Hi there,
this is my first post on this forum and I apologize if I misspell some word because I am not a native English speaker.
I don’t consider myself a professional sceptic but due to fact that it seems that mystical beliefs are getting a revival at the beginning of 21. century from time to time I ponder about various fringe topics.
One of the subjects that attracts me are fortune tellers. It seems that some of them are good at what they do. Arthur C. Clarke wrote in his book ‘World of Strange Powers’ where he writes about several fringe subjects. He mentions a research which was done by a doctor and his assistance back in sixties who decided to visit several fortune tellers in London and some of them had pretty good hits. For example, one of the fortune tellers guessed correct date of wedding and number of children of a one researcher, and profession and some life details of the second researchers. They also had misses.
I have family members who are convinced that one of their neighbours has special powers and confirm their beliefs with positive cases. For example, that guy warned one of his neighbours that she must be careful while traveling in Africa because of black magic that is still practice there or something bad is going happen to her (couple of days after she returned from the trip she got some kind of corneal damage that seemed to appear out of nothing and her reaction was panicky); or he guesses correctly that of their friends who had a serious traffic accident will soon wake from coma; or he guessed that a girlfriend of one guy has scar on her back which resulted from window incident during youth …
Also, I have an acquaintance who claims that she and her mother saw a levitating plate in their apartment (I am aware about Folie à deux syndrome). However, that was during a stressful time when she experienced some other strange phenomena such… As I know her mother also encouraged her beliefs and was considered silly. I could write some other examples but I think this will be more than enough.
I try to approach this stories as they are but not to succumb to magical explanations. However, it is hard to rationalize away magical explanations without knowing all the relative factors involved in described events. I know that natural explanations of the events are more plausible than ‘paranormal’. However, it is very hard to explain away everything because I wasn’t there when it happened. I know that some people are more sensitive than other and are more prone to magical thinking. Also, I think that psychics are gifted people in a sense they brain can pick up details about you much better than ordinary people and make precise descriptions and predictions based on that information. However, there are still some hits that are statistically very improbable (for example guessing correct date of a wedding). However, all of the laboratory testing of psychics showed that the don’t possess extraordinary powers. So, how to explain hits? Are they just flukes? And what to think about all of similar stories that can be found online. It is hard to explain them all.
Thanks,
Shuca
this is my first post on this forum and I apologize if I misspell some word because I am not a native English speaker.
I don’t consider myself a professional sceptic but due to fact that it seems that mystical beliefs are getting a revival at the beginning of 21. century from time to time I ponder about various fringe topics.
One of the subjects that attracts me are fortune tellers. It seems that some of them are good at what they do. Arthur C. Clarke wrote in his book ‘World of Strange Powers’ where he writes about several fringe subjects. He mentions a research which was done by a doctor and his assistance back in sixties who decided to visit several fortune tellers in London and some of them had pretty good hits. For example, one of the fortune tellers guessed correct date of wedding and number of children of a one researcher, and profession and some life details of the second researchers. They also had misses.
I have family members who are convinced that one of their neighbours has special powers and confirm their beliefs with positive cases. For example, that guy warned one of his neighbours that she must be careful while traveling in Africa because of black magic that is still practice there or something bad is going happen to her (couple of days after she returned from the trip she got some kind of corneal damage that seemed to appear out of nothing and her reaction was panicky); or he guesses correctly that of their friends who had a serious traffic accident will soon wake from coma; or he guessed that a girlfriend of one guy has scar on her back which resulted from window incident during youth …
Also, I have an acquaintance who claims that she and her mother saw a levitating plate in their apartment (I am aware about Folie à deux syndrome). However, that was during a stressful time when she experienced some other strange phenomena such… As I know her mother also encouraged her beliefs and was considered silly. I could write some other examples but I think this will be more than enough.
I try to approach this stories as they are but not to succumb to magical explanations. However, it is hard to rationalize away magical explanations without knowing all the relative factors involved in described events. I know that natural explanations of the events are more plausible than ‘paranormal’. However, it is very hard to explain away everything because I wasn’t there when it happened. I know that some people are more sensitive than other and are more prone to magical thinking. Also, I think that psychics are gifted people in a sense they brain can pick up details about you much better than ordinary people and make precise descriptions and predictions based on that information. However, there are still some hits that are statistically very improbable (for example guessing correct date of a wedding). However, all of the laboratory testing of psychics showed that the don’t possess extraordinary powers. So, how to explain hits? Are they just flukes? And what to think about all of similar stories that can be found online. It is hard to explain them all.
Thanks,
Shuca
via International Skeptics Forum http://ift.tt/2gtwiAn
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