James Randi Lecture @ Caltech - Cant Prove a Negative

I'm highly skeptical sure but what is that skepticism based on if you're skeptical as well have you asked yourself upon what do I base my skepticism are you just playing ornery you just don't want to go along with the rest of the thing do you know some other people who believe in it that are really pretty dense and you don't want to join their group you've got to have a reason I think for yourself and for others as to why you were skeptical these things are not likely to be true therefore you need proof of them now you're not required or am I certainly required to prove a negative I can't do that I can't prove telepathy doesn't exist I remember getting a question years ago they you stood up in the iron said and you proved to me that yes pee doesn't exist and I said no I can't then she sat down haha their arms folded I was a victory for her and then I went on to explain I can't prove a negative my question is do you believe in it she says absolutely I said can you prove that it is so she said well I'm quite convinced of it it's not my question can you prove that any so or that it is so not you can't prove that it ain't so can you prove that it is so you're the one making the claim and they are the folks making the claims we're not.we skeptics as Michael sherbert clearly pointed out we're not in the business of debunking if I were in the business of debunking and I often had that label pinned on me and I've always resented it and I've denied it if I were in the business of debunking it means I go into an investigation convinced that this ain't so and I'm going to show you that it isn't I'm not a lawyer I don't have an advocacy position to take on convinced this is and so I don't care what the evidence is I'm somehow going to prove that it ain't so no I go into the thing investigating now to be perfectly fair with you let's be real for a minute well all the way through this I hope I can't prove a negative it's true but I go into this thing I say prepared to be shown am i prejudiced against it oh yes I have to admit that after all if you've been sitting by a chimney for 63 years on the evening of December 24 and a fat man in a red suit has never bounced down the chimney oh you can say is 100% of my evidence shows me that this is not necessarily so I don't have any proof that it is and what's more important folks is this one fact it's not very likely to be true based upon what you already know now I often end my lectures with this little illustration people will ask the question and I'll see you show it again so know that I got you know you have to prove to me since you say it is so that it is so suppose I illustrate for you I think rather well but you'll be the judge of that in a moment whether or not you can prove a negative let's take Santa Claus that's a very good example well around the end of December I'm awfully popular I must admit in the street and I have kids almost worshipping me sorry out there disillusioned later on but who knows wasn't my fault I didn't tell them the myth in the first place you'll have to examine the Santa Claus saying by specific means now there's one way you can go around and measure chimneys but that's not much of a you know it he does come in the back door I'm told occasionally if the chimney is occupied or it's too small so that's not much of a way of investigating it let's trying reindeer there's a good way hey that we can test oh please don't tell the ASPCA about this I I don't really want to do the experiment I must say that in advance I really don't want to do the experiment but let's just walk through it as if I were doing the thing okay let's name some numbers now okay select by some randomizing process Oh a thousand reindeer okay and you get them all together in a reindeer truck or something I don't know what you put a reindeer in and a whole bunch of people with whip surd I don't know and what do you do with Rangers but anyway get some people know how to handle reindeer and stick them up on top of the World Trade Center in New York you're laughing and you're making assumptions now it can't happen you're going to test whether or not reindeer can fly okay so I'll sort of walk through it with you if you'll bear with me you have a guy there with a that's a dirty laugh lady I want to tell you but I like it keep it up yes you go on the top of the Empire Putney the World Trade Center and you have your thousand reindeer there all right I put numbers on the side one two three all the way up to thousand big numbers so you can see them and you have a guy with a video tape camera lots of pads of paper and whatnot and pens at work and you say okay the time is now ten plus ten in the morning okay first experiment number one please and number one up to the edge and they're ready okay video camera going good push uh right down No really no number to push well now I don't know what the result of the experiment will be I suspect strongly what it will be based upon my meager knowledge of the aerodynamics of the average reindeer though I'm not an expert on it and based upon previous accounts of what reindeer can and cannot do I think we are going to end up with a pile of very unhappy and broken reindeer at the foot of the World Trade Center and probably a couple policemen standing outside a squad car saying I don't know but here comes another one now it gets better I won't tell anymore Ranger I promise um now what have we proven with this experiment now we proven that reindeer cannot fly no of course not think about it now we have only shown that on this occasion under these conditions of atmospheric pressure temperature radiation all this sort of thing at this position geographically on the season etc that these 1000 reindeer either could not fly or chose not to now if the second then we know something certainty about the IQ of the average reindeer in their group however we have not proven a negative we cannot prove a negative technically and rationally and philosophically speaking however people will often look at this example and say well how many reindeer would you have to test now I'm not going to get into the statistics of the thing our adventure one can have left for you I'm not going to get into the arguments on the matter I will only tell you that you cannot prove a negative and I think that's a rather good example of the two might wish to use in illustrating your point the other folks who claim that it is so are required to prove it and if it's so it's very easy just show me one flying reindeer of course then they come up with the rationalizations and they say oh though it's only the eight tiny reindeer that live at the North Pole who can and will on the evening of December the 24th fly to do that specific job in that case you have to throw up your hands and say well I don't think your hypothesis is very testable for more of James Randi and the educational foundation make sure you visit Randy's org [Music] you

Channel: JamesRandiFoundation

Views: 135,472

Rating: 4.9218283 out of 5

Keywords: james randi, jref, caltech, psychic, paranormal, santa, esp

Id: qWJTUAezxAI

Length: 7min 50sec (470 seconds)

Published: Thu Nov 05 2009

Reddit Comments

[u/contactlite]

Prove it to me that he's dead.

[u/StrangeCitizen]

He's debunking claims in heaven now.

[u/bea-sti]

"You cannot prove a negative."

What an amazing human.

[u/ManyWeek]

"I'm James Randi, bitch!" - James Randi

[u/Kill3rT0fu]

I don't think he's dead. Prove it.