the public's perspective, seeing the plane fly is more important than understanding the physics behind it.

Where I (and others) are apparently losing you is in your claim that science hinders progress because it is biased. People doubted the Wrights because they were not willing to provide evidence (i.e. a demo flight) for their claims.

Just as we are now doubting you and your so-called "empty force" because you cannot provide evidence. Even you admit that the force cannot be replicated consistently, yet you claim it exists. And you're not overly willing to discuss how to produce this force, nor are you providing any kind of explanation as to how the scientific community is hindering the exploration and exploitation of empty force, which seems to be the overarching purpose of this thread.

[CapelDodger]

from Antonio Alejandro:

Quote:

I never initiated a discussion about emptyforce, nor should it be a subject to be discuss here.

You're missing a parallel. The secrecy of the Wright brothers provides a chink that woo-woo partisans can exploit. The secrecy of the woo-woo partisans provides a chink that rationalists can exploit. To make it simple for you I choose to refer to the brand of woo-woo you're familiar with.

(I'm not familiar with it - I haven't visited your site, nor do I intend to. For all I know I'm going to get a dose of bad energy or inverse chi or what-all else down the line if I do. I have reasonable confidence in anti-virus software because I understand computer viruses, but I know nothing about the woo-woo world and thus have no reliable means of protection.)

The chink in the rationalist armour is easily filled, of course. Your original example has been thoroughly discredited. It presumably seemed convincing when you were fed it - after all, it fits with your prejudices and therefore is unlikely to have been thought about too much if at all - but it's bollocks. I must say it's refreshing to see some honest, down-to-earth, disinterested idiocy for a change, and I thank you for that. It's like watching a smiling baby crawl into the alligator pool, without all the blood and the guilt about seeing the funny side.

Quote:

Yes you are correct, it cannot be reliably demonstrated.

Which makes it a rather piss-poor martial-arts technique, wouldn't you say? OK, maybe you can wait for a good mojo day before attacking someone, but in the self-defence mode a club would be a lot more reliable. Despite being a very material thing.

The chink in the woo-woo artists' armour is a rather harder to fill. In a couple of pages we've arrived at "it exists but does not manifest itself" as your particular defence of the Empty Farce. And you've fallen back on it without anyone learning about your secrets. A "force" is, of course, entirely within the scientific "paradigm". Something we have in common. It can therefore be detected and measured ... except it's just disappeared in a puff of smoke (invisible, undetectable, immaterial smoke, of course, but it exists, oh yes).

[CapelDodger]

Another nail in the coffin of "science as religion" is the recent discovery of the accelerating expansion of the Universe. At first it manifested as discrepancies in calculations of the Hubble Constant - something gleefully trumpeted by anti-rationalists. Then the study of supernovas (type 1a, was it?) indicated the accelerated expansion, which would harmonise the Hubble Constant calculations. This result was subjected to criticism and detailed examination, just as it should be. Then microwave background measurements were found to support the concept. Now a third study, of galactic clustering, has pretty much confirmed it. All within the last ten years or so. How does that sit with the idea that a scientific mindset is retarding the progress of knowledge and discovery? Not well.