UKH

https://www.concordia.ca/news/stories/2019/09/20/3-concordia-researchers-co...

I can understand that culture could influence research in subjects such as sociology but the idea that the physics of light is somehow biased towards white western males is beyond me.

I guess I need to go and check my privilege or something.

In reply to Removed User:

You've missed the point. You could try reading something by Sir Terry Pratchett.  He explains it well.  

In reply to Removed User:

The thing I find really disappointing in that is that the history of the study of light is not rooted in colonialism.

I was once lucky enough to be given a personal guided tour of the Crawford collection at the Royal Observatory Edinburgh library.  They have some ~C13 Latin translations of Arabic manuscripts from over a millennium ago including Alhazen.  To mis-quote Chasing Amy, Arabic scholars figured out the key principles of human vision, colour and optics while all you European motherf——-s were still hiding in caves and shit, all terrified of the sun.

To pretend optics and light is all about colonialism is to be as blinkered about the history of the subject as the Western colonialists, whoever they are.

In reply to Removed User:

I think you may have misinterpreted their intent. They’re not as far as I can tell trying to undermine conventional physical theories of light but to extend understanding. But I don’t think it’s very well articulated- needs more explanation. 

In reply to Removed User:

This looks like simply an attempt to bring people of different backgrounds to this field.
Why not ?

In reply to Removed User:

While it does seem to have a bunch of waffle and rubbish the core seems to be around getting indigenous students involved as opposed to anything else.

Getting peoples attention by relating the subject to them directly is always a good teaching technique so if they have identified some ways to improve it for a specific cultural group doesnt seem a bad thing.

In reply to wintertree:

Worth catching the series 'Science and Islam' on iPlayer. In particular, episode 2

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00gnqck/episodes/player

In reply to Removed User:

It's an approach from "critical studies", which is an ideology dominant in many areas of academia nowadays.

"Critical studies" says that all that matters is power, and that one should analyse any subject in terms of who has the power (white males usually).  It then goes further, saying that there is no objective truth about such matters as science, they are all social constructs, and are constructed by whoever has the power, for their own aims. 

From this point of view, the "socially constructed knowledge" of indigenous peoples is just as "valid" as Western science. (The latter has gained more prominence merely because it is promoted by those white, Western males.) Thus one needs to "decolonise" science by treating indigenous knowledge as being on an equal footing with Western science. 

In reply to KriszLukash:

It goes way beyond that and is way more pernicious than that.  

When they say: "the project aims to decolonize contemporary physics" they mean it.  It really does mean treating all different bodies of knowledge as "social constructs", which are all as "valid" as each other. 

Hence: "Tajmel questioned the colonial assumptions made in the way Western science evaluates light and what it considers knowledge."

Underlying all this is the fact that this is from Canada.  Adopting such attitudes amounts to virtue-signalling ones regret and embarrassment about how Europeans took over Canada from the Indigenous Peoples.  

In reply to Coel Hellier:

Given that the perception of wavelength as colour is entirely a construct of the human brain, there are interesting effects on the language used. In the UK we describe things as red, orange, yellow, green etc but other cultures don't make as many, or make more, distinctions. Given my budgie sees in the UV and my pot plant has more photoreceptors than any mammal, the influence of the viewer on what we consider important is interesting.

In reply to Removed User:

Maxwell's equations have f*ck all to do with maleness or colonisation or any other social construct.  A sexless intelligent computer in another galaxy would find the same underlying mathematics.

IMHO contemporary physics should tell these social scientists to take their soft pseudo-scientific bullsh*t to sociology departments and social 'science' journals.

In reply to Removed User:

We did something in NZ like this back in 2005. I was working on developing the Biosecurity Science Strategy for NZ (much of what was done these last few months we covered...), and a huge part was the incorporation of Mauri knowledge. I held so many meetings with Tribal leaders when developing it. 

It was a hard balance between including them, gaining their knowledge on especially things like species movements/seasonal changes, not ignoring them thinking western science was superior, or data mining them. 

It was really fun to be involved in. 

In reply to Removed User:

They're "decolonizing academia" because, as we all know, academia is rife with hardcore racism and bigotry and every potential student or staff member is glanced at interview and if they're not white they're told, "I'm terribly sorry, but you're the wrong colour and we've already got 3 of you anyway".

Also, Inuit spirits are just as valid a way of understanding light as modern physics.  (Norse gods are not a valid way of understanding light, because they were white and therefore evil).

This looks very much like three academics jumping on the powerful Canadian SJW bandwagon to secure their jobs.  Smart move, because disagreeing with them or even questioning them makes you a monstrous racist.  

Or, they could be sincere.  Either way, it's not good news.  It was only a matter of time before the SJWs slimed out of the humanities and into the hard sciences.  Gotta redefine truth and evidence if you're going to smash capitalism and democracy....

In reply to Thrudge:

You've opted for the whites are discriminated against line of defense. Well done!

In reply to Removed User:

"Behind all this bad behaviour was an insecurity magnificent in scope, metaphysical in nature. Space was big, and the boys from Earth were awed despite themselves by the things they found there: but worse, their science was a mess. Every race they met on their way through the Core had a star drive based on a different theory. All those theories worked, even when they ruled out one another's basic assumptions. You could travel between the stars, it began to seem, by assuming anything. If your theory gave you a foamy space to work with — if you had to catch a wave — that didn’t preclude some other engine, running on a perfectly smooth Einsteinian surface, from surfing the same tranche of empty space. It was even possible to build drives on the basis of superstring-style theories, which, despite their promise four hundred years ago, had never really worked at all."

from Light by M. John Harrison.

In reply to Roadrunner6:

Nope.  I've neither said, implied, or meant that.  I see you've opted for the lazy attack rather than engaged with the foolishness of 'decolonisation' 

My defence is of science, and against radical political activism masquerading as science.

In reply to Removed User:

In Africa and many third world countries there are many words to describe what comes out of the rear end of male cattle and if you get it on your feet or clothes it smells pretty bad , and people aren't keen to be near you. In English we call it bullshit, it has its uses as a fertiliser but its still bullshit and recognised as such worldwide even if the actual words are different. Some Ancient civilisations may have revered or even worshipped this stuff and it seems some people today of an academic bent revere it as well and dress it up in a complicated language but really its just bullshit.

In reply to Thrudge:

Worth reading roadrunner's other post. 

In reply to toad:

I did, and took particular note of this: "gaining their knowledge on especially things like species movements/seasonal changes", which I agree is a highly worthwhile endeavour, providing the knowledge is confirmed by the usual scientific practices. 

However, ancient ways of observing the world and forming conclusions about it are not always valid and are frequently invalid, despite Ms White's (or perhaps the author's) efforts to elevate them by repeatedly capitalising 'Elder' and speaking of 'Knowledge Keepers'.  I doubt she'd show a similar reverence for, or afford capitalisation to, a Chemist, a Physicist, or a Biologist.  

The idea that race, or being indigenous, or 'ancient' somehow trumps scientific inquiry is a foolish - and often dishonest - one.  

There are, I think, two key phrases in the article:

1) "physics does not exist by itself and must become more involved in the critical discourses emerging in academia". 

2) "we are finally gaining momentum in elevating Indigenous knowledges as equally valid to Western science"

Those discourses are about redrafting our view of reality by declaring science to be no more than a social construct, rather than an objective description of phenomena or a tool of enquiry.  All other descriptions and tools are the equal of science, including spirits, demons, and any other ancient and unsubstantiated idea.  And physics does exist 'by itself' and independent of Critical Theory.  You can be the most devout believer in voodoo, or Hinduism, or any faith you like, but your iPad will still work and your aircraft will still fly, and they will (provably, demonstrably) do it courtesy of physics, not gods or spirits.

In reply to Removed User:

Stop posting links to things that make me angry.

I'm trying to chill out FFS

In reply to Thrudge:

I would say science - as in the scientific method - is a social construct but so far as we can reasonably and exhaustively tell physics is not a social construct. It is fair to look for bias in the scientific method but frankly stupid to look for it in the physics.   

In reply to Thrudge:

 "(Norse gods are not a valid way of understanding light, because they were white and therefore evil)."

This is exactly what you did here. You played the white victim card. 

In reply to wintertree:

Well put.

In reply to wintertree:

I can't see how it is stupid? Maybe it will come to nothing but the pursuit of a greater understanding is never stupid. 

In reply to Roadrunner6:

Nope, I'm afraid your attributing to me something which I have not stated and do not believe.  The comment you quoted has nothing to do with (non-existent) 'white victimhood' - it was a lighthearted remark about the foolish and determinedly racialised views of people like the nitwits in the article.  

You seem to be coming at this from the viewpoint of race - it's a racial question.  I am not.  My viewpoint is that science is an investigative tool, and not a white construct designed to bash or exclude non-whites.  Science has not been 'colonised' and does not need 'decolonising'.

In reply to Thrudge:

You specifically brought race into this and you seem to want a fight over this. If it was a light hearted remark put a smile on it, but there are plenty of old angry men who play white victimhood on a daily basis.

I'm not sure you actually read the article.

It seems a valid effort, and quite frankly its a piss small amount of money for a grant, and 90% will go to indigenous people. In terms of risk reward it looks a pretty good use of public money which could bring some novel insights.

You say science hasn't been colonized. Of course it was. That is undisputable. Of course, apart from by you.. And again, just because you say something isn't true doesn't make it so. Have you read the literature on this matter?

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1479546/

"Traditional environmental knowledge is an important part of humankind's cultural heritage—the result of countless civilizations and traditions that have emerged over human history. This cultural diversity is as important for our future as is biodiversity. It is a potential source of creativity and enrichment embodied in several social and cultural identities, each of which expresses its uniqueness (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, 2002). However, European colonization has eroded and destroyed much of this traditional knowledge by replacing it with Western educational and cultural systems. The trend towards a global culture might even worsen this situation and enhance a process of cultural homogenization."

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/science-bears-fingerprints-co...

Yet you are able to definitely say there is no such thing. We know there is. The extent of it is up to debate, and it is great this is being investigated.

In reply to Roadrunner6:

Because so far as we can tell with basically every experiment ever, space-time is homogeneous and anisotropic, and it existed long before humans and therefore human social constructs.

There are a million and one dumb ideas about Physics out there - some people post them to me as monologs in actual envelopes. Arguably every dumb idea should be investigated because disproving it adds evidence (and you never know until you try), but the idea that social constructs influence the laws of Physics is quite far down the list and resources are limited...  You could argue that social constructs influence how we codify the laws of Physics and you could be on to something, perhaps our current preferred notations of mathematics shape the developing mind in such a way that it's unable to make the intuitive leaps that will lead to a unified quantum gravity.  Then again we don't have so much experimental data to drive those intuitive leaps either.  If our notations do limit us however, I suspect the answers lie not in different, less-scientific societies but in building a new educational program for younglings rooted in what we now know, introducing quantum concepts from a much earlier age.  There are various innovative interdisciplinary programs doing this (I know people doing one such project) and I think they have far more potential to change the world that the one linked by the OP. 

The indigenous North American population was quite weak at science and technology and it cost them.  The trend linked in the OP could go one of two ways - it could weaken modern science in North America through politicising and diluting actual research, or it could strengthen it through widening the participation pool for science - with people from different cultures and so on bringing different perspectives that make the process of doing science stronger.  It would be ironic if it causes history to repeat itself. 

In reply to wintertree:

I largely agree with that. I just think for the small amount ($163,000), with  “More than 90 per cent of this project’s funding goes directly to Indigenous peoples as bursaries for students, and honoraria for Elders and Knowledge Keepers,” 

Of the 300 million or so put aside for this fund it's a very small amount. 

It's pretty low risk. Maybe it will come to nothing but it will help build bridges, inclusion and get more of the indigenous people into science. Maybe it will give some novel insight. Most grants don't anyway. But part of that de-colonising science is inclusion in science and education and this seems like a decent step.

In reply to wintertree:

One of the big areas where we ignored indigenous people was forest management. In Australia, the US and other countries the indigenous people used fire to keep the forests healthy and safer. 

We thought no fire was better and ended up with more dangerous hotter fires which caused more ecological damage.

https://theconversation.com/the-worlds-best-fire-management-system-is-in-no...

In reply to Coel Hellier:

 

I think you are seeing this through your own very politicised lens, if I may say so.

I don’t see the problem. What we consider “knowledge” is s pretty interesting philosophical question worth exploring. I mean as long as they are happy spending money on it...

Sounds quite made up to fit a political narrative all that.

In reply to Roadrunner6:

I absolutely agree with you about that but the article implies that tales dreamt up by a old bloke in a sod house on the tundra has equivalence with Maxwell's equations. It doesn't any more than if the old bloke thinks the earth is flat and the Sun revolves around us. 

In reply to wintertree:

One of the things mentioned in the article was about teaching - and there the subject of physics does have some issues.  As you mentioned up-thread, there's a lot of Arabic discovery that's missed out in the bog-standard science curriculum which often draws a straight line for the history of science from the Greeks to the Renaissance.  Changing that line doesn't alter the physics, but can alter how its progress is seen.  How much that applies within Canada, I don't know - but how much can it hurt to find out?

In reply to Roadrunner6:

Well, that's rather unfair.  The nitwits in the article specifically brought race into it (and many like-minded individuals do the same) and I countered their point.  This can hardly be described as me 'bringing race into it'.  

And, again, you ascribe to me an attitude which I do not hold - I do not 'want a fight', I want to express an objection to a foolish and dishonest idea: the idea that the descriptions of the world that come from indigenous cultures automatically have equal value to those of science.

"Old angry men"?  I hope you're ashamed of the ugly bigotry you just displayed with that ageist, sexist comment     (See what I did there? I used a smiley thing so you'd know I wasn't serious.  What a helpful fellow I am).

I'm sure that I did.  

It might bring some novel insights.  It might not.  I believe I already acknowledged that investigating the knowledge of indigenous peoples may be worthwhile.  That's a non-issue for me.  As I keep trying to explain, elevating such knowledge to the status of science is a foolish idea.  If some of that indigenous knowledge is a) novel and b) becomes confirmed by science, then that knowledge becomes part of science.  

My objection is not to the grant, nor is it to the idea that indigenous cultural beliefs or observations may have something to contribute to science (although I can't see the contribution being particularly large).  It is, I stated in a previous post, these ideas:

1) "physics does not exist by itself and must become more involved in the critical discourses emerging in academia". 

2) "we are finally gaining momentum in elevating Indigenous knowledges as equally valid to Western science"

Hmm, perhaps this needs clarifying.  By what or whom are you claiming science has been colonised?  I'm not asking what the articles you cite are claiming, I'm asking what you are claiming.  I'm not so impertinent as to request a full exposition; a simple sentence or two would be appreciated.

The only people I can think of to have colonised science is scientists.  Which is rather fortunate, because they do a far better job of it than right-on humanities professors.

In reply to Niall_H:

I agree with your comments on the teaching of Physics - even within the western history part of western Physics curriculums there's a very biased pedagogy that dwells on some people and skips over others; just look at "Maxwell's Equations" - their current form and their notation that makes them so accessible to 2nd year undergraduates comes from Oliver Heaviside, but he is basically never mentioned.  That's one example; there are many more - there is something of an orthodox version of the history of discovery Physics and it's very abbreviated, truncated and standardised.

It's important however to separate the following:

1. The teaching of Physics where there is a lot of omission and bias towards certain cultures and its entirely reasonable to challenge the orthodoxy both in terms of cultural narrow-mindedness and omission, and in terms of an over-reliance on teaching in historical order leading to muddle and confusion when eventually reaching the current state of knowledge 
2. Looking for cultural bias in the laws of Physics

It is (2) I ranted against, and the (2) that others take umbrage too.  The language used is sufficiently wooly that others assuming it is the (1) that is being discussed.  You really have to get in to the details to understand where it is and isn't appropriate to look at cultural factors in Physics and most of the material released in to the public domain doesn't do that; and people tend to read it in one of two polarised ways.   The grant covered in the OP is sufficiently wooly that I don't have a clue what they'll actually do (except hint hint buried in there was "Physics research projects using synchrotron radiation" - anyone want to take a punt on why they applied to this funding source?).

On the subject of Oliver Heaviside, here's my one and only original Physics joke... Everyone knows the "Dirac Delta" function, but few recall the "Heaviside Step Function".  This is a shame as the dirac delta is purely derivative work.   

Heaviside is one of my Physics heroes - he came from an improvised background, he was often poorly and was disabled as a result of this, he was largely self-taught and yet he drove himself ever onwards and he transformed many different fields, yet he is largely forgotten in teaching.  In teaching introductory electromagnetism I talk a bit him and use him as an example that achievement is about more than just formal education, that fundamentally it derives from personal motivation and drive, and that the resources were there 150 years ago for those who wanted them.  I finish by wondering what he might have achieved with the resources my students have access to these days.

In reply to Thrudge:

So basically you won’t read the articles I posted, yet have a strong view that you are right.

I later posted an example how Indigenous observational science had led to them having a better understanding of fire management. Yet western science had come in, rolled over traditional knowledge and only a 100 years or so late are we listening to the indigenous people.

In reply to Niall_H:

Sort of true, but when it comes to physics its rare to mention anything earlier than Galileo.  And, as wintertree says, the "history of physics" that is taught is very much a tidied-up version, since primarily they're not interested in the history, they're just bringing in mentions as an aid to teaching physics.

In reply to Roadrunner6:

Few would disagree that indigenous cultures can have a lot of important understanding of local ecology.   But that is not what the article and the "critical theory" attitudes that underlie it are about.

Saying they know about local ecology is very different from wanting to "decolonise physics" and regarding folk-cultural understandings of physics as being equally "valid" to scientific understandings of physics.

In reply to KriszLukash:

No, not really, I'm just aware of the wider movement and set of attitudes of which this is one part. 

One could, if reading this in isolation, see it only as a laudable -- but perhaps badly phrased -- attempt to widen engagement with science. 

But, if you are aware of the "critical theory" approaches more generally in academia, particularly in North American universities, and particularly in swathes of the humanities, you see that it goes way beyond that. 

In reply to Removed User:

I think it's important to distinguish between the process of doing science, which is obviously strongly influenced by the culture of the people doing it, and the "reliable knowledge" that emerges, which hopefully isn't.  

So Maxwell, in coming up with his laws of EM, thought of them in terms of complex mechanical models of cogs and gears that were obviously influenced by the spirit of the time and place, in industrial revolution Britain.  Since then, as Wintertree observes, they way we think about them have been much tidied up, so the milieu of the origins is less obvious.

The way we look at the history of science, is as Coel says, highly distorted.  One distortion is that we only learn about the ideas that turned out to work.  A nice example I recently read about is that in the late 19th century, physicists were obsessed by the idea that atoms were in effect smoke rings in the ether.  It's easy to imagine that this idea would more easily to gentleman physicists used to the smoking room of the Athenaeum than scientists from other cultures and classes!

In reply to Roadrunner6:

So basically, you're extremely passionate about something, but you're unwilling (or perhaps unable) to say what it is.  Forgive me if I find that stance unconvincing....

And, as I have repeatedly explained, I take no issue with this and similar facts.  The concerns I do have, and about which I have been quite explicit, you have not addressed.  May I take it that you have done so because you agree with me about those concerns so we have nothing to discuss there?

In reply to Richard J:

Maxwell's use of the cogs and gears metaphor is illustrative of the way in which physics may be influenced by context and culture. Analogical thinking and metaphor are key elements in how physical phenomena can be envisaged, learnt and taught. They are also products of the prevailing culture. 

These presentations are interesting on this:

https://per.physics.illinois.edu/people/David/Ohiotalk2003.pdf

https://per.physics.illinois.edu/people/David/Marylandtalk.pdf

In reply to Coel Hellier:

And I think you have a bee in your bonnet.

Because that’s what it is ?

In reply to KriszLukash:

No, too many loaded phrases used.

In reply to Removed User:

Such as ?

The loaded part was in the reaction. “Virtue signalling” “check my privilege” etc etc. The usual memes.

Personally I find that that new ideas often emerge as a result of getting people from very different cultures working together and encouraging it is perfectly sensible, and not necessarily an evil communist plot.

In reply to Coel Hellier:

I'd say that was just PR talk. We had to walk such a narrow line in NZ when dealing with the local Maori Tribes. Any suggestion Western Science was superior to indigenous knowledge would have killed our process. At the time we were settling the Treaty of Waitangi so there was a real commitment to writing the wrongs of the past and Canada has taken a similar stance.

From what the article says most of the funding is bursaries for indigenous people to get involved in science, what they are actually studying isn't so relevant.

In reply to Thrudge:

Eh? So I wont take time to summarize the articles you are too lazy to read?

Forgive me if I find your stance unconvincing..

In reply to KriszLukash:

Well "decolonising" for a start.

In reply to Coel Hellier:

Regarding the view that the sciences are equal, I think that's part of the decolonizing science. A huge amount of African academic work is undertaken with outside collaborators from developed countries and the local scientists are largely either seen a field assistants and the majority did not appropriately acknowledge the African Scientists.

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/science-bears-fingerprints-co...

"about 80 percent of Central Africa’s research papers were produced with collaborators based outside the region. With the exception of Rwanda, each of the African countries principally collaborated with its former colonizer. As a result, these dominant collaborators shaped scientific work in the region. They prioritized research on immediate local health-related issues, particularly infectious and tropical diseases, rather than encouraging local scientists to also pursue the fuller range of topics pursued in the West.

In the case of Cameroon, local scientists’ most common role was in collecting data and fieldwork while foreign collaborators shouldered a significant amount of the analytical science. This echoed a 2003 study of international collaborations in at least 48 developing countries that suggested local scientists too often carried out “fieldwork in their own country for the foreign researchers.”

In the same study, 60 percent to 70 percent of the scientists based in developed countries did not acknowledge their collaborators in poorer countries as co-authors in their papers. This is despite the fact they later claimed in the survey that the papers were the result of close collaborations."

In reply to Removed User:

Some areas are worse than other.  I would start with gastroenterology.

In reply to Removed User:

Why? It's hard to argue it hasn't happened. The extent of it we can argue, and it's an interesting thread, but there is certainly an issue.

In reply to Roadrunner6:

Nope, you are too lazy to summarise them - or more likely unwilling to, because you know they are unconvincing.  I'll ask again: how about one or two sentences stating by what or whom you believe science has been 'colonised'?

In reply to Thrudge:

Again, you are so lazy it is incredible. I just explained to Coel an example. That's two examples I've given. I'm not retyping answers because you are too lazy to click links or read other replies.

In reply to Removed User:

Pretty vague term in this context, however they clarify what they mean later on:

 « investigating our blind spots and the knowledge that we, as scientists, are producing and contributing to »

« dismantling systemic barriers and making space for new conversations and relationships. »

I don’t see where is the harm in those objectives.

In reply to Removed User:

I once had this arguement with a History of Art PHD student who credited the Hindus with scientific discoveries such as saying 'nothing travels faster than light' in the Mahabharata.... Unfortunately saying something is not the same as providing proof, methodology or measured results. 

Otherwise we'd all be drinking cow piss to cure Covid19. 

We were incredibly lucky that the west hit the right bit of the curve on discovery for what is taught up to the end of degree level science and engineering. I expect that the scientific curriculum will move on eventually just as it did from a broad based teaching at the time of Newton. What we consider the need to know for later, cutting edge development will be taught to a younger audience and modern, more diverse discoveries will be taught to those at university. 

In reply to Richard J:

One wonders if some future physicists will say the same about us, as some of us do about past physicists and the aether.

Back on more interesting terrain it's worth reading about Heaviside to see how shitty and tribal the physics community can be to an emerging genius. If physics was as pure as some claim and without social constructs this would be impossible. After he was rightly famous the episode of dignitaries arguing with him through his letter box about accepting a prize was an absolute peach of the history of Physics.

In reply to JohnBson:

"We were incredibly lucky that the west hit the right bit of the curve on discovery for what is taught up to the end of degree level science and engineering."

But the Western religions also held science back hundreds of years. Even Darwin was still heavily influenced by the Church, but certainly early astronomy.

The west has certainly controlled education and led the way. To this day if you ask people to list the top 5-10 universities in the world they will probably just list British and US universities.

It's hard to know just how we have changed the course of science over time. We certainly destroyed a lot of indigenous science. But even saying it has to follow the same method we use is putting our spin on how we do science.

This is an interesting read, again you don't have to agree with things for them to be interesting. It just helps us to see things from a different perspective.

https://daily.jstor.org/what-we-lose-when-we-lose-indigenous-knowledge/

There's another interesting paper here to have a look at.

https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/44071904.pdf?refreqid=excelsior%3A178a244d...

As I said, maybe all this will come to nothing but get more involvement of indigenous people in science. That's a worthwhile step when you look at the sums of money involved.

Re the proposals, in proposals we write all sorts of bollox to tick boxes. I've co-written and won NIH/BBSRC/NERC grants and had articles written about my work from that publicly available information on those grants (it's public money so normally in a database). The best was a Help The Aged grant I got to study Clams and my own University Press murdered me. My boss wouldn't allow me to respond but they calculated how many blankets and tins of soup they could buy for the 50 grand I got. But the whole point of the grant was to bring in new researchers from other fields into gerontology, my proposal to study aging in clams ticked the boxes perfectly, but I had a newspaper article written as though I was going to prevent your gran dying.. Things I had written were taken totally out of context. We even had a protestor try to come into the lab over clam-gate.. 

I feel this grant is similar, it looks like it is largely targeted at novel interdisciplinary science rather than the science they are doing. It funds science that probably wouldn't get funded without this aspect. it's a pretty cool collaboration, politically ticks boxes,  but that's what science also involves these days. My Dads in Engineering and his grant writing is heavily dominated by things like encouraging women in STEM.

In reply to Roadrunner6:

It seems you are determined to avoid the issue of what you believe.  I've seen, and accepted, your examples - but still you will not state who or what you believe has 'colonised' science.  Could it be that you are embarrassed by your belief?  Whatever the case, if you're unwilling to state your point there's no mileage in me pushing you to do so.

So, let's try another angle. 

1) Would you accept that an explanation of, say, the aurora borealis as a manifestation of ancestor spirits is an explanation having equal weight and validity as a description of reality to the explanation given by physics?

2) Do you think, as one of the academics in the article states,  that physics "must become more involved in the critical discourses emerging in academia"?  Bearing in mind that those discourses include demoting science to the level of 'just another idea' and no more valid than superstition?

In reply to Thrudge:

I quite clearly state what has been colonized. I give the stats on the collaborations and acknowledgements. If you are unwilling to read words that's your issue. 

That's not my area of science. And that just is not the aim of this project.

2) you then take it further than what the article says. It just says be more involved.

"Despite having reservations of their own, it was mutual respect, trust and understanding that sparked the collaboration."

Of course they have reservations (From the Article: Coming from vastly different disciplines, the three professors took a brave approach to this project. Despite having reservations of their own, it was mutual respect, trust and understanding that sparked the collaboration.) , but they are working together, they aren't saying this must be 50-50. A new theory which is 50% Einstein or whoever and 50% indigenous knowledge isn't the aim of this. 

“Indigenous ways of knowing have been suppressed and marginalized throughout academic history and we are finally gaining momentum in elevating Indigenous knowledges as equally valid to Western science,” says White"

This is just the view of White (which isn't surprising with their field),  it doesn't mean everyone in that team or funding body agrees with that stance. I see it as a more of a willingness to look at it in another way. And White is just saying "gaining momentum".

In reply to Offwidth:

The smoke ring example came from a book I've just read called "Higher Speculations: grand theories and failed revolutions in physics and cosmology".  It's really chastening to see how many ideas that turned out to be fruitless past physicists came up with, including great names like Dirac.  The book brings the story up to date with current physics trends that one suspect will meet the same fate...

In reply to Roadrunner6:

Oh dear.  I think we may have found out something about what you believe.  No wonder you were hesitant to express it.

Someone once told me the moon is made of cheese.  I'm just not able to say that it isn't - that's not my area of science.

In reply to Roadrunner6:

But the Western religions also held science back hundreds of years. Even Darwin was still heavily influenced by the Church, but certainly early astronomy.

Don't all religions hold back science when their core beliefs are threatened?

In reply to KriszLukash:

You really have to interpret this in the light of how "critical studies" has taken over swathes of the humanities and social sciences, especially in Northern American universities. 

Such as: "we are finally gaining momentum in elevating Indigenous knowledges as equally valid to Western science, ...". 

Note that this is explicitly in the context of physics (not, say, local ecology).

Such as: "... recognizing and affirming the expertise of our Elders as Knowledge Keepers, ..."

Again, the context here is explicitly about physics.

Such as: "Salzmann looks forward to collaborating with Indigenous Knowledge Keepers to bring Indigenous knowledges to academic attention.  “Through this project, physics students will engage in these discourses, ..." "

Such as: "Our Elders’ wisdom and their contribution to knowledge creation at Concordia is just as important as that of the Western scientist, ..."

Again, this is explicitly about physics. 

In reply to Roadrunner6:

The projects listed are:

1) "Cultural ideas about light in Indigenous knowledges and philosophies ..."

That is not about physics/science. 

2) "Physicists’ views on colonialism in science"

That's more "sociology of science" rather than getting involved in actually doing science.   (Not that there's anything in-principle wrong with commentary on the sociology of science, but it is distinct from doing science.)

3) "The concept of light in the history of science through a decolonial lens"

That again, is history and sociology of science, not science. 

4) "Physics research projects using synchrotron radiation"

Yes, that sounds like science.  So only 1 of the 4 projects listed reads as "bursaries for indigenous people to get involved in science".

In reply to Roadrunner6:

And just a note on your remark to Thrudge. 

No, he didn't, the "critical theory" people did. 

If you go to the project website, it starts:

"Even more than other sciences, physics is a white male dominated field and, thus, a mirror of colonial patterns and social inequality."

That's the perspective they're starting from.

In reply to Coel Hellier:

Nonsense. It's through a lens. How much more physics-y can you get? 

In reply to Thugitty Jugitty:

What’s the wavelength of a concept?  Which field does it propagate in?  Can it be leased?  Now there’s a grant to get your writing teeth in too.

In reply to Coel Hellier:

The article says 90% is

In reply to Coel Hellier: even for you, that’s odd.

theres no mention of race in the article.

thrudge brought up race.

In reply to Roadrunner6:

No it does not. 

It says: "More than 90 per cent of this project’s funding goes directly to Indigenous peoples as bursaries for students, and honoraria for Elders and Knowledge Keepers,”.

As I said, only 1 of the 4 projects listed that the students would do amounts to "getting involved in science".   So, depending on how much goes to the "honoraria for Elders and Knowledge Keepers", only a small fraction will go to indigenous students actually doing science. 

In reply to Thrudge:

Brilliant. You’d just test it.

you are making up what the project is doing, presumably this threatens you judging by your race comment.

and thanks for partially quoting. It’s been your problem through all this, and ironically is what it is about. Closed minds. That’s basically part of the project. Offer a new look. There’s no further promises. 

In reply to Roadrunner6:

Thrudge is well aware of the "critical theory" perspectives underlying the article, which are all about race. 

As I said, the project website starts with: "Even more than other sciences, physics is a white male dominated field and, thus, a mirror of colonial patterns and social inequality."  That directly makes the project about race.

Again, one has to understand the wider context, and what critical theorists mean by "colonisation".

In reply to Coel Hellier:

So 90% is going to indigenous people to be involved in science. I’m not sure we know that the honoraria payments are not science related. Are you saying it’s just giving them cash for no reason?

In reply to Coel Hellier:

How do you know? Trudge mentioned nothing about that, just a rant about being white and therefore evil.

you seem to be interpreting his words for meaning that isn’t there. Look at the post.

that was a reply to Eric’s original post. No mention of an additional project, no mention of your theory. You seem to be building a case for his comment without knowing where it came from.

“They're "decolonizing academia" because, as we all know, academia is rife with hardcore racism and bigotry and every potential student or staff member is glanced at interview and if they're not white they're told, "I'm terribly sorry, but you're the wrong colour and we've already got 3 of you anyway".

Also, Inuit spirits are just as valid a way of understanding light as modern physics.  (Norse gods are not a valid way of understanding light, because they were white and therefore evil).

This looks very much like three academics jumping on the powerful Canadian SJW bandwagon to secure their jobs.  Smart move, because disagreeing with them or even questioning them makes you a monstrous racist.  

Or, they could be sincere.  Either way, it's not good news.  It was only a matter of time before the SJWs slimed out of the humanities and into the hard sciences.  Gotta redefine truth and evidence if you're going to smash capitalism and democracy....“

In reply to Roadrunner6:

Nope. Since 3 of the 4 projects listed are not getting involved with science (they're more the history and sociology of science).

They are about (quoting the website): "engaging Indigenous ontologies and epistemologies for knowledge creation, ...". That's not science. 

And yes, it likely does amount to "cash for no reason", or at least the reason is, as I said: "virtue-signalling ones regret and embarrassment about how Europeans took over Canada from the Indigenous Peoples".

Giving them honoraria as "Elders and Knowledge Keepers" signals ones support for: "elevating Indigenous knowledges as equally valid to Western science".

In reply to Coel Hellier:

Why?

the colonization of science has been talked about for decades, as said I worked kind of in it in NZ and we had no idea of critical theory. We just wanted a more inclusive society. There was no ‘white men are evil’ idea in our work, we just knew we had no accessed a huge amount of science held by the Maori. We also knew science was dominated with European males and so looked at strategies to make the scientific community more reflective of society.

we didn’t see any more than that. We weren’t going to marry the science 50-50 if there was no merit, it was very hard and delicate work. I’ve no doubt if you spoke to some elders in those meetings that was their aim.

In reply to Coel Hellier:

Hence interdisciplinary...

and all your later comment is just your view ‘likely does’. Come on you’re a scientist. You’re building an argument without actual evidence.

In reply to Roadrunner6:

As I said, Thrudge is aware of how the concepts of "critical theory" and "colonialism" work in today's academia (at least, in swathes of the humanities and social sciences). And those really are all about race. 

In reply to Roadrunner6:

And perhaps your approach was sensible and appropriate.

Again, it's not your approach that is being criticised here. It is the "critical theory" approaches now common in North-American universities in the humanities and social sciences that are being criticised.

In reply to Coel Hellier:

Do you know who Thrudge is? I don’t. I’ve no evidence he’s aware, his term ‘SJW’ more suggests an annoyance at Canada’s liberal ideas.

In reply to Coel Hellier: ok enjoy the day.. I’ve a kid to take to the park and I think we’re in circles now, Enjoy the day.

In reply to Removed User:

If these researchers are familiar with ancient indigenous teachings then they should be aware of the medicine wheel that tells us how different peoples from different locations in the world are loosely predisposed to some set qualities.

White Northerners for example are predisposed to the purely intellectual, rooted in the mind whereas those in the west are more physical, rooted in the body and those from the east are more emotional, rooted in the heart, leaving those from the south as more spiritual, rooted in the infinite. 

It's an old native American teaching that would seem to account for the lack of diversification in STEM. If there were any truth in it. 

In reply to Roadrunner6:

Allow me to help - I am aware of the ugly phenomenon of Critical Theory sweeping through the academy in the US and Canada.  And of the efforts by its proponents to attack not just science, but it's foundations: the argument is that reason, rationality and evidence are nothing more than tools of oppression.

Regarding liberal ideas, I'm not seeing them in the article.  I am seeing an attempt to dilute the status and validity of science.  This is not in any reasonable sense of the word a 'liberal' activity.  It is a deliberately destructive one.  

Finally, let me offer a partial olive branch.  It may be that your work in NZ has made you feel that, by attacking the content of the article, I am implicitly criticising the work you did.  While I only have scant knowledge of your project, I'm happy to accept your assurance that it was worthwhile.  I make no criticism of it. 

And, for what it's worth, I take no at pleasure at all in discovering your apparent willingness to elevate 'elder knowledge' to the level of science.  On the contrary, it makes me rather sad, particularly when it comes not from the too often woolly-headed humanities graduates (of whom I am one) but from an actual scientist.

In reply to Coel Hellier:

 

No, you don’t have to, unless you have a bee in your bonnet.

I don’t see the problem with that, other then the term « western » science as if science was a « western » thing.

But it tells me that they aren’t really taking about science.

Don’t really see the issue here.

What is the issue with bringing indigenous knowledges to academic attention ?

You seem to be really struggling to make any point, and just taking out banal quotes.

In reply to Thrudge:

When you say elevate to the « level » of science it’s not clear at all what is being measured.

In reply to KriszLukash:

Critical theory sees science very much as a Western thing. To them, "science" is just the idea-system of the Europeans, and as they see it science has gained dominance, not because it is a better route to truth (they reject that whole idea), but purely because it has been promoted by the powerful (the "white males").

They do not have expertise in physics.  And, again, the context of the project is physics. 

There are no "indigenous knowledges" about physics that are worth bringing to academic attention.   And, again, the context of the project is physics. 

In reply to Thrudge:

But there are loads of really fundamental basic stuff that science doesn't have the faintest idea about like how so called matter can become conscious and the most ridiculous in which science postulates a world outside consciousness. 

But indigenous spiritual elders all have the answers to these basic fundamental questions and yet you or science have only a clamped up mouth/mind.

So don't get so arrogant about things you or science has no answers for and never will.

In reply to Thrudge:

"I take no at pleasure at all in discovering your apparent willingness to elevate 'elder knowledge' to the level of science."

Apart from I never did that. At all. It's not faced the same tests but their observational data may provide unique insights. In the realm of physics I'd say this is unlikely (I'd not say impossible as you never know - and it's not my field (which I don't think is embarrassing to add), I teach high school physics but know enough about other sciences that the extend of my knowledge is limited), but in other sciences its quite possible they knew of ancient migrations which have changed with the climate, or medicinal compounds that are worth looking at (Manuka honey for example). In Biosecurity we needed baseline data of what is and was present and they certainly held a lot of information we didn't. It's all semantics what we call science anyway. It's just a framework we created to investigate the natural world.

I was actually in an incursion response to a sea squirt when in NZ, spent millions, bleached bays and harbors, yet we'd not got the background data to realize it had been there since the 1950's. To this day it is still there, as I said it would be 15 years ago. It took until 2013 until they finally turned around and said it wasn't possible to eradicate. Had we had better community outreach we'd have known how wide spread it was as the local divers even had nicknames for it.

Those small sums of money we spent on workshops with the Maori community members certainly helped correct that. We funded PhD's, paid honoraria, brought people in and it will have certainly paid dividends. 

 Mātauranga Māori 

https://www.sciencelearn.org.nz/resources/2545-matauranga-maori-and-science

Re Critical Theory, then explain that is your worry and not go off on a rant about evil white men. Then you just come across as playing the white men are victims card.

In reply to Roadrunner6:

What you did was to a) dodge the question by claiming it's not your field, and b) decline to accept that physics has a better explanation of the aurora than 'ancestor spirits'.

I already did, and you are - I'm afraid I'll have to say dishonestly - claiming that I 'went off on a rant about evil white men'.  I made a single comment, which I have explained was a skit on the racially obsessed.

I'm nothing if not fair, though, so I'm happy to let you have another run at it: do you accept that physics has a better explanation of the aurora than 'ancestor spirits'?  By 'better' I mean more thorough, more in keeping with the evidence, and more descriptive of objective reality.

It shouldn't be hard to answer.  I'll bet you can do it faster than I can say "meep-meep!"   

In reply to Thrudge:

How did I say that? I don't think I need another run at it because you are now dishonestly saying I said something I didn't. As a scientist our aim is often to knock down/challenge accepted theory, it's highly unlikely this will knock such an established theory in such a novel approach but that is what the grant is for. Interdisciplinary high risk, high reward research. But we should certainly be open to the idea that our current understanding is wrong. You seem to think I am suggesting it's likely they have a better explanation. 

In reply to Roadrunner6:

OK, so that's twice you've dodged the question.  I hope you can see that dodging it makes it look, to any reasonable reader, very much like you think 'ancestor spirits' and physics are of equivalent value. 

Perhaps this will help: I'll offer a quid pro quo.  You answer my question and I'll answer any two questions about my beliefs you care to come up with.  And I'll do it under these solemn strictures: my answers will be brief, entirely to your point, and honest.  I will not evade, obfuscate, decline or redefine.  You ask, I'll tell.  

In reply to Pefa:

And just a few centuries science didn't have the faintest idea about electromagnetism or gravity, and relativity and quantum field theory were beyond its wildest dreams. What is your point?

In reply to Thrudge:

I really haven’t. You keep saying I said something I didn’t. Can you please quote where I said they were equal views? 
 

“. As a scientist our aim is often to knock down/challenge accepted theory, it's highly unlikely this will knock such an established theory“

This is laughable.

i said above in the last post its highly unlikely they would knock such an established theory. Yet you see that as me evading. How is that saying they are equal?
 

how is that evading? 
by saying it’s an established theory. The moon being made if cheese isn’t an established accepted theory. Therefore in no way could you say they have equal weight - to go back to a previous analogy.

In reply to Thrudge:

I just read through our debate.. 

2) "we are finally gaining momentum in elevating Indigenous knowledges as equally valid to Western science"

That’s all I can find. That was you quoting White. 

can you actually quote where I say or imply what you are claiming I said? That I “ think 'ancestor spirits' and physics are of equivalent value. “

In reply to Roadrunner6:

I haven't claimed that you did.  I said it looks very much as if you do, and I've repeatedly sought clarification from you by asking directly - and every time you dodge.  I then went on to say that this makes it look even more as if you do view 'ancestor spirits' and physics as being descriptions of the aurora with equal value.

Let's cut to the chase - you aren't going to answer the question, and it's very hard to avoid the inference that you believe nonsense but are too embarrassed to admit it.  The embarrassment is to your credit, of course, but you might help yourself further by engaging with it and being honest about physics being a better tool than ancestor spirits.

You said this after my repeated question, not before it.  Don't be naughty now....

I know I really shouldn't, but I so want to have another run at it.  Do you believe that ancestor spirits as an explanation of the aurora is an explanation of equal value to the explanation given by physics? 

In reply to Thrudge:

Honestly I don't even know what question you are asking.

I ask you to say where I said that. You then say "I haven't claimed that you did. " and then. " Do you believe that ancestor spirits as an explanation of the aurora is an explanation of equal value to the explanation given by physics? "

So why ask this? I'm genuinely lost. 

I have said: “. As a scientist our aim is often to knock down/challenge accepted theory, it's highly unlikely this will knock such an established theory“

How does that leave any room for your view that: "I then went on to say that this makes it look even more as if you do view 'ancestor spirits' and physics as being descriptions of the aurora with equal value."

I never mentioned ancestor spirits having validity, I've never even mentioned anything about ancestor's spirits or anything like that. I'm genuinely lost. I cannot see how I have led you to believe that. I've asked you to show me where, and you say ""I haven't claimed that you did. ".  And then claim it is my view. 

I can't be embarrassed because I now have genuinely no idea what you are on about.

As far as I can see, you are the only one to talk about Ancestor's spirits. It's not in the article, and I've certainly not mentioned them, yet you are stubbornly holding on to this idea that is what I believe.

Do you not see why I am lost?

In reply to Robert Durran:

I though my point was clear - many materialists think they know it all when in reality they are wrong about the most fundamental parts of existence. Yet they are more than happy to arrogantly dismiss people and fields of inquiry that look beyond the narrow confines of materialism to questions and topics that are beyond materialism yet fundamental to life.

I'm not dismissing science or treating materialists with the same arrogance they hold for idealists but I don't think they do themselves or anyone else any favours by adopting that attitude. I mean many of these same materialists get pretty freaked out when you show them how their worldview is fundamentally wrong and especially when you use rational thought to do so, ie use their own methods to prove them wrong. They don't like it, they react badly and start telling you things that are faith based which betrays their rational thought. This is a natural reaction though to a threat to your entire worldview but if your worldview is wrong then it is you who must adjust and it is pretty wild looking at all the scientific theories which desperately try and explain away consciousness rather than embracing it.They hit ever more fanciful materialist brick walls and they must see this but so closed are their minds by their materialist path that they can't turn around and go the other way they just keep banging their heads off it. 

There will come a time when science will eventually need to face this and I'm sure it will - hopefully soon-but that will take the most radical rethink in the history of science to do so. And for ardent materialists to admit they are wrong,get over themselves, put that behind them and move on by embracing the fundamentals they overlooked and start investigating them. This is easier said than done though as it will take some brave influential scientists to break from the thoroughly entrenched current worldview but science as you point out is famous for paradigm shifts though this one would not just be seismic. As a joining of both fields it would move us on to new territory that puts the non-material to the fore where it belongs and materialism would of course be a huge part of it but not the dominant one it is today. 

In reply to Pefa:

No they don't, because this has never happened.

In reply to Coel Hellier:

You know I'm referring to consciousness don't you?

How materialism states consciousness resides in the brain when in fact it is the other way around and how without consciousness there is no so called world of matter.Materialism doesn't know what consciousness is and thinks one day it will make a robot conscious which is nonsense. Materialism comes up with ever more elaborate and silly theories about consciousness to desperately try and fix this massive empty space in its knowledge. 

It puts objects first, as fundamental rather than subjects which is the wrong way around and the reason it has no clue on consciousness - the subject-and gets more and more ridiculous in its theories as it won't look at the obvious, verifiable experience of us all. 

In reply to Pefa:                                                                                                                                           Have you ever considered that your 'world view' might not be correct, after all political ideology could be regarded as faith based. Science and especially Applied science seems to do what it says on the tin, when it becomes faith based it usually comes a cropper(eg the Lysenko affair, eugenics etc.) although some still lingers on in the field of alternative medicine ('there's medicine and alternative medicine and if alternative medicine works it just becomes medicine'-Francis Wheen).

However the report quoted by the OP and the so called 'alternative narratives' sniffs of post modernism trying to get its feet under the table thinly disguised as encouraging ethnic minorities to become involved in science. They have tried before and got their nose bloodied. Sophistry has no place in science.

In reply to Removed User:

I think a stealth approach like this to grant applications is genius. Wrapping up Grievance Studies in a Trojan Horse of STEM should be roundly applauded. Hopefully we won’t be let down by their peer-reviewed outputs, “Dog Park” ahoy!

In reply to paul_in_cumbria:

It's not exactly stealthy!   

In reply to Removed Userjess13:

Yes I am open to all criticism and willing to change my views at any point if better evidence becomes available. For example up until 2 years ago I was a hardened materialist who gave all faith based religious people a hard time and I still have no room for blind faith. 

Until it is tried and tested then it is no longer faith based so how does that apply to anything to do with me? 

I totally agree as blind faith is not anything I would agree to. 

I want evidence only, facts, direct experience not wishy washy faith. 

In reply to Roadrunner6:

I agree on the forest management; there are also lessons from the indigenous north Americans on the danger of over-using scarce water resources (whole abandoned towns since rediscovered), history seems to be repeating itself here...

However, there's a big difference between indigenous knowledge on the landscape and on Physics.   I could well believe people from different cultures and education systems bring something different (and perhaps desperately needed, given our century long impassion in Physics) to pondering the nature of reality but there is no ancient repository of Physics wisdom in tribal elders.

Forest management was very much on my mind on my last trip to the USA in 2013; I had vey much hoped we could visit Hetch Hetchy but the giant forest fires in the Yosemite area had closed access, as well as closing the road East to Mono Lake which we'd hoped to visit.  There was a lot of discussion on the radio about this being due to a policy of putting out small fires meaning the dead underbrush built up to catastrophic levels...

I find the issues around Hetch Hetchy fascinating; I'd hoped to see it before and after it gets drained, if that ends up happening...

In reply to Pefa:

Yes, but I don't accept that anyone has shown that the worldview of "materialist scientists" is "fundamentally wrong, nor do I accept your claim that "indigenous spiritual elders all have the answers to these basic fundamental questions" in a way that "materialist scientists" do not.  

In reply to wintertree:

Exactly.  Near where I live is a 70-yr-old sheep farmer who has lived his entire life on the hill farm that he inherited from his father and grandfather.  About local ecology he could contribute a huge amount that would be valuable to scientists studying the local ecology. 

But he could not contribute anything at all to a modern understanding of physics (nor chemistry nor paleontology nor engineering nor cosmology nor lots of other things).  To pretend otherwise would be just silly.   And it would be the same for the "Elders and Knowledge Keepers" of the Canadian indigenous peoples. 

In reply to Pefa:

I look forward to reading about your independently reproducible test for the existence of consciousness in an organism or other complex system.

In reply to Coel Hellier:

As I pointed out before materialists will never know about consciousness until they acknowledge it as the primary part of life and until they do they will know nothing of it and continue to come up with ridiculous theories about it and we will not move forward. We are trapped in a narrow confined tunnel of materialism that shuts us off from our true nature which is really pretty crazy and dangerous and is perhaps one of the reasons for what we do to each other and the world. If we opened up and embraced the non-material and in fact turned our resources toward studying it then think how truly wonderful that could be. 

We could show this infinite consciousness by applying science and our massive  resources to it and not stopping but making it our focus for once. Imagine the effects, if we scientifically prove we are all one consciousness, all the same thing. 

Imagine the unity, empathy, love, happiness and peace that could come from spreading this knowledge worldwide and making this the new orthodoxy. Not only would it transform religions but it would transform everything for the better. Perhaps then and not before time we could truly start to call ourselves civilised. 

In reply to Pefa:

I'm not getting this are you suggesting that all matter eg atoms,rocks,dead bodies planets can become conscious and that  these 'indigenous spiritual elders' have known about this all along. Is there any empirical evidence for this conscious matter or do you just 'know' what they say is correct?

By ridiculing the idea of a world without consciousness are you suggesting that Mars for example has a consciousness. By suggesting it cant be proved it doesn't would be more in the realms of philosophy (only things that have been proved are open to being disproved- Karl Popper). Accepting things on just someones say so is an airy fairy way of trying to get to the truth.

In reply to Removed Userjess13:

No rocks can't become conscious that is pan-psychism which is a ridiculous theory that tries to bring consciousness into the world of matter but under materialist rules which is back to front. 

Ancient tribes worshipped many things and inquired into our true nature using many tools from sleep deprivation, dance, ritual, chanting and substances. I'm no anthropologist but some got it right and some didn't over thousands of years but the vast majority if not all were in tune with nature and had a deep respect and reverence for it that we have become removed from. 

I'm not ridiculing it I'm saying it isn't primary and inanimate objects like Mars are not conscious. 

I'm not for one minute saying it can't be proved as it is obvious inanimate objects cannot be conscious. 

In reply to Pefa:

So, what evidence did you find for this 'infinite consciousness' that flipped you from hardened materialist to hardened anti-materialist?

In reply to captain paranoia:

I had what people would call a spiritual experience then I intensely enquired more to see if I could recapture this experience but I couldn't, although I could in a different more manageable way. I've been banging on about it on here for over a year now as you well know. And I'm not anti-materialist as materialism is relative. 

In reply to Pefa:

I didn't know, sorry.

In reply to wintertree:

I'm not going to disagree with that, It seems pretty unclear just what they are doing though. But I've not clicked the links more than just read the article and the funding stream they got.

In reply to Pefa:

Well that's me convinced. Spiritual experiences clearly better than science.

In reply to Kid Spatula:

No one is saying that. What I and many others are saying is that science/materialism deliberately ignores the most fundamental part of existence in favor of studying so called matter and by doing so it is closed to it and we are missing out on so much that is our true nature.Studying our relative world of say matter is very important but we lack full understanding if we sacrifice our true nature to it by completely ignoring what we really are. 

It is unscientific, irrational and I would say very unhealthy to be ignoring and in fact ridiculing our primary fundamental being. And we will never progress in our understanding unless we do. 

In reply to Pefa:

This is just empty assertion, backed by no evidence or reason.

This is just wishful thinking,  "I would like things to be this way, therefore they are this way".

In reply to Pefa:

I think that scientific studies of consciousness are trying to establish 'who we are' and also why we do what we do and our beliefs. There are plenty of theories about including ones from 'indigenous tribal elders' and our 'ancestors' Science is only trying to rationalise it using modern tools eg neuroscience. There's a long way to go and as we know when we think we have found an answer we discover another load of questions.

You seem to lump science and materialism together. Are you arguing that science cannot be pure and that it will always be exploited by materialists (a thin disguise for capitalists?). If so it didn't take long for our ancestors to use their 'knowledge' to create power structures (divine right of kings etc) and suppress 'other' knowledge leading to many cultures falling by the wayside. I agree with you that we should be open minded but that isn't how the 'alternate' people work, to them their theory/belief is the true one and science knows nothing, inconvenient facts are just ignored (it also amazes me that so many of the modern variety are so proud to be innumerate). I've met many of these people when I lived in Hebden Bridge it seemed the town was populated by crystal botherers(as opposed to God Botherers although there were some of them), as much alternative medicine as you could think of, ley lines etc. Admittedly it was heavily influenced by copious amounts of dope and LSD but as examples of 'alternative narratives' they were pretty pathetic. Yes I had to move away to keep sanity but today the town is populated by a cosmopolitan nouveau riche  although 'alternate' ideas  still persist -reiki,holistic healing heavily reinforced by 'cosmic energy' being some of the modern offerings.

In reply to Removed Userjess13:

Which is why, although I have many friends there, and have lived close by, and am probably an old hippy to boot, I could never live in it.  

In reply to Richard J:

Just re-watching Jim Al Khalli's excellent Chemistry a volatile history and he highlighted just how humiliated John Newlands was by the Society of Chemists on his insightful idea of the law of octaves.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Newlands_(chemist)

Well worth watching for anyone who missed it.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00qbq7f

In reply to Offwidth:

It must have been hard to find your lifetime's work being debunked. But it also illustrates the rigorous attitude in science particularly in subjects like chemistry, a fudge just wouldn't do in this case. Mendeleevs Table seems to tick all the boxes for now but maybe in the future it may become obsolete. Science has this ability to just move on when new knowledge becomes available and makes past theories untenable. Faith based belief systems dont have this flexibility.

In reply to Offwidth:

Is there hard evidence that he was humiliated? I think the narrator's words were "he must have found it a humiliating experience".

Yes his theory got flak but surely that proves that scientific method is critical and if you have a theory then you had better explain it very well and very rigorously to change the paradigm.

It also suggests that science is not racist, John Newlands being a white honky and all that. 

In reply to Offwidth:

I find it astonishing how 19th century chemists made any progress at all, with the existence of atoms unproven and no idea at all about the origin of chemical bonds.  Without an understanding of quantum mechanics the law of octaves and the periodic table alike are really just numerology.  But nonetheless they managed to piece together a huge amount of practical understanding just on the basis of careful  observation and experimentation.

In reply to Coel Hellier:

Well I have experienced infinite consciousness many times now and so have millions of others but that doesn't help you to experience it. In my statement I was imaging a world where materialists opened their minds and embraced our primary experience which is consciousness rather than putting something they call matter as fundamental over consciousness. It's not difficult but to do so would destroy their worldview because their worldview is unscientific. 

It states that consciousness is in a brain and everything else is outside of it and called matter, when that is completely wrong and based on blind faith that even defies everyone's experience and you don't need a degree to tell you that. 

How's that for evidence? 

Of course it is wishful thinking to create a better world but your beliefs in materialism are also wishful thinking but of another kind. 

In reply to Removed Userjess13:

When you haven't experienced a spiritual experience then it is easy to dismiss it all which exactly what I did for years. I had no time for it, felt sorry for religious folk but ridiculed them to online, I'm ashamed to say, I was totally closed up.

Then it happened and its real, its realer than real, its the realest thing you have ever experienced and there is no doubt, no faith required, no question as you know what happened directly as if you have seen reality for the first time but you only know it because it is the real you that you have always been so is actually nothing new. Nothing and I mean nothing comes close. It is beyond words, thought, science, duality so therefor everything, that is why metaphors are used so often in religious teachings to describe it.

So I wouldn't be too hard on people and what they know or think they know as one day you may find out it was true after all. Don't get me wrong though I'm still a very critical thinker, you must be. 

In reply to Pefa:

What you mean is that you have had experiences that you interpret as "infinite consciousness".  This is no more convincing to me than religious people claiming to have experienced God.

It doesn't even begin to be evidence, it is empty assertion.

In reply to Removed Userjess13:

I feel that your chakras are taking on a very dark hue, and this is disturbing your cosmic balance away from empathy and love.  Have you considered inhaling some Obi Wan Kenobi while having a nice bath?

In reply to Pefa:

I cant get a handle on you ,in another thread you tell me you are a Marxist -Leninist and now I'm being led to believe that you have had a spiritual epiphany which I find hard to reconcile. Are you a master troll? Using words like 'infinite consciousness' sounds suspiciously like another name for God. You and Marx would certainly be at loggerheads over that one. As for Mr Lenin I think you would have been lucky to get a one way trip to Siberia. They were definitely materialists attempting to improve this reality and had little time for any airy fairy stuff about 'other realities' perceived in any individuals head.

In reply to Pefa:

No, it's the realest thing you have experienced.  Which doesn't make it real, it makes it subjective.

In reply to Dave Garnett:

Yes, and delusions which ill, psychotic people experience seem absolutely real to them at the time.

In reply to Coel Hellier:

No its unmistakable from every other experience and is the same as genuine mystical experiences of God. Its basically the universal consciousness that we all are. 

Sorry to use the c word again I know how much materialists run away when they hear it or call you names, give dislikes lol,even accuse you of being insane since they cannot cope with reality because it ruins their make believe work of matter and objects that they think exist outside of consciousness bless! 

Have you ever tried, I mean really tried to meditate for long periods or opened your mind in order to look for this 'evidence'? Remember I was even more of a materialist than you considering my whole Marxist outlook was as an atheist a militant atheist who ridiculed all notions of a god but I didn't ridicule Nirvana though but they are basically the same in a way but I didn't know that before. 

How can I provide evidence? Can you experience my consciousness? No so how can I show you it when only you can be your consciousness, only you can find the unchanging, undying, unborn, unaffected, infinite consciousness that we all are. But you need to develop an openness before you even start and with respect you seem extremely closed up tight. I was to but no where near as much as you appear. 

You and other frightened materialists on here don't actually want there to be a non-material world because its so much cosier for you in this little fairy tale that you think you have all the answers for but whatever you do don't talk about consciousness as that ruins your whole materialist outlook. 

Reality(consciousness) is non-dual,beyond subject/object, beyond thought, beyond the limitations of mind, beyond language as the Buddha said to a very advanced pupil in his sangha when asked for an insight or instruction to help him gain enlightenment 'Silence is the best teaching for you'. 

Why did he say that? Because our true nature is beyond beyond words, that is infinite consciousness. 

In reply to Dave Garnett:

What is real without a subject? 

In reply to Removed Userjess13:

Yes I'm a Marxist-Leninist, ex atheist, ex materialist, now I'm a Marxist-Leninist who knows the enlightened people are correct as I've known enlightenment.

Although why your surprised I don't know as there is much unity of Buddhism and socialism and even the Dalai Lama called himself a Marxist. 

In reply to Pefa:

Well, for starters, avoid arguments like:

... because you just come across as a deluded loon unable to give any actual arguments for your religion.   When religious people are unable to give even a smidgeon of evidence for their god, they resort to "why are you so afraid to consider it ...?".

In reply to Robert Durran:

Aren't they real to them? Same as they would be real to you if it were you? Is waking reality real? Are dreams not real? Is waking reality a dream?Perhaps everything is a dream for infinite consciousness/God.

I'm not psychotic and nor have I had any episodes I'm fortunate to say thanks for your concern although I know you are only using it as a defence mechanism to either protect your own fragile ego or yourfragile worldview. 

The most natural part of you, the most fundamental part of you is something you want to hide, bury, run away from because you were indoctrinated into believing everything is matter and that's it, nothing more. But deep in you you know that is untrue, oh not your ever chattering mind, no, I mean the real you, beyond the limitations of mind that which knows the mind and everything else including itself which is pure infinite undying unborn awareness/ consciousness /God. 

In reply to Coel Hellier:

For me to show evidence of a big consciousness to you is not something which is possible as it is experiential and has hee haw to do with the fact materialists run away like frightened kids from debates about consciousness, both points are true yet Unrelated. 

Ps. If I'm a deluded loon yet I can easily lay waste your arguments then what does that make you? 😎

In reply to Pefa:

Someone who isn't deluded?

In reply to captain paranoia:

Oh dear, no, wrong answer( to such a simple question as well) it means far more deluded/loonish.

Ps. I'm not calling anyone that I'm just ridiculing calling me it just because someone runs out of answers in a debate. 

In reply to Pefa:

If you're now arguing that it's impossible for you to provide evidence for your claim then it's sounding even more like a religion.

In reply to Coel Hellier:

If you want to play the evidence game then show me your evidence that consciousness is in the brain rather than the other way around and while your there show me what exists outside of this consciousness in the brain.

Thing is you can experience the evidence of all three if you really want to but it won't give you the evidence that you want to hear but it will give you the revealing truth instead.

You should try it out but only in your own time, when you really want to that is important, I mean what is there to lose? There are plenty of very intelligent people like you who are seekers of the ultimate truth in fact most that I see are. 

In reply to Pefa:

For starters, if you flood the brain with certain chemicals (anesthetics such as sodium thiopental) then you can switch consciousness off and on.  That suggests that consciousness is a product of the material brain. 

Also, can you point me to anything that even claims to be conscious, that is not a material brain?  

Once again this tactic is out of the religious playbook: "you have to pray and open your heart and really want to experience God, and then you will".

In reply to Coel Hellier:

That is similar to falling asleep for a short time and not dreaming so that you wake up not realising how long you slept or even if you slept or even similar to deep sleep where you are still aware but just don't know it. I am talking about the part of each of us that is aware during sleep, waking and even deep sleep. 

Being anaesthetised is no different to that because you can't remember doesn't mean you were not aware. To become unconsciousness doesn't mean you lose consciousness as you are aware of dreams and other experiences whilst seemingly out for the count. It just means you have slipped into another realm of consciousness but you are still fully aware but your memory may or may not remember it. 

Without getting sidetracked onto whether jellyfish and Starfish are conscious as I don't know if they are. If a subject must have a brain that does not mean consciousness is in the brain it means to have a body and be alive in this manifestation you need a brain which are two totally separate matters. Look at people who die and come back telling how they were looking at what was going on from out of their body and can describe it accurately. Did they need a brain to do that when they were dead? No but they were still conscious. 

See closed tight! in fact your threatened ego/mind is pushing on the doors to keep them shut and let nothing in. I'm just providing ways for you to know the evidence you fight against. 

So consciousness is not in the brain (as materialism indoctrinates us to believe from a young age) it is the brain and everything else that is in consciousness. This fundamental fact is verifiable by every human being. 

That is real undisputed evidence. Well undisputed by everyone except materialists and that is only because it goes against their faith. 

In reply to Pefa:

Of course these people are not literally dead - if they were they would no longer have brain activity and consciousness. I can imagine looking at myself from outside and I can dream it; it is no big deal - presumably just the result of activity in an oxygen depleted brain or whatever.

In reply to Pefa:

Do you think that people undergoing surgery are experiencing utter agony, but just don't remember it?

Now provide some evidence that this actually happens, and that people can "describe accurately" things that they could not otherwise have known. 

In reply to Coel Hellier:

I'm no Anesthetist but are these substances not used to numb your nervous system so you cannot feel the pain as well as putting you to sleep. 

Personally I've only read of a few accounts over the years that seem very compelling but it seems studies have been done-

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6172100/

https://goop.com/wellness/spirituality/1000s-near-death-experiences-can-tea...

I didn't realise there was so much documented info on this subject having only seen a few individual accounts like the one where the trucker after a cardiac arrest on the heart surgery theatre states when he came back to life how he remembered looking down on his body and seeing the surgeon flapping his arms in and out as if trying to fly and wondering what he was doing. Afterwards the surgeon couldn't believe it because what he was doing was putting his gloves on in a way that would look like that from above. 

It's  covered in the first 15 minutes of this discussion with John Cleese -  youtube.com/watch?v=4RGizqsLumo&

In reply to Robert Durran:

" Line of Evidence #1

Lucid, organized experiences while unconscious, comatose, or clinically dead 

Near-death experiences occur at a time when the person is so physically compromised that they are typically unconscious, comatose, or clinically dead. Considering NDEs from both a medical perspective and logically, it should not be possible for unconscious people to often report highly lucid experiences that are clear and logically structured. Most NDErs report supernormal consciousness at the time of their NDEs."

youtube.com/watch?v=WnoIf2NwaRY&

" A lot of people with a medical or scientific background, like me, are very persuaded by people who have had near-death experiences while under general anesthesia. Under adequate general anesthesia, they’re very carefully monitoring heart respiration—in fact, it’s artificially controlled in many operations because you literally shut the brain down to the point where the brain can’t simultaneously breathe. And so the person needs to be artificially ventilated. When their heart stops, i.e., when they code, and they’re under general anesthesia, it’s extremely well-documented that they have no brain activity—yet, when these people have an out-of-body experience, what they report of what goes on during codes is what really happens, and not what Hollywood shows. Its frantic, crash carts aren’t immediately available, there can be some swearing typically by the doctors. It is very difficult for everybody there. It’s not like what they show on TV—you would have to be there to accurately report on what is happening. After this out-of-body experience, when they then go on to have a typical near-death experience, it again seems doubly impossible. For one, they’re under general anesthesia and there shouldn’t be any possibility of any conscious experience; secondly, their heart has stopped, and 10-20 seconds after your heart stops, the electroencephalogram, or EEG, that measures brain critical electrical activity goes absolutely flat. So, during general anesthesia to have your heart stop and have a near-death experience absolutely, in my mind, almost single-handedly refutes the possibility of a near-death experience being the result of a physical brain function as we know it. It is not a dream state, it is not a hallucination. It is absolutely beyond any medical explanation."

Much more info on here- https://www.nderf.org/

" For some people, do these have the quality of a vivid dream?"

" That’s a great question. In the very first version of the survey in 1998 when I first put the website up, I asked that question: Was your experience dream-like in any way? I deliberately worded that in a somewhat non-scientific way because it was leading them to answer yes if any part of their NDE was dreamlike. I thought, geez that’s about as aggressively as I can conceive of wording a question to bring out any dream-like aspects, at any time, in any way during the experience. Well, the responses to that question were so overwhelmingly, “NO, absolutely not, no way, are you kidding?” I felt bad I was asking them that because the responses were not only so uniformly no, but so emphatically no. I ended up taking that question out because I got a tongue thrashing up behind the ears. That was one of the very first things I learned at the dawn of my research and understanding: No, near-death experiences are not dream-like in any way."

Edit-BTW I don't know about NDE at all but I have experienced big consciousness through meditation which doesn't have the component where you are looking down on yourself or at yourself from outside like NDE's but it is pure knowing, absolute reality,your essense, total peace, complete love and beyond life and death. So there appear to be similarities and both involve this big or infinite eternal consciousness. 

In reply to Coel Hellier:

I'm pretty sure the answer is no, not least because you can tell if someone undergoing surgery under GA is too light and becoming stressed. 

However, sometimes unpleasant procedures are, for good reason, done under sedation (or relative analgesia, as we used to call it) and there is no memory of it afterwards.  It's an interesting moral question as to how much it matters.

In reply to Pefa:

So brain activity continues in surprising ways when close to death in ways which are not yet fully understood, but that is no reason to postulate wildly speculative stuff about cosmic consciousness or whatever. There are plenty of things which are not yet fully understood.

In reply to Coel Hellier:

When I had my hip replaced last year it was done under a spinal block rather than GA.  I have no memory whatsoever of anything between the last injection in the anaesthetic room and waking up in the recovery ward.  Yet the anaesthetist told me that during the operation I was talking to the surgeon (and wriggling around too much).  That's what comes from having a load of heroin injected in your spinal cord and getting a big dose of propafol, I guess.

But it does emphasise that consciousness, and the memory of consciousness, are different things, and trying to understand consciousness through introspection is very difficult.  Our introspective understanding of consciousness is tied up very closely with our perception of "now", a point separating a past which we know only through memories and a future of which we can only guess.  "Now" is I think rather a difficult thing to understand in physics, with its framework of space-time and generally time-reversible equations.

Which is not to say that I don't think there will be a physicalist explanation of consciousness, it's just that we haven't got one yet.

In reply to Robert Durran:

Personally as I have stated many times there is no postulating on my behalf or that of millions of other people who directly experience infinite consciousness. 

You see we don't have a belief or a faith in something we don't know about because we do know about it through direct experience. 

It is you and materialists in general who only have faith in that which is opposed to what you (and everyone else) directly experience. 

Now why would you refute your own (and everyone's else's) irrefutable evidence for a blind faith in something that doesn't exist?

That is the completely unscientific, illogical and irrational faith based religion of materialism. Created because we have lost our way due to our fascination with objects over that in which objects appear.

It's just a faulty interpretation of life which caught on a long time ago though it has helped us control what we perceive to some degree and help us live longer etc which is wonderful but it isn't the big picture or even our primary one. 

In reply to Richard J:

Only when and not before materialists acknowledge what is self evident to all humans which is that the brain(and everything else) is in consciousness and not the other way around. Which then means it is not a 'physicalist' explanation but a metaphysical explanation to our shared reality.

Materialists can never know consciousness without consciousness, its that simple. Like knowing the game of football if all you know is a ball and not the entire field it is played in. 

You say it's just because materialists don't understand it(consciousness) even when the simplest most basic experiences of everyone take place for you and everyone else every moment of every day in consciousness . Now if this was a materliaist experiment it would be done and dusted a long time ago but materialists fight against what is known. Known even by their own experience, just so they can continue to support an irrational, antiquated , defuncted faith in something(materialism) which defies everyone's, even their own experience. 

It is understandable, when we take consciousness out of the equation but not when we realise that consciousness is the equation. 

​​​​

In reply to Pefa:

You lose at “self evident to all humans”

experiences during Anaesthesia are interesting. A small number of patients are able to accurately report events that occur during surgery. Unfortunately some people are paralysed but conscious and this grim state is not detected by the anaesthetist - this is happily rare.

Another group of patients report consciousness during surgery, with vivid detail. However their recollections do not fit what actually happened. 
 

To what extent these are similar to NDE is debatable. Remember whilst the brain may have zero activity at some points during an arrest, before and after it will have activity and can form memories. 

In reply to Pefa:

It is not self-evident to me.  I am human.

You don't "directly experience infinite consciousness" you think you directly experience infinite consciousness.

You do not "know about it through direct experience", you interpret your experience that way.

If all you've got is witnessing like this then you're unlikely to convince many.

In reply to Coel Hellier:

So tell me what is outside of consciousness? Or what can be outside of consciousness? 

No.Thinking is thoughts, thoughts are mental objects, so to experience infinite consciousness there are no thoughts.You go beyond thoughts and they no longer intrude, in fact it is that which becomes easier the more often you meditate. 

Knowing is the direct experience of what is left when thoughts, body sensations ,sense perceptions are left behind. Knowing awareness is what we are.The knowing of a thought or feeling or anything is the experience of knowing one of those objects so when you take away all those objects you are left with directly knowing that which knows a thought or feeling or anything except having no thought or feeling or anything to know you then know your essence which is pure knowing awareness. Knowing knowing knowing. 

That's just the mind telling you that. It is when we focuse attention inward and away from objects, it's self inquiry which can only be experienced but it can be experienced by everyone. It's all very logical because how else would you find out about consciousness ie. What we are? Other than looking, sorry not looking but turning inside and going, though not going as it's a path less path but the only way to know consciousness is to know consciousness directly and that is by  turning attention on to it for once and not objects. It's all very rational. 

In reply to Dr.S at work:

Is it not self evident to us all that nothing or no thing can be outside of consciousness? 

That's a literal waking nightmare. 

Yes but afterwards how can it tell other people who were there what was happening in visual detail when the NDE'er was lying eyes shut flatlined? 

In reply to Pefa:

Not to me.

Good question - one of the difficulties in deciding if somebody was conscious or not during anaesthesia is how well they describe things - the patient may have a very precise recollection, which is not accurate. There can be a lot of overlap between recollection and actuality - but what did the patient actually experience, and when?

In reply to Dr.S at work:

Yes not self evident because of what we are taught from an early age but if you ask yourself that question then what answer do you come up with? 

Did you see my links up thread to - https://www.nderf.org/ 1 

I know practically nothing about NDE I'm happy to say😬 but certain individual ones state what was going on visually that the knocked out person could not have seen. Here's the John Cleese trucker one again for example( you only need watch 15 mins) 

youtube.com/watch?v=4RGizqsLumo&