Magical Realists Magical Reality

Discussion in 'The Cesspool' started by Magical Realist, Mar 30, 2015.

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  1. Trippy ALEA IACTA EST Staff Member

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    As predicted - meanwhile completely overlooking the point that people don't have to be deliberately misdirected - they're perfectly capable of misdirecting themselves, and still ignoring the point that the mind abhors a vacuum and will fill in missing detail.
     
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  3. Kittamaru Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Adieu, Sciforums. Valued Senior Member

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    "The Unknown" is, inherently, misdirection - human nature, the very way our brain is wired, all but demands that we find patterns in chaos, even when there are none. This has been explained to you repeatedly... and yet you (quite dishonestly) continue to ignore simple fact.
     
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  5. Russ_Watters Not a Trump supporter... Valued Senior Member

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    The fact that well-practiced distraction and diversion can be so successful is related to one of the several reasons why eyewitness testimony is so poor.
    No. Interpretation skill is a separate and additional flaw in eyewitness testimony that is significantly lesssened with expert witness testimony -- but by definition, an "expert" is better than a non-expert. The primary issue we are discussing here is memory.
     
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  7. Russ_Watters Not a Trump supporter... Valued Senior Member

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    No one has ever suggested that. You've moved the goalposts back somewhat by providing qualifiers, but you are still operating on a similar strawman as what you had said before.
    You really need to clearly acknowledge/answer that you recognize that the two situations are not utilizing memory in equally fallable ways - that they are, in fact, near the opposite ends of your strawman absolutes. That is the critical issue being pointed out by so many people and you are ignoring it. I'll be blunt: if you don't want people to think you are trolling, you need to stop acting like it and answer key questions rather than conveniently ignoring them.
    Agreed, but what situation are you referring to? In terms of UFO/bigfoot reports, the observations tend to be similarly mostly false. In terms of scientific reports, the observations tend to be similarly almsot completely accurate.
    [strawman ignored] It is still better than nothing.

    What you seem to not be grasping (I say "seem to" because you probably actually do) is that both pattern recognition and memory are extremely difficult brain functions. As bad as it seems we are, humans are actually exceptionally good at them. Computers have only just started to approach our pattern recognition capabilities, though they are better suited for memory than we are.
    Agreed. Most do, though it shouldn't be surprising or overly criticized that after seeing the same type of poor evidence over and over and over again, they stop putting the effort in to evaluating new evidence of similar type.
    You're using your mirror incorrectly.
     
  8. Daecon Kiwi fruit Valued Senior Member

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    Eyewitness evidence barely counts as a secondary source of evidence.

    To be taken seriously, you need primary evidence - such as a biopsy or CT scan for medical issues - forensic evidence for criminal issues - hair, blood or a whole body (alive or dead) for bigfoot issues, and so on.

    Of course, I'm sure you already know that and are just being argumentative for the sake of being contrary.
     
  9. Russ_Watters Not a Trump supporter... Valued Senior Member

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    Expanding on part of my previous post, most people don't actually understand just how exceptionally difficult pattern recognition is and exceptionally good humans are at it -- which then also leads to false positives.

    Below is a link to a 60 minutes piece on a medical condition called "face blindness". While it is fascinating that some people lack the brain function for facial pattern recognition, what I found more fascinating is the fact that our facial recognition skill is extremely narrowly tasked: When shown an upside-down picture of someone who you would normally recognize, you can't. (skip to 2:45 for that part)

    http://www.cbsnews.com/news/face-blindness-when-everyone-is-a-stranger-20-03-2012/
     
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  10. Russ_Watters Not a Trump supporter... Valued Senior Member

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    Given that when pressed he correctly explains the difference -- then ignores his own explanation -- I come to the same conclusion.
     
  11. Magical Realist Valued Senior Member

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    Then all these videos of how distracted people can NOT see changing details of their environment are rather pointless then since these are alleging a flaw in perceiving itself and not just one's memory of it. Maybe you all should get on the same page about this before trying to argue different things further.
     
  12. Russ_Watters Not a Trump supporter... Valued Senior Member

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    Memory has several linked and inter-dependent components, including (but not necessarily limited to):
    1. Data acquisition
    2. Filtering
    3. Recording
    4. Retaining
    5. Recalling

    Humans have multiple failings in the working of all of these functions and we've touched on many of the different ones, but all can be considered part of the overall memory function. And even if they weren't, if different people were discussing different failings, that still makes eyewitness testimony worse not better. It's not a contradiction and pointing it out - even if you were correct - wouldn't help you! Just like Yanza, it seems you are desperate to "win" *something*, anything, no matter how pointless/unrelated to the issue at hand.
     
  13. Bells Staff Member

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    You mean they carried on with the stupid in your name? I don't know if that is something I would be thanking or praising them for.

    How?

    Are you suggesting that a tumor clearly showing up on a brain scan can be interpreted differently because of a personal bias from a doctor? Please show evidence of this.

    And now you have picked up the batton of the stupid and you are running with it.

    Why?

    Because you are completely ignoring the physical evidence and now you are going with a doctor apparently performing a jedi mind trick to convince all doctors of his apparently biased towards a brain.

    No one has said they should be completely disregarded. What everyone has said is that eyewitness testimony is known to be unreliable and as everyone has shown and Trippy has very very effectively shown with numerous videos, the mind will automatically fill in the blanks. This is why eyewitness testimony is unreliable and why when multiple witnesses witness the same event, each one will describe something different.

    Look at the shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson as a perfect example. Note the differences in the eyewitness testimony. Keep in mind, they all watched the same event happen.*




    *Sorry about the edit, for some weird reason, half my post had a strike-through subscript and it wouldn't let me change it.
     
  14. Magical Realist Valued Senior Member

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    Bells spued: "You mean they carried on with the stupid in your name?"

    "And now you have picked up the batton of the stupid and you are running with it."

    You DO realize calling people stupid is an example of flaming don't you? Maybe you should acquaint yourself with those forum rules again:

    "Attack the argument, not the person. Avoid phrases such as ‘Only an idiot would say that’, which is equivalent to the personal insult ‘You are an idiot’. If you disagree with a position, explain why clearly and politely, and don’t forget to provide suitable evidence in support of your own position."
     
  15. Daecon Kiwi fruit Valued Senior Member

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    First, it's "spewed".

    Second, replace "the stupid" with "the argument" and you'll see it wasn't anywhere near a personal attack.
     
  16. Magical Realist Valued Senior Member

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    I see. So first you dismiss my analogy with the doctor because you claim that is not what was being argued, and then reembrace that argument again because afterall, it just further supports the case that eyewitness accounts are unreliable. Then that means my analogy still applies. A doctor relies on his own eyes to make out what the Xray photo is showing. Therefore doctors' accounts of Xrays must be unreliable.
     
    Last edited: Jun 19, 2015
  17. Magical Realist Valued Senior Member

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    http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/spue

    Secondly, saying a person is carrying on with the stupid or taking up the baton of stupid is calling them stupid. Which ofcourse is flaming.
     
  18. Daecon Kiwi fruit Valued Senior Member

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    You know, eventually people are going to stop giving you the benefit of the doubt and stop entertaining your attitude and opinions.

    You're not advocating a position and you're not giving a hypothetical perspective for the sake of argument.

    You're just being antagonistic and eventually people are going to get sick of it and you.
     
  19. Magical Realist Valued Senior Member

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    You have anything other than a trollish attack on me as a person then let's hear it. Till then, it's the usual one-liner put-down with you. I've learned to expect nothing else from you.
     
  20. Russ_Watters Not a Trump supporter... Valued Senior Member

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    Oy. You are so desperate for a win, now you are trying to replay a loss, just so you can have a win of saying I shouldn't have been so dismissive? Sure, MR, you can have it: yes, I was wrong for being dismissive of yet another thing you were wrong about. I should have given that additional wrong claim of yours additional treatment. I should not let you get away with adding additional wrongs even if they are off topic wrongs. That was wrong of me*.

    Happy that you won something? Great. Still doesn't help you with the topic of the discussion (either the narrow or broader one).

    So here it is, I'll correct my wrong by giving it fuller treament (don't worry: I'll still let you count it as a win):
    Yes, that's nonsense, for a different reason than your memory claims are nonsense. The doctor's reliance on his eyes is more reliable than the UFO/bigfoot sighter because:
    1. The xray isn't transient.
    2. He's a trained expert at interpreting it, which means he is actually looking at different things in the xray than an untrained person might.

    Both of these differences are huge. MR, you aren't an idiot. Neither is Yantza. Neither of you would go to a doctor who used techniques similar to what you cite for bigfoot/UFOs.

    Here's another gift for you though: I'll mispel some wrods so you can point them out and get a win form that to. (if you want, you can have a separate "win" for each misspelling you point out. And no negatives if you miss any.)

    *Caveat. There's a reason I try to keep a discussion focused. Hit-and-run is itself a trolling tactic, and letting you/Yantza get away with that would be insufficient of me as well. That's why I try to resolve one issue before going-on to (letting you escape to) the next.
     
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  21. Kristoffer Giant Hyrax Valued Senior Member

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    The link brought up a pop-up saying 'To get your free 14-day...' so I've decided to look up the definition elsewhere.
    Urban dictionary ?
     
  22. Kittamaru Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Adieu, Sciforums. Valued Senior Member

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    First - Way to link to a website requesting you pay to see the content:

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!



    Second:
    Spue is an archaic spelling of the word Spew... while technically still a valid word, it is hardly a recognized word... so why use it, except to be obtuse?
     
  23. Daecon Kiwi fruit Valued Senior Member

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    Putting "spue" in Google came up with "spew" as the first hit.

    Perhaps it's a British/American spelling disparity.
     
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