The VFF Test is On!

Several times now I've asked what seems to be a pretty straightforward question, and I note that you, too, choose ignorance over a straightforward answer. So I'll try this another time. According to the protocol, which is publicly available, how much credit was to be given for guessing which person was missing a kidney if she guessed the wrong kidney?

The answer is ZERO.

The reason for 100% accuracy requirements were:
A. Anita Ikonen claimed to be 100% accurate.
B. In order to keep the Demonstration from running even longer than it did we reduced our preferred setup of 10 Subjects per Round (1 in 20 chance of correctly identifying missing kidney) to 6 Subjects per Round (1 in 12 chance of correctly identifying missing kidney).

Also, please keep in mind that Anita refused to allow less time than 4.5 minutes per Subject. At an early point in the discussions she wanted even more time per Subject.

I was not directly involved in the Protocol Negotiations with Anita. That was left to Steve Muscarella and Jim Newman. Once they had a potential protocol worked out with Anita it was submitted to the IIG Steering Committee, of which I am a member, for review and changes.

-Derek
 
My point was that she didn't perform significantly better than purely random guessing, certainly not enough better to pique my interest.
My point was that she did perform significantly better than random guessing -- enough to peak my interest. Since I don't believe she can see inside people, and since the evidence is inconsistent with her being able to see inside people, I want to speculate as to what explanations the evidence is consistent with. It's not fully inconsistent with random guessing (at least at the p=.05 level), but it's fully consistent with being able to detect which person knows he's missing a kidney through reading body language and guessing.
I claim the results of the test are consistent with skill in reading (backed up by observations from the audience, no less, that the selected subjects were visibly agitated more than the other subjects).

Several times now I've asked what seems to be a pretty straightforward question, and I note that you, too, choose ignorance over a straightforward answer. So I'll try this another time. According to the protocol, which is publicly available, how much credit was to be given for guessing which person was missing a kidney if she guessed the wrong kidney?
I chose to ignore your question because the answer is obvious. There's no one reading this who doesn't understand that the protocol counted only 100% accuracy as success. She failed the test. She would have failed the test had she guessed all three of the people correctly but guessed the kidney location wrong on one of them.
And that's not what we're talking about. We're talking about whether her performance on the test demonstrates anything else about her methods or abilities. I think it's evidence that she reads people and uses cues from them to determine her diagnosis. You don't think the events provide any evidence for that. That's where we disagree.
 
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This is why Anita's observations are so varied. In fact she almost never repeats an observation. Each one has a separate set of circumstances that lead to an educated guess. She has managed to weave them together with her fantasies to create her sooper powers.

This seems to be key. Her m.o. seems to be all about keeping these things as one-off anecdotes.

However, all of the stuff about her many claims aside, I contend we have ample evidence that she is a conscious fraud and a liar.

Maybe she didn't start out that way, but by now she is.

If nothing else, I wouldn't say she's a liar if she had done what she said over and over she would do (see post 935 for a few examples): take failure at the IIG demonstration as the falsification of her claimed ability to see inside people.

On her website, she made it clear that this lumped together many related, but distinct claims--all the ones having to do with sensing medical conditions in people (sorry I can't find that exact quote at the moment, and it may no longer be there, but I'm pretty certain she said she would abandon all her claims of medical sensing powers).
 
I think it's evidence that she reads people and uses cues from them to determine her diagnosis. You don't think the events provide any evidence for that. That's where we disagree.

Reading based on body language and other visual signs? Everybody does that every time we have a conversation or walk past somebody in the street. Some people do it better than others.

What is there about Anita's reading that you find interesting or worth further study?

Norm
 
My point was that she did perform significantly better than random guessing [...]


Only if you redefine Anita's claim and/or the purpose of the demonstration... after the fact. That seems like a pretty crappy way to go about a scientific endeavor.
 
Also, please keep in mind that Anita refused to allow less time than 4.5 minutes per Subject. At an early point in the discussions she wanted even more time per Subject.

And please keep in mind that her claim was the ability to see people's internal organs when she looks at them.

(In at least one place she said she can do it "immediately". In another anecdote she claims she spotted a diaphragm (or some such) in a woman who walked down a hallway passing an open door to the room Anita was in--meaning it happened instantly.)

I'm certain now, given the method she described in the IIG test (which bears no resemblance to the claim and her anecdotes) that her only motive for wanting longer time was to get a chance at using some type of information leakage (cold reading, for example) to skew the odds slightly in her favor.
 
By your "logic", if there had been 12 rounds and Anita had come up with the correct person each time, but had missed the locations, you would conclude that she has no paranormal ability and that there is no need to investigate further.
Again, you're saying if she had taken a different test than the one she took and was testing a different claim than the one she made, we might be reading the results differently.

Again, "If I had some ham, I could have ham and eggs, if I had some eggs."

Why do you think there is any reason to think she has the ability to determine which person is missing a kidney but not to be able to see or otherwise detect which kidney, but you don't think there's any reason to suspect she has the ability to levitate?

I've asked this several times, and I'd really like to know what you think distinguishes the likelihood of her having either of these abilities she never claimed and has never been tested for.
 
This seems to be key. Her m.o. seems to be all about keeping these things as one-off anecdotes.
I told her more than once that it was ridiculous to test the kidney claim because even if you take her story as 100% true, it only happened once.

However, all of the stuff about her many claims aside, I contend we have ample evidence that she is a conscious fraud and a liar.

Maybe she didn't start out that way, but by now she is.

If nothing else, I wouldn't say she's a liar if she had done what she said over and over she would do (see post 935 for a few examples): take failure at the IIG demonstration as the falsification of her claimed ability to see inside people.

On her website, she made it clear that this lumped together many related, but distinct claims--all the ones having to do with sensing medical conditions in people (sorry I can't find that exact quote at the moment, and it may no longer be there, but I'm pretty certain she said she would abandon all her claims of medical sensing powers).

Your facts are essentially correct. I do, however, disagree with your interpretation. It's not terribly important that you or anyone agrees with me, but I don't think she's a deliberate liar and fraud. That said, I don't think the English language has the right words to describe her because from a practical standpoint, none are needed. We simply choose not to trust those people.

To use an analogy, think of someone in love who has recently been dumped. They say they know it's over, but they rationalize things to give themselves hope. They say they won't call the person, but then they find an excuse to call (you left a pair of socks at my house). They say they are over the person, but they still check them out on Facebook. You get the idea.

Are they deliberate liars and frauds? Well, not really, but how else would you describe them? They go back on their word. They may even know deep down that they are lying at the time, but I think a lot of the times their thoughts are muddled and confused while their intentions are genuine.

To compound the problem, I firmly believe that Anita is suffering from mental illness. She is disconnected from reality. I've had quite a number of chats with her, and in doing so interact with her in a way that nobody else here understands unless they have dealt first-hand with someone desperately clinging to delusions.

Contrary to what the great Longtabber asserted, we have yet to see Anita try to parlay this into any type of woo career. It's important to note what she has *not* done, which is try to build up a woo following. She repeatedly throws herself into the lion's den in a desperate attempt to get the validation from the people she believes to be on her level. In her interactions here with woo-ish people, she looks down on them. This is one of the characteristics of Narcissistic Personality Disorder, which I think on the surface explains her actions over the last year.

On my site I tried to get her to answer questions about what the test would mean if she failed, but she refused. In a way it was almost an "honest" non-response because I was very specific. She tried to appease people, gain praise, and all the while try to leave wiggle room.

Sure, we could see through it. Maybe on some level she could as well. But if you actually sat down with her and talked about this, I bet you would conclude that she's twisted but sincere.

Like I said, it's not important if you agree or not because we have to deal with her the same way regardless of how judge her. And both interpretations explain her reaction to failing the test and why she refused other simpler tests.
 
Are they deliberate liars and frauds? Well, not really, but how else would you describe them? They go back on their word. They may even know deep down that they are lying at the time, but I think a lot of the times their thoughts are muddled and confused while their intentions are genuine.
Point well taken.

I'll go back to my earlier phrasing: either she's a conscious fraud or she's got some severe cognitive problem.

I still think there's a pretty good case (the Xs and ?s business which is inconsistent with her claim, the insistence for a long time, etc.) that she is a conscious fraud who merely tried her best to tweak the odds to her favor.

At any rate, I stand behind the "liar" charge even if for no other reason than the case I made in post number 935. ETA: While she may have left herself wiggle room when you spoke to her in person, she definitely made it clear here that if she failed she would take it as falsification of her claim.
 
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Joe, she's definitely a liar and *knows* it. That's been proven time and again, and is separate from her, well, let's call it rationalizations. Take the "failing the test will falsify the claim" remarks. She freely admits she failed the test. She said this would falsify her claims, right?

Now she's saying, "I truly do not know whether the claim is ready to be put to rest. How did I know the accuracy of each trial beforehand?" Do you see what she has done there? She's changing the claim to now being able to "know" when knows and wants to investigate that. The claim of always being accurate is falsified, but this, in so many words, is a new claim.

These are just the ramblings of a woman with a tenuous grasp on reality.

As for the X marks, I can assure you that she has a perfectly reasonable (to her) explanation. Something like, "I am a skeptic. I don't believe the ability is real, but the uncanny accuracy compels me to investigate. I looked at each person multiple times to be sure that what I was perceiving was consistent because if it wasn't, that might cast doubt on my abilities. I did not want to guess, so I wanted to be as sure as possible for submitting my answer. It would not be very scientific of me to just answer off the top of my head without following the scientific method of confirming the data using all the time allotted."

Of course, she wouldn't have been as brief. :D
 
derekcbart,

I have a question.

What exactly were the test subjects told about the test, and how were they picked?

There was a mention at the start of the demonstration about other missing organs in people. This suggests to me that the IIG tried to recruit people and keep them in the dark as to what was being looked for.

I believe that Jim mentioned that the test subjects would not know that she was looking for a kidney as well.

Any light you could shed on this would be helpful. Thanks.
 
derekcbart,

I have a question.

What exactly were the test subjects told about the test, and how were they picked?

There was a mention at the start of the demonstration about other missing organs in people. This suggests to me that the IIG tried to recruit people and keep them in the dark as to what was being looked for.

I believe that Jim mentioned that the test subjects would not know that she was looking for a kidney as well.

Any light you could shed on this would be helpful. Thanks.

Hello.

Only one member of the IIG was involved in the recruiting/organizing of test subjects, Spencer Marks. This was so that only one person would know who did, or did not, have a missing kidney. He was kept on a different floor of the building and never had any contact with Anita until after the Demonstration was completed. Members of the IIG sent requests to various friends asking them to get in touch with Spencer if they could be a volunteer, but, as far as I know, they did not tell their friends any specific details about what the volunteers would be needed for. I know that I did not tell any of the people I suggested.

I do not know specifically what he told people, but my impression is that he asked everyone if they had ever had any form of surgery and, if so, what surgery the person had. From there he would ask additional questions to find out if the person was missing a kidney or not. His overview of how he recruited people will be part of the complete IIG report once it is completed.

-Derek
 
I couldn't possibly keep up with all of the posts here! I will see to arranging another test. Not to qualify for a paranormal challenge cash prize, not to verify myself as with psychic abilities, but just to find out more about this experience that I have.

I will not bother the IIG, JREF, or local FACT Skeptics with the next test though. The next test will have better screens, that also conceal head, arms and legs of the subjects. No hair, tattoos, or skin will be visible. The amount of time will be the same. And only two trials in one day, not three.

If statistical chance was responsible for the somewhat of a 50% accuracy I acchieved in the IIG Preliminary, then I would hope for chance to fall into a lower result in the next one. Or if there is *something* else involved, I would hope for that to be revealed again to some extent.

I am not doing this to pass as a psychic. I am investigating an experience I have of feeling and seeing health information and organs. Needless to say, I have not yet falsified the claim.

Well, carry on among yourselves. Any pressing questions can be e-mailed to me and will be answered. I am far too busy.
 
Because she narrowly missed performing at the generally-accepted level for statistical significance.

Vision is supposed to work a little better than statistical significance.
 
No, I saw it, but ignored it. :) By your "logic", if there had been 12 rounds and Anita had come up with the correct person each time, but had missed the locations, you would conclude that she has no paranormal ability and that there is no need to investigate further.

What you and the rest of the folks here who fancy themselves to be skeptics need to do is consider the following hypothetical: If someone developed a novel hypothesis regarding early detection of cancer, and conducted a study that produced a P of .0567, would you say that the hypothesis should not be evaluated further?

No all we need to do is see if she met her claims.
 

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