How can we tell science from pseudoscience?

[Greylorn Ell]

...
Pseudo-science is science that promotes evidence that matches its theories/beliefs (e.g. Darwinism, Big-Bang cosmology, the Standard Model) while ignoring contrary evidence. ...

Or 'God' forbid 'Beon Theory'.

AUK,
You may be correct, although not in the way you intended. He/she/it/they or whatever passes for "God" may well have forbidden Beon Theory's acceptance. It will probably die with me because I am a poor salesman/marketer, and that is unfortunate because it has world-changing potential.

For example, whereas you seem to have concluded that Beon Theory ignores contrary evidence, it is actually the only paradigm about the beginnings of the universe that incorporates all evidence, especially the evidence that science and religions ignore.

You think otherwise because like most who denigrate all ideas contradicting those they've been programmed to believe, you do not study the ideas with which you disagree.

I know that you will never take the trouble to understand the ideas behind B. T., but I'm addressing your remark in case an open-minded reader stumbles across this thread by mistake.

Beon Theory is unlike all its predecessors-- religious, scientific, mystical-- in that it is the only paradigm about the beginnings which incorporates all known facts and explains most of them.

For example, Beon Theory explains Dark Energy. It describes the beginnings without resorting to either an omnipotent God or a complex entity. Beon Theory treats consciousness as the inevitable consequence of a natural event. It does not resort to the "something from nothing" nonsense of either Christianity or Cosmology.

Every theory about the beginnings of things seems to require a hypothetical miraculous (i.e. an event or the existence of something that cannot be explained) starting point, and Beon Theory is not the exception. However, it uses a new kind of starting point. Let me explain.

An omnipotent God who knows all things is the starting point for many religions. A cosmic micro-pea, physical singularity, or sudden appearance of a universe from "nothing" provides cosmologists with their starting point. Each of these starting points requires a low-entropy creating force, that is, a highly organized force with tremendous potential already built-in-- like a thermonuclear bomb ready to explode, or a seed waiting to germinate. Sir Roger Penrose has complained about the idea of a low-entropy beginning, a situation common to both religious and scientific theories. However he has done nothing to fix it, and so far has not been interested in considering the alternative offered by Beon Theory--

Instead of one low-entropy source for the beginnings, why not two entropy-one sources?

An entropy-one thing, source, or whatever, is something that has no potential to do anything. Reiterated: Zero inherent potential to change.

In the course of explaining how a contrary pair of entropy-one spaces might have created our universe, Beon Theory uses every item of factual information available. Empirical evidence, oft repeated, is fodder for B.T. Hard science data, likewise. Beon Theory was born from physics, engineered into functionality, and nurtured with unemotional logic. It is the only available paradigm that incorporates all valid data.

Beon Theory likes every bit of parapsychological information and predicts most of it.

Beon Theory explains the core nature of Dark Energy and its relationship to our time-dependent universe, including why the universe was built with a clocked and quantized structure.

Beon Theory even explains the creators' screw-ups, which in turn explains their reluctance to let Beon Theory loose. Imagine the Creators of the Universe supporting a theory outing them as brilliant fools who neglected to plan ahead and are now incapable of saving the Universe and ultimately themselves from the consequences of their dreadful mistakes.

By way of comparison, see if you can find a professor who declared on his deathbed, "I lived a life of lies, teaching absurd beliefs to mindless students who accepted the garbage I fed them, as if it was truth, because they trusted my credentials-- credentials I obtained by kissing asses and parroting the accepted intellectual nonsense."

As the only paradigm that encompasses all experimentally obtained evidence accepted by scientists, Beon Theory explains:

1. The origin and development of consciousness.

2. Specific mechanisms for the conscious, subconscious, and super-conscious components of mind.

3. Parapsychological evidence (telepathy, telekinesis, precognition, etc.-- the kind of stuff most scientists dismiss.)

4. Evolution, plus abiogenesis and odd little things like the C-value Enigma.

5. Etc, etc.

Love and kisses,
Greylorn

[Arising_uk]

AUK,
You may be correct, although not in the way you intended. ...

No I think it in exactly the way I intended.

He/she/it/they or whatever passes for "God" may well have forbidden Beon Theory's acceptance. ...

You are delusional.

It will probably die with me because I am a poor salesman/marketer, and that is unfortunate because it has world-changing potential.

Many ideas have have this property but I think it will die because you cannot provide any proof of what you talk about and it is, as you say, just a idea cobbled together to save your previously indoctrinated religious beliefs.

For example, whereas you seem to have concluded that Beon Theory ignores contrary evidence, it is actually the only paradigm about the beginnings of the universe that incorporates all evidence, especially the evidence that science and religions ignore.

From my point of view it's just a religious version of the Monadology.

You think otherwise because like most who denigrate all ideas contradicting those they've been programmed to believe, you do not study the ideas with which you disagree.

I've read what you've put up on the web, I've even answered the question you posed that you said would get me access to the whole text, but still no joy.

I know that you will never take the trouble to understand the ideas behind B. T., but I'm addressing your remark in case an open-minded reader stumbles across this thread by mistake.

I understand the ideas behind BT, you wish to retain your religious belief in 'creators', 'souls' and 'external purpose'. What I can't understand is any of the proofs or experiments you propose that would justify your idea as you have not supplied them. Other than in your book but like I said I'm strapped for cash and think there better and more interesting books to buy out there as you are in a long-line of those with a physics based religious metaphysic to punt. You got an e-book version at a cheaper price?

Beon Theory is unlike all its predecessors-- religious, scientific, mystical-- in that it is the only paradigm about the beginnings which incorporates all known facts and explains most of them.

So you keep saying but without the relevant parts I'll not be taking your word for it.

For example, Beon Theory explains Dark Energy. It describes the beginnings without resorting to either an omnipotent God or a complex entity. Beon Theory treats consciousness as the inevitable consequence of a natural event. It does not resort to the "something from nothing" nonsense of either Christianity or Cosmology.

So you keep saying but without the relevant parts I'll not be taking your word for it. Given you claim to be a physicist I'm amazed you cannot get a hearing with such a claim?

Every theory about the beginnings of things seems to require a hypothetical miraculous (i.e. an event or the existence of something that cannot be explained) starting point, and Beon Theory is not the exception. However, it uses a new kind of starting point. Let me explain.

An omnipotent God who knows all things is the starting point for many religions. A cosmic micro-pea, physical singularity, or sudden appearance of a universe from "nothing" provides cosmologists with their starting point. Each of these starting points requires a low-entropy creating force, that is, a highly organized force with tremendous potential already built-in-- like a thermonuclear bomb ready to explode, or a seed waiting to germinate. Sir Roger Penrose has complained about the idea of a low-entropy beginning, a situation common to both religious and scientific theories. However he has done nothing to fix it, and so far has not been interested in considering the alternative offered by Beon Theory--

Instead of one low-entropy source for the beginnings, why not two entropy-one sources?

Because it still doesn't solve anything. Where did they come from? If I was to waste my time with metaphysics I'd prefer Cerverny's model of one substance undergoing change with the universe within the phase-change boundary or even Zuse and Fredkin's digital model, it's all an ancestor sim I tell you or is that an emulation?

An entropy-one thing, source, or whatever, is something that has no potential to do anything. Reiterated: Zero inherent potential to change.

In the course of explaining how a contrary pair of entropy-one spaces might have created our universe, Beon Theory uses every item of factual information available. Empirical evidence, oft repeated, is fodder for B.T. Hard science data, likewise. Beon Theory was born from physics, engineered into functionality, and nurtured with unemotional logic. It is the only available paradigm that incorporates all valid data.

It wasn't born from Physics was it, it was born from your religious indoctrination but with the bits you didn't like left-out, the Physics is just your way of supporting it.

Beon Theory likes every bit of parapsychological information and predicts most of it.

It may well do but who will ever know, not me as you will not honour the deal you offered.

Beon Theory explains the core nature of Dark Energy and its relationship to our time-dependent universe, including why the universe was built with a clocked and quantized structure.

That's because we're living in an ancestor-sim.

Beon Theory even explains the creators' screw-ups, which in turn explains their reluctance to let Beon Theory loose. Imagine the Creators of the Universe supporting a theory outing them as brilliant fools who neglected to plan ahead and are now incapable of saving the Universe and ultimately themselves from the consequences of their dreadful mistakes.

You are delusional. But let's say you're not, who's to know as you book is safely kept to yourself.

By way of comparison, see if you can find a professor who declared on his deathbed, "I lived a life of lies, teaching absurd beliefs to mindless students who accepted the garbage I fed them, as if it was truth, because they trusted my credentials-- credentials I obtained by kissing asses and parroting the accepted intellectual nonsense."

As the only paradigm that encompasses all experimentally obtained evidence accepted by scientists, Beon Theory explains:

1. The origin and development of consciousness.

2. Specific mechanisms for the conscious, subconscious, and super-conscious components of mind.

3. Parapsychological evidence (telepathy, telekinesis, precognition, etc.-- the kind of stuff most scientists dismiss.)

4. Evolution, plus abiogenesis and odd little things like the C-value Enigma.

5. Etc, etc.

Love and kisses,
Greylorn

Like you say, it'll vanish with you, as you don't honour your deals and not least because it's just another physics based religious metaphysic, along with a whole host of political and religious baggage.

[Greylorn Ell]

AUK,
You may be correct, although not in the way you intended. ...

No I think it in exactly the way I intended.

AUK,

Thank you for your reply, not because it was agreeable, but because it was detailed, thought out. You made a point to format your comments correctly, distinguishing your part of the conversation from mine. Few take the trouble to do that. Moreover, you made some excellent points.

In this reply I'll address only a few of your comments, as I'm in the midst of a life/work troublesome time. I'll complete a reply in the next week or so. Perhaps at some point in the distant future we can settle on whose intentions were prevalent. Even better, we might realize that compared to more interesting topics, personal intentions are merely passing thoughts or changing plans. Unless you want to argue that your comments are more important to the intellectual ecology than mine. I'm willing to concede that argument here and now because I hope we have more promising things to discuss.

He/she/it/they or whatever passes for "God" may well have forbidden Beon Theory's acceptance. ...

You are delusional.

Very likely. But what's life w/o a few delusions? Can you honestly declare that you have none?

It will probably die with me because I am a poor salesman/marketer, and that is unfortunate because it has world-changing potential.

Many ideas have have this property but I think it will die because you cannot provide any prove of what you talk about and it is, as you say, just a idea cobbled together to save your previously indoctrinated religious beliefs.

Although I've done a fair amount of real science and published a few minor papers in astronomy and technology, with respect to metaphysics I'm a theorist. I have put some of Beon Theory to the test, but only informally (sometimes inadvertently) and not in a controlled experimental environment. I lack the connections to do so.

Since you've certainly read Thomas Kuhn's big little book, you'll appreciate the fact that theory is more important than experimental data. As a Ph.D astronomer with whom I worked back when said in a Socorro, New Mexico bar, "Never let mere data get in the way of a good theory."

You'll know that many contributors of valuable ideas were not experimenters. Einstein is a classic example. He did thought-experiments. To investigate his ideas, others did the physical experimental work. Beon Theory must be experimentally verified by someone other than its inventor.

A small part of Beon Theory has already been verified by paranormal researchers. These guys have been formally investigating psi-stuff using scientific methodology for well over a century, work pioneered by the British Society for Psychical Research in the 19th century. Their US offspring, the American Society for Psychical Research, has been following in their footsteps, and both groups have amassed impressive evidence for the reality of phenomena like telepathy, telekinesis, precognition, and the survival of some vestiges of consciousness after death. However, during their entire history of work they have failed to develop a coherent paradigm into which their evidence might fit.

Of course I've tried to convince them that Beon Theory would give them a leg up on their paradigm problem, but they do not recognize that they have a paradigm problem. I cannot make personal contact with the powers behind that peculiar throne. Why? Dunno. Perhaps their efforts have been narrowly channeled into the experimental verification of parapsychological data for so long that they no longer care about theories or paradigms.

Your comment about cobbling some ideas to justify my religious indoctrinations is a good description for the origins of Beon Theory, which did not get its name until about a half century after the cobbling. However, the development of Beon Theory took its own path, which diverged from its origination. I'd originally wanted to integrate Catholicism with physics, along the lines of your remarks. That is not possible because that belief system and its derivatives are fundamentally absurd. An all-knowing omnipotent God created a rabble of pinheads to worship and love him? Give me a break!

Yet, indoctrination is powerful, and having been the resuscitated victim of it, I've learned to recognize its power. Of course you've seen that power at work in religious programming that convinces billions of people that an omnipotent God exists, but have you seen programming's work in your own life? Would you believe in the truth of a theory that had odds of less than 10exp-2,000,000 of being the true and correct explanation of anything? If you accept that neo-Darwinism explains evolution, you believe in worse odds.

My thoughts and studies have convinced me that religions and atheism are just the top and bottom side of the same smelly turd. The Jehovah's Witnesses and Mormons who show up at my door on occasional Sunday mornings are incapable of appreciating how their brains have been indoctrinated by illogical bullshit.

I can point out a conflicting Biblical passage to a Bible thumping Christian (e.g: God ordered the Jews, who captured Jericho on his orders and with his help, to kill all males in the city, including children, and enslave (e.g. rape) the women.) I can mention that anyone who murders and rapes children is an evil piece of shit, by their alleged "standards." Doesn't matter. This simple information from their own book is irrelevant to these pinheads, because their brains believe otherwise.

Likewise I can point out to a confirmed atheist that the probability of a single, small, 900 base-pair human gene (the program for one of the approximately 23,000 proteins in the human body) developing by random mutation is 1.4 x 10exp-542, i.e. impossible. But why bother? To the programmed Darwinist brain, or the programmed Christian brain, facts and logic are merely pebbles tossed at the walls of a medieval castle.

Programming and societal agreement rule the normal mind. The direction intelligence might take is usually guided by that programming, most of which is supplied by society.

For example, my IQ was tested when I was a young dogmatic Catholic. I learned about the results (which were kept "secret") and was surprised. It was (and might still be, despite the ravages of age and experience) in line with or a few ticks better than most of the Ph.D atheists who taught my physics classes and with whom I subsequently worked. My point? Although pretty smart I was still a programmed, dogmatic, and deluded Catholic.

Although you are also very intelligent, you could be a programmed, dogmatic, and deluded atheist. Welcome to the "human race" club.

Like you say, it'll vanish with you, as you don't honour your deals and not least because it's just another physics based religious metaphysic, along with a whole host of political and religious baggage.

Your point about honoring deals is important and correct. I vaguely recall my offer, but have no recollection of your reply, your answer to whatever question I proposed. Kindly give me a repeat, with date and time. It might have come in while I was amid surgeries and recoveries, or while I was too drunk to give a shit, or on pain meds or both.

I'll fix that. Kindly provide the needed info, especially your answer. The answer-date would be helpful. I might be able to find it. The point of my question, whatever is was, was to determine if you'd actually read the material. But if I'd concluded that you'd not done so, I should have replied accordingly. I fucked up. I appreciate your feedback, and I apologize. I'll clean this up.

Greylorn

[Wyman]

I also answered your questions, like Arising, GE. I've found you very intelligent and creative, albeit grumpy and odd at times. I mean no disrespect - actually the opposite - but I see you and Arising in one of those parks in New York playing chess every day and talking 'theory;' always ending up calling each other idiots and then coming back the next day and starting all over again. Let him (and I'll tag along) see the book - what's the worst that could happen - he calls you an idiot and trashes beon theory as a crappy quasi-religion? Well, considering he does that every chance he gets already....

[Greylorn Ell]

I also answered your questions, like Arising, GE. I've found you very intelligent and creative, albeit grumpy and odd at times. I mean no disrespect - actually the opposite - but I see you and Arising in one of those parks in New York playing chess every day and talking 'theory;' always ending up calling each other idiots and then coming back the next day and starting all over again. Let him (and I'll tag along) see the book - what's the worst that could happen - he calls you an idiot and trashes beon theory as a crappy quasi-religion? Well, considering he does that every chance he gets already....

Wyman,
I appreciate your assessment. Nothing disrespectful about the truth. For what it's worth, I was born odd, and a really nice person. Ornery took some practice and support from my social environment.

Your chess-in-the-park analogy is excellent. I had to learn that game to pass the final exam in my first computer course, but it's not my game. I preferred Contract Bridge, baseball, and football, plus an occasional fistfight-- for the personal engagement. Way too old for that shit now.

As with Arising, I must clean up my failure to follow up on communications with you. Do you have a copy of your reply to my question? I can proceed without it but would like to see it.

The first version of Digital Universe, Analog Soul pretty much sucked. Way too much political and personal horseshit, as AUK noted. There is an ongoing revision available via internet if you're interested.

You and AUK, each entirely different kinds of thinkers, both represent examples of the kinds of minds with whom I need to connect. The analogy that comes to mind is, if you want to be a serious quarterback in the NFL, play in Green Bay in December.

Greylorn

[uwot]

... Of course you've seen that power at work in religious programming that convinces billions of people that an omnipotent God exists, but have you seen programming's work in your own life? Would you believe in the truth of a theory that had odds of less than 10exp-2,000,000 of being the true and correct explanation of anything? If you accept that neo-Darwinism explains evolution, you believe in worse odds.

Greylorn

You've used variations of this argument several times. Is it not like flipping a coin a few hundred times and being amazed that the sequence of heads and tails just happens to be the one that occurs? In terms of thermodynamics: of all the essentially infinite permutations of high entropy systems, one was always going to be the case. The odds of predicting this one, from the original low entropy state, (the Big Bang being one possibility) are as long as you suggest, at least. But one high entropy state was going to happen, it just happens to be this one.

[Greylorn Ell]

... Of course you've seen that power at work in religious programming that convinces billions of people that an omnipotent God exists, but have you seen programming's work in your own life? Would you believe in the truth of a theory that had odds of less than 10exp-2,000,000 of being the true and correct explanation of anything? If you accept that neo-Darwinism explains evolution, you believe in worse odds.

Greylorn

You've used variations of this argument several times. Is it not like flipping a coin a few hundred times and being amazed that the sequence of heads and tails just happens to be the one that occurs? In terms of thermodynamics: of all the essentially infinite permutations of high entropy systems, one was always going to be the case. The odds of predicting this one, from the original low entropy state, (the Big Bang being one possibility) are as long as you suggest, at least. But one high entropy state was going to happen, it just happens to be this one.

Uwot,

I learned awhile back that an unfamiliar idea must be presented repetitively before anyone even notices it. Of all the times I've described the extraordinarily low probability for successful neo-Darwinian random mutations to DNA, you are the first person on this forum to so much as comment about it. Probably because you are one of the few on this forum qualified to do so. I'm delighted to finally have your attention. Perhaps this could initiate a serious conversation, and with that goal in mind...

Evidently you understand the appropriate interpretation of probability. Clearly, the probability that a particular definable pattern of information assembled via random chance is exactly 1.0 once it is assembled. And as you know, that comment is not relevant to this conversation.

Every Superbowl begins with a coin flip. The probabilities of the coin flip results from Superbowl I through XLIX are all exactly 1.0 because the coins have been flipped. That conversation is done and no longer interesting.

What might be interesting to a football fan are the results of subsequent coin flips, because one can bet on those outcomes. For example, theory says that the probability of the NFC team winning the flip in Superbowl L is exactly 0.5, and common sense says that the probability that any players on that team learned in school that "L" is the Roman numeral symbol for 50 is exactly zero.

Anyone who's studied elementary probability theory also knows how to calculate the likelihood of the NFC team winning the next 10 successive coin flips (just shy of 1 chance in 1000, absent a precognitive team captain-- i.e. a dumb bet). He also knows that a probability can only be calculated in the context of an outcome yet to be realized.

The DNA of any given gene has exactly a 100% probability of being that gene's DNA structure. This is more tautological than insightful. But if one was to consider how that gene came into existence over the course of time, and the sequence of mutations or other genetic events, it is only interesting to calculate the probability of that gene's assembly-probability in the larger context of time and necessity.

Remember the two cornerstones of Darwinism--- random changes (which we now interpret as modifications to DNA) plus natural selection. A small 900 base-pair gene does not come into existence at once. Evolution demands that it grow and mutate according to the needs of the body (i.e. the entire genome) it serves. Biological data also makes it obvious that only germ-cell mutations are relevant. If at any point a germ-cell gene mutates into something that does not enhance its potential offspring's ability to reproduce, the critter whose characteristics are not favorably enhanced by its contribution will not survive, and the ineffective or deleterious mutation will very likely be lost.

The only useful probability computations come from a past-time perspective.

You are essentially saying that our planet/universe/etc. has achieved an entropy 1 state (or combination of such states) and so why concern ourselves about the processes involved in reaching that state. Reminds me of the religious fundies who showed up at my door last month, trying to preach the notion that, "Look, God created the universe in six days. We know that, and the proof of it is that the universe is here. No need to worry about how God might have accomplished that, or why. No need to be concerned about the nature and properties of God. Our beliefs explain everything a man needs to know. Trust us."

Can you and I engage in a logical conversation on this, or will you insist on nothing other than a dogmatic Darwinist abuse of common logic?

BTW, have you studied Michael Behe's books?

Greylorn