one click and it broke. Just one damn click....................
Signed, Grandma's everywhere
Somewhere, hundreds of thousands of grandsons and daughters are receiving frantic phone calls informing them that the family matriarch has just broken the internets... Oh, excuse me a second, my celly's ringing...
At some point an IP address would stop becoming sufficient justification to raid someone's house.
That point will probably be when the cops bust down the wrong door, and a firefight ensues.
Which, considering the pure idiocy of Knee-Jerk America, will likely result in even more attempts to ban guns, instead of focusing on and fixing the actual problem of overzealous, militarized police departments.
It is still better to try and have a rational discussion about something rather than dismissing people as idiots.
Well, sure, but what's the proper recourse when it becomes obvious that said people will not allow a rational discussion? Screaming at a wall does no good to anyone.
We, as a society, need to come to the realization that yes, there are groups of people out there who hold opinions so blindingly stupid that they should not be allowed to take part in any discussion of public policy. Sadly, right now, those groups are the ones who get the most attention, and those of us with rational thought processes are ignored, presumably because we don't scream as loud as the extremists.
The big problem I have with the majority of "research" in this particular field is that it's quite obviously biased; hell, a good portion of the "research" is heavily funded by anti-smoking lobby groups like the American Cancer Society (to whom I used to donate, until I realized most of the 'cancer research' money was actually going to push lawmakers into instituting smoking bans), who of course have a vested interest in getting a certain result from their research.
Then there's the CDC's SAMMIC algorithm, which they use to determine smoking related deaths... but it's not really an algorithm at all, rather a program that searches hospital records for 2 criteria: people who died, and whether or not those people smoked. If the answer is "yes" to both terms, SAMMIC puts it down as a "smoking related death," even if the actual cause had nothing to do with smoking (smokers killed in car wrecks are often included in the "smoking death" numbers).
I do find it hilariously ironic how many people here will praise Mr. Randi for his no-nonsense approach to demanding the proper scientific method be followed, but in the same breath attack me for asking the same questions Mr. Randi does, but in a different arena.
If the applicant thinks the JREF are being unreasonable about the testing protocol they're free to publish any and all correspondence to that effect for everyone to see.
Except, according to the website, JREF owns the rights to any and all material submitted by applicants.
So no, they really can't publish anything they've submitted; another reason to find this "contest" dubious in nature.
I'm not seeing how this is shady. Or at least not any shadier than any other product placement. Fortunately, the actual article doesn't use that term.
But I also don't really see the connection with marketing cigarettes to kids. The worry about marketing cigarettes to kids is not that they will think "I can't wait to turn 18 so I can try that". The worry is that they will start smoking while still kids (i.e. the concern is that kids will start an addictive behavior at an age when we know decision-making is not so good). I'm not sure that same concern exists for marketing a.50-caliber sniper rifle.
After reading TFA, I came to the conclusion that the only shady person in this instance is the guy who wrote TFA; the attempts to demonize firearm manufacturers as death-merchants obsessed with selling guns to kids (Because they license their products to makers of ADULT ONLY market games) kinda cinched it for me. Also, the fact that he seems convinced this is a firearm industry conspiracy, but apparently absolves game developers of any blame, even though they are the ones marketing violent games to kids, and the parents who irresponsibly let their kids play said violent games.
In other words, he found a way to exploit the fears of, for lack of a better term, stupid reactionaries, and used the opportunity to go on a full offensive against an industry he's decided to hate, regardless of their actual actions or intent. And the reactionaries are eating right out of his hand.
Also, what exactly is a "shoulder-mounted" rifle?
Obviously, something that exists only in the minds of simpletons and people scared of their own shadows.
What is not fair is the restrictions placed on how the item can be used in the game.
It's perfectly fair - it's not like we're talking about a situation where Barrett licensed the gun to the game developer, then came along later and said, "Oh, BTW, here are some extra conditions..." No, the conditions were present in the original contract, and if the developer didn't like the terms, they didn't have to sign the agreement; but they did, and thus, are legally bound to its conditions.
Also, it's not uncommon for licensing contracts to have such "positive use" clauses - why do you think there aren't any real cars or guns or locations or anything else in the GTA series?
This is much ado about nothing.
How is that a fair depiction of the real world?
"The real world" and "fair" do not belong in the same sentence.
It's like paying to be an advertiser for the gun company..
Why shouldn't you be responsible for what your invited guest does, especially if you gave them a golf club, or challenged them to some kicking contest?
He was pointing out that OP's contention was a straw man; he was not, however, asking you to provide an example.
Furthermore, you can't prove a negative. Can you prove that bigfoot doesn't exist? How? Can you prove that there isn't a teapot sitting in the middle of a crater on Titan? Both those things, however, could very easily be proved - if they were true. Until then, it seems wise to assume that they aren't.
Therein lies the lack of scientific reasoning that I am questioning; ironic, as you point it out yourself ("you can't prove a negative"), then jump right into doing just the thing you claim can't be done ("both those things... could very easily be proved - if they were true") - trying to prove a negative by citing the lack of evidence.
The whole point of Randi's challenge is to create actual tests of claimed effects.
Presuming that is actually what's happening, and this isn't yet another example of a confidence man making his fortune by playing on the firmly-held beliefs of a particular group, that's a good challenge. It's just that I'm not 100% convinced Mr. Randi is actually trying to test for these things, and not just using the "debunking of junk science" as a rather lucrative way to become and stay an extremely wealthy man.
The challenge is much more limited than testing if an entire field has value - it tests the validity of specific claims. "I can dowse water", "I can read your mind", "I can predict the future" are the general types of claims that get tested,
OK, but what about the specific claim of, "I can prove these other guys are liars and fakes?" I mean, that's a pretty damn specific claim, but I have yet to see anyone ask Mr. Randi to back it up with empirical data; have you?
Testing specific claims is vitally important in these sorts of fields, and is in now way intellectually dishonest.
Agreed, so long as the testing is done in a scientific and not at all biased way. Which is what I'm asking Mr. Randi to do; prove that his scientific method is truly scientific, and not just another of the money-grabs that he accuses others of engaging in.
My dad always used to tell us as kids: the man who accuses everyone around him of being a liar, is a man you'll probably never hear the truth from.
The question of the op is about failing the preliminary test quote "Is there any way you can prove that your organization is not falsely debunking claims during the "Preliminary Tests," i".
This is totaly different than actively not setting a proper protocol. The reason I could answer that question btw is that on jref.org this is asked again and again and again. With a lot of woo coming by and stating the same question insinuating the same things. But if you look at the protocols (which are public btw) you will see this is never the case.
I understand slashdot is not jref, but I would rather see "new" question than question which were answered to death.
Can you provide reference for these claims of test verification? Like Mr. Randi, I am not one for taking another person at their word, I prefer to base my opinions on empirical data and evidence.
Because one is a service, subject to terms of service, and the other is physical goods?
I fail to see why that would justify differing treatment.
But if a physical analogy helps: If you have unmetered water at your apartment, what do you think would happen if you bought a huge water tank, pipes and hoses and set yourself up as a utility company for your entire neighborhood?
I'm going to ignore, for the sake of argument, that public utilities are not the same thing as private services, and are under different regulations as a result; you may as well be literally comparing apples to oranges.
Well, if it's an apartment, I would say that since you don't own the property, that would be a bad idea to do without the landlord's permission.
If I weren't feeling pedantic, and assumed by "apartment" you meant "property you own," I'd say, besides the fact that this is the worst non-car analogy I've ever seen on Slashdot, that my neighbors would probably continue to buy their water from the utility company, as I do not have the machinery or clearance to start digging up public lands and installing my own infrastructure, and nobody in their right mind is going to want open pipes run across their property above ground.
Now, if I were to use that unmetered water to fill a cistern, and subsequently sold the water from the cistern to my neighbors... I'd probably be running a lemonade stand.
Since you brought it up, let's compare public utility to Ma Bell, instead of Ford (even though they are regulated differently):
The public utility company can't tell customers that the water they pay for must only be used by the resident of the property, so what makes Ma Bell any different?
Only if you fail 100% of the time. Idiocy is not necessarily a permanent state: if you can convince just a section of the idiot population that they're being idiots, you're already winning.
Note that I don't mean idiot as in "low intelligence", often smart people believe stupid things because they've never encountered the counter-argument. They're _being_ idiots but aren't actually idiots. When you show them a solid argument, the lights do go on.
I could buy that, if not for the fact that more often than not, the lights don't go on when you show people a solid argument; if anything, most of the time they get even more stupid and defensive.
A couple of topics that I've seen otherwise "smart" people get really, really stupid about:
- Abortion
- Guns
- Drugs
- Smoking
Now, you may be saying to yourself, 'but CanHas, those are hot-button topics; of course there will be highly emotional responses!' I do not disagree; However, as any Special Forces soldier will tell you, emotion is the enemy when it comes to intelligent decision making. Thus, when discussing a topic that a person feels strongly about, regardless of how intelligent they are, there is a tendency to eschew intellect in favor of slobbering-at-the-mouth fanaticism. Whether or not the choice is made consciously, I think would be a topic of great debate.
I'm a firm believer that everything can be explained scientifically (and, by extension, mathematically); however, I also understand that our current understanding of science is not a complete understanding, and thus, to claim that a concept is fraudulent without giving consideration to our collective lack of topical understanding is just as non-scientific as, say, insisting on the existence of Bigfoot despite lack of evidence.
FWIW, this is coming from a guy who has personally witnessed some hardcore unexplainable shit, up-to-and-including inanimate objects lifting from a shelf and hurling themselves in a horizontal track across the room, despite the complete lack of apparent stimuli.
Actually, I think I HAVE seen such devices. They present two SSIDs to the world, one of which is a guest setup that prevents LAN access and restricts bandwidth, the other behaves more traditionally with WPA2 or what-have-you.
The only problem is that I can't for the life of me remember who made it, or what model it was, or if it was actually the behavior of one of the open-source firmwares out there.
I've always questioned the legality of such clauses; Ford can't tell their customers that Explorers are not allowed to be used for building Chevy's, so what makes Ma Bell any different?
Why open your internal network up to every Tom, Dick, and Harry on the street, when you can easily supplement it, and your income as well?
Assuming you don't want to charge others for the access, there's really nothing stopping you from setting up a secondary, open wifi router on the DMZ of your network.
I'm going to quote an AC who replied here, because I don't have mod points and he's made the point succinctly:
3) What scientific, empirical evidence can you present that proves your contention that what you label as the flying spaghetti monster is fraudulent? I.e., have you yourself conducted sufficient experimentation to prove, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that there is no such thing?
That's not how the burden of proof works. You don't have to entertain such claims unless there is proof, he doesn't need to supply the proof the ones making the claims do.
The only point AC made there was to point out his lack of understanding between a specific example, and a category as a whole. I was speaking of the latter.
Furthermore, you can't prove a negative. Can you prove that bigfoot doesn't exist? How? Can you prove that there isn't a teapot sitting in the middle of a crater on Titan? Both those things, however, could very easily be proved - if they were true. Until then, it seems wise to assume that they aren't.
Therein lies the lack of scientific reasoning that I am questioning; ironic, as you point it out yourself ("you can't prove a negative"), then jump right into doing just the thing you claim can't be done ("both those things... could very easily be proved - if they were true") - trying to prove a negative by citing the lack of evidence.
Don't get me wrong, I loathe charlatans who prey on people's scientific ignorance as-much-if-not-moreso than the next guy here - I'm just not so convinced Mr. Randi here isn't one himself.
I think OP's point was to state their belief that dedicating one's life to reminding idiots that they are, in fact, idiots, is quite idiotic in it's own right.
I'd say that the countless entries in the Challenge where people who do really well under non-controlled conditions suddenly fail spectacularly when possible mundane explainations are controlled for, is his answer to point 2.
I'd prefer to hear Randi's actual answers, rather than the responses people speculate he may have.
Point 1 is up to the person making the challenge, isn't it? It's not like he roams the world looking for things to label as paranormal.
Randi is the person making the challenge,so it stands to reason to ask what criteria he judges applicants by, does it not?
Rule #4 of the Applicant Rules for your prize reads:
In all cases, the Applicant will be required to perform a Preliminary Test in a location where a properly authorized representative of the JREF can attend. This Preliminary Test is intended to determine if the Applicant is likely to perform as promised during the Formal Test, using the agreed-upon protocol. To date, no applicant has passed the Preliminary Test, and therefore no Formal Test has yet been conducted. At any time prior to the Formal Test, the JREF reserves the right to re-negotiate the protocol if issues are discovered that would prevent a fair and unbiased test. After an agreement is reached on the protocol, no part of the testing procedure may be changed in any way without an amended agreement, signed by all parties concerned.
Couldn't this be construed as an attempt to prevent any potentially legitimate applicants from being considered for the prize?
Is there any way you can prove that your organization is not falsely debunking claims during the "Preliminary Tests," in order to prevent the prize from being claimed?
Do you believe the Surgeon General's 1986 (and subsequent 2006 updated) claims about the dangers of second hand smoke, in spite of the lack of evidence supporting the claims*? If so, how can you criticize others for believing unscientific bunk, when you yourself do?
*Most people don't think about it (probably because they don't smoke, and thus see no issue with the demonization of smokers), but if you actually read the reports, you'll notice a distinct lack of defining words like "definitely causes" or "is a factor;" instead, they use 'weasel words' such as "may cause" and "estimated" or "could be a factor" to create an illusion of fact, when in reality it's all pure speculation.
Slashdot Mirror
one click and it broke. Just one damn click....................
Signed,
Grandma's everywhere
Somewhere, hundreds of thousands of grandsons and daughters are receiving frantic phone calls informing them that the family matriarch has just broken the internets... Oh, excuse me a second, my celly's ringing...
You all know the words - it's sing along time!
Why can't we be friends,
Why can't we be friends...
At some point an IP address would stop becoming sufficient justification to raid someone's house.
That point will probably be when the cops bust down the wrong door, and a firefight ensues.
Which, considering the pure idiocy of Knee-Jerk America, will likely result in even more attempts to ban guns, instead of focusing on and fixing the actual problem of overzealous, militarized police departments.
It is still better to try and have a rational discussion about something rather than dismissing people as idiots.
Well, sure, but what's the proper recourse when it becomes obvious that said people will not allow a rational discussion? Screaming at a wall does no good to anyone.
We, as a society, need to come to the realization that yes, there are groups of people out there who hold opinions so blindingly stupid that they should not be allowed to take part in any discussion of public policy. Sadly, right now, those groups are the ones who get the most attention, and those of us with rational thought processes are ignored, presumably because we don't scream as loud as the extremists.
The big problem I have with the majority of "research" in this particular field is that it's quite obviously biased; hell, a good portion of the "research" is heavily funded by anti-smoking lobby groups like the American Cancer Society (to whom I used to donate, until I realized most of the 'cancer research' money was actually going to push lawmakers into instituting smoking bans), who of course have a vested interest in getting a certain result from their research.
Then there's the CDC's SAMMIC algorithm, which they use to determine smoking related deaths... but it's not really an algorithm at all, rather a program that searches hospital records for 2 criteria: people who died, and whether or not those people smoked. If the answer is "yes" to both terms, SAMMIC puts it down as a "smoking related death," even if the actual cause had nothing to do with smoking (smokers killed in car wrecks are often included in the "smoking death" numbers).
I do find it hilariously ironic how many people here will praise Mr. Randi for his no-nonsense approach to demanding the proper scientific method be followed, but in the same breath attack me for asking the same questions Mr. Randi does, but in a different arena.
If the applicant thinks the JREF are being unreasonable about the testing protocol they're free to publish any and all correspondence to that effect for everyone to see.
Except, according to the website, JREF owns the rights to any and all material submitted by applicants.
So no, they really can't publish anything they've submitted; another reason to find this "contest" dubious in nature.
I'm not seeing how this is shady. Or at least not any shadier than any other product placement. Fortunately, the actual article doesn't use that term.
But I also don't really see the connection with marketing cigarettes to kids. The worry about marketing cigarettes to kids is not that they will think "I can't wait to turn 18 so I can try that". The worry is that they will start smoking while still kids (i.e. the concern is that kids will start an addictive behavior at an age when we know decision-making is not so good). I'm not sure that same concern exists for marketing a .50-caliber sniper rifle.
After reading TFA, I came to the conclusion that the only shady person in this instance is the guy who wrote TFA; the attempts to demonize firearm manufacturers as death-merchants obsessed with selling guns to kids (Because they license their products to makers of ADULT ONLY market games) kinda cinched it for me. Also, the fact that he seems convinced this is a firearm industry conspiracy, but apparently absolves game developers of any blame, even though they are the ones marketing violent games to kids, and the parents who irresponsibly let their kids play said violent games.
In other words, he found a way to exploit the fears of, for lack of a better term, stupid reactionaries, and used the opportunity to go on a full offensive against an industry he's decided to hate, regardless of their actual actions or intent. And the reactionaries are eating right out of his hand.
Also, what exactly is a "shoulder-mounted" rifle?
Obviously, something that exists only in the minds of simpletons and people scared of their own shadows.
What is not fair is the restrictions placed on how the item can be used in the game.
It's perfectly fair - it's not like we're talking about a situation where Barrett licensed the gun to the game developer, then came along later and said, "Oh, BTW, here are some extra conditions..." No, the conditions were present in the original contract, and if the developer didn't like the terms, they didn't have to sign the agreement; but they did, and thus, are legally bound to its conditions.
Also, it's not uncommon for licensing contracts to have such "positive use" clauses - why do you think there aren't any real cars or guns or locations or anything else in the GTA series?
This is much ado about nothing.
How is that a fair depiction of the real world?
"The real world" and "fair" do not belong in the same sentence.
It's like paying to be an advertiser for the gun company..
Welcome to the world of marketing.
Dude - you need a different insurance company.
Why shouldn't you be responsible for what your invited guest does, especially if you gave them a golf club, or challenged them to some kicking contest?
He was pointing out that OP's contention was a straw man; he was not, however, asking you to provide an example.
Seriously - "kicking contest?" What are you, 10?
whoops, bad quoting. I should have said:
Furthermore, you can't prove a negative. Can you prove that bigfoot doesn't exist? How? Can you prove that there isn't a teapot sitting in the middle of a crater on Titan? Both those things, however, could very easily be proved - if they were true. Until then, it seems wise to assume that they aren't.
Therein lies the lack of scientific reasoning that I am questioning; ironic, as you point it out yourself ("you can't prove a negative"), then jump right into doing just the thing you claim can't be done ("both those things... could very easily be proved - if they were true") - trying to prove a negative by citing the lack of evidence.
The whole point of Randi's challenge is to create actual tests of claimed effects.
Presuming that is actually what's happening, and this isn't yet another example of a confidence man making his fortune by playing on the firmly-held beliefs of a particular group, that's a good challenge. It's just that I'm not 100% convinced Mr. Randi is actually trying to test for these things, and not just using the "debunking of junk science" as a rather lucrative way to become and stay an extremely wealthy man.
The challenge is much more limited than testing if an entire field has value - it tests the validity of specific claims. "I can dowse water", "I can read your mind", "I can predict the future" are the general types of claims that get tested,
OK, but what about the specific claim of, "I can prove these other guys are liars and fakes?" I mean, that's a pretty damn specific claim, but I have yet to see anyone ask Mr. Randi to back it up with empirical data; have you?
Testing specific claims is vitally important in these sorts of fields, and is in now way intellectually dishonest.
Agreed, so long as the testing is done in a scientific and not at all biased way. Which is what I'm asking Mr. Randi to do; prove that his scientific method is truly scientific, and not just another of the money-grabs that he accuses others of engaging in.
My dad always used to tell us as kids: the man who accuses everyone around him of being a liar, is a man you'll probably never hear the truth from.
The question of the op is about failing the preliminary test quote "Is there any way you can prove that your organization is not falsely debunking claims during the "Preliminary Tests," i". This is totaly different than actively not setting a proper protocol. The reason I could answer that question btw is that on jref.org this is asked again and again and again. With a lot of woo coming by and stating the same question insinuating the same things. But if you look at the protocols (which are public btw) you will see this is never the case. I understand slashdot is not jref, but I would rather see "new" question than question which were answered to death.
Can you provide reference for these claims of test verification? Like Mr. Randi, I am not one for taking another person at their word, I prefer to base my opinions on empirical data and evidence.
Because one is a service, subject to terms of service, and the other is physical goods?
I fail to see why that would justify differing treatment.
But if a physical analogy helps: If you have unmetered water at your apartment, what do you think would happen if you bought a huge water tank, pipes and hoses and set yourself up as a utility company for your entire neighborhood?
I'm going to ignore, for the sake of argument, that public utilities are not the same thing as private services, and are under different regulations as a result; you may as well be literally comparing apples to oranges.
Well, if it's an apartment, I would say that since you don't own the property, that would be a bad idea to do without the landlord's permission.
If I weren't feeling pedantic, and assumed by "apartment" you meant "property you own," I'd say, besides the fact that this is the worst non-car analogy I've ever seen on Slashdot, that my neighbors would probably continue to buy their water from the utility company, as I do not have the machinery or clearance to start digging up public lands and installing my own infrastructure, and nobody in their right mind is going to want open pipes run across their property above ground.
Now, if I were to use that unmetered water to fill a cistern, and subsequently sold the water from the cistern to my neighbors... I'd probably be running a lemonade stand.
Since you brought it up, let's compare public utility to Ma Bell, instead of Ford (even though they are regulated differently):
The public utility company can't tell customers that the water they pay for must only be used by the resident of the property, so what makes Ma Bell any different?
Only if you fail 100% of the time. Idiocy is not necessarily a permanent state: if you can convince just a section of the idiot population that they're being idiots, you're already winning.
Note that I don't mean idiot as in "low intelligence", often smart people believe stupid things because they've never encountered the counter-argument. They're _being_ idiots but aren't actually idiots. When you show them a solid argument, the lights do go on.
I could buy that, if not for the fact that more often than not, the lights don't go on when you show people a solid argument; if anything, most of the time they get even more stupid and defensive.
A couple of topics that I've seen otherwise "smart" people get really, really stupid about:
- Abortion
- Guns
- Drugs
- Smoking
Now, you may be saying to yourself, 'but CanHas, those are hot-button topics; of course there will be highly emotional responses!' I do not disagree; However, as any Special Forces soldier will tell you, emotion is the enemy when it comes to intelligent decision making. Thus, when discussing a topic that a person feels strongly about, regardless of how intelligent they are, there is a tendency to eschew intellect in favor of slobbering-at-the-mouth fanaticism. Whether or not the choice is made consciously, I think would be a topic of great debate.
I'm a firm believer that everything can be explained scientifically (and, by extension, mathematically); however, I also understand that our current understanding of science is not a complete understanding, and thus, to claim that a concept is fraudulent without giving consideration to our collective lack of topical understanding is just as non-scientific as, say, insisting on the existence of Bigfoot despite lack of evidence.
FWIW, this is coming from a guy who has personally witnessed some hardcore unexplainable shit, up-to-and-including inanimate objects lifting from a shelf and hurling themselves in a horizontal track across the room, despite the complete lack of apparent stimuli.
Great - you've figured out how to parrot phrases.
Now, if only you'd present some empirical data, we'd be in business.
Actually, I think I HAVE seen such devices. They present two SSIDs to the world, one of which is a guest setup that prevents LAN access and restricts bandwidth, the other behaves more traditionally with WPA2 or what-have-you.
The only problem is that I can't for the life of me remember who made it, or what model it was, or if it was actually the behavior of one of the open-source firmwares out there.
That would be the Fonera, made by FON
Incidentally, that little device also happens to be the basis of one of my favorite pen-testing tools, the wifi pineapple
I've always questioned the legality of such clauses; Ford can't tell their customers that Explorers are not allowed to be used for building Chevy's, so what makes Ma Bell any different?
Why open your internal network up to every Tom, Dick, and Harry on the street, when you can easily supplement it, and your income as well?
Assuming you don't want to charge others for the access, there's really nothing stopping you from setting up a secondary, open wifi router on the DMZ of your network.
Everybody has a DMZ, right?
I'm going to quote an AC who replied here, because I don't have mod points and he's made the point succinctly:
3) What scientific, empirical evidence can you present that proves your contention that what you label as the flying spaghetti monster is fraudulent? I.e., have you yourself conducted sufficient experimentation to prove, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that there is no such thing?
That's not how the burden of proof works. You don't have to entertain such claims unless there is proof, he doesn't need to supply the proof the ones making the claims do.
The only point AC made there was to point out his lack of understanding between a specific example, and a category as a whole. I was speaking of the latter.
Furthermore, you can't prove a negative. Can you prove that bigfoot doesn't exist? How? Can you prove that there isn't a teapot sitting in the middle of a crater on Titan? Both those things, however, could very easily be proved - if they were true. Until then, it seems wise to assume that they aren't.
Therein lies the lack of scientific reasoning that I am questioning; ironic, as you point it out yourself ("you can't prove a negative"), then jump right into doing just the thing you claim can't be done ("both those things... could very easily be proved - if they were true") - trying to prove a negative by citing the lack of evidence.
Don't get me wrong, I loathe charlatans who prey on people's scientific ignorance as-much-if-not-moreso than the next guy here - I'm just not so convinced Mr. Randi here isn't one himself.
I think OP's point was to state their belief that dedicating one's life to reminding idiots that they are, in fact, idiots, is quite idiotic in it's own right.
I'd say that the countless entries in the Challenge where people who do really well under non-controlled conditions suddenly fail spectacularly when possible mundane explainations are controlled for, is his answer to point 2.
I'd prefer to hear Randi's actual answers, rather than the responses people speculate he may have.
Point 1 is up to the person making the challenge, isn't it? It's not like he roams the world looking for things to label as paranormal.
Randi is the person making the challenge,so it stands to reason to ask what criteria he judges applicants by, does it not?
Couldn't this be construed as an attempt to prevent any potentially legitimate applicants from being considered for the prize?
Is there any way you can prove that your organization is not falsely debunking claims during the "Preliminary Tests," in order to prevent the prize from being claimed?
Randi,
Do you believe the Surgeon General's 1986 (and subsequent 2006 updated) claims about the dangers of second hand smoke, in spite of the lack of evidence supporting the claims*? If so, how can you criticize others for believing unscientific bunk, when you yourself do?
*Most people don't think about it (probably because they don't smoke, and thus see no issue with the demonization of smokers), but if you actually read the reports, you'll notice a distinct lack of defining words like "definitely causes" or "is a factor;" instead, they use 'weasel words' such as "may cause" and "estimated" or "could be a factor" to create an illusion of fact, when in reality it's all pure speculation.
Follow up question: Assuming you answered "no experimentation" for # 2 above, why should we believe your non-scientific claims over someone else's?
This question can and should be ignored if sufficient experimentation has been performed.