For the record, neither of these two questions have been answered:
What did the Dowsers mean by underground rivers?
Can you show where Randi has said that he considers all bogus science to be paranormal or pseudoscience?
For the first you responded by asking me what I thought underground rivers. That is not an answer to the question. For the second you said you didn’t have do, but I didn’t ask if you had to, I asked if you could.
(Added`emphasis mine)
His “challenge” hinges on "drilling deep enough, not “consult[ing] geolgical surveys.” Do really not see that this a substantial altering of his words, something that you are on record as being against?
He is talking about drilling through rock. You are talking about map reading. Do you think that the two are equivalent? If not, why do feel free to make the substitution.
I believe I will not be violating great debates rules when I say that, unless there is significant difference between an underground stream and an underground river, you are a liar.
Daniel
Then, by the official rules, you do not qualify to be a challenger. Why do you insist on persuing this action?
(bolding mine)
Given your own track record in this specific department, you do not want to go down that road.
Peter Morris,
Given the following example:
There is a woman who is explaining how to paint a house to some people who don’t know how. She further states that you need to be wary of people who will offer to paint your house for you, who don’t have a license. And further she says that people who don’t have a license can’t actually paint at all, and she will pay you X dollars to anyone who finds a person who isn’t licensed, but who can paint.
As she is saying all this, another man overhears this and also where the woman comments that the house they are looking at is “yellow”. The house is, however, “tan”, as anyone can see. But the woman uses the term yellow simply because it’s close enough and the people she is talking to aren’t the most exciting people in the world and probably only know the primary colors.
Now, the man who overhears all this, for whatever reason, comes to the conclusion that:
So now, my question is: Why do you think that Mr. Randi admitting that there are underwater rivers, flowing through underwater caves, but also saying that this is irrelevant to Dowsing because wells can be built on 94% of all land and don’t require these underwater streams, is at all relevant to you, his challenge, or possibly will make him want to give you a million dollars when his whole point is to prove that Dowsers are wrong, not to give a technically precise descriptions of underground water flow for the teeming millions?
Dang, Peter, I just read the cite from where the Randi quote was mined. It was a documentary film! About the filmmakers parents, one of whom dowses, one of whom dowse not.!
One sentence from a flm is a challenge? And specifically, an invitation to the JREF Challenge? I gotta call bullshit on that. You have provided absolutely no context for this statement. This citation is useless.
sigh. So, Randi once wrtote an article saying that :
Not a *huge *difference from the other statements he’s made where he said that water does not flow at all.
Now, I say that there are plenty of other places that water flows underground. Not all of it is limestone. I say that it flows through beds of sand and gravel, through cracks in solid rock such as granite, in paleochannels and lava tubes and all sorts of other structures. And the flow rate is a lot more than a few feet per year.
Would you agree that Randi’s words in post#226 deny the existence of such things?
Yes it was. Stop pretending it wasn’t. Asked and answered.
Do you read?
My emphasis.
False. Here’s what Randi actually said:
So it can occur in limestone (and he doesn’t talk about the rate of flow at all when discussing flow through limestone caves), AND it can occur in porous material (where it can flow as much as a few miles in a year).
Beds of sand and gravel are porous. Cracks in solid rock, paleo channels, lava tubes, and so forth are not. Whether his words deny the existence of such things is ambiguous, but you may well be right that he denied them. In such a case, it would be helpful to ask him, “Randi, do you believe that water sometimes flows underground through lava tubes?” If he says, “Of course it does,” then you have no case: he’s corrected an error in speech. If he continues to deny that water sometimes flows underground through lava tubes, AND if he claims that a demonstration of such flow would constitute paranormal power, then you have a case.
Daniel
I’m pretending nothing. The only conceivable answer I can derive from that is that you’re proposing Clarke as the authority on randi’s meaning, and you’ve denied that’s what you meant. You’re just blatantly wrong on this; whether it’s a lie or a delusion is beyond my ken.
Daniel
Three questions for Peter.
Is the purpose of this thread at least partially an attempt to make money from ad revenue generated by people visiting your site?
If not true, can you stop linking to your site as answers to questions?
If it is true, wouldn’t you be better off adding a forum section to the site?
Regarding the third, while you’d definitely be made fun of by just about every visitor who happened upon the site, you’d at least get a great bump in page views.
Wow, that didn’t even occur to me. That’s a pretty corrupt approach to debate, if you’re right.
Daniel
First question - I am not a mind reader, I can’t tell you what other people meant and if the term “underground rivers” means anything other than “rivers that are under the ground” then I can’t help you.
Second question. I never claimed he said that, it has no connection to my application, it has no relevence to me at all. If it matters to you, then YOU do the research. It makes no difference to me.
I should have wondered about that when I made the pit thread (all are invited to the roast):
In any case, I have seen enough lies from Peter Morris to not bother anymore here.
Will come back here when he stops tap dancing to **Priceguy’s ** posts.
I would agree that his words deny it, but as the Left Hand has stated, this is most likely an issue of speaking with too many sweeping statements. He is probably correct that only 1% of underground water flows, and that most of that is limitted to limestone. That he omitted the word “most” is not cause for him to give you a million dollars. It just means that he had a brain fart.
You obviously don’t follow the rules. Many of the people challenged by Randi say that their claim isn’t paranormal. Randi tells them to apply anyway, and they will win the prize as long as their claim is true - paranormal or not.
see : http://www.proverandiwrong.net/about.aspx for some examples of this.
So…
We know what you are trying to prove. We know that nothing you are trying to prove particularly conflicts with what Randi has ever said (beyond nitpicky stuff.) And we know that you’ve applied anyways.
So, what exactly are you hoping we will ask you?
Oh, that’s part of the purpose of the website, all right. What of that? Do you imagine that Randi ISN’T motivated in large part by attempting to make money from the JREF? You do realise that a considerable portion of JREF expense is the money Randi pays himself, don’t you.
But the main purpose of this thread is to allow me to tell my side of the story. I knew that if I didn’t do so, Miskatonik or Musicat or someone of their ilk would start a much nastier thread about it.
And, BTW, I got the mods permission before doing so.
They talked among themselves, then emailed me permission to post my thread.
no, my site sets out the answers to many questions you might have.
something to consider, for the future.
doesn’t bother me if people agree with me or not. I’m perfectly happy for them to think I’m wrong and Randi is right.
If YOU believe he’s right and I’m wrong, then by all means email him and urge him to take me on.