OllyK

It is common practice in the USA where this is big business. It changes things from a "Cold reading" in to a "Warm Reading". It seems in the USA everything gets on to TV. Mediums, faith healers etc are no exception. Some of the better known mediums make big money due to the large number of TV "performances" they make.

It is not unusual at the TV recordings for the following to occur:
1) A researcher for the medium obtains a list of the people who have tickets to the show.
2) Some initial investigation is performed (as mentioned, the amount of information you can find out on on-line in the US with just a name and address is incredible).
3) Targets are selected for their wow factor, ones that they have been able to find something interesting out about etc.
4) When the "marks" are queuing to get in, a researcher be-friends them and engages in "idle" chit chat. Asking what they are hoping to find out about at the show if they are asked and so on.
5) The information is passed back to the medium.
6) The show starts and the medium appears to pick somebody by random and chooses the "mark". On occasion the host will choose somebody and it will be the wrong person. This usualy gets a response along the line of "sorry I am not feeling anything from you at the moment, it happens, but please come and see me 1 to 1 another time and I am sure we can get things to work, how about the person behind you?" from the medium
7) The medium starts off gently, a few pacing statements, obvious small stuff that he knows he will get right.
8) Then he starts to feed in all the stuff the reasearchers have found out.
9) The mark gasps in amazement, not realising that the information she has been told was found on the internet and from the innocent little conversation she had an hour or so before.

Now again, I am not claiming all of them do it this way, some just pure cold read. And as I have said before, there may really be one out there who can genuinely do this, I have just never seen them and seriously doubt they exist.

Mediums being exposed is nothing new, it has been going on for as long as mediums have been around. The thing I find hard to grasp is that when people have the techniques explained to them, and even demonstrated by a proficent magician etc who will assure them that there is nothing super natural about it the person will still choose to prefer to belive that the medium they saw is doing things the hard way and really is in contact with the "other side"

If you didn't know how an exhaust was made would you assume that the exhaust faries made it? Unlikely I suppose but it is possible. Assuming you did, would still belive that after I took you round an exhaust manufacturing plant? It seems the "believers" would!

carl

Although a bit light-hearted, I think these are important points. If a medium were to have these "powers" there would surely be legitimate ways of using them to make more money than could be made hiring out your services for 25 quid a pop. I guess a lot of these would involve gambling, spread betting, buying and selling shares, etc. Although a genuine medium could also make an absolute killing in the media -- television, newspaper,etc.

The fact that they don't suggests to me that they are charlatans. They may even believe themselves that they have "spiritual powers" but IMHO that makes them as vulnerable and deluded as the suggestible idiots that go to see them.

I mean, FFS, maybe we should start burning them at the stake for witchcraft


[Edited by carl - 1/31/2004 11:11:29 AM]

AsifScoob

Please lets try to maintain an adult thread without resorting to insults.

Several times now I have been called an 'idiot', 'gullible', 'brain diarrhoea' and am beginning to resent it. John Banks has gone so far as to say that I am no beter than the hypochondriachs who attend his practice! I mean, if only my GP had the time that I could just stroll in for a chat whenever I felt like it!

Some of the sweeping generalisations I have read here are no different to me saying that anyone who is a sceptic clearly has a problem believing in anything, has an unnatural fear of faith and/or religon, is too terrified to accept that there may be an afterlife (as they may be implications to their present one!), is a control freak, has a problem with authority, is too scared to believe in a spirit world, is afraid of the dark, and wets their bed.

No doubt if I actually accused anyone of this there would be lots of people explaining carefully how they are not those things - well thats exactly what I have been trying to do in this thread.

Please read the following as I have typed it many times already:

1. I WAS a complete 100% sceptic.
2. I got in touch with a RECOMMENDED Medium (I heard Sharon Neil on Christian O'Connells Breakfast Show on XFM, who, if anyone knows of CO'C, is one of the biggest mickey takers around, and would not stand for this if he thought it was a fake)
3. Sharon Neil was able to tell me a number of things, 100% accurately, that anyone who knew only my first name could not possibly know, or more importantly, find out.
4. Without ANY, NONE, ABSOLUTE ZERO, ZILCH, THAT MEANS WITHOUT ANY prompting from me, she was able to tell, my Father was dead, the EXACT day that he died, how he died, how he was buried (very particular)etc etc
5. Having just listened to the tape again and in answer to one of Ollys earlier questions/challenges, there is barely a miss. I would go so far as to the hits out number the misses 10 to 1.
6. Some other facts she got spot on, whom I work for, my job title, what I do, how I do it, how I was about to be made redundant and in the exact manner, ie who else was GOING to be involved (so I didn't even know it at this point, but it transpired exactly as she told me!), what was (exactly) wrong with my Mother, what WAS GOING to happen to her (she had a mini stroke later that year) She passed on messages from my Great Grandfather, who fought in the British Indian Army in WWI, described him, his uniform, and where he was. etc etc etc. How much more do you want?
7. I played the tapes to my Brothers, who could verify it against historical fact and family history, My eldest Brother is a complete 110% sceptic but he was silenced by the end of the tape and I believe he muttered something along the lines of "Hmm..interesting". His initial reaction had been roars of laughter.

So, if anyone can give me a scientific, plausible, explanation as to how she could have found these things out about me, by ONLY KNOWING MY FIRST NAME, then I am prepared to withdraw everything I have said, and wear a placard down Oxford Street stating "I am a gullible idiot, with diarrhoea for brains"

OK?

Asif

AsifScoob

Thanks for your words of support B20.

Sounds like tough times you had with your son mate, glad that things got better. Was that him with you at Bolney last year? If you may remember you managed to snap a photo of me when taking shots of a R33 Skyline there?

I remember the pair of you, as you were taking photos of him in front of various motors.

Asif

AsifScoob

WWP8,

I would certainly recommend Sharon Neil. She lives in Ireland, but travels to the UK frequently, doing personal readings and tours.

If you like I can email her number to you and you can enquire for yourself? Others have already requested the info.

Asif

AsifScoob

Incredible about the cranial osteopath, I had no idea.

Sorry, I was in the R33 pic, but thats as close as I get to owning one right now, I was just drooling mate, I have a UK scoob.

The pic was of the black R33, owned by the gentlemen with the large mullett? You can see the back of my head in one of them! I think it was the first one you posted up?

Asif

john banks

B20 sorry to hear about you bad GP experience. Covering 90% of the contacts with the NHS on 10% of the budget inevitably leads to resource problems. However, a failure of some GPs does not imply that all are rubbish any more than a success story that is related in time to contact with an alternative therapist or spiritualist implies that the interventions they offer work. Some alternative therapies do have a place, especially accupunture and some herbal remedies. Others that appear to do nothing physical have benefit because of the time that the therapist is able to spend on a case. By no means all of modern Western medical practices have repeatable, double blind randomised controlled trials to support their use, but there is rather more than there is for spiritualism or homeopathy. There is evidence to support the use of chiropractic and ostoepathy even though the underlying principles are debated.

So a comparison of spiritualism with chiropractic is spurious.

Clearly you don't spend all your life at the GP having a chat, but my opinion is that people that do are similar in personality to people that seek out spiritualists and participate in the lunatic fringe of religion. If I was a really bad GP I would just precribe people medication and not try to tackle the psychological issues that are going on. It is much quicker to print a prescription than listen to someone that no-one else will listen to.

I am not afraid of spiritual experience, I just think that after looking hard for it that it has no relevance to my life and haven't seen any evidence that is at all satisfactory for any spirit world whatsoever. As well as having no relevance I have seen a lot of harm result from it. Any argument that there is no spiritual world is met with experiential proof that so far has been laughably inadequate and at worst fraudulent, or it is met with a faith construct that is so designed that it can never be proved or disproved. I could as well assert that I was a giraffe in my previous life and there is not a shred of evidence I or you can bring to doubt it. It is a matter of faith

The guy that offers the big money for evidence of the spiritual has my vote, think he'll keep his money.

Just my opinion, not ramming it down your throat.

CataIunya

Read all this thread through and had personal experience of it all don't have a crack at John coz you had a bad experience with a GP at the end of the day there all human and make mistakes. As for this BS about spiritualism its all been said before, if they were really above board they would take James up on his offer of 1 million squid and give it to charity........why do they not do that ? why coz its feckin bull thats why.....u bunch of losers...........

wwp8

asif can you email me the number please

OllyK

Asif, I think John was generalising rather than pointing a finger at you, at least I hope he was. Yes I did make mention of "gulible" in one of my posts, but again that was making a point about my beliefs and pointed out that you would probably find it hard to understand how "I could not see what was so glaringly obvious to you". It certainly wasn't intended as an insult, just an illustration of our opposing views, which I hope we can continue to debate in and open, frank and adult way.

Yes I have genralised, but keep stressing that a genuine medium may be out there, I just have no evidence to back that up, but an awful lot of evidence to say there isn't.

"belief" now that's a nasty one. I have a belief that things that have been proven and repeated scientifically are on the whole correct. But again I have also admited that I am more than happy to change my beliefs based on new evidence.

I do not fear faith, I just does not form a part of my life. Faith is having a belief that is unsupported by any evidence. What I have is trust, which is based on experience. I don't have "faith" that people will not crash in to me, I have "trust" as experience tells me that on the whole people do not want to crash their cars.

Again I am quite happy with the belief that there is no afterlife, it make much more sense to me that the idea that there is one. Again, I am happy to proved wrong. I would say if anything it is the other way round. The fear that there is nothing after death has resulted in the "creation" of an afterlife to passify the masses. I don't have issues with authority in so far as I am not an anarchist, that doesn't mean that I don't think the current government is cr@p however.

My beliefs are not based on the fear of the unknown. What I have evidence for I accept pending further or alternative eveidence. The things I don't have answers for I may ponder on, but I certainly don't fear them and they daon't cause me any undue concern.

Also I would think people who belive in ghosts and are scared of them are far more likely to be scared of the dark, than somebody who is only worried about muggers, rapists, muders etc roaming about in the dark, hmmm maybe I should be scared of the dark!

OllyK

Just as a general point of interest, do those who belive that mediums are genuine belive in all things supernatural or are you selective about what things you belive in?

weapon69

ROFL You really are full of ****.

john banks

Thank you for your well informed and reasoned reply.

OllyK

weapon69 - you may not agree with John's opinions (and I would agree that he could have been a little more diplomatic on occasions), that's fine, but rather than just coming back with a 1 line insult, why don't you try and explain your concerns. At least John has gone to the trouble to outline why he holds his particular views.

The kind of response you have made just adds weight to my earlier arguments that you have absolutely nothing solid to base your arguments on and so all you have left it insults and mud slinging.

Asif is trying (and I think suceeding) to put his point across in a well thought out manner, and is "fighting the spiritualist corner". Why don't you pull your head out of the sand and enter the debate as a grown up or go and play in muppets.

AsifScoob

What happened to the thread?

Am I the only one with just the first two pages of this?

Where is the rest of it?

OllyK

Hmmm - partial thread recovey!

OllyK

Only seems to show the rest after a post to the thread - teething troubles me thinks

weapon69

OllyK -im not going to explain my life on here just to make a point. If you don't believe, fine thats ok, thousands like you. But JohnBanks has just insulted people in his posts and then is surprised i don't come back with a 'well informed answer'?

OllyK

weapon69

As I said, I do think John went a little over the top, having said that there is a key sentence here, which you yourself chose to high light when you replied:

1) He is expressing his opinion, which is what this thread is about.
2) He uses the word "similar" not "are the same as"
3) He is generalising and not pointing a finger at anybody specifically

Unless you are suggesting he is not entitled to an opinion on the subject then your response was not very helpful. Likewise I do belive we still have freedom of speech in this country, and while you may not like his generalisation, he is entitled to hold his opinion.

Directly insulting him:
is petty and unhelpful, not to mention a direct insult rather than a generalisation.

I didn't ask you to explain your life, I suggested you came back with a well thought out counter argument to John's comments. It seems that rather than explore the possibility that you could be wrong, you would rather retreat in to your shell and hurl insults at somebody who challenges your beliefs.

Actually many more than that. To be honest I suspect the majority of the population really don't give two hoots and don't give it a second thought.

Just interested why nobody has responded to my earlier question:
Anbody prepared to stand up and be heard?

If you only belive in one or two supernatural phenomena, why is that? What makes the ones you belive in different, better or more "real" than the others? Just wondering.

weapon69

LOL. Retreat in my shell? OK i'll just be doing that Olly. You got me, i haven't got a leg to stand on against your amazing comebacks. And John you sound like an absolutely fantastic GP.

Mice_Elf

I've seen this explained before. It's true that the researcher compiles a list of those who have tickets to attend the show in a week / 2 weeks hence.

Someone will then call round at the address of a few of those people, using a story like their car's broken down, can they use the phone? or similar story. Whilst there and "waiting" for the recovery service / friend to pick them up, they engage in idle nattering and take note of items in the house. They ask to use the bathroom and make a note of room positions, colour of toothbrush, type of toothpaste, any ornaments visible etc.

In the living room they pay attention to personal photographs, plates on the wall, hanging pictures - all the little bits and bobs.

Then, some time later, the "mark" appears on the show and suddenly, the "medium" knows all about them! Uncanny! Of course the "mark" doesn't equate someone breaking down 2 weeks earlier with them appearing on the show.

Now, I'm not saying that all mediums (media?) are like this, but it was one explanation of how things happened on these shows.

AsifScoob

So,

Have I got this right? The 'end' of the thread is now at the 'beginning'?

Sorry not read anything else, I am sure there is some explanation for all the new functionality.

So I have out of touch with this thread for a couple of days. I will get acquainted with the new and then get back here.

Asif

Buzzer

Medii Micey, Medii !

PMSL

On a more serious note, we cant tar everyone with the same brush. I guess these "mediums" have a lot to gain with television exposure and they must command huge fees too boot.

I think the type of mediums that Asif & W69 are talking about are not these sorts of profit seeking mediums that you speak of but more the ones who only wish to cover their own expense or indeed not charge at all

john banks

Any medium/diviner/prophet/stone basher/weirdo/psychic that can post an 8 digit number on the bbs after I have written it down and put it in a sealed envelope and posted it to someone independent but before it arrives with them? So if it is postmarked before the post on here, but well before the envelope could arrive.

Easy money available for a minute's work for such skilled individuals.

Alternatively, for easy starters, email me the names of my first cat and dog, my last cholesterol reading and tell me how many bytes are free on my laptop's hardrive.

Shouldn't be too difficult? And since my email address is not in my profile (or wasn't with old Scoobynet) even an amateur internet sleuth or spam engine has no trouble working it out, so you shouldn't too.

Can anyone come up with any peer reviewed quality scientific papers that establish the credibility of the supernatural in any shape or form?

Circumstantial evidence and individual testimony is too weak to be considered when the claims are so dubious.

The more fantastic the claim, the more rigorous the evidence, otherwise we just end up in the mumbo jumbo world of faith where less evidence is required for the incredible than is required for the mundane and routine. Truly twisted logic.

I'm not the first and not the last to mention a connection between psychosis and spiritualism, or even softer between the vulnerable personality disordered and people who seek out spiritualists or who are on the lunatic fringes of religion. I'm not even going to claim it was my original thought, you can blame a lot of existing literature on that. Particularly interesting are the difficulties psychologists face in trying to counsel individuals with diagnoses of psychotic illness who report florid quasi-spiritual experience. Depending on the therapist's own views this can produce a difficult therapeutic encounter.

The most extreme spiritual content to any discussion I have had with anyone has been in grossly psychotic patients.

There are similarities that are well documented.

The other way of looking at it is that people with developing psychoses can often seek out spiritual experiences/explanations for their thoughts and "experiences". It doesn't necessarily mean that in seeking spiritual experiences you are becoming psychotic though. There are a lot of grey areas.

Which leads to the other? Just because they share similarities doesn't mean they are the same thing.

A psychotic individual tends to have lost function and connection with the normal world, whereas a lot of people that claim extreme spiritual experiences function at up to and including the highest levels of society.

So I'm not saying you are all mad

But I'm also not backing away one inch from my assertion that Spiritualism is unproven.

NotoriousREV

Pete (Buzzer) are you going to see this spiritualist? I'd be interested in coming along if you do. (Not read the whole thread, got bored by the same arguments being repeated on both sides )

I just want to see what happens at these things.

OllyK

Well as you don't seem to have anything useful to contribute, would seem like a good idea.

Finally, the penny drops!! You don't have a leg to stand on and it is nothing to do with "comebacks" (actually I wasn't whinging and bitc*ing, I was debating various issues), it is to do with not having a shred of evidence.

Look in user CP and check your options, you can select to have newest posts displayed first. Suspect you got that as the default.

Very common when TV appearances are concerened, less so with 1 to 1 personal meetings, but as discussed that still leaves plenty of scope for other skullduggery!

I am obviously in the wrong business. I'll have to set up shop selling guesses about people's lives for £25 a shot! £25 / hr is pretty good going by anybody's measure, and that's assuming the readings do last an hour. Also watch out for premium rate booking numbers etc!

John - no spiritualist will take you up on your challenge, it has been offered by many others before and has not been taken up. We both know why they will not indulge us poor sceptics by means of a double blind scientific test.

There is no scientific papers (well there are a couple of seriously badly flawed ones) about the confirmation of spiritualism as spiritualists will not be tested as they know the result - about the only bit of seeing in to the future they can do that is not purely based on guesswork and skullduggery.

andrewdelvard

Great topic, super to read.
OllyK.
Have you had any personal experiences with spiritualists that would add some background to your feelings on this topic? BTW this is a direct question with no underhand meaning or suggestion! Just wondered that's all.

OllyK

andrewdelvard

Think I covered this on page 1 or 2! I have not been to see a spiritualist personally. I have seen them "perform" on TV and have read a lot about them and have drawn my own conclusion.

If you know the "Nigerian dictator transferring money to you account" e-mail is a con, do you give it a go anyway just to make sure?

As I have said, I am prepared to admit, that there may just be somebody out there who really can get in touch with the other side and come out with same sort of stuff that the guessing con merchants do. However I am not prepared to spend a significant amount of time, effort and money visiting every spiritualist just to see if they may be "the one"

I have offered on here to get in touch with Sharon Neil to see if she is prepared to meet for a reading under scientific conditions, just to prove a point. As yet I have only been able to get her answer phone. I have stated elsewhere in this thread and will state it again, once Sharon knows I want to test scientifically if she really does have any ability, I think it highly unlikely she will agree to to meet and if she does, I doubt she would turn up. As previously stated, if this happens, it would speak volumes to me, I just hope it would do the same for those who are so convinced that she is genuine. I'll keep you all posted