Why did scientists in 1944 change their minds regarding the existence of psi?

More details, please. Which psi are you speaking of?

psychic Psi

I don’t think it is widely accepted, or that “scientists” as a community changed their collective mind. But in 1944, as part of the war effort, there was research into lots of things that might help end the war quickly. They proved fruitless. Correlation is not causation.

can you simplify that? i dont quite understand

You asked “why did scientists change their mind…” but you do not offer any evidence or reference. I am saying that widely accepted “science” has not acknowledged paranormal activity.

What subject is this a homework question for?

ToK

Theory of Knowledge?

Which particular scientists is this question about? What field? How many of them?

yeah theory of knowledge on this article http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=psychic-drift

…wait, what? I’m with @fyrius I don’t know what you’re talking about.

okay the question is Why did scientists in 1944 change their minds regarding the existence of psi? based on this article
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=psychic-drift

@earthyearthcoth Um, the answers are right there in the article, spelled out for you. It even pretty much says “this is why psi isn’t compelling”. Read it already.

They just said they are not believers… and are keeping experiments hush hush, lest they lose funding… I’ve experienced Psi… so I know it is real… and I don’t mean Pounds Per Square Inch

psssst this is his homework

@talljasperman
I have experience Deja vu. That means we live in the Matrix.
And they stopped because their research did not go anywhere.
If I spend years on finding Nessie and I can not even find a trace of it, then at one point the only reasonable option is to give up and admit that the monster most likely does not exist.

I’m curious as to what class would ask this question as homework. Seems odd to me.

@Rarebear I am guessing third year philosophy of mind

@ragingloli nessie could be an lost animal from a space zoo..and was later recovered thats why we can’t find it…

Seems the article you linked to answers your question. In a word: psi research was bad science. The evidence is unconvincing and the theory fails to make sense of it.

@talljasperman
You can find excuses to give any notion the benefit of doubt. But if you actually want to know whether Nessie is/was a real creature or just something made up and then blown way out of evidential proportion to attract tourists, then that sort of thinking is not good enough.

@Fyrius what sort of thinking is good enough?... I’m just being comical… I don’t believe Nessie is a space alien… but considering the improbable is where I feel the most comfortable starting at….

@talljasperman
A more detached and objective sort of thinking, that does not give benefits of doubt. A sort of thinking that does not even begin to take a conjecture seriously unless it’s already proven itself more worthy of the attention than another random guess. A sort of thinking that looks for concrete things that would be different if the conjecture is true from if the conjecture is false, and figures out which possibility matches reality best.
In short, a scientific sort of thinking.

@Fyrius sounds expensive…I’m a Liberal Arts/Philosophy/Psychology/Business major… Your not going to sell many interesting books starting with science…. being that Nessie probably doesn’t exist.. besides I think we are way off topic… and I hope we can continue this conversation in another question or PM.

@talljasperman, I think we would all benefit from hearing your experience of “psi”. Perhaps you can put some skepticism to bed.

@talljasperman
If you’re interested in learning scientific thinking – and perhaps even more advanced techniques in the art of not being wrong – then I’d recommend reading LessWrong. It’s a fun and easy to read blog that has many valuable lessons to teach.
Specifically, I recommend you start reading here.

By the way, I’m a Linguistics Master – not exactly a beta science either. :)

@Fyrius Great blog, thanks! My problem with it is that these people appear to be believers in the singularity—a concept I’m by nature highly skeptical of.

@quarkquarkquark I’ll mention it in another question… on a different account

If even a tiny fraction of the world’s population had psi power in 1944, Hitler would have been a dead duck. ;)

Seriously, I was never aware that there was a significant community within science that believed in it up to that date and then rejected it.

@Rarebear
Well, you needn’t believe in the Singularity to learn their ways of thinking. It’s in the first place a community devoted to avoiding fallacies and eliminating or compensating for biases; the truth on the Singularity has no bearing on any of that.
Like in any rationalist community, you’re encouraged to make up your own mind.