I take (some) exception to your listing chiropractic in the list. About 5 years ago, for reasons I still don't know, I became barely ambulatory through back pain. I purposely didn't go to chiropractor even though my health insurance would have paid for a wide selection of them. After several months and reaching a point where I could barely get in and out of my car, I went to a chiropractor recommended by a coworker. In three weeks and three visits I was cured.
In years thereafter, in a ad hoc sort of way, I would visit her from time to time for no particular reason usually for a good back cracking. For no explainable reason, suddenly she shifted from mechanical manipulation to hocus-pocus garbage. She bought in to ear candling and all kinds of other garbage and REDUCED the physical part that obviously had the miraculous effect on me years ago. I'm betting that she lost more customers than me.
Er... but back to my point. Obviously people can have something seriously wrong with their back that can be fixed by proper manipulation.
know what was wrong with your back. So you definitely cannot say that the a chiropractor healed you (I use cured for pathogens).
Occasionally I get horrible back pain. So bad that I cannot enter and exit my vehicle or even stand up straight. But they eventually go away after a few weeks after I adjust me sleep posture. I'm overweight so I sleep with a support under my legs which helps the back pain.
So my point is that back pain can be a tricky thing that is difficult to diagnose properly. And that you may have becoem better if you did nothing.
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...you don't know what was wrong with your back. So you definitely cannot say that the a chiropractor healed you...
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I agree with your point in principle, but I know countless people who have had back problems "cured" or improved by a chiropractor. Some of these anecdotes are probably true. Why is it so hard to believe that mechanical manipulation of a painful area can cause an adjustment that resolves the problem? I also believe that more than half of chiropractors are total charlatans, hence my reluctance to have one manipulate this very important part of me. And also my insistance on only visiting one who had received glowing reviews from someone whose opinion I respected. Because the field is predominated by charlatans, before my back pain, I couldn't imagine a scenario that would cause me to visit a chiropractor. Being athletic all my life and in tune with my body, and then over months reaching a state of virtualy not being ambulatory caused me to have the opinion "I ain't got nothing, so I ain't got nothin' to lose" otherwise you couldn't have dragged me there. It is my religiously held belief that this chiropractor is the reason my back was repaired.
This is what Dave thinks: There is no amount of time of failed UFO observations that will go by that will make him understand the folly of throwing even $1 or $20,000,000 or any amount of $ additional at the issue.
I am absolutely sure that anyone who believes in UFOs is either uneducated or it is their religion. Trust me, if you/we are lucky enough for space aliens to visit here during our life time, it will not be debateable that it occurred.
You are perfect examples of Bill Beaty's term: "True disbelievers". You are also the reason that organized skepticism (AKA: "True Disbelief") continues to experience a "Skeptical about Skeptics" backlash!
Real skeptics simply withold judgement. As such, I qualify as a better skeptic than any of the three of you, who are already frozen in your personal dogmas.
Let me add to my original comment:
"So, Al (Ray, and Brain), you're absolutely, 100% sure that UFOs are "fairy tales", eh, he asked in response, also rhetorically?" And you're also absolutely sure that no amount of careful, scientific research will ever turn up solid evidence as to what the TRULY unknown flying entities are? And you're even more convinced that under no circumstances could they possibly be non-terrestrial spcecraft.
Gentlemen, no-one who waves the Banner of Science should ever be that sure of anything! At best, Science is only a tentative, consensual, human interpretation of reality. None of you may be comfortable with that, but them's the facts, Guys!
Thanks for the compliment Dave to put me in the same category with Ray and Al
Lets look at the facts first! 39% of households in Western Europe have a digital camera and in the US it’s not much different. This year in western Europe 29.8 million units were sold and last year 22,5 million http://www.dpreview.com/news/0509/05092101west_bigmarket.asp . What about United States, Japan and Asia? There are at least 100 million digital cameras world wide and how many digital camcorders (video cameras) are there? What about film cameras and the old VHS camcorders? From all of them hundreds of millions still cameras that people have and also video cameras worldwide, no two people were able to take a sharp picture of the same "UFO" from a different angle. Pictures were taken of Shoemaker-Levy 9 by armature astronomers and nobody has ever taken two pictures from different angles of this soooooooooooo famous, fabulous "UFO".
Since there are so many cameras and even more "UFO" believers and no two people were able to take two pictures from a different angle of the "UFO", there is only one logical conclusion. The "UFO" is as real as voodoo, horoscopes and reincarnation!
About organized skepticism. The reason why it’s not accelerating is the lack of advertisement and proper product placement. Organized skepticism, like any other commodity, has to be presented at the marketplace to consumers in to them known, acceptable ways like any other similar commodity.
Brain
By unknown: Be careful of your thoughts, for your thoughts become your words. Be careful of your words, for your words become your actions. Be careful of your actions, for your actions become your habits. Be careful of your habits, for your habits become your character. Be careful of your character, for your character becomes your destiny.
This isn't aimed at you Dave, since I've said all this before long ago, and it's not my goal to change your mind. But it is my goal to make you look foolish every time you provide the ammo for it. So this is for all the lurker(s) who may be passing through.
***** DTW ********* And you're also absolutely sure that no amount of careful, scientific research will ever turn up solid evidence as to what the TRULY unknown flying entities are? And you're even more convinced that under no circumstances could they possibly be non-terrestrial spcecraft. *******************
Nothing said in this thread so far is a logical antecedent to the two questions DTW asks above. They merely show him twisting what anyone said in his typical and hackneyed way to suit his intentions. Or (more likely?) trolling like usual.
****** DTW ************ Gentlemen, no-one who waves the Banner of Science should ever be that sure of anything! ***********************
Almost anything imaginable is impossible compared to the relatively few things that comply with laws of physics. At will, I can cough up reams of garbage, as people do every day, it is the easiest thing in the world to spew forth ideas and proposition that don't even have a low probability of being true. The world is awash in garbage. One can build the foundation of your weltanschauung on a floating see of garbage, where you believe that all things may be possible, like reincarnation, astrology, homeopathy, ghosts, candling, etc. and every once in a rare while you can step on something that looks like it will sink and you will actually be standing. Or one can take the opposite approach and stand on what is real and use it as a foundation to discover what else is real while dismissing the distracting dross of the improbable and only on rare occasions be wrong in doing so.
It is no wonder that DTW believes in reincarnation. His foundation is a swamp of untruths and impossibilities. Every new impossible idea looks like it may be OK after you accept that anything may be true. He has chosen this and yet he is smart enough to chose otherwise. Go figure everyone. Once one believes that anything is possible, well, I guess, ... anything is possible to you. Some people say; "anything is possible". When it is said in the metaphorical sense, OK, I get it, and I'm right there with them. But some say "anything is possible" and literally mean it. This definitely ranks up there with the dumbest thing anyone can say.
DTW's foundation of garbage makes him unprovably wrong all the time. My foundation of science makes me hardly ever wrong. DTW is basically a pussy, I've said this before, this is not an ad hominem attack, it is an explanation of why he has his point of view. He is afraid to be wrong. He can have his unfalsifiable beliefs indefinitely and never be proven wrong. He has a safe haven of mush. On the other hand, people making assertions based on known laws of physics are going to be provably right or wrong all the time. DTW doesn't want to even be wrong rarely. I don't give a crap about the rare times that I am wrong since it takes so little effort for me to be right with my approach.
I must add here, that if I was a researcher/scientist, (and occasionally when I am researching at work) then I would (and do) have a different point of view. You can't find the rare unexpected truths if you don't let every idea flow in to the mix with equal impartiality.
********* DTW *************** You are also the reason that organized skepticism (AKA: "True Disbelief") continues to experience a "Skeptical about Skeptics" backlash! *****************************
DTW is just plain silly here. No one even knows who I am except for a few people on this board and outside of it. And I am happy with that and don't do things to try to change that. I am not speaking for the others, but I am guessing it is similar for them. We have nothing to do with any movement. I feel safe saying that about Ray, maybe Brain will correct me if I'm wrong about him.
But if I could, by fiat, divert $10,000,000 dollars spent worldwide on studying "ghosts" (or pick your favorite garbage, baseless, belief) every year, instead to fortifying critical thinking at an early level in schools, guess which way would have a greater impact on the broadening of knowledge and truth?
We have nothing to do with any movement. I feel safe saying that about Ray, maybe Brain will correct me if I'm wrong about him.
I agree with you, unfortunately the social, economic, political Skeptics, Steve, Reverend Moore, CRACKpot and Robin think the same
The word movement implies to move, change, come forward and that’s what’s missing in both paranormal as well as social, economic and political Skeptics
Brain
GEORGE BERNARD SHAW: Some men see things as they are and say, "Why?" I dream of things that never were and say, "Why not?
"Where do they recruit scientists for the research?"
December 6 2005, 5:25 PM
he asked, before adding: "I won't oppose it if they just want to promote local tourism through the programme."
While some thought it was UFOs that did all these strange things, scientists said after a field trip that thunder, lightning and tornados were the probable causes.
---Al
