Going to a psychic medium party

[Scorpion]

'generalisations' (sic) is a relative term. If the 'circumstances of his death are too personal to reveal in a public forum, you should carefully consider the points others have made here about how cold reading operates.

I guess my life experience is pretty shallow, but honestly I don't even know what you mean by "died in the war'--does that mean died during the war? Died as a direct consequence of wartime activities?? You say you got specifics, and yet you speak in very vague terms. If that is the way you communicate with skeptics, who demand hard evidence, then I can only imagine how you mind spins generalizations into something that has meaning to you personally. And that's exactly how cold reading works, it preys on the willingness of people to believe and find connections, without the hard facts that science demands.

I cannot remember the exact words the medium used but it was to the effect that my brother died because there was no equipment in the hospital due to the war. I asked my mother about this and she confirmed he died because the hospital had no oxygen tents.
So the medium was right, and to answer another poster, that information would be unlikely to be on his death certificate

 

[Scorpion]

This strikes me as possibly the most credulous thing I've ever read on these boards.

I suggest you read, 'The teachings of Silver Birch'. To understand the mind set of mediums, many of whose lives are spent giving service to others. To comfort the bereaved, and inspire people with a better vision of God than the cruel tyrant described in the bible.

 

[Cosmic Yak]

I cannot remember the exact words the medium used but it was to the effect that my brother died because there was no equipment in the hospital due to the war. I asked my mother about this and she confirmed he died because the hospital had no oxygen tents.
So the medium was right, and to answer another poster, that information would be unlikely to be on his death certificate

I'd like to get some clarification on how this message was delivered. Correct me if I'm wrong, but from what you say, it seems you were in a church, along with a number of other people during this session with the medium.
The point I would like clarified is this: did the medium say "someone here has a brother they don't know about, who died in the war", or did the medium address you, and only you, with this information?
Also, was your mother present during this session, and was the first response to the message from you, or from her?

 

[Scorpion]

I'd like to get some clarification on how this message was delivered. Correct me if I'm wrong, but from what you say, it seems you were in a church, along with a number of other people during this session with the medium.
The point I would like clarified is this: did the medium say "someone here has a brother they don't know about, who died in the war", or did the medium address you, and only you, with this information?
Also, was your mother present during this session, and was the first response to the message from you, or from her?

The medium spoke directly to me, she said " I have got your brother here"
I said " No". she went on to give me a message from him, saying he had grown up in the spirit world and some other things.
My Mother had never been to the church and did not believe in spiritualism.
When I went home and asked her about the baby she was shocked.
This message was given to me in the 1970's before the time of home computers, so mediums could not look up family details very easily.

 

[fuelair]

Going to a psychic medium party !!!



Why? Were they out of large?

 

[Scorpion]

This is a tremendous alarm bell. Even without being part of the predatory network outlined in M. Lamar Keene's The Psychic Mafia, the mere fact of repeated visits gives the lie to any claim of hot reading being impossible.

Mediums circulate the spiritualist churches usually giving services on Wednesdays and Sundays. They travel the country to different churches every week and may only visit the same church a couple of times a year at most.
I also visited several different churches up and down the south of England, but still received evidential messages in churches I had not been in previously.
I received many messages from my grandmother who was a believer in her lifetime. I used to laugh at her, and I once asked her what she would of if she survived death and she said " I will watch over you darling".
As far as I can see she was true to her words as I had messages from her for years, when attending various churches.
One medium I had not seen before said " I have got your grandmother here, she says she has been through to you many times before"

 

[Garrette]

Mediums circulate the spiritualist churches usually giving services on Wednesdays and Sundays. They travel the country to different churches every week and may only visit the same church a couple of times a year at most.
I also visited several different churches up and down the south of England, but still received evidential messages in churches I had not been in previously.
I received many messages from my grandmother who was a believer in her lifetime. I used to laugh at her, and I once asked her what she would of if she survived death and she said " I will watch over you darling".
As far as I can see she was true to her words as I had messages from her for years, when attending various churches.
One medium I had not seen before said " I have got your grandmother here, she says she has been through to you many times before"

All very Psychic Mafia stuff, and that's even if we accept your description of the event that you were addressed specifically, though I do not.

Here's why:

I cannot remember the exact words the medium used but it was to the effect that my brother died because there was no equipment in the hospital due to the war. I asked my mother about this and she confirmed he died because the hospital had no oxygen tents.
So the medium was right, and to answer another poster, that information would be unlikely to be on his death certificate

All of this after you have insisted your memory cannot be faulted.

Hi yes, I have popped in again after a year or two. I think you will find my recollection of past events remains the same as always. I do not think my memory is that inaccurate. I still think that the evidence I received is valid, and no medium would have gone out of their way to deceive me, because there was nothing in it for them. I was just a face in the crowd and I gave them no money.

Your recollection obviously does not remain the same as always else you would remember what was said.

Everything you have described here is entirely consistent with the tricks of mediums.

 

[Scorpion]

All very Psychic Mafia stuff, and that's even if we accept your description of the event that you were addressed specifically, though I do not.

Here's why:
All of this after you have insisted your memory cannot be faulted.

Your recollection obviously does not remain the same as always else you would remember what was said.

Everything you have described here is entirely consistent with the tricks of mediums.

When I remember exactly what was said I use quotation marks, but I cannot always remember exact words so I explained that when I was discussing what the medium said about hospital equipment. I am sure she said "equipment", because when I recounted that to my mother on the same evening she piped in that it was because there were no oxygen tents.

 

[Garrette]

When I remember exactly what was said I use quotation marks, but I cannot always remember exact words so I explained that when I was discussing what the medium said about hospital equipment. I am sure she said "equipment", because when I recounted that to my mother on the same evening she piped in that it was because there were no oxygen tents.

You are sure now that she said equipment. Who knows what you were sure of then? But let's assume that you are correct that she actually said equipment. There was obviously context, and obviously it had to be filled in not just by you but by your mother. The medium did not say hospital; the medium did not say oxygen tents; the medium said 'equipment.' So if your brother had died in a fire because the responding truck had a broken ladder, then 'equipment' would fit just as well. If your brother had died from carbon monoxide poisoning because the furnace and the detector failed, then 'equipment' would fit just as well. You will, no doubt, have more reasons why my objections don't apply to your case, but that gets us back to my earlier question you have not answered:

Reference the part I highlighted: is everyone with the same degree of certainty automatically correct about whatever they are remembering, regardless of topic? Or are some people incorrect regardless of certainty?

Is it at all possible for someone to be wrong about a medium even if they are as certain as you?

 

[Scorpion]

You are sure now that she said equipment. Who knows what you were sure of then? But let's assume that you are correct that she actually said equipment. There was obviously context, and obviously it had to be filled in not just by you but by your mother. The medium did not say hospital; the medium did not say oxygen tents; the medium said 'equipment.' So if your brother had died in a fire because the responding truck had a broken ladder, then 'equipment' would fit just as well. If your brother had died from carbon monoxide poisoning because the furnace and the detector failed, then 'equipment' would fit just as well. You will, no doubt, have more reasons why my objections don't apply to your case, but that gets us back to my earlier question you have not answered:


Is it at all possible for someone to be wrong about a medium even if they are as certain as you?

The medium did say "hospital" and she did say "equipment" but I cannot remember all the exact words of the sentence.

I no longer attend spiritualist churches and have not done so for years, So I have lost touch, and I do doubt my own beliefs. I have to keep reminding myself of what I experienced in the past to keep my faith alive.
I am aware there are fake mediums, and on occasions I may have been fooled. But most of the mediums that circulate the churches are genuine, because the churches are largely run by psychic people who would not ask a fake medium to return.

 

[Donn]

I no longer attend spiritualist churches and have not done so for years, So I have lost touch, and I do doubt my own beliefs. I have to keep reminding myself of what I experienced in the past to keep my faith alive.
I am aware there are fake mediums, and on occasions I may have been fooled. But most of the mediums that circulate the churches are genuine, because the churches are largely run by psychic people who would not ask a fake medium to return.

I appreciate this honesty and would encourage you to see how, in the closing paragraph, your wish to freshen faith is on auto-pilot.

 

[Garrette]

The medium did say "hospital" and she did say "equipment" but I cannot remember all the exact words of the sentence.

Again, even if I grant this, the memory bit is key. You don't remember it all; that's not me critiquing you, it's pointing out how your honesty in admitting it should inform your analysis. Not only do you not remember the exact words the medium said, what you remember right now is not the same as you remembered when you told your mom of it, and what you told your mom may or may not have been an accurate representation of what was actually said. I am sorry, but regardless how strongly you feel otherwise, your memory is simply not reliable enough to claim that this was a miraculous hit. And even if it were, the circumstances of the reading are not sufficient to rule out non-medium methods.

I no longer attend spiritualist churches and have not done so for years, So I have lost touch, and I do doubt my own beliefs. I have to keep reminding myself of what I experienced in the past to keep my faith alive.

That's progress, actually, and I mean it seriously, but it further undermines your analysis. Every time you remind yourself of what you experience you are reconstructing the memory anew; you are not rewinding the tape and reviewing a non-changing event. It is precisely what you are doing that results in what we know about memory now, i.e., that it gets rebuilt and changed every time we remember something. Maybe the changes are inconsequential, maybe not, but the intensity of the memory does not guard against them, and even inconsequential changes add up to mountains over time.

I am aware there are fake mediums,

How do you distinguish them from the real ones?

and on occasions I may have been fooled.

How do you distinguish those times from the ones you weren't fooled?

But most of the mediums that circulate the churches are genuine,

By what criteria did you come to this conclusion?

because the churches are largely run by psychic people who would not ask a fake medium to return.

How did you determine that (a) the churches are run by legitimate psychics, and (b) that genuine psychics would not ask a fake medium to come back?

More importantly, this new bit of information (that the churches are fun by psychic people) brings back the whole "Psychic Mafia" thing in spades. With that set up it would not matter if the visiting mediums ever repeat at all.

In the sense of mathematical certainty or uncertainty, it is conceivable that you ran across real mediums there, but every single aspect of what you have said is completely indistinguishable from fraud, even if some of the fraud is unintentional.

 

[Darat]

This is a tremendous alarm bell. Even without being part of the predatory network outlined in M. Lamar Keene's The Psychic Mafia, the mere fact of repeated visits gives the lie to any claim of hot reading being impossible.

It is not unusual to have people who travel from church to church to see the same medium perform time and time again.

 

[Darat]

I cannot remember the exact words the medium used but it was to the effect that my brother died because there was no equipment in the hospital due to the war. I asked my mother about this and she confirmed he died because the hospital had no oxygen tents.So the medium was right, and to answer another poster, that information would be unlikely to be on his death certificate

#

Rubbish. You and your medium should bone up on actual history if you want to make up convincing stories.

 

[Scorpion]

How do you distinguish them from the real ones?

Its a whole package. Fake mediums are vague and inconclusive, and they pump you for information, and charge money for their services.
I know I was taken for a ride by a so called psychic artist called Ivor Mariants
Because he drew a picture of a man and said it was my Japanese spirit guide.
He wrote some characters on it that were supposed to be a message in Japanese. But I took it to the Japanese embassy and asked them to translate it for me and they said it was fake writing.
I also paid another so called psychic artist called Coral Polge and I went to her three times. Each time she drew someone I did not recognise so I gave up trying to get evidence from her.
How do you distinguish those times from the ones you weren't fooled?

By the logic of what was said. I quote the case of my brother because I believe that was an example of a genuine medium.


How did you determine that (a) the churches are run by legitimate psychics, and (b) that genuine psychics would not ask a fake medium to come back?

I have not only attended spiritualist churches but gone behind the scenes and got involved in their activities. I sat in two psychic developing circles myself and one was run by a friend of mine who developed into a medium in front of my eyes. His name was Trevor Williams, and as far as I know he is still a practicing medium forty years later.

I messed up the quote box, but I think its clear I am answering Garrette's questions

 

[Scorpion]

#

Rubbish. You and your medium should bone up on actual history if you want to make up convincing stories.

I made up nothing, I told it how I saw it. I am still a truth seeker and would abandon my beliefs if It was proved to me they were false.

 

[Garrette]

..

??

I made up nothing, I told it how I saw it. I am still a truth seeker and would abandon my beliefs if It was proved to me they were false.

Wrong way round. You should assume them false until proven true. To do so, you must eliminate other explanations -- explanations which obviously cannot be ruled out based simply on your own description of what happened.

 

[Scorpion]

??

Wrong way round. You should assume them false until proven true. To do so, you must eliminate other explanations -- explanations which obviously cannot be ruled out based simply on your own description of what happened.

I have actually had some personal psychic perceptions, and although I did not develop as a medium I did have some evidential experiences. Here is one.

I was moaning to myself about having no money for a computer in 1998 and a female voice said in my head "help is coming from an unexpected source"
Later that week I felt a presence when I was picking the lottery numbers, and I felt guided to certain numbers. One hour before the lottery was drawn I picked up the ticket and said to myself maybe this ticket is worth a fortune, then though no and threw it down. At that moment the same female voice I had heard before said " You won".
The lottery was drawn an hour later and I won five numbers. I had never heard that voice before and have never heard it since, so the only time I did win the lottery I was told I would.
I won just enough money to buy a good computer and pay off my credit card.
I have tried to get the lady in my head to give me a big win, but in my heart I know she never will because that would be bad karma.
Incidentally if I am right and a spirit told me I would win the lottery it is evidence they can see into the future.

 

[fuelair]

No, no they can't. Things that are not real but just special imaginary friends with no powers at all.cannot do jack feces!!!!!

 

[Pixel42]

You can recount all the anecdotes you like, Scorpion, they remain inadequate to reach a reliable conclusion. There's a reason why the scientific method had to be invented. As long as mediums continue to fail every test conducted using it there is only one rational conclusion.