Oh, wow. I read the article and the bit where he said “I waited for eight years so I’d have enough data to be sure it wasn’t a fluke” sounded to me like it took him eight years to find a fluke big enough that it fell within the publishable p-value range—if this comment is true then he either doesn’t understand statistics (bad), or is manipulating the statistics (very bad). One possibility is that he’s doing this as a proof of concept that the p-value criteria is flawed: cognitive dissonance in academics trying to disbelieve a sound study showing psychic phenomenon would be a powerful force indeed to enact change.
Oh, wow. I read the article and the bit where he said “I waited for eight years so I’d have enough data to be sure it wasn’t a fluke” sounded to me like it took him eight years to find a fluke big enough that it fell within the publishable p-value range—if this comment is true then he either doesn’t understand statistics (bad), or is manipulating the statistics (very bad). One possibility is that he’s doing this as a proof of concept that the p-value criteria is flawed: cognitive dissonance in academics trying to disbelieve a sound study showing psychic phenomenon would be a powerful force indeed to enact change.