Remote Viewer Dr. Paul Smith has concerns about the direction of parapsychology research. Also doubts 9/11 remote viewing.

photo by: David Webb
A few years ago, when the kids were younger, they loved playing hide-and-seek in our backyard. Our version of the game was played at night. The finder was granted the use of a flashlight, but had to cover a large area with many good hiding spots. My kids were good at hiding and I wasn't very effective at finding them -- except once!  The game had started as usual, but for some reason (probably related to a Skeptiko interview I had done) I thought about psychicly remote viewing their location. As soon as the thought crossed my mind an image of my oldest son and daughter crouched underneath a wooden play flashed in my mind. Even though I had never had such an experience before, I felt quite sure about what I had seen and immediately ran there. I turned on the flashlight and there they were -- exactly as I had seen them.

While my brush with remote viewing wouldn't impress serious parapsychology researchers, or professional remote viewers like today's guest Dr. Paul Smith, it defiantly left me with the sense that I had experienced something beyond what traditional science can explain. Today's guest on Skeptiko explores how science is approaching strange phenomena like remote viewing and whether a tradition/reductionist scientific approach is likely to yield results:

Dr. Paul Smith: I call it the “Stockholm Syndrome” of the parapsychology community. Stockholm Syndrome is where people who are taken hostage start to identify with the hostage takers and start to sympathize with them. I kind of see--at least some members of the parapsychology community--longing so much to be one with the physicalists that they are attempting to come up with an explanation--a physical explanation--that captures the phenomenon that they’re researching. I agree with you. I don’t think the physical model will ever explain it. That’s a conclusion I come to in my dissertation is essentially, the odds are … in science and in parapsychology for that matter, you can only go on odds. In fact human knowledge itself is based on probabilities. So the odds are that there is no real physical explanation for parapsychology and parapsychology effects because they aren’t physical.

Alex Tsakiris: I don’t think there’s enough of a discussion about that because the other thing that you’re really drawing out there is we have to be real about the pull for that. These are human beings, number one, and they’re professionals and they’re seeking to have some kind of career to put bread on the table. But there’s also the peer pressure to fit in the existing paradigm. Until we’re really honest and say this is social enterprise as well, and of course there can’t be a purity, then we can have more compassion and say, okay, now I understand how this could happen the way that Dr. Smith is saying…that this Stockholm Syndrome could take effect to these very intelligent scientists. Because otherwise people look at it and say, oh that couldn’t possibly be true.

Dr. Paul Smith: It really is a sociological game. Science always has been. If you look at how much the majority rules when theories are wrong, and how there’s this massive inertia to keep from changing once the science has been proved to be wrong on some cause-and-e...