David Bailey
Member
I think I am saying the effect is probably real, but it can't reasonably be said to have been experimentally demonstrated. We don't know all the constrains that Dr Powell may have been under, but you can't really say that the demonstration was convincing - I mean, I imagine that an autistic child might develop a very deep bond with her carers, and who knows what information may flow between them by who knows what means.thx for this analogy... gets at the reality of how this kind of science is done and perceived.
It's absurd (i.e. deifies common sense, rational thinking) to suggest that cueing and leakage could account for these off-the-chart results. the only reason this kind of silliness gets any traction at all is because science-as-we-know-it folks are so determined to find a way to jam everything back into their crazy mind=brain model that they'll grasp at anything that gets them there (classic Apologetics). I mean, come on, do any of you really believe that cueing explains this???
Finally, stack up the natural history of telepathy versus the natural history of this kind of unintentional cueing.
I am inclined to think this is real telepathy because there are various related reports of such things with autistic people, and some of the feats of autistic savants seem to require ψ of one sort or another, but that is not the same as thinking that this experiment demonstrates ψ. Don't forget that this is not potential cueing between random individuals, but between two individuals that are very close, and have been dealing with similar problems (arithmetic etc) together for months or years.
My biggest concern is that the child seems to touch more than one number before the stencil is suddenly snatched away. As I understand it, the person who is snatching it away can see what is going on, and knows the number in question!
Dr Powell seemed to say she was going back to do improved tests, and maybe this will resolve the problem.
Since the girl has two carers, I don't see why one can act as the sender, while the other would help the child with the stencil. This would be a perfectly acceptable ψ experiment.
If that doesn't work, I would try a precognition experiment in which child and carer would be a team, trying to guess a number or word that would be displayed to both of them a few seconds later.
Even if the statistics were inferior, a successful experiment of one of these sorts would be more persuasive IMHO.
If you are in touch with Dr Powell, I would hope you could use your influence to get her to try some experiments of this sort.
David