I thought that I had posted this a week or so ago, but I cannot find it in a search. If this is a duplicate thread then just ignore it - David.

Science is a process as opposed to a discovered fact. It starts with an observation that needs explaining. If your explanation is testable, meaning that you provide a means of disproving your explanation, then we call that explanation a hypothesis.

If we test the hypothesis and fail to disprove it, and the implications of the explanation are broad, encompassing more than just the data necessary to formulate it, then we call the hypothesis a theory. The more we try, and then fail, to disprove the theory, and the more broadly you are able to apply the theory, the stronger that theory becomes. You never prove it though; you just make it more and more solid.<Hr Align=Center Width=80% NoShade>
In another thread, I tried to explain to another member the need to attempt to disprove a theory before you label it as solid. Although the person was knowledgeable, he did not get what I was saying, and after several attempts, I gave up trying to convince him. Without aggressive failed attempts to disprove the theory, you fall victim to the very non-scientific trap of confirmation. Karl Popper made a strong case for it in his 1963 paper entitled, <A HRef=http://www.stephenjaygould.org/ctrl/popper_falsification.html Target=Blank>Science as Falsification</A>. It is one of the great papers in science because it defines for us the difference between the process of science and that of pseudo-science.

I thought I saw this somewhere else, along with three or four replies. Mind you, I just posted in a thread aboutdeja vu so I may be a little sensitive.
I'm not quite sure why you are posting this, since your statements should not encounter any disagreements in our intelligent community, or are you trying to flush a few pseudo-scientists out of hiding?

Well, there is a bit of a clogged toilet problem . . .

Well, there is a bit of a clogged toilet problem . . .
I guess, it is pseudoscience that clogged it

e :D s

Yeah Popper was a genius. Marx, Freud and Alder were con men. Who would have thunk?

Yeah Popper was a genius. Marx, Freud and Alder were con men. Who would have thunk? Marx was a certifiable complete idiot. He is one in his class :D


es

Marx certainly knew how to work a scam. His heirs, Lenin, Trotsky, Zinoviev, Radek, Munzenburger laundered billions they stole from Russia in their banks in the west.

They worked the envy/greed con on one side of the street, Freud worked the guilt/insecurity con on the other.

Freuds and his acolyte's allies in the media convinced millions to fork over big bucks to make the disease they convinced people they had to go away.

Sigismund Schlomo's first visit to America was to lecture at Clark University in Worcester, Massachusetts (1909).

En route onboard the the ocean liner George Washington Schlomo boasted: "We are bringing them the plague"

Marx certainly knew how to work a scam. Marx did not know anything. He was an idiot, a clinical case.

I have no idea what you are accusing others in your list. Freud was certainly a smart man. You are thoroughly confused, if you ask me


:D

Freud was a brilliant con man. His con had enough built in self-defense mechanisms for it to survive, despite never curing anyone of anything, for decades.

Don't tell me you believe "A Young Girl's Diary" and the rest of his fairy tales were for real.

He never believed any of it. It was all for the rubes.

What is astounding is that scientists bought into it.

What is astounding is that scientists bought into it/Freud/. I doubt you have a tenth of the mind of man. Do not make a fool of yourself.

e :) s

well, you are right. Science is more about breaking theories than about proving theories.

extrasense....if you believe Freud had anything to do with science, you are among the last few thousand people on earth who does.

You seem to overlook the novelty of Freud's approach to mental problems. Certainly his solutions appear inadequate at best today. The breakthrough was in forcing a new way of looking at the mind.
You seem to be taking a 'novelty' approach to condeming him. Do you have any evidence to support your bizarre contentions?

Wow! Extrasense and Ophiolite in the same few thousand. Which one will be more embarassed?

How "novel" they are is how we judge medical theories now? Anton Mesmer had a novel theory. Phrenology was novel. Lysenko had an unusual theory.

I'm supposed to prove Freud wrong? Where are his double blind studies? Where is any Freudian empirical research or clinical trials?

The answer is there isn't any. Except cocaine. He did a little empirical research on cocaine. Much of it on himself.

Are you aware the medical profession has been running away as fast as it can from Freud for decades? He's an embarrassment.

Freud tried some innovative new directions, but he suffered in logic. The group he studied was women in mental institutions. He applied his observations not only to women in the general population, but to men as well. Although the work was a breakthrough for its time, it would not pass a college homework assignment today.

I don't see Freud made any breakthrough. If anything, he slowed down scientific progress. Back in the 1970s, students at Yale Med were telling me nothing has changed. A third get better, a third stay the same and a third get worse no matter what therapy they got. The husband of the coupe we used to hang out with was an MD doing research in Neuropharmacology. "It's the synapse! It's all happening at the synapse!", he would bang on the table when anyone started in talking about Freud or those who followed him.

This guy's father was a well know rabbi so metaphysical statements--such as Freud's-- masquerading as science really annoyed him.


Aside from his (correct) analysis of Freud, our Doc pal invented (or said he invented) a drink. "The Sundowner"--named after the phenomenon of patients in mental wards becoming agitated at sunset (even if the windows were closed). Orange juice, Tequila and Grenadine syrup.

Muhlenberg,
let me be clear on this I became familiar with Freud's work decades ago. I read Interpretation of Dreams when I was fifteen. My conclusion then, as I suspect it would be now: if you study sexually repressed women, you are likely to find evidence of sexual repression. Don't extrapolate that to the general populace.
I am not defending Freud's ideas, but his pioneering approach. Maddad has summed it up well.
Really, would you care to join me in an attack on the outmoded ideas of Newton, or the faulty experimental methods of Mendel. Historical hindsight gives us a powerful tool for criticism. I think that should be used wisely, not wantonly.

Muhlenberg,
let me be clear on this I became familiar with Freud's work decades ago. I read Interpretation of Dreams when I was fifteen. My conclusion then, as I suspect it would be now: if you study sexually repressed women, you are likely to find evidence of sexual repression. Don't extrapolate that to the general populace.

d))))Andrew Masson's book, Against Therapy, gives a good critique against Freud

I am not defending Freud's ideas, but his pioneering approach. Maddad has summed it up well.
Really, would you care to join me in an attack on the outmoded ideas of Newton, or the faulty experimental methods of Mendel. Historical hindsight gives us a powerful tool for criticism. I think that should be used wisely, not wantonly.

Then it is the pioneering apporach that needs seeing through, and the focus on the faulty ideas.
For example, Newton's idea of a mechanical universe is still belieed in

Freud wasn't doing science so there is nothing to build on or correct.

To compare him to Newton and Mendel is absurd.

Freud wasn't doing science so there is nothing to build on or correct.

To compare him to Newton and Mendel is absurd.

You've forgotten one CRUCIAL thing. In order for Freud or ANYone to get their shit accepted in the Age of Science....., it HAs to be CONSIDERED a science!

Yup. Sure does. And if you develop a catholic theory of the human mind as Freud did, you better have some empirical data which can be independently verified.

Somehow Freud slipped through all that. Because, I guess, so many wanted to believe (and many saw a good way to make some bucks too).

What was Freud's take on closed minds?

As I mentioned, Freud's metaphysical creations were catholic in nature and bristled with self-defense mechanisms. Criticize his concoction and one is diagnosed with aliments--such as closed-mindedness.

Totalitarians found Freud's inclusiveness most useful. In the early 1950's, dissidents were diagnosed as suffering from "Sluggish Schizophrenia." As was the case with Frued himself, there was no clinical evidence to back up the diagnosis.

Freud wasn't doing science so there is nothing to build on or correct.. You are still complaining about Freud. I wonder what he would say about you, babe.

e :D s

Hey...if those on this forum who claim to be rational and scientifically minded want to tell us all Freud was a scientist, I'm more than happy to play. Already sent a link to the thread to a few medical people I know for their amusement.

Far as the suggestion that anyone who attacks Freud needs mental help....sheesh....I thought I mocked that con pretty well above. Guess not.

I'll make it simple for you. The tactic is called playing the Freud Card. The left uses it all the time.

"THe Left uses it all the time"

examples?

Far as the suggestion that anyone who attacks Freud needs mental help... Absolutely. What did you do to your mom?

:D

Actually, Freud's question was, "Did you stop doing it to your mom?"