Is this legit?

[Mokele]

An article on the project in question

 

Website of the project itself

 

I happened across this on another forum, and for the life of me, I can't tell if it's legit, a mistake, or just very, very crafty psuedoscience. My immediate reaction was that it's BS, but I don't want to be closed-minded about it, so I dug into it.

 

The first thing that comes to mind is that their random numbers were from a psuedo-random number generation algorithm, but the site actually lists the devices they use, which are apparently based on quantum principles. Then again, they could just be detecting patterns in what quantum assumes is patternless. But why would multiple machines simultaneously deviate?

 

I'm also suspicious because of the rather artistic flourish of the site and presumptive names of the project and the URL, but then again, they wouldn't be the first to "put the theoretical cart before the empirical horse". We all cen get carried away and overenthusiastic about our pet theories.

 

The last thing that comes to mind, and the biggest, given their list of "predictions" is that it's merely random fluctuations in the random numbers (as would be expected), which they then explain post hoc with the biggest news story from that time period. That they don't have any list of the total number of "peaks" (or whatever) makes me suspicious they're just only counting the hits, not the misses.

 

 

Thing is, quantum stuff and the math of random numbers aren't fields I have any degree of strong background in, so I'd appreciate any input from people with more knowledge than me on this subject.

 

So, am I right to be skeptical of this, or are my innate biases clouding my thinking on what might be interesting and worthwhile science?

 

Mokele

[Sayonara]

It's... odd.

 

Certainly some independent investigation is required.

[Supaiku]

http://noosphere.princeton.edu/

That link was at the bottom and it has a bunch of stuff... like real numbers and the like.

[5614]

I think what will really prove one of these predicty thingies correct is for it to predict something big, a bit before it happens and publicise it well. that way everyone will know, if it happens, that you predicted it before and you were right about it, then they will be more likely to believe you in the future.

 

saying that something predicted something correctly, an event that has already happened in that past is not really good enough, in my opinion.

[Supaiku]

The problem is it sounds like it the data just spikes before something big. So there's no telling WHAT will happen, just (possiblty) that SOMETHING will happen. Lame, but still some form of prediction.

[Cap'n Refsmmat]

Couldn't they be just telling us about when they were right, but actually they get spikes once every few days or whatever?

 

It sounds like a bunch of bs to me, but that's just coming from a skeptic. If there's real proof, you can bet I'll be going over it really well.