The Paranormal Thread

[Schatze]

See, that is exactly the problem. You list an "experiment" with inappropriate control comparisons, no protections against fraud and sensory leakage (independent research, observation of person being read), Reliance on non-standardized, untested dependent variables (what objective metric can you use to determine if your manipulation of the independant variable succeeded or failed in proving the null), failure to use double-blind procedures (BIGGEST PROBLEM RIGHT THERE), neglected to independently check on facts the sitters endorsed as true (see next paragraph), use of plausibility arguments to substitute for actual controls, negation of proving the null. He also only used believers in psychic phenomenon as test subjects (hello major confounder, how are you?). There's a reason he published a polemic and not a paper, because what he did was not science by any means.

Apparently he got a bunch of cold readers to come in and perform their schtick and then came to the conclusion, "psychics exist!" Ignored "fallacy of personal validation, subjective validation, confirmation bias, belief perseverance, the illusion of invulnerability, compliance, demand characteristics, false uniqueness effect, foot-in-the-door phenomenon, illusory correlation, integrative agreements, self-reference effect, the principle of individuation", by failing to fact check whether the hits were actual hits, how specific they were, if any of it was fed by the subjects themselves, and how many "misses" as opposed to hits. He only counted the self-reported hits, not the misses, and failed to check up if they were actual hits or not!

edit: there are a bunch of critiques out there for this Schwartz et. al., and all of them tear very large holes in the shit he did. Not because of the subject matter, but because of how he conducted the experiments. I mean, a control group of undergraduate psych students as opposed to a control group of admitted cold readers? No double blind? "hit" based on a subjective, qualitative basis by the subject, whereas the controls were graded given a pass/fail, and were not even allowed to perform their own cold reading, if they even would have had the knowledge to do so.

Even funnier is, for the actual paper, he did do a double blind experiment with a control involved (another person's reading). 4/6 people picked "their reading" as more accurate then the control. Except, 4/6 IS NOT STATISTICALLY SIGNIFICANT within any reasonable confidence interval. Furthermore, the other two metrics, dead on hits and rating the number of hits or misses between the two reading and the control, again failed, as there were no statistically meaningful differences between the "real" reading and the control. His one double blinded experiment proved the null, that is, that no psychic reading was going on. Lawlz. Now here's an important part. On the outset of the experiment, you must set metrics for a null result. You don't create them after the fact, you don't alter them after the fact. What Schwartz did, was even though his experiment proved the null, he went on to negate the null by looking at one reading where a subject had recorded an exceptional number of dead on hits and partial hits. He then negated his null conclusions by using this one example. Which, one, you don't do. You just don't do it. There are many reasons why you don't. Second, the reasons for negating the null were so open to confounding variables (see second paragraph in post, e.g. highly suggestible person, true believer, blah blah, everything listed) that there was no basis for rejecting the null, even if post hoc rationalization on altering the conditions for a null result isn't horrible enough in regards to experimental rigor.

Schwartz follows the same old tired routine as to the experiments that I know of that have been debunked. That's the beauty of science, one person just doesn't say "ZOMG I FOUND PSYCHICS!", while another responds "WOAH DUDE REALLY? JAWESOME OFF FOR SOME TAROT". People actually critique and criticize and look for flaws! Wow!

That is the point of peer review and publishing. So that you can reproduce or critique elements of the experiment itself. All experiments are not made equal. There are tons of junk experiments on all sorts of topics under the sun. It just so happens that every single "ZOMG ESP" paper that's been attempted to be published has not only been a junk paper, but it's been so bad that even a non-professional can look at the math or procedure or methods and go, "huh? WTF? Results and conclusions don't match".

Convenient, isn't it? All the papers that have tried to prove ESP have been horrible abortions that either didn't pass peer review, or were subsequently mauled after the fact, including Dr. Schwartz's. That people who believe in ESP, and try to prove it... Create shitty experiments that don't follow normal experimental rigor, and are open to all sorts of manipulation (and like Schwartz, overtly doing so), to prove their belief! Whoulda thought? Although to be fair, it's not only ESP researchers who do this. Which is why a randomized, double blind, controlled experiment is used in any serious experiment. Which is why experimental rigor must be maintained, why procedures and methods must be set, followed, and highly specific. Why results and scores must be graded in a consistant, objective, standardized method. This is to reduce as much as possible confounding factors, bias, etc.

It's... Almost as if scientists who fail to follow the paradigm have a vested interest in proving their own beliefs! Imagine that!

[Astrocreep]

Im of 2 minds on the subject. first i have had an experience with something i cant explain. About 10 years ago when i was in my mid 20s, a friend and i had lunch at an IHOP on our break. After the pancakes came, we both used the Maple syrup pitcher for them. i placed the pitcher in the middle of the table and thats where it stayed for 5 minutes. as we were working quickly on our lunches (we had to be back at work in 10 minutes) i noticed movement in the corner of my eye. the maple syrup pitcher was moving across the table of its own volition. we both stopped what we were doing to watch this pitcher continue to move very slowly across the table. it went about 6 inches over the course of 10-15 seconds and then stopped. we were both shocked and my friend said he wasnt ever gonna tell anyone he saw that. i of course told the people at work what happened cuz i thought it was pretty cool.

Now was that a ghost? I dunno, i just know i cant explain it.

My other train of thought is that, if you have to resort to faking evidence of soemthing to prove your point then you are on pretty shaky ground to begin with and you know it. That video link left by the OP was so ridiculously faked. most of that footage is from a stationary video camera with a complete view of the upcoming phenomena. How very considerate of these ghosts to let the cameraman know where and when and how they will show their presence.
The stuff like the cemetary and the road ghosts are just silliness. unless this man goes everywhere filming everything and i like how he spots a ghost and the camera doesnt shake in the slightest and the car stays steady on the road.

Anyway im not saying all ghost sightings are hoaxes as i posted my story above, there are still unexplainable things in our world so im trying to keep an open mind. I do have many questions for the "true believers" tho. ok what makes a ghost? why do ghosts have clothes? if a ghost can go to all the trouble of throwing heavy furniture about and scaring the shit out of you, why not try and write a letter? If a ghost is a result of a harrowing experience like someone getting violently killed, how come there are no ghosts of harrowing experiences of people who were violently injured but lived?

[Twobit Whore]

You probably just set the pitcher down on a roach and he was struggling to get free.

[Believe]

I'm about 98% sure I've read the hitch-hiking ghost one is done by some film students.

(Which is pretty obvious anyways)

[The Edge]

Originally Posted by Schatze

See, that is exactly the problem. You list an "experiment" with inappropriate control comparisons, no protections against fraud and sensory leakage (independent research, observation of person being read), Reliance on non-standardized, untested dependent variables (what objective metric can you use to determine if your manipulation of the independant variable succeeded or failed in proving the null), failure to use double-blind procedures (BIGGEST PROBLEM RIGHT THERE), neglected to independently check on facts the sitters endorsed as true (see next paragraph), use of plausibility arguments to substitute for actual controls, negation of proving the null. He also only used believers in psychic phenomenon as test subjects (hello major confounder, how are you?). There's a reason he published a polemic and not a paper, because what he did was not science by any means. etc...

There's so many things wrong with that response I don't even know where to begin. It's as if you're relying on someone else's opinion of the book to form your own opinion. You say no protection against fraud or sensory leakage, yet a large section of the book was dedicated to showing the opposite. There were many different forms of tests used, yet people pick a few and complain that they aren't traditional tests, failing to realize that they had to come up with new ways to test these people. That's how science works isn't it? If traditional ways of testing aren't satisfactory, you have to come up with new forms of tests. You say he doesn't use double blind tests, but two paragraphs later you show where he did. Contradict yourself much? Again with false information you stated that he only used one double blind test. That is entirely false. Much of the last year of experiments were double blind experiments. You should really not rely on others to give you your opinion. Please show me any cold reader that could perform as well as these subjects did under the same conditions. It's not going to happen. You either do not know how cold reading works, or again you didn't actually read the book and are relying on someone's biased opinion. It is not cold reading when you cannot see or hear the person you're reading. Also the responses they give go far beyond cold reading. In your position you would HAVE to claim hot reading. Which again refers back to my previous post. You have two sides you can side with at this point. They cheated or they didn't.

------edit

Schwartz had said "His intent at the outset was not to prove or disprove the existence of life after death, but to determine whether the successes that many mediums claim could stand up to the scientific method." Yet from what you said, you would have the people here believe that he was some religious nut trying to convert people to his side.

[Schatze]

Originally Posted by The Edge

There's so many things wrong with that response I don't even know where to begin. It's as if you're relying on someone else's opinion of the book to form your own opinion. You say no protection against fraud or sensory leakage, yet a large section of the book was dedicated to showing the opposite. There were many different forms of tests used,

The only valid one was the double blind. Which proved the null. Which he then subsequently tried to negate by looking at one particularly "accurate" report. Which again, you don't do. You don't change experimental protocol and the basis for a null result in the middle of the experiment. You especially don't do so for so specious a reason. Go wiki "proving the null" or "null experiment"

yet people pick a few and complain that they aren't traditional tests, failing to realize that they had to come up with new ways to test these people.

One, it's not a matter of tradition. It's a matter of doing an experiment correctly. You follow the protocols with rigor because it reduces or eliminates bias or distorted results. And no, he didn't come up with new ways to test the results. He did a crappy experiment. Non blinded, sensory/information leakage, improper control group, improper sampling population. These are not "minor things" nor are they "new ways to test things" they're WRONG ways to test things. Go wiki experimental bias.

That's how science works isn't it? If traditional ways of testing aren't satisfactory, you have to come up with new forms of tests.

No, it isn't. A double blind, randomized, controlled experiment is not something you chose to circumvent to test things in new ways. The only way these things alter the test is to introduce bias. There are so many ways to introduce bias into an experiment that it's just crazy. Which is why you follow these protocols so that you can say, "see? No bias". Failure to follow them is failure to protect against bias. Not to mention his junk data by changing the evaluation of the dependant variable from control to test group, etc. etc. and all the things mentioned before. Go hit wiki up on what "independent" and "dependent" variables are.

You say he doesn't use double blind tests, but two paragraphs later you show where he did. Contradict yourself much?

He did one double blind test. And I brought it up, and showed how it failed. He proved the null. That there was no ESP. The he tossed up his hands and decided he was going to reject the null anyways.

Again with false information you stated that he only used one double blind test. That is entirely false. Much of the last year of experiments were double blind experiments.

He did one double blind experiment that is listed in his paper (not book), with 6 subjects. That is one experiment, six subjects. Not 6 different experiments.

You should really not rely on others to give you your opinion. Please show me any cold reader that could perform as well as these subjects did under the same conditions. It's not going to happen.

You mean prove that ESP doesn't exist? Certainly. Because that's what his only remotely valid experiment did. On all three measures of his dependant variable he proved the null, that there was no ESP. As to what John Edwards et. al. do, James Randi easily does the same and makes no pretense of psychic activity. In fact, go to Randi's website and look up John Edwards.

Oh it's ironic, because you blithely accept all this new age crap while I actually know something about statistical analysis and experimental procedure. You're entirely credulous, yet you accuse the non-credulous person of getting opinions fed to him. I did look at critiques by others on his paper, and I did my own critiquing. Surprise! I have an education and can understand these terms! You don't.

You either do not know how cold reading works, or again you didn't actually read the book and are relying on someone's biased opinion.

No, I read his damned "scientific" paper. And yes I know how cold reading works. And from the excerpts of his book, Schwartz expressly states that there was contact and exchange between the medium and the subject, except for the double blinded protocol that ultimately proved the null, that there was no ESP going on.

It is not cold reading when you cannot see or hear the person you're reading.

And that experiment PROVED THE DAMNED NULL. The rest weren't blinded or isolated. He chose to use the blinded test for his paper. Blame him not me.

Also the responses they give go far beyond cold reading. In your position you would HAVE to claim hot reading. Which again refers back to my previous post. You have two sides you can side with at this point. They cheated or they didn't.

Wrong. It's pure cold reading. Go look up what that is, what psychological mechanisms are in play during a cold reading, why people fall for it.

Schwartz had said "His intent at the outset was not to prove or disprove the existence of life after death, but to determine whether the successes that many mediums claim could stand up to the scientific method." Yet from what you said, you would have the people here believe that he was some religious nut trying to convert people to his side.

He obviously had a bias or he wouldn't have failed to accept the null despite he himself setting the conditions for the null result. To go back, and reject the null even though your keystone experiment proved the null, and come up with some bullshit rationalization why instead, is proof of bias. Because as soon as you do that, you eliminate any validity for your experiment. Null conditions are always set out ahead of time. Why? So you can't alter the null conditions in order to insert your own bias into the results. Which, surprise! He did.

Why don't you go take a basic primer on science? You have a horrible, horrible, distorted understanding of what science is. Or wiki some of what I'm saying, because you obviously don't understand anything in regards to the actual scientific method. You at best have a highschool science class understanding of the scientific method. That understanding is grossly simplified and distorted to make things easier to comprehend.

For god's sake, educate yourself. And I don't mean by reading Deepak or whatever, go to a university and take a science based course. You can even do that online now! Or watch lectures online for free!

[Believe]

My wife was actually watching Wife Swap tonight, where two wives switch families for 2 weeks.

Well it turns out one of the wives is a psychic. So after they swap, the other wife has to do 'psychic readings' and the 3 people she meets with that day all say how she was spot on, and how now they finally feel some closure with their dead one. Afterwards she says she was just making shit up because she thought it was so ridiculous, and was just saying things about her own family members.

Not that it means, anything, just thought it was funny considering the recent conversation here.

[The Edge]

Originally Posted by Schatze

The only valid one was the double blind. Which proved the null. Which he then subsequently tried to negate by looking at one particularly "accurate" report. Which again, you don't do. You don't change experimental protocol and the basis for a null result in the middle of the experiment. You especially don't do so for so specious a reason. Go wiki "proving the null" or "null experiment"



One, it's not a matter of tradition. It's a matter of doing an experiment correctly. You follow the protocols with rigor because it reduces or eliminates bias or distorted results. And no, he didn't come up with new ways to test the results. He did a crappy experiment. Non blinded, sensory/information leakage, improper control group, improper sampling population. These are not "minor things" nor are they "new ways to test things" they're WRONG ways to test things. Go wiki experimental bias.



No, it isn't. A double blind, randomized, controlled experiment is not something you chose to circumvent to test things in new ways. The only way these things alter the test is to introduce bias. There are so many ways to introduce bias into an experiment that it's just crazy. Which is why you follow these protocols so that you can say, "see? No bias". Failure to follow them is failure to protect against bias. Not to mention his junk data by changing the evaluation of the dependant variable from control to test group, etc. etc. and all the things mentioned before. Go hit wiki up on what "independent" and "dependent" variables are.



He did one double blind test. And I brought it up, and showed how it failed. He proved the null. That there was no ESP. The he tossed up his hands and decided he was going to reject the null anyways.



He did one double blind experiment that is listed in his paper (not book), with 6 subjects. That is one experiment, six subjects. Not 6 different experiments.



You mean prove that ESP doesn't exist? Certainly. Because that's what his only remotely valid experiment did. On all three measures of his dependant variable he proved the null, that there was no ESP. As to what John Edwards et. al. do, James Randi easily does the same and makes no pretense of psychic activity. In fact, go to Randi's website and look up John Edwards.

Oh it's ironic, because you blithely accept all this new age crap while I actually know something about statistical analysis and experimental procedure. You're entirely credulous, yet you accuse the non-credulous person of getting opinions fed to him. I did look at critiques by others on his paper, and I did my own critiquing. Surprise! I have an education and can understand these terms! You don't.



No, I read his damned "scientific" paper. And yes I know how cold reading works. And from the excerpts of his book, Schwartz expressly states that there was contact and exchange between the medium and the subject, except for the double blinded protocol that ultimately proved the null, that there was no ESP going on.



And that experiment PROVED THE DAMNED NULL. The rest weren't blinded or isolated. He chose to use the blinded test for his paper. Blame him not me.



Wrong. It's pure cold reading. Go look up what that is, what psychological mechanisms are in play during a cold reading, why people fall for it.




He obviously had a bias or he wouldn't have failed to accept the null despite he himself setting the conditions for the null result. To go back, and reject the null even though your keystone experiment proved the null, and come up with some bullshit rationalization why instead, is proof of bias. Because as soon as you do that, you eliminate any validity for your experiment. Null conditions are always set out ahead of time. Why? So you can't alter the null conditions in order to insert your own bias into the results. Which, surprise! He did.

Why don't you go take a basic primer on science? You have a horrible, horrible, distorted understanding of what science is. Or wiki some of what I'm saying, because you obviously don't understand anything in regards to the actual scientific method. You at best have a highschool science class understanding of the scientific method. That understanding is grossly simplified and distorted to make things easier to comprehend.

For god's sake, educate yourself. And I don't mean by reading Deepak or whatever, go to a university and take a science based course. You can even do that online now! Or watch lectures online for free!

You just proved that you have no idea what information is in the book, and get all your info from Googling for skeptical responses. You'll see what you want to see as there are skeptical responses for every subject imaginable. That doesn't make them correct.

Again, there was much more than one double blind test run, and only at first did the mediums have contact with subjects. Once it was suggested that people could cry foul by claiming "omgz cold reading" they removed that possibility and allowed for no contact, visual, audio or otherwise, between the subjects. They produced the exact same results as before. But you would already know that had you actually read the book.

As I state over and over again, much of the testing is beyond the whole statistical analysis, percentage of yes/no responses that were right or wrong. Moan all you want about the test not being good enough, that doesn't change the whole of the data received and witnessed. You also have to look at the type of information being given. Responses that cannot be explained by random guessing, or cold reading.

We already know where this is leading though. Every debate that points out these faults of the skeptics where they can't point to cold reading or random chance as the answer leads to someone accusing the test takers/makers of cheating or falsifying the information available. It's the only crutch you can fall back on without admitting there might be credible evidence worth looking at.

[Schatze]

To everyone who is not edge, and is not interested in reading me getting pissed off at his stupid claims, skip this post. I apologize for fagging up the thread. I like ghost stories :/

For you, The Edge

Spoiler Alert, click show to read:

Originally Posted by The Edge

You just proved that you have no idea what information is in the book, and get all your info from Googling for skeptical responses. You'll see what you want to see as there are skeptical responses for every subject imaginable. That doesn't make them correct.

.[/quote]

I READ HIS DAMNED PAPER. I AM AT A UNIVERSITY, I HAVE JOURNAL ACCESS AND CAN SEARCH FOR A SPECIFIC PAPER. I CAN'T HOWEVER GET ANYTHING OTHER THAN EXCERPTS FROM HIS POLEMIC. HOWEVER, POLEMICS ARE NOT SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH. THE PAPERS THEMSELVES, ARE. YOU DON'T MAKE SCIENTIFIC CLAIMS/PROOFS IN A POLEMIC, YOU MAKE THEM IN THE PAPER. THE POLEMIC EXISTS TO EXPLAIN TO A LAYPERSON WTF IS HAPPENING.

Going by his book and ignoring the paper is the exact backward way of doing things.

Again, there was much more than one double blind test run, and only at first did the mediums have contact with subjects. Once it was suggested that people could cry foul by claiming "omgz cold reading" they removed that possibility and allowed for no contact, visual, audio or otherwise, between the subjects. They produced the exact same results as before. But you would already know that had you actually read the book.

No there wasn't, in his paper he refers to one double blind experiment with 6 subjects. That is ONE experiment. That is the one experiment mentioned in his published paper.

To get info on his book, of course I had to google. Not that a book will be more informative than a scientific paper. During my googling of the actual book, I found out that the one experiment he refers to in his paper was the only double blind one that he did. 6 subjects != 6 experiments, 6 subjects = an extremely small test subject pool for one experiment. Jesus. As to the rest, I was able to find several responses (which scientists do) which outlined his entire course of experiments and described them, other than the ones in his paper. I was able to then read Schwartz's counter response, defending his methodology, experiments, etc.. Guess what? It was a big FAIL. These were letters published in response to presentations he made at conferences. That is also another thing scientists do.

And NO THEY DIDN'T. I READ THE PAPER. In his paper, the statistical analysis on all three measurement criterion for the dependant variable PROVED THE NULL. He THEN failed to accept null results and instead focused on one specific reading which he claimed was impossible to replicate by chance (which it wasn't, and he didn't even attempt to fact check the reading but accepted the subjects subjective ratings). Let me repeat that; IN THE SCIENTIFIC PAPER HE PUBLISHED, HE FAILED TO GET MEANINGFUL STATISTICAL RESULTS WITHIN ANY REASONABLE CONFIDENCE INTERVAL.

As I state over and over again, much of the testing is beyond the whole statistical analysis, percentage of yes/no responses that were right or wrong. Moan all you want about the test not being good enough, that doesn't change the whole of the data received and witnessed. You also have to look at the type of information being given. Responses that cannot be explained by random guessing, or cold reading.

Then that is NOT science. To determine results you need to do a statistical analysis of an experiment. If you can't prove your results following a scientific procedure, your results are MEANINGLESS. Baloney. Bogus. If you can't replicate them in a scientific procedure, then it was almost certainly confounders, uncontrolled variables, etc., of which there were a TON. But you don't have any basic understanding of science or (as is pertinent in cold reading/behavioural biases/etc. that I listed in a previous post) psychology. You do not have the understanding to critically examine what he did, you just credulously accept what he did and his claims. That is not science, that is charlatanry.

As I state over and over again, much of the testing is beyond the whole statistical analysis, percentage of yes/no responses that were right or wrong. Moan all you want about the test not being good enough, that doesn't change the whole of the data received and witnessed. You also have to look at the type of information being given. Responses that cannot be explained by random guessing, or cold reading.

How do you determine random chance, stupid? Statistical analysis. In the statistical analysis of his paper he proved the null, that is there was no meaningful causation/correlation between the manipulation of the independant and consequent results of the dependent variable. You don't just wave your arms and hocus pocus meaningful results, you do the damned math, you do a statistical test. And that is ignoring the facts behind his extremely flawed methodology. His paper is what is referred to as a "junk paper", poor method, procedure, manipulation of independent variables, poor measurement of the dependent variables. Yet his experiment STILL returned a null result within his own (poorly) selected criterion. He failed on his OWN terms.

You have absolutely no understanding of the subject of cold reading. Go read some information on cold reading, and wiki each and every one of the concepts that the person brings up. Because they are not just making shit up. Also wiki each term I'm using in here because you obviously don't understand what a null result is, what experimental rigor is, the purpose of the double blind, the purpose of controls, what independent and dependent variables are, on consistant internal rigor, etc. etc.

And again, his PAPER, the one he PUBLISHED, had NO STATISTICAL BASIS FOR HIS CLAIMS. On all three criterion that the dependent variable was measured, he failed to make any statistically significant findings. And no that isn't me just "parroting the critics", I had to take a behavioural statistics class in the 2nd year of my honors degree, and a lab stats course in the 3rd year of the same degree. Of course I don't do that shit by hand anymore, I load up SPSS, and surprise, it takes approximately 2 seconds for that program to tell me none of his results were statistically significant within any meaningful confidence interval.

Just because you assume a bunch of shit, don't assume everyone else is just as ignorant as you. Even though any number of profs would kill me for telling you to wiki shit, at least you'll have *some* understanding which you currently lack.

Until you actually get a handle on basic scientific procedure talking to you is pointless, because it all just goes over your head because you're either too lazy or too unwilling to get the pertinent information to understand what I am saying.

I'm done, all you do is wave your hands and plug your ears and go "NANANANA" whenever your new age hokey shit gets pointed out for the shit that it is. Just don't, don't, ever refer to anything you believe as scientific or scientifically verified. Stop pretending that this isn't basically your religion and therefore beyond the bounds of rational science.

edit: to everyone else, sorry about fagging up this thread. I like ghost stories.

[NargorothRiP]

nod please continue to post interesting stories. i dont come to an internet forum to debate fucking epistemology.

[The Edge]

Originally Posted by Schatze

To everyone who is not edge, and is not interested in reading me getting pissed off at his stupid claims, skip this post. I apologize for fagging up the thread. I like ghost stories :/

For you, The Edge
[spoiler]

It really sucks that Schwartz, myself, and those like us know so little about the scientific method. We sure suckered our Universities out of a degree. Thanks for being my guiding light.

/sarcasm

I like ghost stories too, but this isn't the Urban Legend Fairy Tale thread. People are here to discuss the paranormal with videos or personal experiences. For someone that doesn't believe this stuff exists in some form, I have to question why you even bothered clicking the thread? Seems like a waste of time to me.

[Schatze]

I'm interested in the phenomenon, and I'm interested in the scary stories. I'll outline a real, verified, tale of the paranormal.

Imagine you wake up one day, to find your wife, your son, your daughter... replaced. That is, while your loved one, sitting at the breakfast table looks, sounds, smells, and even has the mannerisms of your old loved one, you know they are not. That somehow, someway, your loved one is not who they were. They are an entirely different person. Your mind goes crazy, trying to explain what happened. You don't know how it's possible, but it is. Maybe the person across from you is a changeling, a clone, an alien implanted imposter. You don't know, all you know is, that person is not who they look and sound like.

What's worse is you know your real loved one is out there. You can talk to them on the phone, you can email them, you can do all these things, yet the person who eats at your table or sleeps in your bed is not the real individual. Either your loved one is complicit with the switch, or is being forced to cooperate in the charade. You don't know what's worse, whether they're complicit but safe, or being coerced into maintaining the charade. You try to find some way to get your loved one back, anyway you can. You could kill the imposter, hold them for ransom and demand the return of your real loved one, or, well, you don't know. You don't know what nefarious force is behind the switch, but you do know that it has happened...

That's the reality behind the Capgras delusion. The loved one is not an imposter. There is no conspiracy. But either due to a head blow or lesion, the link between the FFA and the amygdala in the limbic system is caused to malfunction. The FFA is responsible for facial recognition and identity. The amygdala for multiple roles, including emotions, emotional memory, etc. A lesion between the two breaks the interconnection. Subconsciously you recognize who the person is, and subconsciously you know how you should feel about that person, but due to the actual physical severing of the link, the two parts of the brain do not function in conjunction. The information that emerges into the consciousness is that you recognize this person, but that this person is [i]not the one you care about, it's a different person[i]. The delusion only emerges when you are looking at the person themselves, talking on the phone will cause no such dissonance. People rationalize this brain functioning in the ways I've described, replacement by an impostor, clone, by aliens, the government, or supernatural forces. While the Capgras delusion can arise in schizophrenics without the lesioning, in people with the lesion, they may be in otherwise perfect mental health with little to no impairment except for the delusion.

Just because the subjective experience of the sufferer is not true, doesn't mean that this syndrome isn't scary as fuck and interesting. Not that I'm claiming people who experience paranormal stuff have a lesion (although honestly they may, or a tumor, or other abnormality, for the people who experience chronic, recurring, unexplainable phenomenon esp. including visual hallucinations), but while I don't think the objective reality of ghosts is real, the subjective experience and the objective phenomenon are what interest me. Whether it's a glitch in the brain or whatever, the phenomenon is still cool as fuck.

some more for edge

Spoiler Alert, click show to read:

By the way, do you believe in ID? Cause Gary Schwartz does! After his recent bout on writing about mediums, he's now turned up as an intelligent design proponent.

Some more on Schwartz's parapsychology experiments, from primary participants.

For four years, Schwartz tested DuBois in his lab. He came out with a book last October called The Truth About Medium: Extraordinary Experiments with the real Allison DuBois of NBC's Medium and other Remarkable Psychics. There used to be photo of DuBois with Schwartz and his psychic buddy Laurie Campbell on DuBois's website. Not any more. There is now an "editorial" lambasting Schwartz for his duplicity. DuBois writes:

... I do not endorse Dr. Gary Schwartz. I was disappointed to find out that the four years that I spent in the lab for "science" are, in my view, being misused by Dr. Schwartz -- even after I expressed my disapproval.

Gary says that I asked him to write a book about me which is a figment of his imagination. I actually asked him to NOT write a book about me which his publisher Hampton Roads is well aware of since they were served by my attorney before it released....He points to an e-mail from a year ago that he cut and pasted and only shows part of the e-mail trying to make the argument that I said I'd endorse his book.

Participating in lab studies with Dr. Schwartz was never to be a for-profit venture. I always understood that we were participating in scientific studies to help us and the world gain a better understanding of our abilities. Several of our "sitters" in the lab, unknown to many of the mediums, turned out to be writing their own books. In turn, Dr. Schwartz wrote forewords for those books or was mentioned in them. I was promised complete confidentiality and anonymity in how Dr. Schwartz and the University would report the results of these studies. Needless to say, I as well as other mediums were surprised to find our participation in the lab featured in so many other books.

Seems to be a rather incestuous relationship between Schwartz, his participants, and judging by what you've posted and some of his new stuff, the Deepend Chap indeed.