Trivun said:
There's every possibility that it is real, just as there's every possibility that things like Spiritualism and telepathy and whatnot are real. Unlikely, but still possible. Thing is, we haven't proven scientifically that these things don't exist, and we have no idea what the extent of the mind's powers, or natural laws of nature and science, are yet. There are still tons of things we don't know. So, there is every possibility in the world that all these things are real, and we just don't understand them yet. Don't dismiss something out of hand, unless you can decisively prove that it's not actually real.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russels_teapot
The problem is that its impossible to prove that something doesn't exist. We can't prove that unicorns, leprechauns, dragons or Cthulu don't exist as its possible that we just haven't found one yet. If we keep on in this manner, it becomes clear that just because we can't prove that something doesn't exist is no grounds for claiming that it does.
However, unlike unicorns (where even though unlikely, its not impossible that a species of horse evolved horns on their heads and we just haven't found them yet), the idea of psychic powers or voodoo actually goes against many of our current theories of nature. There is no evidence that say, sticking a pin in a voodoo doll could effect someone else, and there is nothing in physics that could account for that happening.
If someone managed to use voodoo magic in a measurable way, under strictly controlled conditions and could repeat it, then science would have to take account of that and adjust its theories accordingly. At the moment "adjusting its theories accordingly" would mean "throwing pretty much everything we know about physics and biology* out the window".
And its not that "we have no idea what the extent of the mind's powers, or natural laws of nature and science, are yet". We have been studying these things for hundreds, maybe thousands of years. We know enough about physics to send us to the moon or examine the things that make up the things that make up atoms, enough about biology to map the human genome or clone an animal. While science doesn't know everything, we are fairly sure about what we do know, and we have a pretty good idea about where the gaps in our knowledge lie.
