Likely to be my last posting till monday, as the server seems to be already slowing to a crawl, but Jay, same challenge to you as Czar. “magic may exist”. Care to disprove it?
Holy Shiite. Have you even READ “Truth and Falsifiability”? The arguments you make below are EXACTLY the kind of thing Popper’s theorem was created to kill! By the Falsifiability Theorem, your ideas about magick aren’t considered valid scientific thought.
Epistemologically, black swan is a canard anyway. We know that color usually varies between members of an animal species (like, say, humans??), so the existence of a black swan wouldn’t greatly muck up our model of the world. In fact, it’s something we’d come to expect.
Here’s my theory - You may be a serial rapist responsible for a rash of attacks in the greater Seattle area.
Care to disprove it? No matter how you try and deny it, I can restructure my argument to keep you suspect in the eyes of the law.
OBJECTION: “But I’m a dedicated family man!”
ANSWER: “So was Robert Yates, the Spokane man recently convicted of a string of murders spanning a decade.”
O: “But I live in Tel Aviv!”
A: “Ever hear of airplanes?”
O: “But I’m gay!”
A: “The perfect cover story!”
See how ugly the world would become if we had to run around disproving idiotic ideas that lacked any evidence in the first place?
So, no, I can’t categorically prove that magick doesn’t exist. All I can say is that there is zero evidence that magick - as currently understood, structured and practiced - exists. The burden is on YOU to prove otherwise, not on me to disprove a negative - just as a defendant in court doesn’t have to prove his innocence. (Well, theoretically…)
If you can (1) show that your incantations, under controlled conditions, affect external reality, and (2) show me the causal mechanism that makes this happen - Hell, no one would be happier than I. I’d start batting for your team immediately.
-J-
Welcome to The Straight Dope! I hope you are around for a very long time!
A damn hearty welcome to JAA!
What he said :). Statements such as “Such-and-such may exist. Prove me wrong!” should not be proven or disproven-they should be ignored by anyone with an I.Q. over 35. It is a non-sensical statement, usually brought up as a last resort by people who have nothing whatsoever in the way of proof one way or another.
Yeah, it’s like the guy who realizes all the evidence is against him and all he can say is “Well, it’s POSSIBLE!”
If your opponent says that, you know you’ve won.
Sheesh… “may exist”? My theory is you may grow a dick on your forehead tomorrow. Actually it cannot be called a theory as “may exist” cannot be subjected to validation - it is empty of such concept. It either does or doesn’t. In other words, because I would like to make sure you don’t try to turn this around, only when you phrase it like “magic exists” or “magic does not exist” can it be validated or not with adequate scientific proof so that’s a non-issue (Damn I hate these wording debates). Since no one has presented credible evidence that it does I have every reason to assume it doesn’t, with adequate proof that no one has ever been able to levitate a quarter with a spell in a scientific experiment. Furthermore “magic does not exist” is always valid until disproven. Picking this from your angle, I say Dragons do not exist. It is a valid claim is it not?
Your post credits merit and I am unfamiliar with Popper’s Falsifiability Theorem but your looking at this from a wrong perspective (in my opinion:) ).
JayAndrewAllen addressed this very well, you cannot prove a NEGATIVE, people who claim magic(k) exists and has an impact on the natural, physical, outside world (forget spells to change mindset) have to prove their claims. If they don’t or take refuge in evasives like “I can do it but I don’t need to prove anything to anyone” then by all means stay a deluded moron.
Valid statement that! 
I have enjoyed this thread and in particular your posts. Keep up the good work fighting ignorance.
P.S: Your apology was, IMHO, uncalled for. The Pit is the place for venting and that is what I think it was.
I think the title of this thread, “Stupid fucks who believe in magic”, sums up the pro-magic argument quite eloquently.
This particular me doesn’t take that on faith… if anything (and I stress that that word does not pertain my feelings to this issue) it tells me such “forces” do not exist. Our current methods are working fine with things far more complex than the so called magick that has been put forth before here. But I’m open to that possibility alright, otherwise I’d would not have been participating in this thread.
And that’s a relief because I’d have some considerable difficulty trying not to burst out laughing in your face!
I do see the difference (thankyouverymuch). We also have come a long way since the times when things we couldn’t understand like thunder or fire were explained upon deities or magic so a little arrogance doesn’t shock me. Still the first quote you made strikes me as more reasonable than the second. All I’m saying is that, if people who do deal with magic (money invoking magic mind you), please share that knowledge so that I can learn from them and benefit from their experience. I would just like the believers to prove their spells can have a real effect on, let’s say me for example, or admit that “This is not possible, based upon are current understanding of the laws of nature”. Pretty straightforward stuff to me…
<Curtsy> Good to be here in the realm of the sane.
-J-
Roughtly, the Falsifiability Theorem states that an idea does not even belong in the realm of science unless you can construct a condition in reality - usually an experiment - whose failure to perform to your predictions would disprove the idea. Popper created it in response to things like Adlerian psychology, specifically after he witnessed Adler diagnose a child he had never met, based on ten minutes conversation with a third party. “How can you do that?” Popper asked. Adler replied, “Because of my thousand-fold experience.” “Well,” Popper retorted, “I guess that makes it thousand-and-one-fold.”
Rock on, Rice Krispies Treats…
-J-
…so I should be the one to finish it off.
Sir Francis Bacon once said, “Man prefers to believe what he prefers to be true.” It’s something everyone should remember, skeptics and believers alike. If what you prefer to believe turns out to be true, you’re okay. If what you prefer to believe turns out to be false, you ought to change your mind, no matter how difficult it is to do, no matter how comforting that false belief may be. In the long run, you’ll be better off.
Moderators, I move that we end this thread if only because it’s gotten so fucking long. 350+ posts are enough, I say! If the rest of you wish to continue the discussion, start a Part Two thread.
My apologies Jab, but I wish to respond to Czar.
Get over youself, Czar. If you can’t prove it wrong, accept it. Coming out with ridiculous little tantrums and asserting a statement isn’t worth your consideration is the move of a child.
Or, to paraphrase you, statements like “should be ignored by anyone with an I.Q. over 35” is the last resort of a person who has no way whatsoever to disprove a hypothesis they disagree with.
I state again. It may exist. It appears to be a big old universe and I doubt very much we’ve seen half of all there is to see yet.
He has, as he’s stated numerous times.
However, YOU seem unable to grasp the fact that he shouldn’t HAVE to be asked to “prove it wrong”.
And monkeys may fly out of my butt. And Dubya may be an absolute genius. And Timothy McVeigh may be completely innocent of the OK bombing.
On the other hand, there is far more evidence to suggest otherwise. I don’t see why this is a difficult notion to understand.
Or are we going to stop fighting ignorance and just start throwing out wild assumptions about what MAY be true?
Eight pages in, somebody finally mentions Popper, and now jab1 wants to end the thread. Meanwhile, assuming that after his apology this thread would end, I hang out in GD and wait for someone to post something interesting in Czar’s thread, blithely unaware that the real debate is raging down here.
I was clearly born under a bad sign. Not that I believe in astrology, mind you.
Just to quickly address the point about Sir Karl: I don’t think he would be too worried about whether or not magic exists. Popper’s criteria are mainly designed to differentiate between what might properly be considered “science” and what might not. He explicitly states that he was never interested in the “truth value” of a statement, which he believed was a pointless philosophical side issue (see Conjectures and Refutations, somewhere around page 30, I believe). He also argued that one can’t induce the “truth” about Nature, one can only discover one’s own false beliefs. One does that by attempting to falisify “observation statements” derived from theories.
Theories from which it is difficult, or impossible, to derive observation statements can’t be tested, and are thus “unfalsifiable.” That means that according to Popper’s criteria, they are unscientific. It does not mean, however, that they are untrue. It merely implies that we cannot use scientific methods to ascertain their status as statements that reflect the fundamental laws of Nature. Thus, such statements go into the pile of “possible but probably unknowable, thanks to Hume’s critique of induction.” With regard to the big three (Adler, Marx, and Freud), for example, Popper claims that he has no doubt that there is much that is true in Freud’s theories, but that he believes the theory is still in its “metaphysical” stage and has yet to develop to a point at which it can be tested – thus it is still “unscientific.”
Popper had a very humble attitude towards “truth” (from what I’ve read, that is) and was pessimistic about the possibility of ever reaching an ultimate certainty. I’m sure that he would find the proposition “magic exists” to be extremely doubtful, but I don’t know if he would necessarily rule it out using his critieria. Instead, I would guess that he would simply rule such statements are untestable.
Finally, welcome to SMDB, JayAndrew. Although I don’t quite know how sane we all are, really…
Ah, the old fighting ignorance schmaltz, how good to see. Tell me again how fighting ignorance is construed as piously declaring that things that lie outwith our knowledge must surely not exist? Tell me how it lies with making pronouncements that are logically wrong? Bullshit to that.
What really fucking riles me is this. I don’t believe in magic, I’ve never seen it done or know anybody who has, I don’t practise any form of it, or have any reason to want such a thing to exist. That doesn’t mean I close my mind to the whole concept though, and just tritely announce that it cannot exist. How the fuck can people proudly announce that they’re fighting ignorance whilst indulging in such hubris? You don’t personally believe in magic, good for you, more power to you. But until you find some way of proving a negative, all you’re doing is stating a fucking opinion so stop acting like you’ve got some intellectual high ground for your opinion. As for me, I’ll stick to giving it a maybe, and getting on with things that actually can be looked into and researched.
As for the butt monkeys, is there some anal-primate fixation going here, or what?
If there’s no evidence to something’s existence, we don’t go around claiming that it MIGHT exist just because there’s not clear, damning evidence to the contrary.
The pronouncement “There’s not evidence of the existence of magic” is NOT logically wrong. Or is it? If you believe it is, please explain to me how.
You know, neither do I. But I don’t tritely announce that it MAY exist, either. Also, I don’t immediately go off and try to insult everyone else who tries to keep a rational mind about the whole issue.
It’s simple: We look at the evidence and base our comments and arguments on that. And the evidence shows that magic is far more likely to NOT exist.
We’re not trying to prove a negative, you idiot! We’re trying to get someone else to prove a positive! So far, nobody’s succeeded in offering any evidence that magic exists!
How often must you be told that before it sinks in through the layers of stupid that surround your brain?
You never saw Wayne’s World, did you?
Spoofe, I’ll try to keep this short enough to give you a go at understanding it.
You are trying “to prove a negative, you idiot” - you’re trying to say that something does not exist. Which part of that confuses you? Which bit do you not have the capacity to follow? To say that something does not exist is to assert a negative.
And now, to some of your other comedy statements:
"If there’s no evidence to something’s existence, we don’t go around claiming that it MIGHT exist just because there’s not clear, damning evidence to the contrary."
No, you make proclamations that it doesn’t exist, then throw your rattle out of your pram when the lack of logic in that statement is pointed out.
"The pronouncement “There’s not evidence of the existence of magic” is NOT logically wrong."
No it’s not, which is why I made that statement myself.
"I don’t immediately go off and try to insult everyone else who tries to keep a rational mind about the whole issue."
Which is an amusing piece of hypocrisy in a thread that includes phrases like “you idiot” and “sinks in through the layers of stupid”
"And the evidence shows that magic is far more likely to NOT exist."
Ah, good old likelihood and inductive reasoning. Why do I get the feeling you won’t be adding to the debate on what Karl Popper or David Hume’s stance on this would be?
I agree it is unwise to say you can prove something doesn’t exist. (I might have a go at the Loch Ness monster, because the Loch is limited in size, and over the years there’s never been any evidence of the many monsters that would need to exist to keep the ‘species’ alive.)
So I’ll go with the OP - why do people believe in magic when there’s no evidence for it?
Why do you give it a maybe?
I’ll believe in anything, given some evidence. (A box powered by electricity playing chess well comes to mind )But experience shows that if some unscrupulous people can make money out of a hoax, they will. So I do ‘cast doubt’ on stuff like psychics, mediums, astrology and levitation. All these are available for money - and yet there is no evidence they exist!
SPOOFE: “I don’t immediately go off and try to insult everyone else who tries to keep a rational mind about the whole issue.”
**Gary Kumquat:**Which is an amusing piece of hypocrisy in a thread that includes phrases like “you idiot” and “sinks in through the layers of stupid”
SPOOFE did not immediately call people stupid. He waited until they had provided evidence they were stupid.
I did not want to end this thread because I thought the argument was over. I wanted to end it because it’s gotten so fucking long. (BTW, it’s the longest thread I’ve ever started and it spawned others.)