From: utzoo!dciem!mmt
Newsgroups: net.philosophy
Title: Re: The Observability of "Psychic Phenomena"
Article-I.D.: dciem.199
Posted: Sat Feb 26 22:55:50 1983
Received: Sun Feb 27 03:36:14 1983
References: unc.4699

Scientific method is often misunderstood to mean that the phenomenon
is reproducible. Unfortunately, the entire circumstances of a
single event can never be reproduced, so we have to make do with less
than complete reproducability. If we understand a phenomenon well enough,
we can set up circumstances in which key components of the phenomenon
will PROBABLY occur, but there are always an infinity (I mean that)
of variables that could interfere, and about which we did not know.
Usually, the study of a field begins with an observation, and the
discoverer may not know what happened and how to reproduce it.
Today, we can make X-rays to order, but Dr Roentgen took a while to
discover what had magically exposed his film in a dark drawer. It was
not reproducible until he found out what had been causing the effect.
There are lots of phenomena that we suspect we should be able to
predict or control (how about sunspot cycles on climate over a 200-year
time scale?), but for which we don't know all the circumstantial
variables. It may be that ESP is one such area. It isn't "unscientific"
just because it is at present not reproducible. There may indeed be
psychological or situational variables that affect it. One of those
could be the testing situation itself. Who knows? It is a little
arrogant to think that 20th century science has all the methods and/or
knowledge. 19th century physicists thought there was no need to train
more physicists because it was all known except for details. Since then,
we have discovered 2 new fundamental forces of nature.
   Science is exciting! And it is probably never going to be finished.
		Martin Taylor