Psychics and Mediums

[Munch]

I asked this question over on another thread, but I thought maybe it was worth opening a thread where we can discuss about psychics and mediums and the cons they run making a career out of gullible people.

Sad to say, but my own mum is someone who believes in this crap. I've questioned her on it before, but she continues to believes in such things. Mostly it came from when she was younger and her son died at age 12, she used a Ouija board and said she had a dream of her son. I've honestly never wanted to go in deep to this with her, because the grief she felt in losing her child was so much for her that she nearly killed herself. So i simply choose to not talk to her about my feelings on the whole psychics and mediums thing.

In a way, I see these things are sort of harmless when its just someone pulling out some tarot cards or palm reading without money involved and just some fun people do with each other. However its when I see reports like this that it becomes clear the dangers of these practices.

http://www.kirotv.com/videos/news/oregon-psychic-accused-of-million-dollar-scheme/vCbBWk/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lx6k7df0Zqw

or this

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NUxgRApwWDw

I'm thankful my mum hasn't ever brought into psychics, giving them money, as she acknowledges fake psychics, but still believes some people can tap into psychic energy.

[aitm]

Psychics, astrology, tarot..I think most people really understand that they are hokum but can't help but want there to be something other than their miserable life to cling to. Lots of people just find life is not as they want it to be.

[Youssuf Ramadan]

Psychics, astrology, tarot..I think most people really understand that they are hokum but can't help but want there to be something other than their miserable life to cling to. Lots of people just find life is not as they want it to be.

^^^ This. Much like religion. People want there to be more than there is to make life more magical, and there's good money to be made from fleecing the credulous.

[Munch]

What I want to know though are cases where police use psychics to solve cases. Reason why is because the program mum was watching had a case of a psychic hired by police and apparently she 'gave clues' to the location of the body, and it was there.
To me alarm bells would ring in how she knew the body was there, but apparently the police gave her full credit for the investigation.

[Solitary]

My best friend tried to convince me that his wife who was dying in the hospital woke up when he was there, and told him her uncle had died and she knew it. He tried to tell me she knew he did because he told her when she was dreaming. Later that day they found out he had died. I told him it was a coincidence. He said no it wasn't because she knew he did. I tried to tell him that she thought she did after the fact that she knew he did to no avail. I think a lot of people are very intuitive and can see patterns of events that give them a good guess as to what took place. Psychics that help police raises a red flag to me if they aren't somehow involved in what took place if they are spot on accurate. When it comes to psychics' taking money to talk to the dead are the worst kind of frauds. 

[Baruch]

All things are coincidence ... to those who are epistemological nihilists ;-)  But actually in "consilience" you have an explanation ...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consilience

Trances and hypnosis are dangerous.  Ouija (anecdotally) is dangerous.  Because altered states of consciousness (Ouija is a group trance) are dangerous (at least while driving a large semi).

As I posted on that other thread, I am experienced in Tarot and understand how it operates.  It can be seen in strictly psychological terms, but then there are probably people here who don't believe in psychology.

If a politician takes money, they are a fraud, right?  Anyone who takes money is a fraud, including city workers digging a new water main?  I did Tarot for free, but taking money would have had nothing to do with how the cards were read.  Personally I don't believe in predicting the future ... but almost everyone does it anyway.  Will my favorite football team make it to the playoffs this year?  The most arcane fantasy football math calculations are made, not unlike astrology.  Pythagorean woo woo at its best.

[Solitary]

If a politician takes money, they are a fraud, right?

YES! Like anyone else that takes your money under false pretenses. I believe phycology is an art form open to interpretation that can be wrong because of personal bias for various reasons.

[Baruch]

But all human beings exist in false pretense.  Is that your real name on this blog?  Hmm?  Someone on this blog doesn't believe in the military, unless it is done for free.  Millions of upper and middle class people hate the government, because they think government workers should do their work for free.  If you don't like money ... please donate it at your earliest convenience at a charity near you ;-)

You are correct, that psychology isn't a science like physics.  In fact, Freud borrowed and enhanced techniques from Jewish exorcists.  But other than neuropharmacology ... there isn't much science we can do, in a field that completely depends on subjective phenomena.  One can give some drug to a person for ADHD ... and compare with a test group that didn't take it ... but this is not the same as measuring a battery with a voltmeter.  As to what the patient experiences with or without the drug, we can't objectively know, but as per Behaviorism ... a person has no internal states, because only what is observed outside of people is real.  Fortunately Behaviorism is as much out of style as Freudianism.

[aitm]

Coincidence is tossed right out the window for most people. The very idea, WELL!!!  I like the shows where they have sets of twins that were separated at birth and they married twins both named Mame and they both smoked camels and they worked as barbers and they both had two boys and yada yada yada....and people go..OOOOOOO  WOW! Forgetting that of the millions of twins born the rest had no similarities whatsoever. Its called probability. When a little child survives a plane crash. OOOOOO its a miracle, despite the very real probability that sooner or later someone would survive a plane crash and most likely it would be a person of lesser mass.

[Baruch]

Coincidence only happens, if there is no causal (or canonical) connection between two events.  But in the space-time continuum ... it is continuous ... every event is connected directly or indirectly with every other event.  Analysis is only possible, because of relative independence between things ... the independence isn't absolute.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synchronicity

Mind you, this is from a psychologist, and we know they are as fake as psychics and mediums ;-)

I have it on the best authority (the Turtle sensei in Kung Fu Panda) that there is no such thing as a coincidence.

[SGOS]

Coincidence is tossed right out the window for most people.

Yes, yes.  Coincidence is a word used only by short sighted people who cannot see the obvious link between natural disasters, and whatever that last thing was that the government did that they didn't like.  <sarcasm off>

[AllPurposeAtheist]

One of the real dangers is when certain residents of the white house are consulting psychics. Mrs. Just Say No comes to mind.