re: #43 Obdicut

The study was based on assumptions about the nature of consciousness that are little more than speculation. That they even carried these conjectures to measure a large population implied that a large population possesses these phantom mechanisms, and that these mechanisms are triggered at an unconscious level when exposed to certain stimuli. This is Pavlovian.

The dog doesn’t know why it salivates, it just does. A participant in the study doesn’t know why they feel good or bad about something, they just do.

Instead of calling it a Pavlovian response, they call it Implicit Associations. The cute trick is that if people believe that the test has somehow read their deepest feelings, it gives credence to an unprovable assumption about consciousness. Sleight of hand. Not science.

So I guess you’re right. At least Pavlov was scientific.