Jerry and Joe, Jerry
What... makes a phenomenon valuable for science if there are numerous unexplained facts that can be subject to exact analysis but not enough time to examine them all?
Peirce's definition of truth depends on what would be discovered if inquiry is pursued indefinitely. He even said that the time to complete all the analysis might take longer than the survival of the human race. Then perhaps some future beings or even some aliens in a distant galaxy might be able to continue the inquiry. JR
That is, how do you go from a strange, isolated and unexplained fact useful to science to “a very serious problem requiring respectful treatment”, which renders it useful?
Peirce's criterion for evaluating the truth of any assumption is its ability to make testable predictions. A single observation, such as some message obtained through telepathy, doesn't provide sufficient information for predicting how and when other messages might come through telepathy. For the word 'telepathy', I found 42 examples by searching CP. In some examples, he talks about cases where somebody dies, and a close friend or relative instantly get a feeling that the person had died. That is very hard to test. Even if someone gets a strong feeling that seems to be telepathic, it's quite possible that the information was an "educated guess" based on knowledge about somebody's health. Joe
Interesting case, however it is not clear what motion detection technology was deployed... Depending on type, infrared motion detectors can be triggered by temperature change, and/or light wave pattern disturbance.
I agree that there may be some physical explanation for the phenomena. The people from the Percy Grainger Society asked the experts at the company that made the camera and motion detector about possible causes. But no one could suggest any likely cause. But given that we are now reaching the end of June, I started to think about the Fourth of July. And I noticed that the date might be significant: Saturday, 2 July 2016 at 8:32 pm and 9:23 pm. Kids often get fireworks for the Fourth, and I have sometimes seen and heard some them practicing on the weekend before. The time of 8:32 pm EDT is just after sunset, and 9:23 pm is long enough after twilight for more complete darkness. Just behind the Grainger house is a parking lot for a business on the next street, and the Grainger property includes a side lot next to the house. Either one might be a place sufficiently removed from watchful parents. It's possible that a loud noise might have set off the motion detector, and it's possible that the light might have affected the camera. Now that would be a testable hypothesis. In New York, fireworks are illegal without a permit. But some scientists (or kids) who have the time, funding, and inclination to perform repeated experiments might be able to determine what kind of fireworks from what positions could trigger the motion detector and be recorded by the camera. On the other hand, the fireworks might have awakened Percy's ghost. John
----------------------------- PEIRCE-L subscribers: Click on "Reply List" or "Reply All" to REPLY ON PEIRCE-L to this message. PEIRCE-L posts should go to peirce-L@list.iupui.edu . To UNSUBSCRIBE, send a message not to PEIRCE-L but to l...@list.iupui.edu with the line "UNSubscribe PEIRCE-L" in the BODY of the message. More at http://www.cspeirce.com/peirce-l/peirce-l.htm .
