Interesting Research by Cornell Psychology Prof
Posted by Ken70
Re: Interesting Research by Cornell Psychology Prof
Posted by: Robb (---.198-178.cust.bluewin.ch)
Date: January 17, 2011 05:57PM
Saw this a while ago and immediately thought, "I bet half the folks on eLynah could debunk his statistics..."Ken70
Research that shows in some cases humans can anticipate and act on future events before they occur...fascinating.
[dbem.ws]
Re: Interesting Research by Cornell Psychology Prof
Posted by: Beeeej (Moderator)
Date: January 17, 2011 06:06PM
Robb
Saw this a while ago and immediately thought, "I bet half the folks on eLynah could debunk his statistics..."Ken70
Research that shows in some cases humans can anticipate and act on future events before they occur...fascinating.
[dbem.ws]
I knew that's what you were going to say.
___________________________
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Beeeej, Esq.
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- Steve Worona
Re: Interesting Research by Cornell Psychology Prof
Posted by: Ken70 (---.bstnma.fios.verizon.net)
Date: January 17, 2011 09:08PM
Robb
Saw this a while ago and immediately thought, "I bet half the folks on eLynah could debunk his statistics..."Ken70
Research that shows in some cases humans can anticipate and act on future events before they occur...fascinating.
[dbem.ws]
I bet they can't, nor could you. Do a little research and you'll see the peer review found nothing to take exception to. Immediate thoughts aren't as reliable as considered ones.
Re: Interesting Research by Cornell Psychology Prof
Posted by: Jacob '06 (---.nycmny.east.verizon.net)
Date: January 17, 2011 09:42PM
Ken70
Robb
Saw this a while ago and immediately thought, "I bet half the folks on eLynah could debunk his statistics..."Ken70
Research that shows in some cases humans can anticipate and act on future events before they occur...fascinating.
[dbem.ws]
I bet they can't, nor could you. Do a little research and you'll see the peer review found nothing to take exception to. Immediate thoughts aren't as reliable as considered ones.
It got through peer review, but that is not the be all end all of it being correct. In fact, most of the people who peer reviewed it likely had little expertise in statistics since it is a psychology journal and would have gone to psychologists. In fact there is debate about the validity of the statistics used in the article: [www.nytimes.com]
Re: Interesting Research by Cornell Psychology Prof
Posted by: Robb (---.198-178.cust.bluewin.ch)
Date: January 17, 2011 10:36PM
I've read several articles about it, thankyouverymuch (including the one Jacob posted). They found 53% "heads" in one of the MANY studies that they conducted - the others all came up "negative" (i.e. only 50% correct guesses). I'm guessing a meta-analysis across all the studies would suggest that it would actually be fairly improbable that ALL the studies would come out to exactly 50%. In fact, he found the effect to be "significant" with a p-value of 0.01. In other words, there's a 1% probability that what he encountered would have happened by chance - big deal.Ken70
Robb
Saw this a while ago and immediately thought, "I bet half the folks on eLynah could debunk his statistics..."Ken70
Research that shows in some cases humans can anticipate and act on future events before they occur...fascinating.
[dbem.ws]
I bet they can't, nor could you. Do a little research and you'll see the peer review found nothing to take exception to. Immediate thoughts aren't as reliable as considered ones.
He was trying to test so many different things with a limited number of students and trials that there weren't all that many actual trials for the "erotic" pictures that showed the 53% result. All the news articles of course report that "1000 students were used" in the study, but that is highly misleading. This is why his significance is merely 0.01 - there weren't enough trials with the erotic pictures to be any more confident than that. It's the probability of flipping 7 heads in a row - unlikely? Sure, but in reality it should happen almost 1% of the times that you try it.
And then he has to go and throw statements around like "What I showed was that unselected subjects could sense the erotic photos, but my guess is that if you use more talented people, who are better at this, they could find any of the photos." Uh-huh. And a p-0.01 significance in one small portion of the overall results supports this conclusion how?
Show me a study with a p-value in the 1e-6 range and I might start to have second thoughts...
Re: Interesting Research by Cornell Psychology Prof
Posted by: ugarte (---.dyn.optonline.net)
Date: January 18, 2011 12:33AM
I predict that this study will be shown to be complete bullshit, thereby proving the study correct after all.
___________________________
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Re: Interesting Research by Cornell Psychology Prof
Posted by: jtwcornell91 (Moderator)
Date: January 18, 2011 07:39AM
Jacob '06
Ken70
Robb
Saw this a while ago and immediately thought, "I bet half the folks on eLynah could debunk his statistics..."Ken70
Research that shows in some cases humans can anticipate and act on future events before they occur...fascinating.
[dbem.ws]
I bet they can't, nor could you. Do a little research and you'll see the peer review found nothing to take exception to. Immediate thoughts aren't as reliable as considered ones.
It got through peer review, but that is not the be all end all of it being correct. In fact, most of the people who peer reviewed it likely had little expertise in statistics since it is a psychology journal and would have gone to psychologists. In fact there is debate about the validity of the statistics used in the article: [www.nytimes.com]
The rebuttal article is a rather nice read, and delves into the larger issues related to statistical analysis as it's used in psychology.
ETA: this is indeed interesting (although I think not for the reasons Ken meant), and I hadn't seen it; thanks for bringing it to my attention.
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/18/2011 08:14AM by jtwcornell91.
Re: Interesting Research by Cornell Psychology Prof
Posted by: Jim Hyla (---.arthritishealthdoctors.com)
Date: January 19, 2011 08:04AM
Show me a biologic study with those stats and I'll... ,well I don't know what I'd do, other than say I've never seen anything like it. Really, I haven't yet read the rebuttal, but a p value of .01 in medicine is good. It would take extraordinary numbers of subjects to really crank the p down, I think.Robb
I've read several articles about it, thankyouverymuch (including the one Jacob posted). They found 53% "heads" in one of the MANY studies that they conducted - the others all came up "negative" (i.e. only 50% correct guesses). I'm guessing a meta-analysis across all the studies would suggest that it would actually be fairly improbable that ALL the studies would come out to exactly 50%. In fact, he found the effect to be "significant" with a p-value of 0.01. In other words, there's a 1% probability that what he encountered would have happened by chance - big deal.Ken70
Robb
Saw this a while ago and immediately thought, "I bet half the folks on eLynah could debunk his statistics..."Ken70
Research that shows in some cases humans can anticipate and act on future events before they occur...fascinating.
[dbem.ws]
I bet they can't, nor could you. Do a little research and you'll see the peer review found nothing to take exception to. Immediate thoughts aren't as reliable as considered ones.
He was trying to test so many different things with a limited number of students and trials that there weren't all that many actual trials for the "erotic" pictures that showed the 53% result. All the news articles of course report that "1000 students were used" in the study, but that is highly misleading. This is why his significance is merely 0.01 - there weren't enough trials with the erotic pictures to be any more confident than that. It's the probability of flipping 7 heads in a row - unlikely? Sure, but in reality it should happen almost 1% of the times that you try it.
And then he has to go and throw statements around like "What I showed was that unselected subjects could sense the erotic photos, but my guess is that if you use more talented people, who are better at this, they could find any of the photos." Uh-huh. And a p-0.01 significance in one small portion of the overall results supports this conclusion how?
Show me a study with a p-value in the 1e-6 range and I might start to have second thoughts...
___________________________
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Cornell lawyers stopped the candy throwing. Jan/2005
"Cornell Fans Made the Timbers Tremble", Boston Globe, March/1970
Cornell lawyers stopped the candy throwing. Jan/2005
Re: Interesting Research by Cornell Psychology Prof
Posted by: Robb (---.198-178.cust.bluewin.ch)
Date: January 19, 2011 10:09AM
That's exactly the point - for such an extraordinary claim, we should *expect* extraordinary results to confirm it.Jim Hyla
Show me a biologic study with those stats and I'll... ,well I don't know what I'd do, other than say I've never seen anything like it. Really, I haven't yet read the rebuttal, but a p value of .01 in medicine is good. It would take extraordinary numbers of subjects to really crank the p down, I think.Robb
I've read several articles about it, thankyouverymuch (including the one Jacob posted). They found 53% "heads" in one of the MANY studies that they conducted - the others all came up "negative" (i.e. only 50% correct guesses). I'm guessing a meta-analysis across all the studies would suggest that it would actually be fairly improbable that ALL the studies would come out to exactly 50%. In fact, he found the effect to be "significant" with a p-value of 0.01. In other words, there's a 1% probability that what he encountered would have happened by chance - big deal.Ken70
Robb
Saw this a while ago and immediately thought, "I bet half the folks on eLynah could debunk his statistics..."Ken70
Research that shows in some cases humans can anticipate and act on future events before they occur...fascinating.
[dbem.ws]
I bet they can't, nor could you. Do a little research and you'll see the peer review found nothing to take exception to. Immediate thoughts aren't as reliable as considered ones.
He was trying to test so many different things with a limited number of students and trials that there weren't all that many actual trials for the "erotic" pictures that showed the 53% result. All the news articles of course report that "1000 students were used" in the study, but that is highly misleading. This is why his significance is merely 0.01 - there weren't enough trials with the erotic pictures to be any more confident than that. It's the probability of flipping 7 heads in a row - unlikely? Sure, but in reality it should happen almost 1% of the times that you try it.
And then he has to go and throw statements around like "What I showed was that unselected subjects could sense the erotic photos, but my guess is that if you use more talented people, who are better at this, they could find any of the photos." Uh-huh. And a p-0.01 significance in one small portion of the overall results supports this conclusion how?
Show me a study with a p-value in the 1e-6 range and I might start to have second thoughts...
JTW - great rebuttal paper. And just for Beeeej, it cited Jeffreys (and some other guy named Jefferys). Can it get any better?
Re: Interesting Research by Cornell Psychology Prof
Posted by: Trotsky (---.dc.dc.cox.net)
Date: January 19, 2011 11:14AM
My favorite blog has a wonderful discussion of this.
Nonetheless, in reading the rebuttal paper, I got the impression I often get from skepticist literature: the psi question struck some hidden nerve, and the argument is not really about what it purports to be about. It seems that "Feeling the Future" is not just wrong. It is methodologically, metaphysically, and statistically wrong. Indeed, its wrongness is so overdetermined that it is a wonder that the manuscript did not fall like neutron-star material to the center of the Earth
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/19/2011 11:15AM by Trotsky.
Re: Interesting Research by Cornell Psychology Prof
Posted by: Jeff Hopkins '82 (---.airproducts.com)
Date: January 19, 2011 12:34PM
Trotsky
My favorite blog has a wonderful discussion of this.
Nonetheless, in reading the rebuttal paper, I got the impression I often get from skepticist literature: the psi question struck some hidden nerve, and the argument is not really about what it purports to be about. It seems that "Feeling the Future" is not just wrong. It is methodologically, metaphysically, and statistically wrong. Indeed, its wrongness is so overdetermined that it is a wonder that the manuscript did not fall like neutron-star material to the center of the Earth
Wouldn't the center of the earth fall into the center of the neutron star material?
Re: Interesting Research by Cornell Psychology Prof
Posted by: Roy 82 (128.18.14.---)
Date: January 30, 2011 08:25PM
Re: Interesting Research by Cornell Psychology Prof
Posted by: Jeff Hopkins '82 (---.airproducts.com)
Date: January 31, 2011 08:24AM
Saw that. Didn't exactly help his "cause", did it?
Re: Interesting Research by Cornell Psychology Prof
Posted by: Robb (---.198-178.cust.bluewin.ch)
Date: January 31, 2011 09:49AM
Not for me. 53% is "significant" because that's the amount of the popular vote Obama got? Funny, I don't remember studying the "one-tailed Obama test" in any of my stats classes...Jeff Hopkins '82
Saw that. Didn't exactly help his "cause", did it?
Re: Interesting Research by Cornell Psychology Prof
Posted by: KeithK (---.external.lmco.com)
Date: January 31, 2011 06:15PM
53% would be pretty damn significant if he had as many samples as there were votes in 2008.Robb
Not for me. 53% is "significant" because that's the amount of the popular vote Obama got? Funny, I don't remember studying the "one-tailed Obama test" in any of my stats classes...Jeff Hopkins '82
Saw that. Didn't exactly help his "cause", did it?
Re: Interesting Research by Cornell Psychology Prof
Posted by: Jeff Hopkins '82 (---.airproducts.com)
Date: February 01, 2011 09:04AM
KeithK
53% would be pretty damn significant if he had as many samples as there were votes in 2008.Robb
Not for me. 53% is "significant" because that's the amount of the popular vote Obama got? Funny, I don't remember studying the "one-tailed Obama test" in any of my stats classes...Jeff Hopkins '82
Saw that. Didn't exactly help his "cause", did it?
And the whole discussion came down to: Weak statistics show that people have ESP because they anticipated porn appearing. Did it have to be porn? Besides the fact that the statistics don't seem overwhelming, the fact that it was porn really makes the study look somewhat silly, or at least childish.
Re: Interesting Research by Cornell Psychology Prof
Posted by: Robb (---.198-178.cust.bluewin.ch)
Date: February 01, 2011 09:36AM
Apparently, it did - the other 8 studies (that didn't use porn) didn't find anything...Jeff Hopkins '82
KeithK
53% would be pretty damn significant if he had as many samples as there were votes in 2008.Robb
Not for me. 53% is "significant" because that's the amount of the popular vote Obama got? Funny, I don't remember studying the "one-tailed Obama test" in any of my stats classes...Jeff Hopkins '82
Saw that. Didn't exactly help his "cause", did it?
And the whole discussion came down to: Weak statistics show that people have ESP because they anticipated porn appearing. Did it have to be porn? Besides the fact that the statistics don't seem overwhelming, the fact that it was porn really makes the study look somewhat silly, or at least childish.
Re: Interesting Research by Cornell Psychology Prof
Posted by: Trotsky (---.dc.dc.cox.net)
Date: February 01, 2011 11:05AM
Occam's Razor. We are always anticipating porn.Robb
Apparently, it did - the other 8 studies (that didn't use porn) didn't find anything...
Re: Interesting Research by Cornell Psychology Prof
Posted by: ugarte (---.dyn.optonline.net)
Date: February 01, 2011 12:35PM
This. Or we are just optimistic by nature.Trotsky
Occam's Razor. We are always anticipating porn.Robb
Apparently, it did - the other 8 studies (that didn't use porn) didn't find anything...
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