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Reading the wikipedia article might give one this is a scientifically controversial topic, because that article fails to mention the one scientific experiment that was performed with participation from both sides of the "debate".
became known to the general public following his coauthoring a paper on what is popularly known as Bible code, the supposed coded messaging in the Hebrew text of the Torah....
In 1994, Rips, together with Doron Witztum and Yoav Rosenberg, published a seminal article in the journal Statistical Science, "Equidistant Letter Sequences in the Book of Genesis", which claimed the discovery of encoded messages in the Hebrew text of Genesis. This, in turn, was the inspiration for the 1997 book The Bible Code by journalist Michael Drosnin. While Rips originally claimed that he agreed with Drosnin's findings, he later distanced himself from his interpretations.[3] Since Drosnin's book, Bible codes have been a subject of controversy, with the claims being criticized by Brendan McKay and others.
So unless someone can post additional scientific experiments which have been peer-reviewed, this scientific attempt to validate the bible code showed that there was nothing to it. In fairness I should add that Rips who agreed to the experiment beforehand objected to it afterward when it didn't support his claims, citing errors, however his critics responded that even after accounting for these error there was still no statistical validity to the claim.
DR LYNDA WHITE: Rips original experiment gave us odds of 62,500 to 1. When we did our experiment we had two lists, we had the sceptics list and we had the Rips list. The odds for the sceptics list turned out to be 2 to 1 against, much smaller than Rips’ original odds. In very simple terms this represents a chance of about 1 in 3 that the clustering is accidental. So no evidence at all for hidden codes. When it came to the Rips’ list we get odds of 2 to 3 which again putting it simple represents a chance of just over 50% that the clustering is accidental. So when we look at these two together there is absolutely no evidence at all, absolutely none that there are hidden codes here.
NARRATOR: One experiment is never accepted as proof in science, however the only Bible code experiment involving both sides of the debate had failed to show any evidence of their existence.
But he explains they aren't really codes at all and the reason we can find coincidences in large texts:
NARRATOR: Brendan McKay is an expert in advance probability theory. He’s been investigating mathematical mysteries for almost 30 years. He decided to take up Drosnin’s challenge. He bought a copy of the 150 year old American novel Moby Dick and using a search programme similar to Rips began to comb it for hidden messages. The results were at first glance remarkable.
BRENDAN MCKAY: What’s really going on of course is that the computer can search in so many ways, millions or hundreds of millions of ways that even though any particular pattern is unlikely, it’s going to find something sooner or later.
Using the scientific method, you could make the hypothesis that the "codes" found in Moby Dick exceed expected statistical probability, and test your hypothesis. McKay says they don't, and he's an expert on statistical probability.
Originally posted by GBP/JPY
Cool, but actually....when related topics are superimposed in the same location, like 4 or 6 related topics.....that's interesting.
also, moby dick and other books than the Bible may have supernatural help
As I said this is a thread about the science. Science can't be used to prove or disprove things which are beyond the scope of science, like the supernatural.
....don't discount supernatural design....it's a miracle world that we have here for sure
Good comments, thanks.
Originally posted by BayesLike
It's only statistically controversial among non-statisticians. There are lots of people who claim to be statisticians who really aren't educated in the field. Even though these individuals may be (but generally aren't) adequate in their usual application, as soon as they get outside of those specific applications where they follow well-defined procedures they tend to make huge errors in assumptions and methodology choices.
One big difference between the experiment McKay was involved in and Rips earlier work was carefully agreeing on the specific parameters in advance.
NARRATOR: But as McKay examined Drosnin’s findings, he thought he saw a flaw. Rips is a brilliant mathematician, but he is not an expert in statistics. It’s a very different science. To get a figure recognised by statisticians you need to follow a rigorous statistical procedure.
BRENDAN McKAY: In order to actually give a statistical significance to a Bible code type finding it’s essential that you specify in advance what it is that you have to find in order to be successful and you specify the way in which this experiment’s results will be analysed and without such a formal experiment the numbers are simply meaningless, they’ve got no statistical value.
Good point. ATS member Sigismundus wrote a detailed reply to the thread that got deleted about just that. I think he said there were at least 6 versions.
Originally posted by Eonnn
Then you have to wonder what is the original edition?