SCEPCOP Forum

This skeptic blogger girl has totally the wrong idea about what this site is about. Will someone help enlighten her?

http://struckbyenlightning.wordpress.co ... kookiness/

She uses a classic pseudoskeptical falllacy of claiming that we advocate that one should believe EVERYTHING we hear without evidence. In reality, I've NEVER EVER even met one paranormalist who advocated believing everything one hears. EVER. That is a total straw man they use time and time again.

When will they get it? Sheesh.

Yet they STILL claim there is no evidence for the paranormal or psi and that we aren't presenting any. It's some type of fanaticism. I've already posted some videos by Dean Radin to her and book recommendations, to get her started. She seems to have been totally brainwashed by the Randi crowd.

I think you handled it quite well.

i just have a question
how did you found about her site?

i made a post on her site in your favor winston

Like Ciscop I tend to find blogs rather dull.

I could never call myself a "Forum Junky" though!

Far too many Forums, - (even good ones), - have a way of becoming Troll Magnets for my liking.

I think that this young blogger is sincere and I have posted asking her to pay us a visit before she writes off the entire Forum.

I doubt that she will accept, but she is an articulate writer and would probably be an asset to the Forum if she joined.

Odd.

I also posted in support of Winston and SCEPCOP at that site, but my post seems to have been deleted.

I do not think that I was rude although I did question how it was that the blogger says that she converted in less than a year from a wooist into, - by her definition, - a "critical thinker."

Hopefully my post was not percieved as offencive since such was not my intent.

well sciscop
if you judge me for my library i would say i am somewhere in between
i have authors like wiseman, randi, shermer, dawkins, hatchins..
but then.. i also have wicca stuff, psicoquinesis, ghost stories, divination, bla bla bla..

i wont say i believe in the weird stuff like i trust in the skeptic authors
i am a guy that likes to be amazed by the human thinking, and the paranormal is quite an interesting field
i dont know if there are paranormal stuff
here in this site i might find stuff that cant find anywhere else

and welcome to the site skeptic blogger girl
i would have said... skeptic chick but thats on sgu

Hi Linzee! Thanks for coming out and visiting with us. I think you will find that Mr. Wu's concept of this forum is pretty diverse. We're all getting to know each other (at least I am) and I'm starting to really enjoy the exchange of views about the paranormal. I find this place to be very tolerant and really different. A nice place to discuss the paranormal. Is either side right or wrong? Only time will tell. Either way, I want to be part of the action and the conversation. There is a lot of stimulating questions and ideas up for discussion and so far it's been friendly.

Welcome Linzee.

Thanks for coming.

By the way, I forgot to make another key point. You seemed to insinuate in your post that we oppose the concept of skepticism and it's stance on requiring evidence to believe in something. That is a straw man and misunderstanding I'm afraid. No one here, not even the most staunch paranormal supporters, has a problem with wanting evidence to believe in something. None of us ever advocates believing everything you hear, that is a classic straw man that pseudo-skeptics use against us, which we NEVER say in reality. We have no problem against the concept of skepticism itself, what we are opposing is PEOPLE who call themselves skeptics but are in fact pseudo-skeptics because of their ACTIONS and BEHAVIORS. See here for a list of their behaviors so you understand what we're talking about. I've just updated it with more quotes and citations from dictionaries.

http://www.debunkingskeptics.com/characteristics.php

Thanks,
Winston

Hi Lindsay!

Here are the chapter abstracts from Varieties of anomalous experience: Examining the scientific evidence:

http://psycnet.apa.org/index.cfm?fa=bro ... pbid=10371

You asked me for 'one piece' of evidence. I don't like doing that. You can get 'one piece' anywhere. What I do is recommend good books that I have actually read myself. I've read many. If someone doesn't want to read it for whatever reason, I shrug my shoulders and say 'whatever, it's your loss'.

The way I see it, skeptics should be reading books like this, of this quality, all the time, just out of principle. But unfortunately it seems that sometimes when people are skeptical about something they don't look into it much. Or they look at at the wrong things, there's a lot of crap out there.



[...]

"This regrettable condition acts to preclude their unbiased consideration of phenomena on the cutting edge of science, which is not how a true scientist should behave. In fact, many “Skeptics” will not even read significantly into the literature on the subjects about which they are most skeptical. I have direct experience with this specific behavior on the part of a number of PhACT members.

Initially, I attributed that behavior to just plain laziness, but lately I’ve begun to suspect that those individuals may actually have a phobia about reading material that is contrary to their own views. It seems entirely possible that they fear “contamination” from that exposure will eventually lead to (Gasp!) acceptance of the opposition’s position." (bold mine)

[...]

I don't like arguing with the pathologically skeptical too much. They usually piss me off. So I test people. If they can't bring themselves to read a book, then I judge them to be lazy or their skepticism to be pathological and I don't bother with them. What's the use? It's the same as arguing with a young-earth creationist - a waste of time.

Welcome Linzee!

I hope that you enjoy this site and find it fun.

You write well and I look foreward to reading your contributions.

Regards,

Warrigal

Good catch. You've exposed that blogger for what she really is. She pretended to be an innocent open minded truth seeker who just wanted "evidence" that's all. Then when she's given some evidence, she panicked as though she can't accept it and wasn't sure how to reject it, so she goes to the JREF forum for advice on how to dismiss it so she can go back to her belief system of "there's no evidence for any paranormal or psychic phenomena". Her actions fit exactly what I predicted.

I should make an example of this and show her quote in my treatise of how pseudo-skeptics react when presented with evidence.