You will have heard the good news about three missing women - Amanda Berry, Gina DeJesus and Michelle Knight – who just escaped captivity after 10 years locked up in a house in Cleveland. Here is something you’re less likely to hear in all the excitement and good cheer – in 2003 supposed “psychic” Sylvia Brown told the Mother of Amanda Berry that she was already dead.
“Can you tell me…Is she out there?” Berry’s mother Louwana Miller asked. “I hate when they’re in the water,” Browne said. “She’s not alive honey.”
Ugh! - “She’s not alive honey.” Honey! Stop Sylvia Browne has a more detailed analysis of the reading: Montel: Amanda Berry Reading.
Once again this old fraud played the odds guessing game and lost. Just like with Shawn Hornbeck dead. I mean, alive, and Sylvia Browne - Miners are alive! (oh, sorry, no they're not). And yet she continues as though nothing has happened, and dopes such as Montel still allow her on his show.
And also of note, once again, none of the professional “psychics” (Allison Dubois, John Edward James Van Praagh etc) were any use at all in finding these women (just girls when they were kidnapped) who had been held captive for 10 years. 10 years and nothing. Ditto remote viewers (eg Psi Tech, that still offers courses on remote viewing despite their confident prediction of where Elizabeth Smart’s dead body would be found). As always, all the psychics in the world were completely useless, in an area where, if psychic powers were real, they would have been able to make a huge difference.
I'm not sure if I see the 'ratings whores' that run many television shows in a much better light than the bloodsucking 'psychic' frauds!
Posted by: Woody | May 07, 2013 at 11:29 PM
"bloodsucking 'psychic' frauds!"
Who could reasonably dispute that?
The media outlets that promote these frauds fund these bastards and must therefore accept guilt as being accessories to their crimes and for enabling their criminal and morally abhorrent activities.
Posted by: Protista Amoeba | May 13, 2013 at 12:07 PM
5 (out of thousands) of psychics failed on 3 situations (out of millions), and you conclude all the psychics in the world are useless. That's not skeptical, that's stupid (among other things).
Posted by: D | November 21, 2013 at 01:19 PM
Hi D,
Skeptics look at the evidence that exists and see what it suggests, challenging their own beliefs if necessary. Please provide an address or link to the data that shows proof of the claims you make. Then I can know what you are talking about and I wont be confined to the information that is available to me, I can give the data you present appropriate consideration.
Skepticism taught me well how to assess a scientific test, maybe you can alter my view on the subject. (Assuming the data can hold water)
Posted by: Woody | November 22, 2013 at 02:07 AM
You don't know much about what skeptics say about psychics, D.
So far, every single properly double-blinded and controlled test performed with a psychic has resulted in failure. If I'm wrong, I'd like you to point to a success instead of making cliched personal accusations. It only takes one psychic who is willing and able to pass such a test, and none have emerged despite skeptics making demands over the course of decades.
Many of us would love it if psychic powers were demonstrably real because it'd open up a new wild field of science where we could watch scientists devise and test competing hypotheses. We'd have a front row seat as the scientific community hammers a consensus out of the chaos of the formerly unknown. We might even see inventors apply that hard won knowledge for practical use. We'd get to see a field of science grow from infancy to maturity within our lifetime.
But in reality, the failures have happened so consistently and predictably, a great many of us have gotten bored with the topic. The field of parapsychology hasn't made any advances I'm aware of.
If you want us to pay closer attention, you have to present us with something truly extraordinary to shock us out of apathy. Most believers don't even know what that would be because they aren't interested in listening to us or our expectations. We know a lot about what ordinary human beings are capable of, and I typically find that believers underestimate human ingenuity and imagination. Instead of taking the time to really listen and tailor their message to us, they rehearse the same old prejudices instead of acknowledging that they need to approach us differently.
Psychics are generally only willing to be tested under loose circumstances where non-psychics have been known to succeed through known methods of trickery (stage magicians do such things for a living) or have their believers interpret any questionable outcome as a success because they fell prey to known, universally human methods of self-deception. Clear failures are explained by inconsistent ad hoc hypotheses after the fact.
We want test protocols that prevent known methods of trickery that can be performed by ordinary human beings and produce clear success or clear failure that aren't so easily subjected to spin. We want psychics to do things non-psychics can't.
Posted by: Bronze Dog | November 22, 2013 at 10:20 AM