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blauney
New Member

USA
2 Posts

Posted - 12/09/2010 :  11:18:13   [Permalink]  Show Profile Send blauney a Private Message  Reply with Quote
I'm new to this forum, but I wanted to share something with those of you interested in Bem's paper. I did an analysis of Bem's 8th experiment on retroactive facilitation of recall using a very simple approach. I believe I have pretty clearly demonstrated that the results of his 8th experiment are well within the expected range of outcomes that random chance would generate. My findings running 100 trials of 100 randomly generated participants (through the use of pseduo random number generators) in the experiment indicated that in 34 of the 100 trials there were higher DR% values than the 2.27% Dr. Bem found. I did this with some pretty basic calculations using Microsoft Excel.

My results can be found at http://blauney.blogspot.com/20...-work.html which includes links to the Excel spreadsheets I used in performing my analysis. I welcome any responses to my work on my blog.
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Kil
Evil Skeptic

USA
13477 Posts

Posted - 12/09/2010 :  15:19:37   [Permalink]  Show Profile  Visit Kil's Homepage  Send Kil an AOL message  Send Kil a Yahoo! Message Send Kil a Private Message  Reply with Quote
Originally posted by blauney

I'm new to this forum, but I wanted to share something with those of you interested in Bem's paper. I did an analysis of Bem's 8th experiment on retroactive facilitation of recall using a very simple approach. I believe I have pretty clearly demonstrated that the results of his 8th experiment are well within the expected range of outcomes that random chance would generate. My findings running 100 trials of 100 randomly generated participants (through the use of pseduo random number generators) in the experiment indicated that in 34 of the 100 trials there were higher DR% values than the 2.27% Dr. Bem found. I did this with some pretty basic calculations using Microsoft Excel.

My results can be found at http://blauney.blogspot.com/20...-work.html which includes links to the Excel spreadsheets I used in performing my analysis. I welcome any responses to my work on my blog.
Welcome to SFN, blauney. Thanks for the info but unfortunately, your link doesn't work.

Uncertainty may make you uncomfortable. Certainty makes you ridiculous.

Why not question something for a change?

Genetic Literacy Project
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H. Humbert
SFN Die Hard

USA
4574 Posts

Posted - 12/09/2010 :  15:23:52   [Permalink]  Show Profile Send H. Humbert a Private Message  Reply with Quote
Originally posted by Kil
Thanks for the info but unfortunately, your link doesn't work.
You can simply click the link in the error message (which does work) or click here.


"A man is his own easiest dupe, for what he wishes to be true he generally believes to be true." --Demosthenes

"The first principle is that you must not fool yourself - and you are the easiest person to fool." --Richard P. Feynman

"Face facts with dignity." --found inside a fortune cookie
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Kil
Evil Skeptic

USA
13477 Posts

Posted - 12/09/2010 :  16:02:44   [Permalink]  Show Profile  Visit Kil's Homepage  Send Kil an AOL message  Send Kil a Yahoo! Message Send Kil a Private Message  Reply with Quote
Originally posted by H. Humbert

Originally posted by Kil
Thanks for the info but unfortunately, your link doesn't work.
You can simply click the link in the error message (which does work) or click here.


Duh! Thanks!

Uncertainty may make you uncomfortable. Certainty makes you ridiculous.

Why not question something for a change?

Genetic Literacy Project
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blauney
New Member

USA
2 Posts

Posted - 12/10/2010 :  10:25:40   [Permalink]  Show Profile Send blauney a Private Message  Reply with Quote
Doh! Sorry about the bad link. Thanks for fixing it! I hope my math is better than my posting skills.
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Dr. Mabuse
Septic Fiend

Sweden
9688 Posts

Posted - 12/11/2010 :  12:24:47   [Permalink]  Show Profile  Send Dr. Mabuse an ICQ Message Send Dr. Mabuse a Private Message  Reply with Quote
I'm new to this forum, but I wanted to share something with those of you interested in Bem's paper.

First off, welcome to Skeptic Friends Network.

Thank you for your interesting analysis of the paper! Usually when I hear about papers like this, I always return to statistics: Is the measured effect statistically significant? If there is no psi-effect, could random chance explain the result? The answer is yes, if the number of data points isn't large enough. Random numbers aren't evenly distributed until you have a very large set. This clustering can create the illusion of something significant, if are not careful what to count as a hit or as a miss.
Sort of what blauney indicated in his blog.


Something I would have liked to see is if any individual consistently performed better than others. The classic yarn of psi is that some people are more sensitive than others. If that is true, then tracking every single participant's performance throughout the test would surely point to certain individuals we could single out and test some more. Grouping the top 25% in one group, and the bottom 25% in another, then have these new teams compete against each other through a new trial.

Dr. Mabuse - "When the going gets tough, the tough get Duct-tape..."
Dr. Mabuse whisper.mp3

"Equivocation is not just a job, for a creationist it's a way of life..." Dr. Mabuse

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Send them unarmed civilians for target practice..
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