ipl-logo

Tsakiris, Psychic Detectives, And Bad Science By Benjamin Radford

783 Words4 Pages

In the article, “Alex Tsakiris, Psychic Detectives, and Bad Science”, Benjamin Radford explains the difference between good and bad science, by using examples from Alex Tsakiris book, “Why Science is Wrong..About almost everything”, where Tsakiris uses the example of a case Radford researched about psychic detective Nancy Weber. Radford begins by saying that good science needs good data and scientists need to consider all of the evidence for results to be valid, and that when researchers only present the data that support their conclusion it is, “Bad Science(at best) or outright fraud(at worst).” In the case that is mentioned in the book, “Why Science is Wrong..About almost everything” Psychic Detective Nancy Weber assisted police officers in helping to catch serial killer, James Koediatich by predicting biographic details about him which were believed by Tsakiris to be accurate, but Radford denies. This case reminded Radford of how evidence can be “cherry picked” and a psychic’s perdiction will usually be correct due to random chance. Radford states that, “If the selection criteria are valid and the rate is signifigantly above random chance, …show more content…

He could do this by getting false information published, but Radford says that Tsakiris does not understand how his “best case” for psychic detectives is a failure and does not hold any reasonable evidence. Despite Tsakiris asking questions of skeptics and science, according to Radford he is following a special formula that goes against how science works. This formula is: “Speak quickly, act confidently, attack critics, and refuse to aknowledge errors in evidence or arguments. Tsakiris made a weak case for how science is wrong, Radford says that, “If this example is his marquee of how science is wrong, than science is in far better shape than anyone dared

Show More
Related

Write A Rhetorical Analysis Of The Scientific Method By John Barry

581 Words | 3 Pages

Scientific research is methodical. Created from a desire to make the unknown known, the “scientific method” was created in the 15th century based on common sense. As Barry analysis the scientific process, he says that the unknown must be made into a tool, even against one’s own ideas and beliefs. However, that concept is tenuous, so Barry uses logical situations to present the idea.

Read More

The Great Influenza Rhetorical Analysis

429 Words | 2 Pages

Author John M. Barry, in The Great Influenza, claims that scientists must embrace uncertainty and doubt their ideas in order to be successful in their research. To support his claim, he first states that “uncertainty creates weakness”, then lists the traits required by scientists (including curiosity and creativity), and finally explains that experiments must be made to work by the investigator. The purpose of this is to further support his claim in order to encourage readers to embrace uncertainty because certainty creates something to lean on, while uncertainty forces one to manipulate experiments to produce answers. Barry adopts a formal tone to appeal to a worldwide audience, specifically those interested in scientific research, by using

Read More

Suzan Harjo's Last Rites For Indian Dead

679 Words | 3 Pages

However, Harjo needs to remember that numbers can 't "talk," but they can tell you as much as your human sources can. In order to get confident results we need a big sampling size. The bigger the sample size, the less likely errors are to occur. “For a 95% confidence level, which means that there is only a 5% chance of your sample results differing from the true population average’ a good estimate of the margin of error, or confidence interval, is given by 1/√N, where N is the number of participants or sample size”(Niles) In essence, Harjo’s main problem lies not so much in her ability to win us over as a reader emotionally and ethically. She is primarily unsuccessful in raising counterpoints to her position and her logical appeal.

Read More

Analysis Of The Talking Cure By Margaret Talbot

560 Words | 3 Pages

In “The Talking Cure” by Margaret Talbot the author argument is very good and is evaluated through the many different ways. One way Talbot’s argument is evaluated is by the amount the of research she has done to support her argument. In the story, it states that “In all, Hart and Risley reported, they analyzed more than 1,300 hours of casual interactions between parents and their language-learning children” which shows the great amount research Talbot did find out how each social class has an effect on their children’s intellectual development because doing more than 1,300 hours of listening and recording the data would weeks and months to do. In addition to the vast amount of research Talbot had done to get her information she also gave many

Read More

'Battling Bad Science' By Ben Goldacre

182 Words | 1 Pages

In the Ted talk on "Battling Bad Science", the speaker Ben Goldacre tackles the lack of critical analysis by the public of scientific claims by debunking popular medical claims and exposing methods of borderline falsifying evidence behind claims. Science is a unique subject varying from all others in many rights, particularly when it comes to the critical analysis of its claims by the general public. Unlike politics, law, history, etc., science is given huge leeway to make uncontested claims by the public, where as in other fields their claims are scrutinized before being accepted. On the contrary, people willingly expect dodgy “scientific” claims which often contradict themselves.

Read More

Self-Contraicty Is Sometimes True

513 Words | 3 Pages

What’s wrong here? For each of the following, explain the mistake that makes it untrue. 1. A statement is a tautology if it is true. Tautology is a statement only if the words have a mean for the way they are worded.

Read More

False Memories In Ted Talk

497 Words | 2 Pages

No matter the confidence one may feel when recalling an event or piece of information, the accuracy of what is remembered seems to be remarkably unstable. In this Ted Talk, psychological scientist Elizabeth Loftus discusses the tentative nature of memory, and the potential consequences of its failure. She begins by sharing a story of a false rape accusation, in which a man is convicted solely on the inaccurate testimony of the victim. Despite early uncertainty, the victim is later insistent that he is the man responsible. Even after being proven innocent, the damage caused by this false accusation untimely ruined and ended his life.

Read More

Dead Baby Mystery

799 Words | 4 Pages

With what Gawande examined, if they judge Marie Noe with the use of science, such as the example evidence of SIDS, she will be judged from circumstantial evidence. With all that of what Gawande describes the limits of science, he writes, "Science often can provide only circumstantial evidence" (204), explaining that it is how science is limited in the use of determining the guilt of a child abuse

Read More

Albert Einstein: Annotated Bibliography

214 Words | 1 Pages

In response on finding researching on how CIA described Albert Einstein, Pat Brown makes a small article looking over how Albert Einstein was described by CIA Psychics in the article “Albert Einstein, as described by CIA psychics”. In this article Brown allows the audience to come to their own conclusions on what to think about what the CIA put down for the famous Albert Einstein. For instance Albert was called “He looked like a hippie. He wore glasses and smoked a pipe. He made a fuss.

Read More

Waterboarding At Guantanamo Bay Summary

1371 Words | 6 Pages

The integration of science into criminal interrogation came forth because of the public's critiques of the “third degree.” In order to become more respected and trusted by the public, cops began to use more professional and non-abusive means. The third degree was eventually shown to be less effective in gaining confessions. From scientific methods came the innovative polygraph, or “lie detector,” test. Eventually, police tried to create human lie detectors using supposed scientific means, but the author states that “There is no psychological or physiological responses unique to lying.”

Read More

Summary Of Arguing About The Mind By Alvin Goldman

856 Words | 4 Pages

Data can be reliable without being public as well as data can be public without being reliable. Therefore, publicity and reliability are not necessarily dependent. Finally, data retrieved from introspection is not necessarily unreliable simply because it is not public. Goldman declares that “A statement is an item of scientific evidence if and only if some investigator arrives at a belied in this statement by means of a method that is both public and reliable” (pg. 72).

Read More

Common Causes Of Wrongful Conviction

1086 Words | 5 Pages

It has contributed to “nearly half (45%) of DNA exoneration cases” (Innocence Project). Misapplication of forensic science is a broad category that encompasses unreliable or invalid forensic discipline, insufficient validation of a method, misleading testimony, mistakes, and misconduct. This categorization makes it easier for the Innocent Project to advocate for general policy changes and to document and analyze specific incidents/cases. A specific example of the misapplication of forensic science is the conviction of Steven Avery. “Steven Avery, at the age of 22, was wrongfully convicted of rape.

Read More

Consensus And Disagreement Analysis

1306 Words | 6 Pages

Firstly, this question needs to be broken down and understood. The first thing that must be understood is the definition of robust. Robust for me, and this essay, is that robust is going to mean a large and solid amount of something and in this case it is describing knowledge. Therefore this knowledge will be very vast and also understood to a good degree. Though more importantly what is consensus and what is disagreement?

Read More

Criminal Justice Errors

261 Words | 2 Pages

To err is human but when it comes to errors in investigations of criminal cases, they can lead to fatal conclusions. There are thousands of people suffering in prisons just because of errors of personal inquiry including inaccurate observation, overgeneralization, selective observation, illogical reasoning or other ideological and political factors. According to Police Chief Magazine, these errors in investigative thinking can be subdivided into further categories like cognitive biases, organizational traps, probability errors, etc In July 1992, a 23 year old attractive woman was murdered. Police found her body stabbed 49 times and her throat was cut. The police did not try to make any connection with the previous such incidents and focused

Read More

Popper's Falsification Theory Essay

961 Words | 4 Pages

All these criticisms are supported by the criteria on Popper’s (1971) demarcation, as it concerns the logical structure of theories (Hansson, 2008). He claims that a theory may only be deemed to be scientific if it can be falsified (Popper, 1971; Hansson, 2008).   The philosopher, Karl Popper (1971), is famously known for his theory of falsification theory and according to him, many applied sciences, especially social science, are not scientific due to their lack of potential for falsification. In other words, a theory must consist of an inherent testability so as to be proven false and thus conceivably refuted.

Read More

More about Tsakiris, Psychic Detectives, And Bad Science By Benjamin Radford

Related Topics

Open Document