The Collective Placebo Effect? Collective Belief & Disbelief?

[David Bailey]

Originally Posted by Paul C. Anagnostopoulos

Not if you use the Earth's magnetic field as an inclination compass.


~~ Paul

To use inclination - which gives you l attitude - you also need longitude. OK, in theory if the bird could keep exact track of time (even while anaesthetised), it could get that from the sun's position in the sky, but we may only be talking about a few tens or hundreds of miles, so the change would be very small. Do we really believe all that - after all, the US had to install a fleet of navigation satellites to make its cruise missiles work properly.

To me, this is an example of the "any explanation is OK just so long as it is conventional" school of thought.

David

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

Originally Posted by David

To use inclination - which gives you l attitude - you also need longitude. OK, in theory if the bird could keep exact track of time (even while anaesthetised), it could get that from the sun's position in the sky, but we may only be talking about a few tens or hundreds of miles, so the change would be very small. Do we really believe all that - after all, the US had to install a fleet of navigation satellites to make its cruise missiles work properly.

No, birds use the inclination of the Earth's magnetic field lines, not their own inclination. They are somehow comparing the angle of the lines to the horizon. There is evidence for additional migration mechanisms having to do with light, I think.

To me, this is an example of the "any explanation is OK just so long as it is conventional" school of thought.

You're not paying attention, David. There are actual experiments being conducted to find evidence for these ideas. It's as if you believe that a couple of grad students toss this out at some conference and everyone says "Okay, that's good enough for me. Problem solved. No work required."

On the other hand, Sheldrake says he thinks that birds are navigating by some morphic field and everyone says "Ooh, yeah, that 'splains it!" What happens next? How about this: Sheldrake proposes a storage mechanism for the morphic field, a mechanism by which the bird senses the field, figures out how to suppress that sense, and then sees what happens to the birds. Or the rats running a maze. Or anything. No one else can do it, because no one else has a clue what in hell Sheldrake is thinking. You might as well ask scientists to consider whether aliens living on the Moon are bird whisperers.

There is no hundredth monkey. Part of the problem here is that you can only refer to a proposal as "conventional" if it's been around for awhile. But it's precisely the proposals with staying power that you scoff at. There was once a time when navigation by electromagnetic field was not conventional. For some reason, scientists were willing to consider it anyway.

~~ Paul

[David Bailey]

Paul,

So how come my navigator has to reference multiple satellites to achieve the same effect?

This is what I mean - people can propose a mechanism without actually building a device, or even really proving that it would work. This is the same kind of explanation as the dying neuron theory of NDE's.

Obviously if RS could turn his morphic field on and off at will, that would be great - but just because he can't, doesn't prove the idea is worthless. Please remember that Rupert did not come to his ideas out of the blue while working as a postman - read his biography:

About Rupert Sheldrake - Biography

I am sure he realises that his morphic field is a very tentative concept, but I suspect that it gets closer to the truth than many extremely far fetched 'conventional' explanations.

David

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

Originally Posted by David

So how come my navigator has to reference multiple satellites to achieve the same effect?

Because that's much more accurate than a compass. Even so, some GPS systems have a compass backup subsystem.

Note that your navigator doesn't use morphic field navigation, either.

This is what I mean - people can propose a mechanism without actually building a device, or even really proving that it would work. This is the same kind of explanation as the dying neuron theory of NDE's.

What are you talking about? Prior to GPS, all navigation was done with compass-based systems. Compasses use the Earth's magnetic field, too.

Obviously if RS could turn his morphic field on and off at will, that would be great - but just because he can't, doesn't prove the idea is worthless.

I didn't ask for him to turn off morphic fields. I asked for him to disable the bird's morphic field receptor. There is a receptor, right? We're not assuming that the bird is the morphic field, are we?

I am sure he realises that his morphic field is a very tentative concept, but I suspect that it gets closer to the truth than many extremely far fetched 'conventional' explanations.

Why? How can you know this if you don't know how it works?

~~ Paul

[David Bailey]

Originally Posted by Paul C. Anagnostopoulos

Because that's much more accurate than a compass. Even so, some GPS systems have a compass backup subsystem.

Note that your navigator doesn't use morphic field navigation, either.


What are you talking about? Prior to GPS, all navigation was done with compass-based systems. Compasses use the Earth's magnetic field, too.


I didn't ask for him to turn off morphic fields. I asked for him to disable the bird's morphic field receptor. There is a receptor, right? We're not assuming that the bird is the morphic field, are we?


Why? How can you know this if you don't know how it works?

~~ Paul

Navigation used to be done with a compass, but that never allowed people to navigate from an unknown point back to a known point. To do that, you have to have an accurate time fix (and a clear sky) to get longitude. The inclination of the magnetic field will give you latitude - but will it be accurate enough for bird navigation?

Of course people used compasses, but at least over short distances, I don't think they ever used measurements of the inclination of the magnetic field (but I might be wrong).

To use a compass to navigate, you need to know where you are starting from, and also to use a map (otherwise the errors build up).

My guess would be that the bird's morphic field receptor would be its brain. Also, I sense that Rupert hates to do invasive things to animals, so injuring them in various ways is probably not an option for him.

David

[Chris Noble]

Originally Posted by Paul C. Anagnostopoulos

On the other hand, Sheldrake says he thinks that birds are navigating by some morphic field and everyone says "Ooh, yeah, that 'splains it!" What happens next?

Nothing. Sheldrake can claim he has evidence for "morphic resonance". Case closed. No need to investigate further. Let's move on to elephants and earthquakes.

It's equivalent to ID. It's a science stopper.

How do bats fly at night? Morphic resonance! You don't need to investigate natural explanations like ultrasound.

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

Originally Posted by David

Navigation used to be done with a compass, but that never allowed people to navigate from an unknown point back to a known point. To do that, you have to have an accurate time fix (and a clear sky) to get longitude. The inclination of the magnetic field will give you latitude - but will it be accurate enough for bird navigation?

It'll get the bird close. Then smells and sights can take over. Notice how birds migrate primarily north/south.

Of course people used compasses, but at least over short distances, I don't think they ever used measurements of the inclination of the magnetic field (but I might be wrong).

No, and that's why birds are clever than we used to be at navigation. Animals use lots of senses that we don't use at all or very poorly. Please don't tell me that bats are zooming around nabbing mosquitos by using the morphic field.

My guess would be that the bird's morphic field receptor would be its brain. Also, I sense that Rupert hates to do invasive things to animals, so injuring them in various ways is probably not an option for him.

How convenient. And how odd that all the people who have disected birds (and every other animal on the planet) have never found anything in the brain that looks like a morphic field receptor. There would have to be a transmitter, too, since the morphic field is supposedly formed by collective learning.

~~ Paul

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

Now this is cool:

Do Migratory Birds 'See' The Magnetic Field?

~~ Paul

[Chris Noble]

Originally Posted by Paul C. Anagnostopoulos

Now this is cool:

Do Migratory Birds 'See' The Magnetic Field?

~~ Paul

The radical pair mechanism that is believed to be associated with this vison-mediated magnetic sense is far more exciting than any wishy-washy morphic resonance nonsense.

Peter Hore at Oxford has done some really interesting experimental work in this field. In contrast to Dean Radin's bullshit about quantum entanglement these effects can be accurately described with quantum mechanics.

I've met Peter Hore at conferences and he's visited our lab.

[Open Mind]

Originally Posted by Chris Noble

I still don't see precisely how this follows transparently from "Morphic Resonance" as it has not been described in a concise and consistent form. I'm not sure whether Sheldrake would agree as to whether "morphic resonance" in fact predicts this.

I'll ask Sheldrake whenever the opportunity arises.