• About Skeptical Thinking

Skeptical Fallacies

Evidence

• There is no evidence for spirits or the afterlife.
• Intelligent people don't believe in the afterlife.
• If afterlife research was valid, mainstream science would accept it.
• If paranormal phenomena were real we would see signs of it in society.
• Equating an untested hypothetical explanation with empirical data.
• Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof.
• Consciousness Is Produced by the Brain
• The Transmission Model of The Brain is not Falsifiable and is not Scientific
• Belief in the Afterlife is not Falsifiable and Therefore is not Scientific
• You can't prove a negative, you can't prove spirits and the afterlife don't exist.
• Memories of past lives recovered during past life regression therapy are false memories caused by suggestions or leading questions by the hypnotist.
• The theory of natural selection explains of the origin of life and humankind and therefore there is no reason to believe in supernatural entities.

• Mediums use information gathered about the subjects before giving them a reading.
• Mediums use cold reading techniques to seem like they are getting information from spirits.
• Magicians can reproduce the phenomena of physical mediumship and other paranormal abilities.
• Mediums take unfair advantage of people who are grieving or who are afraid of death.

• Parapsychological research is not published in peer reviewed journals.
• If there was research demonstrating the afterlife, the researchers would win the Nobel Prize.
• Afterlife researchers were fooled by charlatans.
• Paranormal phenomena disappear when scientists try to reproduce them in a laboratory.
• The results of psychical research are not reliable if they are not obtained from repeatable laboratory experiments.
  
• Anecdotal Evidence
  • Anecdotal evidence is not reliable.
  • Anecdotal evidence is unscientific because it is not repeatable.
  • Anecdotal evidence is unscientific because it cannot be disproved.
  • Anecdotal evidence is the result of people who are in emotional turmoil and is therefore unreliable.
  • Anecdotal evidence is not meaningful without a statistical basis for understanding it. Anecdotes may be due to chance coincidence.
• Evidence for the afterlife is unacceptable because the research took place too long ago.
• Near Death Experiences can be explained by biological phenomena such as lack of oxygen or a "dying brain".
• More articles on skepticism at "Life in B Flat"

About Skeptical Thinking

This chapter is intended to help you understand how skeptics may use flawed reasoning to try to dissuade you from believing in the afterlife. Skeptics may give explanations which sound very rational from their point of view, but when examined closely are found to be insufficient to invalidate the evidence for the afterlife or to discredit belief in it. You also might find yourself trying to justify your beliefs and find it helpful to understand skeptical thinking in order to explain to a skeptic why you do not accept their reasoning. However, be aware this may not allow you to actually convince a skeptic of your point of view.

Skeptics often know very little about the evidence for the afterlife. They have little interest in learning about it because they they don't believe in it. Therefore it would seem that simply providing information to educate them would result in a meeting of minds. While an educated believer can point out the skeptic's ignorance and mistaken assumptions, this does not guarantee a meeting of minds because the skeptic and the believer often have very different mind sets.

The skeptic often feels that in order for him to accept a new belief, there must be proof of it. If he can hypothesize a possible flaw in the evidence, he will not consider the evidence proof even if there is no evidence that flaw has a real effect. In this case, an untested hypothetical explanation of why belief based on that evidence might not be justified is sufficient for the skeptic to remain disbelieving. However, you should realize that an untested hypothetical explanation is not necessarily sufficient to prove a belief is wrong. The skeptic often has difficulty seeing this. Sometimes this causes the skeptic to be accused of circular reasoning - it seems like he doesn't accept evidence because he knows the phenomena is not possible. However, if one considers the many scientific controversies of the past, one will see that whether or not a possible though untested flaw in the evidence is sufficient to dismiss a conclusion based on the evidence is very often a matter of opinion.

A believer, on the other hand, would like a skeptic to offer proof the belief is incorrect. Often the skeptic will decry "It can't be disproving" or "You can't prove a negative". For example, you cannot prove spirits don't exist because spirits might exist in some place which we are not able to interact with or have any knowledge of. Making this complaint is a mistake and is usually due to ignorance of the evidence. It applies only when belief is based on faith alone. It does not apply when belief is based on an analysis of evidence such as the large body of evidence supporting belief in the afterlife. It is ironic that the skeptic who is ignorant of the evidence of the afterlife bases his disbelief not on an analysis of the evidence, but upon his own faith that the afterlife does not exist.

It is not necessary for the skeptic to do the impossible and disprove the existence of the afterlife. It is sufficient to show that the evidence for belief is invalid, or show that a hypothetical flaw in the evidence has a real effect. For example, if a skeptic can show a medium was using cold reading techniques by analyzing a transcript of a reading and showing how the principles of cold reading were applied, that would invalidate the evidence attributed to that reading. However, a skeptic would be unlikely to agree to undertake such an effort. Since he doesn't believe in the afterlife, it would seem to him to be a waste of time to try to disprove it. He would expect the believer to provide proof cold reading did not occur. Again, considering the many scientific controversies of the past, one can see that what is a reasonable conclusion to draw from evidence can also be a matter of opinion. Often the believer is accused of being to credulous or not sufficiently analytical.

When a skeptic and a believer try to discuss the subject, an argument in which both sides demand proof and criticize the other side's reasoning can result. The skeptic doesn't feel obligated to prove anything since if he is going to change his belief it is incumbent on the believer to provide iron clad proof. The believer makes what is in his mind a reasonable conclusion from the evidence and expects the skeptic to prove the evidence is flawed or that another explanation is true.

Often it is hard to tell who is the believer and who is the skeptic. There is a certain symmetry where a believer acts like a skeptic of the opposite belief, and the skeptic acts like a believer in the opposite belief. The skeptic demands the believer provide better proof, the believer demands the skeptic prove his concerns have real consequences.

Occam's razor doesn't help because it can be a matter of opinion as to what entities are unreasonable and therefore extraneous.

So this begs the question, when discussing the afterlife with a skeptic, what should you do? It depends. Are you trying to educate the skeptic about the evidence? Are you trying to convince the skeptic that the belief is correct? Are you trying to explain why it is reasonable to believe? Are you trying to explain why his arguments against belief are not convincing? Which of these you attempt depends on the person involved and the situation. Whatever your intention, you should be clear in your own mind what you are trying to do.

In general, it is wise to ignore and refrain from personal attacks and stick to a polite discussion of facts. Try to refrain from acrimony since making someone angry will decrease the likelihood that they will adopt your beliefs. Sometimes if you keep a neutral or friendly tone and ignore the negativity in a skeptic's approach and stick to facts he will see that you are serious in conducting a reasoned discussion and drop the attitude and continue the discussion in a less hostile manner. Keep in mind that two people can have the exact same experience and because of their personal bias' believe different things. For example, two bird watchers might be out in the countryside and see an unusual bird that is not native to the area. One person, an amateur meteorologist, might think it was blown off course by a recent hurricane, and another, a pet store owner, might think it is a pet escaped from a home destroyed in the hurricane. Who is right?

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Skeptical Fallacies

Evidence

There is no evidence of spirits or the afterlife.

There is a huge amount of empirical evidence collected by researchers from interviewing experiencers and from controlled experiments including experiments conducted in laboratories. The chapter A Summary of Evidence has more details.

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Intelligent people don't believe in the afterlife

People who have more education are more likely to believe in the afterlife.

Contrary to researchers' expectations, a poll of 439 college students found seniors and grad students were more likely than freshmen to believe in haunted houses, psychics, telepathy, channeling and a host of other questionable ideas.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10950526/

Most doctors believe in the afterlife.

In the survey of 1,044 doctors nationwide, 76 percent said they believe in God, 59 percent said they believe in some sort of afterlife, and 55 percent said their religious beliefs influence how they practice medicine.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/8318894/

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If afterlife research was valid, mainstream science would accept it.

If the second person isn't sure of the answer, he’s liable to go along with the first person’s guess. By then, even if the third person suspects another answer is right, she’s more liable to go along just because she assumes the first two together know more than she does. Thus begins an “informational cascade” as one person after another assumes that the rest can’t all be wrong.
...
And so the informational cascade morphed into what the economist Timur Kuran calls a reputational cascade, in which it becomes a career risk for dissidents to question the popular wisdom.
...
"Senator McGovern, I recognize the disadvantage of being in the minority," Dr. Ahrens replied. Then he pointed out that most of the doctors in the survey were relying on secondhand knowledge because they didn't work in this field themselves.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/09/science/09tier.html?
_r=1&science&pagewanted=all&oref=slogin

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If paranormal phenomena were real we would see signs of it in society.

There are practical uses of the paranormal phenomena, as well as practical consequences of paranormal research in society. Energy healing, mediumship, induced after-death communication, past life regression, remote viewing, dowsing, psychic detectives, and the use of psychics in the commercial sector are all examples of this.

There are professionals who practice energy healing and mediumship both of which have been validated by scientific experiments. In some hospitals nurses are allowed to practice therapeutic touch because research has demonstrated its effectiveness.

Scientific research has demonstrated the effectiveness of mediumship. An example of such research is: "Anomalous Information Reception by Research Mediums Demonstrated Using a Novel Triple-Blind Protocol" Julie Beischel, Gary E. Schwartz Explore (New York, N.Y.) 1 January 2007 (volume 3 issue 1 Pages 23-27 DOI: 10.1016/j.explore.2006.10.004)
http://www.explorejournal.com/article/PIIS155083070600454X/fulltext

Scientific research has also demonstrated the effectiveness of energy healing. An example of such research is: "The Effect of the "Laying On of Hands" on Transplanted Breast Cancer in Mice" William F. Bengston, David Krinsley Journal of Scientific Exploration, Vol. 14, No. 3, pp. 353-364, 2000
http://www.scientificexploration.org/journal/jse_14_3_bengston.pdf

Induced after death communication (IADC) is a therapy developed by a Veteran's Administration psychologist that helps patients with post traumatic stress syndrome. The therapy allows the patient to communicate with the spirits of those who's death was involved in the traumatic experience of the patient. For more information see:
http://metgat.zaadz.com/blog/2007/8/induced_after-death_communication
http://www.induced-adc.com

Similarly, past life hypnotic regression therapy has had great healing effects on patients with emotional and physical problems. The evidence is clear that it has helped patients and therefore is beneficial to society. For more information on past life regression therapy see the Reincarnation section in the Short Topics chapter.

Remote viewing is another application of psychic abilities that we see in our society. There are a number of commercial enterprises that provide remote viewing services and offer classes in remote viewing. To learn more about remote viewing read "Remote Viewing - the Real Story" by Ingo Swann:
http://www.biomindsuperpowers.com/Pages/2.html

Dowsing services are also available commercially. In "The Geller Effect" by Guy Lyon Playfair and Uri Geller, Playfair writes in chapter 17 "Whatever It Is" that many business leaders believe in ESP because they use it themselves. In chapter 9 of this book, Uri Geller describes some of the work he was hired to do by companies that paid him very large fees to use his psychic powers to locate oil and minerals. The book can be found on-line at:
http://site.uri-geller.com/en/books

Police departments use psychics to help solve criminal investigations, as this article on the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation web site explains:

"Police in Nelson, B.C., have found the body of a young woman who disappeared last March, and they credit a local psychic for pointing them in the right direction."
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2005/01/27/psychic-body050127.html

A number of businesses hire psychics as consultants to help with their business planning. In the June 30, 2008 issue of Newsweek the article "The $10,000-a-Month Psychic", discusses intuitionist Laura Day who works for several corporations.
http://www.newsweek.com/id/142632

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Equating an untested hypothetical explanation with empirical data.

If it is to be convincing, skeptical debunking must be backed up with facts and evidence and the same rigorous analysis of the data that skeptics demand from believers. When a debunker offers a reason to dismiss empirical evidence they must offer evidence of their own. If a skeptic accuses a medium of cold reading, they must provide a transcript of a reading and show how the medium is applying the techniques of cold reading to give the impression he is communicating with spirits. If they accuse an investigator of being duped by a medium they must describe the methods the investigator used, propose how a medium could commit fraud under those conditions, and demonstrate that it is actually possible to produce fraud under those conditions.

This is the most common fallacy - to equate an untested and hypothetical explanation with a theory based on empirical data.

This logical mistake can be hard for skeptics to admit. Some people believe in the religion of Materialism. Their belief is based on faith. Often such believers don't investigate the evidence for the afterlife because it contradicts their religious beliefs. They often try to discredit the empirical evidence for the afterlife by making up stories about why that evidence might be wrong without really investigating the evidence or by backing up their stories with facts. They don't even realize their stories are contradicted by facts because they never investigated the evidence in the first place.

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Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof.

The fallacy that extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof is often used by skeptics to reject scientific evidence of paranormal phenomena. The skeptic insists that even though a phenomena has been demonstrated to the normal standards of scientific proof, paranormal phenomena require a higher level of proof. The chapter Skeptical Misdirection has a section on The Double Standard which gives an example of how this fallacy is used by a well known skeptic as a rationale for rejecting the results of parapsychology even though he admits they meet the normal standards of scientific proof.

The notion that extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof was first phrased in those words by Marcello Truzzi. He later came to believe that...

The central problem however lies in the fact that "extraordinary" must be relative to some things "ordinary." and as our theories change, what was once extraordinary may become ordinary (best seen in now accepted quantum effects that earlier were viewed as "impossible"). Many now extraordinary claims may become more acceptable not when they are replicated but when theoretical contexts change to make them more welcome.
Source: "On Some Unfair Practices towards Claims of the Paranormal" by Marcello Truzzi
http://www.skepticalinvestigations.org/anomalistics/practices.htm

This suggests that what constitutes an "extraordinary" claim is subjective.

What is an extraordinary claim? An extraordinary claim is a claim that contradicts strongly held beliefs. What any one person considers an extraordinary claim is therefore subjective. Science cannot objectively determine whether or not a claim is extraordinary.

What is extraordinary proof? Extraordinary proof is evidence that disproves strongly held beliefs. Again, this is subjective. If a person with strongly held beliefs chooses to maintain disbelief in the face of contradicting evidence, then by the fact of that continuing disbelief, the proof is not extraordinary. Science cannot objectively determine whether or not proof is extraordinary.

The notion that extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof is not a principle of the scientific method. It is actually a statement about psychology masquerading as scientific philosophy.

There is no correspondence whatsoever between how strongly a person believes something and the method by which a contradicting claim can be proven. Each scientific question requires its own unique proof. The type of evidence required for that proof has nothing to do with whether or not someone has strong beliefs against it. The proof depends solely on the particulars of the problem in question. Some problems can be proven mathematically, some can be proven logically for example by deduction or induction. Some problems can be proven through observation in the field, others can be proven by experiments in the laboratory. Some things are easy to prove, some are hard.

Due to the subjective nature of identifying extraordinary claims and extraordinary proof, all this notion really means is that if someone has strongly held beliefs, they will resist giving up those beliefs. It is an observation about human nature not a requirement determined by the nature of scientific inquiry. In fact, it is an observation about a characteristic of human nature which interferes with scientific progress. For example, a committee of scientists reviewing a scientific paper should judge that paper on it's own merits. They would be wrong to reject its conclusions if their only reason was because those conclusions contradicted the strongly held beliefs of some outside scientist. However that committee might reject the conclusions if those conclusions contradicted their own beliefs. Therefore this notion of extraordinary claims and proof cannot be considered part of the scientific method. It is only possible to consider it a statement of how bias interferes with objectivity. When skeptics assert this notion, if they are not cynically trying to misdirect the discussion away from evidence they don't want to consider, and if they are being sincere, then they are actually demonstrating that they are refusing to consider the evidence objectively.

A corrected version of this notion would then read:

An analysis of the history of science shows that extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof when people are unwilling to objectively assess evidence that contradicts their strongly held beliefs, and this has been an persistent obstacle to progress.

The chapter A Summary of Evidence has a link to a skeptic's definition of scientific proof. At the time of this writing, that definition makes no mention of special requirements for extraordinary claims. What is interesting about that chapter is that the evidence for the afterlife which it outlines is, in fact, extraordinary. The evidence which proves the afterlife includes evidence from both observations in the field and experiments. Anyone who doubts this proof should look at that chapter and follow the links and read the references that give a full account of the evidence.

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Consciousness Is Produced by the Brain

There is no evidence that consciousness is a result of brain activity.

Neurological activity can be measured and shown to be associated with mental activity, but this is not evidence that neurological activity generates consciousness. Clearly the brain and the conscious mind interact. Nerve impulses from sensory organs result in brain activity and the conscious mind becomes aware of the sensations perceived. When the mind generates the impulse to move, nerve impulses are carried from the brain to the muscles to cause movement. Consciousness is affected by brain activity and is able to influence brain activity. The brain might be an interface between the mind and the physical body, however there is no evidence that consciousness itself is generated by the brain.

One theory is that consciousness is a non-physical process and that one of the functions of the brain is not to generate consciousness but to restrict consciousness. In that case, if you release the conscious mind from the brain as happens during a near death experience you should have expanded consciousness. This is exactly what happens. People who experience NDE's are able to perceive more than they do when in the body. They report seeing in 360 degrees and seeing colors that they do not see when in the body. Blind people report seeing during NDE's. Some near death experiencers report being able to communicate telepathically with other beings. Some report understanding that time is just an illusion or that they seem to have access to all the knowledge in the universe.

This theory is often referred to as the "filter model" where the brain filters some aspects of consciousness like a colored glass can filter out some wavelengths of light. What passes through the filter is a restricted set of conscious faculties that we have while in the physical body.

Restricting consciousness probably has some survival value. If a person had access to all the information in the universe about any time in the past, present or future, it might be difficult to concentrate on surviving here and now.

One of the early descriptions of the filter model of consciousness can be found in the introduction to of "Human Personality and its Survival of Bodily Death" volume I by Frederic William Henry Myers. Myers compares consciousness to light, likening the conscious mind to the visible spectrum and the unconscious mind to parts of the spectrum that are not visible. The brain may filter faculties from any part of the spectrum conscious or unconscious and those faculties that are passed through the filter are those faculties that are available while we are in the body.
http://www.archive.org/search.php?query=title%3A%28human
%20personality%29%20AND%20creator%3A%28myers%29

In the sun's spectrum, and in stellar spectra, are many dark lines or bands, due to the absorption of certain rays by certain vapours in the atmosphere of sun or stars or earth. And similarly in the range of spectrum of our own sensation and faculty there are many inequalities permanent and temporary of brightness and definition. Our mental atmosphere is clouded by vapours and illumined by fires, and is clouded and illumined differently at different times. The psychologist who observes, say, how his reaction-times are modified by alcohol is like the physicist who observes what lines are darkened by the interposition of a special gas. Our knowledge of our conscious spectrum is thus becoming continually more accurate and detailed.

But turning back once more to the physical side of our simile, we observe that our knowledge of the visible solar spectrum, however minute, is but an introduction to the knowledge which we hope ultimately to attain of the sun's rays. The limits of our spectrum do not inhere in the sun that shines, but in the eye that marks his shining. Beyond each end of that prismatic ribbon are ether-waves of which our retina takes no cognisance. Beyond the red end come waves whose potency we still recognise, but as heat and not as light. Beyond the violet end are waves still more mysterious, whose very existence man for ages never suspected, and whose intimate potencies are still but obscurely known. Even thus, I venture to affirm, beyond each end of our conscious spectrum extends a range of faculty and perception, exceeding the known range, but as yet indistinctly guessed. The artifices of the modern physicist have extended far in each direction the visible spectrum known to Newton. It is for the modern psychologist to discover artifices which may extend in each direction the conscious spectrum as known to Plato or to Kant. The phenomena cited in this work carry us, one may say, as far onwards as fluorescence carries us beyond the violet end. The X rays of the psychical spectrum remain for a later age to discover.

It is known that brain damage can also effect memory, reasoning, language and other mental functions. If the brain filters consciousness and what passes through the filter is a restricted set of faculties of consciousness that we have while in the physical body, then if the brain is damaged in certain ways, it might filter out more faculties or fail to transmit certain faculties clearly.

This theory is sometimes called the transmission theory. It is discussed in detail in:

"Human Immortality: Two Supposed Objections to the Doctrine" by William James
http://www.survivalafterdeath.org.uk/articles/james/immortality.htm

In this lecture James agrees that thought is a function of the brain.

Every one knows that arrests of brain development occasion imbecility, that blows on the head abolish memory or consciousness, and the brain-stimulants and poisons change the quality of our ideas. The anatomists, physiologists, and pathologists have only shown this generally admitted fact of a dependence to be detailed and minute. What the laboratories and hospitals have lately been teaching us is not only that thought in general is one of the brain's functions, but that the various special forms of thinking are functions of special portions of the brain. When we are thinking of things seen, it is our occipital convolutions that are active; when of things heard, it is a certain portion of our temporal lobes; when of things to be spoken, it is one of our frontal convolutions.

...

When the physiologist who thinks that his science cuts off all hope of immortality pronounces the phrase, ``Thought is a function of the brain,'' he thinks of the matter just as he thinks when he says, ``Steam is a function of the tea-kettle,'' ``Light is a function of the electric circuit,'' ``Power is a function of the moving waterfall.'' In these latter cases the several material objects have the function of inwardly creating or engendering their effects, and their function must be called productive function.

However he points out that there are different types of functional dependence. Besides thought being produced by the brain it might be released by the brain or transmitted by the brain.

But in the world of physical nature productive function of this sort is not the only kind of function with which we are familiar. We have also releasing or permissive function; and we have transmissive function.

The trigger of a crossbow has a releasing function: it removes the obstacle that holds the string, and lets the bow fly back to its natural shape. So when the hammer falls upon a detonating compound. By knocking out the inner molecular obstructions, it lets the constituent gases resume their normal bulk, and so permits the explosion to take place.

In the case of a colored glass, a prism, or a refracting lens, we have transmissive function. The energy of light, no matter how produced, is by the glass sifted and limited in color, and by the lens or prism determined to a certain path and shape. Similarly, the keys of an organ have only a transmissive function. They open successively the various pipes and let the wind in the air-chest escape in various ways. The voices of the various pipes are constituted by the columns of air trembling as they emerge. But the air is not engendered in the organ. The organ proper, as distinguished from its air-chest, is only an apparatus for letting portions of it loose upon the world in these peculiarly limited shapes.

James goes on to suggest that the functional dependency of thought on the brain might in actuality be a transmissive function.

Suppose, for example, that the whole universe of material things--the furniture of earth and choir of heaven--should turn out to be a mere surface-veil of phenomena, hiding and keeping back the world of genuine realities. Such a supposition is foreign neither to common sense nor to philosophy. Common sense believes in realities behind the veil even too superstitiously; and idealistic philosophy declares the whole world of natural experience, as we get it, to be but a time-mask, shattering or refracting the one infinite Thought which is the sole reality into those millions of finite streams of consciousness known to us as our private selves.

...

Suppose, now, that this were really so, and suppose, moreover, that the dome, opaque enough at all times to the full super-solar blaze, could at certain times places grow less so, and let certain beams pierce through into this sublunary world. These beams would be so many finite rays, so to speak, of consciousness, and they would vary in quantity and quality as the opacity varied in degree. Only at particular times and places would it seem that, as a matter of fact, the veil of nature can grow thin and rupturable enough for such effects to occur. But in those places gleams, however finite and unsatisfying, of the absolute life of the universe, are from time to time vouchsafed. Glows of feeling, glimpses of insight, and streams of knowledge and perception float into our finite world.

Admit now that our brains are such thin and half-transparent places in the veil. What will happen? Why, as the white radiance comes through the dome, with all sorts of staining and distortion imprinted on it by the glass, or as the air now comes through my glottis determined and limited in its force and quality of its vibrations by the peculiarities of those vocal chords which form its gate of egress and shape it into my personal voice, even so the genuine matter of reality, the life of souls as it is in its fullness, will break through our several brains into this world in all sorts of restricted forms, and with all the imperfections and queernesses that characterize our finite individualities here below.

According to the state in which the brain finds itself, the barrier of its obstructiveness may also be supposed to rise or fall. It sinks so low, when the brain is in full activity, that a comparative flood of spiritual energy pours over. At other times, only such occasional waves of thought as heavy sleep permits get by. And when finally a brain stops acting altogether, or decays, that special stream of consciousness which it subverted will vanish entirely from this natural world. But the sphere of being that supplied the consciousness would still be intact; and in that more real world with which, even whilst here, it was continuous, the consciousness might, in ways unknown to us, continue still.

He points out that there is no more evidence to suggest thought is produced by the brain than there is evidence that it is transmitted by the brain.

Is it not more rigorously scientific to treat the brain's function as a function of production?

...

The theory of production is therefore not a jot more simple or credible in itself than any other conceivable theory. It is only a little more popular. All that one need do, therefore, if the ordinary materialist should challenge one to explain how the brain can be an organ for limiting and determining to a certain form a consciousness elsewhere produced, is to retort with a tu quoque, asking him in turn to explain how it can be an organ for producing consciousness out of whole cloth. For polemic purposes, the theories are thus exactly on a par.

In the Preface to the Second Edition of "The Will to Believe and Other Essays", where this lecture is reprinted, James addresses the question: If the personality is a result of consciousness transmitted through the brain, how does that translate into immortality? If the brain dies, then the individuality dies. His answer is that the source of the transmitted consciousness is an individualized consciousness and what happens in the brain may be registered back in the consciousness that is the source of the transmission - the transmission is a two way transmission.

If our finite personality here below, the objectors say, be due to the transmission through the brain of portions of a pre-existing larger consciousness, all that can remain after the brain expires is the larger consciousness itself as such, with which we should thenceforth be perforce reconfounded, the only means of our existence in finite personal form having ceased.

The plain truth is that one may conceive the mental world behind the veil in as individualistic a form as one pleases, without any detriment to the general scheme by which the brain is represented as a transmissive organ.

...

And in transmitting it - to keep to our extremely mechanical metaphor, which confessedly throws no light on the actual modus operandi - one's brain would also leave effects upon the part remaining behind the veil...

In summary, the brain may filter consciousness rather than produce consciousness. Only those faculties of consciousness which are transmitted through the filter are the faculties we have while in the body. This explanation of the relationship between the mind and the brain explains the same phenomena that are explained by the theory that the brain produces consciousness:

• If the filter is damaged, it might not transmit some faculties clearly and there could be loss of some mental functions as happens after a stroke or a head injury.
• During sleep, or anesthesia, or coma, it may be that nothing passes through the filter and there is no consciousness ie. unconsciousness.

• Survival After Death: If consciousness is not produced by the brain but exists separately from the brain, then it can be possible for consciousness to survive the death of the physical body. This can explain the many types of evidence for the afterlife.
• Near Death Experiences: If the mind is released from the filter, there may be expanded consciousness which could explain what happens during an NDE.
• Extra-Sensory Perception: If consciousness exists separately from the brain then it must have some means of perceiving its environment and communicating with other consciousnesses when not incarnated. This suggests that consciousness should have the ability to perceive the environment without using the physical senses. This explains extra-sensory perception, telepathy and clairvoyance, which may be the normal mode of communication and perception by consciousness when it is existing apart from the brain.
• Psychokinesis: If consciousness is distinct from the brain there must be some means by which the consciousness can influence the physical brain in order to control the body. This predicts the existence of psychokinesis - the ability of mind to influence matter.
• Quantum Mechanics: If consciousness is distinct from the brain there must be some means by which the consciousness can influence the physical brain in order to control the body. This is consistent with the observation from quantum mechanics that consciousness has ability to influence matter by collapsing the wave function of particles.
• Mystical Experiences: In deep meditation that reduces brain activity, filtering may be reduced and more faculties of consciousness may be passed through. This could explain mystical experiences of oneness and unlimited knowledge reported by practitioners of Zen Buddhism, Yoga, and other eastern traditions.
• Enhanced Psychic Perceptions During Dreams and the Hypnogogic State: Reduced brain activity during sleep, and during the hypnogogic state may result in reduced filtering. This could allow more faculties of consciousness to pass through the filter and result in increased psychic abilities such as clairvoyance, precognition, and spirit communication which have been reported to occur in those states. This is discussed in more detail in the chapter on A Natural Method for Learning to Communicating with Spirits.
• ESP Under Hypnosis: Similarly, hypnosis has been used to enhance psychic perception. The hypnotic state may also reduce the filtering of consciousness by the brain. In addition, subjects under hypnosis can remember in much greater detail than they can under normal consciousness. Hypnosis may modify the filter so that a greater faculty of recollection can pass through the filter.
• Talents released by brain injury: There was an article in the dailymail.co.uk on June 1, 2009, of a man who suffered a stroke and as a result gained artistic talents:
  http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1190002/Masterstroke
  -Man-draw-stickmen-wakes-life-saving-brain-surgery--artist.html

  For most, stroke and brain surgery can be devastating but for Alan Brown it sparked a previously unseen talent... as an artist.

  When Alan, 49, emerged from a gruelling 16-hour operation following his stroke, he found he had become a reborn 'Michelangelo' and was able to paint and draw with incredible detail.

  This is strong evidence that the brain does not produce consciousness but restricts it. It is extremely unlikely that a brain injury could cause the same changes in the brain that learning a skill would produce. If an injury to the brain can give a person a new talent, that suggests that the talent originally existed in the non-physical consciousness but the brain was restricting that talent from expressing itself in the physical organism. The stroke may have damaged the part of the brain that restricted the talent from emerging. This might then allow the patient to become more fully conscious of his innate abilities.
• Some individuals might have natural differences in the filtering ability of the brain and some individuals might be able to learn to control that filtering ability. This might explain why some people are naturally more psychic than other and why some people are able to develop their psychic abilities.
• Certain types of damage to the filter might let some faculties that are normally restricted, pass through. This could explain why increased psychic abilities sometimes occur after head injuries.

The theory that the brain filters consciousness is superior to the theory that the brain produces consciousness because the filter theory explains everything the production theory explains and it also explains many more phenomena that the production model cannot explain.

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The Transmission Model of The Brain is not Falsifiable and is not Scientific

The section on the fallacy: Belief in the Afterlife is not Falsifiable and Therefore is not Scientific explains the significance of falsifiability to a scientific theory.

In short, for a theory to be scientific it must be supported by evidence. For a theory to be supported by evidence it must pass a test that could demonstrate the theory is false.

Someone might question whether the transmission/filter model of the brain can be falsified. Any change in mental function can be explained by it. If conscious faculties are increased, as occurs during an NDE, it is ascribed to less filtering, if conscious faculties are decreased, as may occur after a stroke, it is ascribed to increased filtering. However the transmission model makes at least two predictions that can be tested:

• Consciousness can exist independently of the brain.
• The brain does not produce consciousness.

The other way to falsify the filter model is to study the brain and determine if it produces consciousness or not. Proving the brain produces consciousness will falsify the transmission model.

An electronics engineer can examine a radio receiver and determine that it does not generate the signal it receives and converts to sound. A scientist should be able to examine the brain and determine how it works in the same way. The research that is currently being conducted by neuroscientists to prove the brain produces consciousness may eventually reach a blank wall like an engineer tracing the signal all the way back to the antenna of a radio and then not being able to go any further and concluding that the radio is a receiver.

The electronics engineer doesn't have to know anything about radio waves nor should the scientist have to know anything about non-physical consciousness. The engineer only needs an amplifier and and oscilloscope and he can trace the signal. Similarly the scientist only needs to understand the physical mechanism of the brain.

The same electronics engineer can analyze a computer and show that all the behavior of the circuits are determined by the physical elements of the computer. If the brain produces consciousness, the scientist should be able to do the same thing for the brain. If you properly understand the brain you will know how, for example, an impulse to move your arm originates. If you can't explain how that impulse originates by the mechanism of the brain then you have to look for something outside the brain to explain it.

If someone says a computer is a receiver for radio waves you can falsify it by demonstrating the behavior of the computer is explained by the properties of the physical elements comprising it. If someone says a brain is a filter for consciousness you can falsify it by demonstrating the behavior of the brain is explained by the properties of the biological elements comprising it. Neuroscience will eventually resolve this question.

How might the filter model be proven? Perhaps some extremely improbable quantum phenomena will be found to occur in the brain on a regular basis. If nothing known to science can explain it, scientists will have to look for some new phenomena which may lead to the "discovery" of consciousness.

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Belief in the Afterlife is not Falsifiable and Therefore is not Scientific

This fallacy is often stated in this way but what it really means is that belief in the afterlife is not supported by evidence.

The philosopher Karl Popper wrote that for a theory to be scientific it must be supportable by empirical evidence. Empirical evidence is evidence from either observation or experiment. Popper stated that a theory that is supported by empirical evidence is not just consistent with the evidence but must pass a test which if it failed would demonstrate the theory is false. The theory must be falsifiable.

In short, for a theory to be scientific it must be supportable by evidence. For a theory to be supported by evidence it must pass a test that could demonstrate the theory is false.

An essay written by Karl Popper explaining this philosophy can be found at:

Science, Pseudo-Science, and Falsifiability by Karl Popper
http://www.kenrahn.com/jfk/critical_thinking/Science_pseudo_falsifiability.html

The theory of the afterlife has passed tests that could falsify it, and therefore it is supported by empirical evidence, which is to say, belief in the afterlife is scientific.

Several tests of the theory of the afterlife come from Richard Hodgson's investigation into the mediumship of Mrs. Piper. This research is described in:

A Further Record of Observations of Certain Phenomena of Trance by Richard Hodgson L.L.D. Proceedings of the Society for Psychical Research Vol. XIII. 1898, p 284 - 582:
http://books.google.com/books?id=5dTNAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA284
&dq=editions:LCCN09022954&lr=&output=html

In his investigation, Hodgson observed "communicators" that would communicate through Mrs. Piper while she was in a trance. There were different hypotheses proposed to explain them. They included deliberate fraud, alternate personalities, telepathy, and spirits.

Tests for the hypothesis that the communicators were spirits included:

• Communicators should have knowledge that is unknown to the medium and the sitters.

• Communicators should have knowledge that the person they claimed to be had while living.

• Communicators should demonstrate mannerisms and patterns of speech of the person they claimed to be.

• Characteristics of the communication should vary with the communicator independently of who the sitters are.

Failure at any of these these test would rule out the spirit hypothesis as an explanation Mrs. Piper's mediumship.

In fact, the mediumship of Mrs. Piper passed all of these tests.

The details of the investigation are in the Proceedings. Hodgson found that the communicators were not a result of fraud, and that they had knowledge unknown to the medium and the sitters. The communicators exhibited gestures, patterns of speech, and personal knowledge of the person they claimed to be. ( Communicators also showed an interest in living friends and relatives, and demonstrated that they maintained current knowledge about them.) Characteristics of the communication varied with the communicator not with the sitters. Spirits communicating shortly after death had difficult communicating. Spirits that suffered a long illness or mental turmoil before death had more difficulty communicating. Spirits who were communicating for the first time had difficulty coming through but learned after a few attempts and could be assisted by other spirits. Some spirits were never very good at communicating. Other spirits were particularly good at communicating names. These variations in characteristics of the communicators were unaffected by who the sitters were.

Based on this evidence, Hodgson believed the communicators were spirits.

If communicators knew only what the medium knew, the spirit hypothesis would be falsified. If the communicators did not demonstrate personal knowledge and characteristics of the person they claimed to be, the spirit hypothesis would be falsified. If characteristics of the communication were found to vary with the sitters, for example if some sitters always brought through strong communicators and other sitters always brought through weak communicators, then the theory that the communicators were independent entities would be falsified.

Based on this empirical evidence one can see that belief in the afterlife is supported by empirical evidence, it has passed several tests that could falsify it and therefore belief in the afterlife is scientific.

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You can't prove a negative, you can't prove spirits and the afterlife don't exist.

Some skeptics use this fallacy to avoid the burden of justifying their opinions. However, the proposition that you can't prove a negative can be disproved under the formal rules of logic. This is discussed in the article:

You Can Prove A Negative by Steven D. Hales
http://departments.bloomu.edu/philosophy/pages/content/hales
/articlepdf/proveanegative.pdf

This article also explains why giving adequate reasons for rejecting the evidence said to prove something exists is equivalent to proving the thing doesn't exist. Therefore, a skeptic can disprove the existence of spirits and the afterlife by giving adequate reasons for rejecting the evidence said to demonstrate their existence.

This shouldn't be a problem. Most skeptics claim to believe only what is proved. It is implicit in this claim that they will not believe what is not proved. If they don't believe in spirits and the afterlife, then they should be able to explain why they reject the evidence that is said to demonstrate their existence. In fact, most skeptics have no reluctance to explain why they reject the evidence for spirits and the afterlife. Many of their arguments are discussed right here in this chapter on skeptical fallacies.

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Memories of past lives recovered during past life regression therapy are false memories caused by suggestions or leading questions by the hypnotist.

In past life regression therapy, memories of past lives are recovered without leading questions or suggestions by the hypnotist. Many psychologists have discovered past life regression therapy independently and accidentally when doing ordinary regression therapy. They ask the patient to "go back to the source of their problem" and the patient spontaneously remembers a past life. This procedure never generates false memories of the present life but often recovers memories of past lives. For more information on past life regression therapy see the Reincarnation section in the Short Topics chapter.

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The theory of natural selection explains of the origin of life and humankind and therefore there is no reason to believe in supernatural entities.

Alfred Russel Wallace discovered the theory of natural selection at the same time Charles Darwin did. Wallace began as a skeptic but his great powers of observation, the same ones which led him to formulate the theory of natural selection, also forced him to accept that mediumistic phenomena proved the existence of supernatural intelligences. More on Alfred Russel Wallace can be found in the chapter on Eminent Researchers.

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Mediumship

Mediums use information gathered about the subjects before giving them a reading.

Some charlatans pretend to be mediums and do collect information about people and use it to give fake readings. However if a skeptic is going to accuse a particular medium of doing this, they should have some evidence otherwise they are simply guessing. Evidence could include testimony by people who inadvertently provided information or who were probed for information by the medium. Some charlatans routinely request personal information about sitters before allowing them into a seance. Such a fact, if verified, would also provide evidence. Also such charlatans usually keep records on people and share them with other charlatans (see The Psychic Mafia in the chapter on Book Reviews ). Evidence of the existence of records can also provide evidence that they are dishonest.

One should also be careful with terminology. A medium is someone who facilitates communication with spirits. Someone who pretends to do this is not a medium just as a con-artist who pretends to be a doctor is not a doctor.

Furthermore, just because charlatans exist, that does not prove there are no true mediums. Gary Schwartz has published numerous research reports demonstrating the accuracy of mediums in scientific experiments including a triple-blind experiment in which the medium has no contact with the person getting the reading. This eliminates cold reading or the use of previous knowledge as an explanation for mental mediumship.

Anomalous Information Reception By Research Mediums Demonstrated Using A Novel Triple -Blind Protocol
http://veritas.arizona.edu/papers/Beischel%20EXPLORE%202007%20vol%203.pdf

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Mediums use cold reading techniques to seem like they are getting information from spirits.

Cold reading is when a medium makes general statements or uses body language or statements made by the sitter to make it seem like they are getting information from spirits. If someone thinks a medium is cold reading, they can examine a transcript of a reading and show how he does it. Either they can show how the information is provided by the sitter or how he makes general statements or how he changes his story based on what the sitter says.

Cold reading cannot replicate what mediums do. Psychical researcher Montague Keen was on a TV show with a prominent stage magician in 2003. He described the magician's attempts at cold reading:

The edited version [of the TV show] omitted his first futile but extended attempts at cold reading which was so unsuccessful that the embarrassed floor manager had to announce a technical fault and stop the show.
http://www.survivalafterdeath.org.uk/articles/keen/randi.htm

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Magicians can reproduce the phenomena of physical mediumship and other paranormal abilities.

A number of the best magicians have said that magicians are not able to reproduce spiritual phenomena in the same conditions in which mediums demonstrate such phenomena. Magicians have also express belief in the paranormal and the belief that some mediums they have observed are genuine.

The following quote is from "Is There an Afterlife" by David Fontana

Will Goldston, one of Europe's leading professional magicians, author of 40 works on sleight of hand, and founder of the Magicians' Club of London, testified in a national newspaper (the Daily Sketch) that 'I am convinced that what I saw [at a Rudi Schneider séance organized by Harry Price] was not trickery. No group of my fellow- magicians could have produced those effects under such conditions.' Goldston also spoke up for independent voice medium Hazel Ridley and for Helen Duncan (who may have been another who used mixed mediumship) and was sufficiently impressed by physical phenomena actually to become a spiritualist. Both David Abbott and Howard Thurston, contemporaries of Houdini and two of America's best-known magicians, confessed their conviction in the genuineness of physical phenomena (like Goldston, Thurston also became a spiritualist).

More information about Will Goldston's investigation and validation of Helen Duncan's mediumship can be found in "Helen Duncan Confounds the Magicians" by Will Goldston at survivalafterdeath.org.uk:
http://www.survivalafterdeath.org.uk/articles/goldston/duncan.htm

(More information about Helen Duncan can be found in the chapter Skeptical Misdirection in the section Helen Duncan, framed by the British government.)

The following quote is from "Magicians Who Endorsed Psychic Phenomena" By George P. Hansen
http://www.tricksterbook.com/ArticlesOnline/MagWhoEndors.htm

Samuel Bellachini was the Court Conjuror for Emperor William I at Berlin. Bellachini investigated the controversial American medium Henry Slade. The sittings were not only held in darkness, but some were in full daylight. Bellachini was convinced that the results were not due to trickery.

The famous historical medium, Eusapia Palladino, readily admitted herself that she used trickery when she could. Skeptics have often thus dismissed positive reports of her phenomena. But no less than Howard Thurston [a well known magician] believed in some of her results and said so in the New York Times. Thurston was nevertheless well aware of her trickery.

The "Official Report: Society Of American Magicians, Assembly 30, Atlanta Chapter" by Artur Zorka, Chairman of The Occult Investigations Committee says:

... it is the unanimous finding of this committee that although we, as magicians, can duplicate each of these test results using methods known by us, under the proper conditions . . . there is no way, based on our present collective knowledge, that any method of trickery could have been used to produce these effects under the conditions to which Uri Geller was subjected.
http://www.uri-geller.com/books/geller-papers/g14.htm

Leo Leslie, a Danish magician wrote in his book "Uri Geller":

The judgment of all of us who were present for what occurred was one of total endorsement of Geller's paranormal claims: both his ability to bend metal and his talent for receiving telepathic signals.
http://www.uri-geller.com/books/geller-papers/g23.htm

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Mediums take unfair advantage of people who are grieving or who are afraid of death.

People who are afraid of death take comfort from the knowledge that they will continue on in the afterlife. People suffering from grief take comfort from the fact that their loved ones continue to exist, can communicate with them, and may be reunited with them in the afterlife. When people who have not investigated the empirical evidence for the afterlife deny it's existence or try to explain away the evidence by offering untested and unsupported hypotheses, they are also harming those suffering from grief.

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Research

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Parapsychological research is not published in peer reviewed scientific journals.

According to the Parapsychology Association Bibliography for 1998 the following journals are peer-reviewed and publish parapsychological research.

• Journal of Parapsychology
• Journal of Scientific Exploration
• Journal of the Society for Psychical Research
• European Journal of Parapsychology
• Japanese Journal of Parapsycholog
• Journal of the American Society for Psychical Research

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If there was research demonstrating the afterlife, the researchers would win the Nobel Prize.

There is research demonstrating the afterlife (see the section in this chapter on the fallacy: There is no evidence of spirits or the afterlife.). In fact there was evidence that should have brought afterlife research into the mainstream of science as early as 1922 (see the section Early Research in the chapter Summary of Evidence). Unfortunately it is human nature that when people encounter evidence that contradicts their beliefs they tend to either ignore it or attribute it to fraud or incompetence. An exception to this, that reinforces people's disbelief in evidence for the afterlife, is that people are also prone to accept the beliefs of the majority even if it contradicts their own beliefs (see the section in this chapter on the fallacy: If afterlife research was valid, mainstream science would accept it.).

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Afterlife researchers were fooled by charlatans.

Skeptics may try to apply this fallacy to both early and current researchers. The way to counter this fallacy is the same in both cases. Most scientists have published books or research papers where they describe their materials, methods, observations, and steps taken to prevent fraud. If someone is going to prove the researchers were fooled, they must describe the experimental methods used, suggest how the research subjects committed fraud, and demonstrate that it is possible to commit fraud in that way under those conditions.

Researches into the Phenomena of Spiritualism by Sir William Crookes

http://www.survivalafterdeath.org.uk/books/crookes/researches/contents.htm
Or:
http://books.google.com/books?id=PMg0AAAAMAAJ&printsec=
titlepage&output=text

In another part of the room an apparatus was fitted up for experimenting on the alterations in the weight of a body. It consisted of a mahogany board, 36 inches long by 9 1/2 inches wide and 1 inch thick. At each end a strip of mahogany 1 1/2 inches wide was screwed on, forming feet. One end of the board rested on a firm table, whilst the other end was supported by a spring balance hanging from a substantial tripod stand. The balance was fitted with a self-registering index, in such a manner that it would record the maximum weight indicated by the pointer. The apparatus was adjusted so that the mahogany board was horizontal, its foot resting flat on the support. In this position its weight was 3 lbs., as marked by the pointer of the balance.
http://www.survivalafterdeath.org.uk/books/crookes/researches
/investigation.htm
Or:
http://books.google.com/books?output=text&id=PMg0AAAAMAAJ&jtp=7

Thirty Years of Psychical Research - Charles Richet

We have read and re-read, studied and analyzed the works written on these subjects, and we declare it vastly improbable, and even impossible, that eminent and upright men such as Sir William Crookes, Sir Oliver Lodge, Reichenbach, A. Russel Wallace, Lombroso, William James, Schiaparelli, F. W. H. Myers, Zollner, A. de Rochas, Ochorowicz, Morselli, Sir William Barrett, Ed Gurney, C. Flammarion, and many others, in spite of their close attention and their scientific knowledge, should all have been duped over and over again a hundred times by tricksters or have been the victims of an astounding credulity. It is not possible that they should all and always have been so blind as not to perceive frauds necessarily gross; so incautious as to form conclusions where no conclusion was legitimately possible; and so unskilful as never to have made a single unexceptionable experiment. A Priori, their experiments deserve careful consideration and not to be contemptuously rejected.

This book can be downloaded from:
http://survivalebooks.org/#Thirty Years of Psychical Research

In addition, the possibility of fraud does not prove fraud occurred, nor does one proven fraud imply there are no true psychics. There have been many cases of fraud in every profession but this does not mean that those professions are all populated by charlatans.

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Paranormal phenomena disappear when scientists try to reproduce them in a laboratory.

There are many laboratory studies that prove the paranormal. Here are just a few:

• 1993: Observation Of A Psychokinetic Effect Under Highly Controlled Conditions
  http://www.fourmilab.ch/rpkp/observ.html

• Toward Understanding the Placebo Effect: Investigating a Possible Retrocausal Factor
  http://www.liebertonline.com/doi/pdfplus/10.1089/acm.2006.6243
  http://www.liebertonline.com/toc/acm/13/7?cookieSet=1

• Effects of Intentionally Enhanced Chocolate on Mood
  http://download.journals.elsevierhealth.com/pdfs/journals
  /1550-8307/PIIS1550830707001802.pdf
  http://www.explorejournal.com (September 2007)

• The Effect of the "Laying On of Hands" on Transplanted Breast Cancer in Mice
  Abstract (HTML)
  http://www.scientificexploration.org/jse/abstracts/v14n3a2.php
  Full Text (PDF)
  http://www.scientificexploration.org/jse/articles/pdf/14.3_bengston_krinsley.pdf

• "On the Latest Study of ESP and OBEs" has several references.
  http://www.mind-energy.net/archives/232-On-the-Latest-Study
  -of-ESP-and-OBEs.html

Here are a few journals that publish psychic research:

• The Journal of the American Society for Psychical Research
  http://www.aspr.com/jaspr.htm
• Journal of Scientific Exploration
  http://www.scientificexploration.org/journal.html
• Journal of Parapsychology
  http://www.rhine.org/journal.shtml
• European Journal of Parapsychology
  http://ejp.org.uk/

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The results of psychical research are not reliable if they are not obtained from repeatable laboratory experiments.

This fallacy is easily exposed by comparing psychical research to research on evolution. The evidence for the theory of evolution by natural selection was not obtained through laboratory experiments. The evidence for natural selection was first observed by Charles Darwin in the wild on the Galapagous Islands. Later more evidence was found by other investigators burried in the ground as fossils. There is a huge amount of evidence for the theory of natural selection and virtually all scientists recognize it is reasonable to believe the theory based on that evidence.

There are also a huge number of observations of paranormal phenomena made by scientists and other reliable sources. It is reasonable to believe those phenomena are real because the phenomena of psychical research are repeatable. These same phenomena are observed, in many cases under controlled conditions, over and over by different observers. Psychics have produced the same phenomena for different investigators, and investigators have observed similar phenomena from different psychics.

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Anecdotal evidence is not reliable.

It is not correct to assert that all research conclusions based on anecdotal evidence are invalid because there are reliable forms of anecdotes and valid uses of anecdotal evidence. Certain fields of psychical research are often incorrectly criticized because they are said to rely on anecdotal evidence. These fields include crisis apparitions, near death experiences, death bed visions, and past life memories.

While there are valid criticisms of anecdotal evidence and how anecdotes can be misused to reach incorrect conclusions, not every criticism of anecdotal evidence applies to every anecdote or every use of anecdotes. Many of the criticisms of anecdotal evidence do not apply to the way anecdotal evidence is used in psychical research.

The value of anecdotal evidence depends on the quality of the anecdotes and what they are used to demonstrate. For example, a high quality anecdote would involve first hand accounts by multiple identified witnesses of good character where each witness corroborates the others.

The way anecdotes are use in research also determines whether the conclusions drawn from them are valid. For example anecdotes are often criticized because they cannot prove a cause and effect relationships. However anecdotes in psychical research are often used merely to prove a phenomena occurs and are not used to demonstrate a cause and effect relationship.

The following is list of a the criticism of anecdotal evidence. The reasons they do not apply to the way anecdotes are used in psychical research is explained.

(The following criticisms of anecdotal evidence are discussed in the Wikipedia article on anecdotal evidence.)

• Vivid emotionally charged anecdotes seem to be more plausible and are given greater weight. This is relevant when anecdotes are being used to argue that a decision be swayed in a certain direction. It is irrelevant when anecdotes are used in psychical research to demonstrate that a phenomena occurs.

• You don't know how many people are not reporting such anecdotes. This is not relevant in psychical research where anecdotes are not used to demonstrate the frequency of a phenomena but are used only to demonstrate the phenomena sometimes occurs. Also see below Anecdotal evidence is not meaningful without a statistical basis for understanding it.

• Anecdotes are easily misused to incorrectly assert cause and effect relationships. Anecdotes are not used to demonstrate cause and effect relationships in psychical research, they are used to demonstrate a phenomena occurs.

• Anecdotes that refer to the exception rather than the rule are misleading. It is proper to use anecdotes to demonstrate that exceptions to a rule exist. This is appropriate in psychical research when one is trying to demonstrate a paranormal phenomena occurs.

• Anecdotes cannot be used to demonstrate statistical facts. Anecdotes are not used to demonstrate statistical facts in psychical research, they are used to demonstrate a phenomena occurs. Also see below Anecdotal evidence is not meaningful without a statistical basis for understanding it.

• Anecdotes do not carry the weight of authority. Authority is not required for a fact to be true.

• Anecdotes are subject to cognitive bias and are unfalsifiable.

  Cognitive bias occurs when a person's judgment is affected by their preconceived ideas, expectations, and opinions.

  This criticism is often misapplied to psychical research due to a misunderstanding that the anecdotes are from individual subjective experiences, when, in fact, the anecdotes often involve multiple witnesses making objective observations. Anecdotes are verifiable when there are multiple identified witnesses who corroborate each other. There are cases of multiple corroborating witness for crisis apparitions, memories of past lives, and even some NDEs.

  In many cases, the paranormality of an NDE is demonstrated not by the subjective nature of the experience but by verifiable information brought back by the experiencer which could not have been perceived even if the experiencer had been conscious. These are called veridical NDE's

  For examples see:

  "People See Verified Events While Out-Of-Body"
  http://www.near-death.com/experiences/evidence02.html

  The NDE and Out-of-Body Kevin Williams' research conclusions
  http://www.near-death.com/experiences/research11.html

  Individual NDE Experiences
  http://www.nderf.org/archives_1stHalf2002.htm
  (Search the page for "veridical" to find these types of cases)

• Anecdotes are subject to subjective validation

  Subjective validation "occurs when two unrelated or even random events are perceived to be related because a belief, expectancy, or hypothesis demands a relationship. Thus people seek a correspondence between their perception of their personality and the contents of a horoscope." ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forer_effect)

  This is one of the biggest criticism of psychical research, but it is irrelevant unless the anecdote is being used to demonstrate a correspondence between events. It doesn't apply when objective, verifiable observations are reported. For example, as often occurs with crisis apparitions, if several people saw an apparition of someone but they didn't know the person's life was in danger, there would be no cause for subjective validation.

  (See "Phantasms of the Living" by Edmund Gurney
  http://www.archive.org/search.php?query=title%3A%28phantasms%20
  of%20the%20living%29%20AND%20creator%3A%28edmund%20gurney%29 ).

  In the case of death bed visions, there are a number of cases where visions were seen of people who were thought to be living but in actuality had died.

  (See "Death Bed Visions" by William Barrett chapter 2
  http://www.survivalafterdeath.org.uk/books/barrett/dbv/chapter2.htm ).

  This is exactly the opposite of what you would expect if subjective validation were occurring.

Rejecting conclusions of psychical research that uses anecdotal evidence is inappropriate because there are reliable forms of anecdotes and reliable uses of anecdotal evidence. If someone asserts that psychical research is flawed because it relies on anecdotal evidence, they must prove that assertion by identifying the conclusions of that research and demonstrate which specific criticisms of anecdotal evidence apply to the anecdotes used to reach those conclusions.

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Anecdotal evidence is unscientific because it is not repeatable.

When a researcher interviews someone who has made an observation it is evidence. This type of evidence is not just scholarly, it is scientific. Collecting evidence from individuals is used in other fields of science such as anthropology and sociology.

There are many fields of science where research is not always done in a laboratory. Ecology, astronomy, field biology, botany, zoology are examples. Sometimes you have to go to where the phenomena are if you want to study them.

In the book "21 Days into the Afterlife" Piero Calvi-Parisetti, MD. gives a good explanation of how anecdotal evidence is used.

"Let's say, for example, that a biologist goes to Antarctica to study one particular aspect of the penguins’ behaviour. After five weeks of observation he comes back with a report saying that the penguins do this and that. Is that not science?

"Well, of course it is. But we expect that if another biologist went and observed the same penguins, he would report the same behaviour.

"Precisely. And this is precisely what happens with most of the anecdotal evidence I am talking about. People observe phenomena and report what they have seen. And then other people observe the same phenomena and report the same kind of things. Just swap the biologist with a psychic researcher and the penguins with mediums or other psychic phenomena."
http://www.openmindsite.com/book.htm

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Anecdotal evidence is unscientific because it cannot be disproved.

The section on the fallacy: Belief in the Afterlife is not Falsifiable and Therefore is not Scientific explains the significance of falsifiability to a scientific theory.

In short, for a theory to be scientific it must be supported by evidence. For a theory to be supported by evidence it must pass a test that could demonstrate the theory is false.

It is possible for anecdotal evidence to be used in a test that can falsify a theory. One case where this was done was an investigation on crisis apparitions.

When an apparition of a person is seen near the time of his death, it is called a crisis apparition. Evidence of crisis apparitions comes in the form of anecdotes because their occurrence is not predictable and can't be studied in a laboratory. The section on the fallacy: Anecdotal evidence is not meaningful without a statistical basis for understanding it. Anecdotes may be due to chance coincidence. describes an investigation that determined the frequency of apparitions and then taking into account the frequency of deaths, determined that seeing a apparition of someone near the time of his death occurred much more frequently than chance coincidence could explain.

This investigation demonstrated that crisis-apparitions are a paranormal phenomena and should be a high priority for scientific investigation because the known laws of science cannot explain the correlation between the death of an individual and the appearance of an apparition of them. However, if this investigation had shown that crisis-apparitions occurred at a frequency expected by chance coincidence, the paranormal hypothesis would have been falsified and crisis-apparitions would have no special priority for scientific investigation. This demonstrates that there are ways that anecdotal evidence can be used to confirm a theory and therefore anecdotal evidence can be scientific.

Furthermore, conclusions drawn from eyewitness accounts can also be disproved. For example, if someone says he saw a ghost on main street, you may be able prove he was somewhere else at that time. You may not be able cross-check every statement in an anecdote but if you can demonstrate a high frequency of inaccuracy in those statements that can be cross-checked within a study, then you can cast doubt on the conclusions of that study. It is hard to do this, but all you have to do is interview people. It would be much easier to investigate a first hand eye witness account than for example to try to disprove astronomical observations that require expensive telescopes or physics experiments that required huge particle accelerators and require expensive computer time to analyze. The case of cloning fraud in Korea is another example. I don't have the equipment to show that was a fraud but I do have a telephone and I could easily investigate anecdotes.

Additionally, if someone thinks anecdotal evidence is used to draw the wrong conclusions, they can try to reproduce the study. They can collect new anecdotes and investigate them more carefully. If they think the anecdotes are the result another phenomena they can design a study to test that hypothesis.

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Anecdotal evidence is the result of people who are in emotional turmoil and is therefore unreliable.

Anecdotes are not all about people under stress. Many occur when the observer is in perfectly good health, not aware anyone is ill or has any expectation of experiencing anything paranormal.

About fourteen years ago, about 3 o'clock one summer's afternoon, I was passing in front of Trinity Church, Upper King Street, Leicester, when I saw on the opposite side of the street a very old playmate, whom, having left the town to learn some business, I had for some time lost sight of. ... The next week I was informed of his somewhat sudden death at Burton-on-Trent, at about the time I felt certain he was passing in front of me.
http://www.survivalafterdeath.org.uk/articles/rogo/apparitions.htm

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Anecdotal evidence is not meaningful without a statistical basis for understanding it. Anecdotes may be due to chance coincidence.

Anecdotes can be understood in a statistical context if a survey is conducted to learn about the frequency of the type of event described by the anecdotes. This methodology may be used to rule out chance coincidence as an explanation of anecdotal evidence.

The psychical researchers of the late 19th century wanted to extend the methods of science so that personal experiences could be studied quantitatively and objectively.

One way they did this was to use a survey to help make sense of anecdotal information about crisis apparitions. The survey was called "the census of hallucinations". They tried to do a representative survey of the British population asking a simple question:

"Since January 1, 1874, have you when in good health, free from anxiety, and completely awake had a vivid impression of seeing or being touched by a human being, or of hearing a voice or sound which suggested a human presence, when no one was there ? Yes or no ?"

If a subject answered yes, they requested further information. If the event seemed to include veridical information, they sought corroborating testimony from other witnesses such as family members to whom the subject described the hallucination at the time it occurred.

This is described in "Phantasms of the Living" by Edmund Gurney, Volume 2 Chapter XIII "The Theory of Chance Coincidence"
http://www.archive.org/search.php?query=title%3A%28phantasms
%20of%20the%20living%29%20AND%20creator%3A%28edmund%20gurney%29

Next, using sources of information on the frequency of deaths such as "Supplement to the 45th Annual Report of the Registrar-General", they calculated the expected probability of having a hallucination near the time of death of a relative or acquaintance. From this they were able to demonstrate that the frequency of crisis apparitions (seeing an apparition of someone near the time of their death) was much too high to be explained by chance coincidence.

The census of hallucinations is also described in The Proceedings of the Society for Psychical Research. Many articles on the census can be read in the Proceedings on line at books.google.com. These articles can be easily found the Web Guide to the PSPR.

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Evidence for the afterlife is unacceptable because the research took place too long ago.

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Near Death Experiences can be explained by biological phenomena such as lack of oxygen or a "dying brain".

The following on-line sources discuss how "scientific" theories of NDEs fail to explain all of the observed phenomena associated with NDEs.

• People See Verified Events While Out-Of-Body
  http://www.near-death.com/experiences/evidence02.html
• Michael Prescott discusses chapter 6 of the book "Irreducible Mind" by Edward F. Kelly, Emily Williams Kelly, et al.
  http://michaelprescott.typepad.com/michael_prescotts_blog/2007
  /03/irreducible_min.html
• Michael Tymn discusses the section on NDE's in chapter 2 "Where Are You?" in the book "Your Eternal Self" by R. Craig Hogan, Ph.D.
  http://metgat.gaia.com/blog/2008/3/debunking_the_nde_debunkers
• Scientific Theories of the NDE
  http://www.near-death.com/experiences/experts01.html

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