HART_CHRISTIAN
Tue, 19 Sep 2000 20:39:46 -0700
Miguel, You are not alone regarding your views on such allegations. After reading Paul Brandon's post I spent the better part of Thursday afternoon and evening composing a response, deleting said response, and then repeating those steps several times again. Finally I realized I needed to stop and reflect first before responding. Where was all this anguish I was feeling coming from? But in the meantime, your response regarding the notes was exactly what I intended to write (though probably far less succinctly). To my esteemed colleagues on this list, I pondered Miguel's question about the impetus behind the ire. I believe that I understand from whence some, but not all, of it may come. [This was written before I read the post from Jim Clark confirming this concern-I hadn't heard of the case mentioned, though it sounds chilling.] I suspect that part of it derives from a concern for the welfare of our students, who will benefit from clear and rational thinking habits. I agree wholeheartedly with that concern. But, can't we strive to assist our students in honing their thinking skills without making any of those students feel ashamed? I'm specifically referring to a very small minority of students who experience anomalous experiences. As I noted in a previous post, the criticisms made (actually, I just wrote allegations and then changed it, but that reflects the "feel" of this to me)...the criticisms made regarding lack of replicability, allegations of fraud, and lack of theoretical mechanisms are the very same criticisms repeatedly leveled at psychoneuroimmunology (PNI) before the advent of meta-analysis. Researchers in PNI were seen as pseudo-scientists by many, including Marcia Angell who wrote a damning editorial in the New England Journal of Medicine in 1985. Now all that contempt and scorn has given way to standard sections about PNI in the health psych portions of our introductory textbooks. And yet, in a recent interview with Robert Ader in the APA Monitor, Ader said that despite the now consistent replications, there are still a few holdouts who refuse to believe that there can be any effect of the mind on immune function. <http://www.apa.org/monitor/jun99/pni.html> Incidentally, although we make much of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis as a theoretical mechanism in PNI, it's merely our best guess. In that same interview, Ader goes beyond acknowledging this saying "there are many psychological phenomena, and medical phenomena for that matter, for which we have not yet defined the precise mechanisms. It doesn't mean it's not a real phenomenon." Doesn't our history with PNI at least counsel us to remain curious if also skeptical? And with such, at the time, mixed findings, what do you suppose motivated those scientists to keep looking. Were they just lucky to have their blind faith justified? Hardly. We may not like to talk about it because it's hard to prove, but our brains are peerless when it comes to pattern recognition (although that false positive rate is real bear). Those researchers stuck with it because their instincts or intuition said there something there. My point-mired as it it in digression-is that, if we do not affirm the null hypothesis regarding psi, yet convey contempt in our voices to students, I fear we may be crushing valuable curiosity...and also esteem. I feel ambivalent about this issue. On the one hand, I grew up knowing I was gay, and seeing all the harm that some people-using organized religion and various kinds of sloppy thinking-cause to gays and lesbians. So, in fact, I am strongly motivated to see that our students receive training in critical thinking. On the other hand, I was one of those rare (?) students who had anomalous experiences. I AM one of those adults who has anomalous experiences. Since around the age of 13 I have seen a blue light around living and sometimes non-living things. Let me state at the outset that I do NOT consider myself psychic; indeed, I have never pursued anything regarding this "light" or visual anomaly since I was a teenager. Most importantly, never has it seemed to confer any benefit or advantage, of which I'm aware. (Certainly, some "information transfer" would have been NICE during visits to Las Vegas, but alas....) You may well ask why I even make the connection between this anomaly and anything paranormal. I do, only because when I first read a little about the paranormal, descriptions by those who described "auras" bore a striking resemblance to what I saw and in the places where I tended to see it. That's it. But like I said, it's never conferred any kind foreknowledge or specialized "power" (ugh) beyond what my clinical acumen tells me about clients. Pretty uninteresting, believe me. I have never spoken of this in any public forum and I feel intensely vulnerable about doing so now. I have been interested in science since I was a child. I only had passion for a career in which science played a role. After learning about the scientific (mainstream) view on psi as a young man, I studiously avoided trying to see this anomaly. And yet, if I am honest with myself, I have to admit that it was perhaps partially what guided my interest in PNI as a grad student. PNI was just safe enough because we were dealing with biology, and 'what could be more solid than counting cells or measuring immunoflourescence?' But my willingness not to uncritically believe every canon of science arose because my personal experience-this visual anomaly-suggested that we scientists did not know everything yet. Why do I even bring this up? Because being gay taught me the cruel pain of those who, not knowing I was gay, felt they could make hateful comments about my brothers and sisters, about me-comments made by the "blind" to children who must remain "dumb"...or suffer the consequences (see Matthew Shepherd). It's strange for me to be linking together two issues that had always seemed completely "orthogonal," if you will. But right now, the feelings of shame about this dirty little secret seems quite similar to how I used to feel as an adolescent about being gay. Yet coming out as gay in some ways was easier than revealing this anomaly. When I was young at least, I discovered there were many gay people who seemed, to my adolescent view-forgive me-normal. I have only found in very round-about ways, one other psychologist-a prominent researcher in child development-who has different, but anomalous experiences. She and I have talked about the feeling of unintentional oppression from our colleagues regarding this. This is sad: scientists being made to feel like heretics by other scientists? But now I'm coming to appreciate the source of that: concern for the welfare of students. For my part, I realized late Thursday night the origin of the anguish I had been feeling regarding recent posts on psi. I felt anxiety for the students who might have some type of anomalous experiences and yet hear that undertone of derision in some professor's voice. I have no desire to prove or disprove the theories of the parapsychologists. And I would prefer not to say anything more about my visual quirks, because frankly, I don't know anything and haven't the desire to explore something that at worst makes me sound delusional and at best something less than the rational psychologist I consider myself to be. (And for the curious (mild defensive tone), until fairly recently, my vision was better than average. Now it's down to a measly 20/20.) To you, my colleagues, even if you discount everything that I've written (and why wouldn't you?), BUT you also care about ALL of your students-and I believe, without data, that you do-I have a request. I would request for that young man who I used to be, and for other young men and women that may currently be, in your classes and labs today-a rare few of whom may experience inexplicable, neurological glitches-please, do teach those critical thinking skills, but do so with humor and perhaps an awareness that there MAY be additional explanations for paranormal phenomena that do not involve revoking the laws of physics or faking data. The history of PNI at least should caution that much. And thanks, Miguel. Your courage in responding reminded me 'to thine own self be true' even if that means risking tenure for a job that I really love. (That sounds way more melodramatic than I intended, but it's what it is). Respectfully, Christian Hart, Ph.D. Assistant Professor of Psychology Department of Behavioral Studies Santa Monica College Postscript from today 9/19: My personal experience studying PNI before and after it became "respectable": the lay public vastly overestimates the range of effect sizes for the relationships typically studied; and they almost never distinguish between an immune parameter and "health." BUT I also noted among the hard-core biomedical types (at UCLA medical center) the equally inaccurate assessment that there could be no relationship beyond the theoretically less interesting pathways of diet, exercise, etc. -----Original Message----- From: Miguel Roig [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Sent: Saturday, September 16, 2000 8:46 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: Fwd: Re: James Randi & Daryl Bem I hope that I am not alone on this list in holding the view that allegations of fraud in ANY area of SCIENTIFIC investigation should be taken very seriously and should NOT be made lightly. So, let's review for the moment what has transpired: In a previous post Jim Clark stated: > For a discussion of possible ways of and >evidence for cheating in lab studies, including labs involved in >many of the Ganzfeld studies, see Blackmore's "In search of the >light: The adventures of a parapsychologist." I felt that the above statement unfairly casts a pretty dark shadow, not only on an entire area of research, i.e, the ganzfeld, but also, on the entire already badly battered field of parapsychology and those individuals, many of them psychologists who currently work in it. Given my familiarity with parapsychology (relative, it appears, to the rest of TIPs members) and not having immediate access to either edition of her books, I asked Jim for additional clarification on Blackmore's claims. He then posted the following: >It is not easy to isolate a few quotes. Blackmore presents a >lengthy description of some anomalies that she observed in >Sargent's lab (she does cite and quote from the articles Miquel >quoted) when she visited because of her own failures to obtain >the Psi effects that Sargent was reporting. Essentially, there >were some indications that someone might have been controlling >which envelopes were being selected. There was a set of >identified envelopes in a drawer. These were supposedly used >just to replace envelopes selected from the target pile. The >numbers of cards remaining in the drawer after several >experiments were inconsistent with what they should have been. >She also reports that they found various envelopes "hidden" >around the room, which would have been necessary if substitution >was going on. There was also a short comment on possible >prompting of subjects by Sargent. First, based on Jim's clarification of his previous statement we find that Blackmore's allegations of possible cheating apply to only one lab experiment, possibly two (I do not know how many ganzfeld experiments she had actually observed). Furthermore, the above characterization is consisted with my quote of Berger's review of her first edition of the book: Blackmore observed some inconsistencies in _one_ laboratory protocol which _could conceivably_ be interpreted as cheating/fraud. Based on that evidence Jim states that: >She acknowledges that what she >observed could not account for the degree of hits obtained. So, does Blackmore really offer "evidence for cheating in lab studies, including labs involved in many of the Ganzfeld studies"? No. According to Jim's posts there is evidence from one experiment (perhaps 2) in one lab that can be interpreted as cheating or as mere procedural errors. Such evidence, in my view, is less suspicious than, say, some of the evidence found against Cyril Burt's which included, the exact same correlation coefficient repeatedly found over several studies (incidentally, Jensen has argued that it may very well be that such correlations of IQ between mono zygotic twins reared apart represent the actual parameters of that population [Jensen, 1992]). At any rate, Jim then adds: >I was not referring to methodological concerns when using the >term "cheating." Contrary to Miquel, I do not see the charge as >a worse ethical violation than leaving Psi results to stand >without including this hypothesis. How can I possibly respond to this? As David Epstein pointed out in a previous post in another reference to research fraud (f-word) unrelated to parapsychology: "The f-word can end a career, and thus it can be used to intimidate researchers whose results make us uncomfortable." Perhaps the possibility of the existence of ESP makes Jim Clark and others on this list a little uncomfortable? Miguel - spelled with a g not a q Reference Jensen, Jr., A. R. (1992) Scientific Fraud or False accusations? The case of Cyril Burt. In Miller, D. J. and Hersen, M. Research fraud in the behavioral and biomedical sciences. New York: Wiley. <>< <>< <>< <>< <>< <>< <>< <>< <>< <>< <>< <>< <>< Miguel Roig, Ph.D. Voice: (718) 390-4513 Assoc. Prof. of Psychology Fax: (718) 442-3612 Dept. of Psychology [EMAIL PROTECTED] St. John's University [EMAIL PROTECTED] 300 Howard Avenue http://area51.stjohns.edu/~roig Staten Island, NY 10301 ><> ><> ><> ><> ><> ><> ><> ><> ><> ><> ><> ><> ><>