RE: virus: Theory....

Brett Lane Robertson (unameit@tctc.com)
Tue, 18 Nov 1997 22:14:56 -0500

>[Forgive the ramblingness here, or don't.... A non-trivial knee injury
>has me full of pain-killers, and I may be even more disjoint than
>usual....]
>
>If your experiment shows your theory to be incorrect, you move on. It is
>not that something _must_ be falsifiable, but that an experiment requires
>the design feature of falsifiability.
>No <shaman> would ever engage in such an experiment, which altogether
>explains the fact James Randi is still in possession of 1.1 million in
>usanian dollars.
>
>I am also convinced no <shaman> could design such an experiment. This is
>the crux of my argument with <shamanism>.
>
>At the same time, I do not dismiss the activities (perhaps products is a
>better term...) of the <shaman> as being immune from this scientific
>scrutiny, or unworthy of investigation.
>
>But the economic justification of the <shaman> is whittled away by such
>discoveries. To which I say, good riddance, because some real market
>value instantly ensues.
>
>And the scientist _does_ move on.
>
>Reasons for things is postscript. Causes for things is science. Yes,
>Robin, science came first. But I seem to be equating curiosity with
>science more than most people do, as well as thinking it is more like
>language than anything else. I don't know, that is still simmering away.
>It ain't soup yet.

Wade T. Smith

Wade,

Hi. I don't have anything to add to what you say. I know it is well
thought out, I HAVE been following along. I might ask what a shaman is
supposed to produce which a scientist could measure. A meme, perhaps...a
virus as big as a house which has never existed before? I see the
theoretical possibility that as matter changes in response to thought (often
by way of action, work, to be sure). That such a mental construct could
become a physical reality. My suggestion, as always, is draw the plans for
it and build it, then measure it.

Brett

Returning,
rBERTS%n
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