Agreed. If what someone calls proof relies on a willingness to have an open mind, and personal experiences, it is not proof.

It's not even evidence.

If I say that I had a hippo swim up my urethra, and that my proof is me saying that it happened, I wouldn't expect others to accept my proof. If I could objectively prove it, then perhaps, but in this case it'd be deeply unpleasant I expect.

I bet. I'd watch.

"Mary loves Dick! Mary loves Dick!"

Classic

I wouldn't say there was anything particularly 'rational' about so called psychic abilities.

But, that's just me talking as a biologist.

As a fellow biologist, I second this.

....was that a warped version of peer reviewal?

Haha I suppose we could call it that

"Psychics" are cold readers. Derren Brown explains exactly how they do what they do and replicates their "skill". The difference is that Derren Brown tells everyone that it is a trick where as "Psychics" take money from vulnerable people who think they will get to talk to a dead loved one. Psychics are pure scum.

Yes I have for a fact, I am not claiming personally to be psychic but I have had readings done and I have been told personal details and predictions that have come true, not vague references but facts times and dates. I would say that in 95% of cases of claims of psychic ability I am a sceptic but as I said I have had experiences that cannot be refuted and you just have to take my word for that, calling me a liar really won't make those facts go away

No, I said that it was very vague, which it is. If you want to count it as a hit, then I'm happy to go along with that. It doesn't matter. The reason it doesn't matter is replicability. Sollog constantly makes vague predictions. That one of them can be counted as a hit isn't remarkable. If more of them were hits then you'd expect by chance alone, then it would be something noteworthy. But it's not. That is the one hit he can count in the past 15 years.


Ask yourself how good his prediction really is if it only mentioned Washington DC. It's like describing WWII but neglecting to mention Germany's involvement.


It's low if taken by itself. It's high if taken in conjunction with all the other predictions. As I said, it all comes down to how much you really understand probability.

Do you have recordings of these sessions, by any chance? You'd be amazed how often people make the exact same claims as you who are then gobsmacked to find that things aren't quite as they believed them to be upon listening back to a recording.

No, I don't. And that's exactly why you haven't had an experience that proves what you claim. Do you see?

Derren Brown is also exponentially better at doing it that the vast vast majority of them.

It's like a magician explaining to someone how they do a trick and then that person seeing the exact same trick done again and still believing it's magic.

Once you understand Probability, Cold Reading, and Confirmation Bias, you'll understand that there is no such thing as Psychic reading.

probably one of the few times I would agree with Judi James. As for Mark he hasn't exactly done anything to change my mind regarding the quackery of psychics.

Think of a number between 1 and Z. Is it 1?

I do actually, I have 4 tapes recorded over 10 years and after each session I was encouraged to write it all down in long hand which I did and I am still ticking off things that are coming true 10 years after the lady's death. Yes there are some general predictions in there but I have some very specific predictions too.

Unfortunately even this isn't true in many cases and people will continue to blindly believe even if they are shown countless examples of the tactics, ploys, and tricks such as cold reading, warm reading, barnum statements etc that all of them use.

You can even show some of the more well known mediums and psychics being exposed for what they are and show how they do what they do and yet it still won't be enough.

It's classic conformation bias.

At that point, it becomes classic stupidity and self delusion.

I wasn't talking so much about the predictions, as we again are encountering the "long enough time-scale" factor, but you claimed that she gave you personal details. Leaving aside the possibility of hot reading for now, could you maybe give an example of some of these personal details? I'm not asking you to give out personal details - so, for example, rather than saying "she said that my name is Nick, and that it was a name that my father thought of while he was shaving on Oct. 3rd 1973", say "she said that my name is [my name], and that it was a name that my father thought of while he was shaving on [day, month and year]" - but an actual transcript of exactly who said what would go some way towards people not being able to dismiss you outright.

There are many previously 'renowned' mediums and psychics that have been exposed as conmen/ women over the years. All of these had countless testimonials from people claiming that what they were told 'could not possibly have come from anything other than paranormal or psychic sources'.

Many many things that people assume cannot be explained, in fact can be explained. Pretty easily as well.

Forget the word psychic. I meant that if people that called themselves psychic were just people who had an amazing ability to be able to somehow absorb other people's brain signals, then this would explain how they could do it. Also, this would have to mean that people's brains would have to broadcast the signals though. I don't know if this happens and that only very few people can absorb them. It's the only thing I can think of.

I know of one thing that scientists wouldn't be able to explain. I'm not going to say what it is, obviously.

Again, there's no evidence that people can read other people's minds. Trying to come up with a theory as to how people can read other people's minds is entirely redundant without first establishing that they can. Coming up with an explanation which would require mountains of evidence as it would have to overcome established physics is doubly redundant given that no such evidence exists.

Just because scientists can't explain something, it doesn't mean that Science can't.

I don't think anyone is calling you a liar. What people are saying is that your experiences are not proof that psychic powers exist.